In Darkest England, and the Way Out

by William Booth

SECTION 4.—SOME OBJECTIONS MET.

Objections must be expected. They are a necessity with regard to any Scheme that has not yet been reduced to practice, and simply signify foreseen difficulties in the working of it. We freely admit that there are abundance of difficulties in the way of working out the plan smoothly and successfully that has been laid down. But many of these we imagine will vanish when we come to close quarters, and the remainder will be surmounted by courage and patience. Should, however, this plan prove the success we predict, it must eventually revolutionise the condition of the starving sections of Society, not only in this great metropolis, but throughout the whole range of civilisation. It must therefore be worthy not only of a careful consideration but of persevering trial.

Some of these difficulties at first sight appear rather serious.
Let us look at them.

Objection I.—It is suggested that the class of people for whose benefit the Scheme is designed would not avail themselves of it.

When the feast was prepared and the invitation had gone forth, it is said that the starving multitudes would not come; that though labour was offered them in the City, or prepared for them on the Farm, they would prefer to rot in their present miseries rather than avail themselves of the benefit provided.

In order to gather the opinions of those most concerned, we consulted one evening, by a Census in our London Shelters, two hundred and fifty men out of work, and all suffering severely in consequence. We furnished a set of questions, and obtained answers from the whole. Now, it must be borne in mind that these men were under no obligation whatever to make any reply to our enquiries, much less to answer them favourably to our plan, of which they knew next to nothing.

These two hundred and fifty men were mostly in the prime of life, the greater portion of them being skilled workmen; an examination of the return papers showing that out of the entire number two hundred and seven were able to work at their trades had they the opportunity.

The number of trades naturally varied. There were some of all kinds:
Engineers, Custom House Officers, Schoolmasters, Watch and Clockmakers,
Sailors, and men of the different branches of the Building trade;
also a number of men who have been in business on their own account.

The average amount of wages earned by the skilled mechanics when regularly employed was 33s. per week; the money earned by the unskilled averaged 22s. per week.

They could not be accounted lazy, as most of them; when not employed at their own trade or occupation, had proved their willingness to work by getting jobs at anything that turned up. On looking over the list we saw that one who had been a Custom House Officer had recently acted as Carpenter's Labourer; a Type-founder had been glad to work at Chimney Sweeping; the Schoolmaster, able to speak five languages, who in his prosperous days had owned a farm, was glad to do odd jobs as a Bricklayer's Labourer; a Gentleman's Valet, who once earned #5 a week, had come so low down in the world that he was glad to act as Sandwich man for the magnificent sum of fourteenpence a day, and that, only as an occasional affair.

In the list was a dyer and cleaner, married, with a wife and nine children, who had been able to earn 40s. a week, but had done no regular work for three years out of the last ten.

We put the following question to the entire number: — "If you were put on a farm, and set to work at anything you could do, and supplied with food, lodging, and clothing, with a view to getting you on to your feet, would you be willing to do all you could?"

In response, the whole 250 replied in the affirmative, with one exception, and on enquiry we elicited that, being a sailor, the man was afraid he would not know how to do the work.

On being interrogated as to their willingness to grapple with the hard labour on the land, they said: "Why should we not? Look at us. Can any plight be more miserable than ours?" Why not, indeed? A glance at them would certainly make it impossible for any thoughtful person to assign a rational reason for their refusal—in rags, swarming with vermin, hungry, many of them living on scraps of food, begged or earned in the most haphazard fashion, without sufficient clothing to cover their poor gaunt limbs, most of them without a shirt. They had to start out the next morning, uncertain which way to turn to earn a crust for dinner, or the fourpence necessary to supply them again with the humble shelter they had enjoyed that night. The idea of their refusing employment which would supply abundantly the necessaries of life, and give the prospect of becoming, in process of time, the owner of a home, with its comforts and companionships, is beyond conception. There is not much question that this class will not only accept the Scheme we want to set before them, but gratefully do all in their power to make it a success.

II.—Too many would come. This would be very probable. There would certainly be too many apply. But we should be under no obligation to take more than was convenient. The larger the number of applications the wider the field for selection, and the greater the necessity for the enlargement of our operations.

