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Title: London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 4
Author: Mayhew, Henry
Language: English
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Transcriber's Note
Superscript text is indicated by caret signs, e.g. "Adm^l".
Large tables have been refactored for display on smaller screens.
Illustrations have been moved to paragraph breaks and/or placed next
to the text which they illustrate, and may not match the locations
give in the List of Illustrations.
The text (enclosed in ~swung dashes~) beginning "Removing any goods off"
on p. 444 was printed as vertical text.
On p. xxii, the figures "2,721,73" and "54,00" were each printed
without the final digit.
Corrected errata are listed at the end of the text.
[Illustration: A MIDNIGHT MEETING.--REV. BAPTIST NOEL SPEAKING.]
LONDON LABOUR
AND THE LONDON POOR
A Cyclopædia of the Condition and Earnings
OF
THOSE THAT _WILL_ WORK
THOSE THAT _CANNOT_ WORK, AND
THOSE THAT _WILL NOT_ WORK
BY
HENRY MAYHEW
THOSE THAT WILL NOT WORK
COMPRISING
PROSTITUTES · THIEVES · SWINDLERS · BEGGARS
BY SEVERAL CONTRIBUTORS
With an Introductory Essay on the Agencies at Present in Operation in
the Metropolis for the Suppression of Vice and Crime
by
THE REV. WILLIAM TUCKNISS, B.A.
CHAPLAIN TO THE SOCIETY FOR THE RESCUE OF YOUNG WOMEN AND CHILDREN
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
VOLUME FOUR
First edition 1851
(_Volume One only and parts of Volumes Two and Three_)
Enlarged edition (Four volumes) 1861-62
New impression 1865
ADVERTISEMENT.
It would be a work of supererogation to extol the utility of such a
publication as “London Labour and the London Poor,” so apparent must be
its value to all classes of society. It stands alone as a photograph of
life as actually spent by the lower classes of the Metropolis. That one
half of the world does not know how the other half lives is an axiom of
antiquity, but the truthful revelations and descriptions of the London
street folk, workers and non-workers, and the means by which they
exist, will go a great way to enlighten the educated classes respecting
matters which have hitherto been involved in mystery and uncertainty.
The class of individuals treated of in this volume are the Non-Workers,
or in other words, the Dangerous Classes of the Metropolis; and every
endeavour has been made to obtain correct information, not only through
the assistance of the police authorities, but by an expenditure of much
time and research among the unfortunates themselves. Their favourite
haunts, and the localities in London wherein they chiefly congregate,
as well as their modes of existence, are accurately described; in
addition to which have been inserted very many deeply interesting
autobiographies, faithfully transcribed from their own lips, which go
far to unveil the intricate schemes of villany and crime that abound
in the Metropolis, and prove how much more rational and effective are
preventive measures than such as are merely correctional.
Every phase of vice has been investigated and treated of, in order that
all possible information that can prove interesting to the moralist,
the philanthropist, and the statist, as well as to the general public,
might be afforded. In a word the veil has been raised, and the skeleton
exposed to the view of the public.
In order to inspire hope and confidence in those who would shudder
and lose heart in the perusal of such a record of crime and misery,
the volume is prefaced by a comprehensive account of the agencies in
operation within the Metropolis for the suppression of crime and vice,
in which is detailed the aim and scope of the numerous religious and
philanthropic associations now actively following the footsteps of that
Divine Saviour, Whose chief mission was to the poor and guilty.
These brave workers now abound in all the dark places of the
Metropolis, and the fruits of their labours, particularly in the
case of youthful criminals, are becoming, through the blessing of
Providence, abundantly apparent.
A vast amount of statistical information, compiled from authentic
records, is contained in the body of the work, and in the Appendix, and
a few illustrations are introduced, graphically showing the extremes of
vice and crime.
The publishers have to thank Sir Richard Mayne and the authorities at
Scotland Yard, as well as the Secretaries of the various charitable
societies, for much valuable information and assistance.
_Stationers’ Hall Court;
December, 1861._
CONTENTS.
THE AGENCIES AT PRESENT IN OPERATION WITHIN THE METROPOLIS, FOR THE
SUPPRESSION OF VICE AND CRIME.
BY THE REV. WILLIAM TUCKNISS, B.A.
PAGE
UNIVERSAL DESIRE FOR INVESTIGATION xi
MERE PALLIATIVES INSUFFICIENT TO CHECK THE GROWTH OF CRIME xi
DECREASE OF CRIME DOUBTFUL xii
GENERAL DESIRE TO ALLEVIATE MISERY xiii
GUTHRIE ON GREAT CITIES xiv
SOCIAL POSITION OF LONDON xv
AGENCIES AT WORK IN LONDON xvii
Their Number and Income xvii
CURATIVE AGENCIES xviii
British and Foreign Bible Society xix
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge xix
Institution for Reading the Word of God in the Open Air xix
Theatre Services xix
London City Mission, xx
Church of England Scripture Readers’ Society xxii
Religious Tract Society xxiii
Pure Literature Society xxiii
PREVENTIVE AGENCIES xxiv
National Temperance Society xxiv
United Kingdom Alliance xxiv
Free Drinking Fountain Association xxv
Ragged School Union xxv
Society for Improving the Condition of the Labouring Classes xxv
Female Servants’ Home Society xxvi
Female Aid Society xxvii
Training Institutions for Servants xxvii
Field Lane Night Refuges xxvii
Dudley Stuart Night Refuge xxvii
Houseless Poor Asylum xxviii
House of Charity xxviii
Foundling Hospital xxviii
Society for the Suppression of Mendicity xxviii
Association for Promoting the Relief of Destitution xxviii
Association for the Aid and Benefit of Dressmakers and Milliners xxix
Young Women’s Christian Association and West-end Home xxix
Society for Promoting the Employment of Women xxx
Metropolitan Early Closing Association, &c. xxx
REPRESSIVE AND PUNITIVE AGENCIES xxx
Society for the Suppression of Vice xxxi
The Associate Institution xxxi
Society for Promoting the Observance of the Lord’s Day xxxiv
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals xxxiv
REFORMATIVE AGENCIES xxxiv
Reformatory and Refuge Union xxxiv
Reformative Agencies for Fallen Women xxxv
Magdalen Hospital xxxvi
London by Moonlight Mission xxxvii
Society for the Rescue of Young Women and Children xxxvii
London Female Preventive and Reformatory Institution xxxvii
CONCLUDING REMARKS xxxviii
INTRODUCTION AND CLASSIFICATION. BY HENRY MAYHEW 1
WORKERS AND NON-WORKERS 2
Classification of ditto 11
THOSE WHO WILL WORK 12
Enrichers 13
Auxiliaries 16
Benefactors 19
Servitors 20
THOSE WHO CANNOT WORK 22
Those who are provided for 22
Those who are unprovided for 22
THOSE WHO WILL NOT WORK 23
Vagrants or Tramps 23
Professional Beggars 23
Cheats and their Dependants 24
Thieves and their Dependants 25
Prostitutes and their Dependants 27
THOSE THAT NEED NOT WORK 27
Those who derive their Income from Rent 27
Those who derive their Income from Dividends 27
Those who derive their Income from Yearly Stipends 27
Those who derive their Income from obsolete or nominal Offices 27
Those who derive their Income from Trades in which they do
not appear 27
Those who derive their Income by favour from others 27
Those who derive their support from the head of the family 27
THE NON-WORKERS. BY HENRY MAYHEW 28
PROSTITUTES.
THE PROSTITUTE CLASS GENERALLY. BY HENRY MAYHEW AND
BRACEBRIDGE HEMYNG 35
PROSTITUTION IN ANCIENT STATES 37
The Jews, &c. 39
Ancient Egypt 43
Ancient Greece 45
Ancient Rome 49
The Anglo-Saxons 34
PROSTITUTION AMONG THE BARBAROUS NATIONS 58
African Nations 58
Australia 67
New Zealand 71
Islands of the Pacific 76
North American Indians 84
South American Indians 90
Cities of South America 93
West Indies 94
Java 96
Sumatra 99
Borneo 103
PROSTITUTION AMONG THE SEMI-CIVILIZED NATIONS 104
Celebes 107
Persia 108
The Affghans 111
Kashmir 115
India 117
Ceylon 125
China 129
Japan 136
The ultra-Gangetic Nations 139
Egypt 141
Northern Africa 149
Arabia, Syria, and Asia Minor 151
Turkey 155
Circassia 158
The Tartar Races 160
PROSTITUTION AMONG THE MIXED NORTHERN NATIONS 163
Russia 165
Siberia 167
Iceland and Greenland 172
Lapland and Sweden 174
Norway 177
Denmark 179
PROSTITUTION IN CIVILIZED STATES 181
Spain 191
Amsterdam 195
Belgium 195
Hamburg 196
Prussia--Germany 198
Berlin 198
Austria 200
Modern Rome 201
Turin 203
Berne 204
Paris 205
PROSTITUTION IN LONDON. BY BRACEBRIDGE HEMYNG 210
GENERAL REMARKS 210
SECLUSIVES, OR THOSE THAT LIVE IN PRIVATE HOUSES AND APARTMENTS 215
THE HAYMARKET 217
DEGREE OF EDUCATION AMONG PROSTITUTES 218
BOARD LODGERS 220
Autobiographies 220
THOSE WHO LIVE IN LOW LODGING HOUSES 223
Swindling Sall 223
Lushing Loo 224
SAILORS’ WOMEN 226
Visit to Ratcliff Highway 228
Visit to Bluegate Fields, &c. 231
SOLDIERS’ WOMEN 233
Visit to Knightsbridge 235
THIEVES’ WOMEN 236
Visit to Drury Lane, &c. 236
PARK WOMEN 242
Examples 242
THE DEPENDANTS OF PROSTITUTES 246
Bawds 246
Followers of Dress Lodgers 247
Keepers of Accommodation Houses 249
Procuresses, Pimps, and Panders 250
Fancy Men 252
Bullies 253
CLANDESTINE PROSTITUTES
Female Operatives 255
Maid Servants 257
Ladies of Intrigue and Houses of Assignation 258
COHABITANT PROSTITUTES 259
Narrative of a Gay Woman 260
CRIMINAL RETURNS 263
TRAFFIC IN FOREIGN WOMEN 269
THIEVES AND SWINDLERS.--BY JOHN BINNY.
INTRODUCTION 273
SNEAKS, OR COMMON THIEVES 277
Juvenile Thieves 277
Stealing from Street Stalls 277
Stealing from the Till 278
Stealing from the Doors and Windows of Shops 279
Stealing from Children 281
Child Stripping 281
Stealing from Drunken Persons 282
Stealing Linen, &c. 283
Robberies from Carts 284
Stealing Lead from House-tops, Copper from Kitchens, &c. 285
Robberies by false Keys 286
Robberies by Lodgers 288
Robberies by Servants 289
Area and Lobby Sneaks 290
Stealing by Lifting Windows, &c. 292
Attic or Garret Thieves 293
A Visit to the Rookery of St. Giles 294
Narrative of a London Sneak 301
PICKPOCKETS AND SHOPLIFTERS 303
Common Pickpockets 306
Omnibus Pickpockets 309
Railway Pickpockets 310
A Visit to the Thieves’ Dens in Spitalfields 311
Narrative of a Pickpocket 316
HORSE AND DOG STEALERS 325
Horse Stealing 325
Dog Stealing 325
HIGHWAY ROBBERS 326
A Ramble among the Thieves’ Dens in the Borough 330
HOUSEBREAKERS AND BURGLARS 334
Narrative of a Burglar 345
Narrative of another Burglar 349
PROSTITUTE THIEVES 355
Prostitutes of the Haymarket 356
Common Street Walkers 360
Hired Prostitutes 361
Park Women 362
Soldiers’ Women 363
Sailors’ Women 365
FELONIES ON THE RIVER THAMES 366
Mudlarks 366
Sweeping Boys 367
Sellers of Small Wares 367
Labourers on board Ship 367
Dredgermen or Fishermen 368
Smuggling 368
Felonies by Lightermen 368
The River Pirates 369
Narrative of a Mudlark 370
RECEIVERS OF STOLEN PROPERTY 373
Dolly Shops 373
Pawnbrokers, &c. 374
Narrative of a Returned Convict 376
COINING 377
Coiners 378
Forgers 380
CHEATS 383
Embezzlers 383
Magsmen or Sharpers 385
Swindlers 388
BEGGARS.--BY ANDREW HALLIDAY.
INTRODUCTION 393
ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE POOR LAWS 394
Statistics of the Poor Laws 397
Report of the Poor Law Board 397
STREET BEGGARS IN 1816 398
MENDICANT PENSIONERS 399
MENDICITY SOCIETY 399
Examples of Applications 401
BEGGING LETTER WRITERS 403
Decayed Gentlemen 404
Broken-down Tradesmen 405
Distressed Scholar 405
The Kaggs’ Family 406
ADVERTISING BEGGING LETTER WRITERS 410
ASHAMED BEGGARS 412
THE SWELL BEGGAR 413
CLEAN FAMILY BEGGARS 413
NAVAL AND MILITARY BEGGARS 415
Turnpike Sailor 415
Street Campaigners 417
FOREIGN BEGGARS 419
The French Beggar 419
Destitute Poles 420
Hindoo Beggars 423
Negro Beggars 425
DISASTER BEGGARS 427
A Shipwrecked Mariner 428
Blown-up Miners 429
Burnt-out Tradesmen 429
Lucifer Droppers 431
Bodily Afflicted Beggars 431
Seventy years a Beggar 432
Having swollen Legs 433
Cripples 433
A Blind Beggar 433
Beggars subject to Fits 434
Being in a Decline 435
Shallow Coves 435
Famished Beggars 436
The Choking Dodge 437
The Offal Eater 437
PETTY TRADING BEGGARS 438
An Author’s Wife 440
DEPENDANTS OF BEGGARS 441
Referees 445
DISTRESSED OPERATIVE BEGGARS 446
Starved-out Manufacturers 446
Unemployed Agriculturists 446
Frozen-out Gardeners 446
Hand-loom Weavers, &c. 447
APPENDIX.
MAPS AND TABLES
ILLUSTRATING THE CRIMINAL STATISTICS OF EACH OF THE COUNTIES OF
ENGLAND AND WALES IN 1851.
PAGE
Map showing the Density of the Population 451
Table of ditto 452
Map showing the Intensity of Criminality 455
Table of ditto 456
Map showing the Intensity of Ignorance 459
Table of ditto 460
Table of Ignorance among Criminals 462
Table of Degrees of Criminality 464
Comparative Educational Tables 465
Map showing the Number of Illegitimate Children 467
Table of ditto 468
Map showing the Number of Early Marriages 471
Table of ditto 472
Map showing the Number of Females 475
Table of ditto 476
Map showing Commitals for Rape 477
Table of ditto 479
Map showing Committals for Assault with Intent to Ravish and
Carnally Abuse 481
Table of ditto 482
Map showing Commitals for Disorderly Houses 485
Table of ditto 486
Map showing Concealment of Births 489
Table of ditto 490
Map showing attempts at Miscarriage 493
Table of ditto 494
Map showing Assaults with Intent 497
Table of ditto 498
Map showing Committals for Bigamy 499
Table of ditto 500
Map showing Committals for Abduction 501
Table of ditto 502
Map showing the Criminality of Females 503
Table of ditto 504
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
A MIDNIGHT MEETING--REV. BAPTIST NOEL SPEAKING _Frontispiece_
GREEK DANCING GIRL--HETAIRA--AGE OF SOCRATES _Page_ 45
ROMAN BROTHEL--IMPERIAL ERA 47
WOMEN OF THE BOSJES RACE 59
GIRLS OF NUBIA--MAKING POTTERY 65
WOMAN OF THE SACS, OR “SAU-KIES,” TRIBE OF AMERICAN INDIANS 85
DYAK WOMEN--BORNEO 103
CHINESE WOMAN--PROSTITUTE 129
SCENE IN THE GARDENS OF ‘CLOSERIE DES LILAS’--PARIS 213
A NIGHT HOUSE--KATE HAMILTON’S 217
THE NEW CUT--EVENING 223
THE HAYMARKET--MIDNIGHT 261
BOYS EXERCISING AT TOTHILL FIELDS’ PRISON 301
CELL, WITH PRISONER AT CRANK LABOUR IN THE SURREY HOUSE
OF CORRECTION 345
FRIENDS VISITING PRISONERS 377
LIBERATION OF PRISONERS FROM COLDBATH FIELDS’ HOUSE OF CORRECTION 387
INTRODUCTION.
THE AGENCIES AT PRESENT IN OPERATION WITHIN THE METROPOLIS FOR THE
SUPPRESSION OF VICE AND CRIME.
One of the most remarkable and distinctive features of the present age
is the universal desire for analytical investigations. Almost every
branch of social economy is treated with a precision, and pursued with
an accuracy, that pertains to an exact science. Demonstration has been
reduced to a mathematical certainty; figures and statistics everywhere
abound, and supply data for further research.
Too often, however, it happens that the solution of the social problem,
or the collation of facts tending to throw light upon the moral and
religious condition of our country, forms the goal, and not the
starting point of our labours.
Having accomplished a diligent, and often a laborious, search, and
succeeded in eliminating truth from a mass of contradictory evidence,
men are generally satisfied with the mere pleasure derived from
success. Their knowledge, the hard pursuit of which has called forth
immense energy and perseverance, and entrenched largely on their time
and capital, is no longer the means to an end, but the end itself.
Having gathered a few pebbles from the exhaustless arcana of social
philosophy, they complacently enjoy their newly-found treasures,
without a thought of the practical uses to which they may be applied.
Other men are found who enter into their labours, and use the materials
thus collected as the basis of further philanthropic investigations.
While thus perpetually rising higher in the scale of intelligence, and
arriving at closer approximations to truth, men too often neglect to
turn their discoveries to any utilitarian or practical purpose, and
rest content with merely theoretical results.
Thus it is that while an inductive philosophy is built up from a
series of statistics and particulars, very little is being done to
reduce this knowledge to practice. The science of investigation is
admirable as far as it goes, and the pursuit of truth is at all times
an object worthy of human ambition; but it must become the pioneer to
tangible results, or its utility will by no means be apparent; and
indeed it becomes a question, in an active state of existence, how
far knowledge, which is final in its character and valuable merely
for its own sake, is calculated to reward the efforts expended on its
acquisition. It is true that the old philosophers held a contemplative
life to be the highest development of human happiness, but their dreamy
and fluctuating views are hardly likely to carry weight in an age of
bustling activity; and it is equally certain that the bare, quiescent
contemplation of evil in all its endless ramifications and hideous
consequences, apart from all remedial efforts, is not likely to prove
satisfactory to the philanthropist, nor consolatory to the Christian.
It is only so far as knowledge opens up to us the path of usefulness,
and directs us how and where to plant our energies for the benefit of
the human race, that it becomes really valuable. If, however, knowledge
be power, and if the discovery of an evil be half-way towards its
cure, then have we a right to expect that our humanitarian and other
appliances for the alleviation of misery and the prevention of crime,
should at least keep pace with modern developments of social science.
Hitherto men have been content to declaim against these evils, wherever
they existed, without suggesting any feasible remedies.
For a length of time our philanthropic schemes have partaken too
much of the character of mere surface appliances, directed to the
amelioration of existing evils, but in no way likely to effect their
extirpation. We have been dealing with effects rather than with first
causes, and in our zeal to absorb, divert, or diminish the former,
the latter have generally escaped detection. When too late, we have
discovered that mere palliatives will not suffice, and that they are
powerless to resist the steady growth of crime in all its subtle
developments. For, as well might we attempt to exhaust the perennial
flow of a spring by the application of sponges, as prescribe external
alleviations for our social disorders.
Our homes, penitentiaries, and industrial reformatories will continue
to do their work of mercy upon an infinitesimal scale, and will snatch
solitary individuals from impending destruction; but in the meantime
the reproductive process goes on, and fresh victims are hurried upon
the stage of suffering and of guilt, from numberless unforeseen and
unsuspected channels, thus causing a continuous succession of want,
profligacy, and wretchedness.
We have affected surprise, that, notwithstanding all our benevolent
exertions, and the completeness and efficiency of our reclaiming
systems, the great tide of our social impurities continues to roll on
with increasing velocity. Happily, however, for future generations,
there is a manifest tendency in the present age to correct these fatal
mistakes, and to return to first principles.
The science of anatomy is not confined to hospitals and
dissecting-rooms, nor restricted in its application to the human frame.
Social science conferences, and other associations are laying bare the
deeply-imbedded roots of our national evils, and are preparing the way
for their extirpation. Men are getting tired of planting flowers and
training creepers to hide their social upases, and are beginning to
discover that it is both sounder policy and truer economy to uproot a
noxious weed than to pluck off its poisonous berries.
We have flattered ourselves that education and civilization, with all
their humanizing and elevating influences, would gradually permeate
all ranks of society; and that the leaven of Christianity would
ultimately subdue the power of evil, and convert our outer world into
an Elysium of purity and unselfishness. The results, however, of past
years have hardly answered these sanguine expectations; and our present
experience goes far to prove, that while there has undoubtedly been
progress for good, there has been a corresponding progress for evil;
for although the criminal statistics of some localities exhibit a
sensible diminution in certain forms of vice, we must not forget that
an increase of education and a growing intelligence bring with them
superior facilities for the successful perpetration and concealment of
crime.
All the latest developments of science and skill being pressed into
the service of the modern criminal, his evasion of justice must
often be regarded less as the result of caution, or of a fortuitous
combination of favourable circumstances, than of his knowledge of
chemical properties and physical laws. So far indeed from our being
able to augur favourably from the infrequency of convictions, the
fearful tragedies which are occasionally brought to the surface of
society, coupled in many instances with a surprising fertility of
resource and ingenuity of method, are indicative of an under current
of crime--the depth and foulness of which defy all computation. We may
add further, that the immense difficulty of obtaining direct evidence
in cases of criminal prosecution, and the _onus probandi_ that the
law, not unfairly, throws upon the accusers, are sufficient to hush
up any cases of mere suspicion; so that at present we possess no
adequate data by which to gauge the real dimensions of crime, or to
judge respecting its insidious growth and power. It is not, however,
so much with crime in the abstract, as with the most prolific sources
of vice that the philanthropist has to deal; and it is a highly
suggestive and encouraging fact that, in these days, men are concerned
in investigating the various causes of crime, and in exposing its
reflex influence upon society. Just in proportion as they adhere to
this course, which is distinguished alike by prudence and sagacity,
will they become instrumental in effecting a radical reformation of
existing evils, and in restoring society to a more healthy and vigorous
condition. “What we want in all such cases is no false rhetoric and no
violent outbursts of passion, but clear statements of that vivid truth
which contains the intrinsic elements of reformation amongst mankind.
The true philanthropist is the man whose judgment is on a par with his
feelings, and who recognizes the fact that there is some particle of
meaning in every particle of suffering around us.
“Some of this wretchedness is remediable, the result of actual causes
which may be altered, though much is beyond human control. In an age
like this, however we may toil to overtake the urgent need of our own
time, the difficulty is, at the same time, calmly and deliberately
to satisfy the fresh wants which may daily arise--keeping pace with
them. With the heavy defalcations from past years weighing upon them,
our statesmen and economists are often bewildered at the magnitude of
their engagements; while the best and wisest amongst us are crushed
and appalled by the new and giant evils which are continually being
brought to light. Earnest thought, however, is the true incentive to
action,”[1] and we would thankfully recognize as one visible result of
the increasing attention given to matters of public interest, a growing
disposition on the part of all who are qualified by position and
authority, to grapple manfully with the various phases of wretchedness
and crime now contributing their influence upon our social condition.
Nowhere are these hopeful indications more manifest than in this giant
metropolis, where the various conditions of ordinary life seem to be
intensified by their direct contact with good and evil; and where
Christianity appears to be struggling to maintain its independent
and aggressive character, amid much that is calculated to retard its
progress and check its influence.
It is here, within the crowded areas and noisome purlieus of this
greatest of great cities, that we may gather lessons of life to be
gained nowhere else--and of which those can form a very inadequate
conception, who dwell only in an atmosphere of honied flowers and rural
pleasures.
It is here especially that the sorrows and sufferings of humanity
have evoked an active and pervasive spirit of benevolence, which has
infected all ranks and penetrated every class of society; so that the
high born and the educated, the gentle and the refined, vie with each
other in a restless energy to alleviate human misery and to assuage
some of the groans of creation. This disposition to relieve distress
in every shape, and to mitigate the ills of a common brotherhood,
proclaims at once its divine origin, and is, in fact, the nearest
assimilation to the character of Him who “went about doing good.”
The germ of this heaven-born principle has survived the fall; and
though its highest development is one of the distinguishing marks of
the true Christian, its existence is discernible in all who have not
sinned away the last faint outlines of the Divine image.
Some philosophers, indeed, would persuade us that there is no such
thing in existence as a principle of pure, unmixed benevolence; that
every exercise of charity is simply another mode of self-gratification,
and every generous impulse a mere exhibition of selfishness.
Undoubtedly there is a “luxury in doing good,” and the ability to
contribute to the happiness of others is one of the purest sources of
human gratification; but we question whether an act, resulting from
mere self-love, is capable of yielding any solid satisfaction to the
agent; and we therefore hold the existence of genuine benevolence,
believing that it is a principle innate in the human breast, and
requiring only to be developed and consecrated by religious influence
to become one of the most powerful levers for the evangelization of the
world.
Unhappily there are too many who have schooled themselves to the
practice of inhumanity, and closed up the springs of spontaneous
sympathy, thus depriving the heart of its rightful heritage, and
restricting the sphere of its operations to self. Those who thus
sever themselves from all external influences are left at length in
undisturbed possession of a little world of their own creation. No
longer linked to their fellow-men in the bonds of true fellowship,
their orbit of activity becomes narrower, until at length every
avenue to the heart is hermetically sealed, except such as minister
to self-gratification and indulgence. The man who has thus estranged
himself from the rest of creation, and become isolated from all the
ties of a common humanity, is indeed an object of unqualified pity,
because he has destroyed one of the purest springs of happiness.
He who, on the other hand, is most fully alive to the claims of
universal brotherhood, and whose heart is most
“At leisure from itself,
To soothe and sympathize,”
is the highest type of man, and the best representative of his race.
This spirit of brotherhood if recognised by the world, would “hush the
thunder of battle, and wipe away the tears of nations. It would sweep
earth’s wildernesses of moral blight, causing them to blossom as the
rose.”
Those persons who accustom themselves to speak of London as a mere
seething caldron of crime, or as a very charnel-house of impurity,
without any redeeming character or hopeful element, are surely as wide
of the mark as they who under-rate its vast resources for crime, or
take a superficial view of its predominant vices.
It would, perhaps, be a curious and not unprofitable subject of
inquiry how far the metropolis contributes its influence for good or
evil upon the provinces, and to what extent the country is capable of
reciprocating this influence. Probably, allowance being made for the
difference of population, the law of giving and receiving is pretty
evenly adjusted. Those forms of vice which seem to be more indigenous
to our great cities are steadily imported into the country, while on
the other hand, the hamlet and the village transmit to the town those
particular vices in which they appear to be constitutionally most
prolific.
It is in the crowded city, however, that the seeds of good or evil are
brought to the highest state of maturity, and virtue and vice most
rapidly developed, under the forcing influences that everywhere abound.
“Great cities,” says Dr. Guthrie, “many have found to be great curses.
It had been well for many an honest lad and unsuspecting country
girl, that hopes of higher wages and opportunities of fortune--that
the gay attire and polished tongue, and gilded story of some old
acquaintance--had never turned their steps cityward, nor turned them
from the rude simplicity, but safety of their rustic home. Many a foot
that once lightly pressed the heather or brushed the dewy grass, has
wearily trodden in darkness, and guilt, and remorse, on these city
pavements. Happy had it been for many that they had never exchanged
the starry skies for the lamps of the town, nor had left their lonely
glens, or quiet hamlets, or solitary shores, for the throng and roar of
our streets. Well for them that they had heard no roar but the rivers,
whose winter flood it had been safer to breast; no roar but oceans,
whose stormiest waves it had been safer to ride, than encounter the
flood of city temptations, which has wrecked their virtue and swept
them into ruin.
“Yet I bless God for cities. The world had not been what it is without
them. The disciples were commanded to ‘begin at Jerusalem,’ and Paul
threw himself into the cities of the ancient world, as offering the
most commanding positions of influence. Cities have been as lamps of
light along the pathway of humanity and religion. Within them science
has given birth to her noblest discoveries. Behind their walls freedom
has fought her noblest battles. They have stood on the surface of
the earth like great breakwaters, rolling back or turning aside the
swelling tide of oppression. Cities, indeed, have been the cradles
of human liberty. They have been the radiating, active centres of
almost all church and state reformation. The highest humanity has
been developed in cities. Somehow or other, amid their crowding and
confinement, the human mind finds its fullest freest expansion.
Unlike the dwarfed and dusty plants which stand in our city gardens,
languishing like exiles for the purer air and freer sunshine, that
kiss their fellows far away in flowery fields and green woodland, on
sunny banks and breezy hills, man reaches his highest condition amid
the social influences of the crowded city. His intellect receives its
brightest polish, where gold and silver lose theirs, tarnished by the
scorching smoke and foul vapours of city air. The mental powers acquire
their full robustness, where the cheek loses its ruddy hue, and the
limbs their elastic step, and pale thought sits on manly brows, and as
aërolites--those shooting stars which, like a good man on his path in
life, leave a train of glory behind them on the dusky sky--are supposed
to catch fire by the rapidity of their motion, as they rush through
the higher regions of our atmosphere, so the mind of man fires, burns,
shines, acquires its most dazzling brilliancy, by the very rapidity of
action into which it is thrown amid the bustle and excitements of city
life. And if, just as in those countries where tropical suns, and the
same skies, ripen the sweetest fruit and the deadliest poisons--you
find in the city the most daring and active wickedness, you find there
also, boldly confronting it, the most active, diligent, warm-hearted,
self-denying and devoted Christians.”[2]
London then may be considered as the grand central focus of operations,
at once the emporium of crime and the palladium of Christianity. It is,
in fact the great arena of conflict between the powers of darkness and
the ministry of heaven. Here, within the area of our metropolis, the
real struggle is maintained between the two antagonistic principles
of good and evil. It is here that they join issue in the most deadly
proximity, and struggle for the vantage-ground.
Here legions of crime and legions of vices unite and form an almost
impenetrable phalanx, while the strong man armed enjoys his goods in
peace--no, not in peace, for here too the banner of the cross is most
firmly planted, and Christianity wins its freshest laurels. Here is
the stronghold, the occupation of which by the everlasting gospel,
has given vigour, support, and consistency to the religion of the
world. Here is concentrated that fervent and apostolic piety that has
made itself felt to the remotest corner of the earth; and here is the
nucleus of missionary enterprise, and the radiating centre of active
benevolence.
“The Christian power that has moved a sluggish world on, the Christian
benevolence and energy that have changed the face of society, the
Christian zeal that has gone forth, burning to win nations and kingdoms
for Jesus,” have received their birth or development in London.
Since, then, this busy mart of the world, in which the most opposite
and dissimilar wares are exhibited, is made up of such composite
materials and conflicting elements, it is only fair that while
estimating its capabilities for crime, and endeavouring to plumb
its depths of depravity, ignorance, and suffering, we should, when
possible, faithfully depict their opposites, and take cognizance of
such instrumentalities as present the best antidotes and alleviations.
It is questionable, indeed, how far the cause of religion and morality
would be promoted by a ghastly array of facts, representing the
dimensions of crime in all its naked deformity, or by any exhibition,
however truthful, of vice and wretchedness under their most repulsive
aspects, and without any cheering reference to corrective and remedial
agencies. The effect produced upon the mind, in such a case, would be,
in the generality of instances, blank despair; and the only influence
thus excited would partake strongly of that morbid sympathy and
unhealthy excitement, awakened by delineations of fictitious distress.
To unravel the dark catalogue of London profligacy, and present to
the eye of the reader the wearisome expanse of guilt and suffering,
unrelieved by any indications of improvement, would be like exhibiting
the convulsive death-agony of a drowning man without the friendly
succour of a rope, or like conjuring up the horrors of a shipwreck
without the mental relief afforded by a life-boat.
We need the day star of hope to guide us through the impenetrable gloom
of moral darkness. The olive branch of mercy and the rainbow of promise
are as needful tokens of social and religious improvement, as of abated
judgments and returning favour.
After being required to give attention to figures and statistics
representing crime in the aggregate, the mental eye requires
alleviation from the gross darkness it has encountered, and looks
impatiently for some streak of light in the moral horizon, indicative
of approaching day. To view London crime and misery, without their
encouraging counterparts, would be like groping our way through the
blackness of midnight, unrelieved by the faintest glimmer of light.
Just, however, as stars shine brightest in the darkest nights, so may
we discover some element of hope under the most appalling exhibitions
of human depravity, which thus serve as a background to portray in
bolder relief, and by force of contrast, the redeeming qualities of
Christianity.
As a work of absorbing interest and utility to the British
philanthropist, Mr. Mayhew’s wonderful book, “London Labour and London
Poor,” stands probably unrivalled. The mass of evidence and detail,
accumulated after the most careful and indefatigable research, and
the personal interest which is sustained throughout, by the relation
of facts and occurrences, gleaned from the author’s own private
observation, or in which he took an active share, render his work both
invaluable to the legislator and acceptable to the general reader.
While, however, the former will refer to it as a book of reference,
the latter would probably rise from its perusal, with a sickening
apprehension of London depravity, and unless fortified by a previous
knowledge of counteracting agencies would probably form a too
lugubrious and desponding view of its social aspects. As any such
impression, derived from _ex-parte_ statements, would be highly
detrimental to the cause of truth and religious progress, and might
contribute to the relaxation of individual effort, the publishers
have naturally hesitated to allow one of the most startling and vivid
records of crime to go forth to the world, without directing attention
to the most approved and popular agencies, for the correction of such
abuses, as have been faithfully delineated in the course of the work.
The following brief summary of charitable and religious organizations,
having for their object the repression of crime and the diffusion of
vital Christianity, is intended therefore to form a supplement, or
prefatory essay, to the fourth and concluding volume of _London Labour
and London Poor_.
It would be impossible, within the narrow limits that have been
assigned to this essay, to do more than touch in a cursory and
incidental manner upon some of the principal agencies now at work
within the metropolis, for the suppression of vice and crime; the
object being not so much to exhibit the results which have rewarded
such instrumentalities, great and incalculable as they are, as to
indicate the best channels of usefulness, towards which public
attention should be constantly directed; not to foster pride and
self-complacency by tracing the progress we have already made, in
the race of Christian philanthropy, but rather to show how we may, by
rendering efficient support to existing organizations, advance still
further towards the goal, and rise to higher degrees of service in that
ministry of love, which aims at nothing less than the regeneration of
society, and the restoration of its unhappy prodigals to a condition of
present and eternal peace.
What we want is not so much the elaboration of new schemes and the
introduction of untried agencies, as a more unanimous and hearty
co-operation in sustaining such as are at present in existence, many
of which though fully deserving of a large measure of confidence and
support, are grown effete solely from want of funds to maintain them in
efficiency.
It has been truthfully remarked that there is hardly a woe or a misery
to which men are liable, whether resulting from accidental causes or
from personal culpability, which has not been assuaged or mitigated
by benevolent exertions. Experience indeed would go far to prove that
there are everywhere around us two mighty conflicting elements at
work, each having no other object than to pull down and destroy the
other. Every vice has its corresponding virtue, every form of evil
its counteracting influence for good, every Mount Ebal, its Gerizim;
the one being designed to act as an antidote or corrective to the
other, and to restore the type of heaven which the other has defaced.
The highest glory of our land--a glory far removed from territorial
acquisitions and national aggrandisement, and that which makes it
pre-eminently the admiration and envy of all other countries--are its
benevolent and charitable endowments. There is not another nation
in the world, where eleemosynary institutions have obtained such a
permanent hold upon the sympathies of all classes of society, nor where
such vast sums are realized by voluntary and private contributions.
“Palatial buildings, hospitals, reformatories, asylums, penitentiaries,
homes and refuges, there are, for the sick, the maimed, the blind, the
crippled, the aged, the infirm, the deaf, the dumb, the hungry, the
naked, the fallen and the destitute; and it is to the support of such
institutions, and the works which they carry on, that the nobles of
the land, and our prosperous merchants devote a large proportion of
their wealth.” No less than 530 charitable societies exist in London
alone, and nearly £2,000,000 of money is annually spent by them, while
probably the amount of alms bestowed altogether is not less than
£3,500,000.[3]
How far these resources, vast and extended as they really are, are
capable of satisfying present demands, may be best inferred from the
state of our criminal population, which is still to be counted by tens
of thousands, even while our prisons, refuges, and reformatories are
filled to overflowing.
“In spite,” says the author just quoted, “of our prison discipline, our
classification system, our silent system, and our separate system, all
these efforts that we make, and perhaps boast that we make, to turn
back the law-breaker to honest paths, nearly 30,000 criminals are each
year sent to prison, who only know the higher classes as objects of
plunder, and the maintenances of law and order as things; if possible
to be destroyed, and if not avoided.” £170,000 are annually expended
in London for the reformation of such offenders, and every modern
appliance that mercy or ingenuity can devise is brought to bear upon
our prison system, with what results may be clearly ascertained by the
large and increasing number of re-commitments--which form a proportion
of something like 30 per cent. on such as have been previously
incarcerated; while these, be it remembered, represent only the number
of those who render themselves amenable to justice by detection; there
being no means of ascertaining how many continue their avocations with
impunity.
Results like these are sufficiently disheartening to the
philanthropist, and embarrassing to the statesman, and serve to
show that however necessary it may be to devise methods for criminal
reformation, it is even more incumbent upon us, and far more
remunerative in the end, to carry out the principles of prevention.
The various agencies, at work in London, for the suppression of vice
and crime, may be treated under the following heads, which will serve
to indicate their relative value and proportionate influence; and
though, in their popular sense, many of the words used, may appear to
be only convertible terms, it is intended, for the sake of perspicuity
and arrangement, to assign to each a distinctive and separate meaning.
Thus the word _curative_ is used, not in its loose, remedial sense, as
applying to expedients calculated to produce a diminution of crime, but
must be understood as tending to the entire and absolute change of the
human will, and the renovation of a corrupt nature--such a thorough
change, in fact, as is implied in the word _cure_.
{ 1. Curative (radical).
Agencies for the { 2. Preventive (obstructive).
suppression of vice { 3. Repressive and punitive (compulsory).
and crime. { 4. Reformative (remedial).
1. _Curative Agencies._
Under this head _religion_ naturally occupies the foremost place;
since, by its restraining influence and converting power, it presents
the only true antidote, and the only safe barrier to the existence or
progress of crime; all other specifics, however valuable, being liable
to the imputation of failure, and their influence being either more
or less efficacious, according to the various phases of moral disease
exhibited by different mental and physical constitutions.
While applying political expedients for the cure of such disorders, it
must ever be borne in mind, that the origin of all evil is to be found
in the corruption of the human heart, and in its entire alienation
from God; and it is only so far as these intrinsic defects can be
remedied, that any permanent influence will be produced. That power,
therefore, which seizes upon the citadel of the heart, controlling
its affections, regulating its principles of action, and subduing its
vicious propensities or illicit motions, is the only sovereign remedy
for crime. In its natural state the heart may be compared to a fountain
discharging only turbid and bitter waters; but while various agencies
are employed to sweeten, disguise, or check this poisoned current,
religion is the only influence which purifies the fountain head, and
dries up the noxious springs, by placing a wholesome check upon the
first motive principles of action--the thoughts.
The truth of these remarks is even more strikingly exemplified in
the sudden and complete transformations of character, effected by
the all-mighty influence of religion. The moral demoniac finds no
difficulty in bursting the chains and fetters, in which society has
attempted to bind him. He is never changed, only curbed, pacified, or
restrained by such artificial modes of treatment. The wound may be
cauterised, cicatrised, or mollified, but the poison, if left in the
system, is sure to rankle and exhibit itself afresh. Religion, however,
casts out the unclean spirit, restores human nature to its right mind,
and asserts the supremacy of reason over that of passion and caprice.
Next in value and importance to religion itself, are those subordinate
instrumentalities calculated to exhibit or extend its influence, and
which bear the same relation to it as the means do to the end. Such
are the various agencies, in that divinely-appointed machinery for the
regeneration of mankind, the universal spread of “truth and justice,
religion and piety” throughout the world, and for the formation and
support of the spiritual Church of Christ.
The most powerful and efficacious of all levers for the social, moral,
and spiritual elevation of mankind is the _Word of God_. Into whatever
quarters of the habitable globe the sacred volume is diffused, there is
a corresponding spread of civilisation, and a sensible improvement in
the scale of humanity; and those countries are most socially, morally,
and politically debased, in which its circulation is debarred or
restricted.
Here it is only right to mention those societies which are directly
concerned in diffusing the Scriptures.
_The British and Foreign Bible Society_ is one of the most honoured and
influential channels for promoting the circulation of the Word of God,
“without note or comment.” It dates its origin from 1804, and since
this period it has, either directly or indirectly, been instrumental in
translating the Scriptures into 160 different languages or dialects,
including 190 separate versions. Connected with this Society, there are
in the United Kingdom 3728 auxiliary branches or associations.
The number of issues from London alone, during the last financial year,
amount to 594,651 copies of the Old Testament, and 544,901 copies of
the New Testament. The grants made during the same time amounted to
£58,551 17_s._ 7_d._ The total receipts of the Society derived from
subscriptions, and from the sale of publications, amounted last year to
£206,778 12_s._ 6_d._
Next to the Bible Society, the _Society for Promoting Christian
Knowledge_ is most directly concerned in the propagation of the
Scriptures. It was founded in 1698. During the past year 157,358
Bibles, and 78,234 New Testaments have been issued, besides
prayer-books, tracts, and other publications. In addition to the
dissemination of religious works, its objects include the extension of
the Episcopate in the colonies, by contributing to the erection of new
sees, and the support of colleges and educational institutions. The
receipts for the past year amounted to £31,697 19_s._ 7_d._ besides
£81,516 6_s._ 8_d._ received for the sale of publications.
In addition to these larger instrumentalities for the circulation
of the Scriptures, it has been reserved for modern zeal and piety
to discover a “missing link” in the operations hitherto in use, and
this void has been admirably supplied by the “Bible women” of the
nineteenth century. The appointment of these female colporteurs has
been attended with the most beneficial and encouraging results, for
not only has the sale of Bibles been facilitated among classes almost
inaccessible to such influences, but opportunities have been afforded
of permanently benefiting some of the most wretched and morally debased
of our population. The introductions, gained by means of this traffic,
have been turned to the best account, and a kindly influence has been
established over the families thus visited, which has been often
attended with the most favourable results.
“The lowest strata of society are thus reached by an agency which
takes the Bible as the starting point of its labours, and makes IT
the basis of all the social and religious improvements which are
subsequently attempted. Small in its beginnings, the work, by its
proved adaptation and results, has greatly enlarged its dimensions,
enlisting the sympathy and liberality of the Christian public; and in
almost all the metropolitan districts affording scope for the agency,
the Bible women are to be found prosecuting their arduous labours,
with immense advantage to the poor. At the present time there are
152 of these agents employed. During the past year the Bible women
in London disposed of many thousand copies of the Scriptures amongst
classes, which, to a very great extent, were beyond the reach of
the ordinary means used to effect this work; and this circulation
was attained not by the easy method of gift, but by sale, the very
poorest of the population being willing, when brought under kind and
persuasive influence, to pay for the Bible or Testament by small weekly
instalments.”
Another kindred agency of recent appointment is the “_Institution for
reading aloud the Word of God in the open air_,” in connection with
which are the “_Bible Carriages_,” or locomotive depôts, now employed
for extending the sale of the Scriptures in various parts of London,
and which have succeeded in drawing a large number of purchasers,
attracted, no doubt, by the novelty and singularity of the means
adopted.
While enumerating the religious agencies concerned in the repression
of crime in London, allusion need only be made incidentally to such as
necessarily spring out of an organized, ecclesiastical, or parochial
machinery consisting of clergy, churches, chapels, schools, &c., and
to the various societies and associations designed to extend and give
support to this machinery; the object of this essay being rather to
draw public attention to such auxiliary and supplemental organisations,
as are less generally known, or are of more recent origin.
One of the most remarkable movements of modern times in connection with
preaching, has been the establishment of _Theatre services_, which
owe their existence to the present Earl of Shaftesbury. So irregular
and unconstitutional a proceeding provoked, as might naturally have
been expected, a large amount of censure and unfriendly criticism.
Ecclesiastical dignities were at first somewhat scandalized by such an
innovation of church discipline, and evidently regarded the movement as
one calling rather for reluctant toleration, than as being entitled to
episcopal sanction--a feeling which was probably largely shared by the
more sober and orthodox portion of the community.
There appeared to be, at first sight, it must be confessed, a singular
incongruity, if not an absolute impropriety, in converting the stage
of a playhouse into a temple for the provisional celebration of divine
worship, and using an edifice habitually consecrated to amusement,
for the alternate promulgation of sacred verities and pantomimic
representations. Apart, however, from the repulsive features of the
proceeding arising from local associations, and from the periodical
juxtaposition of objects the most hostile and dissimilar, there
appeared to be no graver objection to the arrangement. The end was
here, at least, supposed not only to justify, but even to sanctify the
means, and the defence of this mal-appropriation was not unfairly said
to consist in the inadequacy of church accommodation, and in the cheap
facilities thus afforded, for bringing under the occasional ministry of
the word of life, classes, who from long habits of neglect, prejudice,
and an utter disrelish of religious ordinances, had become isolated
from the ordinary channels of instruction and improvement. The movement
having now had a fair trial, and the results being found to answer
the expectations of the originators, it may be regarded as no longer
a hazardous experiment, but as a part of the recognised machinery
employed for the evangelisation of the masses.
These special services for the working classes are now regularly
conducted in the various theatres and buildings temporarily
appropriated to divine worship. The attendance has been uniformly
good, and that of a class who habitually absent themselves from
religious ordinances, and could not therefore be reached by any of
the usual instrumentalities. Considering the unpromising materials of
which these singular congregations are composed, and the unfavourable
antecedents of most of the audience, it is something to be able to
state that on such occasions they are, for the most part, orderly and
well conducted, while the continued good attendance at these services
marks the appreciation in which they are held. During the Sabbath,
then, at least, a wonderful outward transformation is effected in the
pursuits and general demeanor of the frequenters, who meet together,
week after week, to hear the Gospel message expounded in the very
edifice, which during the previous six days has resounded with their
oaths, ribaldries, and licentious language. Is there not room for at
least a charitable hope, that when the heralds of salvation carry
their proclamations into the very heart of the enemy’s territory, and
aggressively plant the banner of the cross, where only the cloven foot
is wont to be seen, some victories will be achieved over the world,
the flesh, and the devil, and that some who usually meet to scoff and
jeer, will return home savingly impressed with what they have heard?
In strict conformity with the objects contemplated by this arrangement,
and arising out of the same temporary necessity, is _The Open-Air
Mission_, which was established in 1853 “for the purpose of stirring up
the Church of Christ, especially the lay elements, to go out into the
streets and lanes of the city, the towns and villages of the provinces,
the great gatherings that periodically occur at races, fairs,
executions, &c.; to go into lodging-houses, workhouses, and hospitals,
and in fact wherever persons are to be met with and spoken to about sin
and salvation.” Since the formation of the Society, open-air preaching
has become as it were a standing institution, and is recognized as an
indispensable agency in working densely-populated districts. Ministers
and laymen are to be found on every hand using this divinely-appointed
and apostolic agency to “bring in the poor, the maimed, the halt, and
the blind,” and God has eminently blessed their labours.
From May 1st, 1860, to March 31st, 1861, the London City Missionaries
conducted 4,489 outdoor meetings, at which the average attendance was
103, and the gross attendance 465,070. Numerous associations have
been formed in connection with this Society for Open-Air Preaching,
in various parts of London, and during the summer, eighteen stations
are occupied for this purpose by the students at the Church Missionary
College, under the direction of the Islington Church Home Mission.
A course of Sunday afternoon services is also regularly held by the
appointment of the rector in Covent Garden Market, which are generally
well attended and appear admirably calculated to benefit the classes
whose welfare is designed. The Bishop of London and other dignities of
the Church have been the preachers on such occasions, and have thus
lent their countenance to the proceeding.
In reference to all such agencies as open-air services, prayer
meetings, tract distributions, Bible readings, &c., it may be safely
asserted, that never in the entire history of the Church was there a
period, when such extraordinary efforts have been made to evangelise
the poor and the criminal population of London; or when a similar
activity has been displayed in ministering to the social and spiritual
wants of the community.
One of the oldest and most privileged institutions within the
metropolis, for bringing the influences of religion to bear upon the
dense masses of our population is the _London City Mission_. It was
founded in 1835, and its growth has steadily progressed up to the
present date. The object of the mission is to “extend the knowledge
of the Gospel, among the inhabitants of London and its vicinity
(especially the poor), without any reference to denominational
distinctions, or the peculiarities of Church government. To effect
this object, missionaries of approved character and qualifications
are employed, whose duty it is to visit from house to house in the
respective districts assigned to them, to read the Scriptures, engage
in religious conversation, and urge those who are living in the neglect
of religion to observe the Sabbath and attend public worship. They
are also required to see that all persons possess the Scriptures,
to distribute approved religious tracts, and to aid in obtaining
Scriptural education for the children of the poor. By the approval
of the committee they also hold meetings for reading and expounding
the Scriptures and prayer, and adopt such other means as are deemed
necessary for the accomplishment of the mission.”
The London City Mission maintains a staff of 389 missionaries, who are
employed in the various London and suburban districts; and thus the
entire city is more or less compassed by this effective machinery, and
brought under the saving influences of the Gospel. The very silent and
unobtrusive character of the work thus effected, precludes anything
like an accurate estimate of results, or a showy parade of success.
It works secretly, quietly, and savingly, in districts too vast to
admit of pastoral supervision, and in neighbourhoods too outwardly
unattractive and unpropitious, to win the attention of any who are not
animated with a devoted love of souls. The influence which is thus
exerted in a social and religious point of view is inestimable, and the
benefits conferred by this mission, are of an order that would be best
understood and appreciated by the community, if they were for a time to
be suddenly withdrawn.
In addition to the regular visitation of the poor, the missionaries
are employed in conducting religious services in some of the “worst
spots that can be found in the metropolis, and the audiences have been,
in such cases, ordinarily the most vicious and debased classes of the
population.”
Six missionaries are appointed, whose exclusive duty it is to visit
the various public-houses and coffee-shops in London, and to converse
with the _habitués_ on subjects of vital importance. There are also
three missionaries to the London cabmen, a class greatly needing their
religious offices, and by their occupation almost excluded from any
social or elevating influences.
The following summary of missionary work, and its results for 1861, is
sufficiently encouraging, as pointing in some instances, at least, to a
sensible diminution of crime, and as being suggestive of a vast amount
of good effected by this pervasive evangelistic machinery.
Number of Missionaries employed 381
Visits paid 1,815,332
Of which to the sick and dying 237,599
Scriptures distributed 11,458
Religious Tracts given away 2,721,73
Books lent 54,00
In-door Meetings and Bible Classes held 41,777
Gross attendance at ditto 1,467,006
Out-door Services held 4,489
Gross attendance at ditto 465,070
Readings of Scripture in visitation 584,166
Communicants 1,535
Families induced to commence family prayer 681
Drunkards reclaimed 1,230
Unmarried couples induced to marry 361
Fallen females rescued or reclaimed 681
Shops closed on the Sabbath 212
Children sent to school 10,158
Adults who died having been visited by the Missionary _only_ 1,796
The income of the London City Mission, during the past year, amounted
to 35,018_l._ 6_s._ 10_d._; 5,763_l._ 15_s._ 7_d._ having been
contributed by country associations.
Next to the London City Mission, the _Church of England Scripture
Readers’ Society_ is one of the most extensive and important channels
for disseminating a religious influence among the masses by means of a
parochial lay agency.
It is the special duty of the Scripture readers to visit from house to
house; to read the Scriptures to all with whom they come in contact; to
grapple with vice and crime _where they abound_; and to shrink from no
effort to arrest their career.
“To overtake and overlook the growing multitudes which crowd our large
and densely-peopled parishes,” was a work universally admitted to be
beyond the present limits of clerical effort; and this _desideratum_
has been supplied, at least to some extent, by the appointment of a
lay agency, acting under the direction and control of the parochial
clergy. By this means “cases are brought to light and doors opened
to the pastoral visit, which were either closed against it or not
discovered before; and an amount of information concerning the
religious condition of the parish is obtained, such as the minister,
single-handed, or with the aid of a curate, never had before.” The
following results, which are reported as having attended the labours
of a single Scripture reader, during a period of fourteen years, will
serve as an illustration of the nature of those services rendered by
this instrumentality:--
Visits paid to the poor 23,986
Infants and adults baptized on his recommendation 3,510
Children and adults persuaded to attend school 2,411
Persons led to attend church for the first time 307
Persons confirmed during visitation 429
Communicants obtained by ditto 269
Persons living in sin induced to marry 48
One hundred and twenty-five grants are now made by the Society for the
maintenance of Scripture readers in eighty-seven parishes and districts
in the metropolis, embracing a population of upwards of a million.
The Society’s income for the past year amounted to 9,850_l._ 2_s._
10_d._
Second only in importance to personal evangelistic effort is the
influence of a _Religious Press_. Public opinion being often
fluctuating, and its general estimates of morality being, to a
considerable extent, formed by the current literature of the age, it is
essential that this mighty and controlling power should be exerted on
the side of religion and virtue.
Works of a high moral tone, inculcating correct principles and
instilling lessons of practical piety, conduce, therefore, in
the highest degree, to a wholesome state of society, and to the
preservation of public morals.
The two great emporiums of religious literature, most directly
concerned in producing these results, are the _Religious Tract Society_
and the _Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge_. The latter
has already been referred to, as one of the main channels for the
diffusion of the Scriptures.
None of the works issued by the _Religious Tract Society_ can compete
in point of interest or usefulness with those widely-circulated and
deservedly-popular serials the Leisure Hour, the Sunday at Home, and
the Cottager, a periodical lately published, and admirably adapted for
the homes of the working classes.
The publications issued by the Society during the past year amounted
to 41,883,921; half of which number were English tracts and handbills;
537,729 were foreign tracts; and 13,194,155 fall under the head of
periodicals.
The entire number of both English and foreign publications issued by
the Society, since its foundation in 1799, amount to 912,000,000.
Grants of books and tracts are annually made by the Society for schools
and village libraries, prisons, workhouses, and hospitals, for the
use of soldiers, sailors, emigrants, and for circulation at fairs and
races, by city missionaries and colporteurs.
The total number of such grants during the past year amounted to
5,762,241; and were of the value of £6,116 14_s._ 4_d._
The entire receipts of the Society from all sources for the past year
amounted to £103,127 16_s._ 11_d._; the benevolent contributions being
£9,642 9_s._ 2_d._
Other channels for the supply and extension of religious literature are
the _Weekly Tract Society_, the _English Monthly Tract Society_, and
the _Book Society_, which latter aims especially at promoting religious
knowledge among the poor.
As a supplemental agency for the collection and dissemination of a
wholesome literature, the _Pure Literature Society_, established 1854,
is deserving of especial commendatory notice.
The following is a list of the periodicals recommended by the Society;
and the circulation of which it seeks to facilitate:--
For Adults:--Leisure Hour, British Workman, Good Words, Old Jonathan,
Youth’s Magazine, Appeal, Bible-Class Magazine, Christian Treasury,
Churchman’s Penny Magazine, Evening Hour, Family Treasury, Family
Paper, Friendly Visitor, Mother’s Friend, Servant’s Magazine, Sunday at
Home, The Cottager, Tract Magazine.
For Children:--Young England, Band of Hope Review, Child’s Own
Magazine, Child’s Companion, Child’s Paper, Children’s Friend,
Children’s Paper, Our Children’s Magazine, Sabbath School Messenger,
Sunday Scholar’s Companion.
Upwards of 140,000 periodicals are sent out annually by the Society in
monthly parcels.
The Society’s income during the past year amounted to £2,783 12_s._
2_d._
2. _Preventive Agencies._
Under this division are not included those measures which have
for their object the forcible suppression of crime, which will be
considered under a separate head, nor yet such as are calculated
to extinguish those criminal propensities, which are ever lying
dormant in the human heart, for these, as has been already shown,
can only be effectually subdued, or eradicated by the influences of
religion. By preventive agencies are rather to be understood, those
instrumentalities best adapted to effect the removal of peculiar forms
of temptation, or to abridge the power of special producing causes of
vice; whatever means, in fact, are efficacious in removing hindrances
to the development of virtue, and in fostering principles of morality.
Human nature, owing to the force of adverse circumstances, being often
placed at a disadvantage, it is the peculiar province of preventive
agencies to give it a fair chance of escape, by extricating it from
its perilous position, and surrounding it with virtuous influences and
humanizing appliances. Under this head, moreover, are included all
such measures as conduce to the social and moral improvement of the
community, either by presenting an indirect barrier to the progress of
crime, or by the employment of counteracting agencies.
In this connexion the _Temperance Associations_ are deserving of
especial prominence. Drunkenness being the most fruitful source of all
crime, and the primary cause of want and wretchedness, it follows that
whatever instrumentalities are capable of arresting its progress, or
curtailing its influence, are in every way worthy the consideration
of the philanthropist and the statesman. The utility of temperance
societies has often been called in question; but it must be admitted,
that as an instrumental agency for the suppression of drunkenness,
and consequently for the diminution of crime, the influence of such
associations is unlimited. Whether or not the entire-abstinence
system is based on philosophical arguments, or is deducible from
Scripture teaching, is little to the point, provided the fruits it has
yielded are unquestionably salutary in their effects upon society,
and conducive to the present and eternal happiness of millions of
individuals, who, but for this timely interference would have continued
in their mad career of dissipation, without the power to break off the
thraldom, or to dispel the infatuation in which they were held.
_The National Temperance Society_, formed in 1842, is now in active
operation, and seeks by means of meetings, lectures, and publications,
to disseminate its principles, and to draw attention to the objects it
is endeavouring to promote.
_The United Kingdom Alliance_, for the legislative suppression of
the liquor traffic, is a step in advance of the ordinary temperance
movement, and aims at nothing short of the entire extinction of a
commerce in intoxicating drinks. This body has already secured a large
number of influential adherents, and appears to be rapidly gaining
ground. A monster meeting has lately been held in Manchester in
furtherance of the Society’s proximate aims, which are to introduce a
permissive Bill into Parliament, to delegate to local authorities the
power to prohibit such traffic within their respective neighbourhoods.
The passing of this Act will in effect resolve the question of
abolition or toleration into one of public opinion; and districts, if
so inclined, will possess the power of deciding whether or no the sale
of intoxicating drinks shall be carried on within their own parochial
boundaries.
As a counteracting agency to the beer-shop and the gin-palace, _The
Metropolitan Free Drinking Fountain Association_, formed two years ago,
is deserving of special notice. It has for its objects the erection and
maintenance of drinking fountains in the various crowded thoroughfares
of the metropolis, thus humanely furnishing the means of alleviating
that feverish thirst, which during the hot season impels so many to an
excessive use of intoxicating drinks.
_The Ragged Schools_ hold a prominent place among the indirectly
preventive agencies for the suppression of crime in the metropolis; for
since ignorance is generally the parent of vice, any means of securing
the benefits of education to those who are hopelessly deprived of it,
must operate in favour of the well-being of society.
_The Ragged School Union_ has been formed with a view to develope and
give consistency to this movement, which it does by collecting and
diffusing information respecting schools now in existence, and by
pecuniary grants towards their foundation and support.
The number of buildings now in existence in London, appropriated to
these educational purposes, is 176. The day-schools are 151 in number,
and are attended by 17,230 scholars. The evening-schools number 215,
and the scholars 9,840; Sunday-schools 207, and scholars 25,260. The
number of scholars placed in situations last year amounted to 1,800.
Penny Banks, Clothing Clubs, Reading Rooms, Mother’s Meetings, and
Shoe-Black Brigades have been established in connexion with this
movement, and contribute their influence to the general well-being of
those attending the schools, as well as to that of society at large.
In connexion with the Union are 16 refuges for the homeless and
destitute, accommodating 700 inmates.
The receipts of the Union amounted last year to £5,739 7_s._ 8_d._;
and probably no money was ever laid out at better interest, than that
contributed by the benevolent public towards the rescue and moral
training of these embryo criminals. Difficult as the principle of
Government intervention no doubt is, that would be a wise, politic,
humane, and economical course which should sever this Gordian knot, by
constituting the State the lawful guardian of such as are deprived of
all that is understood by the terms home influence, and moral training.
Another agency contributing largely to the prevention of crime is _the
Society for Improving the Condition of the Labouring Classes_, not so
much, however, in the transformations and improvement of buildings
effected under its own immediate control, which are rather designed to
serve as models to those desirous of carrying out these principles of
reform, as by drawing public attention to one of the most interesting
and painful subjects that can occupy the mind of the philanthropist,
viz., the inadequate provision of decent, and proper house
accommodation for the industrial classes, which is now universally
admitted to be productive of the worst social disorders.
The important provisions of the Common Lodging-Houses Act, passed
in 1851, under the auspices of Lord Shaftesbury, and the system
of registration thus enforced, have also been attended with great
benefits, and have conduced not a little to the promotion of
social and sanatory reform, by bringing legal enactments to bear
upon the disorders, indecencies, and impurities of low and crowded
lodging-houses.
There is no class of preventive agencies in the metropolis, which on
every principle of justice and humanity have stronger claims on the
sympathy of the benevolent than such as interpose their friendly
shelter and kind offices, to rescue those who are suddenly reduced to
positions of great extremity and temptation. It is doubtless an act of
mercy to rescue a drowning man, and such charitable deeds are performed
by those who labour for the reformation of the criminal; but it is a
higher act of charity, and a wiser and more Christian course to prevent
his falling into the stream; experience, however, proves that it is
easier to enlist sympathy on behalf of one who is already being swept
away by the current of crime, than to rescue one who is bordering on
destruction, and perhaps bravely battling with temptation. This is
perhaps only natural; our perception of danger in the one case is far
greater than in the other, and our commiseration is awakened at sight
of the death agony of the drowning wretch, but is hardly stirred on
behalf of him who walks on the slippery brink.[4]
It is unhappily a fact too well authenticated to need further
demonstration, that owing perhaps to sudden reverses of fortune, to the
removal of natural protectors, or to the force of some overwhelming
temptation, many persons are unwillingly, and almost unavoidably,
pressed into the ranks of crime, who but for the extremity in which
they were placed, would have continued to walk erect in the path of
honour and virtue. Let none then who move in the calm sunlight of
prosperity, presume to judge those who stumble in the dark night of
trial.
“The path of a man, even of a man on the highway to heaven, is never
one of perfect safety. There are many dangerous passes in the journey
of life. The very next turn, for anything we know, may bring us on one.
Turn that projecting point, which hides the path before you, and you
are suddenly in circumstances which demand that reason be strong, and
conscience be tender, and hope be bright, and faith be vigorous.”
Happily there are persons whose qualities of head and heart have
enabled them by precautionary measures to provide against the weakness
of human nature, and to offer assistance to those who are placed in
such critical positions.
There is no class more essential to the well-being and comfort of
society, and none, it is to be feared, more exposed to dangers and
temptations, than domestic servants. It is calculated that in London
alone there are upwards of one hundred thousand females engaged in
domestic service, and that ten thousand of these are continually
in a transition state, and therefore out of employment. When it is
borne in mind that vast numbers of these young women have migrated,
at an early age, from various parts of the country in search of a
livelihood, that many of them are orphans and friendless, or at least
wholly destitute of friends and resources in London, that they are
moreover inexperienced, unsuspecting, and ignorant of the snares and
temptations that surround them, it cannot be a matter of surprise that
the reports of all the London penitentiaries should bear witness to the
fact, that a large majority of the fallen women who are received into
these institutions came originally from the ranks of domestic service.
It would be superfluous to attempt to prove the value of associations
formed to counteract these evils, by offering advice, shelter, and
protection to servants who are out of situations or seeking employment.
One of the oldest and best organizations of this kind is the _Female
Servants’ Home Society_,[5] which has now been in active operation
four-and-twenty years. Its objects are to provide a safe _home_ for
respectable female servants when out of place, or for those seeking
situations. The Homes, four in number, are under the control of
experienced and pious matrons, who establish a kind and motherly
influence over the inmates, and are indefatigable in endeavouring to
promote their welfare. The Homes are regularly visited by Christian
ladies, and a service is conducted every week by the chaplain. A
registry, free to the servants, is attached to each Home, where for
a trifling fee of half-a-crown, or by an annual subscription of one
guinea, every facility is afforded to employers of procuring efficient
and trustworthy servants.
Since the formation of the Society, upwards of 7,000 servants have been
received into the Homes, and 37,000 have availed themselves of the
registry provided, while in numberless instances young and friendless
girls have been rescued from positions of extreme and imminent danger.
A kindred institution to the above is _The Female Aid Society_,
established in 1836. Its objects, which are threefold, are thus
defined:--
1st. “It provides a home for female servants, where they may
reside with comfort, respectability, and economy, while seeking
for situations;” and in connexion with which is a register for the
convenience of servants and employers.
2nd. “It receives into a home, for purposes of protection and
instruction, young girls to be trained for service and other
employments, who, from circumstances of poverty, orphanage, or sinful
conduct in those who should preserve them from evil, are exposed to
great temptations, and are in want of a home where there is proper
guardianship and example.”
3rd. “A home and rescue is offered to women who, weary of sin, are
desirous of leaving a life of awful depravity and misery;” and no
depth of past degradation, provided there is any sign of amendment,
presents a barrier to their reception, shelter being freely offered to
the very outcast among the outcasts, to inmates of refractory wards,
of workhouses, and to women freshly discharged from prison. Since the
formation of the Society 4,116 servants have been admitted into the
Home, and 7,622 placed in service; 2,008 young women have enjoyed the
protection of the Friendless’ Home, and 2,205 have been received as
penitents. Want of funds, however, has obliged the Society to curtail
its operations.
_The Girls’ Laundry and Training Institution for Young Servants_ is
an industrial home, affording shelter, protection, and instruction in
household duties to forty young girls, who are thus carefully trained
and prepared for domestic service.
Other institutions for the accommodation, temporary relief, and
permanent benefit of servants are, _The National Guardian Institution_,
_The Marylebone Philanthropic Servants’ Institution and Pension
Society_, _The Provisional Protection Society_, _The General Domestic
Servants’ Benevolent Institution_, and _The Servants’ Provident and
Benevolent Society_.
Among the London preventive agencies must be classed the various homes,
refuges, and asylums for the relief of the utterly destitute and
friendless of good character, and which severally offer food, shelter,
and protection to those needing their assistance.
_The Field Lane Night Refuges_ provide accommodation nightly for 200
men and women; and by this instrumentality many are rescued from death
and crime, and are enabled to regain their positions in life, or to
maintain themselves in respectability. During the past year 31,747
lodgings were afforded to persons of both sexes. Many of those thus
assisted were poor needlewomen, who, during an inclement winter, had
been, together with their families, turned into the street, having been
stript of everything for rent.
_The Dudley Stuart Night Refuge_, founded by Lord Dudley Stuart in
1852, provides for the reception of the utterly destitute during the
winter months. Accommodation is offered to 95 persons in two warm,
spacious, and well-ventilated apartments. The relief afforded consists
of a night’s lodging, bread night and morning, and medical attendance,
if required. This charity has, since its foundation, alleviated a vast
amount of suffering. It admits those against whom every other door is
closed, and requires no recommendation beyond the utter destitution of
the applicants. Upwards of 8,000 men, women, and children were admitted
and relieved during last winter.
_The Houseless Poor Asylum_ is the oldest night-refuge in London, and
was opened to “afford nightly shelter and sustenance to the absolutely
destitute working classes, who are suddenly thrown out of employment
during the inclement winter months.” Accommodation is provided for 700;
and since the opening of the Asylum 1,449,047 nights’ lodgings and
3,515,951 rations of bread have been supplied.
_The House of Charity_ provides for the reception of distressed persons
of good character, who, from various accidental causes, require a
temporary home, protection, and food. Nearly 3000 persons of both sexes
have been thus accommodated for an average period of a month or five
weeks.
_The Foundling Hospital_, first opened in 1741, for the reception
of illegitimate children, has undergone considerable changes and
improvements, and now shelters, maintains, and educates 460 children,
who, at the age of fifteen, are apprenticed or otherwise provided
for, and are thus humanely rescued from the early and contaminating
influence of vicious associations. No child is eligible for this
charity unless there is satisfactory proof of the mother’s previous
good character and present necessity, of desertion by the father, and
that the reception of the child will, in all probability, be the means
of replacing the mother in the course of virtue, and the way of an
honest livelihood.
_The Society for the Suppression of Mendicity_ was instituted in 1818,
“for the purpose of checking the practice of public mendicity, with all
its baneful and demoralizing consequences; by putting the laws in force
against imposters who adopt it as a trade, and by affording prompt
and effectual assistance to those whom sudden calamity or unaffected
distress may cast in want and misery upon the public attention.”
A just discrimination between cases of real and fictitious distress,
and a judicious adaptation of relief to deserving cases, is a
necessary, but very difficult, part of true benevolence. The frauds
which are successfully practised by systematic sharpers upon a
charitable, but over-credulous public, and the existence of an immense
amount of genuine and unrelieved suffering, are sufficient proofs of
the value and importance of any agency designed to counteract these
abuses, and to accord a just measure of benevolence.
By means of printed tickets supplied to subscribers, beggars can
be directed to the Society’s offices, where their cases are fully
investigated, and treated according to desert, a sure provision being
thus made against imposture.
Since the formation of the Society 51,016 registered cases have been
disposed of, and food, money, and clothing dispensed to deserving
applicants, while employment has been provided for such as were found
able to work.
_The Association for Promoting the Relief of Destitution in the
Metropolis_ is likewise a safe channel for the exercise of public
benevolence. It is carried on under the direction of the bishop
and clergy, and the efforts of the Association are directed to
the origination and support of local undertakings, thus forming a
connection and a centre of union between the various parochial visiting
societies.
The present condition of that large class of female workers in London,
comprehended under the terms milliners and dressmakers, is one of
the saddest reproaches upon a country whose benevolent objects are
so numerous, and so extensive, and one of the severest comments upon
the heartlessness and artificialism of that society, which takes no
cognizance of those who are most largely concerned in administering to
its necessities. The miseries of this shamefully under-paid and cruelly
over-worked class of white slaves have been too often eloquently
animadverted upon, to need any further denunciations of the system,
under which they are hopelessly and unfeelingly condemned to labour.
The impossibility of supporting life on the wretched pittance accorded
to their labours, is the oft-heard, and the unanswerably extenuating
plea for their recourse to criminal avocations.
While, however, the State shrinks from the task of ameliorating their
condition by any legislative interference, it is satisfactory to know
that public benevolence in this wide field is not wholly unrepresented.
_The Association for the Aid and Benefit of Dressmakers and Milliners_
is a noble breakwater against the inroads of oppression, and a valuable
counteracting agency to the force of temptation.
Its objects, briefly stated, are to obtain some remission of labour and
other concessions from employers, and to afford pecuniary and medical
assistance in cases of temporary distress or illness. A registry and
provident fund are provided in connexion with the association.
Actuated by the same humane intention, although different in object, is
the _Needlewomen’s Institution_, established in 1850, “with the twofold
view of affording those who had suffered under the oppression of middle
men and slop-sellers, the opportunity of maintaining themselves, by
supplying them with regular employment at remunerative prices, in airy
work-rooms, and if desired, lodging at a moderate charge.”
Another institution of very recent origin directed to the religious and
social improvement of the same unhappy class, is the _Young Women’s
Christian Association and West London Home_, for young women engaged in
houses of business. Its objects are twofold, 1st, “to supply a place
where young women so employed, can profitably spend their _Sundays
and week-day evenings_,” thus counteracting the evil influence of
badly conducted houses of business; and 2nd, “the home is intended to
provide a residence for young people coming from the country to seek
employment, and for those who are changing their situations, or who
from over-work and failing health require rest for a time.” The rooms
of the Association are open every evening from seven until ten o’clock,
when educational and religious classes are held for the benefit of
those attending.
Thus, “where occasional spasms of sympathy, the well-merited
castigations of the press, and the voice of popular opinion had
unitedly failed to shake the throne of the god of Mammon, erected on
skeletons, and cemented with the blood of women and children, it was
reserved for a Christian lady to strike out a plan which has already
been productive of an immensity of good, and has commended itself to
the approval of all who are labouring to promote the welfare of this
oppressed and neglected class. The better to appreciate the importance
of this noble and truly womanly enterprise, only let the solemn and
fearful fact be borne in mind, that in London _alone_ 1,000 poor girls
are yearly crushed out of life from over-toil and grinding oppression,
while 15,000 are living in a state of semi-starvation. Ah! who can
wonder that our streets swarm with the fallen and the lost, when SIN
OR STARVE is the dire alternative! Who cannot track the _via doloroso_
between the 15,000 starving and the thrice that number living by sin as
a trade!
“Here, then, is an Institution that meets the wants of the case.
It not only catches them before they go over the precipice, and
lovingly shelters them from the fierce blasts of temptation, beating
remorselessly on many a young and shrinking heart, but ensures them a
‘_Home_,’ where soul and body alike may find rest and peace.”[6]
The _Society for Promoting the Employment of Women_ has lately been
called into existence, by the emergencies of the present age, the
object of which is to develop and extend the hitherto restricted field
of female labour, by the establishment of industrial schools and
workshops, where girls may be taught those trades and occupations which
are at present exclusively monopolised by men. Those “educated in this
school will be capable of becoming clerks, cashiers, railway-ticket
sellers, printers,” &c.
These and similar measures which tend to open up resources to women
in search of a livelihood, will have the happiest effect in diverting
numbers into paths of honest industry, who now labour under strong
temptations to abandon themselves to a life of criminal ease and
self-indulgence.
The remaining agencies indirectly tending to the prevention of crime,
are the _Metropolitan Early Closing Association_, for abridging
the hours of business, so as to afford to assistants time for
recreation, and for physical, intellectual, and moral improvement; the
_Metropolitan Evening Classes for Young Men_, for furnishing the means
of instruction and self-improvement; and the _Young Men’s Christian
Association_, for promoting the spiritual and mental improvement of
young men, “by means of devotional meetings, classes for Biblical
instruction, and for literary improvement, the delivery of lectures,
the diffusion of Christian literature, and a library for reference
and circulation.” This last instrumentality has been widely blessed,
and its beneficial influence is now extended, by means of branch
associations, to most of the provincial towns.
3. _Repressive and Punitive Agencies._
The various instrumentalities falling under this head appear deserving
of separate consideration, and cannot therefore be appropriately
included under either of the previous divisions, being neither curative
in their character, nor preventive to any appreciable extent. They
evidently presuppose the existence of crime, and merely seek to
diminish its influence, or curtail its power by the application of
legal provisions and compulsory measures, intended on the one hand to
indemnify society against the infraction of its rights, and on the
other to intimidate or restrain the criminal offender. The absolute
reformation of the viciously disposed can hardly be expected to result
from the use of such means, and belongs properly to another class
of agencies. It may indeed be achieved by punitive measures, but in
this case reformation of character is rather a startling accident
than an essential property of the system pursued. Experience has
abundantly established the utility of legal provisions as a “terror
to evil doers;” but the statistics of our police-courts will by no
means warrant the assumption that penal measures have _per se_ been
successful in reclaiming the offender. It is not intended, however,
while speaking of repressive and punitive agencies, to include in this
category the strictly legal efforts employed by the State to deter and
correct the criminal who renders himself amenable to justice. This
subject will be found fully and distinctly treated by Mr. Mayhew, in
a work now in the press, entitled “Prisons of London, and Scenes of
Prison Life.”
The inquiry pursued in the course of this Essay is not designed to
comprehend such constitutional measures as are employed by either
Church or State, for the suppression of vice and crime; but rather to
draw from their obscurity, and to give prominence to those resources
and expedients which society itself adopts, for the defence and
preservation of its own interests.
_The Society for the Suppression of Vice_, which was established
in 1802, has for its objects the repression of attempts “to spread
infidelity and blasphemy by means of public lectures, and printed
publications.” The operations of the Society have also been
directed to the suppression of disorderly houses, the punishment of
fortune-tellers, and other important objects. “It is represented that
by means of this Society many convictions have taken place, and persons
have been sentenced to imprisonment for selling obscene publications
and prints,” while their works have been either seized or destroyed.
With such admirable intentions and useful objects, to commend it to
benevolent support, and with the entire voice of public opinion in its
favour, the only wonder is that this Society does not carry on its
operations with greater publicity, vigilance, and efficiency. Unhappily
the loathsome traffic in Holywell Street literature is still carried
on with bold and unblushing effrontery, and its existence, although
greatly diminished in the country, is too notorious and too patent, in
certain portions of the metropolis, to need any extraordinary efforts
to promote exposure and punishment.
The demoralizing influence of low theatres, and the licentious
corruptions of the Coal Hole, and Posés Plastiques, might surely afford
scope for vigorous prosecutions under the Society’s auspices; and yet
these dens, in which the vilest passions of mankind are stimulated, and
every sentiment of religion, virtue, and decency grossly outraged, or
publicly caricatured, are allowed to emit their virulent poison upon
all ranks of society without the slightest let or hindrance! Only let a
man smitten by the plague or with any other infectious disease, obtrude
himself by unnecessary contact upon the public, and his right to free
agency would be summarily disposed of, by speedy incarceration within
the walls of a hospital; but provided only the disorder be a moral
one--and therefore far more to be dreaded, in its pestiferous influence
and baneful effects upon society--it is forsooth to be tolerated as a
necessary evil! _Proh tempora et mores!_
_The Associate Institution_, formed in 1844, has been in active
operation fifteen years, and has been instrumental in effecting a large
amount of good, by improving and enforcing the laws for the protection
of women. It has maintained a strenuous crusade against houses of
ill-fame, and has since its establishment conducted upwards of 300
prosecutions, in most of which it has been successful in bringing
condign punishment upon the heads of those, who have committed criminal
assaults upon women and children, or who have decoyed them away for
immoral purposes.
Important as these results have been, a larger amount of good has
probably been achieved by means of lectures and meetings held in
various parts of the country by Mr. J. Harding, the Society’s
travelling secretary, whose faithful and stirring appeals and bold
denunciations of vice have contributed not a little to the spread
of sounder and more wholesome views on social questions, and to the
removal of that ignorance of profligate wiles and artifices, which, in
so many cases, proves fatal to the unsuspecting and unwary.
Two Bills prepared by this Association, one for the protection of
female children between 12 and 13 years of age, and the other to
simplify and facilitate the prosecution of persons charged with
keeping houses of ill fame, were this year submitted to parliament,
but unhappily without success, having been lost either on technical
grounds, or for want of support. It is refreshing to turn from the
supineness of statesmen to the energy and decision manifested by
private associations in resisting the encroachments of vice. The _East
London Association_, composed of a committee partly clerical and partly
lay, and including most of the influential parochial clergy in the
district, was instituted four years ago for the purpose of checking
“that class of _public offences_, which consists in acts of indecency,
profaneness, drunkenness, and prostitution.”
Its modes of action are as follows:--
1. To create and foster public opinion in reprobation of the
above-named acts.
2. To bring such public opinion to bear upon all exercising social
influence, with a view to discountenance the perpetrators and abettors
thereof.
3. To secure the efficient application by the Police of the laws
and regulations for the suppression of the class of public offences
above named; and to obtain, if necessary, the institution of legal
proceedings.
4. To procure the alteration of the law, wheresoever needful to
the object contemplated, and especially to the obtaining further
restrictions in granting Licenses for Music and Dancing to houses
where intoxicating liquors are sold.
5. To find Houses of Refuge and means of restoration for the victims
of seduction by honest employment, emigration, &c.
It is satisfactory to state that already, and with the very limited
funds placed at the disposal of this Association, no fewer than
“seventy-five houses in some of the worst streets in the east of
London, hitherto devoted to the vilest purposes, have been cleared
of their inmates; one of these houses having had thirty rooms, which
were occupied by prostitutes; that more than one house ostensibly
open for public accommodation, but really for ensnaring females for
prostitution, has been closed; and that in one instance of peculiar
atrocity, the owner of the house has been convicted and punished.
Handbills have also been issued, containing extracts from the Police
Acts, to show the power of remedy for offences against public decency,
such as swearing, the use of improper language, and the exhibition of
improper conduct in the streets.”
Such are the objects and results of this Association, and such the
praiseworthy example set to other London districts, which if vigorously
followed would result, at least, in the repression of vice, and in a
marked diminution of crime.
“It is chiefly from the reserve which, rather by implication than by
compact, has so long been preserved in those influential quarters
where the power to correct and guide public opinion is maintained,
that the crying social evil of our day has attained such dimensions,
and exhibited itself in such dangerous and revolting forms as we
have referred to. Preachers, moralists, and public writers have been
deterred by the difficulty and delicacy of the subject from their
obvious duty of protecting the social interests, and a sluggish
legislature, ever inert in introducing such measures as are calculated
to foster and conserve the public virtue, has thus lacked the external
pressure which might have aroused it to vigilance and forethought in
the discharge of its duties. Recently, however, there have been clear
indications that a distrust of the old plan is spreading. With manifest
reluctance, but not without interest, has public attention fastened
itself on a subject in which not merely the happiness of individuals,
and the peace of families, but the national prosperity and the concerns
of social life, are felt to be bound up. Inquiries as to the best mode
of doing something to stem the tide of immorality which is coursing
onwards are made in quarters where indifference, if not acquiescence,
was formerly manifested. Public opinion is ever slowly formed, but
is seldom wrong at the last in detecting the true source of generic
evils, and in applying to them the best remedies. Example, also, is as
contagious on the side of virtue as of vice; and where an initiative
step, taken by another, appeals to our intuitive sense of right and
duty, it is seldom that the courageous right-doer has to wait long for
the expression of sympathy and the proffer of aid.
“It is only recently that the great sin of our land has received a
measure of the attention it has long and loudly called for.
“First in one quarter, and then in another, has the subject been
discussed with tolerable delicacy, and with an approximate fidelity.
“The discussion has done good. Men have thought about the subject,
have been led to measure the fearful dimensions of this evil, to
observe its progress and influence within their own neighbourhoods,
and have come at last to deplore the existence of that which they have
too long tolerated or connived at. Where remedial measures have been
attempted, they have not lacked for countenance and support; and,
in some quarters, at least, there have been indications of a desire
to pass from the feebler stage of alleviation to the more potential
remedy of prevention. Whilst it seems to be admitted on all hands,
that to aim at the forcible extinction of immorality would be Utopian
and disappointing, the repression and diminution of crime is felt to
be an imperious obligation upon all who are vested with any power and
influence for that end.
“We cannot help regarding the measures which have been recently
adopted by certain parochial authorities in the metropolis as at once
a proof of the benefit which has arisen from the partial discussion of
this subject in the various public channels into which it has gained
admittance; and we regard it, further, as a cheering sign that a
deepening conviction is spreading on all sides respecting the absolute
necessity of a well-organised antagonism to evil, in place of our
former supine indifference, or more culpable acquiescence. Some of
the most influential metropolitan vestries have commenced a crusade
against the keepers of bad houses in their respective parishes, and,
by the vigour and promptitude characterizing their prosecutions, seem
determined to hunt down the hosts of abandoned householders who are
mainly concerned in extending and facilitating immorality.
“Aristocratic St. James’s, and more plebeian Lambeth, have alike joined
in these laudable measures; and it is to be noticed, with extreme
satisfaction, that the steps thus taken have been almost invariably
successful, and that severe punishments have been inflicted upon the
wretches who were the objects of these prosecutions. Such a movement
cannot be sufficiently applauded, and fervently is it to be trusted
that the example thus shown in these influential centres may not only
reach to every other parish in the metropolis, but may also stir up
the parochial authorities in every city and town in the land to a like
course of procedure. This is to strike at the main root of the evil. In
vain are all our Reformatories and Refuges, in vain the endeavours of
Christian people to repress the evil by exertions for the rescue even
of a large number of its victims, if the floodgates of vice be allowed,
by public neglect, to remain open, ever to pour out into our streets
fresh streams of wickedness and pollution. There are, no doubt, persons
who think that measures, such as those now under consideration, will
not materially check the traffic in vice, but will only lead to its
being more subtly and secretly practised. Even that result, if brought
about, would be something gained, something as a protest on the side
of public purity and virtue, and something in the amount of warning
and terror brought home to guilty breasts, leading them to dread
retribution in future, whenever offended justice could detect them
in their malpractices. But in truth there is no limit to the amount
of good which would result from these repressive measures becoming
universal and well-sustained.
“Many persons would be saved from future ruin, a manifest check would
be given to the further development of iniquity, and the example of
authority thus generally exercised in aid of the cause of virtue, would
greatly tend to the spread of sounder views of social duty in regard to
this matter.”[7]
One of the greatest scandals on a country professedly Christian, is
the extent to which Sabbath desecration pervades the metropolis.
Although the traffic now openly pursued in the streets, or carried on
with impunity in shops, is strictly illegal, yet the technicalities
which are too often allowed to obstruct the ends of justice, and
the smallness of the fines inflicted, even where summary conviction
follows, concur to render the law, in this particular, a mere dead
letter.
The permission to sell on Sunday, originally extended only to
vendors of perishable articles, is now claimed by whole troops of
costermongers, who, presuming upon the license they have so long
enjoyed, no longer hesitate to ply their usual calling in the most
public and offensive manner, frequently pursuing their traffic in the
open streets during the hours of divine service, and disturbing whole
congregations by their noisy vociferations around the very doors of our
churches.
These evils call loudly for more stringent legal measures, and it is to
be hoped the time is not far distant when some improvement will take
place.
As one means of directing public attention to this subject, by the
circulation of appeals and tracts, and of promoting the introduction
of salutary legal provisions for the repression of such acts of
desecration, the _Society for Promoting the Due Observance of the
Lord’s Day_ is entitled to a large measure of support. The efforts made
by the Society to awaken public opposition to the obnoxious provisions
of Lord Chelmsford’s Sunday Trading Bill, were probably mainly
instrumental in securing its rejection.
One of the noblest repressive agencies within the metropolis is the
_Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals_, established
in 1824, which employs a number of agents to frequent the markets
and public thoroughfares, for the purpose of bringing to punishment
persons detected in the commission of acts of cruelty to animals. It
seeks, moreover, by means of suitable tracts, to diffuse among the
public a just sense of the duty of humanity and forbearance towards the
lower orders of creation. Allusion was made during the present year
to the objects embraced by this Society from upwards of two thousand
London pulpits, which will doubtless have the effect of directing the
attention of the benevolent public to an instrumentality which has
already achieved a large amount of good; and only requires to be better
known to enjoy a corresponding measure of support.
4. _Reformative Agencies._
Must be understood as referring solely to individuals, and include
all such measures as are employed to effect an external change of
character, and render those, who are vicious and depraved, honest and
respectable members of society.
While, however, agencies of this kind are reformative in their relation
to persons, they have also a preventive aspect, when viewed in their
bearings upon the entire community; for the reformation of every
vicious man is a social boon, inasmuch as it removes one individual
from a course of vice, and thus diminishes the aggregate of crime.
As a nucleus of reformatory operations, and a “centre of information
and encouragement,” the _Reformatory and Refuge Union_ was established
in 1856. It seeks to diffuse information respecting the various
agencies at present in existence, and to encourage and facilitate the
establishment of new institutions. In connection with the Union is a
“_Female Mission_” for the rescue of the fallen. The Mission maintains
a staff of female missionaries, whose business it is to distribute
tracts among the fallen women of the metropolis, to converse with them
in the streets, and visit them in their houses, in the hospitals, or
in the workhouses. These missionaries, “as a rule, leave their homes
between eight and nine o’clock at night, remaining out till nearly
twelve, and occasionally till one in the morning. They are located in
different parts of London, near to the nightly walks and haunts of
those they desire to benefit. They have the means of rescuing a large
number who have been placed in the Homes or restored to their friends.”
There are upwards of fifty metropolitan institutions for the reception
of the destitute and the reformation of the criminal, or those who are
exposed to temptation, capable of accommodating collectively about
4,000 persons of both sexes.
Nine of these institutions are designed especially for the reception
and training of juvenile criminals, sentenced under the “Youthful
Offenders’ Act,” and two for vagrants sentenced to detention under the
“Industrial School Act.” Three are exclusively appropriated to the
benefit of discharged prisoners, and the rest are chiefly employed in
the rescue and reformation of destitute or criminal children.[8]
Most of these institutions, with the exception of such as are certified
by Act of Parliament, and aided by Government subsidies, are supported
entirely by voluntary contributions and by the earnings of the inmates,
who are either admitted free on application, or by payment of a small
sum towards the expense of maintenance.
Such is the benevolent machinery now at work within the metropolis for
the reformation of our criminal population, and for the preservation of
those who are in a fair way of becoming the moral pests and aliens of
society.
The results, both in a religious, social, and sanatory point of view,
achieved by these different agencies, are beyond all human calculation;
and it is mainly to their beneficial and restraining influence that the
peace, safety, and well-being of society may be attributed.
The other _Reformative Agencies_ are those adapted to the rescue and
reformation of fallen women, or such as have been led astray from the
paths of virtue.
There are twenty-one institutions in London devoted to these objects,
and unitedly providing accommodation for about 1,200 inmates. Ten of
these are in connexion with the Church of England, and in the remaining
eleven the religious instruction is unsectarian and evangelical.
Three, viz., _The Female Temporary Home_, _The Trinity Home_, and _The
Home of Hope_, are designed for the reception of the better educated
and higher class of fallen women. One, viz., _The London Society for
the Protection of Young Females_, is limited to girls under fifteen
years of age; and another, _The Marylebone Female Protection Society_,
affords shelter exclusively to those who have recently been led astray,
and whose previous good character will bear the strictest investigation.
It may be fairly assumed that the objects of all these institutions
are substantially the same, viz., the reformation of character, and
the restoration of the individual to religious and social privileges.
While, however, the end is in most cases one and the same, the methods
and subordinate means adopted to insure its attainment, are often
strikingly dissimilar, and present distinctive and almost opposite
features. Thus one class of institutions, in imitation of our Lord’s
merciful forbearance towards the sinner, make their treatment
pre-eminently one of love, and seek by means the most gentle and
attractive to win back the stubborn wills and depraved natures of those
entrusted to their care. Kindness is the only instrument used in laying
siege to the hard heart, and in mollifying the seared conscience. Stern
discipline, irritating restraints, and rigorous exactions, form no
part of a system which is built up on the model prescribed by Him, who
“spake as never man spake.”
That a mode of treatment which affords such a remarkable coincidence,
and such a striking parallel to the divine method of dealing with
the sinner, so eloquently taught under the parable of the Prodigal
Son, should be found by experience to be the only really efficacious
one, can hardly be a matter of surprise. The fact is too notorious to
require any proof that in numberless instances
‘Law and terrors do but harden’
the heart which can be easily subdued by the exhibition of Christian
kindness. Here is the omnipotent weapon which has achieved such moral
victories, when wielded by gentle and loving women, like Miss Marsh,
Mrs. Wightman, and Mrs. Sheppard.
The opposite mode of treatment, however successful it may be in the
restoration of external character, or in the subjugation of turbulent
passions, is defective, inasmuch as it fails to influence the heart,
and therefore at best contributes only to an incomplete and partial
cure. The almost penal character of the system pursued in many of
the older penitentiaries is founded on the misconception, that the
injury sustained by society in the departure from virtue of her female
members, can only be atoned for by some personal mulct inflicted on the
offender. While, therefore, the ultimate object is the reformation of
lost character, this is too often overlooked or rendered subsidiary to
the proximate one of propitiating society; and the austere regimen by
which the latter point is secured, is generally found to be subversive
of the other. When, however, as is too frequently the case, society is
the _tempter_, the offence may surely be condoned by a less rigorous
process! Society may indeed well waive the right to compensation
for supposed damages, when it can be proved that she is at least
_particeps criminis_, and when, moreover, she has a personal interest
in the speedy restoration of her unhappy prodigals. The retributive
suffering, which, in the majority of cases, so surely overtakes the
female delinquent, may be urged as another reason for dealing leniently
with the erring; but the strongest justification of such a method is
undoubtedly derived from the success attending it, and from the Divine
sanction which it has received.
The impediments which the old penitentiary system of close confinement,
criminal fare, and hard labour, have unfortunately presented to the
rescue of fallen women is too well known to those who are accustomed
to deal with this class. Frequently are the urgent entreaties of the
missionary to forsake an abandoned course of life, and seek shelter
in some institution, met with either rancorous denunciations against
the penal system, or by polite but firm refusals to submit to the
discipline, which is supposed to extend to all reformatory asylums.
Gradually, however, this prevailing opinion is being cleared away, and
the fallen women themselves are not slow to distinguish between the
two opposite methods of treatment, a fact which is rendered clearly
apparent by the overwhelming number of applications for admission into
those Homes which are characterized by a more humane and gentle regimen.
The oldest reformatory institution in the metropolis for the reception
of fallen women is _The Magdalen Hospital_, founded in 1758. During the
last 100 years of its existence nearly 9,000 women have been admitted,
about two-thirds of whom have been restored to friends or relations.
At the time when this charity was first instituted “the notion of
providing a house for the reception and maintenance of ‘Penitent
Prostitutes’ seems not to have suggested itself to the public mind.
Even good and actively benevolent men appear to have been startled at
the novelty of the proposition, while they doubted the wisdom, and
still more the success of such an attempt. The newspapers of that
period contained both arguments against, and ridicule of the plan and
its promoters. God, however, blessed the undertaking, and raised up
friends and supporters in every direction.”
So that eighteen years after its incorporation its friends were able to
use the following cheering language.
“We see many fellow-creatures, by means of this happy asylum, rescued
from sorrow in which they had been involved by all the iniquitous
stratagems of seduction; in which condition they had been detained
by a species of horrid necessity; from which they had no probable or
possible retreat; and in which they must, therefore, according to all
human appearance, have perished. We see them restored to their God,
to their parents, to their friends, their country, and themselves.
What charitable heart, what truly Christian hand can withhold its best
endeavours to promote an undertaking so laudable, so beneficent? Who
would not desire to add to the number of souls preserved from the
deepest guilt--of bodies rescued from shame, misery, and death? Who
would not wish to wipe the tear from a parent’s eyes--to save the hoary
head from being brought down with sorrow to the grave?”
An interval of half a century elapsed after the foundation of the
Magdalen Asylum before the establishment of any similar institution.
Within the last ten years, however, public attention has been directed
with increasing interest to this subject, and numerous efforts have
been made to provide more ample accommodation for those who are
desirous of escaping from their wretched mode of life.
The _London by Moonlight Mission_, inaugurated some years ago by
Lieutenant Blackmore, has been followed in our own day by the
_Midnight Meeting Movement_, which has excited a world-wide sympathy
and interest, and has been very generally approved even in quarters
where encouragement could be least expected. The commencement of
these meetings in London was the signal for similar experiments in
Manchester, Liverpool, Nottingham, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, Dublin,
and other large towns.
Twenty-two of these meetings have now been held, and attended by
upwards of 4,000 women, more than 600 of whom have been rescued, and
either restored to friends, or placed in situations, where they are
giving satisfactory evidence of outward reformation, and many of them
of a thorough change of character.
The largest association in London for the reformation of fallen
women, is the _Society for the Rescue of Young Women and Children_.
The Society has at present eleven homes in various parts of London,
and one at Dover. Four of these are “Family Homes” for the reception
of _preventive_ cases, or young girls who have not strayed from the
path of virtue, but are addicted to crime, or are in circumstances of
danger. One is a Home for orphan children, from nine to thirteen years
of age; and the remaining seven are for fallen cases.
Upwards of 2,700 women and children have been admitted into these
Homes since the Society’s formation in 1853, the greater part of whom
have given satisfactory proof of having been reclaimed and permanently
benefitted. The Society’s income for the past year amounted to £6,789
17_s._ 2_d._ The Homes are under the care of pious and experienced
matrons, who labour incessantly to promote the spiritual and social
welfare of their charges.
Another institution of recent origin, but of rapidly increasing growth,
is the _London Female Preventive and Reformatory Institution_, which
already numbers four Homes, and has admitted, during the past year,
upwards of 250 inmates.
The following are the objects embraced by the Institution:--
“I. To seek the destitute and fallen by voluntary missionary effort.
“II. To afford temporary protection to friendless young women, whose
circumstances expose them to danger; also to effect the rescue of
fallen females, especially those decoyed from the country, by admitting
them to the benefits of this Institution.
“III. To restore, when practicable, the wanderer to her family and
friends, whether in town or country.
“IV. To qualify those admitted into the Institution for various
departments of domestic service, to obtain suitable situations for
them, and provide them with clothing.
“V. To aid such as for approved reasons wish to emigrate.
“VI. Above all, to seek the spiritual welfare of the inmates.”
The two last-named Societies and the _Home of Hope_, which is another
Refuge identical in character and spirit with that last named, have
received most of the cases rescued by the midnight meetings.
Great and encouraging as are the results effected by these
institutions, and wide as the sympathy is which they have awakened, it
is clear that the means of rescue are as yet wholly disproportioned to
the numbers claiming assistance.
Calculating the number of fallen women in London at _eighty thousand_,
which is probably not far wide of the truth, and computing the number
at present in the different institutions to be 1,000, the chance of
rescue through the only recognized medium for female reformation is
offered to _one woman in every eighty!_
This is _the high-water_ mark of public charity, and the utmost
provision made by Society for the rescue of these 80,000 outcasts!
And yet there are special reasons which seem to give them a strong
claim upon the sympathy and compassion of the benevolent public. The
brief term of their existence, the average length of which is at best
but a few years, and the fact that large numbers of them are driven
upon the streets by a stern necessity, and compelled to live by sin
as a trade, while everything contributes to prevent their escape from
the mode of life into which they have been involuntarily forced, are
surely considerations calculated to stimulate Christian effort on their
behalf. But more than this,--it is well known that they are hanging as
it were over the mouth of the bottomless pit.
“Their life-blood is ebbing at a fearful rate, and their souls are
drifting madly to eternity. Their fate is certain; their doom impends:
and, for their death-bed, there is not even the faintest glimmer
of hope which charity can bequeath to the dying sinner. All others
_may_ find peace at last; but these, suddenly overtaken by death,
and perishing _in_ and _by_ their sins, _must_ be irrevocably lost.
And who are they on whose warm vitals the ‘worm feeds sweetly,’ even
on this side the grave, and around whose heads the unquenchable fire
prematurely burns? Who are those whose souls, in countless numbers,
are now glutting the chambers of hell? Not swarthy Indians nor sable
Africans, whose deeds of violence and superstition have spread horror
and astonishment among civilized nations, but delicately-nurtured Saxon
women, who in infancy were lovingly fondled in the arms of Christian
mothers, and received ‘into the ark of Christ’s Church’ in baptism,
before a praying congregation; young girls, for whom pious sponsors
promised that they should be ‘virtuously brought up to lead a godly and
a Christian life,’ and who, in the faithful discharge of this promise,
were trained in our Sabbath-schools, and ‘taken to the Bishop to be
confirmed by him.’ They have sung the same hymns which we now sing;
our congregational melodies are still familiar to them. They have read
the same Scriptures which we now read, worshipped in the same temple
in which we assemble, offered up the same prayers, listened to the
same exhortations, and looked forward to the same glorious fruition of
future blessedness. But where are they now? What are their hopes and
expectations, and what the probable end of their existence? Let those
answer these questions who sneeringly ask why such prodigious efforts
are made to rescue the fallen.
“It not unfrequently happens, however, that the benevolent promoters
of such schemes are perplexed and disheartened by those who assume a
tone of expediency and argue thus: ‘Yes, it is all very true; and we
can sympathise with your efforts, and pity the poor unhappy objects of
your solicitude; but, then, this is a necessary evil, and any attempts
to remove it are altogether mistaken, and are sure to end in failure,
or to produce greater mischief. Besides, the demand will always create
the supply, and for every fallen woman you snatch from the streets,
an innocent, and hitherto virtuous girl, must be sacrificed. No, we
are sorry for them, but better let them perish than save them at the
sacrifice of other victims.’
“First then, this is a ‘_necessary_ evil.’ Falsehood is sufficiently
patent upon the face of this foolish and monstrous assertion. Could the
Creator have pronounced his work ‘very good’ with such an inseparable
appendage to social life? Again, how comes it that a ‘_necessary_ evil’
only exhibits itself in _certain localities_, and under particular
circumstances, disappearing altogether in uncivilized countries,
and gathering strength and virulence in the most refined states of
society? Will any modern philosopher favour us with a solution of this
difficulty?
“But ‘the demand will always create the supply.’ Inexorable logic
apparently, and incontrovertible if the supply were limited to the
demand. This, however, we deny. Thousands are driven to prostitution
as the only alternative from starvation. _Necessity_, and not the
demand, here creates the supply, and it is well known that the supply
_suggests_ the demand. Is, then, the balance of vice so exact and
undeviating, that the gap occasioned by the removal of one victim must
be speedily filled by another? Is the equilibrium of profligacy so
nicely adjusted, that it would be dangerous to assert the prerogative
of virtue; and shall we desire its unhappy votaries to continue in sin
that virtue may abound? Shall we drive back anxious souls, striving to
‘flee from the wrath to come,’ with the cold-blooded assurance that,
‘for the good of society, they had better remain where they are?’ Will
it satisfy an immortal spirit, to be told that she helps to maintain
the proper equilibrium of vice; or that, by standing in the gap, she
is a benefactor to the innocent of her own sex, who would otherwise be
sacrificed? Shall we assign as our reason for not preaching the Gospel
to ‘every creature,’ that the state of society would be unhinged by
curtailing a necessary evil, or that greater injuries would result from
any attempt to rescue perishing souls? Shall we mock Him who has said
‘All souls are mine,’ by elevating a doctrine of human expediency above
the authority of a distinct command? Let us be sure that, in a case so
intimately affecting the honour and glory of God, to ‘obey is better
than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.’ In vain may we
plead political necessity as a plausible pretext for disobedience.
“We are not afraid, however, to meet this argument on philosophical
grounds; and we affirm, confidently, that the rescue of every fallen
woman is a social boon. Admitting the _possibility_ that, eventually,
her place will be supplied by another--for we can approach no nearer
to the truth--is it not better to remove a _present_ evil than to
provide for a _remote_ contingency? Supposing that in the long vista of
future years, the immolation of a fresh victim is the price of every
individual rescue, do we overlook the fact, that _in the mean time_
a powerful temptation is removed, and that not merely _units_, but
probably _hundreds_, of the young of the opposite sex are delivered
from the toils of the strange woman? Is nothing achieved by the
temporary removal of one tempter from the streets, and is society a
loser in the end, by the reformation of one whose sole occupation is to
waylay and ruin the youth of the opposite sex? Let our moral economists
escape from this dilemma if they can; the philanthropist and the
Christian need no further arguments to convince them that they have not
only the law of God, but the inexorable logic of common sense on their
side.
“Who can tell the pestiferous influence exercised on society by
one single fallen woman? Who can calculate the evils of such a
system? Woman, waylaid, tempted, deceived, becomes in turn the
terrible avenger of her sex. Armed with a power which is all but
irresistible, and stript of that which can alone restrain and purify
her influence, she steps upon the arena of life qualified to act her
part in the reorganization of society. The _lex talionis_--the law of
retaliation--is hers. Society has made her what she is, and must be
now governed by her potent influence. The weight of this influence is
untold: view it in the dissolution of domestic ties, in the sacrifice
of family peace, in the cold desolation of promising homes; but,
above all, in the growth of practical Atheism, and in the downward
tendency of all that is pure and holy in life! One and another who
has been educated in an atmosphere redolent of virtue and principle,
and has given promise of high and noble qualities, falls a victim to
the prevalence of meretricious allurements, and carries back to his
hitherto untainted home the noxious influence he has imbibed. Another
and another, within the range of that influence, is made to suffer
for his sacrifice of moral rectitude, and they, in their turn, become
the agents, and the originators of fresh evils. Who, in contemplating
this pedigree of profligacy resulting from a solitary temptation, will
venture to affirm that the temporary withdrawal of a single prostitute
is not a social blessing? Surely for such _immediate results_ we are
justified in dispensing with considerations of _future expediency_;
and, acting upon the first principles of Christian ethics, may help
to reform the vicious and profligate, leaving it in the hands of a
merciful God to avert the contingency of ruin overtaking the as yet
unfallen woman.”[9]
In reference to all such Christian efforts to reclaim the fallen, it
has been truly said that “You may ransack the world for objects of
compassion. You may scour the earth in search of suffering humanity,
on which to exercise your philanthropy; you may roam the countless
hospitals and asylums of this vast city; you may penetrate the dens
and caves of all other profligacy; you may lavish your bounty upon a
transatlantic famine, or dive into Neapolitan dungeons, or scatter the
Bible broadcast throughout the great moral wildernesses of heathendom:
but in all the million claims upon your faith, upon your feeling as
a man, upon your benevolence as a Christian, you will never fulfil
a mission dearer to Christ, you will never promote a charity more
congenial to the spirit of this gospel; you will never more surely wake
up joy in heaven, and force tears into the eyes of sympathising angels,
than when you can bring a Magdalene face to face with her Redeemer, and
thrill her poor heart, even to breaking, with the plaintive music of
that divine voice, calling her by name--MARY.”
LONDON LABOUR
AND THE
LONDON POOR.
THOSE THAT WILL NOT WORK.
INTRODUCTION.
I enter upon this part of my subject with a deep sense of the misery,
the vice, the ignorance, and the want that encompass us on every
side--I enter upon it after much grave attention to the subject,
observing closely, reflecting patiently, and generalizing cautiously
upon the phenomena and causes of the vice and crime of this city--I
enter upon it after a thoughtful study of the habits and character of
the “outcast” class generally--I enter upon it, moreover, not only as
forming an integral and most important part of the task I have imposed
upon myself, but from a wish to divest the public mind of certain
“idols” of the platform and conventicle--“idols” peculiar to our own
time, and unknown to the great Father of the inductive philosophy--and
“idols,” too, that appear to me greatly to obstruct a proper
understanding of the subject. Further, I am led to believe that I can
contribute some new facts concerning the physics and economy of vice
and crime generally, that will not only make the solution of the social
problem more easy to us, but, setting more plainly before us some of
its latent causes, make us look with more pity and less anger on those
who want the fortitude to resist their influence; and induce us, or at
least the more earnest among us, to apply ourselves steadfastly to the
removal or alleviation of those social evils that appear to create so
large a proportion of the vice and crime that we seek by punishment to
prevent.
Such are the _ultimate_ objects of my present labours: the result
of them is given to the world with an earnest desire to better the
condition of the wretched social outcasts of whom I have now to treat,
and to contribute, if possible, my mite of good towards the common weal.
But though such be my ultimate object, let me here confess that my
immediate aim is the elimination of the truth; without this, of course,
all other principles must be sheer sentimentality--sentiments being, to
my mind, opinions engendered by the feelings rather than the judgment.
The attainment of the truth, then, will be my primary aim; but by the
truth, I wish it to be understood, I mean something _more_ than the
bare facts. Facts, according to my ideas, are merely the elements of
truths, and not the truths themselves; of all matters there are none so
utterly useless by themselves as your mere matters of fact. A fact, so
long as it remains an isolated fact, is a dull, dead, uninformed thing;
no object nor event by itself can possibly give us any knowledge, we
must compare it with some other, even to distinguish it; and it is the
distinctive quality thus developed that constitutes the essence of a
thing--that is to say, the point by which we cognize and recognise
it when again presented to us. A fact must be assimilated with, or
discriminated from, some other fact or facts, in order to be raised to
the dignity of a truth, and made to convey the least knowledge to the
mind. To say, for instance, that in the year 1850 there were 26,813
criminal offenders in England and Wales, is merely to oppress the brain
with the record of a fact that, _per se_, is so much mental lumber.
This is the very mummery of statistics; of what rational good can such
information by itself be to any person? who can tell whether the number
of offenders in that year be large or small, unless they compare it
with the number of some other year, or in some other country? but to
do this will require another fact, and even then this second fact can
give us but little real knowledge. It may teach us, perhaps, that the
past year was more or less criminal than some other year, or that the
people of this country, in that year, were more or less disposed to the
infraction of the laws than some other people abroad; still, what will
all this avail us? If the year which we select to contrast criminally
with that of 1850 be not itself compared with other years, how are we
to know whether the number of criminals appertaining to it be above
or below the average? or, in other words, how can the one be made a
measure of the other?
To give the least mental value to facts, therefore, we must generalize
them, that is to say, we must contemplate them in connection with
other facts, and so discover their agreements and differences, their
antecedents, concomitants, and consequences. It is true we may frame
erroneous and defective theories in so doing; we may believe things
which are similar in appearance to be similar in their powers and
properties also; we may distinguish between things having no real
difference; we may mistake concomitant events for consequences; we
may generalize with too few particulars, and hastily infer that to
be common to all which is but the special attribute of a limited
number; nevertheless, if theory may occasionally teach us wrongly,
facts without theory or generalization cannot possibly teach us at
all. What the process of digestion is to food, that of generalizing
is to fact; for as it is by the assimilation of the substances we eat
with the elements of our bodies that our limbs are enlarged and our
whole frames strengthened, so is it by associating perception with
perception in our brains that our intellect becomes at once expanded
and invigorated. Contrary to the vulgar notion, theory, that is to say,
theory in its true Baconian sense, is not opposed to fact, but consists
rather of a _large_ collection of facts; it is not true of this or
that thing alone, but of _all_ things belonging to the same class--in
a word, it consists not of _one_ fact but an _infinity_. The theory of
gravitation, for instance, expresses not only what occurs when a stone
falls to the earth, but when every other body does the same thing; it
expresses, moreover, what takes place in the revolution of the moon
round our planet, and in the revolution of our planet and of all the
other planets round our sun, and of all other suns round the centre of
the universe; in fine, it is true not of one thing merely, but of every
material object in the entire range of creation.
There are, of course, two methods of dealing philosophically with
every subject--deductively and inductively. We may either proceed
from principles to facts, or recede from facts to principles. The one
explains, the other investigates; the former applies known general
rules to the comprehension of particular phenomena, and the latter
classifies the particular phenomena, so that we may ultimately come
to comprehend their unknown general rules. The deductive method is
the mode of _using_ knowledge, and the inductive method the mode of
_acquiring_ it.
In a subject like the crime and vice of the metropolis, and the country
in general, of which so little is known--of which there are so many
facts, but so little comprehension--it is evident that we must seek by
induction, that is to say, by a careful classification of the known
phenomena, to render the matter more intelligible; in fine, we must,
in order to arrive at a _comprehensive_ knowledge of its antecedents,
consequences, and concomitants, contemplate as large a number of facts
as possible in as many different relations as the statistical records
of the country will admit of our doing.
With this brief preamble I will proceed to treat generally of the class
that will not work, and then particularly of that portion of them
termed prostitutes. But, first, who are those that _will_ work, and who
those that _will not_ work? This is the primary point to be evolved.
OF THE WORKERS AND NON-WORKERS.
The essential quality of an animal is that it seeks its own living,
whereas a vegetable has its living brought to it. An animal cannot
stick its feet in the ground and suck up the inorganic elements of
its body from the soil, nor drink in the organic elements from the
atmosphere. The leaves of plants are not only their lungs but their
stomachs. As _they_ breathe they acquire food and strength, but as
animals breathe _they_ gradually waste away. The carbon which is
_secreted_ by the process of respiration in the vegetable is excreted
by the very same process in the animal. Hence a fresh supply of
_carbonaceous_ matter must be sought after and obtained at frequent
intervals, in order to repair the continual waste of animal life.
But in the act of seeking for substances fitted to replace that which
is lost in respiration, nerves must be excited and muscles moved;
and recent discoveries have shown that such excitation and motion
are attended with decomposition of the organs in which they occur.
Muscular action gives rise to the destruction of muscular tissue,
nervous action to a change in the nervous matter; and this destruction
and decomposition necessarily involve a fresh supply of _nitrogenous_
matter, in order that the loss may be repaired.
Now a tree, being inactive, has little or no waste. All the food
that it obtains goes to the invigoration of its frame; not one atom
is destroyed in seeking more: but the essential condition of animal
life is muscular action; the essential condition of muscular action
is the destruction of muscular tissue; and the essential condition of
the destruction of muscular tissue is a supply of food fitted for the
reformation of it, or--_death_. It is impossible for an animal--like a
vegetable--to stand still and not destroy. If the limbs are not moving,
the heart is beating, the lungs playing, the bosom heaving. Hence an
animal, in order to continue its existence, must obtain its subsistence
either by its own exertions or by those of others--in a word, it must
be _autobious_ or _allobious_.
The procuration of sustenance, then, is the necessary condition of
animal life, and constitutes the sole apparent reason for the addition
of the locomotive apparatus to the vegetative functions of sentient
nature; but the faculties of comparison and volition have been further
added to the animal nature of Man, in order to enable him, among
other things, the better to gratify his wants--to give him such a
mastery over the elements of material nature, that he may force the
external world the more readily to contribute to his support. Hence
the derangement of either one of those functions must degrade the
human being--as regards his means of sustenance--to the level of the
brute. If his intellect be impaired, and the faculty of perceiving
“the fitness of things” be consequently lost to him--or, this being
sound, if the power of moving his muscles in compliance with his will
be deficient--then the individual becomes no longer capable, like his
fellows, of continuing his existence by his own exertions.
Hence, in every state, we have two extensive causes of allobiism, or
living by the labour of others; the one intellectual, as in the case
of lunatics and idiots, and the other physical, as in the case of the
infirm, the crippled, and the maimed--the old and the young.
But a third, and a more extensive class, still remains to be
particularized. The members of every community may be divided into
the _energetic_ and the _an-ergetic_; that is to say, into the
hardworking and the non-working, the industrious and the indolent
classes; the distinguishing characteristic of the _anergetic_ being
the extreme irksomeness of all labour to them, and their consequent
indisposition to work for their subsistence. Now, in the circumstances
above enumerated, we have three capital causes why, in every State, a
certain portion of the community must derive their subsistence from
the exertions of the rest; the first proceeds from some _physical_
defect, as in the case of the old and the young, the super-annuated and
the sub-annuated, the crippled and the maimed; the second from some
_intellectual_ defect, as in the case of lunatics and idiots; and the
third from some _moral_ defect, as in the case of the indolent, the
vagrant, the professional mendicant, and the criminal. In all civilized
countries, there will necessarily be a greater or less number of human
parasites living on the sustenance of their fellows. The industrious
must labour to support the lazy, and the sane to keep the insane, and
the able-bodied to maintain the infirm.
Still, to complete the social fabric, another class requires to be
specified. As yet, regard has been paid only to those who must needs
labour for their living, or who, in default of so doing, must prey on
the proceeds of the industry of their more active or more stalwart
brethren. There is, however, in all civilized society, a farther
portion of the people distinct from either of those above mentioned,
who, being already provided--no matter how--with a sufficient stock of
sustenance, or what will exchange for such, have no occasion to toil
for an additional supply.
Hence all society would appear to arrange itself into four different
classes:--
I. THOSE THAT WILL WORK.
II. THOSE THAT CANNOT WORK.
III. THOSE THAT WILL NOT WORK.
IV. THOSE THAT NEED NOT WORK.
Under one or other section of this quadruple division, every member,
not only of our community, but of every other civilized State, must
necessarily be included; the rich, the poor, the industrious, the idle,
the honest, the dishonest, the virtuous, and the vicious--each and all
must be comprised therein.
Let me now proceed specially to treat of each of these classes--to
distribute under one or other of these four categories the diverse
modes of living peculiar to the members of our own community, and so to
enunciate, for the first time, the natural history, as it were, of the
industry and idleness of Great Britain in the nineteenth century.
It is no easy matter, however, to classify the different kinds of
labour scientifically. To arrange the several varieties of work into
“orders,” and to group the manifold species of arts under a few
comprehensive genera--so that the mind may grasp the whole at one
effort--is a task of a most perplexing character. Moreover, the first
attempt to bring any number of diverse phenomena within the rules of
logical division is not only a matter of considerable difficulty, but
one, unfortunately, that is generally unsuccessful. It is impossible,
however, to proceed with the present inquiry without making some
attempt at systematic arrangement; for of all scientific processes,
the classification of the various phenomena, in connection with a
given subject, is perhaps the most important; indeed, if we consider
that the function of cognition is essentially _discriminative_, it is
evident, that without distinguishing between one object and another,
there can be no knowledge, nor, indeed, any perception. Even as the
seizing of a particular difference causes the mind to _apprehend_ the
special character of an object, so does the discovery of the agreements
and differences among the several phenomena of a subject enable the
understanding to _comprehend_ it. What the generalization of events
is to the ascertainment of natural laws, the generalization of things
is to the discovery of natural systems. But classification is no less
dangerous than it is important to science; for in precisely the same
proportion as a correct grouping of objects into genera and species,
orders and varieties, expands and assists our understanding, so does
any erroneous arrangement cripple and retard all true knowledge.
The reduction of all external substances into four elements by the
ancients--earth, air, fire, and water--perhaps did more to obstruct the
progress of chemical science than even a prohibition of the study could
have effected.
But the branches of industry are so multifarious, the divisions of
labour so minute and manifold, that it seems at first almost impossible
to reduce them to any system. Moreover, the crude generalizations
expressed in the names of the several arts, render the subject still
more perplexing.
Some kinds of workmen, for example, are called after the _articles
they make_--as saddlers, hatters, boot-makers, dress-makers,
breeches-makers, stay-makers, lace-makers, button-makers,
glovers, cabinet-makers, artificial-flower-makers, ship-builders,
organ-builders, boat-builders, nailers, pin-makers, basket-makers,
pump-makers, clock and watch makers, wheel-wrights, ship-wrights, and
so forth.
Some operatives, on the other hand, take their names not from what they
make, but from the _kind of work they perform_. Hence we have carvers,
joiners, bricklayers, weavers, knitters, engravers, embroiderers,
tanners, curriers, bleachers, thatchers, lime-burners, glass-blowers,
seamstresses, assayers, refiners, embossers, chasers, painters,
paper-hangers, printers, book-binders, cab-drivers, fishermen,
graziers, and so on.
Other artizans, again, are styled after the _materials upon which they
work_, such as tinmen, jewellers, lapidaries, goldsmiths, braziers,
plumbers, pewterers, glaziers, &c. &c.
And lastly, a few operatives are named after the _tools they use_; thus
we have ploughmen, sawyers, and needlewomen.
But these divisions, it is evident, are as unscientific as they are
arbitrary; nor would it be possible, by adopting such a classification,
to arrive at any practical result.
Now, I _had_ hoped to have derived some little assistance in my attempt
to reduce the several varieties of work to system from the arrangement
of the products of industry and art at “the Great Exhibition.” I
knew, however, that the point of classification had proved the great
stumbling block to the French Industrial Exhibitions. In the Exposition
of the Arts and Manufactures of France in 1806, for instance, M. Costaz
adopted a topographical arrangement, according to the departments of
the kingdom whence the specimens were sent. In 1819, again, finding
the previous arrangement conveyed little or no knowledge, depending,
as it did, on the mere local association of the places of manufacture,
the same philosopher attempted to classify all arts into a sort of
natural system, but the separate divisions amounted to thirty-nine,
and were found to be confused and inconvenient. In 1827 M. Payon
adopted a classification into five great divisions, arranging the arts
according as they are chemical, mechanical, physical, economical, or
“miscellaneous” in their nature. It was found, however, in practice,
that two, or even three, of these characteristics often belonged to the
same manufacture. In 1834 M. Dupin proposed a classification that was
found to work better than any which preceded it. He viewed man as a
locomotive animal, a clothed animal, a domiciled animal, &c., and thus
tracing him through his various daily wants and employments, he arrived
at a classification in which all arts are placed under nine headings,
according as they contribute to the alimentary, sanitary, vestiary,
domiciliary, locomotive, sensitive, intellectual, preparative, or
social tendencies of man. In 1844 and 1849 attempts were made towards
an eclectic combination of two or three of the above-mentioned systems,
but it does not appear that the latter arrangements presented any
marked advantages.
Now, with all the experience of the French nation to guide us, I
naturally expected that especial attention would be directed towards
the point of classification with us, and that a technological system
would be propounded, which would be found at least an improvement on
the bungling systems of the French. It must be confessed, however, that
no nation could possibly have stultified itself so egregiously as we
have done in this respect. Never was there anything half so puerile as
the classification of the works of industry in our own Exhibition!
But this comes of the patronage of Princes; for we are told that at
one of the earliest meetings at Buckingham Palace his Royal Highness
_propounded_ the system of classification according to which the works
of industry _were to be_ arranged. The published minutes of the meeting
on the 30th of June, 1849, inform us--
“His Royal Highness communicated his views regarding the formation of
a Great Collection of Works of Industry and Art in London in 1851, for
the purposes of exhibition, and of competition and encouragement. His
Royal Highness considered that such a collection and exhibition should
consist of the following divisions:--
Raw Materials.
Machinery and Mechanical Inventions.
Manufactures.
Sculpture and Plastic Art generally.”
Now, were it possible for monarchs to do with natural laws as with
social ones, namely, to blow a trumpet and declaring “_le roi le
veut_,” to have their will pass into one of the statutes of creation,
it might be advantageous to science that Princes should seek to lay
down orders of arrangement and propound systems of classification. But
seeing that Science is as pure a republic as Letters, and that there
are no “Highnesses” in philosophy--for if there be any aristocracy at
all in such matters, it is at least an aristocracy of intellect--it is
rather an injury than a benefit that those who are high in authority
should interfere in these affairs at all; since, from the very
circumstances of their position it is utterly impossible for them to
arrive at anything more than the merest surface knowledge on such
subjects. The influence, too, that their mere “authority” has over
men’s minds is directly opposed to the perception of truth, preventing
that free and independent exercise of the intellect from which alone
all discovery and knowledge can proceed.
Judging the quadruple arrangement of the Great Exhibition by the laws
of logical division, we find that the three classes--Raw Materials,
Machinery, and Manufactures--which refer more particularly to the Works
of Industry, are neither distinct nor do they include the whole. What
is a raw material, and what a manufacture? It is from the difficulty
of distinguishing between these two conditions that leather is placed
under Manufactures, and steel under Raw Materials--though surely
steel is iron _plus_ carbon, and leather skin _plus_ tannin; so that,
technologically considered, there is no difference between them. If
by the term raw material is meant some natural product in its crude
state, then it is evident that “Geological maps, plans, and sections;
prussiate of potash, and other mixed chemical manufactures; sulphuric,
muriatic, nitric, and other acids; medicinal tinctures, cod liver oil,
dried fruits, fermented liquors and spirits, preserved meats, portable
soups, glue, and the alloys” cannot possibly rank as _raw_ materials,
though one and all of these articles are to be found so “classified”
at the Great Exhibition; but if the meaning of a “raw material” be
extended to any product which constitutes the substance to be operated
upon in an industrial art, then the answer is that leather, which
is the material of shoes and harness, is no more a manufacture than
steel, which is placed among the raw materials, because forming the
constituent substance of cutlery and tools. So interlinked are the
various arts and manufactures, that what is the product of one process
of industry is the material of another--thus, yarn is the product
of spinning, and the material of weaving, and in the same manner
the cloth, which is the product of weaving, becomes the material of
tailoring.
But a still greater blunder than the non-distinction between products
and materials lies in the confounding of _processes_ with _products_.
In an Industrial Exhibition to reserve no special place for the
processes of industry is very much like the play of Hamlet with the
part of Hamlet omitted; and yet it is evident that, in the quadruple
arrangement before mentioned, those most important industrial
operations which consist merely in arriving at the same result by
simpler means--as, for instance, the hot blast in metallurgical
operations--can find no distinct expression. The consequence is that
methods of work are arranged under the same head as the work itself;
and the “Executive” have been obliged to group under the first
subdivision of _Raw Materials_ the following inconsistent jumble:--Salt
deposits; ventilation; safety lamps and other methods of lighting;
methods of lowering and raising miners, and draining; methods of
roasting, smelting, or otherwise reducing ores; while under the second
subdivision of Raw Materials chemical and pharmaceutical _processes_
and _products_ are indiscriminately confounded.
Another most important defect is the omission of all mention of those
industrial processes which have _no special or distinct products of
their own_, but which are rather engaged _in adding to the beauty or
durability of others_; as, for instance, the bleaching of some textile
fabrics, the embroidering of others, the dyeing and printing of others;
the binding of books; the cutting of glass; the painting of china,
&c. From the want of an express division for this large portion of
our industrial arts, there is a jumbling and a bungling throughout
the whole arrangement. Under the head of _manufactures_ are grouped
printing and bookbinding, the “dyeing of woollen, cotton, and linen
goods,” “embroidery, fancy, and industrial work,” the cutting and
engraving of glass; and, lastly, the art of “decoration generally,”
including “ornamental, coloured decoration,” and the “imitations of
woods, marbles, &c.,”--though surely these are one and all _additions_
to manufactures rather than _manufactures_ themselves. Indeed, a more
extraordinary and unscientific hotch-potch than the entire arrangement
has never been submitted to public criticism and public ridicule.
Amid all this confusion and perplexity, then, how are we to proceed?
Why, we must direct our attention to some more judicious and more
experienced guide. In such matters, at least, as the Exposition of
the Science of Labour, it is clear that we must “put not our trust in
princes.”
That Prince Albert has conferred a great boon on the country in the
establishment of the Great Exhibition (for it is due not only to his
patronage but to his own personal exertions), no unprejudiced mind can
for a moment doubt; and that he has, ever since his first coming among
us, filled a most delicate office in the State in a highly decorous
and commendable manner, avoiding all political partizanship, and
being ever ready to give the influence of his patronage, and, indeed,
co-operation, to anything that appeared to promise an amelioration of
the condition of the working classes of this country, I am most glad
to have it in my power to bear witness; but that, _because of this_,
we should pin our faith to a “hasty generalization” propounded by him,
would be to render ourselves at once silly and servile.
If, with the view of obtaining some more precise information concerning
the several branches of industry, we turn our attention to the
Government analysis of the different modes of employment among the
people, we shall find that for all purposes of a scientific or definite
character the Occupation Abstract of the Census of this country is
comparatively useless. Previous to 1841, the sole attempt made at
generalization was the division of the entire industrial community into
three orders, viz.:--
I. _Those employed in Agriculture._
1. Agricultural Occupiers.
_a._ Employing Labourers.
_b._ Not employing Labourers.
2. Agricultural Labourers.
II. _Those employed in Manufactures._
1. Employed in Manufactures.
2. Employed in making Manufacturing Machinery.
III. _All other Classes._
1. Employed in Retail Trade or in Handicraft, as Masters or Workmen.
2. Capitalists, Bankers, Professional, and other educated men.
3. Labourers employed in labour not Agricultural--as Miners,
Quarriers, Fishermen, Porters, &c.
4. Male Servants.
5. Other Males, 20 years of age.
The defects of this arrangement must be self-evident to all who have
paid the least attention to economical science. It offends against
both the laws of logical division, the parts being neither distinct
nor equal to the whole. In the first place, what is a manufacturer?
and how is such an one to be distinguished from one employed in
handicraft? How do the workers in metal, as the “tin manufacturers,”
“lead manufacturers,” “iron manufacturers,”--who are one and all
classed under the head of manufacturers--differ, in an economical
point of view, from the workers in wood, as the carpenters and
joiners, the cabinet-makers, ship-builders, &c., who are all classed
under the head of handicraftsmen? Again, according to the census of
1831, a brewer is placed among those employed in retail trade or in
handicrafts, while a vinegar maker is ranked with the manufacturers.
According to Mr. Babbage, _manufacturing_ differs from mere _making_
simply in the quantity produced--he being a manufacturer who makes
a greater number of the same articles; manufacturing is thus simply
production in a large way, in connection with the several handicrafts.
Dr. Ure, however, appears to consider such articles manufactures as
are produced by means of machinery, citing the word which originally
signified production by hand (being the Latin equivalent for the Saxon
_handicraft_) as an instance of those singular verbal corruptions
by which terms come to stand for the very opposite to their literal
meaning. But with all deference to the Doctor, for whose judgment I
have the highest respect, Mr. Babbage’s definition of a manufacturer,
viz., as a producer on a large scale, appears to me the more correct;
for it is in this sense that we speak of manufacturing chemists, boot
and shoe manufacturers, ginger-beer manufacturers, and the like.
The Occupation Abstract of the Census of 1841, though far more
comprehensive than the one preceding it, is equally unsatisfactory and
unphilosophical. In this document the several members of Society are
thus classified:--
I. _Persons engaged in Commerce, Trade, and Manufacture._
II. _Agriculture._
III. _Labour, not Agricultural._
IV. _Army and Navy Merchant Seamen, Fishermen, and Watermen._
V. _Professions and other pursuits requiring education._
VI. _Government, Civil Service, and Municipal and Parochial Officers._
VII. _Domestic Servants._
VIII. _Persons of Independent Means._
IX. _Almspeople, Pensioners, Paupers, Lunatics, and Prisoners._
X. _Remainder of Population, including Women and Children._
Here it will be seen that the defects arising from drawing distinctions
where no real differences exist, are avoided, those engaged in
handicrafts being included under the same head as those engaged in
manufacture; but the equally grave error of confounding or grouping
together occupations which are essentially diverse, is allowed to
continue. Accordingly, the first division is made to include those
who are engaged in trade and commerce as well as manufacture, though
surely--the one belongs strictly to the distributing, and the other
to the producing class--occupations which are not only essentially
distinct, but of which it is absolutely necessary for a right
understanding of the state of the country that we know the proportion
that the one bears to the other. Again, the employers in both cases
are confounded with the employed, so that, though the capitalists
who supply the materials, and pay the wages for the several kinds
of work are a distinct body of people from those who _do_ the work,
and a body, moreover, that it is of the highest possible importance,
in an economical point of view, that we should be able to estimate
numerically,--no attempt is made to discriminate the one from
the other. Now these three classes, distributors, employers, and
operatives, which in the Government returns of the people are jumbled
together in one heterogeneous crowd, as if the distinctions between
Capital, Labour, and Distribution had never been propounded, are
precisely those concerning which the social inquirer desires the most
minute information.
The Irish census is differently arranged from that of Great Britain.
There the several classes are grouped under the following heads:--
I. _Ministering to Food._
1. As Producers.
2. As Preparers.
3. As Distributors.
II. _Ministering to Clothing._
1. As Manufacturers of Materials.
2. As Handicraftsmen and Dealers.
III. _Ministering to Lodging, Furniture, Machinery, &c._
IV. _Ministering to Health._
V. _Ministering to Charity._
VI. _Ministering to Justice._
VII. _Ministering to Education._
VIII. _Ministering to Religion._
IX. _Various Arts and Employments, not included in the foregoing._
X. _Residue of Population_, not having specified occupations, and
including unemployed persons and women.
This, however, is no improvement upon the English classification. There
is the same want of discrimination, and the same disregard of the
great “economical” divisions of society.
Moreover, to show the extreme fallacy of such a classification, it is
only necessary to make the following extract from the Report of the
Commissioners for Great Britain:--
“We would willingly have given a classification of the occupations of
the inhabitants of Great Britain into the various wants to which they
respectively minister, but, in attempting this, we were stopped by the
various anomalies and uncertainties to which such a classification
seemed necessarily to lead, from the fact that many persons supply more
than one want, though they can only be classed under one head. Thus to
give but a single instance--_the farmer and grazier may be deemed to
minister quite as much to clothing by the fleece and hides as he does
to food by the flesh of his sheep and cattle_.”
He, therefore, who would seek to elaborate the natural history of
the industry of the people of England, must direct his attention to
some social philosopher, who has given the subject more consideration
than either princes or Government officials can possibly be expected
to devote to it. Among the whole body of economists, Mr. Stuart
Mill appears to be the only man who has taken a comprehensive and
enlightened view of the several functions of society. Following in the
footsteps of M. Say, the French social philosopher, he first points out
concerning the products of industry, that labour is not creative of
objects but of utilities, and then proceeds to say:--
“Now the utilities produced by labour are of three kinds; they are--
“First, utilities _fixed and embodied in outward objects_; by labour
employed in investing external _material_ things with properties which
render them serviceable to human beings. This is the common case, and
requires no illustration.
“Secondly, utilities _fixed and embodied in human beings_; the labour
being in this case employed in conferring on human beings qualities
which render them serviceable to themselves and others. To this
class belongs the labour of all concerned in education; not only
schoolmasters, tutors, and professors, but governments, so far as
they aim successfully at the improvement of the people; moralists and
clergymen, as far as productive of benefit; the labour of physicians,
as far as instrumental in preserving life and physical or mental
efficiency; of the teachers of bodily exercises, and of the various
trades, sciences, and arts, together with the labour of the learners
in acquiring them, and all labour bestowed by any persons, throughout
life, in improving the knowledge or cultivating the bodily and mental
faculties of themselves or others.
“Thirdly, and lastly, utilities _not fixed or embodied in any object_,
but consisting in a mere _service rendered_, a pleasure given, an
inconvenience or pain averted, during a longer or a shorter time, but
without leaving a _permanent_ acquisition in the improved qualities of
any person or thing; the labour here being employed in producing an
utility _directly_, not (as in the two former cases) in _fitting some
other_ thing to afford an utility. Such, for example, is the labour of
the musical performer, the actor, the public declaimer or reciter, and
the showman.
“Some good may, no doubt, be produced beyond the moment, upon the
feeling and disposition, or general state of enjoyment of the
spectators; or instead of good there may be harm, but neither the one
nor the other is the effect intended, is the result for which the
exhibitor works and the spectator pays, but the immediate pleasure.
Such, again, is the labour of the army and navy; they, at the best,
prevent a country from being conquered, or from being injured or
insulted, which is a service, but in all other respects leave the
country neither improved nor deteriorated. Such, too, is the labour of
the legislator, the judge, the officer of justice, and all other agents
of Government, in their ordinary functions, apart from any influence
they may exert on the improvement of the national mind. The service
which they render is to maintain peace and security; these compose the
utility which they produce. It may appear to some that carriers, and
merchants or dealers, should be placed in this same class, since their
labour does not add any properties to objects, but I reply that it
does, it adds the property of being in the place where they are wanted,
instead of being in some other place, which is a very useful property,
and the utility it confers is embodied in the things themselves, which
now actually are in the place where they are required for use, and in
consequence of that increased utility could be sold at an increased
price proportioned to the labour expended in conferring it. This
labour, therefore, does not belong to the third class, but to the
first.”
To the latter part of the above classification, I regret to say I
cannot assent. Surely the property of being in the place where they are
wanted, which carriers and distributors are said to confer on external
objects, cannot be said to be fixed--if, indeed, it be strictly
_embodied_ in the objects, since the very act of distribution consists
in the alteration of this local relation, and transferring such objects
to the possession of another. Is not the utility which the weaver fixes
and embodies in a yard of cotton, a very different utility from that
effected by the linendraper in handing the same yard of cotton over the
counter in exchange for so much money? and in this particular act, it
would be difficult to perceive what is fixed and embodied, seeing that
it consists essentially in an exchange of commodities.
Mr. Mill’s mistake appears to consist in not discerning that there is
another class of labour besides that employed in producing utilities
_directly_, and that occupied in _fitting other things_ to afford
utilities: viz., that which is engaged in _assisting_ those who are so
occupied in fitting things to be useful. This class consists of such
as are engaged in aiding the producers of permanent material utilities
either _before_ or during production, and such as are engaged in
aiding them _after_ production. Under the first division are comprised
capitalists, or those who supply the materials and tools for the
work, superintendents and managers, or those who direct the work, and
labourers, or those who perform some minor office connected with the
work, as in turning the large wheel for a turner, in carrying the
bricks to a bricklayer, and the like; while in the second division, or
those who are engaged in assisting producers _after_ production, are
included carriers, or those who remove the produce to the market, and
dealers and shopmen, or those who obtain purchasers for it. Now it is
evident that the function of all these classes is merely _auxiliary_ to
the labour of the producers, consisting principally of so many modes of
economizing their time and labour. Whether the gains of some of these
auxiliary classes are as disproportionately large, as the others are
disproportionately small, this is not the place to inquire. My present
duty is merely to record the fact of the existence of such classes, and
to assign them their proper place in the social fabric, as at present
constituted.
Now, from the above it will appear, that there are four distinct
classes of workers:--
I. ENRICHERS, or those who are employed in producing utilities
fixed and embodied in material things, that is to say, in producing
exchangeable commodities or riches.
II. AUXILIARIES, or those who are employed in aiding the production of
exchangeable commodities.
III. BENEFACTORS, or those who are employed in producing utilities
fixed and embodied in human beings, that is to say, in conferring upon
them some permanent good.
IV. SERVITORS, or those who are employed in rendering some service,
that is to say, in conferring some temporary good upon another.
Class 1 is engaged in investing _material_ objects with qualities
which render them serviceable to others.
Class 2 is engaged in aiding the operations of Class 1.
Class 3 is engaged in conferring on _human beings_ qualities which
render them serviceable to themselves or others.
Class 4 is engaged in giving a pleasure, averting a pain (during
a longer or shorter period), or preventing an inconvenience, by
performing some office for others that they would find irksome to do
for themselves.
Hence it appears that the operations of the first and third of the
above classes, or the Enrichers and Benefactors of Society, tend to
leave some _permanent acquisition_ in the improved qualities of either
persons or things,--whereas the operations of the second and fourth
classes, or the Auxiliaries and Servitors, are limited merely to
promoting either the labours or the pleasures of the other members of
the community.
Such, then, are the several classes of Workers; and here it should be
stated that, I apply the title Worker to all those who do _anything_
for their living, who perform any act whatsoever that is considered
worthy of being paid for by others, without regard to the question
whether such labourers tend to add to or decrease the aggregate wealth
of the community. I consider all persons doing or giving something for
the comforts they obtain, as self-supporting individuals. Whether that
something be really an equivalent for the emoluments they receive, it
is not my vocation here to inquire. Suffice it some real or imaginary
benefit is conferred upon society, or a particular individual, and
what is thought a fair and proper reward is given in return for it.
Hence I look upon soldiers, sailors, Government and parochial officers,
capitalists, clergymen, lawyers, wives, &c., &c., as self-supporting--a
certain amount of labour, or a certain desirable commodity, being
given by each and all in exchange for other commodities, which are
considered less desirable to the individuals parting with them, and
more desirable to those receiving them.
Nevertheless, it must be confessed that, economically speaking, the
most important and directly valuable of all classes are those whom I
have here denominated Enrichers. These consist not only of Producers,
but of the Collectors and Extractors of Wealth, concerning whom a few
words are necessary.
There are three modes of obtaining the materials of our wealth--(1)
by collecting, (2) by extracting, and (3) by producing them. The
industrial processes concerned in the collection of the materials
of wealth are of the rudest and most primitive kind--being pursued
principally by such tribes as depend for their food, and raiment, and
shelter, on the spontaneous productions of nature. The usual modes by
which the collection is made is by gathering the vegetable produce
(which is the simplest and most direct form of all industry), and when
the produce is of an animal nature, by hunting, shooting, or fishing,
according as the animal sought after inhabits the land, the air, or
the water. In a more advanced state of society, where the erection of
places of shelter has come to constitute one of the acts of life, the
felling of trees will also form one of the modes by which the materials
making up the wealth of the nation are collected. In Great Britain
there appears to be fewer people connected with the mere _collection_
of wealth than with any other general industrial process. The fishermen
are not above 25,000, and the wood-cutters and woodmen not 5000; so
that even with gamekeepers, and others engaged in the taking of game,
we may safely say that there are about 30,000 out of 18,000,000, or
only one-six hundredth of the entire population, engaged in this mode
of industry--a fact which strongly indicates the artificial character
of our society.
The _production_ of the materials of wealth, which indicates a far
higher state of civilization and which consists in the several
agricultural and farming processes for increasing the natural stock of
animal and vegetable food, employs upwards of one million; while those
who are engaged in the _extraction_ of our treasures from the earth,
either by mining or quarrying, both of which processes--depending, as
they do, upon a knowledge of some of the subtler natural powers--could
only have been brought into operation in a highly advanced stage of
the human intellect, number about a quarter of a million. Altogether,
there appear to be about one million and a half of individuals engaged
in the industrial processes connected with the collection, extraction,
and production of the materials of wealth; those who are employed
in operating upon these materials, in the fashioning of them into
manufactures, making them up into commodities, as well as those engaged
in the distribution of them--that is to say, the transport and sale
of them when so fashioned or made up--appear to amount to another two
millions and a half, so that the industrial classes of Great Britain,
taken altogether, may be said to amount to four millions. For the more
perfect comprehension, however, of the several classes of society, let
me subjoin a table in round numbers, calculated from the census of
1841, and including among the first items both the employers as well as
employed:--
Engaged in Trade and Manufacture 3,000,000
„ Agriculture 1,500,000
„ Mining, Quarrying, and Transit 750,000
---------
Total Employers and Employed 5,250,000
Domestic Servants 1,000,000
Independent persons 500,000
Educated pursuits (including Professions
and Fine Arts) 200,000
Government Officers (including
Army, Navy, Civil Service, and
Parish Officers) 200,000
Alms-people (including Paupers,
Prisoners, and Lunatics) 200,000
---------
7,350,000
Residue of Population (including
3,500,000 wives and 7,500,000 children) 11,000,000
----------
18,350,000
Now, of the 5,250,000 individuals engaged in Agriculture, Mining,
Transit, Manufacture and Trade, it would appear that about one million
and a quarter may be considered as employers; and, consequently, that
the remaining four millions may be said to represent the numerical
strength of the operatives of England and Scotland. Of these about
one million, or a quarter of the whole, may be said to be engaged in
producing the materials of wealth; and about a quarter of a million,
or one-sixteenth of the entire number, in extracting from the soil the
substances upon which many of the manufacturers have to operate.
The artizans, or those who are engaged in the several handicrafts
or manufactures operating upon the various materials of wealth thus
obtained, are distinct from the workmen above-mentioned, belonging
to what are called skilled labourers, whereas those who are employed
in the collection, extraction, or growing of wealth, belong to the
unskilled class.
An artisan is an _educated_ handicraftsman, following a calling that
requires an apprenticeship of greater or less duration in order to
arrive at perfection in it; whereas a labourer’s occupation needs no
education whatever. Many years must be spent in practising before a
man can acquire sufficient manual dexterity to make a pair of boots
or a coat; dock labour or porter’s work, however, needs neither
teaching nor learning, for any man can carry a load or turn a wheel.
The artisan, therefore, is literally a handicraftsman--one who by
practice has acquired manual dexterity enough to perform a particular
class of work, which is consequently called “skilled.” The natural
classification of artisans, or skilled labourers, appears to be
according to the materials upon which they work, for this circumstance
seems to constitute the peculiar quality of the art more than the tool
used--indeed, it appears to be the principal cause of the modification
of the implements in different handicrafts. The tools used to fashion,
as well as the instruments and substances used to join the several
materials operated upon in the manufactures and handicrafts, differ
according as those materials are of different kinds. We do not, for
instance, attempt to saw cloth into shape nor to cut bricks with
shears; neither do we solder the soles to the upper leathers of our
boots, nor nail together the seams of our shirts. And even in those
crafts where the means of uniting the materials are similar, the
artisan working upon one kind of substance is generally incapable of
operating upon another. The tailor who stitches woollen materials
together would make but a poor hand at sewing leather. The two
substances are joined by the same means, but in a different manner, and
with different instruments. So the turner, who has been accustomed to
turn wood, is unable to fashion metals by the same method.
The most natural mode of grouping the artisans into classes would
appear to be according as they pursue some _mechanical_ or _chemical_
occupation. The former are literally mechanics or handicraftsmen--the
latter chemical manufacturers. The handicraftsmen consist of (1) The
workers in silk, wool, cotton, flax, and hemp--as weavers, spinners,
knitters, carpet-makers, lace-makers, rope-makers, canvas-weavers,
&c. (2) The workers in skin, gut, and feathers--as tanners, curriers,
furriers, feather dressers, &c. (3) The makers up of silken, woollen,
cotton, linen, hempen, and leathern materials--as tailors, milliners,
shirt-makers, sail-makers, hatters, glove-makers, saddlers, and the
like. (4) The workers in wood, as the carpenters, the cabinet-makers,
&c. (5) The workers in cane, osier, reed, rush, and straw--as
basket-makers, straw-plait manufacturers, thatchers, and the like.
(6) The workers in brick and stones--as bricklayers, masons, &c. (7)
The workers in glass and earthenware--as potters, glass-blowers,
glass-cutters, bottle-makers, glaziers, &c. (8) The workers in
metals--as braziers, tinmen, plumbers, goldsmiths, pewterers,
coppersmiths, iron-founders, blacksmiths, whitesmiths, anchor-smiths,
locksmiths, &c. (9) The workers in paper--as the paper-makers,
cardboard-makers. (10) The chemical manufacturers--as powder-makers,
white-lead-makers, alkali and acid manufacturers, lucifer-match-makers,
blacking-makers, ink-makers, soap-boilers, tallow-chandlers, &c. (11)
The workers at the superlative or extrinsic arts--that is to say, those
which have no manufactures of their own, but which are engaged in
adding to the utility or beauty of others--as printing, bookbinding,
painting, and decorating, gilding, burnishing, &c.
The circumstances which govern the classification of _trades_ are
totally different from those regulating the division of work. In trade
the convenience of the purchaser is mainly studied, the sale of such
articles being associated as are usually required together. Hence the
master coachmaker is frequently a harness manufacturer as well, for
the purchaser of the one commodity generally stands in need of the
other. The painter and house-decorator not only follows the trade
of the glazier, but of the plumber, too; because these arts are one
and all connected with the “doing up” of houses. For the same reason
the builder combines the business of the plasterer with that of the
bricklayer, and not unfrequently that of the carpenter and joiner
in addition. In all of these businesses, however, a distinct set of
workmen are required, according as the materials operated upon are
different.
We are now in a position to proceed with the arrangement of the several
members of society into different classes, according to the principles
of classification which have been here laid down. The difficulties of
the task, however, should be continually borne in mind; for where so
many have failed it cannot be expected that perfection can be arrived
at by any one individual; and, slight as the labour of such a task may
at the first glance appear to some, still the system here propounded
has been the work and study of many months.
CLASSIFICATION
OF
THE WORKERS AND NON-WORKERS
OF GREAT BRITAIN.
THOSE WHO WILL WORK.
I. ENRICHERS, as the Collectors, Extractors, or Producers of
Exchangeable Commodities.
II. AUXILIARIES, as the Promoters of Production, or the Distributors
of the Produce.
III. BENEFACTORS, or those who confer some permanent benefit,
as Educators and Curators engaged in promoting the physical,
intellectual, or spiritual well-being of the people.
IV. SERVITORS, or those who render some temporary service, or
pleasure, as Amusers, Protectors, and Servants.
THOSE WHO CANNOT WORK.
V. THOSE WHO ARE PROVIDED FOR BY SOME PUBLIC INSTITUTION, as the
Inmates of workhouses, prisons, hospitals, asylums, almshouses,
dormitories, and refuges.
VI. THOSE WHO ARE UNPROVIDED FOR, and incapacitated for labour, either
from want of power, from want of means, or from want of employment.
THOSE WHO WILL NOT WORK.
VII. VAGRANTS.
VIII. PROFESSIONAL BEGGARS.
IX. CHEATS.
X. THIEVES.
XI. PROSTITUTES.
THOSE WHO NEED NOT WORK.
XII. THOSE WHO DERIVE THEIR INCOME FROM RENT.
XIII. THOSE WHO DERIVE THEIR INCOME FROM DIVIDENDS.
XIV. THOSE WHO DERIVE THEIR INCOME FROM YEARLY STIPENDS.
XV. THOSE WHO DERIVE THEIR INCOME FROM OBSOLETE OR NOMINAL OFFICES.
XVI. THOSE WHO DERIVE THEIR INCOME FROM TRADES IN WHICH THEY DO NOT
APPEAR.
XVII. THOSE WHO DERIVE THEIR INCOME BY FAVOUR FROM OTHERS.
XVIII. THOSE WHO DERIVE THEIR SUPPORT FROM THE HEAD OF THE FAMILY.
THOSE WHO WILL WORK.
I. _Enrichers_, or those engaged in the collection, extraction, or
production of exchangeable commodities.
A. COLLECTORS.
1. Fishermen.
2. Woodmen.
3. Sand and Clay-collectors.
4. Copperas, Cement-stones, and other finders.
B. EXTRACTORS.
1. Miners.
_a._ Coal.
_b._ Salt.
_c._ Iron, Lead, Tin, Copper, Zinc, Manganese.
2. Quarryers.
_a._ Slate.
_b._ Stone.
C. GROWERS.
1. Farmers.
_a._ Capitalist Farmers.
i. Yeomen, or Proprietary Farmers.
ii. Tenant Farmers.
_b._ Peasant Farmers.
i. Peasant Proprietors; as the Cumberland “Statesmen.”
ii. “Metayers,” or labourers paying the landlord a certain portion of
the produce as rent for the use of the land.
iii. “Cottiers,” or labouring Tenant Farmers.
2. Graziers.
3. Gardeners, Nurserymen, Florists.
D. MAKERS OR ARTIFICERS.
1. Mechanics.
_a._ Workers in Silk, Wool, Worsted, Hair, Cotton, Flax, Hemp, Coir.
_b._ Workers in Skin, Gut, and Feathers.
_c._ Workers in Woollen, Silken, Cotton, Linen, and Leathern Materials.
_d._ Workers in Wood, Ivory, Bone, Horn, and Shell.
_e._ Workers in Osier, Cane, Reed, Rush, and Straw.
_f._ Workers in Stone and Brick.
_g._ Workers in Glass and Earthenware.
_h._ Workers in Metal.
_i._ Workers in Paper.
2. Chemical Manufacturers.
_a._ Acid, Alkali, Alum, Copperas, Prussian-Blue, and other
Manufacturers.
_b._ Gunpowder Manufacturers, Percussion-Cap, Cartridge, and Firework
Makers.
_c._ Brimstone and Lucifer-match Manufacturers.
_d._ White-lead, Colour, Black-lead, Whiting, and Blue Manufacturers.
_e._ Oil and Turpentine Distillers, and Varnish Manufacturers.
_f._ Ink Manufacturers, Sealing-wax and Wafer Makers.
_g._ Blacking Manufacturers.
_h._ Soap Boilers and Grease Makers.
_i._ Starch Manufacturers.
_j._ Tallow and Wax Chandlers.
_k._ Artificial Manure Manufacturers.
_l._ Artificial Stone and Cement Manufacturers.
_m._ Asphalte and Tar Manufacturers.
_n._ Glue and Size Makers.
_o._ Polishing Paste, and Glass and Emery Paper Makers.
_p._ Lime, Coke, and Charcoal Burners.
_q._ Manufacturing Chemists and Drug Manufacturers.
_r._ Workers connected with Provisions, Luxuries, and Medicines.
i. Bakers, and Biscuit Makers.
ii. Brewers.
iii. Soda-water and Ginger-beer Manufacturers.
iv. Distillers and Rectifiers.
v. British Wine Manufacturers.
vi. Vinegar Manufacturers.
vii. Fish and Provision Curers.
viii. Preserved Meats and Preserved Fruit Preparers.
ix. Sauce and Pickle Manufacturers.
x. Mustard Makers.
xi. Isinglass Manufacturers.
xii. Sugar Bakers, Boilers, and Refiners.
xiii. Confectioners and Pastry-cooks.
xiv. Rice and Farinaceous Food Manufacturers.
xv. Chocolate, Cocoa, and other Manufacturers of Substitutes for Tea.
xvi. Cigar, Tobacco, and Snuff Manufacturers.
xvii. Quack, and other Medicine Manufacturers, as Pills, Powders,
Syrups, Cordials, Embrocations, Ointments, Plaisters, &c.
3. Workers connected with the Superlative Arts, that is to say, with
those arts which have no products of their own, and are engaged either
in adding to the beauty or usefulness of the products of other arts, or
in inventing or designing the work appertaining to them.
_a._ Printers.
_b._ Bookbinders.
_c._ Painters, Decorators, and Gilders.
_d._ Writers and Stencillers.
_e._ Dyers, Bleachers, Scourers, Calenderers, and Fullers.
_f._ Print Colourers.
_g._ Designers of Patterns.
_h._ Embroiderers (of Muslin, Silk, &c.), and Fancy Workers.
_i._ Desiccators, Anti-dry-rot Preservers, Waterproofers.
_j._ Burnishers, Polishers, Grinders, Japanners, and French Polishers.
_k._ Engravers, Chasers, Die-Sinkers, Embossers, Engine-Turners, and
Glass-Cutters.
_l._ Artists, Sculptors, and Carvers of Wood, Coral, Jet, &c.
_m._ Modellers and Moulders.
_n._ Architects, Surveyors, and Civil Engineers.
_o._ Composers.
_p._ Authors, Editors, and Reporters.
⁂ Operatives are divisible, _according to the mode in which they are
paid_, into--
1. Day-workers.
2. Piece-workers.
3. “Lump” or Contract-workers; as at the docks.
4. Perquisite-workers; as waiters, &c.
5. “Kind” or Truck-workers; as the farm servants in the North of
England, Domestic Servants and Milliners, Ballast-heavers, and men
paid at “Tommy-shops.”
6. Tenant-workers; or those who lodge with or reside in houses
belonging to their employers. The Slop-working Tailors generally lodge
with the “Sweaters,” and the “Hinds” of Northumberland, Cumberland,
and Westmoreland have houses found them by their employers. These
“Hinds” have to keep a “Bondager,” that is, a female in the house
ready to answer the master’s call, and to work at stipulated wages.
7. Improvement-workers; or those who are considered to be remunerated
for their work by the instruction they receive in doing it; as
“improvers” and apprentices.
8. Tribute-workers, as the Cornish Miners, Whalers, and Weavers in
some parts of Ireland, where a certain proportion of the proceeds of
the work done belongs to the workmen.
The wages of “society-men” among operatives are settled by _custom_,
the wages of “non-society-men” are settled by _competition_.
Operatives are also divisible, _according to the places at which they
work_, into--
1. Domestic workers, or those who work at home.
2. Shop or Factory workers, or those who work on the employer’s
premises.
3. Out-door workers, or those who work in the open air; as
bricklayers, agricultural labourers, &c.
4. Jobbing-workers, or those who go out to work at private houses.
5. Rent-men, or those who pay rent for
_a._ A “seat” at some domestic worker’s rooms.
_b._ “Power,” as turners, and others, when requiring the use of a
steam-engine. Some operatives have to pay rent for tools or “frames,”
as the sawyers and “stockingers,” and some for gas when working on
their employer’s premises.
Operatives are further divisible, _according to those whom they employ
to assist them_, into--
1. Family workers, or those who avail themselves of the assistance of
their wives and children, as the Spitalfields Weavers.
2. “Sweaters” and Piece-master workers, or those who employ other
members of their trade at less wages than they themselves receive.
3. “Garret-master” workers, or those who avail themselves of the
labour (chiefly) of apprentices.
Operatives are moreover divisible, _according to those by whom they are
employed_, into--
1. “Flints” and “Dungs;” “Whites” and “Blacks,” according as they work
for employers who pay or do not pay “society prices.”
2. Jobbing piece-workers, or those who work single-handed for the
public (without the intervention of an “employer”) and are paid by the
_piece_. These mostly do the work at their own homes, as cobblers,
repairers, &c.
3. Jobbing day-workers, or those who work single-handed for the public
(without the intervention of an “employer”) and are paid by the _day_.
These mostly go out to work at persons’ houses and frequently have
their food found them. Among the tailors and carpenters this practice
is called “whipping the cat.”
4. “Co-operative men,” or those who work in “association” for their
own profit, obtaining their work directly from the public, without the
intervention of an “employer.”
Lastly, Operatives admit of being arranged into two distinct classes,
viz., the superior, or higher-priced, and the inferior, or lower-priced.
The superior, or higher-priced, operatives consist of--
1. The skilful.
2. The trustworthy.
3. The well-conditioned.
The inferior, or lower-priced operatives, on the other hand, are
composed of--
1. The unskilful; as the old or superannuated, the young (including
apprentices and “improvers”), the slow, and the awkward.
2. The untrustworthy; as the drunken, the idle, and the dishonest.
Some of the cheap workers, whose wages are minimized almost to
starvation point, so that honesty becomes morally impossible, have to
deposit a certain sum of money, or to procure two householders to act
as security for the faithful return of the work given out to them.
3. The inexpensive, consisting of--
_a._ Those who can live upon less; as single men, foreigners,
Irishmen, women, &c.
_b._ Those who derive their subsistence from other sources; as Wives,
Children, Paupers, Prisoners, Inmates of Asylums, Prostitutes, and
Amateurs (or those who work at a business merely for pocket-money).
_c._ Those who are in receipt of some pecuniary or other aid; as
Pensioners, Allottees of land, and such as have out-door relief from
the workhouse.
II. _Auxiliaries_, or those engaged in promoting the enrichment and
distributing the riches of the community.
A. PROMOTERS OF PRODUCTION.
1. Employers, or those who find the materials, implements, and
appurtenances for the work, and pay the wages of the workmen.
_a._ Administrative Employers, or those who supply wholesale or retail
dealers. These are subdivisible into--
i. Standard Employers, or those who work at the regular standard
prices of the trade.
ii. “Cutting” Employers, or those who work at less than the regular
prices of the trade; as Contractors, &c.
_b._ Executive Employers, or those who work directly for the public
without the intervention of a wholesale or retail dealer; as Builders,
&c.
_c._ Distributive Employers, or those who are both producers and retail
traders.
i. Those who retail what they produce; as Tailors, Shoemakers, Bakers,
Eating-house Keepers, Street Mechanics, &c.
ii. Those who retail other things (generally provisions), and compel
or expect the men in their employ to deal with them for those
articles, as the Truck-Masters and others.
iii. Those who retail the appurtenances of the trade to which they
belong, and compel or expect the men in their employ to purchase such
appurtenances of them; as trimmings in the tailors’ trade, thread
among the seamstresses, and the like.
_d._ Middlemen Employers, or those who act between the employer and the
employed, obtaining work from employers, and employing others to do it;
as Sub-contractors, Sweaters, &c. These consist of--
i. Trade-working Employers, or those who make up goods for other
employers in the trade.
ii. Garret-masters, or those who make up goods for the trade on the
smallest amount of capital, and generally on speculation.
iii. Trading Operative Employers, or those who obtain work in
considerable quantities, and employ others at reduced wages to assist
them in it; as “Sweaters,” “Seconders,” &c. These are either--
α. Piece Masters; as those who take out a certain piece of work and
employ others to help them at reduced wages.
β. “Lumper” Employers, or those who contract to do the work by the
lump, which is usually paid for by the piece, and employ others at
reduced wages in order to complete it.
