Before the use of tokens was insisted upon, the only means of identification open to the governors was the style in which the infant was dressed. Some of the entries show that "the quality" were by no means above taking advantage of the hospital. Thus under date 1741, on the very opening of the institution, we find the following record :-"A male child, about a fortnight old, very neatly dressed; a fine holland cap, with a cambric border, white corded dimity sleeves, the shirt ruffled with cambric." Again, "A male child, a week old; a holland cap with a plain border, edged biggin and forehead cloth, diaper bib, shaped and flounced dimity mantle, and another holland one; Indian dimity sleeves turned up with stitched holland, damask waistcoat, holland ruffled shirt." This poor baby of a week old must have exhibited a remarkable appearance. Doubtless these costly dresses were used with the idea that special care would be taken of the wearers; but this was a vain hope: the offspring of the drab and of the best "quality" stood on an equal footing inside the Foundling gates; and possibly in after years their faces-that invariable indication of breed-proved their only distinguishing mark. Besides the tokens, letters were occasionally deposited in the basket with the child; some of these were impudent attempts upon the credulity | of the governors. Thus, one had the following doggerel lines affixed to its clothes : "Pray use me well, and you shall find the children so received, no sign of their "belongings" is left behind. The present plan of admitting children dates from the abolition of these hundred-pound infants. The regulations are very curious, and apparently rather capricious. Thus, the committee will not receive a child that is more than a year old, nor the child of a footman or of a domestic servant, nor any child whose father can be compelled to maintain it. When, however, the father dies, or goes to the "diggings," or enlists as a soldier, the child is eligible. The mother's moral character must be generally good, and the child must be the result of her "first fault ;" and she must show that, if relieved of the incumbrance of her child, she can shift to another part of the town or country, where her "fault" will be unknown. The first step to be taken by the mother is to obtain a printed form of petition; when this is done a day is appointed for her examination, when, if she prevaricates in any of her statements, her application is rejected, and many otherwise eligible cases are dismissed on this ground. The following is the printed form of petition :THE PETITION OF (name) OF (place of abode) HUMBLY SHEWETH That your petitioner is a (widow or spinster, ( ) years of age, and was on the ( ) day of ( ) delivered of a (male or female) child, which is wholly dependent on your petitioner for its support, being deserted by the father. That father's name) is the father of the said child, and was, when your petitioner became acquainted with him, a (his trade), at (residence when the acquaintance began), and your petitioner last saw him on the () day of ( ), and believes he is now (what is become of him). Your petitioner therefore humbly prays that you will be pleased to receive the said child into the aforesaid hospital. The instructions appended to this printed form state that no money is ever received for the admission of children, nor any fee or perquisite taken by any officer of the hospital. It may be added that no recommendation is necessary to the success of a petitioner's claim. In less than four years, while this indiscriminate admission lasted, and until Parliament, appalled at the consequences, withdrew the grant, no less than nearly 15,000 babes were received into the hospital; but out of this number only 4,400 lived to be apprenticed, this "massacre of the innocents" having been effected at a cost to the nation of £500,coo. After the withdrawal of the The mother is obliged to attend before the Government grant, the governors were left to their board and tell her story, and inquiries are afterown resources, to recruit their now empty ex- wards set on foot in as secret a manner as possible chequer; and this they did by the very notable to verify her statement. The object of the charity plan of taking in all children that offered, accom- is not only to save the life of the child, but to panied by a hundred-pound note, no questions being hide the shame of the mother, by giving her time asked, and no clue to their parents being sought. to retrieve her faults. The world is but too prone As none but the wealthy could deposit children at to be hard upon poor women who have "made a the gates of the hospital on such terms, it is slip" of this nature; and but too often their own obvious that this was nothing less than a premium sex affix a kind of moral ticket-of-leave to them, upon pure profligacy in the well-to-do classes. which effectually prevents their regaining their This system lasted, nevertheless, for upwards of position. Under the contumely and the desperaforty years-in fact, till the year 1801; and of all tion to which such treatment reduces them, the Foundling Hospital.] BAPTISM OF THE FOUNDLINGS. 