Round about a Pound a Week

CHAPTER XII
MOTHERS’ DAYS

In a previous chapter some description was given of the way in which the women arrange their work. It is the province of this chapter to describe in greater detail the “days” of several of the women—mounting up, as they do gradually from the day of the young mother of one baby to that of the worn woman of thirty-eight with eight children under thirteen. Washing-day was not considered fair by the mothers. They said, “You’d expeck ter be a bit done-like washin’-day;” so an ordinary day was chosen in every case. They anxiously explained that the time-table form in which the visitor took the day wasn’t fair either because, “You jest as likely as not get a bit be’ind if ’indered.” But the subject was so richly interesting, and led up to such absorbing anecdotes when left to the mothers’ taste in method, that the time-table form had to be used in self-protection by the visitor. The following is a specimen of a mother’s way of telling it:

“Me young man ’as ter be up abart five. E’s a fair whale at sleep. If I didn’t wake ’im ’e’d be late all the days in the year: I tell yer. E’ come ’ome abart six, ’n soon’s ’e’s ’ad ’is tea ’e’s that sleepy agen you’d ’ardly get a word off ’im.” Gently reminded here that it is her own day that is required, she continues: “Oh, me? Well, I tells yer I wakes ’im at five. I ’as ter give ’im a good thump, an’ ’e gets up quiet-like if ’e can; but ’e generly can’t, an’ then the kids begin talkin’, an’ I ’as a fair job ter keep ’em in bed. See that one with red ’air—’e’s a fair treat in the mornin’s,” etc.

The first day given is that of a young mother aged twenty, with her first baby—a fat, round morsel who may be called well cared for after the initial disadvantage of living with its parents in one small and dismal room has been recognised. The young mother owns a large sewing-machine, of which she is intolerably proud. As Lambeth mothers’ days go, hers is a very easy one.

6.0.—Get up and light fire.

6.15.—Wake husband, who has to be off by seven; get his breakfast.

6.30.—Give him his breakfast, and while he eats it, nurse baby.

7.0.—When he has gone, put baby down and eat breakfast.

7.30.—Wash up; do a little washing every day for baby; air bed; carry down dirty water; bring fresh up from yard (second floor).

8.30.—Baby wakes; give her a bath and dress her; nurse her; let her lie and kick while sweeping room and blacking grate and scrubbing stairs; make bed; carry baby out, and do shopping for dinner.

11.0.—Come in and nurse baby; get dinner ready.

12.15.—Husband comes in; give him dinner. He leaves a few minutes to one o’clock.

1.0.—Wash up, and nurse baby; take her out for a walk, if fine, for as long as can bear it. She is heavy. Come in when time to nurse her again, and sit down to sew. Make all her clothes and most of own, and mend husband’s.

4.30.—Get tea ready and cook relish.

5.0.—Husband comes in; give him tea, and help him clean himself in warm water; wash up and carry down dirty water, and bring up clean water.

6.0.—Nurse baby and get her to bed; husband not strong, and likes to go to bed early; sit and sew till time to nurse baby at nine o’clock. Get everything ready for morning.

9.30.—Go to bed.

One week in every three the husband works at night, instead of the day. The wife finds this less convenient for her, and is certain that it over-strains him, as he cannot sleep properly in the day, though she tries to be as quiet as ever she can. But the baby is bound to disturb him, as the room is very small. During this week, dinner is whenever he gets up, and all the cleaning and washing has to be squeezed in afterwards.

The next case is that of Mrs. O., who has but two children alive, both very young. Two rooms have to be looked after, and extremely well looked after, for Mr. O. is the gentleman who keeps 5s. a week out of 25s., and expects 4s. 4d. a week spent on his own extra food. He likes the place nice, and cannot see that his wife need ever go out except for the purpose of buying the family food. He believes that women are prone to extravagance in dress, and does not encourage Mrs. O. in any such nonsense. When it was necessary that she should come once a fortnight to the weighing centre, to have the baby weighed, the price of a pair of boots had to be saved out of several weeks’ food, much to the annoyance of Mr. O., who could not understand why any of his family should ever leave the two rooms where they live.

Her day runs as follows:

7.0.—Get up and get husband’s breakfast; nurse baby while he has it.

7.30.—He goes to work. Get little girl dressed, get her breakfast, and have it with her.

8.0.—Wash up.

8.30.—Get baby’s bath and wash and dress him.

9.0.—Nurse him and put him to sleep.

9.30.—Do beds and sweep bedroom, and carry up water (first floor).

11.0.—Start to make little girl a frock till baby wakes; nurse him when he does.

12.15.—Get dinner for self and child ready (husband has dinner away from home).

1.0.—Have dinner.

1.30.—Nurse baby and clear away and wash up dinner things. Sweep and scrub floor and passage, clean grate; every other week do stairs.

2.30.—Wash myself and little girl, and take children out till four.

4.0.—Get tea and nurse baby.

4.30.—Clear away, and get husband’s tea; wait for him till he comes in; very uncertain, between five and seven o’clock; go on making frock till he does.

6.0.—Put children to bed.

6.30.—Wash up husband’s tea things, if he has finished. As soon as he has finished, he changes and goes out.

