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but a small lump of leaven when compared with the mass of corruption around it. This is a flock of the ragged and utterly forlorn, to many of whom green fields and fresh air are absolutely new, but we have other flocks besides these." "Indeed! Well, now I look at them more carefully, I see that their garments do speak
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of squalid poverty. I have never before seen such a ragged crew, though I have sometimes encountered individuals of the class on the streets." "Hm!" coughed the missionary with a peculiar smile. "They are not so ragged as they were. Neither are they as ragged as they will be in an hour or two." "What do you mean?" "I m...
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that these very rough little ones have to receive peculiar treatment before we can give them such an outing as they are having to-day. As you see, swings and see-saws have been put up here, toys are now being distributed, and a plentiful feast will ere long be forthcoming, through the kindness of a Christian gentleman ...
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has inclined to `consider the poor,' but before we could venture to move the little band, much of their ragged clothing had to be stitched up to prevent it falling off on the journey, and we had to make them move carefully on their way to the train--for vans have brought us only part of the way. Now that they
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are here, our minds are somewhat relieved, but I suspect that the effect of games and romping will undo much of our handiwork. Come, let us watch them." The youth and the missionary advanced towards a group of the children, whose souls, for the time being, were steeped in a see-saw. This instrument of delight consisted...
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balanced on the trunk of a noble tree which had been recently felled, with many others, to thin the woods of the philanthropist's park. It was an enormous see-saw! such as the ragged creatures had never before seen--perhaps never conceived of, their experiences in such joys having been hitherto confined to small bits o...
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barrels, or back-yard fences. No fewer than eight children were able to find accommodation on it at one and the same time, besides one of the bigger boys to straddle in the centre; and it required the utmost vigilance on the part of a young man teacher at one end of the machine, and Hetty Frog at the other end,
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to prevent the little ragamuffins at either extremity from being forced off. Already the missionary's anticipation in regard to the undoing of their labour had begun to be verified. There were at least four of the eight whose nether garments had succumbed to the effort made in mounting the plank, and various patches of...
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poor little wearers were innocent of flannels. But it was summer-time, and the fact had little effect either on wearers or spectators. The missionary, however, was not so absorbed in the present but that he felt impelled to remark to Welland: "That is their winter as well as summer clothing." The bicyclist said nothing...
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not lost upon him. "Now, Dick Swiller," said the young man teacher, "I see what you're up to. You mustn't do it!" Richard Swiller, who was a particularly rugged as well as ragged boy of about thirteen, not being in the habit of taking advice, did do it. That is, he sent his end of the plank up with such
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violence that the other end came to the ground with a shock which caused those who sat there to gasp, while it all but unseated most of those who were on the higher end. Indeed one very small and pinched but intelligent little boy, named by his companions Blobby, who looked as if Time, through the influence of privatio...
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suffering, had been dwindling instead of developing him,--actually did come off with a cry of alarm, which, however, changed into a laugh of glee when he found himself in his teacher's arms, instead of lying "busted on the ground," as he afterwards expressed it when relating the incident to an admiring audience of fell...
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Blobby was immediately restored to his lost position, and Swiller was degraded, besides being made to stand behind a large tree for a quarter of an hour in forced inaction, so that he might have time to meditate on the evil consequences of disobedience. "Take care, Robin," said Hetty, to a very small but astonishingly ...
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of the see-saw, who was impressed with the notion that he was doing good service by wriggling his own body up and down, "if you go on so, you'll push Lilly Snow off." Robin, unlike Dick, was obedient. He ceased his efforts, and thereby saved the last button which held his much too small waistcoat across his bare bosom....
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a sweet face the child she calls Lilly Snow has--if it were only clean," observed Welland. "A little soap and water with a hair brush would make her quite beautiful." "Yes, she is very pretty," said the missionary and the kindly smile with which he had been watching the fun vanished, as he added in a sorrowful voice, "...