⁂ Employers are known among operatives as “honourable” or
“dishonourable,” according as the wages they pay are those, or less
than those, of the Trade Society.
2. Superintendents, or those who look after the workmen on behalf of
employers.
_a._ Managers.
_b._ Clerks of the Works.
_c._ Foremen.
_d._ Overlookers.
_e._ Tellers and Meters, or those who take note of the number and
quantity of the articles delivered.
_f._ Provers, or those whose duty it is to examine the quality or
weight of the articles delivered.
_g._ Timekeepers, or those who note the time of the operatives coming
to and quitting labour.
_h._ Gatekeepers, or those who see that no goods are taken out.
_i._ Clerks, or those who keep accounts of all sales and purchases,
incomings, and outgoings of the business.
_j._ Pay Clerks, or those who pay the workmen their wages.
3. Labourers.
_a._ Acting as motive powers.
i. Turning wheels, working pumps, blowing bellows.
ii. Wheeling, dragging, pulling, or hoisting loads.
iii. Shifting (scenes), or turning (corn).
iv. Carrying (bricks, as hodmen).
v. Driving (piles), ramming down (stones, as paviours).
vi. Pressing (as fruit, for juice; seeds, for oil).
_b._ Uniting or putting one thing to another.
i. Feeding (furnace), laying-on (as for printing machines).
ii. Filling (as “fillers-in” of sieves at dust-yards).
iii. Oiling (engines), greasing (railway wheels), pitching or tarring
(vessels), pasting paper (for bags).
iv. Mixing (mortar), kneading (clay).
v. Tying up (plants and bunches of vegetables).
vi. Folding (printed sheets).
vii. Corking (bottles), or caulking (ships).
_c._ Separating one thing from another.
i. Sifting (cinders), screening (coals).
ii. Picking (fruit, hops, &c.), shelling (peas), peeling, barking, and
threshing.
iii. Winnowing.
iv. Weeding and stoning.
v. Reaping and mowing.
vi. Felling, lopping, hewing, chopping (as fire-wood), cutting (as
chaff), shearing (sheep).
vii. Sawing.
viii. Blasting.
ix. Breaking (stones), crushing (bones and ores), pounding (drugs).
x. Scouring (as sand from castings), scraping (ships).
_d._ Excavating, sinking, and embanking.
i. Tunnelling.
ii. Sinking foundations.
iii. Boring.
iv. Draining, trenching, ditching, and hedging.
v. Embanking.
vi. Road-making, cutting.
B. DISTRIBUTORS OF PRODUCTION.
1. Dealers, or those who are engaged in the buying and selling of
commodities on their own account.
_a._ Merchants or Importers, and Exporters.
_b._ Wholesale Traders.
_c._ Retail Traders.
_d._ Contracting Purveyors, or those who supply goods by agreement.
_e._ Contractors for work or repairs; as Road Contractors, and others.
_f._ Contractors for privileges, as the right of Printing the
Catalogue of the Great Exhibition, or selling refreshments at Railway
Stations, &c.
_g._ Farmers of revenues from dues, tolls, &c.
_h._ Itinerants, or those who seek out the Customers, instead of the
Customers seeking out them.
i. Hawkers, or those who cry their goods.
ii. Pedlars, or those who carry their goods round.
2. Agents, or those who are engaged in the buying or selling of
commodities for others, as Land Agents, House and Estate Agents,
Colonial and East India Agents, &c., &c.
_a._ Supercargoes.
_b._ Factors, or Consignees.
_c._ Brokers, Bill, Stock, Share, Ship, Sugar, Cotton, &c.
_d._ Commission Salesmen, or Unlicensed Brokers.
_e._ Buyers, or those who purchase materials or goods for
Manufacturers, or Dealers.
_f._ Auctioneers, or those who sell goods on Commission to the highest
bidder.
3. Lenders and Lettors-out, or those who receive a certain sum for the
loan or use of a thing.
_a._ Lenders or Lettors-out of commodities, as--
i. Job-horses, carriages, chairs and seats in parks, gardens, &c.
ii. Plate, linen, furniture, piano-fortes, flowers, fancy dresses,
Court suits, &c.
iii. Books, newspapers, prints, and music.
_b._ Lettors-out of tenements and storage room, as--
i. Houses.
ii. Lodgings.
iii. Warehouse-room for imports, &c., as at wharfs.
iv. Warehouse-room for furniture and other goods.
_c._ Lenders of money, as--
i. Mortgagees.
ii. Bankers.
iii. Bill-discounters.
iv. Loan offices with and without policies of assurance.
v. Building and investment societies.
vi. Pawnbrokers.
vii. Dolly shopmen.
⁂ The several modes of distributing goods or money are--
1. By private contract or agreement.
2. By a fixed or ticketed price.
3. By competition, as at Auctions.
4. By games of chance, as Lotteries (with the “Art Union”), Raffles
(at Fancy Fairs), Tossing (with piemen and others), Prizes for skill
(with throwing sticks, &c.), Betting, Racing, &c.
The places at which goods are distributed are--
1. Fairs, or annual gatherings of buyers and sellers.
2. Markets, or weekly gatherings of buyers and sellers.
3. Exchanges, or daily gatherings of merchants and agents.
4. Counting-houses, or the places of business of wholesale traders.
5. Shops, or the places of business of retail traders.
6. Bazaars, or congregations of shops.
4. Trade Assistants.
_a._ Shopmen and Warehousemen.
_b._ Shopwalkers.
_c._ Cashiers or Receivers.
_d._ Clerks.
_e._ Accountants.
_f._ Rent-Collectors.
_g._ Debt-collectors.
_h._ Travellers, Town as well as Commercial.
_i._ Touters.
_j._ Barkers (outside shops).
_k._ Bill deliverers.
_l._ Bill-stickers.
_m._ Boardmen.
_n._ Advertizing-van Men.
5. Carriers.
_a._ Those engaged in the external transit of the Kingdom.
i. Mercantile Sailing Vessels.
ii. Mercantile Steam Vessels.
_b._ Those engaged in the internal Transit of the Kingdom.
i. Those engaged in the coasting trade from port to port.
ii. Those engaged in carrying inland from town to town, as--
α. Those connected with land carriage; as railroad men, stage
coachmen, mail coachmen, and mail cartmen, post boys, flymen,
waggoners, country carriers, and drovers.
β. Those connected with water carriage; as navigable river and canal
men, bargemen, towing men.
iii. Those engaged in carrying to and from different parts of the same
town by land and water.
α. Passengers; as Omnibus-men, Cabmen, Glass and Job Coachmen, Fly
Men, Excursion-van Men, Donkey-boys, Goat-carriage boys, Sedan and
Bath Chair Men, Guides.
β. Goods; as Waggoners, Draymen, Carters, Spring-Van Men, Truckmen,
Porters (ticketed and unticketed, and public and private men).
γ. Letters and Messages; as Messengers, Errand Boys, Telegraph Men,
and Postmen.
δ. Goods and Passengers by water; as Bargemen, Lightermen, Hoymen,
Watermen, River Steamboat Men.
_c._ Those engaged in the lading and unlading and the fitting of
vessels, as well the packing of goods.
i. Dock and wharf labourers.
ii. Coal whippers.
iii. Lumpers, or dischargers of timber ships.
iv. Timber porters and rafters.
v. Corn porters.
vi. Ballast heavers.
vii. Stevedores, or stowers.
viii. Riggers.
ix. Packers and pressers.
III. _Benefactors_, or those who confer some _permanent_ benefit by
promoting the physical, intellectual, or spiritual well-being of others.
A. EDUCATORS.
1. Professors.
2. Tutors.
3. Governesses.
4. Schoolmasters.
5. Ushers.
6. Teachers of Languages.
7. Teachers of Sciences.
8. Lecturers.
9. Teachers of “Accomplishments”; as Music, Singing, Dancing, Drawing,
Wax-Flower Modelling, &c.
10. Teachers of Exercises; as Gymnastics.
11. Teachers of Arts of Self-Defence; as Fencing, Boxing, &c.
12. Teachers of Trades and Professions.
B. CURATORS.
1. Corporeal.
_a._ Physicians.
_b._ Surgeons.
_c._ General Practitioners.
_d._ Homœopathists.
_e._ Hydropathists.
2. Spiritual.
_a._ Ministers of the Church of England.
_b._ Dissenting Ministers.
_c._ Catholic Ministers.
_d._ Missionaries.
_e._ Scripture Readers.
_f._ Sisters of Charity.
_g._ Visitants.
IV. _Servitors_, or those who render some _temporary_ service or
pleasure to others.
A. AMUSERS, or those who contribute to our entertainment.
1. Actors.
2. Reciters.
3. Improvisers.
4. Singers.
5. Musicians.
6. Dancers.
7. Riders, or Equestrian Performers.
8. Fencers and Pugilists.
9. Conjurers.
10. Posturers.
11. Equilibrists.
12. Tumblers.
13. Exhibitors or Showmen.
_a._ Of Curiosities.
_b._ Of Monstrosities.
B. PROTECTORS, or those who contribute to our security against injury.
1. Legislative.
_a._ The Sovereign.
_b._ The Members of the House of Lords.
_c._ The Members of the House of Commons.
2. Judicial.
_a._ The Judges in Chancery, Queen’s Bench, Common Pleas, Exchequer,
Ecclesiastical, Admiralty, and Criminal Courts.
_b._ Masters in Chancery, Commissioners of the Bankruptcy, Insolvent
Debtors, Sheriffs, and County Courts, Magistrates, Justices of the
Peace, Recorders, Coroners, Revising Barristers.
_c._ Barristers, Pleaders, Conveyancers, Attorneys, Proctors.
3. Administrative or Executive.
_a._ The Lords Commissioners of the Treasury; the Secretaries of
State for Home, Foreign, and Colonial Affairs; the Chancellor and
Comptroller of the Exchequer; the Privy Council, and the Privy Seal;
the Board of Trade, the Board of Control, and the Board of Health; the
Board of Inland Revenue, the Poor-Law Board, and the Board of Audit;
the Commissioners of Woods and Forests; the Ministers and Officials in
connection with the Army and Navy, the Post Office, and the Mint; the
Inspectors of Prisons, Factories, Railways, Workhouses, Schools, and
Lunatic Asylums; the Officers in connection with the Registration and
Statistical Departments; and the other Functionaries appertaining to
the _Government at home_.
_b._ The Ambassadors, Envoys Extraordinary, Ministers Plenipotentiary,
Secretaries of Legation, Chargés d’Affaires, Consuls, and other
Ministers and Functionaries appertaining to the _Government abroad_.
_c._ The Governors and Commanders of British Colonies and Settlements.
_d._ The Lord Lieutenants, Custodes Rotulorum, High and Deputy
Sheriffs, High Bailiffs, High and Petty Constables, and other
Functionaries of _the Counties._
_e._ The Mayors, Aldermen, Common Councilmen, Chamberlains, Common
Sergeants, Treasurers, Auditors, Assessors, Inspectors of Weights
and Measures, and other Functionaries of _the Cities or incorporated
Towns_.
_f._ The Churchwardens, the Commissioners of Sewers and Paving, the
Select and Special Vestrymen, the Vestry Clerks, the Overseers or
Guardians of the Poor, the Relieving Officers, the Masters of the
Workhouses, the Beadles, and other _Parochial Functionaries_.
_g._ The Masters and Brethren of the Trinity Corporation, the Pier
and Harbour Masters, Conservators of Rivers, and other Functionaries
connected with Navigation, and the Trustees and Commissioners in
connection with the Public Roads.
_h._ The Naval and Military Powers; as the Army, Navy, Marines,
Militia, and Yeomanry.
_i._ The Civil Forces; as Policemen, Patrole, and Private Watchmen.
_j._ Sheriffs’ Officers, Bailiffs’ Followers, Sponging-house Keepers.
_k._ Governors of Prisons, Jailers, Turnkeys, Officers on board the
Hulks and Transport Ships, Hangmen.
_l._ The Fiscal Forces; as the Coast Guard, Custom-house Officers,
Excise Officers.
_m._ Collectors of Imposts; as Tax and Rate Collectors, Turnpike Men,
Toll Collectors of Bridges and Markets, Collectors of Pier and Harbour
dues, and Light, Buoy, and Beacon dues.
_n._ Guardians of special localities; as Rangers, and Park-keepers,
Arcade-keepers, Street-keepers, Square-keepers, Bazaar-keepers, Gate
and Lodge-keepers, Empty-house-keepers.
_o._ Conservators; as Curators of Museums, Librarians, Storekeepers,
and others.
_p._ Protective Associations; as Insurance Companies against Loss by
fire, shipwreck, storms, railway accidents, death of cattle, Life
Assurance Societies, Provident or Benefit Clubs, Guarantee Societies,
Trade Protection Societies, Fire Brigade and Fire-escape Men, Humane
Society Men, and Officers of the Societies for the Suppression of
Mendicity, Vice, and cruelty to Animals.
SERVANTS, or those who contribute to our comfort or convenience by the
performance of certain offices for us.
1. Private Servants, regularly engaged.
_a._ Stewards.
_b._ Farm Bailiffs.
_c._ Secretaries.
_d._ Amanuenses.
_e._ Companions.
_f._ Butlers.
_g._ Valets.
_h._ Footmen, Pages, and Hall Porters.
_i._ Coachmen, Grooms, “Tigers,” and Helpers at Stables.
_j._ Huntsmen and Whippers-in.
_k._ Kennelmen.
_l._ Gamekeepers.
_m._ Gardeners.
_n._ Housekeepers.
_o._ Ladies’ Maids.
_p._ Nursery Maids and Wet Nurses.
_q._ House Maids and Parlour Maids.
_r._ Cooks and Scullery Maids.
_s._ Dairy Maids.
_t._ Maids of all work.
2. Private Servants temporarily engaged.
_a._ Couriers.
_b._ Interpreters.
_c._ Monthly Nurses and Invalid Nurses.
_d._ Waiters at Parties.
_e._ Charwomen.
_f._ Knife, boot, window, and paint Cleaners, Pot scourers, Carpet
beaters.
3. Public Servants.
_a._ Waiters at hotels and public gardens.
_b._ Masters of the Ceremonies.
_c._ Chamber-Maids.
_d._ Boots.
_e._ Ostlers.
_f._ Job Coachmen.
_g._ Post-boys.
_h._ Washerwomen.
_i._ Dustmen.
_j._ Sweeps.
_k._ Scavengers.
_l._ Nightmen.
_m._ Flushermen.
_n._ Turncocks.
_o._ Lamplighters.
_p._ Horse Holders.
_q._ Crossing Sweepers.
THOSE WHO CANNOT WORK.
V. _Those that are provided for by some Public Institution._
A. THE INMATES OF WORKHOUSES.
B. THE INMATES OF PRISONS.
1. Debtors.
2. Criminals (Some of these, however, are made to work by the
authorities).
C. THE INMATES OF HOSPITALS.
1. The Sick.
2. The Insane; as Lunatics and Idiots.
3. Veterans; as Greenwich and Chelsea Hospital men.
4. The Deserted Young; as the Foundling Hospital children.
D. THE INMATES OF ASYLUMS AND ALMSHOUSES.
1. The Afflicted; as the Deaf, and Dumb, and Blind.
2. The Destitute Young; as Orphans.
3. The Decayed Members of the several Trades or Sects.
_a._ Trade and Provident Asylums and Almshouses.
_b._ Sectarian Asylums and Almshouses--as for aged Jews, Widows of
Clergymen, &c.
E. THE INMATES OF THE SEVERAL REFUGES AND DORMITORIES FOR THE HOUSELESS
AND DESTITUTE.
VI. _Those who are Unprovided for._
A. THOSE WHO ARE INCAPACITATED FROM WANT OF POWER.
1. Owing to their Age.
_a._ The Old.
_b._ The Young.
2. Owing to some Bodily Ailment.
_a._ The Sick.
_b._ The Crippled.
_c._ The Maimed.
_d._ The Paralyzed.
_e._ The Blind.
3. Owing to some Mental Infirmity.
_a._ The Insane.
_b._ The Idiotic.
_c._ The Untaught, or those who have never been brought up to any
industrial occupation; as Widows and those who have “seen better
days.”
B. THOSE WHO ARE INCAPACITATED FROM WANT OF MEANS.
1. Having no tools; as is often the case with distressed carpenters.
2. Having no clothes; as servants when long out of a situation.
3. Having no stock-money; as impoverished street-sellers.
4. Having no materials; as the “used-up” garret or chamber masters in
the boot and shoe or cabinet-making trade.
5. Having no place wherein to work; as when those who pursue their
calling at home are forced to become the inmates of a nightly
lodging-house.
C. THOSE WHO ARE INCAPACITATED FROM WANT OF EMPLOYMENT.
1. Owing to a glut or stagnation in business; as among the
cotton-spinners, the iron-workers, the railway-navigators, and the
like.
2. Owing to a change in fashion; as in the button-making trade.
3. Owing to the introduction of machinery; as among the sawyers,
hand-loom weavers, pillow-lace makers, threshers, and others.
4. Owing to the advent of the slack season; as among the tailors and
mantua-makers, and drawn-bonnet-makers.
5. Owing to the continuance of unfavourable weather.
_a._ From the prevalence of rain; as street-sellers, and others.
_b._ From the prevalence of easterly winds; as dock-labourers.
6. Owing to the approach of winter; as among the builders, brickmakers,
market-gardeners, harvest-men.
7. Owing to the loss of character.
_a._ Culpably; from intemperate habits, or misconduct of some kind.
_b._ Accidentally; as when a servant’s late master goes abroad, and a
written testimonial is objected to.
THOSE WHO WILL NOT WORK.
VII. _Vagrants or Tramps._
Under this head is included all that multifarious tribe of “sturdy
rogues,” who ramble across the country during the summer, sleeping
at the “casual wards” of the workhouses, and who return to London in
the winter to avail themselves of the gratuitous lodgings and food
attainable at the several metropolitan refuges.
VIII. _Professional Beggars and their Dependents._
A. NAVAL AND MILITARY BEGGARS.
1. Turnpike Sailors.
2. Spanish Legion Men, &c.
3. Veterans.
B. “DISTRESSED-OPERATIVE” BEGGARS.
1. Pretended Starved-out Manufacturers, as the Nottingham “Driz” or
Lace-Men.
2. Pretended Unemployed Agriculturists.
3. Pretended Frozen-out Gardeners.
4. Pretended Hand-loom Weavers, and others deprived of their living by
Machinery.
C. “RESPECTABLE” BEGGARS.
1. Pretended Broken-down Tradesmen, or Decayed Gentlemen.
2. Pretended Distressed Ushers, unable to take situation for want of
clothes.
3. “Clean-Family Beggars” with children in very white pinafores, their
faces newly washed, and their hair carefully brushed.
4. Ashamed Beggars, or those who “stand pad with a fakement” (remain
stationary, holding a written placard), and pretend to hide their
faces.
D. “DISASTER” BEGGARS.
1. Shipwrecked Mariners.
2. Blown-up Miners.
3. Burnt-out Tradesmen.
4. Lucifer Droppers.
E. BODILY AFFLICTED BEGGARS.
1. Having real or pretended sores, vulgarly known as the “scaldrum
dodge.”
2. Having swollen legs.
3. Being crippled, deformed, maimed, or paralyzed.
4. Being blind.
5. Being subject to fits.
6. Being in a decline, and appearing with bandages round the head.
7. “Shallow coves,” or those who exhibit themselves in the streets
half clad, especially in cold weather.
F. FAMISHED BEGGARS.
1. Those who chalk on the pavement, “I am starving.”
2. Those who “stand pad” with a small piece of paper similarly
inscribed.
G. FOREIGN BEGGARS.
1. Frenchmen who stop passengers in the street and request to know if
they can speak French, previous to presenting a written statement of
their distress.
2. Pretended Destitute Poles.
3. Hindoos and Negroes, who stand shivering by the kerb.
H. PETTY TRADING BEGGARS.
1. Tract sellers.
2. Sellers of lucifers, boot-laces, cabbage-nets, tapes, and cottons.
⁂ The several varieties of beggars admit of being sub-divided into--
_a._ Patterers, or those who beg on the “blob,” that is, by word of
mouth.
_b._ Screevers, or those who beg by screeving, that is, by written
documents, setting forth imaginary cases of distress, such documents
being either--
i. “Slums” (letters).
ii. “Fakements” (petitions).
I. THE DEPENDENTS OF BEGGARS.
1. Screevers Proper, or the writers of slums and fakements for those
who beg by screeving.
2. Referees, or those who give characters to professional beggars when
a reference is required.
IX. _Cheats and their Dependents._
A. THOSE WHO CHEAT THE GOVERNMENT.
1. Smugglers defrauding the Customs.
2. “Jiggers” defrauding the Excise by working illicit stills, and the
like.
B. THOSE WHO CHEAT THE PUBLIC.
1. Swindlers, defrauding those of whom they buy.
2. “Duffers” and “horse-chaunters,” defrauding those to whom they sell.
3. “Charley-pitchers” and other low gamblers, defrauding those with
whom they play.
4. “Bouncers and Besters” defrauding, by laying wagers, swaggering, or
using threats.
5. “Flatcatchers,” defrauding by pretending to find some valuable
article--as Fawney or Ring-Droppers.
6. Bubble-Men, defrauding by instituting pretended companies--as Sham
Next-of-Kin-Societies, Assurance and Annuity Offices, Benefit Clubs,
and the like.
7. Douceur-Men, defrauding by offering for a certain sum to confer
some boon upon a person as--
_a._ To procure Government Situations for laymen, or benefices for
clergymen.
_b._ To provide Servants with Places.
_c._ To teach some lucrative occupation.
_d._ To put persons in possession of some information “to their
advantage.”
8. Deposit-Men, defrauding by obtaining a certain sum as security for
future work or some promised place of trust.
C. THE DEPENDENTS OF CHEATS ARE--
1. “Jollies,” and “Magsmen,” or accomplices of the “Bouncers and
Besters.”
2. “Bonnets,” or accomplices of Gamblers.
3. Referees, or those who give false characters to swindlers and
others.
X. _Thieves and their Dependents._
A. THOSE WHO PLUNDER WITH VIOLENCE.
1. “Cracksmen”--as Housebreakers and Burglars.
2. “Rampsmen,” or Footpads.
3. “Bludgers,” or Stick-slingers, plundering in company with
prostitutes.
B. THOSE WHO “HOCUS,” OR PLUNDER THEIR VICTIMS WHEN STUPIFIED.
1. “Drummers,” or those who render people insensible.
_a._ By handkerchiefs steeped in chloroform.
_b._ By drugs poured into liquor.
2. “Bug-hunters,” or those who go round to the public-houses and
plunder drunken men.
C. THOSE WHO PLUNDER BY MANUAL DEXTERITY, BY STEALTH, OR BY BREACH OF
TRUST.
1. “Mobsmen,” or those who plunder by manual dexterity--as the
“light-fingered gentry.”
_a._ “Buzzers,” or those who abstract handkerchiefs and other articles
from gentlemen’s pockets.
i. “Stook-buzzers,” those who steal handkerchiefs.
ii. “Tail-Buzzers,” those who dive into coat-pockets for sneezers
(snuff-boxes,) skins and dummies (purses and pocket-books).
_b._ “Wires,” or those who pick ladies’ pockets.
_c._ “Prop-nailers,” those who steal pins and brooches.
_d._ “Thimble-screwers,” those who wrench watches from their guards.
_e._ “Shop-lifters,” or those who purloin goods from shops while
examining articles.
2. “Sneaksmen,” or those who plunder by means of stealth.
_a._ Those who purloin goods, provisions, money, clothes, old metal,
&c.
i. “Drag Sneaks,” or those who steal goods or luggage from carts and
coaches.
ii. “Snoozers,” or those who sleep at railway hotels, and decamp with
some passenger’s luggage or property in the morning.
iii. “Star-glazers,” or those who cut the panes out of shop-windows.
iv. “Till Friskers,” or those who empty tills of their contents during
the absence of the shopmen.
v. “Sawney-Hunters,” or those who go purloining bacon from
cheesemongers’ shop-doors.
vi. “Noisy-racket Men,” or those who steal china and glass from
outside of china-shops.
vii. “Area Sneaks,” or those who steal from houses by going down the
area steps.
viii. “Dead Lurkers,” or those who steal coats and umbrellas from
passages at dusk, or on Sunday afternoons.
ix. “Snow Gatherers,” or those who steal clean clothes off the hedges.
x. “Skinners,” or those women who entice children and sailors to go
with them and then strip them of their clothes.
xi. “Bluey-Hunters,” or those who purloin lead from the tops of houses.
xii. “Cat and Kitten Hunters,” or those who purloin pewter quart and
pint pots from the top of area railings.
xiii. “Toshers,” or those who purloin copper from the ships along
shore.
xiv. Mudlarks, or those who steal pieces of rope and lumps of coal
from among the vessels at the river-side.
_b._ Those who steal animals.
i. Horse Stealers.
ii. Sheep, or “Woolly-bird,” Stealers.
iii. Deer Stealers.
iv. Dog Stealers.
v. Poachers, or Game Stealers.
vi. “Lady and Gentlemen Racket Men,” or those who steal cocks and hens.
vii. Cat Stealers, or those who make away with cats for the sake of
their skins and bones.
_c._ Those who steal dead bodies--as the “Resurrectionists.”
3. Those who plunder by breach of trust.
_a._ Embezzlers, or those who rob their employers.
i. By receiving what is due to them, and never accounting for it.
ii. By obtaining goods in their employer’s name.
iii. By purloining money from the till, or goods from the premises.
_b._ Illegal Pawners.
i. Those who pledge work given out to them by employers.
ii. Those who pledge blankets, sheets, &c., from lodgings.
_c._ Dishonest servants, those who make away with the property of their
masters.
_d._ Bill Stealers, or those who purloin bills of exchange entrusted to
them, to get discounted.
_e._ Letter Stealers.
D. “SHOFUL MEN,” OR THOSE WHO PLUNDER BY MEANS OF COUNTERFEITS.
1. Coiners or fabricators of counterfeit money.
2. Forgers of bank notes.
3. Forgers of checks and acceptances.
4. Forgers of wills.
E. DEPENDENTS OF THIEVES.
1. “Fences,” or receivers of stolen goods.
2. “Smashers,” or utterers of base coin or forged notes.
XI. _Prostitutes and their Dependents._
A. PROFESSIONAL PROSTITUTES.
1. Seclusives, or those who live in private houses or apartments.
_a._ Kept Mistresses.
_b._ “Prima Donnas,” or those who belong to the “first class,” and
live in a superior style.
2. Convives, or those who live in the same house with a number of
others.
_a._ Those who are independent of the mistress of the house.
_b._ Those who are subject to the mistress of a brothel.
i. “Board Lodgers,” or those who give a portion of what they receive
to the mistress of the brothel, in return for their board and lodging.
ii. “Dress Lodgers,” or those who give either a portion or the whole
of what they get to the mistress of the brothel in return for their
board, lodging, and clothes.
3. Those who live in low lodging-houses.
4. Sailors’ and soldiers’ women.
5. Park women, or those who frequent the parks at night, and other
retired places.
6. Thieves’ women, or those who entrap men into bye streets for the
purpose of robbery.
7. The Dependents of Prostitutes:
_a._ “Bawds,” or Keepers of Brothels.
_b._ Followers of Dress Lodgers.
_c._ Keepers of Accommodation Houses.
_d._ Procuresses, Pimps, and Panders.
_e._ Fancy-Men.
_f._ Magsmen and Bullies.
B. CLANDESTINE PROSTITUTES.
1. Female Operatives.
2. Maid Servants.
3. Ladies of Intrigue.
4. Keepers of Houses of Assignation.
C. COHABITANT PROSTITUTES.
1. Those whose paramours cannot afford to pay the marriage fees.
2. Those whose paramours do not believe in the sanctity of the
ceremony.
3. Those who have married a relative forbidden by law.
4. Those whose paramours object to marry them for pecuniary or family
reasons.
5. Those who would forfeit their income by marrying, as officers’
widows in receipt of pensions, and those who hold property only while
unmarried.
THOSE WHO NEED NOT WORK.
XII. _Those who derive their income from rent._
A. LANDLORDS OF ESTATES.
B. LANDLORDS OF HOUSES.
XIII. _Those who derive their income from dividends._
A. FUNDHOLDERS.
B. SHAREHOLDERS.
1. In Mines.
2. In Canals.
3. In Railways.
4. In Public Companies.
XIV. Those who derive their income from yearly stipends.
A. ANNUITANTS.
B. PENSIONERS.
XV. _Those who hold obsolete or nominal offices._
SINECURISTS.
XVI. _Those who derive their incomes from trades in which they never
appear._
A. SLEEPING PARTNERS.
B. ROYALTY MEN.
XVII. _Those who derive their incomes by favour from some other._
A. PROTEGÉS.
B. DEPENDENTS.
XVIII. _Those who derive their support from the head of the family._
A. WIVES.
B. CHILDREN.
OF THE NON-WORKERS.
The exposition of the several members of society being finished, I now
come to treat of that inoperative moiety of it, which more especially
concerns us here. The non-workers, we have seen, consist of three
broadly marked and distinct orders, viz:--
_The incapacitated_, or compulsory non-workers.
_The indisposed_, or voluntary non-workers.
_The independent_, or privileged non-workers.
It would be of the highest possible importance, could we ascertain
with any precision the number of people existing in this country, who
do no manner of work for their support; and I was anxious to have
concluded the preceding account of the several divisions of society,
with an estimate of the numbers appertaining to each of the four great
classes, as well as the incomes accruing to them. I found, however, on
consulting the official documents with this view, that the government
returns were in such an economical tangle--distributor being confounded
with employer, and employer again jumbled up with the employed--that
any attempt to unravel the twisted yarn would have cost an infinity of
trouble, and have been almost worthless after all; and it was from a
long experience as to the incompetency of the official returns to aid
the social inquirer in solving the great economical problems concerning
the production and distribution of wealth, that I was induced to
suggest to Sir George Grey (to whom I had been indebted for much
courtesy and valuable information, and who, from the commencement of my
investigations, had shown a readiness to afford me every assistance),
that, in the ensuing census, an attempt should be made to obtain
some definite account of the numbers of employers and employed, and
I am happy to say that, in conformity with my suggestion, the next
“Abstract of the Occupations of the People,” will at least teach us
the proportion between these two main elements of our social state; so
that if the Distributors are but kept distinct from the Promoters and
Producers of the wealth of the country, one important step towards a
right understanding of the subject will assuredly have been made[10].
It should, however, be borne in mind, that, though the distribution,
the promotion, and the production of the riches or exchangeable
commodities of a country are usually distinct offices in every
civilized nation, they are not invariably separate functions, even in
our own. The exceptions to the economical rule with us appear to be as
follows:--
1. Sometimes the producers themselves supply the materials, tools,
shelter, and subsistence, that they require for their work, though
this is usually done by some capitalist; and having finished the work,
proceed themselves to find purchasers for it likewise (though this is
generally the office of the distributor or dealer). Street artizans,
or those who make the goods they sell in the streets, may be cited as
instances of a class uniting in itself the three functions of producer,
capitalist (supplying the materials, &c.), and distributor.
2. Sometimes the capitalist employer is also the distributor of the
commodities, such being the case with bakers, tailors, and the like,
who themselves “purvey” what they employ others to produce.
3. Sometimes the craft does not admit of a distributor being attached
to it; the employer himself undertaking to supply the wants of the
public; this is the case with the building and decoration of houses.
4. Sometimes the work is done directly for the public, without the
intervention of either a distributor or trading-employer; such is the
case with the jobbing, day, or piece workers--among the seamstresses
and journeymen tailors, for instance--who “make up ladies’ and
gentlemen’s own materials,” either at home or at the houses of those
for whom the work is done.
5. Sometimes the artificers or working men are their own capitalists;
providing the materials, tools, shelter, and subsistence requisite for
the work, as is the case with the garret and chamber-masters in the
slop cabinet and shoe trades, and among the members of co-operative
associations.
6. Sometimes the artificers are both employers and employed; being
supplied with their materials and subsistence from a capitalist, and
supplying them again to other artificers working under them; this is
the case with sweaters, piece-working masters, first hands, and the
like.
7. Sometimes the capitalist employer, on the other hand, is, or rather
assumes to be, the proprietor of both the capital and labour; as is the
case with the slave-owners, masters of serfs, bondmen, villeins, and
the like; though this state of things, thank God, no longer exists in
this country.
8. Sometimes the capitalist supplies all the requisites of production,
excepting the subsistence of the artificer, who is remunerated by a
certain share of the profits (if any); this is often the case with
publishers and authors.
9. Sometimes the capitalist supplies only the materials and
subsistence, but not the tools, of the artificers, and sometimes he
compels them to pay him a rent for them out of their wages; as is the
case with the employers of the sawyers and stockingers.
10. Sometimes the capitalist supplies the materials, tools, and
subsistence of the artificers, but not the appliances of their work;
and sometimes he compels them to purchase such appliances of him at an
exorbitant profit; as the trimmings in the tailors’ trade, thread with
the seamstresses, and the like.
11. Sometimes the capitalist supplies the materials, tools,
subsistence, and shelter of the artificers, but not their gas-light,
and compels them to pay a rent for the same out of their wages.
12. Sometimes the capitalist supplies the materials, tools, appliances,
and subsistence, but not the shelter, necessary for the due performance
of the work, the artificers, in such cases, doing the work at their own
homes.
* * * * *
But all this concerns the workers more directly than the non-workers of
society, and it is mentioned here merely with the view of completing
the classification before given. Our more immediate business in this
place lies with the inoperative, rather than the operative, members of
the community. Nor is it with the entire body of these that we have
to deal, but rather with that third order of the non-working class
who are unwilling, though able, to work, as contradistinguished from
those who are willing, but unable, to do so. The non-workers are a
peculiar class, including orders diametrically opposed to each other:
the very rich and the very poor, in the first place, and the honest and
dishonest in the second. The dishonest members of society constitute
those who are known more particularly as the criminal class. Hence
to inquire into their means of living and mode of life, involves an
investigation into the nature and the extent of crime in this country.
Crime, sin, and vice are three terms used for the infraction of three
different kinds of laws--social, religious, and moral. Crime is the
transgression of some social law, even as sin is the transgression of
some religious law, and vice the breach of some moral one. These laws,
however, often differ only in emanating from different authorities;
while infractions of them are merely offences against different powers.
To thieve is to offend at once socially, religiously, and morally; for
not only does the social, but the religious and moral law, each and
all, enjoin that we should respect the property of others.
But there are other crimes or offences against the social powers,
besides such as are committed by those who will not work. The crimes
perpetrated by those who object to labour for their living, are
habitual crimes; whereas those perpetrated by the other classes of
society are accidental crimes, arising from the pressure of a variety
of circumstances. Here, then, we have a most important fundamental
distinction: all crimes, and consequently all criminals, are divisible
into two different classes, the professional and the casual; that is
to say, there are two distinct orders of people continually offending
against the laws of society, viz., those who do so as a regular means
of living, and those who do so from some accidental cause. It is
impossible to arrive at any accurate knowledge on the subject of crime
generally, without making this first analysis of the several species
of offences according to their causes; that is to say, arranging them
into opposite groups or classes, according as they arise from an
habitual indisposition to labour on the part of some of the offenders,
or from the temporary pressure of circumstances upon others. The
official returns, however, on this subject are as unphilosophic as the
generality of such documents, and consist of a crude mass of undigested
facts, being a statistical illustration of the “rudis indigestaque
moles,” in connection with a criminal chaos.
At present the several crimes of the country are officially divided
into four classes:--
I. Offences against persons; including murder, rape, bigamy, assaults,
&c.
II. Offences against property.
A. With violence; including burglary, robbery, piracy, &c.
B. Without violence; including embezzlement, cattle-stealing, larceny,
and fraud.
C. Malicious offences against property; including arson, incendiarism,
maiming cattle, &c.
III. Forgery and offences against the currency; including the forging
of wills, bank-notes, and coining, &c.
IV. Other offences; including high-treason, sedition, poaching,
smuggling, working illicit stills, perjury, &c.
M. Guerry, the eminent French statist, adopts a far more philosophic
arrangement, and divides the several crimes into--
I. Crimes against the State; as high treason, &c.
II. Crimes against personal safety; as murder, assault, &c.
III. Crimes against morals (with and without violence); as rape,
bigamy, &c.
IV. Crimes against property (proceeding from cupidity or malice); as
larceny, embezzlement, incendiarism, and the like.
The same fundamental error which renders the government classification
comparatively worthless, deprives that of the French philosopher of
all practical value. It gives us no knowledge of the character of
the people committing the crimes; being merely a system of criminal
mnemonics, as it were, or easy method of remembering the several
varieties of offences. The classes in both systems are but so many
mental pigeon-holes for the orderly arrangement and partitioning of
the various infractions of the law; further than this they cannot help
us.
Whatever other information the inquirer may want, he must obtain for
himself; if he wish to learn from the crimes something as to their
causes, as well as the nature of the criminals, he must begin _de
novo_, and, using the official facts, but rejecting the official system
of classification, proceed to arrange all the several offences into two
classes, according as they are of a professional and casual character,
committed by habitual or occasional offenders. Adopting this principle,
it will be found that the _non-professional_ crimes consist mainly of
murder, assaults, incendiarism, ravishment, bigamy, embezzlement, high
treason, and the like; for it is evident that none can make a trade or
profession of the commission of these crimes, or resort to them as a
regular means of living[11].
The _professional_ crimes, on the other hand, will be generally found
to include burglary, robbery, poaching, coining, smuggling, working of
illicit stills, larceny from the person, simple larceny, &c., because
each and every of these are regular crafts, requiring almost the same
apprenticeship as any other mode of life. Burglary, coining, working
illicit stills, and picking pockets, are all _arts_ to which no man,
without some previous training, can take. Hence to know whether the
number of these dishonest _handicrafts_--for such they really are--be
annually on the increase or not, is to solve a most important portion
of the criminal problem; it is to ascertain whether crime pursued as
a profession or business, is being augmented among us--to discover
whether the criminal class, as a distinct portion of our people is, or
is not, on the advance. The non-professional crimes will furnish us
with equally curious results, showing a yearly impress of the character
of the times; for being only occasional offences, of course the number
of such offenders at different years will give us a knowledge of the
intensity of the several occasions inducing the crimes in such years.
The accidental crimes, classified according to their causes, may be
said to consist of--
I. Crimes of malice, exercised either against the person or the
property of the object.
II. Crimes of lust and perverted appetites; as rape, &c.
III. Crimes of shame; as concealing the births of infants, attempts to
procure miscarriage, and the like.
IV. Crimes of temptation, } with, or without
V. Crimes of cupidity, } breach of
VI. Crimes of want, } trust.
VII. Crimes of political prejudices.
With the class of casual or accidental criminals, however, we are not
at present concerned. Those who resort to crime as a means of support,
when in a state of extreme want, for instance, cannot be said to belong
to the _voluntary_ non-workers, for many of these would willingly work
to increase their sustenance, if that end were attainable by such
means, but the poor shirt-workers, slop-tailors, and the like, have not
the power of earning more than the barest subsistence by their labour,
so that the pawning of the work entrusted to them by their employers,
becomes an act to which they are immediately impelled for “dear life,”
on the occurrence of the least illness or mishap among them. Such
_offenders_, therefore, belong more properly to those who cannot work
for their living, or rather, who cannot live by their working, and
though they offend against the laws in the same manner as those that
will not work, they cannot certainly be said to be of the same class.
The _voluntary_ non-workers are a distinct body of people. In the
introductory chapter to the first volume of the “Street-folk,” they
have been shown to appertain to even the rudest nations, being
as it were the human parasites of every civilized and barbarous
community. The Hottentots have their “_Sonquas_,” and the Kafirs their
“_Fingoes_,” as we have our “Prigs” and “Cadgers.” Those who will not
work for the food they consume, appear to be part and parcel of a
State--an essential element of the social fabric as much as those who
cannot, or need not work for their living. Go where you will, to what
corner of the earth you please, search out or propound what new-fangled
or obsolete form of society you may, there will be some members of it
more apathetic than the rest, who object to work--some more infirm
than the rest, who are denied the power to work--and some more thrifty
than the rest, who from their past savings have no necessity to work
for the future. These several forms are but the necessary consequences
of specific differences in the constitution of different beings.
Circumstances may tend to give an unnatural development to either one
or other of the classes; the criminal class, the pauper class, or the
wealthy class, may be in excess in one form of society, as compared
with another, or they may be repressed by certain social arrangements;
nevertheless, to a greater or less degree, there they will and _must_
ever be.
Since, then, there _is_ an essentially distinct class of people who
_will_ not work for their living, and since work is a necessary
condition of the human organism, the question becomes, How do such
people live? There is but one answer:--If they do not labour to procure
their own food, of course they must live on the food procured by
the labour of others. But how do they obtain possession of the food
belonging to others? There are but two means: it must either be given
to them by, or be taken from, the industrious portion of the community.
Consequently, the next point to be settled is, what are the means by
which those who _object_ to work get their food given to them, and what
the means by which they are enabled to take it from others. Let us
begin with the last mentioned.
The means by which the criminal classes obtain their living constitute
the essential points of difference among them, and form indeed
the methods of distinction among themselves. The “Rampsmen,” the
“Drummers,” the “Mobsmen,” the “Sneaksmen,” and the “Shofulmen,”[12]
which are the terms by which they themselves designate the several
branches of the “profession,” are but so many expressions indicating
the several modes of obtaining the property of which they become
possessed.
The “_Rampsman_” or “_Cracksman_” plunders by force; as the burglar,
footpad, &c.
The “_Drummer_” plunders by stupefaction; as the “hocusser.”
The “_Mobsman_” plunders by manual dexterity; as the pickpocket.
The “_Sneaksman_” plunders by stealth; as the petty-larceny men and
boys.
The “_Shofulman_” plunders by counterfeits; as the coiner.
Now each and all of these are distinct species of the genus, having
often little or no connection with the others. The “Cracksman,” or
housebreaker, would no more think of associating with the “Sneaksman”
than a barrister would dream of sitting down to dinner with an
attorney; the perils braved by the housebreaker or the footpad make
the cowardice of the sneaksman contemptible to him; and the one is
distinguished by a kind of bulldog insensibility to danger, while the
other is marked by a low cat-like cunning. The “Mobsman,” on the other
hand, is more of a handicraftsman than either, and is comparatively
refined by the society he is obliged to keep. He usually dresses in the
same elaborate style of fashion as a Jew on a Saturday (in which case
he is more particularly described by the prefix “swell”), and “mixes”
generally in the “best of company,” frequenting--for the purposes of
his business--all the places of public entertainment, and often being
a regular attendant at church and the more elegant chapels, especially
during charity sermons. The Mobsman takes his name from the gregarious
habits of the class to which he belongs, it being necessary, for the
successful picking of pockets, that the work be done in small gangs or
mobs, so as to “cover” the operator. Among the Sneaksmen, again, the
purloiners of animals, such as the horse stealers, the sheep stealers,
the deer stealers, and the poachers, all belong to a particular tribe
(with the exception of the dog stealers)--they are agricultural
thieves; whereas the others are generally of a more civic character.
The Shofulmen, or coiners, moreover constitute a distinct species, and
upon them, like the others, is impressed the stamp of the peculiar line
of roguery they may chance to follow as a means of subsistence.
Such are the more salient features of that portion of the voluntary
non-workers who live by _taking_ what they want from others. The other
moiety of the same class who live by getting what they want _given_ to
them, is equally peculiar. These consist of the “Flatcatchers,” the
“Hunter” and “Charley[13] Pitchers,” the “Bouncers” and “Besters,” the
“Cadgers,” the Vagrants, and the Prostitutes.
The “_Flatcatchers_” obtain what they want by false pretences; as
swindlers, duffers, ring droppers, and cheats of all kinds.
The “_Hunter_” and “_Charley Pitchers_” obtain what they want by
gaming; as thimblerig men, &c.
The “_Bouncers_” and “_Besters_” obtain what they want by betting,
intimidating, or talking people out of their property.
The “_Cadgers_” obtain what they want by begging, and exciting false
sympathy.
The _Vagrants_ obtain what they want by declaring on the casual ward
of the parish workhouse.
The _Prostitutes_ obtain what they want by the performance of an
immoral act.
Each of these, again, are unmistakeably distinguished from the rest.
The “Flatcatchers” are generally remarkable for great shrewdness,
especially in the knowledge of human character and ingenuity in
designing and carrying out their several schemes. The “Charley
Pitchers” appertain more to the conjuring or sleight-of-hand and
blackleg class. The “Cadgers,” again, are to the class of cheats what
the “Sneaksmen” are to the thieves, the lowest of all, being the least
distinguished for those characteristics which mark the other members
of the same body. As the “Sneaksmen” are the least daring and expert
of all the thieves, so are the “Cadgers” the least intellectual and
cunning of all the cheats. A “shallow cove,” that is to say, one who
exhibits himself half naked in the streets as a means of obtaining his
living, is looked upon as the most despicable of all, since the act
requires neither courage, intellect, nor dexterity for the execution
of it. The Vagrants, on the other hand, are the wanderers--the English
Bedouins--those who, in their own words, “love to shake a free
leg”--the thoughtless and the careless vagabonds of our race; while the
Prostitutes, as a body, are the shameless among our women.
Such, then, are the characters of the voluntary non-workers, or
professionally criminal class, the vagrants, beggars, cheats, thieves,
and prostitutes--each order expressing some different mode of existence
adopted by those who object to labour for their living. The vagrants,
who love a roving life, exist principally by declaring on the parish
funds for the time being; the beggars, as deficient in courage and
intellect as in pride, prefer to live by soliciting alms of the public;
the cheats, possessed of considerable cunning and ingenuity, choose
rather to subsist by continual fraud and deception; the thieves,
distinguished generally by a hardihood and comparative disregard
of danger, find greater delight in risking their liberty by taking
what they want, instead of waiting to have it given them; while the
prostitutes, as deficient in shame as the beggars are in pride, prefer
to live by using their charms for the vilest of purposes.
The exposition of the _causes_ why the several species of voluntary
non-workers object to labour for their living, I shall reserve for a
future occasion; that they do _object_ to work is patent in the fact
that they might sustain themselves by their industry if they chose
(for those who are unable to do so, and are consequently driven to
dishonesty, have been purposely removed from the class).
The number of individuals belonging to the professional criminal class,
we are not yet in a position to ascertain; but few dependable facts
have been collected on the subject, and even these have been obtained
so many years back that, with the increase of population, they have
become almost worthless, except in a historic point of view. Such as
they are, however, it will be as well to add them to this introduction
to the class of voluntary non-workers, as the best information at
present existing upon the subject.
TABLE SHOWING THE NUMBER OF DEPREDATORS, OFFENDERS, AND SUSPECTED
PERSONS WHO HAVE BEEN BROUGHT WITHIN THE COGNIZANCE OF THE POLICE IN
THE YEAR 1837, COMPREHENDING:--
1. Persons who have no visible means of subsistence, and who are
believed to live wholly by violation of the law, as by habitual
depredation, by fraud, by prostitution, &c.
2. Persons following some ostensible and legal occupation, but who are
known to have committed an offence, and are believed to augment their
gains by habitual or occasional violation of the law.
3. Persons not known to have committed any offences, but known as
associates of the above classes, and otherwise deemed to be suspicious
characters.
--------------------------------------------------------+--------------------------------------
| Metropolitan Police District.
Character and description of Offenders. +--------+--------+-------+------------
| 1st | 2nd | 3rd | Total
| Class. | Class. | Class.|all Classes.
--------------------------------------------------------+--------+--------+-------+------------
{ Burglars | 77 | 22 | 8 | 107
RAMPSMEN[14] { Housebreakers | 59 | 17 | 34 | 110
{ Highway robbers | 19 | 8 | 11 | 38
|---- 155|--- 47|--- 53|---- 255
| | | |
MOBSMEN Pickpockets | 544| 75| 154| 773
| | | |
SNEAKSMEN Common thieves | 1667| 1338 652| 3657
| | | |
{ Horse stealers | 7 | 4 | | 11
ANIMAL STEALERS { Cattle stealers | | | |
{ Dog stealers | 45 | 48 | 48| 141
|---- 52|--- 52| |---- 152
| | | |
{ [15]Forgers | | 3 | | 3
SHOFULMEN { [15]Coiners | 25 | 1 | 2 | 28
{ Utterers of base coin | 202 | 54 | 61 | 317
|---- 227|--- 58|--- 63|---- 348
| | | |
{ [15]Obtainers of goods by false pretences| 33 |108 | | 141
FLATCATCHERS { [15]Persons committing frauds of any | | | |
{ other description | 23 |118 | 41| 182
|---- 56|--- 226| |---- 323
| | | |
Receivers of stolen goods | 51| 158| 134| 343
| | | |
[15]Habitual disturbers of the public | | | |
peace | 723| 1866| 179| 2768
| | | |
Vagrants | 1089| 186| 20| 1295
| | | |
CADGERS { [15]Begging-letter writers | 12 | 17 | 21 | 50
{ Bearers of begging-letters | 22 | 40 | 24 | 86
|---- 34|--- 57|--- 45|---- 136
| | | |
{ [15]Prostitutes, well-dressed, living in | | | |
{ brothels | 813 | 62 | 20 | 895
PROSTITUTES {[15]Prostitutes, well-dressed, walking the| | | |
{ streets |1460 | 79 | 73 |1612
{ Prostitutes, low, infesting low | | | |
neighbourhoods |3533 |147 |184 |3864
|----5806|--- 288|--- 277|---- 6371
| | | |
[15]Classes not before enumerated | 40| 2| 438| 470
| | | |
Total | 10,444| 4353| 2104| 16,901
--------------------------------------------------------+--------+--------+-------+-----------
The estimate made for five of the principal provincial towns in the
same year was as follows:--
TABLE SHOWING THE NUMBER OF DEPREDATORS, OFFENDERS, AND SUSPECTED
PERSONS BROUGHT WITHIN THE COGNIZANCE OF THE POLICE OF THE
UNDERMENTIONED DISTRICTS, IN THE YEAR 1837.
-------------------------------------+-----------------------------------+----------+-----------
| | |
| Number of Depredators, Offenders, | | Proportion
| and Suspected Persons. | Average | of
District or Place. | | Length | known bad
+--------+--------+--------+--------+ of | Characters
| 1st | 2nd | 3rd | | Career. | to the
| Class. | Class. | Class. | Total. | |Population.
-------------------------------------+--------+--------+--------+--------+----------+-----------
Metropolitan Police District | 10,444 | 4353 | 2104 | 16,901 | 4 yrs. | 1 in 89
Borough of Liverpool | 3,580 | 916 | 215 | 4,711 | ...... | 1 in 45
City and County of Bristol | 1,935 | 1190 | 356 | 3,481 | ...... | 1 in 31
City of Bath | 284 | 470 | 847 | 1,601 | ...... | 1 in 37
Town and County of Newcastle-on-Tyne | 1,730 | 222 | 62 | 2,014 |2-1/4 yrs.| 1 in 27
+--------+--------+--------+--------+ |
Total | 17,973 | 7151 | 3584 | 28,708 | |
-------------------------------------+--------+--------+--------+--------+----------+-----------
By the above table it will be seen that, in 1837, there were 28,708
persons of known bad character, infesting five of the principal towns
in England: nearly 18,000 of the entire number had no visible means of
subsistence, and were believed to live wholly by depredation; 7000 were
believed to augment their gains by habitual or occasional violation
of the law; and 3500 were known to be associates of the others, and
otherwise deemed suspicious characters. According to the average
proportion of these persons to the population, there would have been
in the other large towns nearly 32,000 persons of a similar class, and
upwards of 69,000 of such persons dispersed throughout the rest of the
country. Adding these together, we have as many as 130,000 individuals
of known bad character in England and Wales, _without_ the walls of the
prisons.
To form an accurate notion of the total number of the criminal
population at the above period, we must add to the preceding amount the
number of persons resident _within_ the walls of the prisons. These, at
the time of taking the last census, amounted to 19,888, which, added
to the 130,000 above enumerated, gives within a fraction of 150,000
individuals for the entire criminal population of the country, as known
to the police in 1837.
Let us now, for a moment, turn our attention to the number and cost of
the honest and dishonest poor throughout England and Wales. Mr. Porter,
usually no mean authority upon all matters of a statistical nature,
tells us, in his “Progress of the Nation,” p. 530, that “the proportion
of persons in the United Kingdom who pass their time without applying
to any gainful occupation is quite _inconsiderable!_ Of 5,800,000
males of 20 years and upwards living at the time of the census of 1831,
there were said to be engaged in some calling or profession 5,450,000,
thus leaving unemployed only 350,000, or rather less than six per
cent.” “The number of unemployed adult males in Great Britain in 1841,”
he afterwards informs us, “was only 274,000 and odd.”
But this statement gives us no accurate idea of the number of persons
subsisting by charity or crime, for the author of the “Progress of
the Nation,” strange to say, wholly excludes from his calculation the
mass of individuals maintained by the several parishes, as well as
the criminals, almspeople, and lunatics throughout the country! Now,
according to the Report of the Poor-law Commissioners, the number of
paupers receiving in and out-door relief, in 1848, was no less than
1,870,000 and odd. The number of criminals and suspicious characters
throughout the country, in 1837, we have seen, was 150,000. In 1844 the
number of lunatics in county asylums was 4000 and odd; while, according
to the occupation abstract of the population returns there were in 1841
upwards of 5000 almspeople, 1000 beggars, and 21,000 pensioners. These,
formed into one sum, give us no less than 2,000,000 of individuals
living upon the income of the remainder of the population. By the above
computation, therefore, we see that, out of a total of 16,000,000
souls, in England and Wales, one-eighth, or twelve per cent. of the
whole, continue their existence either by pauperism, mendicancy, or
crime.
Now, the cost of this immense mass of vice and want is even more
appalling than the number of individuals subsisting in such utter
degradation. The total amount of money levied in 1848 for the
relief of the poor throughout England and Wales, was 7,400,000_l._
But, exclusive of this amount, the magnitude of the sum that we give
voluntarily towards the support and education of the poorer classes,
is unparalleled in the history of any other nation, or of any other
time. According to the summary of the returns annexed to the voluminous
reports of the Charity Commissioners, the rent of the land and other
fixed property, together with the interest of the money left for
charitable purposes in England and Wales, amounts to 1,200,000_l._
a year; and it is believed that, by proper management, this return
might be increased to an annual income of at least two millions of
money. “And yet,” says Mr. MʻCulloch, “there can be no doubt that
even this large sum falls far below the amount expended every year in
voluntary donations to charitable establishments. Nor can any estimate
be formed,” he adds, “of the money given in charity to individuals,
but in the aggregate it cannot fail to amount to an immense sum.” All
things considered, therefore, we cannot be very far from the truth, if
we assume the sums _voluntarily_ subscribed towards the relief of the
poor to equal, in the aggregate, the total amount raised by assessment
for the same purpose (the income from voluntary subscriptions to the
_metropolitan_ charities alone equals 1,000,000_l._ and odd); so that
it would appear that the well-to-do amongst us expend the vast sum
of 15,000,000_l._ per annum in mitigating the miseries of their less
fortunate brethren.
But though it may be said that we give altogether 15,000,000_l._ a
year to alleviate the distress of those who want or suffer, we must
remember that this vast sum expresses not only the liberal extent of
our sympathy, but likewise the fearful amount of want and suffering,
on the one hand, and of excess and luxury on the other, that there
must be in the land. If the poorer classes require fifteen millions to
be added in charity every year to their aggregate income in order to
relieve their pains and privations, and the richer can afford to have
the same immense sum taken from theirs, and yet scarcely feel the loss,
it shows at once how much the one class must have in excess and the
other in deficiency. Whether such a state of things is a necessary evil
connected with the distribution of wealth, this is not the place for me
to argue. All I have to do here is to draw attention to the fact. It is
for others to lay bare the cause, and, if possible, discover the remedy.
There still remains, however, to be added to the sum expended in
voluntary or compulsory relief of the poor, the cost of our criminal
and convict establishments at home and abroad. This, according to the
Government estimates, amounts to very nearly 1,000,000_l._; then there
is the value of the property appropriated by the 150,000 habitual
criminals, and this, at 10_s._ a week per head, amounts to very nearly
4,000,000_l._; so that, adding these items to the sum before-mentioned,
we have, in round numbers, the enormous amount of 20,000,000_l._
per annum as the cost of the paupers and criminals of this country;
and, reckoning the national income, with Mr. MʻCulloch and others,
at 350,000,000_l._, it follows that the country has to give upwards
of five per cent. out of its gross earnings every year to support
those who are either incapable or unwilling to obtain a living for
themselves.
OF THE PROSTITUTE CLASS GENERALLY.
We have now seen that the two modes of obtaining a living other than
by working for it are, by forcibly or stealthily appropriating the
proceeds of another’s labour, or else by seducing the more industrious
or thrifty to part with a portion of their gains. Prostitution,
professionally resorted to, belongs to the latter class, and consists,
when adopted as a means of subsistence without labour, in inducing
others, by the performance of some immoral act, to render up a portion
of their possessions. Literally construed, prostitution is the
putting of anything to a vile use; in this sense perjury is a species
of prostitution, being an unworthy use of the faculty of speech;
so, again, bribery is a prostitution of the right of voting; while
prostitution, specially so called, is the using of her charms by a
woman for immoral purposes. This, of course, may be done either from
mercenary or voluptuous motives; be the cause, however, what it may,
the act remains the same, and consists in the base perversion of a
woman’s charms--the surrendering of her virtue to criminal indulgence.
Prostitution has been defined to be the illicit intercourse of the
sexes; but illicit is unlicensed, and the mere sanctioning of an
immoral act could not dignify it into a moral one. Such a definition
would make the criminality of the act to consist solely in the absence
of the priest’s licence.
In Persia there are no professional prostitutes permitted; but though
the priest’s sanction there precedes the surrendering of the woman’s
virtue in every instance, still the same immoral perversion takes
place--it being customary for couples to be wedded for a small sum by
the priest in the evening, and divorced by him, for an equally small
sum, in the morning. Here, then, we find the licensed intercourse
assuming the same immoral cast as the unlicensed; for surely none
will maintain that these nuptial ephemeræ are sanctified, because
accompanied with a priestly licence. Nor can we, on the other hand,
assert that the mere fact of continence in the association of the
sexes, the persistence of the female to one male, or the continued
endurance of an unsanctioned attachment, can ever be raised into
anything purer than cohabitation, or the chastity of unchastity.
Prostitution, then, does not consist solely in promiscuous intercourse,
for she who confines her favours to one may still be a prostitute; nor
does it consist in illicit or unsanctioned intercourse, for, as we have
seen, the intercourse may be sanctioned and still be prostitution to
all intents and purposes. Nor can it be said to consist solely in the
mercenary motives so often prompting to the commission of the act; for
fornication is expressly that form of prostitution which is the result
of illicit attachment.
In what, then, it may be asked, _does_ prostitution consist? It
consists, I answer, in what the word literally expresses--putting
a woman’s charms to vile uses. The term _whore_ has, strictly, the
same signification as that of _prostitute_; though usually supposed
to be from the Saxon verb _hyrian_, to hire, and, consequently, to
mean a woman whose favours can be procured for a reward. But the
Saxon substantive _hure_, is the same word as the first syllable of
_hor-cwen_, which signifies literally a filthy quean, a _har_-lot.
Now the term _hor_, in _hor-cwen_, is but another form of the Saxon
adjective _horig_, filthy, dirty, the Latin equivalent of which is
_sor_-didus; hence the substantive _horines_ means filthiness, and
_horingas_, adulterers (or filthy people), and _hornung_, adultery,
fornication, whoredom (or filthy acts). Prostitution and whoredom,
then, have both the same meaning, viz., perversion to vile or _filthy_
uses; and consist in the surrendering of a woman’s virtue in a manner
that excites _our moral disgust_. The offensiveness of the act of
unchastity to the moral taste or sense constitutes the very essence
of prostitution; and it is this moral offensiveness which often makes
the licensed intercourse of the sexes, as in the marriage of a young
girl to an old man, for the sake of his money, as much an act of
prostitution as even the grossest libertinism.
The next question consequently becomes, what are the invariable
antecedents which excite the moral disgust in every act of
prostitution? or are there any such invariable antecedents
characterizing each offensive perversion of a woman’s charms? Is the
offensiveness a mere matter of taste, differing according as the moral
palates of the individuals or races may differ one from the other, and
ultimately referable to some peculiar form of organization, convention,
fashion, or geography? or is it a part of the inherent constitution of
things?--in a word, is there an abstract chastity and unchastity; an
erotic τὸ καλὸν and τὸ κακὸν; an universal standard of moral beauty and
ugliness in woman--that, go where you will, is the same to all natures
and in all countries? or is the vice of one set of people the virtue of
another, as this race admires white teeth and that black?
This is a matter lying, as it were, across the very threshold of the
subject, and which must necessarily, according as one or other view
be taken, give a wholly different cast, not only to all our thoughts
in connection with the evil, but to all our plans for the remedy of
it. If prostitution be loathsome to us, merely because it is the moral
fashion of our people that it should be so, then by popularizing new
forms of thought and feeling among us may we remove all opprobrium from
the act, and so put an end to all the moral evil in connection with it;
but if it be naturally and innately offensive to every healthy mind,
then can it be remedied solely by improving the tone of the thoughts
and feelings of the depraved, and restoring the lost moral sense, as
well as directing the perverted taste to more wholesome and beautiful
objects.
To solve this part of the problem, then, it will be necessary that
we should take as comprehensive a view of the subject as possible,
collecting a large and multifarious body of facts, and examining
the matter from almost every conceivable point of view. It will be
necessary that we should regard it by the light of the early ages of
society--that we should contemplate it amid all the primitive rudeness
of barbaric life--and ultimately that we should study it under the many
varied phases that it assumes in civilized communities.
For the better performance of this task I have availed myself of the
services and assistance of my friend, Mr. Horace St. John, whom I shall
now leave to lay before the reader the many curious and interesting
facts which he has collected at my request in connection with the
ancient and foreign part of the subject, after which I shall return to
the consideration of that branch of the general inquiry connected more
immediately with the prostitution of this country.
OF PROSTITUTION IN ANCIENT STATES: GENERAL VIEW.
In the following inquiry, though the chief object will be to ascertain
the extent and character of the prostitute class of women, it will be
necessary to indicate generally the condition of the sex in various
ages, and among different nations. This will afford a comparative view
of the subject. It is impossible to form a judgment on the condition
of this class, and its influence on society, without learning in what
degree of estimation morality is viewed by a people; what position in
the social scale is occupied by their women; at what price chastity
is held; and what are the relative stations of the sexes. To afford
a correct idea of this, in plain, popular language, is the task to
which we now apply ourselves; and we commence with the ancient states
whose institutions have, in a greater or less degree, influenced those
of all others, in every later age. It is necessary to maintain a
distinction between those countries where marriage was an institution,
and those--if they are not quite fabulous--at least savage communities
where the intercourse of men with women is looser than that of beasts.
Far as we can trace the history of society we discover no state without
the blemish of prostitution. In some it was more, in others less
prevalent; but in all it existed in one form or another. In examining
the manners of the ancient nations, Hebrews, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans,
Celts, and Anglo Saxons, we find women who degraded themselves from
vanity, lust, or for gain; and, among the old communities of the East,
less known to us, public immorality was a characteristic. We shall
show this to have been the case, and, basing our statements on the
most creditable authority, indicate the principal features of each
system. The information, it is true, which has been bequeathed to us,
and elucidated by the learning and diligence of numerous scholars, is
far from complete; but enough may be collected among the antiquities
of Israel, Greece, Rome, and Egypt, to establish a fair opinion. The
general design of this inquiry will be to draw a view of the position
occupied by the female sex in different ages and countries, to measure
the estimation in which it was held, to fix the accepted standard of
morality, to ascertain the recognised significance of the marriage
contract, the laws relating to polygamy and concubinage, the value
at which feminine virtue and modesty were held, and thus to consider
the prostitute in relation to the system of which she formed a part.
_She_ will be the particular object of investigation; but the others
are by no means unimportant. They are, indeed, necessary to a just and
comprehensive view of the question before us. In a society where men
lived in brutal promiscuousness with the women, prostitution could
scarcely exist; where chastity was lightly esteemed, and marriage
held to be a loose contract for social purposes, adultery could
hardly be very full of shame. In this, therefore, as in all other
inquiries, it is necessary to view the actual object in relation to
others which are invariably connected with it. There is no universal,
unvarying standard, by which even prostitution can be measured.
Circumstances, not belonging, yet not entirely foreign to it, are to
be considered. Consequently, while we hold that in view as the main
ground of research, we shall, where materials allow, draw a sketch of
the situation occupied by the female sex, and of the other traits of
civilization to which we have referred.
In a general view, Greece and Rome, with the great city of Babylon,
stand most prominently forward with their system of prostitution.
Closer inquiry, however, induces us to hesitate before assigning
them that distinction. Of the two classical states especially, it is
because our information is more immediate and complete, that their
public immorality is more remarkable. The poets of the earlier, and
the historians of the later, period, have transmitted to us numerous
accounts of the manners and customs of Greece and Rome; their painters
have left us views,--their architects and sculptors, monuments of
their civilization. Their moralists and satirists have enlarged on the
prevalent vices, and from all these sources we are enabled to derive
clearer ideas of their women, and especially their prostitution.
Besides, in a polished state, with pure manners the prostitute class
will always be more distinct, and therefore more conspicuous.
Babylon, far more than a thousand years ago, was a proverb of
immorality. Her name and the name of Whore have been associated ideas,
not on account only of the idolatry practised by her people, but on
account of their licentious manners. Concerning Egypt, though Diodorus
and Herodotus wrote of it, little is known; of the marriage ceremony
absolutely nothing. The prostitutes are not described; but, from every
trace and record of their civilization which has been preserved, it
is evident that a large class addicted itself to this calling. Who
were the public musicians, disreputable in the eyes of all other
persons?--who were the dancers who performed their wanton feats at the
entertainments of the rich, and stripped themselves half, or entirely,
naked before their couches?--who were the drunken women, who bared
their bodies, and capered in that state on the Nile boats, during the
festival of Bubastis?--who were they who assisted at the sacerdotal
orgies, which defiled the temples of ancient Egypt?--who could they
have been, but women of abandoned character, who prostituted themselves
for vile purposes, for gain or pleasure?
Among the Jews, again, the continually reiterated allusions to harlots,
in the Scriptures, the abominations perpetually charged to their
account, the threats pronounced upon their wickedness, the frequent
allusions to their licentious manners, indicate a wide prevalence of
this system. Among a people so commonly guilty of nameless crimes,
we cannot expect to find chastity a peculiar virtue. Indeed, it is
seldom such vices are practised until all the inferior offences against
decency have become insipid through satiety. The writers, therefore,
who parade before us the civilization of the Jews, as an example of
public morality, base their conclusions on a strange interpretation of
facts. To contrast them with the manners of Attic Greece, is a pure
satire on common sense. Sparta was licentious, but not in the low and
gross manner of the Jews. Athens harboured a licentious class; but none
like those bestial voluptuaries among the Hebrews, in whom lust became
a loathsome passion. Although, therefore, the actual manners of ancient
Israel have been less vividly described than those of Greece, it is
evident from the tenour of Scripture history, that morality there was
less pure than in the Attic state.
Rome, under the republic, was, perhaps, still farther removed from
the charge of corruption. Prostitutes it had, and brothels; but its
women were generally virtuous. The chastity of the Roman matron has
passed into a proverb. It was, however, if we may credit the historian
Tacitus, exceeded by the modesty of the women in ancient Germany. Among
them morals appear purged of licentiousness. Polygamy was forbidden,
and practised only by the petty kings who set themselves above the law.
The manners of the people, rather than the enactments of their code,
prohibited divorce. Adultery, rare as it was, ranked as an inexpiable
crime; while seduction was condemned, and prostitution unknown. It was
not, however, the severity of the law which enforced the virtue; it
was the virtue that imparted its spirit to the law. From the morals
of ancient Germany, the lawgivers of society might learn many useful
lessons. Bars and bolts, multiplied walls, troops of eunuchs, jealous
lattices, and the dread of punishment, failed to guard the harems of
the East; while the hut of the German barbarian, open on all sides,
was impregnable against the seducer. The poor toy of the Persian’s
seraglio, protected by a hundred devices, often eluded them all; but
the German women were the guardians of their own honour. They may be
described as possessing all the virtues, without the vices, of the
stern Spartan stock; and, living on terms of equality with the men,
held their virtue at too dear a price to prostitute it for admiration,
or lust, or money. Civilization, in this respect, has done the Germans
a very ill office.
Allied to these fierce wanderers in the Hyrcynian wood were the Saxons,
from whom our ancestors descended. We shall find among them, on their
native soil, similar manners, especially in the circumstance of the
adulteress being whipped without mercy through the village. Among
them prevailed, however, an enlightened reverence for the female sex,
which contrasted strongly with the ideas of many surrounding nations,
who looked on a woman as a creature merely dedicated to the service
and gratification of man. They brought over to England institutions
susceptible of being moulded to a different form. They became more
refined and less moral. Whenever, indeed, rude men, who have not given
themselves up to the indulgence of their low physical appetites, turn
from the chase, from war, and similar rough occupations, to the framing
of laws, to the formation of society, to any intellectual exercise, it
appears natural that other propensities should be awakened in them,
and of these the sensual always form a part. It is, consequently,
interesting to study the progress of manners from stage to stage of
civilization, from the rudest tribe to the most refined community.
We shall occupy ourselves first with the Hebrew republic, and then
with the monarchy which succeeded it. From Israel we proceed to Egypt,
related to it in various ways. Thence our attention will be directed
to Greece, which offered models to the statesmen and public economists
of all time. The contrast between the Ionic and the Doric states will
be presented. Then we shall proceed to Rome, which will lead us to the
Anglo-Saxons, others being incidentally noticed by the way.
In all, as far as our limits and our materials will allow, a sketch
of the condition of women, the national ideas of feminine virtue,
the laws of marriage, and the extent of prostitution, will be given;
and thus the reader will be prepared to enter on the wider field of
modern society abroad. This will be divided into the barbarous and the
civilized; and of the barbarous, the hunters, fishers, shepherds, and
tillers of the soil, may be separately noticed.
The account of every ancient people will not be equally complete,
because the sources of information are not so. Thus of Egypt, its
marriage-customs are wholly unknown; of the Anglo-Saxons, although the
learning and industry of Sharon Turner have been employed upon them,
our knowledge is extremely imperfect. Even Rome and Greece, though
they present us with the general features of their social systems,
disappoint us when we search into details. Nevertheless, the reader
may be enabled, as we have before said, to form a just idea of the
condition of women in antiquity; for the researches of modern scholars
have succeeded, at least, in laying bare the principal roots of the
ancient system, upon which all the institutions of existing society
are, in one form or another, established.
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG THE JEWS AND OTHER ANCIENT NATIONS.
A slight and rapid view of the subject in connection with the Jews, and
more obscure nations of antiquity, is all that can here be attempted.
With reference to the republic of the Hebrew race, though the ingenuity
of modern writers has built up very pleasing theories, described as the
manners and customs of the Jews, we can look nowhere for information
except to the Bible, and, in a later age, to Josephus.
The position of woman among the Jews was by no means exalted. She was
seldom consulted by her friends, when an union with her was desired
by a wealthy suitor. Indeed, in the patriarchal times she was regarded
more as her husband’s property than as his companion. Such must
invariably be the case where polygamy and concubinage are institutions
of society. At a still earlier period the customs of society were even
more at variance with our ideas. Of course the sons of Adam must have
married their sisters, and the practice continued after the necessity
for it had ceased. Abraham formed such an union without exciting
surprise. The patriarchs permitted men to wed two sisters at once,
but the law of Moses brought a reform of marriage customs among the
Jews[16]. They discontinued the intercourse between blood-relatives
long before it was abandoned by the surrounding nations. Marriages
with sisters not by the same mother were forbidden in the Mosaic code.
Previously, however, none were unlawful except those of a man with his
mother, or mother-in-law, or full sister. In the new dispensation the
widow of a deceased brother was placed within the prohibited degree of
consanguinity.
The laws against adultery were severe; death was ordained for both
the guilty persons, and the punishment appears always to have been by
stoning. Many victims, doubtless, perished under this cruel code; but
the example of Jesus Christ gave a new lesson to mankind. The woman was
brought before him, and the Jews claimed her condemnation. They asked
him “should she be stoned.” Had he said no, they might have charged
him with favouring adultery, and denying the Mosaic law; had he said
yes, the Romans might have impeached him, for they had assumed the
distribution of justice, and abolished the punishment of death for
adultery. But he evaded their malice, and gave the law of mercy. “Let
him that is without sin among you cast the first stone.” They all went
out, and when he was alone with her he said, “Hath no man condemned
thee?” She answered, “No man, Lord.” And he again said, “_Neither do I
condemn thee--go, and sin no more_.”
That sentence should ever be in remembrance when we frame our moral
code.
Adultery, however, was a crime only to be committed with a married
woman, or one who was betrothed. The man’s marriage placed him under no
obligation to abstain from intercourse with other than his wife. Wives
to the number of four were allowed, while concubinage was unlimited.
The first wife, however, was superior to the others. Jealousy,
therefore, among the Jewish women could not have been a powerful
feeling. Indeed we find strong proofs to the contrary. When Sarah found
herself barren, she gave Hagar, her Egyptian maid, to Abraham, as a
concubine or inferior wife. Other women, frequently, on discovering
themselves to be sterile, begged their husbands to procure another
companion of the bed, that they might not die childless. Similar
instances are common in the social history of the East.
Marriage with an idolater was forbidden; but a man might marry a
proselyte captive. When he saw a beautiful woman among his prisoners
of war, he was to take her home, shave her head, pare her nails,
change her raiment into that of a free person, and as he had _humbled_
her, was forbidden to make merchandise of her again. The possession,
nevertheless, of two wives by a private individual was a rare thing.
Popular feeling was generally averse to it. The personages who most
commonly practised it were the great men and kings, who were most
expressly prohibited. In the Book of Deuteronomy, when the degraded
Israelites had clamoured for a king, the law was given, “Neither
shall he multiply wives to himself, so that his heart turn not away.”
No command was more frequently broken in the palaces of Israel.
David had an immense harem; it seemed to be reckoned among the
regalia. Solomon, who married Pharaoh’s daughter, had seven hundred
wives--princesses--and three hundred concubines; but we find that he
“did evil in the sight of the Lord,” and that “his heart was turned
away.”
Respecting the children born to these parents there was a change in
the law. In _Genesis_ a man was allowed to transfer the inheritance
to a favourite child; but, probably from the many flagitious actions
committed, it was in Deuteronomy ordained, that if a man had two wives,
of whom he hated one and loved the other--each bearing a child, the
first-born, whether of the loved or the hated woman, should enjoy the
right of inheritance.
From all the passages in Scripture referring to this subject, it
appears that women among the Jews held but an indifferent position,
being made the subject of barter, and that marriage was not a sacred
but a civil institution,--a legal bond, which might be broken by a
legal act. Matches were usually made by the woman’s kindred, she
herself being a secondary actor in the transaction.
Throughout the Bible, notwithstanding, we find women held by the
inspired writers in great respect, their treatment by the rebellious
Jews, as they sank through various degrees of corruption, being
continually set forth among the abominations practised by that
flagitious people.
In the Scriptures we discover innumerable references to women, and to
prostitutes in particular; but, collecting and comparing them all, we
find for our present purpose materials by no means abundant: there is
no exact information. Prostitutes, we know, existed, and we are told
in what estimation they were held; that they stood at the corners of
streets, that they practised many seductive arts, and sold themselves
at a very cheap rate: but how many they were, how they lived, what was
the nature of their places of resort, we are left uninformed, or guided
only by obscure allusions. Nevertheless, sufficient is known upon which
to base a view of the condition of women, and the extent of morality
among the most ancient nation recognised in history.
In the book of Genesis, whence we obtain our first glimpses of the
social history of mankind, we find interesting, though imperfect,
sketches of a curious state of society. We meet, even so early as
this, with a woman wearing a veil, not taking her meals in company
with men, living in separate apartments, and presenting a model of the
system still prevalent in the East. Simplicity and luxury in strange
combination characterized the manners of that remote age. Their morals
appear to have been at all times gross; and one of the principal tasks
of legislation was to restrain the licentiousness to which the people
were so prone to abandon themselves. Many barbarous races present at
this day social institutions similar to those of the Jews, whence many
writers have traced them to that stock. It is more probable, however,
that similar manners grow out of a similar condition.
Several writers, we know, contend for the purity of manners among the
Jews, and point to the rigid laws which ruled them. The social history
of mankind, however, if it proves anything, proves this, that it is
not by any means the nation with the severest code which is the most
virtuous. Examples of the contrary might be multiplied. No state,
savage or civilized, could ever have more rigorous laws than Achin and
Japan, and nowhere have the people been more flagitious. While the
Draconic code was in force, morals in Greece went to rot. Consequently,
if we are to consider the Jews to have been a moral people, it must
certainly not be on the ground of their severe laws. Arguing from that,
a contrary inference should be drawn. The direct evidence, however,
tends the other way. Chastity appears to have been by no means a
favourite virtue. Not to allude to the unnatural abominations mentioned
in the Bible, it is certain that there existed a considerable class
of public women, who prostituted themselves to any one for a certain
reward.
The story of Tamar is a curious illustration of this subject. To impose
on Judah, and bear a child by him, and in spite of him, she assumes the
habit and appearance of a regular prostitute. She then goes out, and
sitting down by the highway covers her face. Judah thought her to be
a harlot, “because she covered her face,” which, as the commentators
tell us, it was the custom for such women to do, as among the same
class of females in Persia, in mimicry of a shame they did not feel.
Judah speaks to her, and says, “Go to, I pray thee, let me come in unto
thee.” She answers, “What wilt thou give me, that thou mayest come in
unto me!” He promises to give her a kid from his flock, but she demands
a pledge; this he gave, and went with her.
The circumstance is related in a manner which seems to show that the
practice was common with men, nor does any particular disgrace appear
to attach to it. When, however, Judah learns that his daughter-in-law
Tamar is “with child by whoredom,” he condemns her to the punishment of
death by burning, on the secret being at length revealed to him[17].
We have here a singular illustration of manners among the primitive
tribes of that great family of mankind. The corruption of manners
reached, it is probable, a high degree before the laws were given.
Where concubinage was practised, feminine virtue could not be held as
a precious possession. The intercourse accordingly of a married man
with an unmarried woman was esteemed simply as a proof of deficient
chastity. At the same time, the encouragement of prostitution, or
“the feeding of whores,” is denounced as the conduct of foolish
and profligate men, who unwisely waste their substance. The class
of prostitutes was held in very low esteem; they were, in general,
foreigners and heathens, and are spoken of usually as “strange women.”
Delilah, who beguiled Sampson, was probably a Philistine, though it is
not certain that she was not an Israelite. At any rate, there appear
to have been many Jewish women, of the lowest order, who followed this
degrading occupation. To render them as few as possible, a law was
passed forbidding men, under severe penalties, from bringing up their
daughters to prostitution for gain. Legislation, however, could not
entirely restrain the vicious from such a course of life.
Apparently the prostitutes, among the Jews, sometimes obtained
husbands. Priests, however, were forbidden on any account to marry
a harlot, or indeed any woman with even a breath of imputation on
her fame. For the daughter of a priest, who took to the calling of
a prostitute, the punishment was death by burning. For any woman it
was infamous, but in spite of what was laid down in the law, or by
the public opinion of the Jews, cities never wanted prostitutes, and
women walked the streets, or stood in groups at the corners, ready to
entrap the young men who came forth in quest of pleasure. Among the
exhortations of parents to their sons, and of patriarchs to youth, we
always find an injunction to beware of strange women, which implies a
considerable prevalence of the system. The readers of the Bible will
at once remember the many passages of this kind contained in that
volume[18].
With respect to prostitution among the Jews, an illustration is
afforded by the story of the two mothers who came before Solomon for
judgment. They were _harlots_, though bearing children, and they
said they dwelt in one house, and “there was no stranger with us in
the house.” Another is afforded by the account of the two men whom
Joshua sent out as spies. They came into a harlot’s house at Rabbah--a
brothel, in fact, where, as at Rome in the Imperial age, the woman sat
impudently, without a veil, at the door, and solicited the passers
by. They wore peculiar clothing. In addition to the vile customs of
the East, we find, “Thou shalt not bring into the temple the price of
a whore.” This was to guard against the introduction of a practice
not uncommon among some ancient and modern nations, of the priests
enriching themselves and their temple by hiring out prostitutes[19].
Another state, known to us from Scripture, is Babylon, surnamed the
Whore, as well from its profligacy as its idolatry. The one, indeed,
was accompanied by the other. Luxury and debauch were carried to
the highest excess. The Temple of Venus,--a goddess known there as
Mylitta,--was sacred to prostitution. The priests had, in immemorial
time, invented a law that every woman should once in her life present
herself at the temple, and prostitute her body to any stranger who
might desire it. Consecrated by religion, this act appeared odious to
few of the Babylonian citizens. The woman came, dressed brilliantly,
and crowned with a garland of flowers; she sat down with her companions
in a place where the strangers who filled the galleries might observe
and make choice of their victims. Numbers were found always ready
enough to enjoy the privilege procured for them by the priests. When
a man had selected one of the women who pleased him most, he came
down, and making her a present of money, which she was compelled to
take, took her hand and said, “I implore in thy favour the goddess
Mylitta!” He then led her to a retired spot and consummated the
transaction. Having once entered the temple it was impossible for any
ordinary woman to return home without having prostituted herself.
Nevertheless, the priests allowed some ladies of rank and wealth to
make a bargain for their chastity, which they probably desired to
dispose of more agreeably to their own caprice. These few privileged
persons went through the ceremonies without performing the usual act of
prostitution. At the taking of Babylon by Cyrus, men were found ready
to hire out their daughters and prostitute them for profit, while in
the Alexandrian age men sent their wives to strangers for a sum of
money[20].
Throughout the countries of the East, upon the history of which at that
early period any light has been thrown, we discover the prevalence of
similar customs. The most celebrated appear the most licentious, but
probably only because they have been the most strictly investigated.
The wealthy and luxurious capitals, in which the spoils of great
conquests were piled up, never failed to supply a sufficient number
of abandoned women, supported by the looser sort of men, in various
degrees of position, from penury to splendour. Though circumstances
of time and place, of religion and civilization, imparted peculiar
characteristics to the prostitute class of each age and country, the
general features of the system were invariably the same, and the
prostitutes of Babylon resembled very much the prostitutes of New
Orleans and London. We turn next to ancient Egypt, a country of whose
laws and manners we have had interesting, if not complete, accounts
bequeathed us.
OF PROSTITUTION IN ANCIENT EGYPT.
Turning to ancient Egypt, we find, in the records of that singular
people, little directly bearing on the question before us. Herodotus,
and Diodorus the Sicilian, are almost the sole lights which guide
us in our researches among them. Recently, the labours of a learned
antiquarian have tended to increase our acquaintance with the people
of old Egypt, by translating into language the volumes of information
engraved or painted on the walls of tombs, temples, palaces, and
monuments, so numerous in the cities on the banks of the Nile. We
have thus had broad glimpses of the ancient history, the geography,
population, government, the arts, the industry, and the manners of
that country at that period; but the extent of the prostitute system
has not been touched upon. Nevertheless, as one of the most ancient
civilizations known to history, Egyptian society deserves some
attention, and it is worth while to glance at the general condition of
its women, especially as a few facts throw light on the especial point
of our inquiry.
The position of a woman in ancient Egypt was in some respects
remarkable. Entire mistress of the household, she exercised
considerable influence over her husband, and was not subjected to any
intolerable tyranny. In all countries, however, where concubinage
is allowed, the condition of the sex must be in a degree degraded.
Herodotus tells us that the Egyptians married only one wife, Diodorus
that they married as many as they pleased, the restriction applying
only to the sacerdotal order. The contradiction may be reconciled
by supposing that the former writer described the general practice,
and the latter the permission granted by the law; or, which is more
probable, that he confounded concubinage with polygamy. From frequent
allusions to this system we know it was tolerated. Wise laws, however,
held a check upon the practice. Every child, the fruit of whatever
union, was to be reared by its parents, infanticide being severely
punished. Illegitimacy was a term not recognised. The son of the free,
and the son of the bondwoman, had an equal right to inheritance, the
father alone being referred to, since the mother was viewed as little
more than a nurse to her own offspring. Women in Egypt bore numerous
children, which rendered many concubines a burden too heavy for any but
the wealthy to bear; nevertheless, some did indulge themselves in this
manner, procuring young girls from the slave-merchants who came from
abroad, or captives taken in the field.
In a country where the marriage of brother and sister was allowed,
we might expect to find curious laws relating to the subject before
us. But they were not curious, in any particular degree. Adultery was
punished in the woman by the amputation of her nose, in the man by a
thousand blows with a stick. The wealthier men were extremely jealous,
forcing their wives to go barefooted, that they might not wander in
the streets. Eunuchs, also, were maintained by some. Among classes of
a lower grade, the women enjoyed peculiar freedom, being allowed to
take part in certain public festivals, on which occasions they wore
a transparent veil. Among all sorts and conditions of the sex, the
drinking of wine was permitted, as it was by the Greeks, though not by
the Romans; and ladies are occasionally represented on the monuments,
exhibiting all the evidences of excess.
These observations apply to the respectable female society of ancient
Egypt. There existed, however, another class, nowhere indeed indicated
under the term harlot, or prostitute, but evidently such from the
accounts we have received. If the descriptions transmitted to us of
the ordinary female society be correct, the women to whom we allude
could have been no other than public prostitutes. Such were, in all
probability, those who enlivened the festival of Bubastis, and danced
at the private entertainments. What ideas of decency prevailed among
them, may be imagined from the brief though curious account afforded
by Herodotus. When the time of the festival arrived, men and women
embarked promiscuously, and in great numbers, on board the vessels
which conveyed them up or down the river. During the voyage, they
played on various instruments, and whenever they arrived at a city
moored the boats. Then some of the women, who could have been no
other than the Almé of those days[21], played furiously all kinds of
music, flung off their garments, challenged the women of the town with
gross insulting language, and outraged decency by their gestures and
postures. An immense concourse of people assembled on the occasion,
and a large proportion of them belonged to the female sex. “Some of
them” only, according to our author, took part in the exhibitions of
profligacy we have noticed.
The public dancers and musicians of the female sex were also, in all
probability, members of the sisterhood we allude to. They were, it is
well known, held in extremely low estimation: they were clothed, like
the prostitutes of ancient Greece, in a single light garment; indeed,
from the monuments, it is questionable whether they did not, like
those in the Roman saturnalia of Flora, dance entirely naked at some
of the more dissolute private festivals of the wealthy. At any rate,
their forms are represented so completely undraped, that any garment
they wore must have been a light veil which clung to the skin, and was
transparent. But from what we are told of the festival of Bubastis, it
is by no means improbable that they were actually nude.
In that remote period, fancifully called the age of Sesostris, chastity
does not appear to have been the capital virtue of society among the
Egyptians. At least, we must draw this inference if we are to attach
any significance to traditions or fables, which generally reflect
some phase of truth. Sesostris, it is said, having offended the gods,
was struck blind, and ordered to find a woman who had been strictly
faithful to her husband. He was very long in performing the task, being
furnished with an unerring rule of judgment. Of course the account is
an idle fable, yet it is not altogether unworthy of notice, for it
indicates an opinion as to the chastity of that period[22].
OF PROSTITUTION IN ANCIENT GREECE.
In the heroic ages of Greece, we find women--on the authority, indeed,
of poets, the sole historians of those times--enjoying a considerable
share of liberty, held in much respect, accustomed to self-reliance,
and allowed freely to mingle with others of their own sex and with men.
A modest simplicity of manners is ascribed to them, which is wholly
foreign to modern ideas of refinement. What education they received is
not well known, though they appear to have been trained to practise
many of the useful as well as the elegant arts of life; but with
respect to the morality prevalent among them little exact information
can be gained. As in the Bible, however, frequent allusion is made to
harlots and strange women, waiting at the corners of the streets, so
in the poets of antiquity, passages occur which point to the existence
of a class, dedicating itself to serve, for gain, the passions of
men who could not afford marriage, or would not be bound by its
restrictions. The science of statistics, however, does not seem to have
been cultivated in those days. We are not told with certainty of the
population of cities, or even whole countries, and men were not then
found to calculate how many in a hundred were immoral, or to compare
the prostitute with the honourable classes of women.
With the commencement of the strictly historical age, though
statistics are still wanting, there have been collected materials
from which we may gather fair ideas of the _status_ of women, and the
position and extent of the prostitute class among them. Beginning
with Sparta, a very peculiar system displays itself. Among the
citizens of that celebrated Doric state, women were regarded as
little more than agencies for the production of other citizens. The
handsome bull-stranglers of Lacedæmon held exceedingly lax notions
of morality, and would have considered a delicately chaste woman as
one characterized by a singular natural weakness. Taught to consider
themselves more in their capacity of citizens than of women, their
duty to their husbands, or to their own virtue, occupied always the
second place. Their education inculcated the practice of immorality.
All ideas of modesty were by a deliberate public training obliterated
from their minds. Scourged with the whip when young, taught to wrestle,
box, and race naked before assemblages of men, their wantonness and
licentiousness passed every bound. Marriage, indeed, was an institution
of the state; but no man could call his wife his own. On occasions
when the male population was away in the field, the women complained
that there was no chance of children being born, and young men were
sent back from the camp, to become the husbands of the whole female
population, married and single.
[Illustration: GREEK DANCING-GIRL--HETAIRA: _Age of Socrates_.
[From “_Costume Antico e Moderno_.”--Milan, 1616.]]
In times of peace, also, the public laws gave every woman a chance
of becoming what we should in these days term a public prostitute. A
man without a wife might insist on borrowing for a certain time the
wife of another. Should her husband resist, the law was called in to
enforce the demand. It is asserted, indeed, by some, that adultery was
unknown in Sparta. There was no such offence, in truth, recognised in
the code. It was common, legal, and occurred every day. At the same
time, however, it is to be remembered, that the severe laws of Sparta,
recognising no concessions to the weaker passions of men, allowed these
things only for state purposes, that citizens might be brought forth.
There appears to have been no class of prostitutes gaining a livelihood
by selling their persons to the pleasures of men: the rigorous code of
the state forbade such sensual indulgences. Women were not allowed,
apparently, to walk the streets. The young were strictly watched by the
elders, the elders jealously observed by the young; and any proneness
to a practice subversive of that vigorous health in the population,
considered essential to preserve the manhood of Sparta, would have
been denounced as an attempt to introduce luxury and effeminacy--the
vices, in their eyes, of slaves. To assert that in the whole state no
virtuous women, and no public prostitutes, in our sense of the word,
could be found, would be rash; but it is certain that no authority
which has come down to us represents chastity as a Spartan virtue,
or prostitution for money, or from predilection, one of their social
institutions.
In Athens a wholly different picture is presented. There, and generally
among the Ionians, the duty of the wife was to preserve a chastity as
delicate and pure as any which is required in our strictest social
circle. There, at the same time, the courtezan class existed, and men
of all descriptions and all ages encouraged prostitution, to which a
considerable class of women devoted themselves. This is a complete
contrast with Sparta.
The young girls of Attica were early trained to all the offices of
religion; they acquired considerable knowledge; their intellectual
qualities were to some degree developed: they were educated to become
housekeepers, wives, and mothers, such as we describe under those
heads. Exercising considerable influence over their male relatives,
they possessed consequently considerable weight in the community, and
altogether held a higher position than the women of Sparta. They led
secluded lives, yet they enjoyed many opportunities of intercourse with
the other sex; and though, in their theatres, and in their temples,
indecency of the grossest description was frequently displayed to
their sight, they seem otherwise to have been somewhat refined in this
respect. In Sparta, the virgins never hesitated to expose themselves
naked before any circle of spectators: in Athens they observed at least
the public forms of decorum, and, with the exception of the Hetairæ or
prostitute class, were sufficiently modest in their conversation and in
their behaviour.
Accustomed to be present at public spectacles, to converse with men, to
share in the performance of ceremonies at religious or civic festivals,
the women of Athens occupied a position somewhat approaching that
which we believe is proper to their sex. Marriages, as among us, were
contracted, some from sentiment, others from interest. We are led
to form a high idea of the general morality prevailing in the Attic
states of Greece at an early period, from the exalted view of love, of
chastity, of matronly duties, urged in the writers of the time. This
seems a fair measure to employ, since, in a later age, when morals were
more corrupt, and the regular class of prostitutes might be confounded
with the general society, the style and sentiment of poets and others
formed an exact reflex of the prevailing state of morality.
Traditions point to a period in the social history of Greece, when
men and women dispensed altogether with the ceremony of marriage,
living not only out of wedlock, but promiscuously, without an idea
of any permanent compact between two individuals of opposite sexes.
If such a state of things ever existed, it must have been before any
regular society was formed, and it is therefore vain to dwell upon
it. Polygamy, we know, long continued in practice among the Greeks,
though it was a privilege and a propensity chiefly followed by the
powerful and rich. In Athens marriage was held sacred. The character
of a bachelor was disreputable. So, indeed, was it in Sparta, where
young men remaining single after a certain period might be punished
for the neglect of a duty exacted from them by the severe laws of
the state. In both states, but in different degrees, the prohibition
of marriage within certain limits of consanguinity extended; but
when once the union took place, it was, in Athens, a crime of great
enormity to defile its sanctity. The influence of the wife was, in the
household, powerful; and commanding, as she did, the respect of men,
the advantages of her position were so great, that to risk their loss
by a transgression of the moral law, was not a common occurrence. We
may therefore assign to the women of Athens a high average of morality,
and consider them as having been held in remarkable estimation.
An important point in the manners of every people is the institution
of marriage. From an inquiry into its estimation, whether it be held
a religious rite, or a civil contract, or both, with various other
circumstances in connection with these, we are aided in forming a just
idea of the prevalent civilization. In the Doric states of Greece,
it was esteemed as little more than a prudent ceremony, binding man
and woman together for purposes of state. As among the savages of
Australasia, it was the custom for a man to bear a woman forcibly from
among her companions, when he took her to the bridesmaid’s house, and,
her hair being cut short and her clothes changed, she was delivered
to him as wife. His intercourse with her however, was, for some time
clandestine, and he shunned being seen in her society. This was the
case with the wealthier maidens. The portionless girls were, from time
to time, shut up in a dark edifice, and the youths, being introduced,
accepted each the woman he happened to seize upon. A penalty was
imposed on any one refusing to abide by the decision of chance.
Occasionally public ceremonies were enacted at the marriages of the
rich; but from all testimony it appears certain that the union of
man with woman at Sparta was entirely of a civil, and by no means of
a sacred character. Private interest, sentiment, and happiness were
indeed, in this, as in all other matters, subordinate to the public
exigencies. When a woman had no children by her own husband, she was
not only allowed, but required by the law to cohabit with another man.
Anaxandrides, to procure an heir, had, contrary to all custom, two
wives. The state excused no licentiousness for its own sake, but any
amount for a public object[23].
In Attic Greece, the ceremony of marriage was viewed in a more poetical
light, and divinity was supposed to preside over it. We have already
alluded to the notion of the promiscuous intercourse among them at a
remote period; but, passing from this fable, we find traces of polygamy
long discernible. Heracles maintained a regular seraglio. Egeus,
Pallas, Priam, Agamemnon, and nearly all the chiefs, possessed harems,
but these were irregularities, contrary to law and custom, and only in
fashion among royal personages. The story of the two wives of Socrates
seems a pure invention.
In the Athenian Republic, marriage, being held in reverence, was
protected by the law. In the later and better known ages, consanguinity
within certain limits was a bar to such union. Men, however, might
marry half-sisters by the fathers’ side, though few availed themselves
of the permission. Betrothed long before marriage by their parents,
the young man and woman were nevertheless allowed on most occasions to
consult their own inclinations. Numerous religious rites preceded the
actual ceremony, and heavenly favour was invoked upon it. The marriage
was performed at the altar in the temple, where sacrifice was made,
and a mutual oath of fidelity strengthened by every sacred pledge.
Adultery was held a debasing crime, and divorce discreditable to man
and wife[24].
In connection with the subject of marriage is that of infanticide. It
prevailed among the Greeks, under the sanction of philosophy. Among the
Thebans and the Tyrrhenians it was, however, unknown. Why? Because they
were more humane, or moral? Not by any means. They were among the most
profligate societies of antiquity. It is generally shame which induces
to child-murder women bearing offspring from illicit intercourse
with men. Where no disgrace attaches to illegitimate offspring, the
principal incentive to destroy them is taken away; and in Tyre, where
female slaves served naked at the table of the rich, and even ladies
joined the orgies in that condition, modesty was by no means a common
grace of their sex.
The Thebans, a very gross people, made infanticide a capital crime; but
allowed the poor to impose on the state, under certain circumstances,
the burden of their children. In Thrace, the infant, placed in an
earthen pot, was left to be devoured by wild beasts, or to perish of
cold and hunger[25].
In Sparta, clandestine infanticide was a crime; but the state often
performed what it declared a duty, by condemning weakly and delicate
infants to be flung into a pit. In Athens, on the contrary, it was left
for desperate women, and cold-blooded men, privately to accomplish
the act, exposing their children in public places to perish, or to
claim charity from some wayfarer. Frequently the rich had recourse to
this, for concealing an intrigue, and left a costly dowry of gold and
jewels in the earthen jar where they deposited the victim. The temple
steps sometimes received the foundling; but occasionally they were left
to die in desert places.
In the flourishing period of the Republic, however, poverty was so
rare, indeed so unknown, that it seldom exacted these sacrifices from
the humbler people. Infanticide was then left to the wholly unnatural
who refused the burden, or the guilty who dreaded the shame, of a child.
But in the female society of that state, there was, as we have said,
a sisterhood which exercised no inconsiderable influence on public
manners. These were the Hetairæ, or prostitutes, who occupied much the
same position which the same class does in most civilized communities
of modern times. The youthful, beautiful, elegant, polished, and
graceful, commanded, while their attractions lasted, the favours and
the deference of wealthy and profligate young men, and, when their
persons had faded, sank by degrees, until they dragged themselves in
misery through the streets, glad to procure a meal by indiscriminate
prostitution, with all who accepted their company. When children
were born to them, infanticide usually--especially in the case of
girls--relieved them of the burden.
The position the prostitute class of Athens occupied in relation to the
other women in the community was peculiar. They entered the temples
during the period of one particular festival--and in modern countries
the church is never closed against them; but they were not, as among
us, allowed to occupy the same place at the theatre with the Athenian
female citizen. Yet this was not altogether to protect the virtue of
the woman; it was to satisfy the pride of the citizen, since every
stranger suffered an equal exclusion from these “reserved seats.”
Notwithstanding this, however, the courtezans occasionally visited the
ladies in their own houses, to instruct them in those accomplishments
in which, from the peculiar tenor of their lives, they were most
practised, while it appears that both classes mingled at the public
baths.
The Hetairæ, or prostitute class, exercised undoubtedly an evil
influence on the society of Athens. They indulged the sensual tastes
and the vanity of the young, encouraged among them a dissolute manner
of life, and, while the power of their attractions lasted, led them
into expensive luxury, which could not fail of an injurious effect
on the community. The career of the prostitute was, as it is in all
countries, short, and miserable at its close. While their beauty
remained unfaded they were puffed up with vanity, carried along by
perpetual excitement, flattered by the compliments of young men, and
by the conversation of even the greatest philosophers, and maintained
in opulence by the gifts of their admirers. Premature age, however,
always, except in a few celebrated cases, assailed them. They became
old, ugly, wrinkled, deformed, and full of disease, and might be seen
crawling through the market places, haggling for morsels of provision,
amid the jeers and insults of the populace.
In some instances, indeed, there occurred in Athens what occasionally
happens in all countries. Men took as wives the prostitutes with
whom they had associated. Even the wise Plato became enamoured of
Archæanassa, an Hetaira of Ctesiphon. For many of these women were no
less renowned for the brilliancy of their intellectual qualities than
for their personal charms. Of Phryne, whose bosom was bared before
the judges by her advocate, and who sat as a model to the greatest of
ancient sculptors, all the world has heard. Her statue, of pure gold,
was placed on a pillar of white marble at Delphi. Aspasia exercised
at Athens influence equal to that of a queen, attracting round her
all the characters of the day, as Madame Roland was wont to do in
Paris. Socrates confessed to have learned from her much in the art
of rhetoric. Yet these women, harsh as the judgment may appear, were
common whores, though outwardly refined, and mentally cultivated.
Instances, indeed, of high public virtue displayed by members of that
sisterhood, distinguished among the Hetairæ of ancient Greece, are on
record, and sufficient accounts of them have been transmitted to us to
show that they were among the male society a recognised and respected
class, while by the women they were neither abhorred nor considered
as a pollution to the community. Still, prostitutes they were, to all
intents and purposes.
The mean, the poor, and faded, were chiefly despised for their ugliness
and indigence, not for their incontinence. It was, in the Homeric ages,
as we learn from the Odyssey, held disgraceful for “a noble maiden”
to lose her chastity. But in Athens, at a later time, chastity in an
unmarried woman was not held a virtue, the loss of which degraded her
utterly below the consideration of all other classes, or debarred her
for ever from any intercourse with the honourable of her own sex. The
Hetaira was not, it is true, admitted to mingle freely in the society
of young women; but she was not shut out from all communication with
them; while among men, if her natural attractions or accomplishments
were great, she exercised peculiar influence. Consequently, it appears
that in Athens the superior public prostitute had a _status_ higher
than that of any woman of similar character in our own day. If we look
for a comparison to illustrate our meaning, we may find it in many of
the ladies who at various periods have frequented our court--known but
not acknowledged prostitutes[26].
In the public judgments of Athens we find, it is true, a penalty or
fine imposed on “whoredom,”[27] from which, however, the people escaped
by a variation of terms, calling a whore a mistress, as Plutarch tells
us. Solon, however, recognised prostitution as a necessary, or at least
an inevitable evil, for he first built a temple to Aphrodite Pandemos,
which, truly rendered, means Venus the Prostitute; and his view was
justified by the declaration that the existence of a prostitute class
was necessary, in order, as Cato also thought, that the wives and
daughters of citizens might be safe from the passion which young men
would, in one way or the other, satiate upon the other sex. Though
procurers, therefore, were punishable by law, and the Hetairæ were
obliged to wear coloured or flowered garments, it was enacted in
the civil code of Athens, that “persons keeping company with common
strumpets shall not be deemed adulterers, for such shall be common for
the satiating of lust.”
Brothels, consequently, existed in moderate numbers at Athens, and
the young men were not discouraged from attending them occasionally.
There were also particular places in the city where the prostitutes
congregated, and a Temple of Venus, which was their peculiar resort.
We find in the poets passages, indeed, advocating the support of
whores[28].
Still, respected and beloved as the Hetairæ were among their friends
and lovers, recognised by the law, and protected by it, general public
respect was denied them, for the Athenians estimated above their
brilliant charms the modest virtues of inferior women[29].
One of the most remarkable features in the public economy of Athens was
the tax upon prostitutes, introduced also in Rome by Caligula. It was
annually farmed out by the Senate to individuals who knew accurately
the names of all who followed this calling. It is to be regretted
that their statistics have not been furnished to us. Every woman, it
appears, had a fixed price, which she might charge to the men to whom
she prostituted her person, and the amount of the tax varied according
to their profits. Apparently, they were principally “strangers” who
filled the ranks of the Hetairæ, for we find that if persons enjoying
the rank and privilege of citizens took to the occupation, a tax was
imposed on them as on the ordinary prostitutes, and they were punished
by exclusion from the public sacrifices, and from the honourable
offices of state. The same writer informs us, on the authority of
Demosthenes, that a citizen who cohabited with an alien paid a penalty,
in case he was convicted, of a thousand drachmas, but the penalty
could not often have been enforced, as the laws of Solon recognised
prostitution; it was a feature in the manners of the city, and brothels
were fearlessly kept, and entered without shame. Numerous evidences of
this have been supplied us[30]. To preserve a respect for chastity,
however, and to inculcate a horror for the prostitute’s occupation, the
same code allowed men to sell their sisters or daughters when convicted
of an act of fornication, which, in Athens, as elsewhere, frequently
was the first step in the regular career of these women[31].
The dishonour thus accruing to the general body of prostitutes, though
a small class of them enjoyed many superior advantages from their
wealth, and the polish of their manners, served at Athens, in some
degree, to preserve public morality. The system never seems to have
reached the height which it has gained in many of our modern cities,
where married women often follow the occupation, and live upon its
gains[32].
In Corinth, however, prostitutes abounded, and the Temple of Venus
in that city was sometimes thronged by a thousand of them. They were
usually the most beautiful women of the state, presented or sold
to the temple, who prostituted themselves for hire. They were of a
superior kind, admitting to their embraces none but men who would
pay munificently, and in this manner many of them are said to have
accumulated large fortunes[33].
Tabular statements, and numerical estimates, have been wanting to
complete this glance at the system in ancient Greece; but it may,
nevertheless, afford a just idea of the extent and character of the
prostitute class there.
OF PROSTITUTION IN ANCIENT ROME.
If our knowledge of ancient Greece, with reference to its moral
economy, is slight, ancient Rome is still less understood. Nothing,
indeed, like a detailed account of its social institutions has been
preserved; its scheme of manners is incompletely comprehended; and only
an outline picture of its private life can be formed from passages
supplied by hundreds of authors, from allusions in the poets and in the
satirical writers. German scholars have laboured industriously in the
field of classical politics; but the social economy of Rome has been
neglected, or, which is worse, obscured by them. We are, therefore,
enabled only to afford a general sketch of the subject in connection
with the great Republic, and the imperial system which grew out of its
decay.
Examining the condition of the female sex, especially with reference to
prostitutes, we must in Rome, as in all other states, distribute our
observations over several distinct periods--for such there were in the
social history of the nation.
In the more honourable days of the Republic, women occupied a high
status. While the state was extremely young we find them, indeed, in
perpetual tutelage; but gradually, as institutions were improved and
manners refined, they rose to independence, and formed an influential
element in society. The matron, in particular, stood in her due
position. Respected, accomplished, allowed to converse with men, she
was, in the most flourishing era of Roman history, a model for her sex.
She presided over the whole household, superintended the education
of the children, while they remained in tender years, and shared the
honours of her husband. Instead of confined apartments being allotted
to her as a domestic prison, the best chambers in the house were
assigned, while the whole of it was free to her. Other circumstances in
her condition combined to invest her with dignity; and the consequence
was, that the Roman matron seldom or never transgressed against the
moral or social law. No divorce is recorded before the year 234 B.C.;
and that instance was on account of the woman’s barrenness--a plea
allowed by the law, but universally reprobated by the people. Yet the
obstacles to this dissolution of the marriage compact were by no means
formidable. Under the imperial régime, when there was less facility,
divorces were more frequent.
The Roman law of marriage was strict. Degrees of consanguinity were
marked, though within narrower limits than among us, within which
marriage was not only illegal, but wholly void, and any intercourse, by
virtue of it, denounced as incest by the law. Public infamy attached to
it--not only the odium of opinion, but a formal decree by the prætor.
Adultery was held as a base, inexpiable crime. It was interdicted
under every penalty short of death, and even this was allowed under
certain circumstances to be inflicted by the husband. Wedded life,
indeed, was held sacred by every class from the knights to the slaves,
though among these social aliens actual marriage could not take place.
Celibacy was not only disreputable, but, in a particular degree,
criminal; while barrenness brought shame upon the woman who was cursed
with it. In an equal, or a greater ratio, was parentage honourable.
Polygamy was illegal; but the social code allowed one wife and several
concubines, occupying a medium position, finely described by Gibbon,
as below the honours of a wife, and above the infamy of a prostitute.
Such institutions were licensed that common whoredom might be checked;
though the children born of such intercourse were refused the rank of
citizens. Often, indeed, they were a burden to the guilty as well as
to the poor; and infanticide, which was declared in 374 B.C. a capital
crime, was resorted to as a means of relief.
If we examine our question in connection with marriage among the
ancient Romans we find a curious system. First, there were certain
conditions to constitute _connubium_, without which no legal union
could be formed. There was only connubium between Roman citizens[34];
there was none where either of the parties possessed it already with
another; none between parent and child, natural or by adoption; none
between grandparents and grandchildren; none between brothers and
sisters, of whole or half blood; none between uncle and niece, or
aunt and nephew: though Claudius legalized it by his marriage with
Agrippina, the practice never went beyond the example. Unions of this
kind taking place were void, and the father could claim no authority
over his children. Mutual consent was essential--of the persons
themselves, and of their friends. One wife only was allowed, though
marriage after full divorce was permitted.
There were two kinds of marriage,--that _cum_, and that _sine
conventione_. In the former the wife passed into her husband’s family,
and became subject to him; in the latter she abdicated none of her
old relations, and was equal to her husband. There was no ceremony
absolutely essential to constitute a marriage. Cohabitation during a
whole year made a legal and lasting union; but the woman’s absence
during three nights annually released her from the submission entailed
by the marriage _cum conventione_. Certain words, also, with religious
rites, performed in presence of ten witnesses, completed a marriage;
but certain priestly offices, such as those of the _flamen dialis_,
could only be performed for those whose parents had been wedded in a
similar way[35]. The sponsalia, or contracts between the man and his
wife’s friends, were usual, but not essential, and could be dissolved
by mutual consent. The Roman idea of marriage was, in a word, the
union of male and female for life, bringing a community of fortune, by
a civil, not a sacred contract. Yet from the ceremonies _generally_
observed, it is evident that an idea, though unrecognised, of a
religious union, existed among the Romans in their more pious age.
With respect to property, its arrangement depended on settlements made
before hand. Divorce was at one time procured by mutual consent, though
afterwards it became more difficult, but never impossible.
There was in Rome a legal concubinage between unmarried persons,
resembling the morganatic or “left-handed” marriage, giving neither the
woman nor her children any rights acquired from the husband. Widowers
often took a concubine, without infamy[36].
The law of Romulus, enacting that no male child should be exposed, and
that the first daughter should always be preserved, while every other
should be brought up, or live on trial, as it were, for three years,
has misled some writers into giving the Romans credit for a loftier
humanity. No parent, it is argued, would destroy a three years’ old
child. Nevertheless, it is certain that, in the imperial age, at least,
infanticide and child-dropping were frequent occurrences. Deformed
or mutilated infants, having been shown to five witnesses, might be
destroyed at once. The Milky Column, in the Herb-market, was a place
where public nurses sat to suckle or otherwise tend the foundlings
picked up in various parts of the city. In the early Christian age
it was a reproach to the Romans that they cast forth their sons,
as Tertullian expresses it, to be picked up and nourished by the
fisherwomen who passed. Mothers would deny their children when brought
home to their houses. Some strangled them at once. Various devices were
adopted among them, as among other nations of antiquity, to check the
overflow of population, as well as to hide the crimes of the guilty.
Thus the Phœnicians passed children through fire, as a sacrifice; the
Carthaginians offered them up at the altar; the Syrians flung them
from the lofty propylæa of a temple[37]. One observation, however,
applies to the Romans, and, we believe, to every other nation, savage
or civilized, in every age of the world--exceptions being invariably
allowed. Cruel as may have been the laws sanctioning infanticide,
when once the child was received into the bosom of the family it was
cared for with tenderness, and, generally, with discretion. It is not
sentiment, but justice, which induces us to say that the mother, having
once accepted her charge, has seldom been guilty of wilful neglect.
The abandoned and dissolute, especially in those societies where
fashion has made the performance of maternal duty ridiculous, if not
disreputable, have consigned their offspring to others; but women in
their natural state usually fulfil this obligation.
In Rome, from various causes, public decency was, at least during
the republican period, more rigidly observed, and licentiousness
less common and less tolerated than in Sparta or even the later age
of Athens. None of its institutions rivalled the dissolute manners
of Crete or Corinth. One cause of prostitution being less common was
the licence of concubinage, which was to the rich a preferable and
a safer plan of self-indulgence. It existed, however, in the State,
and employed a considerable class of women, though we are told the
accomplished prostitute was known as a Grecian import. Nevertheless,
the frequent allusions of the laws to these women prove that they
formed no insignificant element in the society of the capital.
[Illustration: ROMAN BROTHEL.--IMPERIAL ERA. (DUFOUR.)]
Lenocinium, or the keeping of female slaves to hire them out as
prostitutes for profit, was an offence rather against the moral than
the written law of Rome. The lenones, in many instances, kept brothels
or houses open for the trade of prostitution. They purchased in the
market handsome girls, for each of whom a sum equal to about 250_l._ of
English currency was given--from which we infer that the rates charged
in the superior establishments of this kind were somewhat high. Free
women were also kept for the same purpose, upon a mutual agreement. The
practice was not actually interdicted, but branded as infamous by the
prætor’s declaration. No woman, however, whose father, grandfather,
or husband had been a Roman knight was allowed to prostitute herself
for gain. The independent prostitutes, or those who occupied houses
of their own, were compelled to affix on the door a notice of their
calling, and the price they demanded. They were also required, when
they signified to the prætor, as they were bound to do, their intention
of following this disgraceful occupation, to drop their real names,
which they resumed whenever they abandoned that mode of life. Cato,
the censor, recognised prostitution as Solon did, and Cicero declared
no State ever existed without it. Notwithstanding this, the occupation
of the prostitute was, in the republican age, so infamous that a
comparatively small class practised it; but under the emperors it
grew so prevalent, that during the reign of the few of them who even
pretended to morality, the severest edicts appeared called for against
it. Caligula, however, made a profit from the system. The lenones
were subject to a tax, which fell, of course, as in Athens, upon the
prostitutes themselves. No check, therefore, was offered by him to
prostitution. But Theodosius and Valentinian sought, by formidable
penalties, to prevent parents from prostituting their children, and
masters their slaves, for gain. Lenocinium was interdicted under pain
of the scourge, banishment, and other punishments. In one age public
opinion, in the other the whip, held guardianship over the morals of
the State.
The owners of houses who allowed lenocinium to be carried on on their
premises were liable to forfeit the property, besides paying a price of
ten pounds weight of gold. Such edicts, however, only drove immorality
into the dark. When the prostitutes could not find enough brothels to
harbour them--and, indeed, at all times the poorer sort were excluded
from these large establishments--places of refuge were still open. The
_fornices_ of Rome were long galleries, divided into a double row of
cells--some broad and airy, others only small dark arches, situated on
a level with the street, and forming the substructure of the houses
above. Some of them, as those of the Formian villa of Cicero, were
tastefully stuccoed, and painted in streaks of pink, yellow, and blue.
In these long lines of cells the prostitutes of the poorer class were
accustomed to assemble, and thence was derived the ecclesiastical term
fornication, with its ordinary English meaning. Allusions to this
practice occur in the works of Horace and Juvenal, as well as other
writers. Some of the arches appear to have been below the surface of
the ground, as we find a decree of Theodosius against the subterranean
brothels of Rome.
The great satirist who has left us his vivid, though exaggerated
picture of manners in the imperial age, supplies some allusions in
elucidation of our subject. He speaks of the “transparent garments”
worn by prostitutes, as by the dancers of ancient Egypt; of the
“foreign women” who swarmed in its “foul brothels;” of the “gay
harlots’ chariots” dashing through the streets; and of the porticos
and covered walks forming for these women places of promenade. We
learn that some of them were forced, as a punishment for disorderly
behaviour, to wear the male toga, while most were distinguished by
a yellow headdress. The fornices were publicly opened and closed
at certain hours. The women stood at the doors of their cells, in
loose, light attire, their bosoms exposed, and the nipples gilt. Thus
Messelana stood at the door of the lupanaria, with her breast adorned
with this singular ornament[38].
At various periods efforts were made to suppress the prostitutes’
calling, but never with success. The lawmakers of the imperial age gave
no example of the morality which their edicts pretended to uphold.
Thus, the bawds who inveigled or ravished girls from their homes, to
obtain a livelihood by their prostitution, became liable to “extreme
penalties,” though what these were we know not. The law of lenocinium
was more widely interpreted, as manners became more corrupt. If a
husband permitted his wife to prostitute herself that he might share
the gains, it was lenocinium. Justinian allowed a woman the privilege
of divorce, if her husband endeavoured to tempt her into such adultery:
he was forced also to restore her dowry. On the other hand, if a woman
committed the crime, it was lenocinium for the husband to receive her
again, to spare the adulterer if caught in the act, or to refrain
from prosecuting him if otherwise detected. If a man married a woman
convicted of adultery, discovered a crime of this kind and was bribed
to hold his peace, commenced a prosecution for adultery and withdrew
it, or lent his house for rape or prostitution, the Julian law made him
guilty of lenocinium, and penalties of various kinds were attached to
the offence in its different modifications.
Lupanaria, or common brothels, were at all times considered infamous.
Young men seem to have been more careful to visit them in secret than
at Athens, where they visited and left them in the light of open day,
and were encouraged to do so by the poets. There was, however, another
class of disreputable places of assembly, to which a similar exists in
most modern cities. These were the lower order of _popinæ_, or houses
of entertainment, not absolutely recognised as “stews,” but generally
known to be the resorts of prostitutes and their companions. In Pompeii
there appears to have existed a class of the same description, for in
one of the wine-houses discovered there, an inner room is situated
behind the shop, the walls of which are covered with lewd and filthy
pictures. Pornography, or obscene painting, was much practised at
Rome, and doubtless afforded much pleasure to the company who nightly
assembled in the Ganeæ, or regular brothels.
As among the Greeks, instances of men willing to marry prostitutes
occurred among the Romans. It was found necessary to check the
practice by rendering it disreputable. The penalty of public infamy
was denounced against all freemen contracting such an union; while a
senator, and the son of a senator, were especially forbidden.
The prostitutes of Rome, like those of many other countries, varied
their principal calling by others which rendered them more attractive
to the dissolute youth of the city. They cultivated the arts of
dancing, singing, and playing on musical instruments. They performed
lascivious dances at their places of assembly, playing on the flute,
and practising all those tricks of seduction employed so successfully
by the Almé of Egypt.
Difficulties have arisen before many inquirers into the social
condition of the ancient Romans, as to whence the prostitutes came,
seeing that they were chiefly strangers. Some light, we think, is
thrown on the subject by the fact that the Ambubaiæ were Syrian
musicians, who performed dances in Rome, and, like the Bayaderes of
India, the Almé of Egypt, and the dancers of Java, led a life of
prostitution. They continued long to be imported; for, in the History
of Gibbon, we find particular notice of the lascivious dances performed
by the Syrian damsels round the altars on the Palatine Hill, to please
the bestial senses of Elagabalus. During the public pantomimes, the
prostitutes danced naked before the people; and, at the Floralian
festival, the actresses at the theatre, who are known to have been
common prostitutes, were compelled to strip, and perform indecent
evolutions for the delight of the audience. This refers, however,
to the imperial age. It was at no time a task of much inconvenience
to divest themselves of clothing, for the harlots never encumbered
themselves with much. In this they resembled the Hetairæ of Greece,
whose thin slight garment was so insufficient for the purposes of
decency, that it was designated as “naked.” This was not, however,
from hardiness or simplicity, but merely to promote the profit of
their calling. In other respects the luxury of the wealthy prostitutes
was boundless, and they were borne through the streets on the rich
and elegant lactræ or portable couches, softly pillowed on which they
reposed their limbs in voluptuous indolence. In the reign of Domitian
a decree was passed that no whore should in future make use of these
couches, which were reserved as an especial luxury to the privileged
classes of Rome.
The edicts against prostitution increased in severity under various
emperors. The severity of Constantine enacted that a man guilty of
rape should die, whether he accomplished his purpose by violence, or
by gentle and gradual seduction. The virgin who confessed her consent,
instead of procuring a mitigation of this sentence, exposed herself
to share the penalty. Slaves who were accomplices in the crime of
procuring young women for prostitution, were punished by being burnt,
or having boiling metal poured down their throats. The consequence of
such a savage law was, that it could not be generally applied; nor was
it enforced by the example of the emperor, who, once rigidly strict,
turned dissolute and luxurious towards the close of his reign.
It will be seen, from the information here collected, that no actual
knowledge exists of the precise extent of the prostitute system in
Rome. Facts, and some of these extremely curious, have been preserved
in connection with it; but the statistics of the question are wholly
lost, if, indeed, they ever existed. On this account, it appeared
possible to do no more than bring those facts together, and, throwing
them into a general sketch of the morality prevailing at different
periods in the social history of that state, to draw thence an idea
of the truth. Under the comparatively virtuous Republic, a line could
certainly be drawn between the profligate and the moral classes of the
community. Under some of the emperors such a distinction was wholly
impossible. The vulgar prostitute was commonly met at the tables of the
rich, and the palace itself was no more than an imperial brothel. A few
notes on the history of the empire will justify these remarks.
In the early period of the decline, the licentious amours of Faustina
were excused, even encouraged, by her husband, and the nobles paid
homage in the temples before the image of an adultress. In the eyes
of Commodus virtue was criminal, since it implied a reflection upon
his profligacy. Dissolving his frame in lust amid 300 concubines and
boys, he violated by force the few modest women remaining near his
court. Julia, the wife of Severus, though flattered in life and death
by public writers, was no better than a harlot. We have already noticed
the pleasures of Elagabalus, who committed rape upon a vestal virgin,
and condescended to the most bestial vice. The nobles readily followed
his example, and the people were easily led into the fashion. Maximin
drowned every coy maiden who refused his embraces. In process of time,
the most degrading features of Asiatic profligacy were introduced
into Rome, and eunuchs crowded the palaces of the emperor and his
nobles. History alludes to no more vulgar prostitute than the Empress
Theodora, who played comedies before the people of Constantinople,
and prostituted her person--of unparalleled beauty as it was--night
after night to a promiscuous crowd of citizens and strangers, of every
rank and description. She exhibited herself naked in the theatre. Her
sympathy for the prostitute class may be indicated by almost the only
virtuous action recorded of her;--inducing her husband Justinian to
found a monastery on the shores of the Bosphorus, where 500 miserable
women, collected from the streets and brothels, were offered a refuge.
When we remember the usual relative proportion of objects relieved by
charity, to the numbers from which they are selected, this indicates a
considerable trade in prostitution then carried on in Constantinople.
When, however, such a social system prevailed, no inquiry could fix the
professional class of harlots, since moral women, if any existed, were
certainly exceptions.
It is always necessary, while inquiring into the morality of any
people, to inquire into the extent to which the practice of procuring
abortion was carried, and how it was viewed. Montesquieu justly
observes, that it is by no means unnatural, though it may be criminal,
for a prostitute, should she by chance conceive a child, to seek to
be relieved from the burden. She has no means of support except one
which she cannot possibly follow and at the same time fulfil the
duties of a mother. These considerations, perhaps, had some weight
with the legislators of Rome, as well as those reasons of political
prudence which in various ancient states recognised infanticide. That
it was practised to some extent there, is shown by frequent allusions
in various works. It has been asserted, indeed, that the custom of
procuring abortion prevailed to such an extent, that, combined with
celibacy, it materially affected the population of the state, but this
appears a false view. There are no accounts to support such an idea.
It is not known at what particular time a law was introduced against
it. Certainly it was held in a different light than it is by our
religion, and our civilization. Plato’s republic permits it. Aristotle
also allows it to be practised under certain circumstances, but only
before the child is quick in the womb. So, also, among the Romans, it
seems long to have been unrestrained by law, though it is impossible
to believe that the natural instincts of women would not deter them,
except in desperate situations, from such unnatural offences.
Such is the view of the prostitute system, with a sketch of general
morality, which the facts preserved by history enable us to offer. It
appears from these facts, that, during the more flourishing period of
the Roman state, the prostitutes formed a class, to which the principal
immorality of the female society was confined, while in the later
or imperial age profligacy ran loose among the people, so that the
distinction between the regular harlot and the unrecognised prostitute
was all but lost. Chastity, under the Republic, was a peculiar Roman
virtue, and the prostitutes were usually foreigners, while we do not
find that they ever mixed with reputable women who had characters to
lose[39].
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS.
We leave the countries of classical antiquity and arrive at the
Anglo-Saxons of our own history, in whom the reader will feel a
peculiar interest. Unfortunately, our usual observations with reference
to ancient times, apply to them also. Extremely imperfect records exist
of their manners, laws, and institutions. The learned and industrious
Sharon Turner has collected most of the facts known, yet neither the
word prostitution, nor any term analogous to it, is to be found in his
work. In the Leges Anglo-Saxonicæ, we find laws and regulations in
reference to the chastity of the women, but nothing which indicates
the existence of a class professionally addicted to prostitution.
Nevertheless, it is improbable that such a class was utterly unknown,
for the modern historians, as well as the old chroniclers, who have
described the era, allude repeatedly to the licentious manners of the
period. Gluttoning and deep drinking may, however, have excused the
epithet, without supposing any prevalence of immorality.
Sharon Turner refers us to the Maories of New Zealand, for a parallel
to the manners and condition of Great Britain, when first invaded by
the Romans. As far as profligacy goes, the comparison appears correct.
Among the Britons, however, prevailed the extraordinary and pernicious
institution of small societies of ten or twelve men, with a community
of women among them. Ceremonies of marriage, indeed, took place, but
for no other purpose than to provide that each woman’s husband should
maintain all her children, whoever their fathers might be. In some of
their religious ceremonies women officiated naked, and in all their
modes of life a coarse licentiousness obtained.
The Romans introduced a more refined luxury, and manners became
less coarse, though no less profligate. The Saxons, however, then
transported themselves to these islands from the Cymbric Peninsula, and
the civilization of the country passed through a complete revolution.
In their original country they had displayed a system of manners
peculiar to themselves, and the other wild races inhabiting the mighty
woods of Germany. Their laws against adultery were of the most savage
character. When a woman was guilty of it, she was compelled to hang
herself, her body was burned, and the execution of the adulterer took
place over the pile of her ashes. Among some communities the punishment
was still more severe, and infinitely more barbarous. The guilty
creature was whipped from village to village by a number of women, who
tore off her garments to the waist, and pierced her with their knives.
Company after company of them pursued her until she sank under the
shame, torture, and loss of blood. Chastity, indeed, was very generally
regarded among these rude people, but their ideas were very foreign
from ours. The degrees of consanguinity within which marriage was
prohibited were extremely narrow, a son being permitted to marry his
father’s widow, provided she was not his own mother.
In their marriage customs the Anglo-Saxons displayed considerable
regard for the female sex, although the wife was taken rather as the
property than as the companion of the husband. The original laws
of Ethelbert, indeed, as we have said, made the transaction wholly
one of purchase; but in the reign of Edmund a more refined code was
established. The betrothal usually took place some time before the
actual ceremony. This was held as a sacred tie, the high-priest being
at the marriage to consecrate it, and pray for a blessing on the wedded
pair[40].
The manners of the Anglo-Saxons, after their settlement in England,
underwent considerable improvement. They became, indeed, to a degree
civilized. Their women were no longer the savages of Germany. They
occupied a position wholly different from that of their sex among
the more polished and luxurious nations of the East. It was, we may
say, similar to that which they at present fill among us. They were
recognised as members of the body politic, could bequeath and inherit
property, could appeal to the law against any man; they possessed, in
a word, the rights, the duties, and the public relations of citizens.
Of course, in all these particulars, their position was modified by
the natural restraints imposed on their sex. This refers to the more
improved period of their civilization. In the laws of Ethelbert a man
was permitted to buy a wife, provided he did it openly. By Edmund’s
time, however, the practice was changed, and the woman’s consent,
as well as that of her friends, was necessary. The man was also
pledged before the law to support and respect her. She carried public
protection into her new home. Considerable honour, consequence, and
independence were there pre-enjoyed by the female sex. Nevertheless
there continued long to be in the transaction much of a business
character, and the consent of the woman was frequently no more than
submission to the terms of a bargain struck between her lover and her
parents. By some husbands, indeed, a wife seems to have been considered
as little more than a property. We find adultery, for instance, allowed
to be compounded. “If a freeman cohabit with the wife of a freeman he
must pay the fine, and obtain another woman with his own money, and
lead her to the other.” In other words, when he has destroyed the
value of one wife, he must buy a fresh one for the injured husband.
This would seem to indicate that women were to be had for money.
Adultery, indeed, was at all times an affair of payments. It was
punished only by various fines, varying according to the rank of the
woman. The chastity of the high noble’s wife was valued at six pounds,
that of a churl’s attendant at six shillings.
In the Leges Anglo-Saxonicæ we find many regulations laid down
respecting rape and fornication, which imply the occasional practice
of those crimes. From the tone of the enactments on the subject, it
seems impossible reasonably to doubt that a class of women existed who
prostituted themselves for gain or pleasure to the other sex. None
such, it is true, is directly indicated. We find, however, a rule of
the venerable Bede, that any “slave woman” or “servile” turning her
eyes immodestly on men, is to be severely chided. Blount also, quoted
in Brand’s “Popular Antiquities,” with the historian Henry, describes
the punishment of the cucking stool, as inflicted by the Anglo-Saxons,
both in Germany and in England, upon scolds, disorderly women, and
strumpets, who in the more barbarous society on the Continent were
suffocated in marshes. In Cornwall harlots were long punished in the
ludicrous and degrading manner described by Brand.
In the absence of any ground upon which to stand, we cannot describe a
particular class among the Anglo-Saxons as addicted to prostitution,
but from the whole colour of their civilization, from the rudest to
the most refined period, it is evident the practice was followed, in a
greater or less degree[41].
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG THE BARBAROUS NATIONS.
INTRODUCTION.
In surveying the social aspects of the barbarian world, we discover
many striking phenomena. The relations of the sexes, among uneducated
races, appear modified by every circumstance of their position; but
everywhere the natural ascendancy of the strong over the weak is
displayed. A few savage communities allow women a position nearly
level with that of the men; but wherever this is the case, a degree of
civilization has been attained.
If we divide mankind into two classes--the civilized and the
savage--forming an ideal of both extremes, we shall not find one tribe
or community to occupy either pole of our supposed sphere. No one
requires to be told that every part of the human race is still below
the perfect development of its good attributes; but the observation
is equally true, though less generally accepted, that every family of
creatures showing our nature has advanced beyond the utterly savage
state. When we find men wandering not only unclothed, but unhoused,
over the earth, and following only their animal propensities, we may
regard them as wholly untaught. At present no such tribe is known.
Every human being that has come under our notice has progressed beyond
the simple gratification of his appetites. The love of ornament and the
practice of exchange have raised him one step in the scale.
The Africans, the Australians, the New Zealanders, the ruder tribes
of the Pacific Isles, the Dyaks of Borneo, and the natives of Sumatra
and Celebes, with the Indians of North and South America, may be
included under the appellation _barbarous_. They vary, however, in the
characteristics of their barbarism, as the nations of Europe vary in
the characteristics of their civilization. They are even divided into
classes. (1) The hunters, with little property in the soil, precarious
means of existence, and migratory habits; the fishers, who are only the
hunters of the sea; (2) the pastoral tribes, with property in herds
and flocks, nomade, and therefore little property in the soil; (3) the
agricultural tribes, permanently or temporarily fixed to localities,
whose means of life are less precarious, and whose habits are more
regular than those of the two former. The third is the most educated,
the second the most innocent, the first the most simple state. It is
among the shepherds that women enjoy most consideration, and that
morality is highest. The hunters are more savage, and the tillers of
the earth more sensual.
In judging the condition of the female sex, it is always necessary to
hold in view the general state of manners. When we inquire how husbands
behave to their wives, and how parents treat their daughters, we must
ask also how they live themselves. Where the male sex is degraded the
female will be so. On the other hand, the refinement of any people may
be estimated by the condition of its women. The islanders of Celebes
are among the most elevated of barbarian races, and the sexes are
nearly on an equality. The hordes of Western Africa are the most gross
and ferocious of savages, and their women are treated as reptiles. The
Indians of North America offer, apparently, an exception to this rule,
for their lofty, proud, and polished warriors behave contemptuously to
the squaws in their wigwam, who crouch to the earth while their lords
stand haughtily before the most powerful conquerors. But the Choctaws
and the Cherokees are in reality as far removed from true civilization
as the dwellers in New Zealand. The amenities and not the arts of life
civilize men. Wherever in the Indian village the gentler influences of
humanity prevail, the feebler sex is treated with respect and affection.
The points of contrast between barbarian and civilized races display
themselves strongly in relation to the condition of the female sex.
Throughout the savage portions of Africa one system of manners
prevails. The men occupy the lowest stage of the social scale. They
are neither hunters, fishers, shepherds, nor tillers of the soil; but
mix up several occupations, though none of an elevating character.
Some raise a few materials of food; others collect ivory in the
woods; others live on the profits of the slave-trade; but the greater
number subsist on the refuse of what they gain in the service of
their petty kings. They have been sophisticated from the simplicity
of savages without acquiring one grace from civilization. Subject to
the gross caprice of princes more miserable than themselves, they
have remained beyond the reach of every humanizing influence, and,
as a natural consequence, their women are debased. Polygamy produces
its worst results. The wife is an object of barter; a slave, whose
labour assists to support her owner. In some parts diligence is more
valued than chastity. In others the husband makes a profit from his
wife’s prostitution. The slave trade has assisted largely towards
this melancholy state of manners. The finer sentiments of humanity
are altogether lost, and the contempt for life, as well as for all
that is amiable or pure, has reduced men far below the level of the
brute creation. We speak literally in saying that a nobler, happier
spectacle is presented among the antelope and elephant herds than among
the swarms of men and women corrupting in Africa. In the few parts
where the male sex has risen from this debasement, the female has been
equally improved. The barbarous Edeeyahs offer an example.
The savages of Australia differ in many respects from those of Western
Africa. They are even less educated, but they are also less ferocious;
their women are their abject servitors, but there is more humanity in
their treatment. They have scarcely approached so near to the forms
of regular society, as to systematize the intercourse of the sexes.
Nevertheless, among some tribes we not only find the institution of
marriage respected, but wives guarded with Turkish jealousy. Among a
people which does not dwell in regular habitations, or even lodge in
roomy tents, it is scarcely possible to imagine the sanctity of a man’s
harem; but it is true, notwithstanding, that a similar seclusion is
enforced. The Australian woman, in the desert and under the open sky,
is hedged round by her husband’s jealousy as securely as the ancient
German was in her unwalled shelter of thatch.
It is seldom, however, that among barbarous races we find the sentiment
of chastity in its abstract sense. Women are generally treated as
though their inclinations were licentious, and in this consists one
great line of distinction between civilization and barbarism. With the
one, moral influence--with the other, material force, is employed as
the guardian of female honour. The result is important to be noticed.
Women are depraved by the rude and gross means devised to keep them
virtuous. Where the moral sentiment is feebly developed, guilt is
created by the efforts made to prevent it. The wife perpetually
watched, as though her heart were full of adultery, becomes an
adulteress. The young girl continually guarded, with the avowed object
of compelling her to be chaste, loses insensibly any natural feeling
she may have possessed, and covets the opportunity to sin.
In the South Sea Islands this truth is illustrated; in New Zealand
it is still more strongly proved. It is taken for granted that a
woman will prostitute herself if she can. The state of morality is
consequently so low that it is difficult for parents to preserve
a daughter’s virtue until she is given in marriage. To prevent
her holding _vicious_ intercourse she is forbidden to hold _any_
intercourse with the opposite sex.
Another characteristic of civilized races is the separation of the
vicious from the moral classes; they systematize the offences against
society. Every class of vile persons becomes, as it were, an isolated
community; the prostitute is segregated from the rest of her sex. In
some barbarian states, as in Dahomey, the same division is effected;
but the kings of that country have sought to mimic the forms of
educated communities. The professional is distinguished from the
habitual prostitute only by her open assumption of the title; but the
immorality of the female sex in Dahomey is far from being represented
by the order of confessed harlots.
The inhabitants of some islands, and the shores of bays and roadsteads,
have discovered that in prostituting their women to the crews of
trading ships they have a readier means of subsistence than was
offered by their former industry. This has produced a frightful system
of vicious commerce, which still prevails to a great extent in the
Pacific, as well as in New Zealand and the ports of Africa. It is
for Europeans to repair the evil created by the incontinence of their
predecessors. Many captains of vessels have already effected much good
by forbidding women to come on board.
In proportion as nations approach the higher stages of civilization
does the respect for human life increase. Infanticide is practised with
the least remorse by the most savage tribes. Among those communities
with whom the means of existence are precarious this crime is most
common. Wherever barbarians have been induced to labour, and secured
in the enjoyment of their earnings, the natural feelings of the breast
have revived; and mothers who have slain six infants cherish the
seventh as a sacred possession. Missionary enterprise has produced
much good in this respect; while the beneficent rule of our Indian
government has bestowed incalculable blessings on the people of the
East, among whom the system of infanticide is daily becoming rarer, and
the condition of women more elevated.
The same may be remarked of that unnatural practice upon which, as
indeed on all kindred subjects, writers are reluctant to touch--that,
we mean, of destroying the unborn fruits of union. The savage regards
it as an act rather meritorious for its ingenuity than abominable
for its unnatural character. The cause that encourages infanticide
encourages this, which, indeed, is the less horrible crime. The woman
is less reluctant to extinguish the vitality of a being which has
become to her dear only in anticipation, than to quench a life which
has once been embodied before her eyes, and warmed in her bosom. The
operation, so dangerous to females in civilized communities, is, like
childbirth, far easier among savages. The native of the Bornean woods,
without any of the delicacy engendered by luxury, may one moment be
without a pang giving birth to an infant, and the next be washing it
in a neighbouring brook. The Malayan lady, bred in a city in indolence
and comfort, suffers agony under which she sometimes perishes before
her offspring has breathed. So it is with the practice of destroying
the unborn child. Civilization lessens in all creatures their means of
independent life, and their powers of endurance; but it also enables
them to discover or compound the elements by which these artificial
ills may be remedied.
In proportion as the intercourse of the sexes is loose is the
difficulty of learning the actual extent of immoral practices. The
prostitute class, as we proceed from the pure savage to the highest
point of civilization, becomes more and more distinct--being more
conspicuous because more isolated. This is accompanied by another
process, which is a superior standard by which to measure the social
elevation of a people. Women respect themselves in proportion as
men respect them. Where locks and bolts, scourges and cudgels, are
the guardians of female chastity, it is only preserved when there
is no opportunity to lose it. When the protecting influence springs
from within, the woman moves a virtuous being, defended even from a
licentious glance by the impenetrable cloud which her native modesty
and virtue diffuse around her.
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG AFRICAN NATIONS.
In the wide field of inquiry presented by the barbarian races of our
own time, Africa occupies a prominent place. Some of the most wild
and savage tribes of the human family are to be found on that immense
peninsula. Many degrees in the inferior scale of civilization are
represented, from the uncouth Hottentots of the south to the wandering
Arabs of the desert, in whose blameless lives we have a picture of
original simplicity--not far removed from the real refinement, though
very far from the vices, of the most polished among the communities
of Europe. The inquiry we have made into the condition of women and
the state of manners in Africa, has confirmed us in our opinion, which
is supported also by many circumstances observed among other races of
men. The medium of refinement is accompanied by the least immorality.
As in our own, among other civilized states, the ratio of profligacy
is greatest at the opposite poles of society--the wealthiest and the
most indigent--so in Africa it is among the basest savages and among
the most highly polished communities that immorality prevails to the
greatest extent. The brutal hordes on the western coast, with the
populations of the half-civilized cities of the north, abound in vices,
while the barbarian though innocent communities, with the wandering
dwellers in the desert, are characterised by manners far more pure.
In ranging over Africa in search of facts to complete the present
inquiry, we meet with numerous tribes belonging to seven separate
races of mankind: the Hottentot, the Kaffir, the Negro, the Moor, the
Abyssinian, the Arab, and the Copts or descendants of the true Egyptian
stock. Among each of these we perceive some varieties of manners;
but everywhere in Africa one circumstance is prominent--the degraded
condition of the female sex. The women of Cairo and Algiers are in
comparison treated with little more refinement than those of some
purely savage states; but we shall not include such communities among
the barbarian races, reserving Egypt and some of the other countries
characterised by a mongrel civilization for separate notices. We may,
as far as our present inquiry goes, present the subject clearly and
without confusion by making a geographical arrangement, and, commencing
from the south, pass over the continent, until we encounter a form of
civilization in the valley of the Lower Nile.
The condition of women generally in heathen countries is degraded. As
we proceed through Africa this truth will be strongly illustrated.
Commencing with the Hottentots of the south, we find them a dissolute
profligate race, who have been so from the earliest period. It was
remarked in 1655 by Van Riebeck, when the chiefs, departing on a
distant expedition, were urged to leave their women behind, they
replied “that their wives must be with them everywhere so as to be kept
from the other men.” It was remarked also in 1840 by Colonel Napier,
who describes them as proverbially unchaste. Polygamy, at the early
period referred to, was prevalent. Men bought their wives--sometimes
from their wealthier, sometimes from their poorer, neighbours; but
all alliances between persons of near kindred were held in utter
abhorrence. Indecency and lewdness are their characteristics, for
though now accustomed to clothing, it is no uncommon thing for them,
when drunk at their festivals, to strip naked and perform lascivious
dances, to music of the rudest harmony. Many among them appear to
prostitute themselves readily to strangers, some from inclination,
others for money, many for a gift of finery; but in what numbers this
disreputable class exists we have no means of knowing[42]. A superior
order, however, is scattered among these degraded creatures, and many
lively, intelligent, and well-conducted women have attracted the notice
of travellers.
[Illustration: WOMAN OF THE BOSJES RACE.
[_From a Daguerreotype by_ BEARD.]]
The pastoral Kaffirs are perhaps a more moral though a more ferocious
people than the Hottentots. They are, indeed, superior in mental and
physical characteristics, being more addicted to arms, and less to
debauch. They also, however, practise polygamy, and buy their wives for
so many head of cattle. Among them, as well as among the Bechuanas,
the girls undergo a probation before marriage, during which they live
apart, and hold no intercourse with their tribe except through an old
woman. Sichele, king of the Bechuanas, had numerous wives, of whom
one was a favourite; but he granted each a separate hut, so that his
palace was a kind of village surrounded by a fence. They punish theft
in a woman by twisting dry grass round her fingers and burning them to
the bone. Wandering from place to place in tent-shaped temporary huts,
they carry their women with them, and condemn them to domestic labour.
Even the chief’s wives assist in grinding the corn, and tending their
husband’s nomade household. Divorce is easy, on very slight grounds.
We occasionally hear of women committing what is termed fornication,
but no professed class of prostitutes has been described. As among all
nations practising polygamy, marriage is not held as a sacred tie; but
adultery on the wife’s part is severely punished as an infraction of
the social law. The bonds of natural affection appear extremely weak
among the Kaffir tribes. Men are inspired by an inclination, not an
attachment, to their wives, and mothers possess less affection for
their children than is observed even in the Australian savage. The weak
and sickly are sometimes abandoned, to save the expense or trouble
of their support. Mrs. Ward knew of a woman who, having a little
daughter in a decline, buried it alive, to be rid of the burden. The
little creature, imperfectly interred, burst from its grave and ran
home. Again it was forced into the hole, again it escaped, and a third
time it was removed to the earth; once more, however, it struggled
till free, and, flying to its mother’s hut, was at last received,
and ultimately recovered. Such instances of inhumanity are not rare
among the Kaffir tribes, whose passion for blood and war seems to have
blunted some of their natural sentiments. Husbands, when their wives
are sick, frequently drag them into a neighbouring thicket, where they
are left to die, and women continually do the same with their poor
offspring. It is important, however, to mention, that in the instances
of Kaffirs converted to Christianity their manners undergo a most
favourable modification. One of them was known to Mrs. Ward who had
refused to take a second wife, in deference to the moral law laid down
by the interpreters of his adopted religion; and, where the conversion
is sincere, they always manifest an inclination to practise the
manners of the white men[43].
In the rude maritime region extending from the countries on the border
of the Cape territory as far as the Senegal, a set of characteristic
features is universally marked on the people, varied though their
nationality be. Differences, of course, prevail among the numerous
tribes in the several states; but the impress of African civilization
is there all but uniform.
Those between the tropics, especially, are absorbed in licentiousness.
Morality is a strange idea to them. Polygamy is universally practised,
and in most places without limitation; while nowhere is a man
restrained by the social law from intercourse with any number of
females he chooses. The result is that women are, for the most part,
looked upon as a marketable commodity; that the pure and exalted
sentiment of love is utterly unknown; and that even the commonest
feelings of humanity appear absent from among them. Husbands, for
instance, on the Gold Coast, are known to prostitute their wives to
others for a sum of money. This is an open transaction. In other
places, however, where the adulterer pays a fine to the husband he
has injured, we find men allowing their wives an opportunity to be
unfaithful, in order to obtain the price of the crime. Throughout,
indeed, the gloomy and savage states, sheltered by the woods bordering
the Niger, and over the whole western coast, mankind appears in its
uncouthest form. Human nature, degraded by perpetual war against
itself, rots at the feet of a gross superstition. As we have said, the
result is developed in various modifications of barbarian manners.
When Laird, in 1832, visited the Niger, he found the condition of the
female sex upon its borders most humiliating. In the dominions of King
Boy polygamy was unlimited, and the wives reduced to slavery in their
own homes. The people dwelling on the banks of the Lower Niger may be
described, in fact, as among the most idle, ignorant, and profligate
in Africa. The prince himself set the example to his subjects. He
possessed 140 wives and concubines, of whom one was no more than
thirteen years of age, whom he had purchased for a few muskets and a
piece of cloth. Half a dozen enjoyed the distinction of favourites;
one of them was more than 25 stones in weight. The mother of this
pluralist was maintained in her son’s palace, where she amused the
court by dances of the most revolting and obscene description. No
care was, in any respect, taken to preserve a sense of virtue in the
king’s harem; but adultery was, nevertheless, punished with death.
This appears the case in most countries where shame holds no check on
immorality; it may, indeed, be taken in some measure as an index to
the state of manners where crimes against chastity are visited with
public infamy alone, or with legal penalties. In the dominions of Boy,
one wife, at least, was expected to attend her husband, even when
dead. The chosen victim was bound and thrown into the river; a mode
of death preferable to that practised at Calabar, on the coast, where
the miserable woman is buried alive. In the kingdom of Fundals, when a
chief died leaving fifteen women in his harem, the king selected one
to be hung over the tomb, and transferred the rest to his own palace;
nevertheless, a few of these enjoyed an independent existence. One
lively intelligent woman possessed an estate of land and 200 slaves,
whom she employed in trade. Industry flourished, there being small
competition, as a more idle demoralized people than the dwellers on the
Niger as far as Ebo cannot be imagined.
Above that place, where the land is less marshy and more favourable
to cultivation, the natives are more intelligent, more addicted to
agriculture, more manly in their habits, and in proportion more kind
and respectful to their women. Polygamy, it is true, prevails, as it
does all over Western Africa, but the sex is somewhat raised above a
mere instrument of sensual gratification. In other directions the old
features are resumed. The Bambarras, a Pagan people, marry as many
wives as they can support; and the Mandingoes, who are only allowed
four, treat them as slaves, though they love their children.
The native of Western Africa, in most cases, looks upon his wife, in
one respect as a source of pleasure, in another as a source of gain,
reckoning her as property to the amount she can earn by labour. In the
institution of marriage, therefore, it may easily be conceived that
no sacred tie is acknowledged. It is merely a civil contract, to be
dissolved at will. The man sends a present to the woman’s father; if
a virgin, she exchanges her leathern girdle for a cloth wrapped about
the loins, and a little merry-making consummates the transaction. This
account applies especially to the Tilatates. In Yarriba and Bughor,
when a woman finds herself _enceinte_, she is obliged to inform her
husband, or suffer a public whipping when the discovery is made. This
custom refers, there is no doubt, to a feature in the morals of the
people. Mothers, also, are forced to suckle their children until three
years old, and punished if, during that period, they cohabit with a man.
Strange inconsistencies occasionally display themselves in the manners
of these unintellectual barbarians. They have introduced a feature
of Asiatic luxury, by having eunuchs to guard their seraglios, while
instances occur in which the uncouth savage professes a sentiment of
attachment. The King of Attah told Lander that he loved him as he loved
the wife who shared his bed. Yet he was a polygamist, and a sensualist.
In Abookir the prince was continually multiplying the inmates of his
harem, and having many daughters, had numbers of wives younger than
they. Girls of eleven years old are there considered marriageable.
Regarded as a mere social contract, temporary or otherwise, marriage,
in this region, is held among the most ordinary occurrences of life.
A man arriving at the age of 20 takes one wife, and then another,
increasing the number from four to 100, as his circumstances allow.
Many women, even under this system, cannot procure husbands. This,
however, we must not ascribe so much to a vast preponderance of the
female sex over the male, as to the fact that thousands of men take no
permanent partners at all. It may, perhaps, be safe to assert that,
of the single men, none remain without intercourse with women, and of
the unmarried women, that not one preserves her chastity. The idea
of that virtue appears foreign to those races. Adultery, indeed, is
held a crime, but not so much against morals as against the husband.
A wife suspected of it is compelled to drink a decoction called Sassy
water, which poisons her, unless she bribes the priest to render it
harmless by dilution, in which case she is pronounced innocent. The
widow, even, who has been known to live on bad terms with her husband
is forced, among the tribes on the banks of the Lower Niger, to undergo
this ordeal. An illicit connection with the king’s wife, however, is
punished with death to both parties, while among the chiefs the fine
of a slave is exacted. Every woman, except the consort of royalty,
has thus her market value, which is greatly increased if her friends
fatten her up to a colossal size. Men frequently buy slender girls at
a cheap rate, and feed them to a proper obesity before taking them as
companions. Marriage, or concubinage, may be entered on at the age of
thirteen, and so universal is the system in this part of Africa, that
the sex seems absolutely wedded to its degradation.
Among the people of Ibu a singular custom exists. When twins are born
they are immediately exposed to wild beasts. The mother, compelled to
go through a long course of purification and penance, is thenceforward
an outlaw, disgraced among the women, who hold up two fingers as she
passes, to remind her of the misfortune:--she is at once divorced from
her husband.
Though thus reduced to slavery by the other sex, women, among these
tribes, enjoy a certain degree of freedom, which is a mitigation of
their miserable state. Married without their own consent, they are sold
to a husband for from 26_s._ and upwards, and thenceforward become his
servants. Yet the favourite wives of the rich, exempt from toil, are
allowed to amuse themselves in various ways, and even to walk about
unveiled, under the guard of an eunuch. Men never eat with their wives,
and often treat them brutally, bewailing the loss of a slave far more
than the death of a wife, unless she happens to please the caprice
of the hour. It is among the poorest that most freedom is allowed,
and among those tribes who have intercourse with Europeans that most
ferocity prevails. Some dig the soil, some attend to the household,
some support their husbands by the profits of a petty retail trade,
while others, kept for his gratification, are allowed to idle. These
favoured ones are often slaves. A handsome young one often sells for
from 60,000 to 120,000 cowries (from 3_l._ 15_s._ to 7_l._ 10_s._[44]),
while the price of a common wife is only 20,000 cowries (25_s._).
Frequently, the man’s inclination changes its direction, and he sells
one girl to purchase another. With many of the kings and chiefs a
continual trade in women is common. King Bell, of the Cameroons, for
instance, had more than 100 wives, and his wealth was increased by
their numbers. In his dominions the young maidens had considerable
liberty, sporting in the fields, and enjoying, for a few years,
comparative independence of the men[45].
In the kingdom of Dahomey, on the Guinea Coast, we find some of the
most remarkable institutions with respect to women which exist in
the world. It has been the centre of the slave trade. Few of the
comparatively fair aboriginal race exist, but in their place has been
gathered a mixed population, incontestably one of the most profligate
in Africa. Entering its seaport town the traveller is at once struck
by the remarkable immodesty of the female population. Throughout the
country the same characteristic is observable, though in a modified
degree. Sir John Malcolm observed of the subjects of the Imaum of
Muscat--manners they have none, and their habits are disgusting. The
same description has been judiciously applied to the people of Dahomey.
They are profligates, from the highest to the lowest--a bloody-minded
savage race, delighting in human suffering, and finding their national
pleasure in customs the most revolting and cruel that ever obtained in
the world.
The king practises all these, and is superior in brutality and
filthiness to any of his subjects. This has been a characteristic of
the throne in Dahomey. He has thousands of wives, while his chiefs
have hundreds, and the common people tens. The royal favourites are
considered too sacred to be looked upon by vulgar eyes. Whenever they
proceed along the public road, a bell is rung to warn all passengers of
their approach, and every one must then turn aside or hide his face. If
one of them commits adultery, she is, with her paramour, put to death.
The harem is sacred against strangers, but the privileged nobility
attend the royal feasts, where the king’s wives sit, attired in showy
costumes of the reign of Charles II., drinking rum and leading the
debauch. Those of an inferior class, or the concubines, are employed
in trade, the profits of which accrue to their master. Every unmarried
woman in Dahomey is virtually the property of the sovereign, who makes
his choice among them. No one dares to dispute his will, or to claim a
maiden towards whom he has signified his inclination.
When the king desires to confer honour on any favourite, he chooses a
wife for him, and presents her publicly. In this case she performs the
ceremony of handing to her husband a cup of rum, which is a sign of
union. Otherwise no rite or ceremony whatever is essential. However,
the man must finally take his wife or concubine, in the usual business
manner, for if he seduces a maiden he must marry her, or pay to her
parent or master 160,000 cowries (equal to 7_l._ 10_s._ of our money).
Failing in this, he may be sold as a slave. This punishment also is
inflicted on those who commit adultery with a common person’s wife.
The rich often buy a number of concubines, live with them for a short
time, and then sell them at a profit. It is in Dahomey, too, that
the practice prevails of throwing a wife in the way of committing
adultery for the sake of the penalty which her husband may exact from
the criminal. It is commonly known that the king of Dahomey supports
an army of several thousand Amazonian soldiers. These women dress
in male attire, and are not allowed to marry, or supposed to hold
intercourse with the other sex. They declare themselves, indeed, to
have changed their nature. “We are men,” they say, “and no women.” In
all things--courage and ferocity among the rest--they seek to preserve
the character. They dwell in barracks, under the care of eunuchs; they
practise wild war-dances, and, officered by their own sex, scorn the
allurements of any weaker passion; they are, therefore, for the most
part chaste. Vanity and superstition combine to guard their virtue.
They boast of never encountering a man except in the field of battle.
Thus their pride is enlisted in the service of their chastity. A charm
is placed under the threshold of their common dwelling, as it is under
that of the palace harem, which is supposed to strike with disease the
bowels of any guilty woman who may cross it. So strong is this belief,
that many incontinent Amazons have voluntarily revealed their crime,
though well aware that the punishment of death will be, without mercy,
dealt upon them as well as their lovers[46].
Most men have a favourite wife, and her privilege is valuable so
long as her husband lives; but on his decease it entails a terrible
obligation. The dying chief invites one or more of his principal wives
to die with him, and these, with a number of slaves, varying according
to his rank, are sacrificed at his tomb.
In consequence of the immense number of wives and concubines kept by
the king and his wealthier subjects, numbers of the common people are
forced to be content with the company of prostitutes, who are licensed
in Dahomey, and subject to a particular tax. There is a band of them,
according to Dalzel, who appears worthy of belief, in every village,
though confined to a certain quarter, and they prostitute themselves
to any who desire it, at a moderate fixed price. The profits thus
obtained are often insufficient for their support, and they eke out
their gains by breeding fowls, and other industrial occupations. Women
also hire themselves out to carry heavy burdens, and they no doubt
belong to the prostitute class. Norris saw 250 of these unfortunate
women collected in a troop on a public occasion. The object of this
institution, according to the king, was to save the respectable people
from seduction. There were many men who could not get wives, and,
unless prostitutes existed, they would seduce the wives or daughters
of others. At Whyddah, on the coast, Mr. John Duncan was assailed by
numbers of women who offered to “become his wives,” or, in other words,
to prostitute themselves to him, for a drop of rum. Many of the poorer
class strolled about naked, ready to accept any one for a miserable
gratuity. In that city it was the custom when a man committed adultery,
to press him into the king’s army. Formerly he was sacrificed, but
the practice was abolished--prisoners of war furnishing “the annual
customs” with victims. Whatever the punishment was, however, it was
ineffectual to suppress the crime, as depravity was the general
characteristic of the people. At Zapoorah, beyond Dahomey, a chief
offered one of his wives for sale, and parents asked a price for their
children; while at Gaffa, still further, the men are more jealous, and
the women more modest. Adultery with the king’s wife was punished by
impalement on a red-hot stake.
The dirty, lazy, and dull people of the Fantee coast, near Dahomey,
wear the same moral aspect as the subjects of that kingdom. Women
support the men. Parents would sell their children, husbands their
wives, and women themselves, for a trifling sum. One woman was so
desirous of changing her companion, that she took possession of a
recent traveller’s bed, and could only be expelled by force. Marriage
is a mere purchase--of from six to twenty wives and concubines. The
rich support their harems at a great cost. The common price is sixteen
dollars. Maidens are seldom bought when beyond fifteen or sixteen years
of age, so that many men have wives younger than their daughters. The
individual committing adultery is forced to buy his paramour at her
original price. Contrary to the custom of Ibu and Bony, the mother of
twins is, among the Fantees, held in great respect.
Along the coast of Benin manners, in most respects similar to these,
prevail--public dancers acting as prostitutes in most of the native
towns, and offering themselves for a wretched price. Every woman holds
it an honour to be the king’s companion even for one night[47].
In Ashantee, where polygamy, as elsewhere in Africa, prevails, adultery
is common, especially among the king’s wives, who, when discovered,
are hewn to pieces. The manners of the people are profligate beyond
anything of which in England we can realize an idea. In the country of
the Kroomen, eastward on the Guinea Coast, where nearly all the labour
devolves on women, men become independent by the possession of from
twenty to forty wives. One practice prevailing there is characterized
by an unusual depravity. The son, inheriting his father’s property,
inherits also his wives, his own mother then becoming his slave. In
the interior, on the banks of the Asinnee, we find a people among
whom the men are industrious, and the women treated with respect. The
consequence is a far higher standard of morality[48].
It is remarkable to find among the Edeeyahs of Fernando Po a strong
contrast to these general characteristics of manners and morality in
Western Africa. Generous, hospitable, humane, practising no murder,
possessing no slaves, with only innocent rites, they treat their women
with comparative consideration, and assign them far less than the usual
amount of hard labour. To cook food, bear palm oil to market, and press
the nuts, are their principal occupations. Polygamy is allowed, and
when a man undertakes a journey, he is accompanied by one or more of
his wives, who are much attached to their husbands and children.
