Salvation Army, and looks at things from the point of view of her
duty, and not from that of her comfort.'
It is curious at what a tender age children learn to note the habits
of those about them. When this little Bessie was given _2d_. she
lisped out in her pretty Scotch accent, 'Mother winna have this for
beer!'
THE WOMEN'S LODGING-HOUSE
GLASGOW
The last place that I visited in Glasgow was the Shelter for women, an
Institution of the same sort as the Shelter for men. It is a
Lodging-house in which women can have a bed at the price of 4_d_. per
night; but if that sum is not forthcoming, they are not, as a rule,
turned away if they are known to be destitute.
The class of people who frequent this Home is a very low one; for the
most part they are drunkards. They must leave the Shelter before ten
o'clock in the morning, when the majority of them go out hawking,
selling laces, or other odds and ends. Some of them earn as much as
2_s_. a day; but, as a rule, they spend a good deal of what they earn,
only saving enough to pay for their night's lodging. This place has
been open for sixteen years, and contains 133 beds, which are almost
always full.
The women whom I saw at this Shelter were a very rough-looking set,
nearly all elderly, and, as their filthy garments and marred
countenances showed, often the victims of drink. Still, they have good
in them, for the lady in charge assured me that they are generous to
each other. If one of the company has nothing they will collect the
price of her bed or her food between them, and even pay her debts, if
these are not too large. There were several children in the place, for
each woman is allowed to bring in one. When I was there many of the
inmates were cooking their meals on the common stove, and very curious
and unappetizing these were.
Among them I noted a dark-eyed lassie of about sixteen who was crying.
Drawing her aside, I questioned her. It seemed that her father, a
drunken fellow, had turned her out of her home that afternoon because
she had forgotten to give him a message. Having nowhere to go she
wandered about the streets until she met a woman who told her of this
Lodging-house. She added, touchingly enough, that it was not her
mother's fault.
Imagine a girl of sixteen thrown out to spend the night upon the
streets of Glasgow!
On the walls of one of the rooms I saw a notice that read oddly in a
Shelter for women. It ran:--
_Smoking is strictly prohibited after retiring_.
THE LAND AND INDUSTRIAL COLONY
HADLEIGH, ESSEX
The Hadleigh Colony, of which Lieut.-Colonel Laurie is the Officer in
charge, is an estate of about 3,000 acres which was purchased by the
Salvation Army in the year 1891 at a cost of about £20 the acre, the
land being stiff clay of the usual Essex type. As it has chanced,
owing to the amount of building which is going on in the neighbourhood
of Southend, and to its proximity to London, that is within forty
miles, the investment has proved a very good one. I imagine that if
ever it should come to the hammer the Hadleigh Colony would fetch a
great deal more than £20 the acre, independently of its cultural
improvements. These, of course, are very great. For instance, more
than 100 acres are now planted with fruit-trees in full bearing. Also,
there are brickfields which are furnished with the best machinery and
plant, ranges of tomato and salad houses, and a large French garden
where early vegetables are grown for market. A portion of the land,
however, still remains in the hands of tenants, with whom the Army
does not like to interfere.
The total turn-over of the land 'in hand' amounts to the large sum of
over £30,000 per annum, and the total capital invested is in the
neighbourhood of £110,000. Of this great sum about £78,000 is the cost
of the land and the buildings; the brickworks and other industries
account for £12,000, while the remaining £20,000 represents the value
of the live and dead stock. I believe that the mortgage remaining on
the place, which the Army had not funds to pay for outright, is now
less than £50,000, borrowed at about 4 per cent, and, needless to say,
it is well secured.
Lieut.-Colonel Laurie informed me on the occasion of my last visit to
Hadleigh, in July, 1910, that taken as a whole even now the farm does
not pay its way.[6] This result is entirely owing to the character of
the labour employed. At first sight, as the men are paid but a
trifling sum in cash, it would appear that this labour must be
extremely cheap. Investigation, however, gives the story another
colour.
It costs the Army 10_s_. a week to keep a man at Hadleigh in food and
lodgings, and in addition he receives a cash grant of from 6_d_ to
5_s_. a week.
