Leather-lane, and, if you understand London life, you will see at a glance how much there is in a Sabbath market to attract and interest the lower classes. The street, with its confusion of voices and mud ancle-deep, is, to the vulgar crowd, a fair and a world in itself. What disgusts genteel visitors possesses fascinations for others less fastidious. You are a person of taste; so is the artisan or labourer in morning deshabille yonder, though his taste may be coarser than yours. The market is a scene of life such as he thoroughly enjoys, provided the sky be clear and the wind be not too biting to hinder his standing at the street-corner to smoke and gossip. Even small shop-keepers are persons honoured in a way by the class beneath them. Humble customers appreciate the opportunity of lingering over a bargain, or of chatting over the process of paying another instalment off the accumulating score. They would not attend the ordinary public worship of God were there no market, and they prefer the street to a confined and dirty home. They would not hear the gospel at all were not the mission station open, and its agents abroad to seek for the people the good they will not seek for themselves.

In certain of these markets the stalls are packed closely together, and are heavily laden with vegetables, earthenware, toys, and other goods, all of which are pressed upon public notice with eager looks and shrill cries. These Sunday fairs were formerly allowed to remain during the whole morning, but in Whitecross-street, as well as in other localities, a compromise has been arranged with threatening Vestries, and a clearance has to be effected by eleven a.m.

But though Vestries may oust poor costers, they can interfere little with the shops. These being less subject to the authority of Bumbledom open wide their doors, and should it suit their convenience, they will employ a person to take up a position on the pavement whose natural gifts chiefly consist in a capacity for making unlimited noise. We have even met with a Sabbath auction in one notorious thoroughfare-" Pass in, gentlemen, jest a goin' to commence "-and the numbers who did pass in to the frouzy store showed that auctions possess charms for a class of loungers with whom time passes heavily before the taverns open at one o'clock. Yet all these are missionary subjects, and experience has proved that not a few may be gathered into the gospel fold.

Yes, he who would know anything about the manners and customs of the London poor must see them in the Sunday market. How interested they become in mere trifles, such as the marking of a bird and the cost of a chisel; cannot they be taught to show some interest in the gospel? See, yonder is a man selling braces on the pavement, and a popular preacher might be proud while commanding an audience as attentive as the one gathered around that dealer. Those braces, now, are such palpable bargains that the salesman seems to think he is justified in being patronising. He is not going to ask half-a-crown, not even eighteen pence for a pair-the price is one shilling only. He does a trade, and doubtless pities those who, unimpressed by noise and argument, deny themselves a luxury by withholding their shilling.

A person even more successful, to judge by the crowd he attracted, was a hat salesman whom we have encountered. This genius whose

mouth was too large to show a gentle origin, and whose lungs were too powerful to warrant our approaching within a certain number of yards of his shop door, may have owed much of his popularity to a green hat with a purple rim, with which he adorned his person for the purpose of producing a picturesque effect. "Take up the 'ats gentlemen, and judge the harticles for yerselves. If you don't buy, why there's no 'arm done, cos this 'ere aint like a ware'ouse as yer goes in and then don't like to come out on again without buying nothink." A crowd of curious men examine the hats, and half-crowns pass rather rapidly from the pockets of purchasers to the till of the seller. This trade is stimulated by the premium of a cigar with every hat sold. This, then, is the nature of the soil on which London evangelists labour for a harvest. They must work hard and patiently to gather a congregation. An interested crowd may be gathered in a few minutes by the shameless chicanery of petty traders.

If any one person is known better than another in the purlieus of Golden-lane that individual is Lord Shaftesbury, or "The Earl," as the people invariably call him. He is quite an idol among the costers and is reckoned one of their number. On the day that the Princess Louise was married, in June, 1871, the President of the Mission left the wedding party at Windsor to attend the annual festival of the dealers, when he was welcomed by a native, who, mounted on "The Earl" barrow, made a characteristic speech. Lord Shaftesbury has been presented with several testimonials by his lowly friends, such as a photograph of costers selling in Whitecross-street, a gold pencil-case, and a bouquet for the ladies at home. When the late Countess lay in her last illness, it is well known how the converts of Mr. Orsman's Mission sent up to heaven their earnest prayers for her recovery.

