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OUR COMMON LAND
(AND OTHER SHORT ESSAYS).
[Illustration: Logo]
OUR COMMON LAND
(AND OTHER SHORT ESSAYS).
BY
OCTAVIA HILL.
London:
MACMILLAN AND CO.
1877.
[_All Rights reserved._]
CHARLES DICKENS AND EVANS,
CRYSTAL PALACE PRESS.
CONTENTS.
I.
PAGE
OUR COMMON LAND 1
II.
DISTRICT VISITING 18
III.
A FEW WORDS TO VOLUNTEER VISITORS AMONG THE POOR 46
IV.
A MORE EXCELLENT WAY OF CHARITY 63
V.
A WORD ON GOOD CITIZENSHIP 88
VI.
OPEN SPACES 105
VII.
EFFECTUAL CHARITY 152
VIII.
THE FUTURE OF OUR COMMONS 175
OUR COMMON LAND.
I.
OUR COMMON LAND.
Probably few persons who have a choice of holidays select a Bank
holiday, which falls in the spring or summer, as one on which they
will travel, or stroll in the country, unless, indeed, they live
in neighbourhoods very far removed from large towns. Every railway
station is crowded; every booking-office thronged; every seat--nay,
all standing room--is occupied in every kind of public conveyance;
the roads leading out of London for miles are crowded with every
description of vehicle--van, cart, chaise, gig--drawn by every size
and sort of donkey, pony, or horse; if it be a dusty day, a great dull
unbroken choking cloud of dust hangs over every line of road.
Yet in spite of all this, and in spite of the really bad sights to be
seen at every public-house on the road, in spite of the wild songs and
boisterous behaviour, and reckless driving home at night, which show
how sadly intoxication is still bound up with the idea and practical
use of a holiday to hundreds of our people, how much intense enjoyment
the day gives! how large a part of this enjoyment is unmixed good! And
the evil is kept in check very much. We may see the quiet figure of the
mounted policeman as we drive home, dark in the twilight, dark amidst
the dust, keeping order among the vehicles, making the drunken drivers
mind what they are doing. He keeps very tolerable order. And then these
days in the country ought to lessen the number of drunkards every year;
and more and more we shall be able to trust to the public opinion of
the quiet many to preserve order.
And watch, when at last the open spaces are reached towards which
all these lines of vehicles are tending--be it Epping, or Richmond,
or Greenwich, or Hampstead--every place seems swarming with an
undisciplined, but heartily happy, crowd. The swings, the roundabouts,
the donkeys, the stalls, are beset by dozens or even hundreds of
pleasure-seekers, gay and happy, though they are not always the
gentlest or most refined. Look at the happy family groups--father,
and mother, and children, with their picnic dinners neatly tied up in
handkerchiefs; watch the joy of eager children leaning out of vans
to purchase for a halfpenny the wonderful pink paper streamers which
they will stick proudly in their caps; see the merry little things
running untiringly up and down the bank of sand or grass; notice the
affectionate father bringing out the pot of ale to the wife as she sits
comfortably tucked up in shawls in the little cart, or treating the
children to sweetmeats; sympathise in the hearty energy of the great
rough lads who have walked miles, as their dusty boots well show; their
round, honest faces have beamed with rough mirth at every joke that has
come in their way all day; they have rejoiced more in the clamber to
obtain the great branches of may than even in the proud possession of
them, though they are carrying them home in triumph. To all these the
day brings unmixed good.
Now, have you ever paused to think what Londoners would do without
this holiday, or what it would be without these open spaces? Cooped up
for many weeks in close rooms, in narrow streets, compelled on their
holiday to travel for miles in a crowded stream, first between houses,
and then between dusty high hedges, suddenly they expand into free
uncrowded space under spreading trees, or on to the wide Common from
which blue distance is visible; the eye, long unrefreshed with sight of
growing grass, or star-like flowers, is rejoiced by them again. To us
the Common or forest looks indeed crowded with people, but to them the
feeling is one of sufficient space, free air, green grass, and colour,
with a life without which they might think the place dull. Every atom
of open space you have left to these people is needed; take care you
lose none of it; it is becoming yearly of more vital importance to save
or increase it.
There is now a Bill for regulating inclosure before the House of
Commons. Mr. Cross has said what he trusts will be its effect if it
becomes law; but those who have been watching the history of various
inclosures, and the trials respecting special Commons, are not so
hopeful as Mr. Cross is as to the effect this Bill would have. It makes
indeed good provisions for regulating Commons to be kept open for the
public when a scheme for regulation is applied for. But the adoption
of such a scheme depends in large part on the lord of the manor.
