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by Parliament largely owing to the evidence furnished by Dr. Barnardo as to the iniquitous condition of the law as it formerly stood. Under the old law, which the judges themselves condemned when they administered it, there were twelve cases brought into court. Of these the majority were decided in Dr. Barnardo's favour. Only in three cases did the judges give judgment against him, and in those cases the conduct of Dr. Barnardo was admitted to be morally right although judicially it had to be pronounced legally wrong. He practised what he described as philanthropic abduction in one case only. A little girl, whose step-father was said to have twice assaulted her, was declared by the Court to have no option but to return again to the brute who was her legal guardian. To save that child from the worst outrage, which on the third attempt would probably have been completed, Dr. Barnardo, at the child's urgent entreaty, sent her abroad, thereby placing her outside the jurisdiction. This was, of course, extra legal conduct, for which he was held to have committed contempt of court, but many people still think he did nothing moro than his obvious duty. Such action as he attempted in this case and in the celebrated Gossage case, can, Dr. Barnardo says, never again be necessary, the law, which has since been altered, being now efficient to safeguard the welfare of any child or young person in jeopardy through evil-disposed relatives.

The worst that can be charged against Dr. Barnardo has been an excessive reluctance to give up children whom he has rescued from the slums to the hands of those from whom they had been delivered, especially when those persons were admittedly the mere catspaws of the priests. Dr. Barnardo is an Irish Protestant who sees the Pope through lurid spectacles, and in one or two cases he made, what seemed to me, a quite unnecessary fuss about returning the child to Catholic custody. Fortunately saner counsels now prevail on both sides. The policy adopted by Cardinal Vaughan on this question deserves honourable mention, as the one sɔlitary instance in which he has shown himself wiser than his predecessor. There is now peace between the Cardinal and Dr. Barnardo, although, of course, neither has abated one jot or one tittle of his deep conviction as to the essentially heretical religious beliefs of the other.

This is not a biography. But in passing it would be unpardonable to ignore the extent to which the good man has triumphed over the assaults of his enemies. When he began his missioning in East London nothing was more common than for him to be mobbed by a horde of loafers and corner boys. "There was much more intolerance in those days," Dr. Barnardo said to me the other day" much. Nowadays if the worst rough will not listen attentively to anything and anybody, he will at least never assume that he ought to throw a brick at the speaker whose doctrines strike him as novel and his appearance uncalled-for. The man in the slum, like the man in the drawing-room, has been wakened up to a dim but real sense of the possibility that there may be 'something in it,' and that it is wiser to listen to what is being said than to silence speech by violence. The increase of tolerance, which you do not appreciate, is to me one of the most marked features and the most hopeful of our times. Why, I have been time and again hunted like a mad dog down streets in East London where now any man can preach and teach anything he pleases without any dread of molestation." "Catholics?" I asked. "Not at all," he said; "the people who mobbed me would just as soon have mobbed

a priest. They did not want me down there talking, and so they ran me out. Although I escaped with my life, it was not without many a bruise, and, occasionally, a broken bone. Now and then the attack would be varied, and I would be overwhelmed in the midst of an openair address by an avalanche of slops emptied from an upstairs window over my head. But there is none of that now. Believe me, the East of London is a different place from what it was."

It would seem that now, as of old, it is through much tribulation that men must enter the Kingdom. But Dr. Barnardo had worse enemies than the roughs. There seems to be a certain fatality which impels good men to consider they cannot do God better service than by roasting Catholics. It was, of course, quite within the rules of the game that the Catholics should assail the fervent and enthusiastic Protestant; and no one can blame the gin-sodden savage of the slums if he occasionally chevied the earnest and aggressive advocate of temperance and civilisation. But no one, except the devil himself the ingenious and indefatigable father of all evil-can explain why, twenty years ago, the most bitter and deadly attack on Dr. Barnardo should have emanated from certain earnest Evangelicals of his own particular way of thinking. It is an old story now; but it is worth remembering as a reminder that "A man's foes shall be they of his own household," is the statement of a law that appears to be universal. Dr. Barnardo, being rudely challenged as a thief and an impostor, and for having cruelly ill-used some of his waifs, appealed to the Courts for the vindication of his character. But under the persuasion of Lord Radstock, Mr. Thomas Stone, and men of that ilk, he consented to an arbitration. The arbitration lasted forty days, and cost Dr. Barnardo £8,000. The result, however, was a triumphant vindication of his character. How triumphant may be inferred from the fact that as soon as the arbitration was over, Earl Cairns, then Lord Chancellor, wrote a letter stating that he had read every word of the proceedings before the arbitrators, and that he had been so thoroughly satisfied with the way in which every accusation had been repelled, and with the information furnished as to the management of the Homes, that he would gladly accept the post of president of any committee that might be formed if Dr. Barnardo should desire his help. Thus does good come out of evil, and so signally does the accuser of the brethren succeed in establishing the reputation of those against whom he rages.