The first wife taken by a man must be betrothed to him at least two
years before marriage. During that period the lover must perform all
the duties which otherwise would have been performed by her. He must
go, indeed, through a probation resembling the servitude of Jacob
for Rachel. Meanwhile the maiden is kept in a hut, concealed from the
sight of the people. These courtships often begin while the girl is
no more than thirteen or fourteen, and her lover only a youth; but
if he seduces her before the two years are elapsed, he is severely
punished. That time having expired the young wife is still kept in the
hut, where she receives her husband’s visits until it is evident she
is about to become a mother--or if not, for eighteen months. When she
first appears publicly as a married woman, all the virgins of her tribe
salute her and dance about her. These customs indicate far more purity
and elevation of manners among the Edeeyahs than among any other people
in Western Africa. They are only observed, however, with regard to the
first wife, all the others being virtually no more than concubines
governed by her. Some chiefs have upwards of a hundred, and the king
more than twice that number.
Adultery is severely punished, but, nevertheless, not very rare. For
the first offence both parties lose one hand. For the second the
man, with his relatives, is heavily fined, and otherwise chastised,
while the woman, losing the other hand, is driven as an outlaw into
the woods. This exile is more terrible to the Edeeyahs than the
mutilation[49].
In examining the condition of Africa, in the light we have chosen,
it would entail a tiresome repetition to pass in review all the
various groups of states sunk in barbarism. The natives are generally
barbarian. Elevated slightly above the hunting or pure savage state,
they have subdued some animals to their use, and practise some
ingenious arts; but their manners are baser than those of any race
below them in point of art and luxury. We have seen that in the West,
with a few rare exceptions, profligacy is the universal feature of
society. In the East it is almost equally so. Our knowledge of that
coast, it is true, is less full than of the West; but travellers afford
sufficient information to justify an opinion on the general state of
manners. In Zulu, as an example of the rest, the king has a seraglio of
fifteen hundred women, who are slaves to his caprice. His mother was in
that condition when Isaacs visited the country. She endured corporal
chastisement from her son. A number of women and boys, belonging to
the royal harem, and suspected of illicit intercourse, were massacred
by the prince’s orders. Adultery, indeed, was a thing of continual
occurrence in the palace. Marriage is held among the people not as a
sacred tie but as a state of friendship. All the people, however, are
polygamists, and the laws of morality refer only to wives. With others
the intercourse of the sexes is unrestrained. Men do not cohabit with
their wives on the first night after their wedding. This ceremony among
the rich is accompanied by a grand feast, though, as in other parts
of Africa, the wife is bought--at the most for ten cows. A man cannot
sell but may dismiss his wife, over whom also he has the power of
life and death. Adultery is always capitally punished, that is, when
discovered; for with eighty or ninety women in his possession, it is
not always possible for the husband to watch their conduct--especially
as they labour for his support. Girls are not allowed to marry or
become concubines until the age of fourteen, until which period they go
without clothing. The degrees of consanguinity, within which marriage
is strictly prohibited, are very wide--an union being permitted only
between the most distant relations.
It is necessary to observe that in the Zulu kingdom profligacy is more
general among the men than among the women, for wives hold the marriage
tie in great estimation. It is the unlimited power of the male sex over
the other which forces it to become the prey of sensuality. Throughout
the Eastern region, indeed, women are the mere instruments of pleasure,
being bought and sold like cattle--forced to toil and live in drudgery
for the benefit of their masters and husbands[50].
Among the nomade and stationary tribes of the Sahara, who are not
aboriginal to that region, we have a different system of manners. In
the Arabian communities you may find women ready to perform indecent
actions, and even to prostitute themselves for money; but these are of
the low classes. Cases of adultery are rare.
The Mohammedans believe that a man cannot have too many wives, or, at
least, too many concubines. They declare it assists their devotion;
but the feeling is one merely sensual. Pure sentiment is a thing in
which they can scarcely believe. Rich men who are accustomed to travel
in pursuit of trade, have one family at Ghadames, another, perhaps,
at Ghat, and another at Soudan, and live with each of them by turns.
These women stand in great fear of their husbands. The rich are veiled,
and live in retirement; the poor do not; but all will unveil their
faces to a stranger, if it can be done with safety. The white, or
respectable women of Ghadames, never descend into the streets, or even
into the gardens of their houses. The flat roof of their dwelling is
their perpetual promenade, and a suite of two or three rooms their
abode. It is said that in these retreats many of the women privately
rule their husbands, though no men will confess the fact. Among the
Marabouts it is held disgraceful to be unmarried, but shameful also to
be under the wife’s control.
The negresses and half-castes who may be seen in the streets of the
cities of the Sahara, are generally slaves. The women of the Touarik
tribes, however, are by no means so. They belong to a fierce and
warlike tribe, half vagrant, half stationary, and are bound by few
restrictions. Their morals are described as superior to those of the
lower class of women in Europe; though exceptions, of course, are
found. One Touarik woman offered to prostitute herself to Richardson
for a sum of money; or, as it was expressed, to become his wife.
Polygamy, though universally allowed in the Sahara, is not carried to
an extent at all equal to that prevailing in the savage regions on the
east and west. Three wives usually occupy the harem of a rich man.
Marriage is, as usual with people of that religion, a civil contract
with a shade of sanctity upon it, but celebrated with great feasts and
rejoicings. The bridegroom is expected to live in retirement during two
or three weeks. He occasionally walks about the town at evening alone,
dressed in gay clothes of blue and scarlet, and bearing a fine long
stave of brass or polished iron. He never speaks or is spoken to, and
vanishes on meeting any one.
[Illustration: GIRLS OF NUBIA (MAKING POTTERY).
[_From_ ST. JOHN’S “_Oriental Album_.”]]
The manners of the communities in the Sahara are imperfectly known;
but from the accounts we have received they appear to be of a far more
elevated order than those of any other part of Africa. It is true
that customs prevail which shock our ideas of decency. A chief, for
instance, offered Richardson his two daughters as wives. It is also
true that many women exist who follow the profession of prostitutes,
though we have no distinct account of them. But immorality is usually
among them a secret crime. Their general customs with regard to
sexual intercourse are at least as pure as those of Europe. Among the
wandering tribes of the desert the hardship of their lives, continual
occupation, varied scenes of excitement, and contempt for sensual
enjoyments, contribute to preserve chastity among their virtues;
while the Marabouts of the cities are of a generally moral character.
Intoxication never happens among the women. Still, the condition of
the sex is degraded; for they are, with exceptions, regarded only
as the materials of a man’s household, and ministers to the sensual
enjoyments of his life[51]. The Mohammedans of Central Africa, bigoted
as to dogmas, are nevertheless more liberal to women, who enjoy more
consideration among them than in the more important strongholds of that
religion[52].
The wandering Arabs of Algeria hold marriage as a business transaction,
though the estimation of the sex is not low. The lover brings to the
woman’s home ten head of cattle, with other presents, which usually
form her dowry. The father asks, “How much does she whom you are going
to have for wife cost you?” He replies, “A prudent and industrious
woman can never be too dear.” She is dressed, placed on a horse, and
borne to her new home amid rejoicing. She then drinks the cup of
welcome, and thrusting a stick into the ground, declares, “As this
stick will remain here until some one forces it away, so will I.” She
then performs some little office to show she is ready for the duty of a
wife, and the ceremony is ended[53].
Transferring our observations to Abyssinia, we find in its several
divisions different characteristics of manners. In Tajura, on the Red
Sea, profligacy is a conspicuous feature of society. Men live with
their wives for a short period, and then sell them, maintaining thus
a succession of favourites in their harems. Parents, also, are known
not only to sell their daughters as wives, but to hire them out as
prostitutes. One chief offered a traveller his daughter either as a
temporary or a permanent companion; he showed another whom he would
have sold for 100 dollars. One woman presented herself, stating, as a
recommendation, that she had already lived with five men. These are
nothing but prostitutes, whatever the delicacy of travellers induces
them to term them. Unfortunately the inquiries made into this system
are very slight, affording us no statistics or results of any kind. We
are thus left to judge of morality in Tajura by the fact that syphilis
afflicts nearly the whole population, man and woman, sultan and beggar,
priests and their wives included.
In the Christian kingdom of Shoa, the Christian king has one wife,
and 500 concubines; seven in the palace, thirteen at different places
in the outskirts, and the rest in various parts of his dominions. He
makes a present to the parents of any women he may desire, and is
usually well paid in return for the honour. The governors of cities and
provinces follow this example, keeping establishments of concubines at
different places. Scores of the royal slaves are cast aside, and their
place supplied by others.
In Shoa there are two kinds of marriage; one a mere agreement to
cohabitation, another a holy ceremony; the former is almost universally
practised. The men and women declare before witnesses that they intend
to live happily together. The connection thus easily contracted is
easily broken; mutual consent only is necessary to a divorce. In Shoa
a wife is valued according to the amount of her property. The heiress
to a house, a field and a bedstead, is sure to have a husband. When
they quarrel and part, a division of goods takes place. Holy ceremonies
are very rare, and not much relished. A wedded couple, in one sense
of the term, is a phenomenon. Instances of incontinence are frequent;
while the caprice of the men leads them often to increase the number
of their concubines. These are procured as well from the Christians as
from the Mohammedans and Pagans; but the poor girls professing these
religions are forced to a blind profession of Christianity. Favourite
slaves and concubines hold the same position with married women; while
illegitimate and legitimate children are treated by the law with no
distinction. Three hundred of the king’s concubines are slaves, taken
in war or purchased from dealers. They are guarded by fifty eunuchs,
and live in seclusion; though this by no means prevents the court from
overflowing with licentiousness. Numerous adulteries take place, and
this example is followed by the people; among whom a chaste married
couple is not common.
Women in Abyssinia, which is an agricultural country, mix freely with
the men, and dance in their company; though a few jealous husbands or
cautious parents seclude them. Morality is at an extremely low ebb. At
the Christmas saturnalia, gross and disgusting scenes occur, as well as
at other feasts. What else can be expected in a country where 12,000
priests live devoted, in theory at least, to celibacy; and where, at
the annual baptisms, these priests, with men, women, and children strip
naked, and rush in promiscuous crowds into a stream, where they are
baptised according to the Christian religion! The sacerdotal class of
Shoa is notoriously drunken and profligate. Another cause of corruption
is the caprice which induces men to abandon their concubines after
short cohabitation with them. These women, discarded and neglected,
devote themselves to an infamous profession, and thus immorality is
perpetuated through every grade of their society: in a word, the morals
of Shoa are of the lowest description. In the Mohammedan states in its
neighbourhood the condition of the sex is no better. If there is less
general prostitution, it is because every woman is the slave of some
man’s lust, and is imprisoned under his eye. He is jealous only of
her person; scarcely attributing to her a single quality which is not
perceptible to his senses[54].
In the southern provinces of Kordofan, under the government of Egypt,
south of the Nubian Mountains, immense labour is imposed on the
unmarried girls; yet the sentiment of love is not altogether unknown to
them, and men fight duels with whips of hippopotamus hide on account
of a disputed mistress. The wife is nevertheless a virtual slave, and
still more degraded should she prove barren; the husband, in that
case, solaces himself with a concubine, who, if she bears a child, is
elevated to the rank of wife. It is common among the rich for a man to
make his wife a separate allowance after the birth of her second child,
when she goes to live in a separate hut. All their bloom is gone by
the time they are twenty-four years old, and thenceforward they enjoy
no estimation from the men. Yet, improvident in their hearts, the
young girls of Kordofan are merry; and, whether at work or idle, spend
the day in songs and laughter; while in the evening they assemble and
dance to the music of the Tarabuka drum. Their demeanour, in general,
is modest, and their lives are chaste. Married women, on the contrary,
especially those who are neglected by their husbands, occupy themselves
in gossip, and find solace in criminal intrigues. In some parts of the
country, indeed, men consider it an honour for their wives to have
intercourse with others; and the women are often forwarded in their
advances. Female slaves often have liberty when they bear children to
their proprietors.
Women eat when the men have done, and pretty dancers attend at the
feasts to amuse their employers. These girls, like the Ghawazee of
Lower Egypt, are usually prostitutes, and very skilful in the arts of
seduction. Numbers of this class fled from Egypt into Kordofan, on one
occasion, when Mohammed Ali, in one of his affected fits of morality,
endeavoured to suppress their calling altogether.
Marriage, it may be scarcely necessary to say, is concluded without
the woman’s consent. The man bargains for her, pays her price, takes
her home, strips off her virginal girdle, which is the only garment
of unmarried girls, and covers her with a cloth about her loins; a
feast and a dance occasionally celebrate the event. When a wife is
ill-treated beyond endurance, she demands a divorce; and, taking her
female offspring, with her dowry, returns home. Trifles often produce
these separations. That her husband has not allowed her sufficient
pomatum to anoint her person with, is not unfrequently the ground of
complaint. Few men in Kordofan have more than two wives; but most have
concubines besides, whom the more opulent protect by a guard of eunuchs.
These remarks apply to the agricultural or fixed population. The
Baghaira, or wandering pastoral tribes of Kordofan, are a modest, moral
race--naked, but not on that account indecent[55].
A chief of the Berbers offered a late traveller the choice of his two
daughters for a bedfellow. They were already both married. Women there,
however, as well as in Dongola, are, many of them, ready to prostitute
themselves for a present. A virgin, whether as wife or concubine, may
be purchased for a horse. “Why do you not marry?” said a traveller to a
young Berber. He pointed to a colt and answered “When that is a horse I
shall marry.”[56]
The condition of women and state of manners on the upper borders
of the Nile, we find described in Ferdinand Werne’s account of his
recent voyage to discover the sources of the White Stream. The system
in Khartum may be indicated by one sentence in the traveller’s own
language. He speaks of desiring that the pay might be advanced to
prevent starvation from visiting the soldiers’ families, “which,
from the low price of female slaves, were numerous.” It may, without
resort to hyperbole, be said, that the female monkeys peopling the
neighbouring woods occupy a far nobler and more natural position.
Among the barbarians on the banks of the river further up, the state
of manners is in a great degree more pure. The Keks, for example,
are described as leading a blameless life. The travellers saw no
marriageable maidens or children, married women alone appearing. The
most singular social economy prevails among them. The women live,
during a considerable part of the year, in villages apart from the men,
who possess only temporary huts. Their wives have regular substantial
habitations, which are common to both sexes during the rainy season. A
man dare not approach the “harem village,” except at the proper period,
though some of the women occasionally creep into their husbands’
village. Polygamy is allowed, but only practised by the chiefs, since
all the wives are bought, which renders the indulgence costly.
Among some of the tribes on the banks of the White Nile women will sell
their children if they can do so with profit. Everywhere in that region
the maidens mingle naked with the men, but appear by no means immodest.
When married they wear an apron. All exhibit a sense of shame at
exhibiting themselves unclothed before strangers. Beyond the Mountains
of the Moon, however, Werne found people, among whom the unmarried men
and women were separated. They were completely naked, but chaste and
decent nevertheless. A heavy price was always asked for a girl, which
prevented common polygamy, though their social code permitted it[57].
It must be evident that, in an inquiry like the present, a view of the
manners and morals of Africa with regard to the female sex must be
incomplete. In the first place, our information is very limited; in
the second, we are confined for space--for otherwise these sketches
could be extended to an indefinite extent. We have, however, taken
observations in Southern, in Western, in Eastern, in Northern, and
Central Africa. Kingdoms and communities, indeed, there are which we
have not included in our description. Of these some wear features
so similar to others we have noticed, that to particularise them is
unnecessary in a general view. Of others, such as Egypt, Nubia, Barca,
Tripoli, Algiers, and Morocco, we shall treat in a future division of
the subject, because they are not included, by the character of their
civilization, among the communities of which we have hitherto spoken.
The reader will, we trust, have been enabled to form a fair idea of
the average of morals among the savages and semi-savages of Africa.
With modern barbarians, as with ancient states, tabular statistics are
impossible: but from a description in general terms, we cannot always
refuse to ground a confident opinion.
WOMEN IN AUSTRALIA.
In Australia we have a family of the human race still more uneducated,
though not more barbarous, than that which inhabits the woods of the
African continent. There is among them less approach to the arts of
civilization, less ingenuity, less intelligence, but there is more
simplicity. Their customs are not so brutal as those prevailing on
the banks of the Joliba or the Senegal. Nevertheless they are true
savages, and the condition of their women is consistent with all the
other features of their irreclaimed state. Of the Australians, however,
as of all races imperfectly known, there obtains in this country a
vulgar idea drawn from the old accounts, which are little better than
caricatures. They have been represented as a hideous race, scarcely
elevated above the brute, blood-thirsty, destitute of human feeling,
without any redeeming characteristics, and, moreover, incapable of
civilization. Such a description is calculated only to mislead. The
aborigines of Australia are certainly a low, barbarous, and even a
brutal race, but the true picture of their manners, which form the
expression of their character, is not without encouraging traits.
Considering the great extent of New Holland, it is surprising to find
such an uniformity of character and customs, as we actually discover
among its nations. The language, varied by dialects, the habits, social
laws, and ideas of the people, are extremely similar, whether we visit
them in that province called the Happy or in the districts around Port
Essington. Consequently, though it occupy a large space on the map,
this region will not require any very extended notice. An idea of the
condition and morality of its women may be afforded by one general
view, with reference to the various local peculiarities noticed by
travellers.
The native inhabitants of Australia are generally nomadic. They dwell
in temporary villages scattered over vast surfaces of country, and
move from place to place, as the supply of provisions, spontaneously
provided by the earth, is more or less abundant. Separated as they are
into small isolated communities--rarely numbering more than eighty
members--they resort to the borders of lakes and streams, which dry up
at certain seasons, and force them to seek elsewhere a home. A rude
copy of the patriarchal form of government prevails among them--old men
being the rulers of the tribe.
The condition of women among these primitive savages is extremely low.
They are servants of the stronger sex. In some of their dialects wife
and slave are synonymous. All the labour devolves on her, and, as no
form of agriculture is practised, this consists principally in the
search for the means of life. She collects the daily food, she prepares
the camp or the hut at night, she piles fire-wood, draws water, weaves
baskets, carries all burdens, and bears the children on her back, and
the return for all this willing devotion is frequently the grossest
ill-usage.
There is no form of marriage ceremony observed. A man gets a wife in
various ways. Sometimes she is betrothed to him while an infant--even
before her birth, and sometimes she devolves to him with other
property. The eldest surviving brother, or next male relative, inherits
the women of a whole family. Thus many households are supplied. Others
steal their wives from hostile tribes, and frequent wars arise from
such proceedings. Polygamy is universally allowed, but not by any
means generally practised; for there are few parts of Australia where
the female sex is not outnumbered by the male. Plurality of wives
consequently implies wealth and distinction--each additional one being
regarded as a new slave, an increase of property. Nor are the women
jealous of polygamy. When a man has many wives, they subdivide the
labour, which otherwise would devolve on one, thus lightening each
others’ burdens, and procuring companionship. There can indeed be
little jealous feeling where affection on the part of the husband to
the wife is almost a thing unknown.
The Australian wife when past the prime of life is usually a wretched
object. She is often deformed and crippled by excessive toil--her body
bent, her legs crooked, her ankles swollen, her face wearing an aspect
of sullen apathy, produced by long hardship. When young, however, they
are frequently lively and happy, not being cursed with keen feelings,
and caring for little beyond the present hour. Should a young woman,
nevertheless, be distinguished by peculiar beauty, she leads, while
her attractions last, a miserable course of existence. Betrothed at
an early age, she is perpetually watched by the future husband, and
upon the least suspicion of infidelity is subjected to the most brutal
treatment. To thrust a spear through her thigh or the calf of her leg
is the common mode of punishment. She may, in spite of all precautions,
be snatched away: whether consenting or not, she must endure the same
penalty. If she be chaste, the man who has attempted to seduce her may
strike her with a club, stun her, and bear her to a wood, where she is
violated by force. Still she is punished, and it is, says Sir George
Grey, no common sight to see a woman of superior elegance or beauty
who has not some scars disfiguring various parts of her person. This
period, however, is soon over, for the bloom of an Australian woman
is very short-lived. When the seducer is found, he is punished in a
similar manner, and if he have committed adultery with a married woman,
suffers death.
The jealousy of the married men is excessive, and would be ridiculous
were it not that their vigilance is absolutely called for. A careless
husband would speedily suffer for his neglect. Accordingly we find
the Australian savages practising in their woods or open plains
restrictions not dissimilar to those adopted in the seraglios of the
East. When an encampment is formed for the night every man overlooks
his wives while they build one or more temporary huts, over which he
then places himself as a guard. The young children and the unmarried
girls occupy this portion of the village. Boys above ten years of
age and all single men are forced to sleep in a separate encampment,
constructed for them by their mothers, and are not allowed to visit
the bivouacs of the married men. Under no circumstances is a strange
native allowed to approach one of the family huts. Each of these little
dwellings is placed far from the rest, so that when their inmates
desire to hold converse they sing to each other from a distance. When
the young men collect to dance, the maidens and wives are allowed to be
spectators, but only on a few occasions to join. They have dances of
their own, at which the youth of the other sex are not permitted to be
present.
In spite of this excessive jealousy the idea of a husband’s affection
for his wife appears strange to them. Men return from journeys without
exchanging a greeting with the mothers of their children, but those
children they salute with many endearing terms, falling on their necks
and shedding tears with every demonstration of love. A man has been
known, when his wife was grievously sick, to leave her to die in the
wilderness, rather than be troubled with her on his journey.
Yet the influence of women is not by any means small. In some of the
tribes they obtain a position of moderate equality with the husband,
are well-fed, clothed, and treated as rational beings. Everywhere the
men, young and old, strive to deserve their praise; and exhibitions of
vanity take place, perfectly ludicrous to those European travellers who
forget that the silly dandyism of the Australian savage, with his paint
and opossum skin, is only peculiar in its form of expression. Women
are often present on the field of battle, to inspire their husbands by
exhortations, to rouse them by clamours of revenge or appeals to their
valour; and among the chief punishments of cowardice is their contempt.
The man failing in any great duty of a warrior is so disgraced. Thus,
if he neglect to avenge the death of his nearest relation, his wives
may quit him; the unmarried girls shun him with scorn, and he is driven
by their reproaches to perform his bloody and dangerous task.
Where polygamy exists it is seldom the woman’s consent is required
before her union with a suitor. In Australia it is never required
or expected. The transaction is entirely between her father and the
man who desires her for a wife, or, rather, for a concubine. She is
ordered, perhaps, to take up her household bag, and go to a certain
man’s hut, and this may be the first notice she has of the marriage.
There she is in the position of a slave to her master. If she be
obedient, toil without torture is her mitigated lot; but if she rebel,
the club is employed to enforce submission. She is her husband’s
absolute property. He may give her away, exchange her, or lend her
as he pleases. Indeed, old men will sometimes offer their wives to
friends, or as a mark of respect to strangers; and the offer is not
uncommonly accepted.
Though we have mentioned three ways of obtaining a wife, the system of
betrothal is the most general. Almost every female child is so disposed
of a few days after its birth. From that moment the parents have no
control whatever over her future settlement; she is in fact a bought
slave. Should her betrothed die she becomes the property of his heir.
Whatever her age she may be taken into the hut; cohabitation often
commencing while the girl is not twelve years old, and her husband only
a boy. Three days after her first husband’s death the widow goes to the
hut of the second.
Some restrictions, however, are imposed on the intercourse of the
sexes. Thus all children take the family name of their mother, and a
man may not marry a woman of his own family name. Relations nearer than
cousins are not allowed to marry, and an alliance even within this
degree is very rare. The Australians have, indeed, a horror of all
connections with the least stigma of incest upon them, and adjudge the
punishment of death to such an offence. Their laws, which are matters
not of enactment but of custom, are extremely severe upon this and all
other points connected with their women.
Chastity, nevertheless, is neither highly appreciated nor often
practised. It is far from being prized by the women as a jewel of
value; on the contrary, they plot for opportunities to yield it
illicitly, and can scarcely be said to know the idea. Profligacy is
all but universal among them; it is a characteristic even of the
children. When some schools were formed at Perth, for the education of
the natives, it was found absolutely necessary to separate children
of tender years, in order to prevent scenes of vile debauch from
being enacted. It should be said, however, that though indiscriminate
prostitution among the women, and depraved sensuality among the men,
exist in the most savage communities, disease and vice are far less
characteristic of them than of those tribes which have come in contact
with Europeans. In all the colonial towns there is a class of native
women following the calling of prostitutes, and there the venereal
disease and syphilis are most deadly and widely prevalent. The former
appears to have been brought from Europe, and makes terrible havoc
among them. The latter, ascribed by their traditions to the East, has
been found among tribes which had apparently never held intercourse
with the whites; in such cases, however, it is in a milder form.
Several causes contribute to the corruption of manners among these
savage tribes. One of the principal is, the monopoly of women claimed
by the old men. The patriarchs of the tribe, contrive to secure all
the young girls, leaving to their more youthful brethren only common
prostitutes, prisoners of war, and such women as they can ravish from
a neighbouring community, or seduce from their husbands’ dwellings.
They also abandon to them their own wives when 30 or 40 years old,
obtaining in exchange the little girls belonging to the young man’s
family. The youthful warrior, therefore, with a number of sisters, can
usually succeed in obtaining a few wives by barter. That their personal
attractions are faded is not of any high importance; since they are
needed chiefly to render him independent of labour. His sensual
appetites he is content to gratify, until he becomes a patriarch, by
illicit intrigues with other women of the tribe. Of these there are
generally some ready to sell or give away their favours. The wives,
especially of the very old chiefs, look anxiously forward to the death
of their husbands, when they hope, in the usual course of inheritance,
to be transferred to the hut of a younger man; for, among nations in
this debased state, it is not _the_ woman that is prized, but _a_
woman. Personal attachment is rare. The husband whose wife has been
ravished away by a warrior from a neighbouring tribe may be pacified
by being presented with another companion. Even in Australia Felix,
which is peopled by the most intelligent, industrious, and manly of
the Australian race, the young man disappointed of a wife in his own
tribe sets off to another, waylays some woman, asks her to elope with
him, and, on her refusal, stuns her with his club, and drags her away
in triumph. Marriage, indeed, appears too dignified a term to apply to
this system of concubinage and servitude which in Australia goes under
that name. Travellers have found in the far interior happy families of
man and wife, roaming together, with common interests, and united by
affection; but such instances are rare.
A large proportion of the young men in Australia can by no means obtain
wives. This arises from the numerical disparity between the sexes,
which is almost universal in that region, and is chiefly attributable
to the practice of infanticide. Child-killing is indeed among the
social institutions of that poor and barbarous race. Women have been
known to kill and eat their offspring, and men to swing them by the
legs and dash out their brains against a tree. The custom is becoming
rare among those tribes in constant intercourse with Europeans, but
that intercourse itself has caused much of the evil. Half-castes,
or the offspring of native women by European fathers, are almost
invariably sacrificed. They are held in dread by the people, who fear
the growth of a mixed race which may one day conquer or destroy them.
Females, also, are killed in great numbers. This class of infanticide
is regulated by various circumstances in different communities. Among
some tribes all the girls are destroyed until a boy is born; in others,
the firstborn is exposed; in others, all above a certain number
perish; but everywhere the custom prevails. One of two twins--a rare
birth--is almost always killed. It may be ascribed to the miserably
poor condition of the people, and the degraded state of the female sex;
for in a region where the aborigines have not yet learned to till the
soil, and where the means of life are scanty, there will always be an
inducement to check the growth of numbers by infanticide; and where
women have to perform all the labour, and follow their husbands in long
marches or campaigns, ministering to every want they may experience,
the trouble of nursing an infant is often saved at the cost of the
infant’s life. Neglect also effects the same purpose.
The population, under these circumstances, has always been thin, and is
apparently decreasing. Among 421 persons belonging to various tribes
in Australia Felix, Eyre remarked that there were in the course of two
years and a half only ten children reared. In other places one child to
every six women was not an unusual average. This, however, is not all
to be ascribed to infanticide. Many of the females abandon themselves
so recklessly to vice that they lose all their natural powers, and
become incapable of bearing offspring. Eyre found in other parts of
Australia that the average of births was four to every woman. In New
South Wales the proportion of women to men appears to be as two to
three; while in the interior, Sturt calculated that female children
outnumbered the male, while with adults the reverse was true. This
indicates an awful spread of the practice of infanticide, which we
cannot refuse to believe when we remember the facts which travellers of
undeniable integrity have made known to us.
To suppose from this that in Australia the natural sentiments of
humanity are unknown, would be extremely rash. On the contrary, we find
very much that is beautiful in the character of its wild people, and
are led to believe that civilization may go far towards elevating them
from all their barbarous customs. Women are known to bear about their
necks, as relics sacred to affection, the bones of their children,
whom they have mourned for years with a pure and deep sorrow. Men have
loved and respected their wives; maidens have prized and guarded their
virtue; but it is too true that these are exceptions, and that the
character and the condition of the female sex in Australia is that of
debasement and immorality.
With respect to the prostitute class of the colonial towns, to which
allusion has been made, it will be noticed in another part of this
inquiry, when we examine into the manners of English and other settlers
abroad.
Of prostitutes as a class among the natives themselves, it is
impossible to speak separately; for prostitution of that kind implies
some advance towards the forms of regular society, and little of this
appears yet to be made in that region. From the sketch we have given,
however, a general idea may be gained of the state of women and the
estimation of virtue among a race second only to the lowest tribes of
Africa in barbarity and degradation[58].
OF PROSTITUTION IN NEW ZEALAND.
In the New Zealand group we find a race considerably elevated above
the other inhabitants of Australasia, with a species of native
civilization--a system of art, industry, and manners. Perhaps the
savage of New Holland is one of the most miserable, and the New
Zealander one of the most elevated, barbarians in the world. By
this we do not mean that he has made any progress in refinement,
or been subdued by the amiable amenities of life; but he is quick,
intelligent, apt to learn, swift to imitate, and docile in the school
of civilization. The Maories, in their original state, are low and
brutal; but they are easily raised from that condition. They have
exhibited a capacity for the reception of knowledge, and a desire to
adopt what they are taught to admire--which encourage strong hopes
of their reclamation. Among them, however, vice was, until recently,
almost universal, and at the present day it is so, with the exception
of a few tribes brought directly under the influence of educated and
moral European communities. The only class which has discarded the
most systematic immorality is that which has reconciled itself to the
Christian religion, or been persuaded to follow the manners of the
white men. The unreclaimed tribes present a spectacle of licentiousness
which distinguishes them even among barbarous nations.
They show, indeed, an advance in profligacy. Their immorality is
upon a plan, and recognised in that unwritten social law which among
barbarians remedies the want of a written code. It is not the beastly
lust of the savage, who appears merely obedient to an animal instinct,
against which there is no principle of morals or sentiment of decency
to contend;--it is the appetite of the sensualist, deliberately
gratified, and by means similar, in many respects, to those adopted
among the lowest classes in Europe. We may, indeed, compare the Maori
village, unsubjected to missionary influence, with some of the hamlets
in our rural provinces, where moral education of every kind is equally
an exile.
The New Zealanders have been divided into the descendants of two
races, the one inferior to the other; and the Malay has been taken
as the superior. Ethnologists may prove a difference between them,
and trace it through their manners; but these distinctions of race
are not sufficiently marked to require separate investigations. The
social institutions of the islanders are very generally the same,
with some unimportant variations among the several tribes. We are
placed in this peculiar difficulty when inquiring into the manners
of New Zealand--that they appear to have undergone considerable
modification since, and in consequence of, the arrival of Europeans.
The natives refer to this change themselves, and in some cases
charge the whites with introducing various evils into their country.
Undoubtedly this is as true of New Zealand as of every other portion
of the globe whither men have carried from Christendom the vices as
well as the advantages of civilization. But in speaking of European
settlers, a broad distinction must be borne in mind. White is not
more contrasted with black, than are the regular orderly colonies
established under the authority of Great Britain with the irregular
scattered settlements planted by whalers, runaway or released convicts,
land speculators, and other adventurers before the formal hoisting
of our flag. The influence of the one has been to enlighten and to
elevate, of the other to debase and demoralize, the native population.
Gambling, drinking, and prostitution were encouraged or introduced
by the one, Christianity, order, and morality are spreading through
the exertions of the other; and it is, therefore, unjust to confound
them in one general panegyric or condemnation. Nor shall we include
all the unrecognised settlements in this description. Many of the
hardy whalers and others have taken to themselves Maori wives, who,
sober, thrifty, and industrious, submit without complaining to rough
usage and hard work, and are animated by a deep affection for their
husbands. Contented with a calico gown and blanket, an occasional pipe
of tobacco, and a very frugal life, they cost little to support, and
appear for the most part not only willing but cheerful.
The female sex throughout New Zealand is not in such complete
subjection to the male as in New Holland. With the right they have
acquired the power to resist any unnatural encroachment upon their
liberties, though still in a state of comparative bondage. They are
influential in society, and whenever this is the case they enjoy, more
or less, remission of oppression. We find them declaiming at public
meetings of the people, and fiercely denouncing the warriors who may
be dishonourably averse to war, or have behaved ignominiously in the
field. By influencing their friends and relatives they often secure to
themselves revenge for an injury, and thus security against the same
in future. In various other ways their position is defended against
utter abasement. They are not regarded merely as subservient to the
lust and indolence of the male sex. When dead they are buried with
ceremony according to the husband’s rank, and formal rites of mourning
are observed for them. In public and in domestic affairs their opinions
are consulted, and often their hands are obtained in marriage by the
most humble supplication, or the most difficult course of persuasion,
by the lover. All this is evidence of a higher state than that which is
occupied by females either in Africa or New Holland.
Polygamy is permitted and practised by those who can afford it. In
reality, however, the man has but one wife and a number of concubines,
for though the second and third may be ceremoniously wedded to him,
they are in subjection to the first, and his intercourse with them is
frequently checked by her. She is paramount and all but supreme, though
a man of determination will sometimes divorce his first wife to punish
her contumelious behaviour to his second.
It is customary for a man to marry two or more sisters, the eldest
being recognised as the chief or head of the family. They all eat with
the men, accompanying them, as well as their lovers and relations,
before marriage, on their war expeditions or to their feasts. Betrothal
takes place at a very early age--often conditionally before birth. Thus
two brothers or two friends will agree that if their first children
prove respectively a boy and a girl, they shall be married. When it
is not settled so early, it is arranged during infancy, or at least
childhood--for a girl of sixteen without an accepted lover is regarded
as having outlived her attractions and all chance of an alliance.
The betrothal is usually the occasion of a great feast, where wishes
for the good success and welfare of the young couple are proclaimed
by a company of friends. Three varieties of marriage formality are
observed--differing as the girl is wanted to fill the place of first,
second, third, or fourth wife. The first is a regular ceremony, the
second less formal, and the last, which is merely conventional, is when
a slave is raised from servitude to the marital embrace. The highest
is that in which the priest pronounces a benediction, and a hope, not
a prayer, for the prosperity of the married couple. The rest, which is
the most approved and common, is for the man to conduct his betrothed
to his hut, and she is thenceforward mistress of the place. Unless
she be divorced, no one can take away her power, and no inferior wife
can divide it. When they have entered the dwelling a party of friends
surround it, make an attack, force their way, strip the newly-married
pair nearly naked, plunder all they can find, and retire. By taking
a woman to his house a man makes her his wife, or virtually, except
in the case of the first, his concubine. When he merely desires to
cohabit with one, without being formally united to her, he visits her
habitation.
Though polygamy or concubinage has been practised in New Zealand from
immemorial time, jealousy still burns among the wives as fiercely as
in any Christian country where the institution is forbidden by the
social law. It is the cause of bitter domestic feuds. The household,
with a plurality of women, is rarely at peace. It is universally known
to what an extent the jealousy of the Dutch women in Batavia carried
them when their husbands indulged in the practice--common in Dutch
settlements--of keeping female slaves. They watched their opportunity,
and when it occurred would carry a poor girl into the woods, strip her
entirely naked, smear her person all over with honey, and leave her
to be tortured by the attacks of insects and vermin. A similar spirit
of ferocious jealousy is characteristic of the women in New Zealand.
The inferior wives consequently lead a miserable life, subjected to
the severest tyranny from the chief, who makes them her handmaids, and
sometimes terrifies her husband from marital intercourse with them. She
exposes them to perpetual danger by endeavouring to insinuate into his
mind suspicions of their fidelity, and thus the household is rendered
miserable. When a man takes a journey he is usually accompanied by one
of his wives, or, if he goes alone, will bring one back with him. Hence
arise bitter heart-burnings and quarrels. Occasionally they lead to the
death of one among the disputants, and frequently to infanticide.
So furious are the passions of the women when their jealousy is excited
against their younger rivals, that many of the chiefs in New Zealand
fear to enjoy the privilege allowed them by their social law. When
they resolve upon it, they often proceed with a caution very amusing
to contemplate. More than one anecdote in illustration of this is
related in the works of recent travellers. A man having a first wife
of bad temper and faded beauty, whom he fears, nevertheless, to offend
altogether, is attracted by some young girl of superior charms, and
offers to take her home; she accepts, and the husband prepares to
execute his design. It is often long before he acquires courage to
inform his wife, and only by the most skilful mixture of persuasion,
management, and threats, that she is ever brought to consent. Women
captured in battle, however, may be made slaves, or taken at once to
their captor’s bed. Thus raised from actual slavery, their condition
is little improved. The tyranny of the chief wife is exercised to
oppress, insult, and irritate them. Should one of them prove pregnant,
her mistress--especially if herself barren--will often exert the most
abominable arts to ensure her miscarriage, that the husband may be
disappointed of his child, and the concubine of his favour which would
thence accrue to her.
Divorces, according to the testimony of most writers, are not
unfrequent in New Zealand. Among the ordinary causes are, mere decline
of conjugal affection, barrenness in the wife, and a multiplication
of concubines. A stepmother ill-treating the children, or a mother
wantonly killing one of them, is liable to divorce. The latter is not
an useless precaution, for jealous wives have been known in cold blood
to murder an infant, merely to revenge themselves upon their husbands,
or irritate them into divorce. A woman extravagantly squandering the
common property, idling her time, playing the coquette, becoming
suspected of infidelity, or refusing to admit a new wife into the
house, is sometimes put away. This is effected by expelling her from
the house. When it is she who seeks it, she flies to her relatives
or friends. Should the husband be content with his loss, both are at
liberty to marry; but if he desire to regain her, he seeks to coax
her back, and, failing in that, employs force. She is compelled to
submit unless her parents are powerful enough to defend her--for in
New Zealand arms are the arbiters of law. When the desire to separate
is mutual, it is effected by agreement, which is a complete release to
both. If the husband insist on taking away the children, he may, but he
is forbidden, on pain of severe punishment, from annoying his former
wife any further.
There is among the New Zealanders a rite known as _Tapu_, and the
person performing it is sacred against the touch of another. While in
this condition no contact is allowed with any person or thing. There
are, however, comparative forms of Tapu. Thus a woman, in the matter
of sexual intercourse, is _tapu_ to all but her husband, and adultery
is severely punished. Formerly the irrevocable remedy was death, and
this may still be inflicted; but jealousy is seldom strong in the New
Zealand husband, who often contents himself with receiving a heavy
fine from his enemy. The crime is always infamous, but not inexpiable.
The husband occasionally, when his wife has been guilty, takes her
out of the house, strips her, and exposes her entirely naked, then
receiving her back with forgiveness. The paramour usually attempts to
fly. If he be not put to death, he also is sometimes subjected to a
similar disgrace. When a wife discovers any girl carrying on a secret
and illicit connection with her husband, a favourite mode of revenge
is, to strip and expose her in this manner. For, in New Zealand,
libidinous as the conduct of the people may be, their outward behaviour
is, on the whole, decorous. They indulge in few indecencies before a
third person. The exposure of the person is one of the most terrible
punishments which can be inflicted. A woman has hanged herself on its
being said that she has been seen naked. One girl at Karawanga, on the
river Thames, charged with this offence, was hung up by the heels and
ignominiously flogged before all the tribe. Shame drove her mad, and
she shot herself. They are otherwise obscene, and the children are
adepts in indecency and immorality. One strong characteristic of their
rude attempts at art is the obscenity in their paintings and carvings.
In those singular specimens which crowd the rocks of Depuch Island, on
the coast of New Holland, not a trace of this grossness is visible.
One of the most melancholy features in the manners of this barbarous
race, is the prevalence of infanticide. The Christian converts, as well
as some of the natives who hold frequent intercourse with the more
respectable Europeans, have abandoned it, as well as polygamy; but,
with these exceptions, it is general throughout the thinly-scattered
population of New Zealand. It almost always takes place immediately
after birth, before the sentiment of maternal affection grows strong
in the mother’s breast. After keeping a child a little while they
seldom, except under the influence of frenzy, destroy it. As they
have said to travellers, they do not look on them, lest they should
love them. The weakly or deformed are always slain. The victim is
sometimes buried alive, sometimes killed by violent compression of its
head. This practice has contributed greatly to keep the population
down. It is openly and unblushingly pursued, the principal victims
being the females. The chief reasons for it are usually--revenge in
the woman against her husband’s neglect, poverty, dread of shame, and
superstition. One of the most common causes is the wife’s belief that
her husband cares no longer for his offspring. The priests, whose
low cunning is as characteristic of the class in those islands as
elsewhere, frequently demand a victim for an oblation of blood to the
spirit of evil, and never fail to extort the sacrifice from some poor
ignorant mother. Another injurious and unnatural practice is, that of
checking or neutralizing the operations of nature by procuring abortion.
Tyrone Power, in his observations on the immorality prevalent in New
Zealand, remarks that some of the young girls, betrothed from an early
age, are _tapu_, and thus preserved chaste. He regrets that this
superstition is not more influential, since it would check the system
of almost universal and indiscriminate prostitution, which prevails
among those not subject to this rite. Except when the woman is _tapu_,
her profligacy is neither punished nor censured. Fathers, mothers,
and brothers will, without a blush, give, sell, or lend on hire, the
persons of their female relatives. The women themselves willingly
acknowledge the bargain, and Mr. Power declares the most modest of them
will succumb to a liberal offer of money. Nor is anything else to be
expected, in any general degree. The children are educated to obscenity
and vice. Their intercourse is scarcely restrained, and the early age
at which it takes place has proved physically injurious to the race.
Even those who are betrothed in infancy and rendered _tapu_ to each
other, commence cohabitation before they have emerged, according to
English ideas, from childhood. Except in the case of those couples
thus pledged before they can make a choice of their own, the laws
which in New Zealand regulate the intercourse of the sexes with regard
to preparations for marriage, approach in spirit to our own. A man
desiring to take as wife a woman who is bound by no betrothment has to
court her, and sometimes does so with supplication. The girls exhibit
great coyness of manner, and are particular in hiding their faces from
the stranger’s eye. When they bathe it is in a secluded spot; but they
exercise all the arts which attract the opposite sex. When one or two
suitors woo an independent woman, the choice is naturally given to the
wealthiest; but should she decline to fix her preference on either, a
desperate feud occurs, and she is won by force of arms. Sometimes a
young girl is seized by two rivals, who pull on either side until her
arms are loosened in the sockets, and one gives way.
Perhaps, under these circumstances, the system of betrothal is
productive of useful results, since it prevents the feuds and conflicts
which might otherwise spring from the rivalry of suitors. The girl
thus bound must submit to marriage with the man, whatever may be
her indifference or aversion to him. Occasionally, indeed, some
more youthful, or otherwise attractive, lover gains her consent to
an elopement. If caught, however, both of the culprits are severely
whipped. Should the young suitor be of poor and mean condition, he
runs the chance of being robbed and murdered for his audacity. When,
on the contrary, a powerful chief is desirous of obtaining a maiden
who is betrothed, he has little difficulty in effecting his object,
for in New Zealand the liberty of the individual is proportionate to
his strength. It is a feudal system, where the strong may evade the
regulations of the social law, and the weak must submit. Justice,
however, to the missionaries in those islands requires us to add, that
in the districts where their influence is strong, a beneficial change
in this, as in other respects, has been produced upon the people. They
acknowledge more readily the supremacy of law; they prefer a judicial
tribunal to the trial of arms; they restrain their animal passions in
obedience to the moral code which has been exhibited to them; and many
old polygamists have put away all their wives but one, contented to
live faithfully with her.
Among the heathen population chastity is not viewed in the same light
as with us. It not so much required from the _woman_ as from the
_wife_, from the _young girl_ as from the _betrothed maiden_. In fact,
it signifies little more than faithful conduct in marriage, not for
the sake of honour or virtue, but for that of the husband. With such
a social theory, we can expect no general refinement in morality.
Indeed, the term is not translatable into the language of New Zealand.
Modesty is a fashion, not a sentiment, with them. The woman who would
retire from the stranger’s gaze may, previous to marriage or betrothal,
intrigue with any man without incurring an infamous reputation.
Prostitution is not only a common but a recognised thing. Men care
little to receive virgins into their huts as wives. Husbands have
boasted that their wives had been the concubines of Europeans; and one
declared to Polack that he was married to a woman who had regularly
followed the calling of a prostitute among the crews of ships in the
harbour. This he mentioned with no inconsiderable pride, as a proof of
the beauty of the prize he had carried away.
Formerly many of the chiefs dwelling on the coast were known to derive
a part of their revenue from the prostitution of young females. It was,
indeed, converted into a regular trade, and to a great extent with
the European ships visiting the group. The handsomest and plumpest
women in the villages were chosen, and bartered for certain sums
of money or articles of merchandise, some for a longer, some for a
shorter period. The practice is now, if not abolished, at least held
in great reprobation, as the following anecdote will show. It exhibits
the depraved manners of the people in a striking light, and is an
illustration of that want of affection between married people which has
been remarked as a characteristic of the New Zealanders. A chief from
Wallatani, in the Bay of Plenty, went on an excursion to the Bay of
Islands, and was accompanied by his wife and her sister. There he met
a chief of the neighbourhood, who possessed some merchandise which he
coveted. He at once offered to barter the chastity of his wife for the
goods, and the proposal was accepted. The woman told her sister of the
transaction, and she divulged the secret. So much reproach was brought
upon the chief among his people, that he shot his wife’s sister to
punish her incontinent tongue.
Jerningham Wakefield describes the arrival of the whalers in port.
He mentions as one of the most important transactions following this
event, the providing of the company with “wives for the season.”
Some had their regular helpmates, but others were forced to hire
women. Bargains were formally struck, and when a woman failed to give
satisfaction, she was exchanged for another. She was at once the slave
and the companion of her master. This is neither more nor less than
a regular system of prostitution; but it is gradually going out of
fashion, and is only carried on in a clandestine manner in the colonies
properly so called. Indeed this is, unfortunately, one of the chief
products of imperfect civilization--that vice, which before was open,
is driven into the dark; it is not extirpated, but is concealed. A man
offered his wife to the traveller Earl, and the woman was by no means
loth to prostitute herself for a donation. Barbarians readily acquire
the modes of vice practised by Europeans. In the criminal calendar of
Wellington for 1846, we find one native convicted and punished for
keeping a house of ill-fame.
Extraordinary as it may appear, prostitution in New Zealand has
tended to cure one great evil. It has largely checked the practice of
infanticide. For, as the female children were usually destroyed, it
was on the supposition that, instead of being valuable, they would be
burdensome to their parents. This continued to be the case until the
discovery was made that by prostituting the young girls considerable
profits might be made. It is to Europeans that the introduction of
this idea is chiefly owing. The females were then, in many cases,
carefully reared, and brought up to this dishonourable calling without
reluctance. No difficulty was ever experienced from their resistance,
as they would probably have become prostitutes of their own free will,
had they not been directed to the occupation. Slavery, which has from
the earliest time existed in New Zealand, has supplied the materials
of prostitution, female servants being consigned to it. When possessed
of any attractions they are almost invariably debauched by their
masters, and frequently suffer nameless punishments from the jealous
head wife. Concubinage does not, as in some other countries, release a
woman from servitude, but she enjoys a privilege which is denied to the
chief wife--she may marry again after her master’s death.
Formerly the general custom, however, was for a wife to hang, drown,
strangle, or starve herself on the death of her husband. Her relatives
often gave her a rope of flax, with which she retired to a neighbouring
thicket and died. It was not a peremptory obligation, but custom viewed
it as almost a sacred duty. Sometimes three of the wives destroyed
themselves, but generally one victim sufficed. Self-immolation is
now, indeed, becoming very rare; but it is still the practice for the
widow, whether she loved her husband or not, to lament him with loud
cries, and lacerate her flesh upon his tomb. Whenever she marries again
a priest is consulted to predict whether she will survive the second
husband or not. Occasionally we find instances of real attachment
between man and wife, such as would sanctify any family hearth; while
examples have occurred of women hanging themselves for sorrow, on the
death of a betrothed lover.
These, however, are only indications that humanity is not in New
Zealand universally debased below the brute condition. The general
colour of the picture is dark. Women are degraded; men are profligate;
virtue is unknown in its abstract sense; chastity is rare; and
prostitution a characteristic of female society. Fathers, mothers,
and brothers--usually the guardians of a young woman--prostitute her
for gain, and the women themselves delight in this vice. There is,
nevertheless, some amelioration observable in the manners of the
people, produced by the influence of the English colonies. Those
colonies themselves, however, are not free from the stain, as will be
shown when we treat of communities of that description in general[59].
OF PROSTITUTION IN THE ISLANDS OF THE PACIFIC.
Among the innumerable islands which are scattered over the surface
of the Pacific, we discover various phases of manners developed
under different influences. In some of the lonely groups lying out of
the usual course of trade or travel, communities exist whose social
habits remain entirely pure--that is, unchanged by intercourse with
foreigners. In others continual communication through a long period,
with white men, has wholly changed the characteristic aspects of
the people--given them a new religion, a new moral code, new ideas
of decency and virtue, new pleasures, and new modes of life. The
same process appears likely, at a future day, to obliterate the
ancient system of things. In all the islands of this class, indeed,
the reform of manners is not so thorough as the florid accounts of
the missionaries would induce us to believe; but those pioneers of
civilization have done enough, without assuming more than their due,
to deserve the praise of all Christendom. To have restrained the
fiercest passions of human nature among ignorant and wilful savages;
to have converted base libidinous heathens into decent Christians;
to have checked the practice of polygamy; and in many places to have
extinguished the crime of infanticide;--these are achievements which
entitle the missionaries to the applause and respect of Europe; but it
is no disparagement of their labours to show, where it is true, that
immense things yet remain to be performed before the islanders of the
Pacific are raised to the ordinary level of civilized humanity.
The main family of the Pacific--the Society, the Friendly, the
Sandwich, the Navigators’, and the Marquesas Islands--present a
state of society interesting and curious. Inhabiting one of the
most beautiful regions on the face of the earth, with every natural
advantage, the inhabitants of those groups were originally among the
most degraded of mankind. Superior to the savage hordes of Africa
and the wandering tribes of Australia, they are in physical and
intellectual qualities inferior to the natives of New Zealand, though
excelling them in simplicity and willingness to learn.
Tahiti may be considered the capital of Polynesia, as it is the head of
its politics, trade, and general civilization. Before the settlement
of the missionaries and the introduction of a new social scheme, its
manners were barbarous and disgusting. The condition of the female sex
corresponded to this order of things. It was humiliated to the last
degree. Most of the men, by a sacred rite, were rendered too holy for
any intercourse with the women except such as was pleasant to their
own lusts. It was similar to the _tapu_ of the New Zealanders, but was
not, as among them, common to all. It was an exclusive privilege of the
males. In consequence of this, women lived in a condition of exile from
all the pleasures of life. They never sat at meals with their husbands,
dared not eat the flesh of pigs, of fowls, of certain fish, or touch
the utensils used by the men. They never entered the houses of their
“_tabooed_” lords, dwelling in separate habitations, which these might
enter when they chose. Those of the royal blood, however, were excepted
from the action of this law. They might mingle with the other sex,
might inherit the throne, and enjoy the advantages of society. With
almost all others, beggary, toil, and degradation was the universal lot.
Marriage under such circumstances could not be looked upon as a sacred
tie, or even a dignified state. It was held to serve only the purposes
of nature and the pleasures of the men. With all, indeed, except
the rich, it was a mere unceremonious bargain, in which the woman
was purchased, though the parents usually made a present to their
son-in-law. Among the nobler orders of society there was a little more
parade, though an equal absence of sanctity. A person with a beautiful
daughter brought her to some chief, saying, “Here is a wife for you.”
If she pleased him he took her from her father’s hands, placed her
under the care of a confidential servant, and had her fattened, until
old and plump enough for marriage. All her friends assembled with his
at the temple, and proceeded to the altar. The bride, with a rope
hanging about her neck, was accompanied by a man bearing a bunch of
the fragrant fern. Prayers were muttered, and blessing invoked upon
the union. Then the names of their ancestors were whispered, and at
each one of the leaves was torn. The nearest kinsman of the woman next
loosened the rope from about her neck, and delivered her over to the
bridegroom, bidding him take her home. Presents of various kinds were
made to the newly-married pair, but, with all this ceremony, the tie
was merely one of convenience. Within a month the man might tire of
his partner and wish to be rid of her. All he had to do was to desire
her departure, saying, “It is enough--go away.” She immediately left
him, and almost invariably became a prostitute. This process might
be repeated as often as he pleased. The caprice of the male sex thus
threw numbers of the females into a necessity of supporting themselves
by the public hire of their persons. For, although polygamy existed,
it was practised only by the rich, since the facility of divorce
rendered it more convenient to take one wife, dwell with her a short
time, and abandon her for another, than to be troubled or burdened
with several at the same time. The wealthy, however, took numerous
concubines--indulging in this luxury more than any of the other
islanders. In all their customs and national characteristics, if we
desire to view them in their original form, we must contemplate the
people of those islands as they were twenty years ago. A great change
is now apparent among them. The accounts, therefore, published at that
period, though improved by later inquiries, afford us the information
we are in search of. We are not surprised to find an indolent
licentious people, as they were, when under no restraint, addicted to
the most odious forms of vice. One natural result of their manner of
life was infanticide. It was practised to a frightful extent, and was
encouraged by a variety of causes. In the first place, poverty and
idleness often induced parents to destroy their children--choosing
to suffer that short pang of natural sorrow than the long struggles
with starvation which awaited the indigent--even in those prolific
islands. Next the common licentiousness produced innumerable bastards,
which were generally killed. Thirdly, the social institutions of the
country, with the division of classes, contributed to increase the
prevalence of the custom--for the fruit of all unequal matches was
cast aside. Superstition also aided it, for the priests demanded for
their gods frequent oblations of infant blood. The missionary Williams
was informed that, from the constant occurrence of wars, women, being
abandoned by their husbands, slew their children, whom they knew not
how to support. When a man married a girl of inferior rank, two, four,
or six of her children were sacrificed before she could claim equality
with him, and should she bear any more they were spared. Vanity, too,
exercised its influence, for, as nursing impaired the beauty of the
women, they sought to preserve their attractions by sparing themselves
the labour. Perhaps, however, we should not lay it to the charge of
vanity. The miserable women of these islands found in the flower of
their persons the only chance of attachment or respect from their
husbands. When this had faded, nothing could save them from neglect.
Whatever the cause, the extent of the practice was fearful.
Three-fourths of the children were destroyed, and sometimes in the
most atrocious manner. A wet cloth placed on the infant’s mouth, the
hands clenched round its throat, or the earth heaped over it while
alive in a grave, were among the most humane. Others broke the infant’s
joints, one by one, until it expired. This was usually the plan of
the professional child-killers, of whom there was a class--male and
female--though the parents often performed the office themselves.
Before the establishment of Christianity, Williams declares he never
conversed with a woman who had not destroyed one or two of her
offspring. Many confessed to him, as well as to Wilmer, that they had
killed, some three, some five, some nine, and one seventeen.
Connected with infanticide was one of the most extraordinary
institutions ever established in a savage or a civilized country. This
was the Areoi Society. It was at once the source of their greatest
amusements and their greatest sorrow, and was strictly confined to
the Society group, though indications of a similar thing have been
discovered in the Ladrones. The delicacy of the missionary writers--in
many instances extremely absurd--has induced them to neglect informing
us in detail of the practices and regulations adopted by this society;
but enough is known from them, and from less timid narrators, to allow
of a tolerably full sketch.
From the traditions of the people it appears that the society was of
very ancient date: they said there had been Areois as long as there
had been men. Its origin is traced to two heroes--brothers, who, in
consequence of some adventures with the gods, were deified, and made
kings of the Areoi, which included all who would adhere to them as
their lords in heaven. Living in celibacy themselves, they did not
enjoin the same on their followers; but required that they should leave
no descendants. Thus the great law of the Areois was that all their
children should be slain. What the real origin of the institution was
it is impossible to discover. This legend, however, indicates a part of
its nature.
The Areois formed a body of privileged libertines, who spent their days
travelling from province to province, from island to island, exhibiting
a kind of licentious dramatic spectacle to the people, and everywhere
indulging the grossest of their passions. The company located itself
in a particular spot as its head-quarters, and at certain seasons
departed on an excursion through the group. Great parade was made
on the occasion of their setting out. They bore with them portable
temples for the worship of their tutelar gods, and, wherever they
halted, performed their pantomimes for the amusement of the people. The
priests and others--all classes and things--were ridiculed by them in
their speeches, with entire impunity, and they were entertained by the
chiefs with sumptuous feasts. There were, however, seven classes of
the Areois, of which the first was select and small, while the seventh
performed the lower and more laborious parts in their entertainments.
Numbers of servants followed them to prepare their food and their
dresses, and were distinguished by the name of Fanannan; these were not
obliged to destroy their children.
Every Areoi had his own wife, who was sacred from attack. Improper
conduct towards her was severely punished, sometimes by death. Towards
the wives of other persons, however, no respect was shown; for after
one of their vile and obscene spectacles, the members of the fraternity
would rush abroad, and commit every kind of excess among the humble
people. At their grand feasts, to which the privileged orders only were
admitted, numbers of handsome girls were introduced, who prostituted
themselves for small gifts to any member of the association.
The practice of destroying all their children, which was compulsory
among the Areois, licensed them to every kind of excess. The moment a
child was born its life was extinguished--either strangled, stabbed
with a sharp bamboo, or crushed under the foot. The professional
executioner waited by the woman’s couch, and, immediately the infant
came into the world, seized it, hurried it away, and in an instant
flung it dead into some neighbouring thicket, or a pit prepared
beforehand.
Infanticide was by no means confined to the Areois; it was an universal
practice. Generally the sacrifice took place immediately after the
birth; for, with the exception of those children demanded by the
priests to offer in the temple, it was seldom that an infant allowed to
live half an hour was destroyed. Whenever the execution was performed,
it was previously resolved upon. The females were killed oftener than
the males, and thus sprang up a great disproportion between the sexes,
which was evidently owing to this and their often unnatural customs,
as, since their abolition, the sexes are nearly equal.
Adultery was sometimes punished with death, but not under the public
law. It was optional with the husband to pursue the criminal, or
content himself with procuring another wife. A strange state of manners
is exhibited by the account we have of the early missionaries arriving
in Tahiti. The King Pomare came down to meet them with his wife Idia.
This woman, though married to the prince, remaining on friendly terms
with him, offering him advice, and influencing his actions by her
counsel, was then cohabiting with one of her own servants, who had for
some time been her paramour. The King, meanwhile, had taken his wife’s
youngest sister as a concubine; but she had deserted him for a more
youthful lover, whereupon he contented himself with a girl belonging to
the poorer class. Women, indeed, and men of the royal blood, were above
the law.
Abandoned wives, and girls who could find no husbands, usually became
prostitutes, as distinguished from those who pursued a profligate life
from sheer sensuality. They hired themselves out to the young men whom
the monopoly of women by the rich constrained to be contented with such
companions. We have no information whether they were subject to any
especial regulations; what the terms of contract were between them and
their temporary cohabitants; how they supported themselves in old age;
or, indeed, of anything concerning them, except the general nature of
their calling. A large class of these prostitutes dwelt near the ports
and anchoring grounds, deriving their means of subsistence from open or
clandestine intercourse with the sailors, who willingly paid them with
little articles of ornament or utility from Europe.
One of the missionaries of the first company desired to marry a Tahiti
woman. His brethren, however, strongly objected to the act; first,
because she was a heathen, second, because she was a prostitute. There
could not be then found on the island, as they declared themselves on
belief, a single undebauched girl above twelve years of age; therefore,
in accordance with the Scripture prohibition against marrying a
“heathen harlot,” they forbade him forming the connection. Nevertheless
he persisted, took the prostitute as wife, and is supposed to have been
murdered with her connivance.
Inconstancy among wives, and profligacy among unmarried women, was then
a characteristic almost universal in Tahiti. The wide-spread practice
of procuring abortion concealed many of the intrigues which took
place, and the last crime which began visibly to decrease was that of
adultery. Nor could this be a matter of wonder. The education of the
people was in a school of licentiousness. The most effective lessons
in obscenity were afforded by the priests in the temples, and children
of tender years indulged in acts of indescribable depravity. Thus in
few parts of the world could be discovered a more corrupt system of
manners, a more complete absence of morals, than in Tahiti.
Under the influence of the missionaries a great and beneficial change
was produced. French priests have now in a measure superseded them;
but even their exertions have not been able to neutralize the good
effects of the new code of morals introduced by the English friends of
civilization.
As to the actual amount, however, of the good which has been effected,
the accounts are contradictory. From the missionaries themselves we
learn that Christianity has been firmly established; that the female
sex has been elevated to an honourable position; that the Christian
rite of marriage is now generally observed; that infanticide is wholly
abolished; and that the manners of the people have become comparatively
pure. The picture, indeed, drawn by these artists, is vivid and full of
charms. We cannot, however, accept it without reserve; for such writers
have in many parts of the world been too eager to ring their peals
of triumph over the appearance of reform, without inquiring into its
substantial and durable nature.
Other accounts insist on the truth of a totally different view. A
recent author, a merchant, many years resident in Tahiti, describes
the result of missionary labour as a mere skinning over of the
corruption which exists. “Even now,” he says, speaking of that island,
“a people more ready to abandon themselves to sensuality cannot be
found under the canopy of heaven.” And further, in noticing the state
of the youthful population, he asserts, “It is a rare thing for a
woman to preserve her chastity until the age of puberty.” Delicacy,
he proceeds to tell us, is a thing unknown. There is hardly a man who
would not wink at his wife’s prostitution, or even abet it, to support
himself. The same system of corrupt manners is general throughout
the islands. The missionaries, by making adultery and fornication
offences punishable by fines--so many dollars each--have set up a
species of licence for immorality. The penalty is either eluded or
laughed at. Sometimes the woman’s paramour pays the penalty, and
continues with her. The morals of the people, therefore, have not
been radically reformed. Public decency is observed, but private
manners are disgusting. The Tahitians have thus learned hypocrisy,
for they now practise secretly what was formerly a recognised custom.
The men are jealous of their own race, but will bargain for their
wives with Europeans. One was asked the reason of this distinction. He
instantly made answer, that when a white man took one of their wives
he made her a present, passed on his way, and thought no more of her;
but it was very different with their own people, for they would be
continually hovering about the woman. The legal penalty for adultery by
a single man is a fine of ten hogs to the husband. If it is committed
by a married man he pays the ten hogs, while his paramour pays his
wife another ten to compensate her for the injury she has suffered;
thus the bargain is equal. Divorce is optional on either hand. For
prostitution, or fornication of any kind, the missionaries enacted a
fine. In a climate, however, where the girl ripens into puberty at the
age of eight or nine, this becomes a licence, and immorality is very
slightly checked. The depopulation of the group, which is still going
on, is mainly owing, says the same author, to physical privations
acting on moral depravity; for indigence is the lot of the people, and
licentiousness now, as formerly, their besetting sin.
We believe this to be an unfair account of the state of things now
existing in Tahiti. The writer[60] is possessed of a strong prejudice
against the missionaries, and we are inclined to apply to him, with
some modification, the observations of Commodore Wilkes, commander of
the recent American exploring expedition in reference to that island.
He tells us there is a class of traders who defame the missionaries,
as well as a profligate class who hate them, because they forbid
intoxicating liquors, have abolished lascivious dances, and prevent
women going on board ship to prostitute themselves. One charge against
the missionaries is, however, proved: they are guilty of a misjudging
zeal amounting to fanaticism, forbidding the women to wear chaplets
of flowers, because it is a sinful vanity; such a restriction is
worse than ridiculous. The Commodore, however, whom we accept as a
judicious and a trustworthy authority, already shows that much good
has been effected. The population is now almost stationary--the
births and deaths among all ages and both sexes were in 1839 naturally
proportionate; Christian marriage is established as the national
custom, and polygamy abolished; if infanticide be ever practised,
it is as a secret crime; and as for immorality, though by no means
extirpated, it has been considerably reduced. “Licentiousness,” says
Wilkes, “does still exist among them, but the foreign residents and
visitors are in a great degree the cause of its continuance, and an
unbridled intercourse with them serves to perpetuate it. Severe laws
have been enacted, but they cannot be put in force in cases where one
of the parties is a foreigner.” He proceeds to deny that the island is
conspicuous in this respect, and believes it would show advantageously
in contrast with many countries usually styled civilized.
In the distant Sandwich group a similar system of manners existed
before the abolition of idolatry in 1819. There was, however, one
singular custom: children bore the rank of their mother, not their
father, probably from the reason assigned by other savage races for
different laws, that the parentage was never certain. Polygamy was
practised, but if the king had a daughter by a noble wife she succeeded
to the throne, though he should have numerous sons by the others; in
fact, they were no more than concubines, though their offspring were
not invariably destroyed, unless the mothers belonged to the humbler
class of people; all the king’s illegitimate children, however, were
immediately killed. Adultery was punished with death; but intrigues
were frequent, and infanticide was practised to a terrible extent.
Since the enactment of the laws restraining sexual intercourse, the
crime has become comparatively rare, and the progress of depopulation
has been arrested.
We must, however, first view the people as they were before these
reforms occurred: there was little check upon the intercourse of the
sexes, except with regard to married women; the young girls being
abandoned almost entirely to a dissolute mode of life, the marriage
contract was a loose tie, easily broken, without anything of a sacred
or even honourable character. Husbands continually abandoned their
wives, who invariably destroyed the children thus left to them in
their virtual widowhood, and took to prostitution as a means of life.
The practice of procuring abortion was also resorted to, even more
than infanticide, and women were sometimes killed by the operation;
nevertheless, bastard children are sometimes reared, and the language
of the islanders supplies a delicate designation for one of this
brood: it is called “one that comes.”
Although the condition of the female sex was degraded, and although
the women were for the most part subjected to the will of the chiefs,
a few remained to be wedded among the poor, and to follow their own
inclinations in the choice of partners. The word “courting” is used
among them, or at least a synonymous term, signifying, literally,
“we must be crept to.” This indicates some elevation in their social
intercourse, but appears to have been a recent introduction. When a man
wished to marry a girl, some previous intimacy was supposed. According
to their former customs he goes to her, and offers her a present. If
she was willing to receive him, the gift was accepted; if not, he went
his way. The parents were then consulted. When they consented he at
once took home his bride, and all was consummated. When they refused
he either abandoned his suit or persuaded his lover to elope with him;
or, if possessed of sufficient property and power, forces her away.
When once settled in union the wives were usually faithful, though
previously they indulged in the utmost profligacy without any check.
The infanticide of the Sandwich Islands presented details still more
horrible than the worst of those described in connection with Tahiti.
Children six or seven years old, who so far had been carefully nursed,
were sometimes sacrificed when their parents became desperate or
indolent. An American traveller relates an affecting incident of a
man who desired to be rid of his child, while the mother endeavoured
to save it. Long altercations took place between them, until the
father one day, to put an end to the debate, seized his little son,
threw him over his knees, and with a single blow broke his back. The
circumstance was related to the king, with a demand for punishment
upon the offender. “Whose child was it?” he asked. They answered, “His
own.” “Then that is nothing,” he said, “to you or to me.” Usually the
office was performed by female child-stranglers, who made it their
profession. In a country where marriage, especially among the rich, was
simply a compact for temporary or permanent cohabitation, abundance of
employment was naturally afforded to those people. The chiefs, it is
true, married in the temple, but the addition of ceremonies added not a
whit of sanctity or durability to the bond. The first Christian wedding
took place in Oalm in 1822, and the rite has since that period been
established by law. The edict of 1819, indeed, proclaimed a revolution
in the social system of the group. But it is not easy to reform the
manners of a whole people. It is a slight task to publish laws, but
difficult to enforce them, especially when they assail the most
deeply-rooted prejudices, the sentiments, the passions, the religions,
and the pleasures, of a numerous community. Idolatry, infanticide,
polygamy, concubinage, and prostitution were all prohibited by the
declaration of 1819, but are still practised, though in secret, but by
no means so extensively as in former times. The financial laws check
infanticide. If a man has four children, he is exempt from labour taxes
to the king and to his landlord; if five, from the poll-tax also; if
six, from all taxes whatsoever. Indeed, the condition of the females
has been considerably raised, so that, instead of being the slaves,
they are now, at least in some degree, the companions of the men.
Of the actual state of the sex, and the characteristic of manners
in the Sandwich group, a fair sketch may be gathered from the facts
scattered through the large work of Commodore Wilkes; he went through
many districts, and examined minutely the progress of the people under
the new code. In one district of Dahu, a small island in the group, no
instance of infanticide had occurred (1840) during ten years; the law
against the illicit intercourse of the sexes had not tended to increase
the practice, and the population, which had been almost swept away, was
recovering. In the valley of Halalea the population had been decreasing
at the rate of one per cent. for nine years. In 1837, it was 3024--1609
males, 1415 females; and in 1840, 2935--1563 males, 1372 females. The
general licentiousness of manners, causing barrenness in the women,
with the practice of infanticide and abortion, prevented any increase.
In Waiaulea the population of 2640 decreased by 225 in four years; and
instances were known of women having six, seven, or even ten children,
in as many years, without rearing one of them; the bastards were
almost always destroyed, but the new law operated very beneficially
to check the intercourse of the sexes; and only one case was known of
a woman destroying her child, through fear of the penalty attaching
to fornication. It appears probable, however, that the regulation
compelling all unmarried women, found pregnant, to work on the public
roads, must encourage many unnatural practices; in Hawaii itself, the
principal island, where large numbers of men and women formerly lived
in promiscuous intercourse--as one woman common to several men--great
improvement is visible, and public manners have undergone much change;
licentiousness, notwithstanding, is still a prominent characteristic of
the people. These observations may be applied generally to the whole of
the Sandwich group.
Of the Tonga or Friendly Islands no description equals in completeness,
and none exceeds in general accuracy, that by Mariner, compiled by
John Martin. According to him, the female sex was not degraded there,
old persons of both sexes being entitled to equal reverence; women
in particular were respected as such, considered to form part of the
world’s means of happiness, and protected by that law of manly honour
which prohibits the strong from maltreating the weak. There were many
regulations respecting rank which do not belong to this inquiry; but
others of the same kind must be alluded to. The young girl, betrothed
or set apart to be the wife or concubine of a noble, acquired on that
account a certain position in the community. The rich women occupied
themselves with various forms of elegant industry, not as professions,
but accomplishments; while others made a trade of it.
The chastity of the Tonga people should be measured, in Mr. Martin’s
opinion, rather by their own than by others’ ideas of that virtue.
Among them it was held the positive duty of a married woman to be
faithful to her husband. By married woman was meant one who cohabited
with a man, lived under his roof and protection, and ruled an
establishment of his. Her marriage was frequently independent of her
own will, she being betrothed by her parents, while very young, to some
chief or other person. About a third were thus disposed of, the rest
marrying by their own consent. She must remain with her husband whether
she pleased or not, until he chose to divorce her.
About two-thirds of the females were married, and of these about half
continued with their husbands until death; that is, about a third
remained married till either they or their partners died. Of the others
two-thirds were married, and were soon divorced, marrying again two,
three, or four times; a few never contracted any marriage at all; and a
third were generally unmarried. Girls below puberty were not taken into
this account.
During Mariner’s residence of four years in the islands, where he
enjoyed privileges of social intercourse which no native was allowed,
he made numerous inquiries, and was led to believe that infidelity
among the married women was very rare. He remembered only three
successful instances of planned intrigue, with one other which he
suspected. Great chiefs might kill their wives taken in adultery, while
inferior men beat them. They were under the surveillance of female
servants, who continually watched their proceedings. Independently of
this also, he considered them inclined to conjugal virtue.
A man desiring to divorce his wife, had to do no more than bid her go,
when she became perfect mistress of herself, and often married again
in a few days. Others remained single, admitting a man into their
houses occasionally, or lived as the mistress of various men from time
to time--that is to say, became wandering libertines or prostitutes.
Unmarried women might have intercourse with whom they pleased without
opprobrium, but they were not easily won. Gross prostitution was
unknown among them. The conduct of the men was very different. It
was thought no reproach, as a married man, to hold intercourse with
other females; but the practice was not general. It was checked by the
jealousy of the wife. Single men were extremely free in their conduct;
but seldom made attempts on married women. Rape occasionally happened.
Captives taken in war had, as a thing of course, to submit, and
incurred no dishonour through it. Few of the young men would refuse to
seduce an unmarried girl of their own nation, had they the opportunity.
Nevertheless, in comparison with the islanders in the surrounding sea,
they were rather a chaste than a libertine people.
Commodore Wilkes declares himself glad to confirm the account in
“Mariner’s Tonga Islands” as an “admirable and accurate description.”
The women are said to be virtuous, and the general state of morals
superior far to that of Tahiti. The venereal disease is much less
extensively prevalent.
In the Marquesas the curious social phenomenon of polyandrism
exists--several men cohabiting with one woman. This is in consequence
of the preponderance of the male over the female sex. A young girl may
become attached to a youth, and live with him for a short time. A man
may then become attached to her, and transfer her, with her lover,
to his house, where he supports them both. Infanticide is unknown,
but procuring abortion not uncommon. The marriage tie, though a mere
private compact signified by an exchange of presents, is, in spite
of polyandrism, distinct, binding, and enduring--the parties abiding
by the agreement they have made, until another formal agreement to
dissolve it. In other parts of the Pacific the contrary system is
carried out to an extravagant extent. In the Isle of Rotumah the land
is divided into various estates, the property of certain chiefs. Each
of these lords of the soil has absolute control over all the women in
his district, and not one can marry without his consent. Should he
not desire her for himself he allows her to contract the engagement,
on receiving a present from the bridegroom. Gifts are exchanged on
either side, bowls of cava are drunk, and the ceremony is over. The
wife, in this island, has singular power. She may, a few days after the
marriage, desire her husband to leave her. He does so for three or four
months, and then returns to spend two or three days in her society.
She may then request him again to quit the house; and this is repeated
until she consents to live with him permanently. Occasionally, when all
the preliminaries of the match are arranged, the girl will suddenly
revoke her resolution, and refuse to leave her parents’ house. The man
may be equally desirous of leaving her at home, and in this case she is
henceforward a privileged libertine, and usually lives well upon the
gains of prostitution. But if, previously to the contract, she lose
her virginity, the punishment is death, which is also inflicted for
adultery.
A similar system with respect to the chief’s authority prevails in the
Feejee group. All the young girls in his district are at his mercy; he
may take them all as concubines if he pleases. When they are allowed
to marry they become slaves, living in complete subjection to their
husbands, who flog them at will. They are denied the privilege of
entering a temple, and are bought, sold, and exchanged, like cattle.
Inclined as they are to licentiousness, they have certain ideas of
modesty, and wear a girdle round the loins; any girl seen without this
covering is put to death.
In the wild isles of the Kingsmill group in the Western Pacific,
polygamy prevails; but more consideration is paid to the female
sex than in any other part of that great insular region. All the
hard labour is performed by the men; the women pursuing only those
occupations which are truly domestic and feminine. Men, indeed, beat
their wives, but in a similar manner to the lower classes here. If
she be vigorous or bold enough, she returns blow for blow, and there
is no appeal for him against her retaliation. Chastity is scarcely
esteemed a virtue, nor is it considered essential by a man requiring
a wife. After marriage, however, continence is strictly required.
The adulteress is either put to death or expelled; but, in spite of
these punishments, offences of this class are not uncommon. They are
encouraged by the laws which forbid the younger brothers of a chief,
who are not holders of land, from marriage; for it may be laid down
as an axiom that all restrictions upon lawful intercourse with women
multiply illicit connections. The adulteress and the prostitute in the
Kingsmill Isles, as elsewhere, form the resources of those to whom
celibacy is enjoined.
A wife is not bought, but the parents of both contribute to the
household stock of the newly-married pair. It would be indecent in
the young man to inquire of the girl’s father what is the amount of
her dowry. The marriage ceremony is only a feast, which is continued
during three days. Children are sometimes betrothed during infancy,
and in this case no marriage ceremony is required: as soon as they are
sufficiently old they are sent to live together. When this is not the
case, the young man makes an offer first to the girl, and, if accepted,
next to her parents; but usually carries her off if they do not consent.
On the neighbouring isle of Maluni all the women who are married have
been betrothed during childhood; the rest, without exception, being
prostitutes, living with the single men, and receiving payment from
them.
This is, as usual, in consequence of the rich men having so many wives
that only a few women are left to live in common with the poorer sort.
Infanticide is not practised, but abortion is continually procured. A
woman has seldom more than two, and never more than three children.
After the third is born she invariably calls in the aid of a woman to
prevent another birth. This is not attended with any shame, but is,
on the contrary, considered prudent; with the unmarried females it is
invariable.
In the Samoan or Navigators’ group women now enjoy equal privileges
with the men, and no indiscriminate intercourse of the sexes is
permitted. Polygamy has been very much checked, but is generally
regretted. The people say, with a simplicity which takes away its
profanity from the expression, “Why should God be so unreasonable as to
require them to give up all their wives for his convenience?” Among the
unconverted tribes it still prevails as formerly. Girls are betrothed
early, and tabooed until marriage, which preserves the general
chastity. Infanticide never occurs. Adultery is severely punished,
and seldom committed; the marriage ceremony is only a trifling form
of exchanging presents. The power of divorce may be exercised by the
husband under certain circumstances, but not by the wife. Altogether
their morals are of a superior order; and their libertine disposition
exercises itself chiefly in the performance of lascivious dances.
Everywhere, however, in these seas, except where the power of the
missionaries is supreme, the whaling ships, on arriving at a port,
attract numbers of prostitutes, who offer themselves to the sailors at
various prices. When Coulter made his voyage, not many years ago, the
vessel was assailed at the Kingsmill Islands by dozens of these women,
who came, some attended by their fathers, mothers, or brothers, to
entice the sailors. Some of them were very beautiful, and nearly naked.
When he was in bed, in a house on shore, several young girls came in
with scarcely any clothing, and asked him to choose a companion, or
“wife.” In other places hundreds of prostitutes swarmed down to the
beach, performing the most obscene antics. It was so when La Perouse
visited the region; it is so now. It was remarked by Cook, and it was
remarked by the most recent voyager.
To pass up and down through that prodigious wilderness of sea, visiting
each group in succession, and noticing the peculiar manners of all the
various insular communities which there exist, would exceed the limits
of an ordinary work. Nor would it continue to interest the reader;
for there is an unavoidable monotony in the subject, when extended
too greatly in reference to one region. What we have described will
show that, among the innumerable islands of the Pacific, the original
condition of women, before the partial establishment of Christianity,
was pitifully degraded, and that the labours of the missionaries have
been fruitful in good results. Wherever Christianity has been received,
much outward improvement, at least, is visible. And there is something
in this. When crime is perpetrated in secret, it is so because it is
dangerous or disgraceful; and in proportion as it is either the one or
the other the inducement to it will diminish. There is an immense field
open in the Pacific; but the exertions of future missionaries may be
encouraged by contemplating the good results which have sprung from
the labours of those who have gone before them[61].
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG THE NORTH-AMERICAN INDIANS.
Various as are the phases of civilization in different parts of the
earth, no race is more peculiar than the North American Indian. It
is alone. It stands apart from the rest of the human family. It
resembles no other. In manners, customs, laws, ideas, and religion,
the nation occupies its own ground, related by no tie with any of
the innumerable tribes of the human family inhabiting the remaining
divisions of the world. It has, indeed, exercised the ingenuity of
ethnographical philosophers to trace among the North American Indians
an identity of social institutions with the people of ancient Israel;
but the comparison appears forced except in a few particulars, which
seem rather matters of accident, and by no means the prominent
characteristics of the Red or the Jewish race.
Until the complete establishment of a civilized society in North
America, and before the settlement of peace, our knowledge of the
Indian race was most imperfect. We depended on the relations of certain
imaginative travellers, who wrote not so much to inform as to startle
the reader--a practice not altogether abandoned at the present day.
Carver, indeed, with a few others, brought home honest accounts of
what he saw, but was not always careful to separate that from what
he heard; and thus, even his picture is strangely coloured in some
of its details. Later and more scrupulous travellers, however, have
investigated the manners of the Indian race, and our acquaintance with
it is gradually becoming familiar. Catlin and the various historians
have added to our knowledge; so that a clear outline, at least of
their social institutions, may be drawn. There are three classes
of writers on the subject:--those who paint the red man as poetry
incarnate; those who describe him as a vile and drunken barbarian; and
those who have the sense to discriminate between the Indian of the
seaport town corrupted in the dram-shop, and the Indian of the woods,
displaying the original characteristics of his race. It is from such
authorities we shall draw our view of the condition of women and the
state of morals among them.
[Illustration: WOMAN OF THE SACS, OR “SÁU-KIES” TRIBE OF AMERICAN
INDIANS.
[_Copied, by permission, from a Portrait taken by_ MR. CATLIN, _during
his residence among the Red Indians_.]]
A race divided into several nations, and subdivided into innumerable
tribes, might be supposed to present a similar diversity of manners.
Not so, however. The social institutions of the North-American Indian
are generally uniform, though of course there are many varieties of
detail in their habits and customs. Yet these are neither so numerous
nor so striking as to render it impossible to sketch the whole in a
general view.
The Indian loves society. He is never found wandering alone. He is
attached also to the company of women. Priding himself, however, on
his stoicism, he never, at any period of his history, condescended to
voluptuousness. His sense of manly pride prevented him from becoming
immodest or indecent. This feeling at the same time inspired him with
the idea that everything except the hunt and the war-path was below
the dignity of man. The sentiments, therefore, which saved the female
sex from becoming the mere food of lust, consigned it to an inferior
position. The Indian women formed the labouring class. Such a result
was inevitable. The warrior would only follow the chase or fight.
There was labour to be performed. No men were to be employed for hire.
Whatever, therefore, was to be done must be done by the females. The
wife is, consequently, her husband’s slave. She plants the maize,
tobacco, beans, and running vines; she drives the blackbird from the
corn, prepares the store of wild fruits for winter, tears up the
weeds, gathers the harvest, pounds the grain, dries the buffalo meat,
brings home the game, carries wood, draws water, spreads the repast,
attends on her husband, aids in canoe building, and bears the poles of
the wigwam from place to place. Among the trading communities she is
especially valuable,--joining in the hunt, preparing the skins and fur,
and filling the wigwam with the riches of the prairie, which the men
exchange for the means of a luxurious life. When the hunter kills game
he leaves it under a tree, perhaps many miles from the “smokes” of his
tribe, returns home, and sends his wife to fetch it. Making garments
of skins, sewing them with sinews and thorns; weaving mats and baskets;
embroidering with shells, feathers, and grass; preparing drugs and
administering medicine; and building huts--are among the other offices
of the sex. To educate them for this life of industry, the girls are
trained by the severe discipline of toils; taught to undergo fatigue,
to be obedient, and to suffer without complaining.
Considered as the slaves of the men, it is natural to find a plurality
of wives allowed by the Indian social law; accordingly from Florida
to the St. Lawrence polygamy is permitted, though some tribes further
north have not adopted the practice. Elsewhere also, in other
directions, more than one woman is taken into the chief’s wigwam.
They are his servants, and he counts them as we count our horses and
cattle; some of the great Mandan warriors have seven or eight; indeed,
among all the communities which Catlin had an opportunity of visiting,
polygamy was allowed, and it was no uncommon thing for him to find
six, eight, ten, twelve, or even fourteen wives in the same lodge. The
practice is of an antiquity too remote to fix, and is considered not
only as necessary, but as honourable and just; they are servants, and
a man’s wealth is partly measured by this standard. This is one of the
man’s inducements to follow the custom, though it cannot be denied
that some of these stoic warriors delight in a harem from the same
motives as the Turk or the Hindu. It is allowed, we say, to all, but is
principally confined to the great chiefs and medicine men, the others
being too humble or too poor to obtain girls from their fathers: there
are, indeed, few instances in which an ordinary man has more than one
squaw, and it might be supposed that his wigwam was most peaceful; but
it is not so. The jealousy of the Indian women is not of the same kind
as with Europeans; it is watchful of strangers, not of regular wives,
and six or seven of these dwell in great harmony under the same roof.
So well established is this usage among them, that civilization meets
more resistance in attempting to break it down, than in any other of
its efforts; indeed, in overthrowing polygamy among the North-American
Indians, or the remnant which is left of them, we shall overthrow their
whole social economy and change their national character, and this
it will be long before we are able to do. Probably the custom will
continue as long as the race exists, and be only extinguished with
it. Instances, indeed, have occurred, in which an Indian has sworn
obedience to our social law, but many examples also are known of a
return to the old habit. Sir George Simpson relates an anecdote of one
who came into the settled parts, learned to read and write, adopted
the principle of monogamy, and, returning among his countrymen, sought
to persuade them to follow the same practice, and acquire the same
accomplishments. They held long arguments with him upon the subject,
debated gravely, and, in the end, instead of being converted by him,
won him back to their ancient institution. He took a great number of
wives, forswore books, and alluded no more to his designs of social
reform. Some shame, however, possessed his mind, so that, when some
Europeans were in the village, he kept in his wigwam and would not see
them.
A chief named Five Crows, of the Cayux tribe, offered also to renounce
polygamy, but it was from impulse only, and not from the discovery of
any social principle. He had five wives, and great wealth in horses,
cattle, and slaves. Falling in love, however, with a young Christian
girl, the daughter of a gentleman in the service of the Hudson’s Bay
Company, he dismissed his old companions, and with great parade and
confidence presented himself, made the proposal, but, to his infinite
astonishment as well as mortification, was rejected; in a transport of
spite, he immediately married one of his own slave girls. Generally,
however, the American Indians are far less susceptible of the sentiment
of love, still less of sensuality, than natives of Asiatic blood, and
women among them are usually viewed with indifference; instances of the
contrary occur and will be alluded to.
Whether polygamists or otherwise, the American Indians universally
recognise the marriage contract. There is no such thing among them as
a tribe practising promiscuous intercourse; the reports of such are
idle tales. Such a community would become extinct, in the inevitable
course of nature. The circumstances of the contract vary, however, in
different parts, and among different societies. In fertile districts
polygamy is more common; in barren tracts most of the men of all
classes have only one wife. In some communities the man takes his squaw
for life, and only divorces her for a recognised cause; in others,
no more than a temporary union is expected. Everywhere, however, the
condition of the sex is humiliating, if not miserable, and marriage is
no more than the conjunction of a master with his servant. Thus the
noblest institution of society is perverted into a form of slavery.
That polygamy is practised cannot, nevertheless, be lamented in a
social view. The frequency of wars among the American Indians, in their
original state, caused a disproportion of the sexes, which allowed many
of the men to take several wives, without preventing all from having
one. Had this custom not been prevalent, one alternative only would
have remained to the superfluous women--they would have become common
prostitutes.
The conditions and forms of the marriage contract are various only
in the inferior details--the general tenour of them being that a man
procures a woman from her father as a purchase, and acquires in her a
property over which he has the control of a master. Some restrictions,
however, are laid upon the intercourse of the sexes. Marriage cannot be
contracted among any of the tribes which originally dwelt east of the
Mississippi, or indeed anywhere between kindred of a certain degree.
The Iroquois warrior may choose a partner from the same tribe, but
not the same cabin, or group of wigwams. For it is to be recollected
that, among the tribes, especially of the Algonquin race, the whole
family, or clan of several families, dwell together, bearing a common
designation. One of that nation must look for a wife beyond those who
bear the same token or family symbol. The Cherokee would marry at once
a mother and her daughter, but never a woman of his own immediate
kindred. The Indians of the Red River frequently take two or more
sisters to wife at once.
The manners of the Algonquin race are generally similar. The young
man desiring a wife offers a gift--or, if he be poor, his friends do
it for him--to the girl’s father. If this be accepted, the marriage
is complete. He goes to dwell in the woman’s house for a year,
surrendering the gains of one hunting season to her family, and then
taking her away to a wigwam of his own.
The contract is, with all the other tribes, usually made with the
girl’s father; she is virtually bought and sold. In many cases she is
never consulted at all, and the whole is a mere mercenary transaction.
Instances do occur, also, where the parties approach each other,
express mutual affection, make arrangements, and swear vows, sacred
and inviolable as vows can be; but the marriage is never consummated
without payment to the bride’s father. In the interior of Oregon the
permission of the chief is first asked, then the approval of the
parents, then the assent of the girl; but if she object, her decision
is conclusive. If she consent, the man gives from one to five horses to
her father; they have a feast, and the ceremony is complete. Espousals
often take place during infancy, but neither is absolutely bound by
this engagement. The influence of the parents is, however, so powerful,
that their will is seldom or never resisted; so that a bargain is often
concluded, and a price paid; while the girl is a child. Occasionally
the female courts the male--that is, proposes to become his squaw,
and promises to be faithful, good-tempered, and obedient, if he will
take her to his hut. He seldom refuses, for polygamy is permitted, and
a husband may in this region put away his wife when he pleases. He
usually allows each to have a separate fire.
The missionaries in Oregon have had some success, and have displayed
more prudence than some of their brethren of the same profession in the
island of Tahiti. Men who had a plurality of wives were required, on
their conversion, to maintain them; while those who had only one were
forbidden to take more.
On the Red River, when a young man desires a girl as wife, he addresses
her father, and, if accepted by him, dwells in his wigwam for a
year--as among the Algonquins--and then takes her home. This is only
observed with the first; he adds to the number, if he is wealthy, as
fast as he can. Few of the women are thus left single, and scarcely
any common prostitutes are found. Some will occasionally bear children
before marriage; and the zeal of the missionary West was displayed in
somewhat of a fanatical spirit by his refusing to baptize a child not
born in formal wedlock. We may, however, forgive this eccentric spirit
for the motive which created it; and must admit that, as Sir George
Simpson bears witness, the Indians of Oregon are vastly reformed, and
chiefly by missionary influence.
Among the curious customs preceding marriage in other parts of North
America, is that of the lover going at midnight into the tent of the
woman he desires, and, lighting a splinter of wood, holding it to her
face. If she wake and leave the torch burning, it is a sign for him
to be gone; if she blow it, he is accepted, and we are told that this
frequently leads to immoral intercourse. Catlin knew a young chief of
the Mandans on the Upper Missouri, who took four wives in one day,
paying for each a horse or two. They were from twelve to fifteen
years old, and sat happily in his wigwam, perfectly contented to dwell
under his commands. He was applauded for the act. This extreme youth
in the bride is common among the tribes; children pass from infancy to
womanhood by a single bound--we are assured, on good testimony, that
mothers twelve years of age are not unfrequent. The youths are led
by precept and example to adopt marriage; celibacy beyond the age of
puberty being very rare, especially in those communities which have
come into familiar contact with Europeans. It appears indeed that this
plan is resorted to by the men to secure virgins as their wives, for
among few barbarous nations is the chastity of unmarried woman safe
very long after she has reached a marriageable age. To have no husband
is esteemed by the females a misfortune and a disgrace, while to have
no wife entails great discomfort on a man.
It has already been shown that, when married, the woman becomes her
husband’s servitor; that she is, in many cases, the humiliated drudge,
in all, the humble attendant on her master; that she waits on him in
submissive silence while he eats, and approaches him with the deference
due from an inferior to a superior being. Those who infer, however,
from these circumstances that the sentiments of conjugal, filial, and
parental affection are unknown to the Indian race, think erroneously
of them. Strong and tender attachments continually spring up between
the sexes. The lover sings of the girl he has chosen, and takes her
home with the delight of gratified affection. The husband, too, when
he devolves upon his wife all the labours of the wigwam, is no more
conscious that he is using her harshly than she is that she occupies an
unnatural position. Ideas and sentiments are often no more than things
of habit, and with the Indian chief strong love is not inconsistent
with his walking in lordly indolence along the forest path while
she is bearing the heavy wigwam poles behind. Heckewelder relates a
singular instance of indulgence, which, it must be confessed, is rare
among the barbarians of North America. There was a scarcity in the
district inhabited by a certain tribe, and an Indian woman, being
sick, expressed a strong desire for a mess of Indian corn. Her husband
having been told that a trader at Lower Sandarsky had a little, set
off on horseback for that place, a hundred miles distant, gave his
steed in exchange for a hatful of grain, returned home on foot, and
gratified his wife by the treat he had thus procured. It is seldom that
the most polished society presents a similar instance of kindliness.
Many pictures of domestic happiness are exhibited among the Indians.
The Blackfeet, Sanee, and Blood Indians, reckon it among their chief
desires that their wives may live long and look young. Smoke sometimes
rises for forty years from the same hearth, with one couple presiding
over it. On the other hand, the husband’s infidelity or harshness
sometimes drives his wife to suicide, for the woman has no protector.
The life of hardship they lead soon strips them of all their personal
beauty, when they are entirely consigned to toil. In spite of this,
they are well fed, healthy, and robust, unlike the women of Australia
who are stinted in food, and often deformed or crippled by the severity
of their labour. Nature has been very indulgent to them. Scarcely any
have more than five, and few more than three children. Easy travail
takes away one affliction from their lot. The pains of delivery are
seldom prolonged for more than a quarter of an hour, and she who groans
under the acutest pang is prophesied, with a taunt, to be the mother
of cowards. Death, however, occasionally ensues. The Indian mother
loves her children dearly, never trusting it to a hireling nurse--which
indeed could not be found; for no woman would put away her own infant
to suckle another’s. Bearing the cradle on her back she performs her
daily task, and if she die the nursling is laid in her grave. One
curious and beautiful custom is that of carrying the cradle of a dead
nursling child for a whole year, and all are familiar with the story of
the Canadian mother bedewing the grave of her child with milk from her
bosom. Infanticide is a rare and secret crime, not by any means to be
enumerated among the characteristics of their manners.
Marriage among the North-American Indians is contracted for the
happiness and comfort of the man. He is bound to live with his wife
only so long as these are enjoyed. Adultery, indolence, intemperance,
and sterility are among the causes of divorce. It takes place without
formality by simple separation or desertion; and where there are no
children is very easy. Their offspring forms their most powerful
bond; for, where the mother is discarded, the unwritten law of the
red man allows her to keep the children whom she has borne or nursed.
The husband detecting his wife in adultery may cut off her nose, or
take off part of her scalp. He sometimes kills her with her paramour
at once; and the only blame attached to him on the occasion is,
descending from his dignity to feel so strongly the loss of one woman,
when another may easily be procured to supply her place.
The idea of chastity as a positive virtue is but feebly developed
among them. With the men, indeed, it is a Spartan quality, as opposed
to effeminacy; otherwise, the promiscuous sleeping of whole families
in the same chamber, with various other circumstances, would tend
much to immorality. Nevertheless, among some tribes, as that of the
Mandans, the women are delicate and modest; and in the wigwams of the
respectable families virtue is as cherished, and as unapproachable,
as anywhere in the world. Generally the Indians are decent, and, with
the exception of those customs which form the basis of their manners,
and result directly from their national character, might be won over
without difficulty to the amenities of civilized life. Many of the
squaws, of course, in North America, as elsewhere, are immodest, and
seek occasion to engage in an intrigue. With the unmarried girls the
same is the case. A bastard child may be born without entailing great
shame upon its mother, though the seducer is greatly despised; but such
an occurrence is rare, not altogether, however, because the females
are too chaste, but because they are too cautious, and employ means to
procure abortion. This practice is sometimes resorted to by the squaws,
though discountenanced by the men, except when they are on the march,
or hotly pressed by an enemy.
From a notice of their punishments in Hunter’s narrative of his
captivity, it would appear that the last act of depravity is not
unknown among the Indians. Adultery, he tells us, where not perpetrated
by the husband’s consent, is punishable with divorce. We might doubt
the testimony of this writer, but that Wilkes found Indians in the far
north, within the range of the Hudson’s Bay territories, who would
gamble away their wives, and prostitute them for money. These men he
believed to be degraded from their original condition, but various
authors speak of a similar practice. Carver relates that, among the
Manedowessis, it was a custom when a young woman could not get a
husband, for her to assemble all the chief warriors of the tribe in
a spacious wigwam, to give them a feast, and then, retiring behind a
screen, to prostitute herself to each in succession. This gained her
great applause, and always insured her a husband. It was, however,
nearly obsolete when he wrote, and appears now to be altogether
extinct.
Many of the Europeans dwelling on the Red River were accustomed to take
concubines during the period of their residence there. The Indians,
who are civilized, as it is called, in the provinces of Nova Scotia,
New Brunswick, and Canada, have thus learned also the worst vices of
Europe. Maclean, a very recent writer, declares that the Christianized
tribes in the Hudson’s Bay territories have been deteriorated by
intercourse with the whites, become drunken, sensual, and depraved. The
venereal disease commits frightful ravages among them. Most of their
diseases arise from excess of one kind or another. He says that the men
employed by the Company are chiefly reconciled to their hard employment
and poor remuneration by the immorality of the women, of whom large
numbers follow the occupation of prostitutes, and sell themselves for
the vilest price. On the north-west coast, chastity is scarcely even
a name; indeed, there is no word in the language of the people to
express that idea. The sea tribes are, indeed, in all cases, the most
licentious; which appears to justify the remark, that intercourse with
a strange unsettled population has demoralized them.
At some parts of the coast where the trading ships touch for supplies,
hundreds of women come down, and, by an indecent display of their
persons, endeavour to obtain permission to go on board. When Sir George
Simpson arrived at one of these ports a man asked for the captain’s
wife, and offered his own in exchange. In that part of the country the
tyranny over the female sex is even more severe than in the interior.
When a man takes a wife, he purchases her as his perpetual property;
and if they separate, whether from an offence of hers or his, she must
never marry again. She usually takes to clandestine prostitution as a
means of living. But such instances as the foregoing are not confined
to the coast. In the interior the traveller may observe, wherever a
large concourse of Indians is assembled, a number of beautiful and
voluptuous-looking women continually mixing in the throng, and throwing
their glances upon strangers, or the single young men of the tribe. The
Indians have now been removed to a territory beyond the Mississippi;
and it is probable their corruption will rapidly increase in proportion
to their congregation.
One peculiar feature of the system, introduced of course since
Europeans visited the country, remains to be noticed. Many of the
white traders, among the tribes of the Upper Missouri, find it good
policy to connect themselves by marriage with powerful families, and
they procure then the most beautiful girls of the noblest tribes, who
aspire with delight to such a station, which usually elevates them
above their servile occupations to a life of indolence, ease, and
pleasure. These engagements, however, are scarcely marriages--at least
in the European sense of the term--ceremonies of any kind being seldom
performed. A large price in Indian estimation is paid for the girl, and
she is transferred at once to the trader’s house; with equal facility
he may annul the contract, leaving his companion to be candidate for
another mate, for which her father is not sorry, as he may procure
an additional horse again in exchange for her: this is no more than
a system of virtual prostitution, in which the woman is hired out as
a temporary companion, merely for the pecuniary gain. The trader may
procure the handsomest girl in the tribe for two horses; for a gun with
a supply of powder and ball; for five or six pounds of beads; for a
couple of gallons of whiskey; or a handful of awls. Such is the price
at which the Indian chief will prostitute his daughter. Occasionally,
it must be added, the couple thus united live together permanently
as man and wife, the possibility of which is, indeed, almost always
supposed.
The Indians of New Caledonia, though not belonging to the same stock
with the red race of North America, may be noticed here: they are
extremely profligate; the venereal disease is common among them;
and the blessing of a healthy climate is rendered nugatory by the
intemperance of the people. Among them, nevertheless, women are held
in more estimation than among the red tribes, for the men are not
possessed by that sense of lordly dignity which disdains at once to
become sensual, and to share the labours of the inferior sex. Women
assist in the councils, and those of high rank are even admitted to the
feasts. During the fishing season each sex is equally employed, and
so in all their other tasks. Lewdness could not be carried to greater
excess than it is among them: both men and women are addicted to the
vilest crimes; they abandon themselves in youth to the indulgence of
their most unbridled lust, and the country owes its rapid decrease of
population to the universal depravity of the people. No man marries
until his animal appetite is satiated upon the voluntary prostitutes
who abound, and then his wife, if dissatisfied with the restraints
of matrimony, may refuse to dwell with him; the union is consequently
broken by mutual consent, for a certain time or for ever. Meanwhile
they addict themselves to their former pleasures, but the woman is
nominally prohibited, by law, under pain of death, from cohabiting
with any man during this period of separation from her husband; he
seldom cares, however, to enforce his right, and she seldom fails to
break the law. Polygamy is allowed, but only one woman is actually a
wife--the rest are mere concubines; the chief one may be supplanted
by a new favourite, when the old one yields without a murmur, though
occasionally a woman of violent passions will destroy herself.
To illustrate the general subject of the condition of women among the
North-American Indians, we may notice an incident described by the
observant traveller Catlin. When, among the Sioux, he proposed to
paint the portrait of a woman, his condescension was regarded by the
warriors of the community first as incredible and then as ridiculous.
It appeared marvellous that he should think of conferring on the
females the same honour he had conferred on the medicine men and
braves; those whom he selected were laughed at by hundreds of others
who were, nevertheless, jealous of the distinction. The men who had
been painted said that if the artist was going to paint women and
children the sooner he destroyed their portraits the better; the women
had never taken scalps, never done anything but make fires and dress,
with other occupations equally servile: at length, he explained that
the portraits of the men were wanted to show the chiefs of the white
nation who were great and worthy among the Sioux nation, while the
women were only wanted to show how they looked and how they dressed:
by this means he attained his object. Mr. Catlin considers that, on
the whole, the Old World has no superior morality or virtue to hold
up as an example to the American Indian races. The degradation of the
women, however, is denied by none, though a woman of superior courage
or contrivance sometimes places herself above the degrading laws
which depress the rest of her sex. Thus one whom Catlin saw joined
boldly in a dance--though females are only allowed to join in a few
of these--played off great feats before the warriors, and for her
audacity no less than for her skill was greeted with thundering peals
of applause, besides a pile of gifts[62].
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG THE INDIANS OF SOUTH AMERICA.
The plan and purpose of this inquiry will by this time have become
obvious to every reader. It is to afford a comparative view of the
state of manners throughout the world, with reference to public morals,
the condition and the character of the female sex. We have chosen to
treat of the barbarians in a separate division of the inquiry, and
for this reason have left a large portion of Africa, and by far the
greatest portion of North America, for future pages. With respect
to South America, its various states will be classed among those
half-barbarous communities, which we shall take as the link between
the savage and the civilized portions of the globe; for, in spite of
the dreams in which some romantic travellers have indulged, Lima is
only fit to be compared with Algiers, and Brazil with Morocco. Leaving,
therefore, these half-caste societies, as we shall next turn to them in
a separate notice, we may briefly treat of the Indian race which still,
though in numbers awfully reduced, clings to its native soil in South
America.
A very brief description will suffice. Remembering the difference
of character between the Indian of the North and the Indian of the
South, we may, in most respects, apply our last notices to the present
subject. The barbarians with whom we have now to deal are not possessed
by that rigid masculine vanity which inspires them with a contempt not
only of the female sex, but of the pleasures they furnish to men of
more sensual temperaments and more effeminate mould. They have less
pride, but not more manliness than the Indians of the Red Race. There
is no comparison, in point of mental and moral character, between the
savage of the Brazilian forest and the stately Huron or Iroquois, or
the warrior of the Algonquin race.
Two classes of Indians exist in South America--the pure native, and
the breed corrupted by intercourse with Europeans, half-castes, and
the rest of that variety of colours which have been produced between
the white and the original tenant of the soil. The first is now an
exceedingly small family, and some accounts have represented it as
eminent for virtue and simplicity. We know that romantic pictures have
been drawn of the golden days when Montezuma reigned in the Valley
of Mexico, and gave laws to the free population of the country; but
sober research has dissipated the idea that he was the governor of a
civilized and polished nation. Superior, indeed, the Mexicans were to
the savages who occupied so large a portion of the New World, but they
were deficient in many of the arts, and gross in many of the manners
which assist in comparing the standard of a people’s progress. This
much has been ascertained, though it is little. At the present day, the
great characteristics of the barbarian state are strongly exhibited
in this as in other parts of South America. The miserable remnant of
the Indian race grows yearly more debased, learning little from its
European preceptors except profligacy and the coarsest arts of vice.
Throughout the region women are degraded. The men generally sleep and
lounge, or occupy themselves with easy tasks, but more from indolence
than pride, while the women perform the labours of the house and of the
field. Such is almost the universal practice of Indian manners in South
America. Instances of the contrary, indeed, there are. King found among
the Chedirrione tribes of the Argentine Republic, a primitive state of
society, no less innocent than simple. The women were modest, the men
kind to them, and labour was justly shared. All property was in common,
and the members of the community lived in perfect brotherhood. This,
however, is only one cheerful spot upon the surface of South-American
manners. In the Central Region the females are degraded, and chastity a
rare virtue. Women may bear children before marriage without shame, and
the intercourse of the sexes is unrestrained.
Among the Indians of Brazil a curious system of manners existed before
the establishment of European power, and many traces of it still exist.
No man might marry until he had killed an enemy. When a girl reached
the age of puberty her hair was cut off, her back tattooed, and she
wore a necklace of the teeth of wild beasts until her hair grew again.
Bands of cotton were fastened about her waist and the fleshy parts of
her arms, to signify her maidenhood. It was said that if any but a pure
virgin wore these emblems, the evil spirit would bear her away; but the
national belief was not sufficiently strong to render this a defence of
chastity, for it was lost without reproach or fear, and incontinence
was regarded as no offence. Sleeping in crowds, in large common
dormitories produced a pernicious effect on the people, destroyed all
ideas of decency, and caused universal lewdness. When a man tired of
his wife, he put her away and took another; indeed, as many as he
pleased. Although unrestrained polygamy was allowed, the first wife,
however, continued to enjoy some privileges, as having a separate berth
to sleep in, and a separate plot of ground to cultivate for her own
use. Nevertheless she was bitterly jealous of those who supplanted her,
and frequently, when altogether neglected by her husband, abandoned
herself altogether to vice, and became a clandestine prostitute to any
of the young men who would flatter or pay her for the favour.
Being regarded, more or less, as property, a man’s wives formed part of
his estate, and were bequeathed on his death to his brother or nearest
kinsman. The women thus procured were seldom treated with any delicacy
or consideration, yet they found sources of happiness, and were often
lively and gay to the last degree. When utterly miserable the female
sex does not delight to clothe itself in gaudy attire, or adorn itself
with sparkling trinkets, as in Brazil, where masculine vanity ran so
high that it declared certain ornaments to be the exclusive privilege
of men.
In the neighbouring regions there was some variety among the different
tribes. The Tyrinambas used their women fairly, though they somewhat
overloaded them with employment. They were, however, generally happy,
and were principally employed in spinning and weaving--for the
industrial arts had reached that stage among them. They also cultivated
the ground. On this subject a curious and not unpoetical idea prevailed
among some of the Indians of South America. It was, that as females
only bore children, so the grain planted by their hands would fructify
in a more plentiful increase than that sown by men. Female porters,
also, formed a considerable class.
In Paraguay the wars that spread havoc among the miserable people
gave rise to a flagitious custom, which destroyed the population more
rapidly than pestilence or the sword. No woman ever reared more
than one child. The difficulty of subsistence was one cause which
induced this custom. The practice of producing abortion was adopted in
preference to infanticide, since it inflicted a less violent shock on
the natural feelings of the woman. Remonstrated with upon the horror of
the crime, one mother replied that an infant was a great incumbrance,
that parturition took away from the grace of the figure, rendering
her less attractive to the men, and moreover that abortion was easier
than delivery. The manner of procuring it was singular. The woman lay
down on her back, and was beaten by two aged crones till the result
was certain. Many died in consequence of this barbarous process, while
others contracted a disease which afflicted them through life. Men
and women were equally debauched. Their gregarious habits afforded
unlimited opportunities for intrigue, and husbands cared little to
whom their wives prostituted themselves, though they regarded them
as absolute property, branding them on the thigh or bosom with a hot
iron as they did their horses. One peculiar custom obtained among
them--the married spoke in a dialect different from that employed by
the unmarried people.
Contrasted with this community was the Abifrone, a tribe inhabiting
the same region, more long-lived, healthy, and numerous, because
they were temperate and chaste. Morality was characteristic of them,
and prudence also. The men seldom or never married before the age of
thirty, or the women before that of twenty, and were usually continent
before contracting that engagement. A wife was purchased from her
parents, and was entirely at their disposal, unless bold enough to run
away. There was some poetry in the rite of marriage. If the suit was
accepted, eight maidens carried a canopy of fine tissue over the bride,
who walked in silence, and with downcast eyes, to her husband’s tent.
There he received her with signs of love; she then returned, bearing
the few domestic articles necessary to their simple mode of life, and
her new master dwelt in her father’s house with her until she had borne
a child, or he had sufficiently proved his affection towards her. Women
were obliged to suckle their children for three years, and forbidden
to hold connubial intercourse during that period. This induced the
practice of procuring abortion, for the wife feared her husband would
forget and abandon her after the long interval. Depopulation was thus
caused. Infanticide, also, was practised, but the boys were selected
as victims rather than the girls, who were valuable to their parents.
The intercourse of the sexes before marriage was rigidly watched;
the maidens were educated in habits of industry, and taught to prize
their virtue. When the missionaries came among them preaching against
polygamy and divorce, the women of this tribe were eager listeners.
Transferring our attention to another part of the South-American
Continent, we find among the Sambos of the Mosquito Shore some curious
customs. They are not of the Indian race, but closely allied with
them in their social habits: when a man commits adultery the injured
husband shoots a beeve, takes a horse, or carries off something of
value, no matter to whom it may belong, and the proprietor must obtain
restitution from the adulterer. Polygamy is practised among them, but
one wife is superior to the rest; they marry very young; the Indians
of the same country have a plurality of wives, but each must have a
separate hut; if the husband makes a present to one, he must make one
of equal value to each of the others, and he must spend his time with
them equally, week by week.
In Venezuela, among the native tribes, marriage is frequently dispensed
with altogether, and cohabitation takes place for a temporary period,
or permanently, as the sentiments of the man may incline. This is the
case even among the Christianized people, but no blame can be attached
to them, poor as they are; for the priests, grasping everywhere, charge
such high fees, that marriage is a privilege of the rich.
The same characteristics prevail all over South America, in Chili,
Peru, Mexico, and among the Araucanian tribes: the men idle, the women
labour; and the national idea is, that one sex is born to command,
the other to obey. The Araucanians carry this principle to excess,
and do not allow their wives to eat until they are satisfied. When a
man desires to have a girl as his wife, he proposes for her to the
father; if the father consent, the girl, without being informed of the
bargain, is sent out on some pretended errand, when she is seized by
her purchaser and carried home to his tent or hut. There a feast is
prepared; their friends assemble; her price is paid in horses, cattle,
or money, and the ceremony is concluded by a debauch. Immorality among
them is rather secret than recognised; in Peru it is affirmed that,
among the native Indians, instances of infidelity between man and wife
are very rare, for where polygamy is sanctioned and regulated by law,
it is by no means inconsistent with chastity.
In New Andalusia the men and women go all but naked, wearing only
slight girdles, and appearing strangers to the sentiment of decency.
The condition of the female sex is that of privation and labour; yet,
though overwhelmed with toil, they appear happier, because naturally
more buoyant of heart than the squaws of North America. Even among the
Indians on the banks of the Xingu, where the lordly husband lies all
day in a hammock, and requires literally to be fed by his faithful
wife, the women sing, dance, and seem to enjoy their lives most
heartily. So, throughout the whole region, humiliation and slavery
form their lot, but their spirit yields willingly to the yoke, which
consequently does not pain them.
The regular prostitute class of South America belongs to the
half-civilized communities, and will be noticed in our reference to
them[63].
OF PROSTITUTION IN THE CITIES OF SOUTH AMERICA.
When we visit the semi-civilized communities of South America, instead
of the barbarian tribes still running wild in its deserts of forest,
the state of morals we discover presents a contrast by no means
favourable to the half-educated States, where a hybrid compromise
seems to have been made between refinement and barbarism. The general
characteristic of South-American society is profligacy. Almost every
city on that continent is demoralized and debauched; Brazil, Mexico,
Peru, Chili, all present features very similar, and differing only
in the inferior details. Professional prostitutes, indiscriminate in
their companionship, form only a small part of the system. Immorality
takes many other forms. This, however, we learn only from the general
terms in which traveller after traveller has described those regions,
especially the cities. Absolute information we have none, except with
respect to the station occupied by women, and their moral demeanour in
society. Statistics are entirely wanting. All writers seem by mutual
consent to have avoided our subject, and left us to conjecture the
extent and character of prostitution in Mexico, Rio Janeiro, Lima, and
the various other cities of South America.
In Mexico, the women of the upper or idle classes are described as
elegant, polished, and fascinating, perfectly easy in society, and
attached above all things to the gaieties of life. Their morals
appear to be similar to those of the female sex in the older cities
of Spain--that is, there are many profligates among them; but a large
number are well-conducted, virtuous women, not very timid in society,
but not immodest. Among the lower classes the average of Spain may
also be adopted--if we may ground an opinion on the vague accounts we
receive from travellers.
In Lima, society is far more profligate. The women are superior to the
men in little more than affection for their children; in other respects
their general conduct is loose. They are devoured with that passion for
intrigue--not amounting in many cases to actual adultery--which has
been a famous trait in the manners of that country in Europe whence
South America has derived all its impress of civilization. One remark
which is true of Lima, applies also to the other cities. The veil,
which in some countries is worn as the guard of virtue, is here the
screen of vice. It is inviolable. The woman so draped may pass her
own husband unrecognised, so that she can play truant as she pleases.
Two or three females of good station often pay visits at the houses
of strange men, without being known. Men sometimes take up with their
own wives in the streets, or at some place of public entertainment,
or on the alameda, or city promenade, without being aware who their
companions are.
The state of manners indicated by frequent allusions to these facts is
far from pure. We have also a few other glimpses into the society of
Mexico and Lima. In the former there were, in 1842, 491 persons--312
men, and 179 women--committed to prison for “prostitution, adultery,
bigamy, sodomy, and incest;” besides 65 men, and 21 women, for “rape
and incontinence.” So far for the capital of Mexico.
In Lima, the chief city of Peru, the number of illegitimate children
annually born is about 860; and of new-born infants exposed and found
dead, 460. Two-thirds of the former, and four-fifths of the latter,
belong to the coloured population--which is, indeed, in a proportionate
majority. A dead child is picked up without any sensation being excited
among the inhabitants of the locality in which it is found. Frequently
it is cast away unburied. Ischudi has seen these little carcasses
dragged about by vultures, in the public streets.
The white creoles are noted for sensuality, as well as a brutal want
of sentiment towards their offspring. The dances in which they indulge
are some of them of indescribable obscenity, and the whole population
is addicted to demoralizing pleasures. In Lima, however, though
delicate modest women are rare, actual adultery is not often committed
by that sex. The men seem to obey the exhortation of Cato, who
encouraged prostitutes, while he abhorred unfaithful wives--“Courage,
my friends; go and see the girls, but do not corrupt the married
women.” Concubinage is more common, or rather, perhaps, more public
than in Europe, and the father is usually very fond and careful of his
natural children. Where marriage is contracted, it is, all over the
Continent, fulfilled at an early age. In Brazil the neglect of this
institution and the profligate intercourse of the sexes have diminished
the population to an immense extent. In Rio Janeiro, however, we are
told that the manners of the people have much improved since they have
become more republican in their manners and ideas. The women there
are shy and retired, but ignorance and awkwardness more than modesty
may be assigned as the cause. While slavery was a public institution,
which the government desired to abolish, the only restriction in the
intercourse of the sexes was among the slaves. Procreation among them
was as far as possible prevented; the women and the men in Janeiro were
locked up at night in separate apartments, and carefully watched during
the day.
In Chili, also, a reform of manners has commenced since the reduction
of the military power, which is proverbially demoralizing. The
higher classes of females have a character for modesty and virtue,
but the men generally indulge themselves in vicious pleasures to a
very considerable extent. It is, perhaps, in Brazil that society
is most corrupt, for there the common decencies of life are, among
the inferior orders, grossly disregarded. Matheson, the traveller,
slept in the same room with a young married couple; girls are sold
as concubines, and children are hired out by their mothers to
prostitution. The youth of that sex bathe, while very young, entirely
naked, and afterwards with scarcely any clothing, before the public
eye, so that altogether the manners of the people are wanting in
decency.
Travellers agree in assigning as one chief cause of this general
demoralization, the profligate conduct of the Roman Catholic clergy;
their lives are, in many cases--and of course there are many exceptions
also--exceedingly scandalous. Numbers of them, bound by their vows to
celibacy, live with concubines, and are not even faithful or constant
to them. Where the priests have such influence, and indulge in such
practices, we may expect to find a low state of morals. That this is
the case in the cities of the South America most travellers agree in
declaring; but unfortunately their notices are only vague generalities,
and we have no positive information as to the extent and character of
prostitution in those cities[64].
OF PROSTITUTION IN THE WEST INDIES.
A very slight notice of the West Indies will suffice, until we arrive
at that division of our inquiry which includes the half-civilized
communities, and the colonial societies related to Great Britain.
Of the barbarous race scarcely a vestige remains, and of the negro
population a general view is all that is required, except with
reference to the prostitution carried on under the encouragement
of the European settlers, which we shall hereafter describe. When
Columbus first visited the beautiful islands of the West Indian
group, he found two classes of people inhabiting them--the savage and
cannibal Caribs, who delighted in war, and preyed upon the weaker and
more effeminate tribes; and the comparatively innocent and simple
communities, whose unwarlike habits rendered them victims to their more
powerful neighbours. The characteristics of these distinct populations
were strongly illustrated in their treatment of women. The mild and
peaceful islanders admitted the female sex to a participation in
the delights and enjoyments of life, allowed their women to mingle
with them in the dance, to inherit power, to wear what ornaments
they fancied; and shared, indeed, with them all the opportunities
of happiness which belonged to their savage condition. Among the
cannibal Caribs, on the other hand, a different fashion prevailed.
The handsomest and youngest of female captives taken in war were
preserved as slaves and companions, while their other prisoners were
devoured. The lot of these exiles, however, was little superior to
that of the Carib women themselves. The nation was low and barbarous,
and accordingly treated its women with harshness and indignity. Proud
of their superior power and courage, the men looked down on the
females as on an inferior sex, whose degradation was natural and just.
Although a wife was awarded as the prize of valour, she was regarded
as property acquired. She was her husband’s slave. All the drudgery of
his habitation fell on her. She bore his implements for war or for the
chase. She carried home the game he had killed; and never sat down to a
meal with him, or even dared to eat in his presence. She approached him
with abject humility, and if she ever complained of ill usage, it was
at the peril of her life. Nevertheless, the child born of this slave
was loved and tended with wonderful care. This description, however,
must apply to the weaker race of women, not to those Amazons described
by Columbus, who, well-trained to war, rivalled in power of muscle and
vigour of limb the bull-stranglers of Sparta.
These, however--the original inhabitants of the West-Indian
Islands--have disappeared, and been succeeded by another race or
compound of races, among which the Negroes only claim our notice at
present. Among the blacks of Antigua, as an example of the rest,
immorality is a characteristic which may be traced to the institution
of slavery. Infanticide is frequently practised by them, especially
since the Emancipation Act was passed. The reason of this circumstance,
which at first seems strange, is very clear. Under the institution
of slavery, negroes were not allowed to marry, or, at least, their
marriages were never held as binding before the law. They therefore
cohabited, and their unions lasted usually only so long as the caprice
of affection, or the heat of a criminal appetite existed. Women,
therefore, continually had five, six, seven, eight, or nine children
by various fathers, and no disgrace was attached to the fact. A new
system was introduced by the abolition of the slave system. The
sentiments of shame and modesty have been cultivated in their minds;
and the idea of female virtue has at least been awakened, so that they
often seek to escape the consequences of an illicit amour by destroying
the offspring.
One of the demoralizing effects of slavery was the encouragement of a
species of concubinage. Rewards, indeed, were held out by some masters
to such of the negroes as lived faithfully with a single partner; but
the prevalence of vice was all but universal. A permanent engagement
between a man and a woman was seldom formed. Two females frequently
lived with one man, and of these one was considered his wife and the
other his mistress.
When the negroes were emancipated, in 1834, many of them were anxious
to be legally married. Numbers had been already united in wedlock by
the missionary preachers; yet, though complete in its character, and
regarded as a sacred tie, this act was not held as binding by the law,
and many of the emancipated negroes, putting away the partners of their
compulsory servitude, took new companions to their homes.
The offence of bigamy was not uncommon among them, and still continues
to be so. It is prohibited under a severe enactment, but many devices
are adopted to elude the law. Concubinage is less openly practised than
formerly, but the tie of marriage is by no means generally respected.
Chastity is indifferently regarded; and where the men do not prize it
in women, women will be at little pains to preserve it for the men.
Women are sometimes married who have been living in concubinage with
several persons, and become the mothers of numerous children.
The condition of the free female negroes is by no means so degraded
as in the original country of the blacks. Women enjoy an independent
existence, and live as they please, though many of them labour. Their
character is not distinguished by morality. Decency was entirely
obliterated from their ideas, and they are only beginning to recover
it. Women who were daily stripped and exposed to receive a whipping
from the hands of men, could not be expected long to retain the sense
of feminine shame; and this process, acting upon one generation
after another, has left its impress on the character of the negro
population. Human nature, also, was outraged by the gross tyranny of
the planters. The intercourse of the sexes was regulated, not with
a view to the morals of the negroes, but to the propagation of the
species. They were coupled like beasts, to increase the number of
slaves on the estate. In consequence of this the degradation of the
negro population was so complete that, after it was emancipated, a
woman considered it more honourable to become the mistress of a white,
than the wife of a black man. In all the islands, indeed, this vile
system was carried on. In St. Lucia, however, the intercourse was
almost unrestrained, and consequently became in a degree promiscuous;
for moral law there was none. The St. Lucia negro, in fact, is, even at
this day, averse to matrimony, and inclined to support concubines, to
none of whom is he faithful, even for an interval of time. Yet he is
thoroughly attached to his children. It has been observed, that if any
improvement in the morality of the island has taken place, it is more
in the tone than in the temper, in the appearance than in the reality.
Infanticide is never practised, or only as a rare and secret crime.
It is prevented, however, not by moral restraint, but by the motherly
feelings of the women--by the absence of reproach on bastardy, and the
facility for rearing children.
In Santa Cruz the same low condition of manners is observable in the
negro population; though in Jamaica the negroes are generally married,
and are, on the whole, faithful to the engagement. This, however, is
the result of the Emancipation Act. Previously to that mighty social
reform, marriage, or a connubial contract of any kind, was rare; and
the intercourse of the sexes was loose, profligate, and lewd. The
men lived either with several concubines at once, or replaced one
by another, as their inclination prompted. When the missionaries
endeavoured to change this state of things, any couples which submitted
to their teaching were sure to be ridiculed and jeered by the servile
and demoralized populace. When slavery was abolished, so far had the
corruption of manners proceeded, that numbers of the women, in the
delirium of their new liberty, abandoned themselves to their vicious
appetites, and became common prostitutes.
The example of Europeans has not by any means displayed to the
negroes any instruction in morality; on the contrary, it has, to a
great extent, encouraged their vices. This we shall show in a future
division of the subject. We therefore leave at present the other
islands which form the plantation colonies of England and Spain: we
shall hereafter visit the native community which has recently made
itself ridiculous by enacting the forms of an empire--we allude to
Hayti, or St. Domingo. The brief notice we have given is intended to
apply to the rude black population, but not in respect of its relation
to the white communities[65].
OF PROSTITUTION IN JAVA.
In the island of Java, which is perhaps the most fertile and beautiful
country in the world, a curious system of manners now prevails.
Hindoos have been succeeded by Mohammedans, and these by Dutch: each
of the conquering races has impressed some characteristic trait on the
population, and, unfortunately, the stamp of vice is more easily set
than any other. The character and condition of the female sex in Java
indicate the whole state of manners there. The men are somewhat cold
towards the women, a fact which some learned Theban has ascribed to
their feeding more on vegetable than on animal substances, but they are
neither cruel nor negligent towards them. The institution of marriage
is universally known, if not universally practised or generally
respected. The lot of women may be described as peculiarly fortunate;
in general they are not ill-used at all, and when, as among some of
the more opulent, they are secluded, they are rather withdrawn from
the indiscriminate gaze of the people, than shut up in lonely secrecy,
for they are by no means watched with that exaggerated jealousy which
in some parts of the East renders the husband a continual spy on the
actions of his wife. Though the man pays a price for his bride, he does
not therefore disdain or abuse her.
The condition of the sex in Java is, indeed, an exception to the
habitual custom of Asiatics. The women eat with the men, associate with
them in all the offices and pleasures of life, and live on terms of
mutual equality.
Many queens have, in different States, occupied the throne. The sex is
nowhere in the island, as a rule, treated with coarseness, violence,
or neglect. They are industrious, and hard-working, but they labour
more through desire of praise than through fear of chastisement, and
are admitted to the performance of many honourable tasks. Among the
wealthier classes men sometimes act tyrannically in their households;
but this must be taken as the characteristic not of the race, but of
individuals. Those who seclude their wives do so only from the common
eye; English gentlemen have often been introduced into the most private
chambers of the harem, while the wives and daughters of the greatest
chiefs have appeared at the entertainments given by the European
residents in Batavia, Sumarang, and other cities, where they conduct
themselves usually with modesty and good grace.
Polygamy and concubinage are tolerated, that is, they are practised
among the nobility of Java, who do not allow public opinion to
interfere with the gratification of their desires; both of these
customs are looked upon, however, rather as vicious luxuries, than as
established social institutions; yet, however limited their extent,
they never fail to degrade the position and to vitiate the character
of the female sex. Some circumstances in the feelings of the people
prevent either practice from being generally adopted, and the evil
is thus, in its moral influence, mitigated. The first wife is always
mistress of the household, and the others are little more than her
handmaids, who contribute to her husband’s gratification, but never
share his rank or his wealth. No man of station will give his daughter
as a second or third wife, unless to a chief of far higher nobility
than himself; the inferior wives or concubines are therefore of an
inferior class. Thus the artificial distinctions of classes vitiate
the public morals, for a woman considers it dishonourable, not to
prostitute herself, but to prostitute herself to a poor man of humble
birth.
When we say that polygamy and concubinage are not general in Java, the
reader must by no means infer a high state of manners to exist there.
On the contrary, Java is the most immoral country in insular Asia.
The woman who would be ashamed to become the second wife of a chief
might not be ashamed to commit adultery with him; in general terms,
both sexes are extremely profligate and depraved, though the poets
and historians of the island boast of chastity as the distinguishing
ornament of their women; because a married female shrieks when a
strange man attempts to kiss her before her attendants and a large
mixed company, they hold up their sex in Java as the standard of
feminine purity and virtue.
In most islands of the Indian Archipelago, divorces are not easy to be
obtained; but in Java the total separation of married people may be
procured with the utmost freedom and facility. It is a privilege in
which the women indulge themselves to a most wanton degree, and often
so much as to fall little short of prostitution. A wife may turn away
her husband by paying him a certain sum of money; he is not, indeed,
absolutely bound to accept this, but usually does so, in conformity
with the established opinion of society, that it is disreputable to
live with a woman on such terms. Women often change their partners
three or four times before they are thirty years of age; some have been
seen boasting of a twelfth husband. In Java the means of subsistence
abound, and are easy to be procured as well by females as by men;
one sex is, therefore, in a great measure, independent of the other;
women find no difficulty in living without husbands. They are not,
consequently, forced to remain in a state of bondage through fear of
being drifted destitute upon the world; but, unfortunately for the
theories of our new female reformers, the sex in Java, though thus
enfranchised, is proverbially dissolute and libertine.
This, nevertheless, in reality is no argument for those who attempt
to show that the female sex, enjoying perfect liberty, makes use
of its freedom to indulge in vicious pleasures. The women of Java
are dissolute, not because they are free of control, but because
the whole society of the island is profligate. Among the wealthier
classes, especially, the utmost immorality prevails with respect to
the intercourse of the sexes. In the great native towns the population
is debauched to the last degree. Intrigues among the married women
continually occur; and females of high rank have intercourse with
paramours, to the knowledge, and almost before the faces, of their
husbands. The men are tame and servile, often not daring to revenge
their honour or assert the conjugal right, and they are by no means
inspired with that fiery spirit of jealousy which among many Asiatics
renders a wife sacred from all but her husband’s eye. Females of
respectable rank are often the subject of conversation. An inquiry
after a man’s family is held by no means insulting, but rather as a
conventional act of courtesy.
Flagrant instances of the loose character of Javan manners have come to
the notice of travellers. Before the island was absolutely conquered by
the Dutch, one of its great princes, being desirous of purchasing the
favour of the people, gave many public feasts and entertainments, at
which the wives and daughters of the chiefs attended. He seduced one of
his guests, a married woman, and was in the habit of passing the night
with her, while her husband was engaged with his duty on the public
guard. One morning, by chance, the chief returned home earlier than
usual, and detected them together. He had, however, discovered the rank
of the paramour, and discreetly coughed, that the prince might have
an opportunity to escape. He then went into the chamber, and severely
flogged his guilty wife. She fled, and complained to the king of the
treatment she had received. He being in the critical position of making
good his claim to a crown, dared not exercise the usual prerogative
of a throne; but called for the man he had injured, made him many
rich gifts, and offered him, as compensation, the handsomest woman in
his own household. The husband accepted the peace-offerings, and was
content to take back his adulterous wife. The relation of a subject
to his prince must, at least when developed in this manner, be most
unnatural.
Women in Java are usually married very young, though not before the
age of puberty, which is speedily reached. The reason assigned by
writers for this haste is, that their chastity is no longer safe after
they have reached womanhood. Men wait for two or three years after
that period, during which they may indulge in unbounded profligacy. At
eighteen or twenty a girl is looked upon as verging towards the wane of
life, and becomes a suspected character. No age, however, excludes a
woman from the chance of a match; but scarcely any are unmarried after
22. Widows at 50 often procure husbands; for men at that period of life
usually choose wives equal in years to themselves, and sometimes older.
The preliminary arrangements are made by the parents on both sides; for
no intercourse could previously take place between the young people
themselves without being, and often justly, the occasion of scandal.
They are looked upon, as the natives themselves express it, as mere
puppets in the performance. There are three kinds of connection.
The first is when the rank of the parties is equal, or when the man
is superior to the woman. The second is when the bride is above her
husband, who is taken into the house, and adopted into the family,
by his father-in-law. The third is a species of concubinage, without
any rites whatever, and confirmed by the simple fact of recognised
cohabitation. In such cases, as no formality is required to conclude,
so none is necessary to dissolve the contract, which is, therefore, no
more than a species of prostitution, for the changes of companions are
extremely frequent.
In the other two, the ceremonies are similar. The young people are,
in all cases, betrothed for a longer or a shorter period before their
union--from one month to several years. The father of the youth,
having made for his son what he considers a suitable choice, proceeds
to the parents of the girl, and proposes for an alliance. If they
accept the suit, a betrothal is ratified by some trifling present to
the bride. Visits are made, that the intended nuptials may be publicly
known. At the third stage in the progress of the transaction the price
is arranged, and varies according to the rank and circumstances of
the families. Sometimes it is plainly called the _purchase-money_;
sometimes the act of sale is covered by a more delicate term--_the
deposit_. It is usually considered, however, as a settlement or
provision for the bride.
The only Mohammedan feature in the whole ceremony is the exchange of
vows in a mosque. This is followed by many ritual observances, more
of etiquette than religion, and great parade is affected. At length
the married people eat rice from one vessel, to typify their common
fortune; but in some places the bride washes her husband’s feet, as an
acknowledgment of her subjection to him, or else he treads upon a raw
egg, and she wipes his foot.
Though, as we have said, polygamy and concubinage are not generally
practised, partly because too expensive, partly from a feeling against
them--some of the rich chiefs indulge in them to an extravagant degree,
and glory in a train of 60 children. The wives, however, as already
noticed, can easily release themselves when their married state is
deteriorated into real or fancied bondage. The fact of their early
marriage, without knowing their future husband, or consenting to the
union, causes a great number of divorces. A widow may marry again after
three months and ten days have elapsed since her husband’s death.
Though the intercourse of the sexes is so free that vicious
inclinations may be indulged without difficulty or peril, the Javans
support a large class of women--prostitutes by profession. Adultery
is not considered a very heinous crime, but rather an offence against
the husband’s property and honour, yet it is attended sometimes with
danger, and often with disagreeable results. The vocation of the
trading prostitute is not, therefore, taken away. She unites in Java,
as in India, the profession of a dancer with her infamous calling.
There is a large class of these dancers in the island. The people
are passionately fond of this amusement, but no respectable woman
will join in it. The sultans, indeed, used to have some of their most
beautiful concubines trained to dance, and they were privileged in the
performance of certain figures; but, otherwise, all its professors are
prostitutes. Nevertheless, a Javan chief of high rank is not ashamed to
be seen before a large mixed assembly tripping with one of these women.
The dancers may be found in all parts of Java, but chiefly in the
north-west, towards the capital. They figure at most of the public and
private entertainments. Their conduct is so dissolute that the words
dancer and prostitute are, in the Javan language, synonymous; yet, on
account of the wealth they often amass, petty chiefs occasionally marry
them. In such cases they usually, after a few years, become tired of
their quiet secluded life, divorce their husbands, and resume their
old calling. The dress in which they appear to dance is very immodest,
exposing almost the whole bosom, and the attitudes they assume are
licentious in a high degree. Nevertheless, they seldom descend to the
obscene and degrading postures practised by some of the Bayaderes in
India.
The Europeans in Java have not certainly, up to a late period, at
least, set to their native subjects an example of pure manners. The
Dutch merchant had usually a Javan female at the head of his household,
who served him as a mistress as well. Indeed, the marriage ceremony
is seldom insisted on by the women; while, among the lower classes,
simple cohabitation is the usual method in which the sexes are related.
Yet they are by no means so gross and sensual as the wealthier sort
of people. Altogether, however, the island is remarkable for the
profligacy of its inhabitants. In every city prostitutes abound; and
about the roads in their vicinity women may be seen straying, ready
for hire. They mostly, as we have said, assume also the profession of
dancers, and this, in a manner, covers the profligacy of those who
employ them at their houses[66].
OF PROSTITUTION IN SUMATRA.
The population of this extensive island is divided into several tribes,
slightly differing in their manners and modes of life. The Rejangs,
who may be supposed to represent its original habits, are still rude
barbarians. With them, as with many people of the East, the scrupulous
attention to external show is by no means accompanied by a similar
spirit within. They drape their women from chin to foot, and dread
lest a virgin should expose any part of her person; yet modesty is
not at all a characteristic of the dwellers in villages and towns, to
whom this description refers. Those who live in the rural communities,
and are more easy in their costume, distinguish themselves by their
decency and decorum. In this is exhibited a curious fact, which may be
discovered in many parts of the world.
The civilization, if such it may be called, of Sumatra, is of a
peculiar character. Its people are in that stage of their progress when
great importance is ascribed to the multiplied formulas of etiquette.
Ritual is with them more essential than principle--of which, indeed,
they know little. It is wonderful to examine the intricate details
of the Sumatran marriage contract. Nearly all the litigation in the
country springs from that perplexing cause. Men in a barbarous state
appear to be under the influence of some law which forces them into
extremes. They must be at one pole or another. Either they dispense
altogether with ceremonial usages, and satisfy themselves with
obeying the simple dictates of nature, under plain rules for their
own convenience, or they divide the sexes by a maze of convention,
which prescribes a form for the most trivial occasions of life. True
refinement appears to be in the medium; but this is a question still
to be resolved. In some districts of Sumatra, Europeans, wearied with
the endless legal quarrels arising from these complicated transactions,
have prevailed on the people to simplify their code of marriage, and
the result has proved beneficial.
Some have supposed that the system of procuring wives by purchase,
which renders marriage difficult to the poor, has retarded the growth
of population. Others, however, assert, and with much appearance of
reason, that in Sumatra at least the contrary is true. Children being
considered as property, and daughters being especially valuable for
the price they command, powerful incentives to matrimony exist. The
purchase-money obtained for the girls supplies wives for the sons, and
in few islands are instances of celibacy more rare. It is certain,
however, that the fostering, or rendering obligatory, thrifty habits on
the young, has a tendency to check population, though it may be only
so far as to keep it on a level with the means of subsistence. Various
European countries illustrate that truth. In Sumatra, also, we have a
wealthy region thinly and badly peopled; but misgovernment, war, and
barbarism may be assigned as the chief causes. Besides, it is said the
women are naturally unprolific; that they cease to bear children at an
early age; that ignorance of the medical art causes thousands to perish
of endemic complaints.
There are three modes of forming a marriage contract. The first is
that, when one man pays to another a certain sum of money in exchange
for his daughter, who becomes a virtual slave. There is usually,
however, a certain amount--about five dollars--held back, and, so
long as this remains unpaid, friendship is supposed to exist between
the families, and the girl’s parents have a right to complain if she
be ill-treated. If the husband wound her he is liable to a fine,
and in other ways his absolute command is curtailed. When, however,
on the occasion of a violent quarrel, the sum is paid, the bond of
relationship is broken, and the woman is entirely in her master’s
power. The regulations in regard to money are numerous and intricate;
but need not be explained in detail. They give occasion, however, as we
have said, to endless law-suits, which are bequeathed by one generation
to another.
In other cases the marriage contract is an affair of barter. One virgin
is given for another, and a man who has not one of his own sometimes
borrows a girl, engaging to replace or pay for her when required. A man
having a son and a daughter, may give the latter in exchange for a wife
to the former. A brother may barter his sister for a wife, or procure a
cousin instead. If, however, she be under age, a certain allowance is
made until she becomes marriageable.
Another method is practised when a parent desires to get rid of
a daughter suffering from some infirmity or defect. He sells her
altogether without any reserve, and she has fewer privileges than other
classes of wives.
Sometimes a girl evades these laws by an elopement, and a match is
formed upon mutual affection. If the fugitive couple are overtaken
on the road, they may be separated; but when once they have taken
sanctuary, and the man declares his willingness to comply with all the
necessary forms, his wife is safely secured to him.
Many persons have assigned to whole nations, in various parts of the
world, a Jewish origin, partly because the custom prevails with them of
a man marrying his brother’s widow. The Sumatrans, in this case, belong
to them also, for the same rule is enforced by them; but if there be
no brother surviving, the woman is taken by her husband’s nearest male
relation--the father excepted. If any of her purchase-money remains
unpaid, her new master is answerable for it.
When, under this system, adultery is committed--which is not frequently
the case--the husband usually passes it over, or inflicts revenge
with his own hand. It is seldom such an offence is brought before the
law. When a man desires to divorce his wife thus married to him, he
may claim back her purchase-money, with the exception of twenty-five
dollars, as she is supposed, by cohabitation with him, to have
diminished in value to that amount. If, having taken a woman, he be
unable to pay the whole price, though repeatedly dunned for it, the
girl’s parents may sue for a divorce, but they must restore all they
have received. The old ceremony consisted merely in cutting a rattan
cane in two, in the presence of the disunited couple, their friends,
and the chiefs of the province. The woman is expected to take to her
husband’s house effects to the value of ten dollars. If she take more,
he is chargeable to the amount. Thus the whole transaction is carried
on upon mercenary grounds.
The second kind of marriage is, when a virgin’s father chooses for
her husband some young man whom he adopts into his family, making a
feast on the occasion and receiving what we may term a premium of
twenty dollars. The young man is thenceforward a property in his
father-in-law’s family. They are answerable for the debts he may incur;
but all he has and all he earns belong to them; he is liable to be
divorced when they please, and to be turned away destitute. Under
certain circumstances he may redeem himself from this bondage, but
pecuniary considerations are so entangled with the whole agreement that
infinite confusion is the result. Several generations are sometimes
bound in this manner before the contract can be legally broken by the
fulfilment of all the required conditions.
The Malays of Sumalda have generally adopted the third kind of
marriage, which is called _the free_. It is a more honourable compact,
in which the families approach each other on the natural level of
equality. A small sum is paid to the girl’s parents, usually about
twelve dollars, and an agreement is drawn up, that all property shall
be common between husband and wife, and that, when divorce takes
place by mutual consent, all shall be fairly divided. If the man only
presses a separation, he gives half his effects, and loses the twelve
dollars; if the woman, she then loses her right to any but her female
paraphernalia. This description of contract, which is productive of
most just dealing and felicity, has been adopted in many parts of the
island.
The actual ceremony of marriage, though fenced about with so many
ceremonial observances, is extremely simple. An entertainment is given,
the couple join their hands, and some one pronounces them man and wife.
Where the female sex is a material for sale, little of what we term
courtship can be expected. The manners of the country are opposed to
it; strict separation is enforced between the youth of different sexes;
and when a man pays the full price for a bride, he considers himself
entitled to her without any manner of persuasion or solicitation to
herself. Nevertheless, traces of gallantry--using that word in its
proper, not its ridiculous sense--may be observed in the manners of the
people. A degree of respect is shown to women, which may be favourably
contrasted with the conduct of some polished nations. On the few
occasions on which the young people meet, such as festivals and public
gatherings in the village hall, they dance and sing, and behave with
much delicacy; mutual attachments often spring out of such association,
and the parents frequently promote the desire of union thus arising. In
most countries, indeed, the barbarism of the law is mitigated in its
influence by the universal operation of the natural human sentiments;
it is no less true than strange, that mankind are usually better,
not only than their rulers, but than their laws. The festivals are
enlivened by dances and songs; the dances have been described as
licentious and grotesque, but Marsden, the philosophical historian of
Sumalda, only remarks that the figures displayed at English balls are
often more immodest and absurd. The songs are usually extempore, and
always turn on the subject of love.
The existence or flourishing of any sentiment among a people with whom
marriage is a commercial transaction, and who allow a plurality of
wives, may be considered incredible; but as, in the first instance,
Nature often asserts herself and the law is accommodated to her will,
so, in the second, the nature of things prevents any general extension
of the practice. Polygamy is permitted; but only a few chiefs have
more than one companion. The general indigence of the people is one
cause of this, for the perpetual weight of necessity is more powerful
than the irregular impulse of animal passion. To be a second wife is
also considered by many below the dignity of a reputable person. A man
sometimes prefers a divorce for his daughter when he hears that her
husband is about to take another wife. In the contract which stipulates
for a division of property, polygamy is impossible, for this obvious
reason, that the wife must have half the husband’s effects, which more
than one, of course, could not do. The origin of polygamy in Sumalda
and other parts of Asia has been traced by various ingenious writers
to different causes; but being, as it is, the indulgence which is a
privilege of wealth, it appears to have grown up with the whole system
of manners; no natural reason seems to exist for it. The proportion
of the sexes is nearly equal, and all the theories grounded on a
different assumption fall to pieces. Wherever polygamy exists, women
are purchased, and where they are thus viewed as property, wealthy men
will surely distinguish themselves from their neighbours by a plurality
of wives; and this happens in Rajpooratan, where the women are far
less numerous than the men, as well as in other countries where they
out-number them to an equal extent.
In the country parts of Sumatra, chastity, says Marsden, exists
more than among any other people with which he was acquainted. The
same characteristic appears to distinguish them at the present day.
Interest, as well as decency, renders the parents anxious to preserve
the virtue of their daughters. The price of a virgin is so far above
that of a woman who has been defiled, that the girls are jealously
watched, lest their value deteriorate in this respect. But the truth of
the Oriental idea is sometimes illustrated--that girls should marry
as soon as they are marriageable, or they soon cease to be chaste.
In Sumatra they remain single for some time after that period, and
occasionally lose their chastity in consequence. In such cases the
seducer, if discovered, may be forced to marry the girl, and pay her
price, or make good the diminution he has occasioned in her value.
Regular prostitution is little known, except in the towns. There,
especially in the bazaars, women following that calling may be found
mixed up with the concourse of sailors and others who support them. In
the seaports especially, where the population is not only floating,
but mixed from various nations, there is a great deal of profligacy,
and troops of professional prostitutes ply the streets for hire.
Europeans, however, who represent the general manners of the island
from the experience of short visits to the maritime cities, convey a
false impression of the people. The Sumatran is, as a rule, contented
to marry and be faithful to his wife. This proceeds, however, it would
seem, rather from some peculiar tone of temperament, than from any
principles of morality; for their ideas on this subject are, at any
rate, widely different from ours. Incest they hold as an offence; but
except it occurs within the first degree it is regarded rather as an
infraction of the conventional, than the natural law. It is sometimes
punished by a fine; but sometimes also the marriage is confirmed, and
the parties remain together.
The chiefs of the cannibal nations of Batta have sometimes several
concubines. A man once stole a woman of this kind--the favourite of her
master--and was punished by being cut to pieces, roasted, and devoured.
Among the people of Bulu China, on the east coast, a man may have four
wives, and as many concubines as possible. Some of the chiefs possess
one of these companions in each town or village of their country.
Adultery is punished by death to both criminals.
The general treatment of the sex in Sumatra is of an average character.
They are not absolutely degraded, nor do they enjoy an elevated
position. The poorer classes labour, and all are subject to the men;
but on the whole they are far superior to Java, and, in a considerable
degree, to many other Eastern countries[67].
OF BORNEO.
The splendid achievements in the cause of civilization which Sir James
Brooke has performed, have directed an extraordinary attention to the
immense island of Borneo. Like the rest of the Indian Archipelago,
it is, nevertheless, little known to the English reader--no complete
accounts having been yet published. Sir James Brooke, however, with
Captain Keppel, Captain Mundy, Mr. Hugh Low, and others, have thrown
a new light on the country, and enabled us to discern many striking
features in the social system of the races which inhabit it. The
uniformity of manners observable in Celebes does not exist in Borneo.
The inhabitants of Borneo, for the most part, remain in an inferior
stage of the barbarian state. There are, however, among them many
varieties of the social law. Some are the purest savages, wandering
unclothed in the depths of the forests, and subsisting alone on the
spontaneous gifts of nature. Others cultivate the soil, dwell in
comfortable villages, and traffic with their neighbours. The river
communities are far more advanced than those who live far from the
means of water-carriage; and the inhabitants of the maritime towns
are more educated, and also more profligate, than any. They have been
depraved by that bloody and destructive system of piracy, which was,
until recently, the curse of the Archipelago; but when Sir James
Brooke’s policy has been maturely developed, we may expect to see vast
ameliorations in their manners.
The state of morals among the Sea Dyaks, or dwellers on the coast, is
low, even in comparison with the average of other Asiatic races. There
is no social law to govern the intercourse of the youths of both sexes
before marriage. Even the authority of parents is not recognised to any
extent. The Dyak girl is supposed capable of selecting a husband for
herself; and before she is betrothed to a man she may cohabit, without
disgrace, with any other with whom she may please to associate. The
women appear to make liberal use of this privilege. Loose as their
conduct is, however, before marriage, they are subject afterwards to
a more stringent code. As a man is only allowed one wife, he requires
strict fidelity in her, and if she break faith with him, she is
punished by a severe beating and a heavy fine. On his part, moreover,
he must be continent, for the penalty is the same for either sex. Cases
of adultery are not frequent in times of peace, though during war more
licence is allowed. The Dyak women seldom engage in intrigues with
Malays or other foreigners.
[Illustration: DYAK WOMAN--BORNEO.
[_From_ MARRYAT’S “_Indian Archipelago._”]]
From their long intercourse with the Malays, who are all Mohammedans,
the Dyaks might have been expected to borrow such of their customs as
encourage the savage in the gratification of his animal appetites,
and would enable him to live in lordly indolence on the labour of his
wives. Monogamy, however, still prevails with all the tribes.
The ceremony of marriage--if such it can be called--is simple to the
last degree with all except a few communities, who practise some
particular rites. The consent of the woman is necessary to the match,
which is made without the intervention of the parents, who, after the
mutual willingness of the young people has been expressed, cannot
refuse their sanction. The bride and bridegroom meet, a feast is given,
and the transaction is concluded.
There are certain restrictions on the immoral intercourse of the young
people, to which we have alluded. If a girl becomes pregnant, the
father of her child must marry her. Such an occurrence often precedes
a match. Men and women live with each other on trial, and if no signs
of offspring appear, the acquaintance is discontinued. Constancy during
such an intercourse is not rigidly required. Mr. Hugh Low was assured
that, in some communities, the laxity of manners was carried so far,
that when a chief was travelling from place to place, hospitality
required that at every village he should be furnished with a girl as
his companion while he rested. Such a practice is general among the
Kyans who inhabit a large part of the interior of Borneo. The fear
of not becoming the father of a family--a misfortune greatly dreaded
by the Dyaks--is supposed to encourage the loose intercourse of the
unmarried people, since, as we have said, a man always marries the
woman by whom he has a child.
Among the Dyaks who dwell on the hills in the interior, a higher
morality prevails. The licentious intercourse of the unmarried people
is not permitted. The young and single men are obliged to sleep apart
in a separate building, and the girls are carefully kept from them.
Marriage is contracted at a very early age, and adultery is almost
unknown. Polygamy is not allowed; but some of the chiefs indulge in
a second wife or concubine--an infringement of the law which is held
in great reprobation, though it cannot be prevented. The degrees of
consanguinity within which marriage is prohibited extend beyond
cousins. One man shocked the public feeling of his tribe by marrying
his granddaughter--his wife and the girl’s mother, his own child, being
still alive. The people affirmed that ruin and darkness had covered
the face of the sun ever since the day when that incestuous union took
place. Nevertheless, as they adhere almost constantly to the practice
of marrying within their own tribe, the whole commonwealth comes, in
the course of time, to be united by distant ties of blood, which has
been assigned as a cause for the cases of insanity not uncommon among
them. This may be true, since it is a fact that many royal families,
constrained to perpetual intermarriage, have dwindled into a race of
imbeciles in consequence. The women put faith in medicines to render
them fruitful; but they never resort to the custom of procuring
abortion adopted by the Malay prostitutes on the coast. These women
eat large quantities of honey, largely mixed with hot spices, which
produces the desired result. It is said that among the people of the
south numerous public prostitutes are to be found, though this is on
the equivocal authority of a German missionary, whose testimony is much
to be suspected. No word for prostitution appears to exist in the Dyak
language. Among the Malays such women are numerous.
The Sibnouan females present a fair average of the manners prevailing
with the various divisions of that singular race. Their women are not
concealed, nor are they shy before strangers. They will bathe naked in
the presence of men; yet many of the decencies of life are observed.
Though the unmarried people sleep promiscuously in a common room,
married couples have separate chambers. The labour of the household,
with all the drudgery, is allotted to the females; they grind rice,
carry burdens, fetch water, catch fish, and till the fields, but
are far from occupying the degraded condition of the wives of the
North-American Indians; their situation may, indeed, be compared to
that of women in the humblest classes in England. They eat with the
men, and take part in their concerns as well as their festivals. This
is an agricultural and fishing tribe.
Among the Kayans a _naked woman_ cannot under any circumstances be
killed, or a woman with child.
Among the Mohammedan Malays, as we have said, there is more
civilization and corruption of manners in another form. They are
polygamists, indulge in concubines, encourage prostitutes, and
sometimes treat their wives with great tyranny. An English physician
lately received a message from one of the wives of a chief--celebrated
for fostering privacy--desiring a secret interview with him at a
secluded spot in the jungle. He went with the high belief that the
woman was enamoured of his good looks. He met her, found her young and
pretty, but with an air of firmness and dignity which showed that it
was no frivolous purpose which had led her to take so dangerous a step.
She complained of her miserable life, of the despotism under which
she suffered, declared she would endure it no longer, and requested
the doctor to furnish her with a small dose of arsenic to poison, not
herself, but her husband. Of course he refused, and the poor creature
went away sorely disappointed.
The rich Malays allow their wives to keep female slaves for their
service. The position of these captives is, under any circumstances,
unenviable; should, however, one of them, by her personal qualities,
excite the jealousy of her mistress; her case is miserable, until
she can procure another owner. Sometimes the slaves are used as
concubines, when by law they become free, though they seldom avail
themselves of their liberty, preferring to be supported by their old
masters, while prostituting themselves to others. The wealthy chiefs
spend large sums in the purchase of concubines. The marriage ceremony
is performed according to the ritual of the Koran, but is often
neglected.
The prostitutes who congregate in the seaport towns have not been
particularly described. They appear to be divided into classes:
those who cohabit temporarily with the Malays, are paid a certain
price, and exchange their residence; those who prostitute themselves
indiscriminately to all comers; and those who are supported by the
sailors, and profligate Chinese, who invariably create such a class
wherever they settle. Of their numbers we have no account, nor of
their modes of life; but it is certain they exist in considerable
numbers[68].
PROSTITUTION AMONG THE SEMI-CIVILIZED NATIONS.
INTRODUCTION.
Surveying the social aspects of the globe, we discover an immense range
occupied by races partially civilized, which connect the barbarian with
the polished communities. Some of these, perhaps, are placed below
European nations rather because they differ from, than because they are
inferior to them.
The influence of every great religion is powerful in various divisions
of the vast range. Buddha and Bramah have their millions of worshippers
in China, India, and the intervening regions. The prophet is followed
by whole nations in eastern Europe, Asia, and Africa. Christianity has
numerous adherents on the plains of Syria, Palestine, and the countries
of Asia Minor. An equal variety of institutions prevails among these
half-educated races. British policy in India; paternal despotism in
China; republican simplicity in Arabia, Celebes, and Afghanistan;
religious tyranny in the empire of the Porte; and patriarchal freedom
among the nomades of Asia Minor, exercise different influences on this
mighty and mixed population. In some we find a singular purity of
manners, as among the Bedouins of Arabia; with others, morals are more
gross than among the worst savages; but in all there is a perceptible
contrast between the civilized states of Europe on the one hand, and
the barbarian countries of Africa, Australasia, and the Pacific, on the
other.
The position of the female sex among half-civilized races, as among
all others, may be taken as a standard to measure their progress. It
differs, in some remarkable particulars, from that occupied by women
in purely savage or highly-civilized communities. In the one, where
any regulations exist they are rude and coarse, and only obeyed where
their action is constant, which it seldom is. In the other, men fear
blame more than the law, and manners perform what legislation is unable
to accomplish. In most of the countries of which we are now treating,
government endeavours to rule with parental discipline the minutest
concerns of life, to affix a penalty to every fault, to adjust with
nicety the slightest relations of individuals with individuals, to
guard morals by police and suppress profligacy by imperative decrees.
So it is in China, so in Japan, and so in a less degree in the
dominions of every Asiatic prince. In Egypt Mohammed Ali attempted,
by one stroke of his pen, to blot out the stain of prostitution. He
banished the old professors of that class, and new ones were created
from the remainder of the population. In Persia a royal decree forbade
prostitution, and men immediately prostituted the right of marriage
to evade the law. In China the Emperors have, from time to time,
fulminated proclamations against all profligate persons; but they
have flung their invectives into the void, and no impression has been
produced. The coarse and awkward efforts of a barbarian despot’s will
never produce any better result. The Draconic decree is promulgated and
the offences it is intended to suppress continue to be perpetrated as
before. A distinction must be drawn, however, between those communities
in which severe laws are enacted to produce, and those in which they
are inspired by, public morality. In the one case they are worthless,
because they are in hostility to the prevailing system; in the other
they are the signification, because they are the embodiment, of the
national feeling. They may be symptoms, but they can never be causes,
of virtuous manners.
The view of the half-civilized nations, which is here presented,
includes sketches of India, of Afghanistan, Kashmir, the Hindu-Chinese
races, China, Japan, Celebes, Ceylon, Persia, Egypt, the Barbary
States, Syria, Palestine, Asia Minor, Arabia, and Turkey. In all of
them polygamy exists, though to a very small extent in Ceylon. It
will be seen that the popular ideas on this subject are somewhat
exaggerated. Most persons unaccustomed to read, or reflect, imagine
that throughout the East all men have their harems filled with wives,
who are beautiful prisoners, immured in perpetual seclusion, slaves to
the will of their lord, and never allowed to move unless guarded by
a fierce black eunuch, or a duenna still more dark and angry. It is
left for those who are accustomed to peruse the accounts of veracious
travellers, to know that polygamy, though allowed to almost all, is
practically a privilege only of the rich, and not indulged in even by
the majority of these. The general notions, also, of female seclusion
are extravagant. Women in Turkey enjoy far more liberty than is usually
imagined. So do they even in China, though very wealthy husbands,
especially among the Hindus, shut up their wives and never allow a
stranger’s glance to fall upon their countenances. This excessive
jealousy is not always disagreeable to the objects of it; indeed, in
the harem where three or four wives are congregated, the youngest
and most beautiful sometimes makes it her chief triumph over her
mortified rivals, that she is watched, guarded, shaded even from the
light, and immured beyond the sound of a man’s voice, while they are
far less religiously secluded. Thus the sex, influenced during ages by
a peculiar system of manners, accommodates itself to them, invariably
sinking or rising to the level assigned it by the civilization of the
period.
Throughout the world the numerical disparity of the sexes is nowhere
such as to induce the belief that polygamy is natural to certain
countries. It is practised in many where the females are less numerous
than the males, in consequence of infanticide. Everywhere, when
extensively prevalent, it produces injurious results, diminishing the
fecundity of women, and by no means preventing men from encouraging
a class of professional prostitutes. There is, indeed, in this idea,
something debasing to the female sex. That men should multiply their
wives that they may not be induced to visit harlots, appears to
degrade the institution of marriage, which was not intended for the
satisfaction of sensual appetites, but for the continuation of the
human species. Polygamy is opposed to increase, and thus appears
unnatural; still more revolting to our ideas of civilization is the
custom of polyandrism, or one wife with many husbands. It obtains in
some regions of the Himalaya, among the Nairs of Malabar, and in the
Cingalese kingdom of Kandy. Nowhere else do we find more than a trace
of it, and it is singular to find a practice so utterly repugnant to
the general sense of Orientals, prevailing close to the region in which
men are most jealous and women most carefully guarded. In Hindustan
some men will not divorce a wife whom they thoroughly dislike, because
they will not allow her to be unveiled by a stranger; yet among the
neighbouring Hindu-Chinese nations, a man will frequently prostitute
his wife for gain. On the southern coast, and in Ceylon, eight men will
live with one wife. This proves that institutions have no geographical
distribution. Both kinds of polygamy are equally opposed to the natural
increase of population.
Where nobler qualities distinguish the men of any race, we still find,
as we ascend the scale of civilization, that women rise with them. In
Afghanistan, in Celebes, and among the Bedouins of Arabia, the male
sex is distinguished for its upright, dignified, and manly character.
Chastity in women is prized, and because it is prized it is preserved.
