their neighbourhood. There are no sacrifices which they should not be prepared to make, as a moral condition of their holdings, when the industry of their district is in adversity.
The case is far otherwise with hundreds of subscribers to various relief funds. It makes one’s heart glow to read of whole companies of artizans and labourers in several counties who have given up their Exhibition excursion, and sent the money to Lancashire. It is pleasant to hear of domestic servants, and warehouse clerks, and the workmen in builders’ yards, and children in schools and families, clubbing their shillings and pence; but there is something more moving in the express and instant self-denial of hard-working and intelligent men and women who sacrifice the holiday, and the pleasure, and the improvement of a visit to the Exhibition which must be now or not at all. These classes of benefactors show that, if too many of the people of England are still asleep or drowsy, some are wide awake. If we consider that every man who gets up and bestirs himself rouses several others, we may hope that we are getting on, though the calamity seems to be advancing faster still.
The relief given is too small. There seems to be a general agreement about this,—supposing that it is possible to give more. The answer is, that if the people need more to keep them in health and hope, they must have it. We must all give, rather than that anybody should sink. It may be possible for people to live on eighteenpence a week, if they are clothed, and have beds to lie on; but, if bedding and clothes are in pawn, and the grate is empty, nobody can sustain life and health on a shilling, or fifteen, or even eighteenpence a week. Why should not relief be afforded by private benevolence in the form of releasing clothes and furniture from pawn, so that the eighteenpence might suffice? The objection is, that the things would soon be in pawn again, or that some of them would be sold for drink. On which it is again remarked, that the pawning was for the most part done before the regular relief was instituted, and that it is not likely to be repeated while the relief continues. As for the barter for spirits, the police reports show that there can be no great degree of that abuse. There are fewer offences committed in this time of stringent trial than in the gay days of prosperity; and the drinking and smoking are, in fact, restrained within very narrow limits. Anyone who is disposed for a promising experiment in benevolence may thus, it appears, be doing great good by releasing from pawn the serviceable clothing and bedding of impoverished families, who are not likely to get their property back in any other way.
The subject of employment,—regular paid employment for the factory people till the mills, are going again,—is too large for my limits. Of course, it is the very foremost question in connection with relief; and we all have our own ideas upon it: but I must leave it on one side to-day, on account of its vastness as well as its difficulty. I am the less unwilling to do this for the impression I have that the readers of Once a Week will feel themselves more nearly concerned in the other points of the case. They will probably say that it must be left to the authorities to devise occupation for so many thousands of people. It seems to me that nothing effectual will be done in that way unless ideas proposed by individuals are urged upon the guardians and dispensers of the funds: but I fully agree that the details of the various methods of giving aid concern everybody.
Emigration has been much discussed. Miss Rye’s operations in Manchester are full of comfort and promise. There are wrongheaded people there as everywhere who object for reasons which show that either they do not understand the plan, or they do not feel that there is any duty to the colonies involved in the case. We may pass over the gentlemen who coolly propose that Miss Rye should take unsteady girls and young thieves off their hands, and leave them all the best of the young women. We may pass over the ladies who complain that trained house-servants emigrate, while the rough ones remain, who have everything to learn. We may pass over the wrangling which looks like a scramble for the best order of young women, as if there were not thousands more than can be by any means assisted as we could wish. We may pass on at once to the fact that Miss Rye and her aides are succeeding in a work which does good to everybody concerned, and harm to none. She disburdens the relief funds of a few (would they were more!) of the respectable, industrious and well-conducted young women, who would be doomed to idleness and hunger here while, in the colonies, the wives of clergymen, merchants, farmers and artisans are wearing their lives out by doing all the work of their own houses. These young women will soon repay the cost of their removal, while creating comfort where they go, and no doubt marrying as fast as their place can be supplied. One good way of helping, then, is by sending money to Miss Rye, or clothing to girls who might have a good chance if they could get an outfit.
But there are others who want to go. What can be more affecting than the letter to the “Times,” dated September 12th, of the 130 Manchester overlookers, who are ruined and hopeless here, and long to get away! They have worked and saved: they have now lost all their savings: they are not a class who can endure to throw themselves on the rates; and they implore their countrymen to send them where they may conceal and yet retrieve their poverty. It is too probable that many of these are over the age prescribed, for sound reasons, as a condition of Government emigration: and there may be other disabilities in the particular cases: but the general truth remains that every family transplanted to a colony where labour is scarce is put in the way of fortune, and reduces the pressure at home. It is therefore a good way of helping to assist the emigration of men or women,—in families or singly, who are young and strong, and sincerely disposed for work. To inquire and use influence on their behalf; to raise a loan for their passage; to look to their outfit;—these are things which some of us can do; and some of us could hardly do better.
Every plan proposed seems to bring us round to the consideration of the clothing of these hun-