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is a very sad one, dear child. Her mother is a poor but deserving woman who earns a little now and then by tailoring, but she has been crushed for years by a wicked and drunken husband who has at last deserted her. We know not where he is, perhaps dead. Five times has her home been broken up by
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him, and many a time has she with her little one been obliged to sit on doorsteps all night, when homeless. Little Lilly attends our Sunday-school regularly, and Hetty is her teacher. It is not long since Hetty herself was a scholar, and I know that she is very anxious to lead Lilly to the Lord. The sufferings and sorr...
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to which this poor child has been exposed have told upon her severely, and I fear that her health will give way. A day in the country like this may do her good perhaps." As the missionary spoke little Lilly threw up her arms and uttered a cry of alarm. Robin, although obedient, was short of memory, and his energetic
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spirit being too strong for his excitable little frame he had recommenced his wriggling, with the effect of bursting the last button off his waistcoat and thrusting Lilly off the plank. She was received, however, on Hetty's breast, who fell with her to the ground. "Not hurt, Hetty!" exclaimed the missionary, running fo...
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sir," replied Hetty with a short laugh, as she rose and placed Lilly on a safer part of the see-saw. "Come here, Hetty," said John Seaward, "and rest a while. You have done enough just now; let some one else take your place." After repairing the buttonless waistcoat with a pin and giving its owner a caution, Hetty went...
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sat down on the grass beside the missionary. "How is Bobby?" asked the latter, "I have not found a moment to speak to you till now." "Thank you, sir, he's better; much better. I fear he will be well too soon." "How so? That's a strange remark, my girl." "It may seem strange, sir, but--you know--father's very fond of Bo...
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"Well, Hetty, that's not a bad sign of your father." "Oh but, sir, father sits at his bedside when he's sober, an' has such long talks with him about robberies and burglaries, and presses him very hard to agree to go out with him when he's well. I can't bear to hear it, for dear Bobby seems to listen to
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what he says, though sometimes he refuses, and defies him to do his worst, especially when he--" "Stay, dear girl. It is very very sad, but don't tell me anything more about your father. Tell it all to Jesus, Hetty. He not only sympathises with, but is able to save--even to the uttermost." "Yes, thank God for that `utt...
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the poor girl, clasping her hands quickly together. "Oh, I understood that when He saved _me_, and I will trust to it now." "And the gentleman who called on you,--has he been again?" asked the missionary. "No, sir, he has only come once, but he has sent his butler three or four times with some money for us, and always
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with the message that it is from Miss Diana, to be divided between Bobby and me. Unfortunately father chanced to be at home the first time he came and got it all, so we got none of it. But he was out the other times. The butler is an oldish man, and a very strange one. He went about our
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court crying." "Crying! Hetty, that's a curious condition for an oldish butler to be in." "Oh, of course I don't mean cryin' out like a baby," said Hetty, looking down with a modest smile, "but I saw tears in his eyes, and sometimes they got on his cheeks. I can't think what's the matter with him." Whatever Mr Seaward ...
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on this point he said nothing, but asked if Bobby was able to go out. Oh yes, he was quite able to walk about now with a little help, Hetty said, and she had taken several walks with him and tried to get him to speak about his soul, but he only laughed at that, and said he had too
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much trouble with his body to think about his soul--there was time enough for that! They were interrupted at this point by a merry shout of glee, and, looking up, found that young Welland had mounted the see-saw, taken Lilly Snow in front of him, had Dick Swiller reinstated to counterbalance his extra weight, and was e...
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most hilarious manner among the fluttering rags. Assuredly, the fluttering rags did not enjoy themselves a whit less hilariously than he. In this condition he was found by the owner of the grounds, George Brisbane, Esquire, of Lively Hall, who, accompanied by his wife, and a tall, dignified friend with a little girl, a...
