Voluntaries for an, East London Hospital. (David Stott.)—Our notice of
this volume has been unduly delayed, but coming now, it is not, we hope, unseasonable. Some twenty contributors have written for it, a curiously mingled company, among whom we find Lord Lytton, the Bishop of Bedford, Miss F. Mabel Robinson, Mr. Clement Scott, Mr. Andrew Lang, Mr. R. L. Stevenson, and Mr. J. L. Toole. The institution which it is sought to benefit is the East London Hospital for Children, and of all the papers, good as some of them are, there is none that can be compared to that in which Mrs. Heck- ford tells the pathetic story of how her husband and herself founded it and cherished it through its early days of weakness. Dr. Heckford was on the staff of the London Hospital. On the first anniversary of their wedding-day, he and his wife opened the hospital in what had been two old warehouses at Ratoliff Cross. We shall not attempt to epitomise the story of the devotion with which they carried on the work, and of the answering devotion which they called forth in others. It must be looked for in these pages. Dr. Heck. ford was forced to seek a warmer climate for his health. He returned to help the hospital when it seemed to be in danger, and he just lived to see the site purchased by the Committee of Management for the new building. He was then in his twenty-ninth year. A carious and significant commentary on the need of the hospital is supplied by a table which gives "the weight of two hundred and fifty children taken consecutively and without selection from the hospital books." Here is an extract from ii:—
Highest Average Lowest Proper Age. Weight. Weight. Weight. Weight. lb. oz. lb. oz. lb. oz. lb. oz.
1 17 10 15 0 10 0 24 0 6 39 6 21 6 21 0 48 0 13 698 574 540 82 0
The writers of the papers mingle eerie judo; the reader will enjoy them, we are sure, the more, if he can overcome a too common reluctance in the English mind, and buy the book.
Previous page
