8978 F9f/V3 ROSE AND DRAGON BOOKS YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES LAIN FRIEND California egional acility BY ANNIE MATHESON THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES m m "HER BOY." By permission from " The Gurneys of Earlham " (Allen & Unwin, Ltd.). See piige 46 ROSE AND DRAGON BOOKS YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES A PLAIN FRIEND BY ANNIE MATHESON Author of ^* Rotes ar.d Loaves" '■'■Leaves of Prose," " Day bzok for Girls," " Story of Florence Nightingale" " A Brave Child," and other books WITH FOREWORD BY LADY BETTY BALFOUR PRICE TWO SHILLINGS AND SIXPENCE NET BRITISH PERIODICALS LTD. 15 & 16, GOUGH SQUARE, E.C.4 TO MY BROTHER WILLIAM BROOKLYN MATHESON TIRATAHI, RANGOMAI, NEW ZEALAND 1920 First publhhed in February, 1920 EDITOR'S NOTE These hooks are issued in the belief that Education^ as an evolution of personality, which should seek to evoke in human character the divine ideal, and to make of the body " the finest servant of the soul,'' must breathe, through deeds rather than words, a religion so fundamental in its unity, so vital in its fragrant blossoming and sustaining fruitfulness, that it will necessarily find expression in countless forms, various as the infinite variety of the human countenance, and be strengthened by that noble intercourse and fellowship which are ever a source of inspiration and aspiration. It is hoped that — even as obscure runlets feed mighty rivers — they may play their part in uniting the English- speaking schools throughout the world, and drawing into closer sympathy of mutual understanding, the different orders of society ; restoring to rightful honour the claims alike of manual labour and handicraft and of a really international and popular art. With the children lies the future, and if, ifi the plastic years of adolescence, virtue and courtesy touch their lives, as with warm and tender human 4 EDITOR'S NOTE hands, through other lives radiant with the charm of high character and simple goodness — such goodness as that of Elizabeth Fry and Abraham Lincoln and " Our Hero of the Golden Heart " — who shall say how profound and far-reaching may be the effect ? St. George may yet slay his Dragon and the Secret Rose prove the symbol of an invisible empire, adorning the dwellings of that divine city which, through many generations, hearts faithful to duty seek to build on earth. Then at last may the civic virtues of the patriot found a co-operative fellowship wide as the world, and guard the shining gateways of^^a city that hath foundations.''^ JNNIE MATHESON. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS THIS brief sketch is indebted, directly or in- directly, to many and widely varying sources, mcluding the Chronicles of Nezvgate J the Notes on Prisons^ and the Memoirs of FAizabeih Fry, edited by two of her daughters in 1847. But I must content myself with acknowledging the direct quotations from the Diary in the last-named book, and the letter and other extracts from The Gurneys of Earlham, so graciously permitted by Messrs. Allen and Unwin, who have also allowed me to reproduce from the same book the fascinating portrait of Samuel Gurney, that one of my heroine's younger brothers who was especially regarded as " her boy," a boon for which I am exceedingly grateful. I desire also to thank Mr. Henry J. Stone and Mr. Vernon Kendall for their very great kindness in reading my proofs. The St. George on our cover has been copied as closely as possible by our printer's artist from the beautiful embossment on the old crown-piece, for which I am glad to have been reminded that John Ruskin shared my admiration. The rose 6 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS is a convention based on the wild rose and the fylfoot and, besides Lady Betty's reference to it in her Introductory Note, there is a hint of its further meaning at the foot of p. 15 in " Our Hero of the Golden Heart." I shall rejoice if it sends older readers to that enchanting volume of stories by W. B. Yeats, named 7he Secret Rose* For it is a subsidiary aim of the " Rose and Dragon " books to awaken, by opportune reference and quotation, such an appetite for sound literature as may lead to a natural distaste for those flaunting and sensational attractions which " cheapen life " and are needless in the deeper rapture of fine imaginative work. * This is not a treatise on citizenship, hut tales as a poet tells them. I have not seen it since it came to me for review many years ago and remember only its title and my delight in it. My efforts to secure a sight of it hef ore going to press have proved vain ; I am told it is " out of stock-'^i Nor can I say at this distance of time how far, like " The Way of Divine Vision " and other hooks of A. E. Waite — certainly not written for children — it may have deepened my sense of symbolic meaning in a flower which has ever seemed to me a direct message from the very heart of Sacrificial Love. t A copy has now arrived, too late to altei this final ""^revise" except to add that none should read " The Secret Rose" without reading the beautiful closing sentence on its final page, which ends with the words "/ am at peace." FOREWORD THIS is the first volume in a new biographical series of citizen-patriots — not of our Empire only but of the World. It has been named " The Rose and Dragon Series." The thought underlying this name is no doubt this : Dragon stands for all forms of difficulty to be overcome. Killers of the Dragon may be Saints and Heroes, but also pioneers of Science, and Social Reformers — breakers down of ancient prejudice and custom which hamper the growth and development of wholesome, vital forces. Rose stands — not for the Destruction of Evil, but for the building up of things beautiful and fragrant, the inspiration which will cause the apparently deadest of rods to blossom.* This is a series which can have no end. The examples of the past are too many for any number of volumes comprehensively to contain them, and each year in some part of the world will add a name which will deserve to be included. * // Means this to me, but much more also which can be best expressed in symbol. — Editor. 8 FOREWORD The idea of the series is a noble one. Human examples are poor things to worship in the place of divine ideals, but all true records of humanity can be sources of encouragement, warning, and stimulus to strive for the unattain- able. They can never be substitutes for the divine, but they are windows in an ever-ascending stair through which the divine can be seen to gleam. In such a series the great philanthropists and social reformers have a peculiarly interesting place — because their lives are not merely records of individual greatness, but throw an illuminating light on the period in which they lived. That, as a great lecturer of our day has said, is the great object of the modern historian — not merely to record facts and dates in connection with the prominent figures of history, but so to rebuild the past that we have some approximate conception of how our ancestors lived, and judge them by their own surroundings, not by ours. In the field of Philanthropy women can cer- tainly take a front rank, and Elizabeth Fry is no unworthy figure to stand first in this great series. The short story of her life which may here be read gives a most vivid picture of an intensely human, loveable and dominant personality. A fascinating combination of stubborn, almost FOREWORD 9 rigid strength, and tender gentleness. Her private life gave her full scope to complete every relation of w^omanhood — that of daughter, w^ife and mother — and she is a fine instance of a woman with a heart large enough to undertake active and exhausting public work without marring or leaving unfulfilled, any side of her domestic and private life. But her story, as told in these pages, gives an equally vivid and rivetting picture of the social world in which she lived. The Court life of King George and Queen Caroline — Betsy's own passing flirtation with the Prince of Wales — the gracious little Queen curtseying to " The Plain Friend " who stood tall and erect in adherence to the strictest Quaker principles she had adopted — the country house life of the refined and well educated gentry of her time — the influence on Government of great social names — the prosper- ous world of commerce in which the Quakers always played a part — side by side with the barbarous and brutal cruelty that was tolerated in the prisons of that day — and believed to be inevitable till Elizabeth Fry proved it to be nothing of the kind. Are there no similar inconsistencies in our own day ? Let the spiritual descendants of Elizabeth Fry who are ahve to-day open their eyes and look about them. Relatively to