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[-1-]
MYSTIC LONDON.
CHAPTER I.
OF all the protean forms of misery that meet us in the bosom of that
"stony-hearted stepmother, London," there, is none that appeals
so directly to our sympathies as the spectacle of a destitute child. In
the case of the grown man or woman, sorrow and suffering are often
traceable to the faults, or at best to the misfortunes of the sufferers
themselves; but in the case of the child they are mostly, if not always,
vicarious. The fault, or desertion, or death of the natural protectors,
turns loose upon the desert of our streets those nomade hordes of
Bedouins, male and female, whose presence is being made especially
palpable just now, and whose reclamation is a perplexing, yet still
a hopeful problem. In the case of the adult Arab, there is a life's work
to undo, and the facing of that fact it is which makes some of our bravest
workers drop their hands in despair. With these young Arabs, on the
contrary, it is only the wrong [-2-] bias of a few early years to correct,
leaving carte blanche for any amount of hope in youth, maturity, and
old age. Being desirous of forming, for my own edification, some notion of
the amount of the evil existing, and the efforts made to counteract it, I
planned a pilgrimage into this Arabia Infelix - this Petraea of the London
flagstones ; and purpose setting down here, in brief, a few of my
experiences, for the information of stay-at-home travellers, and still
more for the sake of pointing out to such as may be disposed to aid
in the work of rescuing these little Arabs the proper channels for their
beneficence. Selecting, then, the Seven Dials and Bethnal Green as the
foci of my observation in West and East London respectively, I set
out for the former one bleak March night, and by way of breaking ground,
applied to the first police-constable I met on that undesirable beat for
information as to my course. After one or two failures, I met with an
officer literally "active and intelligent," who convoyed me
through several of that network of streets surrounding the Seven Dials,
leaving me to my own devices when he had given me the general bearings of
the district it would be desirable to visit.
My first raid was on the Ragged School and Soup Kitchen in Charles
Street, Drury Lane, an evil-looking and, unfragrant locality; but the
institution in question stands so close to the main thoroughfare
that the most fastidious may visit it with ease. Here [-3-] I found some twenty
Arabs assembled for evening school. They were of all ages, from seven to
fifteen, and their clothing was in an inverse ratio to their dirt -
very little of the former, and a great deal of the latter. They moved
about with their bare feet in the most feline way, like the veritable
Bedouin himself. There they were, however, over greasy slates and
grimy copy-books, in process of civilization. The master informed me that
his special difficulties arose from the attractions of the theatre and the
occasional intrusion of wild Arabs, who came only to kick up a row.
At eight o'clock the boys were to be regaled with a brass band practice,
so, finding from one of the assembled Arabs that there was a second
institution of the kind in King Street, Long Acre, I passed on
thereto. Here I was fortunate enough to find the presiding genius in the
person of a young man engaged in business during the day, and devoting
his extra time to the work of civilizing the barbarians of this district.
Sunday and week-day services, night schools, day schools, Bands of Hope,
temperance meetings, and last, not least, the. soup kitchen, were
the means at work here. Not a single officer is paid. The task is
undertaken "all for love, and nothing for reward," and it has
thriven so far that my presence interrupted a debate between the gentleman
abovementioned and one of his coadjutors on the subject of taking
larger premises. The expenses were met by the weekly offerings, and I was
surprised to see by a [-4-] notice posted in the room where the Sunday services
are held, that the sum total for the past week was only 19s. 4d. So there
must be considerable sacrifice of something more than time to carry on
this admirable work. Under the guidance of the second gentleman
mentioned above, I proceeded to the St.
George's and St. Giles's Refuge in Great Queen Street, where boys are
admitted on their own application, the only qualification being
destitution. Here they are housed, clothed, boarded, and taught such
trades as they may be fitted for, and not lost sight of until they
are provided with situations. A hundred and fifty-four was the number of
this truly miraculous draught from the great ocean of London streets, whom
I saw all comfortably bedded in one spacious dormitory. Downstairs
were the implements and products of the day's work, dozens of miniature
cobblers' appliances, machines for sawing and chopping firewood, &c.,
whilst, in a spacious refectory on the first floor, I was informed, the
resident Arabs extended on a Friday their accustomed hospitality to other
tribes, to such an extent, that the ,party numbered about 500. Besides
the 154 who were fortunate enough to secure beds, there were twenty new
arrivals, who had to be quartered on the floor for the night ; but at all
events they had a roof above them, and were out of the cruel east
wind that made Arabia Petraea that evening an undesirable resting-place
indeed. Lights were put out, and doors closed, when I left, as this is not
a [-5-] night refuge ; but notices are posted, I am informed, in the
various casual wards and temporary refuges, directing boys to this. There
is a kindred institution for girls in Broad Street. Such was my
first experience of the western portion of Arabia Infelix.