"The huge wave of sorrow as it rolls over the great city deposits its dark sediment here," says our evangelist in reference to his district. His words may be readily credited when we consider that twenty thousand persons are huddled together within the radius of a furlong from the mission station. Of these, "thirty per cent. are costermongers and itinerant street-traders; twenty per cent. are labourers and poor women who live by washing, charing, and needlework; thirty per cent. are either paupers or persons of doubtful occupation; and the remaining twenty per cent. are industriously wearing out their lives in the attempt to earn a livelihood at the following occupations :-artificial-flower makers; brace-sewing at twopence per dozen pairs; toy-makers, woodchoppers, and crossing-sweepers; gutter-searchers for cigar-ends; bone pickers, and dust bin searchers for doctors' bottles, which, when washed are sold to chemists at one shilling and ninepence per gross. Also fusee, sweetstuff, and herb sellers, dealers in old clothes, and sorters of the clearings of warehouses, etc."

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To commence work among this mass of wretchedness and heathenism with a stock-in-trade of a Bible and a bundle of tracts, revealed the existence of faith and moral courage such as few can rejoice in possessing. Answers to prayer were on the wing, however, and rewards also, since one convert's confession like the following-and many such came forward—would repay for a large outlay of persevering toil: "Now mates, yer thinks yer sees Bill Wilkins, don't yer? An' so yer do, but not the same man yer used to see, an' I'll tell yer how it is;— Yer knows how I used to go to Hornsey with my nets a bird-catching every Sunday, an' how I used to come home drunk and 'ave a row with the missus; well, about three year ago I was comin' home a swearin' to myself 'cos I couldn't get my usual beer as they sez as how I wasn't a bony-fidy traveller. Well, I sees the people a-comin' out of church, an' I envied 'em; then I listens to a street-preacher who offered me a tract; sez I, 'No use to me, guv'nor.' 'Why?' 'Cos I can't read.' Then come to our mission-hall this evening says he.' He then described his first visit to the mission, and how that ere party I sees in the mornin' takes me right afore all the people to a seat close agin the preacher, an' I wished I hadn't 'ave gone, &c.' The words 'God so loved the world,' etc., touched his heart, and he went home a wiser and a better man. He suffered much pecuniary loss in his trade, and although much persecuted at home and elsewhere, he was consistent and useful in his life, and he died, as he had lived, rich in faith."

After conversion these men can detail their experience, and can define the gospel before their own companions in language clear and forcible as well as affecting. Listen to one of Mr. Orsman's converts, as he addresses a crowded meeting of costers :

:

"The main p'int of this meeting, my friends, as I consider it, is to p'int ye to the Lamb of God. 'Who hath believed our report? and to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed?' Bless the Lord it has been revealed to me. Ye all know what I were, and I 'ave to tell yer what I am. One text of Scripter has stuck by me- 'God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son that whosoever '-mind, whosoever that takes all in, and leaves none out'believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. One day, afore I were converted, when I were in liquor, I said to a policeman that I'd knock

his brains out. He took me up. As we was going along to the magistrate next morning, I says to him, 'Now, Mr. X., what do you think I should do?' 'Why,' said he, plead guilty.' So when I was taken afore the magistrate, he axed me what I had to say. I said, 'Guilty my lord, and I'm very sorry for what I've done.' Then he fined me half-a-crown, or be locked up. But I was skinned out. Ye all know, my friends, what it is to be skinned out. So I was locked up. But presently the turnkey who locked me up came back, turned the key t'other way, opened the door, and told me to go out. Somebody had paid the fine for me; and when I got outside the walls, a man on the other side of the street made a sign to me wi' his finger to come to him; and when 1 went he put three shillings and sixpence into my hand, so that I had something to go on wi'. Now, my friends, Jesus Christ opens the door of our prison for us, sets us free, and gives us everlasting life to begin wi'. Aint this wonderful! And he invites ye all to trust him."

In another instance, a child in the school became the means of her parents' conversion. Her sister having died of an infectious disease, this little one was sent from home to be away until after the funeral. Unknown to her friends, however, she returned, and was found kneeling in prayer beside her sister's coffin-"I am one of thy lambs, and so I want to leave this wicked world." The mother, moved to tears, may have foreseen the sequel the little creature soon sickened, and then died singing one of the hymns she had learned in her class.

