fellow-countrymen in the recent years of scarcity and distress; who, now that those clouds are passed, and a more happy and prosperous period accompanies a time of plenty, are still willing to make any personal effort or sacrifice to save their neighbours and their country from a recurrence of such scenes aa have stricken with grief and sorrow the hearts of the stoutest during the late years of suffering. We see in all that there surrounds us a silent but eloquent proclamation of the will, the persevering and untiring determination of a people expressed in a way that no statesman can safely overlook. A visit to this scene, with a knowledge of all that has preceded its construction, and a knowledge of the objects and principles which it demands, is well calculated to produce an impression and conviction on the mind of any reflecting man, whatever his previous opinions may have been."
From the Patriot:—
"Yes, the League is a great fact; but this Bazaar is a greater fact still: and it affords us no little satisfaction to have entered the lists in this grand rivalry of devotion to the cause of the people.Our fair friends have made contributions more ingenious and more beautiful, and our great manufacturers have presented offerings more splendid and more costly; but we confidently challenge the whole array of contributors to produce one which could be viewed with greater interest by any well-constituted mind, than that which we venture to claim as, in some sort, our own contribution. In some obscure corner of the theatre, probably where no eye can see them, or where, if seen, they will be passed by wholly unregarded, lie some huge bundles of flocks, sufficient to make 500 beds, together with sundry bales of quilts, blankets, and sheets; the design of which is, to enable benevolent persons to purchase, at the nominal price of five shillings, a perfect bed-suit for gratuitous bestowment upon poor peasants in Oxfordshire and Dorsetshire. How came they there? In the Patriot, of March 20th, there appeared, from a letter addressed to Mr. Harcourt, one of the members for Oxfordshire, which we inserted at the writer's request. On turning to that letter, it that indefatigable friend of the poor, the Rev. W. Ferguson, of Bicester, will be found to convey a picture of misery in the midst of plenty not to be surpassed by the most destitute or squalid court or alley in the city of London, or any part of the empire. This harrowing description of utter destitution found its way from our columns into those of the League and the Economist; and, whether owing to its original insertion in the Pairot, or to its transcription by our contemporaries, those interesting contributions to the League Bazaar which we have noticed are the gratifying result."
