Propagation of the Gospel
At the public meeting held in St. Leonards on the 9th of October, the collection at the doors was a little under £20.
Missionary Meeting
A quarterly meeting of the St. Leonards Juvenile Missionary Association was held in the Girls National School on the 20th of February, the Rev. G. D. St. Quintin, in the capacity of chairman addressed the meeting at some length, during which he alluded to the death of the Rev. Geo. Wagner, a gentleman who had addressed persons in that room with a power of eloquence which he (the chairman) could have wished to possess. He had been ordered to a foreign country in consequence of impaired health, and in that country had died, than whom no one ever left the world more deeply loved.
The Life-boat and Humane Society
There was once a life-boat in Hastings called "The Ariel", which being but little exercised and never called out in any emergency, fell into disuse. It was, as I remember it, a somewhat frail craft, and hardly likely to withstand the buffeting of the sea in a strong gale. It was first kept in the Condemned Hole - perhaps an unlucky omen - and was afterwards removed to the waste ground at the Priory, where it went to comparative decay. But in the month of October, 1857, some St. Leonards gentlemen - the Rev. W. W. Hume, Capt. Parish, Alfred Burton, Esq. and R. Cooper Gardiner, Esq. proposed a movement for the purpose of providing Hastings with a new lifeboat. They met the Mayor (F. Ticehurst, Esq.) and Commander Robertson, and formed themselves into a committee. After that the St. Leonards gentlemen attended a special meeting of the Town Council (Oct. 23rd) as a deputation, and suggested that the matter should be referred to the Stone Beach Committee, with whom the Lifeboat Committee would be glad to confer. They also expressed a hope that the Council would be able to find a piece of ground for a lifeboat house, and to assist in other ways. The Mayor remarked that he felt confident that it was as much to the Council's affair as it was that of the gentlemen who had so kindly and honourably taken the matter up. He was sure that everyone present must feel heartily thankful to them for the manner in which they had acted, and he hoped the Council would meet them with the same good feeling. Ald. Ginner thought that as the said gentlemen had, with great credit to themselves, raised subscriptions among themselves, the Council could not do less than provide the necessary ground. On the motion of Ald. Rock, it was resolved that the report of the Lifeboat Committee be received with thanks, -