Will he in nine cases out of ten ever even apply for a scheme for
regulating a Common, when he knows that by doing so he shuts out from
himself and his successors for ever the possibility of inclosing it,
and appropriating some part of it? Do any provisions for regulating,
however excellent, avail anything when no motive exists which should
prompt the lord of the manor to bring the Common under them? and, as
the Bill stands, it cannot be so brought without his consent.
Secondly, the Bill provides that urban sanitary authorities can
purchase rights which will enable them to keep open any suburban
Common, or may accept a gift of the same. But then a suburban Common
is defined as one situated within six miles of the outside of a town
of 5,000 inhabitants. Now, I hardly know how far out of a large town
Bank-holiday excursionists go, but I know they go every year farther
and farther. I am sure that a Common twelve, nay, twenty, miles off
from a large town is accessible by cheap trains to hundreds of
excursionists all the summer, to whom it is an inestimable boon. Again,
is the privilege of space, and light, and air, and beauty not to be
considered for the small shopkeeper, for the hard-working clerk, who
will probably never own a square yard of English land, but who cares
to take his wife and children into the country for a fortnight in the
summer? Do you not know numbers of neighbourhoods where woods, and
Commons, and fields used to be open to pedestrians, and now they must
walk, even in the country, on straight roads between hedges? The more
that fields and woods are closed, the more does every atom of Common
land, everywhere, all over England, become of importance to the people
of every class, except that which owns its own parks and woods. "On
the lowest computation," says the Report of the Commons Preservation
Society, "5,000,000 acres of Common land have been inclosed since Queen
Anne's reign; now there are but 1,000,000 acres left.[1] The right
of roving over these lands has been an immense boon to our people; it
becomes at once more valued and rarer year by year. Is it impossible,
I would ask lawyers and statesmen, to recognise this right as a legal
one acquired by custom, and not to be taken away? Mr. Lefevre suggested
this in a letter to _The Times_. He says:
"The right of the public to use and enjoy Commons (which they have for
centuries exercised), it must be admitted, is not distinctly recognised
by law, though there is a remarkable absence of adverse testimony on
the subject. The law, however, most fully recognises the right of
the village to its green, and allows the establishment of such right
by evidence as to playing games, &c., but it has failed as yet to
recognise the analogy between the great town and its Common, and the
village and its green, however complete in fact that analogy may be.
But some of these rights of Common, which are now so prized as a means
of keeping Commons open, had, if legal theory is correct, their origin
centuries ago in custom. For long they had no legal existence, but
the courts of law at last learned to recognise custom as conferring
rights. The custom has altered in kind; in lieu of cattle, sheep, and
pigs turned out to pasture on the Commons, human beings have taken
their place, and wear down the turf instead of eating it. I can see
no reason why the law, or, if the courts are too slow to move, the
Legislature, should not recognise this transfer and legalise this
custom. Again, it is probable that Commons belonged originally much
more to the inhabitants of a district than to the lord. Feudal theory
and its subsequent development--English Real Property Law--have ridden
rather roughly over the facts and the rights of the case. The first
placed the lord of the manor in his position as lord, giving him
certain privileges, and coupling with them many responsibilities. The
second gradually removed these responsibilities, and converted into a
property what was at first little more than an official trust. If these
considerations are beyond the scope of the law courts, they are proper
for Parliament. One step has been made. It has been proved that it is
not necessary to purchase Commons for the public, but that ample means
of protecting them from inclosure exist. It is also obvious that the
rights which constitute these means are now in practice represented
by a public user of Commons for recreation. The Legislature should, I
venture to think, recognise this user as a legal right."
If the Legislature would do this, Commons all over England might
be kept open, which, I venture to think, would be a great gain.
Hitherto the right to keep Commons open has been maintained, even in
the neighbourhood of towns, by legal questions affecting rights of
pasturage, of cutting turf, or carting gravel. This is all very well
if it secures the object, but it is on the large ground of public
policy, for the sake of the health and enjoyment of the people, that
the conscience of the nation supports the attempt to keep them open;
it cares little for the defence of obsolete and often nearly valueless
customs, and it would be very well if the right acquired by use could
be recognised by law, and the defence put at once on its real grounds.