The following Sunday I visited the Mission Hall belonging to Bloomsbury
Chapel, in Moor Street, Soho, under the management of Mr. M'Cree, and the
nature of the work is much the same as that pursued at King Street. The
eleven o'clock service was on this particular day devoted to children, who
were assembled in large numbers, singing their cheerful hymns, and
listening to a brief, practical, and taking address. These children,
however, were of a class above the Arab type, being generally well
dressed. I passed on thence to what was then Mr. Brock's chapel,
where I found my veritable Arabs, whom I had seen in bed the previous
evening, arrayed in a decent suit of "sober livery," and perched
up in a high gallery to gather what they could comprehend of Mr.
Brock's discourse - not very much, I should guess ; for that gentleman's
long Latinized words would certainly fire a long way over their heads,
high as was their position. I found the whole contingent of children
provided for at the refuge was 400, including those on board the training
ship Chichester and the farm at Bisley, near Woking, Surrey. This
is certainly the most complete way of dealing with [-6-] the Arabs par
excellence, as it contemplates the case of utter destitution and
homelessness. It need scarcely be said, however, that such a work must
enlarge its boundaries very much, in order to make any appreciable
impression on the vast amount of such destitution. Here, nevertheless, is
the germ, and it is already fructifying most successfully. The other
institutions, dealing with larger masses of children, aim at civilizing
them at home, and so making each home a centre of influence.
Passing back again to the King Street
Mission Hall, I found assembled there the band of fifty
missionaries, male and female, who visit every Sunday afternoon the
kitchens of the various lodging-houses around the Seven Dials. Six hundred
kitchens are thus visited every week. After roll-call, and a brief
address, we sallied forth, I myself accompanying Mr. Hatton - the young
man to whom the establishment of the Mission is due - and another of his
missionaries. I had heard much of the St. Giles's Kitchens, but
failed to realize any idea of the human beings swarming by dozens and
scores in those subterranean regions. Had it not been for the fact that
nearly every man was smoking, the atmosphere would have been
unbearable. In most of the kitchens they were beguiling the enuui of
Sunday afternoon with cards ; but the game was invariably suspended on our
arrival. Some few removed their hats - for all wore them - and a
smaller number still joined in a verse or two [-7-] of a hymn, and listened to a
portion of Scripture and a few words of exhortation. One or two seemed
interested, others smiled sardonically ; the majority kept a dogged
silence. Some read their papers and refused the tracts and publications
offered them. These, I found, were the Catholics. I was assured
there were many men there who themselves, or whose friends, had occupied
high positions. I was much struck with the language of one crop-headed
young fellow of seventeen or eighteen, who, seeing me grope my way,
said, "They're not very lavish with the gas here, sir, are
they?" It may appear that this "experience" has little
bearing on the Arab boys; but really some of the inmates of these kitchens
were but boys. Those we visited were in the purlieus of the old
"Rookery," and for these dens, I was informed, the men paid
fourpence a night! Surely a little money invested in decent dwellings for
such people would be well and even remuneratively spent. The
kitchens, my informant - who has spent many years among them - added, are
generally the turning point between honesty and crime. The discharged
soldier or mechanic out of work is there herded with the
professional thief or burglar, and learns his trade and gets to like his
life.
The succeeding evening I devoted first of all to the Girls'
Refuge, 19, Broad Street, St. Giles's. Here were sixty-two girls of
the same class as the boys in Great Queen Street, who remain until
provided with [-8-] places as domestic servants. A similar number were in
the Home at Ealing. The Institution itself is the picture of neatness and
order. I dropped in quite unexpectedly; and any visitor who may be induced
to follow my example, will not fail to be struck with the happy,
"homely" look of everything, the clean, cheerful appearance of
the female Arabs, and the courtesy and kindness of the matron. These girls
are considered to belong to St. Giles's parish, as the boys to Bloomsbury
Chapel. So far the good work has been done by the Dissenters and
Evangelical party in the Established Church. The sphere of the High
Church - as I was reminded by the Siperintendent Sergeant - is the Newport
Market Refuge and Industrial Schools. Here, besides the male and
female refuges, is a Home for Destitute Boys, who are housed and taught on
the same plan as at St. Giles's. Their domicile is even more cosy than the
other, and might almost tempt a boy to act the part of an "amateur
Arab." I can only say the game that was going on, previously to bed,
in the large covered play room, with bare feet and in shirt sleeves,
was enough to provoke the envy of any member of a Dr. Blimber's
"Establishment." The Institution had just had a windfall in the
shape of one of those agreeable 1000l. cheques that have been
flying about lately, or their resources would have been cramped; but the
managers are wisely sensible that such windfalls do not come every day,
[-9-] and so forbear enlarging their borders as they could wish.