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enjoy yourself so much, my young friend," he said to Welland; "to which of the ragged schools may you belong?" In much confusion--for he was rather shy--Welland made several abortive efforts to check the see-saw, which efforts Dick Swiller resisted to the uttermost, to the intense amusement of a little girl who held Mr...
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in arresting it and leaped off. "I beg pardon," he said, taking off his cap to the lady as he advanced, "for intruding uninvited on--" "Pray don't speak of intrusion," interrupted Mr Brisbane, extending his hand; "if you are here as Mr Seaward's friend you are a welcome guest. Your only intrusion was among the little o...
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seem not to resent it neither do I." Welland grasped the proffered hand. "Thank you very much," he returned, "but I can scarcely lay claim to Mr Seaward's friendship. The fact is, I am here in consequence of an accident to my bicycle." "Oh! then you _are_ one of the poor unfortunates after all," said the host. "Come, y...
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doubly welcome. Not hurt much, I hope. No? That's all right. But don't let me keep you from your amusements. Remember, we shall expect you at the feast on the lawn. You see, Sir Richard," he added, turning to his dignified friend, "when we go in for this sort of thing we don't do it by halves. To have any
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lasting effect, it must make a deep impression. So we have got up all sorts of amusements, as you observe, and shall have no fewer than two good feeds. Come, let us visit some other--Why, what are you gazing at so intently?" He might well ask the question, for Sir Richard Brandon had just observed Hetty Frog, and she, ...
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to such marked attention, was gazing in perplexed confusion on the ground. At the same time little Di, having caught sight of her, quitted Mrs Brisbane, ran towards her with a delighted scream, and clasping her hand in both of hers, proclaimed her the sister of "my boy!" Hetty's was not the nature to refuse such affect...
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poorest of the poor, and clothed in the shabbiest and most patchy of garments, (which in her case, however, were neat, clean and well mended), she was rich in a loving disposition; so that, forgetting herself and the presence of others, she stooped and folded the little girl in her arms. And, when the soft brown hair a...
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face of Poverty were thus seen as it were co-mingling with the golden locks and rosy cheeks of Wealth, even Sir Richard was forced to admit to himself that it was not after all a very outrageous piece of impropriety! "Oh! I'm _so_ glad to hear that he's much better, and been out too! I would have come to see
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him again long long ago, but p--" She checked herself, for Mrs Screwbury had carefully explained to her that no good girl ever said anything against her parents; and little Di had swallowed the lesson, for, when not led by passion, she was extremely teachable. "And oh!" she continued, opening her great blue lakelets to...
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"you haven't the smallest bit of notion how I have dreamt about my boy--and my policeman too! I never can get over the feeling that they might both have been killed, and if they had, you know, it would have been me that did it; only think! I would have-- been--a murderer! P'raps they'd have hanged me!" "But they weren'...
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killed, dear," said Hetty, unable to restrain a smile at the awful solemnity of the child, and the terrible fate referred to. "No--I'm _so_ glad, but I can't get over it," continued Di, while those near to her stood quietly by unable to avoid overhearing, even if they had wished to do so. "And they do such strange thin...
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my dreams," continued Di, "you can't think. Only last night I was in our basket-cart--the dream-one, you know, not the real one--and the dream-pony ran away again, and gave my boy such a dreadful knock that he fell flat down on his back, tumbled over two or three times, and rose up--a policeman! Not _my_ policeman, you...
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another one that I had never seen before! But the very oddest thing of all was that it made me so angry that I jumped with all my might on to his breast, and when I got there it wasn't the policeman but the pony! and it was dead--quite dead, for I had killed it, and I wasn't sorry at
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all--not a bit!" This was too much for Hetty, who burst into a laugh, and Sir Richard thought it time to go and see the games that were going on in other parts of the field, accompanied by Welland and the missionary, while Hetty returned to her special pet Lilly Snow. And, truly, if "one touch of nature makes the
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whole world kin," there were touches of nature enough seen that day among these outcasts of society to have warranted their claiming kin with the whole world. Leap-frog was greatly in favour, because the practitioners could abandon themselves to a squirrel-and-cat sort of bound on the soft grass, which they had never d...