8.0.—Go up The Walk for shopping for next day, leaving children in bed.

9.0.—Mend husband’s clothes, and go on with frock till ten.

10.0.—Nurse baby and make both children comfortable for the night.

11.0.—If husband has come in, go to bed.

This is not a hard day as things go in Lambeth. The noticeable thing about it is its loneliness. Mrs. O. knows nothing of her neighbours, and, until the visitor insisted on the children’s getting out every afternoon, and agitated for the boots, Mrs. O. never took them out. She did her shopping at night in order that her old slippers might not be seen. She sat indoors and mended and made clothes in her neat room, while her pale little girl amused herself as best she could and the baby lay on the bed. The husband merely ate and slept at home. He was a particularly respectable and steady man, who kept his clothes neat and his person scrupulously clean. His wife ministered to him in every way she could, but saw nothing of him. He took no interest in the little daughter, but was proud of the boy, and it was by means of the boy’s need of fresh air that he was persuaded to allow his wife to save for her boots. For her he did not consider them necessary, as he was in favour of women staying at home and minding the house.

The next day is that of a woman who lives in one room in buildings, with her husband and four children. She is rather self-assertive and talkative, very clean, rougher in her manner of speaking to her children than most of the mothers, but very affectionate to both children and husband. Her old mother, whom she partially feeds, is a great deal with her, and helps in the household work. Her day is rather an easy one for Lambeth. The eldest child is eight years old, and the baby is a few months. As the room is in “buildings,” she has water on the same level, so has not to carry it up or down stairs.

4.30.—Wake husband, who has to be at work about five o’clock. He is carman for an L.C.C. contractor. Get him off if possible without waking the four children. He has a cup of tea before going, but breakfasts away from home. If baby wakes, nurse him.

7.0.—Nurse baby.

7.15.—Get up and light fire, wake children, wash two eldest ones. Get breakfast for self and children.

8.0.—Breakfast.

8.30.—Tidy two children for school and start them off at 8.45.

9.0.—Clear away and wash up; wash and dress boy of three; bathe and dress baby.

10.0.—Nurse baby and put him to bed.

10.30.—Turn down beds, clean grate, scrub floor.

11.30.—Make beds.

12.0.—Mother, who has done the marketing, brings in the food; begin to cook dinner.

12.15.—Children all in, lay dinner, and, with mother’s help, tidy children for it.

1.0.—Dinner, which mother serves while Mrs. G. nurses baby who wakes about then.

1.30.—Tidy children for school again.

1.45.—Start them off and sit down with mother to their own dinner; wash up, tidy room, clean themselves.

3.0.—Go out, if it is not washing-day or day for doing the stairs, with baby and boy of three.

3.45.—Come in and get tea for children. Put boy of three to sleep, nurse baby.

4.15.—Children come in.

4.30.—Give children tea.

5.0.—Wash up and tidy room. Tidy children and self.

6.0.—Take up boy of three and go out for a “blow in the street” with all four children.

7.0.—Come in and put children to bed. Nurse baby.

7.30.—Husband returns; get his supper.

8.0.—Sit down and have supper with him.

8.30.—Clear away and wash up. Sew while husband goes to bed. “Talk wile ’e’s doin’ it.”

9.0.—Send mother off. Get everything ready for the morning. Mend husband’s clothes as soon as he gets them off.

10.0.—Nurse baby and go to bed.

We now come to the day of a mother of six children, with two rooms to keep. Mrs. T., whose menu has already been given, is the wife of a builder’s handyman on 25s. a week. The two rooms are upstairs in a small house, and, as there is no water above the ground floor, Mrs. T. has a good deal of carrying of heavy pails of water both upstairs and down. She is gentle and big and slow, never lifts her voice or gets angry, but seems always tired and dragged. She is very clean and orderly. Her husband is away all day; but he dislikes the noise of a family meal, and insists on having both breakfast and tea cooked specially for himself, and eats alone.

6.0.—Nurses baby.

6.30.—Gets up, calls five children, puts kettle on, washes “necks” and “backs” of all the children, dresses the little ones, does hair of three girls.

7.30.—Gets husband’s breakfast, cooks bloater, and makes tea.

8.0.—Gives him breakfast alone, nurses baby while he has it, and cuts slices of bread and dripping for children.

8.30.—He goes, gives children breakfast, sends them off to school at 8.50, and has her own.

9.0.—Clears away and washes up breakfast things.

9.30.—Carries down slops, and carries up water from the yard; makes beds.

10.0.—Washes and dresses baby, nurses him, and puts him to bed.

11.0.—Sweeps out bedroom, scrubs stairs and passage.

12.0.—Goes out and buys food for the day. Children home at 12.15.

12.30.—Cooks dinner; lays it.

1.0.—Gives children dinner and nurses baby.

1.45.—Washes hands and faces, and sees children off to school.

2.0.—Washes up dinner things, scrubs out kitchen, cleans grate, empties dirty water, and fetches more clean from yard.

3.0.—Nurses baby.

3.30.—Cleans herself and begins to mend clothes.

4.15.—Children all back.

4.30.—Gives them tea.