Where, on the contrary, the husband desires his wife may be faithful
to him, not that she may be virtuous, but that he may not be robbed
or wronged, it frequently occurs that she only keeps her vow until she
has an opportunity to break it. On the whole, however, female chastity
among the Hindus and Mohammedans is more general than from some popular
accounts might be inferred. With the mixed races--hybrid in blood,
manners, and religion--an inferior state of morality prevails.
With respect to actual prostitution, the region which is most free
from it is the desert country of Arabia. It flourishes most, perhaps,
in India and China. The flower boats of the Pearl River, the temples
of the Deccan, the kiosks of Barbary, the Ghawazee villages of Egypt,
the dancing houses of Java, and the tea-gardens of Japan, were all
originally consecrated to vice, which nowhere flourishes more rankly
than in those countries where despotism has paralyzed the virtuous
energies of men.
Almost everywhere the prostitute class, among Eastern nations, has
addicted itself to other pursuits--to music and the dance--to inflame
the lust which it designs itself to satisfy. In many countries also
the prostitutes have been allied to the priesthood. Thus in India
they have formed a sacred class; in the cities of Arabia they are
encouraged by the Moolahs to frequent places of worship; elsewhere they
have flourished under the auspices of government, which has placed
them under the charge of inspectors and derived profit from their
degradation. In such countries they carry on their profession more
openly, and are more openly encouraged, than in others where their
occupation is clandestine.
Some of the nations included in this division of the subject appear to
have reached the last stage of their native civilization. Among these
is China: her further progress will not be influenced by internal
causes, but will be regulated by contact with a superior race. In
India the process has already begun, and in the condition of women,
and consequently, also, in their national character, the change is
becoming apparent. Widow-burning is already a thing of the past; the
blot of infanticide will soon be obliterated from the face of society;
the prejudice which prevented the second marriage of women, and drove
thousands to suicide or prostitution, is gradually yielding before
reason; the barriers of caste are being broken down, and more natural
relations restored to society. Women in India are the chief degradation
to the sacred class of Brahmins, in whom were combined the fanaticism
of idolatrous priests and the pride of nobles. Thus the contact of
English with Oriental civilization, gentle as it has been, is leading
to the subjugation of the latter before the more humane and liberal
principles of the former. But it is singular to find that much more
difficulty is experienced in modifying the social institutions of
half-educated, than in changing those of barbarous races. With the
one they are based on habit, with the other on prejudice; and the
pride of a little learning induces the one to cling to them, while the
simplicity of the savage allows him easily to yield.
The sentiment of chastity is nowhere discovered pure except among very
simple and unsophisticated, or very refined and polished nations. It is
found in the Bedouin encampments of Arabia, it is found in the pastoral
communities of Afghanistan, and it is found among the wandering
shepherds of Asia Minor; but amid the barbaric millions of China, with
their innumerable maxims of virtue, the true sentiment is very rare.
So also is that of love, which belongs also to the infancy and to the
maturity of nations, for in the intervening stages it becomes mingled
with an alloy of interest, sensuality, or superstition.
Prostitution, however, belongs to all ages and to every nation. But
it assumes various forms in the different classes of mankind: it is
loose and scattered among the barbarous tribes not yet settled under
the forms of regular society; it is systematized and acknowledged
among the half-barbarous races; it is adopted as a sacred institution,
in regions where the object of the priesthood is, to enslave the
souls of men through their senses; it is encouraged in States where
the desire of government is to absorb the people in the pursuit of
animal gratification, and thus distract their attention from public
affairs; it is submitted to a strict, though awkward discipline in
countries where the rulers desire to mimic the social code of civilized
commonwealths; and as society progresses, though it becomes distinct
and conspicuous, it exchanges the highway for the bye-street, the day
for the night, withdraws from other classes of the people, and becomes
a despised sisterhood, cut off from intercourse with the moral classes
of women.
Various stages of this process may have been remarked in the view of
the condition and character of women, and the extent and state of
the prostitute system in barbarous countries. We now enter on the
half-educated communities which occupy the greater part of the world’s
surface, and these will lead in the communities of Europe, to which
they are linked, on the one hand by Turkey, and on the other by the
inhospitable deserts of Siberia.
OF CELEBES.
In a region so vast as the Indian Archipelago it would be useless to
dwell separately upon every island, especially as many characteristics
are common to most of them. We have taken Java and Sumatra as
representing the Sunda group, and we shall take Celebes as the head of
a family of isles, with Borneo as another. Incidental notices of any
peculiarities in the lesser isles will suffice.
Celebes, in its political and social state, is far in advance of the
other countries in insular Asia. It enjoys in many of its States a
considerable degree of civilization. The idea of freedom, so rare
among barbarous races, is recognised in its political system, and
representative institutions have actually developed themselves into a
republican form of government. Where such progress has been made in the
art of civil polity, we may look with confidence for a superior social
scheme, and this we actually find. It should be premised that the
Indian Archipelago is peopled by two races--the brown, or Malay; and
the black, or Ethiopian. The former is the more powerful, intelligent,
and polished, and has therefore become the conquering race. It has
subdued the Negro hordes of the various islands, and is now paramount
in all the great native States. In Java, Sumatra, and Celebes, it has
entirely displaced the original possessors of the soil, who dwell only
in scattered communities, defended from annihilation by forests and
hills, which serve in some degree to balance that native valour which
has made the Malays an imperial nation, subdued in their turn by the
more powerful race from Europe.
In the States of Celebes women are not excluded from their share in the
public business of the commonwealth, though their influence is usually
indirect. They rule their own households, give counsel to the men on
all important occasions, and even, when the monarchy is elective, are
frequently raised to the throne. They eat with their husbands, and
from the same dish, only using the left side. They appear mixed with
the other sex at public festivals, and, when intrusted with authority,
preside over the councils, and are vigorous in the exercise of their
prerogative. Nor is peace the only era of their reign. They have
sometimes presented themselves in the field, and animated the warriors
to battle by applauding the courageous and upbraiding the timid.
In the State of Wajo, which is, perhaps, the most advanced in the
island, one check upon civilization exists, and that is the extravagant
pride of birth. The spirit, if not the actual institution of caste,
exists, and is productive of the usual evils attending an artificial
division of classes. A woman of pure descent dare not mingle her blood
with that of an inferior, though a man may ally himself with a girl of
humbler station. The offspring of such a connection, however, carry
with them an appellation denoting their imperfect parentage.
Polygamy is universally permitted among the Bugis of Celebes; but
certain restrictions, unknown in other Mohammedan countries, attach to
the privilege. Two wives seldom inhabit the same house, and for three
or four to do so is an extremely rare circumstance. Usually each has
a separate dwelling, and in this private establishment she generally
supports herself, with occasional assistance from her husband. The men
can easily procure a divorce, and when the consent is mutual nothing
remains but to separate as quickly as possible. If the woman only,
however, desire to be set free, she must produce some reasonable ground
of complaint, for the mere neglect of conjugal duties is not considered
a sufficient cause. Many years pass sometimes without any intercourse
taking place between man and wife. Nevertheless, though many of them
indulge in polygamy, concubinage, or the keeping of female slaves for
sensual purposes, is rarely practised. Many of the rajahs, however,
take women of inferior rank to be their companions until they marry a
woman of equal birth, when their old partners are divorced.
In Wajo, the marriage state, though characterised by these
extraordinary customs, is decently preserved, and more honourable than
with any other Eastern nation. So equal, indeed, is the proportion of
the sexes, that not only is the throne, or rather president’s chair,
given to them, but also the great offices of state. Four out of six of
the great councillors are sometimes women. They ride about, transact
business, and visit even foreigners as they please, and enjoy every
advantage. Their manners are easy and self-possessed, though too
listless and slow to be fascinating to an European. Their morals, as
well as those of the men, are far superior to that of any other race in
Eastern or Western Asia, and prostitution is all but unknown. Far from
modest, in the English sense of the term, they are yet very chaste;
and, though they maintain little reserve in their conduct towards
strangers, never exhibit the inclination to be indecent or licentious.
Even the dancing girls, though of loose virtue, dress with the utmost
modesty, but their performances are occasionally lascivious.
Throughout the beautiful and interesting island of Celebes the same
state of things prevails, and wherever the women are most free, they
are least licentious. The intercourse of the sexes is unrestrained;
the youth meet without hindrance; and chastity is guarded more by
the sense of honour and by the pride of virtue, than by the jealousy
of husbands or the rigid surveillance of parents. On the whole,
therefore, the condition of the sex in Celebes is elevated. That women
are there perverted in some of their manners, and that they do not
approach that exalted state which was accorded to them in the Attic
states of Greece, is true, because the people are barbarians. It is
necessary always, in considering the state and character of women in
any country, to hold in view the state and character of the men also.
We are to apply no unvarying standard to measure the condition of one
sex, for it is only by viewing it relatively to the other that we can
arrive at a sound conclusion. The Bugis of Celebes are among the most
manly, enterprising, and virtuous nations of Asia; and their women are
proportionably free, chaste, and happy[69].
OF PROSTITUTION IN PERSIA.
In Persia the Oriental idea of the female sex is completely developed.
Women are there the property of men and their enjoyment of life
is circumscribed to suit the pleasure of their masters; among the
wandering tribes, indeed, they go unveiled, and breathe the air
of partial freedom; but among the fixed inhabitants of cities and
villages, their lot is one of seclusion and servitude. Subservient as
they are to the will and caprice of the supreme sex, the estimation
in which they are held is extremely low. The lower classes consider
them, indeed, valuable in proportion to the amount of household labour
they perform; the higher classes look on them as the means of sensual
gratification. We find, it is true, in Persian romance and poetry,
eulogiums on the beauty of their women, and songs of devotion to them;
but they are the objects of barter, and are consequently in a despised
condition.
There is actually no station assigned to women in Persia; they are
recognised only as ministers to the wants or pleasures of the male
sex. They are what their husbands choose to make them. Instances occur
where a favourite wife or concubine is ruler of the house, or a mother
exercises strong influence over her son, but these are rare examples;
women, in total seclusion, are submissive slaves. The wives of the
Shah, especially, vegetate within the walls of a splendid prison;
occasionally one of them is permitted to walk abroad, but then all must
fly from the route she takes, and no one dare look upon her on pain of
death. She is paraded in stately procession, and eunuchs run in front
to clear the way, firing guns loaded with ball to frighten any bold
adventurer who may be reckless enough to remain on the line of the
cortege. This isolation of the sex pervades all the wealthier orders
of Persian society; even brothers are not allowed to see their sisters
after a certain age.
Polygamy is practised in Persia. The palace especially has a crowded
harem; numbers of female officers and attendants wait on the Shah.
The wives and concubines are arranged with the most rigid regard to
the rules of precedence; none but those of the highest rank and most
distinguished favour dare sit down in the presence of their royal lord;
over all the rest the strictest discipline is preserved. The king
is said sometimes to have a thousand women in his palace, and much
skill is required to preserve decorum among them; some he has given
away to his principal officers. The chief of them lives in splendour,
wearing garments so thickly embroidered with pearls that they impede
her movements; but the others are subject to much rigour, especially
under the savage eunuchs whose favourite mode of chastising the female
slaves is to strike them on the mouth with the heel of a slipper.
However, large numbers of them lead a pleasant, while all enjoy an
indolent life, lounging for hours in the warm bath, whence they emerge,
with enervated frames, to spend an equal time in the coquetry of the
toilette. All the arts which vanity can devise are exhausted to render
their persons attractive to the Shah, whose favours are courted as much
as his displeasure is feared. In the one case, the fortunate woman is
elevated, for a brief period at least, to the very ideal of her hopes,
while, in the other, she may be fastened in a sack and hurled from the
top of a lofty tower.
The Persians generally believe themselves entitled to unlimited
indulgence in the delights of the harem. Their religious law confines
them to four wives, but they may have as many concubines or other
female companions as they can support. The priests are expected to be
the most chaste, but are usually the most licentious; it is remarked as
an extraordinary circumstance of one celebrated spiritual leader, that
it was affirmed that he never had connection with any other woman than
his four legitimate wives.
A Persian is permitted, as well by the enactments of the law as by
common usage, to take a female, not within the prohibited degrees of
affinity, in three different ways: he may marry, he may purchase, or
he may hire her. Persons are frequently betrothed during infancy; but
the engagement is not considered binding unless contracted by both the
actual parents. The girl, indeed, may, even under these circumstances,
refuse her consent, but this privilege is rather nominal than real. If
she resolutely refuse, she may be taken back to the recesses of her
parent’s harem, and there chastened until she chooses to submit; and it
is not long before she is whipped into compliance. The nuptial ceremony
must be witnessed by at least two men, or one man and two women. An
officer of the law attends to attest the contract. The written document
is delivered to the wife, who carefully preserves it, for it is the
deed that entitles her to the amount of her dower, which is part of her
provision in case of being left a widow, and her sole dependence in
case of being divorced. Her right in this respect is strictly guarded
by law, and by her male friends, and it is one of which the women of
Persia are extremely jealous. The marriage festival is usually very
expensive, for the reputation of the husband is supposed to be measured
by the splendour of his nuptials.
Though a man may, when he pleases, put away his wife, the expense and
scandal attending such a proceeding make it rare. It seldom occurs,
indeed, except among the poorer classes, who do not so rigidly seclude
their females; among the wealthier and prouder, a man would be ashamed
to expose a woman, with whom he had once associated, to be seen by
others, unless in the case, of course, of a common woman. Divorce never
takes place on account of adultery, which is punished with death. Bad
temper and extravagance on the woman’s side, and neglect or cruel usage
on the husband’s, may be urged by either as reasons for separation. If
the husband sues for a divorce, he pays back the dowry he received
with his bride; if the wife commences the proceeding, she loses
her claim. In this, as in all other respects, the male sex has the
advantage. A man who desires to be relieved of a disagreeable partner,
sometimes uses her so cruelly that she is compelled to open the suit,
by which means he gets rid of her, but keeps her money.
The Persian may have as many female slaves as he desires or is able to
maintain. They earn no advantage of position by becoming his concubines
instead of the sweepers of his house. They are still in slavery, and
may at any time be sold again if they displease their masters. A woman
so cast off is in a bad position, for she must then sink into worse
degradation than before. Mohammedan jealousy, however, serves, in some
respects, as a kind of protection for the woman; for a man, having once
cohabited with her, will seldom allow her to fall into the hands of any
other.
One very extraordinary custom prevails in Persia, and seems now
peculiar to that country, though it is said to have existed in
Arabia at the time of the prophet’s appearance there. Mohammed
tolerated it; but his successor, Omar, abolished it, as a species of
legal prostitution injurious to the morals of the people. All the
Turks and others, therefore, who hold his precepts in veneration,
abhor and condemn the practice, but it still obtains. It is that of
hiring a companion. A man and a woman agree to cohabit for a certain
period--some for a few days, others for 99 years. In the one case it is
simply an act of prostitution; in the other it is morally equivalent to
marriage, though the woman acquires no right to property of any kind,
except the price of her hire. This sum is agreed upon at the first
compact; and though the man may discard his companion when he pleases,
he must pay her the whole amount promised. If both are willing, the
arrangement may be renewed at the expiration of the term, which is
generally short. This kind of intercourse usually takes place among
persons of very unequal stations. The women are generally of a low
class, and are, for the most part, a peculiar sort of prostitutes, if
prostitution mean the hiring out of a woman’s person for money. The
children springing from such a union are supported by the father. In
one circumstance the custom differs from the ordinary prostitution of
other countries. When a man has parted from a woman of this class, she
is forbidden to form any new connection until a sufficient time has
elapsed to prove whether or not she is pregnant from the last. This
precaution is to hinder the chance of a man’s being burdened with the
support of a child of which he is not actually the father.
The characteristics of women in Persia agree with this picture of their
treatment. They are degraded down to the level of their condition.
Leaving a few exceptions out of sight, we find the rich and idle vain,
sensual, and absorbed by animal desires; the poorer classes, licentious
and intriguing.
The peculiar customs of the country cause strange occurrences to take
place. A man is sometimes deceived into marrying the wrong woman,
under cover of the inviolable drapery which veils her face. He is
usually content to stow her away in his harem, and solace himself
with a concubine, or the company of prostitutes; for though he may
hold that his own wife and daughter would be polluted by the eye of a
strange man, and though he may be able to fill his harem with beautiful
slaves, the Persian voluptuary is not content. He must associate with
the more brilliant and lively beauties, who are ready to receive him
in various retired houses of the city. These houses are generally in
obscure places, dull and uninviting on the outside, but fitted up in
the interior with much elegance and luxury.
Formerly there was a numerous class of public dancing girls in Persia,
and the beauty of their persons, and the melody of their voices, were
celebrated by the most famous poets of the country. They were wealthy
and popular, continuing to figure prominently at the entertainments
of the people until the family of Futteh Ali Khan rose to the throne;
they were then discouraged by a monarch who crowded his harem with a
thousand women, and, in the midst of this multitude of concubines,
issued edicts for the suppression of immorality. The dancing girls
were prohibited from approaching the court, and compelled to seek a
livelihood in the distant provinces of the empire. It is not to be
denied that considerable reform has taken place in the manners of the
people; but profligacy is still a marked characteristic of the cities
in Persia.
Under the Sefi dynasty morals reached the last stage of depravity.
The royal treasury was filled with the proceeds of immorality. Public
brothels were licensed and became extremely numerous. A large revenue
was drawn from them. In Ispahan alone no less than 30,000 prostitutes
paid an annual sum to government. The governors of provinces and
cities also granted the same privileges for sums of money, and there
was scarcely a town of any size in Persia which had not at least one
large brothel, crowded with inmates. The prostitutes were all licensed,
and known by the appellation of _cahbeha_, or _the worthless_. An old
traveller, whose authority is accepted by the best writers, describes
the system then prevailing; it displays the corruption of manners
in the open and systematic character of profligacy. As soon as the
merchants’ shops were closed in the cities the brothels were opened;
the prostitutes then issued into the streets, dispersed themselves, and
repaired to particular localities. There they sat down in rows, closely
veiled; behind each company stood an old woman holding an extinguished
candle in her hand. When any man approached with a sign that he desired
to make a bargain, this harridan lit her taper, and led him down the
line of women, removing the veil of each in her turn until he made his
choice. The girl was then dispatched with him, under the guidance of
a slave, to the house, which usually stood close by the way-side. All
payments were made to the old woman or “_mother_” of the company.
Under the reigning family this open system has been checked,
and prostitution, not being licensed, is a more secret system.
Nevertheless, there abound in the cities of Persia numerous brothels,
to which the men proceed after dark, and where they are entertained as
they desire; numbers of women are always ready to hire themselves out
to any who desire to associate with them.
The females of the wandering tribes are far more virtuous than those of
the cities; they are also more happy and free, for if they share the
labours of the men, they share also their pleasures and hopes; far from
being secluded, they are allowed to converse even with strangers, and
grace the hospitality of the tents with modest but polite attention.
The men seldom have more than one wife, and abhor the practice of
hiring women, though their priests have made attempts to introduce
it among them. Still, even the women of these tribes are below their
proper condition, and the men as they become wealthier become more
corrupt; when, also, they sojourn for a while in the cities, they
speedily contribute to the general profligacy, and often exceed the
regular inhabitants in vice. Among those, however, in the nomade state,
rape and adultery are rare, and when committed the woman suffers a
cruel death at the hands of her nearest kindred. In the cities females
are seldom publicly executed, but are put to death in private, or given
as slaves to men of infamous occupation[70].
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG THE AFGHANS.
Women in Afghanistan are sold to the men. A marriage is a commercial
transaction. The practice is recognised by the Moslem law, and is here,
as in most parts of Asia, universally adopted. The price varies, of
course, according to the condition of the bridegroom or his friends.
Females, consequently, are in some measure regarded as property. They
are in absolute subjection to the other sex. A husband may at any time,
from mere caprice, and without assigning any reason, divorce his wife;
but a woman cannot, unless she have good grounds, and sue for the
separation before a magistrate. Even this is seldom done. When a widow
marries, the friends of her first husband may claim the price that
was originally paid for her; but usually the brother of the deceased
inherits this property, and any one else usurping his privilege becomes
a mortal enemy. However, the widow is not forced to take a new partner
against her will. Indeed, if she have children with claims upon her
care, it is considered more respectable to lead a single life.
In the lower regions of India, on the warm plains, we find marriage
contracts fulfilled at a very early age. In the colder climate of Kabul
they are left to a later period in life--men being wedded at twenty,
women at about fifteen years of age. The time varies, however, with
different classes. Among the poor, with whom the price of a wife is not
easily to be amassed, the men often remain unmarried until forty, and
the women till twenty-five. On the other hand, the rich frequently take
brides of twelve to bridegrooms of fifteen, or even earlier, before
either of them has attained puberty. Those living in towns and in
Western Afghanistan marry earlier than those dwelling in the pastoral
districts and in the eastern parts. These often wait until twenty-five,
until the chin is thoroughly covered with beard, and the man is in all
respects mature. The Ghiljies are still more prudent in this respect.
In most parts of the country, nevertheless, the date of marriage is
determined by the individual’s ability to purchase a wife, provide
a home, and support a family. Usually men form alliances within the
blood of their own tribe; but many Afghans take also Tavjik and Persian
women. It is not considered disreputable to take a wife from those
nations; but it is held below the dignity of the Durani race to bestow
a wife on a stranger, and this, consequently, is seldom or never done.
The intercourse of the sexes is regulated by various circumstances,
many of them accidental. In the crowded towns, where the men have
little opportunity of converse with the women, matches are generally
made with views of family policy, and contracted through the agency of
a go-between. When a man has fixed on any particular girl to be his
wife, he sends some female relation or neighbour to see her and report
to him upon her qualifications. If the account be satisfactory, the
same agent ascertains from the girl’s mother whether her family are
favourable to the match; should all this prove well, arrangements are
made for a public proposal. On an appointed day the suitor’s father
goes with a party of male relations to the young woman’s father, while
a similar deputation of females waits on her mother, and the offer is
made in customary form. Various presents are also sent, the dowry is
settled, a feast is prepared, and the betrothal takes place. Some time
after, when both man and woman have mutually, by free consent, signed
the articles of agreement--which stipulate for a provision for the wife
in case of divorce--the union is completed at a festival, and the bride
is delivered, on payment of her price, at the dwelling of her future
master.
In the country, formalities very similar take place; but, as women
there go unveiled, and the intercourse of the sexes is less restricted,
the marriage generally originates in a personal attachment between the
wedded pair, and the negotiations are only matters of etiquette. An
enterprising lover may also obtain his mistress, without gaining the
consent of her parents, by tearing away her veil, cutting off a lock
of her hair, or throwing a large white cloth over her, and declaring
her to be his lawful and affianced wife. After this no other suitor
would propose for her, and she is usually bestowed on the bold lover,
though he cannot escape paying some price for his wife. Such expedients
are, therefore, seldom resorted to. When a man desires a girl for whom
he cannot pay, and who reciprocates his affection, the common plan is
to elope. This is, indeed, considered by her family as an outrage
equivalent to the murder of one of its members, and pursued with
equally rancorous revenge, but the possession of the wife is at least
secured. The fugitive couple take refuge in the territories of some
other tribe, and find the hospitable protection which is accorded by
the Afghans to every guest, and still more to every suppliant.
Among the Eusufzies different customs prevail. A man never sees his
bride until the marriage rites are completed. The Beduranis, also,
maintain great reserve between the youth and the girl betrothed one to
another. Sometimes a man goes to the house of his future father-in-law,
and labours, as Jacob laboured for Rachael, without being allowed to
see his destined wife until the day for the ceremony has arrived. With
many of the Afghan tribes a similar rule is nominally laid down, but a
secret intercourse is countenanced between the bridegroom and future
bride. It is called Naumzud bauzee, or the sport of the betrothed. The
young man steals by night to the house of his affianced, pretending
to conceal his presence altogether from the knowledge of the men, who
would affect to consider it a great scandal. He is favoured by the
girl’s mother, who privately conducts him to an interior apartment,
where he is left alone with his beloved until the approach of morning.
He is allowed the freest intercourse with her, he may converse with
her as he pleases, he may kiss her, and indulge in all other innocent
freedoms; but the young people are under the strongest cautions and
prohibitions to refrain from anticipating the nuptial night. “Nature,
however,” says Mountstuart Elphinstone, “is too strong for such
injunctions, and the marriage begins with all the difficulty and
interest of an illicit amour.” Cases have not unfrequently occurred
in which the bride has been delivered of two or three children before
being formally received into her husband’s house. This, however, is
regarded as extremely scandalous, and seldom happens among the more
respectable Afghans. However, the custom of Naumzud bauzee prevails
with men of the highest rank, and the king himself sometimes enjoys its
midnight pleasures.
Though polygamy is allowed by the Mohammedan laws, it is too expensive
to be practised by the bulk of the people. The legal number of wives
is four; but many of the rich exceed this, and maintain a crowd of
concubines besides. Two wives and two female slaves form a liberal
establishment for a man of the middle class; while the poor are
obliged to be content with one companion.
The social condition of the female sex in Afghanistan is low, as it
must be in all countries where women are bought and sold. The wives of
the rich, indeed, secluded in the recesses of the harem, are allowed
to enjoy all the comforts and luxuries within reach of their husband’s
wealth. This, however, is more to please the man, than indulge the
women, though many husbands really love their wives, and are influenced
to a considerable degree by their desires. In general, however, it is
to enjoy the pride of having a beautiful wife in his zenana, with all
the appliances of opulence to render her gracious and dainty.
Among the poorer classes the women perform the drudgery of the house
and carry water. Those of the most barbarous tribes share the labours
of the field; but nowhere are they employed as in India, where there
is scarcely any difference between the toils of the sexes. A man by
the Mohammedan law is allowed to chastise his wife by beating. Custom,
however, is more chivalrous and merciful than the written code,
and lays it down as disgraceful for a man to avail himself of this
privilege of his sex.
Though many women of the higher ranks learn to read, and exhibit
considerable talents for literature, it is reckoned immodest for
a female to write, as that accomplishment might be made use of to
intrigue by correspondence with a lover.
Many families have all their household affairs, and many even their
general customs, controlled by women. These sometimes correspond for
their sons. It is usually the mother who enjoys this influence, but
the wives also frequently rise to ascendancy; and all the advantages
conferred on him by the Mohammedan law frequently fail to save a man
from sinking to a secondary position in his own house. All domestic
amusements indulged in by men are, among the lower and more estimable
orders, shared by the women.
In towns, these envelope themselves in an ample white wrapper, like
the Arab burnouse, which covers them to the feet, and altogether
conceals their figure. A network in the hood, spread over the face,
enables them to see, while their features are invisible to others.
When on horseback, those of the upper classes wear large white cotton
wrappers on their legs, which completely hides the shape of the limb.
Frequently, also, they travel in hampers, large enough to allow
of their reclining, which are strung like paniers over a camel’s
back, and covered with a case of broad cloth. They are hot almost to
suffocation during the sultry season. Females are allowed to go about
seated in this manner, and form a large proportion in the crowds which
throng the public ways. Scrupulously concealed as their features are,
they are thus subject to little restraint; and, compared with their sex
in the neighbouring regions, though they do not occupy an honourable,
they are by no means in an unhappy position.
In the rural districts they are still more free, and go without a veil.
Walking through the village or the camp, they are subject to no other
restraint than the universal opinion that it is indecent to associate
with the other sex. Should a strange man approach, they immediately
cover their faces. At home, they seldom enter the public room of
their house if an Afghan with whom they are not intimate is there.
With Armenians, Persians, and Hindoos, indeed, they do not hold this
reserve; for they consider them as of no importance; and the pride
of her race is, in these cases, a sufficient guardian to the woman’s
virtue. When their husbands are from home, also, they receive guests,
and entertain them with all the liberal courtesy required by the sacred
laws of hospitality.
But the modesty and chastity of the country women, especially of
those belonging to the simple shepherd tribes, has been remarked and
admired by almost every traveller. “There are no common prostitutes,”
says Mountstuart Elphinstone, “except in the towns, and very few
even there, especially in the west, which is the colder region;
it is considered very disreputable to frequent their company.” In
Afghanistan, however, as in all other parts of the East, and in many
states of antiquity, the imperfect education of the women is a cause
of profligacy among the men. The wives and concubines who fill a rich
man’s harem are usually ignorant, insipid, and unacquainted even with
the forms of conversation. The prostitutes, on the other hand, are
generally well versed in the science of the world, polished in their
manners, practised in the arts of seduction, and afford amusement
of such interest and variety that men, with four wives and numerous
female slaves at their command, frequently seek the society of these
accomplished women.
An able and judicious writer has observed that, as far as he
recollected, he saw among no people in the East, except the Afghans,
any traces of the sentiment which we call love, that is, according to
European ideas. There, however, it not only exists, but is extremely
prevalent. One sign of this is exhibited in the numerous elopements,
which are always attended with peril, and are risked through love. It
is common also for a man in humble circumstances to pledge his faith
to a particular girl, and then start off to some remote town, or even
to Lower India, where, by industry or trade, he might acquire wealth
enough to purchase her from her friends. One traveller met at Poonah a
young man who had contracted one of these engagements. He had formed
an attachment with the daughter of a Mullah, who reciprocated his
affection. Her father gave his consent willingly to the marriage; but
said that his daughter’s honour would suffer if she did not bring as
large a price as the other women of her family. The young people were
much afflicted, for the man owned only one horse. However, his mistress
gave him a needle used for applying antimony to the eye, and with this
pledge of her affection he was confidently working to accumulate the
fortune which was required to purchase her. These romantic amours are
most common among the country people, especially where the women are
partially secluded--accessible enough to be admired, but withdrawn
enough to excite the lover’s attachment by some difficulty. Among the
higher orders such unions are less frequent, though with them also
they occasionally occur. It was an affair of love between a chief of
the Turkolaunis and a Khan of the Euzufzies that gave rise to a bloody
war which lasted many years. Many of the songs and tales sung and told
among the Afghans have love for their plot and spirit, and that passion
is expressed in the most glowing and flowery language. Such a trait in
a nation’s manners is highly favourable, and, joined with many others,
renders the Afghan one of the most admirable races of the East.
An exceptional feature in the manners of that region is exhibited
by the Moolah Zukkee, a sect of infidel pedants, who are more
unprincipled, dissolute, and profligate than any other class in the
country. They resemble in their conduct the Areois of the South Sea
Islands, doubt the truth of a future state, are sceptical as to the
existence of a God, and have released themselves from every fear of
hell. They have taken full advantage of this, and indulge in the vilest
lusts without check or shame. This is the more extraordinary as the
Afghans are represented, on the whole, as a devout and pious people.
The inhabitants of Afghanistan are divided into the stationary and
wandering population--the dwellers in tents, and the dwellers in
houses. It is a curious fact that the dwellers in tents, who live
chiefly to the West, are the more chaste and moral. It is among these,
however, that the intercourse of the sexes is confined less by law than
by public opinion. Men and women dance together, but in modest measures.
The slaves we have alluded to are divided into the home-born and the
foreign. The beautiful girls are purchased for the harems of the rich;
the others are sold as menials, or attendants on the rich women. The
habit of buying concubines is unfortunately becoming more common.
Intercourse with the voluptuaries of Persia has seduced them into many
Persian vices. Naturally they are, perhaps, one of the least voluptuous
nations in Asia; but their manners are becoming visibly corrupted,
and this decay of their ancient simplicity is felt and regretted by
themselves. Corps of prostitutes and harems full of concubines will do
the work of the sword among them, and their spirit of independence,
which never yielded even before English bayonets, will evaporate, if
they long continue to decline in their morals and manners. Luxury has
subdued more great nations than the sword.
In the Vizeeree country, to the north of the Sherauni district, one
very extraordinary custom prevails; it is quite peculiar to that tribe;
the women have the right of choosing their husbands. When a woman has
fixed on any man whom she desires to marry, she sends the drummer of
the camp to pin a handkerchief on his cap, with a pin which she has
previously used to fasten up her hair. The drummer goes on his mission,
cautiously watches his opportunity, and executes the feat in public,
naming the woman. The man is obliged immediately to take her as his
wife, if he can pay her price to her father[71].
OF PROSTITUTION IN KASHMIR.
In Kashmir we find the Hindu system of manners considerably modified
by various circumstances. The people are not oppressed by that rigid
code of etiquette, which in India isolates every caste and almost
every family. Naturally addicted to pleasure, they find much of their
enjoyment in the society of the female sex, and from the earliest
times have been celebrated for their love of singers and dancers.
Formerly, when the valley was more populous and flourishing than at
present, its capital city was the scene of eternal revel, in which
morals stood little in the way of those gratifications to which the
sensual ideas of the richer orders inclined them. Now, under a vile
and monstrous despotism, the inhabitants relieve themselves from
a continual struggle with misfortune by indulging in gross vices.
Formerly they were corrupted by luxury; now they decay through misery,
and drown the sense of hopeless poverty in the gratification of their
animal passions.
The situation of the female sex in Kashmir differs from that occupied
by them among the Hindus of Bengal. They are far more free, and appear
more licentious. The women of this delightful and romantic valley
have long been celebrated for their grace and beauty. Their renown
extended on the one side as far as the plains of Central Asia, and on
the other beyond the borders of the Ganges. They were formerly much
sought after by the Mogul nobility of Delhi, to whom they bore strong
and handsome sons; and even after that monarchy had declined from its
original opulence and power, its luxurious kings solaced themselves in
their humiliation by concubines and dancing girls from Kashmir. Nor has
the beauty which in those early ages attracted to the women of this
country the admiration of all the East, faded in any degree. They are
still described as the flowers of Oriental grace--not so slender as the
Hindus of Bengal, but more full, round, voluptuous, and fascinating.
Since few except those belonging to the very highest classes wear a
veil, travellers have enjoyed abundant opportunities of observing the
characteristics of the sex. The face is of a dark complexion, richly
flushed with pink; the eyes are large, almond-shaped, and overflowing
with a peculiar liquid brilliance; the features are regular,
harmonious, and fine; while the person, as we have said, is plump
and round, though the limbs are often models of grace. Such is the
portrait we are led to draw by the accounts of the best writers. They
agree, however, in adding, that among all, except the dancers, singers,
and prostitutes, with probably those few women who are shut up in
harems, art has done nothing to aid nature. The eyes, unsurpassed for
brightness, with full orbs, and long black lashes, shine often from a
dirty face, expressing a mind flooded with sensual desires, and utterly
unadorned by education or accomplishments. Among the poorer classes,
especially, filth, poverty, and degradation render many of the women
repulsive, in spite of their natural beauty. It is remarkable that the
inhabitants of the boats on the lakes possess among them the handsomest
women in the valley.
The customs of marriage, courtship, and the general habits of the
women, resemble so closely what have already been described in treating
of India, that we need not enter into any particular account of
them. The life of the woman belonging to a chief of high rank is a
monotonous seclusion. She sits, enveloped in full wrappings of shawls
and robes, amid all the luxury and brilliance of an Oriental harem,
with every appliance of ease and comfort, but not the liberty which
the humbler orders enjoy. Wives of all classes, indeed, are subject to
their husbands, but those of the nobles are most under control. They
often experience in its full bitterness the curse of slavery under a
capricious despot. The authority of the man is absolute.
Mikran Singh, a chief of the valley, was a few years ago, during the
reign of the Maharaja Runjit Singh, guilty of a horrible act, which
illustrates in a striking manner the condition of women in that
country. His wife happened to be in the Punjab, and, while there,
was accused by some enemies of a criminal intrigue. She was sent
to her husband in Kashmir. Her son flung his dagger at the feet of
Mikran Singh, and threw himself at his knees, begging mercy for his
mother. The man promised to forgive her; but, as soon as occasion
offered, ordered her to be forced into a bath the temperature of which
was rapidly increased with the purpose of suffocating her. She was
tenacious of life, and struggled long with her tortures, filling the
palace with shrill and piercing shrieks. Many people fled from the
neighbourhood that they might not listen to these fearful cries. At
length, to put an end to this horrid scene, the husband sent his wife a
bowl of poison, which she drank and immediately died.
Women of the middle and lower classes affect no concealment, and never
wear a veil. They experience less caprice from their husbands, and are
perhaps more free than females in Hindustan formerly were. Widows have
long been released from the disgusting obligation of burning at the
funeral pyre of their husbands. The custom, indeed, was at no time very
prevalent in the valley, and since the decree of abolition, published
by Aurungzebe in 1669, it has never been revived. Women in Kashmir
bear a fair proportion to the men, and are proverbially fruitful. The
depopulation of the country is owing to no natural causes, but to the
rapacious despotism under which it suffers. British government would
soon, without a doubt, restore it to its ancient flourishing condition,
as well as reform its manners.
Travellers in Kashmir always remark the dancing girls, for which it
was formerly renowned. The village of Changus, near the ancient city
of Achibul, was at one time celebrated for a colony of them. They
excelled, in singing, dancing, and other accomplishments, all the other
girls of the valley. When Vigne visited it some years ago, the village
had fallen to decay, and its famous beauties had disappeared. Old men,
however, remembered and spoke of them with regret. One, whose name was
Lyli, still lived in the recollection of many. A few dancers of another
class remained, but were inferior in their natural charms and arts to
those of the city, and were obliged to be content with engagements in
the humbler or country districts.
These women may be divided into classes. Among the highest we
might find some that are virtuous and even modest, as we may among
singers and actresses in Europe. Others frequent entertainments at
the houses of rich men and public festivals, receiving large sums
for their attendance, and occasionally consent to prostitute their
persons for a valuable gift. Others are regular professional harlots,
indiscriminately prostituting themselves to any who desire their
society. Many of these are widows, who are forbidden to marry again,
and are devoted to the service of some god, whose temple and priests
they enrich by the gains of their disreputable calling.
The Watul or Gipsy tribe of Kashmir is remarkable for the loveliness of
its females. Living in tents or temporary huts, these Gipsies pass from
spot to spot; and many of their handsomest girls are sold as slaves
to furnish the harems of the rich, or enter the train of some company
of dancing girls. These are bred and taught to please the taste of
the voluptuary, to sing licentious songs in an amorous tone, to dance
in voluptuous measures, to dress in a peculiar style, and to seduce
by the very expression of their countenances. Formerly many of these
women amassed large sums in their various callings; but now that the
prosperity of the valley has decreased, the youngest and most beautiful
seek their fortunes in the cities of Agra and Delhi; which, though
decaying, still retain traces of the imperial luxury and profligacy
which once rendered them the splendid capitals of the East.
The bands of dancing girls are usually attended by divers hideous
duennas and men, whose conspicuous ugliness makes the loveliness of the
women appear more complete through contrast. Baron Hugel, whose ideas
are purely German, did not find his sense of the beautiful satisfied by
the women, and especially the public women, of Kashmir; but every other
traveller, from Bernier to Vigne, expatiates upon the subject. The
Baron does not, in other respects, inspire us with the idea that he is
an authority on such a question.
The Nach girls are under the surveillance of the Government--which
licenses their prostitution--and lead in general a miserable life. They
are actual slaves, cannot sing or dance without permission from their
overseer, and must yield up to him the most considerable part of their
profits. Some of them still ask large sums, especially from strangers.
One troop demanded from our German author a hundred rupees for an
evening’s performance.
The education of a superior Nach girl should commence when she is no
more than five years old. Nine years, it is said, are required to
perfect them in song and dance. They dress usually in trowsers of
rich-coloured silk, loosely furled round the limb, fitting tight at
the ancle, and confined round the waist by a girdle and tassels, which
hang down to the knee. Over these is draped a tunic of white muslin,
reaching half-way down the leg; but when dancing they wear a full
flowing garment of soft light tissue of various colours, intermixed
with gold. Some have been seen with ornaments on their persons to
the value of 10,000 or 12,000 rupees. Some, also, with all these
adornments, neglect to be clean, and omit perfume from among the graces
of their toilette. Their songs are often full of sentiment and fancy,
finely expressed, and accompanied by pleasing music. Their dances are
not chaste or modest; but neither are they obscene or gross.
Among the poorer orders exist a swarm of prostitutes, frequenting low
houses in the cities or boats on the lakes; but of their modes of life
we have no account. Probably the manners of prostitutes differ little
throughout the world. It is certain that they are largely patronised by
the more demoralised part of the population. The traveller Moorcroft,
who gave gratuitous advice to the poor of Serinaghur, had at one time
nearly 7000 patients on his list. Of these a very large number were
suffering from loathsome diseases, induced by the grossest and most
persevering profligacy. Altogether the manners of Kashmir appear very
corrupt[72].
OF PROSTITUTION IN INDIA.
We shall have to view the Hindus under two aspects--as they were under
their former oppressors, and as they are under the administration
of the Company. The change of rule has wrought, and is working,
a change in the manners and institutions of the people perfectly
wonderful to contemplate. Climate and position have much to do with
national characteristics, but government has more. India under the
English no more resembles India under the Mogul, than the England
of the nineteenth century resembles the England of the Heptarchy. A
beneficent revolution in her fortune has occurred, which is developing
an extraordinary reform in the customs and ideas of her native race.
Consequently a distinction must be observed between the old and the
new state of things. It will be necessary, also, to distinguish those
provinces which are absolutely under our sway from those which are
independent, or only related to us by subsidiary alliances. A strong
contrast is exhibited by these different communities, which, as
far as the welfare of the people is concerned, differ as much from
each other as the slave states of western Africa differ from the
population of Cape Colony. In the one a wise and beneficent government
is administered for the happiness of the people; in the other, an
imbecile yet savage tyranny makes them look with jealousy on their more
fortunate neighbours. This is an important consideration, and by no
means irrelevant to our subject, for it illustrates the influence of
laws and institutions upon the manners and morals of a nation.
The state of women among the Hindus is not elevated, and as long as
their ancient teachers of religion are revered, such must be the case.
The female sex is held absolutely dependent on the male, and, as among
the Chinese, the father before marriage, the husband afterwards, and
the son in widowhood, are the natural protectors assigned by the sacred
law. Nothing is to be done by a woman of her purely independent will.
She must reverence her lord, and approach him with humble respect. She
is bound to him while he desires it, whatever his conduct may be, and,
if she rebel, is to be chastised with a rope or cane on the back part
of her person, “and not on a noble part, by any means.”
Writers with a particular theory to support frequently quote the
institutes of Menu, to show that a contempt of women is inculcated, and
hard usage of them encouraged by the precepts of that singular code.
Indolence, vanity, irascible humours, evil dispositions, and
lasciviousness, are enumerated as the vices which are declared
natural to them. “A woman is chaste, when there is neither place,
time, nor person, to afford her an opportunity to be immoral,” says
the “Hetopadera,” which is quoted in application to the whole sex,
though it applies only as Professor Wilson--the great authority on
this subject--observes, to that class of idle, intemperate, profligate
females, to be found in every society. Passages undoubtedly occur in
the laws and in satirical compositions levelled at the whole sex; but
the Hindus themselves usually describe them as amiable, modest, gentle,
chaste, full of wit, and excelling in every grace. They are allowed
to inherit property; they are permitted under certain circumstances
to exercise power, though by indirect means; and they certainly exert
great influence over the men. In no state of ancient times, except
the polished republics of Greece and Rome, were women held in so much
esteem as among the Hindus.
Debarred as they are from the advantages of education, not allowed to
eat with their husbands, and forbidden from mixing in society, the
Hindu women, of course, are degraded below their just position; but
it is not true that they are abject slaves, or are generally treated
with barbarity. Among the more wild and barbarous tribes, as well as
the more ignorant classes in all parts of India, men frequently beat
their wives; but, from the few revelations of the Zenana which have
been made, it would appear that its inmates are generally treated with
considerable deference and attention. The contact of Mohammedan with
Hindu manners has certainly, however, had an effect on the latter,
which has depreciated the rank and estimation of the female sex.
Nowhere, indeed, where polygamy is allowed, can women hold their true
position. In India, however, though permitted, it was not encouraged
by the religious law, and sanctioned in particular cases only, as
barrenness, inconstancy, aversion, or some other similar cause. The
wife, also, must be consulted, and her consent obtained to the second
match. She still held the principal rank in the family, for the new
comer could not take her place while she remained in the household.
In various parts of India, different customs of marriage prevail. There
are, indeed, four prescribed forms--all honourable, and various only in
detail. A fifth is, when the bridegroom, contrary to the sacred law,
traffics for a girl. Another is, when a captive, left helpless in a
man’s power, is forced to become the companion of his bed. And a last
is, when a girl is ravished, when surprised asleep, and taken off or
deluded to the house of a new master.
Marriage is viewed as a religious duty by the Hindus. A few are
exempted, under special circumstances, from the fulfilment of this
sacred obligation. The rules of law enacted with respect to it apply
chiefly to affairs of caste, with which we have here little to do. It
is forbidden to purchase a wife for money, except under particular
conditions; but the young girls have little share in their own destiny,
being usually betrothed while very young. The father has the disposal
of them until three years after the age of puberty, when it is reckoned
disgraceful for her to be single, and then she may choose a partner for
herself. Few, however, will marry a maiden so old. In Bahar the girl,
betrothed while an infant, is not permitted to enter her husband’s
house until mature, when she is conducted thither with as much ceremony
as the circumstances of the family will allow. In Bengal the couple are
pledged with many rites and a profusion of expense. The bride is taken
to her husband’s house, remains there a little while, and then goes
home for a short period, but the whole is consummated as soon after
ten years of age as practicable. The timid effeminate Bengalee appears
of a sensual character, and regards his wife as little more than the
instrument of his pleasure. A better state of things is now beginning
to prevail there, in consequence of the efforts made by the Company;
but under the old system, not one female in twenty thousand was allowed
to acquire the least particle of learning. The natives excuse or
justify this fact,--first, by the prohibition against educating girls
which are contained in their sacred books; and secondly, by declaring
that many women would, did they possess those means of intrigue, run
riot in profligacy and vice.
The birth of a daughter being throughout the East, and especially in
Bengal, regarded as less auspicious than that of a son, indicates a
low position of the sex. From that moment her parents are solicitous
to settle her, so that she is often in infancy pledged for life.
The character of the bridegroom is of little consequence. Matches,
consequently, often prove unhappy, especially where the jealousy or
despotism of the husband forces the woman to live in seclusion, and
mainly within the private recesses of the zenana. This, however, is
not the general custom, women being allowed to appear at festivals and
jubilees. Even the wives of respectable Hindus frequently quit the
interior apartments set aside for them, and go to bathe in the waters
of the Ganges or some other holy stream. The poorer, of course, who
assign a share of labour to their wives, cannot seclude them if they
would, for the expense of confinement is not inconsiderable.
The wife waits on her husband, and is treated with very partial
confidence. In the lower ranks she is employed to prepare cow-dung for
fuel, to fetch water, to make purchases in the markets, and perform
the drudgery of the house, though this is no more than is done by
the poorer classes in Europe. The rich woman adorns herself, curls
her hair, listens to the gossip of her slaves, and indulges in what
amusements may be within her reach. It may be imagined that the child
or wife, uneducated and without a gleam of light in her mind, amuses
herself by a thousand trivial devices. The home is thus not unhappy,
unless the husband be naturally harsh, or the house be ruled by a
tyrannical mother-in-law, which is often the case. Matches founded
upon a mutual attachment are very rare, but by no means unknown. The
romances of the Hindus are in many cases founded on them. The general
plan, however, is for the parties to be betrothed in childhood.
When they perform the ceremonies of marriage they are complete
strangers to each other; yet Hindu wives are, on the whole, faithful.
When the husband finds himself united to a woman who is hateful to him,
he neglects her altogether, and takes another or a concubine, though
this is against the ancient law. In many things, however, the practice
of this nation, especially among the ruder classes, is opposed to that
extraordinary sacred code. However, if he have no children, he adopts
this plan of ensuring them, and frequently conceals the facts for a
long time from his wife. Polygamy causes great troubles in the Bengalee
households. A man is not allowed by law to take a new partner after
fifty, but this regulation is observed by few. These customs, together
with the facility of divorce--a privilege from which the female sex is
excluded--contribute to the demoralization of society. A man calling
his wife _mother_, by that act renounces her, and is thenceforward free
from the tie. A barren wife may be superseded in the eighth year; she
whose children are all dead in the birth; she who bears only daughters,
in the eleventh; while she who is of an unkind disposition may be
divorced without delay. The whole code, composed by the priestly order,
is unjust to the sex.
Of the general character of the female sex in Hindustan very
exaggerated ideas commonly prevail. It is represented as corrupted
throughout by the obscenity and indecency of the public religion and
the institutions framed by priests. It is true the Hindu Pantheon is
a representation of the lowest vices, and that the manners of the
people are by no means delicate; yet the respectable class of women
appear chaste, orderly, modest, and decorous. The fair muscular race
of Afghanistan has indeed been depicted in favourable contrast to the
dark and slim race of Bengal, but this need suppose no characteristic
depravity in the latter, for the hardy mountaineers are celebrated
for their contempt of sensual pleasures. Other parts of India exhibit
their peculiar features. Among the rude Mughs of Arracan--a hunting
and fishing, as well as cultivating, and formerly a predatory
tribe--when a man wants money he pawns his wife for a certain sum, or
transfers her altogether. In the southern parts of the Peninsula and
the Mysore, manners are more licentious, and women are more debased.
There polygamy has always been practised by the powerful and wealthy
whose means enabled them to enjoy indulgences discouraged by the
precepts of the ancient law. Buchanan, travelling towards the close
of the eighteenth century, found about 80 concubines secluded in the
palace of Tippoo Sultan, at Seringapatam. These were attended by more
than 500 handmaids. The same traveller made a diligent inquiry into
the manners of the various communities he visited. Among the Teliga
Divangas, followers of Siva, a man was allowed to take many wives, but
not to hurt them, or divorce them, except for adultery. It was once
the practice for the widow to bury herself alive with the body of her
husband.
The Shaynagas of Canara were not allowed to take a second wife unless
the first had died, or had no children. The Corannas permitted
polygamy, and girls were purchased for money. Adultery was punished
by a beating or by a divorce, in which case the guilty wife might
marry whom she pleased. The Panchalaru had similar laws, and so indeed
had many other tribes. One of the most general rules was, that a
woman could not be divorced except for faithless conduct. Widows were
sometimes destroyed. Among the Bherid and many others, marriage was
contracted, under obligation, before the age of puberty. If a girl
remained single beyond that age, no credit was given to her virginity;
she was declared incapable of marriage, and usually took resource in
prostitution.
The severe laws against violating the law of chastity have not, in
India, been formed so much for the protection of morals, as for
preserving the boundaries of castes. Women are severely punished for
holding intercourse with a man of superior caste; that is, if the
intrigue be discovered, for there is no doubt that such intrigues
frequently occur.
Among the Woddas the laws of marriage were by no means so stringent
as among many other tribes visited by Buchanan. Women abounded. Every
man had as many wives as he pleased. They all laboured for him; and if
one was lazy she was divorced, though left free to marry again; she
also might leave him if hardly treated, but could not contract a new
engagement without his consent.
The Carruburru permitted adulteresses to live with any man who would
keep them, provided their husbands did not immediately desire revenge.
They were despised, but not altogether cast out from the communion
of social life. The children of concubines enjoyed equal rights with
those of real wives. That they were a gross people is proved by the
fact that adultery was sometimes winked at in an industrious woman, too
valuable as a servant to lose. The more refined idea, however, which
prevailed among them of not allowing a girl to marry until naturally
marriageable, was looked upon by members of the higher castes as a
beastly depravity.
Among the Rajpoots women are not degraded; they hold a higher position.
Ladies of rank are, indeed, secluded, but more from ideas of dignity
and etiquette than sentiments of jealousy or the habit of despotism.
There is an air of chivalry in some of their customs. A woman of high
station, threatened with danger, sometimes sent to any youth whom
she might admire the present of a bracelet. He was then called her
“bracelet-bound brother,” and was expected to defend her under all
circumstances, even at the hazard of his life.
Men, it has been remarked, make the laws--women make the manners--of a
country. In Rajasthan, the few women reared exercised great influence
on the actions, habitudes, and tastes of the men. The Rajpoot consults
his wife on every important occasion; and, much as we are given to
lament the condition of these women, it is by no means so debased as
many writers would persuade us to imagine. Marriage contracts which
often, as among the Jews, took place at the well, where the young girls
assembled to draw water and converse, were, in frequent instances, the
commencement of a happy life. The precepts of Menu have been quoted
to show the contempt of the sex inculcated by the sacred books. His
censures on a class, however, have been taken as his description of
all womankind--but falsely; for the Rajpoot proverbs on this subject
are derived from those famous institutes. The mouth of a woman, we
find there, is constantly pure. Her name should be chosen graceful
and euphonous, resembling a word of benediction. When they are
honoured, the gods are pleased; when they are dishonoured, the gods are
offended. The language of another sage was full of rich, and, perhaps,
exaggerated sentiment. “Strike not, even with a blossom, a wife guilty
of a hundred faults.” The religious maxims laid down for married
couples is equally elevated. “Let mutual fidelity continue until
death.” Intermarriage is prohibited in the same clan, or even tribe,
though the patronymic may have been lost for centuries. Eight hundred
years had divided the two branches of one famous house, yet an alliance
between them was prohibited as incestuous.
Pregnant women and maidens are in Rajpootana treated with great
tenderness and respect. Many women in this country can read and write.
They cannot govern actually; but indirectly as regents, several of them
have equalled in vigour and tyranny any of the masculine tyrants for
which Asia is so celebrated. Polygamy has caused many troubles in the
country; and at a remote period in its history we discover an instance
of polyandrism.
One of the modified systems we have alluded to exists in Sindh and the
Indian provinces of Beluchistan. Little gifted by nature, the Beluchi
women are the servants of their husbands, and labour while their lords
are feasting or sleeping. Nevertheless, when, under the destructive
tyranny of the Amirs, a foray was about to be undertaken, or any danger
averted, the females of the village were taken into consultation, and
strongly influenced the councils of the men. A strong resemblance was
discovered by Pottinger between the moral and social institutions of
the Beluchis, especially in reference to marriage, and those of the
Jews.
A woman’s husband dying, his brother is bound to marry her, and his
children are heirs of the deceased. A similar enactment is to be
found in the law as set forth in Deuteronomy. In cases of adultery,
full expiation and atonement must be made, or both criminals put to
death. The regulations with respect to divorce are very similar. The
resemblance between Indian manners and those of the Jews was, as early
as 1704, noticed by an anonymous French writer, who drew up a curious
parallel in support of his theory.
The Muzmi, or hill tribes of Nepaul, who are not Hindus, follow the
customs of Upper Thibet in most things, except polyandrism, or the
plurality of husbands. Their women enjoy considerable privileges.
The females of the Brahmin and India class in Central India, also,
possess great influence over their husbands. If married to men of
any consequence, they have a right to a separate provision, and an
estate of their own. They enjoy much liberty, seldom wear a veil,
give entertainments, and expend much money in jewels and clothes.
In the families of the great Sindia and Holkar they wielded no mean
degree of power, which they seldom exerted in the cause of peace.
Their education is not by any means so limited as that of their sex in
Bengal. Generally, among the Mohammedans of India, the women of high
rank are somewhat secluded, though not severely restrained; but those
of the lower classes, sharing as they do the labours and the pleasures
of their husbands, are neither watched nor immured. Whether they are
harshly used or not depends very much, as in England, on the individual
character of the husband. No description will apply universally to the
conduct of any race. In Bengal there were, under native rule, many
female zemindars, or village revenue administrators, who were, however,
subject to the influence, but not to the authority, of the male
members of their family. Among the tribes of the Rajamahal Hills, on
the western borders of that province, fewer restrictions still are in
practice. They are not Hindus of caste, and therefore more free to obey
their natural inclinations. One of their most prominent distinctions
is the permission for widows to marry again. Their morality is
tolerably good. When a man sees his son inclined to the company of
prostitutes, he asks him if he desires to be married. If he replies
in the affirmative, a neighbour is sent--unless a choice have been
already made--to find a suitable girl. Both parties must agree to the
match, though the girls, being wedded very young, seldom oppose their
parents’ will. The young man’s father makes a present to the father of
the bride; a marriage dinner is provided, the newly-joined couple eat
off the same leaf, their hands are joined, they are exhorted not to
quarrel, and the youth then takes home his wife.
One of the most remarkable and celebrated institutions of the Hindus
was that of suttee, or the burning of the widow with her husband’s
body. The shastres, or sacred books, are full of recommendations to
perform this terrible sacrifice, and promise ineffable bliss to the
voluntary victim. This custom of female immolation, which distinguished
especially Rajpoot manners, had its origin, according to the priests,
in the example of a holy personage, who, to avenge an insult, consumed
herself before an assemblage of the gods. Custom gave it sanction,
as religion offered it a reward. The institution of castes, however,
and the perpetual separation enjoined upon them, appear to have been
the real origin of the custom. In a few instances a man might marry a
woman of inferior order, but in no case could she descend. Polygamy
being practised, men continually left numerous young widows, who,
being forbidden under the pain of damnation, to contract a second
engagement, had to choose between infamy, misery, and the funeral pile.
It is said that 15,000 victims formerly perished annually in Bengal.
When we remember that 60 sometimes died on one pyre, we can believe
that a large number were thus destroyed; but the calculation alluded
to appears, nevertheless, extravagant. It is unnecessary here to enter
largely on the subject, which is familiar to every general reader.
Happily the horrible practice is now effectually abolished throughout
the British dominions--one among the innumerable blessings achieved
for that region by the Company’s administration. The contrast between
the native states and the English provinces is remarkable, if for this
alone. At the death of Runjit Singh a large sacrifice of women was made
for his funeral, but now that the Punjab is annexed, no more will be
permitted.
In Central India the custom prevailed most when the Rajpoots were
in the height of their power, their influence, and their pride. The
suttees were then very frequent, as is attested, among other evidences,
by the number of monuments still remaining, with representations of
the ceremony, which were erected in memory of the devoted wives. The
Mohammedans, when they were supreme, endeavoured, as far as possible,
to check the practice. The Mahrattas, by a judicious neglect and
indifference, which neither encouraged by approval nor provoked by
prohibition, which they were unable to enforce, rendered it very rare.
When Sir John Malcolm wrote, about 1820, there had not been, as far as
it was possible to know, throughout Central India, more than three or
four instances annually during the last twenty years. These instances
were confined to particular communities of Rajpoots and Brahmins, while
no examples occurred, as under the princes of Jeydpoor, Jaidpoor, and
Ondepoor, of women being forcibly dragged to the pile and thrust, an
unwilling sacrifice, into the flames. Some of the greatest fanatics
had entirely abandoned the custom for several generations. Where
it continued most generally to be preserved was where the priests
denounced the terrors of heavenly vengeance against those who dared to
allow one precept of the sacred code to be set aside. These hereditary
nobles of India obstructed the social reform of the country with all
the bigotry usual to such a class. There was no duty, said the law,
which a woman could honourably fulfil, after her husband’s death,
except casting herself in the same fire with him.
Formerly the horrors of the practice, in its details, could not be
exaggerated, though writers occasionally enlarged upon the general
results. Children of eight or ten years of age have devoted themselves
sometimes, through fear of the harsh usage they experienced from their
relatives. Women of 85 have been plunged into the blazing pile; and
maidens not married, but only betrothed, have been made a sacrifice
with the ashes of their intended husbands. In Ripa, if one wife
consented to burn, all the rest were compelled to follow her example.
Fearful scenes have on these occasions been witnessed by travellers.
A miserable wretch, escaping twice from the pyre, has clung to their
feet, imploring them to defend her, until, naked, with the flesh
burned off many parts of her person, she has been finally flung upon
the burning heap. Young children, bound together, have been laid
struggling by the body, and appeared to be dead from fear before the
wood was kindled. Among the Yogees, the wife sometimes buried herself
alive with the corpse of her husband. In 1803 it was computed that 430
suttees took place within 30 miles of Calcutta--in 1804 between 200 and
300. What “Aborigines’ Protection Society” can regret the revolution
which has given India into the hands of England?
The painful subject of infanticide is next forced upon our
contemplation. Formerly it prevailed to a great extent in India, though
the exertions of the Company have now all but extirpated it from the
British dominions. Various circumstances contributed in Rajpootana
to encourage the destruction of female children. The Rajpoot must
marry a woman of pure blood, beyond the utmost degree of affinity to
him. To find partners for their daughters was, therefore, a difficult
undertaking for the haughty nobility of Rajast’han. Besides, the
stupendous extravagance of the nobles at their wedding feasts--which
the pride of caste compelled--rendered such contracts an overwhelming
expense. The majority of the female infants were therefore slain. In
cases where a community was threatened with danger from an enemy,
all the children, and, indeed, all the women, were slaughtered, lest
they should fall into strange hands. Custom sanctioned, but neither
traditionary law nor religion allowed, infanticide, of which the
ancient dwellers on the banks of the Indus gave an early example. It
was the custom among them, says Ferishta, when a female child was born,
to carry it to the market-place. There the parent, holding a knife
in one hand and his infant in the other, demanded whether any one
wanted a wife. If no one came forward to claim the child as a future
bride, it was sacrificed. This caused a large numerical superiority
of men. Such a birth was among the Rajpoots an occasion of sorrow.
Its destruction was a melancholy event. Families were accustomed to
boast of the suttees to which they had contributed the victims, but
none ever recurred with pride to the children which had thus been
slain. The choice, however, was for the girl to die, or live with a
prospect of dishonour, which could not be endured by the proud people
of Rajast’han. Wilkinson asserted in 1833, that the number of infants
annually murdered in Malwa and Rajpootana was 20,000. In 1840 the
population of Cutch was 12,000, but there were not 500 women. In 1843
a folio of more than 400 pages was presented to Parliament, full of
correspondence on this subject. In many of the states, it appeared, the
Rajahs were induced to offer portions to women when marrying, in order
to check infanticide. In Katteewar great efforts were made, and parents
were rewarded for preserving their female children. Pride of caste,
the expense of marriage feasts, and poverty, were the general causes,
besides a desire to conceal the fruit of illicit intrigues. In some
villages there were only 12 girls to 79 boys under twelve years of age.
In one hamlet of 20 people not one female was living. It is probable,
nevertheless, that much exaggeration has been put forward on this
subject, especially in reference to Rajpootana, as the seclusion of the
females there rendered it impossible accurately to know the number of
births. Undoubtedly, however, it was practised to a great extent; but
by means of funds, for the reward and encouragement of those parents
who reared all their children, as well as by the gradual introduction
of laws, a mighty reform has been effected in India. In Odessa and the
east of Bengal children were formerly sacrificed to the goddess Gunga,
and for this purpose cast into the sacred river. In most countries
infanticide has been chiefly the resort of the poor, but in parts of
India it was the practice of the rich, being caused by pride rather
than indigence. In Bengal, however, the peasantry were occasionally
guilty of this device to rid themselves of a burden. A mother would
sometimes expose her infant to be starved or devoured, and visit the
place after three days had passed. If the child were still living--a
very rare case--she took it home and nursed it.
Another unnatural crime was that of procuring abortion, which is still
practised, though in a clandestine manner, since it is a breach of the
law. It was formerly very prevalent. Ward was assured by a pundit, a
professor, that in Bengal 100,000 children were thus destroyed in the
womb every month. This was a startling exaggeration, but there is no
doubt the offence was of frequent occurrence.
Whether the Hindus and other inhabitants of India are remarkable
for their chasteness or immorality is a question much disputed.
Unfortunately, men with a favourite theory to support, have been so
extravagant in their assertions on either side that it is difficult,
or even impossible, to form a just opinion on the subject. Many have
represented the Hindus as a sensual, lascivious, profligate race; but
we have the weighty testimony of Professor Wilson to the contrary.
There is no doubt that the manners of the people have undergone a
remarkable improvement since the establishment of British rule. The
original institutions of the people were opposed to morality. The
prohibition against the marriage of widows was a direct encouragement
to prostitution. Many enlightened Hindus long ago recognised the
demoralizing influence of this law, and exerted themselves to abolish
it. A wealthy native in Calcutta once offered a dowry of 10,000 rupees
to any woman who would brave the ancient prejudices of her race,
and marry a second husband. A claim was soon made for the liberal
donation. A learned Brahmin of Nagpoor, high in rank and opulence,
wrote against the law. Among one tribe, the Bunyas, it was long ago
abolished; not, however, from a moral persuasion of its injustice, but
under the pressure of circumstances. Even then, however, in Bhopal, the
hereditary dignitaries of the priestly order, naturally attached to
ancient prejudices, sought to re-establish the prohibition. There were
very few exceptions of this kind among all the millions of the Hindu
race. Even the Mohammedans, with the precept and example of their own
prophet to encourage them, held the marriage of a widow disgraceful.
Temporary reform took place at Delhi, but the old custom was, until
recently, supreme. The moral evils were, that it led to depravity
of conduct on the part of the widow, caused a frightful amount of
infanticide and abortion, and induced these women by their practice
to corrupt all others with whom they came in contact. Female children
being married so early, hundreds and thousands were left widows before
they had ripened into puberty. The crowded house--containing men of
all shades of consanguinity, grandfathers, fathers-in-law, uncles,
brothers-in-law, and cousins, all dwelling with the young widow in
the inclosure of the family mansion--led to illicit and incestuous
connections being continually formed. Pregnancies were removed by
abortion. The Bombay code took cognisance of this, and punished it
severely. When a woman was known to be pregnant she was narrowly
watched, and if the father could be found he was compelled to support
his child.
A boy might be betrothed to a child. If she died he was free from the
engagement; but if he died she was condemned to remain a maiden widow,
and subject to the humiliating laws attached to that condition. It is
easy to imagine the demoralizing effects of such an institution. Under
the old system the hardships and indignities imposed on the widow made
her prefer suttee, or the sacrifice by fire, or else a retreat in a
brothel. Another corrupting custom is that of early marriages. Men
seldom have sentiments of affection for any woman, or, if at all, it is
for some fascinating dancing girl, for their wives are chosen while too
young to feel or excite the passion of love. They therefore--and the
Brahmins in particular--resorted to the company of the prostitutes, who
are all dedicated, more or less, to the service of some temple.
All the dancing women and musicians of Southern India formerly belonged
to the Corinlar, a low caste, of which the respectable members,
however, disdain connection with them.
They thus formed a separate order, and a certain number were attached
to every temple of any consequence, receiving very small allowances.
They were mostly prostitutes, at least to the Brahmins. Those attached
to the edifices of great sanctity were entirely reserved for these
priestly sensualists, who would have dismissed any one connecting
herself with a Christian, a Mussulman, or a person of inferior caste.
The others hired themselves out indiscriminately, and were greatly
sought after. Their accomplishments seduced the men. The respectable
women, ignorant, insipid, and tasteless, were neglected for the more
attractive prostitutes. Under the rule of the Mohammedans, who were
much addicted to this class of pleasures, the Brahmins did not dare
enforce their exclusive privileges, but afterwards resumed their sway
with great energy. A set of dancers was usually hired out at prices
varying from twelve shillings to six pounds sterling. They performed
at private entertainments as well as public festivals. Each troop
was under a chief. When one became old she was turned away without
provision, unless she had a handsome daughter following the same
occupation, and in this case was usually treated by the girl with
liberality and affection. Buchanan tells us that all he saw were of
very ordinary appearance, inelegant in their dress, and dirty in their
person. Many had the itch, and some were vilely diseased.
In the temples of Tulava, near Mangalore, a curious custom prevailed.
Any woman of the four pure castes who was tired of her husband, or as
a widow was weary of chastity, or as a maiden, of celibacy, went to
the sacred building and ate some of the rice offered to the idol. She
was then publicly questioned as to the cause of her resolution, and
allowed the option of living within or without the precincts of the
temple. If she chose the former, she got a daily allowance of food
and annually a piece of cloth. She swept the holy building, fanned
the image of the god, and confined her prostitution to the Brahmins.
Usually some priestly officer of the revenue appropriated one of these
women to himself, paying her a small fee or sum, and would flog her, in
the most insulting manner, if she cohabited with any other man while
under his care. Part of the daughters were given away in marriage, and
part followed their mother’s calling.
The Brahminy women who chose to live outside of the temple might
cohabit with any men they pleased, but were obliged to pay a sixteenth
part of their profits to the Brahmins. They were an infamous class.
This system still obtains, though in a modified degree. In other
parts of the region it prevails more or less. In Sindh every town of
importance has a troop of dancing girls. No entertainment is complete
without them. Under the native government this vice was largely
encouraged. The girls swallowed spirits to stimulate their zeal. They
are, many of them, very handsome, and are all prostitutes. To show the
system of manners prevailing before the British conquest, it may be
remarked that numbers of these women accumulated great fortunes, and
that the voices of a band of prostitutes were louder than all other
sounds at the Durbars of the debauched Amirs. In consequence of this
the people of Sindh were hideously demoralized. Intrigues were carried
on to an extraordinary extent in private life, and women generally were
very lax. An evident reform is already perceptible.
Among the Hindus immorality is not a distinguishing characteristic,
though many men of high grade pass their nights with dancers and
prostitutes. In the temples of the south lascivious ceremonies still
occur, but in Hindustan Proper such scenes are not often enacted. This
decency of public manners appears of recent introduction, which is
indeed a reasonable supposition, for the people have now aims in life,
which they never enjoyed in security under their former rulers. It was
for the interest of the princes that their subjects should be indolent
and sensual. It is for the interest of the new government that they
should be industrious and moral. Great efforts have been made with this
object, and much good has resulted.
Towards the close of the last century an official report was made
by Mr. Grant, and addressed to the Court of Directors. It was the
result of an inquiry instituted into the morals of British India.
India and Bengal were especially held in view. Much laxity of morals
in private life then prevailed, and he believed that many intrigues
were altogether concealed, while many that were discovered were
hushed up. Receptacles for women of infamous character everywhere
abounded, and were licensed. The prostitutes had a place in society,
making a principal figure at all the entertainments of the great.
They were admitted even into the zenanas to exhibit their dances.
Lord Cornwallis, soon after his arrival in Bengal, was invited by the
Nawab to one of these entertainments, but refused to go. The frightful
punishments against adultery appeared enacted far more to protect the
sanctity of caste than public or private virtue. A man committing the
crime was threatened with the embraces, after death, of an iron figure
of a woman made red hot. Connection, however, with prostitutes and
dancing girls was permitted by the written law.
If that account was correct--and it is corroborated by many others--an
immense amelioration must have taken place. The Hindus are now
generally chaste, and the profligacy of their large cities does not
exceed that of large cities in Europe. In Benares, in 1800, out of a
population of 180,000, there were 1500 regular prostitutes, besides
264 Nach or dancing girls. They were all of the _Sudra_, which is a
very low caste. In Dacca there were, out of a population of 35,238
Mohammedans and 31,429 Hindus, 234 Mohammedan and 539 Hindu prostitutes.
At Hurdwar it was one of the duties of the female pilgrims to the
sacred stream to bathe stark naked before hundreds of men, which does
not indicate any great modesty.
The better order of Nach girls are of the highest grace and
fascination, with much personal charm, which they begin to lose at 20
years of age. They mostly dress in very modest attire, and many are
decent in their manners.
The Gipsies of India, many of whom are Thugs, have numbers of handsome
women in their camps, whom they send out as prostitutes to gain money,
or seduce the traveller from his road.
It is said that many of the Europeans scattered over India encourage
immorality, taking temporary companions. A large class of half-caste
children has been certainly growing up in the country, whose mothers
are not all the children of white men.
The institution of slavery in Malwa was principally confined to women.
Almost all the prostitutes were of this class. They were purchased when
children by the heads of companies, who trained them for the calling,
and lived upon the gains of their prostitution. The system is even
at present nearly similar, the girls being bargained away by their
parents into virtual servitude. Many of the wealthy Brahmins, with
from 50 to 200 slaves, employed them all day in the menial labours of
the establishment, and at night dispersed them to separate dwellings,
where they were permitted to prostitute themselves as they pleased. A
large proportion of the profits, however, which accrued from this vile
traffic formed the share of the master, who also claimed as slaves the
children which might spring from this vile intercourse. The female
slaves and dancing girls could not marry, and were often harshly used.
Society was disorganized by the vast bastard breed produced by this
system.
The Europeans at Madras, a few years ago, did not consider their
liaisons with the native women so immoral as they would have been
considered in England. The concubines were generally girls from the
lower ranks, purchased from their mothers. Their conduct usually
depends on the treatment they receive. Many of them become exceedingly
faithful and attached, being bitterly jealous of any other native women
interfering with their master’s affections, but never complaining
of being superseded by an English wife. They are often, however,
extravagant gamblers, and involve their “lovers” in heavy debts.
An Indian mother will sometimes dedicate her female child to
prostitution at the temple; and those who are not appropriated by the
Brahmins may go with any one, though the money must be paid into a
general fund for the support of the establishment.
Some of the ceremonies performed in the temples of the south, by the
worshippers of the female deities, were simply orgies of the impurest
kind. When a man desired to be initiated into these rites, he went
with a priest, after various preliminary rites, to some house, taking
nine females (one a Brahmin) and nine men--one woman for himself,
and another for his sacerdotal preceptor. All being seated, numerous
ceremonies were performed until twelve o’clock at night, when they
gratified their inflamed passions in the most libidinous manner. The
women, of course, were prostitutes by habit or profession. Men and
women danced naked before thousands of spectators at the worship of the
goddess Doorga. The impurities originated usually with the priests.
Many of the Brahmins persuaded their disciples to allow them to gratify
their lust upon their young wives, declaring it was a meritorious
sacrifice. At the temple of Juggernaut, during the great festivals, a
number of females were paid to dance and sing before the god daily.
These were all prostitutes. They lived in separate houses, not in the
temple.
The daughters of Brahmins, until eight years old, were declared by the
religious code to be objects of worship, as forms of goddesses. Horrid
orgies took place at the devotions paid them. Other women might be
chosen as objects of adoration. A man must select from a particular
class--his own wife or a prostitute: she must be stripped naked while
the ceremony is performed, and this is done in a manner too revolting
to describe. The clothes of the prostitutes hired to dance before the
idols are so thin that they may almost be said to have been naked. Thus
the immorality of the Hindoos, as far as it extended, was encouraged by
their religion.
In another way some classes of Brahmins contributed to demoralize the
people. A man of this profession would marry from three to 120 wives,
in different parts of the country. Many, indeed, earned a living in
this manner; for as often as they visited any woman, her father was
obliged to make a present. Some go once after their marriage, and never
go again; while others visit their wives once in three or four years.
Some of the more respectable Brahmins never hold sexual intercourse
with any of their wives, who dwell at home, but treat them with great
respect. These neglected women often take to prostitution. The brothels
of Calcutta and other large cities are crowded with such cast-off
mistresses of the Brahmins. They procure abortion when pregnant. In the
city of Bombay a whole quarter is inhabited chiefly by prostitutes.
Riding in the environs, the European resident is frequently assailed
by men, or sometimes boys, who inquire by signs or words, whether he
desires a companion; should he assent, the woman is privately brought
to his house in a close palanquin, or he is taken to a regular place of
resort, in one of these vehicles, which are contrived for secrecy.
Among the Nairs, on the coast of Malabar, the institution of marriage
has never been strictly or completely introduced. Polyandrism is
practised. A woman receives four or five brothers as her husbands, and
a slipper left at the door is a signal that she is engaged with one
of them. The mother is thus the only parent known, and the children
inherit the property of the family in equal divisions. In some cases
the Nairs marry a particular woman, who never leaves her mother’s home,
but has intercourse with any men she pleases, subject to the sacred law
of caste. In the mountain community of Tibet the same custom prevails.
It is to be regretted that our information on this subject is not more
explicit and full.
The venereal disease is known in most parts of Hindustan. Some, with
little reason, suppose it was carried there after the discovery of
America. Had it been so, its introduction would probably have been
noticed in history or by some tradition. It is not, indeed, called by
any Sanscrit word, but is known by a Persian name[73].
OF PROSTITUTION IN CEYLON.
In Ceylon the influence of Christianity, accompanied by the moral law
of England, is working a reform in the manners of large classes among
the people. Under the original institutions of the Singhalese, they
never licensed public prostitution; and whatever effect the Buddhist
religion produced, it produced in the cause of virtue. The temples
were never made brothels; but the character of the people is naturally
sensual, and the capital vices of society widely prevail among them.
The Buddhist code, indeed, abounds with precepts inculcating not only
chastity, but rigid continence. Profligacy, however, among the men,
and want of chastity among the women, are general characteristics of
all classes, from the highest to the humblest caste. To this day the
disregard of virtue is a crying sin of the women, even of those who
profess Christianity. Murders often occur from the jealousy of husbands
or lovers detecting their wives or mistresses with a paramour.
In Ceylon, as in continental India, the division of castes is by the
ancient and sacred law absolute, though custom sometimes infringes the
enactments of the holy code. Marriage from a higher into a lower caste
is peremptorily forbidden; though occasionally it is tolerated, but
never approved, between a man of honourable and a woman of inferior
rank. If a female of noble blood engage in a criminal intrigue with
a plebeian, his life has on many occasions been sacrificed to wash
out the stain, and formerly hers was also required to obliterate the
disgrace. A recent and striking instance of this kind came to the
knowledge of Mr. Charles Sirr. The daughter of a high-caste Kandian,
enjoying the liberty which in Ceylon is allowed to women of all
grades, became attached to a young man of lower caste, and entreated
her parents’ consent to the match, begging them to excuse her for her
affection’s sake, and declaring she could not live unless permitted
to fulfil the design on which her heart was set. They refused, and,
though the petition was again and again renewed, remained obdurate in
their denial. The girl was some time after found to have sacrificed her
honour to the man whom she loved, but dared not wed. He was all the
while willing and desirous to marry her, and would have married her
then, but her parents were inexorable. To preserve the honour of the
family, the father slew his daughter with his own hand. The English
authorities at once arrested the murderer, brought him to trial, and
condemned him to death. He resolutely asserted his right to do as he
pleased with the girl, protesting against any judicial interference
of the English with his family arrangements. He was, nevertheless,
executed, as a warning; and several of these examples have had a
most salutary influence in restraining the passions of the natives
in various parts of the island. It was undoubtedly the man’s sense
of honour that impelled him to murder his daughter; and she was thus
the victim of caste prejudices, which in Ceylon are so rigid that a
man could not force his slave to marry into a rank below him, whether
free-born or otherwise.
In Ceylon, as in most other parts of Asia, marriages are contracted
at a very early age. A man, by the law, “attains his majority” when
sixteen years old, and thenceforward is released from paternal
control; all engagements, however, which he may form previous to that
time, without the consent of his friends in authority, are null and
void. A girl, as soon as she is marriageable according to nature,
is marriageable according to law; and her parents, or, if she be an
orphan, her nearest kindred, give a feast--grand or humble, according
to their means--when she is introduced to a number of unmarried male
friends. If she be handsome or rich, a crowd of suitors is sure to be
attracted. Free as women are in Ceylon after their marriage, they are
rarely consulted beforehand on the choice of a partner. That is settled
for the girl. To this custom much of the immorality prevalent in the
island, as well as in all parts of the East, may without a doubt be
ascribed. Where the sexes are not free to form what lawful unions they
please, it may be taken as an axiom that they will have recourse to
irregular intrigues.
When the feast is given at which a young girl is introduced as
marriageable--a custom very similar in form and _object_ to that which
obtains in our own country--numerous young unmarried men of the same
caste are invited to the house. In a short time after, a relative or
friend of any young man who may desire to take the maiden as his wife,
calls upon her family, and insinuates that a rumour of the intended
union is flying abroad. If this be denied, quietly or otherwise, the
match-maker loses no time in withdrawing; but if it is answered in a
jocular bantering strain, he takes his leave, with many compliments, to
announce his reception to the father of the bridegroom. This personage,
after a day or two, makes _his_ call, inquires into the amount of the
marriage dowry, and carries the negotiation a few steps further. Mutual
visits are exchanged, and all arrangements made, with great precision.
The mother of the young man, with several other matrons, take the girl
into an inner room, where she is stripped, and her person examined, to
see that it is free from any corporal defect, from ulcers, and from
any cutaneous disease. Should this investigation prove satisfactory,
numerous formalities succeed, and an auspicious day is fixed upon for
the wedding. This takes place with much ceremony, the stars being in
all things consulted. Should the bridegroom’s horoscope refuse to
agree with that of the bride, his younger brother may wed her for him
by a species of proxy. The whole is a tedious succession of formal
observances, not so much the ordinance of religion as the details of
an ancient ritual etiquette. This is the Buddhaical custom; but it is
immensely expensive, and cannot be followed by the very poor classes.
It is also forbidden to people of extremely low caste, even though
they should be wealthy enough to afford, or sufficiently improvident
to risk it. Among the humble and indigent the marriage is confirmed by
the mutual consent of the parents and the young couple passing a night
together.
One of the most remarkable features in the social aspect of Ceylon is
the institution of polyandrism, which among the Kandians is permitted
and practised to a great extent. A Kandian matron of high caste is
sometimes the wife of eight brothers. The custom is justified upon
various grounds. Sirr expressed to a Kandian chief of no mean rank
his abhorrence of this revolting practice. The man was surprised at
these sentiments, and replied that on the contrary it was an excellent
custom. Among the rich it prevented litigation; it saved property from
minute subdivision; it concentrated family influence. Among the poor it
was absolutely necessary, for several brothers could not each maintain
a separate wife, or bear the expense of a whole family, which jointly
they could easily do. The offspring of these strange unions call all
the brothers alike their fathers, though preference is given to the
eldest, and are equal heirs to the family property; should litigation,
however, arise concerning the inheritance, they often all claim the
senior brother as a parent, and the Kandian laws recognise this claim.
Although, when a plurality of husbands is adopted, they are usually
brothers, a man may, with the woman’s consent, bring home another, who
enjoys all the marital rights, and is called an associated husband.
In fact, the first may, subject to his wife’s pleasure, bring home as
many strangers as he pleases, and the children inherit their property
equally. It is rare, however, to meet one of these associated husbands
among the Kandians of higher and purer caste, though two or more
brothers continually marry the same woman. This revolting custom is
now confined to the province of Kandy, though some writers assert
that it was formerly prevalent throughout the maritime districts.
In these, however, monogamy is at present practised, except by the
Mohammedans, who are polygamists. Statements to the contrary have been
laid before us; but Sirr positively asserts that he never saw a Kandian
or Singhalese who had acknowledged himself to have more than a single
wife. The Muslims, though long settled in the island, preserve their
peculiar characteristics, their religion, habits, and manners, which
they have not communicated to the rest of the population.
There are two kinds of marriage in Kandy, the one called “Bema,” the
other “Deega.” In the first of these the husband goes to live at his
wife’s residence, and the woman shares with her brothers the family
inheritance. He, however, who is married after this fashion, enjoys
little respect from his bride’s relations; and if he gives offence to
her father, or the head of the household, may be at once ejected from
the abode. In reference to this precarious and doubtful lodgement there
is an ancient proverb still popular in Kandy. It says that a man wedded
according to the Bema process should only take to his bride’s dwelling
four articles of property--a pair of sandals to protect his feet, a
palm-leaf to shield his head from the fiery rays of the sun, a walking
staff to support him if he be sick, and a lantern to illuminate his
path should he chance to be ejected during darkness. He may thus be
prepared to depart at any hour of the day or night.
Deega, the other kind of marriage, is that in which the wife passes
from underneath the parental roof to dwell in her husband’s own house.
In this case she relinquishes all claim to a share in her family
inheritance, but acquires a contingent right to some of her husband’s
property. The man’s authority is, under this form of contract, far
greater than under that of Bema. He cannot be divorced without his own
consent, while, in the other case, separation, as we have seen, is a
summary process, entirely depending on the caprice of the woman or her
family. In a country where the female population is considerably less
numerous than the male, and where women generally enjoy much freedom,
a certain degree of indulgence will always be granted to the fickle
quality in their character. In Ceylon this liberty in the one sex
involves a certain kind of slavery in the other. Women frequently seek
for divorces upon the most frivolous and trifling pretexts, and as
these are too easily attainable by the simple return of the marriage
gifts, they continually occur. Should a child be born within nine
months from the day of the final separation, the husband is bound to
maintain it for the first three years of its life, after which it is
considered sufficiently old to be taken from its mother. If, however,
while under the marriage pledge, the woman defiles herself by adultery,
the husband, if with his own eyes he was the witness of her infidelity,
might with his own hands, under the native law, take away the life of
her paramour. Notwithstanding this terrible privilege, it is asserted
with consistency by many authorities that, in all parts of Ceylon,
from the highest to the lowest caste, the want of conjugal faith in
the married, and chastity in the unmarried people, is frightful to
consider. When a man puts away his wife for adulterous intrigue, he may
disinherit her and the whole of her offspring, notwithstanding that
he may feel and acknowledge them all to be his own children. When,
however, he seeks a divorce from caprice, he renounces all claim to
his wife’s inheritance or actual property, and must divide with her
whatever may have been jointly accumulated during the period of their
cohabitation. The men of Ceylon do not always, however, exercise their
privileges. They are generally very indulgent husbands. Many of them,
indeed, are uxorious to an offensive extreme, and forgive offences
which, by most persons, are held unpardonable. A short time since a
Kandian applied to the British judicial authorities to compel the
return to him and his children of an unfaithful wife, who had deserted
her home for that of a paramour. The husband pleaded his love for her,
implored her for her children’s sake to come back, and promised to
forgive her offence; but she turned away from him, and coolly asked the
judge if he could force her to return. He answered that unfortunately
he could not, but advised her to return to the home of her lawful
partner, who was ready to forgive and embrace her. She disregarded
equally the entreaties of the one and the exhortation of the other,
and returned to her paramour, whom she shortly afterwards deserted for
another.
The numerous instances of this kind which happen in the island have
encouraged a swarm of satirical effusions upon the faithlessness of the
female sex; but if the women were also poets, they might echo every
note of the song. In illustration of the estimate formed of them, we
may quote a few lines translated from the original by Sirr. They apply
to the fraudulent disposition of women, and have become proverbial
among the people.
“I’ve seen the adumbra tree in flower, white plumage on the crow,
And fishes’ footsteps on the deep have traced through ebb and flow.
If man it is who thus asserts, his words you may believe;
But all that woman says distrust--she speaks but to deceive.”
The adumbra is a species of fig-tree, and the natives assert that no
mortal has ever seen its bloom.
Under the native kings the Singhalese were forbidden to contract
marriage with any one of nearer affinity than the second cousin; such
an union was incestuous, and severely punished. Under the English
government, however, many of these old restrictions have been modified.
Among the Christian population, on the other hand--Catholic as well
as Protestant--many traces of their old idolatry are still distinctly
visible in the ceremony of marriage.
The Buddhist law allows to every man, whatever his grade, only one
wife; but the ancient Kandian princes, of course, broke this law and
took as many wives or concubines as they pleased.
We have alluded to the numerical difference between the sexes. The
population of Ceylon is about 1,500,000, and the males exceed the
females by nearly a tenth. In 1814 it was 476,000; there were 20,000
more males than females. In 1835 there was a population of 646,000
males, and 584,000 females. At both these periods the disparity
was greatest in the poorest places. In the fishing villages, where
wholesome food abounded, there were more females than males. The same
circumstance is true at the present day. Some writers attribute this
to a gracious provision of Nature, which checks the increase of the
people; but Nature makes no provision against unnatural things, and
starvation is a monstrous thing in a fertile country. We may with more
safety assign as a cause the open or secret infanticide, which, under
the old laws, was common. Female children, except the first born, born
under a malignant star, were sure to be sacrificed. It was hardly
considered an offence; but being, under the British rule, denounced as
murder, has been gradually abolished. The easier means of life, which
in Ceylon and throughout the rest of our Asiatic dominions are afforded
to the people under English sway, take away the incentive of poverty to
crime. The population has enormously increased, an unfailing sign of
good government, if misery does not increase with it.
The social position of the Singhalese women is not so degraded as in
many other parts of the East; the poor labouring hard, but as partners
rather than as slaves. This superior condition does not, unhappily,
elevate their moral character, for it is unaccompanied by other
essential circumstances. Profligacy, we have said, is widely prevalent
in Ceylon; yet prostitution, at least of the avowed and public kind,
is not so. Under the Kandian dynasty it was peremptorily forbidden;
a common harlot had her hair and ears cut off and was whipped naked.
If, however, we accept the general definition of the word prostitution
as any obscene traffic in a woman’s person, we shall find much of it
clandestinely practised. The women are skilful in procuring abortion,
and thus rid themselves of the consequences which follow their
intrigues. Of course, in the sea-port towns prostitution exists, but we
have no account of it. It is fair, however, to notice the opinions of
Sir Emerson Tennent, that the morals of the people in these and in all
other parts of the islands are rapidly improving, and that marriage is
_becoming_ a more sacred tie[74].
OF PROSTITUTION IN CHINA.
In the immense empire of China, the civilization of which has been cast
in a mould fashioned by despotism, a general uniformity of manners is
prevalent. Singular as many of its customs are, they vary very little
in the different provinces, for although the population be composed of
a mixture of races, the iron discipline of the government forces all
to bend to one universal fashion. The differences which are remarked
between the practice of the people in one district, and those of
another, spring only from the nature of circumstances. It is more easy,
therefore, to take an outline view of this vast empire, than it is to
sketch many smaller countries, where the uniformity of manners is not
so absolute.
China affords a wide and interesting field for our inquiry. Were our
information complete, there is perhaps no state in the world with
reference to which so curious an account might be written as China,
with its prostitution system. Unfortunately, however, the negligence
or prudery of travellers has allowed the subject to be passed over. We
know that a remarkable system of this kind does exist, that prostitutes
abound in the cities of the Celestial Empire, and that they form a
distinct order; we know something of the classes from which they are
taken, how they are procured, in what their education consists, where
and in what manner they live, and how and by whom they are encouraged.
But this information is to be derived, not from any full account by an
intelligent and observing inquirer, but from isolated facts scattered
through a hundred books which require to be connected, and then only
form a rough and incomplete view of the subject. Statistics we have
positively none, though ample opportunities must be afforded travellers
for arriving at something near the truth in such cities as Canton.
However, from what knowledge we possess it is evident the social
economy of the Chinese with respect to prostitution presents clear
points of analogy with our own.
In conformity with the plan of this inquiry, we proceed first to
ascertain the general condition of the female sex in China. Abundant
information has been supplied us on this subject, as well by the
written laws, and by the literature of the country, as by the
travellers who have visited and described it.
As in all Asiatic, indeed in all barbarous, countries, women in China
are counted inferior to men. The high example of Confucius taught
the people--though their own character inclined them before, and was
reflected from him--that the female sex was created for the convenience
of the male. The great philosopher spoke of women and slaves as
belonging to the same class, and complained that they were equally
difficult to govern. That ten daughters are not equal in value to one
son is a proverb which strongly expresses the Chinese sentiment upon
this point, and the whole of their manners is pervaded by the same
spirit. Feminine virtue, indeed, is severely guarded by the law, but
not for its own sake. The well-being of the state, and the interest of
the male sex, are sought to be protected by the rigorous enactments on
the subject of chastity; but the morality, like the charity of that
nation, is contained principally in its codes, essays, and poems, for
in practice they are among the most demoralised on the earth.
The spirit of the Salic law might naturally be looked for in the
political code of such a state. It is so. The throne can be occupied
only by a man. An illegitimate son is held in more respect than a
legitimate daughter. The constitution provides that if the principal
wife fail to bear male children, the son of the next shall succeed,
and if she be barren also, of the next, and so on, according to their
seniority, the son of each has a contingent claim to the sovereignty.
Thus in the most important department of their public economy the
national sentiment is manifested. We may now examine the laws which
regulate the intercourse of the sexes, and then inquire into the actual
state of manners. It will be useful to remember the truth, which has
already been stated, that no language is so full of moral axioms
and honourable sentiments as the Chinese, while no nation is more
flagitious in its practice.
The government of China, styled paternal because it rules with the rod,
regulates the minutest actions of a man’s career. He is governed in
everything--in the temple, in the street, at his own table, in all the
relations of life. The law of marriage, for instance, is full, rigid,
and explicit. The young persons about to be wedded know little or
nothing of the transaction.
Parental authority is supreme, and alliances are contracted in which
the man and wife do not see each others’ faces until they occupy the
same habitation and are mutually pledged for life. Match-making in
China is a profession followed by old women, who earn what we may
term a commission upon the sales they effect. When a union between
two families is intended, its particulars must be fully explained on
either side, so that no deceit shall be practised. The engagement is
then drawn and the amount of presents determined, for in all countries
where women hold this position, marriage is more or less a mercantile
transaction. When once the contract is made, it is irrevocable. If the
friends of the girl repent and desire to break the match, the man among
them who had authority to give her away is liable to receive fifty
strokes of the bamboo, and the marriage must proceed. Whatever other
engagements have been entered into are null and punishable, and the
original bridegroom has in all cases a decisive claim. If he, on the
other hand, or the friend who represents and controls him, desire to
dissolve the compact, giving a marriage present to another woman, he is
chastised with fifty blows, and compelled to fulfil the terms of his
first engagement, while his second favourite is at liberty to marry as
she pleases. If either of the parties is incontinent after the ceremony
of betrothal, the crime is considered as adultery, and so punished.
But if any deceit be practised, and either family represent the person
about to marry under a false description, they become liable to severe
penalties, and on the part of the man most strictly.
The husband, finding that a girl had been palmed off on him by fraud,
is permitted to release himself from the tie. Such incidents,
nevertheless, do occasionally occur. One of rather an amusing nature
is alluded to by several writers. A young man who had been promised in
marriage the youngest daughter of a large family was startled when,
after the ceremony was complete, he unveiled his bride, to find the
eldest sister, very ugly and deeply pitted with the small pox. The law
would have allowed him to escape from such an union, but he submitted,
and soon afterwards consoled himself with a handsome concubine.
Although the girl, when once betrothed, is absolutely bound to the
husband selected for her, he dare not, under pain of the bastinado,
force her away before the specified time. On the other hand, her
friends must not, under similar penalties, detain her after that time.
Thus the law regulates the whole transaction, and the parents dispose
as they will of their children. Occasionally, however, a young man,
not yet emancipated from paternal authority, contracts a marriage
according to his own inclination, and if the rites have actually been
performed, it cannot be dissolved; but if he be only betrothed, and his
parents have in the meanwhile agreed upon an alliance for him, he must
relinquish his own design and obey their choice.
Polygamy is allowed in China, but under certain regulations. The first
wife is usually chosen from a family equal in rank and riches to that
of the husband, and is affianced with as much splendour and ceremony
as the parties can afford. She acquires all the rights which belong
to the chief wife in any Asiatic country. The man may then take as
many as he pleases, who are inferior in rank to the first, but equal
to each other. The term inferior wife is more applicable than that of
concubine, as there is a form of espousal, and their children have a
contingent claim to the inheritance. The practice, however, brings no
honour, if it brings no positive shame, though now sanctioned by long
habit. Originally it appears to have been condemned by the stricter
moralists, and it has been observed that the Chinese term to describe
this kind of companion is, curiously enough, compounded of the words
_crime_ and _woman_. It is a derogatory position, and such as only the
poor and humble will consent to occupy. One of the national sayings,
and the feeling with many of the women, is, that it is more honourable
to be a poor man’s wife than the concubine of an emperor. A man cannot,
under the penalty of a hundred blows, degrade his first wife to this
position, or raise an inferior wife to hers--no such act is valid
before the law.
None but the rich can afford, and none but the loose and luxurious will
practise, polygamy except when the first wife fails to bear a son.
Unless some such reason exists, the opinion of moralists is against it.
Men with too many wives lose the Emperor’s confidence, since he accuses
them of being absorbed in domestic concerns. In this case it is usual
to take an inferior wife, who is purchased from the lower ranks for
a sum of money, that an heir may be born to the house. The situation
of these poor creatures is aggravated or softened according to the
disposition of their chief, for they are virtually her servants, and
are not allowed even to eat in her presence. They receive no elevation
by her decease, but are for ever the mere slaves of their master’s
lust. At the same time their inferior position, and therefore inferior
consequence, gains them some agreeable privileges. The principal wife
is not allowed to indulge in conversation or any free intercourse
with strangers--a pleasure which is sometimes enjoyed with little
restraint by the others, as well as by the female domestics. Not much
jealousy appears to be entertained by these women, who are easily to be
procured. Their sons receive half as much patrimony as the sons of the
mistress of the household.
The social laws of China inculcate the good treatment of wives; but
the main solicitude of the legislator has been with respect to the
fixity of the law, and the rights of the male or supreme sex. Leaving
her parents’ home, the girl is transferred into bondage. Some men,
however, go to the house of their bride’s father, which is contrary to
the established form; but when once received across the threshold as a
son-in-law, he cannot be ejected, and leaves only when he is inclined.
A man may not marry within a certain period of his chief wife’s
death; but if he takes a woman who has already been his concubine,
the punishment is two degrees milder. So also with widows, who cannot
be forced by their friends to make any new engagement at all, but are
protected by the law. Women left in this position have a powerful
dissuasive against a fresh union, in the entire independence which they
enjoy, and which they could enjoy under no other circumstances.
With respect to the laws relating to consanguinity, the Chinese system
is particularly rigid. The prohibited limits lie very widely apart.
In this a change appears to have been effected under the Mantchus,
for among the traces of ancient manners which become visible at a
remoter period, revealed only, however, by the twilight of tradition, a
profligate state of public morals is indicated. We find parents giving
both their daughters in marriage to one man, while the intercourse of
the sexes was all but entirely unrestrained. The strictness of the
modern law is attended with some inconvenient results, for in China
the number of family names is very small, while it enacted that all
marriages between persons of the same family names are not only null
and void, but punishable by blows and a fine. All such contracts
between individuals previously related by marriage within four degrees,
are denounced as incestuous. A man may not marry his father’s or his
mother’s sister-in-law, his father’s or mother’s aunt’s daughter, his
son-in-law’s or daughter-in-law’s sister, his grandson’s wife’s sister,
his mother’s brother’s or sister’s daughter, or any blood relations
whatever, to any degree, however remote. Such offences are punished
with the bamboo. Death by strangling is enacted against one who marries
a brother’s widow, while with a grandfather’s or father’s wife it
is more particularly infamous, and the criminal suffers the extreme
disgrace of decapitation.
These regulations apply to the first wife, similar offences with regard
to the inferior being visited with penalties two degrees less severe.
Not only, however, are the degrees of consanguinity strictly defined,
but the union of classes is under restriction. An officer of government
within the third order marrying into a family under his jurisdiction,
or in which legal proceedings are under his investigation, is subject
to heavy punishment. The family of the girl, if they voluntarily aid
him, incur the chastisement also; but if they have submitted under fear
of his authority, they are exempt. To marry an absconded female, flying
from justice, is prohibited. To take forcibly as a wife a freeman’s
daughter, subjects the offender to death by strangulation. An officer
of government, or the son of any high functionary with hereditary
honours, who takes as his first or inferior wife a female comedian or
musician, or any member of a disreputable class, is punished by sixty
strokes of the bamboo. An equal punishment is inflicted on any priest
who marries at all; and, in addition to this, he is expelled his order.
If he delude a woman under false pretences, he incurs the penalty of
the worst incest. Slaves and free persons are forbidden to intermarry.
Any person, conniving at, or neglecting to denounce, such illegal
contracts, are criminals before the law.
The union after the betrothal must be completed; but it may also
be broken. Seven causes, according to the law, justify a man in
repudiating his first wife. These are--barrenness, lasciviousness,
disregard of her husband’s parents, talkativeness, thievish
propensities, an envious suspicious temper, and inveterate infirmity.
If, however, any of the three legal reasons against divorce can be
proved by the woman, she cannot be put away--first, that she has
mourned three years for her husband’s family; second, that the family
has become rich after having been poor before and at the time of
marriage; third, her having no father or mother living to receive her.
She is thus protected, in some measure, from her husband’s caprice.
If she commit adultery, however, he dare not retain, but must dismiss
her. If she abscond against his will, she may be severely flogged; if
she commit bigamy, she is strangled. When a man leaves his home, his
wife must remain in it three years before she can sue for a divorce,
and then give notice of her intention before a public tribunal. It is
forbidden, under peremptory enactments, to harbour a fugitive wife or
female servant.
A man finding his wife in the act of adultery may kill her with her
paramour, provided he does it immediately, but only on that condition.
If the guilty wife adds to her crime by intriguing against her
husband’s life, she dies by a slow and painful execution. If even the
adulterer slay her husband without her knowledge, she is strangled. The
privilege of putting a wife to death is not allowed for any inferior
offence. To strike a husband, is punishable by a hundred blows and
divorce; to disable him, with strangulation. In all these circumstances
the inferior wife is punished one degree more severely. Thus offences
against them are less harshly, and offences by them more rigidly,
chastised. In addition to these legal visitations the bamboo is at hand
to preserve discipline among the women.
One of the laws of China exhibits a peculiar feature of depravity in
the people. It is enacted, that whoever lends his wife or daughter
upon hire is to be severely punished, and any one falsely bargaining
away his wife or his sister is to be similarly dealt with. All
persons consenting to the transaction share the penalty. Nor is this
an obsolete enactment against an unknown crime. Instances do not
unfrequently occur of poor men selling their wives as concubines to
their wealthier neighbours. Others prostitute them for gain; but these
instances of profligacy usually occur in the large and crowded cities.
Sometimes the woman consents, but sometimes also opposes the infamous
design.
In 1832 a woman was condemned to strangulation for killing her husband
by accident, while resisting an adulterer whom he had introduced for
her to prostitute herself to him. These incidents occur only in the
lowest class. Some men are as jealous as Turks, and maintain eunuchs to
guard their wives.
Under this system many restrictions are imposed on the women of
China. They form no part of what is called society, enjoying little
companionship, even with persons of their own sex. Those of the better
class are instructed in embroidering and other graceful but useless
accomplishments. They are seldom educated to any extent, though some
instances have occurred of learned women and elegant poetesses, who
have been praised and admired throughout the country. Fond of gay
clothes, of gaudy furniture, and brilliant decoration, they love
nothing so much as display; and though assuming a demure and timid air,
cannot be highly praised on this account, for their bashfulness is, in
such cases, more apparent than real. Still they are generally described
as faithful partners. Religious services are performed for them in
the temple, to which women are admitted. The wives of the poorer sort
labour in the fields, and perform all the drudgery of the house, an
occupation which is held as suited to their nature. “Let my daughter
sweep your house” is the expression made use of in offering a wife. It
should be mentioned, however, to relieve the darkness of this picture,
that husbands often present offerings at the temples, with prayers to
the gods for the recovery of their sick wives. The idea may indeed
suggest itself, that this is with a view to economy, as girls are
costly purchases; but no man is the greater philosopher for asserting
that a whole nation exists without the commonest sentiments of human
nature. Indeed, many instances occur even in China of husbands and
wives living as dear friends together, especially when polygamy has not
been adopted in the dwelling. The obedience to old habits is not to be
confounded with characteristic harshness in the individual; nor does it
seem impossible, when we examine the variety of manners in the world,
to believe in a strong and tender attachment between a man and the
woman whom, in adherence to ancient usage, he would not allow to eat
at the same table with himself. A privilege belongs to the female sex
here which it enjoys in no other barbarian country. A strong authority
is recognised in the widow over her son. She is acknowledged to have
the right to be supported by him, and it is a proverbial saying, that
“a woman is thrice dependent--before marriage on her father, after
marriage on her husband, when a widow on her son.”
From this view of the condition of women, and the regulations of
marriage, we proceed to an important part of the subject--the
infanticide for which China has been so infamously celebrated. It is
impossible to conceive a more contradictory confusion of statements,
than we have seen put forward with reference to this question. Weighing
the various authorities, however, we are inclined to adopt a moderate
view, rejecting the extravagant pictures of one, and the broad denials
of the other set of writers. Infanticide, it cannot be disputed, is
practised in the country, and to a considerable extent; but it is, and
always will be impossible, to acquire the exact statistics, or even an
approximation to the precise truth.
Two causes appear to have operated in encouraging this practice--the
poverty of the lower classes, and the severity of the law with respect
to the illicit intercourse of the sexes. The former is the principal
cause. There is a strong maternal feeling in the woman’s breast, and
children are only destroyed when the indigence of the parents allows
no hope of rearing them well. It is invariably the female child which
is, under these circumstances, slain; for the son can always, after
a few years, earn his livelihood, and be an assistance, instead of
a burden, to the family. The birth of a female child is regarded as
a calamity, and brings mourning into the house. One of the national
proverbs expresses this fact in a striking manner, exhibiting also the
inferior estimation in which that sex is viewed. It says, that to a
female infant a common tile may be given as a toy, while to a male a
gem should be presented.
When it is determined to destroy the offspring thus born under the
roof of poverty, a choice of method is open. It may be drowned in warm
water; its throat may be pinched; it may be stifled by a wet cloth
tied over its mouth; it may be choked by grains of rice. Another plan
is to carry the child, immediately after its birth, and bury it alive.
Captain Collins, of the _Plover_ sloop-of-war, relates that some of
his company, while visiting the coast of China, saw a boat full of
men and women, with four infants. They landed and dug two pits, in
which they were about to inter their living but feeble victims, when
they were disturbed. They then made off rapidly, and passed round a
headland, beyond which they, no doubt, accomplished their purpose
without interruption. When the missionary Smith was in the suburbs of
Canton, in 1844, he was presented by a native with a work written by
a mandarin, and published gratuitously at the expense of government,
to discourage the practice of infanticide. When questioned upon the
actual prevalence of the custom, the native said that, taking a circle
with a radius of ten miles from the spot they then occupied, the number
of infanticides within the space thus included would not exceed five
hundred in a year. It was confined to the very poor, and originated in
the difficulty of rearing and providing for their female offspring.
The rich never encouraged, and the poor were ashamed, of the practice.
He knew men who had drowned their daughters, but would not confess the
act, speaking of their children as though they had died of disease.
In Fokien province, on the contrary, infanticides were numerous. At
a place called Kea-King-Chow, about five days’ journey from Canton,
there were computed to be 500 or 600 cases in a month. The comparative
immunity of Canton from the contagion of this crime was the government
foundling-hospital established there. About 500 female children,
born of parents in poverty and want, were annually received, to have
temporary provision and sustenance. From time to time, the more wealthy
merchants and gentry visit the institution to select some of the
children, whom they take home to educate as concubines or servants. The
hospital has accommodation for at least 1000 infants, each of which
is usually removed after three months, either to the house of some
voluntary guardian, or to wet nurses in other districts. This is the
only important institution of the kind in the province. Infanticide
is still, even by the most favourable accounts, lamentably prevalent.
The foundling-hospitals, of which there is one in every great town, do
certainly oppose a check to the practice. That at Shanghae receives
annually about 200 infants.
The villagers in the neighbourhood of Amoy confessed that female
infanticide was generally practised among them, and their statements
were expressed in a manner which left no doubt that they considered it
an innocent and proper expedient for lightening the evils of poverty.
Two out of every four, they said, were destroyed; but rich people,
who could afford to bring them up never resorted to, because they
never needed, such a means of relief. Some killed three, four, or even
five out of six; it depended entirely on the circumstances of the
individual. The object was effected immediately after the infant’s
birth. If sons, however, were born in alternate succession, it was
regarded as an omen of happy fortune for the parents, and the daughters
were spared. None of the villagers denied to any of their questioners
the generality of the custom, but few would confess personally to the
actual fact. In some districts one-half was reported as the average
destruction of the female population, and in the cities some declared
the crime was equally prevalent, though we may take this as the
exaggeration which always attends the loose statements of ignorant men,
who, having little idea of figures, are required to furnish a number,
and speak at random.
Infanticide, however, is not wholly confined to the poor. It is
occasionally resorted to by the rich to conceal their illicit amours.
In 1838 a proclamation against it was published, but the general
perpetration of the crime rendered its repression impossible, with such
machinery as the Emperor has at his command. Abeel calculated that
throughout a large district, the average was 39 per cent. of the female
children. It is evident, however, from all these facts, that under an
improved government, the crime might be altogether extinguished, not
by severe enactments or vigilant police, but by rendering infanticide
unnecessary in the eyes of the people.
The second cause which induces parents to destroy their children is
the stringency of the law against the illicit intercourse of unmarried
people; its provisions are equally characteristic and severe. To render
its enforcement easier, the separation of the sexes is rigidly insisted
upon. Not only are servants, but even brothers and sisters, prohibited
from mixing except under regulation. Intercourse by mutual consent is
punished with 70 blows, while with married people the penalty varies
from 80 to 100. Violation of a female, wedded or single, is punished
by strangulation. An assault, with intent to ravish, by 100 strokes of
the bamboo and perpetual banishment to a remote spot. Intercourse with
children under twelve years of age is treated as rape. Should a child
be born from one of these unlawful intrigues, its support devolves on
the father; but if the transaction be thus far concealed, this evidence
of it is usually sunk in the river, or flung out by the way-side.
An unmarried woman found pregnant is severely punished, whether her
accomplice can be discovered or not. The illicit intercourse of slaves
with their masters’ wives or daughters is punished with death; while
officers of government, civil and military, and the sons of those
who hold hereditary rank, if found indulging in criminal intrigues
with females under their jurisdiction, are subjected to unmerciful
castigation with the stick.
One grace is accorded to the weaker sex in China. No woman is committed
to prison, except in capital cases, or cases of adultery. In all others
they remain, if married, in the custody of their husbands; if single,
in that of their friends. No woman quick with child can be flogged,
tortured, or executed, until a hundred days after her delivery.
Women, however, of the poorer orders, whose friends do not care, or
are unable, to be responsible for them, are lodged under the care of
female wardens, and in reference to this we may instance a curious fact
illustrative of prison discipline in China. In 1805 one of the great
officers of government made a report to the Emperor, that three female
warders of the prison were in the habit of engaging with traders in an
illicit and disgraceful intercourse with female servants, and hiring
out the female prisoners, not yet sentenced or waiting for discharge,
to gain money for them by prostitution.
Sensual as the Chinese are, the punishable breach of the moral law--the
intercourse of unmarried persons--is checked by the system of early
marriages. Children are often betrothed in the cradle. Men seldom pass
the age of twenty, or girls that of fifteen, in celibacy. The Parsees,
however, of all ages, are notorious for their abandoned mode of life.
Prostitution, however, prevails to a prodigious extent. There is
throughout the country a regular traffic in females. “Seduction and
adultery,” says Williams, “are comparatively unfrequent; but brothels
and their inmates occur everywhere on land and water. One danger
attending young girls going alone is, that they will be stolen for
incarceration in these gates of hell.”
This is in allusion to a very extraordinary system prevalent in the
great cities of China. In 1832 it was calculated there were between
8000 and 10,000 prostitutes having abodes in and about Canton. Of these
the greater portion had been stolen while children, and compelled to
adopt that course of life. Dressed gaily, taught to affect happiness,
and trained in seductive manners, they were examples of their class in
Europe. Many young girls were carried away, forcibly violated, and then
consigned to a brothel.
Hundreds of kidnappers, chiefly women, swarmed in the city, gaining a
livelihood by the traffic in young girls and children. Nor was this
the only way in which such places were supplied. In times of general
scarcity or individual want, parents have been seen leading their own
daughters through the streets and offering them for sale. The selling
of children, says Cunynghame, one of the most recent visitors to
Canton, is an every-day occurrence, and is on the whole a check upon
infanticide. The little victims are seen constantly passing on their
way to the habitations of their purchasers gaily dressed out as though
for some great ceremony or happy festival. Of these, indeed, some are
disposed of as concubines, but many also are deliberately sold to be
brought up as prostitutes. It is looked upon as a simple mercantile
transaction, the children being transferred at once to the brothels,
whence they are hired out for the profit of their masters. Some of
those who are deserted or exposed to perish are reserved by the agents
for these places; but the principal supply is brought by kidnappers.
Proclamation after proclamation has been issued to complain of them,
but with little effect. The system appears rather on the increase than
otherwise.
The children thus purchased or picked up in the streets are educated
with care, taught to play on various kinds of instruments, to dance,
to sing, to perform in comedies or pantomimes, and to excel in many
graceful accomplishments, which render them agreeable. They are often
richly clothed, and adorned in such a way as to render them most
attractive to the _roués_ of Canton and Peking.
They do not often compress their feet, as it is a hindrance to their
movements, but may be seen in the streets occasionally--though not
often--with painted faces, looking boldly at the strangers who pass
along. Of the houses they frequent we have no particular description;
but they probably resemble much similar places of resort in civilized
countries. A peculiar feature of China, however, is displayed in the
floating brothels, which are the chief habitations of the prostitutes.
Licentious as the native of that empire is in the general turn of his
ideas, he makes a public display of his indulgence in those pleasures
which in Europe men affect, at least, to conceal from general view.
The floating brothels of the Pearl River are moored in conspicuous
situations, and distinguished from the other boats by the superior
style of their structure and decorations. The surface of the stream,
indeed, is studded with beautiful junks, which are the first objects
to attract the traveller’s eye as he approaches the provincial city of
Canton. Comparatively few of the women parade the streets, except when
they form part of a public procession, so that there is at least in the
heart of the town an appearance of morality.
[Illustration: CHINESE WOMAN (PROSTITUTE), ACCUSED OF DISORDERLY
CONDUCT BEFORE A JUDGE.
[_From_ ALEXANDER’S “_Illustrations of China_.”]]
Many of these brothel junks are called Flower Boats, and are resorted
to by numbers of the class. They form, indeed, whole streets in the
floating city on the Pearl River, which is one of the most remarkable
features of Canton. The prostitutes themselves, like all women of the
same sisterhood, lead a life of reckless extravagance--plunging while
they can into all the exciting pleasures which are offered by their
particular mode of life, careless of the future, and eagerly snatching
at anything which may release them from the change of dulness or time
for reflection. Diseases are very prevalent among them, and cause much
havoc among the men who frequent their boats or houses. They endeavour
to cure themselves by means of drugs and medicinal draughts, and by
this means concentrate the malady upon some secret vital part, whence
it shoots through the frame, but does not manifest itself until the
victim is all but destroyed. With the exception of an unusual paleness
and a heated appearance in the eyes, the prostitutes do not wear the
aspect of disease; but they, indeed, paint themselves inordinately to
mask the ravages of time or the maladies which afflict them.
The prostitutes of Canton are usually congregated in companies
or troops, each of which is under the government of a man who is
answerable for their conduct--if they rob, or disturb the peace, or
commit any gross offence against decency, or perpetrate any other
offence. National delicacy, however, has little to do with the
prohibitions which restrain them from entering certain parts of the
city, and forbid young men of rank and influence to hold intercourse
with them. The brothel junks, of lofty build, brightly painted, and
glittering with gaudy variegated flags, float in squadrons on the
water, are seen and known by all, and are resorted to by numbers of
the citizens. Persons pass to and from them without an attempt at
disguise or concealment. Rich men, on festive occasions, make up a
party of pleasure, embark in a gaily-decorated boat, send to one of
the prostitute junks, engage as many of the women as they please,
and spend the day in amusement with them. It is openly done, and no
disgrace attaches to it. The junks themselves are fitted up in the
interior--according to the class of prostitutes inhabiting them--with
all the appurtenances of luxury, and on board them is a perpetual gala.
It would be interesting to know how many of these boats are known to
float on the Pearl River, with the average number of prostitutes in
each.
But this is not the only, or the most offensive form which prostitution
assumes in China. An incident which occurred at Shensee a few years ago
illustrates another system, which is clandestine, though apparently
carried on to a considerable extent. A young widow resided there with
her mother-in-law, supporting herself and her companion by the wages
of prostitution. At length her occupation failed her; she was deserted
by her associates, and could procure no more rice or money by the
pursuit of her vicious calling. The elder woman, however, would not
hear of these excuses, ordered her daughter-in-law to obtain her usual
supplies from the man she had last cohabited with, and on her declaring
her inability, began to flog her. The prostitute defended herself,
and at last, taking up a sickle, struck her relative dead. She was
seized, tried, and condemned to be cut in pieces for the crime; but as
her mother-in-law had been guilty of an illegal act in forcing her to
prostitute herself, the sentence was changed to decapitation.
It is to be regretted that our sources of information on this
subject are not more copious. Travellers have had opportunities of
communicating more, but have refrained from doing so. We wait for a
separate and full account of prostitution in China[75].
OF PROSTITUTION IN JAPAN.
Among the innumerable islands scattered over the southern and eastern
oceans there are none more curious in their social aspects than Japan.
We find there a kind of native civilization, influenced indeed by
former intercourse with Europeans, but now complete within itself, and
isolated from all other systems in the world. The mountainous, rocky,
and arid country, has been fertilized from the centre to the sea by the
persevering industry of a hardy race; they found it poor, and they have
made it one of the richest agricultural regions in the globe. This fact
serves to illustrate the national character.
The Japanese, upon whose institutions much light has been thrown by the
learned and laborious researches of Mr. Thomas Rundall, of the Hakluyt
Society, may be described as a punctilious, haughty, vindictive, and
licentious people; but there is nothing vulgar in their composition.
Truth is held in reverence, hospitality is viewed as sacred, and the
bonds of friendship are regarded with extraordinary earnestness. St.
Francis Xavier, the apostle of the Indies, declared “the Japans” to be
the delight of his heart. There is, perhaps, more to admire than to
love in their character. They are certainly elevated far above many of
the nations who surround them, as well in the arts as in the amenities
of life. Virtue is a recognised principle, and this indicates a phase
of true civilization.
The character of the male is reflected by the female sex. Intelligent
and agreeable in their manners, affectionate in their family relations,
and faithful to their marriage vows, the women of Japan breathe all the
pride of virtue. The man who attempts the honour of a matron sometimes
encounters death in his adventure.
In illustration of this characteristic, Mr. Rundall relates an
interesting anecdote. A noble, going on a journey, left his wife at
home, and another man of rank made infamous proposals to her. Her scorn
and indignation only inflamed him to his purpose, which he effected in
spite of her denial. When her husband returned she received him with
much reserve, and when he asked why, bade him wait until the morrow,
when a grand feast was to be given. Among the guests was the noble
who had wronged her. They sat down on the terraced roof of the house,
and the festival began. After the repast the woman rose, declared the
injury she had suffered, and passionately entreated to be slain, as
a creature unfit to live. The guests, the husband foremost, besought
her to be calm; they strove to impress her with the idea that she had
done no wrong, that she was an innocent victim, though the author
of the outrage merited no less punishment than death. She thanked
them all kindly; she wept on her husband’s shoulder--she kissed him
affectionately--then, suddenly escaping from his embraces, rushed
precipitately to the edge of the terrace, and cast herself over the
parapet. In the confusion that ensued, the author of the mischief,
still unsuspected, for the hapless creature had not indicated the
offender, made his way down the stairs. When the rest of the party
arrived he was found weltering in his blood by the corse of his victim.
He had expiated his crime by committing suicide in the national manner,
by slashing himself across the abdomen with two slashes in the form of
a cross.
The condition of women in Japan varies with different classes. Those
of high rank have a separate suite of rooms assigned to them, beyond
which they are seldom seen. Among the middle and lower orders they
enjoy more liberty, though they are careful to seclude themselves, and
are distinguished in general by extraordinary reserve. Men pay them
a polite respect not common among semi-barbarians, as the Japanese
will continue to be until they are forced to acknowledge the duty of
intercourse with the rest of mankind.
The marriage laws of Japan are curious, and vary in different classes.
Among the wealthy they are occasions of extravagant parade and long
ceremonies, in which the minutest detail is regulated by a peremptory
law. A full description of all the marriage ceremonial would fill a
small volume. A man can only take one wife; he is united to her in the
temple. In addition, however, he may take as many concubines as he
chooses, who are not degraded by their position. He may separate from
a woman when he pleases; but one who is known to have done so must pay
a large sum for the daughter of any other person whom he may desire
to have. Marriages are seldom contracted before the age of fifteen.
The courtship and betrothal are conducted with much formality; but
sufficient opportunity is allowed to the youth of the two sexes to
become acquainted each with the other.
The Japanese are not so jealous as many other Asiatics: “Indeed,” says
Captain Golovnin, “they are not more so than, considering the frailty
of the sex, is reasonable.” Nevertheless, a man may put his wife to
death for whispering to a stranger; while adultery is always capitally
punished, sometimes by the hand of the injured husband.
In the northern parts, it is said, that in the beginning of the
seventeenth century a curious custom prevailed. When a woman was
convicted of infidelity, her head was shaved. Her paramour was exposed
to an equally disgraceful, but more whimsical penalty. The friends of
his victim, whenever they met him, might strip him naked, and deprive
him of his property. But the modesty with which youth are inspired from
the cradle tends much to protect female virtue. The intercourse of the
sexes, it will thus be seen, is regulated by very natural laws; the
condition of the sex is somewhat high. Its virtues are prized by the
men, and consequently are generally faithfully preserved.
We have said, however, that the men of Japan are licentious; since,
therefore, the wives and daughters of the respectable classes are
difficult to corrupt, a numerous sisterhood of prostitutes is
rendered necessary. Accordingly we find them from the earliest period
associating with every rank of men. In one of William Adams’s letters,
published under the editorship of Mr. Rundall, we find the king coming
on board our countryman’s vessel, bringing with him a number of female
comedians. These formed large companies, and travelled from place to
place, with a great store of apparel for the several parts they played.
They belonged to one man, who set a price upon their intercourse with
others, above which he dared not charge under pain of death. It was
left to his own discretion to set a value on a girl at first; but
afterwards he could not raise, though he might abate his charge. All
bargains were made with him, and the woman must go whither she was
directed. Men of the highest rank, when travelling through the islands,
and resting at houses of entertainment, sent, without shame, for
companies of these prostitutes; but the pander was never received by
them, however wealthy he might be; after death he was also consigned
to infamy. Bridled with a rope of straw, he was dragged in the clothes
he died in through the streets into the fields, and there cast upon a
dunghill for dogs and fowls to devour.
In Kœmpfer’s account of the city of Nangasaki we find a curious
description of the prostitute system. The part of the town inhabited
by these women was called “the bawdy-house quarter,” and consisted of
two streets, with the handsomest houses in Japan, situated on a rising
hill. At these places the poor people of the town sold their handsome
daughters while very young, that is, from ten to twenty years of age.
Every bawd kept as many as she was able in one house; some had seven,
others 30, who were commodiously lodged, taught to dance, sing, play
on musical instruments, and write letters. The elder ones taught the
younger, who in return waited on them; the most docile and accomplished
were most sumptuously treated. The price of these women was regulated
by law; and one wretched creature, having passed through all the
degrees of degradation, occupied a small room near the door, where she
acted as watch all night, and sold herself for a miserable coin. Others
were set to this task as a punishment for ill behaviour. The infamy of
this vile profession attached justly, not so much to the unhappy women
themselves, as to their parents who educated them to it. Many, as they
grew up, changed their mode of life, and were received again among the
reputable and chaste. Generally well educated and politely bred, they
often procured husbands, and passed from a life of daily prostitution
to one of unswerving fidelity. The pander and the tanner of leather
occupied the same position in society; which shows that the prejudice
of class, rather than the abhorrence of an infamous calling, ruled the
Japanese.
The historian classes the temples and brothels together, and not
without justice. Prostitution was greatly encouraged by the priests.
In their public spectacles, representing the adventures of gods and
goddesses, young prostitutes, richly attired, were engaged to act.
Their performances resembled those of the European ballet--dress,
gesture, and action expressing that which in a drama language would
represent.
Such was the prostitute system in the great cities; throughout the
country a similar system prevailed. The houses of entertainment
lining the main highways, with the tea-booths of the villages, were
frequented by innumerable girls. These usually spent the morning in
painting and dressing themselves, and about noon made their appearance
standing before the door of the house, or sitting on benches, whence,
with smiling face and coy address, they solicited the passengers. In
some places their chattering and laughter were heard above all other
sounds; two villages, called Akasaki and Goy, were celebrated on this
account, all the houses being brothels, each containing from three
to seven prostitutes. The Japanese seldom passed one of these “great
storehouses of whores” without holding intercourse with some of these
women. Kœmpfer asserts, in contradiction to Caras, who married a
native, that there was in his time scarcely one house of entertainment
in the islands which was not a brothel. When one inn had too many
customers, it borrowed some girls from a neighbour who had some to
spare. This profligate system is said, in the Japanese traditions,
to have taken its rise at a remote period, during the reign of a
certain martial emperor. That monarch, who was perpetually marching
his armies to and fro, feared lest his soldiers should become weary of
separation from their wives; he therefore licensed public and private
brothels, which multiplied to such an extent that Japan came to be
known as “the bawdy-house of China.” This was in allusion to a period
when prostitution was made in that empire an unlawful calling, and
suppressed by severe laws. The people, deprived of the resources they
had formerly enjoyed at home, made Japan the place of resort; so that
its prostitution system flourished far and wide.
These accounts appear extravagant, and doubtless are so in some degree;
all writers, however, coincide in describing the prostitution system
of Japan as very extensive and flagitious. The French historian,
Charleroix, repeats the statement of Kœmpfer. We have before us
extracts from the autograph “diary of occurrants” written by Captain
Richard Cock, who was chief of the English factory at Firando, from
the year 1613 to 1623. There are many passages corroborative of the
representations we have given. Of these some examples follow, which are
also interesting as illustrations of Japanese manners.
“A.D. 1616, Sept. 8th (at Edo).--We dyned or rather supped at a
merchant’s house called Neyem Dono, where he provided caboques, or
women players, who danced and sung; and when we returned home he sent
every of them to lie with them that would have them all night.
“October 24 (at Yuenda, between Edo and Firando.)--We went to bed, and
paid 3500 gins; and to the servants, 300 gins; and to the children, 200
gins, or about 200_l._ This extraordinary charge was for that we had
extraordinary good cheer, being brought hither by a merchant of Edo,
our friend, called Neyemon Edo, and every one a wench sent to him that
would have her. I gave one of them an ichebo, but would not have her
company.
“1617-18, January 27th (at Firando).--Skiezazon Dono set the masts of
his junk this day, and made a feast in Japan fashion. 29th. Skiezazon
Dono and his consorts had the feast of Baccus for their junk this day,
dancing through the streets with caboques or women players, and entered
into an English house in that order, most of their heads being heavier
than their heels, that they could not find their way home without
leading.
“March 29th (at Firando).--The kyng and the rest of the noblemen came
to dyner (at the English house), and, as they said, were entertained to
their own content, and had the dancing beares or caboques to fill their
wine; Nifon Catanges, with a blind fiddler to sing, ditto.
“July 11th.--There came a company of players, or caboques, with apes
and babons, sent from the tono, or king, to play at our house.
“December 6th (at Meaco).--Our host, Meaco’s brother-in-law, invited
us to dyner to a place of pleasure without the city, where the dancing
girls or caboques were with a great feast; and there came an antick
dance of satyrs or wild men of other Japons, until whom I gave 1000
gins (about 10_s._), and a bar of plate to the good man of the house,
value about 1_l._ 1_s._ 6_d._ So the dancing girls were sent home after
us.”
As not altogether inapplicable to the subject, the following passage,
which shows how the courtezans of Japan proceed towards such as would
cheat them, may be cited: “The caboques took Tane, an interpreter,
prisoner, for fifteen tares (about 3_l._ 15_s._) he owed them for
lichery, and, not having to pay, set his body for sale, no one having
the money for him.”
It would appear that in obtaining possession of a female of this class
by clandestine means tragical consequences may ensue; while, if done
fairly, considerable expense may be involved. Mr. Wickham, one of the
English factors stationed at Mesco, writing on the 15th of April, 1616,
to his chief, Captain Cock, gives an account of a soldier of high
reputation who ran away with a prostitute, and, fearing she would be
reclaimed, was seized with a fit of frenzy, during which he first cut
the throat of the girl, and afterwards ripped himself up. The writer
then communicates a piece of news:--“Micaonæcamo, the nobellman that
gave me my cattan or sword, hath carried away a caboque, and hath payed
her master 10,000 tares (2500_l._). I would I had the money, and it
makes no matter who hath the woman.” Replying to this communication,
Captain Cock quaintly observes on one point, “Yf some will be so
foolish as to cut their bellies for love (or rather lust) of whores,
the worst end of the staff will be their owne;” and on the other point
he agrees with his correspondent that he “had rather have the money
than the ware.”
Vice of a more brutal kind is systematically practised by many of the
Japanese nobility, as well as by the meanest orders; and houses are
kept for this purpose similar to those inhabited by prostitutes.
Some parents apprentice out their daughters for a term of years to this
abominable profession, and the girls then return to honourable life.
The houses they frequent continually resound with music. At Jeddo, a
later traveller was informed there was one brothel, or rather temple
of prostitution, where 600 women were maintained. Notwithstanding
this number, young men were nightly refused admittance, from the
over-crowded state of the rooms. Passing through the streets of the
brothel quarter Golovnin saw groups of girls standing about the doors;
some of them were in the bloom of youth, and so handsome that they
appeared fascinating even to the European eye.
Thus the system of professional prostitution flourishes more in Japan
than in any other part of insular Asia; yet the women of other classes
appear to hold a higher position, and to enjoy more respect from the
men. It is remarked, however, by all writers, that the profligacy of
the female sex is confined to those who are so by profession; but the
male is generally licentious throughout the empire.
OF PROSTITUTION IN THE ULTRA-GANGETIC NATIONS.
In this division we include what are commonly called the Hindu-Chinese
nations, or the inhabitants of that immense tract lying between
Hindustan and China. Geography makes several sections of them, and they
present, it is true, some variety in laws, customs, and degrees of
progress. But these are not more distinct than may be observed in every
large country, whether called by one name or many. The same physical
type is marked upon them all; and, speaking in general terms, their
manners are uniform.
In one respect they are all similar. The condition of women is
extremely low. A curious phenomenon is observable in relation to this
subject. The Buddhists of the ultra-Gangetic countries, uninfluenced
by the jealous spirit of the Hindu and Mohammedan codes, allow to the
female sex great liberty; yet assign it less respect than it enjoys
either in Hindustan or China, to both of which they are inferior in
civilization. The freedom thus conceded to women fails to elevate them.
They are held in contempt, they are taught to abase themselves in their
own minds, and they employ their licence in degrading themselves still
further. In few parts of the world is the effect of Asiatic despotism
more plainly visible than in the countries lying between Hindustan
and China. The peculiar system of government renders every one the
king’s serf. The men labour for the benefit of their master, having no
opportunity to profit themselves by their own industry. Their support,
therefore, naturally devolves on the women, who in Cochin China
especially, plough, sow, reap, fell wood, build, and perform all the
offices which civilization assigns to the abler sex.
The marriage contract is a mere bargain. A man buys his wife from
her parents. The first is usually the chief, but he may have as many
others as he chooses to purchase. A simple agreement before witnesses
seals the union. The band thus easily formed is as easily dissolved.
In Cochin China a pair of chopsticks or a porcupine quill is broken in
two before a third person, and the divorce is complete. When only one
desires a separation it is more difficult, but the law allows a man to
sell his inferior wives.
The unmarried women of this region are proverbially and almost
universally unchaste. They may prostitute themselves without incurring
infamy or losing the chance of marriage. A father may yield his
daughter to a visitor whom he desires specially to honour, or he may
hire her out for a period to a stranger who may reside for a short time
in his neighbourhood. The girl has no power to resist the consummation
of this transaction, though she cannot be married without her own
consent.
The wife, however, is considered sacred, but rather as the property
of her husband than for the sake of virtue. A man’s harem cannot be
invaded, even by the king himself. This, at least, is the theory of
the law; but absolutism never respects the high principles of a code
which opposes its desires. Adultery is punished in Siam with a fine,
in Cochin China with death. In Birmah, executions are very rare among
females. “The sword,” they say, “was not made for women.” In all parts
of the region, however, the bamboo is in requisition to discipline the
women; and husbands are sometimes seen to fling their wives down in
the open street, lay them on their faces, and flog them with a rattan.
It will thus be seen that, lying between two regions, in each of
which a form of civilization has been introduced, the ultra-Gangetic,
or Hindu-Chinese nations, differ from them both. Since no unmarried
woman is required to be chaste, professional prostitutes do not form
so large a class as might be expected. They do exist, however, and
in considerable numbers. In Siam a common prostitute is incapable of
giving evidence before a country justice, but this is by no means
on account of her immorality. It is from other prejudices. The same
disability attaches to braziers and blacksmiths[76].
OF PROSTITUTION IN EGYPT.
Egypt, as the seat of a civilization among the most ancient and
remarkable that have flourished on the earth, calls for particular
attention. The inquiries of the curious have in all ages been directed
as well to its people as to its monuments. It has, indeed, been
the subject of infinite investigation. Travellers innumerable have
explored its beautiful valley; year after year adds to their number and
countless reports have been made to us of the ruins, the antiquities,
the resources, the condition, the scenery, and the manners of Egypt.
In all, consequently, except statistics, our knowledge is very
considerable, though the inexhaustible interest of that celebrated
country still leaves an open field for the romantic traveller. The
dry hot climate is supposed to influence the character of the people.
A remarkable system of politics also modifies the national features,
so that we examine our subject, in reference to Egypt, with peculiar
curiosity.
The population of Egypt is various, being composed of the four
Mohammedan sects, of the Copts, the Greeks, the Armenians, Maronites,
and Levantines. The mass, however, is formed of Arabs, while the
general plan of manners has originated, in a great measure, from the
spirit of the prophets’ civil and religious code. Of the system with
respect to the female sex this is more especially true; but the history
of manners before Mohammed’s age is too incomplete for us to know
precisely how much was originated, and how much was adopted by him.
Had his scheme opposed itself wholly to the previous habits of the
East, it would never have been so universally or so readily accepted.
It is one characteristic of Asiatic countries that women exercise less
influence on manners than in Europe. The laws made by men would, in
fact, isolate them within a sphere of their own; but agencies which are
irresistible counteract this effort. The tendency of social legislation
is to shut them out from a share in the government of society; but the
tendency of nature is in the contrary direction.
The women of Egypt are naturally adapted for the position in which
they are placed--unless we suppose that long discipline has subdued
them to the level of their condition. They display every attraction
for Mohammedans, with few of the characteristics which fascinate an
European. In youth many of them are possessed of every charm--the
bosom richly developed, the whole form gracefully rounded, the face
full of bloom, and the eyes overflowing with brilliance; but all
these beauties speedily fade, and nowhere is old age so unsightly.
The figure approaches maturity at the ninth or tenth year, and at
fifteen or sixteen has reached the perfection of the Oriental ideal.
With rare exceptions they have passed the flower of their lives at
24, and in this short-lived loveliness we may find one cause of
polygamy and frequent divorce, among a people with whom women are
the mere unspiritual ministers to the senses of man. The Mohammedan
peoples even his heaven with feminine creations destined for his
animal gratification. When, therefore, we find religion itself thus
impregnated with a gross element, we can only expect to find the female
sex regarded in a degrading point of view. The opinion prevails with
some Muslims, that Paradise has no place reserved for women; but this
is by no means the universal idea among them.
Though by their tame spirits and submissive humility the women of Egypt
appear moulded to suit the system in which they move, their character
has not, on the whole, been entirely vitiated by the process. Modesty
and virtue are frequent ornaments of the harem, and distinguish the
sex throughout the valley. Even among the lower or labouring orders,
though the maidens may sometimes be seen bathing in the Nile, or
hurrying from hovel to hovel naked, and at all times with a light and
scanty garment, a demure and retiring demeanour is general. Chastity
is a very prevalent virtue, except in the cities, where a crowded
population is immersed in that profligacy surely bred by despotism.
With respect to their modesty, travellers appear to have been led
astray by their prejudices. Many of them appear to carry among the
necessaries for their journey an English measure of propriety, which
they invariably apply to all nations with which they come in contact.
Thus the remark is commonly made, that women in Egypt hide their faces
in obedience to habit, but care not what other part of the person they
expose. Consequently, it is inferred they are devoid of modesty. But
this by no means follows. Custom, which is one of the most powerful
among the laws which regulate society, has taught them that to display
the features is disgraceful, but has made no regulation for more than
that. Unless, therefore, we accept the doctrine of innate ideas--which
meets a refutation in every quarter of the globe--we must not cite the
women of Egypt before the tribunal of our own opinions, and condemn
them on that charge. On the contrary, we must confess that they are
naturally a virtuous race, though the influences of their government
are sufficiently injurious. Any, indeed, but an excellent people would
long ago have been irredeemably depraved.
There are, in Egypt, only two classes of females--those whose opulence
allows them to be wholly indolent, and whose life is entirely dreamed
away in the luxury of the harem; and those to whom poverty gives
freedom, with the obligation of labour. To see the wife of a bey, to
examine her tastes, her conduct, her private pleasures, and daily
occupations, you have the beau ideal of a voluptuous woman literally
cradled in one long childhood, with all the ease, the indulgence, and
the trifling of infancy. Enter the habitation of a fellah or artizan,
and the hardship of the man’s lot is exceeded by that of his wife.
She has to do all that he can do; but if he be personally kind, her
situation is morally superior to that of the petted toy nursed on the
cushions of the harem. The same weakness, however, is paramount over
both. The indolent lady satisfies herself with rich Eastern silks and
shawls, and gems of fine water; while the poor drudge of the field adds
to her toil, and stints herself in food, to purchase decorations for
her person.
The polygamy which is practised in Egypt has, more than in many other
countries, tended to the degradation of the female sex. It seems to
be encouraged in some degree by the rigid separation of the sexes
before marriage. A man takes with less scruple a wife whom he has never
seen when he knows that if she disappoint him he may take another.
The law allows four wives, with an unrestricted number of concubines.
The Prophet, his companions, and the most devout of his descendants,
so indulged themselves; but the idea is vulgar which supposes that
Mohammed introduced the practice. On the contrary, he found it
universal, and was the first to put a check upon it. Some of the higher
moralists contend, that as four wives are sufficient for one man, so
are four concubines; but few of the rich men who can afford to keep
more allow themselves to be influenced by this opinion.
The Muslim lawgiver was wiser than the priestly legislators of India;
for he insulted nature with less peremptory prohibitions against the
union of sects. A Mohammedan may marry a Jewish or a Christian woman,
when he feels excessive love for her, or cannot procure a wife of
the true faith; but she does not inherit his property or impart her
religion to her offspring. The children of a Jewish woman, if they
are not educated to the Mohammedan, must embrace the Christian creed,
which is considered better than their own. In this we find a privilege
reserved by the male sex to itself, for a woman of the Prophet’s faith
dare not marry an infidel, unless compelled so to do by actual force.
This has given rise to many apostasies, which form the subject of
numerous romances.
The degrees of consanguinity within which marriage is prohibited are
strictly marked. A man may not marry his mother or any other relative
in a direct ascending line; his daughter or any descendant; his sister,
or half-sister; his aunt, his niece, or his foster-mother. The Hanafee
code enacts that a man shall not take as his wife any woman from whose
breast he has received a single drop of milk; but E. Shafæee allows it
unless he has been suckled by her five times within the course of the
first two years. Nature, in this respect, is the principal guardian
of the law, for as women in Egypt age very quickly, the men endeavour
to obtain more youthful brides. A man may not marry the mother, or
daughter of his wife, or his father’s or his son’s wife; his wives must
not be sisters, or his own unemancipated slaves--if he already have
a free wife. Those women whom the Muslim is forbidden to marry it is
lawful for him to see, but no others except his own wives or female
servants.
The marriage engagement is merely a civil transaction. The man and
woman having declared in the presence of two witnesses their mutual
willingness, and part of the dowry being paid, their union is legal.
The bride usually signifies her consent through a deputy. If, however,
she be under the age of puberty, her assent is not necessary, and she
is in the hands of her friends. A boy may also be thus disposed of; but
he may divorce his wife if he be not contented with her. Usually, if
rich, he neglects the first, and takes a second by way of solace after
his disappointment.
In one feature of its manners, modern Egypt resembles the States of
ancient Greece. The character of a bachelor is ridiculous, if not
disreputable. As soon as a youth has attained a proper age, with
sufficient means, his friends advise him to marry. His mother, or a
professional match-maker, is usually left to choose the bride. When a
girl has been fixed upon with his approval, some one goes to her father
to effect an arrangement. The price is fixed, with the amount of dowry,
and the future ceremonials depend on the resources of the two families.
Sometimes a profusion of rites is insisted upon; sometimes the simplest
agreement is all that is required, for the law exacts nothing but the
plain convention we have before described. The giving of a dowry is,
however, indispensable. With all who can afford it, also, the sanction
of religion and the witness of the law add solemnity to the occasion.
The rich choose it as an opportunity to display the pride of wealth,
and the poor to indulge in a little show, with that idleness which is
so essential to the happiness of most Asiatics.
The condition of wives in Egypt has been much misrepresented by some
popular writers, to whom the imprisonment and slavery of women offer
a fertile theme for declamation. The word harem, or _harim_, indeed,
meaning _sacred_ or _prohibited_, applies to the women as well as to
the apartments in which they dwell; but considerable liberty is allowed
them. Those of the upper classes are secluded, and go veiled in the
streets. They are seldom seen on foot in public, and their costume is
indicative of this detail in their manners. Though, however, they have
a suite of apartments assigned to them, they are not prisoners. A few
Turks, jealous to exaggeration, may immure the inmates of the harem,
and shut them altogether from contact with the world; but, generally,
they are allowed to go out, pay visits, and control the household.
The theory of the Muslims is more rigid than their practice, which,
were it consistent in all its features, would swathe the female sex
with convention, as the ancient inhabitants used to swathe their
mummies--until the form of humanity is lost amid the very devices which
seek to preserve it. To such an extravagant height do some of them
carry their ideas of the sanctity of the female sex, that their tombs
are closed against strangers, while others will not permit a man and a
woman to be buried in the same grave. Generally, however, husbands do
not object to their wives mingling with the public throng so as they
religiously veil their faces. The lower orders are, of course, the
least restrained. Those of the wealthiest and proudest men are most
strictly secluded; but the interchange of visits between the harems is
constant. With this degree of freedom the Egyptian women are content.
Time has trained them to their situation, until a relaxation in their
discipline is viewed less as an indulgence than a right. The wife who
is allowed too much liberty imagines she is neglected, and, if others
are more narrowly watched, is jealous of the superior solicitude
bestowed on them. Among the rich the harem supplies all the delights
of life. Rose-water, perfumes, sherbet, coffee, and sweatmeats,
constitute the supreme joys of existence, with precious silks, muslins,
and jewels. Among the poor, though reduced to beasts of burden, their
buoyant hearts are not depressed under the load, and they sing from
infancy to old age. Nevertheless their lives are full of misery, but it
is the misery of a class, not only of one sex.
The Muslim woman is _proud_ of her husband, and _fond_ of her children.
Exceptions undoubtedly occur, in which the warmth of the Oriental
temperament takes the form of refined and spiritual love; but these
are rare. In their offspring they find the chief resource of their
lives. They may become mothers at twelve years of age, and at fifteen
commonly do so. They give proof of astonishing fecundity, bearing
numbers of children, though ceasing at an earlier period than among
Europeans. That is the critical occasion of their lives, but they who
pass it safely often survive to an extreme old age. The manners of the
country render it necessary that midwives only should attend at the
accouchement, which is usually easy. When a physician is called in,
he must feel his patient’s pulse through the sleeve of her garment,
while her face is almost invariably wrapped in a veil. The utmost
kindness, even in the indulgence of their most trifling whims, is shown
to pregnant women. The absence of that sentiment which, according to
English notions, should attach a wife to her husband, is made up by
the stronger bond which binds a mother to her child. Upon this all
the wealth of her affection is bestowed, and in that precious charge
all her soul is centred. This feeling--the most pure and true of any
that grow in the human breast--stands to the woman of Egypt in place
of every other. A proverbial saying expresses the national philosophy
upon this subject: “A husband is a husband; if one is lost another
is to be got; but who can give me back my child?” To be childless is
regarded as a signal misfortune, and with those who happen to be barren
many devices are employed to remove the curse. Among these, one of
the most curious is--to wash the skin with the blood of an executed
criminal. Her fecundity, with her parental care, might be expected to
prove itself by a flourishing population; but the blind rapacity and
profligate contempt of human life exhibited by the tyrants who, in
succession, have ruled Egypt, have been more than enough to neutralise
the liberality of nature.
The Mohammedan is essentially an Epicurean. In him the object of nature
appears perverted. Instead of the animal being made subservient to the
intellectual man, the mind is devoted to gratifying the sense. His
life is divided between praying, bathing, smoking, lounging, drinking
coffee, and the gratification of the various appetites. Voluptuary as
he is, therefore, the opulent Egyptian does not rest content with the
four wives allowed him by the law. He takes as many concubines as he
can afford. They are all slaves, and are absolutely at the disposal
of their master, who may handle, whip, or punish them otherwise as he
pleases, and incurs very slight danger by killing one of them. The same
regulations as to blood affinity apply to them as to free women. A man
when he takes a female slave must wait three months before he can make
her his concubine. If she bear him a child which he acknowledges to
be his own, it is free. Otherwise it is the inheritor of its mother’s
bonds. She herself cannot afterwards be sold or given away, but is
entitled to emancipation on the death of her lord. He is not, however,
obliged to free her at once, though, if he have not already four wives,
it is considered honourable to do so. A wife sometimes brings to the
establishment a few handmaidens. Over these she has control, and
need not, unless she pleases, allow them to appear unveiled in their
master’s presence; but occasionally we find a wife presenting her
husband with a beautiful slave damsel, as Sarah presented her bondwoman
Hagar to Abraham. Rich men often purchase handsome white girls. Those
of the humbler class are usually brown Abyssinians, for the blacks are
generally employed in menial offices. Neither the concubine nor the
wife is permitted to eat with the lord of the house. On the contrary,
they are required to wait on him, and frequently, but not always, to
serve as domestics. In consequence of this system, a great gulf lies
between man and wife. His presence is viewed as a restraint in the
harem, which, from all we can learn, is mostly lively and loquacious.
Nor is this surprising, when we consider that the harems of aged men
are so frequently filled with young girls in the fresh bloom of life,
who can never learn to be fond of their husbands. The Egyptian proverb
in reference to this is peculiarly apt. It describes an ugly old Turk
with some beautiful youthful wives as “A paradise in which hogs feed.”
Ibrahim Pasha introduced into his private apartments the amusement of
billiards, which at once became a favourite recreation.
Though polygamy is not only licensed but esteemed, and concubinage
unlimited, few Egyptians have more than one wife, or one female slave.
Not more, indeed, than one in twenty, it is said, indulge in this kind
of pluralism, and it is probable that concubinage might be almost
altogether abolished by the suppression of the slave trade. At present
the markets are continually supplied with girls kidnapped in various
countries, and these are sometimes stripped and exposed naked to the
purchaser’s inspection.
Satisfied as he generally is with one wife, the Egyptian Mohammedan
is not by any means remarkable for continence. He may content himself
with a single woman, but he may change her as often as he pleases, a
privilege which is continually abused. The facility of divorce has had
a most demoralising effect upon Egyptian manners.
A man may twice put away his wife and take her back without ceremony.
If, however, he divorces her a third time, or deliberately unites in
one act the effect of three, he cannot take her again until she has
been married and divorced by another husband. The manner of divorce
is sufficiently simple. The husband says, “I divorce thee,” and
returns his wife about one-third of the dowry, with the effects which
she brought at her marriage. He may do this through sheer caprice,
without assigning or proving any reason; but when a woman desires to
put away her husband, she must show herself to have suffered serious
ill-treatment or neglect, lose the share of her dowry, and often go
into a court of justice to prove her claim. With the man this is
never required, as is indicated by the common proverb: “If my husband
consents, why should the Kadi’s consent be necessary?”
A widow must wait three months, and a divorced woman three months and
ten days, or, if pregnant, until delivery, before marrying again. The
latter, in this case, must also wait an additional forty days before
she can receive her new husband. Meanwhile her former proprietor must
support her, either in his own house or in that of her parents. If he
divorce her before the actual consummation of the marriage, he must
provide for her more liberally. In case, however, of a wife being
rebellious, and refusing to recognise the lawful authority of her
husband, he may prove her to have offended, before a Kadi, and procure
a certificate exempting him from the obligation to clothe, lodge, or
maintain her. Thus she is desolate and without resource, for she dare
not go to another home; but if she formally promise to be obedient in
future, her husband must support or divorce her. When a wife desires
to be freed from any man’s restraint and is unable to dissolve the
union altogether, she may make a complaint and obtain a licence to
go to her father’s house. In that case he, through sheer spite,
generally persists in refusing to divorce her. Sometimes a man with a
disagreeable mother-in-law quartered upon him, puts away his wife in
order to be rid of both.
The slightness of the marriage tie, and the ease with which it may be
severed, leads, as we have said, to a profligate abuse of the power
thus assumed by the male sex. Numbers of men have, in the course of
their lives, 10, 20, 30, or even 40 wives. Women, also, have as many
as a dozen partners in succession. Some profligates have been known
to marry a woman almost every month. A man without property may pick
up a handsome young widow, or divorced woman, for about 10_s._, which
he pays as dowry. He lives with her a few days or weeks, and then
divorces her with the payment of about 20_s._, to support her in the
interval during which she is prohibited from marrying again. Such
conduct, however, is regarded as disreputable, so that few respectable
families will trust a girl with any man who has put away many wives.
The crime of adultery is laid down by the law as worthy of severe
punishment. Four eye-witnesses, however, are necessary to prove the
fact, and the woman may then be stoned to death. From the secluded
nature of their lives, and from the nature of the offence itself, it
is rarely that such testimony is to be had. Cases, therefore, scarcely
ever occur before the public courts. Heavy and ignominious penalties
are denounced against witnesses who make these charges and fail in the
proof. Unmarried persons convicted of fornication may be punished by
the infliction of one hundred stripes, and, under the law acknowledged
by the Sumrh sect, may be banished for a whole year.
Egypt has in all times been famous for its public dancing girls, who
were all prostitutes. The superior classes of them formed a separate
tribe or collection of tribes, known as the Ghawazee. A female of
this community is called Ghazeeyeh, and a man Ghazee. The common
dancing girls of the country are often erroneously confounded with the
Almeh--Awalim in the singular--who are properly female singers; though,
whatever some authoritative writers may assert, they certainly practise
dancing, as well as prostitution, especially since the exile of the
Ghawazee. They perform at private entertainments, and are sometimes
munificently rewarded. The Ghawazee, on the other hand, were accustomed
to put aside their veils and display their licentious movements in
public, before the lowest audience. The evolutions with which they were
accustomed to amuse their patrons were commonly the reverse of elegant.
Commencing with decency enough, they soon degenerated into obscenity,
the women contorting their bodies into the most libidinous postures.
The dress was graceful, but exposed a large portion of the bosom, and
was frequently half thrown aside. The Ghawazee sometimes performed
in the court of a house or in the open street; but were not admitted
into the harems of respectable families. A party of men often met in a
house, and sent for the dancers to amuse them. Their performances, on
such occasions, were more than usually licentious, and their dresses
less decent. A chemise of transparent texture, which scarcely hid the
skin, and a pair of full trousers, was frequently all that covered
them. Drinking copious draughts of brandy or some other intoxicating
liquor, they soon laid aside even the affectation of modesty, and
scenes took place like those with which the priests defiled the
temples of India. Many of the women who thus degrade themselves are
exceedingly beautiful. As a class, indeed, they are described as the
handsomest in Egypt. They are distinguished, by the peculiar caste of
their countenances, from all other females in the country, and there
can be little doubt that they spring from a distinct race. They boast
themselves of the Barmecide descent, but this is impossible to be
proved. It has been conjectured that they are the lineal, as well as
the professional descendants of those licentious dancers who exhibited
naked--as these sometimes do--before the Egyptians in the age of the
Pharaohs. Some imagine that the dancers of Gade, or Cadiz, ridiculed by
Juvenal, were the prototypes of the modern Ghawazee; but it has been
supposed, with more reason, that the Phœnicians introduced the practice
thither from the East, where profligacy flourished at the earliest
period.
It has been the pride of the Ghawazee tribes to preserve themselves
distinct from all other classes of the population, to intermarry, and
thus to perpetuate their blood unmingled. A few have repented their
mode of life, and married respectable Arabs; but this has not often
occurred. They never among themselves took a husband until they had
entered on a course of prostitution. To this venal calling they were
all trained from childhood, though all were not taught to dance. In
this community of harlots, it is singular to find that the husband
was inferior to the wife; indeed he was subject to her, performing
the double office of servant and procurer. If she was a dancer he was
generally her musician, and sat by quietly tinkling upon a stringed
instrument, while she, his wife, exposed her person in the most
indecent attitudes, and by every voluptuous artifice endeavoured to
seduce the spectator. Profligacy never assumed a more infamous form
than that of the husband assisting at the daily adultery of his wife.
Some of the men earned a livelihood as blacksmiths or tinkers. Many of
them, however, were rich, and the women, especially, were possessed of
costly dresses and ornaments.
The Ghawazee generally followed the kind of life led by our gipsies,
whom some, indeed, have traced to an Egyptian origin. Many, but not
all, of the wanderers of this nation in the Valley of the Nile,
ascribe to themselves a descent from a branch of the same family from
which the Ghawazee claim to have sprung; but both traditions rest on
doubtful testimony. The ordinary language of the Ghawazee is similar
to that in use among the rest of the Egyptian population; but like all
other unsettled, wandering tribes, they have a peculiar dialect, a
species of slang, only intelligible to themselves. Most of them profess
the Mohammedan faith, and they were accustomed to follow in crowds the
pilgrim caravans to the sacred shrine at Mecca.
Every considerable town in Egypt formerly harboured a large body of
the Ghawazee, who occupied a distinct quarter, allotted entirely
to prostitutes and their companions. Low huts, temporary sheds, or
tents, formed their usual habitations, since they were in the habit
of frequently transplanting themselves from one district to another.
Others, however, occupied and furnished handsome houses, trading
also in camels, asses, and grain; possessing numerous female slaves,
upon whose prostitution they also realized much profit. They crowded
the camps and attended the great religious festivals, and on these
occasions the Ghawazee tents were always conspicuous. Some joined the
accomplishment of singing with that of the dance.
The inferior Ghawazee women resembled in their attire the common
prostitutes of other classes, which also swarmed in Egypt. Many of
these also, who were not Ghawazees, took the name, in order to increase
the gains of their calling.
The system of marriage, to which we have slightly alluded, is worthy
of more particular notice. The man who married a Ghazeeyeh was a
low and despised creature. The saying is proverbial in Egypt, that
“the husband of a harlot is a base wretch by his own testimony.”
The law among the Ghawazee was, that a girl as soon as marriageable
must prostitute herself to a stranger and then take a husband. He is
constantly employed in looking for persons to bring to her, himself
cohabiting with her only by stealth, for she would be exposed to
shame and made the object of ridicule were it known that she had
admitted her own husband to her embraces. Polygamy is unknown among
the Ghawazee. In that community, indeed, as it existed previously to
the edict of 1835, we find a system exactly the reverse of that in the
midst of which it existed. The birth of a male child was looked upon
as a misfortune, since he was of no value to the tribe. Women, on the
contrary, were precious, because they were sought after by nearly the
whole male population of Egypt. The Ghazeeyeh made it a rule never to
refuse the offer of a person who could pay anything. The fashionable
dancer, therefore, at country fairs, though glittering with golden
ornaments, and arrayed in all the beauties of the eastern loom, would
admit the visit of any rough and ragged peasant for a sum not exceeding
twopence. In this manner, by seizing whatever was offered to them, they
often accumulated wealth, dressed in superb attire, rich embroidery
of gold, with chains of golden coins, and solid bracelets of the
same costly metal. In many instances, when the Ghazeeyeh had lost or
divorced her former husband, and become opulent upon the profits of
her venal calling, she married some village Sheikh, who was proud of
his acquisition. A virgin Ghazeeyeh was never induced to forsake her
hereditary profession; but when she formed such an alliance, she made
a solemn vow on the tomb of some saint, to be true to her new partner,
sacrificed a sheep, and was generally faithful to her sacred engagement.
It was not only in the more populous cities and districts of Lower
Egypt that the Ghawazee pursued their double calling of dancer and
prostitute. Those in the Upper country were equally addicted to that
immoral calling, and were, in proportion, equally encouraged. Even
in the small villages a company of them was usually to be found,
glittering in finery of gaudy colours, unveiled, and clothed only in
those light transparent garments in which the members of the same
sisterhood are represented on the monuments--a loose chemise of gauze,
a scarf negligently hung about the loins, and loose trousers of the
most delicate texture. Their dances were exhibitions of unrestrained
indecency,--attitude, look, and movement being equally lascivious. They
also sang and played on the viol, lute, tambour, lyre, or castanet. The
common prostitutes of the meaner class excelled them, at least in the
affectation of modesty. Many of the Ghawazee, however, appear sensible
of the degradation to which they are consigned.
The dance of the Ghawazee was, to the Egyptians, what an opera ballet
is in England--the representation of some episode, generally of love.
Formerly there was, near Cairo, a little village called Shaarah, the
Eleusis of modern Egypt, where the mystical rites of Athor were,
until recently, celebrated. It was a collection of small mud huts,
distinguished from those of the common people by superior cleanliness
and comfort. Numbers of the Ghawazee dwelt here, and when Mr. J. A.
St. John visited their abode, came out to meet him, dressed in elegant
attire, with a profusion of ornaments. All were young--none were more
than twenty, many not more than ten years of age. Some were exceedingly
handsome, while others, to an European judge, appeared quite the
reverse. In this village lived a considerable number of the Ghawazee.
The greater part of their lives was passed in the coffee-house,
where they lounged all day on cushions, sipping coffee, singing, and
indulging in licentious conversation. In the great room a hundred might
assemble, and here they were visited by the profligates of Cairo, to
whom the village of Shaarah was a regular place of resort. In the
towns they frequented the common coffee-houses, and in the smaller
hamlets up the valley, they wandered all day among the dwellings,
or reclined on benches in the open air until a boat with travellers
appeared on the Nile, when they immediately hurried down to the shore
and commenced their lascivious songs. The Arabs have the reputation of
being extremely profligate, and when on their journeys never visited a
city or village without paying a visit to the Ghawazee quarter. Indeed,
the manners of the population have been debased under every vicious
influence. A despotic government, an epicurean religion, and the spirit
of indolence thus engendered, have encouraged among the men every
species of crime against nature. The corruption which brought a curse
on the Cities of the Plain is emulated in the cities of Egypt.
When Burckhardt wrote, about 1830, the number of males and females of
the Ghawazee nation in Egypt was estimated at from 6000 to 8000. Their
principal settlements were in the towns of the Delta in Lower Egypt,
and, in the Upper country, at Kenneh, where a colony of at least 300
generally resided. The scattered companies generally formed a great
concourse at Tanta, in the Delta, at the three annual festivals, when
a vast multitude was collected from all parts of the valley. Six
hundred Ghawazee have on such occasions pitched their tents near the
town. During the reign of the Memlooks, the influence of these women
was, in the open country, very considerable. Many respectable persons
courted their favour. They were accustomed to dwell in the towns until
the brutality of the soldiers--who sometimes killed one in a fit of
jealousy--drove them into the rural parts. At each of their chief
places of sojourn one was invested with the title of Emir, or chief
of the settlement. She was entitled to no authority over the rest,
yet exercised much influence by virtue of her dignity. In Cairo itself
their number was small, and they inhabited a spacious Khan, or hotel,
overlooked by the castle. “In a city,” says Burckhardt, “where among
women of every rank chastity is so rare as at Cairo, it could not be
expected that public prostitution should thrive.” This is a harsh
judgment on the character of the Caireen females, and, according to the
accounts of most travellers, it is unjust.
