“I think if you had wanted money for your Crusade I would have given you some of mine. I am, however, greatly rejoiced that you do not flood the country with appeals and begging letters, but that this vast and most important organisation is, like the great Sunday-school system, carried on at small cost, which is met by local voluntary contributions.
“But that which I desire to see accomplished cannot well be done by existing institutions, or without extra money.
“My wish is to provide a Training Home for young women who are about to be married, where they may stay, free of cost, for six months, and be under the influence of Christian women at the same time that they are practising such household duties and economies as pertain to the wives of the poor; and for such only as have no mothers to teach them, or those flighty young girls who are not willing to be taught. Plenty of such cases must be known to city missionaries, district visitors, and all the other kindly souls who look after the poor and take an interest in girls.
“Personally, I rejoice in the better wages now paid to the working man. Whoever helps to make the prosperity of a nation should share in it. But wages have less to do with the well-being of a family than most people imagine. Two men are neighbours, they earn the same wages, pay the same rent, have the same number of children; but in one case the people are respectable and respected, in the other they are dejected, suspected, and miserable. What makes the difference? A little bill announcing a Band of Hope meeting is in the window of one, and a broken pane of glass in the other. In the one case the man is steady and the woman is industrious and thrifty, in the other, both man and woman are failures in life and character. I know that human nature is exceedingly stubborn and intractable, and that only the Spirit of God can change the heart; but is not the Spirit always working? Have we not the right to hope that many giddy young things, who would otherwise rush into married life quite unprepared for its duties, may, under the influences of love and happiness, be brought to take more serious views of their responsibilities? I cannot imagine any better way of serving our country than by helping to raise the character of the young mothers among the people. I am casting no slur on the women of England as a whole; no one has anything but praise for the hosts of loyal, loving, enlightened, working mothers who are training their sons and daughters for high and noble futures; but our great weakness and danger are in the multitudes of other women, and it is the lowest class that is laid upon my thought.
“But nothing can be done in this matter except by women of courage, tact, and strong character and goodness. I can find the house and the money; can you find the organisers and the workers? Will you, dear Miss Miller, for the love of Christ and your poor miserable young sisters who do not know Him, undertake the management of the home? and will you love them and care for them, and teach them what goodness is? I ask you, partly because you are yourself young, and can therefore understand and sympathise with girls, and partly because, from all I know of you, I am assured that you can carry this idea forward to success, and mostly for another reason, which is my own alone. My friend Smart has told me all about your private life and character. And I have no hesitation in saying that if you will do your part I will do mine, and with all possible speed. A large, substantial homestead near the coast, in the north-east of Yorkshire, has lately come into my possession. It could be ready for you in a month. It will accommodate forty persons; and I will not only pay all the bills, but will give a present of five pounds’ worth of household utensils to every girl who stays with you six months, and satisfies you. I have an idea that this bribe may win some who would not otherwise submit to any process of improvement, however kindly performed.
“I am only like many other men of my day in my wish to remain unknown, and to do this thing anonymously. You may call me ‘Friend Philip’ if you will; and all our communications had better pass through the hands of my solicitors—Messrs. Smart, Watkin, and Smart. I cannot but hope that your reply may be in the affirmative. Think of the lives you may influence, the homes you may bless; and I pray you help me in this important work. We shall be the pioneers of the movement. Before many years are passed all the big cities—London, Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, and my own Bristol—will consider a Training Home for Mothers as great a necessity as a workhouse or a gaol, and will support one out of the rates. This is surely a crusade for women; and it is worthy of your best powers. But if you will not undertake it I must find some other means of disposing of my money.—Believe me, with great respect, yours faithfully, Friend Philip.”
Margaret might have been disposed to question the validity of this letter but for one from Mr. Smart which accompanied it, and which stated that the necessary funds for commencing the enterprise had already been lodged with his firm, subject to her consent to act. She was, naturally, greatly disturbed by the incident. How could she take up this work when her hands were full already? And it was not of such a life that she dreamed. No woman does. She may accept it, when God sends it, and find it full of wonderful content and exquisite joy; but her early dreams are of something very different from this.
Margaret’s thoughts were of John. She hoped to prove that one young woman was capable of making one young man a good wife—when the time came. Her pleasantest occupations had to do with economical housekeeping, and her imaginings were of a bright little home where hands that love made clever were instead of gold. But in that home, in her dreams, there was always a seat for John’s mother, who had at last taken to her arms the Margaret whom she once despised and hated, and a pang shot through the girl’s heart as she acknowledged that this dream was as far from realisation as ever. She had declared that she would not marry John without his mother’s consent, and his mother had shown no sign of relenting.
“Perhaps I am not to be happy, and God has sent me this work instead,” she thought.
John was to call upon her that evening, but she scarcely knew how to wait until then. She must show him this letter even before Mr. Harris saw it, for John had the greater right. And what would he say but what she had said already, that this strange man who had written to her must find some one else to use his money and do his work?