A LITTLE before Christmas I received an intimation through the women whom I used to meet, that their husbands would be glad to talk with me, if I would give them an opportunity for that purpose. I fixed an evening, and sixteen men came. They told me they had been thinking a great deal about the bad management of their affairs generally, and especially about their habit of buying everything at a great disadvantage; that they wished very much they could see their way to do better. One man had a copy of the rules of a Loan Society which had worked very well in other places, and might be a great help to them. They would require assistance from some of the gentlemen of the neighbourhood to help them to start it. This they asked me to obtain for them, and also the use of the school-room, where they might make their payments; since, if they had to go to a public-house for this purpose, they might as well abandon all thought of saving. Two or three of the men told me they wanted, in some quiet way, to learn to read and write better; for though, when they were asked, they said they could do both, yet they could do neither well enough for the occupation to be pleasant to them. I knew what they meant by the “quiet way:” men have a great dislike to learning as children, or with children. I told them, as to the writing, the best thing they could do would be to save a few sixpences, and buy some of Darnell’s copy-books. Any man might teach himself to write well from them, with no other assistance than just being told how to hold his pen. Good reading, too, they might acquire by constant practice and listening to others who could read better than they.