wife had been so accustomed to the work of taking help to the very doors
of those who needed it, that all they wanted was to find a place in the
midst of that down-east district where they could themselves live and
work. Out of their own means they bought the only available premises for
their purpose--a rough, dilapidated, but substantial, and above all, a
ventilable sail-loft with its adjacent house and store-rooms, and there
they quietly established themselves as residents, with ten little beds,
holding ten poor little patients supported by themselves, in the hope
that voluntary aid from some of the benevolent persons who knew what was
the sore need of the neighbourhood would enable them in time to add
twenty or thirty more, when the big upper storeys should be cleansed and
mended and made into wards. That hope was not long in being realised,
and on the 28th of January, 1868, after a determined effort to maintain
the institution and to devote themselves to its service, a regular
committee was formed and commenced its undertakings, the founders still
remaining and working with unselfish zeal. From twenty to thirty little
ones were received from out that teeming district, where a large
hospital with ten times the number of beds would not be adequate to the
needs of the infant population, the mothers of which have to work to
earn the scanty wages which in many cases alone keep them from absolute
starvation. The struggle to maintain the wards in the old sail-lofts was
all the harder, from the knowledge that in at least half the number of
cases where admission was necessarily refused, from want of space and
want of funds, the little applicants were sent away to die, or to become
helpless invalids or confirmed cripples, not less from the effects of
destitution--the want of food and clothing--than from the nature of the
diseases from which they were suffering.
The young doctor and his wife dwelt there, and with cultivated tastes
and accomplishments submitted to all the inconveniences of a small room
or two, from which they were almost ousted by the increasing need for
space. With a bright and cheerful alacrity they adapted those very
tastes and accomplishments to supplement professional skill and tender
assiduous care: the lady--herself in such delicate health that her
husband feared for her life, and friends anxiously advised her to seek
rest and change--used books and music to cheer the noble work, and
always had a picture on her easel, with which to hide the awkward bulges
and projections, or to decorate the bare walls and brighten them with
light and colour.
It was at Christmas-tide seven years ago that I first visited the
hospital, and there were then very pleasant evidences of the season to
be discovered in all kinds of festive ornament in the long wards, and
especially in the smaller rooms, where this loving woman had attracted
other loving women around her, as nurses to the suffering little ones;
and was there and then engaged in the superintendence of a glorious
Christmas-tree. But the time came when the hoped-for support having
arrived, Mr. and Mrs. Heckford felt that they could leave the family of
forty children to the care of those who had taken up the work with
heartfelt sympathy. They had laboured worthily and well, but, alas!--the
reward came late--late at least for him, who had been anxious to take
his wife away to some warmer climate, in an endeavour to restore the
strength that had been spent in the long effort to rear a permanent
refuge for sick children in that dense neighbourhood. It was he who
stood nearest to shadow-land,--he who was soonest to enter into the
light and the rest that lay beyond. Mr. Heckford died, I believe, at
Margate, after a short period of leisure and travel, which his wife
shared with him. His picture, presented by her to the charity which they
both founded, is to be seen in the boys' ward. Another portrait of
him--a portrait in words written by the late Mr. Charles Dickens, who
visited and pathetically described the children and their hospital in
December, 1868, conveys the real likeness of the man.
"An affecting play was acted in Paris years ago, called the Children's
Doctor. As I parted from my Children's Doctor now in question, I saw in
his easy black necktie, in his loose-buttoned black frock-coat, in his
pensive face, in the flow of his dark hair, in his eyelashes, in the
very turn of his moustache, the exact realisation of the Paris artist's
ideal as it was presented on the stage. But no romancer that I know of
has had the boldness to prefigure the life and home of this young
husband and wife, in the Children's Hospital in the East of London."
What the hospital was then, it has remained--but with such improvements
as increased funds and a more complete organisation have effected. It is
still the ark of refuge for those little ones who, smitten with sudden
disease, or slowly fading before the baleful breath of famine or of
fever, or ebbing slowly away from life by the fatal influences that sap
the constitutions of the young in such neighbourhoods, are taken in that
they may be brought back to life, or at worst may be lovingly tended,
that the last messenger may be made to bear a smile.