I have referred to the opinion expressed by lawyers and members of
Parliament that the opportunity of applying for schemes for regulation
provided by the Bill now before the House will not be used at all
largely, owing to the necessity of the consent of those owning
two-thirds value of the Common, and of the veto possessed by the lord
of the manor. They tell me also (and it certainly appears to me that
both statements are evident on reading the Bill) that _unless Mr.
Cross consents to insert a clause forbidding all inclosures except
under this Act_, the passing of it will be followed by a large number
of high-handed inclosures under old Acts, or without legal right. For
unless the right of some independent body like the public who use
the space can be recognised as having a voice in opposing illegal
inclosures, what chance have the rural Commons? The agricultural
labourers, often tenants-at-will of a powerful landlord, can be ejected
and their rights immediately cancelled; moreover, they do not know
the law, they have few to advise them, to plead their cause, or to
spend money on expensive lawsuits. Mr. Lefevre says in the same letter
quoted above, "I would at least ask them to declare all inclosures not
authorised by Parliament to be _primâ facie_ illegal and to remove the
necessity of litigation by persons actually themselves commoners,
by authorising any public body, or public-spirited individual, to
interfere in the case of any such inclosures, and put the lord to
strict proof of his right."
And do not let us be too ready to see the question dealt with as a
matter of mere money compensation. It is much to be feared lest the
short-sighted cupidity of one generation of rural commoners may lose
a great possession for future times. This danger is imminent because
we are all so accustomed to treat money value as if it were the only
real value! Can we wonder if the eyes of poor men are often fixed
rather on the immediate money value to themselves than on the effect
of changes for their descendants? Should we stand by, we who ought to
see farther, and let them part with what ought to be a possession to
the many in the future? A few coals at Christmas, which rapidly come
to be looked upon as a charity graciously accorded by the rich, or
the recipients of which are arbitrarily selected by them, may in many
cases be blindly accepted by cottagers in lieu of Common rights. Is
the influence of such doles so healthy that we should wish to see them
taking the place of a Common right over a little bit of English soil?
The issue at a nominal charge of orders to cut turf or furze by a lord
of the manor has been known gradually to extinguish the right to do so
without his leave. Is the influence of the rich and powerful so slight
that we should let it be thus silently strengthened? Is the knowledge
just brought so prominently before us that one quarter of the land in
England is owned by only seven hundred and ten persons so satisfactory
that we will stand by and see quietly absorbed those few spots which
are our common birthright in the soil? It is not likely that farms or
estates will diminish in size; and the yeoman class is, I suppose,
passing away rapidly. With the small holdings, is there to pass away
from our people the sense that they have any share in the soil of their
native England? I think the sense of owning some spaces of it in common
may be healthier for them than even the possession of small bits by
individuals, and certainly it now seems more feasible. Lowell tells us
that what is free to all is the best of all possessions:
'Tis heaven alone that is given away,
'Tis only God may be had for the asking;
There is no price set on the lavish summer,
And June may be had by the poorest comer.
Hugh Miller, too, points out how intimately the right to roam
over the land is connected with the love of it, and hence with
patriotism. He says, speaking of his first visit to Edinburgh: "I
threw myself, as usual, for compensatory pleasures, on my evening
walks, but found the inclosed state of the district, and the fence of
a rigorously-administered trespass-law, serious drawbacks; and ceased
to wonder that a thoroughly cultivated country is, in most instances,
so much less beloved by its people than a wild and open one. Rights of
proprietorship may exist equally in both; but there is an important
sense in which the open country belongs to the proprietors and to the
people too. All that the heart and intellect can derive from it may
be alike free to peasant and aristocrat; whereas the cultivated and
strictly fenced country belongs usually, in every sense, to only the
proprietor; and as it is a much simpler and more obvious matter to love
one's country as a scene of hills, and streams, and green fields, amid
which nature has often been enjoyed, than as a definite locality, in
which certain laws and constitutional privileges exist, it is rather
to be regretted than wondered at that there should be often less true
patriotism in a country of just institutions and equal laws, whose
soil has been so exclusively appropriated as to leave only the dusty
high-roads to its people, than in wild open countries, in which the
popular mind and affections are left free to embrace the soil, but
whose institutions are partial and defective." So writes at least one
man of the people; and whether we estimate the relative value of just
laws or familiar and beloved scenes quite as he does, or not, I think
we must all feel there is deep truth in what he says.
Let us then press Government, while there is still time, that no bit of
the small portion of uninclosed ground, which is the common inheritance
of us all as English men and women, shall be henceforth inclosed,
except under this Bill; which simply means that each scheme shall be
submitted to a Committee of the House, and considered on its merits.