Before Mohammed Ali, instigated by the priests, made his awkward
crusade against the Ghawazee tribes, the public prostitutes were put
under the jurisdiction of a magistrate--an aga, or captain of the
dancing girls. He kept a list of them, and exacted from each a sum of
money by way of tax. He also acted as a censor on the general morality
of the people. One of these agas took upon himself an extension of
his jurisdiction, and whenever he found a woman, no matter of what
class, who had been guilty of a single act of incontinence, he added
her name to the list of common prostitutes, and extorted the tax from
her, unless she could offer him a sufficient bribe, and thus escape
the infamy. Nor was this all. To gratify private revenge, he sometimes
inserted in his list the names of respectable ladies; but was at length
detected and punished with death. Whenever a party of Ghawazee was
engaged, they had to pay to their chief a sum of money and procure his
permission to dance. This practice was pursued by persons who farmed
the tax, until Mohammed Ali was smitten by a sudden reverence for
morals, and made an attempt, characteristic of his vulgar genius, to
abolish the profligacy of Egypt. In June, 1834, a law was published
compelling the Ghawazee throughout the country to retire from their
profession. It is said that the Moolahs, or Muslim bishops, objected
to them, not on account of the impurities they practised, but because
it was a scandal that women belonging to the race of true believers
should expose their faces to infidels for hire. An agitation was
raised on the subject; a storm of sacerdotal rage assailed the palace;
and the viceroy, priest-ridden, banished all the dancers to Esneh,
500 miles up the Nile. There they were herded together, with a small
stipend from government to keep them from starvation. The effect of
this truly barbarian device was just what might have been expected. The
profligacy, which had been chiefly confined to them, broke out in other
classes, and demoralization advanced several steps further. It is said
that the Moolahs repent their policy, since some additional burdens
have been laid on them to make up for the loss of revenue.
Under the old system, when all the known prostitutes paid a tax, the
amount contributed by those of Cairo alone was 800 purses, or 4000_l._,
which was a tenth of the income-tax on the whole population. This will
suggest an idea of the numbers in which they existed. The Ghawazee
formed the chief element in this system of prostitution, and Mohammed
Ali imagined that with one stroke of the pen he could obliterate this
blot on the social aspect of Egypt--he who had so worn himself out with
licentious pleasures that his physicians had to persuade him to disband
an army of concubines which he had kept at the expense of his miserable
people. At once prostitution was denounced as a crime. The Ghazeeyeh
daring to infringe the new law was condemned to fifty stripes for the
first, and imprisonment with severe labour for the second, offence. The
punishments of these and of all other women were illegal, according
to the code of the Prophet. It has, however, been a blessing to the
Mohammedan population of the East that their great lawgiver left his
frame of legislation, for, invested with the authority of religion, it
has been some check on the caprice of tyrants.
The men, also, who were detected encouraging the Ghawazee were made
liable to the punishment of the bastinado. Legal enactments, however,
cannot purify the morals of a whole community. Prostitution was
abolished by law, but remained in practice as flagrant as ever. The
Egyptians borrowed a device from the Persians. When a man desires to
have intercourse with a woman of the prostitute class, he marries her
in the evening and divorces her in the morning. The dowry he pays
her is no more than she would receive were this transaction not to
take place. She dare not apply for the usual stipend to maintain her
afterwards. Even these connections are often kept entirely secret.
The dancing has been more successfully suppressed, for many of the
performances were public; but the Europeans, as well as the rich
natives, frequently indulge by stealth in the prohibited amusement.
The Almehs, at least since the banishment of the Ghawazee, dance, and
prostitute themselves, as well as sing--though their name implies
neither practice, meaning simply “learned or accomplished women.” When
an entertainment of the kind is given, it is usual to choose for the
scene a lonely house in the outskirts of the city, surrounded by a
garden with a high wall. There, with the windows veiled, parties meet,
and the dancers are introduced. Women with children at the breast come
sometimes to take part in these abominable orgies; but do not usually,
unless excited by the men, develop all their powers of licentious
expression. Occasionally a party of soldiers breaks in on the forbidden
revel, and the girls are carried off to prison, where stripes, or,
perhaps, sentences of banishment, await them.
There are, however, in Egypt considerable classes of women solely
devoted to prostitution, who practise none of the accomplishments in
which the Almeh and Ghawazee excel. Among them is a peculiar tribe
called the Halekye, whose husbands are tinkers or horse and ass
doctors. They wander about the country like gipsies, and most of the
women engage in prostitution. Prostitutes of the common order swarm in
all the cities and towns of the valley. In and about Cairo they are
particularly numerous, whole quarters being inhabited exclusively by
them. Legislation is powerless to suppress their calling. Their dress
differs from that of the other sorts of women only in being more gay
and less disguising. Some even wear the veil and affect all the airs
of modesty. Many are divorced women, or widows, or wives of men whose
business has obliged them to go abroad. The wives of many of the Arabs,
if neglected for a short time, slide easily into prostitution. When
Ibrahim Pasha was away on the expedition to Syria, it was said that
on his return the soldiers would find all their wives courtezans; but
this, of course, was a satire.
Numbers of the common prostitutes in Cairo have been accustomed to sell
pigeons and other birds in the different bazaars. Hence has arisen a
proverb, that a person who marries in the bird-market must divorce his
wife next morning. We find in these popular sayings many indications
of the features which mark the system in Egypt. We have some in
allusion to the shouts and disorderly conduct of persons issuing from
the brothels in the morning, and others describing the career of the
prostitutes themselves. “The public woman who is liberal of her favours
does not wish for a procuress.” “If a harlot repent she becomes a
procuress.”
One reason assigned for the practice of early marriages is, the
proneness of the young men to be seduced by prostitutes. It is only
just, however, to observe, that in Alexandria, though it is considered
the _refugium peccatorum_ of the Mediterranean, the European community
has preserved itself to an unusual degree uncontaminated by the general
corruption of the male population.
The women of Egypt, as we have already observed, are, in point of
morals, far superior to the men. They are generally silly and childish,
because they are treated as soulless creatures and children; but, on
the whole, their character is not so degraded by unnatural vices as
that of their male rulers. These generally are coarse voluptuaries, in
whom little except the animal appetite is developed.
We perceive in Egypt the illustration of some signal truths. We find
there the proper fruits of Oriental despotism; we see the results of a
vulgar barbarian attempt to reform public morals. We witness also the
influence of its position upon the character of the female sex. Women
in Egypt have been made by their social laws what the originator of
those laws considered them to be--the mere servitors of man. In the
prostitute system of the country we discover some singular features,
which contribute to render modern Egypt, in relation to our actual
subject, one of the most interesting regions in the East. The Christian
population we do not notice, because it is composed of fragments of
races which will be noticed in their proper countries[77].
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG THE STATES OF NORTHERN AFRICA.
A very brief notice is all that is required by the other States of
northern Africa. They are distinguished from the barbarous communities
of that region by having assumed the forms of regular society, which
places them under a separate head, but, in relation to our subject,
they present little that is characteristic. In describing the condition
and morality of the female sex in other Mohammedan countries we shall
meet with nearly all the features offered by Algiers, Barca, Morocco,
Tunis, and Tripoli. Nevertheless, on account of the extraordinary
mixture of the population, some curious details are observed. Turks,
Christians, Arabs, Jews, Berbers, and Moors mingle in the cities of
those States. The last, however, form the mass, and it is to them our
remarks must apply.
The Moors of northern Africa possess all the vices, and scarcely any of
the virtues, of the Mohammedans of the East. They are proud, ignorant,
sensual, and depraved, without any of that high spirit of honour which
often, in the oriental Muslim, half redeems his character.
The treatment of women among the Moors answers exactly to this
view. They are regarded as the mere material instruments of man’s
gratification. Accordingly their whole education is modelled so as to
render them fit to serve the lust of a gross sensualist. Among the more
elevated nations of Asia, men sometimes tire of their wives’ company,
because they are simple beauties, without animation of mind, seeking
the society of educated courtezans, more for their wit and vivacity
than for their meaner and more material accomplishments. But, with the
Moors, the animal appetite is all that they seek to satisfy. A woman
with daughters does not train them in seductive arts; she _feeds_ them
into a seductive appearance--as pigeons and doves are fed in certain
parts of Italy. They are made to swallow daily a number of balls of
paste, dipped in oil, and the rod enforces their compliance. This
practice is adopted as well by the inmate of the rich man’s harem as
by the courtezan; for to be plump, sleek, and fair, are the objects of
their common ambition. A girl who is a camel’s load is the perfection
of Moorish beauty. Thus intellect and sentiment are not the possessions
to recommend her, but fat.
It is strange that the woman’s character does not correspond altogether
with her mode of life. Heavy, corpulent, and sensual, she is,
nevertheless, alive to the keenest feeling. Hot impulses, untameable in
their outbreak, characterize her sex. Rivarol once said, that in Paris
the veins of the women were full of milk; but in Berlin, of pure blood.
Pananti says that in the Moorish woman fire is the circulating fluid.
Fiery hearts, indeed, are general among the women of the East; and are
as remarkable in Egypt as in Morocco, where Oriental passions seem to
spring from African soil.
Immured as the wives of rich men are in splendid harems, and rigidly
excluded from intercourse with the other sex, they seek their whole
enjoyment in the gratification of their passions or their senses. Their
time is spent at home, or at the bath, lounging on cushions, sipping
coffee, smoking, gossiping, or multiplying the devices of the toilette.
The Moors are extravagantly jealous. Some have been known to slay their
women before proceeding on a long journey; others have forbidden them
to name even an animal of the masculine gender. They are, therefore,
entirely shut up within the walls of the harem; muffled under mountains
of ungraceful black drapery as they move along the streets; or secluded
from the sight of the world in the impenetrable recesses of the bath.
There they exhaust all the ingenuity they can command in the perfuming
and decoration of their persons.
Many have wondered why women thus prevented from displaying themselves
should be so untiring in the offices of vanity. The reason, however, is
clear. In the Moorish harem all that a wife or concubine has to look to
is the favour of her lord. If she succeed in charming him, her lot is
far more happy than under any other circumstances. Besides, it is not
only to please him that she labours. The mortification of her rivals is
an additional source of triumph, for in the narrow sphere of the harem,
where the nobler qualities of the mind have no room for development,
the meanest naturally flourish most profusely.
The marriage laws of Mohammedan countries in general prevail in the
Barbary States, with slight modifications. The husband has more
absolute control over the wife. Few take more than one, though polygamy
is universally allowed. Opulent men, however, sometimes indulge in the
full complement of four, besides a number of concubines. Though the
betrothal usually takes place at an extremely early age, the actual
union seldom takes place until the bride is twelve or thirteen, when,
as a poet of Barbary expresses it, “The rose-bud expands to imbibe the
vivifying rays of love.”
An extensive system of professional prostitution prevails in all the
cities of these States. In Algiers and Morocco they are particularly
numerous. The low drinking shops are crowded with men, and the loose
characters of the town have each a companion who is a harlot. The
public dancers all belong to this sisterhood. They exist in large
numbers and are very much encouraged by both sexes. The women in the
baths, after steeping their bodies in warm water until every nerve is
relaxed, and all their limbs are softened into a voluptuous languor,
lie on cushions and sip coffee, while dancers, attired in a slight
costume, display their licentious arts, and Almeh sing songs equally
lascivious. These prostitutes are of various classes, from the low
vulgar wretches, encouraged by the French soldiers in Algiers, to the
wealthy courtezans who live amid luxury and splendour.
A late traveller was introduced by a friend to “a Moorish lady.” She
occupied a fine house, situated, however, in a narrow and retired
street. Its architecture was rich, and on the door being opened,
signs of wealth became everywhere apparent. The visitor was ushered
into a spacious apartment, roofed with graceful arches, and hung with
rich-coloured silks. A lamp burning amid piles of freshly-gathered
flowers, stood on the table. Reclining on a luxurious divan, with a
tiger-skin spread at her feet, was a woman of extreme loveliness,
attired in a superb costume. Though of a fair and brilliant complexion,
her hair was jet black, braided with curious art and bound up with
strings of pearl. Its heavy tresses were partly concealed by a tiara of
crimson, figured with gold. Diamond drops hung from her ears; corals
and gems sparkled round her neck.
A garment, of a fabric almost transparent, was folded over her bosom,
and fastened with a golden ornament. A loose pelisse of blue brocade,
confined at the waist with a cymar of embroidered silk, displayed the
contour of her figure, and full trousers of muslin were furled about
her limbs. Her cheek was tattooed with a blue star, and her nails were
stained pink with henna. She was waited upon by a negro girl wearing
a white muslin turban ornamented with a rose, the leaves and stem of
which were gilded. Elegant in her manners, easy in her mode of address,
this woman appeared to the uninitiated traveller the model of feminine
grace. When he took his leave, however, his friend undeceived him,
with an apology, and he discovered that he had been conversing with a
Moorish prostitute.
This sketch of a woman, belonging to the class, may serve to show the
extent to which some of them are encouraged. Indeed the society of the
dancers, who are all prostitutes, is a favourite recreation with the
Moors of all classes. The women, as we have said, belong to various
grades, from those who debase themselves by their obscene postures
in the low coffee-houses, to those who display their more elegant
licentiousness to amuse the wealthy. A man, entertaining a party of
friends, sends for a company of dancers to enliven them in his kiosk
or pavilion. There, amid the fumes of tobacco, and sometimes of strong
liquors (for the precepts of the Koran are often disregarded), these
unhappy women descend from ordinary immodesty to the most degrading
obscenity, until the orgies become such as no pen could describe. When
the master of the feast is particularly delighted with the beauty or
the dexterity of any girl, he performs a favourite act of gallantry
by dropping a few golden coins into her bosom. The whole company is
liberally rewarded[78].
OF PROSTITUTION IN ARABIA, SYRIA, AND ASIA MINOR.
In whatever countries the Mohammedan religion has been established,
to describe the condition of women would be generally to repeat
the accounts already given. Their character varies in different
populations, but everywhere the laws to which they are subject are
substantially the same.
In Syria and Asia Minor the marriage code is, among the Muslims,
precisely similar to that of Egypt and Turkey, and so also in Arabia.
In Natolia, especially, the influence of the Prophet’s law is powerful,
and the comparative simplicity of its inhabitants leads them to respect
the boundaries laid down to their indulgences. Possessing within
their own country all the materials of prosperity, they might, with
virtue and industry, become once more a powerful and wealthy race; but
misgovernment adds yearly to the mass of their corruption, and they
perish in misery and servitude.
In such countries ambition sees no path but that of reckless crime,
and mental activity only stimulates to sensual pursuits. Accordingly
profligacy flourishes in the cities of Asia Minor, though in the
thinly-peopled tracts there is perhaps more purity of manners than in
any other Mohammedan country, except Arabia. Polygamy, permitted as
it is by the law, is far from being generally adopted. In 1830, the
extensive city of Brussa contained only a single man who had more than
one wife. Women are secluded to some extent, but enjoy great freedom.
Loved and indulged they are, but not respected; and, consequently,
their morals are inferior to those of the Bedouin wives.
The Christians, who are so freely tolerated among the Mohammedan
population of Asia Minor, preserve very much the customs of Europe,
except in the lesser details of their life. In the rich provinces of
Syria, Arabs, Greeks, and Ottomans have mingled, bringing each some
characteristic habits to modify the general social scheme. The pastoral
and the Christian tribes are by far the most moral.
Among the Maronites of Lebanon, who hold our faith, a rigid code
exists, with purity of manners; but, as among the ancient Germans, the
severe law is only the moral influence in action. The law, without the
feeling which upholds it, would be powerful; which constitutes the
difference between a community which frames its own code according to
its own spirit, and that which receives decrees from the caprice of a
ruler. If a man among the Maronites seduce a girl, he must marry her;
should he refuse, fasts, imprisonments, and even blows are employed,
which force him to submit. The illicit intercourse of the sexes,
married or unmarried, is reprobated by the sense of the community, and
the profession of prostitution is unknown. On the whole, this may be
described as a simple and comparatively innocent race, removed above
the profligacy which ferments around them.
The Druses, also, are distinguished by the same characteristics; they
do not permit polygamy, and marry very young. A man may divorce his
wife, however, by only saying, “Go;” or if she ask permission to visit
her relatives, and he concede it, without enjoining her to return,
she must consider herself put away. In spite of this facility such
separations scarcely ever occur. An adulteress is mercilessly put to
death by the hands of her friends. One who commits fornication suffers
a similar punishment, but in this case the father may pardon her if he
choose. The tenderness of the parent sometimes induces him to spare
his child, though her guilt may stain the honour of his house; but
brothers, it is said, never relent, visiting the sin of their sister
with unsparing sternness.
Prostitutes and dancing girls are common in all the cities and towns of
Syria, but they are never met with among any of the pastoral or nomade
tribes. In Asia Minor and Palestine the same circumstance is to be
observed.
There is little to remark upon in the habits or characteristics of the
class, which is similar to others of the same sisterhood in Egypt,
Turkey, and other parts of the East[79]. Since, therefore, little could
be gained by dwelling at length upon these countries, we quit them,
and pass to a region which, if the spirit of romance still remains on
earth, may be described as its chosen home.
In Arabia we find a system of manners at once unique and beautiful. In
saying this, however, we allude to the Bedouins, or representatives
of the true Arab race, who preserve their original simplicity in
the rainless plains of their ancient country. In the cities of the
coast, and wherever the fertility of the soil has attracted a crowded
population, vice has introduced itself, and the graces of the shepherd
state have quickly disappeared. In surveying the civilization of Arabia
this distinction must always be held in view.
Many natural circumstances combine to influence the natural character
of the Arabs in their native region. A country whose sunny and sandy
plains alternate with tracts of hills and valleys of the richest bloom,
has been their home. In the mountains of Yemen wet and dry seasons
alternate, but over the desert hangs a sky of perpetual blue,--bright,
dry, and warm; while, during the summer solstice, a sun almost vertical
floods the waste of rock and sand with insufferable light, parching the
face of all nature.
In this extraordinary region the Arabs live; some, as we have said,
in cities or villages, some in separate families, under tents. An
independent patriarchal form of government has been preserved in
complete unity with their simple system of manners. Their religion
is that of Mohammed, though various interpretations of his law
have divided them into numerous sects. Differing, as they do, in
their scheme of education from Europeans, it is difficult for us to
understand their character. The boy grows up until five years old under
his mother’s care; then, without a graduation, he is taken to his
father’s side. From the companionship of women and children he passes
at once into the society of men.
The Arabs hold the female sex in high estimation. They exclude women,
indeed, from all public assemblies, preclude them from the use of
strong liquors, and hold them from infancy to womanhood under tutelage;
but they restrain themselves as well, and their general demeanour is
modest, sober, and grave. Those in the fertile province of Yemen are
more vivacious than those of the sterile plains. Nevertheless the men
love society. Every village has its coffee-house full of gossipers, and
every camp its place of rendezvous.
The women of the family occupy the interior of the house or tent;
they are secluded to some extent, but not in the extravagant degree
described by some writers. A man will not salute one in public, or
fix his eyes upon her. Strangers, in general, are not allowed to
converse with them, and they are expected to pay great deference to
the ruling sex, but they are neither disguised nor immured. Veils they
wear, but do not hide their faces with that religious care considered
indispensable in some countries. Among many of the tent-dwellers, women
drink coffee with strangers; and in some of the communities towards the
south they are allowed to entertain a guest in their husband’s absence.
Indeed it may be said, that they are in Arabia more free than anywhere
else in Islam, and proverbially abstemious in the gratification of all
their appetites. All the household duties are performed by them. They
fetch water, drive flocks, and wait on the men; but they are loved and
respected, notwithstanding, and no claim is held so sacred as that by
which a mother exacts duty from her son. There is, indeed, something
admirable in the simplicity of these desert tribes, where the wife sits
within her husband’s tent, weaving her own garments from the wool of
his flocks.
Where several families are congregated, the females visit each other,
assemble together, and exchange every pleasant service. They meet in
the evening to sing to the young men of the tribe, and many romantic
assignations are kept in the little secluded valleys in which Arabia
abounds. The well is the favourite spot of rendezvous.
The dances of the Arab girls, who perform before the men, are not only
decent but elegant and romantic--totally in contrast to those of the
Ghawazee. These amusements are as much for their own gratification as
that of the other sex, for sometimes no males are present. Nor are they
forced to exhibit when disinclined. Sometimes when the young men have
offended the maidens of a tribe, they assemble night after night, but
no damsels appear to dance or sing. All this indicates considerable
purity of manners. The Mohammedan marriage law prevails among all the
Arabs of the peninsula, though its details are modified by their system
of manners. A man is expected, though not compelled, to take the widow
of his deceased brother. A man has an exclusive right to the hand
of his cousin, but is not compelled to marry her. He, however, must
finally renounce his claim before she can be taken by any one else.
Each may have four wives and as many concubines as he pleases. Two
sisters may not be had at once; but one being divorced, the other may
be taken.
The disparity between the sexes in point of number, which has been
asserted by some travellers, does not appear to exist. Polygamy, a
privilege of the rich, is seldom practised even by them. Many wealthy
Bedouins, who could well maintain a harem, declare they could not be
happy with more than one companion. The law obliges a man to pass at
least one night in every week with each of his wives, and this has
assisted in checking the practice.
The Mohammedans of Arabia are accused of selling their daughters; but
they do not often bargain them away for profit. They naturally prefer
a wealthy before a poor son-in-law, and receive a bounty from him;
but they richly portion out the bride. She is further endowed by her
husband. The contract drawn up before the Kadi stipulates not only
what she is to receive upon her marriage, but what she may claim in
case of a divorce. In many cases a sheikh of substantial fortune takes
a poor son-in-law, gives him the sum necessary to be paid before the
judge, and exacts from him in return only a pledge of such an amount,
in the event of repudiation, that it can never take place. The wife,
not being compelled to vest all her property in him, is, in some
measure, free from his authority. She is, indeed, more supreme in the
household than in most countries, and is even more happy, because she
can insist upon a divorce if ill-used. Some men, indeed, take two
wives, and some even three, but these instances are so few that, though
the sexes are numerically equal, almost every man may have a wife. In
the towns, soldiers and domestics are more frequently married than in
Europe. No insult wounds an Arab woman more than to compare her to a
fruitless tree. In this way the evils of polygamy, in the cities, are
counteracted. A maiden past the marriageable age is ashamed of her
virginity, and a widow without children is miserable until she finds a
new partner. There are no retreats whither celibacy may fly for refuge
from the taunts of the world. Every woman, consequently, is desirous to
marry; but those who are taken by pluralists bear fewer children than
those who have no rival under the roof. In the house of a polygamist,
each woman, feeling she has to contend for favour, seeks by unnatural
means to increase her own attractions, to seem more voluptuous than she
is, and thus injures her natural powers. Concubinage is more common
than polygamy. The sheriff of Mecca has numerous female slaves, and
his high example is followed by many wealthy men in the luxurious and
corrupt populations of the cities. In the desert it is more rare, and,
indeed, scarcely ever practised, except where a father presents his son
with a beautiful bondmaid, that he may be satisfied with her, and not
enter the towns in search of prostitutes.
In Mecca, the sacred city of the Mohammedan faith, nearly all the
wealthy men maintain concubines, but, if they bear children, must,
unless their complement of four wives be already complete, marry them
or incur public reproach. Some of these voluptuaries, who look on
women only as a means to gratify their animal appetites, marry none
but Abyssinian wives, because they are more servile, obsequious, and
voluptuous than those of pure Arabian blood. Foreigners arriving at
that city with the caravan bargain for a female slave, intending to
sell her at their departure, unless she bear offspring, in which case
she is elevated to the position of a wife. Under any circumstances, to
sell a concubine slave, is by the respectable part of the community,
regarded as disreputable. Speculators, however, sometimes buy young
girls, indulge their sensuality upon them, train them up, educate them,
and sell them at a profit. No distinction is made among the children,
of whichever class of mothers they are born.
It is one sign of pure manners among the simple communities of Arabia,
that chastity is highly prized. When the young Arab marries a girl, he
sometimes stipulates in the contract that she must be a virgin. Of this
he desires to assure himself by examination. If the outward signs are
wanting, the bride’s father has to prove the circumstance accidental;
should he fail in this, the fame of her innocence may be destroyed,
and she may be driven from home overwhelmed with shame. In many of
the nomade communities it is the invariable rule to put away a bride
immediately after the discovery of any suspicious sign, and in the
hills of Yemen the laws are equally severe. The man who marries a woman
disgraced by incontinence shares her infamy unless he send her back to
her father.
The dwellers in towns, estimating less highly the worth of feminine
virtue, laugh at a man who dishonours his family on account of such
a circumstance. A man finding that his bride is not a virgin demands
compensation from her father, keeps her a short time, and then puts
her away privily, as Joseph was minded to do with the mother of
Jesus. Many also understand that nature has refused the sign to some
females, and that it is unjust to condemn a woman on the strength of
a circumstance which a hundred accidents may have caused. If adultery
be committed by the wife, the law condemns her to have her throat
cut by the hand of her brother or father; but in general humanity
prevails against the written code, and this horrible punishment is
seldom inflicted. The usual manner of visiting such an offence is by
summary divorce, which is indeed easily to be obtained for trivial
causes, or for no cause at all. In towns an agreement before the Kadi,
in the desert a lamb slaughtered before the door of the tent, is all
the ceremony needed. The simple pronunciation of the word “Go” is, in
many parts, sufficient. Men of violent passions abuse this privilege,
and it is said that some, not more than 40 years of age, have had as
many as 50 wives; but it is utterly untrue to say that such instances
are frequent. The existence of the pure and true sentiment of love,
which is so rare in Mohammedan countries, is admitted to prevail in
Arabia; the natural jealousy of the male sex, the superior wisdom of
their regulations respecting the intercourse of the sexes prior to
marriage, the independence of the women, and the lofty system of morals
distinguishing the Bedouins of the desert, are totally incompatible
with such a flagrant profligacy in the use of divorce. Were it the
case, the complete confusion of society would ensue; whereas no region
in the world presents spectacles of happier homes than the plains of
Arabia, with their tents and wandering tribes. Women are comparatively
free, being tolerated even in religious differences, which implies a
high estimate of their intellectual qualities. The republican spirit of
the desert assigns them, indeed, their natural position, and, though
much is required from them as modest women, little is exacted from them
as an inferior sex.
Some of the peculiar customs among the various communities of Arabia
are curious enough to require notice. Before the Wahaby Conquest it
was customary among the Deyr Arabs for a man to take his daughter,
when marriageable, to the market-place--where all such engagements
were formed--and proclaim her for disposal, crying aloud, “Who will
buy the virgin?” The Bedouins of Mount Sinai still adhere to their
singular practices. A man desiring matrimony makes a bargain with some
one who has an unmarried daughter, and if able to settle it, sticks in
his turban a sprig of green, which signifies that he is wedded to a
virgin. The bride’s inclinations are not beforehand consulted. She must
go home with her husband, and submit for one night to his embraces.
If she be not pleased, however, she may in the morning go home, when
the contract is dissolved. Among the wealthier tribes of the East, no
price is paid, and every girl is free to choose a partner. Modesty,
with them, is regarded as the finest grace of the sex. It is genuine
and unassailable. The bride even is sometimes so coy, that her husband
is obliged to tie her up and whip her before she will yield to him. A
widow’s marriage is disreputable, and assailed with every demonstration
of disrespect. This proves that divorce among them is unfrequent. Among
the Nazyene, a tribe on the peninsula of Sinai, a girl, when given in
marriage, flies and takes refuge among the hills, where she is supplied
with food by her relations. The bridegroom goes in search, and when
he finds his bride, must pass the night with her in the open air.
She may repeat the flight several times, and indeed is not expected
to live with her husband until a whole year has elapsed or she has
become pregnant. Various other customs characterise different tribes;
but in every feature of Arabian manners we discover a simplicity and
purity as admirable as it is rare. Conjugal infidelity is rare in the
desert. Fornication scarcely ever happens, and common prostitutes are
unknown. In the crowded towns on the coast, however, there are numbers
of professional prostitutes, licensed to carry on their calling, who
pay considerable sums to the magistrates for the enjoyment of their
privileges. In Mecca they are extremely numerous, and for the most
part inhabit the poorest quarter of the city. In Dhyrdda, also, they
are extremely numerous, but the population of that place is almost
exclusively foreign. These women bear scarcely any children. When,
during the early years of their vocation, they are capable of producing
offspring, they employ artificial means to ensure abortion. The seeds
of the tree whence is obtained the balm of Mecca, are used for that
purpose.
In the mosques of the sacred city, prostitutes collect in great
numbers, and are largely encouraged by the Moolah or priestly
class, who find them a source of profit. Those of the more indigent
description inhabit a particular quarter, but the others are dispersed
amid the general mass of the population. They are more decent in their
outward demeanour than the same class in the East and in Europe, and
it requires a practised eye to detect, amid the throng of veiled women
circulating in the streets and bazaars, those of the venal sisterhood.
Contrary, however, to the rule which prevails in England, they are
almost the only females who frequent places of worship, which is on
account not of their devotion, but of their effrontery, the prejudices
of Mohammedans being against it. The Bedouins near cities sometimes
frequent the brothels in their neighbourhood; but these belong to the
class the manners of which have been vitiated by intercourse with
strangers.
In what numbers the prostitutes of the Arabian cities are found we know
not, nor do we discover anything remarkable in their manners or modes
of life. It would, consequently, be unprofitable to dwell on them. We
have to notice, however, in connection with Arabia, two remarkable
customs, one of which exhibits to us a class of male prostitutes, if
such a term may be allowed, and the other a species of hospitality, now
very rare, except among the grossest communities.
In the Arabian province of Hedjaz no unmarried woman may pass within
the boundary or enter the mosque. As, however, many rich old widows and
persons whose husbands have died by the way arrive with every pilgrim
caravan, some device is necessary to procure them admission without
breaking the law. A number of men, therefore, live in the frontier
towns, who, upon the arrival of every concourse, hire themselves out
to the women, marry them, live with them while they pass through the
sacred territory, receive a munificent sum for their services, and
are then divorced. If one of these individuals chooses to insist on
keeping the wife he has procured, she cannot help it; but such an
act would be attended with great discredit and the loss of a very
profitable occupation. Eight hundred men are sometimes employed as
temporary husbands, and a number of boys are continually trained that
they may inherit the calling. On the various roads to the shrine of
Mecca congregate a number of women, with somewhat of a sacred character
attached to them. They are prostitutes, but not indiscriminate in
their connections, since they offer to bear to wealthy pilgrims
children, who are considered as born under a fortunate auspice.
Among the Merehedes, on the frontiers of Yemen, a custom far more
revolting has existed from ancient time, and still prevails. A stranger
arriving as a guest is compelled to pass the night with the wife of
his host, whatever her age or condition. Should he succeed in pleasing
her he is honourably treated. If not, she cuts off a piece of his
garment, turns him out into the village, and leaves him to be driven
away in disgrace. When the Wahabis conquered the Merehedes, they forced
them to abandon this odious practice; but some misfortunes ensuing to
the tribe, they were all imputed to this sacrilegious infringement of
an ancient law. The custom was therefore restored. Some other female
of the family, may, however, be substituted for the wife, but young
virgins are never sacrificed to this barbarous hospitality[80].
OF PROSTITUTION IN TURKEY.
There is one general system of manners pervading the Mohammedan world.
In examining, therefore, the moral aspects of the various countries
in which the religion of the Prophet is established, we find little
in each to distinguish it from the rest. In Turkey exists the same
civilization as in Egypt, though its population is more corrupt.
25,000,000 souls inhabit a region which would support twice as many,
and yearly the work of decay is going on.
The Osmanlis, a race of Scythian extraction, have held Turkey during
400 years, receiving, however, large infusions of Persian and
Mongolian blood. The wealthier people their harems with the beauties
of Georgia and Circassia; the humbler intermarry with Servians,
Bulgarians, Albanians, and Greeks, so that the original physical
characteristics of the race have been greatly modified. Their moral
nature has changed also, but in a less degree. Proud, sensual, and
depraved in their tastes, they are too indolent to acquire even the
means of gratifying their most powerful cravings. Their pride is
satisfied with the recollection of former glories; their lust looks
forward to the enjoyments of paradise, crowded, as they believe, with
celestial creatures devoted to the delight of their senses. Immersed
in an atmosphere of epicurean speculation, the Turk whom poverty does
not compel to labour for his bread passes the day in lounging on
cushions, smoking, sipping coffee, winking with half-closed eyes on
the landscape, dreamily indifferent to all external objects. Even the
poor indulge in this idleness. They measure out the amount of labour
sufficient to keep them from want, and spend the rest of their lives
drowsily awaiting the sensual bliss promised them by their prophet in
heaven. During this lethargy passions more violent than are known to
Europeans sleep in their breasts, and when these are excited, the Turk
cannot be surpassed for brutal fury. All his ideas are gross. He is
able to imagine no authority not armed with whip or sword. Moral power
is to him an incomprehensible idea. It is, perhaps, for this reason
that the Osmanlis have conquered so much, and possessed so little
talent for governing what they acquired.
This notice of the Turkish character is necessary, because it
corresponds exactly with their estimation of the female sex. The person
alone is loved. Intellect in a Turkish woman is a quality rarely
developed, because never prized. It is no part of her education to
learn to read or write. To adorn herself, to dress in charming attire,
to beautify her face, to perfume her hair, and soften her limbs in the
bath or with fine ointments, is the object to which she applies her
mind; and when, thus decorated, she lounges on a pile of cushions in
the full splendour of her costume, her delight is some spectacle which
will stimulate her passions and intoxicate her with excitement. Turkey
is thus the empire of the senses.
Polygamy, authorized by the Prophet’s code, is not now so frequently
resorted to as formerly. It is growing into disrepute, and the female
sex, upon which the laws relating to property have conferred much
independence, are generally averse to it. Men marrying wives equal in
rank to themselves frequently engage in their first marriage contract
not to form a second, and the breach of this agreement is viewed as
a profligate abuse of manners. The practice of polygamy was once,
however, very prevalent among the higher orders, and contributed much
to corrupt as well as to diminish the population. In the families of
those Mohammedans who indulge in a plurality of wives, the children
are fewer than in those of the Greeks, Armenians, and Jews, to whom
polygamy is not permitted.
The offspring of married women, also, in the middle ranks of life is
more numerous than in the wealthier harems. Indeed, the sex in Turkey
is naturally prolific; but the growth of the nation has been checked
by this among other causes. To account for the origin of the practice
in Turkey many ingenious theories have been framed. It appears easy,
however, to find its origin. The men are naturally sensual, and have
never been accustomed to respect the female sex. When, therefore,
an individual’s wealth allowed him, he naturally made use of it to
multiply the sources of that animal enjoyment, dearer to him than
any other earthly pleasure. Some have supposed that polygamy was
necessitated by the numerical disparity of the sexes; but this does not
seem the case. In those cities and towns where the women are in greater
numbers than the men, we find that they are purchased in large numbers
from the neighbouring villages or in the markets, to furnish the harems
of the opulent.
The social code of Turkey requires a woman to preserve herself in
strict seclusion. The privacy of her apartments is so great that,
unless on very rare occasions, no male is allowed to enter them except
the master of the house. There are only certain days of the year in
which a brother, an uncle, or a father-in-law can be admitted, or on
festive occasions, such as a birthday or ceremony of circumcision.
The usages of the country do not even permit a man to see his wife
before marriage. In this respect the Turks are more jealous than their
written law, for the Prophet advised his friend to obtain a glimpse of
the woman whom he designed to receive into his bed. She may gratify
her curiosity by seeing him, but such an occurrence is not frequent.
This severe separation of the sexes has given employment to a class of
professional matchmakers, who, as in China, make considerable profits
by their calling, and often gain money under fraudulent pretences. The
beauty and temper of the woman are exaggerated to the man, who, on
the other hand, is described to the lady as possessed of every heroic
qualification. They are mutually deceived; they rush into a marriage,
and perhaps in a few days a divorce is required. Children of three or
four years are sometimes betrothed, and married when they are fourteen.
This interference of the parents leads often to evil results, for the
youth, who is forced to accept his father’s choice, sometimes hates his
bride before he sees her, and resolves to take a concubine as soon as
circumstances permit.
Each family deputes an agent to promote the satisfactory settlement of
the transaction, while the girl herself, under her cloudy veil, sits
in her harem to await her fate. To expose her face to a strange man’s
gaze would be regarded as a species of prostitution. Her fortune is,
therefore, decided for her. The terms of the contract are laid down in
a document, which is signed by witnesses, and the woman is then called
“a wife by writing.” This is concluded some days before the actual
rite of wedding; but the whole interval is occupied with ceremonies,
rejoicing, and liberal displays of hospitality. A man in Constantinople
usually reckons on spending a year’s income on the occasion of his
marriage. The average of this, in the middle ranks, is from 2000 to
2500 piastres.
On the appointed day the union, which is a mere civil contract, though
blessed by religious rites, is concluded. The bridegroom is conducted
by an Imaum, or priest, to the entrance of the bride’s chamber, and
there a prayer is uttered, to which all his friends make response. He
is then left alone, standing outside the door. He knocks three times. A
slave-maid admits him, going out herself to fetch a table with a tray
of viands. While she is gone the husband endeavours to uncover his
wife’s face, in which, after the usual coy resistance prescribed by
custom, he, of course, succeeds. Meanwhile the damsel returns, and they
eat together. The meal is very quickly dispatched, and a bridal couch
is spread on the floor. Then the bride is taken into a neighbouring
room, where she is undressed by her mother and her friends, after which
the newly-married pair are left alone. Among the most popular stories
connected with Ottoman manners, is that of the sultan throwing his
handkerchief to the woman he chooses as the companion of his pillow,
and the imitation of this practice by great men in their harems. This,
however, is a fanciful invention, repeated by some travellers who
desired the world to suppose they were intimate with the secrets of
the seraglio. When the sultan chooses any one of his women to pass the
night with, he sends an eunuch with a present to inform her of the
intended honour. She is taken to a bath, perfumed, attired in beautiful
garments, and then placed in bed. The story of her creeping in at the
foot of the couch is also a fable. The first chosen is the chief in
rank.
The first of these fanciful accounts was probably suggested by a
custom still practised among some of the Bosnian communities in western
Turkey, where manners are more simple than in the eastern provinces.
The young Muslim girls are there permitted to walk about in the
daytime with uncovered faces. A man inclined to matrimony who happens
to be pleased with the appearance of one of these maidens throws an
embroidered handkerchief, or some part of his dress, over her head
or neck. She then returns to her home, considers herself betrothed,
and never again exposes her features in public. This is the usual
preliminary to marriage; but it is probable that the lover has more
than one look at his mistress before he makes the sign.
Even the sultan’s concubines are purchased slaves, since no free
Turkish woman can occupy that position. Occasionally he gives one away
to a favourite pasha, who looks with pride upon the acquisition, and
glories in the refuse of a palace. Little girls, about seven years of
age, are much prized as slaves, and are often sold for upwards of a
hundred guineas.
Life in the harems of Constantinople is similar to that in those of
Cairo. It is a round of sensual enjoyment, in which vanity is almost
the only relief to the grosser appetites of humanity. The bath is the
favourite place of resort. Lady Wortley Montague has left a celebrated
description of one of these palaces of indolence. The ladies, perfectly
naked, walked up and down, or reclined in various attitudes on heaps of
cushions, attended by pretty slaves, who handed them coffee or sherbet.
They delighted in the voluptuous movements of the female dancers,
of which the public class in Turkey, as in Egypt, is composed of
prostitutes. It struck them with surprise and disappointment that Lady
Mary did not take off her clothes as they did; but she showed them how
she was cased up in her stays, so that she could not strip, which they
imagined was an ingenious device of her jealous husband.
The morals of the Turkish women in general are described by most
writers as very loose. The veils which were invented to preserve their
virtue, favour their intrigues to dispose of it. The most watchful
husband may pass his wife in the street without knowing her. Thus they
live in perpetual masquerade. The places of assignment are usually
at Jews’ shops, where they meet their paramours, though very seldom
letting them know who they are. “You may easily imagine,” said Lady
Montague, “the number of faithful wives to be very small in a country
where they have nothing to fear from a lover’s indiscretion.” This
may be taken, however, as an exaggerated view, for her ladyship was
accustomed to breathe the impure moral atmosphere of courts, and cared
little for the character of her sex in any part of the world.
The wife in Turkey holds this check upon the caprice of her
husband--her property belongs to herself, and if she be divorced she
may take it away. The widow, also, is inviolable in her harem, not only
against private intrusion, but against the officers of the law. If a
woman’s husband neglect her, that is, if he fail to visit her once a
week, she may sue for a separation, which may be easily effected before
a Kadi. If she commit adultery, he may also sue; but if the divorce
takes place by mutual consent no formality whatever is required. As in
Egypt, a man may marry a woman twice after divorcing her; but the third
time he must not take her again, until she has been had and put away by
another person.
Women, in Turkey, regard as an object more pitiable than any other
the childless wife. With them to be barren after marriage is viewed
as more disgraceful than with us to be fruitful before. All sorts of
quackeries are resorted to by them to prolong and increase their powers
of child-bearing, so that many kill themselves by the dangerous devices
they employ. It is common to see a woman who has borne thirteen or
fourteen children; some in the middle ranks bear from 25 to 30. They
pray for the birth of twins, and are usually good mothers, though some
have expressed themselves indifferent whether all their children lived
or half of them were swept off by the plague. The single instance
of superior refinement observable in Egypt is also remarkable here.
Midwives only attend the bed of child-birth. There are no accoucheurs.
Female practitioners also cure diseases; though an European physician
is sometimes admitted to feel a pulse or even to see a patient’s face.
Among the humbler classes the condition of the women resembles very
nearly that of our own country. Their morality is generally superior to
that of those wealthier inmates of the harems whose indolence seduces
them into vice.
The dancing girls of the public class of Turkey resemble, in all
respects, those of Egypt. They are prostitutes by profession; but they
do not appear to be so numerous in that country as formerly. Their
performances, however, are prized by all classes, and they dance
as lasciviously in the harem before women, as in the Kiosk before a
party of convivial men. Those who perform in public indulge in every
obscenity, and vie with each other in their indecent exhibitions. Their
costume is exceedingly rich both in colour and in material. Frequenting
the coffee-houses by day, they pick up companions, whom they entertain
with songs, or tales, or caresses until nightfall, when preliminary
orgies take place, and they disperse, with their patrons, to houses
in various parts of the city, generally in the more narrow, tortuous,
and remote streets. The outsides of these habitations are usually
of a forbidding, cheerless, dirty aspect, but the interior of those
belonging to the wealthier chiefs of the dancing girls are fitted up
with every appurtenance of luxury.
One of the most extraordinary features in the social institutions of
Turkey is the temporary union, or marriage of convenience, which is
adopted by many. It is, indeed, strictly speaking, simple prostitution.
A man going on a journey, and leaving his wife behind, arrives in
a strange city, where he desires to make some stay. He immediately
bargains for a girl to live with him while he remains in the
neighbourhood; a regular agreement is drawn up, and he supports her,
and pays her friends, while he has her in his possession. The Moolahs
declare this to be one valuable privilege of the male sex in Turkey;
but the engagement does not appear to be valid before the law, if
contracted expressly as a temporary union. But this is not necessary.
The facility of divorce renders all such precaution useless. The man,
therefore, takes the girl, nominally as his wife, but virtually as
his mistress, until he is tired of her, or wishes to depart, when she
returns to her friends and waits the occasion of a new engagement.
Such is, in outline, the social system of Turkey with reference to the
female sex[81].
OF PROSTITUTION IN CIRCASSIA.
A peculiar interest attaches to the nation inhabiting that isthmus,
with its stupendous mountains, which forms the natural barrier between
Asia and Europe; and is, perhaps, still the least known region in the
ancient world. The Western Caucasus comprehends an immense district
commencing at the middle Kuban, and terminating with Georgia. It is
peopled by various tribes, claiming a common descent, and governed by
princes, elders, and nobles. The Circassians are a brave and civilized,
hospitable and courteous, race, resembling the ancient Swiss; and they
present a singular system of manners varying considerably with the
different tribes.
There is a race, known as the Abassians, which is considered the
aboriginal nation of the Caucasus,--described by Strabo as a predatory
people,--pirates at sea, robbers on land; characteristics which they
have to this day preserved. They are, however, in other respects,
virtuous, dwelling in fixed habitations, strangers to the worst vices
of civilized life, and humble in their desires. Their religion, a
compound of Judaism, Christianity, and Islamism, permits polygamy;
but, as a wife is expensive, they are usually contented with one, who
is more the companion than the menial of her husband. The women are
exceedingly industrious; employing themselves in a variety of pursuits,
and tasking themselves far more than is essentially necessary in order
to procure ornamental clothes. To reward them for this they are allowed
full liberty, are free in their social intercourse, and, if they wear
a veil, wear it only to screen their complexions from the sun. Their
costume is highly elegant, and their state is indicated by the colour
of their trowsers--white being that for the virgin, red for the wife,
and blue for the widow.
The laws these people have made to protect their own morals, have,
in some degree, answered their purpose. Illegitimate children have
no claim to a share of the patrimony, and can legally claim no
relationship with any one. Should they be sold as slaves there is no
one bound to ransom; should they be assassinated there is no relative
expected to avenge their death. Nevertheless the inherent kindness of
the Abassians mitigates the effect of these harsh laws. Illegitimate
children are rarely treated ill, and their legitimate brothers often
make with them a voluntary partition of property.
But when a man marries a barren woman, he is allowed to take a
concubine, whose children inherit no disability on this account.
When a man dies, be his rank what it may, the social law confers on his
wife the superintendence of the household, and she administers the
property without division until her death, when it is divided among
the sons. Should any of the daughters remain unmarried, their eldest
brother is bound to support them until a suitor appears, when he may
make as good a bargain as he can.
Severe laws have been enacted against immorality. The man detected in
illicit intercourse with a married or unmarried woman is tried before
the elders of the community, who rarely fail to punish him, either by
a fine or by perpetual banishment. The dishonoured wife is returned to
her parents, as well as the girl, and sold as a slave. The dowry which
her husband had given for her is returned to him. If the guilt have
happened in the family of a prince, it can only be washed out by the
blood of one, if not both, of the criminals. So bitter, indeed, is the
shame which such an occurrence brings upon a house, that they who have
been so disgraced often retire to some desolate part of the Caucasus,
there to hide themselves from the obloquy which ever afterwards
attaches to their name.
When a man desires to divorce his wife, he must declare before a
council of elders the reasons for such a step; and if these be not
perfectly satisfactory he is obliged to pay the parents of the women a
sufficient amount to recompense them for the burden thus thrown upon
their hands. Should the woman, however, marry again before two years
have expired, this sum is returned. Frequently a maiden having formed
some romantic attachment, and hating the man chosen as her husband by
her parents, flies alone into the woods, and hides until her friends
proclaim themselves willing to concede her desires. Occasionally, also,
two warriors select the same girl to marry, and in this case a duel is
fought--sometimes with fire-arms--the victor carrying off the prize.
Similar laws and usages prevail among the Circassians, except that
the wealthier men among them seclude their wives, and are altogether
more Turkish in their manners. On the whole, however, the patriarchal
institutions of this singular and romantic people are admirable for
the effect they produce, since the Circassians and Abassians are
exceedingly pure in their morality.
Among the Circassians themselves, with the exception of the prouder
nobles, women are not secluded. The wives and daughters of a house are
often introduced to the traveller, and unmarried girls are frequently
seen at public assemblies. One singular custom, however, is observed,
which is that the husband never appears abroad with his wife, and
scarcely ever sees her during the day. This is not from neglect or
scorn, but in accordance with ancient habits, and a desire to prolong
the first sentiments with which the bridegroom approaches his bride.
All Circassian women wear, until they are married, a tight corset of
leather, which makes their complexion sallow, and hurts the figure,
as all unnatural compression does. The consequence is, that the young
wives are infinitely more beautiful than the maidens; and the charms of
the women of this race are celebrated throughout the world. The reason
assigned for this strange custom is, that it is shameful for a virgin
to have a full bosom. When a girl has been chosen and purchased, her
future husband comes to the house, places her on horseback, gallops
away, and conveys her home. Then, when all the people are supposed
to be asleep, the bridegroom first unlooses the abominable ligatures
which confine the bosom of his bride. He does not, until some time has
passed, live with her openly.
An idea prevails among the vulgar in Europe, that the Circassians
sell their daughters as slaves to any Turk or Persian who may desire
to buy them. This is not correct. They are particularly careful as to
the position and birth of the individual who desires to intermarry
with them, and the sale is no more than takes place among their own
people, as well as among all the nations inhabiting the Caucasus.
Great precautions are taken to secure the happiness of the girls, and
long negotiations frequently produce no bargain. It is true that in
the bazaars of Constantinople, and the principal towns of Asia Minor
and Persia, numerous girls are sold under the name of Circassians, but
they are mostly Abassians, or the children of Circassian peasants, or
children ravished from the neighbouring Cossacks, or slaves procured
from those base Circassian traders who have given in their adhesion to
Russia. Many of the girls, being trained to such ideas from childhood,
prefer the Turkish harem to the life they follow among their native
hills. Some come back after having obtained their liberty, and bring
accounts, in the most fluent language, of the voluptuous joys they
have indulged in in their luxurious prisons; but generally the race is
dearly attached to its freedom.
Throughout the Caucasus we have found a high scale of manners.
Prostitution, as a profession, is unknown. In one of the simple
tribes, still under patriarchal rule, a girl who took up such a calling
would be so shunned and abhorred by the rest of her countrywomen, that
she would speedily be compelled to fly beyond the bounds of their
territory, that is, if she escaped being sold as a slave or put to
death by her indignant friends. The parental authority, more moral
than legal, is a great check upon profligacy, since a man of whatever
age, if he have a father living, pays obedience to him, and fears to
incur his reproof. It is therefore delightful to point out a country
surrounded by gross and profligate nations, where simplicity of manners
still prevails, and where the female sex is as happy and as highly
esteemed as it is modest, chaste, and virtuous[82].
OF PROSTITUTION AMONG THE TARTAR RACES.
The immense region of Central Asia, little known and seldom visited,
has been the cradle of great nations, which have exercised a mighty
influence on the fortunes of the world, and may again become
conspicuous in history. It is, therefore, interesting, as well as
important, to inquire into the characteristics of the populations
which still cling to its soil. They are divided under many names, and
among the most remarkable are the hordes of Kirghiz Kazaks, who wander
between the borders of the Caspian Sea on the west, and the fortified
line which forms the southern frontier of the Russian Empire. On
the east it is divided by a similar chain of posts from the Chinese
dominions, but towards the south the limits of their wanderings are
unknown. Over this vast steppe a various climate prevails; but the
whole is particularly marked by extremes of heat and cold, while the
soil is composed of alternate deserts of sand and pasture, where rain
during the greater part of the year is exceedingly scanty. A short
and delicious spring, a burning and dry summer, a short and miserable
autumn, which speedily darkens into a long, bitter, and gloomy
winter--such are the influences to which these hordes are subject.
Forests, patches of green, salt lakes, springs and rivers of fresh
water, a few rich valleys, and some rocky hills, vary the aspect of
the wilderness which is their home; but generally it is a blank and
monotonous waste. All these circumstances are enumerated, as they
may be supposed to have formed, or at least to have modified, the
character of the Kirghiz Kazaks. They are divided into three principal
hordes--the Great, the Lesser, and the Little--amounting altogether to
from 2,000,000 to 2,400,000 souls. Engaged perpetually in wandering
from place to place, they have nevertheless certain spots, belonging
by prescriptive rights to particular tribes, where they encamp for the
coldest months of the winter. Their manners afford a faithful picture
of the ancient patriarchal life, not, indeed, the poetical life of
Arcadia and the pastures of Israel, but that of the Scythians, as
represented by Herodotus, or the Bedouins in their original simplicity.
Forming a nation of shepherds, they appear to live only on and for
their flocks, accustoming themselves little to the use of arms, and,
though perpetually on horseback, seldom engaging in the chase. They
dwell in huts or temporary habitations of strong wickerwork, covered
in with fleeces; and in the interior of these singular habitations
much comfort, elegance, and even sumptuous luxury may often be found.
Nevertheless they are a robust, hardy race, possessing very indistinct
ideas of property, and, though addicted to sensual enjoyments, long
lived, and seldom visited by epidemic diseases, except when the
small-pox is brought among them from Siberia.
Their manners with respect to the character and treatment of the female
sex are simple, but, in comparison with other pastoral races, somewhat
coarse. In costume the woman differs little from the man. Both men and
women adorn themselves with ornaments of silver, gold, or coral, or
even pearls and other gems, and in this reciprocal display of vanity
we discover a token of equality between the sexes. It is difficult to
ascertain the religion of these hordes, but it is apparently a crude
mixture of Mohammedanism and Paganism. The Muslims have attempted to
disseminate their doctrines widely, but few of the Prophet’s laws
have been accepted so readily as that which allows a plurality of
wives--which the Kirghiz indulge in whenever they can afford the amount
to be paid for a bride according to the usages of their nation.
The Kirghiz are immoderately addicted to voluptuous pleasures, and are
extremely idle. It is curious to remark, however, that while the men
are distinguished by their indolence, the women are fond of exertion,
occupying themselves, as much from inclination as from necessity,
with the affairs of the household, with attendance on the flocks, and
with the manufacture of garments. Their recompense is to be treated
as servitors by masters who are sometimes proud and harsh; but the
labour of the women is not compulsory, nor are they shut up in harems,
or forbidden to mix with the other sex. The seclusion of females,
indeed, is not a custom. Their manner of living exposes them to every
temptation; jealousy has little power to watch, and the wife’s virtue
is, for the most part, left to guard itself.
Though, as we have said, the Kirghiz, when they are rich enough,
eagerly avail themselves of the privilege of polygamy, few possess
wealth enough to enable them to marry more than one wife. This
circumstance prevents them from indulging in that pride which impels a
man to shut up the partner of his pillow from every eye but his own.
They who have seraglios must follow a steady and uniform course of
life. The Tartar’s tent offers few obstacles to curiosity or intrigue.
Turks and Persians who keep a harem usually possess slaves also, whose
labour permits their mistresses to lounge idly on silken cushions;
but as the Kirghiz loves to be indolent, he is constrained to let his
wife be as active as she pleases, and is never so happy as when she
saves him the trouble of moving from his couch, by going everywhere
and doing everything herself. But on horseback he is proud of motion,
which accounts partly for the migratory habits of the hordes, though
the nature of their country is the chief cause of their nomade manner
of life. Women consequently enjoy their liberty, and to their love of
industry they join a goodness of heart and a warmth of affection which
extort praises from many travellers.
The great check upon polygamy is, as we have noticed, the cost of the
_Kalyms_, which is to be paid for every woman. This price varies in
amount, from five or six sheep, and occasionally less among the poor,
to 200 or 500 or even 1000 horses among the rich. To these are added
different household effects, with, on rare occasions, a few slaves,
male or female. Out of these payments a considerable share goes to the
Mohammedan Moolahs who frequent the steppes, and who are attracted
thither no less by their profitable occupation of marrying the people
than by religious zeal. The Kalym increases with the number of wives.
The second costs more than the first, and the third than the second,
and so forth, which enables none but a very wealthy man to keep a
harem. The khan of the Little Horde, who was lord over nearly 1,000,000
men, had sixteen or seventeen wives, besides fifteen concubines, whose
offspring, however, were all on an equality. This patriarch had 42 sons
and about 34 daughters. Young men usually take their first wife not
according to their own choice, but under their father’s direction. As
to girls they are always under their parents’ control, and many are
affianced during infancy.
The first arrangement made when a marriage is in contemplation is to
fix the amount of the _kalym_, and the date on which it is to be paid.
These preliminaries concluded, the Moolah consecrates the transaction
by asking three times of the parents of the bride and those of the
bridegroom, “Do you consent to the union of your children?” and
reading prayers for the happiness of the married couple. Witnesses and
arbitrators are then chosen, who may decide future disputes, should
any such arise, and the nuptials are terminated by a feast and various
kinds of merry-making. The man then begins to pay a kalym, or else his
father does this on his behalf; and the parents of the girl occupy
themselves with getting ready a trousseau for their daughter--among
the articles of which it is essentially requisite to include the tent
which the bride is to occupy when she is finally delivered over to her
husband. While the kalym remains unpaid the marriage is suspended;
though the bridegroom may pay visits to the maiden he has chosen, and
even live with her, provided he engages not to take away her chastity.
Among some tribes these preliminary meetings are conducted with much
ceremony; in all they are often the first interviews which the husband
has with the woman who is to be his wife. When once, however, a part
of the required amount is paid, neither can retract without disgrace.
Ruptures, indeed, rarely, if ever, take place; partly because no young
girl dare to assert a will of her own, and partly because the man does
not care to rebel against a union which he is free to break when he
desires.
Frequently, however, the bride and bridegroom, during their preliminary
visits, anticipate the final nuptial ceremony; in which case this is
usually hastened, though the whole amount of kalym may not have been
paid. They are led, richly clothed if possible, into a tent, where
various rites are performed. The husband then departs, but immediately
comes again on horseback and demands his wife. Her parents refuse to
yield her, when he enters, bears her off by force, places her across
his saddle, and gallops away to his tent, which during many hours after
is sacred against all intruders. This custom, however, is not universal.
If a man finds his wife not to be a virgin, he may disgrace her, send
her home, and demand from her father the restitution of the kalym, or
one of his other daughters who happens to be chaste, without payment.
As every woman brings with her dowry a new tent, so each wife, when
a man has more than one, dwells in a separate habitation. The first
is styled the “rich wife,” and exercises superior authority over all
the rest. Though she may have disgusted her husband, he is bound to
distinguish her by respect; while the others, entirely equal among
themselves, remain always in a certain dependence on her. Prudent
husbands divide even the flocks belonging to the different women, that
the children of each may justly inherit her property. The chief wife
may quit her husband, if she can show any grave cause for separation,
and return to her parents, but the others have not that privilege.
The manners of the Kirghiz women are in general simple and courteous;
and the conduct of the men towards them, though often rude, gross, and
contemptuous, is frequently also polite and deferential. The love songs
of the desert are some of them exceedingly poetical; and the pictures
drawn by Tartar improvisatori of their mistresses are full of passion
and adulation.
A man may kill his wife if he find her actually committing adultery,
but not otherwise. A fine is the usual punishment of the adulterer;
while the woman may be divorced, or chastised in various ways.
Generally the morals of the Kirghiz Kazaks are good. Chastity in their
women is highly prized--its loss entailing disgrace; but as numbers of
the men are extremely sensual, many prostitutes may usually be found
in each camp, though not so many as some appear to imagine. They live
usually in companies, resembling the class of suttlers in European
armies; though some of superior fortune inhabit separate tents, and
live in ease and plenty.
Among the Nogay Tartars, who are also nomades, the custom prevails of
a man serving his father-in-law for a certain number of years. With
them the weaker is absolutely the property of the stronger sex, and
all contracts are transactions of sale. The father sells his daughter,
the brother his sister, and girls are considered part of an inheritance
as much as flocks and herds, and are equally divided among the sons.
The value of a woman is measured in cows; five being the cost of an
inferior, and thirty of a superior one. The man, however, though
obliged to buy, is not allowed to sell his wife. If she transgress
beyond his patience he turns her out of the dwelling, and she returns
to her parents, who seldom fail to receive her kindly. Divorce is
permitted, but is so costly that few resort to it. When a wife leaves
her husband against his consent he may demand her back; but if she
meanwhile commit adultery or theft, her parents must restore the kalym
which was originally paid for her, and she becomes so infamous that
only the poorest man will buy her.
The rich are polygamists; and as the sexes are about equal in point of
numbers, many of the poor cannot get a wife of any kind. The woman is
not allowed to eat with her husband; and if she expect paradise, it
is with the understanding that she is to dwell there as a servitor.
Marriages are not fruitful, and the population is regularly decreasing.
The Russians have introduced into the country certain virulent
diseases, which aid rapidly to thin the people, who themselves have
lost much in morality. Wherever they have large encampments, and settle
for the winter, numbers of prostitutes spring up among them, not
indeed entirely addicted and altogether destined to that calling, but
employing it as a means of gain, and living on its wages for a shorter
or a longer period.
Prostitution, which is unknown among the pastoral tribes of Arabia,
is, in fact, very prevalent among some of the shepherd communities
inhabiting the Tartar steppes. There are two classes of women who
betake themselves to it--widows and divorced women--who, having no
independent means of subsistence, hire out their persons under a sort
of necessity, and linger through a miserable remnant of life, in dirt,
rags, and contempt; and a few who addict themselves to prostitution
simply under the impulse of a profligate disposition. On the whole,
however, the morality of Tartars is of a superior character[83].
OF THE MIXED NORTHERN NATIONS.
INTRODUCTORY.
Pursuing our inquiries among the northern races, to the very extreme
of Polar cold, we discover many interesting peculiarities. Perhaps,
however, the most important result of our research is the establishment
of the fact, that the popular idea is in great measure erroneous,
of hot countries having the most licentious population. Climate,
indeed, may by fine degrees influence the temperament of men; but the
conspicuous truth evolved from all our investigations has been that the
manners of nations are regulated by their moral education, and not by
the thermometer.
In Egypt, India, Persia, and the other hot regions of the African and
Asiatic continents, there prevails a voluptuous spirit; but in Russia,
in Siberia, among the Greenlanders, and the tribes of the snowy deserts
in the utmost north, equal sensuality is to be discovered. In the warm
and happy plains of Arabia, in the sultry champagnes of various parts
of the East, we find shepherd communities with manners most pure and
simple, and we find the same among many roving nations in the cold of
Tartary and Siberia. The languor and indolence engendered by a fervent
climate may, indeed, induce a thirst for exciting pleasure; but the
rigour and inclemency of the north appear equally to dispose men to
take refuge in sensual gratification. Ispahan was never more licentious
than St. Petersburgh 50 years ago; nor are the debauchees in the
burning atmosphere of Africa more gross and indiscriminate in their
pursuit of animal delights than many tribes of Esquimaux, buried though
they be among the frosts of an eternal winter.
Thus climate appears to exert, at least, far less influence than
is popularly imagined. The horrible orgies of the Areois, in the
voluptuous islands of the Pacific, were rivalled and surpassed by
the Physical Societies of Moscow; nor are the revels of Southern
India more profligate than those enacted among the snowy solitudes of
Siberia. Indeed, among the Hindus, we have never found perpetrated,
even by the lowest class, depravities more vile than those we have
discovered among tribes in Kamschatka and other parts of the Arctic
regions.
One circumstance, however, appears to be undeniable. The temperament
of Asiatics is more easily inflamed than that of northern races. Their
mind is more active, their fancy more busy, their imagination more
creative. They give even to their vices a picturesque colour, quality,
and configuration, whereas the voluptuaries of cold countries are dull
and drowsy sensualists, without a tinge of poetry in their composition.
For this reason the ardent passions of the East have been celebrated
in romance and history, while the slothful sensuality of the North has
been neglected and forgotten. The world consequently has heard much of
the one, and little or nothing of the other; and in course of time,
by a very natural process, has imagined that the burning climates of
Asia represent the passions of its inhabitants, while the snows of the
opposite regions of Polar cold are characteristic of their purity and
freedom from the dross of vice.
This idea, which we confess we once shared with the rest of the
public, has been dissipated in our minds by the inquiries we have
made. The sensuality of the East is more striking, more conspicuous,
more celebrated, because it has been dressed by history and fable in
more attractive forms, while that of the North is forgotten, because
it has presented no theme for declamation or romance. But the people
of the one resemble very much the people of the other; and even in
the South, among the old and decaying nations of Europe, the same
truth is discovered. Spain and Italy are supposed to be the cradles of
voluptuous sentiment; but history shows how they have, in the manners
of their people, passed from gradation to gradation, from variety to
variety, while their climate has remained perpetually the same. Nature
alters in nothing, but civilization is in continual change; and Rome,
which was the sanctuary of female virtue in the heroic times of the
Republic, is now, like Babylon, a city where adultery is licensed, and
profligacy has the encouragement of the law.
Manners in Russia appear also to have passed through a considerable
change since the days of the Empress Catherine. When it becomes
civilized, it will, probably, improve still further. Its manners are
now gross and profligate in the extreme, which in servile populations
is invariably the case; but they have undergone considerable
ameliorations since the close of the last century. In the neighbouring
and kindred regions of Siberia, alterations appear only in those
parts where a congregation of tribes has taken place, and the ruder
are giving way to the more refined forms of society. Throughout the
North, indeed, as much variety appears as in the East, and communities
dwelling under the same temperature, present a perfect contrast in
their morals and customs.
In Finland a very extraordinary state of manners still prevails. A
recent traveller affords a curious illustration of this, showing how
the ideas of decency in various countries are modified by habit. He
went to a bath, and when conducted into a private chamber, found to his
astonishment a tall handsome girl ready to attend him. She exhibited
the utmost coolness and indifference, stripped off all his clothes,
and rubbed him with herbs from head to foot as though he had been
a mere log of wood, bathed him, laid him on his face, scourged him
with a bundle of twigs, until he broke out into copious perspiration,
dried him with towels, and all the while appeared utterly unconscious
that her task was inconsistent with modesty or decent manners. In
many parts of the North it is customary, as in some places in the
East, and in the heroic ages in Greece, for the maidens of the house
to attend a guest to his bedchamber, and assist in disposing him in
comfort for the night. These practices do not in all countries, and at
all times, illustrate the same national characteristics. They belong
on the contrary to two extremes of social development. They indicate
either a perfect simplicity or a total corruption of manners. It was
genuine purity of mind and unsuspecting innocence of character that is
represented in the virgin who attended Ulysses to the bath; but it was
the vilest sensuality and brutality of manners that allowed the Roman
Emperor of later days to be bathed and dressed by women.
Consequently in passing from the semi-civilized nations, through the
races of the North, to the educated communities of Christendom, we
proceed without the theory of measuring a country’s manners by its
geographical position. If it be civilized, it will be moral; but
civilization is a false name when it is applied to a corrupt and
enervated society. Art and luxury are not its highest evidences; but
virtue and obedience to the exalted maxims of ethical philosophy.
OF PROSTITUTION IN RUSSIA.
Russia, included by courtesy among civilized states, retains strong
traces of its original barbarism. Resembling China in its system of
government, it resembles it also in manners. What is admirable in its
social characteristics arises from the natural good qualities of the
people, who, notwithstanding a despotism which has wanted no feature to
degrade them, please the traveller by a display of many signs of good
disposition.
Russia resembles Asia in the indolence and apathy of its population.
In the one region nations appear to have been enervated by heat, in
the other benumbed by cold into a torpid submission to power. This is
evident from the state of public manners. In Russia the inquiry is not
what is essentially wrong, but what is wrong according to the police;
and nothing else is condemned. Abject towards their rulers, they assume
towards others the arrogance of slaves, so that a succession of tyrants
may be said to exist from the emperor who tramples down sixty millions,
to the peasant who oppresses his serving-boy.
No more striking proof could be mentioned of the fact that the
condition and character of women form an infallible measure of
civilization, than the state of the sex in Russia. It is true that
our knowledge is very incomplete. Most travellers who have written on
that country complain how difficult it is to describe it well, and
they have generally verified their remark; still we learn enough from
various authorities to enable us to judge in a general way of its
characteristics.
Among the higher classes women affect and study a polish and refinement
of manners, but this relates chiefly to the formalities of life. They
dare not, under their own social code, make an inelegant salutation,
transgress a point of etiquette, ride in an unfashionable equipage, or
converse in a vulgar tone; but they may break the most sacred moral
laws, may speak openly of indecent subjects, and may act and talk in a
way which a modest English lady would blush to think of. The position
they hold in society is in accordance with this view. Formerly marriage
was little more than a bond between master and slave; but the relation
has been, in that respect, improved. Women are to a certain degree
independent, but it is the independence of neglect. They lead, in a
word, a life very nearly resembling that of fashionable persons in our
own metropolis, but their morals are not to be compared.
Little need be said of the marriage contract in Russia, since it is
under the laws of the Christian church. It is, however, necessary to
mention that few engagements occur between persons mutually united by
affection. Interest is the usual tie; and frequently a girl is taken
to the altar, where her appointed husband stands before her, all but
an utter stranger. The ceremony is so theatrical that it wears no
solemnity whatever. It is a drawing-room scene, directed by priests;
so that the very seal of matrimony is of such a kind as to impress the
woman with no idea of a holy union. The wives of the Russian nobles
have accordingly little reputation for fidelity to their husbands;
a characteristic observed by Clarke, long ago, as he travelled, and
confirmed by Mr. Thompson, who wrote a year or two since, as well
as by many other writers. Immorality and intrigue are of universal
prevalence, from the palace to the private house. In a social sense
they are scarcely looked upon as offences. The husband and wife, united
by a bond, not of affection but of policy, look on each other from
the first with coldness and indifference. Gradually each withdraws in
a separate circle of life, and at length one looks without much care
upon the guilt of the other. Before marriage the sexes are divided by
etiquette, after marriage by mutual repulsion. The women, inferior in
personal attractions, but superior in manner and acquirements to the
men, receive from them little respect; and thus society, poisoned in
its very springs, becomes yearly more dissolute and melancholy.
None will require to be reminded that numerous exceptions occur; that
pure and strong family attachments exist in Russia; that young persons
marry sometimes influenced by reciprocal feelings of affection; but
from the accounts of all the writers we know who have described Russia,
no other picture of its society could fairly be drawn. There is in that
state licence for every crime which does not offend the government; and
the more the nation is absorbed in its sensual enjoyments, the less
will it be disposed to weary of servitude.
Among the peasantry sensuality is equally prevalent. They generally
marry very young, but it is by no means essential that the bride should
be a virgin. On the contrary, numbers of women never marry until they
have had an intrigue with some other lover.
St. Petersburgh, it is said, is a city of men, there being, in a
population of about 500,000, 100,000 more males than females. The
native Russians are less handsome and sooner faded than the women of
Germany, Finland, Livonia, Esthonia, and Courland--countries which
supply the state with prostitutes. Such are the manners of the city
that no woman may walk out unless accompanied by a man, not even on the
great promenades, in the broad light of day.
In ten years, from 1821 to 1831, the deaths in St. Petersburgh were
61,616, being 24,229 more than the births; and during the same period
there were 11,429 marriages. The native Russian women are remarkable
for the ease with which they bring forth children, while the foreigners
in that country are precisely the reverse. Of the former, 15 in 1000;
and of the latter, 25 is the average of those who die in childbed. The
average of 20 years gives 6 still-born infants out of every 1000.
The foundling hospitals of Russia, magnificent as they are, cannot but
be regarded as a premium upon immorality. Those of St. Petersburgh
alone cost from 600,000,000 to 700,000,000 of rubles annually;
supporting from 25,000 to 30,000 children, who are received at the rate
of 7000 or 8000 a year. They are called “houses of education,” because
a prejudice attaches to their proper name. They are not, however,
intended for infants who are picked up in the streets. There is never
a case of such exposure. Women who have children of which they desire
to be rid, bring them usually in the twilight, and they are taken in
without any questions being asked. No one can tell whether they are
legitimate or illegitimate--whether the offspring of poverty, adultery,
or prostitution. In cases where fear or shame might in other countries
induce a woman to murder or abandon her child, the mothers bring them
to the hospital, and impenetrable obscurity remains over the previous
part of the transaction. It is questionable whether the crimes thus
prevented would make up an amount of evil equal to that caused by the
profligacy to which the licence of impunity and encouragement is thus
afforded.
Violence committed on a woman, married or single, is, in Russia,
punishable by the knout; but this is almost the only check which the
law, written or social, imposes on immorality. It is said that judges
sometimes compound with a female criminal who happens to possess
beauty, and pardon her at the price of her virtue.
When a French writer, many years ago, astonished the civilized
countries of Europe by the description of a private institution in
Russia known as the Physical Club, his report was rejected by the
majority of persons as one of those travellers’ tales which had
their origin in a man’s impudence or credulity. Lyall, however, made
extensive inquiries upon the subject, and found that there did actually
exist at Moscow a society called the Physical Club, the object of which
exhibited, perhaps, more depravity of manners than could be found in
any other part of the world, except among the Areois of the Pacific.
This club was originated by eight men and women of high rank, who
agreed to hold common intercourse with each other, and for that purpose
established a society. Its members all belonged to the nobility, and
they sought to exclude all but beautiful women with the bloom of youth
still upon them. Admittance was very difficult to be procured. A person
before being initiated was sworn to secrecy, so that the names of the
members remained unknown.
At stated intervals the members of the club assembled at a large
house, where, in a magnificent saloon, brilliantly lighted up, they
indulged in every kind of licentious amusements, inflaming themselves
with strong potations, and preparing for the hideous orgies which
were to follow. Suddenly all the candles were put out, each man chose
a companion, and a scene of indescribable debauch ensued. On other
occasions tickets were drawn by lot, and the company paired off to
bedchambers prepared for this libidinous festival. This horrible
institution, transferring its pestilential influence through every
circle of society in Moscow, was abolished by Catherine the Second,
who hated to see the reflection of her own vices--for it is matter of
history that she was a vulgar prostitute herself.
Of the prostitute system in Russia our accounts are the most scanty
possible. They exist in large numbers in every city and almost in
every village; and a traveller remarks that they have the character of
demanding to be paid beforehand, and refusing afterwards to remain with
their companion. They do not form so distinct and conspicuous a class
as in some countries, for the virtue of married women and young girls
in the various ranks of life is not so inaccessible as to distinguish
the professional prostitute so broadly from the other classes, as in
a society whose manners are less corrupt. They are, in the cities,
under the perpetual surveillance of the police. In the rural districts
numbers of young women, belonging to the village populations, addict
themselves to prostitution for gain--some permanently, others only
until they have a chance of marriage.
There is apparently no check upon this calling, unless the women become
afflicted by disease. When this is discovered the prostitute is forced
to discontinue for awhile her dissolute course of life, and remain in
a hospital until cured. When, as very frequently happens, the wife
of a soldier takes to this occupation, and becomes tainted, she is
delivered to her husband, who is obliged to sign a bond, engaging for
the future to restrain her from profligacy. The wives of serfs are also
delivered up to their husbands, who must pay the expenses of their cure
at the hospitals. If they refuse to do this, and to answer for the
future conduct of their partners, the women are sent, without further
ceremony, to Siberia.
Another peculiarity in the civilization of Russia is exhibited in
the market of wives, which is annually held in St. Petersburgh. It
is one of those things which many persons exercise their philosophy
by refusing to believe; but its existence is undoubted. It is still
practised, even among the upper orders, while among the humbler classes
it is extremely popular. Every year, on the twenty-sixth day of May,
numbers of young women assemble in a particular part of the City
Summer Garden, where they are exhibited in a formal “_bride_-show.”
Decked with an Oriental profusion of ornaments, all the marriageable
girls are arranged in lines along the shady alleys, while some friends
and professional match-makers stand in attendance on each group. The
men who are inclined to matrimony visit the garden, pass along the
rows of maidens, inspect them leisurely, enter into conversation,
and, if pleased, enter into a preliminary, but conditional, contract.
Numerous matches are thus formed; but very frequently the engagement
here concluded, has long, between the youthful couple, been a matter
of contemplation. Those who do not possess sufficient beauty or
fascination are sometimes loaded with the signs of property to induce
men to take them. A mother once, desiring to match her daughter to
a man of substance, hung about her neck a massive chain of gold, to
which was attached six dozen silver-gilt tea-spoons, and three dozen
table-spoons, besides two heavy punch-ladles of the same metal, which
soon attracted the attention of the young men. In the towns, indeed,
we are told that marriages among all classes are generally settled
by interest. In the rural parts this is also the case, but in a less
degree. There it is the custom--among the peasantry--for the bride
and bridegroom to enter the church door side by side, which they take
care to do with the utmost regularity, since the superstitious idea
prevails, that the one who plants a foot first inside the threshold of
the edifice, will be supreme over the other, and become a tyrant in the
family. The serfs cannot marry without the consent of their masters.
In all parts of Russia the marriage of a felon is dissolved by the
sentence which condemns him; but if he be pardoned before his wife has
married again, he can recover her.
It will, from this account, be seen that the manners and morals of the
Russians are dissolute in an extraordinary degree. There is, perhaps,
no part of Europe where the people, as a race, are so profligate.
This does not imply that the society of St. Petersburgh or Moscow is
not distinguished by many virtuous families; but, on the whole, all
travellers concur in showing the facts upon which we have based our
estimate of the national character with respect to morality[84].
OF PROSTITUTION IN SIBERIA.
From Russia the transition is natural to the contiguous and kindred
region of Siberia. Thence we may, without any apology, extend our
inquiries to the remotest north--for the Arctic countries do not
present themselves with sufficient prominence to occupy a separate
account, and to none could they be added as a supplement more fitly
than to the snowy wilderness which spreads on one side to the shores
of the Frozen Sea, and on the other to the frontiers of the Chinese
Empire. It may appear anomalous to include any of these tracts under
the head of civilized countries; but we place them as an appendage of
Russia, to which, indeed, they form an appropriate companion.
The state of manners at which the population of these snowy tracts
have arrived is extremely low. Nature has taught them many rude
arts; but their civilization has not advanced far beyond its crudest
elements. The severe rigours to which they are exposed have produced
pressing wants, which they have ingenuity enough to satisfy, and
further than this their education does not appear to go. They are rude,
ignorant, and gross. Some remain with none but the faintest idea of
a Deity; others preserve the ancient heathen belief of the Shamans;
others have accepted a form of Christianity; but in few of them has a
variation in their religious ideas resulted in a change of manners. In
fact, the form, and not the spirit of our creed has been introduced
among them.
Throughout the immense tracts of Siberia we find numerous tribes, and
even nations, classed under various denominations; but all, in their
general manners, very much resembling each other. The condition and
character of the female sex among them is low; but it is not treated
with that harshness or contumely which it experiences in some savage
races. Although the rude Ostyak, for instance, considers his wife as
no more than a domestic drudge, seldom thinks of giving her a cordial
word, and loads her with tasks, he does not use her with positive
severity. Among the Samoyedes, women are much less happy and more
harshly treated. In the perpetual migrations of the tribes they are
charged with the principal burdens, and drag after the men like a train
of slaves. The wife is viewed as a necessary but almost disgusting
appendage to a man’s household. She is regarded as unclean under
many circumstances--especially childbirth, after which her husband
will not approach her for two months. When about to be delivered she
experiences, instead of the kind, considerate usage which some, even of
the wildest savages pay to their women in such situations, a scorn and
indignity to which, by long custom, she has thoroughly learned to bend.
In many parts of Siberia, however, a better prospect is presented,
and the sexes appear more on an equality. Towards the centre, away
from the sea on one hand, and Russia on the other, the tribes enjoy
a very independent existence, being, indeed, the most free among
the subjects of the Czar. In the winter time, when the rivers are
completely frozen, the young girls assemble on their snowy borders,
taking care to deck themselves out with every sort of finery they can
procure. Their friends also congregate, forming groups, gossip, and
enjoy themselves, while the youths mix with the maidens--each selecting
the partner he likes the best. It is at this time of the year that the
principal matches are arranged. In all parts it is customary to pay a
certain amount to the girl’s parents to buy the privilege of marrying
her. Should a man not be rich enough to offer the sum required, he
hires himself to her father, who tasks him sometimes very heavily, and
continues in servitude for three, five, seven, or ten years, according
to the agreement made beforehand. At the end of that period he takes
his bride, is redeemed from his servile condition, and enters the
family with all the dignities and rights of a son-in-law.
Among the Ostyaks it is regarded as very disgraceful to marry a
brother’s widow, a mother-in-law, or, indeed, any person connected
in an ascending or descending line with the wife; but it is reckoned
honourable to marry several sisters. The sister of a deceased wife is
considered a particular acquisition, and, indeed, is attended with
a solid advantage, for a man taking the second daughter of a house
pays to her father a sum only equal to half of that which he paid for
the first. No one can marry a person of the same family name; but
this seems to apply to men alone, for a woman under this description
who enters another household, and bears a daughter, may bestow her
upon her brother. In a word, every union is lawful provided the
father of the bridegroom and the father of the bride are of different
families--though custom makes other distinctions, which are generally
observed with as much strictness as those marked by the traditionary
law.
When an Ostyak desires to marry he selects from among his companions or
relatives a mediator. He then goes with a train of friends, as numerous
as his influence enables him to collect, and stands before the door of
the house in which the girl whom he has fixed upon resides. Her father
easily guesses, on the arrival of such a cavalcade, what the object of
it is, and consequently asks no questions, but invites the company in
and welcomes them with a feast. Then, retiring with the mediator into
another hut, he enters into a negotiation about the amount which he is
to receive for his daughter. These things are quietly arranged, though
the spirit of bargaining is generally active on both sides. It is not
necessary to pay down the whole amount at once, but this must be done
before the nuptials can take place. Sometimes, however, a man snatches
away his bride before he has fully discharged his debt. In that case
her father waits for an opportunity to seize her, carries her home, and
keeps her in pledge until the amount be faithfully paid.
Similar customs prevail among the Samoyedes, who are polygamists,
though they prefer the changing one wife for another, according to
the changes in their inclination, to having two or three at once. The
Tungueses, however, often keep as many as five, but even among them
the majority of men marry no more than one at a time. They enter into
matrimony at a very early age. It is common to see a husband fifteen
years old, and a wife, or even a widow, of twelve. There is with them
no feast or ceremony of any kind. The bargain is made and ratified, and
the young couple proceed forthwith to their nuptial couch.
The Bulwattes, who are also polygamists, treat their women well.
Among them one curious observance is,--that the consummation of every
marriage must take place in a newly-built hut, where, as they say, no
impure things can have been. This is, at any rate, a poetical and a
somewhat refined idea. Certain feasts are essential before the union is
contracted.
The Tchoutkas, beyond Nigri Kolinsk, have been baptized in large
numbers. Their Christianity, however, does not incline them to remove
polygamy, for they have in most cases a plurality of wives, whom
they marry for a certain period--long or short, as circumstances may
determine. It sometimes happens in one of these households that the
wife obtains sufficient ascendancy over her husband to bind him to her,
and a convention, intended from the first to be only temporary, becomes
permanent. The woman who accomplishes this achievement is honoured
by the rest of her sex, and is thenceforward supreme in the family.
Generally speaking the women of this tribe are more happy and free than
in any other part of Siberia.
Among the Tschuwasses it is customary on the occasion of a betrothal
to offer a sacrifice of bread and honey to the sun, that he may look
down with favour on the union. On the appointed day, while the guests
are assembling, the bride hides herself behind a screen. Then she walks
round the room three times, followed by a train of virgins bearing
honey and bread. The bridegroom entering, snatches over her veil,
kisses her, and exchanges rings. She then distributes refreshments to
her friends, who salute her as “the betrothed girl,” after which she is
led behind the screen to put on a matron’s cap. One of the concluding
rites performed is that of the bride pulling off her new husband’s
boots--a ceremony to symbolise her promise of obedience to him. When,
however, he on his part takes the cap from her head, she is divorced,
and goes home to her parents.
Still more degrading is the custom of the Tchemerisses. A man,
representing the girl’s father, presents to her husband a whip, which
he is allowed freely to use. There is only one occasion during the year
when men permit their wives to eat with them. The Morduans betroth
their children while very young; but the youth does not know his bride
until he marries her. She is then brought to him, placed on a mat,
and consigned to his charge with these words, “Here, wolf, take thy
lamb.” Still more singular is the custom of the Wotyahe tribes. With
them it is usual for the young wife, a few days after the wedding, to
go back to her father’s house, resume her virgin costume, and remain
sometimes during a whole year. At the end of that period the husband
goes to fetch her, when she feigns reluctance, and exhibits every sign
of bashfulness and modesty. The women of this community are habitually
chaste and decorous in their behaviour.
The usual occupations of the men in Siberia are hunting, fishing,
smoking, drinking, and bartering with the Russian traders. Those of the
women are far more numerous and wearisome. They build the huts, they
tend the cattle, they prepare the sledges, they harness the reindeer
when their husbands are away, and drive them also occasionally; they
weave mats, baskets, and cloth; they dye worsted for embroidery; they
tan hides, make garments, cook the food, and, in some tribes, assist in
catching fish. While they perform these varied and harassing offices
without a murmur, as they usually do, their life is one of peace; but
if they repine they are sure to be harshly reproved, if not severely
punished. In some communities the husband is permitted the free use of
his whip; but in others, as that of the Ostyaks, a husband dare not
flog his wife without the consent of her father, and on account of some
grievous fault. If he does she has the privilege of flying home, when
her dowry must be restored, and she has her liberty complete.
Jealousy is a sentiment little known among the Ostyaks, or, indeed,
any of the Siberian races. Sometimes the women wear veils, but not
with that strictness observable with some nations, and more to save
their eyes from the effect of the snow glare than from any other
motive. Modesty, indeed, is by no means one of their characteristics.
Nor is chastity very highly prized. When a Samoyede woman is about to
be delivered, she is obliged to confess, in presence of her husband
and a midwife, whether she has engaged in any criminal intrigue. If
she tell an untruth, the national superstition is that death will
assail her amid the pangs of childbirth. Should she declare herself
guilty, the husband contents himself with going to the person whom her
confession has accused, and exacting from him a small fine by way of
compensation--for having, “without permission,” carried on intercourse
with a stranger’s wife.
The barbarous manners of Siberia do not allow us, indeed, to expect
any refined modesty among its women. Wrangell was introduced into the
family of a rich and influential man--the head of a tribe. Within a
low-roofed but spacious habitation he found five or six women--wives
and daughters, of various ages, all completely naked. They roared with
laughter when their visitor entered, and appeared excessively amused at
being discovered in that condition. The dancing women of these tribes
wear clothing while they display their skill, but otherwise they are
as indecent as possible. Obscene and degrading postures, indeed, make
up the chief merit of their performances. A late traveller, hearing
of these dancers, desired some women to perform, but they appeared so
modest, bashful, and diffident, that he feared to urge them. However,
after considerable solicitation they consented, when he was disgusted
at seeing them fling themselves with marvellous rapidity into a hundred
disgraceful attitudes.
Infanticide is not practised in Siberia, except on those children who
are born with deformities. These are, it is said, invariably destroyed.
There is, in fact, little inducement to the crime, for the whole region
is but scantily peopled, and marriages are not at all prolific.
The morals of the Siberian races are universally low. A licentious
intercourse is carried on between the sexes long before marriage,
early as this takes place. In the great city of Yehaterinbourgh,
where religious dissensions are extremely bitter, profligacy is still
more powerful; and women, from sheer lust, prostitute themselves
to men of all sects, with whom, however, they would rigidly refuse
to eat or drink. In all the towns numbers of prostitutes reside.
They are scarcely, if at all, reprobated by the other classes of
the population, and the young men who do not wish to marry, or
cannot afford to procure a wife, as well as widowers, resort to them
continually. The process, in fact, which educates a Siberian prostitute
to her calling, appears to be this. A young girl, in a community where
general licentiousness of manners prevails, is brought up from her
mother’s breast with the most loose ideas. She is not taught to prize
her chastity, though told that marriage is the destiny to which she
must look, and warned that her husband will require her to be faithful
to him. Meanwhile, however, there is little in her own mind, or in the
care of her friends, to protect her virtue. She forms acquaintances,
and is seduced, first by one, and then by another, until her profligacy
becomes so flagrant and so public that no one will purchase her as
a wife. Accordingly she follows as a means of livelihood that which
she has hitherto resorted to only as a means of indulging her vicious
appetite. Thousands of prostitutes are thus made, especially amid the
crowded communities. In some of the small wandering tribes, the women
are comparatively chaste; but on the whole the refined sentiments of
virtue are unknown, and prostitution extremely prevalent. This appears
strange to those who are accustomed to believe that a warm climate is
essential to form a sensual race. It seems, on the contrary, that one
extreme of temperature is accompanied with influences as demoralising
as another, for it is certain that nations dwelling in the temperate
zone are more moderate in their passions, and more abstemious in the
gratification of them.
For the races inhabiting the Arctic regions, the Esquimaux may be taken
as a proper type. As a race, they are dirty, poor, and immoral, but
not so grovelling as the tribes of Western Africa. Though their ideas
of beauty and grace are totally at variance with ours, it is wrong to
suppose that they have none, for the Esquimaux woman, who tattooes her
skin to charm a lover, exhibits undeniably one of those characteristics
in human nature which allow opportunities to civilize individuals and
nations. They are an ingenious industrious people, understanding well
how to make use of those conveniences and appliances of life which have
been placed by nature at their disposal; and they who make themselves
comfortable and happy in the coldest and most desolate parts of the
earth, must possess a certain amount of that genius which, properly
developed, flourishes in civilization.
The estimation in which women are held among the Esquimaux is
somewhat greater than is usual among savages. They are by no means
abject drudges, those cares only being assigned to them which are
purely domestic, and which are apportioned to the females among the
humbler classes in all European countries. The wife makes and tends
the fire, cooks the food, watches the children, is sempstress to the
whole family, and orders all the household arrangements, while her
husband is labouring abroad for her subsistence. When a journey is
to be performed, they, it is true, bear a considerable share of the
burdens, but not more than among many of the poor fishing populations
of civilized countries in Europe, in some of which the man’s occupation
ceases when his boat touches the shore. It is a division of labour, not
so much imposed as shared, and the toil is not by any means hateful to
them. During the stationary residence in the winter, the life led by
the women is in fact one of ease, indolence, and pleasure, for they sit
at home, cross-legged on their couches, almost all the day, enjoying
themselves as they please, with a fire to warm the habitation, which it
is a pleasant task to attend.
The Esquimaux women are not very prolific, few bearing more than three
or four children. They generally suckle them themselves, but it is not
uncommon for one woman to nurse at her breast the infant of another who
may be closely occupied at the time. They are more desirous of bearing
male than female offspring, for parents look to their sons in old age
as a means of support.
The Esquimaux are permitted by their social and hereditary law to have
two wives, but the custom is by no means general. Parry describes a
tribe of 219--69 being men, 77 women, and the rest children--among
whom there were only twelve men who had two wives, while a few were
doubly betrothed. Two instances occurred of a father and son being
married to sisters. Children are usually plighted during infancy--that
is, from three to seven years of age, and the boy sometimes plays with
his future bride, calling her wife. When a man has two wives, there is
usually a difference of six or seven years between their ages, and the
senior being mistress, takes her station by the principal fire, which
she entirely superintends. Her position is in every respect one of
superiority; but this is seldom asserted, as the two generally live in
the most perfect harmony. The marriage contract has nothing of a sacred
character about it, being merely a social arrangement which may be with
great facility dissolved. A man can without any ceremony repudiate
his wife, to punish her for a real or supposed offence, but this is
rarely done. The husband, who is usually older by many years than his
partner, chastises her himself when she irritates him, though caring
comparatively little for her fidelity. Absolute in his authority,
according to the laws of the Esquimaux, he is sometimes, nevertheless,
ruled by the women. Usually, however, he upholds his prerogative, and
punishes any infringement of it in a very summary manner; but the
utmost harshness commonly employed is to make the delinquent lead her
master’s reindeer while he rides comfortably in his sledge. Women are
very careful of their husbands, partly no doubt from natural sentiments
of affection, but partly also, we may believe, from knowledge of the
fact that widows are not half so happy as wives, being dirty and
ragged, unless they have friends willing to support them, or sufficient
attractions to enable them to gain a livelihood by regular prostitution.
Respecting the virtue of the Esquimaux women and the morality of
the men, little of a favourable nature is to be said. Husbands have
continually offered their wives to strangers for a knife or a jacket.
Some of the young men told Parry, that when two of them were about to
be absent for any length of time on whaling expeditions, they often
exchanged wives as a matter of temporary convenience; instances of
which have been noticed by the voyager--in some cases merely because
one woman was pregnant and unable to bear the hardship of a journey.
The same writer affirms that in no country is prostitution carried to
a greater length. The behaviour of most of the women while the men
are absent, causes a total disregard of connubial fidelity. Their
departure, in fact, is usually a signal to cast aside all restraint,
and, as the last excess of profligacy, children are sent out by
their mothers to keep watch lest the husband should return while his
habitation is occupied by a stranger[85].
ICELAND AND GREENLAND.
Iceland and Greenland, differing in their people, their fortunes and
their civilization, may, nevertheless, be classed together, for both
belong geographically to the western world, while both present intimate
relations with Europe. Iceland, a lonely, gloomy, and extensive
country, is inhabited by a serious, humble, and quiet people, numbering
about 55,000. Isolated from the rest of the world by dreary and
tempestuous seas spreading far around it on every side, its inhabitants
remain to this day almost in their primitive condition. Nine centuries
have produced little change in their language, costume, or modes of
life. Formerly, indeed, they were heathens, and have now been converted
to Christianity. Modifications have also occurred in their manners. At
one period, for instance, the law allowed the exposure of such children
as their parents desired to be rid of, and the unnatural sacrifice
was common. It originated with the men, and the women appear never to
have become reconciled with the usage, which has now been entirely
abolished, though infants perish in large numbers from insufficient
and unskilful nursing. On the whole, however, the original manners
of the Icelanders remain unchanged. We refer, of course, to a period
since what has been termed the heroic age, when a system of society
prevailed, which has been entirely swept away by a new and victorious
civilization. In those ancient times, when Iceland was a republic, with
institutions of a most remarkable nature, the treatment of the female
sex there, and among the Scandinavian nations generally, was unequalled
by any other heathen communities, except the polished state of Greece.
Polygamy, though not forbidden by their religious code, was exceedingly
rare. Their manners, indeed, are, in several other respects, superior
to their enacted laws. Fathers, or other near male relatives, possessed
unlimited power to dispose of the young girls as best suited their
convenience or caprice, but seldom or ever exercised this invidious
prerogative, leaving them rather to their own choice. With mild advice,
indeed, they persuaded them to prudent unions, but with no harsh,
inconsiderate authority. The daughter received, on her marriage, a
dowry from her parents besides a present from her husband. These
acquisitions formed a property which remained absolutely her own, and
constituted her provision in the event of a divorce. This could take
place whenever she chose to express before certain prescribed witnesses
her desire for such separation. A harsh word, any ill-usage, or a hasty
blow, might be pleaded as sufficient reason for her resolve; and by
a liberal use of this prerogative the wives of Iceland obtained high
authority over their husbands. They occasionally accompanied them to
the public assemblies, which were convened in conformity with their
popular institutions, and were always present at the great festivals.
Sometimes they assembled in rooms assigned exclusively to them, and
made merry among themselves; sometimes they mingled with the general
company. With the exception of a few, whom the fearful superstition of
that age condemned to death as witches, no women suffered very severe
punishment. The warriors of the island delighted to celebrate their
praises, and terms expressing the high qualities of the female sex
were abundant in the Icelandic language, and profusely employed in its
literature. At present the condition of the sexes is somewhat equal.
The men of the humbler classes divide their labours with the women,
but do not oppress them with any of the taskmaster’s tyranny. Both are
alike filthy and coarse in their habits. Among the wealthy, as well
as in the middle orders, it is customary for ladies to wait at table
when strangers are present; but this is considered as an employment by
no means menial. The hospitality of the Icelanders, indeed, assumes
some very singular forms. Their women often salute the stranger with
a cordial embrace, from which on account of their uncleanliness he is
generally desirous to escape as quickly as possible. When Henderson,
the missionary, resided there, he visited, during his travels, the
house of a respectable man, where he was liberally treated. At night,
when he retired to his bedroom, the eldest daughter of the family
attended him, and assisted him to undress by pulling off his stockings
and pantaloons. He was unwilling to accept such services, to which he
was wholly unaccustomed; but she imputed his refusal to politeness,
and insisted on performing the office, declaring it was the invariable
custom of her country. It is the task of the women, almost always, to
unloose the sandals or latchets of their husband’s shoes.
The intercourse of the sexes in Iceland is regulated by few absolute
laws; but Christianity has abolished polygamy, while public opinion
holds a strong check upon illicit communication. With the exception
of those seaport populations, which have been corrupted by an influx
of Danes and other foreigners, generally of disreputable character,
they are, as a nation, moral. These exceptions contribute very
considerably to the number of bastard children. In 1801, the population
was 46,607--21,476 males and 25,131 females, or in the proportion of
thirteen to fifteen of men to women. The average marriages during a
period of ten years, were 250, or one out of 188 of the population; the
births 1350, or one in 35, and the deaths 1250. One child out of nine
was illegitimate. In 1821 one out of seven was illegitimate, and in
1833 the proportion remained the same. Men usually marry between the
ages of 25 and 32, women between those of nineteen and 30.
If, however, we give credit to a scandalous anecdote related by Lord
Kames, in his “Sketches of Man,” we must impute to the Icelanders, of a
century and a half ago, a very profligate disposition. In 1707, it is
said, a contagious distemper having cut off nearly all the people, the
King of Denmark fell on an ingenious device to repeople the country.
He caused a law to be promulgated that every young woman in Iceland
might bear as many as six illegitimate children without injuring her
reputation; but, says the gossipping philosopher, the young women
were so zealous to repeople the country, that after a few years it
was found necessary to abrogate the law. Little dependance is to be
placed on such stories, though the number of illegitimate children
born does certainly contradict the panegyrics on the pure morality
of the Icelanders, in which some writers are fond of indulging.
About one person in seven is married; but it is the custom among the
poor for persons of both sexes to sleep promiscuously in small close
cabins, which cannot but corrupt their manners. In the fishing towns,
especially, where numerous foreigners have congregated, there are many
prostitutes, who usually gain only part of their livelihood by that
profession. What their numbers are it is impossible to tell; but it
seems that the crews of the fishing-vessels, as well as the traders who
frequent the ports from time to time, generally resort to the company
of prostitutes, who present themselves in any numbers that may be
required.
Extending our observations to the remote and desolate coast of
Greenland, we find a population partly composed of European colonists
and partly of Esquimaux, who have, however, a system of manners not
identical with that of the tribes we have already noticed. They are a
vain and indolent, but not a very sensual, people. What virtue they
possess consists rather in the negation of active vice, than in any
positive good qualities. Their women occupy an inferior, yet not a
degraded, position. They take charge, indeed, of all domestic concerns,
make clothes, tools and tents, build huts and canoes, prepare leather,
carry home the game, clean and dry the garments, and cook the food,
while their husbands catch seals; but the men often assist their wives
in these occupations. Marriage is essentially a contract for mutual
convenience, to be dissolved when it ceases to be agreeable to both.
The woman looks out for a skilful hunter, the man for an industrious
housewife. She brings him little dowry, possessing usually no more than
a kettle, a lamp, some needles, a knife, and a few clothes. Parents
seldom interfere with the matches of their children. It is considered
proper for a girl, when a man comes to request her in marriage, to
fly away and hide among the hills, whence she is dragged, with a show
of violence, by her suitor. He takes her home, and if her aversion be
real, she runs away again and again, until he is weary of pursuit.
Formerly, it was the custom to make incisions in the soles of a bride’s
feet, as some tribes in Siberia and Borneo are accustomed to do to
the captives, to prevent their escaping. When a woman is courted by a
man whom she detests, she cuts off her hair, which is a sign of great
horror and grief, and usually rids her of her suitor. Among the heathen
tribes polygamy is allowed, though seldom practised. Divorces sometimes
take place. All the man has to do is to assume a stern expression of
countenance, and quit the home for a few days without saying when he
intends to return. The woman takes the hint, packs up her few effects,
and goes with her children to the house of her parents or some friend.
Generally, however, they lead a reputable life, the women being docile,
and the men indulgent.
Considering themselves, as they do, the only civilised people in the
world, the Greenlanders feel a pride in observing the outward shows of
decorum. They do not allow marriages within three degrees of affinity.
It is not considered reputable for persons, though not related, who
have been educated in the same house, to marry. Sometimes a man takes
two sisters, or a mother and her daughter, but this is viewed with
general reprobation. The marriage contract is, on the whole, very
strictly observed, few divorces taking place, except between the young.
“The most detestable crime of polygamy,” as a Danish writer terms it,
produced, where it was practised, little of that jealousy which might
be expected among the wives, until the arrival of the missionaries, who
preached against it, and speedily won the female sex to support their
doctrine.
There was formerly in Greenland a society resembling very closely the
Physical Club of Moscow, but still more obscene in its practices.
This, however, has disappeared. Prostitution, nevertheless, prevails
to a considerable degree, widows and divorced women almost invariably
adopting it, as the only means of life, indeed, to which they can
resort. There are numerous habitations in the larger communities, which
can only be described as brothels; but the profession entails the worst
odium on those who follow it[86].
OF PROSTITUTION IN LAPLAND AND SWEDEN.
A notice of the Scandinavian populations would be incomplete, unless
we touched particularly on the Laplanders; especially as they contrast
very strongly with their neighbours the Swedes, notwithstanding that
these are far more inflated with the pride of civilization. Forming a
nomade race, known in their own region as Finns, they occupy a country
little favoured by the prodigality of nature. Nevertheless, where they
have settled into fixed communities, we find them adopting many forms
of luxury, polishing their manners, and pursuing wealth with eagerness.
But these scarcely belong to the body of the Laplanders, and it is
only necessary to say of them that they are a happy, virtuous people,
distinguished by the affection and harmony existing between men and
women.
The genuine Laplander, among his free rocks and snows, lives partly in
a tent, partly in a hut; but, whichever tenement he inhabits, he is
content with the most simple economy. During the summer he wanders, and
is equally industrious and frugal; during the winter he remains in one
place, enjoying the fruits of his labour in ease and idleness. This is
a peculiar mode of life, and has much influence on the manners of the
people; for, during their leisure months, they invent many pleasures,
few of which are indulged in by one sex apart from the other.
The Lapland families are generally small;--three or four children being
the largest number habitually seen; but what they do bring forth, the
women bring forth easily, scarcely ever requiring help, and speedily
leaving their couch to fulfil their usual tasks.
The general character of the Lapland race is good. From whatever cause
the circumstance proceeds, it is certain that their morals are strict
and virtuous. Few strong passions of any kind prevail among them, and
they are more especially distinguished by their continence.
The priest of a large parish assured one traveller that there had been
but one instance of an illegitimate birth during twenty years, and that
illicit intercourse between the sexes was almost unknown.
Old travellers have amused their readers with accounts of the conjugal
infidelity common in Lapland, and asserted that the men are in the
habit of offering their wives to strangers: this appears to be wholly
untrue. So far from truth is it, indeed, that adultery is a crime
almost unknown among them; they are, in fact, rather jealous than
otherwise of their women. The intercourse of the sexes, nevertheless,
is free and agreeable; their marriages are contracted, sometimes
according to the choice of the young people, sometimes by that of their
parents. Prostitution is unknown among them, except in the fishing
towns, where a few wretched women have taken to that mode of life; but,
on the whole, they are a chaste and virtuous race.
The great difference between the institutions of Norway and those of
Sweden consist in this--that in the former, manners influence the law;
while in the latter, law attempts to regulate every detail of public
manners.
Men, says the public law of Sweden, attain their majority at the age
of 21 years, but women remain in tutelage during the whole period of
their lives, unless the king grants a privilege of exemption: widows,
however, are excepted. Men cannot legally marry before the age of
21. Even to this rule there is an exception, for among the peasants
of the north it is lawful for a youth of eighteen to take a wife--a
device adopted to increase the population of those thinly-inhabited
provinces. Women may marry immediately after their confirmation,
which never takes place before fourteen. The nuptials are recognised
by law, and are celebrated in the presence of a priest, by the gift of
a ring. A man desiring to take his sister-in-law to wife, must have
permission from the king. A few years ago an ordinance was abolished
which required a similar formality to be gone through previous to the
marriage of cousins. A man may marry without the consent of any one;
but a woman must obtain the sanction of her parent or guardian. To
render binding the contract, which stipulates for the rights of each
with respect to property, it must be presented to the magistrates of
the place, and signed by the priest, before the celebration of the
wedding.
In default of such an agreement a division takes place, under rules
which differ in the country and in the town. In the former, two-thirds
of the property belong to the man, and one-third to the woman; in the
latter, half is apportioned to each.
Marriage, when fully consummated, is not indissoluble. Divorce may be
pronounced by the public tribunals of justice. First, for adultery on
the part of the husband or of the wife; second, on the condemnation of
one or the other, on account of a felonious crime, to loss of honour
and liberty for ten years; thirdly, in cases of insanity; fourthly, for
desertion, neglect, or the continued absence, without intelligence,
of husband or wife. When a married person complains of having been
abandoned, the magistrate fixes a certain interval during which the
other may make answer; a notice is inserted in the gazette and the
newspapers. If, at the expiration of this period, no reply is heard,
the divorce is pronounced. The length of absence necessary to justify
such a separation is left to the discretion of the judge. Fifthly,
when one person is palmed off for another; sixthly, for ill-treatment;
seventhly, for apostasy; eighthly, for incurable epilepsy. After
the sentence of the civil tribunal, the divorce is held good in an
ecclesiastical court.
A man is bound to support his natural children, and inquiries in cases
of affiliation are frequent. When a girl accuses a man before a public
tribunal, of being the father of her child, he may deny it upon oath,
when her allegation is dismissed, unless she can prove by witnesses,
or by any other evidence, that her claim is absolutely just. As such a
proof is difficult to obtain, there are abundance of false oaths made
at Stockholm. A girl sometimes accuses a peasant of being the parent
of her child, demanding, perhaps, a sum of money equal to a sovereign
of our coinage, by way of compensation. The man refuses to pay it, and
offers to swear that he is not the child’s father. The magistrate then
seeks by persuasion to induce him to confess the truth; but he persists
in his refusal until the woman modifies her claim. He continues all
the while to threaten her with the oath of repudiation, unless she
is contented with his offer. If she accepts a miserable trifle, he
acknowledges the debt; if not, he perjures himself, and the law allows
him to escape, though morally convinced, beyond all question, of his
profligacy and falsehood.
The illegitimate child has no claim on the property of its father, or
even on that of its mother; but if the parents marry, however short a
time before the child’s birth, it is saved from the stigma of bastardy.
A legitimate child cannot be disinherited by its parents, unless for
marrying against their consent, or being condemned for felony to a
heavy and disgraceful punishment.
Death is the penalty attached to infanticide, but is almost invariably
commuted to detention for a longer or shorter period, with hard labour
in prison. In 1832 the House of Correction for females in Stockholm,
which served for all Sweden, contained 290 women, of which 45 were
condemned to hard labour for life; of these, 30 had murdered their
children.
The punishments denounced against adultery endeavour to mark a
distinction between particular degrees of the crime. Incest and
bestiality are, however, punished only with a moderate fine. When a
married man indulges in guilty intercourse with a married woman, they
both suffer death by decapitation. When it is committed by a married
man with a girl betrothed and pregnant by her lover, he receives 120
blows with a stick, and she 90 lashes with a whip. Punishments of
this sort continually take place in a public square at Stockholm. At
present, in whipping the girls on their naked persons, care is taken
to protect their bosoms and their abdomens with plates of copper.
Formerly, however, when this precaution was not adopted, the lash
frequently lacerated the bosom and tore open the flesh, so as to
expose the bowels. When adultery is committed by a married man with an
affianced girl, or the reverse, a simple fine is exacted; in default
of which, imprisonment on bread and water, or a public flogging, is
inflicted. When one of the criminals only is married, and the other is
entirely free, an inferior money penalty is adjudged.
An unmarried woman becoming a mother pays to the church penance money,
to a certain amount. So also does every man: that is to say, the law
enacts it; but it is, perhaps, needless to add that the priests get, in
this respect, much less than is legally their due.
In 1836 prostitution was forbidden by law throughout Sweden. The public
woman, being convicted, was imprisoned in a house of correction,
until she had time to reclaim herself, and some one was willing to
take her into service. The same, indeed, was done to any poor woman,
whatever her character, who could not describe her occupation. Many
little girls, some not more than eleven years old, were confined as a
punishment for being without a regular avocation. Professional and open
prostitution being thus severally prohibited by the law, there were, at
that period, no regular brothels in Sweden; but the women of the lower
orders were so corrupt, that prostitution was as common as possible.
“Every servant girl,” says the advocate Angelot, who wrote in 1836,
“may be considered as a public prostitute, and every house of public
entertainment may be described as a brothel.”
So far the laws describe the manners of Sweden; that is, they indicate
the profligacy they are unable to cure. The country is, perhaps, one
of the most demoralized in Europe. During many years it continued to
decline in population, prosperity, and character; and if during the
last quarter of a century it has improved in these respects, it is
because the old system of institutions is gradually wearing away.
Superficial travellers, who gather their ideas of other countries by no
other light than that of the chandelier, and in no other society than
that of fops and flirts, describe Sweden as a paradise of good breeding
and elegance. Society is there often gay and lively, which satisfies
the inquiries of such tourists. The ladies of that nation also possess
many fascinations, with an apparent frankness and sincerity, which
never fail to please. The women of the humbler orders wear, in the
streets, the airs of modesty, and never shock the eye by exhibitions
of wantonness or indecency. The intercourse of the sexes is extremely
free; and therefore there are fewer signs of intrigue, because this is
not necessary; but to infer from such circumstances that Sweden is a
moral country, is to fall into a grievous error.
Sweden is immoral, and Stockholm is the most immoral place in Sweden.
For many years it absolutely decayed under the moral disease which
afflicted it. In 1830 it contained nearly 81,000 inhabitants; this
number decreased in a year or two to 77,000, and the deaths during a
period of ten years exceeded the births by an average of 895. Yet it is
in a healthy situation; the people are well lodged; everything, indeed,
is there to render it pure and salubrious; but the moral atmosphere is
tainted by a continual epidemic of depravity.
The whole nation numbers about 3,000,000; but it is in the capital that
the excess of profligacy is displayed. Three or four years ago the
proportion of illegitimate children was as one to two and three-tenths,
that is to say, one person out of every three was a bastard. Taking all
Sweden, we find the proportion of the ten years, from 1800 to 1810, was
one in sixteen; from 1810 to 1820, one in fourteen; from 1820 to 1830,
one in fourteen and six-tenths. It was thus the town population which
was to be charged with the immoral result of depravity. In Stockholm,
however, statistics could not fully exhibit the general demoralization.
Laing asserts his deliberate belief that the offspring of adultery and
children saved from illegitimacy by the late marriage of their parents
were there exceedingly numerous; and it is probable that the law
forbidding young men to marry before they were 21 years of age had, in
this respect, a very evil influence, as similar checks have undoubtedly
had in Norway.
In 1837 the government of Sweden, finding that to prohibit prostitution
was not to prevent it, and that the vice they sought to check increased
in spite of their efforts, ran, at one impulse, to a contrary extreme.
Formerly no public women were allowed, now they were created as a
class; formerly no brothels were permitted to be kept by private
individuals, now a huge brothel was instituted by the authorities. A
large hotel was hired, was fitted up for the purpose, and opened to
all the city. A number of unfortunate women were expected to inhabit
this licensed resort of infamy, and it speedily overflowed. A code
of regulations was framed for the government of the place; but the
barbarity of this discipline prevented the scheme from succeeding.
Prostitution, however, had been recognised by law. Therefore, though
the government brothel was abandoned, others were multiplied in its
place; and vice, which had rioted under a mask, appeared in her
proper form, among the citizens of Stockholm. Nevertheless, numbers
of the restaurants and houses of public entertainment still retain
their original character as the secret resorts of prostitutes and
their companions. One great cause of the immorality prevalent in
Stockholm was, that no woman who could afford to do otherwise, or had
any of the wretched pride of respectability, would suckle her own
child. Wet nurses, therefore, were in great request. Unmarried girls
were absolutely preferred, because the family was not troubled with
their husbands. Their own offspring were meanwhile transferred to
the foundling hospital, which remains another licence to immorality.
There are in Stockholm two of these institutions, where the children
are educated, on payment of a premium varying from five to ten pounds
sterling of English coinage. In 1819 there were born in Sweden 14,000
illegitimate children, being nearly a seventh of the births. M.
Alexandre Daumont says, that there was in Woesend, a canton of Finland,
a special law which, granting to women equal rights of property with
the men, improved the character of their morals. But no institutions
will improve the manners of a country like Sweden, until the national
sentiments are purified, for the example of the court and the nobility,
says Mr. Laing, have instructed the people so far, that it is only a
moral revolution which can reclaim them.
There is in Stockholm a separate hospital for the treatment of
syphilis. It received in one year 701 patients, 148 being from the
country and the rest from the city itself. In that year (1832) the
number of unmarried persons, of both sexes, above the age of fifteen,
was 33,581. Consequently, 1 person out of every 61 was afflicted by the
venereal disease.
The condition of women in Sweden is low in comparison with the other
countries of Europe, and offers a strong contrast with that which we
discover in Norway. Tasks are assigned among the humble orders to the
female sex against which true civilization would revolt. They carry
sacks, row boats, sift lime, and bear other heavy labours. Among the
middle classes they hold an inferior situation; but among the higher,
though little respected, they are comparatively free[87].
OF PROSTITUTION IN NORWAY.
Living under ancient laws and social arrangements distinct in their
principles no less than in their forms from those which discipline
society in the feudal countries of Europe, the people of Norway are
among the most singular and interesting in the world. Their peculiar
institutions, which never admitted of an hereditary nobility, have
distributed property among all, so that nowhere is there less poverty,
or more abundance of the necessaries of life. These circumstances have
exerted a powerful influence on the moral character of the Norwegians.
It is consequently important to inquire into their manners, since the
solution of many social problems may, by such an investigation, be
assisted.
There are in Norway two classes of checks upon the rapid increase
of population--one arising from their public economy, the other
artificial, and under the influence of law. In all countries where the
poor possess the land, provident marriages prevent the growth of a
pauper population, and this is the case in Norway. So far the results
produced are wholly beneficial; but here other restraints are imposed,
which, being somewhat extravagant, miss their object, and exert bad
effects on the moral tone of the community.
A marriage in Norway is an occasion, not only of long and formal
ceremonies, but of considerable expense. This circumstance has
two opposite tendencies on the character of the people. It is not
considered respectable to marry unless some grand display takes
place, with a liberal festival, the distribution of presents, a long
holiday, and other means of expenditure, which create a provident
spirit and prudent habit, which stimulate industry, and contribute to
the general happiness and prosperity. Spending on their wedding-day
what would support them during twelve months, many young couples do,
indeed, commit acts of injurious extravagance in emulation of their
neighbours; but in accumulating what they thus lavish, they have
acquired the custom of saving, the necessity for which puts off the
period of marriage. The Lutheran church also holds another strong check
upon improvident and ill-considered marriages. It compels all within
its communion to observe two separate ceremonies--one the betrothal,
the other the wedding. The first must precede the second by several
months at least, and generally does by one, two, three, or even four
or five years. This interposes a seasonable pause between the first
engagement, which may have sprung out of a temporary passion, and its
irrevocable ratification, which may be the prelude to a life of misery.
It has been calculated that the practical result of this interval
between the period when a girl becomes naturally, and that when she
becomes legally marriageable, checks the growth of the population by
four or five per cent. Maintained within just limits such social laws
are found to act beneficially, and tend in every way to improve the
condition, manners, habits, and morals of the people.
In Norway, however, they have been pushed beyond the frontiers of
moderation, and in many cases cause more evils than they cure. For it
is found impossible to put a bridle on human nature. Powerful impulses
attract the sexes to intercourse, and it frequently occurs that the
betrothed girl becomes a mother before she becomes a wife. Up among
the high districts of the interior, it is said that the peasant girl
rarely marries until she has borne a child. Throughout Norway, indeed,
the proportion of illegitimate to legitimate children is about one
to five, and in some parishes, where the restraint upon marriage is
greatest, the average lies far more towards the side of immorality.
In one of these districts, where there are no other obvious causes of
profligacy, such as the resort of shipping, the cantonment of troops,
the neighbourhood of a great manufactory, or any other of the usual
demoralizing influences, the proportion of illegitimate children is
nearly one to three.
This by no means implies, however, a profligate disposition in the
Norwegians--male or female. The woman who bears offspring by a lover is
almost invariably married to him afterwards; it is impatience of the
restraint put upon them by the law which impels them to this illicit
communication. The evils of illegitimacy are also, in a great measure,
counteracted by liberal and wise regulations. Subsequent marriage of
the parents removes the stigma of bastardy from their children. A man,
even, who feels inclined to marry another woman, when his first friend
has died or become indifferent to him, may legitimatize his former
children, by a particular legal instrument. This, in such cases, which
are rare, is commonly done, and all, consequently, share alike in their
father’s inheritance. Some neglect to perform this act of justice,
but instances seldom or never occur of a man leaving his offspring
desolate when he has any means or opportunity of providing for them,
which in Norway almost every person has. Women in Norway occupy a
position of superior honour. They have, perhaps, more to do with the
real business of life, and more share in those occupations which
require the exertion of intellect and study, than in England. They
enjoy less compliment, but more respect, which all the sensible members
of their sex would infinitely prefer. She, indeed, who provides for a
household, under the peculiar domestic arrangements of the country,
and presides over its economy, is held in high estimation. Women, in
fact, hold a very just position in the society of Norway, having that
influence and participation in its affairs which develope their mental
and cultivate their moral qualities. Yet it is far from true that they
occupy themselves entirely with the sober business, paying no attention
to the elegant arts of life. Many of them adorn themselves also in
those lighter accomplishments which gracefully amuse a leisure hour;
but they certainly do not exhaust on song or dance, or the embroidery
frame, the most valuable powers they possess. The able and observant
traveller, Laing, supplies a true picture of their character and
position, observing that among the wealthier merchants the state of the
female sex is less natural and less to be admired than among the humble
classes, which compose the general mass of society. Generally speaking,
therefore, women nowhere play a more important part in the affairs of
social life than in that remote and romantic part of Europe. Among the
poor the division of labour between the sexes is excellent: all the
indoor work is assigned to the women, all the outdoor labour to the men.
Travellers, among whom Mary Wolstonecroft is one, have nevertheless
complained direly of the situation women hold in Norway. One gentleman
condemns the national character, because the ladies in respectable
houses often wait at their own tables; but this is a national
peculiarity, hereditary among the Norwegians. It is a voluntary office;
no compulsion is used to impose this or any other task upon them. All
that we can infer from such a custom is, the dissimilarity of ideas on
points of propriety which prevail with different nations. The English
pity the women of Norway, because they sometimes wait at their own
tables; the Norwegians accuse the men in England of ill-breeding,
because they do not take off their hats whenever a female appears in
sight, and because they dismiss the ladies after dinner.
With respect to the actual morals of Norway, we may assign them
the highest rank. The number of illegitimate births can scarcely be
described, under the circumstances we have noticed, as indicating
an immoral disposition in the people. Nowhere is adultery less
frequent. The matrons are almost universally above suspicion, while
street-walking and professional prostitution are almost unknown.
The most profligate class of females appears to be the domestic
servants[88].
OF PROSTITUTION IN DENMARK.
In the laws of Denmark in 1834 the position of the sexes, the
regulations of the marriage contracts, and the restrictions on public
immorality were sought to be fixed, with every distinction of detail.
A man was declared under tutelage until the age of eighteen, and
under a modified authority until twenty-five, after which he attained
independence in all the acts of his life as a citizen. The woman was
declared to remain under tutelage all her life. Even the widow must
place herself under a guardian, without whose consent she can do
nothing; but this person she may choose herself. She may place herself
under the direction of one or many, and even distribute authority among
them, but is never allowed to assert an independent existence.
To contract marriage a man must be at least twenty years old, and the
woman not under sixteen. The system of legal and binding betrothments
was abandoned in 1799; but previous to that period the ceremony of
affiancing the bridegroom to the bride was important and almost as
absolute as the last ceremony itself.
To contract a legal marriage, it is essential that both persons shall
be free from the ties of any other legal engagements. Persons who are
related to each other in an ascending or descending line are prohibited
from marrying. Brother and sister, says the code, may not marry; but
brother-in-law and sister-in-law, uncle and niece, may. A man who
desires to marry his mother’s or father’s sister must obtain a special
permission from the government.
It is necessary before marriage to procure the consent of the parents
or guardians of both parties; but if they refuse, their refusal may be
complained of, and the judge, reproving them, may order the union to
take place in spite of their opposition. At twenty-five years of age
the man is released from this authority.
According to an ordonnance passed in 1734, promises of marriage may
be written or verbal; a promise of marriage by written agreement must
bear the handwriting, seal, and signature of him who makes it. It must
be certified by two witnesses, respectable men, before there is any
communication between the man and the woman. The verbal promise must
also be spoken aloud in the presence of two respectable men, before any
intercourse is allowed. Such engagements are binding, and the man who
breaks one may be prosecuted at law.
There are, however, certain descriptions of persons whom the law does
not allow to invoke the faith of such promises. Widows, who desire to
act against their guardians’ consent, and women of bad reputation, are
in this manner excluded. A servant cannot plead a promise of marriage
against her master, her master’s son, or any person dwelling in the
same house. A man may also repudiate, by a formal oath, the accusation
of a pregnant woman who pretends he has promised her marriage, and that
he is the father of the child she bears in her womb, unless she can
prove her allegation by sufficient testimony.
Divorce is permitted, and may be pronounced immediately when legal
cause is proved against one or other of a married pair. It may be
demanded in the case of simple abandonment during seven years, or
malicious intentional desertion for three years, in the case of
condemnation to perpetual hard labour, of impotence existing previously
to marriage, of the venereal disease contracted previously to marriage,
of insanity supervening upon marriage, and of adultery. Divorce may
also take place, without any judgment from the public tribunal, when
both parties equally desire it.
In this case, after the married persons have declared their intention,
they must be entirely separated in bed and at table during three years;
when, if they persevere in their desires, the separation is legally
complete. If, however, at the expiration of that period, one of them
refuse to abide by the agreement, the administrative college may order
it to be fulfilled, notwithstanding all such opposition. Lastly, the
king may always allow a divorce to take place, for any or no cause,
according to his royal pleasure.
Inquiries into the maternity or paternity of children are permitted.
If a girl accuses a man of having been the father of an infant to
her, he can only rebut the charge by taking a solemn oath that he had
intercourse with her at the period presumed to be the date of her
conception. She may then prove, if she can, by any means whatever, that
he is swearing falsely; but such evidence being difficult to complete,
so as to produce legal conviction, many individuals escape the burden
which justly attaches to them.
He who acknowledges or is proved the father of a natural child is
bound, until it attains its tenth year, to maintain it according to
his rank in life. Should he refuse to pay what he has promised, he may
be imprisoned on bread and water. Every twenty-four hours thus spent
acquit him of about half-a-crown of his liability.
Illegitimate children have no claim upon the inheritance of their
father’s property; but to that of their mother, or even of their
mother’s parents, they are absolutely entitled. A natural child may
be adopted or legitimatized by subsequent marriage, in which case it
loses all the disability which attached to its former condition. In
1831 the proportion of illegitimate children in Denmark was one in nine
and three-fifths. In Copenhagen, however, the frightful proportion was
exhibited of one to three and a half.
The law adjudges to the child killer death without mercy. She is
decapitated, and her head fixed upon a spike. The woman who does
not take proper precautions before the delivery of her offspring is
accounted guilty of infanticide should the infant die.
Notwithstanding the severity of the law infanticide is a very common
crime in Denmark, although it contains foundling hospitals, at least in
Copenhagen. Angelot saw in one of the prisons of that city a man, who,
after having flung his four children into the water, went immediately
before a magistrate, declaring that he could not provide them with
sustenance, and had consequently thought it better to send them to God.
Another of these murderers was a woman, who had cut the throats of two
of her children, and was engaged in attempting to kill the third, when
she was arrested. Superstition and misery, combined with the looseness
of morals in the capital of Denmark, were the chief causes of these
fearful crimes against nature. The criminals are condemned to the
death we have mentioned, but their sentence is usually commuted to
imprisonment for life in a house of correction.
The punishment denounced against unnatural crimes was formerly that of
burning alive; but it is now softened to that of perpetual exile or
forced labour.
The husband may be prosecuted for adultery, as well as the wife, and
it is an offence which, says the code, may be punished by law; but
authority seldom interferes. The ancient Danes visited the crime with
death, and that at a period when murderers were only condemned to pay
a fine. At present the penalty is fixed, for the first offence, at
confiscation of a tenth part of the guilty person’s property; for the
second, banishment. For the third repetition of the crime the adulterer
may be tied up in a sack and drowned. The law, however, has now become
obsolete through long disuse.
Women may take to public prostitution if they receive permission from
the authorities. They are not troubled afterwards unless they offend
against peace or decency, or bear more children than may legally be
born. The code declares that any unmarried woman who becomes the
mother of two children may be prosecuted, fined, and committed to
prison. Custom, however, in this, as in many other instances, is more
considerate than the law, and no woman is troubled who has not born
three children by three different men; even then a permission of a
special character is necessary before the prosecution can be carried
on. No doubt these restrictions encourage women to procure abortion,
or destroy their offspring when born. Prostitutes are very numerous,
and the vexatious restraints upon marriage appear to produce much
immorality. In Copenhagen, however, the corruption of society cannot be
altogether, or even chiefly, traced to that cause; for the manners of
the city are, in a general sense, profligate.
The appearance of the women belonging to the lower classes in
Copenhagen, as in Stockholm, is remarkably modest and unpresuming.
Neat and tasteful in their costume, they preserve in their own homes
a freshness and a comfort which indicate that they enjoy a position
of some honour; for where women are not well treated, they never have
a pride in keeping their clothes, habitations, or persons clean and
elegant.
It seems that the condition as well as the morality of the sex has
improved since the laws of the country have become more polished by
civilization. The code we have described belonged to a period several
years back. Since then a new constitution has been established; the
nation has become more free; the penal laws, especially, have been very
considerably modified; the relations of the sexes have lost some of the
rudeness which characterized them before; and though civilization still
remains at a low ebb, public manners have certainly undergone great
improvement.
The prostitutes of Copenhagen live, some in a kind of hotel, where
they take part in mixed entertainments, to which the dissolute persons
of the city congregate; some in a sort of boarding-houses; others in
private dwellings of their own; or they lodge in small rooms, and go
with their companions to houses where temporary accommodation may be
had at various charges. Their numbers would appear to be considerable;
and their habits do not differ in any peculiar manner from those of the
same class in other cities of the Continent, which afford materials for
a more complete description[89].
OF PROSTITUTION IN CIVILIZED STATES.
INTRODUCTION.
We have inquired into the history of the female sex under the social
laws of antiquity, under the rude codes of barbarian races, and under
the Mohammedan and Hindu systems. It will now be interesting to trace
it through the dusky period of modern civilization from the rise of
Christianity to the middle ages. Many writers afford the materials
for a view of the prostitute systems of Europe during that era, and
M. Rabuteaux especially has combined their researches in one wide and
broad view.
The Christian Emperors of Rome endeavoured to suppress prostitution,
but with little success. Constantine, Constantius, Theodosius the
Younger, Valentian, and Justinian took up the task by turns, denounced
penalties against offenders--those who debauched others, and those who
prostituted themselves; but though the world changed its aspect, it did
not change its vices. Among the northern barbarians, indeed, austere
principles ruled over the people, and women occupied a higher place
than is accorded them now. They were companions of the men, not toys
for their pleasure, or bagatelles for their amusement. Called, at a
later age, to the functions of maternity, they previously learned the
use of reason, and succeeded from a virtuous maidenhood to the dignity
of matron. The chastity which Tacitus describes among the barbarians
of Germany continued long to be their characteristic; but their penal
customs became milder as they received better maxims of social policy.
A woman who debauched herself was expelled from the city--a sufficient
punishment. She had no more any family. Even the ties of paternity were
broken. Gradually, however, the barbarian conquerors of Europe bent
to the attractions of a corrupted society, and though the laws of the
Visigoths forbade prostitution, men were found to encourage and females
to pursue this infamous occupation.
The free woman who prostituted herself was, for the first offence,
punished with 300 strokes, and for the second reduced to slavery, given
to some poor man, and prohibited from entering a town. Parents who
connived at the vice of their children were flogged. If the offender
was already in bonds, she was whipped, shorn of her hair, and returned
to her master. Should he himself be the accomplice of her sin, he lost
her, and suffered an equal penalty of the rod. Prostitutes who walked
the streets and fields were flung into prison, scourged, and fined. A
decree of Theodoric, king of the Goths, declared death against all who
gave an asylum or any encouragement to infamous persons.
The epithet of “lost woman” applied to one of honest character was an
insult punishable by law--generally by fines. A maiden or a widow was
especially protected against such imputation. In France the female who
accused another of infamous habits was condemned to pay five sous,
or to walk in penance, only clothed in a light shift, while a matron
followed, and thrust a fine-pointed instrument above her thighs, more
as a humiliation than an injury. The Spanish code also recognised this
offence, as well as that of general defamation.
The church was the universal censor of public manners in the middle
ages. No sin was more severely denounced by the Christian law than
that of licentiousness; yet it inculcated no savage persecution of the
fallen. Good men could never forget, that a courtezan had washed the
feet of Christ, and accordingly a humanizing spirit presided over the
social code of the early fathers. They received into their communion
any woman who renounced her evil life, married, and was faithful to her
husband, or remained single without prostituting herself again.
Everywhere, indeed, Christianity tolerated prostitution. It was
impossible to eradicate vice, and it was better one class should make a
profession of it than that all should follow it as a secret occupation.
Suppress courtezans, said St. Augustine, and you confuse all society by
the caprice of the passions. Nevertheless, efforts were made to check
the evil, though the principal rules of this “police of manners” were
applied to confine the prostitutes of every town in a separate quarter,
and to force on them an uniform apparel, that their shame might not
be concealed, and that other women might be safe from the address of
brutal libertines.
But while the woman who lost herself was forgiven by the civil and
religious law, no toleration was extended to the wretch who made her
such--the pander who seduced young girls and sold them for profit. The
Council of Elvira refused pardon, even on his deathbed, to the wretch
who was guilty of leading the innocent to prostitution. “Miserable
wretch; brand of hell!” exclaimed Merot to one of these, “dost thou
believe that when thy accursed soul is lost in eternal pains, God will
be content? No; he will augment thy punishment;” and he added, that the
young females he had ruined should inflict his tortures. All the rigour
of the law, every form of public infamy, every device of humiliation,
was called in to brand with additional opprobrium the depraved trader
in prostitution.
In France the punishment was in general arbitrary, according to the
circumstances of each case. Nevertheless law and usage regulated the
degree of it. In Paris an edict was published in 1367 forbidding
persons to procure girls for prostitution on pain of being exposed in
the pillory, marked with a hot iron, and expelled from the city. It
was renewed in 1415, and we find an instance of its application in the
next year, for in the public accounts Cassin La Botte is described as
receiving money for the expenses of an execution of this kind, in which
some wretches were led into a public place, branded, mutilated by the
ears, and set in the pillory. Sometimes the procuress was mounted on
an ass, with her face towards its tail, a straw hat on her head, and
an inscription on her back. In this state she was paraded through the
streets, whipped, and sent to prison, or exiled. These circumstances
appear to have frequently occurred as lately as 1756. We find it
applied in a provincial town to some prostitutes who had infringed the
local rules:--“They were led through the place, with a drum beating
before them, and exposed.” In England similar occurrences were common,
and were accompanied by some peculiar details. The cart in which the
culprit sat was preceded by two men playing music, while a crowd
followed and showered filth and mud upon the offenders.
Sometimes, when the penalty was aggravated in severity, the culprit’s
hair was burnt. Thus, in 1399, at Paris, several men and women suffered
this punishment, being pilloried and deprived of all their possessions.
At Toulouse, a prostitute was conducted to the town hall, where the
executioner tied her hands, stripped her naked, placed a cap, made in
the form of a sugar-loaf, ornamented with feathers, on her head, hung
an inscription on her back, and then took her out to a rock in the
middle of the river. There she was compelled to enter an iron cage,
which was plunged three times into the water, while nearly the whole
population was assembled to witness the scene. Afterwards she was led
to the hospital, where she remained labouring for the rest of her days.
A similar custom existed at Bourdeaux. Everywhere, indeed, the same
rude devices were employed to terrify the people from profligacy.
The laws of Naples were extremely severe. Before the thirteenth
century we find every procuress endeavouring to corrupt innocent
females punished, like an adultress, by the mutilation of her nose.
The mother who prostituted her daughter suffered this punishment,
until King Frederic absolved such women as trafficked with their
children under the pressure of want. The same prince, however, decreed
against all who were found guilty of preparing drugs or inflammatory
liquors--to aid in their designs upon virtuous females--death in
case of injury resulting, and imprisonment when no serious harm was
effected. These laws, however, proved insufficient for their purpose,
and towards the end of the fifteenth century profligacy ran riot in
Naples. _Ruffiani_ multiplied in its streets, procuring by force or by
corruption multitudes of victims to fill the taverns and brothels of
the city. Penalties of extreme severity were proclaimed against them.
The _Ruffiani_ were ordered to quit the kingdom, and the prostitutes
were prohibited from harbouring such persons among them. Any woman who
disobeyed was condemned to be burnt on the forehead with a hot iron,
whipped in the most humiliating manner, and exiled.
The code of Alphonso IX., King of Castile, which belonged to the
second half of the twelfth century, included procurers among infamous
persons, which condemned them to “civil death.” Five classes of these
were enumerated:--I. Men who trafficked in debauch: these were expelled
the country. II. Speculators who hired their houses to abandoned women
for the exercise of their vocation: their houses were confiscated, and
they were fined. III. Men or women who kept brothels and hired out
prostitutes: if the females they sold were slaves, the law gave them
liberty; if they were free, their corrupter was under pain of death,
forced to endow and place them in a situation to marry. IV. Death was
denounced against the husband who connived at the dishonour of his
wife, and against every one who seduced an honest woman to infamy. V.
Girls who supported _Ruffiani_ were publicly whipped, and deprived of
the clothes they wore when arrested. The men themselves were, for the
first offence, flogged; for the second, expelled from the city; and
for the third, sent to the galleys. Between 1552 and 1566 additional
terrors were devised against this crime, and the _Ruffiani_ once
convicted were sentenced to ten years chained at the oar, while for a
repetition of the offence they received two hundred blows, and were
condemned for life to the galleys.
The incitement to vice has, indeed, been everywhere considered a crime
deserving of the heaviest punishment; but prostitution itself has not
been tolerated without interference. In France, especially, efforts
were early made for its suppression. The laws, however, failed, on
account of the number of offenders it would have been necessary to
condemn, and a few examples only were made, to show that no licence
was extended to debauch. The first edict published was an absolute
prohibition by Charlemagne. He commanded strict search to be made
throughout his dominions, in every habitation and place of resort,
that every public woman, and all persons without known occupations or
means of livelihood, might be exposed. Men who were found harbouring
prostitutes were compelled to carry them on their shoulders to the
place where they were to be whipped with rods. In case of refusal they
suffered this infliction themselves. It is singular to find, that among
the ancient Parisians no disgrace was equal to that of bearing on the
back a debauched woman.
During three centuries and a half after Charlemagne, public immorality
flowed in a tide over the country. Prostitutes multiplied in every
town, and in the eleventh century Paris was as one general brothel.
Everywhere harlots thronged the streets, soliciting the men who passed,
dragging them by the arms into their dens, and if they resisted,
abusing them in unmeasured terms. In the same house might be found a
school on the upper floor and a brothel below. In 1254 an effort was
made for the reformation of manners; but the only effect was, that vice
dissimulated instead of bearing its title on its face. Clandestine
succeeded to public debauch. At length, however, some real good
resulted from a succession of rigorous edicts. At the commencement of
the fifteenth century, the scourge of society had been lightened, but
there broke out wars and troubles which gave new licence to immorality.
A hundred years revived the pestilence in all its virulent shapes; and
in 1503 a council was assembled at Paris to deliberate on the best
means of abolishing the brothels which were crowded around them. Laws
were passed, which we cannot describe in detail, especially as they
are of no value to the legislators of this age, for in spite of them
the moral malady of France extended, and public custom recognised what
authority refused to allow.
In Paris the prostitutes resorted to places known as _clapiers_, or
mole-holes, in allusion to the brutal subterranean life they led.
They did not live in the houses where they received their temporary
companions; there were localities common to many, where they assembled
during the day, and which the magistrates ordered to be opened and
closed at stated hours. They were not permitted to carry on their
orgies at night, to prostitute themselves in their own homes, or
publicly to shock the decent population; but they rebelled against all
discipline, and evaded where they did not openly contradict the law. In
1307 an edict was published, assigning to prostitutes certain streets
as places of abode--Rue de l’Abreuvorix Macon, la Boucherie, la Rue
Froidmantel, de Glatigny, la Cour Robert de Paris, les rues Baillohé,
Tyron, Charon, and Champ Fleury. It is remarkable that the infamy of
these neighbourhoods has been hereditary; for after the lapse of 500
years, after all the alterations in the city of Paris which have been
effected, after all the vicissitudes of its domestic history, the same
places still exhibit the same spectacles, and are inhabited by the
same population. The complaint of two neighbours was enough to cause
a prosecution against the keeper of a brothel. Notwithstanding every
exertion which the inefficient law and police of those ages enabled
rulers to make, prostitution increased, spread into prohibited streets,
and throughout France was a characteristic feature of society. Nor
were the palaces whence issued decrees for the reformation of public
manners, superior in many instances to the brothels they denounced.
In the eleventh century a brothel and a church stood side by side
at Rome; and 500 years after, under the pontificate of Paul II.,
prostitutes were numerous. Numerous statutes were enacted, and many
precautions taken, which prove the grossness of manners at that epoch.
One convicted of selling a girl to infamy was heavily fined, and if
he did not pay within ten days had one foot cut off. The nobility and
common people indulged habitually in all kinds of excess. Tortures,
flogging, branding, banishment, were inflicted in vain on some to
terrify the others, but with very incomplete success. To carry off and
detain a prostitute against her will was punishable by amputation of
the right hand, imprisonment, flogging, or exile. The rich, however,
invariably bought immunity for themselves. In Spain, although violence
offered to a public woman was an offence, few women dared to complain
of having been seduced. In Naples, also, under King Roger, such a
charge was never taken; but William, the successor of that prince,
punished with death the crime of rape; but the victim must prove that
she shrieked aloud, and prefer her complaint within eight days, or
show that she was detained by force. When once a woman had prostituted
herself, however, she had no right to refuse to yield her person to any
one. This legislation extended to the extreme north, and obtained in
Sleswig.
Among the most extraordinary acts of legislation on this subject was
the bull of Clement II., who desired to endow the church with the
surplus gains of the brothel. Every person guilty of prostitution was
forced, when disposing of her property, either at death or during life,
to assign half of it to a convent. This regulation was easily eluded
and utterly inefficacious. A tribunal was also established, having
jurisdiction over brothels, upon which a tax was laid continuing in
existence until the middle of the sixteenth century. Efforts were made
to confine this class of dwellings to a particular quarter, but without
success. In Naples the same failure attended the attempt. Prostitutes,
in spite of the law, established themselves in the most beautiful
streets of the city, in palatial buildings, and there, with incessant
clamour, congregated a horde of thieves, profligates, and vagabonds of
every kind, until the chief quarter became uninhabitable. In 1577 they
were ordered to quit the street of Catalana within eight days, under
pain of the scourge for the women, and the galleys for such of the
proprietors as were commoners, while simple banishment was threatened
against “nobles.”
One example of good legislation was the pragmatic law of 1470 to
protect the unfortunates against the cupidity, the extortion, and the
fraud of tavern keepers and others, who grew rich upon their infamy.
Men went into their places of entertainment with some single girls,
contracted a heavy debt, and then left their victims to pay. These were
then given the choice of a disgraceful whipping or an engagement in the
house. They often consented, and usually spent the remainder of their
lives in dependence on their creditor, without ability to liberate
themselves. By the new law masters of taverns were forbidden to give
credit to prostitutes for more than a certain sum, and this only to
supply her with food and clothing absolutely necessary. If he exceeded
this amount he had no legal means of recovering it.
The most remarkable feature in the Neapolitan legislation on this
subject was, the establishment, at an unknown but early date, of the
Court of Prostitutes. This tribunal, which sat at Naples, had its
peculiar constitution, and had jurisdiction over all cases connected
with prostitution, blasphemy, and some other infamous offences.
Towards the end of the sixteenth century it had risen to extraordinary
power and was full of abuses. It practised all kinds of exaction and
violence, every species of partiality and injustice, and even presumed
to publish edicts of its own. The judges flung into prison numbers of
young girls, whom they compelled to buy their liberty with money, and
sometimes dared to seize women who, though of lax conduct, could not
be included in the professional class. This was discovered, and led
in 1589 to a reform of the court. Its powers were strictly defined,
and its form of procedure placed under regulation, while the avenues
to corruption were narrowed. The institution itself existed for
nearly a hundred years after that period--until 1768, when a royal
edict declared the ruler’s resolution to abolish the infamous calling
altogether. Vice, however, when widely spread in a nation, does not
vanish at the breath of authority. Denounced by the law, prostitution
continued to flourish and society to feel its influence.
Passing from the south to regions with a less voluptuous climate, we
find Strasburgh as overflowing with vice as perhaps any other city in
the world. Prostitutes were in the fifteenth century so numerous there
that, though a distinct quarter was assigned for their residences, they
invaded every locality, and swarmed in the finest streets. Speculators
were accustomed to travel abroad and bring home unfortunate girls,
whom they kidnapped and reduced to a state of slavery. Officers were
appointed to visit the brothels and collect the tax imposed on them.
More than fifty-seven of these places existed in six streets only.
One contained nineteen, while other neighbourhoods were infested in
an equal degree. At the commencement of the sixteenth century, so far
were public manners demoralized that prostitutes horded in the clock
towers and aisles of the great cathedral as well as in several smaller
churches. In 1521 an ordinance appeared directing the “cathedral
girls,” who were called “swallows,” to quit the sacred places of their
retreat within fifteen days. To those who persevered in their libertine
mode of life, various residences were assigned--in the suburbs.
Strasburgh was now in the depth of demoralization; but the Reformation
soon visited the city, awakened its people from sensual pleasures to
an intellectual battle, and a speedy change was apparent. In 1536
there were only two brothels there. In 1540 public prostitution was
effectually suppressed. Ten years after it was proposed to establish a
house of legal debauch; but the attempt was resisted, though renewed in
the third and fourth year after this.
It was little matter to the prostitutes to inhabit houses especially
dedicated to their vile traffic. They cared not to wait passively at
home for visitors. Wherever men congregated for pleasure or for the
business of life, wherever there was any chance of provoking their
desires, they thronged, sometimes impelled by the love of excitement,
sometimes by the pains of hunger. They thus transformed into so many
brothels wine houses, barber’s shops, and students’ rooms, and the
perseverance of government against them was by no means equalled by
their own tenacity. An edict of 1420 forbade prostitutes to enter the
cabarets; another of 1558 prohibited tavern-keepers from entertaining
them. Another denounced gambling, and prostitutes were only allowed
when desirous of refreshment to stand without and drink what was
handed to them from within. In England similar regulations was
established, and barbers especially were made the object of very severe
restrictions. Sempstresses and butchers were forbidden to employ any
females of bad character, and others were restrained by similar laws.
All these efforts, however, to render the sisterhood of prostitutes
a homeless, desolate, hopeless class--to deprive them of shelter, of
comforts, and the honest means of life--failed in purifying the manners
of the age. The baths became a regular resort of women belonging to
this order--in Paris, in Geneva, in Venice, in Rome, in Naples, in
Milan, in Ferrara, in Bologna, in Lucca, and in every other city of the
Peninsula--so that there was scarcely the keeper of a bath who was not
at the same time a brothel keeper, employing numbers of _Ruffiani_ to
procure attendance at his house. There were other cities in which baths
were publicly tolerated and recognised as places of prostitution. Among
these were Avignon and London. A statute of the Church of Avignon,
dated 1441, interdicted the use of certain baths, known to be brothels,
to the priests and clergy. An offence committed by day was not punished
half so severely as one committed by night. There is only one other
instance of a punishment inflicted during that age on men who violated
the public law of morals. It was that of certain citizens of Anvers in
Flanders, who were condemned to make a pilgrimage to expiate an offence
of this kind. On one occasion, indeed, of which the date is lost,
the magistrates of Bourdeaux caused a man to be hanged for forcibly
violating a prostitute.
In Avignon, however, the licence of prostitution was shortly taken
away. The residence of the popes in that city had attracted a concourse
of strangers from all parts of the globe, and brothels sprung up in
profusion in the neighbourhood of churches, at the door of the Papal
palace, and side by side with prelatical residences--a display of
libertinism so gross that the public acts of encouragement at once
ceased, and an edict drove all the prostitutes out of the city.
In London, as we have said, as at Avignon, prostitution took refuge in
the public baths--a practice of very ancient date. These places were
situated in the borough of Southwark, which was not included in the
city until 1550. It was a miserable quarter, full of inhabited ruins,
to which some public gardens, dedicated to dog and bear baiting, alone
attracted the people of the neighbourhood. In this general preliminary
sketch it is not necessary to say more of London.
In various parts of Europe a continual stream of edicts was poured
out against the system of prostitution; but it was only persecuting
the victims, instead of eradicating the causes. In some States, as
in Lombardy, men were forbidden to give them an asylum; they were
prohibited from appearing among honest citizens; they were prevented
from purchasing food or clothes, or borrowing money by the hire of
their persons; in fact, fines, prisons, whips, still continued to
attempt the reform of morals.
Hitherto, however, we have seen prostitution in some places protected,
but in all restrained, though everywhere freely exercised by those
persons who would brave its perils and its disgrace. It was now sought,
by the direct and continuous intervention of the law, to transform
it into a public institution, organized, watched, disciplined, by
particular officers, and subjected to special authority. In France,
and especially in Languedoc, these principles were, during the
middle ages, firmly established. Louis XI. proclaimed, that from the
remotest antiquity it was the custom in Languedoc to have a house
and asylum for public women. The most celebrated of these were at
Toulouse and Montpellier. That at Toulouse was known to exist during
the twelfth century, and by an abuse of terms, not uncommon at that
period, was called the Great Abbey. The Commune and the University
divided the expense, and were proprietors of the building, and a
good revenue was derived from it for municipal purposes. But in
1424 the receipts diminished considerably, to the great regret of
the governors. The turbulent youth of Toulouse behaved to the poor
girls, whom they sacrificed to their lust, with the utmost violence
and brutality--beating them and their children, breaking up the
furniture, and wrenching off even the doors of the house. Many
attempts were made to repress these outbreaks, but the prostitutes
were at length compelled to take refuge in the interior of the city.
Severe regulations were imposed upon them. All who were diseased were
compelled to live in solitude until cured, and some were whipped for
disobedience. On one occasion, when a famine prevented the inhabitants
from indulging in their ordinary pleasures, the prostitutes emigrated,
but returned to their post in 1560. The magistrates, shamed by public
outcry, which accused them of purchasing their robes from the tax on
debauched women, abandoned the money, at this time, to the hospitals;
but the administrators of these afterwards made them some compensation.
In 1566 a council was called to deliberate on the best means of ridding
the city from the profligacy and wickedness which had grown up through
the immense licensed brothels it contained. To increase the scandal,
four prostitutes were discovered in a monastery of Augustine friars.
Three of these unhappy girls were hung. Shortly afterwards three others
were found in a convent, and they also were sent to the gallows.
It appears that in 1587 prostitution was almost eradicated from
Toulouse, though it flourished in the rural districts around. Many
of the girls were forced to labour at cleansing the streets as a
punishment. Two decrees of Louis XI. and Charles VIII. indicate the
history of prostitution at Montpellier in the fifteenth century. A man
named Panais possessed and governed the place devoted to this purpose,
and dying, left a dynasty of brothel keepers--two sons, who associated
with a banker. They embellished the edifice, furnished it luxuriously,
constructed beautiful baths, and obtained a legal monopoly in their
infamous traffic, by engaging to pay a certain tax. However, in 1458,
another individual was permitted to establish himself, which he did
with _éclat_, and the women deserted their old quarters for the new
“hotel.” A public cause was made of the quarrel, and it was decided
that the original promoters should continue to enjoy their privilege.
The two brothel keepers, who gained the titles of “Friends and faithful
Councillors of the King of France,” grew wealthy, and their trade of
prostitution became one of the most important branches of enterprise in
the city.
The city of Rhodes appears to have been another city of Europe where
a chartered brothel existed, for the bishop, in 1307, forbade the
inhabitants to receive any of the public prostitutes into their
houses, which supposes that some particular retreat was open to them.
There was one also at Lisbon; but it was not until 1394 that the
magistrates deliberated on the propriety of erecting a building at the
public expense, expressly as a brothel. Ten years later we find the
inhabitants lamenting that their wives and daughters were endangered
by the want of such a place, and in 1424 it was established. A tax was
levied on the women to assist in defraying the cost, and fines were
imposed for misconduct.
In Italy licensed brothels were very numerous. There was one at
Mantua, and Venice was the very sink of prostitution. In 1421 the
government enlisted women to this service to guard the virtue of the
other classes. A matron was placed over them, who governed them,
received their gains, and made a monthly division of profits. The names
of several women, the most notorious and beautiful of the Venetian
courtezans, are preserved by Nicolo Daglioni. A very small sum was paid
to them by their patrons.
In Valencia a public brothel, on a colossal scale, existed towards the
end of the fifteenth century. It resembled a little town surrounded
with walls, and had a single gate; in front of this stood a gibbet for
criminals. Near this was an office, where a man stood who addressed
all who entered, and said, that if they would deposit what valuables
they had with him, he would return them safely as they came out; but
if they refused and were robbed within, he was not responsible. The
wall inclosed four or five streets of little houses, inhabited by girls
dressed in brilliant habiliments of velvet and silk. Three or four
hundred of them were usually in attendance. They received only a small
sum for their favours. Whether this system was then general in Spain we
know not, but it is certain that common prostitutes abounded. Servants
appear to have been hired for this purpose, for Philippe II., in 1575,
in order to check the ravages of immorality, ordered that no female
domestics under forty years of age should be hired by men. A decree of
1623 required that in all cities throughout the kingdom public brothels
should be abolished.
In Geneva there was a “Queen of the Prostitutes,” elected by the civic
magistrates, who took an oath of office, and undertook to govern
all the women engaged in her occupation. At Schelstadt a man was
commissioned to a similar duty, and very strict rules were imposed on
the population.
We have seen that in many places prostitution became a source of
revenue, and might enlarge our details and multiply our examples; but
it would be tedious to cite the laws of France, Spain, Italy, and
Germany on the subject. They varied much in different times, but offer
little interest.
The legislator, however, has not contented himself at all times with
dividing the prostitute class from other classes of females, with
shutting them up in separate quarters, or even confining them in houses
of which he kept the key. In some cases he obliged them to assume a
peculiar costume, or at least a conspicuous badge of infamy. They
always endeavoured to resist or elude the restrictions laid upon them,
and, feeling deeply the humiliation of such compulsion, sought by all
means to evade it. The first regulation of this kind for the city of
Paris is mentioned by the chronicler Geoffrey. He says, that the Queen
of Louis VII. going one day to church, met a woman gorgeously attired,
and, deceived by her appearance, gave her, “according to custom,”
the kiss of peace. She was a court prostitute; and when the royal
lady heard this, she complained to her husband, who ordered that no
mantles should in future be worn by prostitutes. From time to time new
edicts on this subject appeared. One of 1360 forbade them to wear any
embroidery, any gold or silver buttons, any pearls, or any trimmings
of gray fur. In 1415 and 1419 golden and gilded zones were prohibited
to them, as well as silver buckles to their shoes. The very fashion
of their dress was afterwards regulated. These devices to distinguish
prostitutes from respectable females were speedily imitated. An
_aiguillette_ of a certain colour, hung from the shoulder, was most
generally adopted in France. In some towns silk was prohibited to them.
The Bishop of Rhodes, in 1307, forbade them to wear mantles, veils,
amber necklaces, or rings of gold, while the popes of Rome followed
the example. The laws of Mantua obliged prostitutes when they appeared
in the streets to cover the rest of their clothes with a short white
cloak, and wear a badge on their breasts. At Bergamo the cloak was
yellow; in Parma, white; in Milan, at first, black woollen, and then
black silk. If disobedient, they might be fined, and, in case of a
second offence, publicly exposed, and whipped. Any one might strip
the garments off any girl he met in the streets illegally attired. In
London a similar distinction was imposed on them, and at Strasburgh
a sugar-loaf bonnet was invented for their use. In Spain, besides
prohibitions concerning dress, they were forbidden the use of coaches
and litters, as well as prayer-carpets or cushions in the churches;
even a hackney-carriage was not allowed to be hired by them.
The acts of legislation in France were almost exclusively police
regulations. Forced to tolerate the prostitute class, the law
endeavoured, by watching, restraining, shaming, and insulting it, to
render its occupation so infamous as to terrify persons from seeking
it as a means of livelihood. It does not seem that in France, during
the middle ages, legislation ever passed this limit or went beyond
the action of police. In Italy, however, and in Spain, this was not
the case. The Roman law had left many vestiges, which have never, in
reality, disappeared; the ecclesiastical prerogative was powerful,
and disposed to be active. Local statutes existed in great abundance,
and the combination of these authorities gave rise to a jurisdiction
full of details: profuse, sometimes strange, always subtle, in parts
inconsistent, and laboriously commented upon by a numerous school of
jurists--a jurisprudence which elevated itself above simple measures of
security and municipal rules, and instituted for prostitutes a civil
and social statute of their own.
Ulpian says that a woman is a prostitute not only when she frequents
regular brothels, but when she visits cabarets, or any other places,
where she is careless of her honour. She is a prostitute who yields
herself for base purposes to all men; but she who has connection only
with one or two is not. Octavenus, however, thinks, more justly, that
she is a prostitute who gives up her person in common, whether she
receive money or not.
The lawgivers of the middle ages were not accustomed to insist on
perfect or precise definitions. They liked to subtilize over terms.
Some held Ulpian’s limited view to be correct; others, with Octavenus,
declared that any woman yielding to the solicitations of several men,
even without being paid, was a prostitute. The Roman law defined
prostitution to be the reception of numerous libertines. But how many?
inquired St. Jerome. This threw divisions among the theorists. Some
declared 40 men to be enough, some insisted on 60, others on 70; while
a few, carrying extravagance to its utmost limits, asserted that no
woman was a prostitute who had not delivered up her person to at least
3000 persons. While these ridiculous disputes engaged attention, the
corruption of manners went on.
It is just to the wisdom of that age, however, to remark, that these
discussions of the casuists appeared no less ridiculous to contemporary
statesmen than to us; while the general public idea of prostitution was
habitual debauch for vile purposes, whether mercenary or otherwise.
Some theorists, nevertheless, insisted that the nature of a hireling
was inseparable from that of a prostitute. On this account the name
_meretrix_ had by the Latins been given to a woman of this class; but
this view led to consequences which the wise legislator would not
accept. If any female accepting a reward for her dishonour was to be
publicly enumerated among professional harlots, many, from a single
offence, must, under compulsion, follow a life of systematic vice.
Others argued that two or three repetitions of this infamous sale would
justify the title being applied; but this is a point on which writers
have never agreed. Consequently, a long controversy arose upon the
three conditions in dispute: what amount of publicity--what number of
vicious connections--what kind of venality--was sufficient to stamp a
woman with the name and character of a common prostitute.
Rabuteaux describes her as one who, under constraint, or by her own
will, abandons herself, without choice, without passion, without even
the impulse of the grossest lust, to an unchaste course of life. By
want of choice he means the absence of a preference for the individual,
by which, he adds, a forbearing judgment extenuates the offence of
immorality. If, he insists, there be any choice of persons, there may
be libertinism, there may be debauch, there may be scandal, there may
be vice, but there is not prostitution in the true sense of the word.
It applies to “sacred prostitution,” whether gratuitous or venal,
which was an unblushing and indiscriminate sacrifice of chastity; to
that which the barbarous hospitality of savages, whether on the rivers
of Lapland or in the deserts of Africa, gave up a woman to every
guest; and to that legal kind in civilized countries which sold itself
promiscuously for hire.
Such is M. Rabuteaux’s idea. We differ from him. Prostitution appears
to us the application to a vile purpose of that which was designed for
honourable uses; and the mere satisfaction of animal lust is in itself
the vilest object. There may exist in a woman’s mind, even when most
debauched, a preference for some, an aversion to others; but she is no
less a prostitute, if she abandon herself viciously, whether to one or
many.
While these theories divided the opinions of lawgivers, legislation on
the subject was extremely difficult. They were forced to be contented
with what they thought imperfect proof; and, to fix the infamy of a
woman, accepted evidence from witnesses, even those accomplices in sin
who, of all others, have lost the right to accuse. A female who chose
the night for the period of her orgies; who, as a wanderer, without
a companion to protect her, entered house after house; who waited
on revellers in a place of entertainment; might be registered among
common prostitutes. A legitimate suspicion, also, attached to her who
received the visits of many young men; and, above all, who, in light or
darkness, frequented a public school.
These women, when once consigned legally to the prostitute class,
gained, in the middle ages, a right which they could not otherwise
assert. The Roman laws adopted by the jurisprudence of that period
allowed her to have a legal claim to payment when she prostituted her
body, and the reason assigned was founded on a strange and subtle
distinction of terms. “The courtesan’s vocation,” said Ulpian, “is
infamous, but the wages of it are not; the act is shameful, but not the
reward which is in prospect when the act is committed.”
The Spanish law was still more favourable to her. When a man paid in
advance, and she refused to submit according to her promise, he could
not demand his money back. On one side she received a legitimate
emolument; on the other, he was guilty of immoral turpitude which the
law would not recognise. The code of Alphonso also permitted this
interpretation; some commentators, however, allowing that the woman had
a right to revoke the promise of yielding her person, but was bound
to restore the amount of hire she had received. Long and vigorous
controversies arose among the theologians when this was referred to
them. It was also disputed in France, whether the prostitute could
enforce payment when she had sold herself and an avaricious person
refused to reward her. An imposing list of authorities is arrayed on
either side.
Another question long debated was the use to which such gains could
lawfully be applied. Alphonso the Wise, on the authority of Isaiah,
forbade priests to receive offerings from such a source. Baldæus and
others insisted that the church could not accept taxes from public
women; but this by many was repudiated, as contrary to the principle
that the wages of prostitution were lawfully acquired. The Spanish
law allowed money of this kind to be given in alms, and the public
opinion recognised the right to dispose of it by testament, though
several popes attempted to decree a contrary usage. If, then, they
could dispose of their gains as they pleased, could they inherit
property? They could, but under limitations. In Savoy it appears that
legacies to prostitutes made by soldiers who had not quitted service
more than a year were null and void. In Spain no woman of this class
could inherit to the disadvantage of the testator’s relatives in a
direct or collateral line. Many authorities only admitted the brother
of the deceased to this right; but an exception was made when it was a
daughter who succeeded to such property, or when the woman was herself
married. A mother, however, could disinherit her daughter for leading
a vicious life, but lost this privilege if she had been the accomplice
of her immorality. The father had equal authority, but with one
curious limitation. When, said the law, a father has sought to marry
his daughter, and endowed her sufficiently, if she, against his will,
refuses to marry and becomes a prostitute, he may cut her off; but
if he have opposed her marriage until she reached the age of 25, and
become a libertine, he cannot refuse to bequeath her his property. In
the duchy of Asota, in Piedmont, a similar regulation was established;
but the age was fixed at 29, and the woman, on every opportunity to
marry, was bound to present herself before her father and demand his
consent. If he refused it, he was not allowed to punish her when, at
30, she became a harlot.