But the hope for the future of this most admirable institution has grown
to fill a larger space. It is indeed essential to any really permanent
effort in such a district that it should be increased, and the founders
looked forward with earnest anticipations of the time when, gathering
help from without, they could enter upon a larger building, which will
soon be completed, and will be more adequate to the needs of such a
teeming population. The area embracing Poplar, Mile End, Whitechapel,
St. George's, Limehouse, Ratcliff, Shadwell, and Wapping numbers some
400,000 inhabitants, and strangely enough--as it will seem to those who
have not yet learnt the true characteristics of the really deserving
poor--many of the distressed people about that quarter will conceal
their poverty, and strive as long as they are able--so that when at last
they go to ask for aid the case may be almost hopeless, and the delay in
obtaining admission may be fatal. There are already so many more
applicants than can be received that it may be imagined what must be the
vast amount of alleviable suffering awaiting the opportunity of wider
means and a larger building. It would be easy to shock the reader by
detailing many of the more distressing diseases from which the poor
little patients suffer, but on visiting the wards you are less shocked
than saddened, while the evident rest and care which are helping to
restore and to sooth the sufferers ease you of the greater pain by the
hope that they inspire.
It is Sunday noon as we stand here in the dull street where, but for the
sudden opening of a frowsy tavern and the appearance of two or three
thirsty but civil customers, who are not only ready but eager to show
you the way to the "Childun's 'orsepital," there would be little to
distinguish it from a thoroughfare of tenantless houses. Ratcliff is at
its dinner at present, but we shall as we go back see the male residents
leaning against the doorposts smoking, and the women and children
sitting at the doors as at a private box at the theatre, discussing the
sordid events of the streets and the small chronicles of their poor
daily lives.
But we must leave the cleanly-scrubbed waiting-room and its adjoining
large cupboard which does duty as dispenser's room. It is dinnertime
here too, or rather it has been, and there are evidences of some very
jolly feasting, considering that, after all, the banqueters are mostly
in bed and on sick diet, which in many cases means milk, meat, eggs, and
as much nourishment as they can safely take. Indeed, food is medicine to
those who are turning the corner towards convalescence--food and air--of
which latter commodity there is a very excellent supply considering the
kind of neighbourhood we are in. Here and there we see a little wan,
pinched, wasted face lying on the pillow; a listless, transparent hand
upon the counterpane--which are sad tokens that the tiny sufferers are
nearing the eternal fold beyond the shadowy threshold where all is dark
to us, who note how every breath bespeaks a feebler hold on the world of
which they have learnt so little in their tiny lives. There are others
who are sitting up with picture-books, or waiting to have their
abscesses dressed, and arms bandaged, or eyes laved with cooling lotion.
Hip-disease and diseases of the joints are evidence of the causes that
bring so many of the little patients here, and there are severe cases of
consumption and of affections of the lungs and of the glands; but as the
little fellow wakes up from a short nap, or catches the eye of the "lady
nurse"--a lively and thoroughly practical Irishwoman, who evidently
knows how to manage, and has come here, after special training, for the
love of doing good--they show a beaming recognition which is very
pleasant to witness. With all the nurses it is the same.
They are young women who, receiving small pay, have come to devote
themselves to the work for Christ's sake and the Gospel's--that is to
say, for the love of humanity and of the good tidings of great joy that
announce the love of Him who gave Himself for us.
In the girls' ward there is the same freshness and cleanliness of the
place and all its belongings, the same wonderful patience and courageous
endurance on the part of the baby inmates, which has been my wonder ever
since we went in. Here is a mite of a girl sitting up in bed, holding a
moist pad to her eye, her poor little head being all bandaged. She never
utters a sound, but the little round face is set with a determined
endurance. "What is she sitting up for?" She is "waiting to see muvver."
