Near at hand is the Dorcas room, where deaconesses are kept busy in cutting out clothing and superintending the sewing classes. During the winter of 1887 thirty widows attended this class three times a week, glad to earn a sixpence by needlework done in a warm, lighted room, while a deaconess entertained them by reading aloud. A large amount of sewing is given out from the same room, and the garments that are made are often sold to the poor at a low price. A most impressive scene is witnessed during the winter months, when, on three evenings of the week, all the basement rooms are crowded with the men’s night-school, which has, it is believed, no rival in England. The ordinary number of names on the books exceeds twelve hundred. There are forty-nine classes, all taught by ladies, the majority of them being deaconesses. The subjects range from the elementary to the higher branches of general and practical knowledge, including arithmetic, geography, geometry, freehand drawing, and short-hand. The Bible is read in the classes on Monday and Friday, and a scriptural address is given by some gentleman on Wednesday.179/175 The school always closes with prayer and singing. The men may purchase coffee and bread and butter before leaving, and of this they largely avail themselves. A lending library is also attached to the school. The highest attendance during last session was five hundred and eighty-one, the lowest two hundred and eighty-seven.
The influence of this school is very great, and many pass on from it to the men’s Bible-class, which is held on Sunday afternoons in the largest basement room.[6]
A servants’ registry is attached to the deaconess house, and through its means about four hundred servants are annually provided with places.
Nearly fifty deaconesses make their home at this central house, many of them having work in the different parts of the city, perhaps at remote distances, but returning at night to the home-like surroundings and purer air of the central house. The large sitting-room, the common living-room of the deaconesses, is a charming place. It is of great size, but made cheerful and attractive by pictures, flowers, and bright and tasteful decorations that are restful to the eyes. Both Mr. and Mrs. Pennefather made it a principle of action to have the home life cheerful, pleasant, and attractive, so that when the180/176 sisters come in toward evening, tired physically, and mentally depressed and exhausted by the long strain of hearing tales of misery, and seeing sights of wretchedness and squalor the day through, they could be cheered not only by the words of sympathy and love of their associates, but by the silent, restful influences of their surroundings.
As I looked around the great room with deep-set windows, brightened by flowers, and still more by the happy faces of the deaconesses, some of whom were young girls with the charms of happy girlhood set off by the plain, black dress and wide white collar of the deaconess garb, I could but think the founders wise in arranging such pleasant, home-like surroundings for their workers.
From the windows you look down into a beautiful garden, a rare luxury for a London dwelling. This garden was among the later accessions of Mr. Pennefather, being purchased by him shortly before his death. A train of circumstances led to its possession which he regarded as markedly providential; and the delightful uses to which “that blessed garden,” as it has been called, has since been put, seem to justify the importance he attached to securing it. During the conference times great tents are reared here for the refreshments which the weary body needs. A fine old mulberry tree181/177 extends its branches, and under its ample shade meetings of one kind or another are held at all hours of the day. The lawn, with its quiet, shady walks, furnished with comfortable garden seats, provides a meeting place for friends, where, in the intervals between the services, those who perhaps never see each other during any of the other fifty-one weeks of the year may walk or sit together. “Here in more ordinary times may be seen the children of the Orphanage (where thirty-six girls form a happy, busy family) playing together, or the deaconesses in their becoming little white caps, who have run out for a breath of air. Here, too, during the summer, a succession of tea-parties is held for the different classes which have been reached by the deaconesses in the more densely populated parts of London, to whom the garden is a very paradise.”[7]
Before leaving the Central Deaconess Home I must speak of one branch of work—the artistic illustration of Scripture texts—because it so illustrates the happy freedom and wisdom of the Mildmay methods, which seek to develop the strength of each sister in the line of her special aptitudes. Two of the deaconesses have marked ability as artists, and they devote their time to illuminating182/178 texts and adorning Christmas and Easter cards with rare and exquisite designs. From the sale of these illuminations over five thousand dollars were realized last year for the benefit of the institution.
The Conference Hall, too, should have a further word of recommendation for the truly catholic spirit in which it serves the interests of a myriad of good causes. Besides the crowded meetings of the conference there are held Sunday services throughout the year. The hospitality of its rooms is readily granted to every good cause with which the mission has sympathy. During 1887 “temperance society meetings, railway men and their wives, Moravian missions, Pastor Bost’s mission at La Force, the MacAll Paris missions, the Sunday closing movement, young men’s and young women’s Christian associations, a Christian police association, the Children’s Special Service mission, the Christmas Letter mission, Bible readings for German residents, and various other foreign and home missions have all in turn been advocated here.”[8]
The larger number of the deaconesses at the central house, as well as the twenty-five at the branch house in South London, are employed in twenty-one London parishes, where their work has been sought by the clergymen; they go to all,183/179 undertaking every kind of labor that can give them access to the hearts and homes of the people. While co-operating with the clergyman in charge of a parish their work is superintended from the Deaconess Home. They visit from house to house among the sick and poor, hold mothers’ meetings, teach night-schools, hold Bible-classes separately for men, women, and children; hold special classes for working women and girls who are kept busily employed during the day, and during the winter months have a weekly average of more than nine thousand attendants on their services. They are solving the problem of “how to save the masses” by resolving the masses into individuals, and then influencing these individuals by the power of personal effort and love.
But a few steps from Conference Hall is the Nursing Home, where about one hundred “nurse sisters,” nurses, and probationers make their home in the intervals between their duties, and are presided over by a lady superintendent of their own. Adjoining is the Cottage Hospital, a beautiful building, the gift of a lady in memory of her son. The walls have been painted and decorated throughout by some ladies who delight in using their skill to make beautiful the homes of the sick.