HOME LIFE.

In thinking of work such as that of our own and similar Missions, we are apt to look on the poor in the mass, and deal with them as such; but it is only as individuals that any class can be approached. Look nearer, and you will find that in their homes, as in ours, little kindnesses do sweeten life just as harsh and hasty words make misery. And we find the poor making or marring their own happiness in the same way as those who are better dressed. We have here brought together a few incidents to place more vividly before our minds the lights and shadows of these lives, only remarking how much harder it is for people to maintain an even temper when a large family is crowded together in one room in which all the work of the house has to go on.

Let us pity and help our brother instead of judging him. It is true that we no longer pass by on the other side of the way, scorning or ignoring him; our Mission-and many others, let us be thankful for it-have crossed the road to the place where he lies naked and wounded; we have raised his head, and hold it in our lap, and see!-the face is like our own, it is a human face, though pale and haggard; let us see if we cannot help him to a place of safety, and heal his wounds; and who knows whether he also may not, cheered and saved, reflect the likeness of the Son of Man?

To begin with the bright side, let us tell a few examples of kind husbands; and happily we hear of many instances of such :

"Mrs. N, a respectable young mother, not long come from the country, expressed her thankfulness for Nurse's help. She had no one to come to her, and her husband is only a very poor man, working at the match factory; yet so kind that after work he comes home, cleans the room and washes most of the clothes. He is content with a basin of broth, which is made with soaked bread, a little dripping and pepper and salt; this

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is called in the part of the country they came from 'kettle broth.' The poor woman was trying to sit up, but she is very weak, and needs more nourishment than they can afford

to get."

Again we read:-"My patient, who is getting on nicely, lives in a small house of two rooms. To-day she was up doing a little needlework, her two elder children playing near her. Just outside the street door, before which is a small yard, are some neatly-made rabbit hutches and a short run for fowls, the work of a steady and kind husband. And it may be mentioned that in this district many homes are made happier by the husband being persuaded by the Nurse to attend the Fathers' Meeting."

It is a greater trial of faith, however, when the wife is an invalid, but such helplessness is sometimes tenderly cared for. "Mrs. B has been ill for a long time of consumption. Nurse makes her bed and does various little things for her. She is at present able to get up and sit by the fire, but can do nothing. It is well for her that she has a good husband who keeps the room clean. He does it bit by bit, after he comes home from work. He would rather do it than see it dirty, and cannot afford to pay others." There are some old couples too who are going down the hill of life hand in hand, such as "old Mrs. L, who is so glad to have her bed made. It cheers and helps her old husband, who keeps everything washed, ironed, and mended. Even the sheet I saw to-day on the bed was made of three different pieces, all his patch-work, and he is as thankful as his wife to Nurse for the comfort of seeing her put back into bed again cheered and attended to. He is a Christian, and reads the Word to his aged wife, and is in every way a great comfort to her."

No doubt the influence of the wife and mother is felt, and returns on herself in reward or punishment, but all do not recognize the need of keeping the home bright for the husband.

"Of Mrs. T-," who had received Nurse's services, we are told, "Her husband is a steady man, and though receiving small wages he is in constant work. They are both sensible

that a small amount earned regularly is much better than casual work even when better paid. Mrs. T is now up, and this morning we found the room so very clean and neat that we felt compelled to praise it. The fire-grate had been blacked, and on the table was a pretty cover, while a shelf in the window had plants arranged along it, looking fresh and green. The husband takes much pride in the home, and they have a small garden at the back of the house, which she was very anxious for us to see. She said it was so much better for her husband to be working there than spending his evenings at the public-house. She is a member of the Mothers' Meeting, and her husband has lately begun to attend the open air preaching, whilst last Sunday evening he went to the Mission Service."

"We notice in this district," continues the Report," that when a woman joins the Mothers' Meeting she soon becomes clean, and tries to keep a tidy home. Mrs. W has been subscribing to the Bible-woman for a Bible, telling us that she did not miss the pennies, and then it came to her like a lovely present.' In the same way her table-cover of striped coloured cotton was paid for weekly, as the half-pence could be spared. The husband is employed making pipes, and the wife is looking forward, as soon as she is strong enough, to return to the same work."