5.0.—Clears away and washes up, nurses the baby, and mends clothes till 6.30.

6.30.—Cooks husband’s tea.

7.0.—Gives husband tea alone.

7.30.—Puts younger children to bed.

8.0.—Tidies up, washes husband’s tea things, sweeps kitchen, and mends clothes, nurses baby, puts elder children to bed.

8.45.—Gets husband’s supper; mends clothes.

10.0.—Nurses baby, and makes him comfortable for the night.

10.30.—Goes to bed.

The last “day” is that of the woman who has eight children under thirteen. The fact that her husband works at night enables the family to sleep seven in one room—the mother and five children by night and the husband by day; in the other bedroom three older children sleep in a single bed. This woman is tall and would be good-looking if her figure were not much misshapen. She has quantities of well-washed hair, and good teeth; but her face is that of a woman of fifty. She is thirty-eight. She can stand very little advice or argument, and simply does not listen when either are offered to her. She seems always to be hearing a baby wake, or correcting a child of two, or attending to the soiled face of the little girl of three and a half, who is so much smaller than her younger brother. She once went for a fortnight’s change to the seaside. The visitor asked her, when she came back, what she had most enjoyed. She thought for a considerable time, and then made the following statement: “I on’y ’ad two babies along of me, an’ wen I come in me dinner was cooked for me.”

There is no doubt that if Mrs. B. were stronger she would not need to nurse her baby quite so often. He is small and hungry, and will soon need to be weaned if his mother is to work as hard as she does on ordinary days; with extra exertion on washing-days, and extra noise and interruption in holiday-time.

Mr. B., printer’s labourer; wage 30s.; allows 28s.; night worker. Eight children; eldest, a girl of twelve years; youngest, three months.

6.45.—Nurses baby.

7.0.—Rises, calls children, lights fire and puts on kettle, washes and dresses elder four children. Girl of twelve can do for herself. Boy of ten can do all but his ears.

8.0.—Gets breakfast; bread and butter and tea for children.

8.15.—Gives children breakfast; gets them off to school by 8.45.

8.45.—Nurses baby.

9.0.—Fetches down the three babies, washes and dresses them; gives the two bigger their breakfast.

9.30.—Husband comes home; cooks him rasher or haddock.

10.0.—Gives him his breakfast, and goes upstairs to tidy her room for husband to sleep in; makes her bed for him, which has been airing since seven o’clock. Turns out and airs beds in other room, taking two elder babies with her.

10.30.—Clears away and washes up all the breakfast things.

11.0.—Nurses baby and puts all three to sleep.

11.15.—Goes out to buy dinner.

11.30.—Prepares dinner.

12.10.—Children all home again; goes on with dinner.

1.0.—Lays and serves dinner.

1.30.—Washes hands and faces of five children, and sends them off to school.

1.45.—Nurses baby, and sits down till 2.30.

2.30.—Washes up and begins cleaning. Sweeps kitchen, scullery, and passage, scrubs them, cleans grate; three babies to mind all the time.

4.10.—Children all home again; gets their tea, nurses baby.

4.30.—Clears away, and begins to cook husband’s dinner.

5.0.—Husband wakes; gives him dinner; sits down while she cuts his food for him to take to work, keeping babies and children as quiet as she can.

6.0.—Nurses baby.

6.30.—He starts for work. She makes children’s beds, turns out his, airs his room, and makes his bed up for herself and three children to sleep in at night. All water used in bedrooms has to be carried upstairs, and when used, carried down.

7.30—Washes and puts to bed two babies.

8.0.—Nurses baby.

8.15.—Washes and puts to bed elder children.

8.45.—Mends clothes.

10.0.—Nurses baby and puts him to bed.

10.30.—Goes to bed; nurses baby twice in the night.

There is no room for the “day” of the mother who bakes her own bread. Her husband, who works for a Post-Office contractor, is on night-duty, and spends most of the day at home. He is an old soldier, as are an appreciable proportion of these low-wage men. He helps his wife in the housework and the cooking, and their home is one of the most spotless the visitor has seen. When his wife was sent to the seaside for two weeks, he managed entirely for himself and the five children. His “day” would have been very valuable could the visitor have persuaded him to make it out for those two weeks. He apologised to her for not making the money go as far as “mother” did, for buying loaves and not baking the bread, for scrubbing without soap, which he had forgotten to buy; but a detailed account of his day he could not give. He was a guardsman when in the army, and stands six feet in his socks. He weighs eleven stone at thirty-six—a stone less than when he was serving. Here are the accounts for his two weeks, alongside a budget of his wife’s, with which to compare (see p. 173). He sent them with the following letter:

The reference to Rachel is that she lost her situation just as his wife left home. He had her food to get as well as the other children’s during his fortnight. She is an excellent worker, and got another place as soon as her mother came back.

Mrs. H., June 18.

Mr. H., June 25.

Mr. H., July 2.

