In

I HARDLY know how it happened that, in the course of my obscure clerical career, I drifted finally into the East End of London. Any destiny of the sort would have been extremely abhorrent to all my finer feelings at the commencement of my clerical career. my time I had moved about considerably, and the lines had fallen to me in pleasant places. I had had a West End curacy, where I read prayers for a very celebrated preacher; and when the great man took himself and his celebrity elsewhere on a Sunday, which he did very frequently, I was called upon to fill his place in the pulpit. The unqualified looks of disgust and disappointment which met me on such occasions had the effect of making me feel very uncomfortable. Not that I in the least degree blamed my highly cultivated congregation. I was conscious that my discourses were very raw and very poorly delivered; but I was only just ordained, and in those days-and perhaps I have not materially improved sinceI had a very narrow share of thoughtfulness or reading. If my rector had left me to my cottage lectures, surplice duty, and the CHRISTMAS, '83.

visitation of the poor, I should have done very well, for I really delighted in work of this kind; but I could not stand the critical and sour looks which were directed at me in the regrettable absence of my chief. This was especially the case with strangers who had been attracted by the report of my rector's eloquence, who sometimes went out of church slamming the door behind them, and leaving depreciating remarks with the verger. I then went to a succession of fashionable watering-places, and though I was never a popular preacher, by compressing my remarks within ten minutes, and making allusions to the current topics of the day, I 'gave much satisfaction to the customers,' as a churchwarden, who was likewise a bootmaker, once appropriately remarked. Í was then in a very affluent town parish, and there was only one poor family in the whole district, and they were not so poor, as the head of it was an artisan earning good wages. A dead set was made upon this luckless individual by all the good and goody people of the parish, who gave him tracts, beef-tea, domiciliary visits, &c., to an extent which would have ex

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hausted the energies of any ordinary parish.

I visited my solitary poor man with much regularity, until he asked me one day, in a surly tone, how I would like it myself. I then determined that I would no longer infringe on the liberty of the subject. The people gave me tea and turn-out to any extent, so much so that I had to lay down a rule that henceforth I would only accept dinner invitations. But time rolled on; there was no accession of income and no prospect of promotion. This, however, is the average lot of the British parson, and I did not complain. But there was a deeper dissatisfaction still which happily found place in my too easily contented nature. I thought that I ought to be doing better and more enduring work. There are three stages in the life of a clergyman. The first stage is when he takes up his work full of ardour and enthusiasm. Then comes the long middle stage, when so often the heart grows faint and the hands feeble. Then, if the man has any good in him, he brightens up and endeavours to do some good work before the end; otherwise his life is constantly degenerating into something thinner and poorer.

I went and talked over matters with my old friend Bertram.

about getting away. It truly is invigorating and delightful work.'

To a man of my ecclesiastical experiences this was an entirely novel line of argument.

'You have never yet been what I should truly call a parish priest. You have never lived for your people and among them, and made them the first consideration second to none, and found all your occupation and interest in working among them. Give yourself thoroughly to the good work, as you promised at your ordination, and you will never regret it.'

So I settled down at the East End, and I am bound to say that Bertram proved himself a friend and a brother to me. Also there was a certain fascination to me in the work. Human beings are,

after all, very much alike. There are only two classes of people in the world, said Lady Mary Wortley Montagu-men and women. I met a few clerks in business houses as gentlemanly and intellectual as men whom I had known at the University, and maidens in simple, humble attire who, gorgeously apparelled, would attract attention in splendid assemblyrooms. But I confess that these instances were few and far between. For the most part my surroundings were infinitely sordid. It required all the vaunted enthusiasm of humanity to carry me through my work. With the exception of my vicar Bertram, and the two medical men of the district, there were really no highly educated men among us. The doctors were indeed a great deal too busy to give much time to the parsons. Also the neighbouring parsons had a great deal too much work to do to enable them to fraternise sociably with their brethren. It would be difficult to convey an idea to the uninitiated what work in an East End parish really

is. In the biggest street of our parish there were only two families that made any pretence of going to church or chapel. There were not half a dozen homes in which

two servants were kept. The streets seemed full of good houses, but each house was let out into several tenements, and a whole family might be huddled into one small apartment. There was not much vice-for vice, as a rule, is rather expensive, and comes to much money-but there was a shocking series of negations as to positive virtues. It certainly did not strike me that honesty much abounded. I had the ground-floor of a house-the best that the district afforded, but which my relations shuddered to see me in-and, for the sake of the light, I used to put my writing-table exactly opposite the front window. It was possible for an adroit person, going along the street, to slip his hand through the open window and abstract anything from the table. In fact, considerable adroitness was shown by some of my parishioners, and the table in its time suffered not a little spoliation. One person was actually detected by a policeman, who exhibited considerable annoyance because I refused to prosecute. I feel quite sure, however, that it never answers for a clergyman to prosecute one of his own people. I found it best to withdraw my table to a safe distance from the window. I am glad to say that the family of the young lad whom I refused to prosecute, often sent me flowers with which the said table was adorned. Despite this unfortunate incident, I positively aver that there is much less wickedness in the East End than in the West.