Here are other examples of work, selected from many more, and given in Mr. Orsman's own words:

"Men and women, ungodly in their lives, when dying have sent for us, and in some cases we have witnessed terrible scenes. Here is a specimen :-A widow with four children of the respective ages of 13, 11, 8, and 5 years, and a married daughter and her husband, lived in a back room 10 feet square, and for which he paid 2s. 9d. weekly. When visited all were ill with the fever. The mother and child died shortly afterwards. The room was filthy and desolate: it contained only a broken table, four chairs tied up with pieces of string, and a broken looking-glass. The bodies of the deceased were like the room, and we had even to supply coverings to bury them in. One evening we were sent for to visit the father of some of our Band of Hope scholars. He was dying of bronchitis, struck down in the prime of life. In the same room lay his wife, in a delirious fever. The poor man was unconscious, and all efforts to rouse him seemed fruitless. His aged mother and many other relatives were weeping round the bed, hoping that he might at last rally sufficiently to hear the sweet message of the gospel, and to avow his faith in Jesus. Just as we were about to leave, it was suggested that we should sing some hymns that he loved to hear his children sing. We sang softly, the hymn, 'Just as I am;' but he seemed to hear not until we sang

'Rock of Ages, cleft for me.'

And when we reached the last verse, his lips moved-his eyes lighted up with unearthly fire, and he sang audibly the last two lines. He died that night, and we trust he is now singing the everlasting song. A young lad recently caught the fever, and died, after two days' illness, in the hospital. Singularly enough, on the previous Sunday he had prayed in the Bible-class-for the first time in public. For three months previously he had been a true Christian. His sudden death has been the means of leading his parents to the house of God. A year ago we were sent for to visit a young married woman of respectable family, who was nearly frantic with terror at the prospect of death. She had caught cold at a ball, and rapid consumption had set in. When we first saw her the doctor had just given her up. We read, prayed, and talked with her

many times after that, and we had the delight of hearing her testimony to the love of Christ. She has gone to be with the angels, and her father and family now regularly attend the mission."

It must occasion Mr. Orsman no little joyful satisfaction when he looks around on the results of his toil. He can point to hundreds of persons who though once wallowing in profligacy, are now adorning the gospel. Numbers of his converts have emigrated to become examples of Christian uprightness in foreign climes. Not a few whom he has been instrumental in raising socially as well as spiritually by the grand ameliorating power of religion, are now occupying honourable positions in life. Some of the rescued youths have entered the Civil Service; others are Sabbath-school teachers, while a few are ministers of the gospel.

Only to completely summarise the work accomplished in Goldenlane during one year would be no easy task. First, the gospel is faithfully preached at the Mission House, where also Bible-classes and enquirers' meetings are held. There are special services for children, a Sabbath-school served by teachers who are converts of the mission, and a free day-school, in which we are told "the best lesson-book is the Bible." Between four and five thousand dinners are given away each winter to famishing children. Then the scholars are taken into the country for an excursion every year, and "the summer outing is looked forward to as the event of the year by these poor little ragged ones. As the time draws nigh they grow so nervous with excitement that it is very hard to restrain them." Tea and cake, followed by lectures and dissolving views, are occasional treats provided for the adults of the neighbourhood, and of the value of such entertainments we need harbour no doubts, since one woman testified when dying, "That picter o' the woman clingin' to the cross, with the roarin' waves all around, made me understand that beautiful hymn, 'Simply to thy cross I cling ;' an' now I know he WILL save me." Nor must we overlook the soupkitchen, the clothing and barrow clubs, "The Emily Fund," the visitation of the sick, the mothers' sewing club, and the maternity society. The boon conferred by this last is best known to those who enter a room all but bare, to carry with them comforts and necessary clothing for some prostrate sufferer who has scarce bed or covering to comfort her during nature's trial.

In his great work, Mr. Orsman has enlisted the gratitude and sympathy of the church at large. While empty City churches are thickly scattered around his district, to serve no higher purpose than that of providing comfortable stipends for scholarly incumbents, or of interesting curious archæologists, this volunteer in Christ's service has stormed the very castle-keep of London heathenism; and to the surprise of his friends, has successfully planted the gospel standard on ground from which many have turned aside with a shudder as from a God-forsaken field. May his life long be spared to win yet greater trophies, and may all needful pecuniary support be offered by those, who possessing wealth, have learned to become cheerful givers to Him who gave himself for them. In fine, may the New Mission Building, as yet only "one of the hopes of the future"-soon be an accomplished fact; and may it testify to another generation of the holy courage and