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It is easy, when it is sought to produce a certain impression rather than to know the truth, to take exceptional instances as general conditions, to show all the evils and none of the good, to base falsehoods upon a slender foundation of truth. This is the most dangerous form of slander, and this is what has been done at Tewksbury. And probably many good people to-day believe that people with foul diseases bathe in the same water as others, which is utterly false; that nurses beat and ill-treat sick women; that people have short allowance of bad food, when food is abundant and good, though too coarse for the sick and feeble, for the most part. Tender hearts ache to think of the suffering there, when in their own towns the paupers never were half so comfortable or well cared for as people have been for the past few years at the State almshouse. The poor of Springfield cost in the almshouse two dollars and forty-eight cents per week each; yet all the seriously sick poor are sent to the City Hospital, at a cost of about twelve dollars per week each, and all children are boarded out in families as the law requires. This law is disobeyed in Lowell and other cities; and children are kept with adult paupers, many of whom are persons of the same character found in our prisons.

With the management of my own city almshouse, I have been familiar for some years, since the Union Relief Society and Children's Aid Society also work in common with the overseers of the poor; by which co-operation the standard of poor relief has been much raised, the people of the city being willing to pay for what is reasonably comfortable and for competent attendance. Great care should be exercised to prevent pauperism from being made too attractive by undue expense. To attain the just medium is our duty, and should be our desire. In conclusion, I would say, that most of the abuses at Tewksbury belong to past years, and have been gradually reformed. I speak of it as I have known it since my first visit there, April 15, 1881. We deal with things as they are. Like all human institutions, I think it can be improved, but gradually and by temperate and well-considered action. All of which is respectfully submitted to my associates, asking that it may be presented to the Legislature.

CLARA T. LEONARD.