and disgrace the metropolis, and in assisting those benevolent institutions that are crippled and hindered from limited resources, although so largely the means, under God, of preserving “ peace within our borders, and prosperity within our palaces." To us the answer was very easy.

66

But to return to our former subject. On the 30th of April last, it was our happiness to witness a more interesting spectacle. The large schoolroom in Field Lane was crowded with interested listeners, assembled at the ninth anniversary of that invaluable institution. The Earl of Shaftesbury occupied the Chair. At the conclusion of an excellent speech, his Lordship intimated that the Committee of the school had been enabled to extend their operations through the benevolence of an excellent lady, and although he was not at liberty to mention her name, he could not refrain from alluding to her many and liberal gifts on behalf of the destitute poor, with feelings of the greatest admiration and thankfulness. This extension consisted in the fitting-up of a Night Refuge at an expense of nearly £300-which, through the influence of his Lordship, was entirely defrayed by this lady-containing one hundred separate sleeping berths, for the poor vagrant outcasts who formerly slept under the arches. It is also fitted up with cold and hot water baths, and such other appliances as are necessary to the health and temporary comfort of the hapless inmates. As it was to be opened for the first time that evening, we remained after the public meeting terminated, to witness another of still greater interest. About twenty youths, who had been supplied with tickets of admission, were standing around the door long before the hour had arrived. On being admitted, each poor creature presented a spectacle of misery wretched in the extreme. The emaciated and withered countenances, naked feet, matted hair, tattered and filthy garments, the vacant and fugitive looks blended with a smile of hopeful gratitude, were enough to melt even a hard heart to pity, and make one envy the position of their kind benefactress, who had provided a nightly home for so many homeless wanderers. The rules of the institution were read over and explained to them; a portion of Scripture was then read, followed by a short address and prayer, during which the greatest order and attention prevailed. They then retired each to his sleeping-berth, grateful for the seasonable shelter, and glad to know that in the morning they would be supplied with a scanty repast before returning to the streets.

The following table will show the numbers admitted during the first month, and the quantity of bread administered :

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THE VAGRANTS' HIDING-PLACE.

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Thus it will be seen, that about fifty was the average number accommodated each night during the first month; but more recently the whole number of berths have sometimes been occupied, as it was necessary to limit the number of admissions at the commencement. A most active and pious man has been appointed as superintendent, who remains with them from the time of their admission until their departure in the morning. His task, in many respects, is a most unenviable one, but he prosecutes his labour with great perseverance and zeal, often acting towards the penitent the part of a missionary and friend. One youth, decoyed away from his parents, has been restored to them, and is now placed in a situation, clothed and in his right mind." Others are showing the effects of the salutary influences exerted upon them by the nightly reading of the Scriptures, followed by suitable exhortations and prayer-privileges to which most of them had ever before been strangers. Several instances have occurred in which the parties having obtained employment, and thereby enabled to pay for lodgings, have returned' their thanks to the Committee for the assistance afforded them, and expressed a desire to be permitted to attend the Evening School, thus exhibiting proper feelings of self-dependence and gratitude.

The expenses connected with this appendage to the schools will doubtless be considerable; but we think they might be materially lessened if the proprietors of large club-houses and hotels, and even many families, would send to it those portions of wholesome food that are often wasted, because "unfit for table again," but which would be greedily devoured by these famishing creatures, who, sometimes almost dying of hunger," are anxiously pleading in the evening for their usual morning allowance of six ounces of bread, as "the gnawings of an empty stomach will not let them sleep." We cannot better conclude these hasty observations than by the following graphic description of the locality in which the school is situated, from the pen of a physician who lately visited it:

"Without actual inspection," he says, "it is difficult to believe the half that might be told of its loathsomeness and squalor. In some parts it is one huge brothel, in other parts a pile of caravansaries, in others are warehouses of stolen goods and manufactories of decomposing poisonous food-while the tout ensemble is the very seat of nauseating stench and putridity, demoralization and crime. I entered one of these dwellings of the poor, one clean as a poor and sickly wretch could make it; it was devoted, the lower part to a family, the upper part to lodgers. In one room in the upper story were four beds, each let at sixpence per night to a married couple. The slanting roof, reaching to within a foot of the head of the bed, was saturated with percolations, while a window-tax-escape-light served to make apparent the misery that reigned within. Shall I dwell on the scenes which may be witnessed there at any hour of the night? Do truth and justice require the whole chain of circumstances by which, from the first act of what may be truthfully termed infantile incest, the miserable daughter of such a people as are here located is sent adrift, an outcast upon the world, to bear the gibes and jeers of unrelenting society, and to be relieved of her despair or her shame only by the death-bed agonies of the withered prostitute?

Can it be that, in this age of Bible Societies, it is necessary to present the very extreme of woe to incite, not to extraordinary effort, but to simple duty? If it be so, then ere long will be a numerous class-those who vegetate in this district, if unrooted—who will regard crime as the title of admission to what, in comparison with those they have, are well appointed and wholesome dwellings. Unhappily, the standard of morality is low enough among the poorer classes; and so it must continue while every condition of their existence tends to brutalize them, and to efface every moral sentiment.

