In Darkest England, and the Way Out

lation. We start, let us remember, from the individual, the ragged, hungry, penniless man who confronts us with despairi

han any other organisation in London, and it is the experience and encouragement which I have gained i

D AND SHELTER

d the hungry children of the East of London and of other centres of our destitute populations, should come into the midst of this abundance, but as it appeared impossible for me to take them to it, I se

London two and a half years ago. This has been followed by others,

xtent to which these Food and Shelter Depots have already struck their roots into the strata of Society which it is pr

POTS AND SHELTE

ight Measu

.... 116,4

tons 106,964

ons 46,98

cwt. 13,

ons 29,22

..............

s ..............

...............

ns .............

s .............

..............

...............

12 tons ..........

..............

...............

s .........

...... 14

nd to make them the threshold of the whole Scheme. Those who have already visited our Depots will understand exactly what th is me

ese both are worked together and minister to the same individuals. Many come for food who do not come for shelter, although most of those who come for shelter also come for food

distribution of victual

e Li

LD AT THE

a

er Bas

ith Br

Cocoa pe

oa With Bread

ad

. .. Per

. .. With

.. .. ..

. .. .. .

ans .. ..

Pudding .

Pudding ..

. .. .. .

m .. .. .

Roll .. ..

g and Potat

eef .. .

tton .. .

cup 1/2d;

cup 1/2d;

up 1/2d;

Jam or Marmala

, 1d per Quart.

d they can in very urgent cases give relief, but the rule is for the food to be pa

pt the absolutely penniless; but it is the Shelter that I regard as the most useful feature in this part of our undertaking, for if anything is to be done to get hold of those who use the Depot, some

penny Dosshouse where, in the midst of strange and ribald company, you may be robbed of the remnant of the money still in your possession. While at a loss as to what to do, someone who sees you suggests that you should go to our Shelter. You cannot, of course, go to the Casual Ward of the Workhouse as long as you have any money in your possession. You come along to one of our S

le. You can write letters to your friends, if you have any friends to write to, or you can read, or you can sit quietly and do nothing. At eight o'clock the Shelter is tolerably full, and then begins what we consider to be the indispensable feature of the whole

who are, as they say in all sincerity, "as happy as the day is long." There is a joviality and a genuine good feeling at some of these meetings which is refreshing to the soul. There are all sorts and conditions of men; casuals, gaol birds, Out-of-Works, who have come there for the first time, and who find men who last week or last month were even as they themselves are now-still poor but rejoicing in a sense of brotherhood and a consciousness of their being no longer outcasts and forlorn in this wide world. There are men who have at last seen revive before them a hope of escaping from that dreadful vortex, into which their sins and misfortunes had drawn them, and being restored to those comforts that they had feared so long were gone for ever; na

. Any night between eight and ten o'clock you will find these people sitting there, listening to the exhortations and taking part in the singing, many of them, no doubt, un

nd with us taking in hand is no mere phrase, for at the close of our meetings our officers go from seat to seat, and if they see anyone who shows signs of being affected by the speeches or the singing, at once sit down beside him and begin to labour with him for the salvation of his soul

n the merchant service, and twelve months afterwards astonished us all by appearing in the uniform of a captain of a large ocean steamer, to testify to those who were there how low he had been, how utterly he had lost all hold on

there has never been any complaint of lack of warmth on the part of those who use the Shelter. The leather can be kept perfectly clean, and the mattresses, covered with American cloth, are carefully inspected every day, so that no stray specimen of vermin may be left in the place. The men turn in about ten o'clock and sleep until six. We have never any disturbances of any kind in the Shelters. We have provided accommodation now for several thousand of the most helplessly broken-down men in London, criminals many of them, mendicants, tramps, those who are among the filth and offscouring of all things; but such is the influence that is established by the meeting and the moral ascendanc

ho have had practical experience of the difficulty of seeking for work in London can appreciate the advantages of the opportunity to get your shirt washed in this way-if you have one. In Trafalgar Square, in 1887, there were few things that scandalised the public more than the spectacle of the poor people camped in the Squar

ay, no doubt; but still not less effective than if he were to be put up at one of the West End hotels, and would be