the lo FOREWORD Standard of our time is not our prison system nearly as defective ? What of the cruelty of solitary confinement, of the orthodox attitude of the gaoler to the prisoner, of the mental vacuity of prison life, of its invariable bad effect upon character ? Let those who feel inspired by this record of what one woman did more than a century ago, determine at least to help and encourage those who hold her torch to-day. Betty Balfour. A PLAIN FRIEND " Of every friendless name the friend." — Johnson. CHAPTER I A FEW miles outside Norwich there is a beautiful old house called Earlham, where lived the heroine of this true story, a flaxen- haired, blue-eyed girl, greatly loved by her relations and friends, who called her Betsy, though her real name was Elizabeth Gurney, her family having taken their name in past days from the town of Gournay in Normandy. Earlham was a delightful home, almost like a house in a fairy-tale, for it was as large and roomy as a castle, yet full of sunshine and freedom and friendly comfort. There were great lawns in front where in springtime grew snowdrops and daffodils, and these were bordered by fine old elms and beeches. Beyond stretched wilder parkland, through which the river Wensum wound its way, where in later years that friend of the gipsies, George Borrow, who wrote Lavengro and The Bible in Spain, tells us that when fishing one day in its blue and sunlit pools, he had an amusing interview with Joseph II 12 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES John Gurney, one of Betsy's brothers, who first rebuked him for his fishing and then invited him up to the Earlham library to see his rare Hebrew books. The Gurneys were followers of George Fox, the shepherd who more than a hundred years before had founded the Society of Friends, often called Quakers. The Friends, like many other good and wise people, believe that this boundless universe, with its millions of stars and endless varieties of life, is ruled by One Who speaks to the love in man as a Father speaks to a cherished son or daughter, when man listens and obeys His messages, till man at last is ready in the spirit of His own unspeakable love to give up to the service of others everything that he values most. And, since they believe that He Who is love is also Truth and desires truth in them, they try to be very watchful over themselves against any least falsehood of word or deed. Betsy was not yet seven years old when her father and mother, John Gurney and his wife, took possession of Earlham in 1786. She was the third daughter in a large merry family of boys and girls. Their names were Kitty, Rachel, John, Richenda, Hannah, Joseph, Louisa, and Priscilla. The three other children who were born at Earlham in the following five years were Samuel, John and Daniel. A PLAIN FRIEND 13 Both father and mother were interesting people, though John Gurney, the father, when a boy, was so cross at some foolish remarks he overheard about his red hair, that he went straight to a barber and had it shaved off so that he had to wear a wig. However, he outgrew this childish folly and grew up a very handsome, sweet-natured, generous man. He married Catharine Bell, a tall, brown-eyed girl whose good looks shine forth in a family group by Gainsborough, the well-known portrait painter. She was a great grand-daughter of Robert Barclay, who was imprisoned in a convict's cell rather than say or do what he thought contrary to his religion. There is a special reason why you will call this to mind when you read of Betsy's calling* — for which most people use the Latin word " vocation " — in later life. Most children love their mothers, but Betsy loved hers to a degree that made the little girl's life quite an anxious one at times. She tells us how she used to watch her mother's sleep, fearing she might stop breathing and never speak to her any more. Her Mother's death, therefore, which happened when Catherine, • It is of course, unusual to use the word quite in this sense — in ordinary usage it generally implies a trade or profession — some kind of paid work, in Betsy's case the wages were the wages of love. Yet the \'oice that called her was the same Voice that bids chimneysweeps do their hard task faithfully and maids-of-all-work keep their doorsteps clean, and accepts all faithful work, whether paid or unpaid, as a holy offering. 14 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES the eldest girl, was only seventeen and Betsy not more than ten, was a terrible grief . John Gurney himself must have been a brave and determined character, for, although a Quaker, he never feared to differ from the ordinary Quaker rule when he thought it too narrow, and he had the courage to leave the management of his children and of his large and important household in the hands of Catherine, Kitty, as the sisters called her. Kitty, young as she was, rose nobly to the trust and proved so good an elder sister that the younger girls adored her. In 1796 little Louisa wrote in her journal, " I am eleven years old. I love my father better than anyone except Kitty : she is everything to me. I cannot feel that she has a fault. If she was to die, I think I could not bear it, we should lose a mother, for I am sure she is one to us."* Louisa was also very fond of Betsy, who was a delicate child needing care, and had a loving sunshiny nature. But Louisa was not a senti- mental little girl, and she sometimes wrote very droll things in her journal. Betsy was brave in some ways, but had a few secret fears which grown up people would never suspect. She had heard how good Abraham was, and how he offered up his son Isaac, and knowing • The Gurney s of Earlham, Vol. I. A PLAIN FRIEND 15 that her father loved her very much, she v^^as afraid that some fine Sunday morning he might feel it a duty to offer her up, and that this v^ould perhaps be mentioned w^hen the family joined the other Quakers at their w^eekly meeting. Strict Quakers are called " plain friends " by the Society to which they belong. In Betsy's time they wore the Quaker dress,* and were very careful to say " thee " instead of " you," if they were speaking to only one person, and they were equally exact in other small matters. They were very particular as to the amusements they allowed their children. Betsy's father, John Gurney, was not one of these " plain friends." He was glad for his children to share in all innocent pleasure — not only to ride, but also to dance and go now and then to a good play, to say nothing of having many lively young friends and much change of society. As the seven beautiful sisters grew up, some of the " plain friends " did not quite approve of their pretty clothes and many pleasures ; but their father was not one of those who took too much heed of other people's opinions, and he • Girls between fifteen and eighteen may like to read in Charles Lamb's Essays of Elia the pages headed " A Quakers' Meeting," and will then under- stand how a Quaker is, as every girl should be, expected to be " clean as a snowdrop," a phrase we owe to a peasant mother in that fine novel, Adam Bede, which girls of that age may like to get out of the Free Library. i6 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES went his own wise way, giving a just and reason- able liberty and trusting to the /^//"-control of his children rather than government from without. The questions of the day were openly discussed among them, and it may be said that the French Revolution had at this time brought ezferything into question. Perhaps their religion was all the more deep and sincere, because it was not taken for granted as a mere matter of routine. But their life was not an idle one. The eleven year old Louisa writes to Miss Enfield, " Thee can't think how well we get on in lessons now- Dear Kitty is always with us and teaches us. We are always dressed by six, and get as many lessons done before breakfast as we can. After breakfast we finish all those that we have to do, and then we seven girls get to our work, and one reads history to us for two hours. We are hard at lessons and our own employment the whole afternoon, and after tea we walk, if it is fine, for more than an hour with Kitty. We then come in and write our journals till supper, Kitty and Rachel and all."