The Press.
London, England, 1854-03-25 00:00:00

MARcu 25, 1854.

So successful has been this training that
our author, writing more than a year ago, tells
us of his own personal knowledge,
Only one of those who have had twelve months' training
has turned out badly. But two have left the institution at
their own request after having been hi it three months,
and but four after two mouths' residence. Only twenty-
nine have been expelled. And there is every reason to
believe that at least two hundred have been redeemed.
We think it a favourable symptom for the
:tritality of the institution that it has reached
its present state of activity and prosperity by
that gradual growth which in the moral as
well as the vegetable world is the chief condi-
tion of strength and durability. The most in-
teresting portion of the present volume is the
account of the steps by which Mr. Charles
.Nash, the founder of the institution, was led
first to conceive and then to execute his pre-
sent design. It seems that having, some-
where about the year 1843, given up the
commercial pursuits to which he was brought
up, in order to make himself the teacher of a
ragged school, he did not confine himself to
the mere routine duties of his office:—
School being ended, he visited the haunts of vice for which
Westminster is remarkable, and invited the ragged chil-
dren to attend his instructions. And as lie lived in the
City, and had to go through the Strand on his way to the
school, like the good Samaritan, he did not pass by the
youthful vagrants and criminals whom he met on his road,
but, tarrying to speak to them, invited them to his school.
This invitation some of them most cheerfully accepted.
A serious difficulty now presented itself. The school in
Pye-street provided no food for the scholars; and the lads
of whom we are now writing pleaded that it was useless to
attend the school in the day, if at night they were obliged
to beg, or to steal necessary food. It was impossible to
meet this exigency in the case of all the lads ; but two of
the most urgent eases were selected, and for these, though
not without great difficulty, food and lodging were pro-
vided.
• Subsequently Mr. Nash, consulting his zeal
rather than his means, took a larger room, and
increased the number of his boarders to six. As
he and they took possession of their new
apartment they knelt down together, and
prayed God to give them that daily bread
which they scarcely knew where to look for
among men. He begged of all his friends,
pawned his clothes, stinted himself in his
meals; but all would not do. Help first came
from a quarter whence it could least be ex-
pected; and this seems to us the most touch-
ing circumstance of the whole narrative. The
day scholars who were fed at home (we may
guess how scantily), knowing to what straits
their master and his boarders were reduced, of-
fered to save for their use what they could spare
from their own meals; and thus a subscription
of crusts was daily brought to the school, which
our author compares to the food collected by
Elijah's ravens, and which, as we have heard it
described, must, in a less serious and more
literal sense, have much resembled a sup-
ply brought by such purveyors. But what
a tale did every tiny uninviting fragment
tell of childish gratitude and childish self-
denial! and such as it was this supply
was steadily continued till better resources
were found.
But other difficulties arose. Mr. Nash's
zeal for his boarding establishment was thought
incompatible with his engagement as teacher
of the ragged school, and he was required
either to give up his little flock or his master-
ship, and with it his only certain means of
support. He did not hesitate for a moment,
but, with a generous recklessness of conse-
quences which in such a case may be accounted
faith in God and reliance on the charity of
man, he resolved to incur the risk. The sa
orifice, however, was not immediately en-
forced; and in the meantime his undertaking
had become more known, and friends and re-
sources had rapidly multiplied :
The notice to our schoolmaster to quit the day school
had not been carried into execution. It was withdrawn a
few weeks after it had been given. But it was again given ;
and now he is required to leave his daily employment. This
he did, March, IMO, and devoted himself entirely to the
work of reforming and training criminal youth. He was
now dependent for rent, for the support and education of
the lads, and for the supply of his own wants, upon the
contributions of the benevolent. Hitherto the entire
management of this good enterprise has been in his own
hands. But the time had come to appoint officers and a
committee. This was done at a public meeting convened
in St. Martin's-hall on the 9th of May, I kW. At this meet-
ing, president, treasurer, secretaries, and committee were
appointed ; and Charles Nash, whom in this brief sketch
we have successively called ragged-school teacher sn
schoolmaster, was installed as governor and correspondyd
secretary.