Careful observation shows that the labour of three of these men, of
whom 92 per cent, be it remembered, come to the Colony through their
drinking habits, is about equal to that of one good agricultural hand
who, in Norfolk, reckoning in his harvest and sundries, would
earn--let us say, 18s. a week. Therefore, in practice where I, as a
farmer, pay about 18s., or in the case of carters and milkmen nearly
£1, the Army pays £2, circumstances under which it is indeed difficult
to farm remuneratively in England.
The object of the Hadleigh Colony is to supply a place where broken
men of bad habits, who chance in most cases to have had some connexion
with or liking for the land, can be reformed, and ultimately sent out
to situations, or as emigrants to Canada. About 400 of such men pass
through the Colony each year. Of these men, Lieut.-Colonel Laurie
estimates that 7-1/2 per cent prove absolute failures, although, he
added that, 'it is very, very difficult to determine as to when a man
should be labelled an absolute failure. He may leave us an apparent
failure, and still come all right in the end.'
The rest, namely 91 per cent or so, regain their place as decent and
useful members of society, a wonderful result which is brought about
by the pressure of discipline, tempered with kindness, and the
influence of steady and healthful work.
Persons of every class drift to this Colony. Thus, among the 230
Colonists who were training there when I visited it in July, 1910,
were two chemists and a journalist, while a Church of England
clergyman had just left it for Canada.
As a specimen of the ruck, however, I will mention the first
individual to whom I happened to speak--a strong young man, who was
weeding a bed of onions. He told me that he had been a farm labourer
in early life, and, subsequently, for six years a coachman in a
private livery stables in London. He lost his place through drink,
became a wanderer on the Embankment, was picked up by the Salvation
Army and sent to one of its Elevator paper-works. Afterwards, he
volunteered to work on the land at Hadleigh, where he had then been
employed for nine months. His ambition was to emigrate to Canada,
which, doubtless, he has now done, or is about to do. Such cases might
be duplicated by the dozen, but for this there is no need. _Ex uno
disce omnes_.
All the labour employed, however, is not of this class. For instance,
the next man to whom I spoke, who was engaged in ploughing up old
cabbage land with a pair of very useful four-year-olds, bred on the
farm, was not a Colonist but an agricultural hand, paid at the rate of
wages usual in the district. Another, who managed the tomato-houses,
was a skilled professional tomato-grower from the Channel Islands. The
experience of the managers of the Colony is that it is necessary to
employ a certain number of expert agriculturalists on the place, in
order that they may train the raw hands who come from London and
elsewhere.
To a farmer, such as the present writer, a visit to Hadleigh is an
extremely interesting event, showing him, as it does, what can be done
upon cold and unkindly land by the aid of capital, intelligence, and
labour. Still I doubt whether a detailed description of all these
agricultural operations falls within the scope of a book such as that
upon which I am engaged.
Therefore, I will content myself with saying that this business, like
everything else that the Army undertakes, is carried out with great
thoroughness and considerable success. The extensive orchards are
admirably managed, and were fruitful even in the bad season of 1910.
The tomato-houses, which have recently been increased at a capital
cost of about £1,000, produce many tons of tomatoes, and the French
garden is excellent of its kind. The breed of Middle-white pigs is to
be commended; so much so in my judgment, and I can give no better
testimonial, that at the moment of writing I am trying to obtain from
it a pedigree boar for my own use. The Hadleigh poultry farm, too, is
famous all over the world, and the Officer who manages it was the
President for 1910 of the Wyandotte Society, fowls for which Hadleigh
is famous, having taken the championship prizes for this breed and
others all over the kingdom. The cattle and horses are also good of
their class, and the crops in a trying year looked extremely well.
All these things, however, are but a means to an end, which end is the
redemption of our fallen fellow-creatures, or such of them as come
within the reach of the work of the Salvation Army at this particular
place.
