'According to the returns of 1864, 333 (or 30 per cent.) of the juveniles could read and write' on their committal; 243 (or 22 per cent.) could read imperfectly;' 90 (or 8 per cent.) knew spelling, 125 (or 11 per cent.) were stated to have known the alphabet, while 320 (or 29 per cent.) were returned as 'wholly illiterate.' But the returns show a striking difference as to the amount of education existing in the sexes, the males registered as 'able to read and write,' amounting to nearly one-third of the entire number of committals of that sex, whilst of the females but one-eighth had attained this grade of proficiency.

"According to the foregoing summary the committals of members of the Established Church stood at 99 (or 9 per cent.) of the whole; those of Presbyterians, 36, slightly exceeding 3 per cent.; while the Roman Catholics afforded a return of 983 (equal to 88 per cent.), proportions corresponding almost exactly with those of the previous year, when they were respectively 9, 2, and 88 per cent. "Previously to the year 1845, the inspection of all institutions in which lunatics were confined, constituted a portion of the duties of the Inspectors-General of Prisons; when, therefore, by an Act passed in June, 1838 (1 Vict., ch. 27), powers were given to the magistrates in Ireland to commit to county and borough gaols lunatics considered 'dangerous,' the latter remained subject to the same inspection and control as the inmates of institutions exclusively allocated to the insane. In August, 1845, seven years after the passing of the Act, which authorized such committals of the insane to prisons, a separate department for the management and inspection of lunatic asylums was created under the Act 8 & 9 Vict., ch. 107, the 23rd section of which directs

"That the functions of the InspectorsGeneral of Prisons, so far as they relate to the inspection of lunatic asylums or other establishments for the insane, shall be transferred to the Inspectors of Lunatic Asylums appointed under the Act, and the Inspectors of Lunatics shall thereon undertake and perform all the duties in respect to such asylums which heretofore have been undertaken and performed by the Inspectors-General of Prisons.'

"Upwards of nineteen years have now elapsed since the period when it ceased to be the duty

of the Inspectors-General of Prisons to provide for the special treatment of the insane, who are, nevertheless, still committed to the gaols under their inspection, but are, by the operation of this section of the Act, withdrawn from their control. During that interval, the condition of the lunatic poor in district asylums and institutions immediately under the Inspectors of Lunatics has been immeasurably ameliorated. Large buildings have been erected, surrounded by pleasure grounds and gardens, in which the insane are beneficially employed at occupations and amusements suited to their state. In these asylums they are supplied with a nutritive diet, of which animal food, tea, coffee, beer, and porter form a part, and are placed under the care of skilled attendants, who have been duly trained to deal with their disease; even persons who have committed murder and other grave crimes, but who have been pronounced insane by the verdict of a jury, and convicted criminals, who after sentence have shown symptoms of insanity, receive a similarly humane treatment. The position, on the contrary, of persons who have committed no offence, but who, according to the words of the Act 1st Vict., ch. 27, already referred to, have been discovered and apprehended under circumstances denoting a derangement of mind and a purpose of committing some crime for which, if committed, such persons would be liable to be indicted,' and as such are consigned, 'dangerous,' to the county and borough gaols of Ireland, has in no degree been improved, and they are still, so long as they remain in the gaol, subjected to a treatment in every respect the opposite to that which all other classes of the insane receive in district and criminal lunatic asylums, and which is now considered by the most experienced authorities on insanity to be indispensable for the proper management and cure of such forms of disease.

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"Their treatment varies according to the circumstances of the locality-in some they are confined in the cells of prisons strictly adapted to the system of 'individual separation,' there being no other part of the establishments in which they can be placed-in others they occupy the gloomy, unheated and flagged cells, and day-rooms of old gaols, from which the criminal prisoners have been removed to properly heated and more suitable new buildings.

The medical officers of some gaols order an adequate quantity of animal food for their use, but in others their diet consists of bread, milk, or stirabout only, animal food under no circumstances forming a part of it—this latter dietary -the cells in which, in many gaols, the insane sleep, the flagged or paved yards in which they take their exercise, and the unavoidable appointment in all county prisons of criminal prisoners as their attendants, are either strangely at variance with their proper treatment, or else the vast sums which have been expended on the district lunatic asylums might have been saved to the country.

