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cially the embroidery of military accoutrements for the army), weaving, spinning, shirtmaking, lace-making, every thing, in short, in which female ingenuity could be employed. They have a large, well-kept garden; a school for the poor children of the neighborhood; an infirmary, including a ward for those whose age had exempted them from work; a capital dispensary, with a small medical library; here I found one of the women preparing some medicines, and another studying intently a French medical work.

This female community is much respected in Turin, and has flourished for more than a century. It is entirely self-supported, and the yearly revenue averages between 70,000 and 80,000 francs. The women are ruled by a superior, elected from among themselves, and in their workrooms were divided into classes, or groups, each under direction of a monitress to keep order. The rules of admission and entrance and the interior regulations are strict. Any inmate may leave at once whenever she pleases, but (as I understood) cannot be readmitted. The costume, which is that worn

by the lower classes in 1740, when the community was founded, is not becoming, but not very peculiar. All looked clean and cheerful.

I have been assured by some of my friends, who ought to understand these matters, that such an institution would be "quite impossible" in England, because the education given to the girls of the working class renders it "quite impossible" for a number of them to dwell together in unity, or in voluntary submission to a controlling power. If it be so, so much the worse ! but is it so?

The other institution I have alluded to, is yet more extraordinary, and of recent origin. A few years ago a poor priest, who had served as chaplain in a hospital, being struck by the dreadful state of the convalescent women, who, after being dismissed as cured while yet too weak for labor, were obliged to have recourse to vice or to starve, fitted up a garret with four old half-rotten bedsteads, into which he received four wretched, sick, sinful creatures, and begged for their support. Such

CHARITABLE INSTITUTION AT TURIN. 253

was the beginning of the "Casa della divina Providenza," called also "La Casa Cotolengo," from the name of its founder, who died about two years ago.

When I visited this extraordinary place, I found that the garret and its four old bedsteads had gradually extended to many ranges of buildings, for different purposes.* There is a hospital with two hundred beds; another hospital especially for wretched, diseased women out of the streets; another for children, containing fifty beds; a refuge for forsaken infants; a small school for deaf and dumb (children and others); a ward especially for epileptic patients and crétins. The attendance on this vast congregation of sick and suffering beings is voluntary, and considered by the physicians, nurses, and sisters as an act of religion. There were about two hundred attendants, men and women. The number of inmates constantly varied, and no regular account was kept of them: one day it was calculated to be about thirteen hundred, pa

*The original "four old bedsteads are preserved in memoriam, and were pointed out to me.

tients and nurses all included. The deaths are about six daily. All who would be rejected from other hospitals, who have incurable, horrid, chronic diseases, who are in the last stage of helpless, hopeless misery, come here; none are ever turned away. There are no funds, and no accounts are kept; nor, I must confess, is there any of the order and neatness of a regular hospital. All the citizens of Turin, more especially the poorer class, contribute something; and so "one day telleth another." "We trust to Divine Providence, and have hitherto wanted for nothing," was the reply to my inquiry. "Sometimes our coffer is empty, sometimes it is full. If we are poor to-day, we shall be richer to-morGod helps us!

row.

In England, a political economist or a poorlaw commissioner would have been thrown into fits by such a spectacle of slovenly charity. Too true it is:

"The wise want love, and they who love want wisdom; And all good things are thus confused to ill! »

AND now, having shown what an extensive field there is for work, what are the qualifications required in the workers? It is plain that mere kindly impulses and self-confidence (so different from practical benevolence and tender, humble faith!) will not suffice. By what means are we to prepare and discipline our women for the work they may be called to perform? What has been done, what may be done, to render them fitting helpmates for energetic and benevolent men, and instruments of beneficent power? These are momentous questions, which we have now to consider.

The complaint has become threadbare; yet I must begin by noticing the mere fact as such. There is no adequate provision for the practical education of the middle and lower classes of girls in this country; and (which is much worse) the importance of this want is either overlooked, or at least no one in power thinks it worth while to treat this part of educational statics with any particular attention. Open the books and pamphlets on national education, read the