[TO THE EDITOR OP THE "SPECTATOR."]
Sin,—I should be obliged if you will allow me to draw the attention of your correspondents to the "Institutions" in the diocese of Chester which have been meeting successfully the needs of the clergy for some years past. "The Society for the Augmentation of Small Benefices" has been for more than twenty-five years engaged in raising the incomes of the poor livings in Cheshire. Its method of working is to draw subscriptions from the parish itself ; it doubles them, and then applies to the Ecclesiastical Commission, or to Queen Anne's Bounty, for a grant of equal amount—so that if a parish offers 2200, the Society adds another 2200, and this 2400 is met by a grant of 2400, and the income of the incumbent receives an augmentation of 224. Then there is the Clergy Pension Fund, started by some excellent laymen to commemorate our late Queen's Jubilee. This fund, which increases year by year, now amounts to 220,000, carefully invested, and providing an income sufficient to pension seven or eight clergy who through the infirmities of advancing years are no longer able to discharge efficiently their duty to their parishes. It is a condition of awarding a pension that no deduction be made from the income of the living. Why should not other dioceses follow suit, and start such funds at once ? Only let the management be in the hands of laymen who are good men of business.—I am, Sir, &c.,
CANONICUS CESTRIENSIS.
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