The church, in those ages, made it a pious act to marry a prostitute,
and absolved from their sins all who did so. In France a woman of this
class might, at a very ancient period, save a criminal from death, by
inducing him to espouse her, and Farnacius relates an anecdote which
shows this custom to have existed in Spain. In a city, which he does
not name, a young man mounted on an ass was being conducted to the
scaffold. A courtezan was struck by his beauty, offered him his life if
he would become her husband. He refused. The temptation was not strong
enough to induce him to accept such a wife. He merely answered, “Let
us move on,” and reached the place of execution. Meanwhile, however,
an account of the incident had reached the king, and he, admiring the
youth’s courage, pardoned him. From this we may learn that though the
church consecrated such a marriage with peculiar grace, public opinion
considered it infamous.
The jurisprudence of the middle ages introduced new principles, and
these unions became more rare. Many doctors of law announced that they
were contrary to the sacred code.
In Spain, where concubinage was legally recognised, men of rank
were forbidden to take as concubines slaves, whether born in actual
bondage or emancipated, dancers, servants of taverns, go-betweens,
or prostitutes. It was disputed whether the children of these women
could be legitimatized by subsequent marriage. It was decided that
they could, though with more difficulty than others, and their mothers
became amenable to the laws against adultery.
Persecution in all barbarous ages and countries has endeavoured to
perform the task of teaching and reclaiming mankind. The members of
the venal sisterhood have, more than any others, experienced the harsh
effects of this species of legislation. The law sought to withdraw
them from vice by shutting from them every approach to virtue, to
reform their minds by forbidding them the society of honest persons,
to elevate them from their degradation by adding to their infamy. It
refused to receive them as witnesses, even when violence was done upon
their persons; though more liberal jurists cried out amid the clamour
of intolerant bigotry, that the protection of justice should attend
even the vilest prostitutes in the vilest dens of her resort; but the
spirit of the times was vindictive, and because society was corrupt
and base, it was most unsparing in its cruelty towards the victims of
debasement and corruption.
In spite of every one of these rude devices of a rude society to banish
immorality to habitations of its own, by badges, quarters, distinct
costumes, and even separate laws, prostitutes swarmed in every city
of Europe, and still more in its innumerable camps. Armies were then
undisciplined bands of adventurers, and pillage was the soldier’s
chief purpose. Xenophon tells that the nations of Persia, Asia Minor,
and India, were accompanied on their marches by their women and their
children, to defend whom they fought with more courage; and Athenæus
describes Chareas, causing a band of beautiful courtezans to dance
before his phalanxes to the tune of flutes and psalteries. Two thousand
prostitutes were driven from the camp of Scipio Africanus; and so, in
the middle ages, every army drew in its train numbers of public women.
Three hundred were with the army which laid siege to St. Jean d’Acre
in 1189, and during the whole of the crusades the Christian armies
were followed by them. Many times the leaders endeavoured to check
this debauchery. Some of the girls were flogged. Sometimes the man who
was found with one of them was obliged to allow her to strip him to
his shirt, and lead him with a rope through the camp. On the plains
of Perretola, after the defeat of the Florentines, in 1325, public
dances were executed by prostitutes for the amusement of the army. In
all parts of Europe similar profligacy distinguished the camp; and
long after we find Jeanne d’Arc, when reviewing the army, chastised
with her sword several prostitutes whom she detected among the ranks.
Marshal Strozzi, with a ferocity worthy of that period, drowned 800
of them in the Loire. When the Duke of Alva invaded Flanders, there
accompanied his army “400 courtezans on horseback, beautiful and grand
as princesses, and 800 others on foot.” These were for the pleasure of
10,000 men, all veterans.
Prostitution was authorized and disciplined, not only in the camps but
in the palaces of those days. From the eleventh century to that of
Francis I., a regular community of public women was attached to the
court.
We have already noticed the Queen of Louis VII. kissing one of them on
her way to church; and we find Charlemagne ordering his palace to be
cleared of them. At the Council of Nantes, in 660, it was complained
that the concubines of the nobility, instead of remaining at home,
thronged to public assemblies; but the seraglios of these lords, in
the ninth century, were places of prostitution. The German law imposed
a fine of six sous on a man who committed violence on a female in the
principal or royal “gynecées,” but only three in any other. It was
formerly the custom to send to one of these retreats a woman convicted
of adultery; but this was at length forbidden, lest it should simply
allow her an opportunity to repeat the offence. Sometimes they were
only the harems of the proprietor, sometimes brothels. William IX., of
Poitou, established in the eleventh century an abbey for prostitutes,
where he added to his profligacy the crime of sacrilege, giving the
harlots the titles of abbess and prioress, and parodying every sacred
rite. The orgies of his palace, and indeed of all others of that age,
are indescribable.
The title of King of the Prostitutes was given to the officer who
presided over the royal brothels. In Paris, in Normandy, and in
Burgundy, we find this functionary. Under the kings of France he
enjoyed a high rank and many privileges; and associated with him was
a woman who governed the prostitutes, and punished them with whipping
when they offended. In England, also, the palace and the mansions
of the nobles contained small brothels. In Henry VIII.’s palace was
a room, with an inscription over the door, “Chamber of the King’s
Prostitutes.”
Thus, throughout the world, there was, in the middle ages, profligacy
and corruption, which rose to its height at the period which preceded
the Reformation. From their chief places of resort in royal palaces
prostitutes spread over the whole of society, invading the church,
the hearth, following the camp, dividing the privileges of the wife,
and ever debauching both sexes by their companionship. Rods, prisons,
gallows, chains, pillories, tortures, served in no way to prevent
or even to discourage them; badges and restrictions proved equally
futile; but it is agreeable to find some relief to this dark spectacle
of demoralization. In the age of primitive Christianity religious
men endeavoured to reclaim from vice those whom they found making a
trade of it. We cannot stay to dwell on the sincere apostleship which
laboured, especially in the East, and was followed by fathers and
hermits from the desert. Stories of conversions of this kind fill
the legends of the time, and earnest attempts were made to offer an
asylum to the unhappy women who had abandoned themselves to profligacy.
We have noticed Theodora, the imperial harlot of Rome, collecting
500 prostitutes in a palace on the Bosphorus; but her impure hand
could not perform well the offices of charity, and she applied force
to fill her asylum. Many of the girls, therefore, who were shut up
in her magnificent and luxurious prison, found their confinement
insupportable, and committed suicide to escape it. In 1198 two Parisian
priests established a nunnery for repentant women, and thirty years
afterwards the House of the “Daughters of God” was instituted, and
these efforts were rewarded with much genuine success. Two centuries
passed without many enterprises of the sort being undertaken; but in
the fifteenth century an association of public women was formed to
exchange their base gains for those of piety and virtue.
In 1489 all the prostitutes of Amiens, animated by a sudden awaking of
remorse, applied for a place of retreat, where they might bury their
shame, and renew their honesty. This was granted, and several others
were established, the inmates of which wore white garments.
In several other parts of France, and generally in Europe, the
religious orders made attempts to recall some of the abandoned class
of females, to redeem the virtue of their sex, and, as they laboured
with sincerity, many of their enterprises were successful. But, on the
whole, prostitution still increased, and, the Reformation broke over a
state of society demoralized to the very core[90].
OF PROSTITUTION IN SPAIN.
Few nations have been described in more various ways and in more
contradictory terms than the Spaniards. In the pages of one writer,
we find them represented as in all things a great example of virtue,
morality, and uncorrupted manners; in another, they are pictured as the
very embodiment of vice and degradation. We have been at much pains to
deduce from the history, from the achievements, and from the actual
state of Spain, as these are set forth by innumerable authorities, a
just opinion of its national characteristics, and the sketch we shall
offer is the result.
In that country we have to divide class from class before we can fairly
view its manners. On the one hand we have a peasantry ill-taught, and
educated to servility; then a trading body, with another employed
in professions; and thirdly, a large order of nobles, degenerated
altogether from its ancient splendour, but preserving nevertheless all
the pride, all the indolence, all the sensuality, which characterized
it in the age of extended conquest and prosperous commerce. Upon all
these classes time has left traces, and the influence of their history
has been remarkably strong. A rich soil, a warm climate, an abundance
of precious minerals--these circumstances have been by no means without
their effect. The Roman Catholic religion, an army of priests, an
arbitrary government, and the habit of respecting persons more than
principles--these have a still more distinct impression on the national
character. A literature once illustrious but now dead, an empire once
splendid but now perished, a commerce once magnificent but now decayed,
a wealth once gorgeous and now turned to poverty, arts once noble
and now degraded--in these we find an index to the Spanish national
character. There is nothing virgin in the country, there is nothing
progressive, there is nothing with hope: all the glory of Spain belongs
to the past. The present is a wreck, and the future is a blank.
The manners of Spain present none of that simple purity which we find
in Switzerland. Every influence to which the people are subject tends
to corrupt them. Young women who stand at their windows, and see with
delight the flagellants go by, lashing themselves until the blood
splashes under their whips, cannot possess much dignity of mind. Yet
such are the spectacles which in Spain have been made familiar and
favourite to the populace. There is throughout Spanish society an
effort to appear better than they are, which in itself is an unfailing
indication of impurity. Men dare not when in company take any improper
liberties with women, even those whom they might be able privately
to seduce. On the stage they hoot a piece, which in France, or even
England, would not be regarded as in the slightest degree indelicate.
Nevertheless, in their retired rooms, ladies who are thus prudish
before the world, will suffer approaches gross enough, will amuse
themselves with obscene pictures, will pardon readily equivocal jokes,
and listen to songs of the worst indecency. Nor will they object to
behold the fandango danced, though, whatever some tolerant travellers
may say, it is proverbially obscene.
In many parts of the country, and especially in Seville, the ancient
national customs are still preserved, and young girls are always
when in the street accompanied by a duenna. In Madrid, where manners
have undergone a change, this is no longer the case; but in the more
primitive cities it is more prevalent. The guardianship of such a
companion, however, by no means implies absolutely a respectable
character, for common prostitutes, when they do walk abroad, are often
accompanied by old women who attract notice to them, and frequently
engage visitors to their places of resort.
The actual intercourse of the sexes in public is reserved, except with
respect to conversation. The gossip at a Tertullia, described by some
tourists as delightful, is characterized by English ladies not at
all inclined to satirize Spanish manners as very far from that which
women in good society among us are accustomed to hear. Children who
appear fresh from the nursery indulge in remarks which to many appear
positively obscene. The intellectual standard among them is low. Ladies
have been known who, with all the pride of an hereditary title, could
scarcely write their own names.
Good wives and good mothers are nevertheless very abundant in Spain.
It has produced heroines of every kind, from the intriguers of the
Camarilla to the defenders of a city. When “in love,” the Spanish woman
is exceedingly full of passion, and, carrying a knife, she occasionally
employs it to revenge a slight. These essential characteristics of
female manners are, however, gradually yielding under what we may term
the common law of society in Europe. Madrid is assimilating itself to
Paris, and Paris to London; so that as time progresses the peculiar
features wear off, and statistics alone may at some future period form
the measure of a people’s morality.
In the rural parts women share with men the heaviest labours of the
field. They may be observed as you pass along the highways, staggering
under the weight of enormous burdens; but this is a circumstance
attaching to poverty in all parts of the world, not to any nation in
particular. It is among the upper and middle classes in Spain, though
in many other countries the contrary is true, that women wear most
strongly a national characteristic appearance. In Madrid and the other
fashionable cities you are surprised by the vast number of women who
crowd the streets. They have no domestic occupations; they trouble
themselves little with the nurture or education of their children; they
devolve on hirelings the management of their household affairs; and
they relieve themselves from ennui by sauntering through the public
places, dressed with the minutest elegance, carrying their fans, and
bargaining on it, by every possible species of coquetry, for admiration
from the passers by.
A Spanish woman is a natural coquette, and when married cannot abandon
the habit familiarly known as flirtation. This gives rise to jealousy
on the husband’s part, which produces infinite misery.
Marriage is held in law a solemn and irrevocable contract. It is under
many legal regulations, and subject to the authority of the Roman
Catholic Church. In the hands of the clergy, indeed, there is vested a
prodigious arbitrary power, which they are careful to exercise, lest it
should become obsolete by disuse. They may still be seen interfering
in matrimonial affairs; and a glance at the manners of the Spaniards
some centuries ago will show that the clerical power has not decreased.
Public morality was carefully guarded under the rule of the Visigoths,
only to be tolerated during the Middle Ages, since which time it has
been at one time lax, at another severely regulated: at the present day
we find it in a strange state of confusion.
In the year 586-601, the king of the Visigoths of Spain forbade
prostitution in a most absolute manner under pain of severe punishment.
The daughter and the wife born of free parents, convicted of having
delivered themselves over to abandonment, received for the first
offence three hundred blows with a stick and were ignominiously
driven from the city; a relapse was punished with the same corporal
punishment, after which the culprit was handed over to a poor person,
who was obliged to employ her in performing the most menial offices.
If the parents were convicted of being accomplices and of having
participated in the gain derived by their daughter’s prostitution, each
one received one hundred blows. The slave who gave herself up publicly
to libertinage received three hundred blows, and when she was sent back
to her master, her head was shaved, and she was banished from the city
or sold in a place from whence she could not return. The master who
refused to submit to these stipulations of the law received in public
fifty blows with a stick or a whip, and the slave became the property
of some poor man pointed out by the king or the judge, under condition
of never being seen in the city again. If the master had participated
in the debauchery of his slave, that is if he had reaped any profit, he
received the same chastisement as the culprit.
This decree, made especially to repress prostitution in the cities,
applied equally to women of ill fame who infested the boroughs, the
villages, and the country at large.
This was at the commencement of the seventh century, and such were the
severities of the laws passed by the king of the barbarians, Recard by
name. The power of the Visigoths was broken a hundred years afterwards
by the Arabs. The conquered fled to the hilly country, taking refuge in
the mountains of the Asturias; but what laws were in force amongst them
we do not know--we only know that the manners of the age were shameful.
Perpetual wars, the capture and consequent pillage of villages, the
license of the soldiery, helped to constitute a state of things not at
all favourable for the developement of female chastity. The Christians
and the Mussulmans held in captivity the women taken in battle and
treated them as slaves.
The Arabs were soon in their turn conquered by the Moors, and, as
the struggle was less bloody, the two people mingled and exercised a
mutual influence over one another; but the influence of the Arabs was
more direct. “The loose manners of the East,” says M. Guardia, “and
the luxury ever prevalent amongst orientals, were impalpably engrafted
on the austerer habits of the Christians. Chivalry was found to be
perfectly compatible with debauchery.” The corruption of manners made
rapid strides. Prostitution reappeared in all its forms; nor was it, as
amongst the Arabs, hampered by municipal restrictions or fettered by
arbitrary and severe legislation.
In the fifteenth century the old regulations were resuscitated, and
immorality found itself once more compelled to bow to the dicta of
priests. Nevertheless these rigorous measures proved that the remedy
was worse than the evil. Secret debauchery took the place of public
libertinage, and clandestine prostitution increased accordingly.
In the year 1552, Charles V. promulgated an edict against the
keepers of houses of ill fame, considerably augmenting the existing
punishments. Four years later this law was confirmed by Philip II.
The sequel, however, proves that laws were powerless against public
corruption. Immorality is buoyant and contagious, and never so
mischievous as when it is hidden.
The end of the fifteenth century witnessed a reform. Prostitution came
to be regarded as a branch of the public administration, and placed
under severe laws and precise regulations.
About 1623, the health of the community began to be considered, and
hygienic measures were introduced. This was a great step, and one
rendered the more necessary by reason of the terrible ravages committed
by lues venerea, which at this epoch assumed the form of a terrible
epidemic.
Three quarters of a century elapsed, and the subject was carefully
studied, for in 1704 the council decided that the mayors of towns
could arrest and imprison immodest women, who showed themselves in
crowds upon the public promenades, and became an object of scandal
and disorder. But these coercive measures often repeated were without
effect. Soon the law was found to be powerless against corruption.
Since this epoch, public morality has been lax and openly disregarded.
The provinces imitated the example of the capital. At the end of the
eighteenth century an attempt was made to legislate, but nothing came
of it. In 1822, the Cortes passed a Bill relating to public health,
which, in point of fact, was nothing more or less than to establish
houses of ill fame and recognise their existence. This fell to the
ground through the opposition of a physician named Garcia.
In 1853, the population of Madrid was estimated at 270,000. These
figures include the floating portion, which is not insignificant.
Every woman who chooses to prostitute herself for money is perfectly
at liberty to do so; she has to render no account of her conduct, no
authorisation of any sort is necessary. The police give no passes nor
is there any registry. Under these circumstances statistics are next
to an impossibility. Not only does the law tolerate and acknowledge
prostitution, but it actually appears to cherish and foster it, by
permitting the grossest disorder, and by placing no obstacle in the
way of the incessant progress of debauchery. Local authority confines
itself to noticing only the most flagrant occurrences--such as a too
great number of women in the promenades and public thoroughfares,
or when a large number of men amongst the soldiers in garrison fall
victims to the ravages of syphilis. It follows from such a state of
things that the hospitals are gorged with sufferers, and frequently do
not suffice to contain all those who wish to enter. The consequence
is that this disease takes the most alarming forms, and does serious
injury to the public health.
We cannot possibly make anything like a correct estimate of the number
of women who live by prostitution in Madrid, although some manuscript
notes furnished to M. Guardia, place it at about one thousand. This
may only be an approximate calculation, and it is clearly putting
it at its minimum rather than its maximum. Two hundred of these are
kept women; though we are inclined to believe this much below the
actual numbers, as manners are very loose in Madrid, and the habits
of Spaniards incline in a singular degree to concubinage. Probably
six hundred women live in houses of ill fame, the keepers of which
exercise the most absolute authority over the unfortunates that come
into their power. In every one of these houses one finds an indefinite
number of young women, which varies from eight to ten. The woman who
keeps the place lodges and dresses them. In many of these places
there are only two or three resident women, for there are also houses
of appointment and convenience. If the number of indoor pensioners is
limited, those who walk about the streets are like locusts or the sand
of the sea-shore, next to innumerable. They have their abode, perhaps,
in their own families, or else they return to their lodgings. Most of
these public women are either milliners, seamstresses, laundresses,
and pastrycooks, or employed in the manufacture of tobacco. The people
who keep houses of ill fame find it to their interest to preserve the
health of their lodgers, which they are not, as a rule, negligent of,
but yet it is a fact that syphilis is prevalent in Spain to a frightful
extent. The authorities are at no pains to prevent its ramification,
and the climate is only too favourable for its growth and extension.
We divide the women who live by prostitution in Madrid into three
classes: 1st, Those who are kept; 2nd, Those who live in houses of
ill fame; and 3rdly, Those who are free, and merely make use of the
above-mentioned houses for a short time. Within this latter category
we must include about three hundred prostitutes, who constitute the
lowest grade and infest the worst parts of the capital. These have been
recruited perhaps from all classes, having sunk lower and lower, until
every vestige of shame and modesty having totally disappeared, they
traffic for the bare means of subsistence and submit to any and every
degradation to obtain it. They even exercise their avocation in the
streets and public places. On the other hand, prostitution has plenty
of places of resort, such as cafés, public houses, and refreshment
rooms.
The police are fully empowered to take into custody any woman guilty of
an open breach of the law, although they may not interfere with her for
plying her trade, or we might, with some justice, say her profession.
Sometimes the magisterial authorities banish them from Madrid, thus
getting rid of the most dangerous characters, who, however, like black
sheep in the provincial flocks, only serve to carry corruption into
districts hitherto uncontaminated.
There is in Madrid a hospital for foundlings, but the fecundity of
Spanish prostitutes is not considerable. This is an asylum for every
child found in the streets or brought by mothers who wish to get rid of
their children. On an average it receives annually from 4500 to 5000
infants. It was founded in the sixteenth century by charitable people.
AMSTERDAM.
One is astonished--exclaim MM. Schneevooght (first physician at
the hospital of Amsterdam), Van Frigt (assistant surgeon to the
same hospital and the syphilitic dispensary), Van Oordt (student in
the Parisian hospitals)--one is astonished that in a country where
legislation adapts itself to the exigencies of modern times, among a
people signalized by a practical genius, an enlightened administration
has only very lately adopted the only measures to check the scourge of
prostitution.
In Holland religious scruples have yielded before considerations of a
higher nature. The Government of the Netherlands has at last decided
to leave to the _Communes_ the power of preventing by regulation the
sad consequences of free and unrestrained prostitution. Supervision,
independantly of the services which it renders to the public health,
assists to prevent the extension of the evil of which we write.
It is easy to suppose that the capital of Holland offers peculiar
facilities for the growth of this vice, which always flourishes in
commercial and maritime cities, and more especially when the two are
combined.
In 1851 1852 1855
The municipal population
was 221,111 240,669 250,304
Floating 3,532 5,687 7,357
Military 881 1,030 793
The number of strangers that come here, the mariners that commerce
attracts, the luxury that reigns among the upper classes, the number of
young men of good family, who are condemned to a life of celibacy by
inadequate means, unite to relax the morals of the Dutch.
Even now the municipal authorities recoil before the difficulties
thrown in their way by the independent spirit of the people, who do not
like restrictions imposed by authority, however salutary they may be.
A curious book which appeared in 1648 relates an edict published in
1506, by virtue of which only agents of the municipal police were
allowed to open and keep disorderly houses and in certain designated
quarters.
In 1789 a commission of health was convoked, and strict precautions
taken to guard against infection. It followed from this that 177 women
were doctored in one year, a number nearly double that of the year
before.
The author of a book about medicine, which appeared in Amsterdam in
1820, complained bitterly of the depravity of manners which led to the
decrease of marriages, and of the great number of prostitutes who day
and night frequented the streets and other public places to attract
passengers by indecent gestures and immodest proposals: more than 800
were known to the police, of which about 200 lived in tolerated houses.
Coming back to modern times, during the year 1850 we find there were in
Amsterdam 764 illegitimate births, among 21,365 unmarried inhabitants,
between 16 and 30 years, of the male sex, and among 25,207 of the
female sex. At the same time there were twenty disorderly houses and
400 prostitutes not inscribed, but simply known to the police.
There is a society in Amsterdam for rescuing fallen women who wish to
lead a new life. It is called the Sternbeck Asylum, and is productive
of great good.
To allude to the insignificant part played by the police is to avow the
insufficiency of the hygienic department.
Although the girls in the tolerated houses are supposed to be compelled
to submit to examination, any inspection, in reality, is voluntary on
their part. Unfortunately there are a vast number of quacks in the
city, who only prolong and aggravate disease, instead of curing it.
There is a hospital for venereal affections, with two wards, one with
24 beds for the men, the other with 50 beds for the women, which are
all at the service of those affected with syphilis. Besides this there
is a syphilitic dispensary, where gratuitous attendance may be obtained.
Syphilis has increased very much lately among the soldiers in garrison.
For instance take the subjoined figures, extending over five years:
1852 1853 1854 1855 1856
---- ---- ---- ---- ----
87 94 199 156 182
All women must be inscribed, whether living in houses or by themselves.
Disorderly houses are under the supervision of the police. The keeper
of one of these houses may not change his residence, under penalty of
a fine of 7 florins and the loss of his licence, without communicating
with the authorities, and loose women must be provided with a license.
The regulations are very much the same all over the country, at
Utrecht, Haarlem, &c.
BELGIUM.
In the year 1856 the floating population of Brussels and its suburbs
was 260,080, to which the garrison contributed 2414. In the same year
the total registration of prostitutes, according to the law in their
respect provided, numbered 638; these were divided into “filles de
maison” and “éparses.” Although the police regulations are remarkably
stringent, their effect upon public morality is absolutely nil,
although it must be admitted that their _surveillance_ has a beneficial
effect upon the public health. Prostitutes in Brussels, disgusted by
the exercise of municipal power, fly without the walls, and withdraw
to St. Josse, which, with other extra-mural spots, is much infested
with them. The same state of things is observable, more or less, in
Antwerp, Bruges, Ostend, Ghent, Mons, Liege, and Namur. By the Belgian
regulations the circulation of prostitutes in the streets after sundown
is prohibited; women under twenty-one may not be inscribed, and the
medical visitation takes place twice a week by the divisional surgeon,
and whenever else he may please by the superintending officer. All the
éparses and third-class filles de maison are seen at the dispensary,
and the first and second classes of the latter order at their
domiciles. The éparses may secure this privilege by payment of an extra
franc per visit.
The tariff of duties payable by houses and women is as follows:--
Every first-class maison de passe pays 25 francs per month.
Every second-class maison de passe pays 15 francs per month.
Every third-class maison de passe pays 5 francs per month.
Every first class “maison de débauche” pays 60 to 78 francs monthly,
according to the number of its authorized occupants--from 6 to 10--and
2 francs extra for each such additional person.
Every such second-class house pays 20 to 32 francs for from 3 to 7
women, and 1 franc extra for every additional.
Every such third-class house pays from 8 to 16 francs for from 2 to 7
women, and 1 franc extra for each additional.
Every first-class fille éparse pays on each inspection 40 centimes.
Every second-class fille éparse pays on each inspection 30 centimes.
Every third-class fille éparse pays on inspection 15 centimes.
Upon punctuality for four successive visits these payments are
returned, for inexactitude they are doubled.
Directly a male military patient is taken into hospital he is minutely
questioned by the surgeon who attends him as to the exact locality
of the house wherein he thinks he was infected, and the appearance
of the woman. She is soon arrested; and if the result of the medical
examination should prove her diseased, she is placed on the police
surgeon’s list and sent to hospital, where she is restrained for some
time from spreading contagion.
HAMBURG.
Hamburg, from its peculiar situation and the extent of its commerce,
may be considered one of the great centres of trade at present existing
in the world, and for that reason it deserves more than a cursory
glance or a casual notice.
Documents drawn up during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries
relating to public women are still in a state of preservation.
There is a Code Municipal for the city of Hamburg (1292), which
contains the most ancient regulations of this description.
The 17th, 18th, 19th, and 30th of this code regulates in detail the
costume of women of ill-fame and the districts where they are allowed
to dwell. Their number is not chronicled, but it appears to have been
considerable.
The contractors or speculators in women were by successive enactments
heavily taxed in 1562: the sum fixed for each woman was from 75 talents
to the extraordinary sum of 569; but this is explained by an urgent
want on the part of the municipality.
The provisions of the ancient code were maintained up to 1603, when
laws of unexampled rigour were passed. Brothels were closed, women
and their paramours were publicly exposed, and, as far as possible,
outlawed.
In order to describe the state of prostitution in the 19th century we
must call the attention of our readers to an enactment of the year
1807: it is of some length, and we have only extracted briefly from it.
1. Every person who lodges women must send to the pretor’s office
a list of the names of people living there, with their age, their
birthplace, and the time of their entering the establishment.
2. When a new girl arrives she must be presented at the office.
3. When a woman leaves, the office must be informed of the fact in
writing, and her new abode pointed out.
4. The landlord or landlady must particularly impress upon the lodgers
not to have connection with men having a contagious malady.
5. When a woman discovers herself to be infected she must intimate
the circumstance to her landlord, and abstain from practising her
avocation, under pain of severe punishment.
6. The employer who makes the lodger infringe this regulation subjects
himself to imprisonment and the pillory.
11. The landlord must look carefully after the health of his lodgers,
who must submit to a surgical examination by the municipal physician
every fifteen days, and follow his advice punctiliously.
17. Landlords are forbidden to attract foreign women by false promises
who have not yet been debauched.
18. The same penalties are inflicted by the law upon a brothel-keeper
who prevents a repentant woman from leaving her course of living.
19. Intoxicated men are not to be robbed, but to pay simply the charge
put down in the general tariff.
A short time afterwards the French occupied the city, when this edict
was repealed and another substituted in its place in the year 1811.
In 1834 the position of women and brothels was regulated, an account of
which may be seen in the blue book.
It will be nothing new if we remark that marriage seems to be on the
decrease in every populous city, and especially in Hamburg, as we had
occasion to notice before.
In 1825 and 1826, among 208 marriages one can count no less than 108
women accouched three or four months after marriage.
We subjoin a table of illegitimate births in proportion to legitimate
marriages:--
Years. Legitimate Natural
Children. Children.
1701--1715 16 81
1780--1790 11 1
1790--1800 9 1
1800--1811 7 1
and from 1836--1846 one in five.
There are many foreign women in Hamburg, for among 512 women inscribed
at the prefecture in 1846, 101 only were born in the city. Many girls
are, in point of fact, known prostitutes, though not positively known
as such to the authorities, for they must have the consent of their
parents before they can be inscribed, which gives a larger number of
strangers, who are fettered by no such restrictions.
Holstein, Prussia, and above all Brunswick and Hanover, contribute more
than any other countries. Austria and France are unrepresented.
At Hamburg a woman who is in want of money may make more by a single
act of indiscretion than by an entire week of labour.
It may be interesting to state the ages of the women inscribed in 1844
at the office of police:--
16 women were less than 20
401 „ „ from 20 to 30
74 „ „ 30 to 40
11 „ „ 40 to 50
---
Total 502
The police regulations to prevent young girls not yet twenty from
abandoning themselves are, as these statistics prove, totally
insufficient.
The Hamburg women are generally, thanks to their strong constitutions,
healthy and robust. It is remarkable that the public women possess
better teeth than the rest of the feminine population.
Syphilis is not so virulent as in former times or in some other cities,
and is, as the annexed hospital returns evidence, upon the decline
amongst men.
In 1843 there were 355 men infected.
1844 „ 335 „
1845 „ 316 „
The way in which women of ill-fame at Hamburg end their career offers
nothing remarkable: some marry, some adopt different professions,
sufficiently lowly; they sell flowers, for instance, they keep
cabarets, and not often houses of evil repute, a very small number
become domestic servants, and some die in prison, where they have been
sent to expiate an offence against the laws.
Registered women may accost persons of the male sex neither by day nor
night, may show no light in their rooms unless behind drawn curtains,
nor receive men under twenty years of age, nor be in the streets
unaccompanied after 11 P.M., under penalties, both to herself and
the landlord of the house she lives in, of from two to eight days’
imprisonment on bread and water diet. She is also strictly forbidden,
when out of doors, by any speech or gesture to indicate her object.
The examination with the speculum, which takes place at home twice
a week, is conducted by a staff of three medical officers and an
inspector of police, who sign the bill of health or remit the
individual to the hospital forthwith, as the case may be.
Marriage seems to be on the decline in Hamburg, for in 1840 there
was only one marriage among every one hundred of the population.
PRUSSIA--GERMANY.
Although education is almost compulsory in Prussia, it fails most
egregiously to produce that which it ought to be the object of
education and knowledge to obtain. Female chastity marks more closely
than any other thing the moral condition of society. They may go
through an entire course of scholastic discipline, but the regulation
of the passions is more the result of home influence than of reading
and writing, or Latin and Greek, inculcated and taught by educational
sergeants or clergymen in primary schools and gymnasia. It is no
uncommon event in the family of a respectable tradesman in Berlin to
find upon his breakfast-table a young child, of which, whoever may be
the father, he has no doubt at all about the maternal grandfather.
Such accidents are so common that they are regarded, if not with
indifference, as mere youthful indiscretions. In 1837 the number of
females in the Prussian population between the beginning of their 16th
year, and the end of their 45th year--that is within child-breeding
age--was 2,983,146. The number of illegitimates born in the same year
was 39,501, so that 1 in every 75 of the whole of the females of an
age to bear children had been the mother of an illegitimate child. The
unsettled military life of every Prussian on his entrance into the
world as a man, inculcates habits of frivolity and thoughtlessness, and
is peculiarly calculated to form the character of the young man for
evil rather than for good.
BERLIN.
Berlin, the richest and most important city in Germany, possesses a
population of 300,000 inhabitants.
In a city like this, containing a far-famed and numerously attended
university, a very large manufacturing business, and a numerous
garrison, we may very justly expect to find prostitution in a
flourishing condition; for money engenders habits of luxury, and luxury
is the forerunner and the parent of vice.
At Berlin, during the middle ages, prostitution laboured under
many restrictions. Documents bearing upon this epoch show us that
prostitutes were confined to certain houses, in specified streets, and
compelled, by command of the authorities, to wear a particular costume.
The first “_maison de joie_” was erected about the end of the 15th
century, privileged by the corporation, and taxed to some extent.
Those prostitutes who infringed the rules imposed upon them were
flogged and expelled from the city. But they were nevertheless under
the protection of the authorities, who, in point of fact, looked
upon them as belonging to the city, and forming a species of public
property. Whosoever assaulted a courtezan was punished as a disturber
of the public peace.
There were certain bath-houses at this time, which were much frequented
by the richer part of the people and women of station, who gave
themselves up to clandestine debauchery, which, if it was discovered
by the police, subjected the participators in it to the severest
punishment, of which banishment from the city formed the chief part. It
is recounted in an old chronicle that, in 1322, an ambassador of the
Archbishop of Mayence was killed by the common people for proposing to
a bourgeoise to accompany him to one of these bathing establishments.
Concubinage was regarded as common prostitution, and absolutely
forbidden. A law was passed, that people living together without having
been united by the laws of the church, should be banished from Berlin.
Besides those prostitutes put under the protection of the authorities,
and called “demoiselles de la ville,” there were others called nomad
or wandering women. They were equally notorious, and were also under
control. They went from market to market, and from fair to fair, to
give themselves up to fornication.
The Reformation changed all this. Severe moral principles made way
among the people. A religious fervour commenced a war against that
which had always been regarded with toleration, or at least a certain
degree of forbearance, up to this time. They went so far as to look
upon celibacy as a vice, and did all they could to compel bachelors
to marry, by banishing all accessories of, and temptations to,
debauchery. A sort of proscription was organized against loose women,
and, in a short time, the city was nearly cleared of them. This was
very laudable, no doubt, and highly praiseworthy from a strictly
puritanical point of view, but its professors soon discovered that such
an artificial state of things could not long hold together. Adultery
increased enormously, clandestine prostitution was the order of the
day, and infants were exposed continually in the public streets. This
caused the most austere to come round to more moderate views: not only
was the ancient state of things re-established, but, as the number of
prostitutes did not suffice to satisfy the wants of the population, it
was considered necessary to augment it, and this was accordingly done.
Calvinistic ideas, that is, rigid Protestantism, and common sense, have
always struggled together in Germany, and the authorities have had the
greatest trouble to regulate a necessary evil--the one of which we are
treating. The practical views of the administration were fought against
up to 1855, when a fixed system was established.
During the whole of this time the public health was entirely neglected,
which one can partially understand, for syphilis did not make many
ravages during the 16th century. It was not until the 17th that the
necessity for checking its progress made itself felt. The first
regulation bearing upon this scourge appeared in 1700. A medical visit
was ordered every fifteen days; women found to be tainted were at once
sent to the hospital, and, when cured, sent to a prison or workhouse,
where they laboured until they had paid off the cost of curing their
illness.
The moral condition of Berlin in 1717 was sad in the extreme. The
houses of correction were not sufficient to hold the prisoners
committed to them, clandestine debauchery had reached its height, and,
to remedy this deplorable state of things, it was found necessary to
increase the number of tolerated houses, the number of which, in a
very little time, increased to an alarming extent. At the end of the
seven years’ war, more than a thousand houses of this nature might have
been counted in the city, each containing on an average nine women.
These houses were divided into three distinct classes, the lowest of
which accommodated ruffians and blackguards of every description. The
prostitutes were there dressed commonly, and like working people. The
houses of the second category were devoted to the artizans and the
middle classes. Those of the third class, were, of course, devoted to
the rich, and contained women well dressed, and in every way qualified
to seduce from the paths of virtue.
In 1796 another attempt was made to reduce the number of prostitutes,
but like all former attempts of the same nature, it proved ineffectual
on account of the augmentation of secret vice. This was at the end of
the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century; and caused syphilis to
increase very much, and the old regulations were put in force from 1815
to 1829.
In 1844 the respectable inhabitants of Berlin clamoured loudly for
the suppression of houses of ill fame; and the government, in spite
of the remonstrances of the police, listened to the petitioners, and,
in 1845, all houses of this nature were closed, and the girls sent
back to their homes, or some other place that they indicated outside
the Prussian territory. This accomplished, the consequences very soon
made themselves felt, and the Puritans, who were at the bottom of
the measure, were compelled to confess that their precipitancy and
ill-advised legislation were productive only of the worst effects.
Clandestine prostitution developed enormously, syphilis extended
its ramifications, and, after ten years, it was found necessary to
re-establish tolerated houses.
The garrison suffered dreadfully from disease; so much so, indeed, that
General Wrangel solicited the Minister of the Interior to put things on
their old footing.
Illegitimate births terrified statisticians by their frequency.
Let us consider the number of natural births during three different
periods. The first period shall indicate the births during the time
that prostitution was tolerated and spread equally over the city. The
second when it was confined to certain streets, and the third during
the suppression.
Years. Illegitimate Legitimate
Births. Births.
1st period, 1838-9, 1840-1 5,652 34,450
2nd „ 1842-3, 4, 5 10,175 54,696
3rd „ 1847-8, 9 5,053 26,782
The proportion of illegitimate births to legitimate, in the first
period, is one to seven; in the second, one to five; in the third, one
to six.
When prostitution was tolerated, the number of prostitutes did not vary
very much; for instance:
In 1792 there were in Berlin 269;
„ 1796 „ „ 257;
of which 190 lived in 54 tolerated houses, and 67 in lodgings.
In 1808 there were 433 in lodgings; of which 230 were spread over 50
houses, and 203 lived in lodgings. Besides this there were about 467,
who gave themselves up to clandestine prostitution. The population was
at this time 150,000: it was during the occupation of the French.
In 1810 there were 165 prostitutes spread over 44 houses.
In 1819 there were 311 prostitutes, 198 in houses, and 113 in lodgings.
In 1837 there were 258 prostitutes spread over 34 houses.
In 1844 there were 287 prostitutes spread over 26 houses, and 18 in
lodgings.
In 1849 the number of prostitutes of all classes in Berlin was
estimated at 10,000.
There is a provision common to Berlin and some other towns, that the
keeper of a licensed house must defray the cost of curing any person
whose contraction of venereal disease in his house can be established.
Dr. Behrend is of opinion that besides the 10,000 prostitutes known
to the authorities that we have before alluded to, there are 8000
clandestine ones.
It may be interesting to English readers to know that the price of
admission to a certain class of tolerated houses in Berlin is 6_d._ for
which a cup of coffee is given, the use of a private room for fifteen
minutes 3_s._, for thirty minutes 5_s._, and those prices include the
company of one of the women, who receives one-third for herself.
AUSTRIA.
In Austria public brothels are not tolerated by the police, and public
women are sent into the houses of correction; but this legislative
enactment will not convey a true idea to a foreigner of the actual
state of morality throughout the country. Strangers, and those whom for
want of a better designation we will term closet moralists, who draw
their conclusions from _primâ facie_ evidence, would be inclined to
consider the territory governed by the house of Hapsburg almost, if not
entirely, free from vice, because the streets of the capital and other
towns are almost free from the spectacles that disfigure the _pavé_
in other well-known places of cosmopolitan pilgrimage and resort. But
we shall prove the reverse to be the case not only in Vienna, but
throughout the kingdom.
Austria is an amalgamation of conquered countries which require an
enormous standing army to keep in subjection, hence it very naturally
follows that the moral sense is deadened in many districts to an
alarming extent; and this is the invariable result of military
despotism, for the sense of morality which is essentially the result of
education, is never so acute as in free and well-governed countries.
The extent and population of the different states that comprise the
Austrian empire is thus estimated in the official reports of 1851.
--------------------------------------+---------------------
| Area |
Provinces. | in Sq. | Population,
| Miles. | 1851.
--------------------------------------+--------+------------
German--Austria, Archduchy | 15,052 | 2,390,376
---- Tyrol, Principality | 10,981 | 859,700
---- Styria, Duchy | 8,670 | 1,006,971
Sclavonian--Illyria, Kingdom | 10,960 | 1,291,196
---- Bohemia, Kingdom | 20,203 | 4,409,900
---- Moravia and Silesia, Margravate | 10,239 | 2,238,424
---- Dalmatia, Kingdom | 5,067 | 393,715
Magyar--Hungary, with Sclavonia, &c., | |
and Croatia, Kingdom | 89,040 | 10,158,939
---- Transylvania, Grand Principality | 21,390 | 2,073,737
---- Military frontier | 15,179 | 1,009,109
Polish--Galicia and Bukovina, Kingdom | 33,538 | 4,936,303
Italian--Lombardo-Venetian Kingdom | 17,511 | 5,007,472
+--------+------------
Total |257,830 | 35,776,842
--------------------------------------+--------+------------
In the capital itself, the lowest and most moderate computation
allows the number of prostitutes to be 15,000. These are under police
supervision, although they are not licensed. The officers of justice
have the power of making domiciliary visits, and enter their dwellings
at any hour of the day or night. If they are discovered in the
streets after a certain hour they may be apprehended, and this to a
great extent prevents that parade and ostentation that is observable
in most European cities of any size and note. We are informed on
reliable authority (Wilde) that almost one in every two children born
in Vienna is “illegitimate,” which evidences very clearly that the
more restrictions you place upon public immorality, so much the more
do you increase private vice; from 1830 to 1837, the proportion of
illegitimate to legitimate births was as ten to twelve in Vienna. In
Austria registers of births, deaths, and marriages, are kept by each
minister of the church for his parish, and also by the Jewish Rabbi
for those of their own persuasion. The register of births records
the year, month, and day of birth, the number of the house in which
the birth occurred, the name of the child and its sex, and whether
it be born in wedlock or illegitimate, the names and surnames of the
parents, their religion and the names and surnames and condition of the
sponsors. In the case of illegitimate children the name of the father
cannot be entered unless he acknowledges the paternity. The register
of marriages records the year, month, and day of the marriage, the
place of solemnization, the names and surnames of the parties, their
religion, age, and whether single or widowed, and the names, surnames,
and condition of the witnesses.
If a woman makes an application to the lying-in hospital and states her
poverty, she is simply asked are you legitimately or illegitimately
with child. The success of her suit depends in a great measure upon
her reply, for if she says I am pregnant illegitimately she is admitted
on the spot, sometimes in the fifth or sixth month of her pregnancy,
generally in the seventh. They present her with an imperial livery to
wear, carefully preserving her old clothes until she departs. After
delivery she has to nurse her own child, sometimes another’s, and
when she goes away she gets a bonus of five shillings, thus actually
receiving a premium for losing her virtue. For the two first months
of its existence the child is nurtured by its mother, it is then sent
into the country at the public expense; and if a male it is always
welcome in an Austrian peasant’s family, for if they can rear it to
eighteen years of age, it is rendered up to the conscription instead
of the eldest son of its adopted father. Education is very general in
Austria. The law of 1821 enacts that no male shall enter the marriage
state who is not able to read, write, and understand casting up
accounts. This is a serious restriction to connubial bliss amongst
the industrial classes; but the law is still more arbitrary, it makes
these qualifications as it were indispensable to a man’s existence.
It further says, no master of any trade shall without paying a heavy
penalty employ workmen who are not able to read and write, and that
small books of moral tendency shall be published and distributed at the
lowest possible price to all the Emperor’s subjects.
Mr. McGregor says, “The provisions of this law appear to me to be
pretty generally put in force, for I have nowhere in Austria met with
any one under thirty years of age who was not able to read and write,
and I have found cheap publications, chiefly religious and moral
tracts, almanacks, very much like ‘Poor Richard’s,’ containing, with
tables of the month, moon’s age, sun’s rising and setting, the fasts,
feasts, holidays, markets, and fairs in the Empire, and opposite to
the page of each month appropriate advice relative to husbandry and
rural economy, with moral sayings and suitable maxims. The spirit of
elementary instruction, if not the most enlightened, inculcates at
every step, morality, the advantage of a virtuous life, the evil of
vice, and the misery consequent on crime.” Works of art are subjected
like books to the censors, who are unremitting in the enforcement of
their political, moral, and religious restrictions.
MODERN ROME.
Mortification of the flesh is one of the first principles of the Romish
faith, and a stranger would expect to find any laxity of morals
amongst the inhabitants of the eternal city severely punished; but in
point of fact prostitution is tolerated and regulated in Rome, although
there does not exist any special act relating to it.
In the Middle Ages many vices stained the fame of Rome; but it is of
the present day that we are about to write. The Romish system has
produced the following results, according to M. Felix Jacquot, who
lived at Rome for four years on purpose to study the morality and the
health of Italy.
1st. Not being able to confine prostitution to certain houses, it has
spread itself among families.
2nd. Clandestine prostitution, which is most prevalent at Rome,
has there produced the evils that it always engenders, houses of
accommodation, seduction at home, and the extension of syphilis.
It is extremely probable that, as there are no standing regulations
relative to prostitution, perhaps a sort of arbitrary power is vested
in the police which opens the door to innumerable evils.
There exist at Rome five forms of clandestine prostitution: let us
begin with the street walkers.
Street walker is the only name that can be given to those ignoble
creatures that prostitute themselves in the evening and during the
night, at the corners of the streets and in the dark angles of
the public squares near the cathedral of St. Peter, and under the
colonnades of Bernin, where the French soldiery are so often infected.
The street walker was not much known at Rome before the revolution of
1849. She is the result of disorder, and the occupation of Rome by the
French gives vitality to her existence. Some of these wretches will
infect ten or even twenty men in one night, who have recourse to them
to satisfy their brutal cravings and bestial desires.
We have to treat, secondly, of houses of ill-fame; but there is little
to be said about them; they do not differ in any respect from those to
be found in other cities. The dangers of frequenting them are precisely
the same. Syphilis acquires new virulence by being fostered by the
inmates, who are recruited from amongst innocent and inexperienced
girls belonging to families in the city.
Thirdly, there are houses where the girls neither live nor sleep,
but where they are sure to be found during certain hours of the day.
The women dine there, and only return to their families at night.
These houses are not numerous, probably there are not more than
six or seven in the whole city. To escape the watchfulness of the
police, these change their locale; whilst one or two close others
open, so that there is no diminution of the evil. They rather affect
quiet localities: the steep hilly streets little frequented, such
as the rampart of the capitol behind the church of _St. Joseph des
Menuisiers_, or those quarters where strangers who come to pass a
season at Rome instal themselves. There are not many women, as a rule,
in these houses; generally six and seldom more than eight. They are
frequented by young girls, and notoriously by married women. As so
many men are obliged to remain bachelors when they take orders, a
vast number of women are compelled, against their will, to embrace a
life of celibacy. Then, in a country without industry and with very
little agriculture, the lower classes have positively no resources to
marry upon. There is a disinclination, also, amongst all classes in
Rome to have children without possessing the means to educate them as
they should be educated. There is quite a passion amongst the ladies
in Rome to get married, and they put every art into requisition to
effect their end. An irreproachable character is one of the means
employed by young unmarried ladies. But once married everything is
changed, and their reserve ceases. This change is to be attributed to
too much exclusiveness and the restraint imposed on naturally strong
and libidinous instincts; at any rate it is a well-established fact at
Rome that marriage is productive of the worst passions and the most
scandalous intrigues.
These houses are subject to no visits of the sanitary police. If the
authorities are cognisant of their existence they take no notice
unless the neighbours complain of such immodest residents in their
immediate vicinity. Their existence depends in a great measure upon
the lowest members of the police force, whose secrecy is often bought
by large bribes. If money is refused them, these fellows complain
to their superiors, and the extermination of the offending house of
accommodation generally ensues.
It is no uncommon thing in England and France to hear the clamour of
drunken men and women issuing from those houses--the noise of bacchanal
lyrics mingled with oaths and curses, the immodesty of the women
joining with the blasphemy of the men; but in Italy it is different.
There is a sort of dignity amongst the Italians even in the midst of
their debauchery. An anonymous denunciation before the clergy of the
parish or the justices that a man was drunk, will often expose the
denounced individual to punishment.
The hospital of San Giacomo is set apart for syphilitic maladies, and
there the women are treated by the physicians, but unfortunately too
late.
Gay women are to be placed in the fourth category. Under this name we
include all those who make the sale of their charms a profession. Some
are mistresses to foreigners and to natives, and transmit infection
from one to the other; the others receive the first comer for a certain
stipulated sum. There are a few, however, who only receive those that
are known to them or who are well introduced. This is a measure of
personal safety; by it they elude the danger of infection, and escape
from the supervision of the police.
Syphilis is very prevalent in Rome, more so than in France; and the
influence of the climate is much felt in accelerating the approach and
increasing the virulence of the disease.
Fifthly. Prostitution in families is one of the most deplorable results
of the non-toleration of open houses of ill fame.
This actually goes on under the eyes of the parents; the mother will
introduce you to her daughter, and the little brothers will provide you
with a ladder to enter the house with.
The love of the _far niente_ is so strong amongst the Italians that
labour, when it can be obtained, is odious to them. “La travailleuse,”
says M. Jacquot, “chaude encore des baisers adultères sera bien reçue
dans l’alcôve conjugale, si elle apporte un bon pécule au bout de la
semaine;” and he adds with indignation, “for a long time I refused to
believe in the existence of such ignominy, to-day I am only too well
convinced.”
An honest woman will on no account be seen in the streets after dark,
and a servant will not go into the city from the suburbs after the day
has disappeared.
The city of Rome contains 150,000 people; and nourishes, lodges, and
takes care of more than 4000 poor people, infirm people, old people,
orphans, foundlings, etc., without reckoning assistance given at their
own houses to those who require it. There are different hospitals too:
the Trinity of the Pelerins, the deaf and dumb asylum, the madhouse,
etc. Nearly 22,000 necessitous are relieved every year. The hospital
of St. Roch gives admittance to women with child without asking their
name or condition, without inquiring whether or not they are married.
Women in a good position, who wish to conceal the fruits of a culpable
amour, can receive every attention by paying 3 scudi (or about 4_s._
6_d._ of our money) a month. The child is taken to the _Pia casa di
Santo-Spirito_. Both men and women when discharged from hospital are so
weak that they cannot pursue their avocations. When this is the case
they are received into the refuge for convalescents, called the Trinity
of the Pelerins, that we have had occasion to refer to before. This
hospital has received six hundred thousand inmates since the year 1625.
As things are at present constituted at Rome there is little more to
be said respecting it, but we cannot conclude without expressing our
admiration of the numerous charitable establishments that one finds
there. Every infirmity is cared for with no sparing hand, and the
defenceless and the destitute are not deserted by the state and the
charity of private individuals.
TURIN.
Turin is as important in every way as Rome, and deserves considerable
attention. Its population, if we include the floating inhabitants, is
more than 150,000.
Almost up to the present day, that is, until very lately, the
supervision of the police was very imperfectly exercised, and the
propagation of disease was the inevitable result. In 1855, M. Ratazzi,
Minister of the Interior, wishing to establish a better organization,
asked Doctor Sperino, well known in the world of letters for his works
upon syphilis, to conceive a project bearing upon this important
department of the public health.
These new ordonnances established a reform not only in Turin, but
throughout the kingdom.
The public women who were visited before 1856 were at Turin 180; since
a scrupulous supervision has been established, the number is increased
to 750. When we compare these figures, we shall see how much this
department of the sanitary police was neglected, and how necessary and
efficacious the measures suggested by M. Sperino were. This is proved
in a better way still by the notable diminution of disease among the
garrison. When the _surveillance_ of prostitution is badly exercised
the disastrous results can escape the notice of the government, but the
registry kept of the soldiers who go into hospital is an index always
to be relied on.
After a long time, a hospital specially devoted to venereal diseases
has sprung up in Turin, called the _Syphilocome_. Tainted women
are here treated gratuitously. They also receive women sent from
the provinces. Married women not prostitutes, who are nursing their
children, are received here in chambers set apart for them. In 1856 the
number of admissions was 1661. A similar institution is about to be
erected at Genoa.
Prostitutes are now inscribed on the registers, and they must renew
their licence annually. The cost of the licence in the first instance,
and the cost of renewal, is
For prostitutes belonging to f. c.
tolerated houses 2 0
For free women of the 1st class 2 0
„ 2nd „ 1 0
„ 3rd „ 0 60
The 88th article of the fifth section of the new regulations says, “The
cost of the visits of the physicians made to independent prostitutes at
their own houses is 1 f. 50 c., and those attached to different houses
is fixed at--
For those in houses of the f. c.
1st class 1 0
For those independent, who
come to the sanitary office,
of the 1st class 1 0
„ 2nd „ 0 50
„ 3rd „ gratis.
In the third class we only include the destitute.”
Art. 89. All the taxes imposed upon prostitutes and upon the chiefs
of houses of tolerance must be paid to the director of the sanitary
office, and are devoted to paying the numerous expenses attendant upon
the supervision of prostitution.
Article 40 of the third section.--The heads of houses of tolerance must
not, in any case, oppose the visits of the agents of police, by day or
night, when the said visits are deemed necessary for the interests of
public security.
41. The number of prostitutes in each house is fixed by the police.
49. In houses of the first class, three-fourths of the fixed price goes
to the master, the other fourth to the prostitute.
50. The masters of houses of all kinds must pay to the officer of
inspection, besides the tax for sanitary visits made to prostitutes
living in the house, an annual sum, fixed as follows:
For houses in the first category, that is, where prostitutes have a
fixed abode,
1st class 400f.
2nd „ 200f.
3rd „ 100f.
For houses coming within the second category, that is, where
independent prostitutes go to exercise their calling,
1st class 100f.
2nd „ 60f.
3rd „ 40f.
Payments for sanitary visits must be made every fifteen days, and the
latter tax three months in advance; at the moment of inscription the
woman is subjected to the first sanitary visit.
Women in houses of ill fame must not present themselves at the windows
or stand in the doorway. Every immoral provocation on the part of the
keeper is absolutely forbidden. All servants in these houses under
forty-five shall be inspected by the doctors.
Every woman found in any of these houses without being furnished with
a licence, and without being inscribed, shall be considered as giving
herself up to clandestine prostitution.
The master of the house, in this case, shall have his licence
suspended, or altogether taken away from him.
The police give every assistance in their power to those prostitutes
who wish to quit their way of living.
Houses of ill fame are to be closed at certain hours determined by the
police.
The rules passed in 1857 are very strict, and place loose women
completely in the power of the police, without whose sanction they
can do nothing. As long as they remain prostitutes they are in a
complete state of servitude; but this severe supervision is productive
of beneficial results, as far as the curtailing of the extension of
syphilis goes; and, after all, this should be the main consideration
with every legislator upon this much-vexed question.
BERNE.
The peculiar customs of the Swiss during the middle ages give an
unusual character to the immorality of this country. In the canton of
Berne, it was the ordinary custom of the young men to make nocturnal
visits in troops to the girls of their acquaintance, generally living
in the same village. These visits were made for the purpose of
contracting intimate relations, and usually succeeded in doing so. Thus
intrigue almost invariably preceded marriage, and it was no unusual
thing for the christening of the first-born to take place immediately
after the marriage of its parents.
“The inconstancy of the human heart,” says M. D’Erlach, “explains why
young women often changed their lovers;” so men could go from one girl
to another for years without any restriction or interruption on the
part of the police.
The use of the bath was established during the middle ages, and
although first erected for sanitary reasons it degenerated, as in
Germany, into a rendezvous for immoral purposes, during the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries. These baths were taken in common, and
this promiscuous bathing, and the peculiar dress worn, promoted the
lasciviousness both of men and women.
About the end of the fifteenth century the demoralization of the
people of Berne had reached its height, when the Emperor Sigismund
visited it on his return to Rome. In 1528 the clergy, in spite of their
professions, their oaths, and their precepts, surpassed every other
class by the most scandalous profligacy. Amongst the houses of ill-fame
one had acquired a shameful ascendancy. At the end of the invasion of
the Republic by the French this tolerated house was established at No.
13, Rue de l’Arsenal, and it was frequented by all the great men of the
day. It was afterwards moved, and placed opposite a church very much
frequented by the people. Towards the end of the Helvetian Republic,
it was once more translated, on account of the scandal its position
occasioned, but it was finally closed in 1828 by a decree of the State
Council. Until then there was not a single article of any sort against
these places--not a law that bore even remotely upon houses of ill fame.
Notwithstanding the closing of this house, several others have sprung
up in retired districts under the name of public baths, and are
unmolested by the police, who tacitly acknowledge the fact of their
existence and acquiesce in it. The girls in these establishments are
engaged under various pretexts; some are supposed to be employed in the
kitchen, some take care of the baths, some are housemaids, and look
after the bed-rooms--an occupation, it is to be presumed, that most of
them find congenial; sometimes they are imagined to be on a visit to
the people of the house, at others they are relatives. The keeper of
the house employs his own physician to look after the health of the
girls; and these are obliged to report to the police if any of them are
found infected, when the police make a personal visit, not generally
conducive to the advancement of the interests of the master of the
house.
Besides the women inhabiting these houses, which are not numerous,
there may be 170 or 200 other prostitutes. These appear on the
register, and are under the eye of the police.
There are belonging to certain families in the city, and exercising no
profession, from 50 to 70 women.
Living in the city without their families, under the pretext of a
profession, but without one, 120 to 130.
“These,” says M. D’Erlach, “are our prostitutes, such as one meets in
the streets, the squares, &c. As in other towns, they, by their looks,
by their provoking deportment, by their dress, and by their glaring
colours, endeavour to arrest attention, and entice the passers-by into
places where beds may be obtained, or into those public baths which are
well known to harbour prostitutes.”
Another class of prostitutes is formed by those who actually have a
profession, but unhappily one not sufficiently lucrative to enable
them to exist. These, driven by the exigencies of their position, seek
in prostitution that which their profession denies them. Among this
class we see milliners, dressmakers, shop-girls, and servants. At Berne
the household servants send the greatest number of prostitutes into
this category. The reason is, that nine-tenths of them come from the
country, and are placed in hotels, public-houses, tobacco-shops, &c.,
and, inexperienced, easily fall a prey to the temptations held out to
them.
A few words concerning the places of rendezvous may be instructive. The
girls in a certain position who have a profession of some sort, and
have no locality adapted for meeting their lovers, have recourse to
the public baths. In these baths each chamber has two bathing places:
often the rooms communicate with one another by little doors, which
facilitates the commerce of the sexes, about which the keeper of the
baths is profoundly ignorant.
The legislature, as regards sanitary regulations, is mute. The only
thing that can be done is to arrest the girls when it can be proved
that they are infected, and they are then sent to prison.
We subjoin some extracts from the law of the 4th June, 1852, respecting
drinking-houses and other analogous establishments:--
“Art. 37. The authorities of police and their servants can, in the
exercise of their functions, open at any hour of the day or night the
inns and other like establishments.
“Art. 39. In cases particularly urgent and important, the Executive
Council is authorized to shut any inn or analogous establishment.
“Art. 55. The innkeeper must not permit in his house any infraction of
the existing police regulations.”
Innkeepers are further forbidden to allow certain rooms in their houses
to be used for immoral purposes.
THE CITY OF PARIS.
From time immemorial the immorality of the city of Paris has been
proverbial. Every historian, no matter what period of Parisian
history he may have been describing, has dwelt more or less on the
characteristic profligacy of the French nation. Yet all documents
relating to the middle ages must be received with some diffidence, as
they were chiefly drawn up by ecclesiastics, whose interest it has
often proved to distort facts and falsify statistics. Nevertheless,
the levity of the French people has always been a matter for comment
amongst the inhabitants of other countries; and although we may not
find much to instruct us in the papers relative to prostitution in
former times among the Parisians, there is much to be relied upon which
is not altogether uninteresting.
The first document which we possess upon the number of prostitutes in
Paris was drawn up about the year 1762. “This document,” says M. Parent
Duchatelet, “is not much known. We found the MS. in the archives of the
Prefecture, with other papers relating to prostitution.” It contains
a memoir presented anonymously to the lieutenant of police of that
period. It is written very carefully, and with great sagacity, showing
a profound knowledge of the subject of which it treats. The writer
estimates the number of prostitutes exercising their profession in the
city of Paris at 25,000. A few years later, another writer, alluding to
the same subject, reckons the number of all classes upon the pavement
of Paris at 20,000; but neither of these give the sources from whence
they derived their calculation.
The celebrated M. Boucher places the number of prostitutes before the
Revolution at 30,000. These figures are, however, supposed to include
gay women of every kind--actresses, shop-girls, manufacturing women,
and public women, openly known as such.
It is easy to see that there is a great uncertainty in this calculation
of the number of prostitutes before the Revolution, but in the year
1802, Fouché, then Minister of Police, having an idea of erecting
dispensaries in every city in France, estimated, in speaking of Paris,
that it actually did contain 30,000 public women.
Eight years later, in 1810, the Police Minister demanded from
his subordinate officer an approximate estimate of the number of
prostitutes in the city; and the return furnished to him places the
number at 18,000, of whom one-half were kept-women. In 1825 the author
of the “Biographie des Commissaires de Police” was of opinion that the
actual number did not exceed 15,000.
It was not until after the administration of Baron Pasquier, and
especially since 1816, that any reliable documents were prepared. The
researches were executed with great care, and every woman who practised
with sufficient publicity was placed on the returns.
According to M. Duchatelet, the total number of prostitutes inscribed
on the register
in 1812 was 15,523
1813 20,113
1814 22,866
1815 22,249
1816 26,226
1817 28,953
1818 31,042
1819 31,280
1820 32,957
1821 34,966
1822 34,831
1823 32,510
1824 31,845
1825 31,483
1826 29,948
1827 29,663
1828 31,956
1829 34,118
1830 36,337
1831 39,128
1832 42,699
(This is amalgamating the monthly inscriptions during the entire year.)
This calculation extends over 21 years, and the author declares the
numbers to be reliable. It is extremely interesting to the statistician
to notice the fluctuations of vice during different periods of a
country’s history. In 1815 it will be perceived that the number
sensibly diminishes, but it increases gradually and regularly from
1816 to 1822, a time at which the inscriptions are augmented by more
than 2900. In 1827 they are again lowered, only to be considerably
increased in 1830. These oscillations must arrest attention, but
it is incontestable that prostitution has advanced with rapid and
irresistible strides during each successive year that has succeeded,
and to prove such to be the fact we accept from the same authority a
table indicating the number of women inscribed on the registers within
the following 22 years, which will bring us up to 1854, when there is a
monthly average of 4200.
The total number of women inscribed on the register
in 1833 was 44,676
1834 45,382
1835 45,759
1836 45,811
1837 46,584
1838 47,881
1839 47,630
1840 47,153
1841 46,635
1842 46,089
1843 45,846
1844 46,340
1845 47,559
1846 49,915
1847 51,422
1848 51,298
1849 50,015
1850 52,291
1851 52,918
1852 51,620
1853 50,614
1854 50,790
(It must be understood that the registry is repeated every month.)
It has been asserted that Paris was the rendezvous of all debauched
women in France, and that out of every ten thousand immodest women
in the kingdom nine thousand at least are to be looked for in the
capital. “Not only,” wrote Restif de Bretonne, “will you find in
Paris ‘Lyonnaises, Picardes, Champenoises, Normandes, Provencales,
Languedociennes,’ &c., but foreigners, Germans, Swiss, Poles, Saxons,
Spaniards, Italians, and even English, have resorted there, so that we
may even denominate Paris the worst place in Europe.”
At the time that Restif wrote, it may be almost supposed that Parisians
were not to be found among the prostitutes of the capital.
Among 12,707 women inscribed at Paris since April 1816, up to April
1831--that is to say, during 15 years--24 were not able to tell what
country they were born in, 31 came from different countries foreign to
Europe, 451 belonged to European countries foreign to France, 12,201
were born in French departments.
Among the 31 strangers to Europe were--
18 Americans.
11 Africans.
2 Asiatics.
During the years 1845 to 1854 Great Britain contributed 56 women to
swell the ranks of the prostitutes in Paris, of which
London sent 30
Bristol 1
Brighton 3
Liverpool 1
Southampton 1
Sundry Villages 14
Ireland 4
Scotland 2
--
Total 56
From the 16th March, 1816, up to the 31st April, 1831, the total number
of girls inscribed on the registers has been 12,607, of which Paris has
furnished 4469, the chief towns 6939, and the others have come from
various places. These statistics we consider sufficient to prove the
fact of the emigration of prostitutes to Paris.
It has been supposed that almost all prostitutes are natural children.
That this is not the case is abundantly proved by a careful analysis by
M. Duchatelet, in which he evidences the contrary; out of 1183 children
born in Paris not quite one-fourth were illegitimate.
The list of the professions practised at one time by women who have
subsequently become prostitutes is alarming, from its extensiveness,
including as it does no less than six hundred distinct trades,
among which we perceive seamstresses, those in the linen trade,
breeches-makers, flannel-waistcoat makers, glovers, upholstresses
or tapestry-makers, darners and menders, strap-makers, botchers,
milliners, embroideresses, gauze-workers, flowerists, feather-makers,
those that colour or illuminate, knitters, lace-makers, fringe-makers,
rope-makers, furriers, wool-workers, hair-weavers, machinists,
cotton-spinners, silk-weavers, gold and silver gauze veil-makers,
shawl-makers, bonnet-makers, and innumerable others; indeed, every
trade may truly be said to be adequately represented in this social
congress for the propagation of vice. There are also those who have
once been much better off. For instance: seven had been shopkeepers
in a very respectable way of business, three were midwives, one an
artist, six were musicians and gave lessons on the harp and the piano,
sixteen had been actresses in Paris and the provinces, and three (this
is a very rare case, and an exception to the general rule,) possessed
an income of 200 francs, of 500, and even 1000. It is not easy to
determine what inducement a life of prostitution could hold out to
these women.
The total number of women whose professions were known amounts to 3120.
The returns go far to evidence the evil effects of sedentary
occupations upon the morals of young girls; then the fluctuations in
the demand for labour are continually throwing the operatives out of
work, and as a means of existence they naturally resort to prostitution
to obtain a livelihood.
To show the extent to which education has spread amongst this class,
we give the number of those who signed the register well, of those who
signed badly, and of those who could not sign at all, out of 4470 girls
born and brought up in Paris.
Those who could not sign 2332
Those who signed badly 1780
Those who signed well, and sometimes
very well 110
And of those who possessed no indication
to show what they were 248
----
Total 4470
Ignorance is the prevailing characteristic of the “femmes galantes”
generally throughout the world, and we find it so in France, which
is rather singular when we consider how comprehensive the scheme of
education is in that country.
As far as religion goes, they are usually deficient in the knowledge of
the most simple articles of belief. Sometimes they are fanatical to a
degree, and always superstitious. This being the case, it will not seem
wonderful that they always receive the rites of the Church on their
deathbeds with the greatest confidence, satisfaction, and delight.
It is very well known that soldiers and sailors have a way of tattooing
themselves on the chest, the arms, and sometimes the legs. The
inscriptions are often of great size, and elaborately executed. One
man will have a battle delineated on his skin, or the likeness of his
sweetheart, but this of course depends upon his turn of mind. This
habit has been adopted in Paris by those prostitutes who live in the
houses frequented by the military. It may in the first instance have
originated from a desire on their part to ingratiate themselves with
their admirers. At all events, from whatever cause it may have arisen,
it is now an established custom. Women occasionally have been seen in
the hospital with as many as thirty lovers imprinted on the throat, the
breast and other parts of the body, although it is customary for them
to remove a lover who has been succeeded by one more favoured, and the
means had recourse to, to effect this, are often prejudicial to the
health of the girl in a fatal degree. They will not hesitate to employ
sulphuric acid, which is as likely as not to raise an ulcer which has
in very many cases ended in the death of the sufferer. Strange to say,
the figures and inscriptions are rarely, if ever, immodest or indecent.
The shibboleth of this class is always “Vive la bagatelle!” When not
actually engaged in the pursuits their avocation entails upon them,
they seldom do anything. Their existence, if not altogether dreamy and
inane, is certainly one marked rather by lassitude and inertness than
energy and briskness. They are perpetually the prey of an irresistible
craving after excitement, which devours them, and the morning and
afternoon not unfrequently serves only to recruit the nerves shattered
by the excesses of the night before. Reading is not a pastime with
them, although some may frequently be found with books in their hands.
Most prostitutes pass under false names, and they even go so far as to
change their names whenever they have an inclination to do so.
* * * * *
The names that the better class are fondest of are:--
Aumale
Zulma
Calliope
Irma
Zélie
Amanda
Pamela
Modeste
Natalie
Sidonia
Olympia
Flora
Thalia
Artemisia
Armande
Leocadia
Octavia
Malvina
Virginia
Azelina
Ismeria
Lodoiska
Palmira
Aspasia
Lucrece
Clara
Angelina
Flavia
Celina
Emily
Reine
Anais
Delphini
Fanny.
The lower class do not, as may be supposed, possess so refined a taste
as their more elevated sisters. We subjoin some of the most popular to
be found in their vocabulary:--
Roussellette
Collette
Boulotte
Mourette
La Ruelle
La Roche
La Courtille
La Picarde
Faux Cul
La Bancale
La Blonde
La Provençale
Belle-Cuisse
Belle-Lambe
Le Bœuf
Brunette
Bouquet
Louchon
Mignarde
Poil-ras
Poillong
Peloton
Cocote
Bourdonneuse.
Leaving this subject, let us touch upon another which deserves our
attention. Every prostitute has a lover; he is generally selected
from among the law students, medical students, or young barristers,
for their minds being cultivated and their address easy, the woman is
charmed by an intellectual superiority she can never hope to attain
to. A great number of prostitutes of course recruit for lovers among
the shop-boys and tradesmen of the city. They become so ardently
attached to them that they will submit to almost any indignity. The
“Paillasson” may be the greatest tyrant in his small way that ever had
the power of lording it over another, but no diminution of her regard
or passion will result from his ill-treatment. A great number of young
men in Paris have no visible means of existence, but a prostitute
will, in most instances, not only keep her lover out of the proceeds
of her prostitution, but clothe, feed, and even lodge him herself.
In fact it is more a madness than a passion. They will put up with
anything,--wounds, curses, blows, all are forgiven and forgotten.
Introducing houses, and houses of accommodation are tolerated by the
Parisian police, for it is found impossible, and perhaps impolitic, to
suppress them. The refuse of the city, both men and women, are confined
by the police to the lowest quarters of the city, that they may be
under the immediate control of the authorities. So that the vilest and
most abandoned women are allowed to mingle with thieves, ruffians, and
malefactors of every description in a particular locality, instead of
infesting other parts of the city.
[Illustration: SCENE IN THE GARDENS OF “CLOSERIE DES LILAS.” PARIS.]
The rank and title of “_Dame de Maison_,” or keeper of a house of
ill-fame, being the highest pinnacle of a prostitute’s career, and the
acme of their ambition, of course renders such a position a matter of
much envy and anticipation to them. We can divide this class into four
distinct divisions--
1st. Those who have, so to say, gone through the world, having been
kept by officers in the army, or men of property, who, perhaps, are
thrown over by their _ci-devant_ admirers, and possessing some money,
establish themselves in this way as a means of making a livelihood and
obtaining a provision for their declining years.
2nd. Those old prostitutes who have exercised some economy during their
youth, and are thus placed in a position to live somewhat at their
ease.
3rd. Old servants and confidential women who have lived in the
service of keepers of houses of ill-fame, who have an agreement with
their mistress to take her business or succeed her on her death or
bankruptcy. These women have a knowledge of the places where they have
lived, and know perfectly well how to manage the girls who resort to
these houses, and thoroughly understand the men who visit them.
4th. The fourth class is composed of women who have never been
prostitutes, who often are married and have children. The appetite of
gain has launched them in this career. It is to keep a furnished house
that they have taken in prostitutes, or having set up a public-house
they entertain loose women to make men come there.
There are in Paris some families who have kept prostitutes for several
generations, having positively no other source of revenue than the
keeping of introducing houses or houses of ill-fame. One sees the
mother exercising her profession in one quarter of the city and her
daughter in another. The daughters succeed their mother, the nieces
their aunt, etc., but in general this is very rare, one not being able
to indicate more than six families of this description.
There are some conditions which these people must subscribe to, and
which offer some guarantee to the authorities for the good management
of the house. To begin with: they must not be too young, lest they
are unable to possess sufficient authority over the women under their
jurisdiction; twenty-five is generally the lowest age, experience
teaches us, at which a woman can become a safe manager of an immoral
house. As a rule, licences are refused to those who have never been
prostitutes.
Force, vigour, energy both of mind and body are requisite to a
keeper of a house of ill-fame, as well as a habit of commanding, and
something of a masculine manner. If to these qualities they join good
antecedents, if they have not been taken before a justice of the peace,
if they are honest, if they do not favour clandestine debauchery, if
they are unaccustomed to get intoxicated, if they know how to read
and write, if while they were prostitutes they had not a tendency to
infringe the regulations, the authorisation they ask for is not refused
them; but unhappily it is found too late, that licences are given to
women who are unable to, or certainly do not, carry out these wholesome
conditions and necessary stipulations. The desire to possess this
coveted distinction, and pass from the condition of a simple prostitute
to that of “dame de maison” often fills young women with the greatest
anxiety, as they do not very well know how to invest their money, and
they often embark in this career in a speculative manner causing their
enterprise to end in bankruptcy and failure; this fills the authorities
with great trouble and they are extremely particular in giving
licences, frequently only giving a fourth-class one when the party
applying for it could easily set up a first-class establishment.
Certain speculators will often furnish a house, and place a woman in it
for immoral purposes, who will encourage other women, and it becomes a
house of ill-fame; other intriguing women will also club together and
establish a house of this sort, and install one of their creatures. Now
these installed women are not really and truly, from their subordinate
position, to be called “dames de maison” for if they do not every week
pay so much money to the speculators who have employed them, they are
instantly turned out and some one else comes in their place. It is easy
to see that this system does not give them much authority over the
women who live in their houses, and through whose instrumentality and
prostitution the money is made. Without authority disorder must ensue,
and then the police have to interfere. There were--
In 1824 -- 163 of these houses in Paris.
„ 1831 -- 209 „ „
„ 1832 -- 220 „ „
On the 1st of January, 1852, there were 1246 women in these houses. On
the 1st of December there were 1316, but making allowance for those
incarcerated, either for some offence or for illness, we find the
number reduced to about 1005 active women. There were--
In 1842 -- 193 tolerated houses in Paris.
„ 1847 -- 177 „ „
„ 1852 -- 152 „ „
In which latter year these houses contained 1005 girls.
In 1854, Paris contained 140 tolerated houses in which 1009 women
existed.
In the suburbs there were--
In 1842 -- 36 of these houses.
„ 1847 -- 53 „ „
„ 1852 -- 65 „ „
In 1852 the number of girls living in them was 417.
In 1854 there were 64 houses containing 493 women.
The number of these tolerated houses, it will be seen, does not
fluctuate or change very largely, with the exception of those existing
in the suburbs, in which in ten years, that is to say from 1842 to
1852, the number was increased by 29. We have shown that the summit of
a prostitute’s ambition is generally to keep a house of ill-fame, and
such being the case it is only wonderful that the number of such houses
is not larger than it is.
A vast deal of prostitution goes on in the small smoking shops, the
low public-houses, the brandy shops, and the wine houses. These
refuges exist all over Paris, they are innumerable, but one finds
them collected especially at those points where the workmen and the
industrial classes meet together, such as the larger barriers, nearly
all the outside boulevards, those of the Hospital and the Temple, the
“Rue Fromenteau” and neighbouring places, the streets that touch the
large bridges, etc.
So far back as 1818, the commissioners of the police consulted about
this evil, and the necessity for suppressing it; for not only did it
encourage secret vice and defeat the ends of the authorities, but it
was a source of drunkenness and fighting, and indeed of all sorts of
disorders.
In December, 1851, a decree was promulgated by Louis Napoleon which has
had some effect in reducing the evil, for several drinking shops have
been closed since then for offences against the decree.
It may be interesting to know that frequently girls take a dislike to
their revolting avocation, and return voluntarily to their parents.
From the 1st January, 1821, to the 30th December, 1827, 254 girls whose
names were erased from the registers were taken back by their friends,
who promised to provide them with the means of subsistence, and gave
guarantees for their good conduct. Amongst this number--
133 were reclaimed by the mother only.
72 „ „ the father only.
22 „ „ the mother and father together.
22 „ „ their brothers.
9 „ „ their sisters.
5 „ „ an aunt.
2 „ „ an uncle.
Each of these girls had been inscribed during the following time--
120 from 1 to 6 months
37 more than 6 months
16 „ 1 year
55 „ 2 years
9 „ 3 years
6 „ 7 years
8 „ 8 years
3 „ 9 years
---
Total--254
The sanitary regulations in Paris are beneficial to the community
at large in the highest degree. Physicians are appointed by the
prefecture, who make periodical visits, generally twice a month, for
the purpose of ascertaining the state of the health of their numerous
clients. If they should discover one infected, she is immediately sent
to the hospital.
In the foregoing pages we have endeavoured to give a brief exposé of
the dark side of the brilliant volatile city of Paris. Such a subject
gives ample scope for volumes, but the nature of this work confines us
to dry facts and statistics.
PROSTITUTION IN LONDON.[91]
The liberty of the subject is very jealously guarded in England, and
so tenacious are the people of their rights and privileges that the
legislature has not dared to infringe them, even for what by many
would be considered a just and meritorious purpose. Neither are the
magistracy or the police allowed to enter improper or disorderly
houses, unless to suppress disturbances that would require their
presence in the most respectable mansion in the land, if the aforesaid
disturbances were committed within their precincts. Until very lately
the police had not the power of arresting those traders, who earned an
infamous livelihood by selling immoral books and obscene prints. It is
to the late Lord Chancellor Campbell that we owe this salutary reform,
under whose meritorious exertions the disgraceful trade of Holywell
Street and kindred districts has received a blow from which it will
never again rally.
If the neighbours choose to complain before a magistrate of a
disorderly house, and are willing to undertake the labour, annoyance,
and expense of a criminal indictment, it is probable that their
exertions may in time have the desired effect; but there is no summary
conviction, as in some continental cities whose condition we have
studied in another portion of this work.
To show how difficult it is to give from any data at present before the
public anything like a correct estimate of the number of prostitutes
in London, we may mention (extracting from the work of Dr. Ryan) that
while the Bishop of Exeter asserted the number of prostitutes in London
to be 80,000, the City Police stated to Dr. Ryan that it did not exceed
7000 to 8000. About the year 1793 Mr. Colquhoun, a police magistrate,
concluded, after tedious investigations, that there were 50,000
prostitutes in this metropolis. At that period the population was one
million, and as it is now more than double we may form some idea of the
extensive ramifications of this insidious vice.
In the year 1802, when immorality had spread more or less all over
Europe, owing to the demoralizing effects of the French Revolution, a
society was formed, called “The Society for the Suppression of Vice,”
of which its secretary, Mr. Wilberforce, thus speaks:--
“The particular objects to which the attention of this Society is
directed are as follow, viz.--
“1. The prevention of the profanation of the Lord’s day.
“2. Blasphemous publications.
“3. Obscene books, prints, etc.
“4. Disorderly houses.
“5. Fortunetellers.”
When speaking of the third division a report of the Society says--
“In consequence of the renewed intercourse with the Continent,
incidental to the restoration of peace, there has been a great influx
into the country of the most obscene articles of every description, as
may be inferred from the exhibition of indecent snuff-boxes in the shop
windows of tobacconists. These circumstances having tended to a revival
of this trade the Society have had occasion within the last twelve
months to resort to five prosecutions, which have greatly tended to the
removal of that indecent display by which the public eye has of late
been too much offended.”
Before the dissolution of the Bristol Society for the Suppression of
Vice, its secretary, Mr. Birtle, wrote (1808) to London the following
letter:--
“Sir,--The Bristol Society for the Suppression of Vice being about to
dissolve, and the agents before employed having moved very heavily, I
took my horse and rode to Stapleton prison to inquire into the facts
contained in your letter. Inclosed are some of the drawings which I
purchased in what they call their market, without the least privacy
on their part or mine. They wished to intrude on me a variety of
devices in bone and wood of the most obscene kind, particularly those
representing a crime “_inter Christianos non nominandum_,” which they
termed the _new fashion_. I purchased a few, but they are too bulky for
a letter. This market is held before the door of the turnkey every day
between the hours of ten and twelve.”
At the present day the police wage an internecine war with these
people, who generally go about from fair to fair to sell indecent
images, mostly imported from France; but this traffic is very much on
the decline, if it is not altogether extinguished.
The reports of the Society for the Suppression of Vice are highly
interesting, and may be obtained gratis on application at the Society’s
chambers.
Another Society was instituted in May 1835, called “The London Society
for the Protection of Young Females, and Prevention of Juvenile
Prostitution.” We extract a few passages from its opening address.
“The committee cannot avoid referring to the present dreadfully immoral
state of the British metropolis. No one can pass through the streets
of London without being struck with the awfully depraved condition of
a certain class of the youth of both sexes at this period (1835). Nor
is it too much to say that in London crime has arrived at a frightful
magnitude; nay, it is asserted that nowhere does it exist to such an
extent as in this highly-favoured city. Schools for the instruction of
youth in every species of theft and immorality are here established *
* * * *. It has been proved that 400 individuals procure a livelihood
by trepanning females from eleven to fifteen years of age for the
purposes of prostitution. Every art is practised, every scheme is
devised, to effect this object, and when an innocent child appears in
the streets without a protector, she is insidiously watched by one of
those merciless wretches and decoyed under some plausible pretext to an
abode of infamy and degradation. No sooner is the unsuspecting helpless
one within their grasp than, by a preconcerted measure, she becomes a
victim to their inhuman designs. She is stripped of the apparel with
which parental care or friendly solicitude had clothed her, and then,
decked with the gaudy trappings of her shame, she is compelled to
walk the streets, and in her turn, while producing to her master or
mistress the wages of her prostitution, becomes the ensnarer of the
youth of the other sex. After this it is useless to attempt to return
to the path of virtue or honour, for she is then watched with the
greatest vigilance, and should she attempt to escape from the clutches
of her seducer she is threatened with instant punishment, and often
barbarously treated. Thus situated she becomes reckless, and careless
of her future course. It rarely occurs that one so young escapes
contamination; and it is a fact that numbers of these youthful victims
imbibe disease within a week or two of their seduction. They are then
sent to one of the hospitals under a fictitious name by their keepers,
or unfeelingly turned into the streets to perish; and it is not an
uncommon circumstance that within the short space of a few weeks the
bloom of health, of beauty, and of innocence gives place to the sallow
hue of disease, of despair, and of death.
“This fact will be appreciated when it is known that in three of the
largest hospitals in London within the last eight years (that is to
say, from 1827 to 1835), there have not been less than 2700 cases of
disease arising from this cause in children from eleven to sixteen
years of age.”
Léon Faucher, commenting on this, exclaims with astonishment, mixed
with indignation, “Deux mille sept cents enfants visités par cette
horrible peste avant l’âge de la puberté! Quel spectacle que celui-là
pour un peuple qui a des entrailles! Et comment éprouver assez de
pitié pour les victimes, assez d’indignation contre les bourreaux!” A
Frenchman, looking at the way in which his own illustrious country is
governed, would very naturally exclaim against the authorities for not
taking steps to prevent so much crime and misery, but he forgets that
although a system may work well in France, it is no criterion of its
excellent working among a nation totally dissimilar in their habits and
disposition to his own.
All French writers have the profoundest horror of our social economics.
MM. Duchatelet, Richelot and Léon Faucher, whom we have just quoted,
all unite in condemning our system of blind and wilful toleration.
They do not understand the temper of the nation, which would never
allow the State to legislate upon this subject. But, nevertheless, we
must confess that the profligacy of the metropolis of England, if not
so patent and palpable as that of some continental cities we have had
occasion to refer to, is perhaps as deeply rooted, and as impossible
to eradicate. The legislature, by refusing to interfere, have tacitly
declared the existence of prostitutes to be a necessary evil, the
suppression of which would produce alarming and disastrous effects upon
the country at large. When any case more than usually flagrant occurs
it falls within the jurisdiction of the Society for the Suppression of
Vice, and the law is careful to punish anything that can be construed
into a misdemeanour or a felony. In cold climates, as in hot climates,
we have shown that the passions are the main agents in producing the
class of women that we have under consideration, but in temperate
zones the animal instinct is less difficult to bridle and seldom
leads the female to abandon herself to the other sex. It is a vulgar
error, and a popular delusion, that the life of a prostitute is as
revolting to herself, as it appears to the moralist sternly lamenting
over the condition of the fallen; but, on the contrary, investigation
and sedulous scrutiny lead us to a very different conclusion. Authors
gifted with vivid imaginations love to pourtray the misery that
is brought upon an innocent and confiding girl by the perfidy and
desertion of her seducer. The pulpit too frequently echoes to clerical
denunciation and evangelical horror, until those unacquainted with the
actual facts tremble at the fate of those whose terrible lot they are
taught rather to shudder at than commiserate. Women who in youth have
lost their virtue, often contrive to retain their reputation; and even
when this is not the case, frequently amalgamate imperceptibly with the
purer portion of the population and become excellent members of the
community. The love of woman is usually pure and elevated. But when
she devotes her affections to a man who realizes her ideal, she does
not hesitate to sacrifice all she holds dear, for his gratification,
ignoring her own interest and her own inclination. Actuated by a
noble abnegation of self, she derives a melancholy pleasure from
the knowledge that she has utterly given up all she had formerly so
zealously guarded, and she feels that her love has reached its grand
climacteric, when, without the slightest pruriency of imagination
to urge her on to the consummation, without the remotest vestige of
libidinous desire to prompt her to self-immolation, without a shadow of
meretricious feeling lurking within her, she abandons her person beyond
redemption to the idol she has set up in the highest place in her soul.
This heroic martyrdom is one of the causes, though perhaps not the
primary or most frequently occurring, of the stream of immorality
that insidiously permeates our social system. The greatest, and one
equally difficult to combat, is the low rate of wages that the female
industrial classes of this great city receive, in return for the most
arduous and wearisome labour. Innumerable cases of prostitution through
want, solely and absolutely, are constantly occurring, and this will
not be wondered at when it is remembered that 105 women in England and
Wales are born to every 100 males, which number is further augmented by
the dangers to which men are exposed by their avocations, and also in
martial service by sea and land. Again, so great are the inducements
held out by men of lax morality and loose principles that procuresses
find entrapping girls into their abodes a most lucrative and profitable
trade. Some are even brought up from their earliest infancy by their
pseudo-protectors with the full intention that they shall embark in
the infamous traffic as soon as their age will permit them to do so
remuneratively. A revolting and horrible case exemplifying the truth
of this statement came under our notice some short time back. We were
examining a girl, who gave the following replies to the questions put
to her.
“My name is Ellen, I have no other. Yes, I sometimes call myself by
various names, but rarely keep to one longer than a month or two. I was
never baptized that I know of; I don’t know much about religion, though
I think I know the difference between right and wrong. I certainly
think it is wrong to live as I am now doing. I often think of it in
secret, and cry over it, but what can I do? I was brought up in the
country and allowed to run about with some other children. We were not
taught anything, not even to read or write; twice I saw a gentleman
who came down to the farm, and he kissed me and told me to be a good
girl. Yes, I remember these things very well. I was about eleven the
last time he came, and two years after I was sent up to town, carefully
dressed and placed in a large drawing-room. After I had been there some
time a gentleman came in with the person I had been sent to, and I
directly recognized him as the one I had seen in the country. For the
first time in my life I glanced at a looking-glass that hung on the
wall, they being things we never saw in the country, and I thought the
gentleman had changed his place and was standing before me, we were so
alike. I then looked at him steadily for a few moments, and at last
took his hand. He said something to me which I don’t remember, and
which I did not reply to. I asked him, when he had finished speaking,
if he was my father. I don’t know why I asked him. He seemed confused,
and the lady of the house poured out some wine and gave me, after that
I don’t know what happened.”
This may be a case of rare occurrence, but it is not so morally
impossible as at first it appears.
In 1857, according to the best authorities, there were 8600 prostitutes
known to the police, but this is far from being even an approximate
return of the number of loose women in the metropolis. It scarcely
does more than record the circulating harlotry of the Haymarket and
Regent Street. Their actual numerical strength is very difficult to
compute, for there is an amount of oscillatory prostitution it is easy
to imagine, but impossible to substantiate. One of the peculiarities of
this class is their remarkable freedom from disease. They are in the
generality of cases notorious for their mental and physical elasticity.
Syphilis is rarely fatal. It is an entirely distinct race that suffer
from the ravages of the insidious diseases that the licence given
to the passions and promiscuous intercourse engender. Young girls,
innocent and inexperienced, whose devotion has not yet bereft them of
their innate modesty and sense of shame, will allow their systems to
be so shocked, and their constitutions so impaired, before the aid of
the surgeon is sought for, that when he does arrive his assistance is
almost useless.
We have before stated (p. 211) the assumed number of prostitutes in
London to be about 80,000, and large as this total may appear, it
is not improbable that it is below the reality rather than above
it. One thing is certain--if it be an exaggerated statement--that
the real number is swollen every succeeding year, for prostitution
is an inevitable attendant upon extended civilization and increased
population.
We divide prostitutes into three classes. First, those women who are
kept by men of independent means; secondly, those women who live in
apartments, and maintain themselves by the produce of their vagrant
amours, and thirdly, those who dwell in brothels.
The state of the first of these is the nearest approximation to the
holy state of marriage, and finds numerous defenders and supporters.
These have their suburban villas, their carriages, horses, and
sometimes a box at the opera. Their equipages are to be seen in the
park, and occasionally through the influence of their aristocratic
friends they succeed in obtaining vouchers for the most exclusive
patrician balls.
Houses in which prostitutes lodge are those in which one or two
prostitutes occupy private apartments; in most cases with the
connivance of the proprietor. These generally resort to night-houses,
where they have a greater chance of meeting with customers than they
would have were they to perambulate the streets.
Brothels are houses where speculators board, dress, and feed women,
living upon the farm of their persons. Under this head we must include
introducing houses, where the women do not reside, but merely use the
house as a place of resort in the daytime. Married women, imitating the
custom of Messalina, whom Juvenal so vividly describes in his Satires,
not uncommonly make use of these places. A Frenchwoman in the habit of
frequenting a notorious house in James Street, Haymarket, said that
she came to town four or five times in the week for the purpose of
obtaining money by the prostitution of her body. She loved her husband,
but he was unable to find any respectable employment, and were she not
to supply him with the necessary funds for their household expenditure
they would sink into a state of destitution, and anything, she added,
with simplicity, was better than that. Of course her husband connived
at what she did. He came to fetch her home every evening about ten
o’clock. She had no children. She didn’t wish to have any.
It must not be supposed that if some, perhaps a majority of them,
eventually become comparatively respectable, and merge into the ocean
of propriety, there are not a vast number whose lives afford matter
for the most touching tragedies,--whose melancholy existence is one
continual struggle for the actual necessaries of life, the occasional
absence of which entails upon them a condition of intermittent
starvation. A woman who has fallen like a star from heaven, may flash
like a meteor in a lower sphere, but only with a transitory splendour.
In time her orbit contracts, and the improvidence that has been her
leading characteristic through life now trebles and quadruples the
misery she experiences. To drown reflection she rushes to the gin
palace, and there completes the work that she had already commenced
so inauspiciously. The passion for dress, that distinguished her
in common with her sex in former days, subsides into a craving for
meretricious tawdry, and the bloom of health is superseded by ruinous
and poisonous French compounds and destructive cosmetics. A hospital
surgeon gave us the following description of the death of a French
lorette, who at a very juvenile age had been entrapped and imported
into this country. She had, according to her own statement, been born
in one of the southern departments. When she was fourteen years old,
the agent of some English speculator in human beings came into their
neighbourhood and proposed that Anille should leave her native country
and proceed to England, where he said there was a great demand for
female domestic labour, which was much better paid for on the other
side of the Channel. The proposition was entertained by the parents,
and eagerly embraced by the girl herself, who soon afterwards, in
company with several other girls, all deluded in a similar manner, were
leaving the shores of their native country for a doubtful future in
one with the language of which they were not even remotely acquainted.
On their arrival their ruin was soon effected, and for some years
they continued to enrich the proprietors of the house in which they
resided, all the time remitting small sums to their families abroad,
who were unwittingly and involuntarily existing upon the proceeds of
their daughters’ dishonour, and rejoicing in such unexpected success.
After a while Anille was sent adrift to manage for herself. Naturally
of a refined and sensitive disposition, she felt her position keenly,
which induced a sadness almost amounting to hypochondria to steal over
her, and although very pretty, she found this a great obstacle in the
way of her success. She knew not how to simulate the hollow laugh or
the reckless smile of her more volatile companions, and her mind became
more diseased day by day, until she found it impracticable to think of
endeavouring to hurl off the morbidity that had taken possession of
her very soul. At last she fell a victim to a contagious disorder, the
neglect of which ultimately necessitated her removal to the hospital.
When there, she was found to be incurable; an operation was performed
upon her but without success. She bore her illness with childish
impatience, continually wishing for the end, and often imploring me
with tearful eyes by the intervention of science to put an end to her
misery. One afternoon, as usual, I came to see her. She exclaimed the
moment she perceived me, I am cheerful to-day. May I not recover; I
suffer no pain. But her looks belied her words; her features were
frightfully haggard and worn; her eyes, dry and bloodshot, had almost
disappeared in their sockets, and her general appearance denoted the
approach of him she had been so constantly invoking. Unwrapping some
bandages, I proceeded to examine her, when an extraordinary change came
over her, and I knew that her dissolution was not far distant. Her
mind wandered, and she spoke wildly and excitedly in her own language.
After a while she exclaimed, “J’ignore où je suis. C’en est fait.” An
expression of intense suffering contracted her emaciated features.
“Je n’en puis plus,” she cried, and adding, after a slight pause, in
a plaintive voice, “Je me meurs,” her soul glided impalpably away,
and she was a corpse. As a pendant to these remarks, I extract an
expressive passage from an old book. “There are also women (like birds
of passage) of a migratory nature, who remove after a certain time from
St. James’s and Marylebone end of the town to Covent Garden, then to
the Strand, and from thence to St. Giles and Wapping; from which latter
place they frequently migrate much further, even to New South Wales.
Some few return in seven years, some in fourteen, and some not at all.
During their stay here, like birds they make their nests upon feathers,
some higher, some lower than others. At first they generally build
them on the first-floor, afterwards on the second, and then up in the
cock-loft and garrets, from whence they generally take to the open air,
and become ambulatory and noctivagous, and as their price grows less,
their wandering increases, when many perish from the inclemency of the
weather, and others take their flight abroad.”[92]
_Seclusives, or those that live in Private Houses and Apartments._
Two classes of prostitutes come under this denomination--first, kept
mistresses, and secondly, prima donnas or those who live in a superior
style. The first of these is perhaps the most important division of the
entire profession, when considered with regard to its effects upon the
higher classes of society. Laïs, when under the protection of a prince
of the blood; Aspasia, whose friend is one of the most influential
noblemen in the kingdom; Phryne, the chère amie of a well-known officer
in the guards, or a man whose wealth is proverbial on the Stock
Exchange and the city,--have all great influence upon the tone of
morality extant amongst the set in which their distinguished protectors
move, and indeed the reflex of their dazzling profligacy falls upon
and bewilders those who are in a lower condition of life, acting as an
incentive to similar deeds of licentiousness though on a more limited
scale. Hardly a parish in London is free from this impurity. Wherever
the neighbourhood possesses peculiar charms, wherever the air is
purer than ordinary, or the locality fashionably distinguished, these
tubercles on the social system penetrate and abound. Again quoting
from Dr. Ryan, although we cannot authenticate his statements--“It is
computed, that 8,000,000_l._ are expended annually on this vice in
London alone. This is easily proved: some girls obtain from twenty to
thirty pounds a week, others more, whilst most of those who frequent
theatres, casinos, gin palaces, music halls, &c., receive from ten to
twelve pounds. Those of a still lower grade obtain about four or five
pounds, some less than one pound, and many not ten shillings. If we
take the average earnings of each prostitute at 100_l._ per annum,
which is under the amount, it gives the yearly income of eight millions.
“Suppose the average expense of 80,000 amounts to 20_l._ each,
1,600,000_l._ is the result. This sum deducted from the earnings leaves
6,400,000_l._ as the income of the keepers of prostitutes, or supposing
5000 to be the number, above 1000_l._ per annum each--an enormous
income for men in such a situation to derive when compared with the
resources of many respectable and professional men.”
Literally every woman who yields to her passions and loses her virtue
is a prostitute, but many draw a distinction between those who live
by promiscuous intercourse, and those who confine themselves to one
man. That this is the case is evident from the returns before us. The
metropolitan police do not concern themselves with the higher classes
of prostitutes; indeed, it would be impossible, and impertinent as
well, were they to make the attempt. Sir Richard Mayne kindly informed
us that the latest computation of the number of public prostitutes was
made on the 5th of April, 1858, and that the returns then showed a
total of 7261.
It is frequently a matter of surprise amongst the friends of a
gentleman of position and connection that he exhibits an invincible
distaste to marriage. If they were acquainted with his private affairs
their astonishment would speedily vanish, for they would find him
already to all intents and purposes united to one who possesses charms,
talents, and accomplishments, and who will in all probability exercise
the same influence over him as long as the former continue to exist.
The prevalence of this custom, and the extent of its ramifications is
hardly dreamed of, although its effects are felt, and severely. The
torch of Hymen burns less brightly than of yore, and even were the
blacksmith of Gretna still exercising his vocation, he would find his
business diminishing with startling rapidity year by year.
It is a great mistake to suppose that kept mistresses are without
friends and without society; on the contrary, their acquaintance,
if not select, is numerous, and it is their custom to order their
broughams or their pony carriages and at the fashionable hour pay
visits and leave cards on one another.
They possess no great sense of honour, although they are generally more
or less religious. If they take a fancy to a man they do not hesitate
to admit him to their favour. Most kept women have several lovers
who are in the habit of calling upon them at different times, and as
they are extremely careful in conducting these amours they perpetrate
infidelity with impunity, and in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred
escape detection. When they are unmasked, the process, unless the man
is very much infatuated, is of course summary in the extreme. They are
dismissed probably with a handsome douceur and sent once more adrift.
They do not remain long, however, in the majority of cases, without
finding another protector.
A woman who called herself Lady ---- met her admirer at a house in
Bolton Row that she was in the habit of frequenting. At first sight
Lord ---- became enamoured, and proposed _sur le champ_, after a little
preliminary conversation, that she should live with him. The proposal
with equal rapidity and eagerness was accepted, and without further
deliberation his lordship took a house for her in one of the terraces
overlooking the Regent’s Park, allowed her four thousand a year, and
came as frequently as he could, to pass his time in her society. She
immediately set up a carriage and a stud, took a box at the opera
on the pit tier, and lived, as she very well could, in excellent
style. The munificence of her friend did not decrease by the lapse of
time. She frequently received presents of jewelry from him, and his
marks of attention were constant as they were various. The continual
contemplation of her charms instead of producing satiety added fuel to
the fire, and he was never happy when out of her sight. This continued
until one day he met a young man in her _loge_ at the opera, whom she
introduced as her cousin. This incident aroused his suspicions, and he
determined to watch her more closely. She was surrounded by spies, and
in reality did not possess one confidential attendant, for they were
all bribed to betray her. For a time, more by accident than precaution
or care on her part, she succeeded in eluding their vigilance, but at
last the catastrophe happened; she was surprised with her paramour in
a position that placed doubt out of the question, and the next day his
lordship, with a few sarcastic remarks, gave her her _congé_ and five
hundred pounds.
These women are rarely possessed of education, although they undeniably
have ability. If they appear accomplished you may rely that it is
entirely superficial. Their disposition is volatile and thoughtless,
which qualities are of course at variance with the existence of
respectability. Their ranks too are recruited from a class where
education is not much in vogue. The fallacies about clergymen’s
daughters and girls from the middle classes forming the majority of
such women are long ago exploded; there may be some amongst them, but
they are few and far between. They are not, as a rule, disgusted with
their way of living; most of them consider it a means to an end, and in
no measure degrading or polluting. One and all look forward to marriage
and a certain state in society as their ultimate lot. This is their
bourne, and they do all in their power to travel towards it.
“I am not tired of what I am doing,” a woman once answered me, “I
rather like it. I have all I want, and my friend loves me to excess.
I am the daughter of a tradesman at Yarmouth. I learned to play the
piano a little, and I have naturally a good voice. Yes, I find these
accomplishments of great use to me; they are, perhaps, as you say, the
only ones that could be of use to a girl like myself. I am three and
twenty. I was seduced four years ago. I tell you candidly I was as
much to blame as my seducer; I wished to escape from the drudgery of
my father’s shop. I have told you they partially educated me; I could
cypher a little as well, and I knew something about the globes; so I
thought I was qualified for something better than minding the shop
occasionally, or sewing, or helping my mother in the kitchen and other
domestic matters. I was very fond of dress, and I could not at home
gratify my love of display. My parents were stupid, easy-going old
people, and extremely uninteresting to me. All these causes combined
induced me to encourage the addresses of a young gentleman of property
in the neighbourhood, and without much demur I yielded to his desires.
We then went to London, and I have since that time lived with four
different men. We got tired of one another in six months, and I was
as eager to leave him as he was to get rid of me, so we mutually
accommodated one another by separating. Well, my father and mother
don’t exactly know where I am or what I am doing, although if they had
any penetration they might very well guess. Oh, yes! they know I am
alive, for I keep them pleasantly aware of my existence by occasionally
sending them money. What do I think will become of me? What an absurd
question. I could marry to-morrow if I liked.”
This girl was a fair example of her class. They live entirely for
the moment, and care little about the morrow until they are actually
pressed in any way, and then they are fertile in expedients.
We now come to the second class, or those we have denominated prima
donnas. These are not kept like the first that we have just been
treating of, although several men who know and admire them are in
the habit of visiting them periodically. From these they derive a
considerable revenue, but they by no means rely entirely upon it for
support. They are continually increasing the number of their friends,
which indeed is imperatively necessary, as absence and various causes
thin their ranks considerably. They are to be seen in the parks, in
boxes at the theatres, at concerts, and in almost every accessible
place where fashionable people congregate; in fact in all places
where admittance is not secured by vouchers, and in some cases, those
apparently insuperable barriers fall before their tact and address.
At night their favourite rendezvous is in the neighbourhood of the
Haymarket, where the hospitality of Mrs. Kate Hamilton is extended
to them after the fatigues of dancing at the Portland Rooms, or
the excesses of a private party. Kate’s may be visited not only
to dissipate ennui, but with a view to replenishing an exhausted
exchequer; for as Kate is careful as to who she admits into her
rooms--men who are able to spend, and come with the avowed intention
of spending, five or six pounds, or perhaps more if necessary--these
supper-rooms are frequented by a better set of men and women than
perhaps any other in London. Although these are seen at Kate’s they
would shrink from appearing at any of the cafés in the Haymarket, or
at the supper-rooms with which the adjacent streets abound, nor would
they go to any other casino than Mott’s. They are to be seen between
three and five o’clock in the Burlington Arcade, which is a well known
resort of cyprians of the better sort. They are well acquainted with
its Paphian intricacies, and will, if their signals are responded to,
glide into a friendly bonnet shop, the stairs of which leading to
the cœnacula or upper chambers are not innocent of their well formed
“bien chaussée” feet. The park is also, as we have said, a favourite
promenade, where assignations may be made or acquaintances formed.
Equestrian exercise is much liked by those who are able to afford
it, and is often as successful as pedestrian, frequently more so. It
is difficult to say what position in life the parents of these women
were in, but generally their standing in society has been inferior.
Principles of lax morality were early inculcated, and the seed that has
been sown has not been slow to bear its proper fruit.
[Illustration: A NIGHT HOUSE.--KATE HAMILTON’S.]
It is true that a large number of milliners, dress-makers, furriers,
hat-binders, silk-binders, tambour-makers, shoe-binders, slop-women,
or those who work for cheap tailors, those in pastry-cooks, fancy
and cigar shops, bazaars, servants to a great extent, frequenters of
fairs, theatres, and dancing-rooms, are more or less prostitutes and
patronesses of the numerous brothels London can boast of possessing;
but these women do not swell the ranks of the class we have at
present under consideration. More probably they are the daughters of
tradesmen and of artizans, who gain a superficial refinement from
being apprenticed, and sent to shops in fashionable localities,
and who becoming tired of the drudgery sigh for the gaiety of the
dancing-saloons, freedom from restraint, and amusements that are not in
their present capacity within their reach.
Loose women generally throw a veil over their early life, and you
seldom, if ever, meet with a woman who is not either a seduced
governess or a clergyman’s daughter; not that there is a word of truth
in such an allegation--but it is their peculiar whim to say so.
To show the extent of education among women who have been arrested by
the police during a stated period, we print the annexed table, dividing
the virtuous criminals from the prostitutes.
DEGREE OF EDUCATION AMONGST PROSTITUTES.
DEGREE OF INSTRUCTION amongst Prostitutes compared with the Degree of
Instruction among Women not Prostitutes, arrested for breaking various
laws (London). The City not included.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PERIODS--taking 10,000 | Degree of Instruction amongst virtuous women brought
in each period. Total of women | up in the Police Courts for various offences during the
arrested of both classes 405·362.| years elapsing from 1837 to 1854 inclusive.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| |Not able |Able to read |Knowing |Very
| |to read |only, or read|how to | well
| |or write.|and write |read and | instructed.
| | |imperfectly. |write well.|
---------------------------------+--------+---------+-------------+-----------+-------------
1st period 6 years 1837-42 | 10,000 | 4,813 | 4,838 | 327 | 22
2nd „ 6 „ 1843-48 | 10,000 | 4,167 | 5,534 | 279 | 20
3rd „ 6 „ 1849-54 | 10,000 | 2,802 | 1,972 | 209 | 17
---------------------------------+--------+---------+-------------+-----------+-------
1st period 9 years 1837-45 | 10,000 | 4,570 | 5,098 | 312 | 20
2nd „ 9 „ 1846-54 | 10,000 | 3,247 | 6,504 | 320 | 19
---------------------------------|
Total period 18 „ 1837-54 | 10,000 | 3,861 | 5,851 | 268 | 20
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PERIODS--taking 10,000 in each | Degree of Instruction among Prostitutes similarly
period. Total of women arrested | arrested.
of both classes 405·362. |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| |Not able |Able to read |Knowing |Very
| |to read |only, or read|how to | well
| |or write.|and write |read and | instructed.
| | |imperfectly. |write well.|
---------------------------------+--------+---------+-------------+-----------+-------------
1st period 6 years 1837-42 | 10,000 | 4,524 | 5,031 | 432 | 13
2nd „ 6 „ 1843-48 | 10,000 | 3,672 | 5,893 | 425 | 10
3rd „ 6 „ 1849-54 | 10,000 | 2,305 | 7,444 | 212 | 39
---------------------------------+--------+---------+-------------+-----------+-------
1st period 9 years 1837-45 | 10,000 | 4,109 | 5,424 | 455 | 12
2nd „ 9 „ 1846-54 | 10,000 | 2,821 | 6,910 | 236 | 33
---------------------------------|
Total period 18 „ 1837-54 | 10,000 | 3,498 | 6,129 | 351 | 22
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This table shows us that public women are a little less illiterate
than those who together with them form the most infamous part of the
population. But we must remember that this is hardly a fair criterion
of the education of all the prostitutes, or of prostitutes as a class,
because we have only summed up those who were arrested for some crime
or offence, so we may justly suppose them to have been the worst of
their class in every respect.
We see however that of the total number of women arrested during a
period of 18 years, there were in every 10,000--
3,498 not knowing how to read or write.
6,129 able to read only, or read and write badly.
351 able to read and write well.
22 educated in a superior manner.
------
10,000
We next come to the consideration of convives, or those who live in
the same house with a number of others, and we will commence with
those who are independent of the mistress of the house. These women
locate themselves in the immediate vicinity of the Haymarket, which at
night is their principal scene of action, when the hospitable doors
of the theatres and casinos are closed. They are charged enormously
for the rooms they occupy, and their landlords defend themselves
for their extortionate demands, by alleging that, as honesty is
not a leading feature in the characters of their lodgers, they are
compelled to protect their own interest by exacting an exorbitant
rent. A drawing-room floor in Queen Street, Windmill Street, which is
a favourite part on account of its proximity to the Argyll Rooms, is
worth three, and sometimes four pounds a-week, and the other _étages_
in proportion. They never stay long in one house, although some will
remain for ten or twelve months in a particular lodging. It is their
principle to get as deeply into debt as they are able, and then to
pack up their things, have them conveyed elsewhere by stealth, and
defraud the landlord of his money. The houses in some of the small
streets in the neighbourhood of Langham Place are let to the people who
underlet them for three hundred a-year, and in some cases at a higher
rental. This class of prostitutes do not live together on account
of a gregarious instinct, but simply from necessity, as their trade
would necessarily exclude them from respectable lodging-houses. They
soon form an acquaintance with the girls who inhabit the same house,
and address one another as “my dear,” an unmeaning, but very general
epithet, an hour or two after their first meeting. They sometimes
prefer the suburbs to reside in, especially while Cremorne is open;
but some live at Brompton and Pimlico all the year round. One of their
most remarkable characteristics is their generosity, which perhaps is
unparalleled by the behaviour of any others, whether high or low in the
social scale. They will not hesitate to lend one another money if they
have it, whether they can spare it or not, although it is seldom that
they can, from their innate recklessness and acquired improvidence.
It is very common, too, for them to lend their bonnets and their
dresses to their friends. If a woman of this description is voluble
and garrulous, she is much sought after by the men who keep the cafés
in the Haymarket, to sit decked out in gorgeous attire behind the
counters, so that by her interesting appearance and the _esprit_ she
displays, the _habitués_ of those places, but more usually those who
pay only a casual visit, may be entrapped into purchasing some of the
wares and fancy articles that are retailed at ten times their actual
value. In order to effect this they will exert all their talents, and
an inexperienced observer would imagine that they indeed entertain some
feeling of affection or admiration for their victim, by the cleverness
with which they simulate its existence. The man whose vanity leads
him to believe that he is selected by the beautiful creature who
condescends to address him, on account of his personal appearance,
would be rather disgusted if he were to perceive the same blandishments
lavished upon the next comer, and would regret the ten shillings he
paid with pleasure for a glove-box, the positive market value of which
is hardly one-fifth of the money he gave for it.
There is a great abandonment of everything that one may strictly
speaking denominate womanly. Modesty is utterly annihilated, and shame
ceases to exist in their composition. They all more or less are given
to habits of drinking.
“When I am sad I drink,” a woman once said to us. “I’m very often sad,
although I appear to be what you call reckless. Well! we don’t fret
that we might have been ladies, because we never had a chance of that,
but we have forfeited a position nevertheless, and when we think that
we have fallen, never to regain that which we have descended from,
and in some cases sacrificed everything for a man who has ceased to
love and deserted us, we get mad. The intensity of this feeling does
wear off a little after the first; but there’s nothing like gin to
deaden the feelings. What are my habits? Why, if I have no letters
or visits from any of my friends, I get up about four o’clock, dress
(”_en dishabille_“) and dine; after that I may walk about the streets
for an hour or two, and pick up any one I am fortunate enough to meet
with, that is if I want money; afterwards I go to the Holborn, dance a
little, and if any one likes me I take him home with me, if not I go
to the Haymarket, and wander from one café to another, from Sally’s
to the Carlton, from Barn’s to Sam’s, and if I find no one there I
go, if I feel inclined, to the divans. I like the Grand Turkish best,
but you don’t as a rule find good men in any of the divans. Strange
things happen to us sometimes: we may now and then die of consumption;
but the other day a lady friend of mine met a gentleman at Sam’s, and
yesterday morning they were married at St. George’s, Hanover Square.
The gentleman has lots of money, I believe, and he started off with her
at once for the Continent. It is very true this is an unusual case; but
we often do marry, and well too; why shouldn’t we, we are pretty, we
dress well, we can talk and insinuate ourselves into the hearts of men
by appealing to their passions and their senses.”
This girl was shrewd and clever, perhaps more so than those of her rank
in the profession usually are; but her testimony is sufficient at once
to dissipate the foolish idea that ought to have been exploded long
ago, but which still lingers in the minds of both men and women, that
the harlot’s progress is short and rapid, and that there is no possible
advance, moral or physical; and that once abandoned she must always be
profligate.
Another woman told us, she had been a prostitute for two years; she
became so from necessity; she did not on the whole dislike her way of
living; she didn’t think about the sin of it; a poor girl must live;
she wouldn’t be a servant for anything; this was much better. She was a
lady’s maid once, but lost her place for staying out one night with the
man who seduced her; he afterwards deserted her, and then she became
bad. She was fonder of dress than anything. On an average she had a new
bonnet once a week, dresses not so often; she liked the casinos, and
was charmed with Cremorne; she hated walking up and down the Haymarket,
and seldom did it without she wanted money very much. She liked the
Holborn better than the Argyll, and always danced.
_Board Lodgers._
Board lodgers are those who give a portion of what they receive to the
mistress of the brothel in return for their board and lodging. As we
have had occasion to observe before, it is impossible to estimate the
number of brothels in London, or even in particular parishes, not only
because they are frequently moving from one district to another, but
because our system so hates anything approaching to _espionage_, that
the authorities do not think it worth their while to enter into any
such computation. From this it may readily be understood how difficult
the task of the statistician is. Perhaps it will be sufficient to say
that these women are much more numerous than may at first be imagined;
although those who give the whole of what they get in return for their
board, lodging, and clothes are still more so. In Lambeth there are
great numbers of the lowest of these houses, and only very recently
the proprietors of some eight or ten of the worst were summoned before
a police magistrate, and the parish officers who made the complaint
bound over to prosecute at the sessions. It is much to be regretted
that in dealing with such cases the method of procedure is not more
expeditious and less expensive. Let us take for example one of the
cases we have been quoting. A man is openly accused of keeping a
ruffianly den filled with female wretches, destitute of every particle
of modesty and bereft of every atom of shame, whose actual occupation
is to rob, maltreat, and plunder the unfortunate individuals who so
far stultify themselves as to allow the decoys to entrap them into
their snares, let us hope, for the sake of humanity, while in a state
of intoxication or a condition of imbecility. Very well; instead of
an easy inexpensive process, the patriotic persons who have devoted
themselves to the exposure of such infamous rascality, find themselves
involved in a tedious criminal prosecution, and in the event of failure
lay themselves open to an action. Mysterious disappearances, Waterloo
Bridge tragedies, and verdicts of found drowned, are common enough in
this great city. Who knows how many of these unfathomable affairs may
have been originated, worked out, and consummated in some disgusting
rookery in the worst parts of our most demoralized metropolitan
parishes; but it is with the better class of these houses we are
more particularly engaged at present. During the progress of these
researches, we met a girl residing at a house in a street running out
of Langham Place. Externally the house looked respectable enough; there
was no indication of the profession or mode of life of the inmates,
except that, from the fact of some of the blinds being down in the
bed rooms, you might have thought the house contained an invalid. The
rooms, when you were ushered in, were well, though cheaply furnished;
there were coburg chairs and sofas, glass chandeliers, and handsome
green curtains. The girl with whom we were brought into conversation
was not more than twenty-three; she told us her age was twenty, but
statements of a similar nature, when made by this class, are never to
be relied on. At first she treated our inquiries with some levity, and
jocularly inquired what we were inclined to stand, which we justly
interpreted into a desire for something to drink; we accordingly
“stood” a bottle of wine, which had the effect of making our informant
more communicative. What she told us was briefly this. Her life was
a life of perfect slavery, she was seldom if ever allowed to go out,
and then not without being watched. Why was this? Because she would
“cut it” if she got a chance, they knew that very well, and took very
good care she shouldn’t have much opportunity. Their house was rather
popular, and they had lots of visitors; she had some particular friends
who always came to see her. They paid her well, but she hardly ever got
any of the money. Where was the odds, she couldn’t go out to spend it?
What did she want with money, except now and then for a drain of white
satin. What was white satin? Where had I been all my life to ask such
a question? Was I a dodger? She meant a parson. No; she was glad of
that, for she hadn’t much idea of them, they were a canting lot. Well,
white satin, if I must know, was gin, and I couldn’t say she never
taught me anything. Where was she born? Somewhere in Stepney. What did
it matter where; she could tell me all about it if she liked, but she
didn’t care. It touched her on the raw--made her feel too much. She was
’ticed when she was young, that is, she was decoyed by the mistress
of the house some years ago. She met Mrs. ---- in the street, and the
woman began talking to her in a friendly way. Asked her who her father
was (he was a journeyman carpenter), where he lived, extracted all
about her family, and finally asked her to come home to tea with her.
The child, delighted at the making the acquaintance of so kind and so
well-dressed a lady, willingly acquiesced, without making any demur,
as she never dreamt of anything wrong, and had not been cautioned by
her father. She had lost her mother some years ago. She was not brought
direct to the house where I found her? Oh! no. There was a branch
establishment over the water, where they were broken in as it were.
How long did she remain there? Oh! perhaps two months, maybe three;
she didn’t keep much account how time went. When she was conquered and
her spirit broken, she was transported from the first house to a more
aristocratic neighbourhood. How did they tame her? Oh! they made her
drunk and sign some papers, which she knew gave them great power over
her, although she didn’t exactly know in what the said power consisted,
or how it might be exercised. Then they clothed her and fed her well,
and gradually inured her to that sort of life. And now, was there
anything else I’d like to know particularly, because if there was, I’d
better look sharp about asking it, as she was getting tired of talking,
she could tell me. Did she expect to lead this life till she died?
Well she never did, if I wasn’t going to preachify. She couldn’t stand
that--anything but that.
I really begged to apologize if I had wounded her sensibility; I wasn’t
inquiring from a religious point of view, or with any particular
motive. I merely wished to know, to satisfy my own curiosity.
Well, she thought me a very inquisitive old party, anyhow. At any rate,
as I was so polite she did not mind answering my questions. Would she
stick to it till she was a stiff ’un? She supposed she would; what else
was there for her? Perhaps something might turn up; how was she to
know? She never thought she would go mad; if she did, she lived in the
present, and never went blubbering about as some did. She tried to be
as jolly as she could; where was the fun of being miserable?
This is the philosophy of most of her sisterhood. This girl possessed
a talent for repartee, which accomplishment she endeavoured to exercise
at my expense, as will be perceived by the foregoing, though for many
reasons I have adhered to her own vernacular. That her answers were
true, I have no reason to question, and that this is the fate of very
many young girls in London, there is little doubt; indeed, the reports
of the Society for the Protection of Young Females sufficiently prove
it. Female virtue in great cities has innumerable assailants, and the
moralist should pity rather than condemn. We are by no means certain
that meretricious women who have been in the habit of working before
losing their virtue, at some trade or other, and are able to unite the
two together, are conscious of any annoyance or a want of self-respect
at being what they are. This class have been called the “amateurs,” to
contradistinguish them from the professionals, who devote themselves to
it entirely as a profession. To be unchaste amongst the lower classes
is not always a subject of reproach. The commerce of the sexes is so
general that to have been immodest is very seldom a bar to marriage.
The depravity of manners amongst boys and girls begins so very
early, that they think it rather a distinction than otherwise to be
unprincipled. Many a shoeblack, in his uniform and leathern apron, who
cleans your boots for a penny at the corners of the streets, has his
sweetheart. Their connection begins probably at the low lodging-houses
they are in the habit of frequenting, or, if they have a home, at the
penny gaffs and low cheap places of amusement, where the seed of so
much evil is sown. The precocity of the youth of both sexes in London
is perfectly astounding. The drinking, the smoking, the blasphemy,
indecency, and immorality that does not even call up a blush is
incredible, and charity schools and the spread of education do not seem
to have done much to abate this scourge. Another very fruitful source
of early demoralization is to be looked for in the quantities of penny
and halfpenny romances that are sold in town and country. One of the
worst of the most recent ones is denominated, “Charley Wag, or the New
Jack Shepherd, a history of the most successful thief in London.” To
say that these are not incentives to lust, theft, and crime of every
description is to cherish a fallacy. Why should not the police, by act
of Parliament, be empowered to take cognizance of this shameful misuse
of the art of printing? Surely some clauses could be added to Lord
Campbell’s Act, or a new bill might be introduced that would meet the
exigencies of the case, without much difficulty.
Men frequent the houses in which women board and lodge for many
reasons, the chief of which is secrecy; they also feel sure that the
women are free from disease, if they know the house, and it bears an
average reputation for being well conducted. Men in a certain position
avoid publicity in their amours beyond all things, and dread being
seen in the neighbourhood of the Haymarket or the Burlington Arcade at
certain hours, as their professional reputation might be compromised.
Many serious, demure people conceal the iniquities of their private
lives in this way.
If Asmodeus were loquacious, how interesting and anecdotical a
scandal-monger he might become!
Another woman told me a story, varying somewhat from that of the first
I examined, which subsequent experience has shown me is slightly
stereotyped. She was the victim of deliberate cold-blooded seduction;
in course of time a child was born; up to this time her seducer had
treated her with affection and kindness, but he now, after presenting
her with fifty pounds, deserted her. Thrown on her own resources, as
it were, she did not know what to do; she could not return to her
friends, so she went into lodgings at a very small rental, and there
lived until her money was expended. She then supported herself and
her child by doing machine-work for a manufacturer, but at last bad
times came, and she was thrown out of work; of course the usual amount
of misery consequent on such a catastrophe ensued. She saw her child
dying by inches before her face, and this girl, with tears in her eyes,
assured me she thanked God for it. “I swear,” she added, “I starved
myself to nourish it, until I was nothing but skin and bone, and little
enough of that; I knew from the first, the child must die, if things
didn’t improve, and I felt they wouldn’t. When I looked at my little
darling I knew well enough he was doomed, but he was not destined
to drag on a weary existence as I was, and I was glad of it. It may
seem strange to you, but while my boy lived, I couldn’t go into the
streets to save his life or my own--I couldn’t do it. If there had been
a foundling-hospital, I mean as I hear there is in foreign parts, I
would have placed him there, and worked somehow, but there wasn’t, and
a crying shame it is too. Well, he died at last, and it was all over.
I was half mad and three parts drunk after the parish burying, and I
went into the streets at last; I rose in the world--(here she smiled
sarcastically)--and I’ve lived in this house for years, but I swear
to God I haven’t had a moment’s happiness since the child died, except
when I’ve been dead drunk or maudlin.”
Although this woman did not look upon the death of her child as a crime
committed by herself, it was in reality none the less her doing; she
shunned the workhouse, which might have done something for her, and
saved the life, at all events, of her child; but the repugnance evinced
by every woman who has any proper feeling for a life in a workhouse or
a hospital, can hardly be imagined by those who think that, because
people are poor, they must lose all feeling, all delicacy, all
prejudice, and all shame.
Her remarks about a foundling-hospital are sensible; in the opinion of
many it is a want that ought to be supplied. Infanticide is a crime
much on the increase, and what mother would kill her offspring if she
could provide for it in any way?
The analysis of the return of the coroners’ inquests held in London,
for the five years ending in 1860, shows a total of 1130 inquisitions
on the bodies of children under two years of age, all of whom had been
murdered. The average is 226 yearly.
Here we have 226 children killed yearly by their parents: this either
shows that our institutions are defective, or that great depravity
is inherent amongst Englishwomen. The former hypothesis is much more
likely than the latter, which we are by no means prepared to indorse.
This return, let it be understood, does not, indeed cannot, include the
immense number of embryo children who are made away with by drugs and
other devices, all of whom we have a right to suppose would have seen
the light if adequate provision could have been found for them at their
birth.
A return has also been presented to Parliament, at the instance of Mr.
Kendal, M.P., from which we find that 157,485 summonses in bastardy
cases were issued between the years 1845 and 1859 inclusive, but
that only 124,218 applications against the putative fathers came on
for hearing, while of this number orders for maintenance were only
made in 107,776 cases, the remaining summonses, amounting to 15,981,
being dismissed. This latter fact gives a yearly average of 1,141
illegitimate children thrown back on their wretched mothers. These
statistics are sufficiently appalling, but there is reason to fear
that they only give an approximate idea of the illegitimate infantile
population, and more especially of the extent to which infanticide
prevails.
_Those who live in Low Lodging Houses._
In order to find these houses it is necessary to journey eastwards, and
leave the artificial glitter of the West-end, where vice is pampered
and caressed. Whitechapel, Wapping, Ratcliff Highway, and analogous
districts, are prolific in the production of these infamies. St.
George’s-in-the-East abounds with them, kept, for the most part, by
disreputable Jews, and if a man is unfortunate enough to fall into
their clutches he is sure to become the spoil of Israel. We may,
however, find many low lodging-houses without penetrating so far into
the labyrinth of east London. There are numbers in Lambeth; in the
Waterloo Road and contiguous streets; in small streets between Covent
Garden and the Strand, some in one or two streets running out of Oxford
Street. There is a class of women technically known as “bunters,”
who take lodgings, and after staying some time run away without
paying their rent. These victimise the keepers of low lodging-houses
successfully for years. A “bunter,” whose favourite promenade,
especially on Sundays, was the New Cut, Lambeth, said “she never paid
any rent, hadn’t done it for years, and never meant to. They was mostly
Christ-killers, and chousing a Jew was no sin; leastways, none as she
cared about committing. She boasted of it: had been known about town
this ever so long as Swindling Sal. And there was another, a great
pal of her’n, as went by the name of Chousing Bett. Didn’t they know
her in time? Lord bless me, she was up to as many dodges as there was
men in the moon. She changed places, she never stuck to one long; she
never had no things for to be sold up, and, as she was handy with her
mauleys, she got on pretty well. It took a considerable big man, she
could tell me, to kick her out of a house, and then when he done it she
always give him something for himself, by way of remembering her. Oh!
they had a sweet recollection of her, some on ’em. She’d crippled lots
of the ---- crucifiers.” “Did she never get into a row?” “Lots on ’em,
she believed me. Been quodded no end of times. She knew every beak as
sot on the cheer as well as she knew Joe the magsman, who, she _might_
say, wor a very perticaler friend of her’n.” “Did he pay her well?”
This was merely a question to ascertain the amount of remuneration that
she, and others like her, were in the habit of receiving; but it had
the effect of enraging her to a great extent. My informant was a tall,
stout woman, about seven-and-twenty, with a round face, fat cheeks,
a rather wheezy voice, and not altogether destitute of good looks.
Her arms were thick and muscular, while she stood well on her legs,
and altogether appeared as if she would be a formidable opponent in a
street-quarrel or an Irish row.
“Did he pay well? Was I a-going to insult her? What was I asking her
sich a ’eap of questions for? Why, Joe was good for a ---- sight more
than she thought I was!--“polite.” Then she was sorry for it, never
meant to be. Joe worn’t a five-bobber, much less a bilker, as she’d
take her dying oath I was.” “Would she take a drop of summut?” “Well,
she didn’t mind if she did.”
An adjournment to a public-house in the immediate vicinity, where
“Swindling Sal” appeared very much at home, mollified and appeased her.
[Illustration: THE NEW CUT.--EVENING.]
The “drop of summut short, miss,” was responded to by the young lady
behind the bar by a monosyllabic query, “Neat?” The reply being in
the affirmative, a glass of gin was placed upon the marble counter,
and rapidly swallowed, while a second, and a third followed in quick
succession, much, apparently, to the envy of a woman in the same
compartment, who, my informant told me in a whisper, was “Lushing
Lucy,” and a stunner--whatever the latter appellation might be worth.
But the added “Me an’ ’er ’ad a rumpus,” was sufficient to explain the
fact of their not speaking.
“What do you think you make a week?” at last I ventured to ask.
“Well, I’ll tell yer,” was the response: “one week with another I makes
nearer on four pounds nor three--sometimes five. I ’ave done eight and
ten. Now Joe, as you ’eered me speak on, he does it ’ansome, he does:
I mean, you know, when he’s in luck. He give me a fiver once after
cracking a crib, and a nice spree me an’ Lushing Loo ’ad over it.
Sometimes I get three shillings, half-a-crown, five shillings, or ten
occasionally, accordin’ to the sort of man. What is this Joe as I talks
about? Well, I likes your cheek, howsomever, he’s a ’ousebreaker. I
don’t do anything in that way, never did, and shant; it aint safe, it
aint. How did I come to take to this sort of life? It’s easy to tell. I
was a servant gal away down in Birmingham. I got tired of workin’ and
slavin’ to make a livin’, and getting a ---- bad one at that; what o’
five pun’ a year and yer grub, I’d sooner starve, I would. After a bit
I went to Coventry, cut Brummagem, as we calls it in those parts, and
took up with the soldiers as was quartered there. I soon got tired of
them. Soldiers is good--soldiers is--to walk with and that, but they
don’t pay; cos why, they aint got no money; so I says to myself, I’ll
go to Lunnon, and I did. I soon found my level there. It is a queer
sort of life, the life I’m leading, and now I think I’ll be off. Good
night to yer. I hope we’ll know more of one another when we two meets
again.”
When she was gone I turned my attention to the woman I have before
alluded to. “Lushing Loo” was a name uneuphemistic, and calculated to
prejudice the hearer against the possessor. I had only glanced at her
before, and a careful scrutiny surprised me, while it impressed me in
her favour. She was lady-like in appearance, although haggard. She was
not dressed in flaring colours and meretricious tawdry. Her clothes
were neat, and evidenced taste in their selection, although they were
cheap. I spoke to her; she looked up without giving me an answer,
appearing much dejected. Guessing the cause, which was that she had
been very drunk the night before, and had come to the public-house to
get something more, but had been unable to obtain credit, I offered
her half-a-crown, and told her to get what she liked with it. A new
light came into her eyes; she thanked me, and, calling the barmaid,
gave her orders, with a smile of triumph. Her taste was sufficiently
aristocratic to prefer pale brandy to the usual beverage dispensed in
gin-palaces. A “drain of pale,” as she termed it, invigorated her.
Glass after glass was ordered, till she had spent all the money I gave
her. By this time she was perfectly drunk, and I had been powerless to
stop her. Pressing her hand to her forehead, she exclaimed, “Oh, my
poor head!” I asked what was the matter with her, and for the first
time she condescended, or felt in the humour to speak to me. “My
heart’s broken,” she said. “It has been broken since the twenty-first
of May. I wish I was dead; I wish I was laid in my coffin. It won’t
be long first. I am doing it. I’ve just driven another nail in, and
‘Lushing Loo,’ as they call me, will be no loss to society. Cheer up;
let’s have a song. Why don’t you sing?” she cried, her mood having
changed, as is frequently the case with habitual drunkards, and a
symptom that often precedes delirium tremens. “Sing, I tell you,” and
she began,
The first I met a cornet was
In a regiment of dragoons,
I gave him what he didn’t like,
And stole his silver spoons.
When she had finished her song, the first verse of which is all I can
remember, she subsided into comparative tranquillity. I asked her to
tell me her history.
“Oh, I’m a seduced milliner,” she said, rather impatiently; “anything
you like.”
It required some inducement on my part to make her speak, and overcome
the repugnance she seemed to feel at saying any thing about herself.
She was the daughter of respectable parents, and at an early age had
imbibed a fondness for a cousin in the army, which in the end caused
her ruin. She had gone on from bad to worse after his desertion, and at
last found herself among the number of low transpontine women. I asked
her why she did not enter a refuge, it might save her life.
“I don’t wish to live,” she replied. “I shall soon get D. T., and then
I’ll kill myself in a fit of madness.”
Nevertheless I gave her the address of the secretary of the Midnight
Meeting Association, Red Lion Square, and was going away when a young
Frenchmen entered the bar, shouting a French song, beginning
Vive l’amour, le vin, et le tabac,
and I left him in conversation with the girl, whose partiality for the
brandy bottle had gained her the suggestive name I have mentioned above.
The people who keep the low lodging-houses where these women live, are
rapacious, mean, and often dishonest. They charge enormously for their
rooms in order to guarantee themselves against loss in the event of
their harbouring a “bunter” by mistake, so that the money paid by their
honest lodgers covers the default made by those who are fraudulent.
Dr. Ryan, in his book on prostitution, puts the following extraordinary
passage, whilst writing about low houses:--
“An _enlightened medical gentleman_ assured me that near what is called
the Fleet Ditch almost every house is the lowest and most infamous
brothel. There is an aqueduct of large dimensions, into which murdered
bodies are precipitated by bullies and discharged at a considerable
distance into the Thames, without the slightest chance of recovery.”
Mr. Richelot quotes this with the greatest gravity, and adduces it as a
proof of the immorality and crime that are prevalent to such an awful
extent in London. What a pity the enlightened medical gentleman did not
affix his name to this statement as a guarantee of its authenticity!
When speaking of low street-walkers, the same author says:--
“These truly unfortunate creatures are closely watched whilst walking
the streets, so that it is impossible for them to escape, and if they
attempt it, the spy, often a female child, hired for the purpose, or
a bully, or procuress, charges the fugitive with felony, as escaping
with the clothes of the brothel-keeper, when the police officer on duty
immediately arrests the delinquent, and takes her to the station-house
of his division, but more commonly gives her up to the brothel-keeper,
who rewards him. This inhuman and infamous practice is of nightly
occurrence in this metropolis. When the forlorn, unfortunate wretch
returns to her infamous abode, she is maltreated and kept nearly naked
during the day, so that she cannot attempt to run away. She is often
half starved, and at night sent again into the streets as often as she
is disengaged, while all the money she receives goes to her keeper
whether male or female. This is not an exaggerated picture, but a fact
attested by myself. I have known a girl, aged fifteen years, who in one
night knew twelve men, and produced to her keeper as many pounds.”
“Paucis horis, hæ puellæ sex vel septem hominibus congruunt, lavant et
bibunt post singulum alcoholis paululum (vulgo brandy vel gin) et dein
paratæ sunt aliis.”
With what a vivid imagination the writer of these striking paragraphs
must have been gifted. The Arabian Nights and the Tales of the Genii
that are so charmingly improbable, are really matter of fact in
comparison. If we multiply 12 by 365, what is the result? We never
took such interest in arithmetic before: 12 × 365 = 4380. This total
of course represents pounds; why, it is nearly equal to the salary
of a puisne judge! But perhaps the young lady whose interesting age
is fifteen, is not so fortunate every night. Let us reduce it by one
half; 4380 ÷ 2 = 2190. Two thousand one hundred and ninety pounds
per annum is a very handsome income; and after such a calculation,
can we wonder that a meretricious career is alluring and attractive
to certain members of the fair sex, especially when “hæ puellæ” make
it “paucis horis?” So lucrative a speculation cannot be included in
the category of those who are “kept nearly naked during the day, and
often half starved.” We suggest this on our own responsibility, for
we have not been an “eye-witness” of such precocious profligacy; but
we make the suggestion because it is something like nigger-keeping in
the Southern States of America. A full-grown, hearty negro is a flesh
and blood equivalent for a thousand or two thousand dollars. If he
were “larruped” and bullied, he would perhaps die, or at any rate not
work so well, and a loss to his owner would ensue that Pompey’s massa
would not be slow to discover. By parity of reasoning the white slave
of England must also be treated well, or it naturally follows that she
will not be so productive, and the 12_l._ received from as many men in
a few hours, may dwindle to as many shillings, gleaned with difficulty
in a great number of hours.
Dr. Michael Ryan evidently possesses an extensive acquaintance among
remarkable men. Let us examine the statement of “my informant, a truly
moral character, a respectable citizen, the father of a family,” who
gives the following account of bullies:--
“Two acquaintances of his, men of the world” (we submit with all
humility that truly moral characters, respectable citizens, and fathers
of families ought to be more select in their acquaintance, for birds of
a feather, &c.), “were entrapped in one of the Parks by two apparently
virtuous females, about twenty years of age, who were driving in a pony
phaeton, to accompany them home to a most notoriously infamous square
in this metropolis. All was folly and debauchery till the next morning.
But when the visitors were about to depart, they were sternly informed
they must pay more money. They replied they had no more, but would
call again, when their vicious companions yelled vociferously. Two
desperate-looking villains, accompanied by a large mastiff, now entered
the apartment and threatened to murder the delinquents if they did
not immediately pay more money. A frightful fight ensued. The mastiff
seized one of the assaulted by the thigh, and tore out a considerable
portion of the flesh. The bullies were, however, finally laid
prostrate: the assailed forced their way into the street through the
drawing-room windows; a crowd speedily assembled, and on learning the
nature of the murderous assault, the mob attacked the house and _nearly
demolished it before the police arrived_” (where _were_ the police?).
“The injured parties effected their escape during the commotion.”
What a surprising adventure! Haroun Alraschid would have had it written
in letters of gold. The man of the world, who had a considerable
portion of the flesh torn out of his leg by the terrible mastiff, must
have been the model of an athlete to effect his escape and punish his
bully after such a catastrophe, more particularly as he jumped out of
the drawing-room window. Then that mob, that ferocious mob that nearly
demolished the house before the police arrived! Mob more terrible than
any that the faubourgs St. Antoine or St. Jacques could furnish during
a bread riot in Paris, to harry the government, and erect barricades.
What a horror truly moral characters must entertain of apparently
virtuous females driving pony phaetons in the Parks! A little further
on the same respectable citizen informs us, in addition, “that in a
certain court near another notoriously profligate square, which was
pulled down a few years ago, several skeletons were found under the
floor, on which inquests were held by the coroner.” What ghastly ideas
float through the mind and obscure the mental vision of that father of
a family!
That rows and disturbances often take place in disorderly houses, is
not to be denied. A few isolated instances of men being attacked or
robbed when drunk may be met with; but that there are houses whose
keepers systematically plunder and murder their frequenters our
experience does not prove, nor do we for an instant believe it to be
the case. Foreigners who write about England are only too eager to meet
with such stories in print, and they transfer them bodily with the
greatest glee to their own pages, and parade them as being of frequent
occurrence, perhaps nightly, in houses of ill fame.
Prostitutes of a certain class do not hesitate to rob drunken men, if
they think they can do so with safety. If they get hold of a gentleman
who would not like to give the thief in charge, and bring the matter
before the public, they are comparatively safe.
_Sailors’ Women._
Many extraordinary statements respecting sailors’ women have at
different times been promulgated by various authors; and from what has
gone forth to the world, those who take an interest in such matters
have not formed a very high opinion of the class in question.
The progress of modern civilization is so rapid and so wonderful, that
the changes which take place in the brief space of a few years are
really and truly incredible.
That which ten, fifteen, or twenty years might have been said with
perfect truth about a particular district, or an especial denomination,
if repeated now would, in point of fact, be nothing but fiction of the
grossest and most unsubstantial character. Novelists who have never
traversed the localities they are describing so vividly, or witnessed
the scenes they depict with such graphic distinctness, do a great deal
more to mislead the general public than a casual observer may at first
think himself at liberty to believe.
The upper ten thousand and the middle-classes as a rule have to combat
innumerable prejudices, and are obliged to reject the traditions of
their infancy before they thoroughly comprehend the actual condition of
that race of people, which they are taught by immemorial prescription
to regard as immensely inferior, if not altogether barbarous.
It is necessary to make these prefatory remarks before declaring that
of late years everything connected with the industrious classes has
undergone as complete a transformation as any magic can effect upon
the stage. Not only is the condition of the people changed, but they
themselves are as effectually metamorphosed. I shall describe the
wonders that have been accomplished in a score or two of years in and
about St. Giles’s by a vigilant and energetic police-force, better
parochial management, schools, washhouses, mechanics’ institutes,
and lodging-houses that have caused to disappear those noisome,
pestilential sties that pigs would obstinately refuse to wallow in.
The spread of enlightenment and education has also made itself visible
in the increased tact and proficiency of the thief himself; and
this is one cause of the amelioration of low and formerly vicious
neighbourhoods. The thief no longer frequents places where the police
know very well how to put their hands upon him. Quitting the haunts
where he was formerly so much at home and at his ease, he migrates
westwards, north, south, anywhere but the exact vicinity you would
expect to meet him in. Nor is the hostility of the police so much
directed against expert and notorious thieves. They of course do not
neglect an opportunity of making a capture, and plume themselves when
that capture is made, but they have a certain sort of respect for a
thief who is professionally so; who says, “It is the way by which I
choose to obtain my living, and were it otherwise I must still elect
to be a thief, for I have been accustomed to it from my childhood. My
character is already gone, no one would employ me, and, above all, I
take a pride in thieving skilfully, and setting your detective skill at
defiance.”
It is indeed the low petty thief, the area-sneak, and that _genus_ that
more especially excites the spleen, and rouses the ire of your modern
policeman. The idle, lazy scoundrel who will not work when he can
obtain it at the docks and elsewhere, who goes cadging about because
his own inherent depravity, and naturally base instincts deprive him
of a spark of intelligence, an atom of honest feeling, to point to a
better and a different goal. Emigration is as a thing unexisting to
them; they live a life of turpitude, preying upon society; they pass
half their days in a prison, and they die prematurely unregretted and
unmourned.
Whitechapel has always been looked upon as a suspicious, unhealthy
locality. To begin, its population is a strange amalgamation of Jews,
English, French, Germans, and other antagonistic elements that must
clash and jar, but not to such an extent as has been surmised and
reported. Whitechapel has its theatres, its music-halls, the cheap
rates of admission to which serve to absorb numbers of the inhabitants,
and by innocently amusing them soften their manners and keep them out
of mischief and harm’s way.
The Earl of Effingham, a theatre in Whitechapel Road, has been lately
done up and restored, and holds three thousand people. It has no boxes;
they would not be patronized if they were in existence. Whitechapel
does not go to the play in kid-gloves and white ties. The stage of the
Effingham is roomy and excellent, the trap-work very extensive, for
Whitechapel rejoices much in pyrotechnic displays, blue demons, red
demons, and vanishing Satans that disappear in a cloud of smoke through
an invisible hole in the floor. Great is the applause when gauzy nymphs
rise like so many Aphrodites from the sea, and sit down on apparent
sunbeams midway between the stage and the theatrical heaven.
The Pavilion is another theatre in the Whitechapel Road, and perhaps
ranks higher than the Effingham. The Pavilion may stand comparison,
with infinite credit to itself and its architect, with more than one
West-end theatre. People at the West-end who never in their dreams
travel farther east than the dividend and transfer department of
the Bank of England in Threadneedle Street, have a vague idea that
East-end theatres strongly resemble the dilapidated and decayed Soho
in Dean Street, filled with a rough, noisy set of drunken thieves
and prostitutes. It is time that these ideas should be exploded.
Prostitutes and thieves of course do find their way into theatres and
other places of amusement, but perhaps if you were to rake up all the
bad characters in the neighbourhood they would not suffice to fill the
pit and gallery of the Pavilion.
On approaching the play-house, you observe prostitutes standing outside
in little gangs and knots of three or four, and you will also see
them inside, but for the most part they are accompanied by their men.
Sergeant Prior of the H division, for whose services I am indebted to
the courtesy of Superintendent White, assured me that when sailors
landed in the docks, and drew their wages, they picked up some women to
whom they considered themselves married pro tem., and to whom they gave
the money they had made by their last voyage. They live with the women
until the money is gone, (and the women generally treat the sailors
honourably). They go to sea again, make some more, come home, and
repeat the same thing over again. There are perhaps twelve or fifteen
public-houses licensed for music in St. George’s Street and Ratcliff
Highway: most of them a few years ago were thronged, now they can
scarcely pay their expenses; and it is anticipated that next year many
of them will be obliged to close.
This is easily accounted for. Many sailors go further east to the K
division, which includes Wapping, Bluegate, &c.; but the chief cause,
the _fons et origo_ of the declension is simply the institution of
sailors’ savings banks. There is no longer the money to be spent that
there used to be. When a sailor comes on shore, he will probably go to
the nearest sailors’ home, and place his money in the bank. Drawing
out again a pound or so, with which he may enjoy himself for a day or
two, he will then have the rest of his money transmitted to his friends
in the country, to whom he will himself go as soon as he has had his
fling in town; so that the money that used formerly to be expended in
one centre is spread over the entire country, ergo and very naturally
the public-house keepers feel the change acutely. To show how the
neighbourhood has improved of late years, I will mention that six or
eight years ago the Eastern Music Hall was frequented by such ruffians
that the proprietor told me he was only too glad when twelve o’clock
came, that he might shut the place up, and turn out his turbulent
customers, whose chief delight was to disfigure and ruin each other’s
physiognomy.
Mr. Wilton has since then rebuilt his concert-room, and erected a
gallery that he sets apart for sailors and their women. The body of the
hall is filled usually by tradesmen, keepers of tally-shops, &c., &c.
And before we go further a word about tally-shops. Take the New
Road, Whitechapel, which is full of them. They present a respectable
appearance, are little two-storied houses, clean, neat, and the owners
are reputed to have the Queen’s taxes ready when the collectors call
for them. The principle of the tally business is this:--A man wants
a coat, or a woman wants a shawl, a dress, or some other article of
feminine wearing apparel. Being somewhat known in the neighbourhood,
as working at some trade or other, the applicant is able to go to the
tally-shop, certain of the success of his or her application.
She obtains the dress she wishes for, and agrees to pay so much a week
until the whole debt is cleared off. For instance, the dress costs
three pounds, a sum she can never hope to possess in its entirety.
Well, five shillings a week for three months will complete the sum
charged; and the woman by this system of accommodation is as much
benefited as the tallyman.
The British Queen, a concert-room in the Commercial Road, is a
respectable, well-conducted house, frequented by low prostitutes, as
may be expected, but orderly in the extreme, and what more can be
wished for? The sergeant remarked to me, if these places of harmless
amusement were not licensed and kept open, much evil would be sown
and disseminated throughout the neighbourhood, for it may be depended
something worse and ten times lower would be substituted. People of
all classes must have recreation. Sailors who come on shore after
a long cruise _will_ have it; and, added the sergeant, we give it
them in a way that does no harm to themselves or anybody else. Rows
and disturbances seldom occur, although, of course, they may be
expected now and then. The dancing-rooms close at twelve--indeed their
frequenters adjourn to other places generally before that hour, and
very few publics are open at one. I heard that there had been three
fights at the Prussian Eagle, in Ship Alley, Wellclose Square, on the
evening I visited the locality; but when I arrived I saw no symptoms of
the reported pugnacity of the people assembled, and this was the only
rumour of war that reached my ears.
Ship Alley is full of foreign lodging-houses. You see written on a
blind an inscription that denotes the nationality of the keeper and the
character of the establishment; for instance _Hollandsche lodgement_,
is sufficient to show a Dutchman that his own language is spoken, and
that he may have a bed if he chooses.
That there are desperate characters in the district was sufficiently
evidenced by what I saw when at the station-house. Two women, both
well-known prostitutes, were confined in the cells, one of whom had
been there before no less than _fourteen times_, and had only a few
hours before been brought up charged with nearly murdering a man with
a poker. Her face was bad, heavy, and repulsive; her forehead, as well
as I could distinguish by the scanty light thrown into the place by the
bulls-eye of the policeman, was low; her nose was short and what is
called pudgy, having the nostrils dilated; and she abused the police
for disturbing her when she wished to go to sleep, a thing, from what
I saw, I imagined rather difficult to accomplish, as she had nothing
to recline upon but a hard sort of locker attached to the wall, and
running all along one side and at the bottom of the cell.
The other woman, whose name was O’Brien, was much better looking than
her companion in crime; her hand was bandaged up, and she appeared
faint from loss of blood. The policeman lifted her head up, and asked
her if she would like anything to eat. She replied she could drink some
tea, which was ordered for her. She had met a man in a public-house
in the afternoon, who was occupied in eating some bread and cheese.
In order to get into conversation with him, she asked him to give her
some, and on his refusing she made a snatch at it, and caught hold of
the knife he was using with her right hand, inflicting a severe wound:
notwithstanding the pain of the wound, which only served to infuriate
her, she flew at the man with a stick and beat him severely over the
head, endangering his life; for which offence she was taken by the
police to the station-house and locked up.
There are very few English girls who can be properly termed sailors’
women; most of them are either German or Irish. I saw numbers of
German, tall brazen-faced women, dressed in gaudy colours, dancing and
pirouetting in a fantastic manner in a dancing-room in Ratcliff Highway.
It may be as well to give a description of one of the dancing-rooms
frequented by sailors and their women.
Passing through the bar of the public-house you ascend a flight of
stairs and find yourself in a long room well lighted by gas. There
are benches placed along the walls for the accommodation of the
dancers, and you will not fail to observe the orchestra, which is
well worthy of attention. It consists, in the majority of cases, of
four musicians, bearded shaggy-looking foreigners, probably Germans,
including a fiddle, a cornet, and two fifes or flutes. The orchestra
is usually penned up in a corner of the room, and placed upon a dais
or raised desk, to get upon which you ascend two steps; the front is
boarded up with deal, only leaving a small door at one end to admit the
performers, for whose convenience either a bench is erected or chairs
supplied. There is a little ledge to place the music on, which is as
often as not embellished with pewter pots. The music itself is striking
in the extreme, and at all events exhilarating in the highest degree.
The shrill notes of the fifes, and the braying of the trumpet in very
quick time, rouses the excitement of the dancers, until they whirl
round in the waltz with the greatest velocity.
I was much struck by the way in which the various dances were executed.
In the first place, the utmost decorum prevailed, nor did I notice the
slightest tendency to indecency. Polkas and waltzes seemed to be the
favourites, and the steps were marvellously well done, considering
the position and education of the company. In many cases there was
an exhibition of grace and natural ease that no one would have
supposed possible; but this was observable more amongst foreigners
than English. The generality of the women had not the slightest idea
of dancing. There was very little beauty abroad that night, at least
in the neighbourhood of Ratcliff Highway. It might have been hiding
under a bushel, but it was not patent to a casual observer. Yet I must
acknowledge there was something prepossessing about the countenances
of the women, which is more than could be said of the men. It might
have been a compound of resignation, indifference, and recklessness,
through all of which phases of her career a prostitute must go; nor is
she thoroughly inured to her vocation until they have been experienced,
and are in a manner mingled together. There was a certain innate
delicacy about those women, too, highly commendable to its possessors.
It was not the artificial refinement of the West-end, nothing of the
sort, but genuine womanly feeling. They did not look as if they had
come there for pleasure exactly, they appeared too business-like for
that; but they did seem as if they would like, and intended, to unite
the two, business and pleasure, and enjoy themselves as much as the
circumstances would allow. They do not dress in the dancing-room, they
attire themselves at home, and walk through the streets in their ball
costume, without their bonnets, but as they do not live far off this
is not thought much of. I remarked several women unattached sitting by
themselves, in one place as many as half-a-dozen.
The faces of the sailors were vacant, stupid, and beery. I could not
help thinking one man I saw at the Prussian Eagle a perfect Caliban
in his way. There was an expression of owlish cunning about his
heavy-looking features that, uniting with the drunken leer sitting on
his huge mouth, made him look but a “very indifferent monster.”
I noticed a sprinkling of coloured men and a few thorough negroes
scattered about here and there.
The sergeant chanced to be in search of a woman named Harrington, who
had committed a felony, and in the execution of his duty he was obliged
to search some notorious brothels that he thought might harbour the
delinquent.
We entered a house in Frederick Street (which is full of brothels,
almost every house being used for an immoral purpose). But the object
of our search was not there, and we proceeded to Brunswick Street, more
generally known in the neighbourhood and to the police as “Tiger Bay;”
the inhabitants and frequenters of which place are very often obliged
to enter an involuntary appearance in the Thames police court. Tiger
Bay, like Frederick Street, is full of brothels and thieves’ lodging
houses. We entered No. 6, accompanied by two policemen in uniform, who
happened to be on duty at the entrance to the place, as they wished
to apprehend a criminal whom they had reason to believe would resort
for shelter, after the night’s debauch, to one of the dens in the Bay.
We failed to find the man the police wanted, but on descending to the
kitchen, we discovered a woman sitting on a chair, evidently waiting up
for some one.
“That woman,” said the sergeant, “is one of the lowest class we have;
she is not only a common prostitute herself, and a companion of
ruffians and thieves, but the servant of prostitutes and low characters
as debased as herself, with the exception of their being waited upon by
her.”
We afterwards searched two houses on the opposite side of the way. The
rooms occupied by the women and their sailors were larger and more
roomy than I expected to find them. The beds were what are called
“fourposters,” and in some instances were surrounded with faded,
dirty-looking, chintz curtains. There was the usual amount of cheap
crockery on the mantel-pieces, which were surmounted with a small
looking-glass in a rosewood or gilt frame. When the magic word “Police”
was uttered, the door flew open, as the door of the robbers’ cave swung
back on its hinges when Ali Baba exclaimed “Sesame.” A few seconds were
allowed for the person who opened the door to retire to the couch, and
then our visual circuit of the chamber took place. The sailors did not
evince any signs of hostility at our somewhat unwarrantable intrusion,
and we in every case made our exit peacefully, but without finding
the felonious woman we were in search of; which might cause sceptical
people to regard her as slightly apocryphal, but in reality such was
not the case, and in all probability by this time justice has claimed
her own.
A glance at the interior of the Horse and Leaping Bar concluded our
nocturnal wanderings. This public-house is one of the latest in the
district, and holds out accommodation for man and beast till the small
hours multiply themselves considerably.
Most of the foreign women talk English pretty well, some excellently,
some of course imperfectly; their proficiency depending upon the length
of their stay in the country. A German woman told me the following
story:--
“I have been in England nearly six years. When I came over I could not
speak a word of your language, but I associated with my own countrymen.
Now I talk the English well, as well as any, and I go with the British
sailor. I am here to-night in this house of dancing with a sailor
English, and I have known him two week. His ship is in docks, and will
not sail for one month from this time I am now speaking. I knew him
before, one years ago and a half. He always lives with me when he come
on shore. He is nice man and give me all his money when he land always.
I take all his money while he with me, and not spend it quick as some
of your English women do. If I not to take care, he would spend all
in one week. Sailor boy always spend money like rain water; he throw
it into the street and not care to pick it up again, leave it for
crossing-sweeper or errand-boy who pass that way. I give him little
when he want it; he know me well and have great deal confidence in me.
I am honest, and he feel he can trust me. Suppose he have twenty-four
pound when he leave his ship, and he stay six week on land, he will
spend with me fifteen or twenty, and he will give me what left when he
leave me, and we amuse ourself and keep both ourself with the rest. It
very bad for sailor to keep his money himself; he will fall into bad
hands; he will go to ready-made outfitter or slop-seller, who will sell
him clothes dreadful dear and ruin him. I know very many sailors--six,
eight, ten, oh! more than that. They are my husbands. I am not married,
of course not, but they think me their wife while they are on shore.
I do not care much for any of them; I have a lover of my own, he is
waiter in a lodging and coffee house; Germans keep it; he is German and
he comes from Berlin, which is my town also. I is born there.”
Shadwell, Spitalfields, and contiguous districts are infested with
nests of brothels as well as Whitechapel. To attract sailors, women and
music must be provided for their amusement. In High Street, Shadwell,
there are many of these houses, one of the most notorious of which is
called The White Swan, or, more commonly, Paddy’s Goose; the owner of
which is reported to make money in more ways than one. Brothel-keeping
is a favourite mode of investing money in this neighbourhood. Some
few years ago a man called James was prosecuted for having altogether
thirty brothels; and although he was convicted, the nuisance was by no
means in the slightest degree abated, as the informer, by name Brooks,
has them all himself at the present time.
There are two other well-known houses in High Street, Shadwell--The
Three Crowns, and The Grapes, the latter not being licensed for dancing.
Paddy’s Goose is perhaps the most popular house in the parish. It is
also very well thought of in high quarters. During the Crimean war,
the landlord, when the Government wanted sailors to man the fleet,
went among the shipping in the river, and enlisted numbers of men. His
system of recruiting was very successful. He went about in a small
steamer with a band of music and flags, streamers and colours flying.
All this rendered him popular with the Admiralty authorities, and made
his house extensively known to the sailors, and those connected with
them.
Inspector Price, under whose supervision the low lodging-houses in
that part of London are placed, most obligingly took me over one of
the lowest lodging-houses, and one of the best, forming a strange
contrast, and both presenting an admirable example of the capital
working of the most excellent Act that regulates them. We went into
a large room, with a huge fire blazing cheerily at the furthest
extremity, around which were grouped some ten or twelve people, others
were scattered over various parts of the room. The attitudes of most
were listless; none seemed to be reading; one was cooking his supper;
a few amused themselves by criticising us, and canvassing as to the
motives of our visit, and our appearance altogether. The inspector was
well known to the keeper of the place, who treated him with the utmost
civility and respect. The greatest cleanliness prevailed everywhere.
Any one was admitted to this house who could command the moderate
sum of threepence. I was informed those who frequented it were, for
the most part, prostitutes and thieves. That is thieves and their
associates. No questions were asked of those who paid their money
and claimed a night’s lodging in return. The establishment contained
forty beds. There were two floors. The first was divided into little
boxes by means of deal boards, and set apart for married people, or
those who represented themselves to be so. Of course, as the sum paid
for the night’s lodging was so small, the lodgers could not expect
clean sheets, which were only supplied once a week. The sheets were
indeed generally black, or very dirty. How could it be otherwise? The
men were often in a filthy state, and quite unaccustomed to anything
like cleanliness, from which they were as far as from godliness. The
floors and the surroundings were clean, and highly creditable to the
management upstairs; the beds were not crowded together, but spread
over the surface in rows, being a certain distance from one another.
Many of them were already occupied, although it was not eleven o’clock,
and the house is generally full before morning. The ventilation was
very complete, and worthy of attention. There were several ventilators
on each side of the room, but not in the roof--all were placed in the
side.
The next house we entered was more aristocratic in appearance. You
entered through some glass doors, and going along a small passage
found yourself in a large apartment, long and narrow, resembling a
coffee-room. The price of admission was precisely the same, but the
frequenters were chiefly working men, sometimes men from the docks,
respectable mechanics, &c. No suspicious characters were admitted by
the proprietor on any pretence, and he by this means kept his house
select. Several men were seated in the compartments reading newspapers,
of which there appeared to be an abundance. The accommodation was very
good, and everything reflected great credit upon the police, who seem
to have the most unlimited jurisdiction, and complete control over the
low people and places in the East-end of London.