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It was a trying game, however, to the rags, which not only betrayed their character to the eye by the exhibition of flesh-tints through numerous holes, but addressed themselves also to the ears by means of frequent and explosive rendings. Pins, however, were applied to the worst of these with admirable though temporary...
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more furious,--especially so when the points of some of the pins touched up the flesh-tints unexpectedly. On these occasions the touches of nature became strongly pronounced-- expressing themselves generally in a yell. Another evidence of worldly kinship was, that the touched-up ones, instead of attributing the misfort...
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under the impression that a guilty comrade was in rear! The proceedings were totally arrested for one hour at mid-day, when unlimited food was issued, and many of the forlorn ones began to feel the rare sensation of being stuffed quite full and rendered incapable of wishing for more! But this was a mere interlude. Like...
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rose up again to play--to swing, to leap, to wrestle, to ramble, to gather flowers, to roll on the grass, to bask in the gladdening sunshine, and, in some cases, to thank God for all His mercies, in spite of the latent feeling of regret that there was so little of all that enjoyment in the slums, and dark courts,
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and filthy back-streets of the monster city. Of course all the pins were extracted in this second act of the play, and innumerable new and gaping wounds were introduced into the clothing, insomuch that all ordinary civilised people, except philanthropists, would have been shocked with the appearance of the little ones....
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of the play that the affair culminated. The scene was laid on the lawn in front of Mr Brisbane's mansion. Enter, at one end of the lawn, a band of small and dirty but flushed and happy boys and girls, in rags which might appropriately be styled ribbons. At the other end of the lawn a train of domestics bearing
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trays with tea, cakes, buns, pies, fruits, and other delectable things, to which the ragged army sits down. Enter host and hostess, with Sir Richard, friends and attendants. (_Host_.)--after asking a blessing--"My little friends, this afternoon we meet to eat, and only one request have I to make--that you shall do your...
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"No platter shall return to my house till it be empty. No little one shall quit these premises till he be full; what cannot be eaten must be carried away." (The ragged army cheers.) (_Host_.)--"Enough. Fall-to." (They fall-to.) (_Little boy_ in tatters, pausing.)--"_I_ shan't fall two, I'll fall three or four." (_Anoth...
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little boy_.)--"I say, Jim, wot would mother say if she was here?" (_Jim_.)--"She'd say nothin'. 'Er mouth 'ud be too full to speak." (Prolonged silence. Only mastication heard, mingled with a few cases of choking, which are promptly dealt with.) (_Blobby_, with a sigh.)--"I say, Robin, I'm gettin' tight." (_Robin_, wi...
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to another pause.)--"I say, Robin, I'm as full as I can 'old. So's all my pockits, an' there's some left over!" (_Robin--sharply_.)--"Stick it in your 'at, then." (Blobby takes off his billycock, thrusts the remnant of food therein, and puts it on.) Enter the brass band of the neighbouring village, (the bandsmen being ...
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and sends a few of the smaller ragamuffins to sleep. (_Sir Richard Brandon_, confidentially to his friend.)--"It is an amazing sight." (_Host_.)--"Would that it were a more common sight!" Enter more domestics with more tea, buns, and fruit; but the army is glutted, and the pockets are brought into requisition: much pin...
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'eaven!" (_Hetty_, remonstratingly.)--"Oh! Lilly, 'eaven is quite different." (_Dick Swiller_.)--"I'm sorry for it. Couldn't be much 'appier to my mind." (_Host_.)--"Now, dear boys and girls, before we close the proceedings of this happy day, my excellent friend, your missionary, Mr Seaward, will say a few words." John...
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too, so simply, so kindly, yet so heartily, that the army is roused to a pitch of great enthusiasm; but we leave this speech to the reader's imagination: after which--_Exeunt Omnes_. And, as the curtain of night falls on these ragged ones, scattered now, many of them, to varied homes of vice, and filth, and misery, the...
