approaching danger, and
endeavoured to avert it by ridicule and sarcasm. Neither the old men nor
the old women could read their books, now they had got them, said the
three Miss Browns. Never mind; they could learn, replied Mrs. Johnson
Parker. The children couldn't read either, suggested the three Miss
Browns. No matter; they could be taught, retorted Mrs. Johnson Parker.
A balance of parties took place. The Miss Browns publicly
examined--popular feeling inclined to the child's examination society.
The Miss Johnson Parkers publicly distributed--a reaction took place in
favour of the prayer-book distribution. A feather would have turned the
scale, and a feather did turn it. A missionary returned from the West
Indies; he was to be presented to the Dissenters' Missionary Society on
his marriage with a wealthy widow. Overtures were made to the Dissenters
by the Johnson Parkers. Their object was the same, and why not have a
joint meeting of the two societies? The proposition was accepted. The
meeting was duly heralded by public announcement, and the room was
crowded to suffocation. The Missionary appeared on the platform; he was
hailed with enthusiasm. He repeated a dialogue he had heard between two
negroes, behind a hedge, on the subject of distribution societies; the
approbation was tumultuous. He gave an imitation of the two negroes in
broken English; the roof was rent with applause. From that period we
date (with one trifling exception) a daily increase in the popularity of
the distribution society, and an increase of popularity, which the feeble
and impotent opposition of the examination party, has only tended to
augment.

Now, the great points about the childbed-linen monthly loan society are,
that it is less dependent on the fluctuations of public opinion than
either the distribution or the child's examination; and that, come what
may, there is never any lack of objects on which to exercise its
benevolence. Our parish is a very populous one, and, if anything,
contributes, we should be disposed to say, rather more than its due share
to the aggregate amount of births in the metropolis and its environs.
The consequence is, that the monthly loan society flourishes, and invests
its members with a most enviable amount of bustling patronage. The
society (whose only notion of dividing time, would appear to be its
allotment into months) holds monthly tea-drinkings, at which the monthly
report is received, a