ABSTRACT
It is of extreme importance that some decision should be immediately formed, or, at any rate, some general principles established, respecting the measures to be taken on behalf of those wives and families of our soldiers who have lost the support of their natural protectors through the exigencies of the war. The public, we suspect is not yet fully impressed with the dimensions which this question is assuming. As soon as the misery and destitution ensuing on the first embarcation of troops became actually visible, an appeal was made to popular sympathy and promptly answered. The case was afterwards so far taken into official consideration that collections at divine service were authorized and recommended throughout the country, and the result has been the formation of a fund for these benevolent purposes now exceeding 40,000l. The reader may imagine that nothing further is required than to distribute those subscriptions according to the necessities or merits of the applicants, but this is far from being the case. It is not clear on what principle this distribution should be made, or through what agency it should be effected. Although, moreover, the sum collected is considerable with reference to present demands, it is but too certain that those demands will be extended; and, though the continuous sympathies of the public may maintain the sufficiency of the resource, this very expansion of the matter augments proportionately the difficulty of the whole question. The proceedings, in fact, will very much resemble the proceedings of Government in providing for the war itself. At first, a small expedition was despatched to the East, and a limited estimate appeared to suffice for its cost, but presently the expedition became one movement in a great campaign, and the original estimate almost disappeared in the comprehensive demands which succeeded. Similarly, we have collected a certain amount of money for the wives and families left behind by the first draught of troops, but the growth of this obligation will naturally be commensurate with the growth of the war, and all our measures must be enlarged accordingly.