Another little creature, who is suffering from abscesses in the neck,
submits to have the painful place poulticed only on the condition that
she shall decide, by keeping her hand upon the warm linseed-meal, when
it is cool enough to put on. These are scarcely pleasant details, and
there are sights here which are very, very sad, and make us shrink--but
I honestly declare that they are redeemed from being repulsive because
of the evidence of love that is to be witnessed,--the awakening of the
tender sympathies and sweet responses of the childlike heart. But for
its being Sunday--which involves another reason to be mentioned
presently--the beds would be strewed with toys and picture-books, while
a rocking-horse, which is a part of the hospital property, and a fit
kind of steed to draw the "hospital-carriage," which is represented by a
perambulator--would probably be saddled and taken out of the stable on
the landing. On the topmost storey we come to the real infants, the
little babies, one of whom is even now in the midst of his dinner, which
he takes from a feeding-bottle, by the aid of an india-rubber tube
conveniently traversing his pillow.
Everywhere there are evidences of the care with which the work is
carried on, and as we descend to the waiting-room again we have fresh
proofs of the benefits that are being effected in the great district, by
the provision made for the little creatures, many of whom would
otherwise be left to linger in pain and want. For the waiting-room is
filled--filled with mothers and elder sisters and little brothers,
tearfully eager and anxious for the weekly visit to the fifty children
upstairs. Here is the secret of the brave little patient faces in the
beds and cots above.
It is infinitely touching to think how the prospect of "seeing muvver"
sustains that chubby little sufferer,--how the expected visit nerves the
stronger ones to endurance, and sends a fresh throb of life through
those who are still too weak to do more than faintly smile, and hold out
a thin pale hand.
If Mr. Ashby Warner, the Secretary at this Hospital for Sick Children at
Ratcliff Cross, could but send some responsive thrill into the hearts of
those who, having no children of their own, yet love Christ's little
ones all over the world,--or could bring home to the fond fathers and
mothers of strong and chubby babes the conviction that to help in this
good work is a fitting recognition of their own mercies; nay, if even to
sorrowing souls who have been bereaved of their dear ones, and who yet
believe that their angels and the angels of these children also, do
constantly behold the face of the Father which is in heaven, there would
come a keen recognition of the blessedness of doing something for the
little ones, as unto Him who declares them to be of His kingdom--there
would soon be no lack of funds to finish building that great new
hospital at Shadwell, which is to take within its walls and great airy
wards so many more little patients, to help and comfort by advice and
medicine so many more suffering mothers and sisters than could be
received in the old sail-loft and its lower warehouse at Ratcliff Cross.
For the hope of the founders and their successors has at last being
realised--a larger building than they had at first dared to expect is to
be erected on ground which has been purchased, still within the district
where the need is greatest--and when the time comes that the last touch
of carpenter and mason shall have been given to the new home, and the
picture of Mr. Heckford shall be hung upon another wall, there may well
be a holiday "down east"--as a day of thanksgiving and of gratitude, to
those who may yet help in the work by giving of their abundance.
_IN THE KINGDOM._
"Of such are the kingdom of heaven;" and "whosoever doeth it unto the
least of these little ones, doeth it unto Me." Surely there is no need
to comment again on these sayings of Him who, in His infinite
childlikeness, knew what must be the characteristics of His subjects,
and declared plainly that whosoever should enter into the kingdom must
become as a little child. One thing is certain, that those who are
within that kingdom, or expect to qualify themselves for it, must learn
something of the Divine sympathy with which Christ took the babes in his
arms and blessed them. Thank God that there is so much of it in this
great suffering city, and that on every hand we see efforts made for the
rescue, the relief, and the nurture of sick and destitute children.
Would that these efforts could relieve us from the terrible sights that
should make us shudder as we pass through its tumultuous streets, and
witness the suffering, the depravity, and the want, that comes of
neglecting the cry of the little ones, and of those who would bring them
to be healed and sanctified.
Only just now I asked you to go with me to Ratcliff to see the forty
tiny beds ranged in the rooms of that old sail-maker's warehouse which
has been converted into a Hospital for Sick Children. There is something
about this neighbourhood of Eastern London that keeps us lingering there
yet; something that may well remind us of that star which shone above
the manger at Bethlehem where the Babe lay. The glory of the heavenly
light has led wise men and women to see how, in reverence for the
childlikeness, they may work for the coming of the kingdom, and those
who enter upon this labour of love, begin--without observation--to find
what that kingdom really is, and to realise more of its meaning in their
own hearts.
