The asylum which received all these children was a departmental ("établissement dépositaire"), and not a communal institution. The "établissement dépositaire" was usually the ward of a hospice, in which, with the exception of children "en dépôt" the stay was the shortest, for by the law of 1904, continuing the principle laid down in 1811, all children under thirteen years of age under the guardianship of the state, except the mentally or physically infirm, must be boarded out in country districts. They were generally apprenticed to someone engaged in the agricultural industry, and until majority they remained under the guardianship of the administrative commissioners of the "". The state paid the whole of the cost of inspection and supervision.