III.—They would run away. It is further objected that if they did come, the monotony of the life, the strangeness of the work, together with the absence of the excitements and amusements with which they had been entertained in the cities and towns, would render their existence unbearable. Even when left to the streets, there is an amount of life and action in the city which is very attractive. Doubtless some would run away, but I don't think this would be a large proportion. The change would be so great, and so palpably advantageous, that I think they would find in it ample compensation for the deprivation of any little pleasureable excitement they had left behind them in the city. For instance, there would be—

A Sufficiency of Food.

The friendliness and sympathy of their new associates. There would be abundance of companions of similar tastes and circumstances— not all pious. It would be quite another matter to going single-handed on to a farm, or into a melancholy family.

Then there would be the prospect of doing well for themselves in the future, together with all the religious life, meetings, music, and freedom of the Salvation Army.

But what says our experience?

If there be one class which is the despair of the social reformer, it is that which is variously described, but which we may term the lost women of our streets. From the point of view of the industrial organiser, they suffer from almost every fault that human material can possess. They are, with some exceptions, untrained to labour, demoralised by a life of debauchery, accustomed to the wildest license, emancipated from all discipline but that of starvation, given to drink, and, for the most part, impaired in health. If, therefore, any considerable number of this class can be shown to be ready to submit themselves voluntarily to discipline, to endure deprivation of drink, and to apply themselves steadily to industry, then example will go a long way towards proving that even the worst description of humanity, when intelligently, thoroughly handled, is amenable to discipline and willing to work. In our British Rescue Homes we receive considerably over a thousand unfortunates every year; while all over the world, our annual average is two thousand. The work has been in progress for three years—long enough to enable us to test very fully the capacity of the class in question to reform.

With us there is no compulsion. If any girl wishes to remain, she remains. If she wishes to go, she goes. No one is detained a day or an hour longer than they choose to stay. Yet our experience shows that, as a rule, they do not run away. Much more restless and thoughtless and given to change, as a class, than men, the girls do not, in any considerable numbers, desert. The average of our London Homes, for the last three years, gives only 14 per cent. as leaving on their own account, while for the year 1889 only 5 per cent. And the entire number, who have either left or been dismissed during that year, amounts only to 13 per cent. on the whole.

IV.—They would not work. Of course, to such as had for years been leading idle lives, anything like work and exhaustive labour would be very trying and wearisome, and a little patience and coaxing might be required to get them into the way of it. Perhaps some would be hopelessly beyond salvation in this respect, and, until the time comes, if it ever does arrive, when the Government will make it a crime for an abled-bodied man to beg when there is an opportunity for him to engage in remunerative work, this class will wander abroad preying upon a generous public. It will, however, only need to be known that any man can obtain work if he wants it, for those who have by their liberality maintained men and women in idleness to cease doing so. And when it comes to this pass, that a man cannot eat without working, of the two evils he will choose the latter, preferring labour, however unpleasant it may be to his tastes, to actual starvation.

It must be borne in mind that the penalty of certain expulsion, which all would be given to understand would be strictly enforced would have a good influence in inducing the idlest to give work a fair trial, and once at it should not despair of conquering the aversion altogether, and eventually being able to transform and pass these once lazy loafers as real industrious members of Society.

Again, any who have fears on this point may be encouraged by contrasting the varied and ever-changing methods of labour we should pursue, with the monotonous and uninteresting grind of many of the ordinary employments of the poor, and the circumstances by which they are surrounded.

Here, again, we fall back upon our actual experience in reclamation work. In our Homes for Saving the Lost Women we have no difficulty of getting them to work. The idleness of this section of the social strata has been before referred to; it is not for a moment denied, and there can be no question, as to its being the cause of much of their poverty and distress. But from early morn until the lights are out at night, all is a round of busy, and, to a great extent, very uninteresting labour; while the girls have, as a human inducement, only domestic service to look forward to—of which they are in no way particularly enamoured—and yet here is no mutiny, no objection, no unwillingness to work; in fact they appear well pleased to be kept continually at it. Here is a report that teaches the same lesson.