359 poor creature sometimes sacrifices not only her own accounts in the handwriting of the great painter, life, but also that of the unhappy child. Immediately the infant is received into the house, it is baptised. Of old, contributions were laid upon every name illustrious in the arts and sciences. When these were exhausted, all our naval heroes were pressed into the service; then our famous poets once more-in name, at least walked the earth. The Miltons, Drydens, and Shakespeares that flourished within the walls of the Foundling in the last century must have made it a perfect Walhalla. Let no man flatter himself that he is descended from our famous bards upon the strength of a mere name, however uncommon, lest some spiteful genealogist should run him to earth at the end of Lamb's Conduit Street. In the Gentleman's Magazine, under date 29th March, 1741, occurs this entry : "The orphans received into the hospital were baptised there, some nobility of the first rank standing godfathers and godmothers. The first male was named Thomas Coram, and the first female Eunice Coram, after the first founder of that charity and his wife. The most robust boys, being designed for the seaservice, were named Drake, Norris, Blake, &c., after our most famous admirals." Thus, when the Foundling was first opened, noble lords and ladies stood sponsors to the little ones, and gave them their own names. As these foundlings grew up, however, more than one laid claim to a more tender relationship than was altogether convenient. Now-a-days, it is thought best to fall back upon the Brown, Jones, and Robinson class of names of ordinary life to be found in the Directory. The governors, however, act in a perfectly impartial manner in this respect. A list of names is made out beforehand, and as the children arrive they are fitted to them in regular order. As soon as they are baptised they are dispatched into the country, where wet-nurses have been provided for them. Within a distance of twenty miles, in Kent and Surrey, there are always about 200 of these foundlings at nurse. Every child has its name sewn up in its frock, and also a distinguishing mark hung round its neck by a chain, which the nurse is enjoined to see is always in its place. These children are regularly inspected by a medical man, and the greatest care is taken that due nourishment is afforded to the babes. When the nurse cannot do this, a certain amount of milk is required to be given. The foster-children, whilst at nurse, are under the observation of visitors in the neighbour hood. When Hogarth lived at Chiswick, he and his wife took charge of a certain number of these little ones; and it is pleasant to read the faded in which he shows that the interest he took in the charity was of the most intimate kind; that he not only enriched it with the gifts of his pencil, as we shall presently show, but also with his tender solicitude for the foundlings who could make him no return for the care with which he watched over them. The foster-children, as a rule, are very well taken care of; a large per-centage, indeed, surviving the maladies of childhood, which they certainly would not have done, under the peculiar circumstances of their birth, inside the walls of the asylum. "Though mothers may abandon their children to the tender mercies of a public company," says a writer in Chambers' Journal, "they cannot do so without pain. The court-room of the Foundling has probably witnessed as painful scenes as any chamber in Great Britain; and again, when the children, at five years old, are brought up to London, and separated from their foster-mothers, these scenes are renewed. Even the foster-fathers are sometimes found to be greatly affected by the parting, while the grief of their wives is excessive; and the children themselves so pine after their supposed parents, that they are humoured by holidays and treats for a day or two after their arrival, in order to mitigate the change. In very many cases the solicitude of the foster-mothers does not cease with their charge of the little ones, as they frequently call to inquire after them, and they, in return, look upon them as their parents.” The education which the children receive at the Foundling is confined to reading, writing, and arithmetic, and they are also taught part-singing. At fifteen the boys and girls are apprenticed, the boys to tradesmen, and the girls to private families as domestic servants; and we hear that, as a rule, both turn out very well. The governors make a very strict inquiry into the characters of those wishing to receive them before they are permitted to have an apprentice, and they desire to be furnished with regular reports as