Surely this is a very reasonable request. Do not let us be satisfied
with less. Do not let us deceive ourselves as to the result of this
Bill if it pass unamended.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] The amount remaining uninclosed and subject to Common-rights is
variously estimated; a report of the Inclosure Commissioners in 1874
putting it at about 2,600,000 for England and Wales, while the recent
return of landowners, prepared by the Local Government Board, makes the
uninclosed area little more than 1,500,000 acres.
II.
DISTRICT VISITING.[2]
I have assumed throughout this paper that most district visitors feel
a certain dissatisfaction both with district visiting and with systems
of relief as they exist, even where such systems are best organised.
Some may think that there is too much relief given, some that there is
too little, others that what is given is of the wrong kind. I believe,
also, some visitors feel that their spiritual influence is interfered
with in different ways by the unsatisfactory character of the temporal
relief. To some of them it seems incongruous to carry tracts in one
hand and coal-tickets in another; to others, that carrying either,
still more carrying both, as a matter of course, shuts them off from
true intercourse with the best kind of working men and women; others,
again, feel that carrying tracts without coal-tickets when the grate is
empty seems a little like want of sympathy; and others that carrying
coal-tickets without tracts is treating the poor as if they were only
concerned with the outside things of life.
However earnestly our clergy have desired to solve this problem of
how to deal wisely with the temporal condition of their flocks, it
remains a problem still. However tenderly our visitors have mourned
over it, as it affects hundreds of individuals, it remains mournful
still. What prospect is there of its being vigorously studied with a
view to solution, or even to radical improvement, by those who have
power to effect improvement? Busy, overworked clergymen, with services
and sermons, and churches and schools, and thousands of souls to see
to, have inherited systems of relief in their parishes which they
hardly have time to reform, and the gigantic pressure of daily duty
perpetuates many unwise plans, though many, I am well aware, are being
abolished. How far the best still falls below what they would like to
see let the clergy themselves say. I believe most of them, if asked,
would reply: "I have tried honestly to make my system of relief as
satisfactory as I could, but it is far from my ideal." And this is
so from another cause. You can never make a _system_ of relief good
without perfect administration, far-sighted watchfulness in each
individual case; and this is specially true in an age in which bad
systems of relief have trained the people to improvidence. Given your
entirely enlightened clergyman, he cannot in a large London parish do
much more than see to his people when the crisis of distress has come.
He cannot watch over them before it comes, yet it is then that distress
is preventable. On whom does the continuous watchfulness devolve at
best? Visitors, young, inexperienced, untaught, undertake districts;
they find themselves part of a system, and follow in its lines; they
meet individual cases of want, improvidence, disease, and though they
know little themselves how to deal with such, they hesitate to make
calls upon the time of a too busy clergyman, kind as he is in helping,
gladly as he would reply to a practical question about the individual;
they cannot talk out with him radical means of dealing with the roots
of such evils. What can they do? They give or withhold the soup-ticket
or the shilling. Has the clergyman usually time, has the visitor often
knowledge to do much more than deal with the individual question of
relief or no relief at the moment in the special case?
And yet the problem has become appalling, gigantic: viewed in its
entirety, it might make us almost tremble?
Statesmen, philanthropists, political economists, try their hands at
it, or rather their heads. Do they succeed better than the clergy and
the visitors? Do they not often succeed worse? For the clergy and the
visitors at least bear witness to the poor of sympathy with them, and
deal with the wants round them practically; while the theorists, let
their theories be ever so excellent, somehow stand so far off that they
bring little practically into operation. Who does not know of good
laws passed which are nearly inoperative because not enforced by brave
persons face to face with the evils which should be removed by them?
Who does not know of sound principles of political economy clearly
enunciated to those unconcerned by them, which never reach the ears of
those whose lives they deeply affect, still less are brought before
them by those whom they would trust?
Now these two classes, the studious, more leisurely, generalising
thinkers, and the loving, individualising doers, need to be brought
into communication; and that is what in this paper I wish most
emphatically to enforce. Each has knowledge the other requires;
separated, they are powerless; combined, they may do much. For I have
drawn miserable pictures of the weakness of both, but see on the other
hand what each has of strength. The clergy have all that is pitiful,
all that is generous in the hearts of their richer parishioners on
their side--the power of calling out workers from among them, the power
of directing a large part of their alms, the distribution of money, the
leadership of the men. Besides these they have the enormous accumulated
knowledge of the poor, gathered in long years of intimate observation
of them in their homes--a mass of information over which they may not
have much time to brood, and from which they may not be in the habit of
generalising, yet what might not the theorists learn from it?