A small Bookbinding Factory is worked in connection with the Rescue Homes in London. The folders and stitchers are girls saved from the streets, but who, for various reasons, were found unsuitable for domestic service. The Factory has solved the problem of employment for some of the most difficult cases. Two of the girls at present employed there are crippled, while one is supporting herself and two young children.

While learning the work they live in the Rescue Homes, and the few shillings they are able to earn are paid into the Home funds. As soon as they are able to earn 12s. a week, a lodging is found for them (with Salvationists, if possible), and they are placed entirely upon their own resources. The majority of girls working at this trade in London are living in the family, and 6s., 7s., and 8s. a week make an acceptable addition to the Home income; but our girls who are entirely dependent upon their own earnings must make an average wage of 12s. a week at least. In order that they may do this we are obliged to pay higher wages than other employers. For instance, we give from 2 1/2d. to 3d. a thousand more than the trade for binding small pamphlets; nevertheless, after the Manager, a married man, is paid, and a man for the superintendence of the machines, a profit of about #500 has been made, and the work is improving. They are all paid piecework.

Eighteen women are supporting themselves in this way at present, and conducting themselves most admirably. One of their number acts as forewoman, and conducts the Prayer Meeting at 12.30, the Two-minutes' Prayer after meals, etc. Their continuance in the factory is subject to their good behaviour—both at home as well as at work. In one instance only have we had any trouble at all, and in this solitary case the girl was so penitent she was forgiven, and has done well ever since. I think that, without exception, they are Salvation Soldiers, and will be found at nearly every meeting on the Sabbath, etc. The binding of Salvation Army publications— "The Deliverer," "All the World," the Penny Song Books, etc., almost keep us going. A little outside work for the end of the months is taken, but we are not able to make any profit generally, it is so badly paid.

It will be seen that this is a miniature factory, but still it is a factory, and worked on principles that will admit of illimitable extension, and may, I think, be justly regarded as an encouragement and an exemplification of what may be accomplished in endless variations.

V.—Again, it is objected that the class whose benefit we contemplate would not have physical ability to work on a farm, or in the open air.

How, it is asked, would tailors, clerks, weavers, seamstresses, and the destitute people, born and reared in the slums and poverty-hovels of the towns and cities, do farm or any other work that has to do with the land? The employment in the open air, with exposure to every kind of weather which accompanies it, would, it is said, kill them off right away.

We reply, that the division of labour before described would render it as unnecessary as it would be undesirable and uneconomical, to put many of these people to dig or to plant. Neither is it any part of our plan to do so. On our Scheme we have shown how each one would be appointed to that kind of work for which his previous knowledge and experience and strength best adapted him. Moreover, there can be no possible comparison between the conditions of health enjoyed by men and women wandering about homeless, sleeping in the streets or in the fever-haunted lodging-houses, or living huddled up in a single room, and toiling twelve and fourteen hours in a sweater's den, and living in comparative comfort in well-warmed and ventilated houses, situated in the open country, with abundance of good, healthy food.

Take a man or a woman out into the fresh air, give them proper exercise, and substantial food. Supply them with a comfortable home, cheerful companions, and a fair prospect of reaching a position of independence in this or some other land, and a complete renewal of health and careful increase of vigour will, we expect, be one of the first great benefits that will ensue.

VI.—It is objected that we should be left with a considerable residuum of half-witted, helpless people.

Doubtless this would be a real difficulty, and we should have to prepare for it. We certainly, at the outset, should have to guard against too many of this class being left upon our hands, although we should not be compelled to keep anyone. It would, how ever, be painful to have to send them back to the dreadful life from which we had rescued them. Still, however, this would not be so ruinous a risk, looked at financially, as some would imagine. We could, we think, maintain them for 4s. per week, and they would be very weak indeed in body, and very wanting in mental, strength if they were not able to earn that amount in some one of the many forms of employment which the Colony would open up.

VII.—Again, it will be objected that some efforts of a similar character have failed. For instance, co-operative enterprises in farming have not succeeded.