to the conduct of their wards. Whilst the term of their apprenticeship lasts, the governors continue their careful watch over them; and when they are out of their time, means are afforded the boys of setting out in life as artisans : whilst the girls are, if well behaved, entitled to a marriage portion. It will be remembered that Thomas Day, the eccentric author of "Sandford and Merton," selected from the Foundling Hospital one of the two girls whom he resolved to bring up and educate, in the hope that she would prove a model wife; but both, it is needless to add, turned out failures, Even at the termination of to Sir Hans Sloane. An economical kitchen, ingeniously fitted up for the institution by Count Rumford, is described at some length in the "Annual Register" for 1798. The whole expenditure of the establishment in town and country, for the year ending December, 1882, amounted to £13,105 os. 4d., which-after deducting the expenses with reference to apprentices, and a few other miscellaneous accountsdivided by the average number of children on the establishment in that year, namely, 497, gave an average cost of £19 10s. per head. The girls and the boys in the hospital are pretty equally divided. Owing to the liberal support afforded to the Benevolent Fund, the design of which is to relieve the hospital altogether from the their children's health, but are allowed no further information. On an average, about eight women per week avail themselves of this privilege, and there have been some who attend regularly every fortnight. Even when application is made by mothers for the return of their child, the request is frequently refused. When they are apprenticed no intercourse is permitted between them, unless master and mistress, as well as parent and child, approve of it; nor when he has attained maturity, unless the child as well as the mother demand it. Thus a woman, who was married from the hospital, and had borne seven children, once requested to know her parents, on the ground that "there was money belonging to her," and her application was refused. But in November of the same year the Foundling Hospital.] STRATAGEMS FOR IDENTIFICATION OF CHILDREN. name of a certain foundling was revealed upon the application of a solicitor, and his setting forth that money had been invested for its use by the dead mother. The governors granted this request upon the ground that the mother herself had disclosed the secret, which they were otherwise bound to keep inviolable. Again, in 1833, a foundling, seventy-six years of age, was permitted, for certain good reasons, to become acquainted with his own 361 preserve its identification during its subsequent abode in the hospital, since the children appear in chapel twice on Sunday, and dine in public on that day, which gives opportunities of seeing them from time to time, and preserving the recollection of their features. In these attempts at discovery, however, mistakes are often committed, and attention lavished on the wrong child; instances have even occurred of mothers coming in mourning attire THE SMALL-POX HOSPITAL, KING'S CROSS, IN 1800. (See page 366.) name, though, as may be imagined, not with his parent. "It is a wise child in the Foundling who knows even its own mother." The stratagems resorted to by women to identify their children, and to assure themselves of their well-being, are often singularly touching. Sometimes notes are found attached to the infant's garments, beseeching the nurse to tell the mother her name and residence, that the latter may visit her child during its stay in the country; and they have been even known to follow on foot the van which conveys their little one to its new home. They will also attend the baptism in the chapel, in the hope of hearing the name conferred upon the infant; for, if they succeed in identifying the child during its stay at nurse, they can always to the hospital, to return thanks for the kindness bestowed upon their deceased offspring, only to be informed that they are alive and well. One exception to the rule of non-intercourse is related, where a medical attendant certified that the sanity of one unhappy woman might be affected unless she was allowed to see her child. Another piece of information afforded by the Commission, and this, perhaps, the saddest of all, is that "twice or thrice in the year the boys are permitted to take an excursion to Primrose Hill; but at other times (except when sent on errands), and the girls at all times, are kept within the hospital walls." This confinement, it is asserted, so affects their growth, that few of either sex attain to the average height of men and women. George III. on more than one occasion testified flat ground in front of the building formed the in a marked and substantial manner the interest chief promenade; and brocaded silk, gold-headed which he took in the institution, and on the 21st of canes, and laced three-cornered hats