And the visitors. I have called them inexperienced, and I might have
added that their work is less valuable in many ways, because it is
intermittent; but pause to think what these visitors are and might be.
Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of gentle, earnest, duty-doing souls, well
born, well nurtured, well provided for, possibly well educated, turning
aside out of the bright paths which they could pursue continuously, to
bring a little joy, a little help, to those who are out of the way.
A voluntary gift this, if a very solemn duty. I have heard persons
who give their whole time to the poor speak a little disparagingly of
these fleeting visits, and young girls themselves, fevered with desire
to do more, talk rather enviously of those who can give their time
wholly to such work; but have they ever thought how much is lost by
such entire dedication?--or, rather, how much is gained by her who is
not only a visitor of the poor, but a member of a family with other
duties? It is the families, the homes of the poor, that need to be
influenced. Is not she most sympathetic, most powerful, who nursed her
own mother through her long illness, and knew how to go quietly about
the darkened room; who entered so heartily into the sister's love and
marriage; who obeyed so perfectly the father's command when it was
hardest? Better still if she be wife and mother herself, and can enter
into the responsibilities of a head of a household, understands her
joys and cares, knows what heroic patience it needs to keep gentle when
the nerves are unhinged and the children noisy. Depend upon it, if we
thought of the poor primarily as husbands, wives, sons, and daughters,
members of households, as we are ourselves, instead of contemplating
them as a different class, we should recognise better how the house
training and high ideal of home duty was our best preparation for work
among them. Nay, to come down to much smaller matters than these family
duties, to the gladness of party, ball, and flower-show, I believe
these, too, in innocent and happy amount, when they brighten the eyes
and bring the ready smile to the face, and make the step free and
joyous, prepare us to bring a gleam of sunlight into many a monotonous
life among the poor. What, in comparison with these gains, is the
regularity of work of the weary worker, whose life tends to make her
deal with people _en masse_, who gains little fresh spring from other
thoughts and scenes? For what is it that we look forward to as our
people gradually improve? Not surely to dealing with them as a class
at all, any more than we should tell ourselves off to labour for the
middle class, or aristocratic class, or shop-keeping class. Our ideal
must be to promote the happy natural intercourse of neighbours--mutual
knowledge, mutual help, of a kind, certainly, but not this professed
devotion of a life; and it will be better from the beginning to mould
our system so that it shall bear witness of what it ought to become. If
we establish a system of professed workers, amateur or paid, we shall
quickly begin to hug our system, and perhaps to want to perpetuate it
even to the extent of making work for it. Well, here we have then our
wonderful company of visitors full of real care for the people, with
time and intelligence to apply the wisest principles, did they but know
them, with fullest thought, to individual cases; capable of inspiring
confidence, of winning allegiance; of getting those whom they visit to
understand what is best for their future, and to make up their minds
to do it. Is not this precisely what is needed--the individual thought
which can apply the wise principles, the love which can influence the
wills which should be brought into harmony with those principles? Then
turn to consider how these principles are now being thought out, with
what painstaking devotion, what science, what accuracy some of our
greatest men are studying them. What a mass of information they have
accumulated! How day by day they are learning to explain better the
meaning of it all! Think of the doctors, the legislators, the poor-law
reformers, the advocates of co-operation, the members of the Charity
Organisation Society, how they examine, study, and expound. Once
duty to the poor was supposed to consist in giving large alms; once,
self-sacrifice and devotion were thought sufficient qualifications for
a worker among the poor; now it is seen that to these must be added
the farthest sight, the wisest thought, the most self-restraining
resolution to make a useful worker.
These two classes, gentle doers and wise thinkers, stand far apart,
yet, if they could be brought into close communication, both would gain
much; the people for whom they are both labouring would gain much more.
In what follows I have tried to show how such a communication might
be made a practical reality. The scheme described is not based wholly
on theory, but has substantially been in operation in a district of
Marylebone for some years, and has been lately adopted by two other
districts.
