CHAPTER XIX.
IN THE WARD.
My next interview was with the rector of a church west of Yonge street, the congregation of which, although attended by many of the elite in Toronto uppertendom, mainly consists of the lower middle class, and of the respectable inhabitants of the St. John’s ward streets. In this church, as in a few others in the city, it may be said in the words of the oldest poetry, “The rich and the poor meet together, for the Lord is the maker of them all.”
This clergyman does not wish his name published, but states his readiness to do so in a letter to The News should any doubt be expressed as to the accuracy of the facts reported.
The portion of Toronto from whence his congregation is drawn covers the poorest and least reputable part of St. John’s ward—Teraulay, Elizabeth, and University streets, with the stretch of lanes and alleys between them, east and west; but north and south from these lanes extend smaller lanes, or rather rearages between the houses in the front streets, and occupying the place of the closets and woodsheds. In this network of slums comes and goes a fluctuating population of pauperism, the enfants perdus of the city, all those broken down by vice or poverty or misfortune.
One morning at the early hour of three this clergyman was awakened by a hard knock at his door. He put his head out of the first window and asked what was the matter. A man on the door-step said that his wife was dying, would Mr. ⸺ visit her? The clergyman hurriedly dressed, and accompanied his guide, who was far-gone in liquor, to a yard in the rear of one of the bye lanes alluded to above. As they entered the yard a number of small curs about the various premises began to bark, on which Mr. ⸺ beheld to his astonishment, several old wooden boxes gradually raised up, from each of which, like the head of a turtle from its shell, protruded the head of a boy who had chosen this strange sleeping-place, the bare ground for his mattress,
AN OLD BOX FOR HIS BED-CLOTHES!
Satisfied that no danger was to be feared, the unkempt little heads were withdrawn under their boxes.
They entered a room, full of men and women, on a table in which, covered with a scanty rag, was laid the corpse of the woman, who, the clergyman soon ascertained, had been dead for three hours. The husband, he shrewdly suspected, had asked for this visit in order to obtain drink-money, under pretence of assistance towards funeral expenses. The occupants of the room, male and female, were, most of them, more or less drunk; they belonged to the lowest type of Irish hoodlum; in the center of the room near the table on which lay the corpse, sat up a skinny old hag, repulsive and horrible in her mirth. Mr. A⸺ was soon pressed for a small immediate sum of money, “jist to make things dacent.” But my friend Mr. ⸺ is possessed, not only of great shrewdness and resolution, but has also the physical strength so necessary in visiting such dens. He refused their request for money, but said he would come next day and help. This kind announcement was by no means received with enthusiasm. The old crone in the bed exclaimed “musha, lave the gintleman alone; sure to-morrow we’ll sind to the ladies at the convint, and it’s they will do the dacent thing for us!” This appeal to the odium theologicum was judged to be ill-timed by the others, one of whom gave the old lady a dig in the ribs which sent her flying from the bed to the floor.
Next day he purchased a plain but neatly got up coffin at a cost of six dollars, with a shroud to match, and sent it to the house of mourning. But when this warm-hearted clergyman later in the day met the bereaved husband the latter broke out with “Arrah, tare ’an ages! did yer riverence think me woife’ud be buried in a thing like that, and she a rale lady born? Sure it ’ud disgrace the honor of the family!” On being thus rebuffed, Mr. ⸺ told the man