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to open again, perchance, in ecstatic dreams of food, and fun and green fields, fresh air and sunshine, which impress them more or less with the idea embodied in the aphorism, that "God made the country, but man made the town." CHAPTER NINE. HOW THE POOR ARE SUCCOURED. "I am obliged to you, Mr Seaward, for coming out o...
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way to see me," said Sir Richard Brandon, while little Di brought their visitor a chair. "I know that your time is fully occupied, and would not have asked you to call had not my friend Mr Brisbane assured me that you had to pass my house daily on your way to--to business." "No apology, Sir Richard, pray. I am
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at all times ready to answer a call whether of the poor or the rich, if by any means I may help my Lord's cause." The knight thought for a moment that he might claim to be classed among the poor, seeing that his miserable pittance of five thousand barely enabled him to make the two ends meet, but he
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only said: "Ever since we had the pleasure of meeting at that gathering of ragged children, my little girl here has been asking so many questions about poor people--the lower orders, I mean--which I could not answer, that I have asked you to call, that we may get some information about them. You see, Diana is an eccent...
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(Di opened her eyes very wide at this, wondering what "eccentric" could mean), "and she has got into a most unaccountable habit of thinking and planning about poor people." "A good habit, Sir Richard," said the missionary. "`Blessed are they that consider the poor.'" Sir Richard acknowledged this remark with a little b...
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you have no objection, what is your chief object in the mission at--what did you say its name--ah! George Yard?" "To save souls," said Mr Seaward. "Oh--ah--precisely," said the knight, taken somewhat aback by the nature and brevity of the answer, "that of course; but I meant, how do you proceed? What is the method, and...
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you put in motion?" "Perhaps," said the missionary, drawing a small pamphlet from his pocket, "this will furnish you with all the information you desire. You can read it over to Miss Diana at your leisure--and don't return it; I have plenty more. Meanwhile I may briefly state that the mission premises are in George Yar...
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of the worst parts of the east of London, where the fire of sin and crime rages most fiercely; where the soldiers of the Cross are comparatively few, and would be overwhelmed by mere numbers, were it not that they are invincible, carrying on the war as they do in the strength of Him who said, `Lo, I am with
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you alway.' "In the old coaching days," continued Mr Seaward, "this was a great centre, a starting-point for mail-coaches. For nigh thirty years the mission has been there. The `Black Horse' was a public-house in George Yard, once known to the magistrates as one of the worst gin-shops and resort of thieves and nurserie...
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is now a shelter for friendless girls, and a place where sick children of the poor are gratuitously fed." From this point the missionary went off into a graphic account of incidents illustrative of the great work done by the mission, and succeeded in deeply interesting both Diana and her father, though the latter held ...
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as he was fond of remarking, that there were two sides to every question. Checking his visitor at one point, he said, "You have mentioned ragged schools and the good that is done by them, but why should not the school-boards look after such children?" "Because, Sir Richard, the school-boards cannot reach them. There ar...
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London who have never lived more than three months in one place. No law reaches this class, because they do not stay long enough in any neighbourhood for the school-board authorities to put the law into operation. Now, nearly three hundred of the children of these wanderers meet in our Free Ragged Day Schools twice a d...
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we teach them as efficiently as we can in secular matters, and of course they are taught the Word of God, and told of Jesus the Saviour of sinners; but our difficulties are great, for children as well as parents are often in extremest poverty, the former suffering from hunger even when sent to school--and they never st...
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long. Let me give you an instance:-- "One morning a mother came and begged to have her children admitted. She had just left the workhouse. Three children in rags, that did not suffice to cover much less to protect them, stood by her side. She did not know where they were to sleep that night, but hoped to obtain a
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little charing and earn enough to obtain a lodging somewhere. She could not take the children with her while seeking work--Would we take them in? for, if not, they would have to be left in the streets, and as they were very young they might lose themselves or be run over. We took them in, fed, sympathised with, and tau...
