In Darkest England, and the Way Out

by William Booth

To begin with, there would be a large amount of the ordinary ship's work that the Colonists could perform, such as the preparation of food, serving it out, cleaning the decks and fittings of the ship generally, together with the loading and unloading of cargo. All these operations could be readily done under the direction of permanent hands. Then shoemaking, knitting, sewing, tailoring, and other kindred occupations could be engaged in. I should think sewing-machines could be worked, and, one way or another, any amount of garments could be manufactured, which would find ready and profitable sale on landing, either among the Colonists themselves, or with the people round about.

Not only would the ship thus be a perfect hive of industry, it would also be a floating temple. The Captain, Officers, and every member of the crew would be Salvationists, and all, therefore, alike interested in the enterprise. Moreover, the probabilities are that we should obtain the service of the ship's officers and crew in the most inexpensive manner, in harmony with the usages of the Army everywhere else, men serving from love and not as a mere business. The effect produced by our ship cruising slowly southwards testifying to the reality of a Salvation for both worlds, calling at all convenient ports, would constitute a new kind of mission work, and drawing out everywhere a large amount of warm practical sympathy. At present the influence of those who go down to the sea in ships is not always in favour of raising the morals and religion of the dwellers in the places where they come. Here, however, would be one ship at least whose appearance foretold no disorder, gave rise to no debauchery, and from whose capacious hull would stream forth an Army of men, who, instead of thronging the grog-shops and other haunts of licentious indulgence, would occupy themselves with explaining and proclaiming the religion of the Love of God and the Brotherhood of Man.

CHAPTER 5. MORE CRUSADES.

I have now sketched out briefly the leading features of the threefold Scheme by which I think a way can be opened out of "Darkest England," by which its forlorn denizens can escape into the light and freedom of a new life. But it is not enough to make a clear broad road out of the heart of this dense and matted jungle forest; its inhabitants are in many cases so degraded, so hopeless, so utterly desperate that we shall have to do something more than make roads. As we read in the parable, it is often not enough that the feast be prepared, and the guests be bidden; we must needs go into the highways and byways and compel them to come in. So it is not enough to provide our City Colony and our Farm Colony, and then rest on our oars as if we had done our work. That kind of thing will not save the Lost.

It is necessary to organise rescue expeditions to free the miserable wanderers from their captivity, and bring them out into the larger liberty and the fuller life. Talk about Stanley and Emin! There is not one of us but has an Emin somewhere or other in the heart of Darkest England, whom he ought to sally forth to rescue. Our Emins have the Devil for their Mahdi, and when we get to them we find that it is their friends and neighbours who hold them back, and they are, oh, so irresolute! It needs each of us to be as indomitable as Stanley, to burst through all obstacles, to force our way right to the centre of things, and then to labour with the poor prisoner of vice and crime with all our might. But had not the Expeditionary Committee furnished the financial means whereby a road was opened to the sea, both Stanley and Emin would probably have been in the heart of Darkest Africa to this day. This Scheme is our Stanley Expedition. The analogy is very close. I propose to make a road clear down to the sea. But alas our poor Emin! Even when the road is open, he halts and lingers and doubts. First he will, and then he won't, and nothing less than the irresistible pressure of a friendly and stronger purpose will constrain him to take the road which has been opened for him at such a cost of blood and treasure. I now, therefore, proceed to sketch some of the methods by which we shall attempt to save the lost and to rescue those who are perishing in the midst of "Darkest England."

SECTION 1.—A SLUM CRUSADE.—OUR SLUM SISTERS.

When Professor Huxley lived as a medical officer in the East of London he acquired a knowledge of the actual condition of the life of many of its populace which led him long afterwards to declare that the surroundings of the savages of New Guinea were much more conducive to the leading of a decent human existence than those in which many of the East-Enders live. Alas, it is not only in London that such lairs exist in which the savages of civilisation lurk and breed. All the great towns in both the Old World and the New have their slums, in which huddle together, in festering and verminous filth, men, women, and children. They correspond to the lepers who thronged the lazar houses of the Middle Ages.

As in those days St. Francis of Assissi and the heroic band of saints who gathered under his orders were wont to go and lodge with the lepers at the city gates, so the devoted souls who have enlisted in the Salvation Army take up their quarters in the heart of the worst slums. But whereas the Friars were men, our Slum Brigade is composed of women. I have a hundred of them under my orders, young women for the most part, quartered all of them in outposts in the heart of the Devil's country. Most of them are the children of the poor who have known hardship from their youth up. Some are ladies born and bred, who have not been afraid to exchange the comfort of a West End drawing-room for service among the vilest of the vile, and a residence in small and fetid rooms whose walls were infested with vermin. They live the life of the Crucified for the sake of the men and women for whom He lived and died. They form one of the branches of the activity of the Army upon which I dwell with deepest sympathy. They are at the front; they are at close quarters with the enemy. To the dwellers in decent homes who occupy cushioned pews in fashionable churches there is something strange and quaint in the language they hear read from the Bible, language which habitually refers to the Devil as an actual personality, and to the struggle against sin and uncleanness as if it were a hand to hand death wrestle with the legions of Hell. To our little sisters who dwell in an atmosphere heavy with curses, among people sodden with drink, in quarters where sin and uncleanness are universal, all these Biblical sayings are as real as the quotations of yesterday's price of Consols are to a City man. They dwell in the midst of Hell, and in their daily warfare with a hundred devils it seems incredible to them that anyone can doubt the existence of either one or the other.

The Slum Sister is what her name implies, the Sister of the Slum. They go forth in Apostolic fashion, two-and-two living in a couple of the same kind of dens or rooms as are occupied by the people themselves, differing only in the cleanliness and order, and the few articles of furniture which they contain. Here they live all the year round, visiting the sick, looking after the children, showing the women how to keep themselves and their homes decent, often discharging the sick mother's duties themselves; cultivating peace, advocating temperance, counselling in temporalities, and ceaselessly preaching the religion of Jesus Christ to the Outcasts of Society.

I do not like to speak of their work. Words fail me, and what I say is so unworthy the theme. I prefer to quote two descriptions by Journalists who have seen these girls at work in the field. The first is taken from a long article which Julia Hayes Percy contributed to the New York World, describing a visit paid by her to the slum quarters of the Salvation Army in Cherry Hill Alleys, in the Whitechapel of New York.