* They had a great deal of freedom and fun, and had often very able and distinguished visitors staying in the house. Probably they learned a great deal from the eager and varied talk of these visitors, who took often widely • The Gurneys of Earlham. A PLAIN FRIEND 17 differing views of life in religion as well as other matters. No child at Earlham Hall was likely to be so vulgar and conceited as to think she knew very much or could decide for other people what was true. But they learned to rule their lives and love their neighbours, and as the boys and girls grew up perhaps their greatest charm was their simplicity — instead of apeing other people they were content to be just themselves. This, with their good looks and high spirits aud warm hearts, made their home very attractive, and all kinds of people enjoyed coming there, including the young Prince George, who seems to have been specially charmed with Betsy, and she with him, when she was about seventeen. She was a slender girl, described by her elder sister about this time as " inexpressibly lovely," and her quick, warm feelings made her afraid of being too impulsive. She was easily amused and thought herself too passionate. She was besides an excellent rider and so fond of music that she was half frightened by the storm of emotion it woke in her. Shall we look over her shoulder and see what she is writing on her seventeenth birthday ? " I am seventeen to-day. Am I a happier or a better creature than I was this time twelve- months ? I know I am happier ; I think I am better. I hope I shall be much better this day year than I am now. I hope to be quite an 1 8 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES altered person, to have some knowledge, to have my mind in greater order ; and my heart too, that wants to be put in order as much, if not more, than any part of me, it is in such a fly-away state ; but I think if ever it were settled on one object it would never, no never, fly away any more ; it would rest quietly and happily on the heart that was open to receive it, it will then be most constant ; it is not my fault it now flies away, it is owing to circumstances." . . . " I am like a ship put out to sea without a pilot. I feel my heart and mind so over-burdened, I want some one to lean upon."* About two months later she finds great fault with herself : " I have given way to my passions, and let them have command over me. I have known my faults, and not corrected them, and now I am determined I will once more try, with redoubled ardour, to overcome my wicked inclinations ; I must not flirt ; I must not be out of temper with the children ; I must not contradict without a cause ; I must not mump when my sisters are liked and I am not." . . . " I am inclined to be extravagant, and that leads to meanness, for those who will throw away a good deal, are apt to mind giving a little." • Memoir of the Life of Elizabeth Fry, edited by two of her daughters, 1847. A PLAIN FRIEND 19 " Never," she writes later, " indulge myself in luxuries that are not necessary." Is it fancy or do we between the lines of her diary divine that she is at this time a good deal interested in one higher in rank than herself,* who could not, she knew, pass the limits of ordinary friendship ? But meanwhile a young Quaker — a plain friend — was admitted to the Gurney household through his comradeship with one of the brothers, and though attracted by aU the sisters, before long made up his mind that Betsy was the one of them all whom he wished to make his wife and the mistress of his home. This was Joseph Fry, of whom more will be heard later. He was, at this time, living with a farmer in Norfolk — a Mr. Holmes — and although he had fallen in love with Betsy, she did not yet care in quite the same way for him, and she was trying to rule her life so thoroughly that feeling as well as action should be well under control. Her sisters were her closest comrades, and a very gay party they were. But she was longing for some friend with a stronger and less variable will than her own — one in whose perfect wisdom she could trust. Perhaps this partly explains what seemed to her family a very surprising incident about this time. She and her sisters were often rather pleased • This refers to the context in the Memoir, too long to be given her*. 20 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES when on the excuse of some small ailment thev could stay at home on Sunday instead of going to the Quakers' Meeting in Goat's Lane, which they called " going to Goats " ; but on the Sunday when the American preacher, William Savery, came to speak to the Friends there, they appeared in great force, and Betsy's very smart shoes with scarlet lacings, in the height of fashion, seem to have been a source of amusement to one of her sisters. Scarlet seems to have been one of her favourite colours, for we read on another occasion that when she rode across the hills one day to carry some special dainty to an invalid, the servant told her mistress that it had been left at the door by a beautiful lady in a scarlet riding habit. She was never very strong, and to her sisters her frail health secured a claim on their tender care, but her high spirits and sunshiny nature made her often a very lively companion, and perhaps no one at that time fully guessed how she was longing to find a Master. William Savery told of such a Master — an unseen Master, strong and wise and loving with a strength and wisdom and love beyond those of earth. To the amazement of the sister who tells the story, when she looked up during the service to take a glance at Betsy and her coquet- tish boots, the tears were simply rolling down her cheeks, and the fair face, so often dimpling A PLAIN FRIEND 21 with smiles, was full of earnest attention to the preacher's words. Savery was lunching at her uncle's, and Betsy asked leave to join the family party there, that she might have an opportunity of hearing more, and next day when he came to visit in her own home, he foretold that she would do great and important work. Betsy all her life was a person of prompt action, and from that time she strove to give herself to the Divine Master of whom William Savery told. To her it seemed that it would make the path of noble living easier if she were to cut off her interest in changing fashion, and all her innocent young amusements, and give her whole time and attention to carrying out the wishes of that Master and spending her days in serving and helping others. But before joining the strict company of the Plain Friends, which she feared might divide her a little from her father and brothers and sisters, and would certainly vex them, she felt it would be wise to know from experience a little more of what the difference between the two kinds of life would be. Her father, therefore, agreed to take her to London where the Gurneys of Earlham could mix with as much rank and fashion as they pleased, the young Prince among others being one of their friends. Betsy met him again there, and also renewed her friendship with 22 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES William Savery, She went to see " Hamlet," took her share in pictures and music, and the kind of social crush which in those days was called a " rout," and, in fact, took her part, so far as time allowed, in most of the gaieties of the London of her day. Her father had been deeply distressed at Betsy's feeling that in dress and speech and outward rule of life she might have to separate herself from the delightful liberty and un-Quakerish " pleasurings " of the rest of the Earlham family whom she loved so dearly, and it was a great disappointment to him and to her brothers and sisters when they found that her glimpses of London life only increased her cer- tainty that for her a life of rigid self-denial and devotion to others would be safest and best. She had a big, warm heart, and had often been frightened by the storm of feeling that in moments of excitement threatened, she fancied, to sweep her off her feet into slippery and dangerous places. She was surrounded by love, but what she most craved was the ever-present Strength of One she could love and worship, to hold her true to all that she instinctively felt to be highest and noblest in life. After much anxious thought and prayer she determined to bear the pain of grieving her family and become a " plain friend." Her sisters in their most private journals describe A PLAIN FRIEND 23 with astonishment the unflinching courage and obedience to conscience with which from that time forth she ruled her Ufe in every smallest detail, gently and sweet-temperedly, putting aside many pleasures which for her were temptations, but which she never dreamed of condemning in others. CHAPTER II 1\ /r EANWHILE there was one young man who -^'-'-must have been deeply interested in Betsy's change of view. This was Joseph Fry, of whom mention has already been made, a schoolfellow of her brother John, through whom he had been introduced to her home — one of the Frys of Plashet, who, like the Gurneys, took their name — originally Erie — from a town in Normandy. He was not handsome, but he had a fine voice and many gifts of mind. His seems to have been just the modest, steadfast, unselfish