It is to me such an amazing result for so comparatively small a sum, that I herewith append an account of the expenditure as recorded in the balance sheet.
| £ | s. | d. | |
| By Rent, Rates, Taxes and Insurance | 108 | 17 | 3 |
| ” Coal, Coke and Gas | 32 | 2 | 9 |
| ” Food, Relief, Travelling, and Household Sundries | 317 | 16 | 1 |
| ” Wages | 125 | 9 | 4 |
| ” Printing and Postage | 10 | 7 | 3 |
| ” Telephone | 9 | 3 | 6 |
| ” Pew Rent | 3 | 3 | 0 |
| ” Audit Fee | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Balance Carried forward to 1925 | 207 | 3 | 2 |
| £816 | 4 | 4 |
This feat of economy and generosity is, of course, only possible by the devotion of the matrons, one of whom has held her post since the inception of the hostel. It is, generally speaking, only in small establishments such as this, that you enlist the unbounded energy necessary to make this kind of thing a success. In larger and more imposing places human interest and enthusiasm deviates into so many channels that it is impossible to rely on that wellspring of living curiosity which vitalises all it touches.
Now let us examine the accounts of the shelter in Union Street, known, to give it its official title, as “The Incorporated Willow Street Philanthropic Mission.” In this home, as I have said, some beds are occupied by paying inmates; others give a nightly fee of ninepence to a shilling, others again are admitted free of charge. The costs of rent, rates, food, new bedding, kitchen utensils, etc., etc., including wages, amount to £799 8s. 7d. for the year. Here again, we must take into account personal devotion, though there is a larger permanent staff here than in King’s Road. The personnel consists of the matron, her assistant, and two women servants. The washing in both establishments is put out and is a very heavy item.
It will be seen, therefore, that no very large demand need be made on public generosity to found a number of these places. It is but a small social service if a millionaire builds a library, or presents a park to the people, and such a gift generally runs into as many thousands as there are hundreds shown in the balance sheets of these two shelters. But it needs only a couple of thousand to start a shelter, and once it is going an annual income of a thousand would be sufficient to carry on the work. I am an extraordinarily bad arithmetician, but considerable mental wrestling has assured me that there being two hundred and forty pence in a pound, twenty-four thousand pennies would ensure a hundred pounds, and if twenty-four thousand women would give a penny twelve times a year, we should have quite enough to be going on with.
In considering the expenditure at the refuge in Crispin’s Street, it is necessary to remember that the cost of the men’s shelter, which accommodates a hundred and forty per night, is included with that of the women’s. Since the foundation of the refuge in 1860, just on two million three hundred thousand free night’s lodgings, and four million six hundred thousand free meals have been provided. Figures such as these connote but little to one in the abstract, but when you have seen the long line of tables set out with food and drink, when you have touched the beds in which the women sleep, and gone into the bathrooms where they wash their aching feet, figures acquire a new significance, and you are conscious of a great throng; each one of these has been ministered to and comforted.
The cost of the refuge is included with the cost of Gilbert House Hostel, Home of Rest, Servants’ Training Home, and other activities. So many are these activities and so far-reaching, that we arrive at a total of nine thousand pounds odd. This refuge, however, as I have said, is practically unique, and it would be almost impossible to construct another on similar lines. Still, remembering the vast area of its activities, and the never-ending stream of demands on its resources, the amount seems to me but small.
The refuge does its work quietly and has but little recognition in the Press; indeed, until I visited Crispin’s Street, like the majority of my fellow journalists, I was unaware of its existence, and for this reason I should like to make it known that for over sixty years the homeless, the hungry and the forlorn have been taken in and quietly and unostentatiously looked after.
You have only to talk to the Sisters in Charge to understand how blessed a thing is this home of healing, where none are turned away and—miraculous significance—no questions are asked.
A little sister told me that she had read my articles in a Sunday newspaper, dealing with the life of the destitute woman, and she had wondered day after day if I had come to St. Crispin’s, and always she looked at each new face with interest and lively curiosity. Had she met me among the homeless I should, I know, have found in her that solace for human suffering which can be given only by the simple people.
I went back to my own home raw with fatigue and with an added perception of sorrow; but a wider and deeper comprehension of the infinite loving kindness of the human heart. The outcasts never failed me. When I was spiritually hungry, my hands were filled to overflowing with those small deeds of kindness which flower to perfection in the darkest and bleakest soil. I had passed through a door little, if ever, used by the well-fed. I had experienced actual physical privations which women of the middle class may weep over, but cannot comprehend. I had touched the bottom of destitution; I had had no place wherein to lay my head. Never again can I look out on life with the same eyes; never again can I forget that all night long women are wandering to and fro upon the pavement, or trying to sleep in an alien bed.
And yet what I have seen has not made me hopeless, rather do I glory in the knowledge that starvation of body, or starvation of