Bluegate fields is nothing more or less than a den of thieves,
prostitutes, and ruffians of the lowest description. Yet the police
penetrate unarmed without the slightest trepidation. There I witnessed
sights that the most morbid novelist has described, but which have been
too horrible for those who have never been on the spot to believe. We
entered a house in Victoria Place, running out of Bluegate, that had
no street-door, and penetrating a small passage found ourselves in a
kitchen, where the landlady was sitting over a miserable coke fire;
near her there was a girl, haggard and woe-begone. We put the usual
question, Is there any one upstairs? And on being told that the rooms
were occupied, we ascended to the first floor, which was divided into
four small rooms. The house was only a two-storied one. The woman of
the place informed me, she paid five shillings a-week rent, and charged
the prostitutes who lodged with her four shillings a-week for the
miserable apartments she had to offer for their accommodation; but as
the shipping in the river was very slack just now, times were hard with
her.
The house was a wretched tumble-down hovel, and the poor woman
complained bitterly that her landlord would make no repairs. The
first room we entered contained a Lascar, who had come over in some
vessel, and his woman. There was a sickly smell in the chamber, that
I discovered proceeded from the opium he had been smoking. There was
not a chair to be seen; nothing but a table, upon which were placed a
few odds-and-ends. The Lascar was lying on a palliasse placed upon the
floor (there was no bedstead), apparently stupefied from the effects
of the opium he had been taking. A couple of old tattered blankets
sufficed to cover him. By his bedside sat his woman, who was half
idiotically endeavouring to derive some stupefaction from the ashes
he had left in his pipe. Her face was grimy and unwashed, and her
hands so black and filthy that mustard-and-cress might have been sown
successfully upon them. As she was huddled up with her back against
the wall she appeared an animated bundle of rags. She was apparently a
powerfully made woman, and although her face was wrinkled and careworn,
she did not look exactly decrepit, but more like one thoroughly broken
down in spirit than in body. In all probability she was diseased;
and the disease communicated by the Malays, Lascars, and Orientals
generally, is said to be the most frightful form of lues to be met
with in Europe. It goes by the name of the Dry ----, and is much
dreaded by all the women in the neighbourhood of the docks. Leaving
this wretched couple, who were too much overcome with the fumes of
opium to answer any questions, we went into another room, which should
more correctly be called a hole. There was not an atom of furniture in
it, nor a bed, and yet it contained a woman. This woman was lying on
the floor, with not even a bundle of straw beneath her, wrapped up in
what appeared to be a shawl, but which might have been taken for the
dress of a scarecrow feloniously abstracted from a corn-field, without
any very great stretch of the imagination. She started up as we kicked
open the door that was loose on its hinges, and did not shut properly,
creaking strangely on its rusty hinges as it swung sullenly back.
Her face was shrivelled and famine-stricken, her eyes bloodshot and
glaring, her features disfigured slightly with disease, and her hair
dishevelled, tangled, and matted. More like a beast in his lair than
a human being in her home was this woman. We spoke to her, and from
her replies concluded she was an Irishwoman. She said she was charged
nothing for the place she slept in. She cleaned out the water-closets
in the daytime, and for these services she was given a lodging gratis.
The next house we entered was in Bluegate Fields itself. Four women
occupied the kitchen on the ground-floor. They were waiting for their
men, probably thieves. They had a can of beer, which they passed from
one to the other. The woman of the house had gone out to meet her
husband, who was to be liberated from prison that night, having been
imprisoned for a burglary three years ago, his term of incarceration
happening to end that day. His friends were to meet at his house and
celebrate his return by an orgie, when all of them, we were told, hoped
to be blind drunk; and, added the girl who volunteered the information,
“None of ’em didn’t care dam for police.” She was evidently
anticipating the happy state of inebriety she had just been predicting.
One of the houses a few doors off contained a woman well known to the
police, and rather notorious on account of her having attempted to
drown herself three times. Wishing to see her, the inspector took me to
the house she lived in, which was kept by an Irishwoman, the greatest
hypocrite I ever met with. She was intensely civil to the inspector,
who had once convicted her for allowing three women to sleep in one
bed, and she was fined five pounds, all which she told us with the most
tedious circumstantiality, vowing, as “shure as the Almighty God was
sitting on his throne,” she did it out of charity, or she wished she
might never speak no more. “These gals,” she said, “comes to me in the
night and swears (as I knows to be true) they has no place where to
put their heads, and foxes they has holes, likewise birds of the air,
which it’s a mortial shame as they is better provided for and against
than them that’s flesh and blood Christians. And one night I let one
in, when having no bed you see empty I bundled them in together. Police
they came and I was fined five pounds, which I borrowed from Mrs.
Wilson what lives close to--five golden sovereigns, as I’m alive, and
they took them all, which I’ve paid back two bob a week since, and I
don’t owe no one soul not a brass farthing, which it’s all as thrue as
Christ’s holiness, let alone his blessed gospel.” The woman we came
to see was called China Emma, or by her intimate associates Chaney
Emm. She was short in stature, rather stout, with a pale face utterly
expressionless; her complexion was blonde. There was a look almost of
vacuity about her, but her replies to my questions were lucid, and
denoted that she was only naturally slow and stupid.
“My father and mother,” she said, “kept a grocer’s shop in Goswell
Street. Mother died when I was twelve years old, and father took to
drinking. In three years he lost his shop, and in a while killed
himself, what with the drink and one thing and another. I went to live
with a sister who was bad, and in about a year she went away with a
man and left me. I could not get any work, never having been taught
any trade or that. One day I met a sailor, who was very good to me. I
lived with him as his wife, and when he went away drew his half-pay.
I was with him for six years. Then he died of yellow fever in the
West Indies, and I heard no more of him. I know he did not cut me,
for one of his mates brought me a silver snuff-box he used to carry
his quids in, which he sent me when he was at his last. Then I lived
for a bit in Angel Gardens; after that I went to Gravel Lane; and now
I’m in Bluegate Fields. When I came here I met with a Chinaman called
Appoo. He’s abroad now, but he sends me money. I got two pounds from
him only the other day. He often sends me the needful. When he was
over here last we lived in Gregory’s Rents. I’ve lived in Victoria
Place and New Court, all about Bluegate. Appoo only used to treat
me badly when I got drunk. I always get drunk when I’ve a chance to.
Appoo used to tie my legs and arms and take me into the street. He’d
throw me into the gutter, and then he’d throw buckets of water over me
till I was wet through; but that didn’t cure; I don’t believe anything
would; I’d die for the drink; I must have it, and I don’t care what I
does to get it. I’ve tried to kill myself more nor once. I have fits
at times--melancholy fits--and I don’t know what to do with myself.
I wish I was dead, and I run to the water and throw myself in; but
I’ve no luck; I never had since I was a child--oh! ever so little. I’s
always picked out. Once I jumped out of a first-floor window in Jamaica
Place into the river, but a boatman coming by hooked me up, and the
magistrate give me a month. The missus here (naming the woman who kept
the place) wants me to go to a refuge or home, or something of that.
P’raps I shall.”
The Irishwoman here broke in, exclaiming--
“And so she shall. I’ve got three or four poor gals into the refuge,
and I’ll get Chaney Emm, as shure as the Almighty God’s sitting on his
throne.” (This was a favourite exclamation of hers.) “I keeps her very
quiet here; she never sees no one, nor tastes a drop of gin, which she
shouldn’t have to save her blessed life, if it were to be saved by
nothink else; leastways, it should be but a taste. It’s ruined her has
drink. When she got the money Appoo sent her the other day or two back,
I took it all, and laid it out for her, but never a drop of the crater
passed down Chaney Emm’s lips.”
This declaration of the avaricious old woman was easily credible,
except the laying out the money for her victim’s advantage. The gin,
in all probability, if any had been bought, had been monopolized in
another quarter, where it was equally acceptable. As to the woman’s
seeing no one, the idea was preposterous. The old woman’s charity, as
is commonly the case, began at home, and went very little further. If
she were excluded from men’s society she must have been much diseased.
I find the women who cohabit with sailors are not, as a body,
disorderly, although there may be individuals who habitually give
themselves up to insubordination. I take them to be the reverse of
careful, for they are at times well off, but at others, through
their improvidence and the slackness of the shipping, immersed in
poverty. The supply of women is fully equal to the demand; but as
the demand fluctuates so much I do not think the market can be said
to be overstocked. They are unintelligent and below the average of
intellectuality among prostitutes, though perhaps on a par with the men
with whom they cohabit.
_Soldiers’ Women._
The evil effects of the want of some system to regulate prostitution in
England, is perhaps more shown amongst the army than any other class.
Syphilis is very prevalent among soldiers, although the disease is not
so virulent as it was formerly. That is, we do not see examples of the
loss of the palate or part of the cranium, as specimens extant in our
museums show us was formerly the case. The women who are patronized by
soldiers are, as a matter of course, very badly paid; for how can a
soldier out of his very scanty allowance, generally little exceeding a
shilling a day, afford to supply a woman with means adequate for her
existence? It follows from this state of things, that a woman may,
or more correctly must, be intimate with several men in one evening,
and supposing her to be tainted with disease, as many men as she may
chance to pick up during the course of her peregrinations, will be
incapacitated from serving her Majesty for several weeks.
The following quotation from Mr. Acton’s book will suffice to show what
I mean. He is speaking of a particular regiment.
“In 1851, Dr. Gordon, surgeon to the 57th, read a paper before the
Surgical Society of Ireland, in which he states, (see ‘Dublin Medical
Press,’ February 26th, 1851,) that during the year ending 31st March,
1850, the following number, out of an average strength of 408 men, were
treated for venereal diseases in the head-quarters hospital--
“Number admitted 113
Number of days in hospital 2519
Amount of soldiers’ pay £136 10 9
“At the first blush, the economist would be apt to imagine that a
very large sum of money is lost to the state annually by the inroads
of syphilis. It is but fair to state that this is not the case, as
tenpence a day is stopped from each man’s pay while he is in hospital,
so that about five-sixths of his wages are recovered. The actual
loss to the country is his time, which, however, during peace, is
non-productive.
“From the statistical reports on the sickness, mortality, and
invaliding among the troops in the United Kingdom, the Mediterranean,
and British America, presented to Parliament some years ago (1839), it
would appear that syphilis is a fatal enemy to the British soldier.
“Total cases during seven and a quarter years 8,072
Total aggregate strength for do. 44,611
Annual mean strength for ditto 6,153
“Thus 181 per 1000, or about one man in five appear to have been
attacked.
“Let us compare this with the following statistics extracted from a
report on army diseases from 1837 to 1847.
“Aggregate strength:
Cavalry 54,374
Foot-guards 40,120
Infantry 160,103
-------
Total 254,597
“Extent of venereal disease:
Cavalry 11,205
Foot-guards 10,043
Infantry 44,435
------
Total 65,683
Deaths 17
“Number of men per 1000 of strength admitted during ten years:
“Cavalry 206
Foot-guards 250
Infantry 277
“This report was drawn up by Dr. Balfour and Sir Alexander Tulloch,
and the reason that a distinction is made between the line and the
foot-guards, is that the line contains a large number of recruits and
men returning from foreign service, whereas in the foot-guards, there
is usually a much greater proportion of soldiers who have arrived at
maturity, on the one hand, and who, on the other, have not served in
foreign climates. As these circumstances were likely to have affected
the amount of sickness and mortality, the returns of the two classes
were kept distinct and separate in preparing the tables.
“Few infected soldiers escape notice, as health inspections are made
once a week, which is the general rule in the service. If a soldier is
found at inspection to be labouring under disease, he is reported for
having concealed it to his superior officer, who orders him punishment
drill on his discharge from hospital. In order to induce him to apply
early for relief, the soldier is told that if he do so, he may probably
be only a few days instead of several weeks under treatment.
“It is contrary to the rules of the service, to treat men out of
hospital; even were it otherwise, the habits of the soldier, and the
accommodation in barracks, would not favour celerity of cure.”[93]
In the brigade of Guards, though the average of syphilis primitiva is
heavy, as above stated, only 11 per cent. of the cases are followed by
secondary symptoms, which, however, follow 33 per cent. of the cases in
the line. Dr. Balfour says a mild mercurial system is usually pursued
in the army; and indeed mercury by many surgeons is held absolutely
necessary for hard, or Hunterian chancres.
A woman was pointed out to me in a Music Hall in Knightsbridge, who
my informant told me he was positively assured had only yesterday
had two buboes lanced; and yet she was present at that scene of
apparent festivity, contaminating the very air, like a deadly upas
tree, and poisoning the blood of the nation, with the most audacious
recklessness. It is useless to say that such things should not be.
They exist, and they will exist. The woman was nothing better than a
paid murderess, committing crime with impunity. She was so well known
that she had obtained the soubriquet of the “hospital” as she was so
frequently an inmate of one, and as she so often sent others to a
similar involuntary confinement.
Those women who, for the sake of distinguishing them from the
professionals, I must call amateurs, are generally spoken of as
“Dollymops.” Now many servant-maids, nurse-maids who go with children
into the Parks, shop girls and milliners who may be met with at the
various “dancing academies,” so called, are “Dollymops.” We must
separate these latter again from the “Demoiselle de Comptoir,” who is
just as much in point of fact a “Dollymop,” because she prostitutes
herself for her own pleasure, a few trifling presents or a little money
now and then, and not altogether to maintain herself. But she will
not go to casinos, or any similar places to pick up men; she makes
their acquaintance in a clandestine manner: either she is accosted in
the street early in the evening as she is returning from her place of
business to her lodgings, or she carries on a flirtation behind the
counter, which, as a matter of course, ends in an assignation.
Soldiers are notorious for hunting up these women, especially
nurse-maids and those that in the execution of their duty walk in the
Parks, when they may easily be accosted. Nurse-maids feel flattered
by the attention that is lavished upon them, and are always ready to
succumb to the “scarlet fever.” A red coat is all powerful with this
class, who prefer a soldier to a servant, or any other description of
man they come in contact with.
This also answers the soldier’s purpose equally well. He cannot afford
to employ professional women to gratify his passions, and if he were
to do so, he must make the acquaintance of a very low set of women,
who in all probability will communicate some infectious disease to
him. He feels he is never safe, and he is only too glad to seize the
opportunity of forming an intimacy with a woman who will appreciate
him for his own sake, cost him nothing but the trouble of taking her
about occasionally, and who, whatever else she may do, will never by
any chance infect. I heard that some of the privates in the Blues and
the brigade of Guards often formed very reprehensible connections with
women of property, tradesmen’s wives, and even ladies, who supplied
them with money, and behaved with the greatest generosity to them,
only stipulating for the preservation of secrecy in their intrigues.
Of course numbers of women throng the localities which contain the
Knightsbridge, Albany Street, St. George’s, Portman, and Wellington
Barracks in Birdcage Walk. They may have come up from the provinces;
some women have been known to follow a particular regiment from place
to place, all over the country, and have only left it when it has been
under orders for foreign service.
A woman whom I met with near the Knightsbridge barracks, in one of the
beer-houses there, told me she had been a soldiers’ woman all her life.
“When I was sixteen,” she said, “I went wrong. I’m up’ards of thirty
now. I’ve been fourteen or fifteen years at it. It’s one of those
things you can’t well leave off when you’ve once took to it. I was
born in Chatham. We had a small baker’s shop there, and I served the
customers and minded the shop. There’s lots of soldiers at Chatham, as
you know, and they used to look in at the window in passing, and nod
and laugh whenever they could catch my eye. I liked to be noticed by
the soldiers. At last one young fellow, a recruit, who had not long
joined I think, for he told me he hadn’t been long at the depot, came
in and talked to me. Well, this went on, and things fell out as they
always do with girls who go about with men, more especially soldiers,
and when the regiment went to Ireland, he gave me a little money
that helped me to follow it; and I went about from place to place,
time after time, always sticking to the same regiment. My first man
got tired of me in a year or two, but that didn’t matter. I took up
with a sergeant then, which was a cut above a private, and helped me
on wonderful. When we were at Dover, there was a militia permanently
embodied artillery regiment quartered with us on the western heights,
and I got talking to some of the officers, who liked me a bit. I was a
---- sight prettier then than I am now, you may take your dying oath,
and they noticed me uncommon; and although I didn’t altogether cut
my old friends, I carried on with these fellows all the time we were
there, and made a lot of money, and bought better dresses and some
jewellery, that altered me wonderful. One officer offered to keep me
if I liked to come and live with him. He said he would take a house
for me in the town, and keep a pony carriage if I would consent; but
although I saw it would make me rise in the world, I refused. I was
fond of my old associates, and did not like the society of gentlemen;
so, when the regiment left Dover, I went with them, and I remained with
them till I was five-and-twenty. We were then stationed in London,
and I one day saw a private in the Blues with one of my friends, and
for the first time in my life I fell in love. He spoke to me, and I
immediately accepted his proposals, left my old friends, and went to
live in a new locality, among strangers; and I’ve been amongst the
Blues ever since, going from one to the other, never keeping to one
long, and not particler as long as I get the needful. I don’t get
much,--very little, hardly enough to live upon. I’ve done a little
needlework in the day-time. I don’t now, although I do some washing and
mangling now and then to help it out. I don’t pay much for my bed-room,
only six bob a week, and dear at that. It ain’t much of a place. Some
of the girls about here live in houses. I don’t; I never could abear
it. You ain’t your own master, and I always liked my freedom. I’m not
comfortable exactly; it’s a brutal sort of life this. It isn’t the sin
of it, though, that worries me. I don’t dare think of that much, but I
do think how happy I might have been if I’d always lived at Chatham,
and married as other women do, and had a nice home and children; that’s
what I want, and when I think of all that, I do cut up. It’s enough to
drive a woman wild to think that she’s given up all chance of it. I
feel I’m not respected either. If I have a row with any fellow, he’s
always the first to taunt me with being what he and his friends have
made me. I don’t feel it so much now. I used to at first. One dovetails
into all that sort of thing in time, and the edge of your feelings, as
I may say, wears off by degrees. That’s what it is. And then the drink
is very pleasant to us, and keeps up our spirits; for what could a
woman in my position do without spirits, without being able to talk and
blackguard and give every fellow she meets as good as he brings?”
It is easy to understand the state of mind of this woman, who had
a craving after what she knew she never could possess, but which
the maternal instinct planted within her forced her to wish for.
This is one of the melancholy aspects of prostitution. It leads to
nothing--marriage of course excepted; the prostitute has no future. Her
life, saving the excitement of the moment, is a blank. Her hopes are
all blighted, and if she has a vestige of religion left in her, which
is generally the case, she must shudder occasionally at what she has
merited by her easy compliance when the voice of the tempter sounded so
sweetly.
The happy prostitute, and there is such a thing, is either the
thoroughly hardened, clever infidel, who knows how to command men and
use them for her own purposes; who is in the best set both of men and
women; who frequents the night-houses in London, and who in the end
seldom fails to marry well; or the quiet woman who is kept by the man
she loves, and who she feels is fond of her; who has had a provision
made for her to guard her against want, and the caprice of her paramour.
The sensitive, sentimental, weak-minded, impulsive, affectionate girl,
will go from bad to worse, and die on a dunghill or in a workhouse.
A woman who was well known to cohabit with soldiers, of a masculine
appearance but good features, and having a good-natured expression, was
pointed out to me as the most violent woman in the neighbourhood. When
she was in a passion she would demolish everything that came in her
way, regardless of the mischief she was doing. She was standing in the
bar of a public-house close to the barracks talking to some soldiers,
when I had an opportunity of speaking to her. I did not allow it to
pass without taking advantage of it. I told her I had heard she was
very passionate and violent.
“Passionate!” she replied; “I believe yer. I knocked my father down and
well-nigh killed him with a flat-iron before I wor twelve year old. I
was a beauty then, an I aint improved much since I’ve been on my own
hook. I’ve had lots of rows with these ’ere sodgers, and they’d have
slaughter’d me long afore now if I had not pretty near cooked their
goose. It’s a good bit of it self-defence with me now-a-days, I can
tell yer. Why, look here; look at my arm where I was run through with a
bayonet once three or four years ago.”
She bared her arm and exhibited the scar of what appeared to have once
been a serious wound.
“You wants to know if them rowses is common. Well, they is, and it’s no
good one saying they aint, and the sodgers is such ---- cowards they
think nothing of sticking a woman when they’se riled and drunk, or
they’ll wop us with their belts. I was hurt awful onst by a blow from a
belt; it hit me on the back part of the head, and I was laid up weeks
in St. George’s Hospital with a bad fever. The sodger who done it was
quodded, but only for a drag,[94] and he swore to God as how he’d do
for me the next time as he comed across me. We had words sure enough,
but I split his skull with a pewter, and that shut him up for a time.
You see this public; well, I’ve smashed up this place before now; I’ve
jumped over the bar, because they wouldn’t serve me without paying for
it when I was hard up, and I’ve smashed all the tumblers and glass, and
set the cocks agoing, and fought like a brick when they tried to turn
me out, and it took two peelers to do it; and then I lamed one of the
bobbies for life by hitting him on the shin with a bit of iron--a crow
or summet, I forget what it was. How did I come to live this sort of
life? Get along with your questions. If you give me any of your cheek,
I’ll ---- soon serve you the same.”
It may easily be supposed I was glad to leave this termagant, who was
popular with the soldiers, although they were afraid of her when she
was in a passion. There is not much to be said about soldiers’ women.
They are simply low and cheap, often diseased, and as a class do
infinite harm to the health of the service.
_Thieves’ Women._
The metropolis is divided by the police into districts, to which
letters are attached to designate and distinguish them. The
head-quarters of the F division are at Bow Street, and the jurisdiction
of its constabulary extends over Covent Garden, Drury Lane, and St.
Giles’s, which used formerly to be looked upon as most formidable
neighbourhoods, harbouring the worst characters and the most desperate
thieves.
Mr. Durkin, the superintendent at Bow Street, obligingly allowed an
intelligent and experienced officer (sergeant Bircher) to give me any
information I might require.
Fifteen or twenty years ago this locality was the perpetual scene of
riot and disorder. The public-houses were notorious for being places
of call for thieves, pickpockets, burglars, thieving prostitutes,
hangers-on (their associates), and low ruffians, who rather than work
for an honest livelihood preferred scraping together a precarious
subsistence by any disreputable means, however disgraceful or criminal
they might be. But now this is completely changed. Although I patrolled
the neighbourhood on Monday night, which is usually accounted one of
the noisiest in the week, most of the public houses were empty, the
greatest order and decorum reigned in the streets, and not even an
Irish row occurred in any of the low alleys and courts to enliven the
almost painful silence that everywhere prevailed. I only witnessed one
fight in a public-house in St. Martin’s Lane. Seven or eight people
were standing at the bar, smoking and drinking. A disturbance took
place between an elderly man, pugnaciously intoxicated, who was further
urged on by a prostitute he had been talking to, and a man who had
the appearance of being a tradesman in a small way. How the quarrel
originated I don’t know, for I did not arrive till it had commenced.
The sergeant who accompanied me was much amused to observe among those
in the bar three suspicious characters he had for some time “had his
eye on.” One was a tall, hulking, hang dog-looking fellow; the second
a short, bloated, diseased, red-faced man, while the third was a
common-looking woman, a prostitute and the associate of the two former.
The fight went on until the tradesman in a small way was knocked head
over heels into a corner, when the tall, hulking fellow obligingly ran
to his rescue, kindly lifted him up, and quietly rifled his pockets.
The ecstasy of the sergeant as he detected this little piece of sharp
practice was a thing to remember. He instantly called my attention to
it, for so cleverly and skilfully had it been done that I had failed to
observe it.
When we resumed our tour of inspection, the sergeant, having mentally
summed up the three suspicious characters, observed: “I first
discovered them in Holborn three nights ago, when I was on duty in
plain clothes. I don’t exactly yet know rightly what their little game
is; but it’s either dog-stealing or ‘picking up.’ This is how they
do it. The woman looks out for a ‘mug,’ that is a drunken fellow, or
a stupid, foolish sort of fellow. She then stops him in the street,
talks to him, and pays particular attention to his jewellery, watch,
and every thing of that sort, of which she attempts to rob him. If
he offers any resistance, or makes a noise, one of her bullies comes
up, and either knocks him down by a blow under the ear, or exclaims:
‘What are you talking to my wife for?’ and that’s how the thing’s done,
sir, that’s exactly how these chaps do the trick. I found out where
they live yesterday. It’s somewhere down near Barbican, Golden Lane;
the name’s a bad, ruffianly, thievish place. They are being watched
to-night, although they don’t know it. I planted a man on them.” Two
women were standing just outside the same public. They were dressed in
a curious assortment of colours, as the low English invariably are, and
their faces had a peculiar unctuous appearance, somewhat Israelitish,
as if their diet from day to day consisted of fried fish and dripping.
The sergeant knew them well, and they knew him, for they accosted him.
“One of these women,” he said, “is the cleverest thief out. I’ve known
her twelve years. She was in the first time for robbing a public. I’ll
tell you how it was. She was a pretty woman--a very pretty woman--then,
and had been kept by a man who allowed her 4_l._ a week for some time.
She was very quiet too, never went about anywhere, never knocked about
at night publics or any of those places; but she got into bad company,
and was in for this robbery. She and her accomplices got up a row in
the bar, everything being concerted before hand; they put out the
lights, set all the taps running, and stole a purse, a watch, and some
other things; but we nabbed them all, and, strange to say, one of the
women thieves died the next day from the effects of drink. All these
women are great gluttons, and when they get any money, they go in for
a regular drink and debauch. This one drank so much that it positively
killed her slick off.”
At the corner of Drury Lane I saw three women standing talking
together. They were innocent of crinoline, and the antiquity of their
bonnets and shawls was really wonderful, while the durability of the
fabric of which they were composed was equally remarkable. Their
countenances were stolid, and their skin hostile to the application
of soap and water. The hair of one was tinged with silver. They were
inured to the rattle of their harness; the clank of the chains pleased
them. They had _grown grey_ as prostitutes.
I learnt from my companion that “that lot was an inexpensive luxury;
it showed the sterility of the neighbourhood. They would go home with
a man for a shilling, and think themselves well paid, while sixpence
was rather an exorbitant amount for the temporary accommodation their
vagrant amour would require.”
There were a good many of them about. They lived for the most part in
small rooms at eighteen pence, two shillings, and half-a-crown a week,
in the small streets running out of Drury Lane.
We went down Charles Street, Drury Lane, a small street near the Great
Mogul public-house. I was surprised at the number of clean-looking,
respectable lodging-houses to be seen in this street, and indeed in
almost every street thereabouts. Many of them were well-ventilated,
and chiefly resorted to by respectable mechanics. They are under the
supervision of the police, and the time of a sergeant is wholly taken
up in inspecting them. Visits are made every day, and if the Act of
Parliament by the provisions of which they are allowed to exist, and
by which they are regulated, is broken, their licences are taken away
directly. Some speculators have several of these houses, and keep a
shop as well, full of all sorts of things to supply their lodgers.
There is generally a green blind in the parlour window, upon which
you sometimes see written, Lodgings for Travellers, 3_d._ a night;
or, Lodgings for Gentlemen; or, Lodgings for Single Men. Sometimes
they have Model Lodging-house written in large black letters on a
white ground on the wall. There are also several little shops kept
by general dealers, in contiguity, for the use of the inmates of the
lodging-houses, where they can obtain two pennyworth of meat and “a
haporth” of bread, and everything else in proportion.
There are a great number of costermongers about Drury Lane and that
district, and my informant assured me that they found the profession
very lucrative, for the lower orders, and industrial classes don’t
care about going into shops to make purchases. They infinitely prefer
buying what they want in the open street from the barrow or stall of a
costermonger.
What makes Clare Market so attractive, too, but the stalls and barrows
that abound there.
There are many flower-girls who are sent out by their old gin-drinking
mothers to pick up a few pence in the street by the sale of their
goods. They begin very young, often as young as five and six, and go on
till they are old enough to become prostitutes, when they either leave
off costermongering altogether, or else unite the two professions. They
are chiefly the offspring of Irish parents, or cockney Irish, as they
are called, who are the noisiest, the most pugnacious, unprincipled,
and reckless part of the population of London. There is in Exeter
Street, Strand, a very old established and notorious house of ill-fame,
called the ----, which the police says is always honestly and orderly
conducted. Married women go there with their paramours, for they are
sure of secrecy, and have confidence in the place. It is a house
of accommodation, and much frequented; rich tradesmen are known to
frequent it. They charge ten shillings and upwards for a bed. A man
might go there with a large sum of money in his pocket, and sleep in
perfect security, for no attempt would be made to deprive him of his
property.
There is a coffee-house in Wellington Street, on the Covent Garden side
of the Lyceum Theatre, in fact adjoining the playhouse, where women may
take their men; but the police cannot interfere with it, because it is
a coffee-house, and not a house of ill-fame, properly so called. The
proprietor is not supposed to know who his customers are. A man comes
with a woman and asks for a bed-room; they may be travellers, they may
be a thousand things. A subterranean passage, I am told, running under
the Lyceum connects this with some supper-rooms on the other side of
the theatre, which belongs to the same man who is proprietor of the
coffee and chop house.
We have before spoken of “dress-lodgers:” there are several to be seen
in the Strand. Any one who does not understand the affair, and had
not been previously informed, would fail to observe the badly-dressed
old hag who follows at a short distance the fashionably-attired young
lady, who walks so gaily along the pavement, and who only allows
the elasticity of her step to subside into a quieter measure when
stopping to speak to some likely-looking man who may be passing. If her
overtures are successful she retires with her prey to some den in the
vicinity.
The watcher has a fixed salary of so much per week, and never loses
sight of the dress-lodger, for very plain reasons. The dress-lodger
probably lives some distance from the immoral house by whose owner she
is employed. She comes there in the afternoon badly dressed, and has
good things lent her. Now if she were not watched she might decamp.
She might waste her time in public-houses; she might take her dupes to
other houses of ill-fame, or she might pawn the clothes she has on,
for the keeper could not sue her for a debt contracted for immoral
purposes. The dress-lodger gets as much money from her man as she can
succeed in abstracting, and is given a small percentage on what she
obtains by her employer. The man pays usually five shillings for the
room. Many prostitutes bilk their man; they take him into a house, and
then after he has paid for the room leave him. The dupe complains to
the keeper of the house, but of course fails to obtain any redress.
I happened to see an old woman in the Strand, who is one of the most
hardened beggars in London. She has two children with her, but one she
generally disposes of by placing her in some doorway. The child falls
back on the step, and pretends to be asleep or half-frozen with the
cold. Her naturally pale face gives her a half-starved look, which
completes her pitiable appearance. Any gentleman passing by being
charitably inclined may be imposed upon and induced to touch her on
the shoulder. The child will move slowly and rub her eyes, and the
man, thoroughly deceived, gives her an alms and passes on, when the
little deceiver again composes herself to wait for the next chance.
This occurred while I was looking on; but unfortunately for the child’s
success the policeman on the beat happened to come up, and she made her
retreat to a safer and more convenient locality.
Many novelists, philanthropists, and newspaper writers have dwelt much
upon the horrible character of a series of subterranean chambers or
vaults in the vicinity of the Strand, called the Adelphi Arches. It is
by no means even now understood that these arches are the most innocent
and harmless places in London, whatever they might once have been. A
policeman is on duty there at night, expressly to prevent persons who
have no right or business there from descending into their recesses.
They were probably erected in order to form a foundation for the
Adelphi Terrace. Let us suppose there were then no wharves, and no
embankments, consequently the tide must have ascended and gone inland
some distance, rendering the ground marshy, swampy, and next to
useless. The main arch is a very fine pile of masonry, something like
the Box tunnel on a small scale, while the other, running here and
there like the intricacies of catacombs, looks extremely ghostly and
suggestive of Jack Sheppards, Blueskins, Jonathan Wilds, and others of
the same kind, notwithstanding they are so well lighted with gas. There
is a doorway at the end of a vault leading up towards the Strand, that
has a peculiar tradition attached to it. Not so very many years ago
this door was a back exit from a notorious coffee and gambling house,
where parties were decoyed by thieves, blacklegs, or prostitutes, and
swindled, then drugged, and subsequently thrown from this door into the
darkness of what must have seemed to them another world, and were left,
when they came to themselves, to find their way out as best they could.
My attention was attracted, while in these arches, by the cries and
exclamations of a woman near the river, and proceeding to the spot I
saw a woman sitting on some steps, before what appeared to be a stable,
engaged in a violent altercation with a man who was by profession a
cab proprietor--several of his vehicles were lying about--and who, she
vehemently asserted, was her husband. The man declared she was a common
woman when he met her, and had since become the most drunken creature
it was possible to meet with. The woman put her hand in her pocket and
brandished something in his face, which she triumphantly said was her
marriage-certificate. “That,” she cried, turning to me, “that’s what
licks them. It don’t matter whether I was one of Lot’s daughters afore.
I might have been awful, I don’t say I wasn’t, but I’m his wife, and
this ’ere’s what licks ’em.”
I left them indulging in elegant invectives, and interlarding their
conversation with those polite and admirable metaphors that have
gained so wide-spread a reputation for the famous women who sell fish
in Billingsgate; and I was afterwards informed by a sympathising
bystander, in the shape of a stable-boy, that the inevitable result of
this conjugal altercation would be the incarceration of the woman, by
the husband, in a horse-box, where she might undisturbed sleep off the
effects of her potations, and repent the next day at her leisure. “Neo
dulces amores sperne puer.”
Several showily-dressed, if not actually well-attired women, who
are to be found walking about the Haymarket, live in St. Giles’s
and about Drury Lane. But the lowest class of women, who prostitute
themselves for a shilling or less, are the most curious and remarkable
class in this part. We have spoken of them before as growing grey in
the exercise of their profession. One of them, a woman over forty,
shabbily dressed, and with a disreputable, unprepossessing appearance,
volunteered the following statement for a consideration of a spirituous
nature.
“Times is altered, sir, since I come on the town. I can remember
when all the swells used to come down here-away, instead of going to
the Market; but those times is past, they is, worse luck, but, like
myself, nothing lasts for ever, although I’ve stood my share of wear
and tear, I have. Years ago Fleet Street and the Strand, and Catherine
Street, and all round there was famous for women and houses. Ah! those
were the times. Wish they might come again, but wishing’s no use, it
ain’t. It only makes one miserable a thinking of it. I come up from
the country when I was quite a gal, not above sixteen I dessay. I come
from Dorsetshire, near Lyme Regis, to see a aunt of mine. Father was a
farmer in Dorset, but only in a small way--tenant farmer, as you would
say. I was mighty pleased, you may swear, with London, and liked being
out at night when I could get the chance. One night I went up the area
and stood looking through the railing, when a man passed by, but seeing
me he returned and spoke to me something about the weather. I, like a
child, answered him unsuspectingly enough, and he went on talking about
town and country, asking me, among other things, if I had long been
in London, or if I was born there. I not thinking told him all about
myself; and he went away apparently very much pleased with me, saying
before he went that he was very glad to have made such an agreeable
acquaintance, and if I would say nothing about it he would call for me
about the same time, or a little earlier, if I liked, the next night,
and take me out for a walk. I was, as you may well suppose, delighted,
and never said a word. The next evening I met him as he appointed, and
two or three times subsequently. One night we walked longer than usual,
and I pressed him to return, as I feared my aunt would find me out;
but he said he was so fatigued with walking so far, he would like to
rest a little before he went back again; but if I was very anxious he
would put me in a cab. Frightened about him, for I thought he might be
ill, I preferred risking being found out; and when he proposed that
we should go into some house and sit down I agreed. He said all at
once, as if he had just remembered something, that a very old friend
of his lived near there, and we couldn’t go to a better place, for
she would give us everything we could wish. We found the door half
open when we arrived. ‘How careless,’ said my friend, ‘to leave the
street-door open, any one might get in.’ We entered without knocking,
and seeing a door in the passage standing ajar we went in. My friend
shook hands with an old lady who was talking to several girls dispersed
over different parts of the room, who, she said, were her daughters.
At this announcement some of them laughed, when she got very angry and
ordered them out of the room. Somehow I didn’t like the place, and not
feeling all right I asked to be put in a cab and sent home. My friend
made no objection and a cab was sent for. He, however, pressed me to
have something to drink before I started. I refused to touch any wine,
so I asked for some coffee, which I drank. It made me feel very sleepy,
so sleepy indeed that I begged to be allowed to sit down on the sofa.
They accordingly placed me on the sofa, and advised me to rest a little
while, promising, in order to allay my anxiety, to send a messenger to
my aunt. Of course I was drugged, and so heavily I did not regain my
consciousness till the next morning. I was horrified to discover that I
had been ruined, and for some days I was inconsolable, and cried like a
child to be killed or sent back to my aunt.
“When I became quiet I received a visit from my seducer, in whom I had
placed so much silly confidence. He talked very kindly to me, but I
would not listen to him for some time. He came several times to see
me, and at last said he would take me away if I liked, and give me a
house of my own. Finally, finding how hopeless all was I agreed to his
proposal, and he allowed me four pounds a week. This went on for some
months, till he was tired of me, when he threw me over for some one
else. There is always as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it,
and this I soon discovered.
“Then for some years--ten years, till I was six-and-twenty,--I went
through all the changes of a gay lady’s life, and they’re not a few,
I can tell you. I don’t leave off this sort of life because I’m in a
manner used to it, and what could I do if I did? I’ve no character;
I’ve never been used to do anything, and I don’t see what employment
I stand a chance of getting. Then if I had to sit hours and hours all
day long, and part of the night too, sewing or anything like that, I
should get tired. It would worrit me so; never having been accustomed,
you see, I couldn’t stand it. I lodge in Charles Street, Drury Lane,
now. I did live in Nottingham Court once, and Earls Street. But, Lord,
I’ve lived in a many places you wouldn’t think, and I don’t imagine
you’d believe one half. I’m always a-chopping and a-changing like
the wind as you may say. I pay half-a-crown a week for my bed-room;
it’s clean and comfortable, good enough for such as me. I don’t think
much of my way of life. You folks as has honour, and character, and
feelings, and such, can’t understand how all that’s been beaten out
of people like me. I don’t feel. _I’m used to it._ I did once, more
especial when mother died. I heard on it through a friend of mine, who
told me her last words was of me. I did cry and go on then ever so,
but Lor’, where’s the good of fretting? I arn’t happy either. It isn’t
happiness, but I get enough money to keep me in victuals and drink, and
it’s the drink mostly that keeps me going. You’ve no idea how I look
forward to my drop of gin. It’s everything to me. I don’t suppose I’ll
live much longer, and that’s another thing that pleases me. I don’t
want to live, and yet I don’t care enough about dying to make away with
myself. I arn’t got that amount af feeling that some has, and that’s
where it is I’m kinder ’fraid of it.”
This woman’s tale is a condensation of the philosophy of sinning. The
troubles she had gone through, and her experience of the world, had
made her oblivious of the finer attributes of human nature, and she had
become brutal.
I spoke to another who had been converted at a Social Evil Meeting, but
from a variety of causes driven back to the old way of living.
The first part of her story offered nothing peculiar. She had been on
the town for fifteen years, when a year or so ago she heard of the
Midnight Meeting and Baptist Noel. She was induced from curiosity
to attend; and her feelings being powerfully worked upon by the
extraordinary scene, the surroundings, and the earnestness of the
preacher, she accepted the offer held out to her, and was placed in a
cab with some others, and conveyed to one of the numerous metropolitan
homes, where she was taken care of for some weeks, and furnished with
a small sum of money to return to her friends. When she arrived at
her native village in Essex, she only found her father. Her mother
was dead; her sister at service, and her two brothers had enlisted
in the army. Her father was an old man, supported by the parish; so
it was clear he could not support her. She had a few shillings left,
with which she worked her way back to town, returned to her old haunts,
renewed her acquaintance with her vicious companions, and resumed her
old course of life.
I don’t insert this recital as a reflection upon the refuges and homes,
or mean to asperse the Midnight Meeting movement, which is worthy of
all praise. On the contrary, I have much pleasure in alluding to the
subject and acknowledging the success that has attended the efforts of
the philanthropic gentlemen associated with the Rev. Mr. Baptist Noel.
I have already described the condition of low and abandoned women in
Spitalfields, Whitechapel, Wapping, and Shadwell, although I have not
touched very closely upon those who cohabit with thieves and other
desperate characters, whose daily means of obtaining a livelihood
exposes them to the penalties the law inflicts upon those who infringe
its provisions. Their mode of living, the houses they inhabit, and the
way in which they pass their time, does not very materially differ from
that of other prostitutes, with this exception, they are not obliged to
frequent casinos, dancing-rooms, and other places of popular resort,
to make acquaintances that may be of service to them in a pecuniary
way, although they do make use of such places for the purposes of
robbery and fraud. Some women of tolerably good repute--that is, who
are regarded as knowing a good set of men, who have admission to the
night-houses in Panton Street and the Haymarket--I am informed, are
connected with thieves. The night-houses and supper-rooms in the
neighbourhood of the Haymarket are for the most part in the hands of a
family of Jews. Kate Hamilton’s in Princes Street, Leicester Square,
belongs to one of this family. She is given a per centage on all the
wine that she sells during the course of the evening, and as she
charges twelve shillings a bottle for Moselle and sparkling wines, it
may readily be supposed that her profits are by no means despicable.
Lizzie Davis’s, Sams’s, Sally’s, and, I believe, the Carlton, also
belong to this family. One of these Jews, I am told, was some few
years back imprisoned for two years on a charge of manslaughter. He
was proprietor of a brothel in the vicinity of Drury Lane, and the
manslaughter occurred through his instrumentality on the premises.
I have been informed by the police that some of the proprietors of
these night-houses are well-known receivers of stolen goods, and
the assertion is easily credible. To exemplify this I will relate a
story told me by a sergeant of the H division. Some two years ago a
robbery was committed by a “snoozer,” or one of those thieves who
take up their quarters at hotels for the purpose of robbery. The
robbery was committed at an hotel in Chester. The thief was captured,
and the Recorder sentenced him to be imprisoned. This man was a
notorious thief, and went under the _soubriquet_ of American Jack.
He was said to have once been in a very different position. He was
polished in his manners, and highly accomplished. He could speak
three or four languages with facility, and was a most formidable and
dexterous thief, causing much apprehension and trouble to the police.
After being incarcerated for a few weeks he contrived in a clever
manner to make his escape from one of the London prisons; it was
supposed by the connivance of his gaolers, who were alleged to have
been bribed by his friends without. Be this as it may, he effected
his liberation, and was successfully concealed in London until the
hue and cry was over, and then shipped off to Paris. But the night
after he escaped he perpetrated the most audacious robbery. He was
dressed by his friends, and having changed his prison attire went to
B---- Hotel, a well-known place, not far from the Freemasons Tavern,
where, singularly enough, the Recorder of Chester, who had sentenced
him, chanced to be staying. American Jack had the presumption to
enter into conversation with the Recorder, who fancied he had seen
his face before, but could not recollect where. The visitors had not
long retired to bed before American Jack commenced operations. He was
furnished by his accomplice with a highly-finished instrument for
housebreaking, which, when inserted in the lock, would pass through and
grasp the key on the inside. This done, it was easy to turn the key
and open the door. The thief actually broke into sixteen or seventeen
rooms that night, and made his exit before daybreak loaded with booty
of every description. The proprietors of the hotel would offer no
reward, as they feared publicity. The Recorder of Chester, when the
robbery was discovered, remembered that the person he had conversed
with the night before was the man he had convicted and sentenced at
the assizes. He repaired to Bow Street with his information, and the
police were put on the scent; but it is well known if no reward is
offered for the apprehension of an eminent criminal the police are not
so active as they are when they have a monetary inducement to incite
them to action. It was imagined that American Jack had taken refuge
with his friends near the Haymarket. A waiter who had been discharged
from one of the night-houses was known slightly to a sergeant of
police, who interrogated him on the subject. This waiter confessed
that he could point out the whereabouts of the thief, and would do so
for twenty pounds, which reward no one concerned in the matter would
offer; and, as I have already stated, the criminal soon after made
his escape to Paris, where he continued to carry on his depredations
with considerable skill, until one day he mixed himself up in a great
jewel robbery, and was apprehended by the _gensdarmes_, and sent to the
galleys for some time, where he is now languishing.
This little history is suggestive--why should not Parliament vote every
year a small sum of money to form a “Detective and Inquiry Fund,” from
which the Commissioners of Police at Whitehall and Old Jewry might
offer rewards for the capture of offenders? Some spur and inducement
surely might be given to our detectives, who take a great deal of
trouble, and, if unsuccessful, are almost always out of pocket through
their researches.
Cannot Sir Richard Mayne and Mr. Daniel Whittle Harvey improve on this
idea?
The police enter the night-houses every evening to see if spirits are
sold on the premises; but as there are bullies at all the doors, and
a code of signals admirably concerted to convey intelligence of the
approach of the officers to those within, everything is carefully
concealed, and the police are at fault. They might if they chose detect
the practices they very well know are commonly carried on; but they
either are not empowered to go to extremities, or else they do not find
it their interest so to do. I have heard, I know not with what truth,
that large sums of money are paid to the police to insure their silence
and compliance; but until this is established it must be received
with hesitation, though circumstances do occur that seem strongly to
corroborate such suspicions. The women who cohabit with thieves are
not necessarily thieves themselves, although such is often the case.
Most pickpockets make their women accomplices in their misdeeds,
because they find their assistance so valuable to them, and indeed
for some species of theft almost indispensable. There are numbers
of young thieves on the other side of the water, and almost all of
them cohabit with some girl or other. The depravity of our juvenile
thieves is a singular feature in their character. It is not exactly
a custom that they follow, but rather an inherent depravity on their
part. They prefer an idle luxurious life, though one also of ignominy
and systematic dishonour, to one of honesty and labour; and this is
the cause of their malpractices, perhaps inculcated at first by the
force of evil example and bad bringing up, and invigorated every day by
independence brought about by the liberty allowed them, the consequence
of parental neglect.
It is of course difficult to give the stories of any of these women,
as they would only criminate themselves disagreeably by confessing
their delinquencies; and it is not easy to pitch upon a thieves’ woman
without she is pointed out by the police, and even then she would deny
the imputation indignantly.
_Park Women, or those who frequent the Parks at night and other retired
places._
Park women, properly so called, are those degraded creatures, utterly
lost to all sense of shame, who wander about the paths most frequented
after nightfall in the Parks, and consent to any species of humiliation
for the sake of acquiring a few shillings. You may meet them in Hyde
Park, between the hours of five and ten (till the gates are closed)
in winter. In the Green Park, in what is called the Mall, which is a
nocturnal thoroughfare, you may see these low wretches walking about
sometimes with men, more generally alone, often early in the morning.
They are to be seen reclining on the benches placed under the trees,
originally intended, no doubt, for a different purpose, occasionally
with the head of a drunken man reposing in their lap. These women are
well known to give themselves up to disgusting practices, that are
alone gratifying to men of morbid and diseased imaginations. They
are old, unsound, and by their appearance utterly incapacitated from
practising their profession where the gas-lamps would expose the
defects in their personal appearance, and the shabbiness of their
ancient and dilapidated attire. I was told that an old woman, whose
front teeth were absolutely wanting, was known to obtain a precarious
livelihood by haunting the by-walks of Hyde Park, near Park Lane. The
unfortunate women that form this despicable class have in some cases
been well off, and have been reduced to their present condition by
a variety of circumstances, among which are intemperance, and the
vicissitudes natural to their vocation. I questioned one who was in the
humour to be communicative, and she gave the subjoined replies to my
questions:--
“I have not always been what I now am. Twenty years ago I was in a
very different position. Then, although, it may seem ludicrous to
you, who see me as I now am, I was comparatively well off. If I were
to tell you my history it would be so romantic you would not believe
it. If I employ a little time in telling you, will you reward me for
my trouble, as I shall be losing my time in talking to you? I am not
actuated by mercenary motives exactly in making this request, but my
time is my money, and I cannot afford to lose either one or the other.
Well, then, I am the daughter of a curate in Gloucestershire. I was
never at school, but my mother educated me at home. I had one brother
who entered the Church. When I was old enough I saw that the limited
resources of my parents would not allow them to maintain me at home
without seriously impairing their resources, and I proposed that I
should go out as a governess. At first they would not hear of it; but I
persisted in my determination, and eventually obtained a situation in
a family in town. Then I was very pretty. I may say so without vanity
or ostentation, for I had many admirers, among whom I numbered the only
son of the people in whose house I lived. I was engaged to teach his
two sisters, and altogether I gave great satisfaction to the family.
The girls were amiable and tractable, and I soon acquired an influence
over their generous dispositions that afforded great facilities for
getting them on in their studies. My life might have been very happy
if an unfortunate attachment to me had not sprung up in the young man
that I have before mentioned, which attachment I can never sufficiently
regret was reciprocated by myself.
“I battled against the impulse that constrained me to love him, but
all my efforts were of no avail. He promised to marry me, which in
an evil hour I agreed to. He had a mock ceremony performed by his
footman, and I went into lodgings that he had taken for me in Gower
Street, Tottenham Court Road. He used to visit me very frequently
for the ensuing six months, and we lived together as man and wife.
At the expiration of that time he took me to the sea-side, and we
subsequently travelled on the Continent. We were at Baden when we
heard of his father’s death. This didn’t trouble him much. He did not
even go to England to attend the funeral, for he had by his conduct
offended his father, and estranged himself from the remainder of his
family. Soon letters came from a solicitor informing him that the
provisions of the will discontinued the allowance of five hundred a
year hitherto made to him, and left him a small sum of money sufficient
to buy himself a commission in the army, if he chose to do so. This
course he was strongly advised to take, for it was urged that he might
support himself on his pay if he volunteered for foreign service. He
was transported with rage when this communication reached him, and he
immediately wrote for the legacy he was entitled to, which arrived in
due course. That evening he went to the gaming table, and lost every
farthing he had in the world. The next morning he was a corpse. His
remains were found in a secluded part of the town, he having in a fit
of desperation blown his brains out with a pistol. He had evidently
resolved to take this step before he left me, if he should happen to be
unfortunate, for he left a letter in the hands of our landlady to be
delivered to me in the event of his not returning in the morning. It
was full of protestations of affection for me, and concluded with an
avowal of the fraud he had practised towards me when our acquaintance
was first formed, which he endeavoured to excuse by stating his
objections to be hampered or fettered by legal impediments.
“When I read this, I somewhat doubted the intensity of the affection
he paraded in his letter. I had no doubt about the fervour of my own
passion, and for some time I was inconsolable. At length, I was roused
to a sense of my desolate position, and to the necessity for action,
by the solicitations and importunity of my landlady, and I sold the
better part of my wardrobe to obtain sufficient money to pay my bills,
and return to England. But fate ordered things in a different manner.
Several of my husband’s friends came to condole with me on his untimely
decease; among whom was a young officer of considerable personal
attractions, who I had often thought I should have liked to love, if
I had not been married to my friend’s husband. It was this man who
caused me to take the second fatal step I have made in my life. If I
had only gone home, my friends might have forgiven everything. I felt
they would, and my pride did not stand in my way, for I would gladly
have asked and obtained their forgiveness for a fault in reality very
venial, when the circumstances under which it was committed are taken
into consideration.
“Or I might have represented the facts to the family; and while
the mother mourned the death of her son, she must have felt some
commiseration for myself.
“The officer asked me to live with him, and made the prospect he held
out to me so glittering and fascinating that I yielded. He declared
he would marry me with pleasure on the spot, but he would forfeit a
large sum of money, that he must inherit in a few years if he remained
single, and it would be folly not to wait until then. I have forgotten
to mention that I had not any children. My constitution being very
delicate, my child was born dead, which was a sad blow to me, although
it did not seem to affect the man I regarded as my husband. We soon
left Baden and returned to London, where I lived for a month very
happily with my paramour, who was not separated from me, as his leave
of absence had not expired. When that event occurred he reluctantly
left me to go to Limerick, where his regiment was quartered. There
in all probability he formed a fresh acquaintance, for he wrote to
me in about a fortnight, saying that a separation must take place
between us, for reasons that he was not at liberty to apprise me of,
and he enclosed a cheque for fifty pounds, which he hoped would pay my
expences. It was too late now to go home, and I was driven to a life
of prostitution, not because I had a liking for it, but as a means of
getting enough money to live upon. For ten years I lived first with one
man then with another, until at last I was infected with a disease,
of which I did not know the evil effects if neglected. The disastrous
consequence of that neglect is only too apparent now. You will be
disgusted, when I tell you that it attacked my face, and ruined my
features to such an extent that I am hideous to look upon, and should
be noticed by no one if I frequented those places where women of my
class most congregate; indeed, I should be driven away with curses and
execrations.”
This recital is melancholy in the extreme. Here was a woman endowed
with a very fair amount of education, speaking in a superior manner,
making use of words that very few in her position would know how to
employ, reduced by a variety of circumstances to the very bottom of a
prostitute’s career. In reply to my further questioning, she said she
lived in a small place in Westminster called Perkins’ Rents, where for
one room she paid two shillings a week. The Rents were in Westminster,
not far from Palace-yard. She was obliged to have recourse to her
present way of living to exist; for she would not go to the workhouse,
and she could get no work to do. She could sew, and she could paint in
water-colours, but she was afraid to be alone. She could not sit hours
and hours by herself, her thoughts distracted her, and drove her mad.
She added, she once thought of turning Roman Catholic, and getting
admitted into a convent, where she might make atonement for her way of
living by devoting the remainder of her life to penitence, but she was
afraid she had gone too far to be forgiven. That was some time ago. Now
she did not think she would live long, she had injured her constitution
so greatly; she had some internal disease, she didn’t know what it was,
but a hospital surgeon told her it would kill her in time, and she had
her moments, generally hours, of oblivion, when she was intoxicated,
which she always was when she could get a chance. If she got ten
shillings from a drunken man, either by persuasion or threats, and she
was not scrupulous in the employment of the latter, she would not come
to the Park for days, until all her money was spent; on an average,
she came three times a week, or perhaps twice; always on Sunday, which
was a good day. She knew all about the Refuges. She had been in one
once, but she didn’t like the system; there wasn’t enough liberty, and
too much preaching, and that sort of thing; and then they couldn’t
keep her there always; so they didn’t know what to do with her. No one
would take her into their service, because they didn’t like to look at
her face, which presented so dreadful an appearance that it frightened
people. She always wore a long thick veil, that concealed her features,
and made her interesting to the unsuspicious and unwise. I gave her
the money I promised her, and advised her again to enter a Refuge,
which she refused to do, saying she could not live long, and she would
rather die as she was. As I had no power to compel her to change her
determination, I left her, lamenting her hardihood and obstinacy. I
felt that she soon would be--
“One more unfortunate,
Weary of breath,
Rashly importunate,
Gone to her death.”
In the course of my peregrinations I met another woman, commonly
dressed in old and worn-out clothes; her face was ugly and mature; she
was perhaps on the shady side of forty. She was also perambulating
the Mall. I knew she could only be there for one purpose, and I
interrogated her, and I believe she answered my queries faithfully. She
said:--
“I have a husband, and seven small children, the eldest not yet able to
do much more than cadge a penny or so by cater-wheeling and tumbling
in the street for the amusement of gents as rides outside ’busses. My
husband’s bedridden, and can’t do nothink but give the babies a dose of
‘Mother’s Blessing’ (that’s laudanum, sir, or some sich stuff) to sleep
’em when they’s squally. So I goes out begging all day, and I takes
in general one of the kids in my arms and one as runs by me, and we
sell hartifishal flowers, leastways ’olds ’em in our ’ands, and makes
believe cos of the police, as is nasty so be as you ’as nothink soever,
and I comes hout in the Parks, sir, at night sometimes when I’ve ’ad a
bad day, and ain’t made above a few pence, which ain’t enough to keep
us as we should be kep. I mean, sir, the children should have a bit of
meat, and my ole man and me wants some blue ruin to keep our spirits
up; so I’se druv to it, sir, by poverty, and nothink on the face of
God’s blessed earth, sir, shou’dn’t have druv me but that for the poor
babes must live, and who ’as they to look to but their ’ard-working but
misfortunate mother, which she is now talking to your honour, and won’t
yer give a poor woman a hap’ny, sir? I’ve seven small children at home,
and my ’usban’s laid with the fever. You won’t miss it, yer honour,
only a ’apny for a poor woman as ain’t ’ad a bit of bread between
her teeth since yesty morning. I ax yer parding,” she exclaimed,
interrupting herself--“I forgot I was talking to yourself. I’s so used
though to this way of speaking when I meant to ax you for summut I
broke off into the old slang, but yer honour knows what I mean: ain’t
yer got even a little sixpence to rejoice the heart of the widow?”
“You call yourself a widow now,” I said, “while before you said you
were married and had seven children. Which are you?”
“Which am I? The first I toll you’s the true. But Lor’, I’s up to
so many dodges I gets what you may call confounded; sometimes I’s
a widder, and wants me ’art rejoiced with a copper, and then I’s a
hindustrious needle-woman thrown out of work and going to be druv into
the streets if I don’t get summut to do. Sometimes I makes a lot of
money by being a poor old cripple as broke her arm in a factory, by
being blowed hup when a steam-engine blowed herself hup, and I bandage
my arm and swell it out hawful big, and when I gets home, we gets in
some lush and ’as some frens, and goes in for a reglar blow-hout, and
now as I have told yer honour hall about it, won’t yer give us an ’apny
as I observe before?”
It is very proper that the Parks should be closed at an early hour,
when such creatures as I have been describing exist and practise their
iniquities so unblushingly. One only gets at the depravity of mankind
by searching below the surface of society; and for certain purposes
such knowledge and information are useful and beneficial to the
community. Therefore the philanthropist must overcome his repugnance
to the task, and draw back the veil that is thinly spread over the
skeleton.
THE DEPENDANTS OF PROSTITUTES.
Having described the habits, &c., of different classes of prostitutes,
I now come to those who are intimately connected with, and dependant
upon, them. This is a very numerous class, and includes “Bawds,” or
those who keep brothels, the followers of dress lodgers, keepers of
accommodation houses, procuresses, pimps, and panders, fancy men, and
bullies.
_Bawds._--The first head in our classification is “Bawds.” They may
be either men or women. More frequently they are the latter, though
any one who keeps an immoral house, or bawdy-house, as it is more
commonly called, is liable to that designation. Bawdy-houses are of
two kinds. They may be either houses of accommodation, or houses in
which women lodge, are boarded, clothed, &c., and the proceeds of whose
prostitution goes into the pocket of the bawd herself, who makes a very
handsome income generally by their shame.
We cannot have a better example of this sort of thing than the
bawdy-houses in King’s Place, St. James’s, a narrow passage leading
from Pall Mall opposite the “Guards Club” into King Street, not far
from the St. James’s theatre. These are both houses of accommodation
and brothels proper. Men may take their women there, and pay so much
for a room and temporary accommodation, or they may be supplied with
women who live in the house. The unfortunate creatures who live in
these houses are completely in the power of the bawds, who grow fat
on their prostitution. When they first came to town perhaps they were
strangers, and didn’t know a soul in the place, and even now they would
have nowhere to go to if they were able to make their escape, which is
a very difficult thing to accomplish, considering they are vigilantly
looked after night and day. They have nothing fit to walk about the
streets in. They are often in bed all day, and at night dressed up in
tawdry ball costumes. If they ever do go out on business, they are
carefully watched by one of the servants: they generally end when their
charms are faded by being servants of bawds and prostitutes, or else
watchers, or perhaps both.
There are houses in Oxendon Street too, where women are kept in this
way.
A victim of this disgraceful practice told me she was entrapped when
she was sixteen years old, and prostituted for some time to old men,
who paid a high price for the enjoyment of her person.
“I was born at Matlock in Derbyshire,” she began; “father was a
stonecutter, and I worked in the shop, polishing the blocks and things,
and in the spring of ’51 we heard of the Great Exhibition. I wished
very much to go to London, and see the fine shops and that, and father
wrote to an aunt of mine, who lived in London, to know if I might come
and stay a week or two with her to see the Exhibition. In a few days
a letter came back, saying she would be glad to give me a room for
two or three weeks and go about with me. Father couldn’t come with me
because of his business, and I went alone. When I arrived, aunt had
a very bad cold, and couldn’t get out of bed. Of course, I wanted to
go about and see things, for though I didn’t believe the streets were
paved with gold, I was very anxious to see the shops and places I’d
heard so much about. Aunt said when she was better she’d take me, but
I was so restless I would go by myself. I said nothing to aunt about
it, and stole out one evening. I wandered about for some time, very
much pleased with the novelty. The crowds of people, the flaring gas
jets, and everything else, all was so strange and new, I was delighted.
At last I lost myself, and got into some streets ever so much darker
and quieter. I saw one door in the middle of the street open, that is
standing a-jar. Thinking no harm, I knocked, and hearing no sound, and
getting no answer, I knocked louder, when some one came and instantly
admitted me, without saying a word. I asked her innocently enough where
I was, and if she would tell me the way to Bank Place. I didn’t know
where Bank Place was, whether it was in Lambeth, or Kensington, or
Hammersmith, or where; but I have since heard it is in Kensington. The
woman who let me in, and to whom I addressed my questions, laughed at
this, and said, ‘Oh! yes, I wasn’t born yesterday.’ But I repeated,
‘Where am I, and what am I to do?’
“She told me to ‘ax,’ and said she’d heard that before.
“I suppose I ought to tell you, before I go further,” she explained,
“that ‘ax’ meant ask, or find out.
“Just then a door opened, and an old woman came out of a room which
seemed to me to be the parlour. ‘Come in, my dear,’ she exclaimed, ‘and
sit down.’ I followed her into the room, and she pulled out a bottle
of gin, asking me if I would have a drop of something short, while she
poured out some, which I was too frightened to refuse. She said, ‘I
likes to be jolly myself and see others so. I’m getting on now. Ain’t
what I was once. But as I says I likes to be jolly, and I always is. A
old fiddle, you know, makes the best music.
“‘Market full, my dear,’ she added, pushing the wine-glass of gin
towards me. ‘Ah! I s’pose not yet; too arly, so it is. I’s glad you’ve
dropped in to see a body. I’ve noticed your face lots of times, but
I thought you was one of Lotty’s girls, and wouldn’t condescend to
come so far up the street, though, why one part should be better nor
another, I’m sure, I can’t make out.’
“‘Really you must make a mistake,’ I interposed. ‘I am quite a stranger
in London; indeed I have only been three days in town. The fact is, I
lost myself this evening, and seeing your door open, I thought I would
come in and ask the way.’
“Whilst I was saying this, the old woman listened attentively. She
seemed to drink in every word of my explanation, and a great change
came over her features.
“‘Well, pet,’ she replied, ‘I’m glad you’ve come to my house. You must
excuse my taking you for some one else; but you are so like a gal I
knows, one Polly Gay, I couldn’t help mistaking you. Where are you
staying?’
“I told her I was staying with my aunt in Bank Place.
“‘Oh! really,’ she exclaimed; ‘well, that is fortunate, ’pon my word,
that is lucky. I’m gladder than ever now you came to my shop--I mean
my house--cos I knows your aunt very well. Me an’ ’er’s great frens,
leastways was, though I haven’t seen her for six months come next
Christmas. Is she’s took bad, is she? Ah! well, it’s the weather, or
somethink, that’s what it is; we’re all ill sometimes; and what is
it as is the matter with her? Influenzy, is it? Now, Lor’ bless us,
the influenzy! Well, you’ll stay with me to-night; you’s ever so far
from your place. Don’t say No; you must, my dear, and we’ll go down to
aunt’s to-morrow morning arly; she’ll be glad to see me, I know. She
always was fond of her old friends.’
“At first I protested and held out, but at last I gave in to her
persuasion, fully believing all she told me. She talked about my
father, said she hadn’t the pleasure of knowing him personally, but
she’d often heard of him, and hoped he was quite well, more especially
as it left her at that time. Presently she asked if I wasn’t tired, and
said she’d show me a room up-stairs where I should sleep comfortable no
end. When I was undressed and in bed, she brought me a glass of gin and
water hot, which she called a night-cap, and said would do me good. I
drank this at her solicitation, and soon fell into a sound slumber. The
‘night-cap’ was evidently drugged, and during my state of insensibility
my ruin was accomplished. The next day I was wretchedly ill and weak,
but I need not tell you what followed. My prayers and entreaties were
of no good, and I in a few days became this woman’s slave, and have
remained so ever since; though, as she has more than one house, I am
occasionally shifted from one to the other. The reason of this is very
simple. Suppose the bawd has a house in St. James’s and one in Portland
Place. When I am known to the habitués of St. James’s, I am sent as
something new to Portland Place, and so on.”
If I were to expatiate for pages on bawds, I don’t think I could give
a better idea than this affords. Their characteristics are selfishness
and avariciousness, combined with want of principle and the most
unblushing effrontery.
* * * * *
_Followers of Dress-Lodgers._--I have spoken before of dress-lodgers,
and I now come to those women who are employed by the keepers of the
brothels in which the dress-lodgers live, to follow them when they are
sent into the streets to pick up men. They are not numerous. They are
only seen in the Strand and about the National Gallery. This species
of vice is much magnified by people who have vivid imaginations. It
might have assumed larger dimensions, but at the present time it has
very much decreased. They follow the dress-lodgers for various reasons,
which I have mentioned already. For the sake of perspicuity and
putting things in their proper sequence, I may be excused for briefly
recapitulating them. If they were not closely watched, they might,
imprimis, make their escape with all the finery they have about them,
which of course they would speedily dispose of for its market value
to the highest-bidding Jew, and then take lodgings and set up on their
own account. These unfortunate dress-lodgers are profoundly ignorant of
the English law. If they were better acquainted with its provisions,
they would know very well that the bawds would have no legal claim
against them for money, board, or clothes, for if the bawds could
prove any consideration, it would be an immoral one, and consequently
bad in law. But the poor creatures think they are completely in the
wretch’s power, and dare not move hand or foot, or call their _hair_
their own. Instances have been known of bawds cutting off the hair of
their lodgers when it became long, and selling it if it was fine and
beautiful for thirty shillings and two pounds.
There is a dress-lodger who perambulates the Strand every night, from
nine, or before that even, till twelve or one, who is followed by the
inseparable old hag who keeps guard over her to prevent her going into
public-houses and wasting her time and money, which is the second
reason for her being watched, and to see that she does not give her
custom to some other bawdy-house, which is the third reason.
This follower is a woman of fifty, with grey hair, and all the
peculiarities of old women, among which is included a fondness for gin,
which weakness was mainly instrumental in enabling me to obtain from
her what I know about herself and her class. She wore no crinoline, and
a dirty cotton dress. Her bonnet was made of straw, with a bit of faded
ribbon over it by way of trimming, fully as shabby and discreditable as
the straw itself.
She told me by fits and starts, and by dint of cross questioning, the
subjoined particulars.
“They call me ‘Old Stock;’ why I shan’t tell you, though I might easy,
and make you laugh too, without telling no lies; but it ain’t no matter
of your’n, so we’ll let it be. They do say I’m a bit cracky, but that’s
all my eye. I’m a drunken old b---- if you like, but nothing worser
than that. I was once the swellest woman about town, but I’m come down
awful. And yet it ain’t awful. I sometimes tries to think it is, but I
can’t make it so. If I did think it awful I shouldn’t be here now; I
couldn’t stand it. But the fact is life’s sweet, and I don’t care how
you live. It’s as sweet to the w----, as it is to the hempress, and
mebbe it’s as sweet to me as it is to you. Yes, I was well known about
some years ago, and I ain’t got bad features now, if it wasn’t for the
wrinkles and the skin, which is more parchmenty than anything else, but
that’s all along of the drink. I get nothing in money for following
this girl about, barring a shilling or so when I ask for it to get
some liquor. They give me my grub and a bed, in return for which in
the day-time I looks after the house, when I ain’t drunk, and sweeps,
and does the place up, and all that. Time was when I had a house of my
own, and lots of servants, and heaps of men sighing and dying for me,
but now my good looks are gone, and I am what you see me. Many of the
finest women, if they have strong constitutions, and can survive the
continual racket, and the wear and tear of knocking about town, go on
like fools without making any provision for themselves, and without
marrying, until they come to the bad. They are either servants, or what
I am, or if they get a little money given them by men, they set up as
bawdy-house-keepers. I wish to God I had, but I don’t feel what I am.
I’m past that ever so long, and if you give me half a crown, or five
bob, presently, you’ll make me jolly for a week. Talking of giving a
woman five bob reminds me of having fivers (5_l._ notes) given me.
I can remember the time when I would take nothing but paper; always
tissue, nothing under a flimsy. Ah! gay women see strange changes;
wonderful ups and downs, I can tell you. We, that is me and Lizzie, the
girl I’m watching, came out to night at nine. It’s twelve now, ain’t
it? Well; what do ye think we’ve done? We have taken three men home,
and Lizzie, who is a clever little devil, got two pound five out of
them for herself, which ain’t bad at all. I shall get something when we
get back. We ain’t always so lucky. Some nights we go about and don’t
hook a soul. Lizzie paints a bit too much for decent young fellows
who’ve got lots of money. They aren’t our little game. We go in more
for tradesmen, shop-boys, commercial travellers, and that sort, and men
who are a little screwy, and although we musn’t mention it, we hooks a
white choker now and then, coming from Exeter Hall. Medical students
are sometimes sweet on Lizzie, but we ain’t in much favour with the
Bar. Oh! I know what a man is directly he opens his mouth. Dress too
has a great deal to do with what a man is--tells you his position
in life as it were. ‘Meds’ ain’t good for much; they’re larky young
blokes, but they’ve never much money, and they’re fond of dollymopping.
But talk of dollymopping--lawyers are the fellows for that. Those
chambers in the Inns of Court are the ruin of many a girl. And they
are so convenient for bilking, you’ve no idea. There isn’t a good woman
in London who’d go with a man to the Temple, not one. You go to Kate’s,
and take a woman out, put her in a cab, and say you were going to take
her to either of the Temples, which are respectable and decent places
when compared to the other inns which are not properly Inns of Court,
except Gray’s Inn and Lincoln’s Inn, and she’d cry off directly. I mean
Barnard’s Inn, and Thavies’ Inn, and New Inn, and Clement’s Inn, and
all those. I’ve been at this sort of work for six or seven years, and I
suppose I’ll die at it. I don’t care if I do. It suits me. I’m good for
nothing else.”
I gave her some money in return for her story, and wished her good
night. What she says about women who have once been what is called
“swell,” coming down to the sort of thing I have been describing,
is perfectly true. They have most of them been well-known and much
admired in their time; but every dog has its day. They have had theirs,
and neglected to make hay while the sun was shining. Almost all the
servants of bawds and prostitutes have fallen as it were from their
high estate into the slough of degradation and comparative despair.
As I have before stated, there are very few dress-lodgers now who
solicit in the streets, and naturally few followers of dress-lodgers
whose condition does not afford anything very striking or peculiar,
except as evidencing the vicissitudes of a prostitute’s career, and the
end that very many of them arrive at.
* * * * *
_Keepers of Accommodation Houses._--Those who gain their living by
keeping accommodation houses, or what the French call _maisons de
passé_, are of course to be placed in the category of the people who
are dependant on prostitutes, without whose patronage they would lose
their only means of support.
When you speak of bawds you in a great measure describe this class
also, for their avocations are the same, and the system they exist
upon very similar. The bawds keep women in their houses, and the
others let out their rooms to chance comers, and any one who chooses
to take them. The keepers are generally worn-out prostitutes, who have
survived their good looks and settled down, as a means of gaining a
livelihood; in Oxenden Street and similar places an enormous amount of
money is made by these people. The usual charge for rooms of course
varies according to the height and the size of the room engaged. A
first-floor room is worth seven or ten shillings, then the rooms on the
second-floor are five shillings, and three shillings, and so on. The
average gains of keepers of accommodation houses in Oxenden Street and
James Street, Haymarket, are from two pounds to ten pounds a night;
the amount depending a good deal on the popularity of the house, its
connection with women, its notoriety amongst men, and its situation.
More money is made by bawdy-house keepers, but then the expenses are
greater. A story is told of a celebrated woman who kept a house of
ill-fame in the neighbourhood of May Fair. The several inmates of her
establishment were dilatory on one occasion, and she gave vent to her
anger and disappointment by exclaiming, “Twelve o’clock striking. The
house full of noblemen, and not a ---- girl painted yet.” I introduce
this anecdote merely to exemplify what I have been advancing, namely,
that the best brothels in London, such as Mrs. C--’s in Curzon Street,
and others that I could mention, are frequented by men who have plenty
of money at their command, and spend it freely.
A Mrs. J--, who kept a house in James Street, Haymarket, where
temporary accommodation could be obtained by girls and their paramours,
made a very large sum of money by her house, and some time ago bought a
house somewhere near Camberwell with her five-shilling pieces which she
had the questionable taste to call “Dollar House.” A woman who kept a
house in one of the small streets near the Marylebone Road told me she
could afford to let her rooms to her customers for eighteen pence for a
short time, and three and sixpence for all night, and she declared she
made money by it, as she had a good many of the low New Road women, and
some of those who infest the Edgware Road, as well as several servants
and dress-makers, who came with their associates. She added, she was
saving up money to buy the house from her landlord, who at present
charged her an exorbitant rent, as he well knew she could not now
resist his extortionate demands. If he refused to sell it, she should
go lower down in the same street, for she was determined before long to
be independant.
When we come to touch upon clandestine prostitution we shall have
occasion to condemn these houses in no measured terms, for they
offer very great facilities for the illicit intercourse of the not
yet completely depraved portion of the sexes, such as sempstresses,
milliners, servant girls, etc., etc., who only prostitute themselves
occasionally to men they are well acquainted with, for whom they may
have some sort of a partiality--women who do not lower themselves in
the social scale for money, but for their own gratification. They
become, however, too frequently insensibly depraved, and go on from
bad to worse, till nothing but the _pavé_ is before them. The ruin of
many girls is commenced by reading the low trashy wishy-washy cheap
publications that the news-shops are now gorged with, and by devouring
the hastily-written, immoral, stereotyped tales about the sensualities
of the upper classes, the lust of the aristocracy, and the affection
that men about town--noble lords, illustrious dukes, and even princes
of the blood--are in the habit of imbibing for maidens of low degree
“whose face is their fortune,” shop girls--dressmakers--very often
dressmakers and the rest of the tribe who may perhaps feel flattered by
reading about absurd impossibilities that their untutored and romantic
imaginations suggest may, during the course of a life of adventure,
happen to themselves. Well, they wait day after day, and year after
year for the duke or the prince of the blood, perfectly ready to
surrender their virtue when it is asked for, until they open their
eyes, regard the duke and the prince of the blood as apocryphal or
engaged to somebody else more fortunate than themselves, and begin to
look a little lower, and favourably receive the immodest addresses of a
counter-jumper, or a city clerk, or failing those a ruffianly pot-boy
may realize their dreams of the ideal; at all events, they are already
demoralized by the trash that has corrupted their minds, and perfectly
willing at the first solicitation to put money into the pockets of the
keepers of accommodation houses.
* * * * *
_Procuresses, Pimps, and Panders._--Procuresses are women who in most
cases possess houses of their own, where they procure girls for men
who employ them. These establishments are called “Introducing Houses,”
and are extremely lucrative to the proprietors. There are also men
who go about for these people, finding out girls, and bringing them
to the houses, where they may meet with men. The procuresses who keep
introducing houses often take in women to lodge and board. But they
are quite independant, and must be well-known about town, and kept by
some one, or the procuress, if she is, comparatively speaking, in any
position, will not receive them.
To show how the matter is accomplished let us suppose an introducing
house of notoriety and good report in its way, somewhere in the
neighbourhood of St. George’s Road, Pimlico, a district which, I may
observe, is prolific in loose women. A well-known professional man, a
wealthy merchant, an M.P., or a rich landed proprietor, calls upon the
lady of the house, orders some champagne, and enters into conversation
about indifferent matters, until he is able delicately to broach the
object he has in view. He explains that he wishes to meet with a quiet
lady whose secrecy he can rely upon, and whom he can trust in every
possible way. He would like her, we will imagine, to be vivacious,
witty, and gay.
The lady of the house listens complacently, and replies that she
knows some one who exactly answers the description the amorous M.P.
has given, and says that she will send a message to her at once if he
wishes, but he must take his chance of her being at home; if she is
out, an appointment will be made for the next day. In the mean time a
messenger is despatched to the lady in question, who in all probability
does not reside at any great distance; perhaps in Stanley Street, or
Winchester Street, which streets everybody knows are contiguous to
St. George’s Road, and inhabited by beauty that ridicules decorum
and laughs at the virtuous restrictions that are highly conducive to
a state of single blessedness and a condition of old-maidism. Some
more champagne is ordered and consumed, every bottle of which costs
the consumer fifteen shillings, making a profit to the vendor of at
least seventy per cent. When the lady arrives, the introduction takes
place, and the matter is finally arranged as far as the introducer is
concerned. The woman so introduced generally gives half the money she
obtains from the man to the keeper of the house for the introduction.
Sometimes these women will write to men who occupy a high position in
society, who are well-known at the clubs, and are reputed to be well
off, saying that they have a new importation in their houses from
the country that may be disposed of for a pecuniary consideration of
perhaps fifty or a hundred pounds. This amount of course is readily
paid by men who are in search of artificial excitement, and the
negotiation is concluded without any difficulty. A woman is usually
seduced five or six times. By that I mean she is represented as a
maid, and imposed upon men as a virgin, which fabrication, as it
is difficult to disprove, is believed, more especially if the girl
herself be well instructed, and knows how to carry out the fraud. The
Burlington Arcade is a well-known resort of women on the long winter
afternoons, when all the men in London walk there before dinner.
It is curious to notice how the places of meeting and appointment have
sprung up and increased within the last few years. Not many years
ago Kate Hamilton, if I am not misinformed, was knocking about town.
Lizzie Davis’s has only been open a year or two. Barns’s very recently
established, and the Oxford and Cambridge last season. The Café Riche
three years ago used to be called Bignell’s Café. Sams’s I believe is
the oldest of the night-houses about the Haymarket. The Café Royal,
or Kate’s, is the largest and the most frequented, but is not now so
select as it used formerly to be. Mott’s, or the Portland Rooms, used
to be the most fashionable dancing place in London, and is now in very
good repute. Formerly only men in evening dress were admitted; now this
distinction is abolished, and every one indiscriminately admitted.
This is beginning to have its effect, and in all likelihood Mott’s
will in a short time lose its prestige. It is always so with places of
this description. Some peculiarity about the house, or some clever and
notorious woman, presiding over its destinies, makes it famous; when
these vanish or subside, then the place goes down gradually, and some
other rival establishment takes its place.
Loose women, as I have before asserted, very often marry, and
sometimes, as often as not, marry well. The other day one of the most
well-known women about town, Mrs. S--, was married to a German count;
a few weeks ago Agnes W-- married a member of an old Norfolk family,
who settled three thousand a year upon her. This case will most likely
come before the public, as the family, questioning his sanity, mean
to take out a writ of _de lunatico inquirendo_, when the facts will
be elicited by counsel in a court of law. Indeed, so little was the
gentleman himself satisfied with the match that a week after marriage
he advertised his wife in the newspapers, saying he would not be
held responsible for her further debts. These out of many others. A
frequenter of the night-houses will notice many changes in the course
of the year, although some well-known face will turn up now and then.
The habitué may miss the accustomed laugh and unabashed impudence
of the “nun,” who always appeared so fascinating and piquante in
her little “Jane Clarke” bonnet, and demure black silk dress. The
“nun” may be far away with her regiment in Ireland, or some remote
part of England; for be it known that ladies are attached to the
service as well as men, and the cavalry rejoices more than the line
in the softening influences of feminine society. Amongst the little
scandals of the night, it may be rumoured within the sacred precincts
of the Café Royal by “Suppers” of the Admiralty, who has obtained
that soubriquet by his known unwillingness to stand these midnight
banquets, that the “Baby” was seen at the Holborn with a heightened
colour, rather the production of art than nature; _ergo_, the “Baby”
is falling off, which remark it is fortunate for “Suppers” the Baby
does not overhear. Billy Valentine, of her Majesty’s “horse and saddle”
department of the Home Office, as is his usual custom, may be seen at
Coney’s, exchanging a little quiet chaff with “Poodle,” whose hair is
more crimped than ever, while the “Poodle” is dexterously extracting
a bottle of Moselle out of him for the benefit of the establishment.
There is a woman of very mature age who goes about from one night-house
to another with her betting book in her hand, perhaps “cadging” for
men. Then there is Madame S. S.--, who plays the piano in different
places, and Dirty Dick, who is always in a state of intoxication; but
who, as he spends his money freely, is never objected to.
But the night-houses are carrying me away from my subject.
Pimps are frequently spoken of, and pimping is a word very generally
used, but I doubt very much whether many of them exist, at least of
the male gender. The women do most of the pimping that is requisite
to carry on the amours of London society, and pander is a word that
merges into the other, losing any distinctive significancy that it may
possess for the eyes of a lexicographer. A woman when she introduces a
man to a woman is literally pimping for him, or what I have said about
keepers of introducing houses must apply generally to the panders and
the pimps. I may add a story I heard of a bully attached to a brothel,
who on one occasion acting as a pimp, went into the streets to pick up
a woman who was required for the purposes of the establishment. He went
some way without success, and at last met a “wandering beauty of the
night,” whom he solicited; she yielded to his entreaties, and followed
him to his brothel. When they reached the light in the passage she
raised her veil, when he was as horrified as a man in his position
and with his feelings could be to perceive that he had brought his
own sister to an immoral house: he had not seen her for some years.
His profligacy had killed his father, had brought him to his present
degraded position, and in a great measure occasioned his sister’s fall
and way of living.
Ex uno--the proverb says--a lesson may be taught a great many.
* * * * *
_Fancy-men._--Fancy-men are an extremely peculiar class, and are highly
interesting to those who take an interest in prostitutes and their
associates. They are--that is the best of them--tolerably well-dressed
and well-looking, and sufficiently gentlemanly for women to like to be
seen about with them. I am now speaking of those who cohabit with the
best women about town.
Parent Duchatelet discourses at some length on this subject, and treats
it with great perspicuity and succinctness. He asserts that it is a
common thing for many law students and medical students to be kept,
or semi-supported, by loose women in Paris. This is a state of things
that I need hardly say is never observed in England. Yet there is a
class who throw all their self-respect into the background, and allow
themselves to be partially maintained by loose women who have imbibed a
partiality for them. They frequent the night-houses in Panton Street,
and often hook gentlemen out of several sovereigns, or by tossing them
for champagne make them pay for several bottles in the course of the
evening. By this it may be readily understood that they are in league
with the proprietor of the establishment; and that this is undeniably
the case in one instance I will unhesitatingly declare. It may be
so in others, but I am not prepared to say so. I need not mention
the name of the house for obvious reasons, but any one who has the
slightest knowledge of the subject will be obliged, if he values his
veracity, to corroborate my statement. The best, or the aristocracy
of fancy-men, are for the most part on the turf. They bet when they
have money to bet with, and when they have not they endeavour, without
scruple, to procure it from their mistresses, who never hesitate a
moment in giving it them if they have it, or procuring it for them by
some means, however degrading such means may be. A fancy-man connected
with a prostitute who is acquainted with a good set of men will, as the
evening advances, be seen in one of the night-houses in Panton Street.
His woman will come in perhaps about one o’clock, accompanied by one or
two men. Whilst they are talking and drinking he will come up and speak
to the woman, as if she was an old flame of his, and she will treat him
in the same manner, though more as a casual acquaintance. In the course
of time he will get into conversation with her men, and they, taking
him for a gentleman, will talk to him in a friendly manner. After a
while he will propose to toss them for a bottle of champagne or a
Moselle cup. Then the swindling begins. The fancy-man has an infallible
recipe for winning. He has in his hand a cover for the half-crown he
tosses with, which enables him to win, however the piece falls. It
is a sort of “heads I win, tails you lose,” a principle with which
schoolboys of a speculative disposition bother their friends. Sometimes
the proprietor of the house will come up and begin to talk to them,
ask them to step upstairs to have supper, and get them into a room
where the victim may be legged more quietly, and more at their leisure.
The proprietor then says that he must in his turn “stand” a bottle of
champagne, but the fancy-man, pretending to be indignant, interposes,
and exclaims, “No, let’s toss;” so they toss. The fancy-man loses the
toss, pays the proprietor at once with money, with which he has been
previously supplied, and the man is more completely gulled than ever.
He may be some man in the service up in town on leave for a short
while, and determined as long as he stays to go in for some fun, no
doubt well supplied with money, and careless how he spends it. He would
be very irate if he discovered how he was being robbed, and in all
likelihood smash the place up, and the fancy-man into the bargain, for
people are not very scrupulous as to what they do in the night-houses.
But the affair is managed so skilfully that he loses his four or five
pounds at tossing or at some game or other with equanimity, and without
a murmur, for he thinks it is his luck which happens to be adverse, and
never dreams for one instant that his adversary is not playing on the
“square.” The rows that take place in the night-houses never find their
way into the papers. It isn’t the “little game” of the proprietors to
allow them, and the police, if they are called in, are too well bribed
to take any further notice, without they are particularly requested. I
was told of a disturbance that took place in one of the night-houses
in Panton Street, not more than a year ago, which for brutality and
savage ferocity I should think could not be equalled by a scalping
party of North American Red Indians.
Two gentlemen had adjourned there after the theatre, and were quietly
drinking some brandy and soda when a woman, with a very large
crinoline, came in and went up to one of them, whom we will call A.
She asked him for something to drink, and he, perceiving she was very
drunk already, chaffed her a little. Angry at his _persiflage_, she
leant over and seized his glass, which she threw into a corner of the
room, smashing it to atoms, and spilling its contents. While doing so
her crinoline flew into the air, and A. put out his hand to keep it
down. She immediately began to slang him and abuse him immoderately,
declaring that he attempted to take indecent liberties with her, and
attempting finally to strike him he good-humouredly held her hands;
but she got more furious every moment, and at last he had to push
her down rather violently into a chair. A man who was sitting at an
opposite table commented upon this in an audible and offensive manner,
which excessively annoyed A., who however at first took no notice of
his conduct. Presently he handed the woman over to one of the waiters,
who with some difficulty turned her out. Then the man who had before
spoken said, “D--d plucky thing, by Jove, to strike a woman.” A. made
some reply to this, and the other man got up, when A. flew at him and
knocked him down. Two waiters ran up and seized A. by either arm,
when the man got up from his recumbent position and struck A., while
he was being retained by the waiters, a tremendous blow in the face,
which speedily covered him with blood. A., exerting all his strength,
liberated himself, and rushed at the coward, knocking him over a table,
jumping over after him, seizing his head and knocking it against the
floor in a frightful manner. The door porters were then called in, and
A. with great difficulty turned out. A.’s friend had been waiting his
opportunity, which had not yet come. When A. was at the door the man
he had knocked down raised himself up. A.’s friend seized him by the
collar and by one of his legs, and threw him with all his force along
the table, which was covered with glass. The velocity with which he was
thrown drove everything before him until he fell down on the top of the
broken glass in a corner stunned and bleeding. His assailant then put
his head down and charged like a battering-ram through the opposing
throng, throwing them right and left, till he joined his friend in the
street.
Many low betting-men are partially kept by prostitutes--men who
frequent Bride Lane and similar places, who, when out of luck, fall
back upon their women. Many thieves, too, are fancy-men, and almost
all the ruffians who go about “picking up,” as the police call it,
which I have explained before to be a species of highway robbery.
The prostitute goes up to a man, and while she is talking to him the
ruffians come up and plunder him. If the victim is drunk so much the
better. Most low prostitutes have their fancy-men, such as waiters at
taverns, labourers--loose characters, half thieves half loafers. It is
strange that such baseness should find a place in a man, but experience
proves what I have said to be true; and there are numbers of men in
the metropolis who think nothing of being kept by a prostitute on the
proceeds of her shame and her disgrace.
* * * * *
_Bullies._--Bullies are men attached to brothels and bawdy-houses; but
this remark must not be understood to apply to houses of a superior
description, for it would not pay them to extort money from their
customers, as they have a character and a reputation to support.
The bullies attached to low bawdy-houses are ostensibly kept to
perform the functions of door-keepers, but in reality to prevent men
from going away without paying enough money; they are in many cases
a necessary precaution against “bilking,” or going away without
paying anything. If a well-dressed man went into an immoral house in
Spitalfields, Whitechapel, or Shadwell, he would assuredly be robbed,
but not maltreated to any greater extent than was absolutely requisite
to obtain his money, and other valuables he might chance to have about
him, at the time the depredation was committed.
A man a little tipsy once found himself, he hardly knew how, on the
transpontine side of Waterloo Bridge, not far from Stamford Street.
It was past twelve, and on being accosted by a woman, he half
unconsciously followed her to her rooms in Stamford Street, which were
situated about half-way down, near Duke Street, Blackfriars. When
upstairs he sent the servant out for some brandy and soda-water, and
not having enough silver gave her half-a-sovereign for that purpose,
telling her to bring him the change. She soon returned with a bottle
of brandy, which she said cost eight shillings, and two bottles of
soda-water, and keeping one shilling for herself, told him she had
no change to give him: he put up with this extortion, for he was too
tipsy to make any resistance. The time passed quickly, and he spent two
or three hours in her society, until the soda-water somewhat sobered
him, when he put on his hat and declared his intention of going away.
The woman sprang up to stop him, and placed her back against the door,
meantime calling some one with all her might. Being a strong powerful
man, he seized her by the arm and flung her on a sofa. Opening the
door, he heard some one rapidly coming up stairs; he rushed back to the
room and laid hold of a chair, which he threw at the advancing figure;
it missed it, but had the effect of causing it to retreat. Chair after
chair followed until the room was nearly denuded of its furniture, the
woman being all the time too frightened to take any part in the affray.
The man next took the poker in one hand the lamp in the other, and
began to descend the stairs, which he did with some difficulty, as the
chairs rather impeded his progress. He had no doubt his adversary was
waiting for him at the bottom, and it was evident that it was there the
real struggle would take place. He descended very cautiously until he
was very near the end of the stairs, when he saw a tall strongly-built
man awaiting him with a bludgeon in his hand. The gentleman carefully,
in the short space he had, reconnoitred the exit to the street by
throwing the light of the lamp full into the passage. The bully finding
he was discovered began to curse and make demonstrations of hostility,
but remained where he was, as he was possessed of the best position.
The gentleman when he was within three or four steps of the ground,
hurled the lamp with all his force at the bully, striking him on the
forehead. The lamp was smashed to atoms, and everything directly
plunged in darkness. After this he ran in the direction of the door,
but he found the chain up: while he was unfastening this as well as
he could in the dark, he heard his antagonist picking himself up and
muttering threats of vengeance. In a moment or two he began to grope
his way towards the door, but fortunately the gentleman had succeeded
in undoing the chain, and flinging the door wide open, he emerged into
the street and began to run in the direction of the Waterloo Road as
fast as he could. He made his escape; but if he had not had presence of
mind, and been strong and powerful enough to fight with the bully, the
result might have been very different.
A man who would be a bully at a bawdy-house would stick at nothing.
During the daytime they either sleep or lounge about smoking a short
pipe, or go to the pawn-shops for the women, or else to the public for
gin.
The men who used to keep the Cocoa Tree in St. James’s Street were
two brothers, who, when they were young, held a position of no great
importance in their mother’s house, which was nothing more than a house
of ill fame. They might have degenerated into something of the same
sort, but they had a certain amount of talent and opportunities, and
once being possessed of this gambling house, which was famous enough in
its day, they made money quickly enough.
It is not men though, who have been amongst these scenes when they are
young, who take to this sort of life. It is generally returned convicts
or gaol birds, who look upon themselves as victims, and get desperate,
and do not care very much what they do as long as they can have an easy
time of it and enough to eat and drink.
Sometimes, if they watch their opportunity, they may become proprietors
of bawdy-houses themselves. Great events spring from little causes;
and good management and a good locality will always make a bawdy-house
remunerative; but bullies generally have no energy, and are wanting in
administrative capability, and more often than not die of disease and
excess in the gutter.
The Argyle Rooms were once a small public-house called the “Hall of
Rome,” where _tableaux vivants_ and _poses plastiques_ found a home and
an audience; but energy and a combination of causes have made it the
first casino in London.
A bully in a house in one of the streets near the Haymarket, who was
loafing about a public-house, told me in return for some spirits I paid
for, that he was a ticket-of-leave man--“he didn’t mind saying it, why
should he? he’d got his ticket-of-leave, he had, and he’d show it me in
two twos.
“When he comed back from Norfolk Island, which he’d been sent to for a
term of seven years, he knew no one in town, his pals mostly was lagged
by police, and his most hintimit friend was hanged by mistake at the
Old Bailey--he knew it was by mistake, as his friend was hincapable of
such an act without he was riled extraordinary. Well, he took to the
bullying dodge, which paid. He couldn’t work, it wornt in his natur,
and he took to bullying, kindly--it suited him, it just did, and that
was all about it.”
The bullies are the lowest ruffians going, and will not mind doing any
act of iniquity, although they stand in great dread of the police, and
generally manage matters so as to keep out of their clutches.
CLANDESTINE PROSTITUTES.
The next division of our subject is clandestine prostitution, whose
ramifications are very extensive. In it we must include: 1. Female
operatives; 2. Maid-servants, all of whom are amateurs, as opposed
to professionals, or as we have had occasion to observe before, more
commonly known as “Dollymops”; 3. Ladies of intrigue, who see men to
gratify their passions; and 4. Keepers of houses of assignation, where
the last-mentioned class may carry on their amours with secresy.
This in reality I regard as the most serious side of prostitution. This
more clearly stamps the character of the nation. A thousand and one
causes may lead to a woman’s becoming a professional prostitute, but if
a woman goes wrong without any very cogent reason for so doing, there
must be something radically wrong in her composition, and inherently
bad in her nature, to lead her to abandon her person to the other sex,
who are at all times ready to take advantage of a woman’s weakness and
a woman’s love.
There is a tone of morality throughout the rural districts of England,
which is unhappily wanting in the large towns and the centres of
particular manufactures. Commerce is incontestably demoralizing. Its
effects are to be seen more and more every day. Why it should be so,
it is not our province to discuss, but seduction and prostitution,
in spite of the precepts of the Church, and the examples of her
ministers, have made enormous strides in all our great towns within
the last twenty years. Go through the large manufacturing districts,
where factory-hands congregate, or more properly herd together, test
them, examine them, talk to them, observe for yourself, and you will
come away with the impression that there is room for much improvement.
Then cast your eye over the statistics of births and the returns of
the Registrar-General, and compare the number of legitimate with
illegitimate births. Add up the number of infanticides and the number
of deaths of infants of tender years--an item more alarming than any.
Goldsmith has said that “honour sinks when commerce long prevails,”
and a truer remark was never made, although the animus of the poet was
directed more against men than women.
* * * * *
_Female Operatives._--When alluding casually to this subject before, I
enumerated some of the trades that supplied women to swell the ranks
of prostitution, amongst which are milliners, dress-makers, straw
bonnet-makers, furriers, hat-binders, silk-winders, tambour-workers,
shoe-binders, slop-women, or those who work for cheap tailors, those in
pastry-cook, fancy and cigar-shops, bazaars, and ballet-girls.
I have heard it asserted in more than one quarter, although of course
such assertions cannot be authenticated, or made reliable, for want
of data, that one out of three of all the female operatives in London
are unchaste, and in the habit of prostituting themselves when
occasion offers, either for money, or more frequently for their own
gratification.
I met a woman in Fleet Street, who told me that she came into the
streets now and then to get money not to subsist upon, but to supply
her with funds to meet the debts her extravagance caused her to
contract. But I will put her narrative into a consecutive form.
“Ever since I was twelve,” she said, “I have worked in a printing
office where a celebrated London morning journal is put in type and
goes to press. I get enough money to live upon comfortably; but then I
am extravagant, and spend a great deal of money in eating and drinking,
more than you would imagine. My appetite is very delicate, and my
constitution not at all strong. I long for certain things like a woman
in the family way, and I must have them by hook or by crook. The fact
is the close confinement and the night air upset me and disorder my
digestion. I have the most expensive things sometimes, and when I can,
I live in a sumptuous manner, comparatively speaking. I am attached
to a man in our office, to whom I shall be married some day. He does
not suspect me, but on the contrary believes me to be true to him, and
you do not suppose that I ever take the trouble to undeceive him. I am
nineteen now, and have carried on with my ‘typo’ for nearly three years
now. I sometimes go to the Haymarket, either early in the evening,
or early in the morning, when I can get away from the printing; and
sometimes I do a little in the day-time. This is not a frequent
practice of mine; I only do it when I want money to pay anything. I am
out now with the avowed intention of picking up a man, or making an
appointment with some one for to-morrow or some time during the week.
I always dress well, at least you mayn’t think so, but I am always
neat, and respectable, and clean, if the things I have on ain’t worth
the sight of money that some women’s things cost them. I have good feet
too, and as I find they attract attention, I always parade them. And
I’ve hooked many a man by showing my ankle on a wet day. I shan’t think
anything of all this when I’m married. I believe my young man would
marry me just as soon if he found out I went with others as he would
now. I carry on with him now, and he likes me very much. I ain’t of
any particular family; to tell the truth, I was put in the workhouse
when I was young, and they apprenticed me. I never knew my father or my
mother, although ‘my father was, as I’ve heard say, a well-known swell
of capers gay, who cut his last fling with great applause;’ or, if you
must know, I heard that he was hung for killing a man who opposed him
when committing a burglary. In other words, he was ‘a macing-cove what
robs,’ and I’m his daughter, worse luck. I used to think at first, but
what was the good of being wretched about it? I couldn’t get over for
some time, because I was envious, like a little fool, of other people,
but I reasoned, and at last I did recover myself, and was rather glad
that my position freed me from certain restrictions. I had no mother
whose heart I shou’d break by my conduct, or no father who could
threaten me with bringing his grey hairs with sorrow to the grave.
I had a pretty good example to follow set before me, and I didn’t
scruple to argue that I was not to be blamed for what I did. Birth is
the result of accident. It is the merest chance in the world whether
you’re born a countess or a washerwoman. I’m neither one nor t’other;
I’m only a mot who does a little typographing by way of variety. Those
who have had good nursing, and all that, and the advantages of a sound
education, who have a position to lose, prospects to blight, and
relations to dishonour, may be blamed for going on the loose, but I’ll
be hanged if I think that priest or moralist is to come down on me with
the sledge-hammer of their denunciation. You look rather surprised at
my talking so well. I know I talk well, but you must remember what a
lot has passed through my hands for the last seven years, and what a
lot of copy I’ve set up. There is very little I don’t know, I can tell
you. It’s what old Robert Owen would call the spread of education.”
I had to talk some time to this girl before she was so communicative;
but it must be allowed my assiduity was amply repaid. The common
sense she displayed was extraordinary for one in her position; but, as
she said, she certainly had had superior opportunities, of which she
had made the most. And her arguments, though based upon fallacy, were
exceedingly clever and well put. So much for the spread of education
amongst the masses. Who knows to what it will lead?
The next case that came under my notice was one of a very different
description. I met a woman in Leadenhall Street, a little past the
India House, going towards Whitechapel. She told me, without much
solicitation on my part, that she was driven into the streets by want.
Far from such a thing being her inclination, she recoiled from it with
horror, and had there been no one else in the case, she would have
preferred starvation to such a life. I thought of the motto Vergniaud
the Girondist wrote on the wall of his dungeon in his blood, “Potius
mori quam fœdari,” and I admired the woman whilst I pitied her. It
is easy to condemn, but even vice takes the semblance of virtue when
it has a certain end in view. Every crime ought to be examined into
carefully in order that the motive that urged to the commission may be
elicited, and that should be always thrown into the scale in mitigation
or augmentation of punishment.
Her father was a dock labourer by trade, and had been ever since he
came to London, which he did some years ago, when there was great
distress in Rochdale, where he worked in a cotton factory; but being
starved out there after working short time for some weeks, he tramped
with his daughter, then about fourteen, up to town, and could get
nothing to do but work in the docks, which requires no skill, only a
good constitution, and the strength and endurance of a horse. This
however, as every one knows, is a precarious sort of employment, very
much sought after by strong, able-bodied men out of work. The docks are
a refuge for all Spitalfields and the adjacent parishes for men out of
work, or men whose trade is slack for a time. Some three weeks before I
met her, the girl’s father had the misfortune to break his arm and to
injure his spine by a small keg of spirits slipping from a crane near
to which he was standing. They took him to the hospital, where he then
was. The girl herself worked as a hat-binder, for which she was very
indifferently paid, and even that poor means of support she had lost
lately through the failure of the house she worked for. She went to
see her father every day, and always contrived to take him something,
if it only cost twopence, as a mark of affection on her part, which
he was not slow in appreciating, and no doubt found his daughter’s
kindness a great consolation to him in the midst of his troubles. She
said, “I tried everywhere to get employment, and I couldn’t. I ain’t
very good with my needle at fine needlework, and the slopsellers won’t
have me. I would have slaved for them though, I do assure you, sir;
bad as they do pay you, and hard as you must work for them to get
enough to live upon, and poor living, God knows, at that. I feel very
miserable for what I’ve done, but I was driven to it; indeed I was,
sir. I daren’t tell father, for he’d curse me at first, though he might
forgive me afterwards: for though he’s poor, he’s always been honest,
and borne a good name; but now--I can’t help crying a bit, sir. I ain’t
thoroughly hardened yet, and it’s a hard case as ever was. I do wish I
was dead and there was an end of everything, I am so awfully sad and
heart-broken. If it don’t kill me, I suppose I shall get used to it in
time. The low rate of wages I received has often put it into my head to
go wrong; but I have always withstood the temptation, and nothing but
so many misfortunes and trials coming together could ever have induced
me to do it.”
This, I have every reason to believe, was a genuine tale of distress
told with all simplicity and truth, although everything that a woman
of loose morals says must be received with caution, and believed under
protest.
Ballet-girls have a bad reputation, which is in most cases well
deserved. To begin with their remuneration--it is very poor. They get
from nine to eighteen shillings. Columbine in the pantomime gets five
pounds a week, but then hers is a prominent position. Out of these nine
to eighteen shillings they have to find shoes and petticoats, silk
stockings, etc., etc., so that the pay is hardly adequate to their
expenditure, and quite insufficient to fit them out and find them in
food and lodging. Can it be wondered at, that while this state of
things exists, ballet-girls should be compelled to seek a livelihood by
resorting to prostitution?
Many causes may be enumerated to account for the lax morality of our
female operatives. Among the chief of which we must class--
1. Low wages inadequate to their sustenance.
2. Natural levity and the example around them.
3. Love of dress and display, coupled with the desire for a sweetheart.
4. Sedentary employment, and want of proper exercise.
5. Low and cheap literature of an immoral tendency.
6. Absence of parental care and the inculcation of proper precepts. In
short, bad bringing up.
* * * * *
_Maid-Servants._--Maid-servants seldom have a chance of marrying,
unless placed in a good family, where, after putting by a little money
by pinching and careful saving, the housemaid may become an object of
interest to the footman, who is looking out for a public-house, or when
the housekeeper allies herself to the butler, and together they set up
in business. In small families, the servants often give themselves up
to the sons, or to the policeman on the beat, or to soldiers in the
Parks; or else to shopmen, whom they may meet in the streets. Female
servants are far from being a virtuous class. They are badly educated
and are not well looked after by their mistresses as a rule, although
every dereliction from the paths of propriety by them will be visited
with the heaviest displeasure, and most frequently be followed by
dismissal of the most summary description, without the usual month’s
warning, to which so much importance is usually attached by both
employer and employed.
Marylebone was lately characterised by one of its vestrymen as being
one of the seven black parishes in London. Half the women it is
asserted who are sent from the workhouse, and have situations procured
for them by the parochial authorities, turn out prostitutes. I have
no means of corroborating the truth of this declaration, but it has
been made and sent forth to the world through the medium of the public
press, though I believe it has been partially contradicted by one of
the workhouse authorities; however this may be, there can be no doubt
that the tone of morality among servant-maids in the metropolis is low.
I will not speak in the superlative--I merely characterise it as low. I
had an opportunity of questioning a maid-of-all-work, a simple-minded,
ignorant, uneducated, vain little body, as strong physically as a
donkey, and thoroughly competent to perform her rather arduous duties,
for the satisfactory performance of which she received the munificent
remuneration of eight pounds annually, including her board and lodging.
She said: “I came from Berkshire, sir, near Windsor; father put me to
service some years ago, and I’ve been in London ever since. I’m two and
twenty now. I’ve lived in four or five different situations since then.
Are followers allowed? No, sir, missus don’t permit no followers. No, I
ain’t got no perleeceman. Have I got a young man? Well, I have; he’s in
the harmy, not a hoffisser, but a soldier. I goes out along of him on
Sundays, leastways on Sunday afternoons, and missus she lets me go to
see a aunt of mine, as I says lives at Camberwell, only between you and
me, sir, there ain’t no aunt, only a soldier, which he’s my sweetheart,
as I says to you before, sir.”
Maid-servants in good families have an opportunity of copying their
mistress’s way of dressing, and making themselves, attractive to
men of a higher class. It is a voluntary species of sacrifice on
their part. A sort of suicidal decking with flowers, and making
preparations for immolation on the part of the victim herself.
Flattered by the attention of the eldest son, or some friend of his
staying in the house, the pretty lady’s maid will often yield to soft
solicitation. Vanity is at the bottom of all this, and is one of the
chief characteristics of a class not otherwise naturally vicious. The
housemaids flirt with the footmen, the housekeeper with the butler,
the cooks with the coachmen, and so on; and a flirtation often begun
innocently enough ends in something serious, the result of which may be
to blight the prospect of the unfortunate woman who has been led astray.
There are book-hawkers, who go about the country, having first filled
their wallets from the filthy cellars of Holywell Street, sowing the
seeds of immorality; servants in country houses will pay, without
hesitation large prices for improper books. This denomination of evil,
I am glad to say, is much on the decrease now, since the Immoral
Publications Act has come into operation.
Maid-servants live well, have no care or anxiety, no character worth
speaking about to lose, for the origin of most of them is obscure, are
fond of dress, and under these circumstances it cannot be wondered that
they are as a body immoral and unchaste.
* * * * *
_Ladies of Intrigue and Houses of Assignation._--The reader will find
more information about “ladies of intrigue” in the annals of the
Divorce Court and the pages of the _Causes Célèbres_ than it is in my
power to furnish him with. By ladies of intrigue we must understand
married women who have connection with other men than their husbands,
and unmarried women who gratify their passion secretly.
There is a house in Regent Street, I am told, where ladies, both
married and unmarried, go in order to meet with and be introduced
to gentlemen, there to consummate their libidinous desires. This
sort of clandestine prostitution is not nearly so common in England
as in France and other parts of the Continent, where chastity and
faithfulness among married women are remarkable for their absence
rather than their presence. As this vice is by no means common or a
national characteristic, but rather the exception than the rule, it can
only expect a cursory notice at our hands.
An anecdote was told me illustrative of this sort of thing that may not
be out of place here.
A lady of intrigue, belonging to the higher circles of society, married
to a man of considerable property, found herself unhappy in his
society, and after some time unwillingly came to the conclusion that
she had formed an alliance that was destined to make her miserable.
Her passions were naturally strong, and she one day resolved to
visit a house that one of her female acquaintances had casually
spoken about before her some little time before. Ordering a cab, she
drove to the house in question, and went in. There was no necessity
for her to explain the nature of her business, or the object with
which she called. That was understood. She was shown into a handsome
drawing-room, beautifully fitted up, for the house was situated in
one of the best streets in May Fair, there to await the coming of her
unknown paramour. After waiting some little time the door opened, and
a gentleman entered. The curtains of the room were partially drawn
round the windows, and the blinds were pulled down, which caused a “dim
religious light” to pervade the apartment, preventing the lady from
seeing distinctly the features of her visitor. He approached her, and
in a low tone of voice commenced a conversation with her about some
indifferent subject.
She listened to him for a moment, and then with a cry of astonishment
recognized her husband’s voice. He, equally confused, discovered that
he had accidentally met in a house of ill-fame the wife whom he had
treated with unkindness and cruelty, and condemned to languish at
home while he did as he chose abroad. This strange rencontre had a
successful termination, for it ended in the reconciliation of husband
and wife, who discovered that they were mutually to blame.
From the Divorce Court emanate strange revelations, to which the press
gives publicity. It reveals a state of immorality amongst the upper
and middle classes that is deplorable; but although this unveils the
delinquencies of ladies of intrigue, they are not altogether the class
we have under discussion. Those who engross our attention are ladies
who, merely to satisfy their animal instincts, intrigue with men whom
they do not truly love. But though we could multiply anecdotes and
stories, it is not necessary to do more than say, they are a class far
from numerous, and scarcely deserve to form a distinctive feature in
the category of prostitution in London.
COHABITANT PROSTITUTES.
The last head in our classification is “Cohabitant Prostitutes,” which
phrase must be understood to include--
1. Those whose paramours cannot afford to pay the marriage fees. This
is a very small and almost infinitesimal portion of the community, as
banns now cost so very little, that it is next to an absurdity to say
“a man and woman” cannot get married because they have not money enough
to pay the fees consequent upon publishing the banns, therefore this
class is scarcely deserving of mention.
2. Those whose paramours do not believe in the sanctity of the ceremony.
There may be a few who make their religious convictions an objection to
marriage, but you may go a very long journey before you will be able to
discover a man who will conscientiously refuse to marry a woman on this
ground. Consequently we may dismiss these with a very brief allusion.
3. Those who have married a relative forbidden by law. We know
that people will occasionally marry a deceased wife’s sister,
notwithstanding the anathemas of mother church are sure to be hurled
at them. Yet ecclesiastical terrors may have weight with a man who has
conceived an affection for a sister-in-law, for whom he will have to
undergo so many penalties.
Perhaps parliamentary agitation may soon legitimatize these
connections, and abolish this heading from our category of Cohabitant
Prostitution.
4. Those who would forfeit their income by marrying,--as officers’
widows in receipt of pensions, and those who hold property only while
unmarried.
This class is more numerous than any of those we have yet mentioned,
but it offers nothing sufficiently striking or peculiar to induce us to
dwell longer upon it, as it explains itself.
5. Those whose paramours object to marry them for pecuniary or family
reasons. This is a subject upon which it has been necessary to dilate;
for it includes all the lorettes in London, and the men by whom
they are kept. By lorettes, I mean those I have before touched upon
as prima donnas, who are a class of women who do not call going to
night-houses in Panton Street walking the Haymarket, and feel much
insulted if you so characterize their nocturnal wanderings. The best
women go to three or four houses in Panton Street, where the visitors
are more select than in the other places, where the door porters are
less discriminating. Sometimes women who are violent, and make a
disturbance, are kept out of particular houses for months.
Of course, the visits of kept women are made by stealth, as the men who
keep them would not countenance their going to such places. Perhaps
their men are out of town, and they may then go with comparative safety.
Women who are well kept, and have always been accustomed to the society
of gentlemen, have an intense horror of the Haymarket women, properly
so called, who promenade the pavement in order to pick up men.
And in reality there is a greater distinction between the two classes
than would at first appear. Even if a good sort of woman has been
thrown over by her man, and is in want of money, she will not pick up
any one at a night-house who may solicit her; on the contrary, she will
select some fellow she has a liking for: while, on the other hand, the
Haymarket women will pick up any low wretch who she thinks will pay
her. She will not even object to a foreigner, though all the best women
have a great dislike to low foreigners.
Were I to dwell longer upon this subject it is clear I should merely
be recapitulating what I have already said in a former portion of this
work.
* * * * *
The following narrative was given me by a girl I met in the Haymarket,
when in search of information regarding the prostitution of the
West-end of London. Her tale is the usual one of unsuspecting innocence
and virtue, seduced by fraud and violence. The victim of passion became
in time the mistress of lust, and sank from one stage to another,
until she found herself compelled to solicit in the streets to obtain a
livelihood. She was about twenty-one years of age, beneath the ordinary
height, and with a very engaging countenance. She appeared to be a
high-spirited intelligent girl, and gave her sad tale with unaffected
candour and modesty.
NARRATIVE OF A GAY WOMAN AT THE WEST END OF THE METROPOLIS.
“I was born in the county of ----, in England, where my father was an
extensive farmer, and had a great number of servants. I have three
brothers and one younger sister. I was sent to a boarding school at
B----, where I was receiving a superior education, and was learning
drawing, music, and dancing. During the vacations, and once every
quarter, I went home and lived with my parents, where one of my chief
enjoyments was to ride out on a pony I had, over the fields, and in the
neighbourhood, and occasionally to go to M----, a few miles distant.
On these occasions we often had parties of ladies and gentlemen; when
some of the best people in the district visited us. I had one of the
happiest homes a girl could have.
“When I was out riding one day at M----, in passing through the town,
my pony took fright, and threatened to throw me off, when a young
gentleman who was near rode up to my assistance. He rode by my side
till we came to a hotel in town, when we both dismounted. Leaving the
horses with the hostlers, we had some refreshment. I took out my purse
to pay the expenses, but he would not let me and paid for me. We both
mounted and proceeded towards my home. On his coming to the door of the
house, I invited him to come in, which he did. I introduced him to my
papa and mamma, and mentioned the kind service he had done to me. His
horse was put up in our stables, and he remained for some time, and had
supper with us, when he returned to M----. He was very wealthy, resided
in London, and only visited M---- occasionally with his servants.
“I was then attending a boarding-school at B----, and was about fifteen
years of age. A few days after this I left home and returned to B----.
We corresponded by letter for nearly twelve months.
“From the moment he rode up to me at M---- I was deeply interested
in him, and the attachment increased by the correspondence. He also
appeared to be very fond of me. He sometimes came and visited me at
home during my school holidays for the next twelve months. One day in
the month of May--in summer--he came to our house in his carriage, and
we invited him to dinner. He remained with us for the night, and slept
with one of my brothers. We were then engaged to each other, and were
to be married, so soon as I was eighteen years of age.
“The next day he asked my parents if I might go out with him in his
carriage. My mamma consented. She asked if any of our servants would go
with us, but he thought there was no occasion for this, as his coachman
and footman went along with us. We proceeded to B---- Railway Station.
He left his carriage with the coachman and footman, and pressed me to
go with him to London. He pretended to my parents he was only going out
for a short drive. I was very fond of him, and reluctantly consented to
go with him to London.
“He first brought me to Simpson’s hotel in the Strand, where we had
dinner, then took me to the opera. We went to Scott’s supper rooms
in the Haymarket. On coming out we walked up and down the Haymarket.
He then took me to several of the cafés, where we had wine and
refreshments. About four o’clock in the morning he called a Hansom, and
drove me to his house; and there seduced me by violence in spite of my
resistance. I screamed out, but none of the servants in the house came
to assist me. He told his servants I was his young wife he had just
brought up from the country.
“I wanted to go home in the morning, and began to cry, but he would not
let me go. He said I must remain in London with him. I still insisted
on going home, and he promised to marry me. He then bought me a watch
and chain, rings and bracelets, and presented me with several dresses.
After this I lived with him in his house, as though I had been his
wife, and rode out with him in his brougham. I often insisted upon
being married. He promised to do so, but delayed from time to time. He
generally drove out every day over the finest streets, thoroughfares,
and parks of the metropolis; and in the evenings he took me to the
Argyle Rooms and to the Casino at Holborn. I generally went there
very well dressed, and was much noticed on account of my youthful
appearance. We also went to the fashionable theatres in the West-end,
and several subscription balls.
[Illustration: THE HAYMARKET.--MIDNIGHT.]
“I often rode along Rotten Row with him, and along the drives in
Hyde Park. We also went to the seaside, where we lived in the best
hotels.
“This lasted for two years, when his conduct changed towards me.
“One evening I went with him to the Assembly Rooms at Holborn to a
masked ball. I was dressed in the character of a fairy queen. My hair
was in long curls hanging down my back.
“He left me in the supper-room for a short time, when a well-dressed
man came up to me. When my paramour came in he saw the young man
sitting by my side speaking to me. He told him I was his wife, and
inquired what he meant by it, to which he gave no reply. He then asked
me if I knew him. I replied no. He asked the gentleman to rise, which
he did, apologising for his seating himself beside me, and thereby
giving offence. On the latter showing him his card, which I did not
see, they sat down and had wine together.
“We came out of the supper-room, and we had a quarrel about the matter.
We walked up and down the ball-room for some time, and at last drove
home.
“When we got home he quarrelled again with me, struck me, and gave me
two black eyes. I was also bruised on other parts of the body, and
wanted to leave him that night, but he would not let me.
“In the morning we went out as usual after breakfast for a drive.
“Next evening we went to the Casino at Holborn. Many of the gentlemen
were staring at me, and he did not like it. I had on a thick Maltese
veil to conceal my blackened eyes.
“The gentleman who had accosted me the previous night came up and spoke
to me and my paramour (whom we shall call S.), and had some wine with
us. He asked the reason I did not raise my veil. S. said because I did
not like to do it in this place. The gentleman caught sight of my eyes,
and said they did not look so brilliant as the night before.
“S. was indignant, and told him he took great liberty in speaking of
his wife in this manner. The other remarked that no one could help
noticing such a girl, adding that I was too young to be his wife, and
that he should not take me to such a place if he did not wish me to be
looked at. He told him he ought to take better care of me than to bring
me there.
“When we got home we had another quarrel, and he struck me severely on
the side.
“We did not sleep in the same bed that night. On coming down stairs
to breakfast next morning I was taken very ill, and a medical man
was sent for. The doctor said I was in a fever, and must have had a
severe blow or a heavy fall. I was ill and confined to my bed for
three months. He went out every night and left me with a nurse and
the servants, and seldom returned till three or four o’clock in the
morning. He used to return home drunk; generally came into my bedroom
and asked if I was better; kissed me and went downstairs to bed.
“When I got well he was kind to me, and said I looked more charming
than ever. For three or four months after he took me out as usual.
“The same gentleman met me again in the Holborn one night while S. had
gone out for a short time, leaving me alone. He came up and shook hands
with me, said he was happy to see me, and wished me to meet him. I told
him I could not. S. was meanwhile watching our movements. The gentleman
asked me if I was married, when I said that I was. He admired my rings.
Pointing to a diamond ring on his finger, he asked me if I would like
it. I said no. He said your rings are not so pretty. I still refused
it; but he took the ring off his finger and put it on one of mine, and
said, ‘See how well it looks,’ adding, ‘Keep it as a memento; it may
make you think of me when I am far away.’ He told me not to mention it
to my husband.
“Meantime S. was watching me, and came up when the man had gone away,
and asked what he had been saying to me. I told him the truth, that the
same man had spoken to me again. He asked me what had passed between
us, and I told him all, with the exception of the ring.
“He noticed the ring on my finger, and asked me where I had got it. I
declined at first to answer. He then said I was not true to him, and if
I would not tell him who gave me the ring he would leave me. I told him
the man had insisted on my having it.
“He thereupon rushed along the room after him, but did not find him. On
coming back he insisted on my going home without him.
“He took me outside to his brougham, handed me in it, and then left me.
I went home and sat in the drawing-room till he returned, which was
about three o’clock in the morning. He quarrelled with me again for
not being true to him. I said I was, and had never left his side for a
moment from the time I rose in the morning till I lay down at night.
“I then told him I would go home and tell my friends all about it, and
he was afraid.
“Soon after he said to me he was going out of town for a week, and
wished me to stop at home. I did not like to remain in the house
without a woman, and wished to go with him. He said he could not allow
me, as he was to be engaged in family matters.
“He was absent for a week. I remained at home for three nights, and was
very dull and wearied, having no one to speak to. I went to my bedroom,
washed and dressed, ordered the carriage to be got ready, and went to
the Holborn. Who should I see there but this gentleman again. He was
astonished to see me there alone; came up and offered me his arm.
“I told him I was wearied at home in the absence of S., and came
out for a little relaxation. He then asked to see me home, which I
declined. I remained till the dancing was nearly over. He got into the
brougham with me and drove to Sally’s, where we had supper, after which
he saw me home. He bade me ‘good-bye,’ and said he hoped to see me at
the Holborn again some other night.
“Meantime S. had been keeping watch over me, it appears, and heard of
this. When he came home he asked me about it. I told him. He swore the
gentleman had connexion with me. I said he had not. He then hit me in
the face and shook me, and threatened to lock me up. After breakfast he
went out to walk, and I refused to go with him.
“When he had gone away I packed up all my things, told the servant to
bring a cab, wrote a note and left it on the table. I asked the cabman
if he knew any nice apartments a long way off from C----, where I was
living. He drove me to Pimlico, and took me to apartments in ---- where
I have ever since resided.
“When I went there I had my purse full of gold, and my dresses and
jewellery, which were worth about 300_l._
“One evening soon after I went to the Holborn and met my old friend
again, and told him what had occurred. He was astonished, and said he
would write to my relations, and have S. pulled up for it.
“After this he saw me occasionally at my lodgings, and made me presents.
“He met S. one day in the City, and threatened to write to my friends
to let them know how I had been treated.
“I still went to the Holborn occasionally. One evening I met S., who
wished me to go home with him again, but I refused, after the ill-usage
he had given me.
“I generally spent the day in my apartments, and in the evening went to
the Argyle, until my money was gone. I now and then got something from
the man who had taken my part; but he did not give me so much as I had
been accustomed to, and I used to have strange friends against my own
wish.
“Before I received them I had spouted most of my jewellery, and some of
my dresses. When I lived with S. he allowed me 10_l._ a week, but when
I went on the loose I did not get so much.
“After I had parted with my jewellery and most of my clothes I walked
in the Haymarket, and went to the Turkish divans, ‘Sally’s,’ and other
cafés and restaurants.
“Soon after I became unfortunate, and had to part with the remainder of
my dresses. Since then I have been more shabby in appearance, and not
so much noticed.”
CRIMINAL RETURNS.
It is very interesting to philanthropists and people who take an
interest in seeing human nature improved, and to those who wish to see
crime decrease, to notice the fluctuations of crime, its increase, its
decrease, or its being stationary, especially among different classes.
Through the kindness of Sir Richard Mayne, and the obliging courtesy of
Mr. Yardley, of the Metropolitan Police-Office, Whitehall, I am enabled
to show the number of disorderly prostitutes taken into custody during
the years 1850 to 1860. Mr. Yardley supplied me with the criminal
returns of the Metropolitan Police for the last ten years, from which I
have extracted much valuable and interesting information, besides what
I have just mentioned.
NUMBER OF DISORDERLY PROSTITUTES taken into Custody during the years
1850 to 1860, and their Trades.
1850 2,502
1851 2,573
1852 3,750
1853 3,386
1854 3,764
1855 3,592
1856 4,303
1857 5,178
1858 4,890
1859 4,282
1860 3,734
After some search I have been enabled to give the trades and
occupations of those women.
74 were Hatters and trimmers.
418 „ Laundresses.
646 „ Milliners, &c.
400 „ Servants.
249 „ Shoemakers.
58 „ Artificial flower-makers.
215 „ Tailors.
33 „ Brushmakers.
42 „ Bookbinders.
8 „ Corkcutters.
7 „ Dyers.
2 „ Fishmongers.
8 „ General and marine-store dealers.
24 „ Glovers.
18 „ Weavers.
The remainder described themselves as having no trade or occupation.
In ten years then 41,954 disorderly women, who had given themselves
up to prostitution, either for their own gratification, because they
were seduced, or to gain a livelihood, were arrested by the police.
The word disorderly is vague, but I should think it is susceptible of
various significations. In one case it may mean drunkenness, in another
assaulting the police, in others an offence of a felonious nature may
be intended, while in a fourth we may understand a simple misdemeanour,
all subjecting the offender, let it be borne in mind, to a fine or
incarceration.
Now, 41,954 is an enormous total for ten years. In an unreflective
mood I should be inclined to say that prostitutes, taken collectively,
were most abandoned, reckless, and wicked; but it is apparent, after a
minute’s study, that they must not be taken collectively. This forty
odd thousand should be understood to represent, for the most part, the
very dregs, the lowest, most unthinking, and vilest of the class.
We must look for them in the East, in Whitechapel, in Wapping, in
transpontine dens and holes, amongst sailors’ and soldiers’ women.
In the Haymarket there is not much drunkenness, and the police are
seldom interfered with. If a man, with whom a woman is walking, is
drunk, and makes an assault upon the police, the woman will content
herself with the innocent, and comparatively harmless amusement of
knocking off the policeman’s hat, afterwards propelling it gracefully
with her foot along the pavement. This pastime is of rather frequent
occurrence in nocturnal street rows, and always succeeds in infusing
a little comic element into the affray. Amongst the disorderly women
of loose habits we see that milliners largely preponderate; 646 in ten
years, who have broken the laws in some way, enables us to form, by
comparison, a vague idea of the number of milliners, dressmakers, &c.,
who resort to prostitution; for if so many were disorderly, the number
of well-behaved ones must be very large.
Another curious item is laundresses, of whom there were 418 in
the hands of the police. Either the influence of their trade is
demoralizing in the extreme; or they are underpaid, or else there are
large numbers of them; I incline to the latter supposition.
That there should have been only 400 servants is rather a matter of
surprise than otherwise, for they are exposed to great temptations, and
form a very numerous body.
In our next statistics we are able to be more precise than in the
former ones. Peculiar facilities are afforded prostitutes for
committing larcenies from the person, and there are annually some
hundreds taken into custody, and some few convicted. Only the other
day I was passing through Wych Street, on my way from New Inn with a
friend, and it so happened that we were instrumental in protecting
a gentleman from the rapacity of some men and women of infamous
character, by whom he had been entrapped.
In Wych Street there are five or six houses, contiguous to one another,
that are nothing more or less than the commonest brothels. The keepers
of these places do not in the least endeavour to conceal the fact of
their odious occupation; at almost all hours of the day, and till
twelve o’clock at night one may perceive the women standing at their
doorways in an undress costume, lascivious and meretricious in its
nature. Although they do not actually solicit the passer-by with words,
they do with looks and gestures.
It might have been a little after twelve o’clock, when, as I was
passing one of these houses, a gentleman, with his coat off, and
without his hat, rushed out of the doorway and ran up the street. He
held a small clasp-knife in his hand, which from his manner I guessed
he would not hesitate to use if hard pressed. He was in an instant
followed by a pack of men and women, perhaps four or five of each sex,
in full cry. They were nearing him, when he turned suddenly round and
doubled upon them, which manœuvre brought him in my direction. I saw,
when near enough, that he was intoxicated. Directly he perceived me
he implored my protection, saying, “For God’s sake keep those fellows
off.” The noise attracted the attention of a policeman at the end of
the street, who came up to see what the origin of the disturbance was,
and the crowd fell back at his appearance.
The gentleman said he went into one of the houses to get a cigar, when
he was set upon by some women, who attempted to rob him. Although
drunk he was able to put his hand in his pocket and take out a small
clasp-knife he always carried about with him. He brandished this in
their faces, when some bullies descended from the upper regions, and
the victim fortunately effected his escape into the street.
This man might have been robbed and subsequently drugged, without much
fear of discovery, for the subjoined statistics will prove that such
outrages are of frequent occurrence in the metropolis.
LARCENIES from the PERSON by Prostitutes, during the years 1850 to 1860.
Larcenies. Convicted. Total loss.
1850 684 116 £1,814
1851 640 98 1,890
1852 639 97 2,095
1853 605 112 1,578
1854 607 119 2,019
1855 688 96 3,017
1856 780 94 2,668
1857 854 79 2,928
1858 777 39 2,370
1859 681 93 1,743
1860 692 39 1,936
The first thing that strikes us in looking at these figures is the
small amount of convictions that followed arrest. For instance in
1850 out of 684 arrested only 116 were convicted. Yet we must not
forget the difficulty of proving a charge of this description, and
the unwillingness of men to prosecute. It is only natural that a man
should have a repugnance to appear in public and mix himself up in a
disgraceful affair of this sort. Any one who cared for his character
and reputation would at once refuse, and in this repugnance we must
look for the cause of the escape of so many offenders.
Whenever an occurrence of this sort takes place in a brothel, one would
imagine the police would have some grounds for prosecuting the keeper
for harbouring thieves and persons who habitually break the public
peace, but the criminal returns of the metropolitan police, from which
we have before quoted, do not give one reason to think so.
Let us examine the number of arrests for keeping common brothels,
during the last ten years.
NUMBER of PERSONS taken into custody for keeping Common Brothels,
during the years 1850 to 1860.
Females. Males. Total.
1850 4 4 = 8
1851 12 5 17
1852 4 6 10
1853 9 3 12
1854 none.
1855 6 4 10
1856 12 7 19
1857 6 8 14
1858 10 8 18
1859 9 9 18
1860 12 5 17
---
143
The largest number (19) was in 1856, while in 1854 there were none at
all. But we have already drawn attention to the difficulty the police
have in dealing with these cases.
Of those arrested:
1 was a clerk,
1 „ sailor,
13 were servants,
3 „ tailors,
1 was a printer,
1 was a sawyer,
1 „ interpreter,
1 „ cabinet-maker,
1 „ brass-founder,
1 „ green-grocer,
1 „ butcher,
2 were milliners,
3 „ laundresses,
9 „ labourers,
2 „ smiths,
6 „ carpenters,
3 „ general and marine store-dealers,
1 was a carver and gilder,
4 were shoemakers,
2 „ watch-makers,
2 „ painters,
3 „ bricklayers.
The rest were of no trade or occupation, and depended for a livelihood
solely upon this disgraceful means of subsistence.
It is odd to see butchers, printers, tailors, carpenters,
brass-founders, interpreters, bricklayers, and cabinet-makers combining
this with their own legitimate trades, and if this is a common thing
among the trades, how wide-spread the evil must be, for we have
only an average of about 12 arrests annually, and this very small
amount, with the perhaps light punishment awarded the offender by the
sitting magistrate, or if committed by the judge, is evidently purely
insufficient and ineffectual to act as a deterrent to others holding
the same demoralizing views, and practising the same odious profession.
A few pages back, while commenting upon crime amongst bawds and
prostitutes, we took the liberty of criticising some remarks of Dr.
Ryan’s about the prevalence of murder in immoral houses. The best proof
presumptive he could have adduced in support of his theory he utterly
neglected to bring forward. I mean the returns of the metropolitan
police of the number of persons reported to them annually as missing.
This return, so enormous, so mysterious, so startling, is certainly
very alarming before it is analysed. But when with the eye of
reflection we calmly and dispassionately look at it, our alarm
diminishes as rapidly as it was excited.
NUMBER OF PERSONS reported to the Police as lost or missing, and the
number found and restored by the Police, during the years 1841 to 1860.
Reported lost Restored by
or Missing. the Police.
1841 1,000 560
1842 1,179 623
1843 1,218 623
1844 1,111 543
1845 2,201 1,000
1846 2,489 1,082
1847 2,216 1,111
1848 1,866 1,009
1849 1,473 994
1850 2,204 1,137
1851 1,876 928
1852 2,103 1,049
1853 2,034 900
1854 2,286 941
1855 2,178 964
1856 2,371 1,084
1857 2,171 1,198
1858 2,409 1,264
1859 2,374 1,054
1860 2,515 1,164
For twenty years the number of persons reported lost, stolen, strayed,
and missing has been steadily increasing.
In 1841 it was 1,000
„ 1851 1,876
„ 1860 2,515
Of which
In 1841 560 were restored by the police.
„ 1851 928 „ „
„ 1860 1,164 „ „
Now unscrupulous statisticians and newsmongers would not hesitate to
say that the “Fleet Ditch” Dr. Ryan is so fond of might unfold a tale
that would elucidate the mystery.
It is surprising that in these enlightened days such monstrosities
should be listened to.
How many, I should like to know, disappear from home and enlist in the
army? How many run away to sea, and how many commit suicide?
A little reflection shows us that the tales of murder in immoral houses
are only bugbears conjured up by moralists to frighten children. Not
designedly perhaps, but more through ignorance than anything else.
Perhaps the number of suicides committed annually in London may be of
some use in reducing the number of lost and missing.
NUMBER OF SUICIDES committed during the years 1841 to 1860.
Year. Suicides committed. Year. Suicides committed.
1841 139 1851 120
1842 134 1852 109
1843 112 1853 131
1844 155 1854 118
1845 144 1855 116
1846 162 1856 127
1847 152 1857 154
1848 100 1858 90
1849 131 1859 180
1850 140 1860 104
I find also that the number of suicides prevented by the police, or
otherwise, is on an average nearly equal to the actual number of
suicides committed.
Many attempted suicides may not be genuine attempts; for we often hear
in the police courts of people endeavouring to make the public believe
they wished to destroy themselves, with the sole object of exciting
sympathy and drawing attention to their case. However, it is difficult
to distinguish, and it is clear there are annually many unhappy
wretches who do make away with their lives, and also numbers who are
providentially prevented.
Rape is a crime that has not fluctuated to any great extent during
the last ten years. I see that in 1850 there were 22 arrests for this
offence, and the same number in 1860. Most of the prisoners were in
a low station in life; 17 in 1850 only being able to read, or read
and write imperfectly, and 15 in 1860 were in the same unintellectual
position. In 1855, 21 individuals were given in charge, 16 of whom were
imperfectly instructed. It must be remembered that not all those who
were charged were convicted, or even committed for trial, because the
charge of rape is one easy to trump up, and it requires very sound and
unconflicting evidence to bring the charge home.
Concealing the births of infants is a crime I am glad to perceive
of more frequent occurrence, than feloniously attempting to procure
abortion; for of two evils it is better the less preponderate.
Concealing Feloniously attempting
Year. Birth of their to procure
Infants. Abortion.
1850 12 1
1855 10 1
1860 17 0
In 1860 there were 2 cases of abduction, and in 1850 none at all; but
in the latter year there were 61 cases of indecently exposing the
person, which offence had in 1860 attained the dimensions of 103, three
only, of which number were females, in the former instance eight.
Of course it is only natural to expect that as the population of the
empire increases, crime also will increase; and will more especially
show its hideous and unwelcome visage in the metropolis, the centre of
a vast and densely-populated kingdom. Where masses of men congregate,
there disorder, dissension, and crime will have a place. We have to
thank an efficient police force for keeping them within reasonable
dimensions.
I have already adverted to the difficulty experienced in even
approximating to the actual number of prostitutes existing; but the
magisterial authorities are enabled to catalogue and number those who
are known to the police and those living in brothels.
The subjoined table will be found extremely interesting:
-------------------+-------------------------------------
| Number known to the Police.
+------+------------+-----------------
Division | | | Who walk
and | | | the Streets.
Local Name. |Total.|Well dressed+--------+--------
| | who live in| Well | All
| | Brothels. |dressed.| others.
-------------------+------+------------+--------+--------
A or Whitehall | None.| None. | None. | None.
B or Westminster | 469 | 177 | 17 | 275
C or St. James | 208 | 58 | 150 |
D or St. Mary’bone | 428 | 143 | 133 | 152
E or Holborn | 511 | 173 | 58 | 280
F or Covent Garden | 428 | 50 | 204 | 174
G or Finsbury | 225 | 24 | 33 | 168
H or Whitechapel | 811 | 73 | 82 | 656
K or Stepney | 1015 | | 310 | 705
L or Lambeth | 657 | 147 | 207 | 303
M or Southwark | 661 | 53 | 140 | 468
N or Islington | 441 | 90 | 136 | 215
P or Camberwell | 222 | 44 | 96 | 82
R or Greenwich | 570 | 172 | 124 | 274
S or Hampstead | 331 | 14 | 56 | 261
T or Kensington | 97 | | 5 | 92
V or Wandsworth | 187 | 14 | 40 | 133
-------------------+------+------------+--------+--------
Totals |7,261 | 1,232 | 1,791 | 4,238
-------------------+------+------------+--------+--------
This is the latest return that the authorities at Whitehall are in
possession of. It will be seen that the largest number of prostitutes
are in Stepney; but the prostitution in this district, it would appear,
is of a low description, and mostly ambulatory, as no evidence of any
women living in brothels is given in the return.
The registered increase since 1857, is in most districts absolutely
nothing, whilst the decrease in many localities contrasts very
favourably indeed with the increase. For instance:--
-----------------------------+----------------------------
Increase since last return, | Decrease since last return,
made in July, 1857. | made in July, 1857.
-----------------------------+----------------------------
A None | A None
B | B 55
C | C 110
D | D 98
E | E 35
F | F 52
G | G 124
H | H 992
K | K 50
L | L 145
M | M 6
N | N 4
P | P 6
R 169 | R
S 100 | S
T | T 9
V | V 22
--- | -----
Total 269 | 1,708
-----------------------------+----------------------------
The police have thought it necessary to make special arrangements in
special localities, to prevent disorder and enforce the law.
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENTS of POLICE made, and at what places, to prevent
disorder and enforce the law.
------------------+-----------------------------
Division and Local|
Name. |
------------------+
A or Whitehall |Cockspur Street--an additional
| constable occasionally. St.
| James’s, Green, and Hyde
| Parks--additional constables
| during summer months.
------------------+------------------------------
C--St. James |Regent Street, Waterloo Place,
| Quadrant, Haymarket, and
| Coventry Street--four additional
| constables (and sometimes
| more) from 3 P.M. to
| 3 A.M., daily.
------------------+-------------------------------------
D--St. Marylebone |Oxford Street, Edgeware Road.
| Harrow Road, and Paddington
| Green--one additional
| constable from 7 P.M. to 6
| A.M., daily. Regent’s Park
| and Bayswater Road--two
| additional constables from 9
| A.M. to 6 A.M., following
| day. Portland Place--an
| additional constable from 10
| P.M. to 6 A.M.
------------------+-------------------------------------
E--Holborn | Lower Regent Street and Portland
| Place--one additional
| constable from 7 P.M. to 10
| P.M.; one ditto from 7 P.M.
| till 2 A.M.; two additional
| constables from 10 P.M. till
| 2 A.M., and a sergeant in
| plain clothes.
------------------+-------------------------------------
F--Covent Garden | Strand--a sergeant, and occasionally
| constables. Long
| Acre--a constable frequently.
------------------+-------------------------------------
H--Whitechapel | St. George’s Street and High
| Street, Whitechapel--a constable,
| and a short beat, each
| place.
------------------+-------------------------------------
L--Lambeth | Waterloo Road, Herbert’s Buildings,
| and Granby Street--an
| additional sergeant and two
| constables patrolling.
------------------+-------------------------------------
S--Hampstead |Regent’s Park--an additional
| constable to patrol. Primrose
| Hill--two additional constables
| for eight hours after
| Park constables go off duty.
------------------+-------------------------------------
COMPARATIVE RETURN of the NUMBER of PROSTITUTES known to the Police,
at four different periods, within the last seventeen years.
Division and Local| In | In | In | In
Name. | 1841| 1850| 1857| 1858
------------------+-----+-----+-----+-----
A or Whitehall | | | |
B „ Westminster | | 660| 524| 469
C „ St. James’s | | 390| 318| 208
D „ St. Marylebone| | 429| 526| 428
E „ Holborn | | 461| 546| 511
F „ Covent Garden | | 698| 480| 428
G „ Finsbury | | 320| 349| 225
H „ Whitechapel | | 474| 1803| 811
K „ Stepney | | 827| 965| 1015
L „ Lambeth | | 854| 802| 657
M „ Southwark | | 531| 667| 661
N „ Islington | | 457| 445| 441
P „ Camberwell | | 152| 228| 222
R „ Greenwich | | 288| 401| 570
S „ Hampstead | | 216| 231| 331
T „ Kensington | | 92| 106| 97
V „ Wandsworth | | 157| 209| 187
------------------+-----+-----+-----+-----
Totals | 6598| 7006| 8600| 7261
------------------+-----+-----+-----+-----
NOTE.--The total number only for 1841 can now be given.
These are the only statistics relative to prostitution that I have
been able to procure--indeed I may almost say they are the only
ones procurable; and for them I am indebted to the courtesy of the
authorities at Whitehall, who, during my researches, have most kindly
afforded me every facility that I could wish for.
I dare say that few things contribute so much to the spread of
immorality as the sale of indecent and obscene prints and books,
which were until lately so widely disseminated over the country by
book-hawkers and the filthy traders of Holywell Street. Even now this
trade is not entirely suppressed, although the police restrictions are
rigorous, and the punishments awarded severe.
Selling obscene prints and exposing for sale:--
In the year 1850 1
„ „ 1851 4
„ „ 1852 0
„ „ 1853 0
„ „ 1854 1
„ „ 1855 0
„ „ 1856 5
„ „ 1857 4
„ „ 1858 0
„ „ 1859 3
„ „ 1860 4
--
22
Recently a man called Dugdale, who has grown grey in this disgusting
occupation, was brought before a magistrate for selling obscene prints,
and also sending some to customers in the country. The magistrate
committed him for trial, when he was sent to prison for two years.
It is always more or less interesting to know the extent of instruction
among criminals, and with that idea in view I have put together the
annexed table, in which I have included all the offences that bear
directly and remotely upon the subject I am treating.
As regards the man Dugdale, and the sale of immoral publications,
obscene prints, &c., a long account of the prisoner’s antecedents was
given in the newspaper reports. He had been engaged in this infamous
and diabolical traffic nearly forty years, and had spent a great number
of them in prison at various times; tons weight of obscene books,
pictures, and plates had been seized upon his premises, and he was well
known to be the principal instrument for the dissemination of this sort
of pollution all over the country. The prosecution was instituted by
the meritorious Society for the Suppression of Vice. The judge made a
few brief but impressive observations upon the inconceivable enormity
of the prisoner’s offence, and the whole course of his life, which
he said had been one of vice, wickedness, infamy, and villainy, the
real extent of which words would fail to describe. From the records
of public proceedings for years past the Court had a knowledge of the
prisoner’s previous history, and it would be a waste of words and the
public time to say any thing further to such a person. He was liable
to three years’ hard-labour, but, considering his age, the Court would
refrain from going to extremity, but in the discharge of their duty
to society and the rising generation they felt bound to pass upon him
a severe sentence, which was that he be kept to hard labour for two
years.
TABLE SHOWING THE DEGREE OF INSTRUCTION OF THE PERSONS TAKEN INTO
CUSTODY DURING A PERIOD OF TEN YEARS--1850 TO 1860.
------------------------------------+------+------+--------+------------+--------+------------
| | | | Read only, | |
| | |Neither |or Read and |Read and| Superior
| | |Read nor| Write | Write |Instruction.
OFFENCES. |Years.|Total.| Write. |imperfectly.| well. |
------------------------------------+------+------+--------+------------+--------+------------
Concealing births of their infants | From | 167| 28 | 124 | 15 |
Feloniously attempting to procure 1850 | | | | |
abortion | to | 9| | 3 | 4 | 2
Rape | 1860.| 324| 44 | 226 | 97 | 1
Disorderly Prostitutes | |41,914| 10,134 | 30,921 | 784 | 75
Indecently exposing the person | | 1,155| 129 | 785 | 212 | 26
Keeping common Brothels | | 143| 22 | 81 | 40 |
Selling and exposing obscene prints | | 22| | 16 | 6 |
for sale | | | | | |
------------------------------------+------+------+--------+------------+--------+------------
Whilst I am dilating upon statistics it may not be inappropriate to
refer to certain figures and facts relating to the Midnight Meeting
movement.
By the courtesy of Mr. Theophilus Smith, secretary to the Midnight
Meeting movement, I have been furnished with the general statistical
results.
20 meetings have been held.
4,000 friendless young women heard the gospel.
23,000 Scripture cards, books, tracts, and Mr. Noel’s address at the
second meeting circulated.
89 females restored to friends.
75 placed in service.
81 in homes.
1 set up in business.
2 emigrated.
6 married.
1 sent to France.
1 to Holland.
1 to New-York.
30 left homes after a short residence.
---
287
Of this number (287) very many (upwards of thirty) have given evidence
of a change of heart.
56 restored at Liverpool.
50 „ Manchester.
130 „ Edinburgh.
30 „ Dundee.
35 „ Dublin.
17 „ Cardiff.
10 „ Ramsgate.
---
358
A total of 645, besides a large number who through the influence of the
movement have given up a life of sin, and sought a way of escape for
themselves. The committee have heard of many.
I append a list of the metropolitan homes and refuges.
1. British Penitent Female Refuge. Cambridge Heath, Hackney, N.E.
2. Female Temporary Home. 218, Marylebone Road, N.W.
3. Guardian Society. 12, North side of Bethnal Green, N.E.
4. Home for Friendless Young Females of Good Character. 17, New Ormond
Street, W.C.
5. Home for Penitent Females. White Lion Street, Islington, N.
6. Lock Asylum. Westbourne Green, Paddington.
7. London Diocesan Penitentiary. Park House, Highgate, N.
8. London Female Dormitory. 9, Abbey Road, St. John’s Wood.
9. London Female Penitentiary. 166, Pentonville Road, N.
10. London Female Preventive and Reformatory Institution. 200, Euston
Road, N.W., and 18, Cornwall Place, Holloway Road, N.
11. London Society for Protection of Young Females. Asylum, Tottenham,
N.; Office, 28, New Broad Street, E.C.
12. Magdalen Hospital. 115, Blackfriars Road, S.
13. Refuge for the Destitute. Manor House, Dalston, N.E.
14. Society for the Rescue of Young Women and Children. There are five
homes; the office at 11, Poultry, E.C.
15. South London Institution.
16. St. Marylebone Female Protection Society. 157, Marylebone Road, N.W.
17. St. James’ Home. Whetstone, Finchley Common, W.
18. Trinity Home. 9, Portland Road, Portland Place, W.
19. Westminster Female Refuge. 44, Vincent Square, S.W.
From February 1860 to February 1861, by contributions and collections
the Society, it appears from the balance sheet, received 2,924_l._
7_s._ 4_d._
TRAFFIC IN FOREIGN WOMEN.
One of the most disgraceful, horrible and revolting practices (not
even eclipsed by the slave-trade), carried on by Europeans is the
importation of girls into England from foreign countries to swell the
ranks of prostitution. It is only very recently that the attention of
Mr. Tyrrwhit, at the Marlborough Police Court, was drawn to the subject
by Mr. Dalbert, agent to the “Society for the Protection of Women and
Children.”
It is asserted that women are imported from Belgium, and placed
in houses of ill-fame, where they are compelled to support their
keepers in luxury and idleness by the proceeds of their dishonour.
One house in particular was mentioned in Marylebone; but the state
of the law respecting brothels is so peculiar that great difficulty
is experienced in extricating these unfortunate creatures from their
dreadful position. If it were proved beyond the suspicion of a doubt,
that they were detained against their will, the Habeas Corpus Act might
be of service to their friends, but it appears they are so jealously
guarded, that all attempts to get at them have hitherto proved futile,
although there is every reason to believe that energetic measures
will be taken by the above-mentioned Society to mitigate the evil and
relieve the victims.
As this traffic is clandestine, and conducted with the greatest
caution, it is impossible to form any correct idea of its extent. There
are numbers of foreign women about, but it is probable that many of
them have come over here of their own free-will, and not upon false
pretences or compulsion. One meets with French, Spanish, Italian,
Belgian, and other women.
The complaint made before the metropolitan magistrate a short while
since was in favour of Belgian women. But the traffic is not confined
to them alone. It would appear that the unfortunate creatures are
deluded by all sorts of promises and cajolery, and when they arrive
in this country are, in point of fact, imprisoned in certain houses
of ill-fame, whose keepers derive considerable emolument from their
durance. They are made to fetter themselves in some way or other to the
trepanner, and they, in their simple-mindedness, consider their deed
binding, and look upon themselves, until the delusion is dispelled, as
thoroughly in the power of their keepers.
English women are also taken to foreign parts by designing speculators.
The English are known to congregate at Boulogne, at Havre, at Dieppe,
at Ostend, and other places. It is considered lucrative by the keepers
of bawdy-houses at these towns to maintain an efficient supply of
English women for their resident countrymen: and though the supply is
inadequate to the demand, great numbers of girls are decoyed every
year, and placed in the “Maisons de passé,” or “Maisons de joie,”
as they are sometimes called, where they are made to prostitute
themselves. And by the farm of their persons enable their procurers to
derive considerable profit.
An Englishwoman told me how she was very nearly entrapped by a foreign
woman. “I met an emissary of a French bawdy-house,” she said, “one
night in the Haymarket, and, after conversing with her upon various
subjects, she opened the matter she had in hand, and, after a little
manœuvring and bush-beating, she asked me if I would not like to go
over to France. She specified a town, which was Havre. ‘You will get
lots of money’, she added, and further represented ‘that I should have
a very jolly time of it.’ ‘The money you make will be equally divided
between yourself and the woman of the house, and when you have made
as much as you want, you may come back to England and set up a café or
night-house, where your old friends will be only too glad to come and
see you. You will of course get lots of custom, and attain a better
future than you can now possibly hope for. You ought to look upon me
as the greatest friend you have, for I am putting a chance in your way
that does not occur every day, I can tell you. If you value your own
comfort, and think for a moment about your future, you cannot hesitate.
I have an agreement in my pocket, duly drawn up by a solicitor, so you
may rely upon its being all on the square, and if you sign this--’
“‘To-night?’ I asked.
“‘Yes, immediately. If you sign this, I will supply you with some money
to get what you want, and the day after to-morrow you shall sail for
Havre. Madame ---- is a very nice sort of person, and will do all in
her power to make you happy and comfortable, and indeed she will allow
you to do exactly as you please.’”
Fortunately for herself my informant refused to avail herself of
the flattering prospect so alluringly held out to her. The bait was
tempting enough, but the fish was too wary.
Now let us hear the recital of a girl who, at an early age, had been
incarcerated in one of these “Maisons de passé.” She is now in England,
has been in a refuge, and by the authorities of the charity placed in
an occupation which enables her to acquire a livelihood sufficient to
allow her to live as she had, up to that time, been accustomed to. Her
story I subjoin:--
“When I was sixteen years old, my father, who kept a public-house in
Bloomsbury, got into difficulties and became bankrupt. I had no mother,
and my relations, such as they were, insisted upon my keeping myself in
some way or other. This determination on their part thoroughly accorded
with my own way of thinking, and I did not for an instant refuse to do
so. It then became necessary to discover something by which I could
support myself. Service suggested itself to me and my friends, and we
set about finding out a situation that I could fill. They told me I was
pretty, and as I had not been accustomed to do anything laborious, they
thought I would make a very good lady’s maid. I advertised in a morning
paper, and received three answers to my advertisement. The first I went
to did not answer my expectations, and the second was moderately good;
but I resolved to go to the third, and see the nature of it before
I came to any conclusion. Consequently I left the second open, and
went to the third. It was addressed from a house in Bulstrode-street,
near Welbeck-street. I was ushered into the house, and found a foreign
lady waiting to receive me. She said she was going back to France,
and wished for an English girl to accompany her, as she infinitely
preferred English to French women. She offered me a high salary, and
told me my duties would be light; in fact by comparing her statement
of what I should have to do with that of the others I had visited, I
found that it was more to my advantage to live with her than with them.
So after a little consultation with myself, I determined to accept her
offer. No sooner had I told her so than she said in a soft tone of
voice--
“‘Then, my dear, just be good enough to sign this agreement between us.
It is merely a matter of form--nothing more, _ma chère_.”
“I asked her what it was about, and why it was necessary for me to sign
any paper at all?
“She replied, ‘Only for our mutual satisfaction. I wish you to remain
with me for one year, as I shall not return to England until then.
And if you hadn’t some agreement with me, to bind you as it were to
stay with me, why, _mon Dieu!_ you might leave me directly--oh! _c’est
rien_. You may sign without fear or trembling.’
“Hearing this explanation of the transaction, without reading over the
paper which was written on half a sheet of foolscap, (for I did not
wish to insult or offend her by so doing,) I wrote my name.
“She instantly seized the paper, held it to the fire for a moment or
two to dry, and folding it up placed it in her pocket.
“She then requested me to be ready to leave London with her on the
following Thursday, which allowed me two days to make my preparations
and to take leave of my friends, which I did in very good spirits, as
I thought I had a very fair prospect before me. It remained for what
ensued to disabuse me of that idea.
“We left the St. Katherine’s Docks in the steamer for Boulogne, and
instead of going to an hotel, as I expected, we proceeded to a private
house in the Rue N-- C--, near the Rue de l’Ecu. I have farther to tell
you that three other young women accompanied us. One was a housemaid,
one was a nursery governess, and the other a cook. I was introduced to
them as people that I should have to associate with when we arrived
at Madame’s house. In fact they were represented to be part of the
establishment; and they, poor things, fully believed they were,
being as much deluded as myself. The house that Madame brought us
to was roomy and commodious, and, as I afterwards discovered, well,
if not elegantly, furnished. We were shown into very good bedrooms,
much better than I expected would be allotted to servants; and when
I mentioned this to Madame, and thanked her for her kindness and
consideration, she replied with a smile:--
“‘Did I not tell you how well you would be treated? we do these things
better in France than they do in England.’
“I thanked her again as she was going away, but she said, ‘_Tais toi,
Tais toi_,’ and left me quite enchanted with her goodness.”
I need not expatiate on what subsequently ensued. It is easy to imagine
the horrors that the poor girl had to undergo. With some difficulty she
was conquered and had to submit to her fate. She did not know a word of
the language, and was ignorant of the only method she could adopt to
insure redress. But this she happily discovered in a somewhat singular
manner. When her way of living had become intolerable to her, she
determined to throw herself on the generosity of a young Englishman who
was in the habit of frequenting the house she lived in, and who seemed
to possess some sort of affection for her.
She confessed her miserable position to him, and implored him to
protect her or point out a means of safety. He at once replied, “The
best thing you can do is to go to the British Consul and lay your
case before him. He will in all probability send you back to your own
country.” It required little persuasion on her part to induce her
friend to co-operate with her. The main thing to be managed was to
escape from the house. This was next to impossible, as they were so
carefully watched. But they were allowed occasionally, if they did not
show any signs of discontent to go out for a walk in the town. The
ramparts surrounding the “_Haute Ville_” were generally selected by
this girl as her promenade, and when this privilege of walking out was
allowed her, she was strictly enjoined not to neglect any opportunity
that might offer itself. She arranged to meet her young friend there,
and gave him notice of the day upon which she would be able to go out.
If a girl who was so privileged chanced to meet a man known to the
_Bonne_ or attendant as a frequenter of the house, she retired to a
convenient distance or went back altogether. The plot succeeded, the
consul was appealed to and granted the girl a passport to return to
England, also offering to supply her with money to pay her passage
home. This necessity was obviated by the kindness of her young English
friend, who generously gave her several pounds, and advised her to
return at once to her friends.
Arrived in England, she found her friends reluctant to believe the
tale she told them, and found herself thrown on her own resources.
Without a character, and with a mind very much disturbed, she found
it difficult to do anything respectable, and at last had recourse to
prostitution;--so difficult is it to come back to the right path when
we have once strayed from it.
Perhaps it is almost impossible to stop this traffic; but at any
rate the infamous wretches who trade in it may be intimidated by
publicity being given to their acts, and the indignation of the public
being roused in consequence. What can we imagine more dreadful than
kidnapping a confiding unsuspecting girl, in some cases we may say
child, without exaggeration, for a girl of fifteen is not so very far
removed from those who come within the provisions of the Bishop of
Oxford’s Act? I repeat, what can be more horrible than transporting a
girl, as it were, by false representations from her native land to a
country of strangers, and condemning her against her will to a life of
the most revolting slavery and degradation, without her having been
guilty of any offence against an individual or against the laws of the
land?
It is difficult to believe that there can be many persons engaged in
this white slave-trade, but it is undeniably true.
It is not a question for the legislature; for what could Parliament
do? The only way to decrease the iniquity is to widely disseminate the
knowledge of the existence of such infamy, that those whom it most
nearly concerns, may be put upon their guard, and thus be enabled to
avoid falling into the trap so cunningly laid for them.
Much praise is due to those benevolent societies who interest
themselves in these matters, and especially to that which we have
alluded to more than once--“The Society for the Protection of Women and
Children,” over which Lord Raynham presides.
Much good may be done by this means, and much misery prevented. The
mines of Siberia, with all their terrors, would be preferred--even with
the knout in prospective--by these poor girls, were the alternative
proffered them, to the wretched life they are decoyed into leading. For
all their hopes are blasted, all their feelings crushed, their whole
existence blighted, and their life rendered a misery to them instead
of a blessing and a means of rational enjoyment.
The idea of slavery of any kind is repulsive to the English mind;
but when that slavery includes incarceration, and mental as well as
physical subjection to the dominant power by whom that durance is
imposed, it becomes doubly and trebly repugnant. If it were simply
the deprivation of air and exercise, or even the performance of the
most menial offices, it might be borne with some degree of resignation
by the sufferer, however unmerited the punishment. But here we have
a totally different case: no offence is committed by the victim,
but rather by nature, for what is her fault, but being pretty and
a woman? For this caprice of the genius of form who presided over
her birth she is condemned to a life of misery, degradation, and
despair; compelled to receive caresses that are hateful to her, she
is at one moment the toy of senile sensuality, and at others of
impetuous juvenility, both alike loathsome, both alike detestable. If
blandishments disgust her, words of endearment only make her state of
desolation more palpable; while profusions of regard serve to aggravate
the poignancy of her grief, all around her is hollow, all artificial
except her wretchedness. When to this is added ostracism--banishment
from one’s native country--the condition of the unfortunate woman is
indeed pitiable, for there is some slight consolation in hearing one’s
native language spoken by those around us, and more especially to the
class from which these girls are for the most part taken. We must add
“_pour comble d’injustice_,” that there is no future for the girl,
no reprieve, no hope of mercy, every hope is gone from the moment the
prison tawdry is assumed. The condemnation is severe enough, for it is
for life. When her beauty and her charms no longer serve to attract
the libidinous, she sinks into the condition of a servant to others
who have been ensnared to fill her place. Happiness cannot be achieved
by her at any period of her servitude; there must always be a restless
longing for the end, which though comparatively quick in arriving is
always too tardy.
The mind in time in many cases becomes depraved, and the hardness of
heart that follows this depravity often prevents the girl from feeling
as acutely as she did at first. To these religion is a dead letter,
which is a greater and additional calamity. But to be brief, the
victim’s whole life from first to last is a series of disappointments,
combined with a succession of woes that excite a shudder by their
contemplation, and which may almost justify the invocation of Death:--
“Death, Death, oh amiable lovely death!
Thou odoriferous stench! sound rottenness!
Arise forth from the couch of lasting night,
Thou hate and terror to prosperity,
And I will kiss thy detestable bones;
And put my eyeballs in thy vaulty brows;
And ring these fingers with thy household worms;
And stop this gap of breath with fulsome dust,
And be a carrion monster like thyself;
Come, grin on me; and I will think thou smil’st,
And kiss thee as thy wife! Misery’s love,
O, come to me!”
SHAKESPERE, _King John_, Act iii. Scene 4.
THIEVES AND SWINDLERS.
INTRODUCTION.
In tracing the geography of a river it is interesting to go to its
source, possibly a tiny spring in the cleft of a rock in some mountain
glen. You follow its windings, observing each tributary which flows
into its gathering flood until it discharges its waters into the sea.
We proceed in a similar manner to treat of the thieves and swindlers of
the metropolis.
