Any boy between the ages of ten and sixteen who may be found in the streets as a vagrant may be taken before the president of the Seccion de Industria de la Real Sociedad Economica, by whom he is articled out to a master of the trade he wishes to learn.  No place of education can be opened without the teacher thereof has been duly licensed.  No game of chance is allowed in any shop or tavern, except in billiard-saloons and coffee-houses, where draughts and dominoes, chess and backgammon are tolerated.  After a certain fixed hour of the night, no person is allowed to drive about in a Volante with the head up, unless it rains or the sitter be an invalid; the penalty is fifteen shillings.  No private individual is allowed to give a ball or a concert without permission of the authorities.  Fancy Londonderry House going to the London police-office to get permission for a quadrille or a concert.  How pleasant!  The specific gravity of milk is accurately calculated, and but a moderate margin allowed for pump mixture; should that margin be exceeded, or any adulteration discovered, the whole is forfeited to some charitable institution.  If such a salutary law existed in London, pigs’ brains would fall in the market, and I should not see so many milk-pails at the spring during my early morning walks to the Serpentine.

Among the regulations for health, the following are to be found.  No private hospital or infirmary is to be opened without a government licence.  All keepers of hotels, coffee or eating houses, &c., are bound to keep their kitchen “battery” well tinned inside, under a heavy penalty of 3l. 10s. for every utensil which may be found insufficiently tinned, besides any further liabilities to which they may be subject for accidents arising from neglect thereof.  Every shop is obliged to keep a vessel with water at the threshold of the outer door, to assist in avoiding hydrophobia.  All houses that threaten to tumble down must be rebuilt, and if the owner is unable to bear the expense, he must sell the house to some one who can bear it.  Another clause, after pointing out the proper places for bathing, enjoins a pair of bathing breeches, under a penalty of fifteen shillings for each offence; the particular cut is not specified.  Let those who object to put convex fig-leaves over the little cherubs, and other similar works of art at the Crystal Palace, take a lesson from the foregoing, and clothe them all in Cuba pants as soon as possible; scenes are generally more interesting when the imagination is partially called into play.  Boys, both little and big, are kept in order by a fine of fifteen shillings for every stone they throw, besides paying in full for all damage caused thereby.  No one is allowed to carry a stick more than one inch in diameter under a penalty of twelve shillings; but all white people are allowed to carry swords, provided they are carried openly and in their scabbards.

The foregoing are sufficient to convey to the reader some idea of the ban of pains and penalties under which a resident is placed; at the same time it may be as well to inform him, that, except those enactments which bear upon espionage, they are about as much attended to as the laws with regard to the introduction of slaves, respecting which latter I will now give you a few of the regulations.