Note 456 — Chapter III

It appears from a Minute of Lord Ebrington that, on entering the Poor Law Board, he was much struck by there being no physiological information available in the office as to the proper amount of food required or as to the physiological equivalents of different foods. The dietaries had apparently all been sanctioned without reference to such an inquiry. He called for a report, and, we believe, had an investigation made by Dr. Lyon (afterwards Lord) Playfair. The Report (signed Thomas Harries, and dated June 1st 1850) reveals the most astounding differences between the amounts of food, the proportions and amounts of nitrogenous materials, and the cost of the dietaries sanctioned for 529 unions. (Eighty-four unions had no dietary sanctioned.) In Berkshire, for instance, the Central Authority had approved of the pauper in the Cookham Union getting only 15-9/10 oz. of nitrogenous ingredients (per day?), whilst the pauper in the Wokingham Union was allowed 24-1/10 oz. In the Metropolis, the inmates of the West London Workhouse had been directed to exist on 14-7/10 oz. a day, whilst those in the Bermondsey Workhouse had been permitted to consume 27-6/10 oz. It was found, contrary to the common belief, that the dietaries of the workhouses in the Metropolis and the great towns were, on an average, lower than those of rural unions. There had, moreover, been a total lack of quantitative definition of the ingredients of soups, puddings, etc., with the result of extraordinary diversity. Sometimes able-bodied women were allowed the same quantities as men; sometimes much smaller quantities. We cannot trace whether any action was taken on this Memorandum. No General Order or Circular was issued on the subject at the time, or, indeed, for more than a dozen years; and the workhouse dietaries remained extremely diverse. But the Central Authority doubtless acted on the information in its possession. In September 1850, for instance, it demurred to approving a dietary proposed by the Bradfield Guardians, on the ground that it was "so decidedly less nutritious than those of other unions, in fact, only half what is given in some, and more than a quarter less than the general average." The Bradfield Guardians triumphantly retorted that their proposed dietary for paupers provided more nourishment than the independent labouring classes of the neighbourhood got in their own homes! (MS. Minutes, Bradfield Board of Guardians, 10th September 1850); which, considering the wages of the Berkshire farm labourers, is not unlikely to have been true.