One poor creature, in the last stage of poverty and dirt, proved to be
an honours man in Oxford. We looked up his record in the University.
He assured us that he intended to begin again a new life, and we
agreed to help start him. We took him to a respectable, temperance
lodging-house, paid for a bed, a bath, and a supper, and purchased a
good second-hand outfit of clothing for him. We were wise enough only
to give this to him after we had taken away his own while he was
having a bath in the tub. We did not give him a penny of money,
fearing his lack of control. Next morning, however, when we went for
him, he was gone--no one knew where. We had the neighbouring saloons
searched, and soon got track of him. Some "friend" in the temperance
house had given him sixpence. The barman offered him the whiskey; his
hands trembled so that he could not lift the glass to his mouth, and
the barman kindly poured it down his throat. We never saw him again.
In this lodging-house work a friend, now a well-known artist and
successful business man, often joined us two doctors.
My growing experience had shown me that there was a better way to the
hearts of my Sunday-School boys than merely talking to them. Like
myself, they worshipped the athlete, whether he were a prize-fighter
or a big football player. There were no Y.M.C.A.'s or other places for
them to get any physical culture, so we arranged to clear our
dining-room every Saturday evening, and give boxing lessons and
parallel-bar work: the ceiling was too low for the horizontal. The
transformation of the room was easily accomplished. The furniture was
very primitive, largely our own construction, and we could throw out
through the window every scrap of it except the table, which was soon
"adapted." We also put up a quoit pitch in our garden.
This is no place to discuss the spiritual influences of the "noble art
of boxing." Personally I have always believed in its value; and my
Sunday-School class soon learned the graces of fair play, how to take
defeat and to be generous in victory. They began at once bringing
"pals" whom my exegesis on Scripture would never have lured within my
reach. We ourselves began to look forward to Saturday night and Sunday
afternoon with an entirely new joy. We all learned to respect and so
to love one another more--indeed, lifelong friendships were developed
and that irrespective of our hereditary credal affiliations. The
well-meaning clergyman, however, could not see the situation in that
light, and declining all invitations to come and sample an evening's
fun instead of condemning it unheard, or I should say, unseen, he
delivered an ultimatum which I accepted--and resigned from his school.
My Australian friend was at that time wrestling with a real ragged
school on the Highway on Sunday afternoons. The poor children there
were street waifs and as wild as untamed animals. So, being
temporarily out of a Sunday job, I consented to join him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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