But, apart from that wide- spread poverty which is already known and relieved, there is, in times like the present, always a certain small proportion, even of the poorest, who will "eat their cake to th' edge," and then starve bitterly before they will complain.

These are the flower of our working population; they are of finer stuff than the common staple of human nature.

Amongst such there must be many touching cases of distress which do not come to light, even by accident.

If they did, nobody can doubt the existence of a generous will to relieve them generously.

To meet such cases, it is pleasant to learn, however, as I did, that there is a large amount of private benevolence at work in Blackburn, industriously searching out the most deserving cases of distress.