I should add, perhaps, that there is a Citadel or gathering hall,
which will seat 400, where religious services are held and concerts
are given on Saturday nights for the amusement of the Colonists. I may
mention that no pressure is brought to bear to force any man in its
charge to conform to the religious principles of the Army. Indeed,
many of these attend the services at the neighbouring parish church.
Notwithstanding the past characters of those who live there,
disturbances of any sort are unknown at Hadleigh. Indeed, it is
extremely rare for a case originating on the Colony to come before the
local magistrates.
THE SMALL-HOLDINGS SETTLEMENT
BOXTED, ESSEX
General Booth and his Officers are, as I know from various
conversations with them, firmly convinced that many of the great and
patent evils of our civilization result from the desertion of the land
by its inhabitants, and that crowding into cities which is one of the
most marked phenomena of our time. Indeed, it was an identity of view
upon this point, which is one that I have advanced for years, that
first brought me into contact with the Salvation Army. But to preach
the advantages of bringing people back to the land is one thing, and
to get them there quite another. Many obstacles stand in the way. I
need only mention two of these: the necessity for large capital and
the still more important necessity of enabling those who are settled
on it to earn out of Mother Earth a sufficient living for themselves
and their families.
That well-known philanthropist, the late Mr. Herring, was another
person much impressed with the importance of this matter, and I
remember about five years ago dining with him, with General Booth as
my fellow-guest, on an occasion when all this subject was gone into in
detail. So lively, indeed, was Mr. Herring's interest that he offered
to advance a sum of £100,000 to the Army, to be used in an experiment
of land-settlement, carried out under its auspices. Should that
experiment prove successful, the capital repaid by the tenants was to
go to King Edward's Hospital Fund, and should it fail, that capital
was to be written off. Of this £100,000, £40,000 has now been invested
in the Boxted venture, and if this succeeds, I understand that the
balance will become available for other ventures under the provisions
of Mr. Herring's will. A long while must elapse, however, before the
result of the experiment can be definitely ascertained.
The Boxted Settlement is situated In North Essex, about three miles
from Colchester, and covers an area of 400 acres. It is a flat place,
that before the Enclosures Acts was a heath, with good road frontages
throughout, an important point where small-holdings are concerned. The
soil is a medium loam over gravel, neither very good nor very bad, so
far as my judgment goes, and of course capable of great improvement
under intensive culture.
This estate, which altogether cost about £20 per acre to buy, has
been divided into sixty-seven holdings, varying in size from 4-1/2
acres to 7 acres. The cottages which stand upon the holdings have been
built in pairs, at a cost of about £380 per pair, which price
includes drainage, a drinking well, and, I think, a soft-water
cistern. These are extremely good dwellings, and I was much struck
with their substantial and practical character. They comprise three
bedrooms, a large living-room, a parlour, and a scullery, containing a
sink and a bath. Also there is a tool-house, a pigstye, and a movable
fowl-house on wheels.
On each holding an orchard of fruit trees has been planted in
readiness for the tenant, also strawberries, currants, gooseberries,
and raspberries, which in all occupy about three-quarters of an acre.
The plan is that the rest of the holding should be cultivated
intensively upon a system that is estimated to return £20 per acre.
The arrangement between the Army and its settlers is briefly as
follows: In every case the tenant begins without any capital, and is
provided with seeds and manures to carry him through the first two
years, also with a living allowance at the rate of 10_s_. a week for
the man and his wife, and 1_s_. a week for each child, which allowance
is to cease after he has marketed his first crops.
The tenancy terms are, that for two years the settler is a tenant at
will, the agreement being terminable by either party at any time
without compensation. At the end of these two years, subject to the
approval of the Director of the Settlement, the settler can take a 999
years' lease of his holding, the Army for obvious reasons retaining
the freehold. After the first year of this lease, the rental payable
for forty years is to be 5 per cent per annum upon the capital
invested in the settlement of the man and his family upon the holding,
which rent is to include the cost of the house, land, and
improvements, and all moneys advanced to him during his period of
probation.
