Over this scattered inheritance was erected a trust, consisting of gentlemen in the neighborhood of Birmingham.

All human affairs tend to confusion:  The hand of care is ever necessary to keep order.  The gentlemen, therefore at the head of this charity, having too many modes of pleasure of their own, to pay attention to this little jurisdiction, disorder crept in apace; some of the lands were lost for want of inspection; the rents ran in arrear, and were never recovered; the streets were neglected, and the people complained.

Misconduct, particularly of a public nature, silently grows for years, and sometimes for ages, ’till it becomes too bulky for support, falls in pieces by its own weight, and out of its very destruction rises a remedy.  An order, therefore, from the Court of Chancery was obtained, for vesting the property in other hands, consisting of twenty persons, all of Birmingham, who have directed this valuable estate, now 227_l_. 5s. per annum, to useful purposes.  The man who can guide his own private concerns with success, stands the fairest chance of guiding those of the public.

If the former trust went widely astray, perhaps their successors have not exactly kept the line, by advancing the leases to a rack rent:  It is worth considering, whether the tenant of an expiring lease, hath not in equity, a kind of reversionary right, which ought to favour him with the refusal of another term, at one third under the value, in houses, and one fourth in land; this would give stability to the title, secure the rents, and cause the lessee more chearfully to improve the premises, which in time would enhance their value, both with regard to property and esteem.

But where business is well conducted, complaint should cease; for perfection is not to be expected on this side the grave.

Exclusive of a pittance to the poor widows above, the trust have a power of distributing money to the necessitous at Christmas and Easter, which is punctually performed.

I think there is an excellent clause in the devisor’s will, ordering his bailiff to pay half a crown to any two persons, who, having quarreled and entered into law, shall stop judicial proceedings, and make peace by agreement—­He might have added, “And half a crown to the lawyer that will suffer them.”  I know the sum has been demanded, but am sorry I do not know that it was ever paid.

If money be reduced to one fourth its value, since the days of Lench, it follows, that four times the sum ought to be paid in ours; and perhaps ten shillings cannot be better laid out, than in the purchase of that peace, which tends to harmonise the community, and weed a brotherhood not the most amicable among us.

The members choose annually, out of their own body a steward, by the name of bailiff Lench:  The present fraternity, who direct this useful charity, are