The items “ink, pen, nibs, stationery, and stamps” directly mother went away are rather touching. The enormous consumption of margarine—3s. 6d. as against 1s. 6d.—is an instance of the way in which the father is kept in ignorance of the privations which are undergone by his family. Directly he was left in charge, this father allowed margarine all round on the same scale as he had always used it himself, with the result of more than doubling the amount spent on it. The item in his first week of 2s. 3d. for gas when there was no baking to be done, as against his wife’s 2s. when there was, shows that the ½ cwt. of coal did not suffice him, and that he cooked by gas. The savings he made in his second week are most entertaining. No soap or cleaning material of any kind, no coal, no matches; and yet the grate did not look bad nor the floor either when the visitor saw them at the end of his strenuous time. The amount spent on tobacco, his one luxury, is interesting, as it is the sole instance in which this item is accounted for in the budgets. He was obliged to put every penny of his wage into the general fund during those two weeks. The penny for the hospital is a very common payment in Lambeth—one which always comes out of the man’s private purse. Incidentally, we are able to construct his own private budget of 4s. pocket-money out of this budget of his. It must run something like this:

That the children of the poor suffer from insufficient attention and care is not because the mother is lazy and indifferent to her children’s well-being. It is because she has but one pair of hands and but one overburdened brain. She can just get through her day if she does everything she has to do inefficiently. Give her six children, and between the bearing of them and the rearing of them she has little extra vitality left for scientific cooking, even if she could afford the necessary time and appliances. In fact, one woman is not equal to the bearing and efficient, proper care of six children. She can make one bed for four of them; but if she had to make four beds; if she even had to separate the boys from the girls, and keep two rooms clean instead of one; if she had to make proper clothing and keep those clothes properly washed and ironed and mended; if she had to give each child a daily bath, and had to attend thoroughly to teeth, noses, ears, and eyes; if she had to cook really nourishing food, with adequate utensils and dishes, and had to wash up these utensils and dishes after every meal—she would need not only far more money, but far more help. The children of the poor suffer from want of room, want of light, want of air, want of warmth, want of sufficient and proper food, and want of clothes, because there is not enough to pay for these necessaries. They also suffer from want of cleanliness, want of attention to health, want of peace and quiet, because the strength of their mothers is not enough to provide these necessary conditions.

CHAPTER XIII
THE CHILDREN

In this investigation forty-two families have been visited. Of these, eight, owing to various reasons, were visited but for a short time. Three were given up after several weeks, because the husbands objected to the household accounts being shown to the visitor; and here it would be interesting to mention that in three other cases, not reckoned in the investigation, the husbands refused after the first week for the same reason as soon as they thoroughly realised the scope of the inquiry. In four cases the babies were born too soon, and lived but a few hours. The investigation was primarily on infantile mortality, so that it automatically ceased with the child’s death. One family moved out of London before the child’s birth. There remain, therefore, thirty-four babies who were watched and studied by the visitors for many months. In every case but one these children were normal, and thriving at birth. Only one weighed less than 6 lbs.; four more weighed less than 7 lbs.; fifteen more weighed less than 8 lbs.; ten more weighed less than 9 lbs.; and four weighed over 9 lbs. The average weight at birth for the whole number was 7 lbs. 10 ozs. The child which weighed 5 lbs. 12 ozs. at birth was always sickly, and died of diarrhœa and sickness during the hot August of 1911 at the age of six months. Her mother was a delicate woman, and had come through a time of dire stress when her husband was out of work for four months before this child was born. A baby born since, which does not appear in this investigation, is now about five months old. Not one of the others seemed otherwise than sound and healthy, and able to thrive on the nourishment which was provided for their special benefit by the investigation. One child, however, a beautiful boy of five months, who weighed 7 lbs. 12 ozs. at birth, and 14 lbs. 14 ozs. at twenty weeks, died suddenly of bronchitis in December, 1910. His mother’s health record was bad. He was the sixth child she had lost out of eleven. She was an extraordinarily tidy, clean woman, and an excellent manager; but her father had died of consumption, and she was one of those mothers who economised in rent in order to feed her flock more adequately. She paid 5s. a week for very dark ground-floor rooms. The death of the child was so sudden and unexpected that an inquest was held. The mother was horrified and bewildered at the entrance of police officers into her home. She wrung her hands and repeated over and over, “I done all I could!” and never shook off the impression that some disgrace attached to her. The burial insurance money paid by the company was £1. Five shillings specially earned by the mother and 5s. lent by a friend brought up the amount to the necessary 30s., and the humble funeral took place. The child was buried in a common grave with seven other coffins of all sizes.

With these two exceptions, the babies all lived to be over a year. They usually did fairly well, unless some infection from the elder children gave them a bad cold, or measles, or whooping-cough, when some of them had a hard struggle to live, and their convalescence was much retarded by the close air and overcrowding of their unhygienic surroundings. Compared with babies who were fighting such surroundings without special nourishment, they did well, but compared with the children of well-to-do people they did badly indeed!