Strangely enough, the Roman Catholics, who usually outdo us in their
work among the poor, seemed a little behindhand in this special department
of settling the Arabs. They have schools largely attended in Tudor
Place, Tottenham Court Rod, White Lion Street, Seven Dials, &c., but,
as far as I could ascertain, nothing local in the shape of a Refuge.
To propagate the faith may be all very well, and will be only the natural
impulse of a man sincere in his own belief; but we must not forget that
these Arabs have bodies as well as souls, and that those bodies have
been so shamefully debased and neglected as to drag the higher energies
down with them ; and it is a great question whether it is not absolutely
necessary to begin on the very lowest plane first, and so to work
towards the higher. Through the body and the mind we may at last reach the
highest sphere of all.
Without for one moment wishing to write down the " religious"
element, it is, I repeat, a grave question whether the premature
introduction of that element does not sometimes act as a deterrent, and
frustrate the good that might otherwise be done. Still there is the
great fact, good is being done. It would be idle to carp at any means when
the end is so thoroughly good. I could not help, as I passed from
squalid kitchen to kitchen that Sunday [-10-] afternoon, feeling Lear's words
ring through my mind :-
O, I have ta'en
Too little care of this. Take physic, pomp,
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou mayst shake the superflux to them,
And show the heavens more just.
And now "Eastward ho!" for "experiences" in Bethnal
Green.
[-11-]
EAST LONDON ARABS.
NOTWITHSTANDING my previous experiences among the Western tribes
of Bedouins whose locale is the Desert of the Seven Dials, I must confess
to considerable strangeness when first I penetrated the wilderness
of Bethnal Green. Not only was it utterly terra incognita to me, but, with
their manifold features in common, the want and squalor of the East have
traits distinct from those of the West. I had but the name of one
Bethnal Green parish and of one lady- Miss Macpherson - and with
these slender data I proceeded to my work, the results of which I again
chronicle seriatim.
Passing from the Moorgate Street Station I made for the Eastern
Counties Terminus at Shoreditch, and soon after passing it struck off to
my right in the Bethnal Green Road. Here, amid a pervading atmosphere
of bird-fanciers and vendors of live pets in general, I found a Mission
Hall, belonging to I know not what denomination, and, aided by a vigorous
policeman, kicked - in the absence of knocker or bell - at all the doors,
without result. Nobody was there.[-12-] I went on to the Bethnal Green parish
which had been named to me as the resort of nomade tribes, and found the
incumbent absent in the country for a week or so, and the Scripture-reader
afraid, in his absence, to give much information. He ventured, however, to
show me the industrial school, where some forty children were employed in
making match-boxes for Messrs. Bryant and May. However, as I was told
that the incumbent in question objected very decidedly to refuges and
ragged schools, and thought it much better for the poor to strain a point
and scud their little ones to school, I felt that was hardly the regimen
to suit my Arabian friends, who were evidently teeming in that locality. I
was even returning home with the view of getting further geographical
particulars of this Eastern Arabia Petraea, when, as a last resource, I
was directed to a refuge in Commercial Street. I rang here, and found
myself in the presence of the veritible Miss Macpherson herself,
with whom I passed two pleasant and instructive hours.
