First Memoir on Pauperism, Second Part, Post 12

I cannot find a better way to complete this sad picture than in transcribing here the following excerpt from my notes on England.

I traveled across Great Britain in 1833.  Others were struck by the country's interior prosperity; I wondered at the secret worry that weighed visibly on the mind of all the residents.  I thought that great troubles must be lurking under the brilliant cloak that Europe admired.  This idea led me to examine pauperism with particular attention, this immense and hideous wound on a body full of health and vigor.

I lived at the time in the house of a large landowner in the south of England; it was the time when justices of the peace met to decide on claims made by the poor against their communities or the communities against the poor.  My host was a justice of the peace, and I accompanied him to court regularly.  In my notes from the journey I find this picture of the first audience at which I assisted; it summarizes in a few words and describes what happened.  I transcribe it exactly here to preserve upon the picture the simple seal of truth:

The first individual who came before the justices of the peace was an old man; his face was fresh and rosy, he was wearing a wig, and was dressed in an excellent black suit; he looked like a landlord, however, he approached the bar and complained vigorously about the injustice of the administrators of his village.  This man was poor and they had unjustly reduced the sum he received from public charity.  They were rehearing the case to give the administrators of the community a chance to present their side.

After this healthy and petulant old man came a young pregnant woman, whose clothing indicated recent poverty and who wore on her wearied features the traces of suffering.  She said that her husband left home some days ago on a sea voyage, and that since then she had received no news or heard from him; she applied for public alms, but the poor administrator hesitated to grant it to her. The father-in-law of the woman was a wealthy merchant who lived in the town where the hearings were taking place, and they hoped that he would want to take the responsibility of supporting his daughter-in-law during his son's absence; the justices of the peace summoned this man, but he refused to take on the duties that nature imposed upon him and that the law did not require him to undertake.  The magistrates insisted; they tried to awaken a feeling of remorse or compassion in this man's egoistic soul, but failed, and the community was required to pay the support claimed.