ELTER T

y striking examples. Here are a few, each of them a transcript of a life experience relating to men who are now active, in

associate of thieves, and drifted into crime. The following are his terms of imprisonment: - 14 days, 30 days, 30 days. 60 days, 60 days (three times in succession), 4 months, 6

his admiring parent was a "quarten o'gin." He got some education at the One Tun Alley Ragged School, but when nine years old was caught apple stealing, and sent to the industrial School at Ilford for 7 years. Discharged at the end of his term, he drifted to the streets, the casual wards, and Metropolitan gaols, every one of whose interiors he is familiar with. He became a ringleader of a gang that infested Lo

trips to sea, developing into a typical brass and rowdy. He had 2 years for mutiny at sea, 4 years for mule stealing, 5 years for cattle stealing and has altogether been in gaol for thirteen years and eleven months. He came over t

owed the sea, became a hard drinker, a foul-mouthed blasphemer, and a blatant spouter of infidelity. He drifted about for years, ashore and afloat, and eventually reached the Shelter stranded. Here he sought God, and has

ted B.A. there. After this he was on the staff of a Welsh paper. He married a decent girl, and had several little ones, but giving way to drink, lost position, wife, family, and friends. At times he would struggle up and recover himself, and appears generally to have been able to secure a position, but again and again his besetment overcame him, and each time he would drift low

e; however, with #10 in his pocket, he was too independent, and he declined; but the gentleman gave him his address, and left him. A few days squandered his cash, and clothes soon followed, all disappearing for drink, and then without a coin he presented himself at the address given to him, at ten o'clock at night. It turned out to be his uncle, who gave him #2 to go back to London, but this too disappeared for liquor. He tramp

oney, and reached Middlesbrough by road. Got work in a nail factory stayed nine months, then stole nine shillings from fellow-lodger, and again took the road. He reached Birmingham, and finding a warrant out for him, joined the Navy. He was in the Impregnable training-ship three years behaved himself, only getting "one dozen," and was transferred with character marked "good" to the Iron Duke in the China seas; soon got drinking, and was locked up and imprisoned for riotous conduct in almost every port in the stations. He broke ship, and deserted several times, and was a thorough specimen of a bad British tar. He saw gaol in Signapore, Hong Kong, Yokohama, Shangh

st situation after situation, and kept on drinking; lost everything, and came to the streets. He found out Westminster Shelter, and eventually got saved; his parents were communicated with, and help an

n of his term passed into the Reserve with a "very good" character. He was a long time unemployed, and this appears to have reduced him to despair, and so to drink. He sank to the lowest ebb, and came to Westminster in a deplorable condition; coatless, hatless, shirtless, dirty alto

ase he married a respectable girl, and tried to reform, but circumstances were against him; character he had none, a gaol career only to recommend him, and so he and his wife eventually drifted to destitution. They came to the Shelter, and asked advice; they were received, and he made application to the sitting Magistrate at Clerkenwell as to a situation, and what he

sick man soon played havoc with his little store, and he became reduced to penury and absolute want. For some time he was in the Workhouse, and, being discharged, he was advised to go to the Shelter. He was low in health as well as in circumstances, and broken in spirit, almost despairing. He was lovingly ad

ords, but those given show

d of God to the salvation of these poor fellows will not be equal

ed them, they would have gone away next day to resume, with increased energy, the predatory and vagrant life which they had been leading. But when our feeding and Shelter Depots brought them to close quarters, our officers were literally able to put their arms round their necks and plead with them as brethren who

FOR THE OUT-OF-W

e has not got his fourpence? What if you are confronted with a crowd of hungry desperate wretches, without even a penny

upplied with sufficient work to enable him to earn the fourpence needed for his bed and board. This is a fundamental feature of the Scheme, and one which I thin

and towselled hair. He has been, he tells you, on the tramp for the last three weeks, seeking work and finding none, slept last night on the Embankment, and wants to know if you can give him a bite and a sup, an

can obtain both. What can we do with him? Before him Society stands paralysed, quieting its conscience every now and then by an occasional dole of bread and soup, varied with the semi-criminal treatment of the Casual Ward, until the manhood is crushed out of the man and you have in yo

e warm shelter; here is your mug of coffee and your great chunk of bread, and after you have finished these there is a meeting going on in full swing with its joyful music and hearty human intercourse. There are those who pray for you and with you, and will make you feel yourself a brother among men. There is your shake-down on the floor, where you will have your warm, quiet bed, undisturbed by the ribaldry and curses with which you have been familiar too long. There is the wash-h

ere an

ork to pay for their lodging until they are able to go out into the world and earn wages for themselves. There is no compulsion upon any one to resort to our shelter, but if a penniless man wants food he must, as a rule, do work sufficient to pay for what he has of that and of other

op self-respect in the man, to make him feel that at last he has go this foot planted on the first rung of the ladder which leads upwards, is vitally important, and this cannot be done

hitechapel. There you will see the Scheme in experimental operation. What we are doing there we propose to do everyw

ey have now in hand is the making of benches for the Salvation Army. Others are engaged in mat-making, some are cobblers, others painters, and so forth. This trial effort has, so far, answered admirably. No one who is taken on comes for a permane