nature to be attracted by the more impulsive Betsy, and though she had refused to marry him, they still met as friends sometimes at the house of their cousins, the Hoares. It was much in his favour that Betsy's father and sisters, who went to stay at Plashet the year after her return from London, came back with glowing accounts of him, and he had by this time determined to have another try. Her father hoped he would succeed, but advised him not to come to Earlham too often. However, a friendly little note which Betsy was persuaded 24 A PLAIN FRIEND 25 to send him, led to her being frightened by a rather purposeful visit, and all the sisters were much agitated when they found he meant to put his fate to the touch in a way that was all his own. He did not want to grieve the tender- hearted Betsy by having to refuse him a second time, so he made it understood that if she would accept a watch and chain that he had bought for her, it would be taken that she would accept him ; but if she left it lying where he laid it, he would return to Plashet without saying a word. It is all rather like a bit of fiction, though it did really happen, for the six sisters were in Betsy's confidence, and after the young lover had left his golden gift to her lying on a well- known white garden seat in the grounds where they had together spent many a happy hour, all the six of them hid themselves in the laurel bushes to see what happened. Possibly — though I never heard such a suggestion — Joseph gave them this opportunity lest any mischievous gardening boy might be tempted to meddle with the pretty treasure. The first time Betsy drew near, after timidly taking up the watch, she laid it down again and withdrew to the house. But her sisters perhaps read her heart more clearly than she did herself, for they still waited, and her father, meanwhile, pleaded Joseph's cause. Kitty gives a loving description of her 26 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES when at last her resolve was taken. She had asked for guidance from the Source of all Wisdom, and Kitty speaks of her as " wafted on the wings of prayer " towards the old cedar tree that overshadowed the garden seat where one of the great decisions of her life was to be made. Can you picture the sunny-haired girl, with eyes like the summer sky, in the plain gown and spotless white 'kerchief of a " plain friend," as she falteringly took the watch into her hand, and thus pledged her troth to the giver^? CHAPTER III IV yr ANY difficulties were solved now that Betsy -^'-•-was to be Joseph Fry's wife ; for all those details which were a daily trial to her father and brothers and sisters made her only the sweeter and dearer to the man who was a " plain friend " him- self. He proved as life went on to be a man of noble and unselfish character, ready to rejoice in all her service of others, even when at times it took her far from his presence and gave to her brothers and friends for weeks together the guardianship and companionship of which, by the necessities of her work, he was himself deprived. He had promised that she should have perfect liberty to follow the light we all must follow if we are to be children of the Light, and very faithfully and bravely he kept his word. She was to visit often the home that meant so much to her at Earlham, where she had nursed the sick and helped the poor, and been almost like a mother to the eighty children whom she had gathered round her to be taught and loved, and who were probably as full of fun and mischief as most others, for her sisters used to call them " Betsy's imps." 27 28 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES From the time when she had made up her mind to serve the Most High as her only Master, she had been, so her sister Kitty tells us, a quite different girl from the Betsy of the old days, her whole aim being the good of other people and the shaping of her life and deeds to the commands of conscience. In a Quaker marriage such as hers there was the impressiveness of a great simplicity — no flowers or music or invited guests — just the simple words, " I, Joseph Fry, take thee, my friend, Elizabeth Gurney, to be my lawful wedded wife, promising by Divine assistance to be unto thee a kind and loving husband until it shall please the Lord by death to separate us," and Elizabeth Gurney made a like promise. CHAPTER IV FOR many years after her marriage Betsy's foremost activities were in her own home. She was the merry, tender comrade and guide of her ever-growing family of children, yet never content to care for them alone to the neglect of others who were in suffering and need. All her life she delighted in working with and for the poor. And because she was no respecter of persons but had the same simple courtesy for the prisoner in his cell as for the king on his throne, she w^as welcomed both in palaces and in prisons. In the days to come, more than one powerful Princess was loved and influenced by the gentle Quaker lady, and among the first to feel her charm was one of whom she writes, after a private interview, as a very lovely and promising child, one who after her coronation was that Victoria, Queen and Empress, who will ever be remembered as Victoria the Good. Hitherto our heroine had been known to those who loved her as Betsy Gurney, but now she was Elizabeth Fry. With her marriage came un- conscious preparation for that new chapter in 29 3 30 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES her life which has made her name known in many- countries as a wise reformer and an able servant of the State. We ought all within our daily round to be good servants of the State, *for every one of us is a part of the State — State being a good, short, simple word for a nation or empire considered as a whole, when agreeing to live under certain rules or laws. In our own Empire the laws of the State seek to give to each as much freedom as possible by preventing every one from taking more than his share. When we read of the men who have died that those who speak the English tongue might be free to live nobly, of the women who have suffered that we might be born, of the great army of toilers who have slaved, day after day, and the poets and statesmen like Shakespeare and Milton, Sir Thomas More and Sir Walter Raleigh, who have helped this little island to live a life above the mere body, we shall try to be not unworthy of the glorious Flag which they upheld. Above all, when we consider the thousands of brave fellows who have left their homes and gone forth to die for that Flag in our own day, we shall seek to improve the lot of the poor and struggling millions who plough the fields and light the • The word State is here used in two distinct ways, both in its generally accepted sense of the Community and in its more accurate meaning of the ezecutive organ of that community. A PLAIN FRIEND 31 fires and build the roofs, and shall revere also the leaders and thinkers who have taken heavy risks and been ready to give up their own ease and pleasure that we might have better laws, diviner thoughts and cleaner lives. Unless we are base, or vulgarly thoughtless, we shall seek to rule our own lives and tempers that there may be no " lazy dogs," no liars or cowards, in an Empire for which such precious blood has been shed. And we are most of us old enough to see that it is even more difficult sometimes to rule others wisely than it is to rule ourselves, but that the first step of all is to rule ourselves. Elizabeth Fry when a mere girl had begun to rule herself, and as life went on she had what seemed an almost magical power over others. Her great life-work in relation to prisons was still to come, though she had never forgotten a visit to the House of Correction at Norwich, having persuaded her father to take her there as a girl. For a long time after her marriage she was kept very busy in her own home ; for she had many children and made the care of them and of her husband her first and highest duty, though she never forgot her duty also to the children of others whose life was harder and more difficult than her own. After a little visit to her husband's parents, she and her husband had settled down in St. 32 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES Mildred's Court in London, where Joseph Fry- looked after his father's tea business. London, in those days, was very different from the London of to-day. The streets were not safe, but infested by gangs of thieves and robbers who delighted in mischief or violence. One young girl was invited by a band of ruffians to smell a bouquet of flowers, and when she stooped to do so, found that they had hidden in it a sharp instrument to injure her face. On one occasion they even smuggled themselves into the king's