THE SALVATION ARMY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7415, 25 August 1885, Page 6

THE SALVATION ARMY.

' ADDRESS BY MARSHAL BOOTH. ■ A VRV large gathering of the Salvation Army was held in the barrack* last night to bear Marshal Booth, eon of General Booth, founder of the movement, deliver an address upon "The progress of the Salvation Army all round the world." There were also present Major Barrett, Adjutant Spratt, Captain Field and Captain Backington. The service was preceded by the ordinary service, led by Marshal Booth, and the singing of popular hymns, which the Marshal aooompauied on a grand pianoforte. After Adjutant Spratt had delivered a few stirring words, the Marshal commenced his address. He said they had now 16 War Crys, printed in 13 languages, and the circulation in Britain was 500,000; they counted nearly 700,000 reformed people among them, while there were 400,000 staunch soldiers under 2650 officers. There were 1050 oorps, and there were, on an average, 19 servioes a week, at which there were upwards of nine millions of hearers. In the colonies the War Cry had a circulation of 74,000, with a average of 296 readers to each copy. There were 300 officers in charge of 155 corps and 252 oatposts, which had sitting accommodation for 156,000 persons. He was pleased to state that permission had been granted by the General to oommenoe operation s in China, that country teeming with population. What does the Salvation Army do in a city of 50,01)0 personssay, with 25,000 Protestants and 5000 Eorpan Catholics— 20,000 who do not go to a service? It was that latter number the Salvation Army drew into its folds. He was glad to see so many strangers at their meeting, for they courted inspection, and asked them to look down deeply into the feelings that influenced them in their work. A clergyman, who critically observed the progress of the movement, said the people numbered thousands who had sought God and found Him by it. Take, for instance, that little story they all knew of two young men who had gone into one of the largest factory towns in England and commenced among ten thou sand of the working classes by mounting a waggon, and soon the crowd they gathered round them numbered 2000, and the result was stated by a member of Parliament to be a change socially and radically in that town. Why were they so much talked of and written down ? It was because they went straight at the root of the evil. He believed, and he said so with all the sincerity he knew of, that God was going to prolong the end of the world until the Salvation Army had conquered the world. {" Amen," "Amen.") He believed that every harlot and reprobate would yet dance for joy before the Lord by the aid of the Salvation Army. (" Hallelujah.") It was by no new truths that they were working these changes ; it J was by the old, old story of the Gospel and i the old Faith. As long ss there were officers J and soldiers the work would go forward in undiminished strides. He would not speak of the anti-tobacco movement, and their efforts used against the liquor traffic, which he need not now remind them was the curse of the English-speaking race. He had read with regret in the columns of the morning paper of the London Plague, which was known as the social evil, and the seething mass it held in its clutches. They had, he was glad to say, organiied in the colonies - in Sydney and Christchurch—Sisters' Rescue Brigades, which he hoped would deal with the iniquittea traffic. By the aid of a number of gentlemen in the hall be proposed to send the Following cablegram to General Booth at the headquarters of the Army, which he thought would act with more force as coming from the 15fl»O0O members of the Army in the colony ;■ — 156,000 persons, who congregate in Salvation Army Barracks, learn with the deepest indignation and shame of the perils of young girls in England, and pray the Queen and Parliament to abolish the iniquitous traffic." [Loud volleys were here firm.} Mr. Booth then described the rise of the Army from his father's first efforts among the coetermongera in 1565 in the ea»t •nd of London. These were so successful that a theatre was soon engaged, and in 1880, in Whitechapel, before assembled thousands, five young persons were commissioned to go to America to the millions there, while in St. James's Hal! £1000 was collected in one night to send a mission to France. He described the work of his sister, Miss Booth, and Miss Charlesworth in Paris, and their treatment in Switzerland, which ultimately ended, after much opposition, in fifty corps being established. He quoted a beautiful hymn which Miss Booth composed when imprisoned in "Heufohatel for eleven days. The Army went through the lowest walks in vice to reclaim the fallen. He himself had ventured into one of the "flash homes," although warned not to go, and accompanied by a detective he found thirteen young ladies reclining in a room, the furniture of which could not be purchased for £600. They had inspired him what to do, and seeing a French lady there, he sang a hymn in her language at the pianoforte. One of them, who was the daughter of a Judge, palled out a letter, amid tears, and said it offered to keep her home open if she left her course of vice. Another was a clergyman's daughter, a third an actress, and two others of highly respeotable families. He had the pleasure of snowing that the first was restored to her .'family, the second obtained a situation, which she kept, and the third, fourth, and fifth were rescued. They were told that the Army only worked among the lower classes, and swept and scoured the gutters of vice ; but they would yet walk among the upper classes, where quite as muoh evil existed. Ha pictured to his audience the labours he bad had to endure in opening fire upon Manchester, and very humorously related his imprisonment because he refused to pay a .fine of 325, imposed for gathering large openir meetings. He concluded by urging them p assist in maintaining the Prison Gate brigade. "Canaries" were then sent round for subscriptions in aid of liquidating the debt upon lie building, and they sang to the tune of £50. It was announced that this evening, )rior to the service, a procession of the Army jad all its sympathisers would patrol the ;treeta upon similar lines to the recent one ■ • Christchuroh, to demonstrate the work -he Army was accomplishing ; and the meet- ■ gig terminated at ten p.m. with the Benediclon, pronounced by Marshal Booth.