"It should also be remembered that in proportion as penal discipline in the gaols has been made more stringent, these establishments have become more unfitted for the reception of persons suffering under affections of the mind, and likewise that the number of insane persons who are thus committed to gaol, and thereby deprived of the curative appliances which, at a considerable cost, have been provided for the lunatic poor in the various districts, has each year increased; and that at no former period has it reached a higher amount in the county and borough gaols of Ireland, than during the past year, 1864.

"The gaols have been generally healthy. The deaths in 1864 amounted to 65 (including 2 executions), or 1 in 566; in 1863 the deaths were 80, or 1 in 477; in 1862 they numbered 66, or 1 in 548; in 1861 they were 61, or 1 in 549; in 1860 they were 48, or 1 in 706; in 1859 they amounted to 65, or 1 in 549; in 1858 they were 38, or 1 in 1,000.

"The total average cost per annum of each prisoner, in 1864, 261. 4s. 41d., was rather higher than in the previous year, viz., 251. 6s. 113d., the difference being caused by the decrease in the daily average number confined (viz., 2,978-69 against 3,179-32 in the previous year), which naturally increases. the average cost of each individual prisoner, whose share of the general expenses, including salaries of officers, is more in proportion as the numbers in gaols are less. A striking illustration of this latter principle is afforded by a detailed examination of the local circumstances, and of the expenditure of each gaol separately. Thus we find that the county of Louth, the smallest in Ireland, embracing

an area of only 315 square miles, contains two prisons, those of Dundalk and Drogheda, with their regular staffs of superior officers, local inspectors, chaplains of the several denomi nations, medical attendants, and governors, whilst the county Cork, with its area of 2,885 miles, the greatest breadth of which, extending from east to west, comprises a distance nearly equal to that intervening from sea to sea be tween the metropolis and the town of Galway, contains only the same number of gaols, viz., one for the county and one for the city. We find also that the whole cost of each individual prisoner in the county gaol of Antrim, at Belfast, has never during any one of the last five years amounted to 151., while at Carlow the same item has risen to no less a sum than 76l. 11s. 5d., one inmate in the latter thus representing an outlay greater than five in the former. Such are the anomalies and inequalities produced by the observance of the arbitrary formation of gaol districts according to counties, irrespective of their area or popula tion.

DENMARK AND GERMANY. Correspondence respecting the Affairs of the Duchies of Holstein, Lauenburg, and Schleswig.

ON the 15th August M. Katte communicated to Earl Russell a despatch of M. de Bismarck to Count Bernstorff, transmitting the conven tion for the suspension of hostilities, expressing the hope that the British Government would recognize the moderation and placability displayed by the two German powers. They did not wish to dismember the ancient and venerable Danish monarchy, but to bring about a separation from it of parts with which a further union had become impossible through the force of circumstances and events, and they must not pass it over in silence, through the fault of the Danish Government. The Danish monarchy was not imperilled in its existence, not a single condition of its existence was damaged; it had received no wounds which could not be healed. It now depended upon the Danish Government and the Danish people whether the natural and peaceful relations with its Southern neighbour shall be reestablished, and whether unrestrained inter

course shall become a source of well-being and prosperity to both sides.

"Present :-For Austria, Count de Rechberg, Baron de Brenner. For Denmark, M. de Quaade, Colonel de Kauffmann. For Prussia, M. de Bismarck, Baron de Werther. The plenipotentiaries of Austria, of Denmark, and of Prussia, being met in conference at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, after having produced their respective full powers, found in good and due form, have agreed on the following preliminaries of peace:

"I. His Majesty the King of Denmark renounces all his rights over the duchies of Schleswig, Holstein, and Lauenburg, in favour of their Majesties the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria, and engages to recognize the arrangements which their said Majesties may make with regard to those duchies.

