(a frank-spoken military man, who had lost
a leg in the Caffre war), that, as a rule, the
duration of the shelter extended by the society
is limited to three nights to Londoners, and
to seven nights to country people. In special
cases, however, special exceptions are made;
and every disposition is shown to strain a
point in favour of those weary wanderers,
and to bear with them, as far as is consistent
with justice to others. A ration of eight
ounces of bread is given to each admitted
person on entrance, another ration when
they leave between eight and nine the next
morning.

Accompanied by the secretary and the
superintendent, I was now shown the
dormitories. We visited the men's side first. Passing
a range of lavatories, where each inmate
is required to wash his face, neck, and
arms; hot water being provided for the
purpose; we ascended a wooden staircase, and
came into a range of long, lofty, barn-like
rooms, divided into sections by wooden
pillars. An immense stove was in the centre,
fenced in with stakes ; and, in its lurid hospitable
light, I could fancy the man in black
and some score more brothers in misery,
greedily basking. Ranged on either side were
long rows of bedplaces, trough-like, grave-
like, each holding one sleeper. In the early
days of the society (it has been in
existence for more than thirty years) the
inmates slept on straw; but, as this was found
to possess many drawbacks to health,
cleanliness, and to offer danger from fire,
mattresses stuffed with hay and covered with
waterproofing, which can be washed and aired
with facility, have been substituted. Instead
of blankets, which harbour vermin and are
besides less durable, there are ample coverlets
of Basil leather, warm and substantial.
With these; with the ration of bread; with
genial warmth, the objects sought for are
attained. It is not an hotel that is required.
The slightest modicum of luxury would
corroborate Pragmos, and be an encouragement
to the worthless, the idle, and the depraved.
The Refuge competes with no lodging-house, no
thieves' kitchen, no tramps' boozing-cellar;
but it is a place for a dire corporeal necessity
to be ministered to, by the simplest corporeal
requisites. A roof to shelter, a bed to lie on,
a fire to warm, a crust to eat—these are offered
to those who have literally nothing.

By the flickering gas, which is kept burning
all night, I stood with my back to one of
the wooden pillars, and looked at this sad
scene. The bed-places were rapidly filling.
Many of the tired-out wayfarers had already
sunk into sleep; others were sitting up in
bed mending their poor rags; many lay
awake, but perfectly mute and quiescent.
As far as the eye could reach, almost, there
were more ranges of troughs, more reclining
heaps of rags. I shifted my position
nervously as I found myself within range,
wherever I turned, of innumerable eyes,—
eyes calm, fixed, brooding, hopeless. Who has
not had this feeling, while walking through
an hospital, a lunatic asylum, a prison? The
eyes are upon you, you know, gazing sternly,
moodily, reproachfully. You feel almost as
if you were an intruder. You are not the
doctor to heal, the priest to console, the Lady
Bountiful to relieve. What right have you
to be there, taking stock of human miseries,
and jotting down sighs and tears in your
note-book?

I found the surgeon at a desk by the fire.
He had just been called in to a bad case;
one that happened pretty frequently, though.
The miserable case was just being supported
from a bench to his bed. He had come in,
and had been taken very ill; not with cholera,
or fever, or dysentery, but with the disease
my friend, Sharplynx, won't believe in—
Starvation. He was simply at death's door
with inanition and exhaustion. Drunk with
hunger, surfeited with cold, faint with
fatigue. He did not require amputation
nor cupping, quinine, colchicum, nor
sarsaparilla; he merely wanted a little brandy
and gruel, some warmth, some supper and
a bed. The cost price of all these did
not probably amount to more than six-
pence; yet, curiously, for want of that
six-pennyworth of nutriment and rest, there
might have been a bill on the police station
door to-morrow, beginning, Dead Body
Found.

I asked the surgeon, if such cases occurred
often. They did, he said: Whether they
ever ended fatally? Occasionally. Only the
other night a man was brought in by a police
sergeant, who had found him being quietly
starved to death behind a cart. He was a tall,
athletic-looking man enough, and was very
sick. While the sergeant was stating
his case, he suddenly fell forward on the
floor—dead! He was not diseased, only
starved.

Seeking for information as to the general
demeanour of the inmates, I was told that
good conduct was the rule, disorderly or
refractory proceedings the exception. "If
you were here at eight o'clock, sir," said the
superintendent (it was now half-past seven),
"you wouldn't hear a pin drop. Poor
creatures! they are too tired to make a disturbance.
The boys, to be sure, have a little chat
to themselves; but they are easily quieted.
When, once in a way, we have a disorderly
character, we turn him out, and there is an
end of it." I was told, moreover, that almost
anything could be done with this motley
colony by kind and temperate language, and
that they expressed, and appeared to feel,
sincere gratitude for the succour afforded to
them. They seldom made friends among
their companions, the superintendent said.
They came, and ate, and warmed themselves,
and went on their way in the morning, alone.
There is a depth of misery too great for
companionship.