formed a June, 1799, his Majesty, accompanied by the Queen, gay and constant assembly in "Lamb's Conduit the Prince of Wales, the Duke of Clarence, and five | Fields," when they were fields indeed. of the princesses, visited the hospital in state. That Tenterden Steeple was the cause of the Goodwin Sands does not seem at all more strange than that the Foundling Hospital should have been in some sense the parent of the Royal Academy of Arts. Yet such was the case. Not long after the incorporation of the society, the present building was erected, as we have mentioned; but as its funds were not available for its decoration, many of the chief artists of the day generously gave pictures from their own easels for the decoration of its several apartments. In course of time these came to be shown to the public on application, and a small sum being charged for admission, they took their place among the sights of the metropolis. Ultimately they proved so attractive that their success suggested a combined exhibition of the works of artists. This, as we have stated,* first took shape in the rooms of the Society of Arts in the Adelphi, from which, again, the Royal Academy took its idea. Thus, within the walls of the Foundling the curious visitor may see the state of British art in the era immediately preceding the extension of the patronage of George III. to Benjamin West. Among the earliest "governors and guardians" of this charity we find the name of William Hogarth, who liberally gave his time, his labour, and his money towards aiding the benevolent design of his friend, Captain Coram. His first artistic aid was the designing and drawing of a head-piece to a power of attorney drawn for collecting subscriptions in support of the institution; and he next presented to the governors an engraved plate of Captain Coram's portrait. The list of the early artistic friends and supporters of the newly-formed society includes the sculptor Rysbrach; Hayman, the embellisher of Vauxhall Gardens; Hudson, Highmore, Allan Ramsay, and Richard Wilson, the prince of English landscape-painters of that age. They often met together at the hospital, and thus advanced the charity and the arts at the same time; for the exhibition of their donations in the shape of paintings drew a daily crowd of visitors in splendid carriages and gilt sedan chairs, so that to pay a visit to the Foundling became one of the fashionable morning lounges in the reign of George II. The straight * See Vol. III., p. 107. Some very interesting memoranda of the artists whose works adorn the Foundling, with a catalogue raisonnée of the pictures which they presented, will be found in Mr. Brownlow's "Memoranda or Chronicles of the Hospital." Among the pictures are "The Charter House," by Gainsborough ; a portrait of Handel, by Sir Godfrey Kneller; and three works of Hogarth, namely, "The March to Finchley," " Moses brought to Pharaoh's Daughter,” and the original portrait of Captain Coram. As we have already shown, Hogarth took a pride and pleasure in this institution. Writing about himself, he remarks that the portrait which he presented with the greatest pleasure, and on which he spent the greatest pains, was that of Captain Coram, which hangs in the gallery of the hospital; and in allusion to the detraction from which he had suffered as an artist, he adds, "If I am such a wretched artist as my enemies assert, it is somewhat strange that this, which was one of the first that I painted the size of life, should stand the test of twenty years' competition, and be generally thought the best portrait in the place, notwithstanding the first painters in the kingdom exerted all their talents to vie with it." The portrait, we may add here, was engraved by McArdell, who resided at the "Golden Ball," in Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, and whose engraved portraits were pronounced by so good a judge as Sir Joshua Reynolds, "sufficient to immortalise their author." The "March to Finchley," which adorns the secretary's room, like several of his other works, was disposed of by Hogarth by way of lottery. There were above 1,840 chances subscribed for out of 2,000; the rest were given by the painter to the Foundling Hospital, and on the same night on which the drawing took place, the picture was delivered to the governors of that institution. There is, however, some little doubt as to how it came into their hands, for it is said by some that the "prize" ticket was among those bestowed on the hospital; others-an anonymous writer in the Gentleman's Magazine, for instance-says that a lady was the holder of the fortunate ticket, for which she had subscribed with the view of presenting the picture to the governors. The writer adds, however, that a kind and prudish friend having suggested that a door would be opened for scandal if one of the female sex should make such a present, it was handed back to Hogarth on condition that he |