The theory of our parish organisation was that every house in its turn should be visited. We always worked steadily in this direc

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tion, but from the constant changing and shifting of the people we could not make very sure of attaining our object. Then there were certain lists that had a claim to more constant attention. First, there came those who were in a condition of real illness, sometimes urgent and dangerous, of which one had a great many examples, especially when smallpox was rife in the parish a short time before my coming. Next, we had our list of aged and bedridden persons who regularly belonged to our church, who expected a regular visit, and were not at all averse to receiving a regular dole. Poor souls! small blame to them. was little enough that we could do among so many, and our effort was to make this little go as far as it could. We were able to give a little teaching and comfort to the afflicted, and I am sure that the afflicted gave even teaching and comfort to us poor parsons by the quiet and even thankful way in which they endured their manifold adversities. But when everything had been put down to the good on the one side of the account, I confess that there was a total absence of any enlivening element except for the occasional tea-fight which we got up for the sake of our poor. The surroundings were depressing. The parsons are so very, very human after all; and though Bertram considered that the general situation was very encouraging,' I confess I did not seem to see it. Of course there was the great danger of dropping into a groove -even of breaking down altogether. Perhaps my feet had well-nigh slipped, but it so happened that. I was strengthened and relieved by the touch of an angel's wing.

I was looking down my list one afternoon. Our parish doctor and I used to compare lists at times.

I found that a doctor's visit was about five minutes, but a visit from a clergyman to his patient would average a quarter of an hour. As I looked at my list that afternoon my conscience smote me. There was a certain widow Beddan whom I had not called on for nearly six months. Hers indeed was no case of urgency. She was old and infirm, and could only get to church under very favourable conditions. I had not seen her there for a long time. My excuse to myself was that there had been an unusual pressure upon us of late. Still, widow Beddan must have her due, and I resolved to go and see her without fail.

She lived in a cellar. I had to grope my way down a dark slimy staircase to her underground abode. At the best of times it would be dark down here; but it was now also the gloaming of the afternoon, and the solitary rushlight only created Rembrandt-like shadows in the corner where the old woman was propped up in her wooden chair.

'Well, dame, I beg your pardon. I hoped to have come and seen you long ago, but I have been very busy.'

Bless your heart, sir, you be main good. I should like to have gone to see you at the church; but my rheumatios have been so bad, and my eyes are not good, and I can't find the places in the prayerbook.'

I discoursed to the old woman for a few minutes on those topics of consolation which seemed best for her. Like the thirsty ground drinking in the dew, she listened about the land very far off where sorrow and sighing should flee

And sure enough close by her there was lying a little heap of parcels. There were tea and sugar and jelly, and a set of picture-tracts, and a quantity of new flannel.

And who brought you all these things?'

'It was just an angel from heaven, sir. heaven, sir. I was sitting here, as might be now, very much in the dumps, as might be now, in the afternoon only three days ago, and in came a real born lady— there be no doubt about it when you see one-and I was a lady'smaid myself in my younger days, before I married poor Beddan the carpenter, who used to do all our work for us when I was in service -and in she comes beautiful to behold, with her lovely dress; and she asks leave to read to me, which she did beautiful, and asked me all about who and what I was, and what I wanted; and next day she came and read to me again and brought me all these things.'

'Do you know her name?'

'Not from Adam, sir, except that no angel could be sweeter than she was.'

Ah me! I came to know so well the truth of what my ancient friend said.

I asked Bertram, when I next saw him, if he knew anything of the lady who had made this happy descent upon our parish.

'O yes,' he said, 'that was one of Monson's people from Belgravia.' Monson, he explained, was very good, and gave them a sermon and an offertory once a year. Some of his people came over from the West End in a sporadic way to stare at the East End, and find what such a kind of country was like. As a rule much did not come of it. Their interest was soon satisfied, and they came no more.

It appeared that this lady's

name was Ursula Beauchamp, the daughter of a baronet deceased, large-estated and famous in his day, and she generally lived with some great friends.

She was not one of those who just appeared for a day and then disappeared for ever. All through the London season she came regularly on an average once or twice a week.

A week or two later I was working one day on my A listthat is, a list of our most urgent cases. There was a poor dying girl in whose case we took the deepest interest. It was a case which a London parson meets not uncommonly in his experience. A poor girl ruined and deserted by a married scoundrel whose deception she found out too late; the lapse into sin and ever-increasing infamy; the illness brought on by cold and exposure and alternations of unwholesome indulgence with actual starvation; the chronic disease which would only have one certain termination. Such was the history from which delicate ladies instinctively shrink-and who can blame them?-but at the same time which demands all the help and sympathy which pure womanhood could render to the unhappiest of the sisterhood.

As I entered the room, the poor dying patient was sobbing bitterly. A lady was sitting very close to her. Her arm was thrown around the sufferer, and she was pressing her to her bosom, to her kiss.

I thought of what the poor widow had said about an angel coming to her, and, indeed, she seemed an angel of pity and love,

this pure and radiant being, so retired and peaceful, doing Mercy's errand amid the most sorrowful and degraded surroundings, and, like Heaven's own sunlight, gathering from the pollution no stain, from the darkness no shadow, but

bringing light and healing on her wing.

I need not tell more of this poor child's history; for, indeed, she was little more. I did my duty, poor earthly priest as I was; and my ministrations, which I distinguish altogether from myself, may have had their effect in soothing and enlightening her. But it was the kindly lady-visitor who did the real work, and produced the most good. She made the poor sufferer's mind easy about nursing and nourishment, and sought, as surely a woman might far better than any man, to bring her back to the blessed paths of peace and repentance. Gradually the thoughts of home and childhood and early innocence came back to the poor girl, and she faded away peacefully at last without a sigh of regret. Sometimes, even up to the present day, in thinking over her history, I recall the lines which Hartley Coleridge, that gifted being with so many temptations and struggles, wrote on the Magdalene :

'She sat and wept, and with her untressed