cer found him in
Oxford Street, and took him to a Shelter in Burne Street, where he was
bathed and put to bed.

That was many years ago, and now he is to a great extent responsible
for the management of this Westminster Refuge. Commissioner Sturgess,
one of the head Officers of the Army, told me that their great
difficulty was to prevent him from overdoing himself at this
charitable task. I think the Commissioner said that sometimes he would
work eighteen or twenty hours out of the twenty-four.

One day this Staff-Captain played a grim little trick upon me. I was
seated at luncheon in a Salvation Army building, when the door opened,
and there entered as dreadful a human object as I have ever seen. The
man was clad in tatters, his bleeding feet were bound up with filthy
rags; he wore a dingy newspaper for a shirt. His face was cut and
plastered over roughly; he was a disgusting sight. He told me, in
husky accents, that drink had brought him down, and that he wanted
help. I made a few appropriate remarks, presented him with a small
coin, and sent him to the Officers downstairs.

A quarter of an hour later the Staff-Captain appeared in his uniform
and explained that he and the 'object' were the same person. Again it
was the clothes that made the difference. Those which he had worn when
he appeared at the luncheon-table were the same in which he had been
picked up on the streets of London. Also he thanked me for my good
advice which he said he hoped to follow, and for the sixpence that he
announced his intention of wearing on his watch-chain. For my part I
felt that the laugh was against me. Perhaps if I had thought the
Salvation Army capable of perpetrating a joke, I should not have been
so easily deceived.

This Staff-Captain gave me much information as to the class of
wanderers who frequent these Shelters, He estimated that about 50 per
cent of them sink to that level through the effects of drink. That is
to say, if by the waving of some magic wand intoxicants and harmful
drugs should cease to be obtainable in this country, the bulk of
extreme misery which needs such succour, and it may be added of crime
at large, would be lessened by one-half. This is a terrible statement,
and one that seems to excuse a great deal of what is called 'teetotal
fanaticism.' The rest, in his view, owe their fall to misfortune of
various kinds, which often in its turn leads to flight to the delusive
and destroying solace of drink. Thus