mic of cholera in 1865 first drew
his attention to the great numbers of homeless and destitute children in
the cities of England. Encouraged by the support of the seventh earl of
Shaftesbury and the first Earl Cairns, he gave up his early ambition of
foreign missionary labour, and began what was to prove his life's work. The
first of the "Dr Barnardo's Homes" was opened in 1867 in Stepney Causeway,
London, where are still the headquarters of the institution. From that time
the work steadily increased until, at the time of the founder's death, in
1905, there were established 112 district "Homes," besides mission
branches, throughout the United Kingdom. The object for which these
institutions were started was to search for and to receive waifs and
strays, to feed, clothe, educate, and, where possible, to give an
industrial training suitable to each child. The principle adopted has been
that of free and immediate admission; there are no restrictions of age or
sex, religion or nationality; the physically robust and the incurably
diseased are alike received, the one necessary qualification being
destitution. The system under which the institution is carried on is
broadly as follows:--the infants and younger girls and boys are chiefly
"boarded out" in rural districts; girls above fourteen years of age are
sent to the industrial training homes, to be taught useful domestic
occupations; boys above seventeen years of age are first tested in labour
homes and then placed in employment at home, sent to sea or emigrated; boys
of between thirteen and seventeen years of age are trained for the various
trades for which they may be mentally or physically fitted. Besides the
various branches necessary for the foregoing work, there are also, among
others, the following institutions:--a rescue home for girls in danger, a
convalescent seaside home, and a hospital for sick waifs. In 1872 was
founded the girls' village home at Barkingside, near Ilford, with its own
church and sanatorium, and between sixty and seventy cottage homes, forming
a real "garden city"; and there Barnardo himself was buried. In 1901,
through the generosity of Mr E. H. Watts, a naval school was started at
North Elmham, near Norwich, to which boys are drafted from the homes to be
trained for the navy and the mercantile marine. Perhaps the most useful of
all the varied work instituted by Barnardo is the emigration system, by
which means thousands of boys and girls have been