"Is complaint made of the irreligion of the masses? I ask, in all reverence, in what

attractive form does a God of mercy appear before these outcasts and wanderers? Amidst scenes and privations such as these, is it not almost a mockery to invite these people to any form of religious worship, recollecting that they must leave the prayers and praises of the temple for the brothel and the den, the purlieus of thieves, and the hiding-places of harlots ?"

DISCHARGED PRISONERS.

SOCIETY claims the right to punish offenders against its well-being, and Christian principles demand that the punishment should be accompanied and followed with reformatory measures. To change the mind and habits of the man is, doubtless, a more difficult undertaking than to afflict or confine his body, and the one is of infinitely more importance than the other. Hence our country has been led to pay so much attention of late years to the subject of prison discipline. But it appears to be necessary to follow the offender beyond the walls of the prison-house. The state of society, the condition of the discharged prisoner, require it. It is not the object of men in these days to take revenge upon erring individuals. Their reformation is desired. The language of Christian men to criminals is, We want you to live holy, unblameably-to do your duty in that state of life to which God has called you.

If this is the object of law, human and Divine, we must not, by our actions, or by our neglect or indifference, frustrate it. It cannot be questioned but that some of our criminals leave the jail with a desire to amend their lives. In the opinion of some the number is small, but with those who are in the confidence of prisoners, and know most of the working of their minds, the number is considerable, bearing a large proportion to the mass of offenders. For proof that there are such we may go to our Industrial and Philanthropic Schools, to our Refuges and Penitentiaries; and if, by voluntary means or by legislation, a bare subsistence in return for hard labour, or emigration to our Colonies, were offered to those who have been at any time incarcerated, there is no doubt thousands would be candidates for the boon; yea, more, if a severe probation for a time, consisting either of hard living and incessant labour, or any act of self-denial, were required of such prior to obtaining that humble, reasonable, and legitimate favour, there would be more applications than our boasted justice and humanity could compass. It is our duty and our interest to assist prisoners discharged from jail and promising reformation, in their exertions to obtain an honest livelihood. Their old companions are frequently found at the prison gate to welcome them on liberation, and poverty, as well as former associations, will make their friendship compulsory, unless means are used to deliver them out of their hands. The law of the country punishes and brands offenders; it moreover endeavours to reform them while undergoing their sentence; but when this is endured, discharge from prison takes place, and what follows? To expect them to obtain work and support immediately on discharge is unreasonable. Employment is not always at hand even to the industrious and honest, who are diligently seeking it-how much less to those who, on leaving the prison, find their former places (if such they had) filled up, and are ignorant as to where such labour as they can perform is to be procured; and when they know even for this they may have to try many places, and probably wait, perhaps, alas! too long, ere they can earn their daily bread. There is a strong feeling in the breast of almost every person against employing those who have been in a jail. Such is their condition. Hence, to loose prisoners on the world without offering them employment or assistance, either at home or abroad, is like saying to them, "Go, make brick, get you straw where you can find it; you are in danger from evil companions-you are destitute and degraded, ignorant and prone to crime-and though you may have been lately taught to fear God and obey the laws, and though you may have made the best and holiest resolutions, still you must take your chance, you must be left to yourself and the mercies

DISCHARGED PRISONERS.