The ex-baby, where such a person existed, was nearly always undersized, delicate, and peevish. Apart from such causes as insufficient and improper food, crowded sleeping quarters, and wretched clothing, this member of the family specially suffered from want of fresh air. Too young to go out alone, with no one to carry it now the baby had come, it lived in the kitchen, dragging at its mother’s skirts, much on its legs, but never in the open air. One of the conveniences most needed by poor mothers is a perambulator which will hold, if possible, her two youngest children. With such a vehicle, there would be some sort of chance of open air and change of scene so desperately necessary for the three house-bound members of the family. As it is, the ex-baby is often imprisoned in a high chair, where it cannot fall into the fire, or pull over the water-can, or shut its finger in the crack of the door, or get at the food. But here it is deprived of exercise and freedom of limb, and develops a fretful, thwarted character, which renders it even more open to disease than the rest of the family, though they share with it all the other bad conditions.

There is no doubt that the healthy infant at birth is less healthy at three months, less healthy still at a year, and often by the time it is old enough to go to school it has developed rickets or lung trouble through entirely preventible causes.

To take several families individually, and go through their history, may serve as illustration of the way in which children who begin well are worn down by the conditions round them:

Mr. A., whose house was visited all the year of 1909, was originally a footman in one of the houses of a large public school. He seemed at the time of visiting to be fairly strong and wiry. He was about 5 feet 8 inches in height, well educated, and very steady. His wife had been a lady’s-maid, who had saved a little money, which she sank in a boarding-house kept by herself and her sister. The boarding-house did not pay, and when Mrs. A. married, the sister went back into the service of the lady with whom she had been before. Mr. A. left his position as footman, and became a bus conductor in one of the old horse-bus companies. When visited in 1909 he had been fifteen years in his position, but owing to the coming of motor traffic, his employers gradually ran fewer buses, and his work became more casual. He was paid 4s. a day, and got four days’ work a week, with an occasional fifth day. He had to present himself every morning, and wait a certain time before he knew whether he would be employed or not. All that he made he brought home. His wife, who by the time the visits began was worn and delicate, was a well-educated woman, and an excellent manager. She saved on all the 20s. weeks in order to have a little extra for the 16s. weeks. Her sister in service often came to the rescue when extra trouble, such as illness or complete unemployment, visited the household. There were five children after the baby of the investigation arrived. The eldest, a girl, was consumptive; the next, a boy, was short in one leg, and wore a surgical boot; the next, a girl, was the airless ex-baby, and suffered with its eyes; and only the new-born child, weighing 9 lbs., seemed to be thriving and strong. The average per week for food was 1s. a head for man, woman, and children. Presently the conductor’s work stopped altogether. No more horse-buses were run on that particular route, and motor-buses did not come that way. Mr. A. was out of work. He used to bring in odd sums of money earned in all sorts of ways between tramping after a new job. The eldest girl was put into a factory, where she earned 6s. a week; the eldest boy got up early one morning, and offered himself to a dairyman as a boy to leave milk, and got the job, which meant work from 6 a.m. till 8 a.m., and two hours after school in the evening. Several hours on Saturday and Sunday completed the week’s work, for which he was paid 2s. 6d. His parents were averse to his doing this, but the boy persisted. The family moved to basement rooms at a cheaper rent, and then the gradual pulling down of the baby began. The mother applied to the school authorities to have the two boys given dinner, and after some difficulty succeeded. The elder boy made no complaint, but the short-legged one could not eat the meals supplied. He said they were greasy, and made him feel sick. He used to come home and ask for a slice of the family bread and dripping. The father’s earnings ranged between 5s. and 10s., which brought the family income up to anything from 13s. 6d. to 18s. 6d. The food allowance went often as low as 8d. a week. A strain was put upon the health of each child, which reduced its vitality, and gave free play to disease tendencies. The eyes, which had been a weak point in every child, grew worse all round. The consumptive girl was constantly at home through illness, the boy had heavy colds, and the younger children ailed. Work was at last found by the father at a steady rate of 20s. a week. He took the consumptive girl from her work, and sent her into the country, where she remained in the cottage of a grandparent earning nothing. The boy was induced to give up his work, and the family, when last seen, were living on a food allowance of 1s. 6d. per head all round the family. The baby was the usual feeble child of her age, the children were no longer fed at school, and the parents were congratulating themselves on their wonderful good fortune.

Mr. B., whose home was visited part of 1911 and all 1912, was a printer’s labourer, and brought his wife 28s. a week every week during the investigation. He had been in the army, and fought all through the South African War. He seemed to be a strong man. His wife was one of the few fairly tall women that were visited. She had been strong, but was worn out and very dreary. There were eight children, all undersized, and increasingly so as they went down the family. The ex-baby was a shrimp of a boy, only eleven months old when the baby—another boy—was born. The third youngest was a girl, and was so delicate that neither parent had expected to rear her. She weighed less than many a child of a year old when she was two and a half. The chief characteristics of these three youngest children were restlessness, diminutiveness, and a kind of elfin quickness. The baby, which was a normal child weighing 7 lbs. at birth, caught the inevitable measles and whooping-cough at four months and six months, and at a year weighed just 15 lbs. He could say words and scramble about in an extremely active way—so much so that his harassed mother had to tie him into the high chair at an earlier age than most children of his class. The eyes of all the children in this family needed daily attention, and showed great weakness. The eldest girl was supplied with spectacles at school, for the payment of which 2d. a week appeared for months in the mother’s budgets. There was no specific disease. The children were stunted by sheer force of circumstances, not, so far as could be ascertained, by heredity. The sleeping was extremely crowded, and the food allowance averaged 1s. 2½d. a week, or 2d. a day for the mother and children.

