Now this subject presents itself in two distinct views--one as regards its humanity, the other its expediency. As the latter, in the year of our Lord, 1844, would seem to offer a stronger claim on our attention, let us examine it first. Consider them how you will, these people form the most dangerous class of our population--these are the "waifs and strays" of mankind. Like snags and sawyers in the Mississippi, having no voyage to perform in life, their whole aim and destiny seems to be the shipwreck of others. With one end embedded in the mud of uncertain parentage, with the other they keep bobbing above the waves of life; but let them rise ever so high, they feel they cannot be extricated.
If rich, their happiness is crossed by their sense of isolation; for them there are no plum-pudding festivals at Christmas, no family goose-devourings at Michaelmas. They have none of those hundred little ties and torments which weary and diversify life. They have acres, but they have no uncles--they have gardens and graperies, but they cannot raise a grandfather--they may have a future, but they have scarcely a present; and they have no past.
Should they be poor, their solitary state suggests recklessness and vice. It is the restraint of early years that begets submission to the law later on, and he who has not learned the lesson of obedience when a child, is not an apt scholar when he becomes a man. This, however, is a part of the moral and humane consideration of the question, and like most other humane considerations, involves expense. With that we have nothing to do; our present business is with the rich; for their comfort and convenience our hint is intended, and our object to supply, on the shortest notice, and the most reasonable terms, such relatives of either sex as the applicant shall stand in need of.
Let there be, therefore, established a new joint stock company to be called the "Grand United Ancestral, Kindred, and Blood Relation Society"--capital any number of pounds sterling. Actuaries--Messrs. Oliver Twist and Jacob Faithful.
Only think of the benefits of such a company! Reflect upon the numbers who leave their homes every morning without parentage, and who might now possess any amount of relatives they desire before night. Every one knows that a respectable livelihood is made by a set of persons whose occupation it is to become bails at the different police offices, for any class of offence, and to any amount. They exercise their calling somewhat like bill-brokers, taking special pains always to secure themselves against loss, and make a trifle of money, while displaying an unbounded philanthropy. Here then is a class of persons most appropriate for our purpose: fathers, uncles, first cousins, even grandfathers, might be made out of these at a moment's notice. What affecting scenes, too, might be got up at Bow-street, under such circumstances, of penitent sons, and pardoning parents, of unforgiving uncles and imploring nephews. How would the eloquence of the worshipful bench revel, on such occasions, for its display. What admonitions would it not pour forth, what warnings, what commiseration, and what condolings. Then what a satisfaction to the culprit to know that all these things were managed by a respectable company, who were "responsible in every case for the good conduct of its servants." No extortion permitted--no bribery allowed; a regular rate of charges being printed, which every individual was bound, like a cab-man, to show if required.