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of the world." No wonder that offenders against the laws, on liberation from prison, and none to care for them, associate and combine together. Hence the pauper child, who absconds from the union, and is punished by imprisonment, is driven into the companionship of thieves; the infant beggar, who only obeys the parents' orders, and is imprisoned, becomes numbered among criminals; the vagrant child, who sleeps in some outhouse or archway, when he has no better place to rest in, is taken to the jail, and thus begins his downward career; the incipient, untaught, unfed, juvenile delinquent, who, without fear or knowledge of the laws of God or man, commits some petty theft, and is whipped, imprisoned, and discharged, takes his place among the enemies of society. Thus, felons, burglars, highwaymen, and murderers, are produced. Our neglect of common sense, not to say of the Christian means of prevention, is the national manufactory of abandoned criminals. When shall we become wise? When will the nation seek to prevent crime by instructing the fallen in the precepts of our holy religion, and by training to habits of industry the destitute and the depraved? Should we even wait for their matriculating in a jail, or graduating as felons, ere we attempt their reformation? Ought we not to discontinue to associate the earliest recollections of our juvenile offenders with prisons, and to cease the pursuit of a system which, from the data of past experience, makes daring and skilful marauders? Ought we not to make more use of the school and the spade, and less of the policeman and the prison? Ought we not to allow some of the advantages to infant and untutored criminals which our transported felons enjoy, and so deliver them from the disgrace, and spare the country the expense of their transportation ? The enemies of reformatory measures would direct attention to those cases which appear hopeless-but how many of these have been driven to crime by force of circumstances, and how many might have been rescued by the hand of kindness, we know not. Some, at least, of our discharged prisoners are the victims of public feeling, objects of scorn by even the honest of their own grade in society. When labourers are wanted, they are the last to be employed, if at all; when workmen are discharged, they are the first to be sent off. Their old masters are afraid to employ, and new masters are slow to engage strangers. Perhaps the discharged prisoner obtains employment without its being known that he has been in jail, but by and bye the truth comes out, and the master is actually compelled by his workmen to get rid of this stranger. If he enters a place of service under no disguise, the first thing lost or mislaid is put to his account, and he is accused of robbery; and a person under accusation or strong suspicion will have one reason less for preserving his honesty than others not suspected. The second loss of a tool or any article will be fatal to him in this situation, if he be able to hold on after the first. Servants will sometimes taunt a fellow-servant, and workmen will treat with contempt any poor unfortunate individual that may be employed in the service of their master, even when they know his object is to preserve from destitution and crime. It may be said, that this is the punishment of crime. It is, indeed; and this part of the punishment is more unmixed with mercy, more severe, and more prolonged, than any judicial sentence short of death. This penalty of crime, though it is not taken into account by the law of the land, and seldom considered by the offenders themselves, tends to make a man a wanderer like Cain, and to degrade him first in the sight of others, and then in his own; and when this ceases to be a punishment, then follows a recklessness of character and abandoned life, which scatter misery and disorder around, involving others as well as himself in moral ruin. Such a result, even in one individual, as it often brings irretrievable injury to society, and destruction in more senses than one to the criminal, should be guarded against by the wisest measures, both of mercy and of judgment. One such individual in a neighbourhood is enough to keep a whole police force on the qui vive, and hence it is folly to talk of the expense of reformatory measures, if such are calculated to attain the end proposed. The jail-bird

may be driven from the door, may be expelled the village or the town, may be treated as an outcast; but such conduct will recoil on society in some form of retribution, and it may be in anarchy and revolution. Bath, June, 1851.

Plans and Progress.

RAGGED SCHOOL ADDRESSES.-No. III.

W. C. O.

I was once in a school where all the children had been invited to a treat, and a ticket offered to every one; and every one who came was expected to be clean and tidy, and to behave well. But there was a boy called James Seton, who foolishly refused to have a ticket, and when he came to the treat his face and hands were very dirty, and he looked cross, and quarrelled with everybody; so the superintendent was obliged to send him away. You remember a parable very like this in the 22nd of Matthew, where we are told that all people, even those who sleep in the streets, and are very poor, are asked to a great and happy meeting, which is to be held in heaven.

Thousands of people are to be at that meeting, and Jesus Christ says that it will be like a king's marriage feast, where a man was found who had not on a wedding garment. So the king told his servants (in the 13th verse) to “bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness."

Now before you can be allowed to sit down at the great feast in heaven, something must be put upon your souls like the wedding garment. This something is the righteousness of Jesus; and let us see how that is like a wedding garment.

I saw a number of persons walking to a marriage in Jerusalem; they had beautiful red cloaks upon them, but I found that all these cloaks belonged to the master of the feast.

(1.) Our goodness is not good enough for heaven; it would look like "filthy rags' amongst a number of beautiful dresses; but Jesus has promised to put his righteousness upon us like "a robe."

(2.) These wedding garments were lent to all the persons who were asked to the marriage, and they had nothing to pay for them. So it is with us; for every one of you boys and girls have been invited to Christ's feast, and you cannot get into heaven with your own honesty, or truth, or love, or good temper, or obedience; but if you trust everything to Jesus, he will give you his own goodness to stand before God in, and all your sins were put on Christ when he was crucified.

(3.) The dresses I saw at the marriage feast were very beautiful to look upon, and the people were not ashamed to wear them. Are you ashamed to be thought religious? Are you afraid to be found kneeling down to pray? Are you afraid of being laughed at because you read your Bible, and love your Sunday School?

(4.) I noticed that these red dresses covered the whole bodies of the men who wore them, so that their own common clothes were quite hidden. If God, at the day of judgment, were to find any of our sins not forgiven, we could not remain in heaven; but Christ's righteousness covers all the bad thoughts and words and works of our whole lives.

(5.) Another thing about these beautiful dresses, was that they were all of the same colour and shape. Boys who love Jesus are like each other, for all their minds are like his. I can tell one of these boys in a very short time, and God himself knows which of you have the holiness of the Saviour on your souls.

(6.) The people who wore these wedding garments were marching on so happily, for it was a dress of joy; and can you point me out the happiest scholar of your school? I am sure it will be that one who has repented of his sins, and who has had them pardoned, and who has a friend in God, and who loves all his companions. That is the boy who is not melancholy when he thinks of death, but is cheerful when he remembers the glorious meeting in heaven, where he will see the apostles, and prophets, and martyrs, and angels, and saints, and the Saviour himself.

(7.) When the man in the parable was asked why he had no wedding garment, he had no excuse-"he was speechless." What excuse can you give if you have not Christ's holiness upon your heart? Can you say you are not good enough? Why nobody is good enough; and it is because you are bad that you need goodness to be