A third family is interesting for the reason that the mother firmly believed in enough to eat, and, being a particularly hard-working, clean woman, she could not bear to take dark underground rooms or to squeeze her family of seven children into a couple of rooms. She solved her problem by becoming a tenant of the Duchy of Cornwall estate. She got four tiny rooms for 8s., and kept them spotless. Her husband, who was a painter’s labourer and a devoted gardener, kept the tiny strip of yard gay with flowers, and kept the interior of the damp, ill-contrived little house fresh with “licks of paint” of motley colours and patches and odds and ends of a medley of papers. When work was slack, Mrs. C. simply did not pay the rent at all. As she said: “The Prince er Wales, ’e don’t want our little bits of sticks, and ’e won’t sell us up if we keeps the place a credit to ’im.” She seemed to be right, for they owed a great deal of rent, and were never threatened with ejection. She explained the principle on which she worked as follows: “Me and my young man we keeps the place nice, and wen ’e’s in work we pays the rent. Wen ’e’s out er work in the winter I gets twenty loaves and 2 lbs. er sixpenny fer the children, and a snack er meat fer ’im, and then I begins ter think about payin’ th’ agent out er anythink I ’as left. I’d be tellin’ a lie if I said I didn’t owe a bit in the rent-book, and now and agen th’ agent gets a shillin’ er two extra fer back money, but ’e carn’t ’elp seein’ ’ow creditable the place is. That piece er blue paper looks a fair treat through the winder, so ’e don’t make no fuss.” The house they lived in, and many like it, have been demolished, and a number of well-built houses are appearing in their stead. The Lambeth people declare that the rents have gone up, however, and that the displaced tenants will not be able to return, but this rumour has not been inquired into. What happened to the C.’s overdraft when they were obliged to turn out is not known. The children of this family were short and stumpy, but of solid build, and certainly had more vigour and staying-power than those of the two other families already mentioned in this chapter. The baby flourished. She weighed 7 lbs. at birth, and at one year she weighed 18 lbs. 10 ozs. She could drag herself up by a chair, and say many words. The system of feeding first and paying rent afterwards seemed to be justified as far as the children were concerned.

Another woman who lived in “the Duchy,” as they all call it, and whose house has since been demolished, had not the temperament which had the courage to owe. She paid her 8s. for rent with clockwork regularity, and fed her husband and four children and herself on a weekly average of 8s. 6d. a week. The average for herself and the children worked out at 1s. a week, or less than 2d. a day. All four children were very delicate. The baby, who weighed 8½ lbs. at birth, weighed 16 lbs. 8 ozs. at one year. The ex-baby suffered from consumption of the bowels, and was constantly in and out of hospital. The two elder children were tuberculous. The father was a printer’s labourer, and appeared to be fairly strong, though a small man. The mother was delicate and worn, but seemed to have no specific disease.

Some of the children in the different families had strong individuality. Emma, aged ten, stood about 4 feet 6 inches in her socks. Four years later, when she began to earn by carrying men’s dinners backwards and forwards to them at work, she measured 4 feet 10 inches. At ten she was a queer little figure, the eldest of six, with a baby always in her arms out of school-hours. She was not highly intelligent, but had a soothing way with children. Her short neck and large face gave the impression of something dwarf-like. But she was sturdy and tough to all appearance, and could scrub a floor or wring out a tubful of clothes in a masterly way. She had a dog-like devotion for a half deaf, half blind little mother, who nevertheless managed to keep two rooms, a husband, and six children in a state of extraordinary order, considering all things. When Emma’s school shoes were worn out, her mother took them over and wore them till there was no sole left, and Emma was provided with a “new” fifth-hand pair, which were generally twice too big. Emma’s mother found her a great comfort, and very reluctantly sent her to work in a factory at the age of fifteen. There she earned 6s. a week, and became the family bread-winner during the frequent illnesses of her father.

Lulu was ex-baby to the deserted wife, and was three years old when her mother was visited. She was a lovely child with brilliant dark eyes and an olive skin. She had round cheeks, which never seemed to lose their contour, though their poor little owner spent many weary weeks in hospital after four different operations for a disease which the visitor only knew by the name of “intersections,” pronounced by Lulu’s mother with awe and respect. Lulu would be playing, and suddenly she would be seized with violent pain and be hurried off in her mother’s arms to the hospital. The visitor was present on one of these occasions, when it seemed as though the whole street knew exactly what to do. One neighbour accompanied the mother and child, one took over the baby, another arranged with a nod and a word to take the mother’s place at work that afternoon, and in two minutes everything was settled. Lulu came out of hospital four weeks later, with pale but still round cheeks and a questioning look in her eyes which gave a pathetic touch to the baby face. She still lives—the very idol of her mother—to whom the two boys are as nothing in comparison.