To effect a union, to establish communication with so numerous a body
as the district visitors of London, would be in itself difficult. The
difficulty is increased by the fact that they are not only a very
numerous, but very changeful body; not only does death, marriage, or
migration take them wholly away, but they are often interrupted by
temporary absence from home, household duties, illness, and this far
more than would be the case with paid workers, their district work
being only a secondary, though a very real, duty. These incessant
changes could never, without enormous labour and much likelihood of
confusion, be registered at one centre; and this necessitates that the
visitors must be dealt with by certain selected persons, who may be
local leaders or centres. Large numbers of them are already gathered
in district groups, round various churches and chapels. My first very
natural thought was to ask the ministers of those churches and chapels
to accept new duties towards their visitors, to bring before them
whatever it might seem to the theorists ought to come under their
notice, and to transmit to the theorists any individual problems quite
too hard for solution in the locality, and to be ready to furnish other
information to visitors on questions affecting the temporal condition
of their people. But it was obviously impossible to ask hard-worked
London clergymen and ministers to undertake additional work, especially
such a work as this. For its whole value should depend on the constant,
living, detailed interchange of information. And, besides, though the
district visitors attached to churches and chapels are by far the
most numerous bodies to be enrolled, there are other groups which it
is important to secure, and there are also individual visitors to
be enlisted who might be ready to help with tangible work, and not
prepared to take spiritual work. And this is another reason for not
asking the clergy to take up the task. On the whole, then, it appears
to me best to suggest leaving the question of all spiritual and moral
work exactly where it is--where it almost must be, gathering round
the clergy and ministers, everything affecting it being referred to
them, and of course all funds and charities now in their hands being
as hitherto managed and distributed wholly under their direction; but
at the same time to ask them to consider whether they could single
out someone from each ecclesiastical district, or from any given
group of visitors, who should be a secretary to the others--a means
of communication between them and the people dealing as officials or
theorists with questions affecting large bodies of the poor.
I will describe what I think such a secretary should be and do.
She need at first have no special knowledge of laws affecting the
poor, institutions established for them, or the principles of action
which those who have thought most on the subject unite in thinking
best; ladies furnished with such knowledge would not be found in many
districts, and though such information would doubtless be of immense
value, it would not be essential to secure it at first, as a great deal
would be rapidly acquired by anyone holding the post of which I speak.
She ought to have a good deal of time for writing, and seeing her
fellow-workers. She need not have time for visiting the poor. In fact
I should advise selecting someone who had experience in visiting them,
but was content to resign that work, as I think her full available
power should be devoted to her secretarial duties. She should be
able, however, to attend regularly at least one meeting weekly of the
Charity Organisation Committee of her district. If she has a house of
her own, or so much control over one as would enable her to see the
visitors often there, it would be a great advantage; in fact, some way
of seeing them frequently and individually appears to me essential.
She should be one who, for the greater part of the year, is resident in
town; for though of course a temporary successor could be appointed,
or her post left vacant, absences, especially if frequent, would be a
drawback to her usefulness. She ought to have tact, gentleness, and
firmness. She must be a careful, conscientious woman of business,
with clear head, or very methodical ways; for next to ready sympathy,
method will be of all things most necessary to her. Such a secretary
should, in that capacity, busy herself only with matters relating to
the temporal condition of the poor. She would have relations to her
own group of visitors, to the locality in which she lived, and to
the metropolis generally. Those to her own fellow-workers would be
different probably in different cases; but I suppose she would help and
advise new visitors, tell them of the local charities, consult with
them about special cases, register their temporary absence, getting
the clergy to fill in such gaps if possible, show them how to keep
written records of families under their charge in given form, so as to
be of use to succeeding visitors, whether temporary or permanent, and
communicate to visitors, new and old, all facts within her knowledge
which might be of value to them. With regard to the local organisation,
I will not stay to describe in detail the ways in which she might be
valuable to the School Board officer, to the relieving officer, to the
inspector of nuisances, who might learn to look to her for more radical
means of help than are at their command, both material and moral, and
for information as to details such as rarely reaches officials, and
yet might enable them to bring beneficent laws more powerfully to
bear on special cases. The secretary should not only avail herself
of the investigating machinery of the Charity Organisation Society,
but she should, as I said, attend the committee meetings. There she
will learn an immense deal about wise principles of relief, new and
important facts of law affecting the people, and the working of
various institutions; in short, she ought to get there nearly all
the instruction she requires. She would also be invaluable to the
committee. She would be well acquainted with the principles on which
relief is given by those whom she represents, could tell whether they
would be likely to make a grant in a certain case, and, approximately,