At starting, Miss Macpherson rather objected to being made the subject
of an article - first of all, for the very comprehensible reason that such
publicity would draw down upon her a host of visitors; and when I
suggested that visitors probably meant funds, she added a second, and not
quite so comprehensible an objection - that these funds themselves might
alloy the element of Faith in which the work had been so [-13-] far
carried on. She had thoroughly imbibed the spirit of Muller, whose Home at
Bristol was professedly the outcome of Faith and Prayer alone. However, on
my promise to publish only such particulars-name, locality,
&c.-as she might approve, this lady gave me the details of her truly
wonderful work. The building in which I found her had been erected to
serve as large warehouses, and here 110 of the most veritable Arabs
were housed, fed, taught, and converted into Christians, when so
convertible. Should they prove impressionable, Miss Macpherson then
contemplates their emigration to Canada. Many had already been sent
out; and her idea was to extend her operations in this respect: not, be it
observed, to cast hundreds of the scum of the East End of London
upon Canada - a proceeding to which the Canadians would very naturally
object - but to form a Home on that side to be fed from the Homes on this,
and so to remove from the old scenes of vice and temptation those
who had been previously trained in the refuges here. She has it in
contemplation to take a large hotel in Canada, and convert it into an
institution of this kind ; and I fancy it was the possibility that
publicity might aid this larger scheme which eventually induced the good
lady to let the world so far know what she is doing. At all events, she
gave me carte blanche to publish the results of my observations.
In selecting and dealing with the inmates of her [-14-] refuges, Miss
Macpherson avails herself of the science of phrenology, in which she believes,
and she advances good reason for so doing. I presume my phrenological
development must hare been satisfactory, since she not only laid aside her
objection to publicity, but even allowed me to carry off with me her MS.
"casebooks," from which I cull one or two of several hundred :-
"' 1. T. S., aged ten (March 5, 1869).-An orphan. Mother died in
St. George's Workhouse. Father killed by coming in contact with a diseased
sheep, being a slaughterman. A seller of boxes in the street. Slept
last in a bed before Christmas. Slept in haycarts, under a tarpaulin. Says
the prayers his mother ' teached him.' "
2. J. H., aged twelve (March 5).--No home but the streets. Father
killed by an engine-strap, being an engineer. Mother died of a broken
heart. Went into ----- Workhouse; but ran away through ill-treatment
last December. Slept in ruins near Eastern Counties Railway. Can't
remember when he last lay in a bed."
" 3. A. R., aged eleven (March 5).-Mother and father left him and
two brothers in an empty room in H----- Street. Policeman, hearing them
crying, broke open the door and took them to the workhouse. His two
brothers died. Was moved from workhouse by grandmother, and she, unable to
support him, turned him out on the streets. Slept in railway ruins ; lived
[-15-] by begging. July 24, sent to Home No. 1 as a reward for good
conduct."
Besides thus rescuing hundreds of homeless ones, Miss Macpherson has in
many instances been the means of restoring runaway children of respectable
parents. Here is an instance :-
"Feb. 25th.-S. W. T., aged fourteen, brought into Refuge by one of
the night teachers, who noticed him in a lodging-house respectably
dressed. Had walked up to London from N-----, in company with two
sailors (disreputable men, whom the lodging-house keeper declined to take
in). Had been reading sensational books. Wrote to address at N-----.
Father telegraphed to keep him. Uncle came for him with fresh clothes and
took him home. He had begun to pawn his clothes for his night's lodging.
His father had been for a fortnight in communication with the
police."
The constables in the neighbourhood all know Miss Macpherson's Refuge,
and her readiness to take boys in at any time; so that many little
vagrants are brought thither by them and reclaimed, instead of being
locked up and sent to prison, to go from bad to worse. Besides this
receptacle for boys, Miss Macpherson has also a Home at Hackney, where
girls of the same class are housed. The plan she adopts is to get a
friend to be responsible for one child. The cost she reckons at 6l.10s.
per annum for those under ten years, and 10l. for those above.
[-16-] But this excellent lady's good works are by no means catalogued
yet. Besides the children being fed and taught in these Homes, the parents
and children are constantly gathered for sewing classes, tea
meetings, &c. at the Refuge. Above 400 children are thus influenced;
and Miss Macpherson, with her coadjutors, systematically visits the
wretched dens and lodging-houses into which no well-dressed person,
unless favourably known like her for her work among the children, would
dare to set foot. I was also present when a hearty meal of excellent soup
and a large lump of bread were given to between three and four
hundred men, chiefly dock labourers out of employ. It was a touching sight
to notice the stolid apathy depicted on most of the countenances, which
looked unpleasantly like despair. One of the men assured me that for every
package that had to be unladen from the docks there were ten pair of hands
ready to do the work, where only one could be employed. Many of the men,
he assured me, went for two, sometimes three, days without food; and with
the large majority of those assembled the meal they were then taking would
represent the whole of their subsistence for the twenty-four hours. After
supper a hymn was sung, and a few words spoken to them by Miss
Macpherson on the allegory of the Birds and Flowers in the Sermon on the
Mount ; and so they sallied forth into the darkness of Arabia Petraea. I
mounted to the little boys' bedroom, where the tiniest [-17-] Arabs of all were
enjoying the luxury of a game, with bare feet, before retiring. Miss
Macpherson dragged a mattress off one of the beds and threw it down
in the centre for them to tumble head-over-tail; and, as she truly said, it was
difficult to recognise in those merry shouts and happy faces any
remains of the veriest reprobates of the London streets.
