Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-03-03

for the sight of green trees, grass and How
ers. The one "day in the country" which
most of the clergymen in the poor districts
try and give their parishioners once year,
is a memory that remains actively present
with them, and one they never tire OF recall,
ing. Years after they will be able to tell
you every single trifing incident OF the
blessed glorious day when they saw green
fields, meadows in flower, and, greatest Joy!
of all, perhaps got glimpse OF the sea!
Many will bring home sods of turf, or roots
of common little ferns. which they will
plant in pot and tend with care such as
Mr.. Chamberlain would even think super
hous to expend on 4 rare orchid.
No wonder, therefore, that the work OF the
Kyrle Society in seizing hold of every strip
of open space they could lay their hands on
and transforming it into fair garden, Wnere
children can play and where the tired men
aud women can sit at rest after, or In the IN
tervals of, their days labor, under tne
shade of trees and surrounded by the slgnt
anu perfume of flowers, has been not only
one of the greatest blessings to the over
crowded and overworked population OF
London, but has also been one of the most
reforming and civilizing influences which
has ever been brought to bear upon them.
We have Shakespeare's word for. it, that
finding tongues in trees, books in the run
ming brooks, sermons in stones, }" precedes
also finding "Good in everything" and the
mental relaxation which a working man
feels when he can sit and smoke his pipe on
comfortable garden seat among trees and
flowers, must go far to make him more con-
tented and satisfied with his lot.
GASES IN THE CITY'S DESERT.
The plan of annexing disused church
yards, and making them into gardens, has
been crowned with success. In many parts
OF London, an open space would be an i'm
possible thing to find, but everywhere there
are, or rather there used to be, those terrible
eyesores of damp neglected churchyards.
with rickety, tumble-down tombstones COW
cred with mildew. One by one these eye
sores to our metropolis are being improved
away, trim gardens, with smooth turf and
flower beds, are taking their place; the
desert is being made to blossom like the
rose; and very soon it will, hope, be i'm
possible to find London churchyard such
as Dickens described in Bleak House, under
the name of Tom-all-Alones.
The Tightening of the darkness of the lives
of the poor would not be complete if music
did not form large part of the programme.
There are several societies in London whose
one aim it is to supply the poor with good
music. It is safe to say that there is room
for them all; for there is nothing that ap-
peals more successfully than music to the
sympathies and feelings of our less fortu-
nate brothers and sisters. Into their dark
apathetic end" of which Tennyson speaks,
music seems to come like the rainbow as a
promise of better things. 1t takes them out
of themselves, it lifts them out of the sordid
unloveliness of their surroundings, and not
only rejoices their hearts, but braces their
imaginations, and helps to give them a
touch of that enthusiasm without which the
lives of each one of US is but an empty shell
after all.
AN ANTIDoTE TO SOCIALISM.
mind me of child who has been brought
up apart from other children, and who has
to be taken by the hand and literally taught
to play. Like such a child, the poor need
to be taught to enjoy themselves, to see the
loveliness of nature and of art.
The bitter struggle for existence has made
them blind, deaf and dumb to aught save
toll. But all work and no play not only
makes Jack dull boy, but an ill-tempered
one into the bargain; and therefore such
work as that done by the Kyrle Society
should be looked upon, not only as being an
effort in the right direction on the part of
the rich to pay their debt to the poor, but
also as one of the best antidotes to the poison
OF Socialistic doctrines that show, of late
years, such tendency to spread.
In the tair Tuscan "City of Flowers, I"
Florence, there is a street called the "Borgo
degli Allegri," the "Street of the joyful
Ones" and it received its name from the
fact that it was here that the people first
had the joy of seeing Cimabue's great
picture of the ''Virgin and Child" They
were made joyful by the sight of beauty and
fervor in art. The beauty came to them as
revelation, the fervor was theirs already;
for those were the simple days of strong and
childlike beliefs. But though most of that
simplicity and lightheartedness have de-
parted from the world, the consultations of
beauty, whether in art or in nature, remain;
and to those who try tto the utmost of our
power" Ito quote the motto of the Kyrle
Society to share those consultations with
their less fortunate brethren, all honor is
due for their gallant efforts to Tighten the
darkness of sorrow, misery and toll.
GERTRUDE E. CAMPBELL.