“O Mrs S—,” said a kind, cheerful woman, who had the good sense to see that the expression of strong feeling was too much for the poor, weak mother just then, “never you mind about that; it did us good to do it: and you must make haste and get well and strong, and then we shall come upon you to help us some day.”
The sequel to this story is too pleasant to be omitted.
During the Christmas week, or as soon as possible afterwards, we invite the poor women of this society, with their husbands, to partake of a social cup of tea together. The nicely lighted and prettily decorated rooms presented last year a most cheerful appearance. About a hundred and fifty of these poor people assembled, with fifty or sixty of their richer neighbours.
That evening I saw, for the first time, the husband of Mrs S—. They were sitting together, and she was nursing her baby; but they both looked uneasy. The drunkard and his family are so accustomed to “hide themselves away from view,” that the bright light and numerous company made them feel how shabby they were. A few kind, encouraging words were at first necessary to reassure them, and make them feel that they were welcome. Presently, I had the pleasure of observing that they had become thoroughly interested in what was passing, and the clouds had passed away from their countenances.
I do not think that any exhortation was given that night to drunkards especially,—in fact, I believe that the subject was never once mentioned in any way. The platform was occupied by gentlemen of no common standing. Amongst the speakers, were some of the leading philanthropists of the day; and it is not matter of surprise that the words of these earnest men should have conveyed to their audience something of the intense love and sympathy which pervaded their own hearts. It was an evening that many will long remember with pleasure; but to our poor friend (Mrs S—) it was the beginning of a new life. After the meeting was over, her husband said to her—
“Wife, I am done for; I can never go back to those drinking ways again. I can stand up against a good deal; but those people there would have moved a post, let alone a man.”
This man was a fishmonger, and once had a business in this trade which he sold for £300. The greater part of this money was squandered in drink. Since then, the only means by which he could support himself and his family had been by hawking fish about the streets. For many hours of a Sunday morning, his loud voice might have been heard resounding through the streets and squares of the neighbourhood; even the church doors were not thick enough to shut out the noise; and the annoyance was often the subject of complaint.
I went to see them, one morning about the beginning of March, but not in the damp cellar where our acquaintance was first made. They had taken a neat little shop, and, though it was not well stocked, they were getting on.
The eldest girl, who was appointed to look after the shop, certainly looked as if she felt herself “a person of consequence.” I could scarcely recognise in her the poor “crushed-out” thing whom I had seen working for the family in their former dark abode. The other children—who used to remind me of the plants which we shut up in our cellars in the winter, keeping them without nourishment or light, that they may not exhaust their powers in growing—were now gambolling about the shop, while the sun was shining on them so brightly that they had to shade their eyes with their hands as they looked up. The mother, though she had lost that look of abject distress, still seemed anxious.
“It is hard work, ma’am,” she said, “to get right when things have been going wrong so long; but I hope, by God’s blessing, we shall get out of trouble after a bit; for my husband keeps steady, thank God. The children go to school now, and the elder ones have joined the Band of Hope. I don’t think anything in the world would make these two boys drink. They go errands sometimes for people, and have drink offered to them, but they will never touch it. I do pray every day that they may never know what it is to suffer and sin as we have done.”