palace. Thousands of little children were sent out to steal by wicked people who lived upon their takings. The regular police of our own day did not exist. Besides the constables appointed by the Burgesses, there were old men called Charlies, chosen chiefly as an excuse for keeping them from starvation, who walked about the streets at night and called out what o'clock it was. There were also men called Bow Street runners, because the first batch employed had a station in Bow Street. The Bow Street runners chased the many pickpockets and made their chief living out of the sums of /"40, offered for every valuable arrest. These last often found it convenient to let people heap up their offences till their conviction would be important enough to earn the forty pound grant — until, in the slang of the day, they had " weighed A PLAIN FRIEND 33 their weight," and would receive the then too frequent punishment of death. Happily children seldom " weighed their weight," but they were constantly thrust into prison among hardened criminals, among whom they were themselves trained for crime. Even in our own day there is need for improvement — much improvement — in our way of treating prisoners ; but in Elizabeth Fry's day the way in which they were tortured was barbarous, though it varied somewhat according to which prison they were in. Often they had heavy iron rings on wrists and ankles, and in some cases they were chained to the floor. The gaolers seldom w^ould take off these irons without payment, and this was but one of many ways in which cruel injustice was done to the poor. The head gaoler of Newgate turned his prison into a sort of " pub " and general stores, where he made great profits on all the food supplied and threw it to the prisoners in lumps to be scrambled for, so that the greediest got the most. As for drink, on that, also, he made great gains, for there was a tap in the prison where it could be had all day long by anyone who could beg, borrow, or steal, the money. Begging had become such an annoyance to visitors that the prisoners were caged in with wire netting to prevent their running up to those who came into the wards. But they got 34 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES over that difficulty by providing themselves with immensely long wooden spoons which they thrust through the wire at everyone who passed, asking for a gift. For very small debts people were cast into prison — one woman was imprisoned because she could not pay sevenpence — and so unjust were the laws of the day to the poor that often for lack of quite a small sum of money which was asked by the gaoler on their discharge, they would be kept in prison so many years that many people were married in prison, and their children were born there. For these poor, miserable prison- children there were no schools, no proper food or clothing. In Mrs. Fry's time prisons were noisome, stuffy holes. In Newgate, twelve hundred souls were living within a quarter of an acre. Light and air were often so shut out that a terrible illnesss called gaol-fever was continually killing people, and the chained prisoners sometimes awaited their death for some small theft or doubtful forgery. It was largely due to Mrs. Fry's efforts that the punishment of death for such offences was done away with. So cruelly unjust were the ways of so-called justice at that time that those who would not say whether they were guilty or not guilty had heavy weights placed on their chests as they lay on the prison A PLAIN FRIEND 35 floor, and even the deaf and dumb had, until then, been exposed to this horrible treatment from the mere fact that they could not speak, though happily, in their case, the punishment was now cancelled. In 1809, after the death of her father-in-law, Elizabeth and her husband had left St. Mildred's Court and moved to the beautiful old country home at Plashet — hitherto occupied by her husband's parents, and her daughter Rachel wrote long afterwards of that time : — " Would that I could bring before you our mother as she was when we first lived at Plashet. The gentle firmness of her rule ; the sober gracefulness of her carriage ; her exceeding love and tenderness towards her little children, especially during their infancy ; the cheerful invigorating influence she maintained over us ; her care of her domestics, mental and bodily ; her systematic attention to the poor."* In October of the same year, 1809, she had been hastily summoned to the deathbed of her own father, who was deeply loved by all his children, and not least by her. It was in those days too much the custom to make of death a mournful pageantry, but in John Gurney's case the ripe golden sheaf was ready for the harvest, and Elizabeth Fry broke through the bad custom. * The Gurneys of Earlbam. 36 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES She was sure that her father's active and joyous life had entered now into yet deeper joys, and her first ministry of prayer was to kneel among her brothers and sisters in an offering of thanks and praise for this. Thus had begun her work as a minister in the Society of Friends. And the death soon afterwards of her little daughter and namesake, who had been a special darling in the household, did but strengthen her faith. These were the first changes by death in the happy family chain since the old days when her mother and little brothers had passed out of sight. It was in 1813 that hearing of the misery of the prison children and their mothers at a time when she had nine little sons and daughters of her own, Elizabeth Fry determined to go with her friend, Anna Buxton, to take them some garments she had been making for them^. Little did she know to what that visit would lead, and through how many European countries the work that began that day would become fruitful. She shrank inwardly from the coarseness and confusion of the strange scene which met her eyes — women yelling and quarrelling, while one of their number, as a mere rude jest, tore every- thing in the shape of a cap off the heads of the rest. The poor souls had been treated so much like animals that they really did behave at moments A PLAIN FRIEND 37 almost like wild beasts, so that the Governor himself was afraid to go unguarded through the prison. But Elizabeth Fry went among them as the messenger of love, and her very presence helped and calmed them, for love shone in her eyes and breathed through her quiet voice and was felt in every touch of her hand. The very shrinking that she felt from their disorder and dirt and noise, but which she was careful not to betray, did but increase her activities on their behalf, for it made her long the more to overcome those differences which divided their sorrowful lot from her own. But although she remained in touch with them by gifts and prayers and loving thoughts, she had to wait a little before she could make their needs and sorrows her absorbing care. For at this time we read : — " With her increasing family of children, it was impossible that Mrs. Fry could devote her- self to other duties than those of her own home. She sent frequent gifts of clothes to the poor women in Newgate, but she could do no more." " She quietly devoted herself during the next few years to her young children. She delighted to watch over them by night as well as by day. She herself attended to their least ailments, and was always in a state of distress when she saw them suffer. She had the gentlest touch with 38 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES little children. She would win their hearts if they had never won hers before, almost at the first glance, and by the first sound of her sweet voice. As the mistress of a household, she loved simple liberality and an unostentatious comfort."