True, but so far as I can ascertain, nothing of the character I am describing has ever been attempted. A large number of Socialistic communities have been established and come to grief in the United States, in Germany, and elsewhere, but they have all, both in principle and practice, strikingly differed from what we are proposing here: Take one particular alone, the great bulk of these societies have not only been fashioned without any regard to the principles of Christianity, but, in the vast majority of instances, have been in direct opposition to them; and the only communities based on co-operative principles that have survived the first few months of their existence have been based upon Christian truth. If not absolute successes, there have been some very remarkable results obtained by efforts partaking somewhat of the nature of the one I am setting forth. (See that of Ralahine, described in Appendix.)

VIII.—It is further objected that it would be impossible to maintain order and enforce good discipline amongst this class of people.

We are of just the opposite opinion. We think that it would —nay, we are certain of it, and we speak as those who have had considerable experience in dealing with the lower classes of Society. We have already dealt with this difficulty. We may say further—

That we do not propose to commence with a thousand people in a wild, untamed state, either at home or abroad. To the Colony Over-Sea we should send none but those who have had a long period of training in this country. The bulk of those sent to the Provincial Farm would have had some sort of trial in the different City Establishments. We should only draft them on to the Estate in small numbers, as we were prepared to deal with them, and I am quite satisfied that without the legal methods of maintaining order that are acted upon so freely in workhouses and other similar institutions, we should have as perfect obedience to Law, as great respect for authority, and as strong a spirit of kindness pervading all ranks throughout the whole of the community as could be found in any other institution in the land.

It will be borne in mind that our Army system of government largely prepares us, if it does not qualify us, for this task. Anyway, it gives us a good start. All our people are trained in habits of obedience, and all our Officers are educated in the exercise of authority. The Officers throughout the Colony would be almost exclusively recruited from the ranks of the Army, and everyone of them would go to the work, both theoretically and practically, familiar with those principles which are the essence of good discipline.

Then we can argue, and that very forcibly, from the actual experience we have already had in dealing with this class. Take our experience in the Army itself. Look at the order of our Soldiers. Here are men and women, who have no temporal interest whatever at stake, receiving no remuneration, often sacrificing their earthly interests by their union with us, and yet see how they fall into line, and obey orders in the promptest manner, even when such orders go right in the teeth of their temporal interests.

"Yes," it will be replied by some, "this is all very excellent so far as it relates to those who are altogether of your own way of thinking. You can command them as you please, and they will obey, but what proof have you given of your ability to control and discipline those who are not of your way of thinking?

"You can do that with your Salvationists because they are saved, as you call it. When men are born again you can do anything with them. But unless you convert all the denizens of Darkest England, what chance is there that they will be docile to your discipline? If they were soundly saved no doubt something might be done. But they are not saved, soundly or otherwise; they are lost. What reason have you for believing that they will be amenable to discipline?"

I admit the force of this objection; but I have an answer, and an answer which seems to me complete. Discipline, and that of the most merciless description, is enforced upon multitudes of these people even now. Nothing that the most authoritative organisation of industry could devise in the excess of absolute power, could for a moment compare with the slavery enforced to-day in the dens of the sweater. It is not a choice between liberty and discipline that confronts these unfortunates, but between discipline mercilessly enforced by starvation and inspired by futile greed, and discipline accompanied with regular rations and administered solely for their own benefit. What liberty is there for the tailors who have to sew for sixteen to twenty hours a day, in a pest-hole, in order to earn ten shillings a week? There is no discipline so brutal as that of the sweater; there is no slavery so relentless as that from which we seek to deliver the victims. Compared with their normal condition of existence, the most rigorous discipline which would be needed to secure the complete success of any new individual organisation would be an escape from slavery into freedom.

You may reply, "that it might be so, if people understood their own interest. But as a matter of fact they do not understand it, and that they will never have sufficient far-sightedness to appreciate the advantages that are offered them."

To this I answer, that here also I do not speak from theory. I lay before you the ascertained results of years of experience. More than two years ago, moved by the misery and despair of the unemployed, I opened the Food and Shelter Depots in London already described. Here are a large number of men every night, many of them of the lowest type of casuals who crawl about the streets, a certain proportion criminals, and about as difficult a class to manage as I should think could be got together, and while there will be 200 of them in a single building night after night, from the first opening of the doors in the evening until the last man has departed in the morning, there shall scarcely be a word of dissatisfaction; anyway, nothing in the shape of angry temper or bad language. No policemen are required; indeed two or three nights' experience will be sufficient to turn the regular frequenters of the place of their own free will into Officers of Order, glad not only to keep the regulations of the place, but to enforce its discipline upon others.