It is estimated that this capital sum will average £520 per holding,
so that the tenant's annual rent for forty years will be £26, after
which he will have nothing more to pay save a nominal rent, and the
remainder of the lease will be the property of himself, or rather, of
his descendants. This property, I presume, will be saleable.
So, putting aside all legal technicalities and complications, it comes
to this: the tenant is started for two years after which he pays about
£4 a year rent per acre for the next forty years, and thereby
virtually purchases his holding. The whole question, which time alone
can answer, is whether a man can earn £4 per acre rent per annum, and,
in addition, provide a living for himself and family out of a
five-acre holding on medium land near Colchester.
The problem is one upon which I cannot venture to express any decisive
opinion, even after many years of experience of such matters. I trust,
however, that the answer may prove to be in the affirmative, and I am
quite sure that if any Organization is able to cause it to work out
this way, that Organization is the Salvation Army, whose brilliant
business capacity can, as I know, make a commercial success of the
most unpromising materials.
I should like to point out that this venture is one of great and
almost of national importance, because if it fails then it will be
practically proved that it is impossible to establish small holders on
the land by artificial means, at any rate, in England, and at the
present prices of agricultural produce. It is not often that a sum of
£40,000 will be available for such a purpose, and with it the
direction of a charitable Organization that seeks no profit, the
oversight of an Officer as skilled and experienced as Lieut.-Colonel
Hiffe, and, in addition, a trained Superintendent who will afford
advice as to all agricultural matters, a co-operative society ready to
hire out implements, horses and carts at cost price, and, if so
desired, to undertake the distribution or marketing of produce. Still,
notwithstanding all these advantages, I have my misgivings as to the
ultimate result.
The men chosen to occupy these holdings by a Selection Committee of
Salvation Army Officers, are for the most part married people who were
born in the country, but had migrated to the towns. Most of them have
more or less kept themselves in touch with country life by cultivating
allotments during their period of urban residence, and precedence has
been given to those who have shown a real desire to return to the
land. Other essentials are a good character, both personal and as a
worker, bodily and mental health, and total abstention from any form
of alcohol. No creed test is required, and there are men of various
religious faiths upon the Settlement, only a proportion of them being
Salvationists.
I interviewed two of these settlers at hazard upon their holdings,
and, although the year had been adverse, found them happy and hopeful.
No. 1, who had been a mechanic, proposed to increase his earnings by
mending bicycles. No. 2 was an agriculturist pure and simple, and
showed me his fowls and pigs with pride. Here, however, I found a
little rift within the rural lute, for on asking him how his wife
liked the life he replied after a little hesitation, 'Not very well,
sir: you see, she has been accustomed to a town.'
If she continues not to like it 'very well,' there will, I think, be
an end to that man's prospects as a small holder.
I had the pleasure of bring present in July, 1910, at the formal
opening of the Boxted Settlement, when the Salvation Army entertained
several hundred guests to luncheon, many of them very well-known
people. The day for a wonder was fine, General Booth spoke for over an
hour in his most characteristic and interesting way; the Chairman,
Earl Carrington, President of the Board of Agriculture, blessed the
undertaking officially and privately; everybody seemed pleased with
the holdings, and, in short, all went merrily as a marriage bell.
As I sat and listened, however, the query that arose in my mind
was--What would be the state of these holdings and of the tenants or
of their descendants on, say, that day thirty years? I trust and hope
that it will be a good state in both instances; but I must confess to
certain doubts and fears.
In this parish of Ditchingham, where I live, there is a man with a few
acres of land, an orchard, a greenhouse, etc. That man works his
little tenancy, deals in the surplus produce of large gardens, which
he peddles out in the neighbouring town, and, on an average, takes
piecework on my farm (at the moment of writing he and his son are
hoeing mangolds) for two or three days a week; at any rate, for a
great part of the year. He is a type of what I may call the natural
small holder, and I believe does fairly well. The question is, can the
artificially created small holder, who must pay a rent of £4 the acre,
attain to a like result?
Again, I say I hope so most sincerely, for if not in England 'back to
the land' will prove but an empty catchword. At any rate, the country
should be most grateful to the late Mr. Herring, who provided the
funds for this intensely interesting experiment, and to the Salvation
Army which is carrying it out in the interests of the landless poor.
