further; their parents he could not attempt to influence. F. Thompson told me that there were several other localities in East London in precisely the same condition. In fact every parish in East London counts at least hundreds of drifted Catholics. Whilst thousands and thousands of Catholics are thus separating from the Church, principally for want of churches and priests, great numbers of missionaries are being sent from Mill Hill, amidst much flourish of trumpets, to India, Borneo, Uganda, &c., and an enormous sum is being collected for an unnecessary cathedral; and the Church of Rome makes a special profession of caring for the poor. Though the phenomenon is not by any means confined to poor districts, it is more conspicuous in them because ecclesiastics are naturally slow to undertake and prosecute such unremunerative toil.
Hence there is such a considerable leakage, as it is called, in the Church that it is questionable whether their 'converts' quite fill up the vacant place. I have thought for many years, and I have been confirmed in the opinion by many colleagues, that for the last twenty years, at least, the Church of Rome in England has made no progress, but has probably lost in numbers; taking into account, of course, the increase of a generation. That the Church has made a large number of converts it is impossible to deny, and it would be foolish to question the sincerity of large numbers of its converts. At the same time the
