From a Lady helping in B. Court.
The cobbling class that I have superintended since the 2nd of December has kept up, as well as I could expect, in some respects, and very much better in others; for, though it has not increased in numbers, some boys have never missed coming. They have really learnt to mend well, and have improved so wonderfully in their manners to each other and to me, that, in three or four cases, we have got really fond of each other, and that is my hope for the future. Good, I like to think, may result. Nine boys attended the last evening, and seemed very sorry that it was the last, asking if, next winter, the class would be again; and, as they have once or twice hinted their hope of my taking them for something else in an evening, I am going to try; and we shall read English History to begin with, and talk, and so on; for we are really so comfortable with each other that just to be together is a pleasure to us now. They are only young. But I found that they and older boys did not do well together.... The boy beyond all the others whom I care for is James ——; and as I fear you may have heard anything but good of him—for I am the only one of your ladies who has any liking for him, except, I think, Miss Leighton,—perhaps it may be a mistake to like James as much as I do, and to hope that he will do so well. But I am quite sure that if you, dear Miss Hill, had the same cause as I have to admire all his ways and work that I can see, you would also care little for what is said about his mother and father. The first evening that he came he did nothing but watch me, and stand, rather rudely, with his cap on all the time. Also he had brought no halfpenny; and I told him that just for that evening he might stay, but that another time he could not without paying.
THE BOYS OF B. COURT
His large head and the powerful expression of his face made me think how bad, or how good, he might be, according to the way he turns. I heard that evening that he was one of the worst (English “troublesome”) boys in the Court. To my surprise he came the next time with his halfpenny; and, when I said that Lush the cobbler was late, he offered very civilly to go for him. I thanked him, and made much of him. During the evening he worked more steadily than any of them; and ever since he has been my best boy, both as regards working, and coming even when he has nothing to mend, just because he seems so happy to be there and to do any little thing that he possibly can for me. Mrs. Jales says that he is now much better in the Court too. To say I like him says little, for I do a great deal more than that. A woman would be strangely made who did not get to feel him as somewhat her own property, and, even if he goes wrong afterwards, not to lose her affection for him easily.
Braemar,
September 16th, 1879.
To Mrs. Shaen.
In an age when doubt assails so many young spirits with its light destruction of belief in the eternal and intangible, will not the possession of such a brother be perhaps to the elder ones something no other possession could be? Those who have never loved and lost may think of the dead as buried and done with; those whose lost ones had nothing noble or specially characteristic which was good about them, may think of them as having lived; but whoever has seen and loved a being with peculiar beauty and nobleness, will have moments, and those the best and deepest in life, when the certainty that that being still lives, will be quite quietly triumphant over all clever talk or brilliant flippancy. I think to you all Frank will be always a blessing—in spite of pain.
OPEN SPACES PRESERVATION
On the attempt to save the site of Horsemonger Lane Gaol as an Open Space.