III. THE SWEET USES OF ADVERSITY.

One of the sayings of Henry Ward Beecher most worthy to be had in continual remembrance is this, "Always thank God for your enemies. At the end of your life you will find they have done a great deal more for you than your friends." Dr. Barnardo has indeed good reason to put up special prayers of grateful recognition for the services rendered him by his ancient enemy the Pope. But for the worrying prosecutions which his antipapal prejudices brought about him, he would never have secured the public certificate of approval that resulted from his condemnation in Court. Before the British public will believe anything it needs to have every one concerned either in the dock or in the witness-box. That is the way in which men and institutions are put under the microscope. Nothing that is destined seriously to affect the life of the nation ever escapes the ordeal of the dock.

Dr. Barnardo has found himself repeatedly before Her Majesty's justices. Sometimes they have condemned

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nothing that yields such good returns. No one faces it if he can help it, and therefore it is that philanthropists and reformers have always to be driven to accept that kind of costly advertisement as a benediction of the gods. We would all be without it if we could, yet there are none of us but are grateful for the ordeal after it is over. In like manner, the attacks made by the press upon any institutions often serve as lightning conductors of charity to the treasury of the establishment assailed. Of this Dr. Barnardo gives an interesting illustration in his last published report. Misrepresentation and calumnious attack, he says, have been increasing, "but yet in spite of all these "-surely he might have said "because of all these ". -"the course of the work has on the whole been one of steady advance":

No one has proved more certainly than I that that even the steady opposition of powerful organs of the press is utterly unable to hinder God's work or stay its progress, if only the workers are honestly desirous of doing His will, and are eager to press forward, spite of the gainsayers, in the path of duty and obedience. A remarkable instance is furnished in the story of the past year, during which I was assailed in the pages of a society journal which has often done good work by exposing shams. For several weeks the crusade against me was kept up with a vigour worthy of a better cause, while sensational headlines on the weekly posters attracted public attention. Nor was this all; extracts from these hostile articles appeared in divers journals all over the kingdom, and it is quite possible that some donors may have in consequence felt their interest lessened, and may even have withdrawn their support. But, on the who'e, chiefly good had come out of the attack. Friends were thereby raised up to help who never helped before. One reader of the journal in question perused a hostile article while sitting in the Reform Club. He had never sent me a shilling previously, but he was moved to send me there and then £500, and he was only one of many who offered sympathy and aid. As the result, the donations for the twelve months, which in 1893 had amounted to £134,000 (the largest sum ever previously contributed in one year), now rapidly rose to £150,000, being £16,000 more than in 1893.

Nor is that the only gain. It is by the attacks of the adversary that weak places are discovered and invaluable hints gained as to how to circumvent. Dr. Barnardo, despite all his uncompromising Protestantism and his repugnance to denominationalism, has been driven to hold a candle to the Devil-and a very good thing too when it is the only way of saving little children from his clutches. For instance, he has started a Church of England Children's Fund, to receive the subscriptions of those who will only give to help Church children. A beginning thus made opens up vistas.

In time to come

I hope to hear that Dr. Barnardo has started a Roman Catholic Children's Fund, with a whole apparatus of Papist teachers and matrons, devised, endowed and conducted solely for the benefit of the poor waifs who, being born of Catholic parents, must not be snatched from the devils of vice and wretchedness except by exclusively Catholic tongs. Of course Dr. Barnardo will not listen to such a proposal now. Still he is getting on. He sends all Catholic children to their priests, and only in case the Catholic Church will not or cannot give them any help does he receive them:

I could not allow any question of sect or creed to close my doors in the face of a really destitute and homeless applicant. But the admission was in every case on the ground of destitution or of grave moral danger alone, and in no single instance with a view to proselytism.