Again, every Colonist, whether in the City or elsewhere, would know that those who took the interests of the Colony to heart, were loyal to its authority and principles, and laboured industriously in promoting its interests, would be rewarded accordingly by promotion to positions of influence and authority, which would also carry with them temporal advantages, present and prospective.

But one of our main hopes would be in the apprehension by the Colonists of the fact that all our efforts were put forth on their behalf. Every man and woman on the place would know that this enterprise was begun and carried on solely for their benefit, and that of the other members of their class, and that only their own good behaviour and co-operation would ensure their reaping a personal share in such benefit. Still our expectations would be largely based on the creation of a spirit of unselfish interest in the community.

IX. Again, it is objected that the Scheme is too vast to be attempted by voluntary enterprise; it ought to be taken up and carried out by the Government itself.

Perhaps so, but there is no very near probability of Government undertaking it, and we are not quite sure whether such an attempt would prove a success if it were made. But seeing that neither Governments, nor Society, nor individuals have stood forward to undertake what God has made appear to us to be so vitally important a work, and as He has given us the willingness, and in many important senses the ability, we are prepared, if the financial help is furnished, to make a determined effort, not only to undertake but to carry it forward to a triumphant success.

X.—It is objected that the classes we seek to benefit are too ignorant and depraved for Christian effort, or for effort of any kind, to reach and reform.—

Look at the tramps, the drunkards, the harlots, the criminals. How confirmed they are in their idle and vicious habits. It will be said, indeed has been already said by those with whom I have conversed, that I don't know them; which statement cannot, I think, be maintained, for if I don't know them, who does?

I admit, however, that thousands of this class are very far gone from every sentiment, principle and practice of right conduct. But I argue that these poor people cannot be much more unfavourable subjects for the work of regeneration than are many of the savages and heathen tribes, in the conversion of whom Christians universally believe; for whom they beg large sums of money, and to whom they send their best and bravest people.

These poor people are certainly embraced in the Divine plan of mercy. To their class, the Saviour especially gave His attention when he was on the earth, and for them He most certainly died on the Cross.

Some of the best examples of Christian faith and practice, and some of the most successful workers for the benefit of mankind, have sprung from this class, of which we have instances recorded in the Bible, and any number in the history of the Church and of the Salvation Army.

It may be objected that while this Scheme would undoubtedly assist one class of the community by making steady, industrious workmen, it must thereby injure another class by introducing so many new hands into the labour market, already so seriously overstocked.

To this we reply that there is certainly an appearance of force in this objection; but it has, I think, been already answered in the foregoing pages. Further, if the increase of workers, which this Scheme will certainly bring about, was the beginning and the end of it, it would certainly present a somewhat serious aspect. But, even on that supposition, I don't see how the skilled worker could leave his brothers to rot in their present wretchedness, though their rescue should involve the sharing of a portion of his wages.

(1) But there is no such danger, seeing that the number of extra hands thrown on the British Labour Market must be necessarily inconsiderable.

(2) The increased production of food in our Farm and Colonial operations must indirectly benefit the working man.

(3) The taking out of the labour market of a large number of individuals who at present have only partial work, while benefiting them, must of necessity afford increased labour to those left behind.

(4) While every poor workless individual made into a wage earner will of necessity have increased requirements in proportion. For instance, the drunkard who has had to manage with a few bricks, a soap box, and a bundle of rags, will want a chair, a table, a bed, and at least the other necessary adjuncts to a furnished home, however sparely fitted up it may be.

There is no question but that when our Colonisation Scheme is fairly afloat it will drain off, not only many of those who are in the morass, but a large number who are on the verge of it. Nay, even artisans, earning what are considered good wages, will be drawn by the desire to improve their circumstances, or to raise their children under more favourable surroundings, or from still nobler motives, to leave the old country. Then it is expected that the agricultural labourer and the village artisan, who are ever migrating to the great towns and cities, will give the preference to the Colony Over-Sea, and so prevent that accumulation of cheap labour which is considered to interfere so materially with the maintenance of a high wages standard.