IMPRESSIONS OF GENERAL BOOTH
It has occurred to the writer that a few words descriptive of William
Booth, the creator and first General of the Salvation Army, set down
by a contemporary who has enjoyed a good many opportunities of
observing him during the past ten years, may possibly have a future if
not a present value.
Of the greatness of this man, to my mind, there can be no doubt. When
the point of time whereon we stand and play our separate parts has
receded, and those who follow us look back into the grey mist which
veils the past; when that mist has hidden the glitter of the
decorations and deadened the echoes of the high-sounding titles of
to-day; when our political tumults, our town-bred excitements, and
many of the very names that are household words to us, are forgotten,
or discoverable only in the pages of history; when, perhaps, the
Salvation Army itself has fulfilled its mission and gone its road, I
am certain that the figure of William Booth will abide clearly visible
in those shadows, and that the influences of his work will remain, if
not still felt, at least remembered and honoured. He will be one of
the few, of the very few enduring figures of our day; and even if our
civilization should be destined to undergo eclipse for a period, as
seems possible, when the light returns, by it he will still be seen.
For truly this work of his is fine, and one that appeals to the
imagination, although we are so near to it that few of us appreciate
its real proportions. Also, in fact, it is the work that should be
admired rather than the man, who, after all, is nothing but the
instrument appointed to shape it from the clay of circumstance. The
clay lay ready to be shaped, then appeared the moulder animated with
will and purpose, and working for the work's sake to an end which he
could not foresee.
I have no information on the point, but I should be surprised to learn
that General Booth, when Providence moved him to begin his labours
among the poor, had even an inkling of their future growth within the
short period of his own life. He sowed a seed in faith and hope, and,
in spite of opposition and poverty, in spite of ridicule and of
slander, he has lived to see that seed ripen into a marvellous
harvest. Directly, or indirectly, hundreds of thousands of men and
women throughout the world have benefited by his efforts. He has been
a tool of destiny, like Mahomet or Napoleon, only in this case one
fated to help and not to harm mankind. Such, at least, is my estimate
of him.
A little less of the spirit of self-sacrifice, a different sense of
responsibility, and the same strength of imagination and power of
purpose devoted to purely material objects, might have raised up
another multi-millionaire, or a mob-leader, or a self-seeking despot.
But, as it happened, some grace was given to him, and the river has
run another way.
Opportunity, too, has played into his hands. He saw that the
recognized and established Creeds scarcely touched the great, sordid,
lustful, drink-sodden, poverty-steeped masses of the city populations
of the world: that they were waiting for a teacher who could speak to
them in a tongue they understood. He spoke, and some of them have
listened: only a fraction it is true, but still some. More, as it
chanced, he married a wife who entered into his thoughts, and was able
to help to fulfil his aspirations, and from that union were born
descendants who, for the most part, are fitted to carry on his
labours.
Further, like Loyola, and others, he has the power of rule, being a
born leader of men, so that thousands obey his word without question
in every corner of the earth, although some of these have never seen
his face. Lastly, Nature endowed him with a striking presence that
appeals to the popular mind, with a considerable gift of speech, with
great physical strength and abounding energy, qualities which have
enabled him to toil without ceasing and to travel far and wide. Thus
it comes about that as truly as any man of our generation, when his
hour is ended, he, too, I believe, should be able to say with a clear
conscience, 'I have finished the work that Thou gavest me to do':
although his heart may add, 'I have not finished it as well as I could
wish.'
Now let me try to convey my personal impressions of this man. I see
him in various conversations with myself, when he has thought that he
could make use of me to serve his ever-present and impersonal ends,
trying to add me up, wondering how far I was sincere, and to what
extent I might be influenced by private objects; then, at last,
concluding that I was honest in my own fashion, opening his heart
little by little, and finally appealing to me to aid him in his
labours.
'I like that man; _he understands me!_' I once heard him say,
mentioning my name, and believing that he was thinking, not speaking.