Still as a matter of fact the question of sect or creed does in very real fashion narrow the entrance to his ever open doors.

Another instance of the immense service rendered by opposition is forthcoming from Canada. Those dogs in the manger, the crude and noisy spokesmen of the Labour party in the Canadian cities, raised an outcry against the immigration of Dr. Barnardo's children, who are eagerly suapped up in the country districts. Various charges were made which rendered it necessary for the Canadian Government to undertake an exhaustive investigation. This investigation into the life history of 6,128 juvenile immigrants simply confounded the assailants of the Doctor. It was proved that of his 6,128 immigrants in a period extending over twenty-seven years only fifty-two had ever been convicted even of the smallest crime, a percentage probably less than that of the members of the House of Commons in a similar period. Thus out of evil cometh good, and by the mouth of the slanderer the truth is established.

IV. THE PRAYER TELEPHONE AND ITS RESULTS IN CASH.

When Dr. Barnardo began thirty years ago he had only the ordinary means at the disposal of any medical student. He was lonely, friendless, and without wealth. Yet since he saw that apocalyptic vision of the Don'tLive-Nowheres on the roof of the shed, he has spent in the noble work to which he has dedicated his life no less a sum than £1,700,000. His income to-day, money freely contributed by 80,000 subscribers scattered all over the world, is no less than £140,000 per annum, nearly equal to 3 per cent. interest on a capital sum of £5,000,000.

How has this miracle been achieved? We had better let the man who worked it give us his explanation. It is in one word-Prayer. Strange though it may seem, this man believes in God as a kind of Telephone Exchange of the universe, who graciously allows Himself to be rung up whenever any of His creatures need anything to carry on His work. Dr. Barnardo, like George Muller of Bristol, prays, and the Divine Manager at the Central Celestial switches on Barnardo or Muller to any number of subscribers, who hear the cry as a voice from God, and send the money in accordingly. Fantastic, is it not? Quite mad? Of course; but the cash comes in and is coming in to-day. Listen to what the good Doctor says:—

My first Home was opened in defiance of all the rules of worldly prudence. It had no capital: not a penny in the bank, nor the promise of a shilling. It was simply and solely a tiny effort made by an altogether insignificant individual to follow what he then strongly felt to be the manifest leadings of the Holy Spirit. But the prayers of Christian friends were around it like an atmosphere.

I think I may claim for our Homes a high place on the list of Christian evidences, as I am sure that it is unto the answered prayer of faith that all their real progress is to be ascribed.

Often the last shilling was expended, but always the coffers were replenished from our Lord's own inexhaustible treasury. Thus it has been even unto this day; and now, my large family of nearly 5,000 children, saved by God's help from the direst evils, is still, as ever, dependent upon supplies sent down from heaven, as literally as if an angel brought them, in direct response to the petitions of Christian helpers, which ascend as daily incense to Our Father's footstool from every country throughout the world. The fact that our extremity has been God's opportunity, is well fitted to stimulate every Christian's faith in the gracious promises and providential guidance of Our Father, and to put to rout the armies of those aliens who would deny the Lord out of His own universe.

In 1894, 77,171 separate donations were received; of these 74,971, or 97 per cent., subscribed under £5 5s.,

67 per cent. were of £1 and under; 6,028 anonymous donors sent nearly £8,000. Decidedly the number of subscribers to the Divinè Telephone Exchange must be numerous, and their addresses are only known at the Central. The average per subscriber has risen from 28s. 2d. in 1889 to 38s. 11d. in 1894; but the number of subscribers curiously enough remained almost stationary till last year, when there was an increase in donors of 5,913. On one exceptional day no less a sum than £1,116 was received in 698 separate donations. The highest gift was £100 from a Scotch lady, the lowest was six penny stamps from a six year old English child. Sixty of that day's gifts were from beyond the four seas. Of these twenty-eight came from Australia, twenty-six from India, two from Africa, and one each from Russia, the United States, China and Switzerland. On another day more recently still the highest gift was also £100, but the lowest was two pence. That day there were forty-six donations from abroad-twenty-two from Australia, fifteen from Africa, four from India, three from the United States, one from Malta and one from Germany.