Let us hear Miss Macpherson herself speak. In a published pamphlet,
"Our Perishing Little Ones," she says : "As to the present
state of the mission, we simply say ' Come and see.' It is impossible by
words to give an idea of the mass of 120,000 precious souls who live
on this one square mile. . . . . My longing is to send forth, so soon as
the ice breaks, 500 of our poor street boys, waifs and strays that have
been gathered in, to the warm-hearted Canadian farmers. In the
meantime, who will help us to make outfits. and collect 5l. for
each little Arab, that there be no hindrance to the complement being made
up when the spring time is come? . . . . Ladies who are householders
can aid us much in endeavours to educate these homeless wanderers to
habits of industry by sending orders for their. firewood-4s. per hundred
bundles, sent free eight miles from the City." And, again, in Miss
Macpherson's book called "The Little Matchmakers," she says :
"In this work of faith and labour of love among the very lowest in
our beloved country, let us press on, looking for great things. [-18-]
Preventing sin and. crime is a much greater work than curing it. There are
still many things on my heart requiring more pennies. As they come, we
will go forward."
Miss Macpherson's motto is, "The Word first in all things;
afterwards bread for this body." There are some of us who would be
inclined to reverse this process - to feed the body and educate the mind -
not altogether neglecting spiritual culture, even at the earliest
stage, but leaving anything like definite religious schooling until the
poor mind and body were, so to say, acclimatized. It is, of course, much
easier to sit still and theorize and criticise than to do what these
excellent people have done and are doing to diminish this gigantic evil.
"By their fruits ye shall know them" is a criterion based on
authority that we are none of us inclined to dispute. Miss Macpherson
boasts - and a very proper subject for boasting it is that she belongs to
no ism. It is significant, however, that the Refuge bears, or bore,
the name o& the " Revival" Refuge, and the paper which
contained the earliest accounts of its working was called the Revivalist,
though now baptized with the broader title of the Christian. Amid
such real work it would be a pity to have the semblance of unreality, and
I dreaded to think of the possibility of its existing, when little
grimy hands were held out by boys volunteering to say a text for my behoof.
By far the most favourite [-19-] one was "Jesus wept ;" next came
"God is love" - each most appropriate ; but the sharp boy, a few
years older, won approval by a longer and more doctrinal quotation,
whilst several of these held out hands again when asked whether, in the
course of the day, they had felt the efficacy of the text given on the
previous evening, "Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth ; keep
Thou the door of my lips." Such an experience would be a sign of
advanced spirituality in an adult. Is it ungenerous to ask whether its
manifestation in an Arab child must not be an anticipation of what
might be the normal result of a few years' training ? May not this kind of
forcing explain the cases I saw quoted in the books - of one boy
who "felt like a fish out of water, and left the same day of his own
accord;" another who "climbed out of a three-floor window
and escaped ?"
However, here is the good work being done. Let us not carp at the
details, but help it on, unless we can do better ourselves. One thing has
been pre-eminently forced in upon me during this brief examination of our
London Arabs - namely, that individuals work better than communities
amongst these people. The work done by the great establishments, whether
of England, Rome, or Protestant Dissent, is insignificant compared with
that carried out by persons labouring like Mr. Hutton in Seven Dials and
Miss Macpherson in Whitechapel, untrammelled by any [-20-] particular
system. The want, and sorrow, and suffering are individual, and need individual
care, just as the Master of old worked Himself, and sent His scripless
missionaries singly forth to labour for Him, as - on however
incommensurate a scale - they are still labouring, East and West, amongst
our London Arabs.