* But the interruption of her life-work was not for long. In 1816, besides aiding with her sympathy her young brother-in-law, Fowell Buxton, in the efforts he shared with so many others toward abolishing slavery in America, and also forming with his aid an English society for helping to a better life boys and girls who had by some first offence come into danger of imprison- ment, she was at last able to renew her visits to the London prisons, and henceforth make the lot of prisoners everywhere her principal care. When in this year she found herself once again among the women in Newgate, she asked to be left quite alone with them and read to them the parable of the Vineyard, helping them to feel that they and she must toil together and be fellow labourers in all that was good, for she never made the mistake of those who thank God that they are not as other men. On the contrary, she was always on the look-out for her own hidden failings instead of those of her neighbours, and was to the end of her life as humble of heart as • The Giirneys of Earlham. A PLAIN FRIEND 39 she was resolute and brave. It was partly this that made her manners so beautiful, whether in the courts of queens, where she was often a welcome guest, or in the dark, unhealthy dungeons of the outcast and the criminal. Then, too, she was a mother, and she divined the mother-heart in other women. She asked the unhappy prisoners whether they would help her to arrange for the education of their poor neglected children. They were over- joyed and begged that they themselves might be taught. Then, with her help, they made rules for themselves, and she chose a school- mistress from among them. The wonder of wonders was not so much that they made the rules, but that they also taught themselves to keep them. They were cheered and helped by Mrs. Fry's visits, and some of them learned deep lessons when she read the Bible among them. They seemed, through her voice, to hear the voice of our unseen Master, of Whom it has been written that He is Love, and therefore hates all injustice and selfishness and untruth ; for, as the great English painter, G. F. Watts,* has shown us in his two pictures at St. Paul's, Love is Justice, and the true Justice is Love. • Mr. Watts before his death explained to me this intention. In the picture entitled Time, Death and Judgment, the face of Justice is hidden by the uplifted, scarlet-robed arm that holds the scales ; but in the companion picture originally named Love Triumphant, the robe has fallen and has disclosed the face of Justice as the face of Love. 40 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES The women had been idle all day long, but now they were helped to make garments for their children, and the quiet needlework for those dear to them helped to cure their restlessness and despair. When the magistrates who used to visit the prison heard of the great change which had come over the women, they were so much astounded that they asked if they might go and see for themselves on some day when everything was going on just as usual, and of course permission was given. It almost seemed to some of them as if a miracle had happened. The women were now neatly dressed and behaved in a respectful and self-respecting way, instead of scrambling and shouting and quarrelling like vixens. Most of them were seated round a table, diligently sewing. In fact they were no longer caged animals, but orderly human beings. Of course it had not happened in a day, but very gradually through weeks and months, yet it was so remarkable that the magistrates invited the lady visitors, with Elizabeth Fry at their head, to form themselves into a standing com- mittee to help in the government of the prison, — a men's committee being formed later among their brothers and friends to help them with money and advice, and in many other ways. Is it not absurd that great objection was at A PLAIN FRIEND 41 first made by foolish people to the undertaking of such public work by Elizabeth Fry ? Although she was very sensitive to approval or disapproval, she knew it would be wrong to care too much. She was among the first to help the unfortunate prisoners who were taken across the seas to New South Wales — " transported," as it was called. In the old days, before steamships and penny posts, all distances seemed far greater than they do now, and to be sent to such a far country away from friends and relations was rightly thought a punishment in itself. But it was cruel to add to the punishment every possible temptation to new wrong doing. Yet that was in many instances the effect of sending helpless, ignorant people into surroundings of which they knew nothing, and dumping them down, without money or friends or means of employment, in a strange, new city. Our heroine never rested until some sort of decent arrangement had been made for their houseing and possible employment on arrival. She was one of those who seized every oppor- tunity of doing good, and while bringing a keen and practical mind to bear upon it, yet made those who were helped feel it came straight from the heart. Hers was a spirit of love and fellowship which recognised the claim of kindred throughout all the great human family, who differ in race and 42 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES in colour, but are all alike the children of our unseen Father, and with whom silly airs of patronising charity only betray a vulgar mind. When staying at Southampton she found that the men who guarded the coasts from smugglers led a lonely and dangerous life, and were shut out from the pleasures of reading. She did what she could then and there, and when her interest was renewed later in the Isle of Wight, she used her influence, which had now become very great, to induce the Government to help her in a scheme by which she actually provided libraries for all the coastguards in the kingdom — no fewer than 2,000 in her day, distributed at 500 different stations. Meanwhile her work for prisons had gone wide and deep. In Ireland and Scotland, as well as in England, she had travelled from prison to prison, carrying hope and healing by her visita- tions, while at the same time making valuable suggestions to the authorities. Her brother, Joseph John Gurney, who accompanied her on the most important of these journeys, made notes which are still kept at the Home Office, and at the London Library, and suggestions made there have becom^e a part of everyday prison law, and were steps in the right direction, though there is still much to be done. CHAPTER V AFTER public work in the north of England, and a visit to Lord Derby's home at Knowsley, Elizabeth Fry received a pretty little public tribute of homage and gratitude from Queen Charlotte, who took the opportunity of paying her special honour at a great public meeting, though, it may be added that Mrs. Fry's own mind at the time was specially humbled by an undeserved reproof implied by some of the Directors of the Bank of England, when she tried to win them over to her view that forgery should no longer be punished by death, as it was in those unhappy days. She believed in the innocence of a poor woman who had changed a forged note handed to her by the man she loved, and what hurt her truthful and sensitive nature was the way in which one or two of the rich City men implied that she herself, Elizabeth Fry, was twisting the facts in order to prove that the woman was guiltless. And though they were wrong in so thinking, her mind was so occupied in anxious self-questioning, that she was still inwardly cast down on the occasion of 43 44 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES her meeting with the Queen, which happened almost directly afterwards. Here is a vivid picture of her, from a letter written by one of her daughters to her sister : — Plashet, May ^rd, l8l8. My Aunt Catharine has commissioned me to write thee a description of our day at the Mansion House — it was the 19th of last month. . . . With infinite difficulty we got into the ante-room. In a few minutes men in very grand Hveries came in a great hurry to clear the way and lay down a piece of scarlet cloth ; the cry was " The Queen is coming." We looked through the entrance door, and saw Mamma (!) with the Bishop of Gloucester (!) and Lady Harcourt with Alderman Wood. Silence had been previously ordered as a mark of respect, but a buzz of " Mrs. Fry, Mrs. Fry," ran through the room. It was to our utter astonishment that we saw them come in and walk along those spread carpets. Lady Harcourt in full court-dress, on the arm of the Alderman in his scarlet gown, and secondly the Bishop of Gloucester (Ryder) in lawn sleeves, leading our darling mother in her plain Friends' cap, one of the light scarf cloaks now worn by plain Friends, and a dark silk gown — I see her now I Her light flaxen hair, a little flush on her face from the bustle and noise she had passed through^ and her sweet, lovely, placid smile. In a few minutes the Queen passed, followed by the Princesses, the Royal Duke^ the Lady Mayoress, and other official personages. The Lord Mayor placed us behind the hustings on which the Queen was. We asked him for Mamma. He burst out Isughing : " There she is, on the bench of Bishops." There were eight of them there. We heard people pointing her out to one another : " That is she with her hair over her forehead." A PLAIN FRIEND 45 — " That must be Mrs. Fry with the bishops." — '' Look now ! you may see Mrs. Fry ; she rises to receive the Queen's salute." Towards the close, after " God save the King " had been sung, everybody began to clap violently, and we asked the cause. " Why, the Queen is speaking to Mrs. Fry." When Queen Charlotte rose to go, she paused and passed to the side where the Bishops sat — of course all had risen- and Lady Harcourt presented our mother. The Queen, who is so short, curtseying, and our motherj who is so tall, not curtseying, was very awkward. Her Majesty asked our mother if she were not afraid of going into prisons, how far she lived from London, how many children she had, &c. The shouts in the hall were tremendous, and were caught up by the crowds outside ; it was told why they shouted, and it was repeated again and again, till it reached our father, sitting in his office at St. Mildred's Court, that " the Queen was speaking to Mrs. Fry." * In 1827, Mrs. Fry's sister, Rachel Gurney, died. Rachel had been thought the most beautiful of all the sisters, and had been loved by a man who wished to marry her, but gave her up when he found her religious views differed from his own. On her death-bed she received a letter from him telling how he had thought of her daily, and this gave her great joy, for she had never cared in the same way for anyone else. Meanwhile time was flying, and Elizabeth Fry's sons and daughters were growing up and marrying, and, despite their deepening friendship with their mother, most of them left the Society of Friends and while possibly not fully aware of • The Gurneys of Earlham. 