Sir Richard came nearer to the confines of a laugh than he had reached
for a long time past.
"No, love--not exactly wet, but--hm--you shall hear. Draw the stool
close to my knee and lay your head on it."
With his large hand on the golden tresses, Sir Richard Brandon began to
examine the record of work done in the George Yard Mission.
"What is this?" he said. "_Toy Classes_,--why, this must be something
quite in your way, Di."
"Oh yes, I'm sure of that, for I adore toys. Tell me about it."
"These toy classes are for the cheerless and neglected," said the
knight, frowning in a businesslike way at the pamphlet. "Sometimes so
many as eighty neglected little ones attend these classes. On one
occasion, only one of these had boots on, which were very old, much too
large, and both lefts. When they were seated, toys and scrap-books were
lent to them. There were puzzles, and toy-bricks, and many other things
which kept them quite happy for an hour. Of course the opportunity was
seized to tell them about Jesus and His love. A blessed lesson which
they would not have had a chance of learning at home--if they had homes;
but many of them had none. When it was time to go they said--`Can't we
stay longer?'
"The beginning of this class was interesting," said Sir Richard,
continuing to read. "The thought arose--`gather in the most forlorn and
wretched children; those who are seldom seen to smile, or heard to
laugh; there are many such who require Christian sympathy.' The thought
was immediately acted on. A little barefooted ragged boy was sent into
the streets to bring in the children. Soon there was a crowd round the
school-door. The most miserable among the little ones were admitted.
The proceedings commenced with prayer--then the toys were distributed,
the dirty little hands became active, and the dirty little faces began
to look happy. When the toys were gathered up, some could not be found,
so, at the next meeting, some of the bigger children were set to watch
the smaller ones. Presently one little detective said: `Please,
teacher, Teddy's got a horse in his pocket,' and another said that Sally
had an elephant in her pinafore! Occasion was thus found to show the
evil of stealing, and teach the blessedness of honesty. They soon gave
up pilfering, and they now play with the toys without desiring to take
them away."
"How nice!" said Di. "Go on, papa."
"What can this be?" continued Sir Richard, quoting--"_Wild Flowers of
the Forest Day Nursery_. Oh! I see--very good idea. I'll not read it,
Di, I'll tell you about it. There are many poor widows, you must know,
and women whose husbands are bad, who have no money to buy food and
shelter for themselves and little ones except what they can earn each
day. But some of these poor women have babies, and they can't work, you
know, with babies in their arms, neither can they leave the babies at
home with no one to look after them, except, perhaps, little sisters or
brothers not much older than themselves, so they take their babies to
this Cradle-Home, and each pays only twopence, for which small sum her
baby is taken in, washed, clothed, warmed, fed, and amused by kind
nurses, who keep it till the mother returns from her work to get it back
again. Isn't that good?"
"Oh! yes," assented Di, with all her heart.
"And I read here," continued her father, "that thousands of the infants
of the poor die every year because they have not enough food, or enough
clothing to keep them warm."
"Oh _what_ a pity!" exclaimed Di, the tears of ready sympathy rushing
hot into her upturned eyes.
"So you see," continued Sir Richard, who had unconsciously, as it were,
become a pleader for the poor, "if there were a great many nurseries of
this kind all over London, a great many little lives would be saved."
"And why are there not a great many nurseries of that kind, papa?"
"Well, I suppose, it is because there are no funds."
"No what? papa."
"Not enough of money, dear."
"Oh! _what_ a pity! I wish I had lots and lots of money, and then
wouldn't I have Cradle-Homes everywhere?"
Sir Richard, knowing that he had "lots and lots" of money, but had not
hitherto contributed one farthing to the object under consideration,
thought it best to change the subject by going on with the George Yard
Record.
But we will not conduct the reader through it all--interesting though
the subject certainly is. Suffice it to say that he found the account
classed under several heads. Under "_Feeding the Hungry_," for
instance, he learned that many poor children are entirely without food,
sometimes, for a whole day, so that only two courses are open to them--
to steal food and become criminals, or drift into sickness and die.
From which fate many hundreds are annually rescued by timely aid at
George Yard, the supplies for which are sent by liberal-minded
Christians in all ranks of life--from Mr Crackaby with his 150 pounds a
year, up through Mr Brisbane and his class to the present Earl of
Shaftesbury--who, by the way, has taken a deep interest and lent able
support to this particular Mission for more than a quarter of a century.
But the name of Sir Richard Brandon did not appear on the roll of
contributors. He had not studied the "lower orders" much, except from a
politico-economical-argumentative after-dinner-port-winey point of view.
Under the head of "_Clothing necessitous Children_," he found that some
of the little ones presented themselves at the school-door in such a
net-work of rags, probably infected, as to be unfit even for a Ragged
School. They were therefore taken in, had their garments destroyed, and
were supplied with new clothes. Also, that about 1000 children between
the ages of three and fourteen years were connected with the
Institution--scattered among the various works of usefulness conducted
for the young.
Under "_Work among Lads_," he found that those big boys whom one sees
idling about corners of streets, fancying themselves men, smoking with
obvious dislike and pretended pleasure, and on the highroad to the jail
and the gallows--that those boys were enticed into classes opened for
carpentry, turning, fretwork, and other attractive industrial pursuits--
including even printing, at a press supplied by Lord Shaftesbury. This,
in connection with evening classes for reading, writing, and
arithmetic--the whole leading up to the grand object and aim of all--the
salvation of souls.
Under other heads he found that outcast boys were received, sheltered,
sent to Industrial Homes, or returned to friends and parents; that
temperance meetings were held, and drunkards, male and female, sought
out, prayed for, lovingly reasoned with, and reclaimed from this perhaps
the greatest curse of the land; that Juvenile Bands of Hope were formed,
on the ground of prevention being better than cure; that lodging-houses,
where the poorest of the poor, and the lowest of the low do congregate,
were visited, and the gospel proclaimed to ears that were deaf to nearly
every good influence; that mothers' meetings were held--one of them at
that old headquarters of sin, the "Black Horse," where counsel and
sympathy were mingled with a Clothing Club and a Bible-woman; that there
were a Working Men's Benefit Society, Bible-Classes, Sunday-School, a
Sewing-Class, a Mutual Labour Loan Society, a Shelter for Homeless
Girls, a library, an Invalid Children's Dinner, a bath-room and
lavatory, a Flower Mission, and--hear it, ye who fancy that a penny
stands very low in the scale of financial littleness--a Farthing Bank!
All this free--conducted by an unpaid band of considerably over a
hundred Christian workers, male and female--and leavening the
foundations of society, without which, and similar missions, there would
be very few leavening influences at all, and the superstructure of
society would stand a pretty fair chance of being burst up or blown to
atoms--though the superstructure is not very willing to believe the
fact!
In addition to all this, Sir Richard learned, to his great amazement,
that the Jews won't light their fires on the Sabbath-day--that is, on
our Saturday--that they won't even poke it, and that this abstinence is
the immediate cause of a source of revenue to the un-Jewish poor, whom
the Jews hire to light and poke their fires for them.
And, lastly, Sir Richard Brandon learned that Mr George Holland, who
had managed that mission for more than quarter of a century, was
resolved, in the strength of the Lord, to seek out the lost and rescue
the perishing, even though he, Sir Richard, and all who resembled him,
should refuse to aid by tongue or hand in the glorious work of rescuing
the poor from sin and its consequences.