how large such grant would be. She would know, too, how to enlist that
individual gentle help which is so often needed in cases coming before
the Charity Organisation Society after the preliminary investigation
is made, and which the paid agent has neither time nor capacity to
give. In fact, for applicants from every street, and court, and lane,
in which a visitor was at work, she would know to whom to turn for the
personal attention which the Charity Organisation Committee feel they
so urgently need. Nor would her services end there. Not only would
she obtain the aid of the visitors she represented at such times of
crisis in the history of a poor family as those in which they usually
apply to the Charity Organisation Society, not only would she be able
to supply a detailed report of the past life of the applicant on
points which might bear on the committee's decision, but afterwards,
when the decision was made and relief granted or withheld, through
succeeding years she would get the people watched over with that
continuous care without which right decisions at any particular crisis
of life lose half their efficacy; indeed, she might often avert such a
crisis altogether. For instance, she might get the visitors to induce
the man to join a provident dispensary or club; which would be more
Satisfactory, though not perhaps more necessary, than refusing him
aid when he has not done so. Sometimes, when I think of those Charity
Organisation Committees so much misunderstood by many, because they
have so resolutely determined to give no fresh unsatisfactory relief,
some of them tenderly pitiful of the poor, some of them a little far
off from them, but all trying to help them in thoughtfully considered
ways, and of the great current of careless, inconsiderate relief going
on unchecked and uncontrolled by them, I feel as if a union between
you and them would do more than almost anything else to help the poor.
There they are all ready for you in every district of London, asking
you to co-operate, asking you to study with them what is best, and you
leave them in too many cases to be mere repressors of the grossest
forms of mendicity, and by no means organisers of charity. If the plan
I suggest were adopted by only a few visiting societies, I delight
to think what might be gained by furnishing the committees with a
few gentle workers representing many more, and associated with the
charities of the neighbourhood.
But I pass on to consider the relations of these secretaries to the
metropolis. They ought to be supplied with information about the laws
affecting the poor, Sanitary Laws, Poor Laws, Education Acts, &c.; they
ought to get notice of important meetings about medical charities; of
new suggestions and arrangements as to the best methods of collecting
and storing the earnings of the poor. And how is this to be done? Much
of it might even now be done through the Charity Organisation Society.
All of it, I hope, will be done through the Society in the future; but
the committees are too busy, too occupied with their daily labour, to
deal with this new matter with the fulness of detail which at first it
will require; and perhaps they do not everywhere nor always command
the full sympathy and confidence of their district. Added to which, I
have noticed that people, curiously enough, are more willing to invite
information from private persons than from official bodies. Something
must be done to meet the wants of a time of transition, and I trust I
am not over-bold in offering, while the plan is new, to do what I can
to fill the gap; but in the future we ought to endeavour to secure that
the visitors should be so organised that they themselves can compare
notes, and each communicate to each how practical difficulties have
been met in particular localities--so organised that facts bearing on
their work should reach them swiftly and certainly, and that their
experience should be accessible for legislators and reformers.
I have set before you nothing great, nothing grand, no new society, no
fresh light even on the problems respecting wiser systems of relief, or
their applications to individuals, which you are desiring so much to
solve, each in your own parish or court. I do believe those problems
to be capable of solution. I do believe that our almsgiving has been
cruel in its kindness. It is for the sake of the people themselves
that I would see it decreased, yes, even put down altogether; I believe
they would be richer, as well as happier, for it. For the sake of the
energy of the poor, the loss of which is so fatal to them, for the sake
of that intercourse with them, happy, friendly, human intercourse,
which dependence renders impossible, seek to your utmost for better
ways of helping them. We can give you no general rules which will
obviate necessity of thought, singly must your difficulties be met,
singly conquered; but see that you throw upon them all available light
from the experience of others, the thoughts of the thoughtful. No new
society, no great scheme, have I to urge, only if here or there any
one or two of the groups of visitors care to select one among them to
be their secretary, and send me her name and address, I will tell her
what I can which I think may be helpful to her or them. We might meet,
too, we secretaries, now and again, to talk over important questions
and strengthen one another; and though I could not possibly find
time to deal with difficulties in detail, I might show, or get shown,
what plans have been found useful in places which I know. I might
help, too, a little about finding employment. I hear of a good many
situations of an exceptional kind, and difficult to fill up suitably,
and notice of such vacancies I might send on to secretaries, who could
find among their visitors someone who would care to spend thought and
time in fitting into an exceptional place the person best adapted for
it. The large demands for labour are, I believe, best dealt with by
advertisement or registry; but there is not any more valuable way of
helping individuals than by fitting them in where they are wanted, in
ways that are not possible except to those who have personal knowledge
of candidates. Mere routine notices might thus meet great human needs.