4 46 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES it, incidentally helped to widen her own religious views, though it was a very natural pleasure to her that her daughter, Richenda, married within the Society. So quickly had the years gone by that the youngest of Mrs. Fry's eleven children was born on the same day as her first grandchild. But in the midst of many friendships and much public usefulness, great sorrows befell her, followed by a severe trial in outward fortune, through the failure of the business in which her husband was a partner, which greatly limited the financial help she could give to others, and in many ways brought new and unexpected difficulties into her life. It was necessary to leave Plashet for the old city home at St. Mildred's Court, though this was varied sometimes by pleasant quiet months in two little cottages in the wilds of the river at Dagenham, where Mrs. Fry specially enjoyed the view of the Thames and of the shipping, as well as the informal boating and country rambles. Samuel Gurney had always held a special place in his sister Elizabeth's heart and life. When they were young together he was always " her boy," and when in later life he became one of the most revered and powerful of London bankers, he was able to befriend and help her in a thousand ways. When after her husband's failure in business — a great grief to her in its A PLAIN FRIEND 47 effect upon others — her beautiful home at Plashet had to be given up and her old home at St. Mildred's Court had to come to an end, as well as the quiet country life at Dagenham, he found a delightful abode for her and for her family at Upton Lane, close to his own home at Ham House, and there the brother and sister enjoyed constant intercourse and friendship. There is a fine story about Samuel Gurney which shows well the sort of man he was. A well-known silversmith in London had been accused of forgery, and the affair was so difficult that many believed him guilty ; but Samuel Gurney, who after most careful investigation, was convinced of his innocence, on the day of his trial entered the felon's dock side by side with the accused man, and thus, we may suppose, turned the scale in his favour. It made a great sensation to see the great banker voluntarily standing by the man who had been thus publicly pointed at. As for Elizabeth Fry, whose life was so pure and peaceable, it was not only to the innocent that she felt tenderness and compassion, for she had written at Liskeard in 1825, " My attraction was to the lowest and worst classes." But hers was not a weak nature that could be dragged down by those beneath her ; on the contrary, she was always helping them to rise above them- selves into a higher and nobler life. 48 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES A poor woman on one of the convict ships tells how the memory of her, years afterwards, saved her from a mean little crime. She had rather wanted to keep out of Mrs. Fry's way, but just as she was leaving the ship, Mrs. Fry very lovingly laid her hands on her two shoulders and looking at her very earnestly, said four simple words, so that afterwards when tempted to a petty theft, the feeling of Elizabeth Fry's thumbs upon her shoulders came back to her with the memory of those words — " Thou shalt not covet," and putting back the gold thimble she had meant to steal, she rushed away from temptation. After a visit to the Channel Islands, and the death of her sister Louisa in 1836, Mrs. Fry travelled in Normandy, and wherever she went the prisons were her first occupation and interest. Everywhere she made important suggestions for reform, and her warm, simple friendship with kings and queens and statesmen and philosophers, gave her amazing power to get those reforms carried out. In Belgium, for instance, where her brother Joseph John Gurney was travelling with her and pleading the cause of the poor natives in the Congo, she instituted very helpful changes, and in Berlin she was treated as an old and valued friend. In all these countries she aroused such A PLAIN FRIEND 49 interest and sympathy for the prisoners that committees were formed to visit and help the poor chained and forgotten people in the dungeons, and new rules of health and employment were introduced. Her influence was felt in most European countries — France, Switzerland, Bel- gium, Denmark, Italy, Germany. The more Elizabeth Fry saw of French character, the more she admired that nation. Her travels in France, like the widening experi- ence brought to her through the dilfering views of her children, taught her much of the holy lives outside the Society of Friends, and she rejoiced at the good she found in all. One incident of travel was her meeting with the young Duchess of Orleans, who had just lost her young husband, the heir to the throne of France, through a terrible carriage accident in the Paris streets. The horses had bolted, and on reaching across to take the reins fron the groom's hands, the Duke was thrown out and killed instantly. After the return of her brother Joseph John Gurney from America, where he had done what he could in the cause of freedom in the United States, Elizabeth Fry took active part with him in the great meetings in London to plead for the abolition of slavery, and became known across the Atlantic more widely than before. Among our own statesmen she was a force at once powerful 50 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES and modest, for they all felt the strength and reality of her character. Meanwhile all the prison life in the United Kingdom was undergoing a gradual change for the better, and in Newgate, the prison she had first visited, there now reigned order instead of confusion. The children were taught, the women held by the good rules which, with Mrs. Fry's help, they had made for themselves, and the magistrates who visited the prison could scarcely believe it was the same place. Wherever Elizabeth Fry could exert influence, she took care that there should be for the prisoners regular employment, regular religious teaching, and regular visits. She did what she could to reform the arrange- ments for food and sleeping, and to lessen the horrible dirt and noise, but although she accom- plished more than those who had been before her in the good work, such as Silas Told and Mr. Baker and John Howard, she could never do as much as her heart desired. She worked, also, with the British and Foreign Bible Society, and chose for giving away what seemed to her the most beautiful and helpful verses in the Bible, which she arranged in small books to be given so far as possible by her own hand. Like Florence Nightingale, through her A PLAIN FRIEND 51 friendship with Ministers of State, she moved many unseen forces in the Government of the day for the good of those who suffered, and Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort were ever ready to give support and help. It was rather amusing that when Wilham the Fourth of Prussia came to England, after going through Newgate with Mrs. Fry, he insisted on putting aside all court etiquette and going to dine with her and her family at Upton Lane, and a very pleasant unceremonious evening they all had. But her most frequent foreign visits were to France, and these she continued until in 1844 she was no longer able to travel, being overtaken by illness and many sorrows, and no longer strong enough for continual public work. CHAPTER VI THE sunset of her life was a peaceful one. She had always feared she might be afraid of death, but as her day closed she felt that the Master she served would care for His timid child. And so indeed it was, for after asking the prayers of those who watched with her, in the early hours of October 13th, 1845, she passed away in unconsciousness, while the dawn flamed upon the world after a troubled and stormy night. She had tried, so far as she could, to do on earth the will of Our Father as it is done in Heaven, and to make our own cities a little less terribly unlike the ideal City of God. Therefore she was a good citizen, a good servant of the State, and she found her strength for that service in the Unseen Presence that fills this wonderful Universe. She wrote of religion in her little private diary : — " How it breaks down partition walls. How it unlooses heavy chains, and unlocks prison doors. How it enables us even to bear with the prejudices of our fellow mortals, and yield to them, if in so doing we do not hurt our own consciences." 