‘To the Editor of the Daily News. / January 20th 1879 / Sir / Being much perplexed by a / Case of distress recently brought under / my notice. I write to your paper, / in the hope of eliating information which / may be useful. not to this individual / only, but perhaps to hundreds in like / condition, for whom may sympathies have / been strongly excited by witnessing the / misery and the hopeless struggles of one / of ther Number. / He is a young man of twenty-three, / very gentlmanly who through circumstances / of the most unfortunate kind is left alone / in the world without friends, without a penny, without any business training and without the knowledge of a / handicraft; but he ist young, healthy, has had good average education, can / play one instrument very well (but has been without an instrument for several years) / There‘s a sincere desire to find work by wich he may live. / His one decided talent is for musical composition, & his talent has been scientificaly / trained. He has written some very good works - but he must [...] something / before that gift can be of any practical use. One an time he was, / until a few weeks ago, of arrive in London, his clothing strawned (save / what he was wearing) and his time opent daily in painfully, fenitlessly hunting for work. / Fate, or as Mr. Ruskin would say ‘The Third Fors‘ brought us together. / I Could not see him starve and have received him into my Home (as one of the / family) and save him from misery while helping him to find employment. / But every door seems closed. / For the sake of all such anxious sufferers I ask those who know (if any / do know) what is to be done in such cases? / Is there in London any Society where advice and help / can be obtained? / Must men & women who are longing to work either starve or become / paupers because misfortune has left them without means and / friends? / I am./ Dearest /Yours faithfully + obeding, / Hubert Herkomer / Dyreham, Bushey, Herts.‘