My cottage clients / [Royal Hospital for Incurables ; illustrated by C. Butterworth].

Date:
1886
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: My cottage clients / [Royal Hospital for Incurables ; illustrated by C. Butterworth]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    be of much, use in the world; and having an invalid brother, and a mother out of health, she almost lost heart. Still, she contributed her mite of help, assisting her mother in teaching the village children, and doing a little needlework, efforts aggravating a malady that, above all things, required repose of mind and body. She became a candi¬ date for the Hospital pension; but, remote and unknown, her case lingered on without a near prospect of success; at length it was brought to the notice of a benevolent lady, Miss B., living in London, and, in less than a year after, she was elected. “1 remember,” she says, “our clergyman came on the Saturday, the day after my election, and told me he had seen my name among the successful candidates in a newspaper. I recollect that I was very weak and poorly at the time, and he told me very gently for fear it would be too much for me. I cannot describe the rest and gratitude that came to me that evening. The thought that now I was so far provided for had a good effect on my health, for I certainly improved in strength, as I had perfect rest of mind and body; and my pension procured me many little comforts which are almost necessaries to one in weak health, and which I could not have before. Now I had the means, I took a journey to London, in the hope that the doctors there might be able to do something for me. But it was not to be, and I returned home very worn and tired, just to rest and be still. Since then, the years have flown very quickly by. My mother and brother have passed away, and my father is growing quite old, though still able to follow his work as carpenter on an estate. I am quietly happy at times, and have my pleasures, such as books and needlework, and being among my friends. My love of reading has soothed my life a great deal, and then Nature has great charms for me : a nosegay, a bunch of autumn leaves, or a fine sunset will make me glad for days. I should like those who are so nobly supporting the institution to know how my very kindest wishes and regards will ever go out to them for all that they have done and are still doing for me and others.” Such testimony speaks for itself; I will only add that A. S. was elected at twenty-nine years of age, and has received the pension nineteen years. The father had come in from work and finished his tea in the kitchen (entered by door number one). He told us he had been a teetotaller forty-five years ; when he first became an abstainer, he left off tea, and, for some time, drank nothing but water; his friends pitied
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