"I mean the same kind of hat. Tall and short; stout and thin; slim or
pudgy; they all wear the same horrible, round hats--I can't bear to look
at them. I vow I'd give them all a different hat for Christmas."
"Oh! my dear, you can't do that--you would spoil them--and it's against
the regulations. You must remember that these children are orphans!"
"Being orphans is bad enough," declared the girl, "but those hats are
worse. Well, I can't teach them, but I might try some other poor
class?"
"Why, let me see. The fact is that we haven't any"--he was speaking
slowly, casting his mind over his field--"very poor people in this
church. There used to be a number; but they don't come any more. They
must have moved out of the neighborhood. I must make my assistant look
them up."
"You have no poor, then?"
"Not in this congregation. The fact is this church is not very well
suited to them. They don't mix with our people. You see our class of
people--of course, we are doing a great work among the poor, our
chapels--we have three, one of them, indeed, is a church and larger than
many independent churches. Another has given me some anxiety, but the
third is doing quite a remarkable work among the working people out in
the east end--that under my assistant, the young man you interested
yourself so much in last year--and which your ball committee was good
enough to consider in selecting the object of its benevolence."
"Yes, I know--Mr. Marvel. I will go out there."
"Oh! my dear, you couldn't go out there!"
"Why not? I want to see him."
"Why, it is away out on the edge of the city--what you might call the
jumping-off place--among manufactories and railroad shops."
"Yes, I know. I have been out there."
"You have--why, it is away out. It is on--I don't recall the name of the
street. It's away out. I know it's near the street-car terminus that
your family own. It's a very pretty chapel indeed. Don't you think so?
It is natural that you should take an interest in it, as your aunt, Mrs.
Argand, helped us to build it. She gave the largest contribution toward
it. I don't know what we should do without charitable women like her."
"Yes, I know. And Mr. Marvel is coming on well?"
A change came over the face of the rector. "Oh, very well--rather an
ungainly fellow and very slow, but doing a very good work for our
parish. I have been wanting to get the Bishop to go there all this year
as there are a number of candidates for me to present; but he has been
so busy and I have been so busy----"
"I will go there," said Miss Leigh, rising.
"I don't think you will like it," urged the rector. "It is a very bad
part of the town--almost dangerous, indeed--filled with working people
and others of that sort, and I don't suppose a carriage ever----"
"I will go in the street cars," said the girl.
"The street cars! Yes, you could go that way, but why not come here and
let me assign you a class?"
"I wish to work among the poor."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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