Regeneration | Page 8

of fiction, and once acted as secretary to a gentleman who
travelled on the Continent and in the East. Losing his employment, he
took to a life of dissipation, became ill, and sank to the very bottom. He
informed me that his ideals and outlook on life were now totally

changed. I have every hope that he will do well in the future, as his
abilities are evidently considerable, and Nature has favoured him in
many ways.
I interviewed a number of the men employed in these works, most of
whom had come down through drink, some of them from very good
situations. One had been the superintendent of a sewing-machine
company. He took to liquor, left his wife, and found himself upon the
streets. Now he was a traveller for the Salvation Army, in the interests
of the Waste-Paper Department, had regained his position in life, and
was living with his wife and family in a comfortable house.
Another was a grocer by profession, all of whose savings were stolen,
after which he took to drink. He had been three months in the works,
and at the time of my visit was earning 6s. a week with food and
lodging.
Another had been a Barnardo boy, who came from Canada as a ship's
steward, and could find nothing to do in England. Another was a
gentleman's servant, who was dismissed because the family left
London.
Another was an auctioneer, who failed from want of capital, took to
drink, and emigrated to Canada. Two years later he fell ill with pleurisy,
and was sent home because the authorities were afraid that his ailment
might turn to consumption. He stated that at this time he had given up
drink, but could obtain no employment, so came upon the streets. As he
was starving and without hope, not having slept in a bed for ten nights,
he was about to commit suicide when the Salvation Army picked him
up. He had seen his wife for the first time in four years on the previous
Whit Monday, and they proposed to live together again so soon as he
secured permanent employment.
Another had been a soldier in the Seaforth Highlanders, and served in
the Egyptian Campaign of 1881, and also in the American Army.
Subsequently he was employed as a porter at a lodging-house at a,
salary of 25s. a week, but left because of trouble about a woman. He
came upon the streets, and, being unable to find employment, was
contemplating suicide, when he fell under the influence of the Army at
the Blackfriars Shelter.
All these men, and others whom I spoke to at random but have no
space to write of, assured me that they were quite satisfied with their

treatment at the works, and repudiated--some of them with
indignation--the suggestion that I put to them tentatively that they
suffered from a system of sweating. For the most part, indeed, their
gratitude for the help they were receiving in the hour of need was very
evident and touching.

THE GREAT PETER STREET SHELTER

WESTMINSTER
This fine building is the most up-to-date Men's Shelter that the
Salvation Army possesses in London. It was once the billiard works of
Messrs. Burroughes and Watts, and is situated in Westminster, quite
near to the Houses of Parliament. I visited it about eight o'clock in the
evening, and at its entrance was confronted with the word 'Full,'
inscribed in chalk upon its portals, at which poor tramps, deprived of
their hope of a night's lodging, were staring disconsolately. It reminded
me of a playhouse upon a first-night of importance, but, alas! the actors
here play in a tragedy more dreadful in its cumulative effect than any
that was ever put upon the stage.
This Shelter is wonderfully equipped and organized. It contains sitting
or resting-rooms, smoking-rooms, huge dormitories capable of
accommodating about 600 sleepers; bathrooms, lavatories, extensive
hot-water and warming apparatus, great kitchens, and butteries, and so
forth. In the sitting and smoking-rooms, numbers of derelict men were
seated. Some did nothing except stare before them vacantly. Some
evidently were suffering from the effects of drink or fatigue; some were
reading newspapers which they had picked up in the course of their
day's tramp. One, I remember, was engaged in sorting out and
crumpling up a number of cigar and cigarette ends which he had
collected from the pavements, carefully grading the results in different
heaps, according to the class of the tobacco (how strong it must be!)
either for his own consumption or for sale to other unfortunates. In
another place, men were eating the 1d. or 1/2d. suppers that they had
purchased.
Early as it was, however, the great dormitories were crowded with
hundreds of the lodgers, either in bed or in process