"II. The cession of the duchy of Schleswig comprises all the islands belonging to that duchy, as well as the territory situated on the mainland. To simplify the tracing of the frontier, and to put an end to the inconveniences which result from the situation of the territories belonging to Jutland, inclosed in the territory of Schleswig, his Majesty the King of Denmark cedes to their Majesties the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria the possessions belonging to Jutland, situated to the south of the southern line of frontier of the district of Ribe, indicated in the geographical charts, such as the Jute territory of Mögeltondern, the Island of Amrom, the Jute parts of the Islands of Foehr, Sylt, and Roemoe, &c. On the other hand, their Majesties the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria consent that an equivalent portion of Schleswig, comprising, besides the Island of Arroe, territories serving to connect the above-named district of Ribe with the rest of Jutland, and to correct the line of frontier between Jutland and Schleswig on the side of Kolding, shall be detached from the duchy of Schleswig and incorporated in the kingdom of Denmark. The Island of Arroe shall only enter into the compensation in the ratio of its geographical extent. The detail of the tracing of the frontier shall be settled by the definitive treaty of peace.

"III. The debts contracted on the special account either of the kingdom of Denmark or of one of the duchies of Schleswig, Holstein,

and Lauenburg, shall continue to be borne by each of those countries respectively. The debts contracted on account of the Danish monarchy shall be divided between the kingdom of Denmark on the one hand, and the ceded duchies on the other, according to the respective proportion of the population of the two parts.

"From this division shall be excepted1. The loan contracted in England by the Danish Government, in the month of December, 1863, and which shall remain charged to the kingdom of Denmark. 2. The war expenses incurred by the Allied Powers, and the reimbursement of which the duchies shall undertake.

"IV. The high contracting parties engage to establish an armistice, on the basis of the military uti possidetis, from the 2nd of August, the conditions of which are specified in the annexed protocol.

"V. Immediately on the signature of these preliminaries of peace, the high contracting parties shall meet at Vienna, to negotiate a definitive treaty of peace.

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Signed, Von Bismarck, Werther, Quaade, Kauffmann, Comte de Rechberg, Brenner. "Done at Vienna, August 1, 1864." The following is the protocol concerning the conditions of the armistice :

"In execution of Article IV. of the Preliminaries of Peace signed between his Majesty the King of Denmark on the one hand, and their Majesties the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria on the other, the undersigned plenipotentiaries, met in conference, have agreed on the following arrangements:

"1. From the 2nd of August next there shall be a complete suspension of hostilities by land and sea, which shall last till the conclusion of the peace. In case, contrary to every expectation, the peace negotiations should. have no result by the 15th of September next, the high contracting parties shall have, from that period, the right of denouncing the armistice at six weeks' notice.

"2. His Majesty the King of Denmark engages to cause the blockades to be definitively raised from the 2nd of August.

"3. Their Majesties the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria while continuing the occupation of Jutland according to the

actual conditions of the uti possidetis, declare themselves ready to retain in that country no more than the number of troops which their said Majesties may consider necessary on purely military considerations.

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4. The levying of contributions is suspended. in so far as it has not yet been effected. The merchandise or other objects which have been seized on account of these contributions of war, and which shall not have been sold before the 3rd of August, shall be restored. New levies of contributions shall not be ordered.

5. The provisions of the allied troops shall be supplied at the expense of Jutland, in conformity with the Prussian and Austrian commissariat arrangements in force for each of the two allied armies on a war footing. The lodging of the troops and of the employés for the army, as well as the means of transport for the use of the army, shall also be furnished at the expense of Jutland.

"6. The excess of the ordinary revenues of Jutland, which may remain in the public treasury of that country after the various supplies and contributions above-mentioned have been paid by the said treasury to the districts charged with the execution of the military requisitions, and after the necessary expenses for carrying on the administration have been also defrayed by the said treasury, shall be restored to the Danish Government, either in specie or in liquidation, at the moment of the evacuation of Jutland.

"7. The pay of the allied troops, including the extra war allowance (Kriegszulage'), is excluded from the expenses to be borne by Jutland.