N ARMY SOCIA

rs- 36, UPPER THAMES

USTRIAL

for the homeless or workless to be compelled to go to the Workhouse or Casual Ward, food and shelter being provided for

lling to do any kind of work allotted to them. While they remain in the first class, they shall be entitled to three m

ur Directors. They will, in addition to the food and shelter above mentioned, receive sums of money up to 5s.

e permitted on the factory premises. No one under the influence of drink will be admitted.

l be closed 5 minutes after 7, 9, and 2 p.m. Food Checks will be given to all as th

the goods so manufactured at less than the market prices. In firewood, for instance, we have endeavoured to be rather above

f the Rates and Taxes, or by Charitable Contributions, should be put upon the market at less than market value, and so compete unjustly with the production of those who have in the first instance to furnish an important quota of the funds by which th

par, under-fed, and suffering from ill health, or the consequence of their intemperance. Many also are old men, who have been crowded out of the labour market by their younger generation. But

uously the whole of the labour hours. The morals of the men have been good, in not more than three instances has there been an overt act of disobedience, insubordination, or mischief. The men, as a whole, are

the rest was a shoemaker, two grocers, a cooper, a sailmaker, a musician, a painter, and a stonemason. Nineteen of these were employed in sawing, cutting and tying up firewood, six were making mats, seven making sacks, and the rest were employed in various

and re-fit, so that he may again push out to the ordinary sea of labour and earn his living. The establishment of these Industrial Factories seems to be one of the most obvious duties of those who would effectually deal with the Social

rent for a few weeks, they would tide over their difficulties, and an untold amount of misery would be averted, In such cases Work would be supplied at their own homes where preferred, especially for the women

propose at once to commence manufacturing match boxes, for which we shall aim at giving ne

tivate a spirit of hopefulness and aspiration. We shall continually seek to impress upon them the fact that while we desire to feed the hungry, and clothe the naked, and p

d, do the same; but there will be no melancholy misery-making for any. There is no sanctimonious long face in the Army. We talk freely about Salvation, because it is to us the very light and joy of our existence. We are happy, and we wish others to share our jo

REGIMENTATION O

s or cobbling the shoes of his fellow-labourers at the Factory, we have next to seriously address ourselves to the problem of how to help him to get back into the regular ranks of in

thrown upon our hands. In order to ascertain this I have already established a Labour Bureau, the operations of which I shall at onc

lable person in the parish. Even in a small town there is little difficulty in knowing who wants employment. But in the cities this knowledge is not available; hence we constantly hear of persons who would be very glad to employ labour for odd jobs in an occasional stress of work while at the same time hundreds of persons are starving for want of work at another end of the town. To meet this evil the laws of Supply and Demand have created the Sweating Middlemen, wh

ows who perambulate the streets as Sandwich Men. These are farmed out by certain firms. If you wish to send fifty or a hundred men through London carrying boards announcing the excellence of your goods, you go to an advertising firm who will undertake to supply you with as many sandwich men as you want for two shillings or half a crown a day. The men are forthcoming, your goods are advertised, you pay your money, but how mu

tuations for no less than one hundred and thirty-two "Out-of-Works" in a few days. Here, in London, we have succeeded in obtaining employment for a great number, although, of course, it is beyond our power to help all those who apply. We have sent hay-makers down to the country and there is every reason to believe that when our Organisation is better known, and in more extended operation, we shall have a great labour exchange between town and country, so that when there is scarcity in one place and congestion in another, there will be information immediately sent, so that the surplus labour can be drafted into those districts where labour is wanted. For instance, in the harve

RMY SOCIAL

R BU

following are particulars of transa

or employment-

n ..

-

=

rom Employers

en

-

=

k-Men .. ..

.. ..

3

=

uations .. ..

ry Empl

, Cleaners, &c

op in Hanbury

=

E HOUSEHOLD S

gs are possible when there is a directing intelligence at headquarters and discipline in the rank and file, which would be utterly impossible when everyone is left to go where he pleases, when ten men are running for one man's job, and when no one can be depended upon to be in the way at the time he is wanted. When my Scheme is carried out, there will be in every populous centre a Captain of Industr

n disgust and despair break your piece into fragments or throw it away. On the contrary, you keep it by you, knowing that before long you will discover a number of other pieces which it will be impossible to fit in until you fix your unmanageable, unshapely piece in the centre. Now, in the work of piecing together the fragments which lie scattered around the base of our social system we must not despair because we have in

e hand; we have waste commodities on the other. About waste land I shall speak in the next chapter; I am concerned now solely with waste commodities. Herein we have a m

needs have not out-grown the range of the individual intelligence and ability of those who dwell therein. Our troubles in large towns arise chiefly from the fact that the massing of population has caused the physical bulk of Society to outgrow its intelligence. It is as if a human being had suddenly developed fresh limbs which were not connected by any nervous system with the gray matter of his brain. Such a thing is impossible in the human being, but, unfortunately, it is only too possible in human society. In the human body no member can suffer without an instantaneous telegram being despatched, as it were, to the seat of intelligence; the foot or the finger cries out when it suffers, and the whole body suffers with it. So, in a small community, every one, rich and poor, is more or less cogni

