have been left behind in poverty, we should rejoice to see their poverty relieved by some plan which would elevate the children of such ancestry above common paupers. In Spitalfields, for instance, we see a population of undoubted Huguenot origin, singular in their customs and in their sufferings. That district has been frequently the occasion of appeals for relief.
In 1793 Rev. Charles Edward De Coctlogon preached a sermon, entitled, “The Grace of Christ in Redemption, enforced as a Model of Sublime Charity.” This sermon was published in 1794 for the benefit of the Spitalfields Weavers — “to add to a collection now making, which is rendered necessary by the uncommon distresses of more than 20,000 objects — men, women, and children — pining in a state of extreme want, not arising from indiscretion, idleness, or profligacy, but from a defect in a particular branch of commerce.”
In 1816 a committee addressing the Lord Mayor represented that the number of unemployed weavers was computed at 30,000, and added this observation: “This district contains much of modest and retiring poverty that suffers comparatively without repining.” At a public meeting in the Mansion House, the mover of one of the resolutions said: “With regard to the soup society, its merits are not confined to the judiciousness of its distribution, but consist also in the real goodness of the soup, in support of which I may safely appeal to an honourable baronet, who is an admirable judge of such matters.” (A loud laugh.)
“Sir William Curtis, in seconding the motion, expressed his sense of the notice taken of himself, though the occasion was of that nature that he hardly knew how to smile at it.”
The Rev. Isaac Taylor, vicar of St. Matthias, Bethnal Green, London,[1] writes: “The work of a parochial clergyman among the descendants of the Huguenots is a sad but most interesting duty. They have none of the servility, none of the brutality which is found among other classes of the London poor. . . . A physiognomist of small skill could, easily and almost infallibly, point out in any assembly of the inhabitants of Bethnal-Green those who could substantiate their claim to Huguenot blood. The jet black hair, the swarthy complexion, the dark, brilliant, and often passionate eye, the small hand, the lithe, well-bred figure, the indescribable charm of demeanour, graceful, courteous, and self-possessed, and often a slightly oratorical manner, and an instinctive taste in dress, all so different from the ordinary type of the London poor, are things which it is impossible to mistake, and are the more striking when their possessors are living in wretched garrets, and often in the extremest poverty. . . . Some of them still cherish a reasonable pride in their long pedigrees, and in the distinguished and noble surnames which they bear . . . a nation of martyrs, not forgetful that they were once among the most prosperous of London artisans.”
Such testimony shows how the Royal Bounty might gracefully relieve their wants, or improve their houses and streets, or transplant some of their families to better fields.
*⁎* Although this section has had to deal only with the bounty of the English to the French refugees, the reader will bear in mind that the refugees had nothing of the pauper spirit. They were known to support the poor of their own congregations, who were also remembered generously in their wills. In the vestry of the City of London French Church, there is exhibited on painted boards on the wall, a list of donations and legacies to the poor of the congregation which we admire, though amused by the curious simplicity of the French words, dons and legs. Mr. James Houblon of London left in 1682, in his legacy of exhortation to his children, a testimony as to the charitable funds of this church: “Be especially charitable to the French Church; I know not any charity better bestowed or more faithfully managed.”
Section VII.
NATURALIZATION alias DENIZATION, WITH LISTS OF NATURALIZED DENIZENS.
There was a reluctance on the part of our country to pass a general Act of Parliament for the naturalization of Protestant strangers. Charles II. undertook to suggest the step to Parliament in 1681, but legislators were deaf to the hint for a quarter of a century. Any Englishman proposing such an act, was upbraided as an Esau,
- ↑ “The Huguenot Colony in Bethnal Green,” an article in Golden Hours for April 1869.