52 A PLAIN FRIEND S3 And there, too, in the same little private book we find the prayer which we may all be glad to learn : — " Keep me, I pray Thee, in the unity of those who love Thee and whom I love ; and if for my humiliation Thou seest meet they should in some things set me at naught, let me ever rest satisfied in Thee and Thy love." Like the girl to whom Milton wrote a sonnet which every girl should know by heart, she prepared for a great and noble future by the diligent self-discipline of early life, and thus kept her lamp bright and pure. And like Florence Nightingale and Father Damien and the thousands who in our own day are serving and helping in a great and holy crusade against the powers of evil, she never tired of carrying it into those desolate places where the people sit in darkness. This little sketch of her shall end with Milton's sonnet, remembering only that while it reminds us of much in Elizabeth Fry's girlhood — Milton's title " To a Virtuous Young Lady," sounds to modern ears rather quaint — it can no more fully present the glory of her mature womanhood, as wife and mother and servant of mankind, than a folded rosebud, enchanting with the hues of dawn, can image the fragrance and the splendour of the later rose : — 54 YOUNG CITIZEN SERIES Lady, that in the prime of earUest youth Wisely hast shunn'd the broad way and the green, And with those few art eminently seen, That labour up the hill of heavenly truth, The better part with Mary and with Ruth Chosen thou hast ; and they that overween, And at thy growing virtues fret their spleen, No anger find in thee, but pity and ruth. Thy care is fix'd, and zealously attends To fill thy odorous lamp with deeds of light. And hope that reaps not shame. Therefore be sure Thou, when the bridegroom with his feastful friends Passes to bliss at the mid hour of night, Hast gain'd thy entrance, Virgin wise and pure. H«adley Brother!. iS, Devonshire Street. K.C.j ; and Ashford. Kent. ROSE AND DRAGON BOOKS Editor Literary Manager Annie Matheson Beriram Pickard rOUNG CITIZEN SERIES Ready : A PLAIN FRIEND, (Elizabeth Fry): By Annie Matheson. With a Foreword by Lady Betty Balfour, and Frontispiece. JOHN BRIGHT. By Bertram Pickard. With a Foreword by John Bright's daughter, Mrs. Bright Clark, and Frontispiece. OUR HERO OF THE GOLDEN HEART. (A Roll of Sacrifice). By Annie Matheson, with a F'oreword by Arthur Waugh, and Frontispiece. In Preparation : DR. ELSIE INGLIS. By Lady Frances Balfour. With a Foreword bv Sir William McEwen, M.D. LIFE OF LORD SHAFTESBURY. By Bertram Pickard. With a Foreword by Beatrice Harraden. LINCOLN'S CITIZENSHIP. By Annie Matheson. With a Foreword bv Lord Charnwood. RUSSIAN PATRIOTS. By Divers Hands. With a Foreword by Dr. Hagberg Wright. FIDELITY. (As exemplified by the Heroes and Heroines of Shakespeare). By Rev. Ronald Bayne. \^ ith a Foreword bv Sir Sidney Lee, D.Litt. COMRADE CITIZENS. (Florence Nightingale and Lord Herbert.) By Annie Matheson. With a Foreword by Sir Arthur Ouiller-Couch. HEROES OF MINES AND RAILWAYS. By Annie Matheson and Bertram Pickard. With a Foreword by Lord Henry Cavendish Bentinck, and a note by the Rt. Honble. J. H. Thomas, M.P. SIR THOMAS MORE. By the Hon. Mrs. Matheson. With a Foreword by G. W. Prothero. INDEPENDENCE AND LIBERTY. By Mrs. Lindsay. With a Foreword by Laurence Binyon. Later Issues will include the Names oj : Madame Naidu — Elizabeth Lee — Dr. Greville MacDonald — E. M. G. Reed— Muriel Stuart— Vernon Rendall — A. J. Mundella — Captain Henry Collis — A. D. Innes and other well-knowTi writers and workers. ? And the following will be among the Titles : The Story of the Loom and the Plough — William Morris and Handicrafts — Comrade Dominions — The Art of Cooking — The People's Part in the World-Music —The Power of Co-operation — Henry Fawcett — India's Sacrifice — Ireland's Tragedy -General Botha — Italian Patriots — Heroes of the Air — London's Foundations — Back to the Land. Price : Two Shillings and Sixpence Net BRITISH PERIODICALS LIMITED. 15 & 16, GOUGH SQUARE, FLEET STREET, E.C.4. *4 The Religion of Humanity '' and Other Poems. By Annie Matheson. Published by Rivington, Percival & Co., King Street, Covent Garden The Saturday Review, Nnv. Sth, 1890, says : — " That it is obviously inspired by a profound conviction of truth. . . . The poet's gifts are, however, more clearly proclaimed in the briefer poems, in such pretty songs as ' Lucy to Ravenswood,' or the pathetic stanzas ' Memory's Song.' " The Athenffium, Oct. z^th, 1890, says : — " We wish Miss Matheson's book contained more ... of such simple and touching verse as ' Memory's Song.' " The Speaker, Dec. 6th, 1890, says : — " Miss Matheson has so succeeded as to deserve our gratitude, and we cordially recommend her little volume to all who know the value and exceeding rarity of true songs of faith and love." Of ^'Love Triumphant '' — The Athenaeum, Aug. 12th, 1899, says : — " The shadow and the dreari- ness have not fallen on her spirit, and the mere sight of a bunch of violets in muddy Fleet Street is enough to bring crowding to her the hopes and memories of a country spring-time. . . . The author has a virile mind ; she is an Amazon, inspired with a fine fighting enthusiasm for humanitarian causes, and she wields her verse like sword or spear." Literature, Jan. zSth, 1899, says : — " Her delicate, thoughtful work takes generally a religious tone. . . . The dominant note of the work however, is sympathy — a sympathy which includes everything that knows sorrow and every one that takes part in the honourable work of the world. And in the expression of these sentiments Miss Matheson has written several poems that will appeal to every lover of high thought and finished work- manship." The Manchester Guardian, Dec. i^th, 1898, says : — " ' Love Triumph- ant ' and Other New Poems, by Annie Matheson (A D. Innes & Co., pp. 114, 5s.) is remarkable for sustained nobility of thought and a genuine distinction of language. A profound scorn for all that is ignoble, and a corresponding enthusiasm for all that is best in human life and nature, have lent no small measure of inspiration. The general level of the volume is so high that selection is not easy, but in our opinion there is nothing finer than the ex- quisite little poem ' The Mist,' where the balance of matter and form (and is not this, after all, the crucial point in all art .') is as perfect as feeling and skill could make it. . . . We recommend all lovers of poetry to purchase ' Love Triumphant,' and can assure them that there is not a page in the volume in which they will not find something to reward them." Of ** Love's Music''— The Literary World, Jan. ^th, 1894, says : — " In ' Love's Music ' Miss Annie Matheson has given us some most reverent poetry — musical, simple, and yet suggestive. . . . It is for this moving impulse of earnestness that ' Love's Music ' is chiefly notable, and many of those who are dimly conscious of that within them which they cannot express for lack of the necessary utterance may find in this volume a voice to help them." The St. James's Gazette, Jan. jri, 1894 says : — " Miss Annie Matheson is philosophical and humanitarian." UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 1 I Thi QiO p- ft ft ■^v rr-rfU\. n L9-50w-4,'61( University of California SOUTHERN REGiONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 405 Hilgard Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90024-1388 Return this material to the library from which it was borrowed. 1 M 'U^y jd i^ iJi ^iJi~^ i . 'u: iiL^ La ^1^ a; IVi M 5 iS39 DUE 2 WKS FRCM DATE RECEIVED ^■■^OlA ACCESS ■■■o Unlvers -^3, CA -^ r ^ / ^ >~v .^ M t19 ^^5-1 575 *«iJ^SWABtE R 7 2000 DUE 2 W.b FROM DATE RECEIVED 3 1158 00581 4651 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACIUTV AA 000 389 010 o S