To the cradle in a manger the wise men of old went to offer gifts. To a
cradle I would ask you to go with me to-day; to a whole homeful of
cribs; which is known by a word that means crib and manger and cradle
all in one--"The Crèche."
There is something, as it seems to me, appropriate in this French word
to the broad thoroughfare (so like one of the outer boulevards of Paris)
out of which we turn when we have walked a score or two of yards from
the Stepney Station, or where some other visitors alight from the big
yellow tramway car running from Aldgate to Stepney Causeway. The
Causeway itself is a clean, quiet street, and is so well known that the
first passer-by can point it out to you, while, if the inhabitants of
the district can't quite master the _crunch_ of the French word, they
know well enough what you mean when you ask for the "babies' home," or
for "Mrs. Hilton's nursery." The home itself is but a baby institution,
for it is only five years old, but it might be a very Methuselah if it
were to be judged by the tender, loving care it has developed, and the
good it has effected, not only on behalf of the forty sucklings who are
lying in their neat little wire cots upstairs, like so many human
fledglings in patent safety cages, and for the forty who are sprawling
and toddling about in the lower nursery, or for the contingent who are
singing a mighty chorus of open vowels on the ground-floor; but also in
the hopeful aid and tender sympathy it has conveyed to the toiling
mothers who leave their little ones here each morning when they go out
to earn their daily bread, and fetch them again at night, knowing that
they are fresh and clean, and have been duly nursed and fed, and put to
sleep, and had their share of petting and of play.
The sound of the forty singing like one is not perceptible as we
approach the house, which, with its large high windows open to the soft,
warm air, lies very still and quiet. The wire-blinds to the windows near
the street bear the name of the institution, and over the doorway is
inscribed the fact that the Princess Christian has become the patroness
of this charity, which appeals to all young mothers, and to every woman
who acknowledges the true womanly love for children. Each day, from
twelve to four o'clock, visitors are welcomed, except on Saturdays, when
the closing hour is two o'clock, as, even in some of the factories down
east, the half-holiday is observed, and poor women working at
bottle-warehouses and other places have the happiness of taking home
their little ones, and keeping them to themselves till the following
Monday morning. Do you feel inclined to question whether these poor,
toil-worn women appreciate this privilege? Are you ready to indulge in a
cynical fear that they would rather forego the claim that they are
expected to assert? Believe me you are wrong. One of the most hopeful
and encouraging results of the tender care bestowed upon these babes of
poverty is that of sustaining maternal love, and beautifying even the
few hours of rest and family reunion in the squalid rooms where the
child is taken with a sense of hope and pride to lighten the burden of
the day. Early each morning the little creatures are brought, often in
scanty clothing, sometimes shoeless, mostly with a ready appetite for
breakfast. Then the business of matron and nurses begins. But, come, let
us go in with the children, and see the very first of it, as women,
poorly clad, coarse of feature, and with the lines of care, and too
frequently with the marks of dissipation and of blows upon their faces,
come in one by one and leave their little living bundles, not without a
certain wistful, softened expression and an occasional lingering loving
look.
The house--stay, there are actually three houses, knocked into one so as
to secure a suite of rooms on each floor--is as clean as the proverbial
new pin; and as we ascend the short flights of stairs, there is a sense
of lightness and airiness which is quite remarkable in such a place, and
is by some strange freak of fancy associated with the notion of a big,
pleasant aviary--a notion which is strengthened by our coming suddenly
into the nursery on the first-floor, and noting as the most prominent
object of ornament a large cage containing some sleek and silken doves,
placed on a stand very little above the head of the tiniest toddler
there.
There is enough work for the matron, her assistant, and the four or five
young nurses who receive these welcome little guests each morning. The
rows of large metal basins on the low stands are ready, and the
morning's ablutions are about to commence, so we will return presently,
as people not very likely to be useful in the midst of so intricate an
operation as the skilful washing and dressing of half a hundred babies.