e as practicable at the present moment, and that, as a matter of fact, it holds the field alone, for no one, so far as I have been able to discover, even proposes to re

is of a household. When I was a boy one of the most familiar figures in the streets of a country town was the man, who, with his small hand-barrow or donkey-cart, made a regular patrol through all the streets once a week, collecting rags, bones, and all other waste materials, buying the same from the juveniles who collected them in specie, not of Her Majesty's current coin, but of common sweetmeats, known as "claggum" or "taffy." When the tootling of his familiar horn was heard the children would bring out their stores, and trade as best they could with the itinerant merchant, with the result that the closets which in our towns to-day have become the receptacles of all kinds of, disused lumber were kept then swept and garnished. Now, what I want to know is why can we not establish on a scale commensurate with our extended need

t likely to furnish the largest supplies of what would be worth collection. T

convenient spot in which the servants could deposit the waste food, and a

requently, according to the season and circumstances, and transfe

tles, tins, canisters, etc. We all know what a number of articles there are which are not quite bad enough to be thrown into the dust heap, and ye

othes, all the things, in short, for which we have no more need, and for which there is

terial, our uniformed collectors would call every other day or twice a week with their hand barrow or pony cart. As these men would be under stri

of finding something which may be worth while "picking up," and should he be impudent or negligent there is no authority to whom they can appeal. Under our Brigade, each district would have its numbered officer, who would himse

ns, nor shall I ever be a party to any contentious quarrels for the control of this or that source of supply. All that is already utilised I regard as outside my sphere. The unoccupied wilderness of waste is a wide enough area for the operations of o

r. The amount of the food which she gathered was enormous. Sometimes legs of mutton from which only one or two slices had been cut were thrown into the tub, where they waited for the arrival of the cart on its rounds. It is by no means an excessive estimate to assume that the waste of the kitchens of the West End would provide a sufficient susten

, namely the Farm Colony. Much of the food collected by the Household Salvage Brigade would not be available for human consumption. In this the greatest c

or in all parts at once. The sole often wears out utterly, while the upper leather is quite good, or the upper leather bursts while the sole remains practically in a salvable condition; but your individual pair of shoes and boots are no good to you when any section of them is hopelessly gone to the bad. But give our trained artist in leather and his army of assistants a couple of thousand pairs of boots and shoes, and it will go ill with him if out of the couple of thousand pairs of wrecks he cannot construct five hundred pairs, which, if not quite good, will be immeasurably better than the apologies for boo

ee well to it that the watchdog is on the premises. But that gentleman is almost the only agency by which old umbrellas can be rescued from the dust heap. Side by side with our Boot Factory we shall have a great umbrell

even a farthing. You throw your empty bottle either into the dust heap, or let it lie about. But if we could collect all the waste bottles of London every day, it would go hardly with us if we

iece on something at the other. This objection reminds me of a remark of a North Country pilot who, when speaking of the dulness in the shipbuilding industry, said that nothing would do any good but a series of heavy storms, which would send a goodly number of ocean-going steamers

more and more the universal envelope of the rations of man. But when you have extracted the contents of the tin what can you do with it? Huge mountains of empty tins lie about every dustyard, for as yet no man has discovered a means of utilising them when in great masses. Their market price is about four or five shillings a ton, b

being overstocked, for there are multitudes of children who have no toys worth speaking of with which to amuse themselves. In these empty tins I see a means of employing a large number of people in turning out cheap toys which will add a new joy to the households of the poor-the poor to whom every farthing is importa

o which it is necessary to allude. I refer to old newspapers and magazines, and books. Newspapers accumulate in our houses until we sometimes burn them in sheer disgust. Magazines and old books lumber our shelves until we hardly know where to turn to put a new volume. My Brigade will relieve the householder from these difficulties, and thereby become a great distributing agency of che

patetic colporteurs, who will go from street to street with literature which, I trust, will be somewhat superior to the ordinary pabulum supplied to the poor. After we have sold all we co

y of a postman, and go his beat with the punctuality of a policeman, you can do great things with him. I do not need to elaborate this point. It will be a universal Corps of Commissionaires, created for the service of the public

olony, would probably soon become the medium for negotiating sundry household repairs, from a broken window to a damaged stocking. If a porter were wanted to move furniture, or a woman wanted to do charing, or some one to clean windows or any

e is London, and so enormous the numbers with which we shall have to deal, that this simple preliminary would require a cost of #25,000. Of course I do not propose to begin on anything like such a vast scale. That sum, which is only one of the many expenditures involved, wil