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them. In the afternoon the mother returned weary, hungry, dejected. She had failed to obtain employment, and took the children away to apply for admission to a casual ward." "What is a casual ward, Mr Missionary?" asked Di. "Seaward, my love,--his name is not Missionary," said Sir Richard. "A casual ward," answered the...
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rows of very poor beds; mere wooden frames with canvas stretched on them, in which any miserable beggars who choose to submit to the rules may sleep for a night after eating a bit of bread and a basin of gruel-- for all which they pay nothing. It is a very poor and comfortless place--at least you would think it
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so--and is meant to save poor people from sleeping, perhaps dying, in the streets." "Do some people sleep in the streets?" asked Di in great surprise. "Yes, dear, I'm sorry to say that many do." "D'you mean on the stones, in their night-dresses?" asked the child with increasing surprise. "Yes, love," said her father, "...
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in their night-dresses--they have no night-dresses." Little Di had now reached a pitch of surprise which rendered her dumb, so the missionary continued: "Here is another case. A poor widow called once, and said she would be so grateful if we would admit her little girl and boy into the schools. She looked clean and tid...
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not been neglected. She could not afford to pay for them, as she had not a penny in the world, and applied to us because we made no charge. The children were admitted and supplied with a plain but nourishing meal, while their mother went away to seek for work. We did not hear how she sped, but she had
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probably taken her case to God, and found Him faithful, for she had said, before going away, `I know that God is the Father of the fatherless, and the husband of the widow.' "Again, another poor woman came. Her husband had fallen sick. Till within a few days her children had been at a school and paid for, but now
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the bread-winner was ill--might never recover--and had gone to the hospital. These children were at once admitted, and in each case investigation was made to test the veracity of the applicants. "Of course," continued the missionary, "I have spoken chiefly about the agencies with which I happen to have come personally ...
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therefore I ignore or am indifferent to the other grand centres of influence which are elsewhere at work in London; such as, for instance, the various agencies set agoing and superintended by Dr Barnardo, whose _Home for Working and Destitute Boys_, in Stepney Causeway, is a shelter from which thousands of rescued litt...
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and useful members of society, instead of dying miserably in the slums of London, or growing up to recruit the ranks of our criminal classes. These agencies, besides rescuing destitute and neglected children, include _Homes for destitute girls_ and for _little boys_ in Ilford and Jersey, an _Infirmary for sick children...
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and Day schools, Free dinner-table to destitute children, Mission Halls, Coffee Palaces_, and, in short, a grand net-work of beneficent agencies--Evangelistic, Temperance, and Medical--for the conduct of which is required not far short of One Hundred Pounds a day!" Even Sir Richard Brandon, with all his supposed financ...
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Dr Barnardo obtain so large an amount?" he asked. "From the voluntary gifts of those who sympathise with and consider the poor," replied Seaward. "Then," he added, "there is that noble work carried on by Miss Rye of the _Emigration Home for Destitute Little Girls_, at the Avenue House, Peckham, from which a stream of d...
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to Canada, where they are much wanted, and who, if allowed to remain here, would almost certainly be _lost_. Strong testimony to the value of this work has been given by the Bishops of Toronto and Niagara, and other competent judges. Let me mention a case of one of Miss Rye's little ones, which speaks for itself. "A li...
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of six was deserted by both father and mother." "Oh! _poor_ little thing!" exclaimed the sympathetic Di, with an amazing series of pitiful curves about her eyebrows. "Yes, poor indeed!" responded Seaward. "The mother forsook her first; then her father took her on the tramp, but the little feet could not travel fast eno...
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and offered her to a workhouse. They refused her, so the tramping was continued, and at last baby was sold for three shillings to a stranger man. On taking his purchase home, however, the man found that his wife was unwilling to receive her; he therefore sent poor little baby adrift in the streets of London!" "_What_ a...
