As a specimen of the ruck, however, I will mention the first individual to whom I happened to speak—­a strong young man, who was weeding a bed of onions.  He told me that he had been a farm labourer in early life, and, subsequently, for six years a coachman in a private livery stables in London.  He lost his place through drink, became a wanderer on the Embankment, was picked up by the Salvation Army and sent to one of its Elevator paper-works.  Afterwards, he volunteered to work on the land at Hadleigh, where he had then been employed for nine months.  His ambition was to emigrate to Canada, which, doubtless, he has now done, or is about to do.  Such cases might be duplicated by the dozen, but for this there is no need. Ex uno disce omnes.

All the labour employed, however, is not of this class.  For instance, the next man to whom I spoke, who was engaged in ploughing up old cabbage land with a pair of very useful four-year-olds, bred on the farm, was not a Colonist but an agricultural hand, paid at the rate of wages usual in the district.  Another, who managed the tomato-houses, was a skilled professional tomato-grower from the Channel Islands.  The experience of the managers of the Colony is that it is necessary to employ a certain number of expert agriculturalists on the place, in order that they may train the raw hands who come from London and elsewhere.

To a farmer, such as the present writer, a visit to Hadleigh is an extremely interesting event, showing him, as it does, what can be done upon cold and unkindly land by the aid of capital, intelligence, and labour.  Still I doubt whether a detailed description of all these agricultural operations falls within the scope of a book such as that upon which I am engaged.

Therefore, I will content myself with saying that this business, like everything else that the Army undertakes, is carried out with great thoroughness and considerable success.  The extensive orchards are admirably managed, and were fruitful even in the bad season of 1910.  The tomato-houses, which have recently been increased at a capital cost of about L1,000, produce many tons of tomatoes, and the French garden is excellent of its kind.  The breed of Middle-white pigs is to be commended; so much so in my judgment, and I can give no better testimonial, that at the moment of writing I am trying to obtain from it a pedigree boar for my own use.  The Hadleigh poultry farm, too, is famous all over the world, and the Officer who manages it was the President for 1910 of the Wyandotte Society, fowls for which Hadleigh is famous, having taken the championship prizes for this breed and others all over the kingdom.  The cattle and horses are also good of their class, and the crops in a trying year looked extremely well.

All these things, however, are but a means to an end, which end is the redemption of our fallen fellow-creatures, or such of them as come within the reach of the work of the Salvation Army at this particular place.