Dorothy, a person of two and another ex-baby, was devoured with a desire to accompany her elder brothers and sisters to school. She was a fair, thin child, with bright blue-grey eyes and straight, wispy tow-coloured hair. Her tiny body was seething with restlessness and activity. She spent her days in a high chair, from which place she twice a day shrieked and wailed a protest when the elder, happier ones started for school. She was quick as a needle, and could spend hours “writing pictures” on a piece of paper with a hard, scratchy lead pencil. She had no appetite, and had to be coaxed to eat by promises, rarely fulfilled, of taking her for a walk as soon as mother’s work was done. She slept in the chair during the day, as her mother declared it was not safe to have her up stairs on the bed or she would be out the window or down the stairs directly she woke. She simply hated the baby, another girl, which had condemned her to second place and comparative neglect. At three, she was kindly allowed a place in a school near by, and her health visibly improved from that moment. She became almost pretty.

’Erbie was of an inquiring turn, and during fifteen months’ visiting had at different times managed to mangle his thumb, fall into the mud of the river at low tide, and get lost for ten hours, and be returned by the police. He was excessively sorry for himself, on each occasion, while his diminutive mother took the catastrophies with infinite calm. He was eight years old and a “good scholar.” Physically he was a small nondescript person, thin, and fair, and colourless, with neat features and a shrill voice, which penetrated into the core of the brain.

Joey had a tragedy attached to him, which clouded a portion of his days. He was guilty of telling a “boomer” to his parents. He said that he had been moved out of the infant school into the boys’ school when he hadn’t. One day his mother accompanied him to the school gate because it was raining, and she was protecting him with the family umbrella. Then the horrid truth was discovered, as the entrance for boys is in a different street to that for infants. Joey urgently declared that he had only been “kidding” his parents, and that when they were so wildly delighted and took his news so seriously he had not had the courage to tell them it was “kidding.” The net result was gloom and disgrace, which floated round Joey’s miserable head for many days. In the middle of this awful time he was moved, and the strained atmosphere was consequently relieved. He distinguished himself in his new class, however, by his answer to a question his teacher put to him as to the origin of Christmas Day. “You get a bigger bit of meat on yer plate than ever you seen before,” he replied, and after a pause he added, “and w’en ’E dies you gets a bun.” The teacher had called round to complain of this way of looking at things, and Joey was in deep disgrace again. He was a nice, chubby thing, with earnest ways and some imagination. His “boomer” preyed on him, and made him thin and anxious till the climax was over. The second offence worried him not at all. He was the pride and delight of two very simple and devoted parents. His two little sisters, both younger than himself, were extremely attached to him.

Benny was twelve and very, very serious. He was the boy who, without telling a soul of his plan, offered himself to the milkman as a boy who would leave milk on doorsteps. He earned 2s. 6d. a week for the job, and faithfully performed the duties for some weeks, till a man who kept a vegetable shop offered him the same money for hours which suited him better, and he changed his trade. He was a very small boy for his age, and had a grave, thin face with inflamed eyes. An overcoat, presented because the visitor could not bear to think of his doing his round in the rain and sitting all day at school afterwards in his wet clothes gave him the keenest flash of pleasure he had ever felt. He turned scarlet and then went white. He had a resolute mouth and a quiet voice and no constitution.

There is one little picture which must be described, though the child and its mother were unknown. The visitor in Lambeth Walk met a thin, decent woman carrying a pot of mignonette. By her side, a boy about seven years old was hopping along with a crutch under one arm. His other arm encircled a pot in which was a lovely blooming fuchsia, whose flowers swung to his movements. The woman was looking straight ahead with grave, preoccupied eyes, not heeding the child. His whole expression was one of such glorified beatitude that the onlooker, arrested by it, could only feel a pang of sharpest envy. They went on their way with their flowers, and round the next corner the visitor had to struggle through a deeply interested crowd, who were watching a man being taken to prison.

Questions are often asked as to how these children amuse themselves. They are popularly supposed to spend their time at picture palaces. As far as close observation could discover, they seemed to spend their play-time—the boys shrilly shouting and running in the streets, and the girls minding the baby and looking on. They played a kind of hop-scotch marked out in chalk, which reminded the visitor of a game much beloved by her in extreme youth. Boys whose parents were able to afford the luxury seemed to spend hours on one roller skate, and seemed to do positive marvels when the nature of the roadway and the nature of the skate are considered. Girls sometimes pooled their babies and did a little skipping, shouting severe orders as they did so to the unhappy infants. One party of soldiers, whose uniform was a piece of white tape round the arm and a piece of stick held over the shoulder as a weapon, marched up and down a narrow street for hours on the first day of the August holidays, making such a noise of battle and sudden death that the long-suffering mothers inside the houses occasionally left their work to scream to them to be quiet. The pathways were full of hatless girls and babies, who looked on with interest and envy. Needless to state, no notice was taken of the mothers’ remonstrance. The best game of all is an ambulance, but that needs properties, which take some finding. A box on wheels, primarily intended for a baby’s perambulator, and with the baby inside, makes a wonderful sort of toboggan along the paved path. The boy sits on one corner and holds with both hands on to the edges, the baby occupies the centre, and off they go, propelled by vigorous kicks.

