method which can hardly be adopted in countries
where there is no efficient and comprehensive Poor Law. In such
countries, for instance, an Austria and Germany, where there is no
proper provision on the part of the State for the feeble, the
helpless, the aged, the maimed, begging, on the part of these
unfortunates, becomes, in many cases, an absolute necessity. Recent
statistics,[20] respecting the working of additions to the Austrian
vagrancy laws passed in 1885, would seem to show that numbers of the
genuine labouring population have been in the habit of resorting to
begging when going from place to place in search of employment. To
meet these cases the Austrian Government, in the year just mentioned,
secured the passing of a law for the establishment of what are called
Naturalverpflegstationen, or refuges for workmen on the tramp. These
shelters or refuges are strictly confined to the use of genuine
labourers; the poor of the surrounding neighbourhood are not allowed
to enter them; nor is any one afforded shelter who cannot show that he
has been at work within the previous three months, or who applies
twice for admission in the course of that time. A man must also
produce his papers and be willing to perform a certain amount of work;
in return for this he is allowed to remain at the shelter for eighteen
hours, but not more, and is informed on his departure where the next
station is situated. He is also told if there is any probability of
getting employment in the district and is given the names of employers
in want of men. These institutions are a combination, of the casual
ward and the labour bureau, differing, however, from the casual ward
in rejecting all mere wanderers and accepting genuine workmen alone.

[20] Cf. Conrad's _Handwoerterbuch der Staatswissenschaften_,
i. 928.

It in only in some parts of the Austrian Empire that this system has
as yet been put into operation, for the act is of a permissive
character and is mainly worked by the local authorities. In those
districts of lower Austria where it has been tried, it has so far
produced most satisfactory results; begging has decreased according to
the statistics for 1888, more than 60 per cent. in the course of three
years, while in other parts of Austria, where these institutions are
not yet adopted, it has only decreased 25 per cent. The system has as
yet been in operation for too short a period to enable an opinion to
be formed of its eventua