LAST WEEK.
THE BLOOD RECKONING.
Fouquier Tinville used to amuse his leisure by the training of canaries. Robespierre liked to have a bouquet of flowers upon his table, which served as a paper-weight to the Reports of the Committee of Public Safety. Mr. Thomas Hopley, F.S.S., who flogged the wretched boy, Cancellor, to death the other day, at Eastbourne, because water on the brain drowned his power of learning the four first rules of arithmetic, was a great philanthropist—a professional lover of his species—a man with what they call a mission. Last year, whilst the skipping-rope was hanging up in his study, and he was taking pleasant sea-side walks up to Beechey Head, with the walking-stick in his hand with which he afterwards killed poor Cancellor, he was engaged in hitching together fine words which were to put all our social sixes and sevens to rights.
The world was out of joint. Oh! cursed spite
That ever he was born to put it right!
Hopley, the Humanitarian, gave his little book the title of
“Wrongs which Cry for Redress.”
The word “wrong,” in the original, is printed in capital letters so big, that you would almost fancy the fellow was about to bring the strong points of a new-fangled coffee-biggin under your notice. He writes for the “Men and Women” of the United Kingdom! He says nothing about the children. He had another way of leading them to correct opinions upon “solemnly momentous questions”—such as Practice, and Vulgar Fractions. He announces himself to his readers as
“Thomas Hopley, F.S.S., Author of ‘Helps towards the Physical, Intellectual, and Moral Elevation of all Classes of Society,’ ‘Lectures on the Education of Man,’ etc.”
The “etc.” perhaps points to his doings in the way of manslaughter—occasion arising. T. H. in his title-page scorns the old-fashioned plan of borrowing a motto from any of the great worthies of our book-shelves. He boldly quotes himself, and hoists as his flag a little dirty rag of nonsense from his own Lecture iii., page 36. The rag is all covered with slang; the kind of slang which people talk when they set up in the philanthropy line, just as more honest men open a ham and beef shop. Hopley tells us that “the true educationist is the bigot of no political party, of no class section.” When a man keeps a school, he might know that there is no such word in English as “educationist.” It is not so bad to murder your own language as to kill little boys; but still it is best to write English, even if you flog your scholars to death. The true “educationist” of the Hopley school must be a very fine fellow. The Chief Justice who set Hopley to work the other day amongst our penal serfs couldn’t hold a candle to him. The fight of the “educationist” is “against cold-heartedness, wherever it exists. His struggle is against the selfishness of the world. . . . He casts his eyes around, and whenever he beholds any infringement of the Creator’s laws—those laws which are ordained to regulate the conduct of the human family—whether the infringement be the deed of the wealthy, or the indigent, of the many or the few—” How one feels that the lecturer has got into his stroke; he is full of what is called “second-wind,” and could go on mumbling this stuff for hours. Well, “the many or the few—whether it affect the mental constitution by acting on the body, or bodily constitution, by acting on the mind; he knows that such infringement must lessen human happiness, and he feels it his duty to lift up his voice and say, ‘These things are contrary to the laws of God.’” Well done, Thomas Hopley, few of us could go off at score in such style as that; the world is not good enough for men like you. How small a poor fellow would have felt now if he had gone down to Eastbourne and taken a walk with the F.S.S. upon the edge of the cliff, and listened to him humming away at his philanthropy like a tea-kettle on the hob. How pleasant it must be for such a man to sit before his own fire of an evening, and groan over the wickedness of his fellow-men, until the time comes for ringing the bell, and saying to Alice Deacon—“Alice, my dear, tell Master Cancellor that I should wish to have the pleasure of speaking with him in the library!” It may be that the “educationist who is the bigot of no class section” would then proceed to lessen the sum of human happiness in a way which would make common people open their eyes pretty wide.
The little book is filled with the grievances of oppressed milliners and dress-makers, hard-ware manufacturers, and others. It is very true these poor folks have too often a hard time of it; but Thomas Hopley and his kind will scarcely mend matters for them. However, it is a pity the lawyers who were handling his case down at Lewes the other day, did not know what his own ideas were about murderers and murder. At page 15 of “Wrongs which cry for Redress,” there are these words:—“Fathers and mothers of England, you have no right to place your children, or to consent to their being placed at any occupations whatever which you know must prove destructive to them. Let your country’s laws say what they may—permit what they may, the laws of God instruct that if you do so place them, or consent to their being so placed, you rank yourselves with murderers.” What happens when a schoolmaster flogs a boy to death, and takes two or three hours about the work? One scrap more from the “Wrongs, &c.,” and we will just bring Hopley’s acts and his words together. He had been very busy scolding the bleaching and scouring people, up one page and down another for over-working the poor children. It is strange, now we know the man for what he is, to see the way in which he gloats over the sores and sorrows of these little folks; but bad as things may be, I, for one, should have been sorry to have been a child in Mr. T. Hopley’s “Bleaching, Scouring, and Finishing Works for Cottons, Woollens, &c.” if he had gone into that line of business. However, when he has told us all about the sore-feet, and the other pains and aches of the poor creatures—this humane school-master bursts out in fiery indignation with these words:—