In holiday-time elder brothers or sisters sometimes organise a party to Kennington Park or one of the open spaces near by, and the grass becomes a shrieking mass of children, from twelve or thirteen years of age downwards. The weary mother gives them bread and margarine in a piece of newspaper, and there is always a fountain from which they can drink. When they come home in the evening, something more solid is added to their usual tea. On Bank Holiday these children are taken by their parents to the nearest park. The father strolls off, the mother and children sit on the grass. Nobody talks. There is scolding and crying and laughing and shouting, and there is dreary staring silence—never conversation.

Indoors there are no amusements. There are no books and no games, nor any place to play the games should they exist. Wet holidays mean quarrelling and mischief, and a distracted mother. Every woman sighs when holidays begin. Boys and girls who earn money probably spend some of it on picture palaces; but the dependent children of parents in steady work at a low wage are not able to visit these fascinating places—much as they would like to. Two instances of “picktur show, 2d.” appeared in the budgets. One was that of a young, newly married couple. The visitor smilingly hoped that they had enjoyed themselves. “’E treated me,” said the young wife proudly. “Then why does it come in your budget?” asked the visitor. The girl stared. “Oh, I paid,” she explained; “he let me take ’im.” The other case was that of two middle-aged people, of about thirty, where there were four children. A sister-in-law minded the children, they took the baby with them, and earnestly enjoyed the representation of a motor-car touring through the stars, and of the chase and capture of a murderer by a most intelligent boy, “not bigger than Alfie.” Here again the wife paid.

The outstanding fact about the children was not their stupidity nor their lack of beauty—they were neither stupid nor ugly—it was their puny size and damaged health. On the whole, the health of those who lived upstairs was less bad than that of those who lived on the ground-floor, and decidedly less bad than that of those who lived in basements. Overcrowding in a first-floor room did not seem as deadly as overcrowding on the floor below. It is difficult to separate causes. Whether the superior health enjoyed by a first baby is due to more food, or to less overcrowding, or to less exposure to infection, is impossible to determine; perhaps it would be safe to say that it is due to all three, but whatever the exact causes are which produce in each case the sickly children so common in these households, the all-embracing one is poverty. The proportion of the infantile death-rate of Hampstead to that of Hoxton—something like 18 to 140—proves this to be a fact. The 42 families already investigated in this inquiry have had altogether 201 children, but 18 of these were either born dead or died within a few hours. Of the remaining 183 children of all ages, ranging from a week up to sixteen or seventeen years, 39 had died, or over one-fifth. Out of the 144 survivors 5 were actually deficient, while many were slow in intellect or unduly excitable. Those among them who were born during the investigation were, with one exception, normal, cosy, healthy babies, with good appetites, who slept and fed in the usual way. They did not, however, in spite of special efforts made on their behalf, fulfil their first promise. At one year of age their environment had put its mark upon them. Though superior to babies of their class, who had not had special nourishment and care, they were vastly inferior to children of a better class who, though no finer or healthier at birth, had enjoyed proper conditions, and could therefore develop on sound and hygienic lines.

CHAPTER XIV
THE PEOPLE WHO ARE OUT OF WORK

There is a large class of people who get less than 18s. a week, because they get irregular work. There is also a class of people who get a regular wage which does not rise above 18s. They get 14s., or 15s., and are generally supposed to be doing a boy’s job. Men sometimes answer an advertisement for a boy’s place and take it rather then go unemployed altogether. The firms who pay by the day often have men receiving 3s. or 3s. 6d. a day and doing three days a week. In many ways it is possible for a man to get less than 18s. a week. He need not be a drunkard or a slacker. He may have been ill and lost his regular job. His employer may have sold the business. The works on which he was employed may suddenly finish. He finds himself out of work and, having no money in hand, he is forced to take anything he can get in order to keep his children from the workhouse. It has been possible to follow the fortunes of a certain number of cases who, for one or other of these reasons, fell out of work. Their subsequent struggles afford material with which to probe the mystery of how such people manage.

Mr. Q., a carter out of work through illness, got an odd job once or twice in the week. His wages had been 24s. Six children were born, of whom five were alive.

July 7, 1910, had earned 5s. 5d.

Leaving for Food, 4s. 3½d.

Or an average per head for food of 7¼d. a week, or 1d. a day.

July 14, had earned 15s. 10d.

Leaving for Food, 3s. 10d.

Or an average per head for food of 6½d. a week, or less than 1d. a day.

Mr. I., bottle washer, out of work through illness, wife earned what she could. Wages 18s. when in work. One child born, one alive.

August 10, 1910, Mrs. I. had earned 2s. 6d.

Mrs. I. was told by infirmary doctor to feed her husband up.

Average per head for food 10d., or 1½d. a day.

August 17, Mrs. I. had earned 3s. 6d.

Mrs. I. still feeding her husband up.

Average per head for food 11d., or 1-4/7d. per day.

When Mr. I. could earn again, his back rent amounted to 15s. He found work in the north of London, he living south of Kennington Park. He walked to and from his work every day, refusing to move because he and his wife were known in Kennington, and rather than see them go into the “house,” their friends would help them through a bad spell.

Mr. J., carter out of work through illness, took out an organ when well enough to push it. Wages 18s. when in work. Six children born, six alive.