Note 259 — Chapter II · (continued 2)

Form of Order, 1840, art. 5; in Seventh Annual Report, 1841, p. 115. This was repeated in the General Order of 5th February 1842, art. 38, and Instructional Letter of the same date, in Eighth Annual Report, 1842, pp. 86, 121. But it was omitted from the General Consolidated Order of 24th July 1847. And when a board of guardians had made all the unchaste women wear a yellow gown, this was in 1839 disallowed by the Central Authority, on the mixed grounds that the Poor Law Amendment Act had removed all penal consequences from incontinence, and that classification should be by present habits and character, not by past conduct (Minute of 5th March 1839, in Sixth Annual Report, 1840, pp. 98-100; see also Instructional Letter of 5th February 1842, in Eighth Annual Report, 1842, p. 121). We are told that the slang term for workhouse wards for immoral women was "Canary Wards," so that the distinctive dress must have been widely known.