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8. The prisoners of war and political prisoners shall be set at liberty on the assurance that the prisoners of war will no longer serve in the Danish army before the conclusion of the peace. The liberation of prisoners shall take place as soon as possible at the ports of Swinemünde and Lubeck.

9. Danish soldiers, to whom leave has been granted to go to Jutland during the armistice, may return without hindrance to the Danish army, in case of the resumption of hostilities, as soon as they are recalled to their regiments.

"Signed, Bismarck, Werther, Rechberg, Brenner, Quaade, Kauffmann."

On the 20th August, 1864, Earl Russell wrote to Mr. Lowther, as follows:

"Her Majesty's Government would have preferred a total silence instead of the task of commenting on the conditions of peace. Challenged, however, by M. de Bismarck's invitation to admit the moderation and forbearance of the great German Governments, her Majesty's Government feel bound not to disguise their own sentiments upon these matters. Her Majesty's Government have, indeed, from time to time, as events took place, repeatedly declared their opinion that the aggression of Austria and Prussia upon Denmark was unjust, and that the war as urged by Germany against Denmark had not for its groundwork either that justice or that necessity which are the only bases on which war ought to be undertaken. Considering the war, therefore, to be wholly unnecessary on the part of Germany, they deeply lament that the advantages acquired by successful hostilities should have been used by Austria and Prussia to dismember the Danish monarchy, which it was the object of the treaty of 1852 to preserve entire. Her Majesty's Government are also bound to remark, when the satisfaction of national feelings is referred to, that it appears certain that a considerable number, perhaps 200,000 or 300,000 of the loyal Danish population, are transferred to a German State, and it is to be feared that the complaints hitherto made respecting the attempts to force the language of Denmark upon the German subjects of a Danish sovereign will be succeeded by complaints of the attempts to force the language of Germany upon the Danish subjects of a German sovereign. Her Majesty's Government had hoped that at least the districts to the north of Flensburg would, in pursuance of a suggestion made by the Prussian plenipotentiary in the Conference of London, have been left under the Danish Crown. If it is said that force has decided this question, and that the superiority of the arms of Austria and Prussia over those of Denmark was incontestable, the assertion must be admitted. But in that case it is out of place to claim credit for equity and moderation. Her Majesty's Government see with satisfaction, however, that the wording of the 1st Article fully admits by implication the right of Christian IX. to rule over the duchies of

Holstein, Schleswig, and Lauenburg, for if they were not his to hold they could not be his to give away. In considering this question her Majesty's Government have always had in view the elements of a solid and durable peace. Even in cases where it is justifiable to depart from the settlements of established and recognized treaties, it is essential that the new settlement should not partake of the weakness of the old; that when new elements of dominion are combined and new bonds of allegiance are required, nations should be satisfied, and should willingly embrace as permanent the new conditions of peace. It is in this point of view that her Majesty's Government are anxious to see the destiny of the duchies, which are now to be separated from Denmark, speedily and satisfactorily settled. They desire to see the wishes of the people of those duchies consulted on the choice of their future sovereign, and to see the duchies receive free constitutional institutions. In this manner alone the welfare and peace of Europe, as well as the future tranquillity of the duchies, will be secured. For her Majesty's Government cannot feel at all secure of the prospects of lasting peace until the wishes of the people of Holstein, Schleswig, and Lauenburg have been fairly ascertained.

SCHLESWIG, HOLSTEIN, AND LAUENBURG. Correspondence respecting the Provisional Recognition of a Flag for the Duchies of Schleswig, Holstein, and Lauenburg.

On the 21st February, 1865, Count Apponyi, and Count Bernstorff communicated to Earl Russell, that the Austrian and Prussian Governments had resolved on granting to the duchies of Holstein and Schleswig, until the definitive settlement of their constitution, a provisional national flag, composed of three horizontal stripes, blue, white, and red, with a yellow square on the blue stripe next to the flagstaff. And he invited the British Government to recognize this flag. In answer, Earl Russell wrote to Lord Napier and Mr. Bonar, that her Majesty's Government were prepared to recognize such flag provisionally, saving the rights of the States of Holstein and Schleswig, and VOL. II.