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Di, with flashing orbs. "Was it not? But, when father and mother cast this little one off, the Lord cared for it. An inspector of police, who found it, took it to his wife, and she carried it to Miss Rye's Home, where it was at once received and cared for, and, doubtless, this little foundling girl is now dwelling
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happily and usefully with a Canadian family." "How nice!" exclaimed Di, her eyes, lips, and teeth bearing eloquent witness to her satisfaction. "But no doubt you have heard of Miss Rye's work, as well as that of Miss Annie Macpherson at the Home of Industry, and, perhaps, contributed to--" "No," interrupted Sir Richard...
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Mr Seaward, are there other institutions of this sort in London?" "Oh! yes, there are several, it would take me too long to go into the details of the various agencies we have for succouring the poor. There is, among others, The Church of England `_Central Home for Waifs and Strays_,' with a `Receiving House' for boys ...
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and one for girls in East Dulwich, with the Archbishop of Canterbury for its President. Possibly you may have heard of the `_Strangers' Rest_,' in Saint George Street, Ratcliff Highway, where, as far as man can judge, great and permanent good is being constantly done to the souls of sailors. A sailor once entered this ...
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drink. He was spoken to by Christian friends, and asked to sign the pledge. He did so, and has now been steadfast for years. Returning from a long voyage lately, he went to revisit the _Rest_, and there, at the Bible-class, prayed. Part of his prayer was--`God bless the Strangers' Rest. O Lord, we thank Thee for this p...
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we shall thank Thee to all eternity.' This is a sample of the feeling with which the place is regarded by those who have received blessing there. In the same street, only a few doors from this Rest, is the `_Sailor's Welcome Home_.' This is more of a home than the other, for it furnishes lodging and unintoxicating refr...
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its devoted soul-loving manager, Miss Child, and her assistant workers, go fearlessly into the very dens of iniquity, and do all they can to bring sailors to Jesus, and induce them to take the pledge against strong drink, in which work they are, through God's blessing, wonderfully successful. These two missions work, a...
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the `Rest' are held prayer-meetings and Bible-classes, and when these are dismissed, the sailors find the open door of the `Welcome Home' ready to receive them, and the inmates there seek to deepen the good influence that has been brought to bear at the meetings--and this in the midst of one of the very worst parts of ...
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to every species of evil is rampant, on the right-hand and on the left, before and behind. "But, Sir Richard, although I say that a grand and extensive work of salvation to soul, body, and spirit is being done to thousands of men, and women, and children, by the agencies which I have mentioned, and by many similar agen...
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I have not now time to mention, as well as by the band of City Missionaries to which I have the honour to belong, I would earnestly point out that these all put together only scratch the surface of the vast mass of corruption which has to be dealt with in this seething world of London, the population of which
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is, as you are aware, equal to that of all Scotland; and very specially would I remark that the work is almost exclusively carried on by the _voluntary contributions_ of those who `consider the poor!' "The little tract which I have given you will explain much of the details of this great work, as carried on in the Geor...
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Mission. When you have read that, if you desire it, I will call on you again. Meanwhile engagements compel me to take my leave." After luncheon, that day, Sir Richard drew his chair to the window, but instead of taking up the newspaper and recommending his little one to visit the nursery, he said: "Come here, Di. You a...
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will examine this pamphlet--this little book--and I'll try to explain it, for reports are usually very dry." Di looked innocently puzzled. "Should reports always be wet, papa?" Sir Richard came nearer to the confines of a laugh than he had reached for a long time past. "No, love--not exactly wet, but--hm--you shall hea...
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and lay your head on it." With his large hand on the golden tresses, Sir Richard Brandon began to examine the record of work done in the George Yard Mission. "What is this?" he said. "_Toy Classes_,--why, this must be something quite in your way, Di." "Oh yes, I'm sure of that, for I adore toys. Tell me about it."
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