The First Fruits.

Feilding Star, Volume I, Issue 191, 14 February 1907, Page 2

The First Fruits.

Thk scheme outlined above had only been in force v few days when the mail which reached here yesterday arrived, but there was plenty of evidence of tho wisdom of the step taken and the fact that useful work could be accomplished. In fact, so pronounced had been tho demands on the intentions of tho promoters that it had been decided to opon a number of branches in the provincial towns. From the time the bureau opened the first day until it closed the stream of applicants was unending. There were men in frock coats and silk hats, in threadbare clothes of Bond street cut in ready-made suits that had seen much wear. Actor followed mechanic, schoolmaster succeeded clerk, profesisonal man fame after commercial traveller. Seme of the women arrived in furs; others in costumes that every breeze must have pierced like a knife. But on thing was common to most of the callers — an expression of utter weariness and despair. A few hid their misery under a smile, but the rest betrayed their wretchedness even in walk and voice. Tho change in the appearance of the visitors they left was remarkable, however. They seemed to have thrown off a great weight, and to be imbued with new hope and joy in life. All publicity was avoided by showing applicants into private waiting-rooms if the officers in charge happened to be engaged. The variety of cases for which sympathy was asked was extraordinary — unfortunate men and women who had become slaves to the drug habit ; some who had succumbed to a passion for intoxicating drinks; men who had embezzled their employers' money, borrowed it and were unable to pay it back ; lonely folk, lost in the great wilderness of London's immense population, and who could not stand the strain ; married couples who contemplated suicide because of their inability to earn enough to live upon; men who had got out of touch with their employment and could not get in the running again ; a foreigner who had married an English girl and was sent co prison for stealing money to provide her luxuries, only to find when he came out that she had transferred her fickle affections; and so on. All applicants were given good counsel, advice as to the course t ■ pursue, assistance to obtain billets, to drive the wolf from the door, and to tide over the period of misery until a better condition of things ai rived. One development of the scheme was that a well-known specialist in mental diseases offered any help he could give, even to treat free at his home anyone who required attention, while the Recorder of Sandwich and Bamsgate, from the Bench, expressed unbounded approval of the movement. The great success which has attended this really philanthropic attempt to cope with the lowest depth of mental misery, speaks volumes for tb6 wisdom of those who find comfort in trying to render aid to the forlorn and helpless.