There is plenty to see in the neighbourhood out of doors, but we need
not wander far to find something interesting, for on the ground-floor of
these three houses which form the Crèche--the babies' home--provision
has also been made for babies' fathers, in the shape of "a British
Workman," or working-man's reading, coffee, and bagatelle room, with a
library of readable books, and liberty to smoke a comfortable pipe.
Of the servants' home, which is another branch of this cluster of
charitable institutions, we have no time to speak now, for our visit is
intended for the Crèche, and we are already summoned to the upper rooms
by the sound of infant voices. Doubt not that you will be welcomed on
the very threshold, for here comes an accredited representative of the
institution, just able to creep on all fours to the guarded door, thence
to be caught up by the gentle-faced young nurse, who at once consigns
the excursionist to a kind of square den or pound, formed of stout bars,
and with the space of floor which it encloses covered by a firm
mattress. There, in complete safety, and with two or three good
serviceable and amiably-battered toys, the young athletes who are
beginning to practise the difficult feat of walking with something to
hold by, are out of harm's way, and may crawl or totter with impunity.
They have had their breakfast of bread and milk, and are evidently
beginning the day, some of them with a refreshing snooze in the little
cribs which stand in a row against a wall, bright, as all the walls are,
with coloured pictures, while in spaces, or on low tables here and
there, bright-hued flowers and fresh green plants are arranged, so that
the room, necessarily bare and unencumbered with much furniture, is so
pleasantly light and gay, that we are again reminded of a great
bird-cage. Out here in a little ante-room is a connected row of low,
wooden arm-chairs, made for the people of Lilliput, and each furnished
with a little tray or table, and, drumming expectantly and with a
visible interest in the proceeding, sit a line of little creatures,
amidst whom a nurse distributes her attentions, by feeding them
carefully with a spoon, just as so many young blackbirds might be fed.
Already some of the little nurslings are sitting up in their cribs,
quietly nodding their round little heads over some cherished specimen of
doll or wooden horse. One wee mite of a girl, quite unable to speak,
except inarticulately, holds up the figure of a wooden lady of fashion,
with a wistful entreaty which we fail to understand, till the quick-eyed
lady who accompanies us spies a slip of white tape in the tiny hand, and
at once divines that it is to be bound about the fashionable waist, as
an appropriate scarf, and at once performs this finishing stroke of the
toilet, to the immeasurable satisfaction of everybody concerned. This is
in the upper room, the real baby nursery, where the age of some of the
inmates is numbered by weeks only, and there is in each swinging cot a
sweet, sleepy sense of enjoyment of the bottle which forms the necessary
appliance of luncheon-time.
At the heads of several of these cots are inscribed the names of
charitable donors, happy parents, bereaved mothers, sympathetic women
with babies of their own, either on earth or in heaven, who desire to
show gratitude, faith, remembrance, by this token of their love for the
childlikeness of those they love and cherish in their deepest memories,
their most ardent hopes. In more than one of the little beds there are
signs of the poverty or the sickliness in which the children were born,
and the effects of which this home, with its freshness and light and
food, is intended to remedy. No cases of actual disease are here,
however, since a small infirmary for children suffering from more
serious ailments has been added to the institution, and the Sick
Children's Hospital is but three street lengths distant.
The first most remarkable experience which meets the visitor
unaccustomed to observe closely, is the freshness and beauty of the
children in this place. Squalid misery, dirt, neglect, starvation, so
disguise and debase even the children in such neighbourhoods, that
squeamish sentimentality turns away at the first glance, and is apt to
conclude that there are essential differences between the infancy of
Tyburnia or Mayfair and the babyhood of Ratcliff and Shadwell. Yet I
venture to assert that if Mr. Millais or some other great painter were
to select his subjects for a picture from these rooms of the old house
in Stepney Causeway, he would leave the galleries of Burlington House
echoing with "little dears," and "what a lovely child!" and popular
prejudice would conclude that from birth the little rosebud mouths were
duly fitted with silver spoons instead of being scant even of the
bluntest of wooden ladles.