[Sidenote: Effects of these institutions.]
There can be no doubt that the prospect of an asylum for the indigent creates amongst the working class a disposition to idleness and debauchery, whilst at the same time there are those who look down with disgust on their miserable brothers who are compelled to accept a public charitable support; and the shame which they consider attaches to a man who does it stimulates them to avoid the doors of an hospital by industry and sobriety. The number of these, however, is very small, whilst the applications for admittance to the Sanitat and to St. Joseph’s are so very numerous, so far beyond the accommodation that can be granted, that after the name of an applicant is registered he has (frequently) to wait 18 to 24 months for his turn. For the sick, however, at the Hôtel Dieu it is not so; for arrangements are made that no delay takes place with any case requiring immediate relief or treatment.
The shades between the healthy labourers of the lowest class that support themselves, and those who obtain relief from charitable institutions, are so slight, that it is almost impossible to state the difference in their conditions. _No man_ has a _legal claim_ upon any of the charities; in the distribution of which, however, there is but one fixed rule that governs the distributors, and that is, to compel the applicants for relief to work to their utmost power, and to give such relief only in each individual case as they suppose to be necessary with the wages he can or ought to earn, according to the demand for labourers at the time.
According to the price of lodgings, victuals and clothing in Nantes, a steady labourer at the highest rate of wages, 1_s._ 3_d._ per day, supposing he had 300 days’ employment in the year, is considered to be able to support a wife and three young children; if he has a larger family, is out of employ, or is at a lower rate of wages, without his wife and children being able to gain a little, he is regarded as indigent, and in need of succour. A labourer, his wife, and three children consume in the day from 8 to 10 lbs. of bread, which is their chief food, and will cost him 240 fr.; his cabbages and other vegetables, butter or fat for his soup, 90 fr.; his room, 50 fr.; leaving 70 fr. or 2_l._ 18_s._ 4_d._ for clothes, fuel, &c.; which make up the sum of his wages for 300 days at 1½ fr., or 1_s._ 3_d._ per day. The wife in general adds a little to the husband’s earnings by spinning, and sometimes weaving; but it is not much when the family is young.