Too often it is the untidy, unlovely home, that makes a man seek brightness and warmth in the false glitter and momentary excitement of the public-house; but let us give one more instance to the contrary.

"Mrs. S, our first patient, is very anxious about her little crippled boy, just eight years of age. The spine, having been injured by a fall, is growing out; the mother fears the bone is diseased. She is going to take him to the Children's Hospital in Chelsea, where we hope he may obtain relief. Sometimes the pain is so very severe that he cannot stand, only roll about on the floor; but he is very patient, and, when able, goes to school, and is quite cheerful. He showed us the pretty text-cards, obtained for early attendance at Sunday-school, pinned up to the wall of the room. The mother attends the

Mothers' Meeting, and has persuaded her husband to go to the Sunday evening service. He was at home this morning; he is a labourer in the dockyard, but had been down to the waterside, and finds that the ship would not be in until two o'clock in the afternoon; he had returned home to mend the children's shoes instead of loitering about. The wife told us she always tries to keep home comfortable, so that he may not be tempted to go with companions into the public-house. She said, 'When he is at home I know where he is; I can't abear him to be waiting about them docks, he is sure to get to drinking.'"

We have some instances, too, of changed homes, such as that here given :-" Mrs. H, now very bad with dropsy, is having much attention from Nurse, and although Nurse says very little about it, I feel her teaching has been blessed to this poor woman, who is now a bright, cheerful Christian, the home clean and comfortably furnished. was converted three years ago. drunkard, the home was dirty and almost empty, and the wife bad-tempered and ill-used, and it is from the effects of this that she is now suffering.

The husband, a cabman, Before that time he was a

"This short paragraph gives but a faint idea of the amount of care and prayer bestowed on this patient by a Nurse who for seven years attended her, but has had the great joy of seeing both Mrs. H— and her husband truly changed. The former, after much suffering, died this autumn."

Some of the instances of bad treatment are too painful to record, and it is saddening to know that in many cases the diseases from which women are suffering have been brought on by violence and ill treatment by a husband.

In the slighter cases of ill-usage the tact and good sense of the Bible-woman has often some influence :

"This family has rather a comfortable home. The street door opens into the living room, in which four young children were running about. On a bed, in a recess, lay the wife and her infant a few days old, and the husband, ill from bronchitis, sat in an arm-chair near the fire. He is a carman, very roughlooking and bad-tempered. A few weeks back he threw the teapot at his wife and scalded her badly. Having some tracts

with me I gave one to one of the children, and asked her to take it to her father. This led to some talk, and I said to him, 'While nurse is washing the baby, Mr. S-, perhaps you would read a few verses to us from the Bible.' He would rather have been without the duty, but took the Book and read from St. Mark, first chapter; but as he went on his voice became thick, and I asked him to leave off. 'No; let me go on,' he said, and so persevered to the end of the chapter without missing a word.”

One instance only shall we give of a home desolated by the one who should be its protector and guardian.

"I had the privilege of seeing Mrs. T. She has been lying ill of consumption for some months. She appeared little more than a skeleton, and could not bear to be moved in the slightest way. She was, however, quite sensible and able to speak. She knew she had not long to live, and I asked if she felt sure she was saved; she shook her head, saying she wished she did. Then we showed her very simply that the Lord Jesus Christ is God's gift to the world, and we have but to accept the gift in order to be saved. Reminded her of His word, 'Come unto me,' and 'Him that cometh unto me I will in nowise cast out.' Then she repeated after me the words, I am coming, Lord, coming now to Thee; Wash me, cleanse me in the blood that flowed on Calvary.' After a little more conversation, which she seemed glad of, we left her with the text in large letters pinned on the wall by her bed, 'He that believeth on the Lord Jesus Christ shall be saved.' We can only hope that she was able to accept the precious truth. She died the next day. Nurse was with her, and tells me she seemed confident and anxious to go. I am so thankful I was permitted to see her. Her life has been one of extreme suffering through a very bad husband. Only two days before her death he brought two of his children home, that were not hers, saying they must stay there, and when she told him she was dying he said it was a good thing. Truly the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel

Sad as this is, it is one of many cases in which the wife has had to work for the family; but often too we find the wife and