In Australia, is one to him, commencing,
"Kind Lord Ashley," in which the boy says, "I wish your lordship would
send out more boys, and use your influence to convert all the prisons
into ragged schools. As soon as I get a farm I shall call it after
your name."
A little anecdote related by Mr. Nash shows the grateful feelings of
the inmates of this institution. A number of them were very desirous
to have a print of Lord Shaftesbury, to hang up in their sitting room.
Mr. Nash told them he knew of no way in which they could earn the
money, except by giving up something from their daily allowance of
food. This they cheerfully agreed to do. A benevolent gentleman
offered to purchase the picture and present it to them; but they
unanimously declined. They wanted it to be their own, they said, and
they could not feel that it was so unless they did something for it
themselves.
Connected with the ragged school, also, is a movement for establishing
what are called ragged churches - a system of simple, gratuitous
religious instruction, which goes out to seek those who feel too poor
and degraded to be willing to enter the churches.
Another of the great movements in England is the institution of the
Laborer's Friend Society, under the patronage of the most
distinguished personages. Its principal object has been the promotion
of allotments of land in the country, to be cultivated by the
peasantry after their day's labor, thus adding to their day's wages
the produce of their fields and gardens. It has been instrumental,
first and last, of establishing nearly four hundred thousand of these
allotments. It publishes, also, a monthly paper, called the Laborer's
Friend, in which all subjects relative to the elevation of the working
classes receive a full discussion.
In consequence of all these movements, the dwellings of the laboring
classes throughout Great Britain are receiving much attention; so
that, if matters progress for a few years as they have done, the
cottages of the working people will be excelled by none in the world.
Another great movement is the repeal of the corn laws, the benefit of
which is too obvious to need comment.
What has been doing for milliners and dressmakers, for the reform
lodging houses, and for the supply of baths and wash houses, I have
shown at length in former letters. I will add that the city of London
has the services of one hundred and twenty city missionaries.
There is a great multiplication of churches, and of clergymen to labor
in the more populous districts.