[-21-]
IN the previous chapter an account was given of the Arabs inhabiting
that wonderful "square mile" in East London, which has since
grown to he so familiar in men's months. The labours of Miss Macpherson
towards reclaiming these waifs and strays in her " Refuge and Home of
Industry, Commercial Street, Spitalfields," were described at some
length, and allusion was at the same time made to the views which
that lady entertained with regard to the exportation of those Arabs to
Canada after they should have undergone a previous probationary training
in the "Home." A short time afterwards it was my pleasing duty
to witness the departure of one hundred of these young boys from the
St. Pancras Station, en route for Canada; and it now strikes me that some
account of the voyage out, in the shape of excerpts from the letters of
the devoted ladies who themselves accompanied our Arabs across the
Atlantic, may prove interesting ; while, at the same time, a calculation
of their probable success in their new life and homes may not improbably
stimulate those who cannot give their time, to give at [-22-] least their
countenance, and it may be, their material aid, to a scheme which
recommends itself to all our sympathies - the permanent reclamation of the
little homeless wanderers of our London streets.
The strange old rambling "Home" in Commercial Street, built
originally for warehouses, then used as a cholera hospital, and now the
Arab Refuge, presented a strange appearance during the week before the
departure of the chosen hundred. On the ground-floor were the packages of
the young passengers ; on the first floor the "new clothes, shirts,
and stockings, sent by kind lady friends from all parts of the kingdom,
trousers and waistcoats made by the widows, and the boots and pilot
jackets made by the boys themselves." The dormitory was the great
store-closet for all the boys' bags filled with things needful on
board ship; and on the top floor, we can well imagine, the last day was a
peculiarly melancholy one. The work attendant upon the boys' last meal
at the Refuge was over, and there, in the long narrow kitchen, stood the
cook wiping away her tears with her apron, and the six little waiting
maids around them, with the novel feeling of having nothing to do -
there, where so much cutting, buttering, and washing-up had been the order
of the day. When the summons came to start, the police had great
difficulty in clearing a way for the boys to the vans through the
surging mass of East London poverty. Some of the little match-box makers
ran ail the three [-23-] miles from Commercial Street to St. Pancras Station
to see the very last of their boy-friends. Derby was the stopping-place on
the journey to Liverpool, and the attention of passengers and guards
was arrested by this strange company gathering on the platform at midnight
and singing two of the favourite Refuge hymns. Liverpool was reached at
4 A.M., and the boys filed off in fours, with their canvas bags over their
shoulders, to the river side, where their wondering eyes beheld the Peruvian,
which was to bear them to their new homes.
At this point, Miss Macpherson's sister - who is carrying on the work
of the Refuge during that lady's absence - wrote as follows :- "Could
our Christian friends have seen the joy that beamed in the faces of
those hundred lads from whom we have just parted - could they know the
misery, the awful precipice of crime and sin from which they have been
snatched - we are sure their hearts would be drawn out in love for
those little ones. If still supported," she continues, " I hope
to send out another party of fifty boys and fifty girls while my sister
remains in Canada, and shall be happy to forward the name and history of a
boy or girl to any kind friend wishing to provide for a special
case. In the broad fields of that new country where the farmers are only
too glad to adopt healthy young boys or girls into their families,
hundreds of our perishing little ones may find a happy home."
On Thursday, the 12th of May, the Peruvian [-24-] dropped down the
river; and, as the last batch of friends left her when she passed out into
the Channel, these one hundred boys, with Miss Macpherson, leaned
over the bulwarks, singing the hymn, " Yes, we part, but not for
ever."
From Derry Miss Macpherson wrote under date May 13th :- "With the
exception of two, all are on deck now, as bright as larks ; they have
carried up poor Jack Frost and Franks the runner. It is most
touching to see them wrap them up in their rugs. Michael Flinn, the
Shoreditch shoeblack, was up all night, caring for the sick boys. Poor
Mike! He and I have exchanged nods at the Eastern Counties Railway
corner these five years. It is a great joy to give him such a chance for
life."
The voyage out was prosperous enough, though there were some contrary
winds, and a good deal of sea-sickness among the lads. The captain seems
to have been quite won by the self-denying kindness of the ladies,
and he lightened their hands by giving occupation to the boys. Then came
out the result of training at the Refuge. Those who had been some
time there showed themselves amenable to discipline ; but the late
arrivals were more fractious, and difficult to manage. These were the lads
"upon whom," as Miss Macpherson says, "the street life had
left sore marks." Even when only nearing the American coast,
this indomitable lady's spirit is planning a second expedition. " As
far as I dare make plans, I [-25-] should like to return, starting from Montreal
July 16th, reaching the Home July 27th, and then return with another
lot the second week in August. This second lot must be lads who are now
under influence, and who have been not less than six months in a
refuge." The finale to this second letter, written from Canada, adds
: "The boys, to a man, behaved splendidly. The agent's heart is won.
