He was certainly a good specimen. His cab was his own; he was well dressed, and his horse as brisk as himself. It was evident that “the one day in seven” agreed with them. It is well known that the life both of man and beast is shortened by the breach of the fourth commandment, and it is clear that the Great Legislator blesses its observance.
We have occasionally fallen in with the regular colporteurs, and been convinced of the good done by the sale of their religious literature. Once at a coffee-stall we were greeted by an emphatic “God bless you and your work,” and the gratuitous contribution did not seem to interfere with the monetary. The holders of these stalls are always glad of something to read, and are willing to distribute wholesome reading to their customers. Strange incidents sometimes occur when you take a poor, wearied, out-of-work yet respectable fellow-creature, for a cup of coffee and a plate of cake or bread and butter, to one of these wayside restaurants. One evening at dusk we encountered a glazier, who, having received the tract, said he had not tasted food since daybreak. He was a foreigner, a Pole, who had been in England ever since the Polish insurrection of some thirty years ago. His father was a gentleman. He had a wife and children, and had been looking for work all the day. A trifle for them and refreshment for him opened his heart, and he gave his address. Subsequently a district visitor found it, and discovered that he was a Polish Jew. He was not in, but his wife said that it was contrary to their faith to receive relief from one not of their own religion; but in his hunger food was heaven-sent through “a sister,” and he could not refuse it. Neither did she reject a shilling. The family were subsequently placed under the protection of a charitable Jewish lady, who said, with truth, “That her people took such care of their own poor, that they had no need to apply to the Christian.” Still, it is well that Jew and Gentile should meet, as they now do, happily, in works of general benevolence. The reign of Christ will begin when universal love takes the place of sectarian hate, and religious persecution ceases.
Time and space would fail us to tell how the men of the Fire Brigade love reading, and how they showed us with pride a number of The British Workman, sent to them monthly by Miss Weston—for are not the brave fellows mostly sailors? Or how other public servants speak gratefully of monthly gifts of religious books sent by friends interested in them, and circulated amongst them. Let no one imagine that either tract, magazine, or book is thrown away, though a kindly discretion, and, perhaps, a cheerful manner are needed for their distribution. We have made an inroad into one of the great laundries, and find that both men and women employed rejoice at “something to read” during their brief leisure. Text cards are always welcomed.
“I shall have this framed. It just suits me,” said one.
“I wonder that ladies do not visit our large laundries,” remarked the superintendent.
This visitation has been begun by members of the Y.W.C.A. May it prosper! These workers in the steam laundries have a hard life of it, and stand for long, long hours over their laborious toil. Here are elderly women and young girls, ready to welcome anyone who will say a kind word to them, and, perhaps, benefit them thereby.
“I like a whole story that I can read all through,” said one of the latter, and the cheap reprints of good stories published by the Religious Tract Society are invaluable. Moreover, they can be lent from one to another.
It is strange that one still meets with people comparatively young who cannot read. Much of their religious knowledge is often due to hymns. A man said he liked the old hymns best, and had known “Glory to Thee” by heart ever since he was a boy. Others are proud of the fact that their children will read to them whatever we are pleased to give them, and sometimes even beg for a book apiece for all the olive branches—“For fear one should be jealous of the other,” said a cabman. To which we replied that “jealousy was expensive.”
The other day we fell in with a gipsy encampment: vans and tents settled on a bit of waste land, having been turned out of a neighbouring holding for building purposes. In one of the tents we found a young man and woman, a lovely three-year-old child, and an infant not yet a fortnight old. The father of the family, aged twenty-two, had been to night-school once upon a time, but his learning was nil; the mother, seated on the ground, baby in arms, could not read; but a ragged urchin who had crept in was going to school the following Monday. The young couple were strangely handsome, and rejoiced in the gipsy name of Loveridge. The woman said she had prayed to the Lord when she was ill. “What else was there to do? I have never been a great sinner; you know what I mean, ma’am. A gentleman comes here to preach on Sunday.”
She did not seem fully to apprehend her need of a Saviour, but acknowledged that we were all sinners. It was a strange, sad scene. She, seated on her bed of rags at one end of the small, dark, smoky, stifling tent; her husband also on the ground making skewers at the other, and apologising for untidiness; the infant apparently dying, the little girl affectionately stroking our garments. The mother said she had had no food that day, for the times were bad; and the trifle we offered was instantly despatched to a shop at some distance for “a little oatmeal and arrowroot,” the husband being the joyful messenger. Still, she said she liked tent-life better than she should life within stone walls. “I have been used to it, and I suppose it is what we are brought up in that we like best,” she added, simply, and in perfect English.