: Ragged Homes and How to Mend Them by Bayly Mrs Mary - Poor Great Britain Juvenile fiction

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INTRODUCTORY.

"Give all thou canst; high Heaven rejects the lore Of nicely calculated less and more."

WORDSWORTH.

We not unfrequently hear people speak of life in such a way as would lead us to suppose that there had been some mistake as to the date of their birth. Had they come a little earlier or a little later, it would have been different; but the present seems to afford them no object of interest. They complain of intolerable dulness, the weariness of life; and in watching the cheerless, the objectless existence of such people, we wonder that it is recorded of only a single individual, that one morning he shot himself, for the reason assigned on a slip of paper which he had left on the dressing-table--"I am tired of living only to breakfast, dine, and sup."

I have often thought, when listening to such complaints, of the prayer of Elisha for his unbelieving servant, "Lord, I pray thee, open his eyes, that he may see;" and if the Lord would do for them as He did for this servant, and open their eyes--not to see "mountains full of horses and chariots of fire" waiting to deliver them--but alleys, and lanes, and villages, full of the needy and the sick, waiting for loving hearts and kind hands to come and help them to rise from their degradation, wretchedness, and filth,--the strain would be changed; and, in the contemplation of such a vast amount of labour, followed by such rich reward, we should rather expect to hear, if it must still be the language of complaint:--

"O wretched yet inevitable spite Of our short span! and we must yield our breath, And wrap us in the lazy coil of death; So much remaining of unproved delight!"

There are many indications in the present day that the fields are "white unto harvest." Several things, that were looked upon some years ago as experiments, have been so eminently successful, that no unprejudiced mind can doubt that they are the means which God has blessed, and by which He intends to accomplish a great work of reformation in this country. It was a glorious sight at St Martin's Hall, on the 2d of March, when 567 young persons came forward to claim the prize for having remained a twelvemonth in a situation; and, were it not for the strictness of the rules, excluding all apprentices, requiring a written character from a master or mistress, it was stated that as many as 1500 would have been present. All these had been rescued from well-nigh certain destruction by the Ragged School, and had there received the education which qualified them to take these situations. There must have been joy in the presence of the angels of God that night, as they witnessed these rescued ones sitting together, and listening eagerly to words by which their souls might live; and which, if the prayers of many there were answered, would prepare them to receive an incorruptible prize, that can never fade away.

One of the most interesting discoveries of the past few years has been, that the humblest instead of the grandest agency is required to accomplish this work which the wisest heads have found so difficult. A little sketch of the early history of one of God's most successful agents will shew that "His thoughts are not as our thoughts;" for it would not have entered into the heart of man to have suggested such a preparation for usefulness. "A drunken father, who broke her mother's heart, had brought a young girl of fifteen, gradually down, down from the privileges of a respectable station, to dwell in a low lodging-house in St Giles's. The father died shortly afterwards, and left her, and a sister five years of age, orphans in the midst of pollution, which they, as by miracle, escaped; often sitting on the stairs or door-step all night, to avoid what was to be seen within. An old man, the fellow-lodger of the children, and kind-hearted, though an Atheist, had taught the elder to write a little, but bade her never read the Bible, since it was full of lies; and that she had only to look around her in St Giles's, and she might see that there was no God. She had learned to read and knit from looking continually at the shop-windows. She married at eighteen years of age her present husband, and for the first time in her young memory knew the meaning of that blessed word, 'home;' although the home was but a room, changed from time to time in the same neighbourhood. After many years of considerable suffering, from loss of children, ill-health, and other calamities, she took shelter one rainy night in an alley which led up to a little Mission Hall in Dudley Street. She entered, and heard it announced that books would be lent, on the next evening, from a newly-formed library for the poor at that place. Going early, she was the first claimant of the promise. She had intended to borrow Uncle Tom's Cabin; but a strong impulse came over her, which she could not resist--it was as if she had heard it whispered, 'Do not borrow Uncle Tom; borrow a Bible.' So she asked for a Bible. 'A Bible, my good woman?' was the missionary's reply. 'We did not mean to lend Bibles from this library; but wait, I will fetch you one. It is a token for good that the Book of God, the best of books, should be the first one asked for and lent from this place.' He brought her the Bible, and asked if he should call, and read a chapter with her. She said respectfully, 'No, sir, thank you; we are very quiet folk, my husband might not like it. I will take the book, and read it for myself.' The Lord's time was come. His message then first entered her house, and went straight to her heart. The Divine Spirit applied the Word with power; and the arrow of conviction was ere long driven home by suffering and affliction.

"A severe illness laid her prostrate, and to this hour she feels--in a way that we who help her in her work cannot feel--what is meant by sickness and poverty coming together."

My acquaintance with the poor began very early. My father's house stood alone, surrounded by beautiful lawns, wood, and water. Our nearest neighbours were the poor people in a village about five minutes' walk from our home; most of them were simple labouring people, and as children we were trusted to go amongst them without much superintendence from our elders. Our dear mother often employed us on errands of mercy to them; and as soon as we could read well enough, we were sometimes sent to cheer the solitary hours of some poor invalid by reading to him. Our relations to each other were so kindly and pleasant, that we always met with a hearty welcome; and for years, I believe, I knew something about the interior of every cottage in the place. I remember even then feeling astonished at the wretched management I saw, especially with regard to children; and as we did not live in any fear of one another, I sometimes took upon myself to remark to the "gudewife" that so-and-so was never done at home. All this was taken in good part: the reply was generally a laugh, and "Law, my dear, poor people's children isn't like gentlefolk's;" or if my observations extended to cooking or house-cleaning, it was, "Law, bless you, you doesn't know anything about that; gentlefolks never does." Notwithstanding all these rebukes, I still thought over these things; and have thought over them, to a greater or less extent, ever since; and the result is, the deliberate conviction that so long as the wives and mothers of the poor continue such as we generally find them, we cannot look for any very great improvement in their social position.

I have known many women, under thirty years of age, with six or eight children, so totally unqualified for almost everything which they had to do, that I have wondered how they managed to exist at all. I am now, of course, speaking of those below the class from which we usually obtain our domestic servants; and amongst this class, more unfit than any other for life's solemn duties, the earliest marriages are contracted, apparently without any idea that at least as much preparation is needed as is deemed necessary for breaking stones on the road.

If a lady feels herself unequal to the management of her family, she can call in the aid of nurses, governesses, and schools; and thus her defects may in some measure be made up by assistance from without. But who or what is to step in between the poor mother and her children? If she cannot train them during the first few years of infancy, they remain untrained; and not only are the wise man's words proved true, that "a child left to itself bringeth its mother to shame," but it is found that the multiplication of these families thus left to themselves, bringeth a nation to shame. When we look honestly at things as they are, we have no right to be much surprised at such a result: it is unreasonable to expect to reap what has never been sown. Seven years of careful training is not thought too much for those who are to be employed in the making of our shoes, our coats, or in the building of our houses. The education of the men of this country is generally, from a very early age, adapted to their future employment. Hence, as might be expected, there is no lack of clever artisans, who have indeed a higher character for cleverness than for goodness. But the girl, who is to grow up to exercise an influence upon persons more than upon things, is left to scramble on as best she can, generally content to do as badly as those who have preceded her; and yet, in the words of one who has thought and written much upon the subject--"It is to the poor man's wife that we must chiefly look, when we indulge the hope of reducing that frightful amount of crime which, with all our inventions, discoveries, and improvements, sometimes awakens a fear that we may not really be in so prosperous a condition, socially and nationally, as our rapid progress in what is called civilisation would lead a superficial observer to suppose."

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