I have spoken throughout this paper of outward means and appliances;
I have referred very little to improvement of the lives and spirits
of men. This is not because I do not care for those lives and spirits.
They are reached, we must remember, in many different ways. A great
deal of life is necessarily spent in getting its surroundings into
order, and in London here, this machinery of ours, all the tangible
things round us, need a great deal done to them; it tests us better
than any words can do. It is very difficult--impossible, I believe--to
make the things of this world fair and orderly, to arrange them
justly, to govern them rightly, without living very nobly. The right
use of money, the laws affecting houses and lands, involve principles
which test the sincerity of a man or a nation; they test it, I say,
as words cannot test it. I think our poor see this very clearly, and
that, strange as it may seem, the messages about God's nature, and
about His relation to them, come in a subtle way through our acts.
More perhaps than through our words. This is emphatically so just
now. They have heard a great many words, and have been puzzled because
our actions have often seemed to them at variance with those words.
I know how hopelessly we must fail in any attempt to live up to the
unspeakable majesty of God's tenderness, and the boundless wisdom of
His righteousness; but even our failure, after sincere trial, brings
a message of what He is to His children. Our actions are speaking to
them. For this reason I have never felt the execution of the most
minute duty with regard to tangible things beneath my notice, and I do
not feel that in urging any of you to consider the right settlement of
questions of temporal relief, I am asking you to devote yourselves to
a task which is otherwise than holy. On the contrary, I have felt that
it can be only rightly dealt with by those who are content to carry it
on in silent allegiance to One who will judge with farther sight than
feeble men, who will know what deeper mercy there may be in the act
which looks to men harsh at the moment. Indeed, I dare not, trust the
difficult things there may be to do in refusal of immediate help to
any mere reasonable political economist. The generals who can direct
the sad retracing of our foolish steps should be those who care for
the people because their Father cares, and so desire to make them what
He would have them to be; and the only ones who will have fortitude
to bear the misunderstanding this may cause will be those who feel
tenderest pity for the people.
Not a small thing, even in itself, is the dealing with the tangible and
soulless things of earth. We may be very proud, justly proud, of the
well-ordered spot of earth, the well-spent income, the self-restrained
providence, whether they are our own, or whether we have helped another
so to regulate the talents entrusted to him; but the glad pride breaks
away, and a deep thankfulness overpowers us, if ever by word or deed
we seem to have helped anyone to catch even a little glimpse of the
mighty Love which enwraps his spirit, uniting it in solemn harmony with
all that _is_ contained, as well as all that _cannot_ be contained, in
this wonderful, visible world.
FOOTNOTE:
[2] Read on the 4th of May, 1876, to a meeting of district visitors and
clergy at the Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol's house in London.
III.
A FEW WORDS TO VOLUNTEER VISITORS AMONG THE POOR.[3]
You have asked me to speak to you to-day about work in this parish,
and you know I have not the pleasure of knowing it or you. If anything
I say is inapplicable you must forgive my ignorance; but if I am able
to give you any hints which are of use it will not be strange, for one
comes across the same kind of difficulties in many various districts
of London just now. After the paper is read, if there are any special
questions affecting your own district which any of you care to ask me
about, I shall be delighted to answer them to the best of my power
from this place, or we will have a little general conversation about
them later.
Now I am going to say a great deal about hurtful gifts; but do not
misunderstand me, and jump to a conclusion that because I speak of
these I have lost sight of the great and good gifts we are each of
us bound to make. The needs of the poor we must consider our special
charge, and each of us give what we can that _is_ real help--not only
time, and heart, and spirit, and thought, but money too; only we must
see that it is really helpful, which needs thought and experience, and
if we haven't experience we must seek it. There are gifts of money to
be made; there are hard workers recovering from illness to be sent
to convalescent homes; there are orphans to be supported and well
educated; there are pensions to feeble old people who have worked hard,
to be given to meet their own savings or compensate for lost savings;
there are children to be placed in industrial schools; girls to be
fitted out for service; travelling expenses to be paid for people going
to better fields of work; but the decision about even these safer forms
of gift requires experience. Give, by all means, abundantly, liberally,
regularly, individually, with all enthusiasm, by all manner of means,
but oh, give wisely too.