Thrift eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 437 pages of information about Thrift.

Thrift eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 437 pages of information about Thrift.
be called the City of Educational Endowments.  There is also the Madras College, at St. Andrews, founded by the late Andrew Bell, D.D.; the Dollar Institution, founded by John Macrat; and the Dick Bequest, for elevating the character and position of the parochial schools and schoolmasters, in the counties of Aberdeen, Banff, and Moray.  The effects of this last bequest have been most salutary.  It has raised the character of the education given in the public schools, and the results have been frequently observed at Cambridge, where men from the northern counties have taken high honours in all departments of learning.

English benefactors have recently been following in the same direction.  The Owen’s College at Manchester; the Brown Library and Museum at Liverpool; the Whitworth Benefaction, by which thirty scholarships of the annual value of L100 each have been founded for the promotion of technical instruction; and the Scientific College at Birmingham, founded by Sir Josiah Mason, for the purpose of educating the rising generation in “sound, extensive, and practical scientific knowledge,”—­form a series of excellent institutions which will, we hope, be followed by many similar benefactions.  A man need not moulder with the green grass over his grave, before his means are applied to noble purposes.  He can make his benefactions while living, and assist at the outset in carrying out his liberal intentions.

Among the great benefactors of London, the name of Mr. Peabody, the American banker, cannot be forgotten.  It would take a volume to discuss his merits, though we must dismiss him in a paragraph.  He was one of the first to see, or at all events to make amends for, the houseless condition of the working classes of London.  In the formation of railways under and above ground, in opening out and widening new streets, in erecting new public buildings,—­the dwellings of the poor were destroyed, and their occupants swarmed away, no one knew whither.  Perhaps they crowded closer together, and bred disease in many forms.  Societies and companies were formed to remedy the evil to a certain extent.  Sir Sydney Waterlow was one of the first to lead the way, and he was followed by others.  But it was not until Mr. Peabody had left his splendid benefaction to the poor of London, that any steps could be taken to deal with the evil on a large and comprehensive scale.  His trustees have already erected ranges of workmen’s dwellings in many parts of the metropolis,—­which will from time to time be extended to other parts.  The Peabody dwellings furnish an example of what working men’s dwellings ought to be.  They are clean, tidy, and comfortable homes.  They have diminished drunkenness; they have promoted morality.  Mr. Peabody intended that his bounty should “directly ameliorate the condition and augment the comforts of the poor,” and he hoped that the results would “be appreciated, not only by the present, but by future generations of the people of London.”  From all that the trustees have done, it is clear that they are faithfully and nobly carrying out his intentions.

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