All have improved by the voyage, and many are brown hearty-looking
chaps fit for any toil."
In.the Montreal Herald, of May 27th, there is an account of
these boys after their arrival, which says :- " Miss Macpherson is
evidently a lady whose capacity for organization and command is of the very
highest order; for boys, in most hands, are not too easily managed, but in
hers they were as obedient as a company of soldiers. . . . . These boys
will speedily be placed in positions, where they will grow up respectable
and respected members of society, with access to the highest positions in
the country freely open to them. . . . . We hope that Miss Macpherson will
place all her bops advantageously, and will bring us many more. She is a
benefactor to the Empire in both hemispheres."
The importance of this testimony can scarcely be overrated, since many
persons hold themselves aloof from a work of this nature through a feeling
that it is not fair to draft our Arab population on a colony. It
will be seen, however, that it is not proposed to export [-26-] these boys until
they shall have been brought well under influence, and so have got rid of
what Miss Macpherson so graphically terms the " sore marks of
their street life."
Apropos of this subject, it may not be irrelevant to quote a
communication which has been received from Sir John Young, the
Governor-General of Canada, dated Ottawa., May 3rd, 1870 :-" For
emigrants able and willing to work, Canada offers at present a very
good prospect. The demand for agricultural labourers in Ontario during the
present year is estimated at from 30,000 to 40,000 ; and an industrious
man may expect to make about one dollar a day throughout the year,
if he is willing to turn his hand to clearing land, threshing, &c.,
during the winter. But it is of no use for emigrants to come here unless
they make up their minds to take whatever employment offers itself
most readily, without making difficulties because it is not that, to which
they have been accustomed, or which they prefer."
I visited the Refuge and Home of Industry a few nights afterwards, and,
though Miss Macpherson was absent, found all is working order. Sixty-three
boys were then its occupants. The superintendent was anxiously
looking forward to be able to carry out the plan of despatching fifty boys
and fifty girls during the ensuing summer. The sum required for an East
End case is 5l. ; for a special case, 10l. The following are
specimens of about sixty cases of boys whom she [-27-] would like to send out,
knowing that in Canada they could readily obtain places :-
P. E., aged seventeen.-Mother died of fever, leaving seven children; father a
dock labourer, but cannot get full employment.
L. J., aged thirteen.-Mother dead; does not know where her father is ; has
been getting her living by singing songs in the lodging-houses; is much improved
by her stay in the Home, and will make a tidy little maid. This is just
one of the many who might thus be rescued from a life of sin and misery.
Returning home through the squalid streets that night, where squatters
were vending old shoes and boots that seemed scarcely worth picking out of
the kennel, and garments that appeared beneath the notice of the rag
merchant, I saw the little Bedouins still in full force, just as though no
effort had been made for their reclamation and housing. As they
crowded the doorsteps, huddled in the gutters, or vended boxes of lights
and solicited the honour of shining "your boots, sir," I could
not help picturing them crossing the sea, under kindly auspices, to the
"better land" beyond, and anon, in the broad Canadian fields or
busy Canadian towns, growing into respectable farmers and citizens ; and
straightway each little grimed, wan face seemed to bear a new
interest for me, and to look wistfully up into mine with a sort of
rightful demand on my charity, saying [-28-] to me, and through me to my
many readers, "Come and help us !"
After the foregoing was written, a further letter arrived from Miss
Macpherson. All the boys were well placed. The agent at Quebec wished to
take the whole hundred in a lump, but only eleven were conceded to
him. At Montreal, too, all would have been taken, but twenty-one only were
left. All found excellent situations, many as house servants at 10l.
and 15l. a year. Eight were in like manner left at Belleville, half
way between Montreal and Toronto. Sixty were taken on to Toronto; and here
we are told "the platform was crowded with farmers anxious to
engage them all at once. It was difficult to get them to the office."
A gentleman arrived from Hamilton, saying that sixty applications had been
sent in for boys, directly it was known that Miss Macpherson was
coming out. So there is no need of anticipating anything like repugnance
on the part of the Canadians to the reception of our superfluous Arabs.