It is easy to sneer at this telephonic theory of prayer, but Dr. Barnardo has a great deal to say for himself. In fact, except upon some such hypothesis, to which, of course, the modern discovery of telepathy adds no little support, it is almost, if not quite, impossible to account for the inflow of the money and the extraordinary coincidences which Dr. Barnardo is compelled to note between the prayer and the answer. Although it costs £140 per day to find bread and meat for his immense family, he has no means for meeting the daily bill except what he can get in by this Prayer Telephone of his. Elijah with his ravens was not a circumstance to Muller of Bristol and Barnardo. Muller is a more remarkable case, because he sticks to the Telephone of Prayer, whereas Dr. Barnardo supplements his Telephone by judicious advertisement, for which he has quite a genius. But when hard pressed it is the Telephone he relies on. He says in one of his reports:

There have been, for example, times this year-many timeswhen I have had literally not one shilling in the bank-no, not one-and when the daily receipts were so low that if I hal expended everything received in food alone, it would not have sufficed to supply a single meal for all my large family. To make the cloud of those dark days darker still, sickness broke out among my little ones in several Homes, and that involved the immediate hire of fresh nurses, the use of expensive medicines. and the employment of curative agencies which at once doubled the cost of living. These things might well dismay the heart of any one whose shoulders bore his own burdens.

In such straits Prayer is his only resource. Anl explain it how we may it has never failed him yet. True he has often been in a very tight place.

As, for instance, when in the early days a sudden incoming of bitter cold wintry weather found him with children shivering in their cots and not a penny to buy

blankets with:

Earnestly I besought the Lord for help. He who sent that bitterly icy wind could surely protect our poor wee bairns from its trying influences! So I asked the Lord to send blankets for my family. But no money came that day; and next day, unable any longer to bear the thought of the little ones being cold, I went to the house of business at which I habitually deal, and selected the kind and quantity of blankets required. They came to close upon £100; but as I had not the money, I simply selected them, and did not buy. I felt that I must

not incur debt; and so again that day I spread before Him, whose work it was, the pressing needs of the case.

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GORDON WARD IN HIER MAJESTY'S HOSPITAL AT STEPNEY.

Next morning at breakfast the first letter he opened was from a clergyman in the South of England with a cheque for £100 "to provide additional clothing needed in consequence of the inclement weather." Who rang that clergyman up?

Dr.

Still more remarkable as a case of coincidence or test was the founding of the Ilford Girls' Homes. Barnardo, like other zealous people, is continually projecting more than he can execute. As a rule he does not attempt to carry out his schemes till he sees his way clear. But on this occasion he was so impressed with a sense of the need for the Girls' Homes that he wrote a letter to the Christian announcing his desire and intention to build cottages at Ilford for neglected girls. No sooner had his letter appeared than he was filled with misgiving, not to say remorse. Had he walked in advance of God's guidance, or had he not? A friend met him, and hearing of his trouble proposed to put the matter to a crucial time-test. Dr. Barnardo was at that time going down to Oxford, so the two of them agree l to pray that if it was God's will that he should go ahead, He should give them a clear sign like Gideon's fleece before he returned to towa. If no sign were given the Home would be abandoned. They prayed, and agreed to abide by the result.

The very morning after they arrived at Oxford a total stranger put his heal into the room. "You are Dr. Barnardo?" "Yes." "You are proposing to found some homes for neglected girls?" "Yes," said Dr. Barnardo. "Put me down for the first cottage," said the stranger, praise and prayer he learnt his story. He had lost a and departed. Dr. Barnardo hurried after him, and after daughter, and had resolved on reading the letter in the Christian to build a Girls' Home as a means of commemorating his child. He had said nothing about it to any one, intending to communicate with Dr. Barnardo on his return to London. By an unexpected chance (?) he found Dr. Barnardo's name among the new arrivals at the hotel in Oxford, and first thing next morning promised the £350 needed for the Home. Need I say that Dr. Barnardo with this dew on his fleece

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