Thousands of our felons are trained from their infancy in the bosom of
crime; a large proportion of them are born in the homes of habitual
thieves and other persons of bad character, and are familiarized with
vice from their earliest years; frequently the first words they lisp
are oaths and curses. Many of them are often carried to the beershop or
gin palace on the breast of worthless drunken mothers, while others,
clothed in rags, run at their heels or hang by the skirts of their
petticoats. In their wretched abodes they soon learn to be deceitful
and artful, and are in many cases very precocious. The greater number
are never sent to school; some run idle about the streets in low
neighbourhoods: others are sent out to beg throughout the city; others
go out with their mothers and sit beside their stalls; while others
sell a handful of matches or small wares in our public thoroughfares.
One day, in going down a dark alley in the Borough, near Horsemonger
Lane Gaol, we saw a little boy--an Irish cockney, who had been tempted
to steal by other boys he was in the habit of associating with. He was
stripped entirely naked, and was looking over a window on the first
floor with a curious grin on his countenance. His mother had kept his
clothes from him that day as a punishment for stealing, and to prevent
him getting out of the house while she went out to her street-stall.
In our brief sketch of the criminals of the metropolis, we have in the
outset directed our attention to the sneaks or common thieves--by far
the larger number of our criminal population--from whose ranks the
expert pickpockets and the ingenious and daring burglars in most cases
emerge. We have treated of the incipient stage of thieving, when the
child of five or six years of age steals an apple, or an orange, or a
handful of nuts from a stall, or an old pair of boots from a shop door,
and then traced the after-stages of more daring crime.
There are thousands of neglected children loitering about the low
neighbourhoods of the metropolis, and prowling about the streets,
begging and stealing for their daily bread. They are to be found in
Westminster, Whitechapel, Shoreditch, St. Giles’s, New Cut, Lambeth,
the Borough, and other localities. Hundreds of them may be seen leaving
their parents’ homes and low lodging-houses every morning sallying
forth in search of food and plunder. They are fluttering in rags and
in the most motley attire. Some are orphans and have no one to care
for them; others have left their homes and live in lodging-houses
in the most improvident manner, never thinking of to-morrow; others
are sent out by their unprincipled parents to beg and steal for a
livelihood; others are the children of poor but honest and industrious
people, who have been led to steal through the bad companionship
of juvenile thieves. Many of them have never been at a day-school
nor attended a Sunday or ragged-school, and have had no moral or
religious instruction. On the contrary, they have been surrounded by
the most baneful and degrading influences, and have been set a bad
example by their parents and others with whom they came in contact,
and are shunned by the honest and industrious classes of society. The
chief agencies which have tended to ameliorate their condition are
the ragged-schools, where they receive sound secular and religious
instruction; the shoeblacks’ brigades, where they are trained in habits
of honest industry; and the juvenile reformatories, which have been
instituted for their moral and social elevation.
Many of them are hungry, and have no food to eat nor money to purchase
it, and readily steal when they find a suitable opportunity. Not having
received the benefit of a sound moral training, they have not the
conscientious scruples possessed by the children of honest parents;
their only care is to avoid being detected in their felonies. When they
successfully steal some article from a stall or shop-door, or rifle a
till by entering the shop, they are congratulated on their expertness
by their companions, and enjoy a larger share of plunder.
The public streets of the metropolis are regarded by these ragged
little felons and the children of honest industrious parents in a
very different aspect. The latter walk the streets with their eyes
sparkling with wonder and delight at the beautiful and grand sights of
the metropolis. They are struck with the splendour of the shops and the
elegance and stateliness of the public buildings, and with the dense
crowds of people of various orders, and trains of vehicles thronging
the streets. These little ragged thieves walk along the streets with
very different emotions. They, too, in their own way, enjoy the sights
and sounds of London. Amid the busy crowds many of them are to be seen
sitting in groups on the pavement or loitering about in good-humour and
merriment; yet ever and anon their keen roguish eyes sparkle as they
look into the windows of the confectioners’, bakers’, and greengrocers’
shops, at the same time keeping a sharp eye on the policeman as he
passes on his beat.
These juvenile thieves find an ample field for plunder at the stalls
and shop-doors in Whitechapel, Shoreditch, Edgeware Road, and similar
localities, where many articles are exposed for sale, which can be
easily disposed of to some of the low fences. In this manner thousands
of our felons are trained to be expert and daring in crime, and are
frequently tried and convicted before the Police Courts.
This is the main source of the habitual felons of the metropolis. As
these boys and girls grow up they commence a system of sneaking thefts
over the metropolis, some purloining in shops, others gliding into
areas and lobbies on various pretences, stealing articles from the
kitchen, and when opportunity occurs carrying off the plate.
As these young felons advance in years they branch off into three
different classes, determined partly by their natural disposition and
personal qualities, and partly by the circumstances in which they are
placed. Many of them continue through life to sneak as common thieves,
others become expert pickpockets, and some ultimately figure as
burglars.
A vast number of juvenile thieves as they grow up continue to carry
on a system of petty felonies over the metropolis, and reside in the
lowest neighbourhoods. Some pretend to sell laces and small wares to
get a pretext to call at the houses of labouring people and tradesmen,
and to go down the areas and enter the lobbies in fashionable streets.
In addition to the paltry profits arising from these sales they get
a livelihood by begging, and as a matter of course do not scruple to
steal when they can find an opportunity.
These common thieves are of both sexes, and of various ages, and are
often characterized by mental imbecility and low cunning. Many of them
are lazy in disposition and lack energy both of body and mind. They go
out daily in vast shoals over the metropolis picking up a miserable and
precarious livelihood, sometimes committing felonies in the houses they
visit of considerable value.
The pickpockets are of various ages and of different degrees of
proficiency, from the little ragged urchin in St. Giles’s stealing
a handkerchief at the tail of a gentleman’s coat, to the elegantly
dressed and expert pickpocket promenading in the West-end and attending
fashionable assemblies. Some are dressed as mechanics, others as
clerks, some as smart business men, and others in fashionable attire.
They are to be found on all public occasions, some of them clumsy and
timid, others daring and most expert. Many of them continue to pursue
this class of felonies in preference to any other. They receive a
considerable accession to their numbers by young women, frequently
servants who have been seduced, and cohabit with burglars, pickpockets,
and others, and who are trained to this infamous profession, and in
many cases are shoplifters.
Many are trained to commit housebreaking and burglaries from fourteen
to fifteen years of age. Boys are occasionally employed to enter
through fanlights and windows, and to assist otherwise in plundering
dwellings and shops. Some of them commit burglaries of small value in
working neighbourhoods, where comparatively little ingenuity and skill
are required, others plunder shops and warehouses and fashionable
dwellings, which is generally done with greater care and ingenuity, and
where the booty is often of higher value.
In addition to the three classes we have named, the common thief, the
pickpocket, and the burglar, there is another class of low ruffians who
frequently cohabit with low women and prostitutes, and commit highway
robberies. They often follow these degraded females on the streets,
and attack persons who accost them, believing them to be prostitutes.
At other times they garotte men on the street at midnight, or in the
by-streets in the evening, and plunder them with violence. This class
of persons are generally hardened in crime, and many of them are
returned convicts.
The habitual crime of the female portion of the community is in most
cases associated with prostitution. We learn from statistics collected
by the metropolitan constabulary for 1860, that there are nearly 7000
open prostitutes or street-walkers in London, three fourths of whom we
have reason to believe are addicted to stealing. While many of these
belong to our native-born felon population, a large proportion have
been seduced from the ranks of honest and industrious people in London,
or have come up from the provinces, while a few of them are from the
Continent.
We believe that the most effective means of checking the crime of the
metropolis is to have an efficient machinery of ragged schools in those
low neighbourhoods, where neglected children are to be found, similar
to the ragged school in George’s Yard, and to train them in honest
employment, as in the shoeblack brigades or industrial schools.
We learn from the statistics of the constabulary of the metropolis that
juvenile crime has been considerably reduced within the past ten years.
Several of our police inspectors have laboured with untiring industry
to reform the lodging-houses and to introduce cleanliness and decency,
where immorality and filth formerly prevailed. And noble exertions have
been made by Christian societies to illumine these dark localities with
the light of Christian truth.
Yet much still remains to be done. And it is a problem worthy of our
highest and wisest statesmen to consider whether adequate means to
elevate this abandoned class are to be provided by voluntary effort, or
by the paternal care of our Government from the public treasury.
It is far easier to train the young in virtuous and industrious habits,
than to reform the grown-up felon who has become callous in crime,
and it is besides far more profitable to the State. To neglect them
or inadequately to attend to their welfare gives encouragement to the
growth of this dangerous class. On the other hand how noble the aim,
to adopt wise and vigorous measures to provide for these children of
adversity and misfortune, and to transform them into useful members of
society!
Our national reformatories are very useful in reclaiming those
juveniles who have fallen into crime; but ragged schools efficiently
conducted would be of still higher value--as prevention is better than
cure. In providing those noble machineries by voluntary effort, or by
the State, we would wisely act as the minister of Divine Providence,
and would thereby promote the best interests and prosperity of our
country.
We have also endeavoured to give a cursory sketch of the swindlers
of the metropolis, who are generally of a different class from our
felon population. They consist of persons embezzling the property
of their employers; of sharpers plundering their dupes by tricks at
card-playing, skittles, or otherwise; and of rogues abstracting the
property of the public by false pretences. Many of these formerly
belonged to the ranks of the honest and industrious working and
middle-classes, and not a few of them are well connected, and have
lived in fashionable society. By improvidence, extravagance, or
dissipation, they have squandered their means, and have now basely
adopted a course of systematic dishonesty rather than lead an
industrious life. Some of them have led a fast life in the metropolis,
and are persons of ruined fortune. Others are indolent in disposition,
and carry on a subtle system of public robbery rather than pursue some
honest occupation or calling.
It may throw considerable light on the crime of London to look to
the criminal statistics of the Metropolitan Police Force. We find a
statement of those who were apprehended or proceeded against in the
year ending 29th September, 1860.
Under the class of persons proceeded against on indictment there are:--
Known thieves 813
Prostitutes 159
Suspected characters 1,440
-----
2,412
Under the class of persons proceeded against summarily there are:--
Known thieves 2,850
Prostitutes 7,381
Vagrants, tramps, &c. 2,888
Suspicious characters 7,044
Habitual drunkards 3,661
------
23,824
A number of these parties have appeared repeatedly before the Police
Courts during the year.
In the return for the month of September, 1860, we find the following
statement of depredators, offenders, and suspected persons at large
within the districts of the police:--
Known thieves and depredators 2,906
Prostitutes 6,881
Suspicious characters 1,770
Vagrants and tramps 1,461
------
In all, 3,018
The average number of persons roaming as thieves over the metropolis
committing depredations may be safely estimated at from 12,000 to
15,000; a huge army living on the industry of the community.
The amount of property abstracted
in the metropolitan districts for the
year 1860 £62,095
Ditto ditto in the City 9,508
-------
£71,603
This does not give the full amount of the depredations committed by the
robbers of the metropolis, as many felonies are not included in the
police returns.
In writing this account of the state of crime in London, we have
received valuable assistance throughout from the city and metropolitan
police force. We have to acknowledge our obligations generally to Sir
Richard Mayne and Mr. Yardley at Scotland Yard, and specially to Mr.
Jones, of Tower Street Police Station, Lambeth, for information on
common thieves; to Mr. Whyte of Marylebone Station on skeleton-key
and attic thieves; to Serjeant McVitti of Hoxton; Mr. Ackrill of
Fleet Street, and Mr. Jones of Tower Street on pickpockets; to
Inspector Foulger of the City police; Mr. Knight, of Fleet Street, and
Serjeant Potter of Paddington Station on burglars, forgers, magsmen
and skittle-sharps; to Mr. Brennan on coiners; to Inspector Broad
of Spitalfields Station on highway robbers; to Inspector Hunt on
embezzlers; to Mr. Stubbs on swindlers; and to numerous other officers
of the city and metropolitan police for their generous and cordial aid.
THE SNEAKS, OR COMMON THIEVES.
The common thief is not distinguished for manual dexterity and
accomplishment, like the pickpocket or mobsman, nor for courage,
ingenuity, and skill, like the burglar, but is characterized by low
cunning and stealth--hence he is termed the _Sneak_, and is despised by
the higher classes of thieves.
There are various orders of Sneaks--from the urchin stealing an apple
at a stall, to the man who enters a dwelling by the area or an attic
window and carries off the silver plate.
In treating of the various classes of common thieves and their
different modes of felony, we shall first treat of the juvenile thieves
and their delinquencies, and notice the other classes in their order,
according to the progressive nature and aggravation of their crime.
_Street-stalls._--In wandering along Whitechapel we see ranges of
stalls on both sides of the street, extending from the neighbourhood of
the Minories to Whitechapel church. Various kinds of merchandize are
exposed to sale. There are stalls for fruit, vegetables, and oysters.
There are also stalls where fancy goods are exposed for sale--combs,
brushes, chimney-ornaments, children’s toys, and common articles of
jewellery. We find middle-aged women standing with baskets of firewood,
and Cheap Johns selling various kinds of Sheffield cutlery, stationery,
and plated goods.
It is an interesting sight to saunter along the New Cut, Lambeth, and
to observe the street stalls of that locality. Here you see some old
Irish woman, with apples and pears exposed on a small board placed on
the top of a barrel, while she is seated on an upturned bushel basket
smoking her pipe.
Alongside you notice a deal board on the top of a tressel, and an Irish
girl of 18 years of age seated on a small three-legged stool, shouting
in shrill tones “Apples, fine apples, ha’penny a lot!”
You find another stall on the top of two tressels, with a larger
quantity of apples and pears, kept by a woman who sits by with a child
at her breast.
In another place you see a costermonger’s barrow, with large green
and yellow piles of fruit of better quality than the others, and a
group of boys and girls assembled around him as he smartly disposes of
pennyworths to the persons passing along the street.
Outside a public-house you see a young man, humpbacked, with a basket
of herrings and haddocks standing on the pavement, calling “Yarmouth
herrings--three a-penny!” and at the door of a beershop with the sign
of the “Pear Tree” we find a miserable looking old woman selling
cresses, seated on a stool with her feet in an old basket.
As we wander along the New Cut during the day, we do not see so many
young thieves loitering about; but in the evening when the lamps are
lit, they steal forth from their haunts, with keen roguish eye, looking
out for booty. We then see them loitering about the stalls or mingling
among the throng of people in the street, looking wistfully on the
tempting fruit displayed on the stalls.
These young Arabs of the city have a very strange and motley
appearance. Many of them are only 6 or 7 years of age, others 8 or 10.
Some have no jacket, cap, or shoes, and wander about London with their
ragged trowsers hung by one brace; some have an old tattered coat, much
too large for them, without shoes and stockings, and with one leg of
the trowsers rolled up to the knee; others have on an old greasy grey
or black cap, with an old jacket rent at the elbows, and strips of the
lining hanging down behind; others have on an old dirty pinafore; while
some have petticoats. They are generally in a squalid and unwashed
condition, with their hair clustered in wild disorder like a mop, or
hanging down in dishevelled locks,--in some cases cropped close to the
head.
Groups of these ragged urchins may be seen standing at the corners of
the streets and in public thoroughfares, with blacking-boxes slung on
their back by a leathern belt, or crouching in groups on the pavement;
or we may occasionally see them running alongside of omnibuses, cabs,
and hansoms, nimbly turning somersaults on the pavement as they scamper
along, and occasionally walking on their hands with their feet in the
air in our fashionable streets, to the merriment of the passers-by.
Most of them are Irish cockneys, which we can observe in their features
and accent--to which class most of the London thieves belong. They are
generally very acute and ready-witted, and have a knowing twinkle in
their eye which exhibits the precocity of their minds.
As we ramble along the New Cut in the dusk, mingled in the throng on
the crowded street, chiefly composed of working people, the young
ragged thieves may be seen stealing forth: their keen eye readily
recognizes the police-officers proceeding in their rounds, as well as
the detective officers in their quiet and cautious movements. They
seldom steal from costermongers, but frequently from the old women’s
stalls. One will push an old woman off her seat--perhaps a bushel
basket, while the others will steal her fruit or the few coppers lying
on her stall. This is done by day as well as by night, but chiefly in
the dusk of the evening.
They generally go in a party of three or four, sometimes as many as
eight together. Watching their opportunity, they make a sudden snatch
at the apples or pears, or oranges or nuts, or walnuts, as the case may
be, then run off, with the cry of “stop thief!” ringing in their ears
from the passers-by. These petty thefts are often done from a love of
mischief rather than from a desire for plunder.
When overtaken by a police-officer, they in general readily go with
him to the police-station. Sometimes the urchin will lie down in the
street and cry “let me go!” and the bystanders will take his part. This
is of frequent occurrence in the neighbourhood of the New-cut and the
Waterloo-road--a well-known rookery of young thieves in London.
By the petty thefts at the fruit-stalls they do not gain much
money--seldom so much as to get admittance to the gallery of the
Victoria Theatre, which they delight to frequent. They are particularly
interested in the plays of robberies, burglaries, and murders performed
there, which are done in melodramatic style. There are similar
fruit-stalls in the other densely populated districts of the metropolis.
In the Mile-end-road, and New North-road, and occasionally in
other streets in different localities of London, common jewellery
is exposed for sale, consisting of brooches, rings, bracelets,
breast-pins, watch-chains, eye-glasses, ear-rings and studs, &c. There
are also stalls for the sale of china, looking-glasses, combs, and
chimney-ornaments. The thefts from these are generally managed in this
way:--
One goes up and looks at some trifling article in company with
his associates. The party in charge of the stall--generally a
woman--knowing their thieving propensity, tells them to go away; which
they decline to do. When the woman goes to remove him, another boy
darts forward at the other end of the stall and steals some article of
jewellery, or otherwise, while her attention is thus distracted.
These juvenile thieves are chiefly to be found in Lucretia-street,
Lambeth; Union-street, Borough-road; Gunn-street, and Friars-street,
Blackfriars-road; also at Whitechapel, St. Giles’s, Drury-lane, Somers
Town, Anderson Grove, and other localities.
The statistics connected with this class of felonies will be given when
we come to treat on “Stealing from the doors and windows of shops.”
_Stealing from the Tills._--This is done by the same class of boys,
generally by two or three, or more, associated together. It is
committed at any hour of the day, principally in the evening, and
generally in the following way: One of the boys throws his cap into the
shop of some greengrocer or other small dealer, in the absence of the
person in charge; another boy, often without shoes or stockings, creeps
in on his hands and knees as if to fetch it, being possibly covered
from without by some of the boys standing beside the shop-door, who
is also on the look-out. Any passer-by seeing the cap thrown in would
take no particular notice in most cases, as it merely appears to be a
thoughtless boyish frolic. Meantime the young rogue within the shop
crawls round the counter to the till, and rifles its contents.
If detected, he possibly says, “Let me go; I have done nothing. That
boy who is standing outside and has just run away threw in my bonnet,
and I came to fetch it.” When discovered by the shopkeeper, the boy
will occasionally be allowed to get away, as the loss may not be known
till afterwards.
Sometimes one of these ragged urchins watches a favourable opportunity
and steals from the till while his comrade is observing the movements
of the people passing by and the police, without resorting to the
ingenious expedient of throwing in the cap.
The shop tills are generally rifled by boys, in most cases by two or
more in company; this is only done occasionally. It is confined chiefly
to the districts where the working classes reside.
In some cases, though rarely, a lad of 17 or 19 years of age or
upwards, will reach his hand over the counter to the till, in the
absence of the person in charge of the shop.
These robberies are not very numerous, and are of small collective
value.
_Stealing from the Doors and Windows of Shops._--In various shopping
districts of London we see a great variety of goods displayed for sale
at the different shop-doors and windows, and on the pavement in front
of the shops of brokers, butchers, grocers, milliners, &c.
Let us take a picture from the New-cut, Lambeth. We observe many
brokers’ shops along the street, with a heterogenous assortment of
household furniture, tables, chairs, looking-glasses, plain and
ornamental, cupboards, fire-screens, &c., ranged along the broad
pavement; while on tables are stores of carpenters’ tools in great
variety, copper-kettles, brushes, and bright tin pannikins, and other
articles.
We see the dealer standing before his door, with blue apron, hailing
the passer-by to make a purchase. Upon stands on the pavement at each
side of his shop-door are cheeses of various kinds and of different
qualities, cut up into quarters and slices, and rashers of bacon lying
in piles in the open windows, or laid out on marble slabs. On deal
racks are boxes of eggs, “fresh from the country,” and white as snow,
and large pieces of bacon, ticketed as of “fine flavour,” and “very
mild.”
Alongside is a milliner’s shop with the milliner, a smart young woman,
seated knitting beneath an awning in front of her door. On iron and
wooden rods, suspended on each side of the door-way, are black and
white straw bonnets and crinolines, swinging in the wind; while on
the tables in front are exposed boxes of gay feathers, and flowers of
every tint, and fronts of shirts of various styles, with stacks of
gown-pieces of various patterns.
A green-grocer stands by his shop with a young girl of 17 by his side.
On each side of the door are baskets of apples, with large boxes of
onions and peas. Cabbages are heaped at the front of the shop, with
piles of white turnips and red carrots.
Over the street is a furniture wareroom. Beneath the canvas awning
before the shop are chairs of various kinds, straw-bottomed and seated
with green or puce-coloured leather, fancy looking-glasses in gilt
frames, parrots in cages, a brass-mounted portmanteau, and other
miscellaneous articles. An active young shopman is seated by the
shop-door, in a light cap and dark apron--with newspaper in hand.
Near the Victoria Theatre we notice a second-hand clothes store. On
iron rods suspended over the doorway we find trowsers, vests, and coats
of all patterns and sizes, and of every quality dangling in the wind;
and on small wooden stands along the pavement are jackets and coats of
various descriptions. Here are corduroy jackets, ticketed “15_s._ and
16_s._ made to order.” Corduroy trowsers warranted “first rate,” at
7_s._ 6_d._ Fustian trowsers to order for 8_s._ 6_d._; while dummies
are ranged on the pavement with coats buttoned upon them, inviting us
to enter the shop.
In the vicinity we see stalls of workmen’s iron tools of various
kinds--some old and rusty, others bright and new.
Thefts are often committed from the doors and windows of these shops
during the day, in the temporary absence of the person in charge. They
are often seen by passers-by, who take no notice, not wishing to attend
the police court, as they consider they are insufficiently paid for it.
The coat is usually stolen from the dummy in this way: one boy is
posted on the opposite side of the street to see if a police-officer
is in sight, or a policeman in plain clothes, who might detect the
depredation. Another stands two or three yards from the shop. The third
comes up to the dummy, and pretends to look at the quality of the coat
to throw off the suspicion of any bystander or passer-by. He then
unfastens the button, and if the shopkeeper or any of his assistants
come out, he walks away. If he finds that he is not seen by the people
in the shop, he takes the coat off the dummy and runs away with it.
If seen, he will not return at that time, but watches some other
convenient opportunity. When the young thief is chased by the
shopkeeper, his two associates run and jostle him, and try to trip him
up, so as to give their companion an opportunity of escaping. This
is generally done at dusk, in the winter time, when thieving is most
prevalent in those localities.
In stealing a piece of bacon from the shop-doors or windows, they wait
till the shopman turns his back, when they take a piece of bacon or
cheese in the same way as in the case alluded to. This is commonly done
by two or more boys in company.
Handkerchiefs at shop-doors are generally stolen by one of the boys and
passed to another who runs off with it. When hotly chased, they drop
the handkerchief and run away.
These young thieves are the ragged boys formerly noticed, varying from
9 to 14 years of age, without shoes or stockings. Their parents are of
the lowest order of Irish cockneys, or they live in low lodging-houses,
where they get a bed for 2_d._ or 3_d._ a night, with crowds of others
as destitute as themselves.
There are numbers of young women of 18 years of age and upwards, Irish
cockneys, belonging to the same class, who steal from these shop-doors.
They are poorly dressed, and live in some of the lowest streets in
Surrey and Middlesex, but chiefly in the Borough and the East end.
Some of them are dressed in a clean cotton dress, shabby bonnet and
faded shawl, and are accompanied by one or more men, costermongers
in appearance. They steal rolls of printed cotton from the outside
of linen drapers’ shops, rolls of flannel, and of coarse calico,
hearthrugs and rolls of oilskin and table-covers; and from brokers’
shops they carry off rolls of carpet, fenders, tire-irons, and other
articles, exposed in and around the shop-door. The thefts of these
women are of greater value than those committed by the boys. They
belong to the felon-class and are generally expert thieves.
The mode in which they commit these thefts is by taking advantage of
the absence of the person in charge of the shop, or when his back is
turned. It is done very quickly and dexterously, and they are often
successful in carrying away articles such as those named without any
one observing them.
Another class of Sneaks, who steal from the outsides of shops, are
women more advanced in life than those referred to,--some middle-aged
and others elderly. Some of them are thieves, or the companions of
thieves, and others are the wives of honest, hard-working mechanics
and labouring men, who spend their money in gin and beer at various
public-houses.
These persons go and look over some pieces of bacon or meat outside of
butchers’ shops; they ask the price of it, sometimes buy a small piece
and steal a large one, but more frequently buy none. They watch the
opportunity of taking a large piece which they slip into their basket
and carry to some small chandler’s shop in a low neighbourhood, where
they dispose of it at about a fourth of its value.
We have met some thieves of this order, basket in hand, returning from
Drury Lane, who were pointed out to us by a detective officer.
The mechanics’ and labourers’ wives in many cases leave their homes in
the morning for the purpose of purchasing their husband’s dinner. They
meet with other women fond of drink like themselves. They meet, for
example, outside the “Plumb Tree,” or such-like public-house, and join
their money together to buy beer or gin. After partaking of it, they
leave the house, and remain for some time outside conversing together.
They again join their money and return to the public-house, and have
some additional liquor: leave the house and separate. Some of them join
with other parties fond of liquor as they did with the former. One says
to the other: “I have no money, otherwise we would have a drop of gin.
I have just met Mrs. So-and-so, and spent nearly all my money.” The
other may reply: “I have not much to get the old man’s dinner, but we
can have a quartern of gin.” After getting the liquor, they separate.
The tradesman’s wife, finding that she has spent nearly the whole of
her money, goes to a cheesemonger’s or butcher’s shop, and steals a
piece of meat, or bacon, for the purpose of placing it before her
husband for dinner, perhaps selling the remainder of the booty at shops
in low neighbourhoods, or to lodging-houses.
Such cases frequently occur, and are brought before the police-courts.
These persons sometimes steal flat-irons for ironing clothes at the
brokers’ shop-doors, which they carry to other pawnbrokers if not
detected. At other times they take them to the leaving-shop of an
unlicensed pawnbroker. On depositing them, they get a small sum of
money. These leaving-shops are in the lowest localities, and take in
articles pawnbrokers would refuse. They are open on Sundays, and at
other times when no business is done in pawnbrokers’ shops.
These shops are well known to the police, and give great assistance to
these Sneaks in disposing of their stolen property.
A considerable number of depredations are committed at the doors of
shoemakers’ shops. They are committed by women of the lower orders, of
all ages, some of them very elderly. They come up to the door as tho’
they were shopping, attired generally in an old bonnet and faded shawl.
The shoes are hanging inside the door, suspended from an iron rod by a
piece of string, and are sometimes hanging on a bar outside the shop.
These parties are much of the same order of thieves already described,
possibly many of them the mothers and some the grandmothers of the
ragged boys referred to. The greater number of them are Irish cockneys.
They come up to the shop-door generally in the afternoon, as if
to examine the quality of the shoes or boots, but seldom make any
purchase. They observe how the articles are suspended and the best
mode of abstracting them. They return in the dusk of the evening and
steal them.
The shops from which these robberies are committed are to be
found in Lambeth-walk, New-cut, Lower Marsh, Lambeth, Tottenham
Court-road, Westminster, Drury-lane, the neighbourhood of St. Giles’s,
Petticoat-lane, Spitalfields, Whitecross-street, St. Luke’s, and other
localities.
Small articles are occasionally taken from shop windows in the winter
evenings, by means of breaking a pane of glass in a very ingenious way.
These thefts are committed at the shops of confectioners, tobacconists,
and watchmakers, &c., in the quiet by-streets.
Sometimes they are done by the younger ragged-boys, but in most cases
by lads of 14 and upwards, belonging to the fraternity of London
thieves.
In the dark winter evenings we may sometimes see groups of these ragged
boys, assembled around the windows of a small grocery-shop, looking
greedily at the almond-rock, lollipops, sugar-candy, barley-sugar,
brandy-balls, pies, and tarts, displayed in all their tempting
sweetness and in all their gaudy tints. They insert the point of
a knife or other sharp instrument into the corner or side of the
pane, then give it a wrench, when the pane cracks in a semicircular
starlike form around the part punctured. Should a piece of glass large
enough to admit the hand not be sufficiently loosened, they apply the
sharp instrument at another place in the pane, when the new cracks
communicate with the rents already made; on applying a sticking-plaster
to the pane, the piece readily adheres to it, and is abstracted. The
thief inserts his hand through an opening in the window, seizes a
handful of sweets or other goods, and runs away, perhaps followed by
the shopman in full chase. These thieves are termed star-glazers.
Such petty robberies are often committed by elder lads at the windows
of tobacconists, when cigars and pipes are frequently stolen.
They cut the pane in the manner described, and sometimes get a younger
boy to commit the theft, while they get the chief share of the plunder,
without having exposed themselves to the danger of being arrested
stealing the property.
The number of felonies of goods, &c., exposed
to sale in the Metropolitan districts
for 1860 1671
Ditto ditto in the City 133
----
1804
Value of goods thereby stolen in the
Metropolitan districts £1487
Ditto ditto in the City 35
-----
£1522
_Stealing from Children._--Children are occasionally sent out by their
mothers, with bundles of washing to convey to different persons,
or they may be employed to bring clothes from the mangle. They are
sometimes met by a man, at other times by a woman, who entices them
to go to a shop for a halfpenny or a penny worth of sweets, meanwhile
taking care they leave their parcels or bundle, which they promise to
keep for them till they return. On their coming out of the shop, they
find the party has decamped, and seldom any clue can be got of them, as
they may belong to distant localities of the metropolis.
In other cases they go up to the children, when they are proceeding on
their way, with a bundle or basket, and say: “You are going to take
these things home. Do you know where you are going to take them?” The
child being taken off her guard may say. She is carrying them to Mrs.
So-and-so, of such a street. They will then say. “You are a good girl,
and are quite right. Mrs. So-and-so sent me for them, as she is in a
hurry and is going out.” The child probably gives her the basket or
bundle, when the thief absconds. A case of this kind occurred in the
district of Marylebone about six months ago.
A girl was going with two silk-dresses to a lady in Devonshire-street,
when she was met by a young woman, who said she was a servant of the
lady, and was sent to get the dresses done or undone, and was very
glad she had met her. The woman was an entire stranger to the lady.
The larceny was detected on the Saturday night, and the lady was put
to great inconvenience, as she had not a dress to go out with on the
Sunday. Robberies of clothes sent out to be mangled, and of articles
of linen are very common. Milliners often send young girls errands who
are not old enough to see through the tricks of these parties prowling
about the metropolis.
These larcenies are generally committed by vagrants decently dressed,
and too lazy to work, who go sneaking about the streets and live in
low neighbourhoods, such as St. Giles’s, Drury-lane, Short’s-gardens,
Queen-street, and the Borough. They are in most cases committed in the
evening, though sometimes during the day.
_Child Stripping._--This is generally done by females, old debauched
drunken hags who watch their opportunity to accost children passing in
the streets, tidily dressed with good boots and clothes. They entice
them away to a low or quiet neighbourhood for the purpose, as they say,
of buying them sweets, or with some other pretext. When they get into a
convenient place, they give them a halfpenny or some sweets, and take
off the articles of dress, and tell them to remain till they return,
when they go away with the booty.
This is done most frequently in mews in the West-end, and at
Clerkenwell, Westminster, the Borough, and other similar localities.
These heartless debased women sometimes commit these felonies in the
disreputable neighbourhoods where they live, but more frequently in
distant places, where they are not known and cannot be easily traced.
This mode of felony is not so prevalent in the metropolis as formerly.
In most cases, it is done at dusk in the winter evenings, from 7 to 10
o’clock.
Number of larcenies from children in
the Metropolitan districts for 1860 87
Ditto ditto in the City 10
--
97
Value of property thereby stolen in the
Metropolitan districts £65 0
Ditto ditto in the City 5 10
-------
£70 10
_Stealing from Drunken Persons._--There is a very common low class of
male thieves, who go prowling about at all times of the day and night
for this purpose.
They loiter about the streets and public-houses to steal from drunken
persons, and are called “Bug-hunters” and “mutchers.” You see many
of them lounging about gin-palaces in the vicinity of the Borough,
near St. George’s church. We have met them there in the course of
our rambles over the metropolis, and at Whitechapel and St. Giles’s.
They also frequent the Westminster-road, the vicinity of the Victoria
Theatre, Shoreditch, and Somers Town. These low wretches are of
all ages, and many of them have the appearance of bricklayers’,
stone-masons’, and engineers’ labourers. They pretend they are
labourers out of work, and are forward in intruding themselves on the
notice of persons entering those houses, and expect to be treated to
liquor, though entire strangers to them.
They are not unfrequently so rude as to take the pewter-pot of another
person from the bar, and pass it round to their comrades, till they
have emptied the contents. If remonstrated with, they return insulting
language, and try to involve the person in a broil.
You occasionally find them loafing about the tap-rooms. They watch for
drunken people, whom they endeavour to persuade to treat them. They
entice him to go down some court or slum, where they strip him of his
watch, money, or other valuables he may have on his person. Or they
sometimes rob him in the public-house; but this seldom occurs, as they
are aware it would lead to detection. They prefer following him out of
the public-house. Many of these robberies are committed in the public
urinals at a late hour at night.
These men have often abandoned women who cohabit with them, and assist
them in these low depredations. They frequently dwell in low courts
and alleys in the neighbourhood of gin-palaces, have no settled mode
of life, and follow no industrious calling--living as loafers and low
ruffians.
Some of them have wives, who go out washing and charing to obtain a
livelihood for their children and themselves, as well as to support
their brutal husbands, lazzaroni of the metropolis.
This class of persons are in the habit of stealing lead from houses,
and copper boilers from kitchens and wash-houses.
There is another class of thieves, who steal from drunken persons,
usually in the dusk of the evening, in the following manner: Two women,
respectably dressed, meet a drunken man in the street, stop him and ask
him to treat them. They adjourn to the bar of a public-house for the
purpose of getting some gin or ale. While drinking at the bar, one of
the women tries to rob him of his watch or money. A man who is called a
“stickman,” an accomplice and possibly a paramour of hers, comes to the
bar a short time after them. He has a glass of some kind of liquor, and
stands beside them. Some motions and signs pass between the two females
and this man. If they have by this time secured the booty, it is passed
to the latter, who, thereupon slips away, with the stolen articles in
his possession.
In some cases, when the property is taken from the drunken man, one
of the women on some pretext steps to the door and passes it to the
“stickman” standing outside, who then makes off with it. In other cases
these robberies are perpetrated in the outside of the house, in some
by-street.
Sometimes the man quickly discovers his loss, and makes an outcry
against the women; when the “stickman” comes up and asks, “what is
the matter?” the man may reply, “these two women have robbed me.”
The stickman answers “I’ll go and fetch a policeman.” The property is
passed to him by the women, and he decamps. If a criminal information
is brought against the females, the stolen goods are not found in their
possession, and the case is dropped.
These women seldom or never allow drunken men to have criminal
connection with them, but get their living by this base system of
plunder. They change their field of operation over the metropolis,
followed by the sneaking “stickman.”
Some of these females have been known in early life to sell oranges in
the street.
The “stickman” during the day lounges about the parlours in quiet
public-houses where thieves resort, and the women during the day are
sometimes engaged in needlework,--some of the latter have a fair
education, which they may have learned in prison, and others are very
illiterate.
Though respectable in dress and appearance, they generally belong to
the felon class of Irish cockneys, with few exceptions.
They are to be found in Lisson-grove, Leicester-square, Portland-town,
and other localities.
Females in respectable positions in society occasionally take too much
intoxicating liquor, and are waylaid by old women, gin-drinkers, who
frequent public-houses in low neighbourhoods. They introduce themselves
to the inebriated woman as a friend, to see her to some place of safety
until she has recovered from the effects of her dissipation,--she may
have been lying on the pavement, and unable to walk. They lift her up
by the hand, and steal the gold ring from her finger.
At other times they take her into some by-court or street in low
neighbourhoods, where doors may frequently be seen standing open;
they rob her in some of these dark passages of her money, watch, and
jewellery, and sometimes carry off her clothes.
If seen by persons in the neighbourhood, it is winked at, and no
information given, as they generally belong to the same unprincipled
class.
There is another low class of women who prowl about the streets at
midnight, watching for any respectable-looking person who may be
passing the worse of liquor. If they notice a drunken man, one comes
and enters into conversation with him, and while thus engaged, another
woman steps up, touches him under the chin, or otherwise distracts his
attention. The person who first accosted him, with her companion, then
endeavours to pick his pockets and plunder him of his property. A case
of this kind occurred near the Marble Arch in August 1860.
They have many ingenious ways of distracting the attention of their
victim, some of them very obscene and shameless.
They take care to see that no policeman is in sight, and generally
endeavour to find out if the person they intend to victimize has
something to purloin.
They may ask him for change, or solicit a few coppers to get beer, or
inquire what o’clock it is, to see if he is in possession of a watch
or money. They abstract the money from the pocket, or snatch the watch
from the swivel, which they are adroit in breaking.
Such persons are often seen at midnight in the neighbourhood of
Bloomsbury and Oxford-street, the Strand, Lower Thames-street, and
other localities.
The most of those engaged in this kind of robbery in Oxford-street come
from the neighbourhood of St. Giles’s and Lisson-grove.
The number of felonies from drunken
persons which occurred in the Metropolitan
districts for 1860 were 221
Ditto ditto in the City 10
---
231
The value of property thereby stolen in
the Metropolitan districts £867
Ditto ditto in the City 40
----
£907
_Stealing Linen, &c. exposed to dry._ This is generally done by
vagrants in the suburbs of the metropolis, from 7 to 11 o’clock in the
evening; when left out all night, it is often done at midnight.
Linen and other clothes are frequently left hanging on lines or spread
out on the grass in yards at the back of the house. Entrance is
effected through the street-doors which may have been left open, or
by climbing over the wall. In many cases these felonies are committed
by middle-aged women. If done by a man, he is generally assisted by a
female who carries off the property; were he seen carrying a bundle of
clothes, he would be stopped by a vigilant officer, and be called to
give an account of it, which would possibly lead to his detection.
These felonies generally consist of sheets, counterpanes, shirts,
table-covers, pinafores, towels, stockings, and such-like articles.
When any of them are marked, the female makes it her business to
pick out the marks, in case it might lead to their detection. Such
robberies are often traced by the police through the assistance of the
pawnbrokers.
They are very common where there are gardens at the back of the house,
such as Kensall Green, Camden Town, Kensington, Battersea, Clapham,
Peckham, and Victoria Park.
The clothes are generally disposed of at pawnbrokers or the
leaving-shops, commonly called “Dolly Shops.” They leave them there
for a small sum of money, and get a ticket. If they return for them
in the course of a week, they are charged 3_d._ a shilling interest.
If they do not return for them in seven days, they are disposed of to
persons of low character. These wretches at the leaving-shops manage
to get them into the hands of parties who would not be likely to give
information--the articles, from their superior quality, being generally
understood to be stolen.
These felonies are also committed by the female Sneaks who call at
gentlemen’s houses, selling small wares, or on some other similar
errand. When they find the door open and a convenient opportunity, they
often abstract the linen and other clothes from the lines, and dispose
of them in the manner referred to.
They are also stolen by ragged juvenile thieves, who get into the yards
by climbing over the wall. This is occasionally done in the Lambeth
district, in the dusk of the evening, or early in the morning, and
is effected in this way:--Some time previously they commence some
boyish game, about half a dozen of them together. They then pretend
to quarrel, when one boy will take the other’s cap off his head and
place it on the garden wall. Another boy lifts him up to fetch it--the
object being to reconnoitre the adjacent grounds, and see if there are
any clothes laid out to dry, as well as to find out the best mode of
stealing them.
When they discover clothes in a yard, they come back at dusk, or at
midnight, and carry them off the lines.
They take the stolen property to the receiver’s, after having divided
the clothes among the party. Some will go off in one direction, and
others in another to get them disposed of, which is done to prevent
suspicion on the part of the police.
The receiving-houses are opened to them at night, as these low people
are very greedy of gain. Sometimes they convey the stolen property to
their lodgings, at other times they lodge it in concealment till the
next day. These clothes are occasionally of trifling value, at other
times worth several pounds, which on being sold bring the thief a very
poor return--scarcely the price of his breakfast--the lion’s share of
the spoil being given to the unprincipled receiver.
They are often encouraged to commit these thefts by wretches in the low
lodging-houses, who are aware of their midnight excursions.
Number of felonies of linen, &c., exposed
to dry in the Metropolitan districts for
1860 236
Ditto ditto for the City 0
---
236
Value of property thereby abstracted
in the Metropolis £150
_Robberies from Carts and other Vehicles._--There are many depredations
committed over the metropolis from carts, carriers’ waggons, cabs,
railway vans, and other vehicles. Many of those people have the
appearance of porters at a warehouse, and are a peculiar order.
At one time they may have been porters at warehouses, or connected
with railways, or carmen to large commercial firms. Some have corduroy
or moleskin jacket and trowsers, and cloth cap; others have a plain
frock-coat and cap.
Many of the robberies from carts are done by the connivance of the
carters. They are sent by business establishments to dispose of goods
over the metropolis; some of them are connected with the worst class
of thieves. They connive with those men in stealing their employers’
property, and in rifling other carts, carry the booty away in their
own, and always manage to secure a part of the prize.
These carters take thieves occasionally to railway stations to assist
them with their work, and when an opportunity occurs, carry off goods
from the railway platform, such as bales of bacon, cheese, bags of
nails, boxes of tin and copper, and travellers’ luggage, which they
dispose of to marine-store dealers and at chandlers’ shops. The wearing
apparel in the trunks they sell at second-hand shops, kept by Jews
and others in low neighbourhoods, such as Petticoat-lane, Lambeth,
Westminster, and the Borough of Southwark.
Many carts are rifled by persons who represent themselves as hawkers or
costermongers--men who have no steady industrious mode of livelihood,
and are usually in the company of prostitutes and thieves of the worst
description. The carter may have occasion to call at a city house, and
to leave his horse and cart in the street, when they steal a whip,
coat, or horsecloth, the reins from off the horse, or any portable
article they can lay their hands on.
Numbers of hay, straw, and store carmen frequently steal a truss of
hay, or clover, or straw, from their employer’s cart, and dispose of
it to some person who has a horse, or pony, or donkey, for a small sum
of money. These dishonest practices are carried on to a far greater
extent than the public are aware of, as it is only occasionally they
are brought to public notice.
Robberies from cabs and carriages are sometimes effected in the
following way: They follow the cab or vehicle with a horse and cart,
driving along in its wake--two or three thieves generally in the cart.
One of them jumps on the spring of the conveyance while the driver is
sitting in front of his vehicle, pulls down the trunk or box, and slips
it into the cart, then drives away with the booty.
At other times they run up, and leap on the spring of the conveyance
while the driver is proceeding along with his back toward them; lower
the trunk or other article from the roof, and walk off with it. These
trunks sometimes contain money, silver plate, and other valuable
property.
These depredations are always done at night, by experienced thieves,
and generally in the winter season. They are common in the fashionable
squares of the West-end, at the East-end, toward the Commercial-road
and St. George’s-in-the-East, at Ratcliffe Highway, the City, the
Borough of Southwark, and Lambeth, along the docks, and at the railway
stations around the metropolis.
There are a number of laundresses residing at Chelsea, Uxbridge,
Hampstead, Holloway, and other districts in the suburbs, who wash large
quantities of clothes for the gentry and nobility in the fashionable
streets and squares of the metropolis. After washing and dressing the
linen, they pack it up in large wicker baskets, and generally convey it
in their own carts to the residences of the owners.
A class of people are frequently on the look-out for these carts to
plunder them of their linen. The carts are under the management of a
man or a woman. The thieves follow the vehicle to a quiet street, one
puts his shoulder under a basket while the other cuts the cord which
attaches it to the cart, when both make off with the stolen property.
These thieves reside over London in low districts, such as St. Giles’s
and Shoreditch, and are occasionally brought before the police courts.
There is a class of robberies from gentlemen’s carriages about the
West-end of the metropolis. In going to the Opera, West-end theatres,
or other fashionable places of amusement, the gentleman frequently
leaves his valuable overcoat or cloak in the carriage. These thieves
follow the conveyance to some quiet street leading to the stables where
the vehicle is to remain till the gentleman returns from his evening’s
amusement. They let down the window of the carriage and carry off any
article which is left. The theft is nimbly committed while the vehicle
is on its way to the stables, or when it is returning to the Opera, and
is done chiefly by young men, experienced thieves. They live in the low
neighbourhoods already referred to.
There is a good deal of this mode of thieving carried on in the
West-end of London during the winter season.
Number of larcenies from carts and other
vehicles in the Metropolitan district for
1860 286
Ditto, ditto, in the City 79
---
365
Value of property thereby stolen in
the Metropolis £1075
Ditto, ditto, in the City 370
----
£1445
_Stealing Lead from House-tops, Copper from Kitchens, and Workmen’s
Tools, &c. in Dwelling-houses._--Of late this mode of thieving has
been extensively carried on over the metropolis, chiefly at unoccupied
houses. In some cases, a key is obtained by the thief, respectable
in appearance, from the gentleman who lets the house, without his
accompanying him to the empty dwelling, when he takes the opportunity
of stealing the copper boiler from the washing-house, and the lead pipe
from the butt or cistern. He passes the stolen property to some of his
associates, and returns the key of the dwelling.
This is a peculiar class who make a livelihood by going round empty
houses in different districts on similar errands. They do not give
their name and address, are strangers in the neighbourhood, and cannot
be easily tracked out by the police.
Lead is frequently stolen from the housetops, by the loafing ruffians,
we have before described, who lounge about public-houses, robbing
drunken men, and occasionally by boys. Sometimes these robberies are
committed by plumbers’ workmen and others engaged in repairing the
houses.
Lead in most cases is stolen from those dwellings which are under
repair, or have been unoccupied for some time. When a house is
repaired, it frequently happens the roofs of the adjoining occupied
houses are stripped and carried off by unprincipled workmen.
These depredations are often committed by the workmen themselves, or
by their connivance. At other times they are done by persons climbing
low walls, and clambering up spouts to the roof, and cutting up the
sheet lead. This is usually done under night by two or more in company;
sometimes, though rarely, by boys. One keeps a look-out to see there is
no person near to detect them. This person is termed a “crow.” If any
one should be near, the “crow” gives a signal, and they decamp. Before
commencing their depredations, they generally look out for the means of
escape, seldom returning the same way they mounted the roof. They make
their way out in another direction. If hard pressed, they sometimes
hide themselves on the roof behind chimneys, or lie down in gutters
or cisterns or any other likely place of concealment. These felonies
are often done by bricklayers’ labourers (Irish cockneys) during the
winter, and in many cases, as we have said, with the connivance of the
workmen engaged in repairing the houses.
There is another class of persons who engage in lead-stealing from
the roofs of houses. They were formerly in the service of builders,
plumbers, or carpenters, but are out of employment. They go to their
late employer’s customers, under the pretext that they were sent by
him to repair the roof, and meanwhile plunder the sheet lead, which
they generally roll up, convey down, and carry off by means of their
accomplices, who are hovering in the neighbourhood. They have the
appearance and dress of industrious workmen, and may have been lately
seen employed in houses in the neighbourhood, so that they are more
likely to deceive the unsuspecting people who admit them into their
dwellings. This kind of lead-stealing has been lately of very frequent
occurrence in the metropolis.
Copper is frequently stolen from the boilers in the kitchens and
wash-houses by the same parties. Sometimes they enter by the area
door or the window, which is left open. At other times they climb
the garden wall at the back of the house, and enter by a window,
left unfastened. They take the copper out of the brickwork in the
wash-house, or from the kitchen, roll it up and carry it away. This
is generally done in unoccupied houses. Sweeps employed cleaning the
chimneys sometimes take away copper in like manner in their soot-bags.
In houses under repair, as well as in unfinished houses, they steal
carpenters’ tools, planes, saws, ploughs, squares, hammers, &c., left
by the workmen.
They obtain access to the house by climbing over the wooden enclosure
or over garden walls. This is generally done in the evening, between
the hours of 9 and 12, and frequently by discharged workmen.
In many cases they are stopped on the way with the tools in their
possession. If a proper account is not given, it often leads to the
detection of the robbery, which generally puts a stop for the time to
such depredations in that neighbourhood.
The stolen tools are taken to pawnbrokers or receiving-shops, and sold
at an under price. In some cases the pawnbroker gives notice to the
police, but in these other shops, this is seldom or never done.
The thieves generally go to some house where no watchman is employed.
The number of larcenies of tools, lead,
glass, &c. from empty or unfinished houses
in the Metropolitan districts for 1860, 472
Ditto, ditto, from the City 22
---
494
Value of the property thereby abstracted
in the Metropolis £462 0
Ditto, ditto, in the City 7 10
--------
£469 10
_Robberies by False Keys._--There are many robberies committed in
the metropolis by means of false keys, generally between the hours
of seven and nine o’clock in the evening. After nine o’clock they
would be considered burglaries. This class of robberies is generally
committed by thieves of experience, and frequently, before depredations
are committed, persons call at the house in the daytime, who take
particular notice of the lock of the street-door, to know the key
which opens it, whether a Bramah, Chubb, or other lock. These persons
are termed “putters up of robberies,” and supply the thieves with the
requisite information, when they come in the evening and enter the
house. In many cases they get clear off with the booty.
The houses entered are frequently respectable lodging-houses, or houses
occupied by one family where there is likely to be no children about
the upper rooms. In the case of entering these dwellings they make
their way to the bed-rooms above, their chief object being to steal
the jewellery and dressing-case left on the dressing-table, often of
great value. They also take clothes out of the drawers, and other
articles. On coming out they often put on some of the apparel, such as
an overcoat, and fill the pockets with stolen property.
In houses in the West-end, single gentlemen, such as government clerks,
officers in the army, and others, are often out dining in the evening,
or at the clubs; and as the servant is generally engaged downstairs at
this time, the thief is frequently not obstructed.
To elude suspicion from the police constables in the street they often
have a carpet-bag to carry off the booty. If they meet one of them near
the house, they generally ask him some question, such as the way to
some street, to take him off his guard.
A case of this kind occurred early this year at the West-end, where
four men were engaged in a robbery. On their arriving at the corner
of the street where the felony was committed they found two policemen
there. They stepped up to them, and conversed for some time, when
the constables left, having no suspicion, from their respectable
appearance. Two of the thieves crossed the street to a house opposite.
Meanwhile their movements were narrowly watched by a keen-eyed
detective, who knew the parties, three of the four being returned
convicts. Having arrived at the door of the house, they endeavoured
to gain an entrance, which, after trying several keys, they effected.
The other two confederates had taken up a position opposite the house,
being what is termed “look-out,” or outside men.
In a short time the two who had entered the house came out and closed
the door behind them. They were perceived to have some bulky articles
in their possession. The other two men remained for a few minutes in
their place on the opposite side of the street, when they followed
their companions. When at a short distance from the house, they
rejoined them, and the property was divided among them. This was done
in the dusk in the quiet street.
The detective officer saw two of the parties with Inverness capes, and
carrying umbrellas in their hand they did not have before they entered
the house. He went up to them, told them who he was, and arrested one
of them; the other was captured a few yards off by another officer
when in the act of throwing off the Inverness cape. The other two,
meanwhile, escaped. On conducting the two men to the police-station
the two capes were taken from them, and in their pockets were found a
number of skeleton keys, a wax-taper, and silent lights, along with
various small articles, evidently part of the robbery which had just
been committed.
Two hours after this a gentleman drove up in a cab to the
police-station, and gave information of the robbery, when he identified
the articles taken from the prisoners as his property. The two
thieves were tried at the sessions, and sentenced to six years’ penal
servitude. One of the two confederates who escaped was apprehended by
the same detective, found guilty, and sentenced to the same punishment,
which broke up a gang of thieves who had infested the neighbourhood for
several months, and occasioned great alarm.
Robberies from gentlemen’s houses by means of false keys are generally
put up by some person acquainted with the house, and who may have
frequented it under some pretext, such as by courting the servant girl,
or by being acquainted with some of the men-servants. They rifle the
valuables from wardrobes and drawing-rooms, such as watches, rings,
purses, clothes, &c.
Attic thieves chiefly aim at abstracting jewels from ladies’ bed-rooms,
generally on the second floor; but this class of skeleton-key thieves
frequently carry away bundles of stolen goods, and are not so
fastidious in their choice.
An instance of a skeleton-key robbery from a gentleman’s house occurred
lately at the West-end of the metropolis. The two thieves had engaged
a cab to carry off the stolen property (the driver of the cab being a
confederate), and drove up to the house next door to where the robbery
was to be committed. They were seen to leave the cab, to go up to the
door of the house, to apply the key to the door, and to walk in. About
ten minutes after, they left the house, and walked to the cab with
large parcels in their hands, when it drove swiftly away.
On that evening the butler of the house discovered that the whole
of his master’s clothes had been stolen from his wardrobe, and his
dressing-case, with costly articles, his gold watch and chain, and the
whole of his linen. Information was given to a detective officer, who
in two days after traced the robbery to two well-known thieves, one of
them being singularly expert in the use of skeleton keys.
The manner in which it was detected was very ingenious, and reflected
high credit on the officer.
On visiting a public-house near Tottenham Court-road, one Saturday
night, he saw a middle-aged, intelligent man, like a respectable
mechanic, conversing with a person at the bar over a pint of
half-and-half. The sharp eye of the detective observed the former
with a neckerchief which corresponded with one of the articles of
this stolen property. The suspicion of the officer was aroused, and
he followed him late at night, and saw where he resided. On the next
morning he went with two officers to his house, and found him in bed
with his paramour, and arrested him for the robbery. On searching his
house a handkerchief was found marked with the crest of the nobleman
to whom the property belonged. On a farther search a quantity of other
articles were found belonging to this robbery.
On his paramour getting out of bed she was perceived by the detective
to conceal something under her petticoats. On being asked to produce
it, she denied having anything. On being searched, another handkerchief
was found on her person, bearing the nobleman’s crest. This man was
afterwards identified as one of the two persons who were seen to enter
the house where the robbery was committed, and to leave with the cab.
He was tried at the Sessions, and sentenced to seven years’ penal
servitude. This man had for some time been well known to the police,
and was suspected of committing a series of large robberies, but he
was so dexterous in executing his felonies that his movements had not
previously been traced.
Number of felonies in the Metropolitan
districts for 1860 by means of false
keys 247
Ditto, ditto, in the City 17
---
264
Value of property thereby abstracted in
Metropolitan districts £1,840
Ditto, ditto, in the City 160
------
£2,000
_Robberies by Lodgers._--Robberies are frequently committed by lodgers
in various parts of the metropolis, in low as well as in middle-class
localities.
A great many of these are committed in low neighbourhoods, by abandoned
women, frequently young. They commit depredations in their own room,
or in other rooms in the house in which they lodge, by entering open
doors, or by turning the key when the door is locked, while the parties
are out. Many of these are done by prostitutes of the lowest order,
who sometimes steal the linen, bedding, wearing-apparel, and other
property, and pawn or sell it.
Robberies of this kind are sometimes perpetrated by mechanics’ wives,
addicted to dissipated habits, who steal similar articles from
dwelling-houses. Sometimes they are done by servants out of place,
driven to steal by poverty and destitution; at other times by sewing
girls, often toiling from 4 in the morning to 10 o’clock at night for
about 8_d._ a day--many of whom commit suicide rather than resort to
prostitution; and occasionally by clerks and shopmen--fast young men,
when in poverty and distress; and by betting-men and skittle-sharps.
In March, 1861, two known prostitutes, lodging together in a house in
Charlotte-street, were brought before the Lambeth police court for a
felony committed in the room in which they lodged. They abstracted
knives and forks, plates and spoons, along with two chairs, rifling
the apartment of nearly all it contained. They were convicted and
sentenced, the one to three months’, and the other to six months’,
imprisonment--the latter having been previously convicted.
Another felony occurred lately in Isabella-street, Lambeth, where a
mechanic’s wife stole the bed-clothes and the feathers out of a bed in
the house in which she lodged. Her husband was glad to pay the amount
to prevent criminal prosecution.
There are many felonies committed by persons lodging in coffee-houses
and hotels, some of them of considerable value. The hotel thieves
assume the manner and air of gentlemen, dress well, and live in high
style. They lodge for an evening or two in some fashionable hotel,
frequently near the railway stations. They get up at night, when the
house is quiet and business suspended, and commit robberies in the
house. They have an ingenious mode of opening the doors, though locked
in the inner side, by inserting a peculiar instrument and turning round
the key. They go stealthily into the rooms, and abstract silver plate,
articles of jewellery, watches, money, and other valuables.
These persons usually leave early in the morning, before the other
gentlemen get up. Some of them are young, and others are middle-aged.
They have generally some acquaintance with commercial transactions, and
conduct themselves like active business men. They are birds of passage,
and do not reside long in any one locality, as they would become known
to the police.
A very extensive robbery of this kind occurred some time ago at a
fashionable hotel in the metropolis, near the Great Northern Railway,
to the amount of 700_l._ or 800_l._ The thief was apprehended at York,
and committed for trial.
Number of felonies in the Metropolitan
districts for 1860, committed by lodgers 1,375
Ditto, ditto, in the City 83
-----
1458
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the Metropolitan districts £3,643
Ditto, ditto, in the City 144
------
£3,787
_Robberies by Servants._--There are a great number of felonies
committed by servants over the metropolis, many of which might be
prevented by prudent precautions on the part of their employers. On
this subject we would wish to speak with discrimination. We are aware
that many honest and noble-minded servants are treated with injustice
by the caprice and bad temper of their employers, and many a poor girl
is without cause dismissed from her situation, and refused a proper
certificate of character. Being unable to get another place, she is
often driven with reluctance from poverty and destitution to open
prostitution on the street. On the other hand, many of our employers
foolishly and thoughtlessly receive male and female servants into their
service without making a proper inquiry into their previous character.
Many felonies are committed by domestic female servants who have been
only a month or six weeks in service. Some of them steal tea, sugar,
and other provisions, which are frequently given to acquaintances or
relatives out of doors. Others occasionally abstract linen and articles
of wearing-apparel, or plunder the wardrobe of gold bracelets, rings,
pearl necklace, watch, chain, or other jewellery, or of muslin and
silk dresses and mantles, which they either keep in their trunk, or
otherwise dispose of.
Female domestic servants are often connected with many of the
felonies committed in the metropolis. Two of the female servants in a
gentleman’s family are sometimes courted by two smart dressed young
men, bedecked with jewellery, who visit them at the house occasionally.
One of them may call by himself on a certain evening, and after sitting
with them for some time in the kitchen, may pretend that he is going
upstairs to the front door on some errand, such as to bring in some
liquor. He goes alone, and opens the door to his companion whom he had
arranged to meet him, and who may be hovering in the street. He admits
him into the house to rifle the rooms in the floors above. Meantime
he comes in with the liquor, and proceeds down stairs, and remains
there for some time to occupy the attention of the servants until his
companion has plundered the house of money, jewels, or other property.
On other occasions two young men may remain downstairs with the
servants, while a third party is committing a robbery in the apartments
above.
Some respectable-looking young women, in the service of middle-class
and fashionable families, are connected with burglars, and have been
recommended to their places through their influence, or that of their
acquaintances. Some of these females are usually not a fortnight or a
month in service before a heavy burglary is committed in the house, and
will remain for two or three months longer to prevent suspicion. They
will then take another similar place in a gentleman’s family, remain
several months there, and by their conduct ingratiate themselves into
the good graces of the master and mistress, when another burglary is
committed through their connivance. The booty is shared between them
and the thieves.
Some continue this system for a considerable time, as their employers
have no suspicion of their villainy. They are often Irish cockneys,
connected with the thieves, and have been trained with them from their
infancy. They generally aim at stealing the silver plate, clothes, and
other valuables. In these robberies they are always ready to give the
“hue and cry” when a depredation has been committed.
There are often instances of these robberies brought before the
police-courts and sessions, where the dishonesty of many servants is
brought to light.
There are many felonies committed by the male servants in gentlemen’s
families; some of them of considerable value. Numbers of these are
occasioned by betting on the part of the butlers, who have the charge
of the plate. They go and bet on different horses, and pawn a certain
quantity of plate which has not the crest of their employer on it, and
expect to be able to redeem it as soon as they have got money when the
horse has won. He may happen to lose. He bets again on some other horse
he thinks will win--perhaps bets to a considerable amount, and thinks
he will be able to redeem his loss; he again possibly loses his bet.
His master is perhaps out of town, not having occasion to use the plate.
On his coming home there may be a dinner-party, when the plate is
called for. The butler absconds, and part of the plate is found to be
missing. Information is given to the police; some pawnbroker may be
so honourable as to admit the plate is in his possession. The servant
is apprehended, convicted, and sentenced possibly to penal servitude.
Cases of this kind occasionally occur, and are frequently caused by
such betting transactions.
Robberies occasionally are perpetrated by servants in shops and
warehouses, clerks, warehousemen, and others, of money and goods of
various kinds.
A remarkable case of robbery by a servant occurred lately. A young
man, employed by a locksmith, near the West-end of the metropolis, was
frequently sent to gentlemen’s houses on his master’s business to pick
locks. In many of the houses where he was employed, money and other
property was found missing. He went to pick a lock at a jeweller’s
shop. After he was gone, the jeweller found a beautiful gold chain
missing. As his son was a fast young man, he was afraid to charge the
young locksmith with the robbery. Meantime the latter was sent to
other houses, and in those places articles were found missing, and
servants in the families were discharged on suspicion of committing the
robberies.
He went to a solicitor’s office to pick the locks of some boxes
containing title-deeds and money. From one of the boxes, which he did
not require to open, he stole 100_l._, and locked it up again. The head
clerk was then away on business for several days. On his return he
found that one of the boxes in the office had been opened and 100_l._
had been abstracted.
Information was given to Bow-street police office by the solicitor,
who offered 5_l._ as a reward to any one who would give information
regarding the robbery. Meantime he stated he would give no one into
custody. His clerks had been with him a long time. He had one man
employed in the office to pick some locks, but as he belonged to
a respectable firm, he did not believe it to be him. Meantime the
solicitor discharged his general clerks. His confidential clerk was so
indignant at this, that he gave in his resignation.
One of the most accomplished detective officers of the Bow-street
police resolved to ferret out the matter. It was arranged the
journeyman locksmith was to be sent to a certain house to pick a lock
in an apartment where some money was placed which had been marked. The
detective watched his movements from the next room. On this occasion
also, he not only picked the lock as requested, but picked other locks
in the room, and carried off part of the money which was marked.
When he went downstairs, he was detained till it was ascertained if the
money had been tampered with. On inspecting it, part was missing. He
was taken into custody, and the money got on his person. On searching
his house a waggon load of stolen property was found, belonging to
a series of robberies he had committed in the houses he visited,
amounting in value to 200_l._ All the charges against him were not
investigated. He was tried for nine acts of robbery at Clerkenwell,
convicted, and sentenced to six years’ penal servitude. He was one of
the finest locksmiths in the world, and received from his employer
higher wages than the other workmen in the establishment.
Number of cases of felony by servants
in the Metropolitan dists. for 1860, 1,790
Ditto, ditto, in the City 199
-----
1,989
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the Metropolitan districts £13,015
Ditto, ditto, in the City 612
-------
£13,627
_Area and Lobby Sneaks._--This is a large, and variegated class of
thieves, ranging from the little ragged boy of six years of age, to the
old woman of threescore and ten. Some are hanging in rags and tatters
in pitiable condition; others have a respectable appearance likely to
disarm suspicion. Some are ignorant and obtuse; others are intelligent,
and have got a tolerable education. Some are skulking and timid; others
are so venturesome as to enter dwelling-houses through open windows,
and conceal themselves in closets, waiting a favourable opportunity to
skulk off, unobserved, with plunder.
Numbers of little ragged boys sneak around the areas of dwellings,
where respectable tradesmen reside, as well as in the fashionable
streets of the metropolis. We may see them loitering about half-naked,
or fluttering in shreds and patches, sometimes alone, at other times
in small bands, looking with skulking eye into the areas, as they move
along. They are not permitted to beg at the houses, and some of them
have no ostensible errand to visit those localities, and are hunted
away by the police. During the day they generally sneak in the thorough
fares and quiet by-streets of London.
A few days ago we saw one of them skulking along Blackfriars-road. He
was about 13 years of age, and had on an old ragged coat, much too
large for him, hanging over his back in tatters, with a string to
fasten it round his waist, and a pair of old trowsers and gray cap. He
had the air of an old man, as he lazily walked along, and looked a very
pitiable object. On seeing us eying him with curiosity, he suddenly
laid aside his mendicant air, and with sharp keen eye and startled
attitude, appeared to take us for a police officer in undress. We
looked over our shoulder, as we moved on, and saw him stand for a time
looking after us, when he resumed his former downcast appearance, and
sauntered slowly along looking eagerly into the areas as he passed. He
appeared to us a very good type of the young area sneak.
These area-divers go down into the areas, and open the safes where
provisions are kept, such as roast and boiled beef, butter and bread,
and fish, and carry off the spoil. If the door is open, they enter the
kitchen, and steal anything they can find, such as clothes, wet and dry
linen, and sometimes a copper kettle, and silver spoons; or they will
take the blacking-brushes from the boothouse. Nothing comes amiss.
There is another class of area sneaks who make their daily calls at
gentlemen’s houses, ask the servants when they come in contact with
them if they have any kitchen-stuff to sell, or old clothes or glass
bottles. Should they not find the servant in the kitchen, they try to
make their way to the butler’s pantry, which generally adjoins the
kitchen, and carry off the basket of plate.
These parties are men from 20 years of age and upwards.
There is a class of women who go down the areas, under pretence of
selling combs, stay-laces, boot-laces, and other trifling commodities.
When they find a stealthy opportunity, many of them carry off articles
from the kitchen, similar to those just described. These people are of
all ages, some young, others tottering with old age. They generally
belong to London, and go their regular rounds over the streets and
squares. Many of them live in Westminster, St. Giles’s and Kent-street
in the Borough.
There are other sneaks who enter the lobbies of houses, and commit
robberies, chiefly in the West-end districts. These persons are of
the same class, with the area sneak, but perhaps a step higher in the
thievish profession. Their depredations are generally committed in
the morning between 7 and 8, when servants are busily engaged dusting
furniture and sweeping the hall and rooms. These thieves are then seen
loitering about watching a favourable opportunity to steal.
The mode of stealing is the same in the passages of the houses of
middle class people, and the entry halls of the elegant mansions of
the gentry and aristocracy. Some of these thieves are men respectably
dressed while others are in more shabby condition. They are young and
middle aged. You may see them in those quiet localities, generally
in dark clothing, having the appearance of respectable mechanics, or
warehousemen. Others are like men who hang about the streets to run
messages and assist men-servants.
They walk into the house, and pilfer any article they can find, such as
articles of clothing, umbrellas, and walking-canes. Sometimes they take
a coat off the knob and whip it under the breast of their coat, or put
it on over their own. They frequently carry off a bundle of clothes,
and sell them to some receiver of stolen property.
Such robberies are frequent in the neighbourhood of Brompton, Chelsea,
Pimlico, Paddington, Stepney, Hackney, Bayswater, Camberwell, the
Kent-road, and other similar districts.
The lobby sneaks are the same class of persons as those who enter
the areas, and contrive to get a livelihood in this way. They live
in various parts of London, such as the dirty slums, alleys, and
by-streets of Covent-garden, Drury-lane, and St. Giles’s, Somers Town,
Westminster, the Borough, Whitechapel, and Walworth Common, and other
similar neighbourhoods.
Sometimes these men are seen in public-houses with large sums of money,
no doubt got from the disposal of their plunder; and at other times
lounge in low coffee-houses, without even the scanty means of paying
for their bed, and are scarcely able to pay a penny for a cup of
coffee. They often have to ask assistance from their companions, though
a few days previous they may have been seen in possession of handfuls
of cash.
They are usually unmarried, and live an uncomfortable, homeless life;
often cohabiting with a low class of women, miserably clad, and
generally wretched in appearance.
Middle aged and elderly women are occasionally engaged in sneaking
depredations from the dwelling-houses of labouring men. An old woman
may observe a child standing at her mother’s door, and ask if her
mother is in. When the child answers, “No,” she will say, “I will mind
the house, while you go and get a halfpenny worth of sweets,” giving
the little girl a halfpenny. On the child’s return the woman has
decamped carrying away with her money, or any other portable article
she may have found in the house. This is the class of women we have
noticed stealing from the shops of the butchers and cheesemongers.
It is a strange fact, that many of these common thieves, engaged in
paltry sneaking thefts, have a more desperate and criminal appearance
than most of the daring burglars and highwaymen. Their soft and timid
natures feel more poignant misery in their debased and anxious life
than the more stern and callous ruffians of a higher class, engaged in
more extraordinary adventures.
Another class of larcenies in dwelling-houses are committed _by means
of false messages_.
This is a very ingenious mode of thieving, and is done by means of
calling at the house, and stating to the servants that they are sent
from respectable firms in the neighbourhood for some article of dress
to be repaired, or for lamps, fenders, glasses, or decanters to be
mended, with other pretences of various descriptions.
Their object is to get the absence of the servant from the hall. While
the servant is upstairs, telling a man has called sent by such and such
a firm, they walk into the dining-room on the first floor, and abstract
any articles of plate that may be exposed, silver-mounted inkstands,
books, or other property. If they don’t succeed in this, and see no
article of value, they will return to the hall, and clear the passages
of the coats hanging on the knobs, and the umbrellas and walking-sticks
from the stand, while an accomplice is generally outside to receive
the property. Should the servant come down too soon, while he has only
got a short distance off, no property is found upon his person. They
seldom take hats, as these could be easily detected.
They have an endless variety of ingenious expedients to effect this
object. A case of this kind occurred in the district of Marylebone a
short time ago, where a gentleman was in quest of a lady’s maid, and
advertised in the ‘Times’ newspaper, and at the same time answered a
number of advertisements by anonymous persons. The next day his house
was thronged by a number of people anxious to obtain the situation.
After all had left, a purse containing a large amount of money was
missing, consisting partly of bank-notes; when he gave information to
the police. Some days after, through the admirable ingenuity and tact
of a detective officer at Marylebone, a person was traced out in the
locality of Edgware-road, as having been guilty of the felony, and
the stolen purse was found on her person. Her apprehension led to the
discovery, that she had been pursuing a system of robberies of this
description over various parts of the metropolis, for twelve months
previously. She was sentenced to three years’ penal servitude, and
while in Millbank Penitentiary, committed suicide about three months
after.
These felonies abound chiefly in the west-end of the metropolis,
in the neighbourhood of Belgravia, Russell and Bedford-squares,
Oxford-square, Gloucester-square, Seymour-street, Hyde Park-street,
Gloucester-terrace, and other fashionable localities. They are often
committed by servants of worthless character out of situation, also
by lads of respectable appearance, sent out by trainers of thieves,
who often begin their despicable life in this manner, and advance to
picking of pockets and burglary.
Number of larcenies in the Metropolitan
districts for the year 1860, by doors being
left open and by false messages 2,986
Ditto, ditto, in the City 535
-----
3,521
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the Metropolitan district £9,904
Ditto, ditto, in the City 724
-------
£10,628
_Stealing by Lifting up Windows or Breaking Glass._--Area-sneaks
frequently lift up the kitchen windows to steal. Sometimes they
cannot reach the articles through the iron bars, and have recourse to
an ingenious expedient to effect their object. They tie two sticks
together, and attach a hook to the end, and seize hold of any articles
they can find and draw them through the bars; they frequently leave
their sticks behind them, which are found by the police.
There is generally an iron fastening in the centre of the window frame.
The thief inserts a small thin knife or other sharp instrument in the
opening of the frame, and forces back the iron catch. In some instances
a fastening or clasp in the inner side of the window is pushed back by
means of breaking a pane of glass. These robberies are often committed
in dwelling-houses in Queen-street, Mitre-street, and Webber-street,
near Blackfriars-road; in Tower-street, Waterloo-road, and similar
localities--generally by a man and a young lad. This young lad is
employed to enter the window of the house to be robbed, which in these
localities is often a front parlour. The window is drawn up softly, not
to excite any alarm.
The man generally keeps watch while the lad enters the house, perhaps
at the corner of the street, when both decamp with the property.
In some instances they break the glass in the same way that
star-glazers do at shop-windows, as already described. This is done
either at the front or the back window. They prefer the back window
if there is a ready access to it. These robberies are committed in
occupied houses as well as in houses while the inmates are absent for a
few days. They steal money, trinkets, linen, or anything that is easily
carried off.
Similar robberies are perpetrated by two or more persons at the
West-end fashionable houses by the area or back windows, when they
steal money, jewels, mantelpiece clocks, clothes, linen, and other
property.
Sometimes they enter by cutting the window with a diamond. These
felonies are often of considerable value.
The parlour windows are sometimes lifted up by young thieves in the
morning, when plate is laid on the table for breakfast; the servant
frequently leaves the dining-room window open for ventilation, when
they effect an entrance in this way:--one throws a cap into the area by
way of joke, or through the window into the room; another mounts the
railings and enters the window. Should any of the inmates detect him,
he will say that “a lad had thrown his cap into the house, and he came
in to fetch it.” If not disturbed, he carries off the silver plate,
and often returns through the window with the plunder without being
observed. These thieves take any article easily carried off, such as
wearing apparel, work-boxes, or fancy clocks, and are generally Irish
cockneys; they are to be found in considerable numbers in the vicinity
of King’s-cross, Waterloo-road, and other localities. They abstract any
valuable property they find lying about, but their chief object is to
get the silver plate.
There are few cases of larceny from back bedroom windows, as the
servants and inmates are generally hovering about after breakfast. This
is sometimes effected, though rarely, by the connivance of the servants.
At other times these robberies from the house are committed by means of
breaking a pane of glass, when the thieves undo the fastening of the
window and effect an entrance. This is often perpetrated during the
temporary absence of the inmates.
The statistics in this class of robberies will be given when we come to
treat on “Attic or Garret Thieves.”
_Attic or Garret Thieves._--These are generally the most expert thieves
in the metropolis. Their mode of operation is this:--They call at a
dwelling-house with a letter, or have communication with some of the
servants, for the purpose of discovering the best means of access, and
to learn how the people in the house are engaged and the time most
suitable for the depredation. They generally come to plunder the house
in the evening, when one or two of their accomplices loiter about,
watching the movements of the police, the other meanwhile proceeding to
the roof of the house.
These attic robberies are generally effected through unoccupied
houses--perhaps by the house next door, or some other on the same side
of the street. They pass through the attic to the roof, and proceed
along the gutters and coping to the attic window of the house to be
robbed. They unfasten the attic window by taking the pane of glass
out, or pushing the fastening back, and enter the dwelling. This is
generally done about 7 or 8 o’clock in the evening, when the family are
at dinner--the servants being engaged between the dining-room on the
first floor and the kitchen below, serving up the dinner.
The thieves proceed to the bedroom on the second floor, and force open
the wardrobe with a short jemmy which they carry, and try to find the
jewel-case and any other articles of value. Their object is generally
to get valuable jewels.
The dining-room is on the first floor, so that they have often full
scope for their operations without being seen or obstructed, while the
inmates are engaged below. They return the same way through the attic
window on the roof, run along the gutters, and escape by the same house
through which they entered.
A very remarkable robbery of this kind occurred in the beginning of
1861 at Loundes-square, where the thieves entered through an attic and
obtained jewels to the amount of 3,000_l._
On their return from the dwelling-house, it being a very windy night,
a hat belonging to one of them was blown from the house-top upon one
of the slanting roofs he could not reach, which afterwards led to his
detection. A short time previously it was in the hands of a hatter for
certain repairs, when he inserted a paper marked with his name within
it. The thief was arrested, tried, and got ten years’ penal servitude.
Some get to the roof by means of a ladder placed outside an unfinished
house, or house under repair, and steal in the same manner.
An ingenious attempt at a jewel robbery occurred lately by means of a
cab drawing up with a lady before a dwelling-house. The cabman, who
was evidently in collusion with the thieves, dismounted, rang the
bell, and told the butler who answered the door, that a lady wished
to see him. On his coming to the cab, it being about ten or fifteen
yards from the street-door, he was kept in conversation by a female.
Meantime he observed a respectable-looking man steal into the house
from the street, while thus engaged. He left the cab without taking any
notice of what he saw, and entered the house, when the cab drove off at
a rapid rate, which convinced him that there was something wrong. He
made his way up into the bedroom on the second floor, and found a man
of respectable appearance concealed in the apartment. An officer was
called and the man was searched. There was found on his person a jemmy,
a wax taper, and silent lights. He was taken into custody; but no trace
of the cabman or woman could be found. He was afterwards committed for
the offence.
These attic thieves generally live in Hackney-road and Kingsland-road.
On one occasion a gang was discovered in a furnished house in
Russell-square. They generally have apartments in respectable
neighbourhoods to avoid suspicion, and have servants to attend them,
who assist in disposing of the stolen property. The best attic thieves
reside in Hackney and Kingsland-roads, and many are to be found in
the neighbourhood of Shoreditch church; a few of them are known to
be residing in Waterloo-road, but not of so high a class as in the
localities referred to.
The women connected with them have an abundance of jewellery; they
live in high style, with plenty of cash, but not displayed to any
great extent at the time any robbery is committed, as it would excite
suspicion.
Many of them have a very gentleman-like appearance, and none but a
detective officer would know them. When brought before the police
courts for these felonies, it is usual to have constables brought from
all the districts to see them and make them known, which very much
annoys them.
They generally succeed in making off with their booty, and are seldom
caught. Their robberies are skilfully planned, in the same experienced
careful manner in which burglaries are effected. They have gone through
all grades of thieving from their infancy--through sneaking and picking
pockets.
This is a late system of robbery, and has been carried on rather
extensively over the west end of the metropolis.
Number of larcenies from dwelling-houses,
by lifting up windows, breaking
glass, and by attic windows through empty
houses, for 1800 515
Ditto, ditto, in the City 14
---
529
Value of property thereby abstracted in
Metropolitan districts for 1860 £3,962
Ditto, ditto, in the City 18
------
£3,980
A VISIT TO THE ROOKERY OF ST. GILES AND ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD.
In company with a police officer we proceeded to the Seven Dials,
one of the most remarkable localities in London, inhabited by
bird-fanciers, keepers of stores of old clothes and old shoes,
costermongers, patterers, and a motley assemblage of others, chiefly of
the lower classes. As we stood at one of the angles in the centre of
the Dials we saw three young men--burglars--loitering at an opposite
corner of an adjoining dial. One of them had a gentlemanly appearance,
and was dressed in superfine black cloth and beaver hat. The other
two were attired as mechanics or tradesmen. One of them had recently
returned from penal servitude, and another had undergone a long
imprisonment.
Leaving the Seven Dials and its dingy neighbourhood, we went to
Oxford Street, one of the first commercial streets in London, and
one of the finest in the world. It reminded us a good deal of the
celebrated Broadway, New York, although the buildings of the latter
are in some places more costly and splendid, and some of the shops
more magnificent. Oxford Street is one of the main streets of London,
and is ever resounding with the din of vehicles, carts, cabs, hansoms,
broughams, and omnibuses driving along. Many of the shops are spacious
and crowded with costly goods, and the large windows of plate-glass,
set in massive brass frames, are gaily furnished with their various
articles of merchandise.
On the opposite side of the street we observed a jolly,
comfortable-looking, elderly man, like a farmer in appearance, not
at all like a London sharper. He was standing looking along the
street as though he were waiting for some one. He was a magsman (a
skittle-sharp), and no doubt other members of the gang were hovering
near. He appeared to be as cunning as an old fox in his movements,
admirably fitted to entrap the unwary.
A little farther along the street we saw a fashionably-dressed man
coming towards us, arm in arm with his companion, among the throng of
people. They were in the prime of life, and had a respectable, and even
opulent appearance. One of them was good-humoured and social, as though
he were on good terms with himself and society in general; the other
was more callous and reserved, and more suspicious in his aspect. Both
were bedecked with glittering watch chains and gold rings. They passed
by a few paces, when the more social of the two, looking over his
shoulder, met our eye directed towards him, turned back and accosted
us, and was even so generous as to invite us into a gin-palace near by,
which we courteously declined. The two magsmen (card-sharpers) strutted
off, like fine gentlemen, along the street on the outlook for their
victims.
Here we saw another young man, a burglar, pass by. He had an engaging
appearance, and was very tasteful in his dress, very unlike the rough
burglars we met at Whitechapel, the Borough, and Lambeth.
Leaving Oxford Street we went along Holborn to Chancery Lane, chiefly
frequented by barristers and attorneys, and entered Fleet Street, one
of the main arteries of the metropolis, reminding us of London in the
olden feudal times, when the streets were crowded together in dense
masses, flanked with innumerable dingy alleys, courts, and by-streets,
like a great rabbit-warren. Fleet Street, though a narrow, business
street, with its traffic often choked with vehicles, is interesting
from its antique, historical, and literary associations. Elbowing our
way through the throng of people, we pass through one of the gloomy
arches of Temple Bar, and issue into the Strand, where we saw two
pickpockets, young, tall, gentlemanly men, cross the street from St.
Clement’s Church and enter a restaurant. They were attired in a suit
of superfine black cloth, cut in fashionable style. They entered an
elegant dining-room, and probably sat down to costly viands and wines.
Leaving the Strand, we went up St. Martin’s Lane, a narrow street
leading from the Strand to the Seven Dials. We here saw a young man, an
expert burglar, of about twenty-four years of age and dark complexion,
standing at the corner of the street. He was well dressed, in a dark
cloth suit, with a billicock hat. One of his comrades was taken from
his side about three weeks ago on a charge of burglary.
Entering a beershop in the neighbourhood of St. Giles, close by the
Seven Dials, we saw a band of coiners and ringers of changes. One of
them, a genteel-looking, slim youth is a notorious coiner, and has
been convicted. He was sitting quietly by the door over a glass of
beer, with his companion by his side. One of them is a moulder; another
was sentenced to ten years’ penal servitude for coining and selling
base coin. A modest-looking young man, one of the gang, was seated by
the bar, also respectably dressed. He is generally supposed to be a
subordinate connected with this coining band, looking out, while they
are coining, that no officers of justice are near, and carrying the bag
of base money for them when they go out to sell it to base wretches in
small quantities at low prices. Five shillings’ worth of base money
is generally sold for tenpence. “_Ringing the changes_” is effected
in this way:--A person offers a good sovereign to a shopkeeper to be
changed. The gold piece is chinked on the counter, or otherwise tested,
and is proved to be good. The man hastily asks back and gets the
sovereign, and pretends that he has some silver, so that he does not
require to change it. On feeling his pocket he finds he does not have
it, and returns a base piece of money resembling it, instead of the
genuine gold piece.
We returned to Bow Street, and saw three young pickpockets proceeding
along in company, like three well-dressed costermongers, in dark cloth
frock-coats and caps.
Being desirous of having a more thorough knowledge of the people
residing in the rookery of St. Giles, we visited it with Mr. Hunt,
inspector of police. We first went to a lodging-house in George Street,
Oxford Street, called the Hampshire-Hog Yard. Most of the lodgers were
then out. On visiting a room in the garret we saw a man, in mature
years, making artificial flowers; he appeared to be very ingenious, and
made several roses before us with marvellous rapidity. He had suspended
along the ceiling bundles of dyed grasses of various hues, crimson,
yellow, green, brown, and other colours to furnish cases of stuffed
birds. He was a very intelligent man and a natural genius. He told us
strong drink had brought him to this humble position in the garret, and
that he once had the opportunity of making a fortune in the service of
a nobleman. We felt, as we looked on his countenance, and listened to
his conversation, he was capable of moving in a higher sphere of life.
Yet he was wonderfully contented with his humble lot.
We visited Dyott House, George Street, the ancient manor-house of St.
Giles-in-the-Fields, now fitted up as a lodging-house for single men.
The kitchen, an apartment about fifteen feet square, is surrounded with
massive and tasteful panelling in the olden style. A large fire blazing
in the grate--with two boilers on each side--was kept burning night
and day to supply the lodgers with hot water for their tea and coffee.
Some rashers of bacon were suspended before the fire, with a plate
underneath. There was a gas-light in the centre of the apartment, and
a dial on the back wall. The kitchen was furnished with two long deal
tables and a dresser, with forms to serve as seats. There were about
fifteen labouring men present, most of them busy at supper on fish,
and bread, and tea. They were a very mixed company, such as we would
expect at a London lodging-house, men working in cab-yards assisting
cabmen, some distributing bills in the streets, one man carrying
advertizing boards, and others jobbing at anything they can find to do
in the neighbourhood. This house was clean and comfortable, and had
the appearance of being truly a comfortable poor man’s home. It was
cheerful to look around us and to see the social air of the inmates.
One man sat with his coat off, enjoying the warmth of the kitchen; a
boy was at his tea, cutting up dried fish and discussing his bread and
butter. A young man of about nineteen sat at the back of the apartment,
with a very sinister countenance, very unlike the others. There was
something about him that indicated a troubled mind. We also observed a
number of elderly men among the party, some in jackets, and others in
velvet coats, with an honest look about them.
When the house was a brothel, about fifteen years ago, an unfortunate
prostitute, named Mary Brothers, was murdered in this kitchen by a man
named Connell, who was afterwards executed at Newgate for the deed. He
had carnal connexion with this woman some time before, and he suspected
that she had communicated to him the venereal disease with which he was
afflicted. In revenge he took her life, having purchased a knife at a
neighbouring cutler’s shop.
We were introduced to the landlady, a very stout woman, who came up
to meet us, candle in hand, as we stood on the staircase. Here we saw
the profile of the ancient proprietor of the house, carved over the
paneling, set, as it were, in an oval frame. In another part of the
staircase we saw a similar frame, but the profile had been removed or
destroyed. Over the window that overlooks the staircase there are three
figures, possibly likenesses of his daughters; such is the tradition.
The balustrade along the staircase is very massive and tastefully
carved and ornamented. The bed-rooms were also clean and comfortable.
The beds are furnished with a bed-cover and flock bed, with sufficient
warm and clean bedding, for the low charge of 2_s._ a week, or 4_d._
a night. The first proprietor of the house is said to have been a
magistrate of the city, and a knight or baronet.
Leaving George Street we passed on to Church Lane, a by-street in the
rear of New Oxford Street, containing twenty-eight houses. It was
dark as we passed along. We saw the street lamps lighted in Oxford
Street, and the shop-windows brilliantly illumined, while the thunder
of vehicles in the street broke on our ear, rolling in perpetual
stream. Here a very curious scene presented itself to our view. From
the windows of the three-storied houses in Church Lane were suspended
wooden rods with clothes to dry across the narrow street,--cotton
gowns, sheets, trousers, drawers, and vests, some ragged and patched,
and others old and faded, giving a more picturesque aspect to the
scene, which was enhanced by the dim lights in the windows, and the
groups of the lower orders of all ages assembled below, clustered
around the doorways, and in front of the houses, or indulging in
merriment in the street. Altogether the appearance of the inhabitants
was much more clean and orderly than might be expected in such a
low locality. Many women of the lower orders, chiefly of the Irish
cockneys, were seated, crouching with their knees almost touching
their chin, beside the open windows. Some men were smoking their pipes
as they stood leaning against the walls of their houses, whom from
their appearance we took to be evidently out-door labourers. Another
labouring man was seated on the sill of his window, in corduroy
trousers, light-gray coat and cap, with an honest look of good-humour
and industry. Numbers of young women, the wives of costermongers,
sat in front of their houses in the manner we have described, clad
in cotton gowns, with a general aspect of personal cleanliness and
contentment. At the corners of the streets, and at many of the
doorways, were groups of young costermongers, who had finished their
hard day’s work, and were contentedly chatting and smoking. They
generally stood with their hands in their breeches pockets. Most of
these people are Irish, or the children of Irish parents. The darkness
of the street was lighted up by the street lamps as well as by the
lights in the windows of two chandlers’ shops and one public-house. At
one of the chandlers’ shops the proprietor was standing by his door
with folded arms as he looked good-humouredly on his neighbours around
his shop-door. We also saw some of the young Arabs bareheaded and
barefooted, with their little hands in their pockets, or squatted on
the street, having the usual restless, artful look peculiar to their
tribe.
Here a house was pointed out to us, No. 21, which was formerly let
at a rent of 25_l._ per annum to a publican that resided in the
neighbourhood. He let the same in rooms for 90_l._ a year, and these
again receive from parties residing in them upwards of 120_l._ The
house is still let in rooms, but they are occupied, like all others in
the neighbourhood, by one family only.
At one house as we passed along we saw a woman selling potatoes, at the
window, to persons in the street. On looking into the interior we saw a
cheerful fire burning in the grate and some women sitting around it. We
also observed several bushel baskets and sacks placed round the room,
filled with potatoes, of which they sell a large quantity.
In Church Lane we found two lodging-houses, the kitchens of which
are entered from the street by a descent of a few steps leading
underground to the basement. Here we found numbers of people clustered
together around several tables, some reading the newspapers, others
supping on fish, bread, tea, and potatoes, and some lying half asleep
on the tables in all imaginable positions. These, we were told, had
just returned from hopping in Kent, had walked long distances, and were
fatigued.
On entering some of these kitchens, the ceiling being very low, we
found a large fire burning in the grate, and a general air of comfort,
cleanliness, and order. Such scenes as these were very homely and
picturesque, and reminded us very forcibly of localities of London in
the olden time. In some of them the inmates were only half dressed, and
yet appeared to be very comfortable from the warmth of the apartment.
Here we saw a number of the poorest imbeciles we had noticed in the
course of our rambles through the great metropolis. Many of them were
middle-aged men, others more elderly, very shabbily dressed, and some
half naked. There was little manliness left in the poor wretches as
they squatted drearily on the benches. The inspector told us they were
chiefly vagrants, and were sunk in profound ignorance and debasement,
from which they were utterly unable to rise.
The next kitchen of this description we entered was occupied by
females. It was about fifteen feet square, and belongs to a house with
ten rooms, part of which is occupied as a low lodging-house. Here we
found five women seated around a table, most of them young, but one
more advanced in life. Some of them were good-looking, as though they
had been respectable servants. They were busy at their tea, bread, and
butcher’s meat. On the table stood a candle on a small candlestick.
They sat in curious positions round the table, some of them with an
ample crinoline. One sat by the fire with her gown drawn over her
knees, displaying her white petticoat. As we stood beside them they
burst out in a titter which they could not suppress. On looking round
we observed a plate-rack at the back of the kitchen, and, as usual in
these lodging-houses, a glorious fire burning brightly in the grate.
An old chest of drawers, surmounted with shelves, stood against the
wall. The girls were all prostitutes and thieves, but had no appearance
of shame. They were apparently very merry. The old woman sat very
thoughtful, looking observant on, and no doubt wondering what errand
could have brought us into the house.
We then entered another dwelling-house. On looking down the stairs we
saw a company of young women, from seventeen to twenty-five years of
age. A rope was hung over the fireplace, with stockings and shirts
suspended over it, and clothes were drying on a screen. A young woman,
with her hair netted and ornamented, sat beside the fire with a green
jacket and striped petticoat with crinoline. Another good-looking young
woman sat by the table dressed in a cotton gown and striped apron, with
coffee-pot in hand, and tea-cups before her. Some pleasant-looking
girls sat by the table with their chins leaning on their hands, smiling
cheerfully, looking at us with curiosity. Another coarser featured
dame lolled by the end of the table with her gown drawn over her head,
smirking in our countenance; and one sat by, her shawl drawn over her
head. Another apparently modest girl sat by cutting her nails with
a knife. On the walls around the apartment were suspended a goodly
assortment of bonnets, cloaks, gowns, and petticoats.
Meantime an elderly little man came in with a cap on his head and
a long staff in his hand, and stood looking on with curiosity. On
the table lay a pack of cards beside the bowls, cups, and other
crockery-ware. Some of the girls appeared as if they had lately been
servants in respectable situations, and one was like a quiet genteel
shop girl. They were all prostitutes, and most of them prowl about at
night to plunder drunken men. As we looked on the more interesting
girls, especially two of them, we saw the sad consequences of one
wrong step, which may launch the young and thoughtless into a criminal
career, and drive them into the dismal companionship of the most lewd
and debased.
We then went to Short’s Gardens, and entered a house there. On the
basement underground we saw a company of men, women, and children of
various ages, seated around the tables, and by the fire. The men and
women had mostly been engaged in hopping, and appeared to be healthy,
industrious, and orderly. Until lately thieves used to lodge in these
premises.
As we entered Queen Street we saw three thieves, lads of about fourteen
years of age, standing in the middle of the street as if on the outlook
for booty. They were dressed in black frock-coats, corduroy, and
fustian trousers, and black caps. Passing along Queen Street, which is
one of the wings of the Dials, we went up to the central space between
the Seven Dials. Here a very lively scene presented itself to our
view; clusters of labouring men, and a few men of doubtful character,
in dark shabby dress, loitered by the corners of the surrounding
streets. We also saw groups of elderly women standing at some of the
angles, most of them ragged and drunken, their very countenances the
pictures of abject misery. The numerous public-houses in the locality
were driving a busy traffic, and were thronged with motley groups of
people of various grades, from the respectable merchant and tradesman
to the thief and the beggar.
Bands of boys and girls were gamboling in the street in wild frolic,
tumbling on their head with their heels in the air, and shouting in
merriment, while the policeman was quietly looking on in good humour.
Around the centre of the Dials were bakers’ shops with large
illuminated fronts, the shelves being covered with loaves, and the
baker busy attending to his customers. In the window was a large
printed notice advertising the “best wheaten bread at 6_d._” a loaf. A
druggist’s shop was invitingly adorned with beautiful green and purple
jars, but no customers entered during the time of our stay.
At the corner of an opposite dial was an old clothes store, with a
large assortment of second-hand garments, chiefly for men, of various
kinds, qualities, and styles, suspended around the front of the
shop. There were also provision shops, which were well attended with
customers. The whole neighbourhood presented an appearance of bustle
and animation, and omnibuses and other vehicles were passing along in a
perpetual stream.
The most of the low girls in this locality do not go out till late
in the evening, and chiefly devote their attention to drunken men.
They frequent the principal thoroughfares in the vicinity of Oxford
Street, Holborn, Farringdon Street, and other bustling streets. From
the nature of their work they are of a migratory character. The most
of the men we saw in the houses we visited belong to the labouring
class, men employed to assist in cleaning cabs and omnibuses, carriers
of advertising boards, distributors of bills, patterers, chickweed
sellers, ballad singers, and persons generally of industrious habits,
along with a few of doubtful character. They are willing to work, but
will steal rather than want.
The lodging-house people here have not been known of late years to
receive stolen property, and the inhabitants generally are steadily
rising in habits of decency, cleanliness, and morality.
The houses we visited in George Street, and the streets adjacent, were
formerly part of the rookery of St. Giles-in-the-Fields, celebrated as
one of the chief haunts of redoutable thieves and suspicious characters
in London. Deserted as it comparatively is now, except by the labouring
poor vagrants and low prostitutes, it was once the resort of all
classes, from the proud noble to the beggar picking up a livelihood
from door to door.
We have been indebted to Mr. Hunt, inspector of the lodging-houses of
this district, for fuller information regarding the rookery of St.
Giles and its inhabitants twenty years ago, before a number of these
disreputable streets were removed to make way for New Oxford Street.
We quote from a manuscript nearly in his own words:--“The ground
covered by the Rookery was enclosed by Great Russell Street, Charlotte
Street, Broad Street, and High Street, all within the parish of St.
Giles-in-the-Fields. Within this space were George Street (once Dyott
Street), Carrier Street, Maynard Street, and Church Street, which ran
from north to south, and were intersected by Church Lane, Ivy Lane,
Buckeridge Street, Bainbridge Street, and New Street. These, with an
almost endless intricacy of courts and yards crossing each other,
rendered the place like a rabbit-warren.
“In Buckeridge Street stood the ‘Hare and Hounds’ public-house,
formerly the ‘Beggar in the Bush;’ at the time of which I speak (1844)
kept by the well-known and much-respected Joseph Banks (generally
called ‘Stunning Joe’), a civil, rough, good-hearted Boniface. His
house was the resort of all classes, from the aristocratic marquis to
the vagabond whose way of living was a puzzle to himself.
“At the opposite corner of Carrier Street stood Mother Dowling’s, a
lodging-house and provision shop, which was not closed nor the shutters
put on for several years before it was pulled down, to make way for
the improvements in New Oxford Street.... The shop was frequented by
vagrants of every class, including foreigners, who, with moustache,
well-brushed hat, and seedy clothes--consisting usually of a frock-coat
buttoned to the chin, light trousers, and boots gaping at each lofty
step--might be seen making their way to Buckeridge Street to regale
upon cabbage, which had been boiled with a ferocious pig’s head or a
fine piece of salt beef. From 12 to 1 o’clock at midnight was chosen by
these ragged but proud gentlemen from abroad as the proper time for a
visit to Mrs. Dowling’s.
“Most of the houses in Buckeridge Street were lodging-houses for
thieves, prostitutes, and cadgers. The charge was fourpence a night in
the upper rooms, and threepence in the cellars, as the basements were
termed. If the beds were occupied six nights by the same parties, and
all dues paid, the seventh night (Sunday) was not charged for. The
rooms were crowded, and paid well. I remember seeing fourteen women
in beds in a cellar, each of whom paid 3_d._ a night, which, Sunday
free, amounted to 21_s._ per week. The furniture in this den might
have originally cost the proprietor 7_l._ or 8_l._ At the time I last
visited it, it was not worth more than 30_s._
“Both sides of Buckeridge Street abounded in courts, particularly the
north side, and these, with the connected backyards and low walls
in the rear of the street, afforded an easy escape to any thief
when pursued by officers of justice. I remember on one occasion, in
1844, a notorious thief was wanted by a well-known criminal-officer
(Restieaux). He was known to associate with some cadgers who used
a house in the rear of Paddy Corvan’s, near Church Street, and was
believed to be in the house when Restieaux and a serjeant entered it.
They went into the kitchen where seven male and five female thieves
were seated, along with several cadgers of the most cunning class. One
of them made a signal, indicating that some one had escaped by the
back of the premises, in which direction the officers proceeded. It
was evident the thief had gone over a low wall into an adjoining yard.
The pursuers climbed over, passed through the yards and back premises
of eleven houses, and secured him in Jones Court. There were about
twenty persons present at the time of the arrest, but they offered no
resistance to the constables. It would have been a different matter had
he been apprehended by strangers.
“In Bainbridge Street, one side of which was nearly occupied by the
immense brewery of Meux & Co., were found some of the most intricate
and dangerous places in this low locality. The most notorious of these
was Jones Court, inhabited by coiners, utterers of base coin, and
thieves. In former years a bull terrier was kept here, which gave an
alarm on the appearance of a stranger, when the coining was suspended
till the course was clear. This dog was at last taken away by Duke
and Clement, two police officers, and destroyed by an order from a
magistrate.
“The houses in Jones Court were connected by roof, yard, and cellar
with those in Bainbridge and Buckeridge streets, and with each other
in such a manner that the apprehension of an inmate or refugee in one
of them was almost a task of impossibility to a stranger, and difficult
to those well acquainted with the interior of the dwellings. In one of
the cellars was a large cesspool, covered in such a way that a stranger
would likely step into it. In the same cellar was a hole about two
feet square, leading to the next cellar, and thence by a similar hole
into the cellar of a house in Scott’s Court, Buckeridge Street. These
afforded a ready means of escape to a thief, but effectually stopped
the pursuers, who would be put to the risk of creeping on his hands and
knees through a hole two feet square in a dark cellar in St. Giles’s
Rookery, entirely in the power of dangerous characters. Other houses
were connected in a similar manner. In some instances there was a
communication from one back window to another by means of large spike
nails, one row to hold by, and another for the feet to rest on, which
were not known to be used at the time we refer to.
“In Church Street were several houses let to men of an honest but poor
class, who worked in omnibus and cab-yards, factories, and such other
places as did not afford them the means of procuring more expensive
lodgings. Their apartments were clean, and their way of living frugal.
“Other houses of a less reputable character were very numerous. One
stood at the corner of Church Street and Lawrence Street, occupied by
the most infamous characters of the district. On entering the house
from Lawrence Lane, and proceeding upstairs, you would find on each
floor several rooms connected by a kind of gallery, each room rented by
prostitutes. These apartments were open to those girls who had fleeced
any poor drunken man who had been induced to accompany them to this
den of infamy. When they had plundered the poor dupe, he was ejected
without ceremony by the others who resided in the room; often without a
coat or hat, sometimes without his trousers, and occasionally left on
the staircase naked as he was born. In this house the grossest scenes
of profligacy were transacted. In pulling it down a hole was discovered
in the wall opening into a timber-yard which fronted High Street--a
convenient retreat for any one pursued.
“Opposite to this was the “Rose and Crown” public-house, resorted to
by all classes of the light-fingered gentry, from the mobsman and
his “Amelia” to the lowest of the street thieves and his “Poll.” In
the tap-room might be seen Black Charlie the fiddler, with ten or a
dozen lads and lasses enjoying the dance, and singing and smoking over
potations of gin-and-water, more or less plentiful according to the
proceeds of the previous night--all apparently free from care in their
wild carousals. The cheek waxed pale when the policeman opened the door
and glanced round the room, but when he departed the merriment would be
resumed with vigour.
“The kitchens of some houses in Buckeridge Street afforded a specimen
of life in London rarely seen elsewhere even in London, though some in
Church Lane do so now on a smaller scale. The kitchen, a long apartment
usually on the ground-floor, had a large coke fire, along with a sink,
water-tap, one or two tables, several forms, a variety of saucepans,
and other cooking utensils, and was lighted with a gas jet. There in
the evenings suppers were discussed by the cadgers an alderman might
almost have envied--rich steaks and onions, mutton and pork chops,
fried potatoes, sausages, cheese, celery, and other articles of fare,
with abundance of porter, half-and-half, and tobacco.
“In the morning they often sat down to a breakfast of tea, coffee,
eggs, rashers of bacon, dried fish, fresh butter, and other good
things which would be considered luxuries by working people, when each
discussed his plans for the day’s rambles, and arranged as to the
exchange of garments, bandages, &c., considered necessary to prevent
recognition in those neighbourhoods recently worked.
“Their dinners were taken in the course of their rounds, consisting
generally of the best of the broken victuals given them by the
compassionate, and were eaten on one of the door-steps of some
respectable street, after which they would resort to some obscure
public-house or beer-shop in a back street or alley to partake of some
liquor.
“Heaps of good food were brought home and thrown on a side-table,
or into a corner, as unfit to be eaten by those “professional”
cadgers,--food which thousands of the working men of London would have
been thankful for. It was given to the children who visited these
lodging-houses. The finer viands, such as pieces of fancy bread, rolls,
kidneys, mutton and lamb, the gentlemen of the establishment reserved
for their own more fastidious palates.
[Illustration: BOYS EXERCISING AT TOTHILL FIELDS PRISON.]
“On Sundays many of the cadgers staid at home till night. They spent
the day at cards, shove-halfpenny, tossing, and other amusements.
Sometimes five or six shillings were staked on the table among a
party of about ten of them at cards, although coppers were the usual
stakes.... The life of a cadger is not in many instances a life of
privation. I do not speak (says Mr. Hunt) of the really distressed, to
whose wants too little attention is sometimes paid. I allude to beggars
by profession, who prefer a life of mendicancy to any other. There are
among them sailors, whose largest voyage has been to Tothill Fields
prison, or to Gravesend on a pleasure trip. Cripples with their arms in
slings, or feet, swathed in blood-stained rags, swollen to double the
size, who may be seen dancing when in their lodging at their evening
revels. You may see poor Irish with from five to thirty sovereigns in a
bag hung round their necks or in the waistband of their trousers; women
who carry hired babes, or it may be a bundle of clothing resembling a
child, on their back and breast, and other such-like impostors.
“Between Buckeridge Street and Church Lane stood Ivy Lane, leading from
George Street to Carrier Street, communicating with the latter by a
small gateway. Clark’s Court was on its left, and Rats’ Castle on its
right. This castle was a large dirty building occupied by thieves and
prostitutes, and boys who lived by plunder. On the removal of these
buildings, in 1845, the massive foundations of an hospital were found,
which had been built in the 12th century by Matilda, Queen of Henry the
First, daughter of Malcolm King of Scotland, for persons afflicted with
leprosy.
“At this place criminals were allowed a bowl of ale on their way from
Newgate to Tyburn.
“Maynard Street and Carrier Street were occupied by costermongers and
a few thieves and cadgers. George Street, part of which still stands,
consisted of lodging-houses for tramps, thieves, and beggars, together
with a few brothels.”
From George Street to High Street runs a mews called Hampshire-Hog
Yard, where there is an old established lodging-house for single men,
poor but honest.
The portion of the rookery now remaining, consisting of Church Lane,
with its courts, a small part of Carrier Street, and a smaller portion
of one side of Church Street, is now more densely crowded than when
Buckeridge Street and its neighbourhood were in existence. The old
Crown public-house in Church Lane, formerly the resort of the most
notorious cadgers, was in 1851 inhabited by Irish people, where
often from twelve to thirty persons lodged in a room. At the back of
this public-house is a yard, on the right-hand side of which is an
apartment then occupied by thirty-eight men, women, and children, all
lying indiscriminately on the floor.
Speaking of other houses in this neighbourhood in 1851, Mr. Hunt
states: “I have frequently seen as many as sixteen people in a room
about twelve feet by ten, these numbers being exceeded in larger rooms.
Many lay on loose straw littered on the floor, their heads to the wall
and their feet to the centre, and decency was entirely unknown among
them.”
Now, however, the district is considerably changed, the inhabitants are
rapidly rising in decency, cleanliness, and order, and the Rookery of
St. Giles will soon be ranked among the memories of the past.
NARRATIVE OF A LONDON SNEAK, OR COMMON THIEF.
The following narrative was given us by a convicted thief, who has for
years wandered over the streets of London as a ballad singer, and has
resided in the low lodging-houses scattered over its lowest districts.
He was a poor wretched creature, degraded in condition, of feeble
intellect, and worthless character, we picked up in a low lodging
house in Drury Lane. He was shabbily dressed in a pair of old corduroy
trousers, old brown coat, black shabby vest, faded grey neckerchief, an
old dark cap and peak, and unwashed shirt. For a few shillings he was
very ready to tell us the sad story of his miserable life.
“I was born at Abingdon, near Oxford, where my father was a bricklayer,
and kept the N----n public-house. He died when I was fourteen years of
age; I was sent to school and was taught to read, but not to write.
At this time I was a steady, well-conducted boy. At fourteen years of
age I went to work with my uncle, a basket-maker and rag merchant in
Abingdon, and lived with my mother. I wrought there for three years,
making baskets and cutting willows for them. I left my uncle then, as
he had not got any more work for me to do, and was living idle with
my mother. At this time I went with a Cheap John to the fairs, and
travelled with him the whole of that season. He was a Lancashire man,
between fifty and sixty years of age, and had a woman who travelled the
country with him, but I do not think they were married. He was a tall,
dark-complexioned man, and was a ‘duffer,’ very unprincipled in his
dealings. He sold cutlery, books, stationery, and hardware.
“When we were going from one fair to another, we would stop on the road
and make a fire, and steal fowls and potatoes, or any green-stuff that
was in season. We sometimes travelled along with gipsies, occasionally
to the number of fifty or sixty in a gang. The gipsies are a curious
sort of people, and would not let you connect with any of them unless
they saw you were to remain among them.
“I assisted Cheap John in the markets when selling his goods, and
handed them to the purchasers.
“The first thing I ever pilfered was a pair of boots and a handkerchief
from a drunken man who lay asleep at a fair in Reading, in Berks. He
was lying at the back of a booth and no one near him. This was about
dusk in September. I pawned the boots at Windsor on the day of a fair
for 3_s._, and sold the handkerchief for 1_s._
“I was about seventeen years of age when I went with Cheap John, and
remained with him about thirteen weeks, when I left, on account of a
row I had with him. I liked this employment very well, got 2_s._ in the
pound for my trouble, and sometimes had from 1_l._ to 25_s._ a week.
But the fairs were only occasional, and the money I earned was very
precarious.
“I left Cheap John at Windsor, and came to Slough with a horse-dealer,
where I left him. He gave me 2_s._ for assisting him. I then came up
to London, where I have lived ever since in the lodging-houses in the
different localities. I remember on coming to this great city I was
much astonished at its wonders, and every street appeared to me like
a fair. On coming to London I had no money, and had not any friend to
assist me. I went to Kensington workhouse, and got a night’s lodging,
and lived for about a fortnight at different workhouses in London. They
used to give the lodgers a piece of bread at night, and another in the
morning, and a night’s lodging on straw and boards.
“I then went out singing ballads in the streets of London, and could
get at an average from 2_s._ to 2_s._ 6_d._ a night, but when the
evenings were wet, I could not get anything. In the winter I sang in
the daytime, and in summer I went out in the evening. I have wandered
in this way over many of the streets and thoroughfares of London. I
sing in Marylebone, Somers Town, Camden Town, Paddington, Whitecross
Street, City, Hammersmith, Commercial Road, and Whitechapel, and
live at different lodgings, and make them my home as I move along. I
sing different kinds of songs, sentimental and comic; my favourites
are ‘Gentle Annie,’ ‘She’s reckoned a good hand at it,’ ‘The Dandy
Husband,’ ‘The Week’s Matrimony,’ ‘The Old Woman’s Sayings,’ and
‘John Bull and the Taxes.’ I often sing ‘The Dark-eyed Sailor,’ and
‘The Female Cabin Boy.’ For many years now I have lived by singing in
the public street, sometimes by myself, at other times with a mate. I
occasionally beg in Regent Street and Bond Street on the ‘fly,’ that
is, follow people passing along, and sometimes in Oxford Street and
Holborn. Sometimes I get a little job to do from people at various
kinds of handiwork, such as turning the wheel to polish steel, and
irons, &c., and do other kinds of job work. When hard up I pick pockets
of handkerchiefs, by myself or with one or two mates. [In the course
of our interview we saw he was very clumsy at picking pockets.] I
sometimes go out with the young dark-complexioned lad you saw down
stairs, who is very clever at pocket picking, and has been often
convicted before the criminal courts.
“I have spent many years living in the low lodging-houses of London.
The worst I ever saw was in Keat Street, Whitechapel, about nine years
ago, before they were reformed and changed. Numbers were then crowded
into the different rooms, and the floors were littered with naked
people of all ages, and of both sexes, men and women, and boys and
girls sleeping alongside indiscriminately. It was very common to see
young boys and girls sleeping together. The conversations that passed
between them, and the scenes that were transacted, were enough to
contaminate the morals of the young.
“In the morning they used to go to their different haunts over the
city, some begging, and others thieving.
“On Sunday evenings the only books read were such as ‘Jack Sheppard,’
‘Dick Turpin,’ and the ‘Newgate Calendar’ they got out of the
neighbouring libraries by depositing 1_s._ These were read with much
interest; the lodgers would sooner have these than any other books. I
never saw any of them go to church on Sundays. Sometimes one or two
would go to the ragged-school, such as the one in Field Lane near
Smithfield.
“It often happened a man left his wife, and she came to the
lodging-house and got a livelihood by begging. Some days she would
glean 2_s._ or 3_s._, and at other times would not get a halfpenny.
“The thieves were seldom in the lodging-house, except to meals and at
bedtime. They lived on better fare than the beggars. The pickpocket
lives better than the sneaking thief, and the pickpocket is thought
more of in the lodging-houses and prisons than the beggar.
“The lowest pickpockets often lived in these low lodging-houses, some
of them young lads, and others middle-aged men. The young pickpockets,
if clever, soon leave the lodging-houses and take a room in some
locality, as at Somers Town, Marylebone, the Burgh, Whitechapel, or
Westminster. The pickpockets in lodging-houses, for the most part, are
stockbuzzers, _i.e._, stealers of handkerchiefs.
“I have often seen the boys picking each others’ pockets for diversion
in the lodging-houses, many of them from ten to eleven years of age.
“There are a great number of sneaks in the lodging-houses. Two of them
go out together to the streets, one of them keeps a look-out while the
other steals some article, shoes, vest, or coat, &c., from the shop
or stall. I sometimes go out with a mate and take a pair of boots at
a shop-door and sell them to the pawnbroker, or to a labouring man
passing in the street.
“Sometimes I have known the lodgers make up a packet of sawdust and
put in a little piece of tobacco to cover an opening, leaving only the
tobacco to be seen looking through, and sell it to persons passing by
in the street as a packet of tobacco.
“When I am hard up I have gone out and stolen a loaf at a baker’s shop,
or chandler’s shop, and taken it to my lodging. I have often stolen
handkerchiefs, silk and cambric, from gentlemen’s pockets.
“I once stole a silver snuff-box from a man’s coat-pocket, and on one
occasion took a pocket-book with a lot of papers and postage stamps. I
burnt the papers and sold the stamps for about 1_s._ 6_d._
“I never had clothes respectable enough to try purses and watches,
and did not have nerve for it. I have seen young thieves encouraged
by people who kept the lodging-houses, such as at Keat Street,
Whitechapel, and at the Mint. They would ask the boys if they had
anything, and wish them to sell it to them, which was generally done
at an under-price. In these lodging-houses some lived very well, and
others were starving. Some had steaks and pickles, and plenty of drink,
porter and ale, eggs and bacon, and cigars to smoke. Some of the
poorest go out and get a pennyworth of bread, halfpennyworth of tea,
halfpennyworth of butter, and halfpennyworth of sugar, and perhaps not
have a halfpenny left to pay for their lodging at night. When they do
get money they often go out and spend it in drink, and perhaps the next
night are starving again.
“I have been tried for stealing a quart pot and a handkerchief, at
Bagnigge Wells police station, and was taken to Vine Street police
station for stealing 2_s._ 6_d._ from a drunken woman respectably
dressed. I took it out of her hand, and was seen by a policeman, who
ran after me and overtook me, but the woman refused to prosecute me,
and I was discharged. I was also brought before Marylebone police-court
for begging.
“In my present lodging I am pretty comfortable. We spend our evenings
telling tales and conversing to each other on our wanderings, and
playing at games, such as ‘hunt the slipper.’ I have often been in
great want, and have been driven to steal to get a livelihood.”
PICKPOCKETS AND SHOPLIFTERS.
In tracing the pickpocket from the beginning of his career, in most
cases we must turn our attention to the little ragged boys living
by a felon’s hearth, or herding with other young criminals in a low
lodging-house, or dwelling in the cold and comfortless home of drunken
and improvident parents. The great majority of the pickpockets of
the metropolis, with few exceptions, have sprung from the dregs of
society--from the hearths and homes of London thieves--so that they
have no reason to be proud of their lineage. Fifteen or twenty years
ago many of those accomplished pickpockets, dressed in the highest
style of fashion, and glittering in gold chains, studs, and rings,
who walk around the Bank of England and along Cheapside, and our busy
thoroughfares, were poor ragged boys walking barefooted among the dark
and dirty slums and alleys of Westminster and the Seven Dials, or
loitering among the thieves’ dens of the Borough and Whitechapel.
Step by step they have emerged from their rags and squalor to a higher
position of physical comfort, and have risen to higher dexterity and
accomplishment in their base and ignoble profession.
We say there are a few exceptions to the general rule, that the most
of our habitual thieves have sprung from the loins of felon parents.
We blush to say that some have joined the ranks of our London thieves,
and are living callous in open crime, who were trained in the homes of
honest and industrious parents, and were surrounded in early life with
all those influences which are fitted to elevate and improve the mind.
But here our space forbids us to enlarge.
The chief sources whence our pickpockets spring are from the low
lodging-houses--from those dwellings in low neighbourhoods, where their
parents are thieves, and where improvident and drunken people neglect
their children, such as Whitechapel, Shoreditch, Spitalfields, New Cut,
Lambeth, the Borough, Clerkenwell, Drury Lane, and other localities.
Many of them are the children of Irish parents, costermongers,
bricklayers’ labourers, and others. They often begin to steal at six
or seven years of age, sometimes as early as five years, and commit
petty sneaking thefts, as well as pick handkerchiefs from gentlemen’s
pockets. Many of these ragged urchins are taught to steal by their
companions, others are taught by trainers of thieves, young men and
women, and some middle-aged convicted thieves. They are learned to
be expert in this way. A coat is suspended on the wall with a bell
attached to it, and the boy attempts to take the handkerchief from
the pocket without the bell ringing. Until he is able to do this with
proficiency he is not considered well trained. Another way in which
they are trained is this: The trainer--if a man--walks up and down the
room with a handkerchief in the tail of his coat, and the ragged boys
amuse themselves abstracting it until they learn to do it in an adroit
manner. We could point our finger to three of these execrable wretches,
who are well known to train schools of juvenile thieves--one of them,
a young man at Whitechapel; another, a young woman at Clerkenwell; and
a third, a middle-aged man residing about Lambeth Walk. These base
wretches buy the stolen handkerchiefs from the boys at a paltry sum.
We have also heard of some being taught to pick pockets by means of an
effigy; but this is not so well authenticated.
Great numbers of these ragged pickpockets may be seen loitering about
our principal streets, ready to steal from a stall or shop-door when
they find an opportunity. During the day they generally pick pockets
two or three in a little band, but at dusk a single one can sometimes
do it with success. They not only steal handkerchiefs of various
kinds, but also pocketbooks from the tails of gentlemen’s coats. We
may see them occasionally engaged at this work on Blackfriars Bridge
and London Bridge, also along Bishopsgate, Shoreditch, Whitechapel,
Drury Lane, and similar localities. They may be seen at any hour of
the day, but chiefly from 10 to 2 o’clock. They are generally actively
on the look-out on Saturday evening in the shopping streets where the
labouring people get their provisions in for the Sunday. At this early
stage the boys occasionally pick pockets, and go about cadging and
sneaking (begging and committing petty felonies).
The next stage commences--we shall say--about fourteen years of age,
when the stripling lays aside his rags, and dresses in a more decent
way, though rather shabby. Perhaps in a dark or gray frock-coat, dark
or dirty tweed trousers, and a cap with peak, and shoes. At this time
many of them go to low neighbourhoods, or to those quieter localities
where the labouring people reside, and pick the pockets of the wives
and daughters of this class of persons; others steal from gentlemen
passing along thoroughfares, while a few adroit lads are employed by
men to steal from ladies’ pockets in the fashionable streets of the
metropolis.
These young thieves seldom commit their depredations in the localities
where they are known, but prowl in different parts of the metropolis.
They are of a wandering character, changing from one district to
another, and living in different lodging-houses--often leaving their
parent’s houses as early as ten years of age. Sometimes they are driven
by drunken loafing parents to steal, though in most cases they leave
their comfortless homes and live in lodging-houses.
When they have booty, they generally bring it to some person to dispose
of, as suspicion would be aroused if they went to sell or pawn it
themselves. In some cases they give it to the trainer of thieves, or
they take it to some low receiving house, where wretches encourage
them in stealing; sometimes to low coffee-houses, low hairdressers or
tailors, who act as middle-men to dispose of the property, generally
giving them but a small part of the value.
In the event of their rambling to a distant part of London, they
sometimes arrange to get one of their number to convey the stolen
goods to these parties. At other times they dispose of them to low
wretches connected with the lodging-houses, or other persons in
disreputable neighbourhoods.
At this time many of them cohabit with girls in low lodging-houses;
many of whom are older than themselves, and generally of the felon
class.
These lads frequently steal at the “tail” of gentlemen’s coats, and
learn the other modes of picking pockets.
Stealing the handkerchief from the “tail” of a gentleman’s coat in the
street is generally effected in this way. Three or four usually go
together. They see an old gentleman passing by. One remains behind,
while the other two follow up close beside him, but a little behind.
The one walking by himself behind is the looker out to see if there are
any police or detectives near, or if any one passing by or hovering
around is taking notice of them. One of the two walking close by the
gentleman adroitly picks his pocket, and coils the handkerchief up in
his hand so as not to be seen, while the other brings his body close to
him, so as not to let his arm be seen by any passer by.
If the party feel him taking the handkerchief from his pocket, the
thief passes it quickly to his companion, who runs off with it. The
looker-out walks quietly on as if nothing had occurred, or sometimes
walks up to the gentleman and asks him what is the matter, or pretends
to tell him in what direction the thief has run, pointing him to a very
different direction from the one he has taken.
They not only abstract handkerchiefs but also pocketbooks from the tail
of gentlemen’s coats, or any other article they can lay their fingers
on.
This is the common way in which the coat-pocket is picked when the
person is proceeding along the street. Sometimes it happens that one
thief will work by himself, but this is very seldom. In the case of a
person standing, the coat-tail pocket is picked much in the same manner.
These boys in most cases confine themselves to stealing from the
coat-pocket on the streets, but in the event of a crowd on any
occasion, they are so bold as to steal watches from the vest-pocket.
This is done in a different style, and generally in the company of two
or three in this manner: One of them folds his arms across his breast
in such a way that his right hand is covered with his left arm. This
enables him to use his hand in an unobserved way, so that he is thereby
able to abstract the watch from the vest-pocket of the gentleman
standing by his side.
A police-officer informed us, that when at Cremorne about a
fortnight ago, a large concourse of people was assembled to see the
female acrobat, termed the “Female Blondin,” cross the Thames on a
rope suspended over the river, he observed two young men of about
twenty-four years of age, and about the middle height, respectably
dressed, whom he suspected to be pickpockets. They went up to a smart
gentlemanly man standing at the riverside looking eagerly at the Female
Blondin, then walking the rope over the middle of the river. As his
attention was thus absorbed, the detective saw these two men go up to
him. One of them placed himself close on the right hand side of him,
and putting his right arm under his left, thus covered his right hand,
and took the watch gently from the pocket of the gentleman’s vest. The
thief made two attempts to break the ring attached to the watch, termed
the “bowl” or swivel, with his finger and thumb.
After two ineffective endeavours he bent it completely round, and yet
it would not break. He then left the watch hanging down in front of the
vest, the gentleman meanwhile being unaware of the attempted felony.
The detective officer took both the thieves into custody. They were
brought before the Westminster police-court and sentenced each to three
months’ imprisonment for an attempt to steal from the person.
The same officer informed us that about a month or six weeks ago, in
the same place, on a similar occasion, he observed three persons, a
man, a boy, and a woman, whom he suspected to be picking pockets.
The man was about twenty-eight years of age, rather under the middle
size. The woman hovered by his side. She was very good-looking, about
twenty-four years of age, dressed in a green coloured gown, Paisley
shawl, and straw bonnet trimmed with red velvet and red flowers. The
man was dressed in a black frock-coat, brown trousers, and black hat.
The boy, who happened to be his brother, was about fourteen years old,
dressed in a brown shooting-coat, corduroy trousers, and black cap
with peak. The boy had an engaging countenance, with sharp features
and smart manner. The officer observed the man touch the boy on the
shoulder and point him towards an old lady. The boy placed himself on
her right side, and the man and woman kept behind. The former put his
left hand into the pocket of the lady’s gown and drew nothing from
it, then left her and went about two yards farther; there he placed
himself by other two ladies, tried both their pockets and left them
again. He followed another lady and succeeded in picking her pocket of
a small sum of money and a handkerchief. The officer took them all to
the police station with the assistance of another detective officer,
when they were committed for trial at Clerkenwell sessions. The man
was sentenced to ten years’ penal servitude, the boy to two months’
hard labour, and three months in a reformatory, and the woman was
sentenced to two years’ imprisonment, with hard labour, in the House of
Correction at Westminster.
It appeared, in the course of the evidence at the trial, that this
man had previously been four years in penal servitude, and since his
return had decoyed his little brother from a situation he held, for the
purpose of training him to pick pockets, having induced him to rob his
employer before leaving service.
The _scarf pin_ is generally taken from the breast in this way. The
thief generally has a handkerchief in his hand, pretending to wipe
his nose, as he walks along the street. He then places his right
hand across the breast of the person he intends to rob, bringing his
left hand stealthily under his arm. This conceals his movements from
the eyes of the person. With the latter hand he snatches out the pin
from the scarf. It is sometimes done with the right hand, at other
times with the left, according to the position of the person, and
is generally done in the company of one or more. The person robbed
is rarely aware of the theft. Should he be aware, or should any one
passing by have observed the movement, the pin got from the scarf is
suddenly passed into the hands of the other parties, when all of them
suddenly make off in different directions soon to meet again in some
neighbouring locality.
At other times the thief drives the person with a push, in the street,
bringing his hands to his breast as if he had stumbled against him, at
the same time adroitly laying hold of the pin. This is done in such a
way that the person is seldom aware of the robbery until he afterwards
finds out the loss of the article.
The _trousers pocket_ is seldom picked on the public street, as this
is an operation of considerable difficulty and danger. It is not easy
to slip the hand into the trousers pocket without being felt by the
person attempted to be robbed. This is generally done in crowds where
people are squeezed together, when they contrive to do it in this way:
They cut up the trousers with a knife or other sharp instrument, lay
open the pocket, and adroitly rifle the money from it; or they insert
the fingers or hand into it in a push, often without being observed,
while the person’s attention is distracted, possibly by some of the
accomplices or stalls. They often occasion a disturbance in crowds, and
create a quarrel with people near them, or have sham fights with each
other, or set violently on the person they intend to rob. Many rough
expedients are occasionally had recourse to, to effect this object.
Sometimes the pocket is picked in a crowd by means of laying hold
of the party by the middle as if they had jostled against him, or
by pressing on his back from behind, while the fingers or hand are
inserted into the pocket of his trousers to snatch any valuables, money
or otherwise, contained therein.
This mode of stealing is sometimes done by one person, at other times
by the aid of accomplices. It is most commonly done in the manner now
described.
By dint of long experience and natural skill, some attain great
perfection in this difficult job, and accomplish their object in the
most clever and effective manner. They are so nimble and accomplished
that they will accost a gentleman in the street, and while speaking to
him, and looking him in the face, will quietly insert their hand into
his vest pocket and steal his watch.
In a crowd, the pin is sometimes stolen with dexterity by a person
from behind inserting his hand over the shoulder. Sometimes the watch
is stolen by a sudden snatch at the guard, when the thief runs off
with his booty. This is not so often done in the thoroughfares, as
it is attended with great danger of arrest. It is oftener done in
quiet by-streets, or by-places, where there are many adjacent courts
and alleys intersecting each other, through which the thief has an
opportunity of escaping.
These are the various modes by which gentlemen’s pockets are generally
picked.
A lady’s pocket is commonly picked by persons walking by her side, who
insert their hand gently into the pocket of her gown. This is often
effected by walking alongside of the lady, or by stopping her in the
street, asking the way to a particular place, or inquiring if she is
acquainted with such and such a person. When the thief is accomplished,
he can abstract the purse from her pocket in a very short space of
time: but if he is not so adroit, he will detain her some time longer,
asking further questions till he has completed his object. This is
often done by a man and a woman in company.
A lady generally carries her gold or silver watch in a small pocket
in front of her dress, possibly under one of the large flounces. It
is often stolen from her by one or two, or even three persons, one of
the thieves accosting her in the street in the manner described. They
seldom steal the guard, but in most cases contrive to break the ring or
swivel by which it is attached. Let us suppose that two pickpockets, a
man and a woman, were to see a lady with a watch in the public street;
they are possibly walking arm-in-arm; they make up to her, inquire the
way to a particular place, and stand in front of her. One of them would
ask the way while the other would meantime be busy picking her pocket.
If they succeed, they walk off arm-in-arm as they came.
Sometimes two or three men will go up to a lady and deliberately snatch
a parcel or reticule-bag from her hand or arm, and run off with it.
At other times a very accomplished pickpocket may pick ladies’ pockets
without any accomplices, or with none to cover his movements.
Walking along Cheapside one day, toward the afternoon, we observed a
well-dressed, good-looking man of about thirty years of age, having
the appearance of a smart man of business, standing by the side of
an elderly looking, respectably dressed lady at a jeweller’s window.
The lady appeared to belong to the country, from her dress and
manner, and was absorbed looking into the window at the gold watches,
gold chains, lockets, pins, and other trinkets glittering within.
Meantime the gentleman also appeared to be engrossed looking at these
articles beside her, while crowds of people were passing to and fro
in the street, and the carts, cabs, omnibuses, and other vehicles
were rumbling by, deadening the footsteps of the passers by. Our eye
accidentally caught sight of his left hand drooping by his side in the
direction of the lady’s pocket. We observed it glide softly in the
direction of her pocket beneath the edge of her shawl with all the
fascination of a serpent’s movement. While the hand lay drooping, the
fingers sought their way to the pocket. From the movement we observed
that the fingers had found the pocket, and were seeking their way
farther into the interior. The person was about to plunge his hand to
abstract the contents, when we instinctively hooked his wrist with
the curve of our walking-stick and prevented the robbery. With great
address and tact he withdrew his hand from the lady’s pocket, and his
wrist from our grasp, and walked quietly away. Meantime a group of
people had gathered round about us, and a gentleman asked if we had
observed a pocket picked. We said nothing, but whispered to the lady,
who stood at the window unaware of the attempted felony, that we had
prevented her pocket being picked, and had just scared a thief with his
hand in her pocket, then walked over to the other side of the street
and passed on.
The more accomplished pickpockets are very adroit in their movements.
A young lady may be standing by a window in Cheapside, Fleet Street,
Oxford Street, or the Strand, admiring some beautiful engraving.
Meantime a handsomely dressed young man, with gold chain and moustache,
also takes his station at the window beside her, apparently admiring
the same engraving. The young lady stands gazing on the beautiful
picture, with her countenance glowing with sentiment, which may be
enhanced by the sympathetic presence of the nice looking young man by
her side, and while her bosom is thus throbbing with romantic emotion,
her purse, meanwhile, is being quietly transferred to the pocket of
this elegantly attired young man, whom she might find in the evening
dressed as a rough costermonger, mingling among the low ruffians at the
Seven Dials or Whitechapel, or possibly lounging in some low beershop
in the Borough.
There are various ranks of pickpockets, from the little ragged boy,
stealing the handkerchief from a gentleman’s coat pocket, to the
fashionable thief, promenading around the Bank, or strolling, arm in
arm, with his gentlemanly looking companion along Cheapside.
The swell-mob are to be seen all over London, in crowded thoroughfares,
at railway stations, in omnibuses and steamboats. You find them
pursuing their base traffic in the Strand, Fleet Street, Holborn,
Parliament Street, and at Whitehall, over the whole of the metropolis,
and they are to be seen on all public occasions looking out for plunder.
Some commence their work at 8 and 9 in the morning, others do
not rise till 11 or 12. They are generally seen about 11 or 12
o’clock--sometimes till dusk. Some work in the evening, and not
during the day, while others are out during the day, and do nothing
in the evening. In times of great public excitement, when crowds are
assembled, such as at the late fire at London Bridge, when those great
warehouses were burnt down--they are in motion from the lowest to the
highest. They are generally as busy in summer time as in the winter.
When the gentry and nobility have retired to their country-seats in
the provinces, crowds of strangers and tourists are pouring into the
metropolis every day.
They often travel into the country to attend races such as Ascot,
the Derby at Epsom, and others in the surrounding towns. They go to
the Crystal Palace, where the cleverest of them may be frequently
seen, also to Cremorne, the Zoological Gardens Regent’s Park, the
theatres, operas, ball-rooms, casinos, and other fashionable places of
amusement--sometimes to the great crowds that usually assemble at Mr.
Spurgeon’s new Tabernacle.
They also occasionally make tours in different parts of the United
Kingdom and to Paris, and along the railways in all directions.
The most accomplished pickpockets reside at Islington, Hoxton,
Kingsland Road, St. Luke’s, the Borough, Camberwell, and Lambeth, in
quiet, respectable streets, and occasionally change their lodging if
watched by the police.
They have in most cases been thieves from their cradle; others are
tradesmen’s sons and young men from the provinces, who have gone into
dissipated life and adopted this infamous course. These fast men are
sometimes useful as stalls, though they rarely acquire the dexterity of
the native-born, trained London pickpocket.
There are a few foreign pickpockets, French and others. Some of
them are bullies about the Haymarket. There are also some German
pickpockets, but the foreigners are principally French. As a general
rule, more of the latter are engaged in swindling, than in picking
pockets. Some of the French are considered in adroitness equal to the
best of the English. There are also a few Scotch, but the great mass
are Irish cockneys, which a penetrating eye could trace by their look
and manner. Many of them have a restless look, as if always in dread of
being taken, and generally keep a sharp look-out with the side of their
eye as they walk along.
They differ a good deal in appearance. The better class dress very
fashionably; others in the lower class do not dress so well. The more
dexterous they are, they generally dress in higher style, to get among
the more respectable and fashionable people. Some of the female
pickpockets also dress splendidly, and have been heard to boast of
frequently stealing from 20_l._ to 30_l._ a-day in working on ladies’
pockets. They are sometimes as adroit as the men in stealing ladies’
purses, and are less noticed lingering beside them on the streets, by
the shop-windows, and in places of public resort.
Yet, though well dressed, there is a peculiarity about the look of most
of the male and female pickpockets. The countenance of many of them is
suspicious to a penetrating eye. Many of them have considerable mental
ability, and appear to be highly intelligent.
The most dexterous pickpockets generally average from twenty to
thirty-five years of age, when many of them become depressed in spirit,
and “have the steel taken out of them” with the anxiety of the life
and the punishments inflicted on them in the course of their criminal
career. The restlessness and suspense of their life have the effect
of dissipation upon a good many of them, so that, though generally
comparatively temperate in the use of intoxicating liquors, they may be
said to lead a fast life.
Some of them take a keen bold look, full into your countenance; others
have a sneaking, suspicious, downcast appearance, showing that all is
not right within.
They dress in various styles; sometimes in the finest of superfine
black cloth; at other times in fashionable suits, like the first
gentlemen in the land, spangled with jewellery. Some of them would pass
for gentlemen--they are so polite in their address. Others appear like
a mock-swell, vulgar in their manner--which is transparent through
their fine dress, and are debased in their conversation, which is at
once observed when they begin to speak.
The female pickpockets dress in fashionable attire; sometimes in black
satin dresses and jewellery. Some of them are very lady-like, though
they have sprung originally from the lowest class. You may see very
beautiful women among them, though vulgar in their conversation. The
females are often superior in intellect to the men, and more orderly in
their habits. They are seldom married, but cohabit with pickpockets,
burglars, resetters, and other infamous characters. Their paramour is
frequently taken from them, and they readily go with another man in the
same illicit manner.
They are passionately fond of their fancy man in most cases; yet very
capricious--so much so that they not unfrequently leave the man
they cohabit with for another sweetheart, and afterwards go back to
their old lover again, who is so easy in his principles that he often
welcomes her, especially if she is a good worker--that is, an expert
pickpocket.
The greater part of these women have sprung from the class of Irish
cockneys; others have been domestic servants and the daughters of
labourers, low tradesmen, and others. This gives us a key to many of
these house robberies, done with the collusion of servants--a kind
of felony very common over the metropolis. These are not the more
respectable genteel class of servants, but the humbler order, such as
nursery girls and females in tradesmen’s families. Many of them have
come from the country, or from labouring people’s families over the
working neighbourhoods of the metropolis. They are soon taught to steal
by the men they cohabit with, but seldom acquire the dexterity of the
thief who has been younger trained. They seldom have the acuteness,
tact, and dexterity of the latter.
They live very expensively on the best of poultry, butcher-meat,
pastry, and wines, and some of them keep their pony and trap; most
of them are very improvident, and spend their money foolishly on
eating and drinking--though few of them drink to excess,--on dress,
amusements, and gambling.
They do not go out every day to steal, but probably remain in the house
till their money is nearly spent, when they commence anew their system
of robbery to fill their purse.
The female pickpockets often live with the burglars. They have their
different professions which they pursue. When the one is not successful
in the one mode of plunder, they often get it in the other, or the
women will resort to shoplifting. They must have money in either of
these ways. The women do not resort to prostitution, though they may be
of easy virtue with those they fancy. Some of them live with cracksmen
in high style, and have generally an abundance of cash.
Female pickpockets are often the companions of skittlesharps, and
pursue their mode of livelihood as in the case of cohabiting with
burglars. Their age averages from sixteen to forty-five.
The generality of the pickpockets confine themselves to their own
class of robberies. Others betake themselves to card-sharping and
skittle-sharping, while a few of the more daring eventually become
dexterous burglars.
In their leisure hours they frequently call at certain beershops and
public-houses, kept possibly by some old “pals” or connexions of the
felon class, at King’s Cross, near Shoreditch Church, Whitechapel, the
Elephant and Castle, and Westminster, and are to be seen dangling about
these localities.
Some of the swell-mobsmen have been well-educated men, and at one time
held good situations; some have been clerks; others are connected with
respectable families, led away by bad companions, until they have
become the dregs of society, and after having been turned out of their
own social circle, have become thieves. They are not generally so
adroit as the young trained thief, though they may be useful to their
gangs in acting as stalls.
Many of them are intelligent men, and have a fund of general
information which enables them to act their part tolerably well when in
society.
OMNIBUS PICKPOCKETS.
The most of this class of thieves are well-dressed women, and go out
one or two together, sometimes three. They generally manage to get to
the farthest seats in the interior of the omnibus, on opposite sides of
the vehicle, next to the horses. As the lady passengers come in, they
eye them carefully, and one of them seats herself on the right side of
the lady they intend to plunder. She generally manages to throw the
bottom of her cape or shawl over the lap of the lady, and works with
her hand under it, so as to cover her movement.
Her confederate is generally sitting opposite to see that no one is
noticing. In abstracting from a lady’s pocket, the female thief has
often to cut through the dress and pocket, which she does with a
pocket-knife, pair of scissors, or other sharp instrument. So soon
as she has secured the purse, or other booty, she and her companion
leave the omnibus on the earliest opportunity, often in their hurry
giving the conductor more than his fare, which creates suspicion, and
frequently leads to their detection. Experienced conductors often
inquire of the passengers on such occasions if they have lost anything,
and if they find they have, they give chase to the parties to apprehend
them.
It often happens the thief follows a lady into an omnibus from seeing
the lady take out her purse perhaps in some shop. If she could not pick
her pocket in the street, she contrives to go into an omnibus, and do
it there. These robberies are committed in all parts of London. They
generally work at some distance from where they live, so that they are
not easily traced if detected at the time.
They invariably give false names and false addresses, when taken
into custody. The same women who pick ladies’ pockets in the street,
perpetrate these felonies in omnibuses, and often travel by railway,
pursuing this occupation--sometimes two women together, sometimes one
along with a man.
Sometimes gentlemen’s pockets are picked in omnibuses by male
pickpockets, who also steal from the lady passengers when they find a
suitable opportunity, especially at dusk.
RAILWAY PICKPOCKETS.
This is the same class of persons who pick pockets on the public street
as already described. They often visit the various railway stations,
and are generally smartly dressed as they linger there--some of them
better than others. Some of the females are dressed like shopkeepers’
wives, others like milliners, varying from nineteen to forty years
of age, mostly from nineteen to twenty-five; some of them attired in
cotton gowns, others in silks and satins.
At the railway stations they are generally seen moving restlessly about
from one place to another, as if they did not intend to go by any
particular railway train. There is an unrest about the most of them
which to a discerning eye would attract attention.
They seldom take the train, but dangle among the throng around the
ticket office, or on the platform beside the railway carriages on the
eve of the train starting off, as well as when the train arrives. When
they see ladies engaged in conversation, they go up to them and plant
themselves by their side, while the others cover their movements. There
generally are two, sometimes three of them in a party. They place
themselves on the right hand side of the ladies, next to their pocket,
and work with the left hand. When the ladies move, the thieves walk
along with them.
The female pickpockets generally carry a reticule on their right arm
so as to take off suspicion, and walk up to the persons at the railway
station, and inquire what time the train starts to such a place, to
detain them in conversation, and to keep them in their company.
The older female thieves generally look cool and weary, the younger
ones are more restless and suspicious in their movements. They
sometimes go into first and second class waiting-rooms and sit by the
side of any lady they suppose to be possessed of a sum of money, and
try to pick her pocket by inserting their hand, or by cutting it with
a knife or other sharp instrument. They generally insert the whole
hand, as the ladies’ pockets are frequently deep in the dress. They
often have a large cape to cover their hands, and pick the pocket while
speaking to the lady, or sitting by her side. The young pickpockets are
generally the most expert.
They seldom take the brooch from the breast, but confine themselves to
picking pockets.
After they take the purse, they generally run to some by-place and
throw it away, so that it cannot be identified; sometimes they put it
into a watercloset, at other times drop it down an area as they pass
along.
After taking the purse, the thief hands it to her companion, and they
separate and walk away, and meet at some place appointed.
They occasionally travel with the trains to the Crystal Palace
and other places in the neighbourhood of London, and endeavour to
plunder the passengers on the way. Frequently they take longer
excursions--especially during the summer--journeying from town to town,
and going to races and markets, agricultural shows, or any places where
there is a large concourse of people. Unless they are detected at the
time they pick the pocket, they seldom leave any suspicion behind them,
as they take care to lodge in respectable places, where no one would
suspect them, and have generally plenty of money.
A considerable number of the male thieves also attend the railway
stations, and pick pockets in the railway trains. They are generally
well dressed, and many of them have an Inverness cape, often of a dark
colour, and sometimes they carry a coat on their arm to hide their
hand. There are commonly two or more of them together--sometimes women
accompanying them. They are the same parties we have already so fully
described, who commit such felonies in the streets, thoroughfares, and
places of public resort in the metropolis, and their movements are in a
great measure the same.
Number of felonies by picking pockets
in the Metropolitan dists. for 1860 1,498
Ditto, ditto, in the City 380
-----
1,878
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the Metropolitan districts £5,819
Ditto, ditto, in the City 375
------
£6,194
SHOPLIFTERS.
There is a class of women who visit the shops in various parts of the
metropolis, sometimes two and at other times three together. They
vary their dress according to the locality they visit. Sometimes you
find them dressed very respectably, like the wives of people in good
circumstances in life; at other times, they appear like servants. They
often wear large cloaks, or shawls, and are to be found of different
ages, from 14 to 60. They generally call into shops at busy times, when
there are many persons standing around the counter, and will stand
two or three together. They ask a look of certain articles, and will
possibly say, after they have inspected them, that they do not suit
them; they will say they are too high in price, or not the article
they want, or not the proper colour. They will likely ask to see some
other goods, and keep looking at the different articles until they get
a quantity on the counter. When the shopman is engaged getting some
fresh goods from the window, or from the shelves, one of them generally
contrives to slip something under her cloak or shawl, while the other
manages to keep his attention abstracted. Sometimes they carry a bag
or a basket, and set it down on the counter, and while the shopman is
busy, they will get some article and lay it down behind their basket,
such as a roll of ribbons, or a half dozen of gloves, or other small
portable goods. While the shopman’s back is turned, or his attention
withdrawn, it is hidden under their shawl or cloak. We frequently find
the skirt of their dress lined from the pocket downward, forming a
large repository all around the dress, with an opening in front, where
they can insert a small article, which is not observed in the ample
crinoline. In stealing rolls of silk, or other heavier goods, they
conceal them under their arm. Women who engage in shoplifting sometimes
pick pockets in the shops. They get by the side of a lady engaged
looking over articles, and under pretence of inspecting goods in the
one hand, pick their pockets with the other.
We find more of these people living in the east end and on the Surrey
side than in the west end of the metropolis. A great many live in the
neighbourhood of Kingsland Road and Hackney Road. Some of them cohabit
with burglars, others with magsmen (skittle-sharps).
We find ladies in respectable position occasionally charged with
shoplifting.
Respectably dressed men frequently go into the shops of drapers
and others early in the morning, or at intervals during the day, or
evening, to look at the goods, and often manage to abstract one or two
articles, and secrete them under their coats. They frequently take a
bundle of neckties, a parcel of gloves, or anything that will go in a
small compass, and perhaps enter a jeweller’s shop, and in this way
abstract a quantity of jewellery. On going there, they will ask a sight
of some articles; the first will not suit them, and they will ask to
look at more. When the shopman is engaged, they will abstract some gold
rings or gold pins, or other property, sometimes a watch. Occasionally
they will go so far as to leave a deposit on the article, promising to
call again. They do this to prevent suspicion. After they are gone, the
shopman may find several valuables missing.
Sometimes they will ring the changes. On entering the shop they will
bring patterns of rings and other articles in the window, which they
have got made as facsimiles from metal of an inferior quality. On
looking at the jewellery they will ring the changes on the counter, and
keep turning them over, and in so doing abstract the genuine article
and leave the counterfeit in its place.
The statistics applicable to this class of felonies are comprised under
those given when treating on “stealing from the doors and windows of
shops.”
A VISIT TO THE DENS OF THIEVES IN SPITALFIELDS AND ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD.
One afternoon, in company with a detective officer, we visited
Spitalfields, one of the most notorious rookeries for infamous
characters in the metropolis. Leaving Whitechapel, we went up a narrow
alley called George Yard, where we saw four brothels of a very low
description, the inmates being common thieves. On proceeding a little
farther along the alley we passed eight or nine lodging-houses. Most
of the lodgers were out prowling over the various districts of the
metropolis, some picking pockets, others area-sneaking.
On entering into a public-house in another alley near Union Street, we
came to one of the most dangerous thieves’ dens we have visited in the
course of our rambles. As we approached the door of the house, we saw
a dissipated looking man stealthily whispering outside the door to the
ruffian-looking landlord, who appeared to be a fighting man, from his
large coarse head and broken nose. The officer by our side hinted to
us that the latter was a fence, or receiver of stolen property, and
was probably speaking to his companion on some business of this nature.
As we went forward they sneaked away, the one through a neighbouring
archway, and the other into his house. We followed the latter into the
public house, and found two or three brutal-looking men loafing about
the bar. We passed through a small yard behind the house, where we
found a number of fighting dogs chained to their kennels. Some were
close to our feet as we passed along, and others, kept in an outhouse
beside them, could almost snap at our face. We went to another outhouse
beyond, where between thirty and forty persons were assembled round
a wooden enclosure looking on, while some of their dogs were killing
rats. They consisted of burglars, pickpockets, and the associates of
thieves, along with one or two receivers of stolen property. Many of
them were coarse and brutal in their appearance, and appeared to be
in their element, as they urged on their dogs to destroy the rats,
which were taken out one after another from a small wooden box. These
men apparently ranged from twenty-two to forty years of age. Many of
them had the rough stamp of the criminal in their countenances, and
when inflamed with strong drink, would possibly be fit for any deed
of atrocious villainy. Some of the dogs were strong and vigorous, and
soon disposed of the rats as they ran round the wooden enclosure,
surrounded by this redoubtable band of ruffians, who made the rafters
ring with merriment when the dog caught hold of his prey, or when the
rat turned desperate on its adversary. During the brief space of time
we were present, a slim little half-starved dog killed several rats.
When the rat was first let loose it was very nimble and vigorous in its
movements, and the little dog kept for a time at a respectful distance,
as the former was ready to snap at it. Sometimes the rat made as though
it was to leap over the wooden fence to get away from the dog, but a
dozen rough hands were ready to thrust it back. After it had got nearly
exhausted with its ineffectual struggles to get away, the little dog
seized it by the throat and worried it; when another rat was brought
out to take its place, and another dog introduced to this brutal sport.
This is one of the most dangerous thieves’ dens we have seen in London.
Were any unfortunate man to be inveigled into it in the evening, or at
midnight, when the desperadoes who haunt it are inflamed with strong
drink, he would be completely in their power, even were he the bravest
soldier in the British service, and armed with a revolver. Were he
to fight his way desperately through the large ferocious gang in this
outhouse, the fighting-dogs in the yard might be let loose on him, and
were he to cleave his way through them, he would have to pass through
the public-house frequented by similar low characters.
Leaving this alley, we proceeded to Fashion Street, and entered a
skittle-ground attached to a low beershop, where we saw another gang of
thieves, to the number of about twelve. Some of them, though in rough
costermonger’s dress, or in the dress of mechanics, are fashionable
pickpockets, along with thieves of a coarser and lower description,
who push against people in crowds, and snatch away their watches and
property. One of them, a tall athletic young man, was pointed out
to us as a very expert pickpocket. He was dressed in a dark frock
coat, dark trousers and cap, and was busy hurling the skittleball
with great violence. On our standing by for a little, he slouched
his cap sulkily over his eyes and continued at his game. He had an
intelligent countenance, but with a callous, bronze-like forbidding
expression. Some of his companions were standing at the other end of
the skittle-ground engaged in the sport, while the rest of his “pals”
sat on a seat alongside and looked on, occasionally eyeing us with
considerable curiosity. Some of them were very expert thieves.
In passing through Church Lane we met two young lads dressed like
costermongers, and a young woman by their side in a light dirty
cotton dress and black bonnet. They were pointed out to us as those
base creatures who waylay, decoy, and plunder drunken men at night.
We proceeded to Wentworth Street, and entered a large lodging-house
of a very motley class of people, consisting of men working at the
docks, prostitutes, and area-sneaks. We called at a house in George
Street, principally occupied by females from eighteen to thirty years
of age, all prostitutes. In Thrall Street we entered a lodging-house
where we saw about thirty persons of both sexes, and of different
ages, assembled, consisting chiefly of area-sneaks and pickpockets.
Here we saw one prostitute, with a remarkably beautiful child on her
knee, seated at her afternoon meal. In the tap-room of a public-house
in Church Street we found a large party of thieves, consisting of
burglars, pickpockets, and area-sneaks, along with several resetters,
one of them a Jew. On the walls of the room were pictures of notorious
pugilists, Tom Cribb and others. Several of them had the appearance
of pugilists, in their bloated and bruised countenances, and most of
them had a rough aspect, which we found to be a general characteristic
of the Whitechapel thieves, as well as of most of the thieves we saw
in the Borough, and at Lambeth. Two of the resetters, who appeared to
be callous, politic men, sneaked off upon our seating ourselves beside
them. One of the band, as we found on similar occasions, stood between
us and the door flourishing a large clasp knife. We sat for some time
over a glass of ale, and he slunk off to a corner and resumed his seat,
finding his bullying attitude was of no avail. The Jewish resetter was
very social and communicative as he sat on the table. The more daring
of the band were also frank and good-humoured.
Being desirous to gain a more intimate acquaintance with the haunts of
the London thieves, we were brought into communication with Mr. Price,
inspector of the lodging-houses of this district, who accompanied us on
several visits over the neighbourhood, one of the chief rookeries of
thieves in London.
Before setting out on our inspection he gave us the following
information:--
About twenty years ago a number of narrow streets, thickly populated
with thieves, prostitutes, and beggars, were removed when New
Commercial Street was formed, leading from Shoreditch in the direction
of the London Docks, leaving a wide space in the midst of a densely
populated neighbourhood, which is favourable to its sanatory condition,
and might justly be considered one of the lungs of the metropolis.
The rookery in Spitalfields we purposed to visit is comprised within
a space of about 400 square yards. It is bounded by Church Street
Whitechapel, East Brick Lane, and West Commercial Street, and contains
800 thieves, vagabonds, beggars, and prostitutes, a large proportion of
whom may be traced to the old criminal inhabitants of the now extinct
Essex Street and old Rose Lane.
For instance, a man and woman lived for many years in George Yard,
Whitechapel, a narrow, dirty, and overcrowded street leading from
Whitechapel into Wentworth Street. The man was usually seen among
crowds of thieves, gambling and associating with them. As his family
increased, in the course of time he took a beershop and lodging-house
for thieves in Thrall Street. His family consisted of three boys and
three girls. His wife usually addressed the young thieves as they left
her lodging-house in the morning, in the hearing of her own children,
in this manner; “Now, my little dears, do the best you can, and may God
bless you!”
The following is a brief account of their children:--
The eldest son married a girl whose father died during his
transportation. He and his wife gained their living by thieving, and
were frequently in custody. At last he connected himself with burglars,
was tried, convicted, and sentenced to six years’ penal servitude. He
is now at Gibraltar, ten months of his sentence being unexpired. His
wife has been left with three young children; since his transportation
she has been frequently in custody for robbing drunken men, and has
had an illegitimate child since her husband left. Her eldest daughter
was taken from her about twelve months ago by Mr. Ashcroft, secretary
of the Refuge Aid Society, and placed in a refuge in Albert Street,
Mile End New Town, where the Society maintains her. The girl is eleven
years of age, and appeared pleased that she was taken away from her
filthy abode and bad companions in George Street. The second son has
been repeatedly in custody for uttering base coin, and was at last
convicted and transported for four years. The eldest daughter married a
man, who also was transported, and is now a returned convict. She was
apprehended, convicted, and sentenced to four years’ penal servitude.
While in Newgate jail, she was delivered of twins, and received a
reprieve, and has since been in custody for shoplifting.
We went with the inspector to Lower Keat Street, and entered a
lodging-house there. Most of the inmates were male thieves, from twelve
to nineteen years of age and upwards. The husband of the woman who
keeps the house is a returned convict, and has been in custody for
receiving stolen property from her lodgers.
We entered another lodging-house in this street, haunted by thieves
of a lower class. An old woman was here employed as a deputy or
servant, who formerly lived in Kent-street in the Borough, and kept a
public-house there, a resort of thieves. She lived with a man there
for twenty years and upwards, keeping a brothel, and was then and is
now an old fence. We found a number of low thieves in the house at the
time of our visit. The landlord has been in custody for having stolen
handkerchiefs in his possession, with the marks taken out.
Opposite to this house is a public-house resorted to by thieves.
We then went to Lower George Street, where we entered a registered
lodging-house. In three rooms we saw about ninety persons of both sexes
and of various ages, many of them thieves and vagrants. This house is
not used as a brothel, but some of the lodgers cohabit together as man
and wife, which is common in these low neighbourhoods.
We went to a lodging-house in Flower-and-Dean Street, the keeper of
which has been recently in prison for receiving from his lodgers. We
saw a number of wretched mendicants here. One man had his leg bound up
with rags. Many of the inmates gain their livelihood by begging, and
others by thieving. Few honest persons reside here.
We next went to a brothel in Wentworth Street, kept by a woman, a
notorious character. She has been repeatedly in custody for robbing
drunken men, and her husband is now in prison for felony. She is a
strong coarse-looking woman, with her countenance bearing marked
traces of unbridled passion,--the type of person we would expect as
the keeper of a low brothel. She had been stabbed on the cheek a few
days previously by another woman, and bore the scar of the fresh wound
at the time of our visit. The rooms of her house were wretchedly
furnished, suitable to the low orgies transacted in this foul abode.
One or two withered prostitutes were lounging about the kitchen.
We passed on to a lodging-house of a very different description,
occupied by industrious honest working people, which we shall describe
afterwards when we treat of an after-visit.
In this locality we visited the elderly woman living in this
neighbourhood whom we have referred to as having blessed the young
thieves. She had a very plausible condoling manner, as she sat with
her two daughters by her side--one a young auburn-haired girl of about
fourteen, with engaging countenance and handsome form, plainly but
neatly dressed; the other, an ordinary-looking young woman, with a
child in her arms.
We made another visit to this rookery with the inspector of police, and
made a more minute survey of this remarkable district.
We went into a lodging-house in George Yard. The kitchen was about
35 feet in length, and had originally consisted of two rooms, the
partition between them being removed. There was a fire-place in each; a
group of people, men, lads, and boys were ranged along the long tables,
many of them labourers at the docks.
The boys were better dressed than the wild young Arabs of the city,
some of them in dark and brown coats and tartan and black caps. They
sat on the forms along the sides of the tables, or lolled on seats by
the fire. The apartments were papered, and ornamented with pictures.
A picture of the Great Eastern steamship set in a frame was suspended
over the mantelpiece; one boy sat with his head bound up, and another
with his jacket off, and his white shirt sleeves exposed. The inmates
consisted of beggars and dock-labourers seated around the ample
kitchen, some busy at their different meals, and others engaged in
conversation, which was suspended on our entrance. At the door we saw
the deputy, a young man decently dressed. On our former visit we saw
an old man with an ample unshorn beard, who works during the day as a
crossing-sweeper. He had when young been engaged in seafaring life, and
has now become an admirable picture of Fagin the Jew, as pictured by
Charles Dickens. The beds are let here at 3_d._ a night. The people who
usually lodge here are crossing-sweepers, bonepickers, and shoeblacks,
&c.
We entered a house in Wentworth Street, and passed through a chandler’s
shop into the kitchen, which is about 31 feet in length and 15 in
breadth. There we found, as is usual in those lodging houses, a large
fire blazing in the grate. The room had a wooden floor, and clothes
were suspended on lines beneath the rafters. There were two large
boilers on each side of the fire to supply the lodgers with hot water
for coffee or tea. Tables were ranged around the wall on each side, and
a motley company were seated around them. Numbers of them were busy at
supper--coffee, bread, fish, and potatoes. An elderly man sat in the
corner of the room cobbling a pair of old shoes with a candle nearly
burned to the socket placed before him. Groups of elderly women were
also clustered around the benches, some plainly but decently dressed,
others in dirty tattered skirts and shabby shawls, with careworn,
melancholy countenances. Some were middle-aged women, apparently the
wives of some of the labourers there. A young man sat by their side, a
respectable mechanic out of work.
Two young lads, vagrants, sat squatted by the fire, one of them
equipped in dirty tartan trowsers, a shabby black frock-coat sadly
torn, and brown bonnet. The other sat in his moleskin trowsers and
shirt. At one of the tables several young women were seated at their
tea, some good-looking, others very plain, with coarse features. An
elderly woman, the servant of the establishment, stood by the fire with
a towel over her bare brown arm.
The tables around were covered with plates, cups, and other crockery;
caps, jackets, and other articles of dress.
While in this street the musical band of the ragged school at George
Yard passed by, with the teacher at their head, and many of the
scholars clustered around them, with other juveniles and people of the
district. Knots of people were assembled in the streets as we passed
along.
We entered several other lodging-houses in this locality, occupied by
beggars, dock-labourers, prostitutes, and thieves, ballad-singers, and
patterers of the lowest class.
We went into a house in George Street. The kitchen was also very large,
about 36 feet long and 24 feet broad, and had two blazing fires to warm
the apartment and cook the food. Tables were ranged round the room as
in the other lodging-houses alluded to. There were about twenty-two
people here, chiefly young of both sexes. There was one middle-aged
bald-headed man among them. Many of them were sad and miserable. A
young good-looking girl, not apparently above seventeen years of age,
sat by the fire with a child in her arms. Many of the young women had a
lowering countenance and dissipated look. Some of the young lads had a
more pleasing appearance, dressed as costermongers.
The long tables were strewed with plates and bowls, cups and saucers.
Some young men sat by reading the newspapers, others smoking their pipe
and whiffing clouds of smoke around them. Some young women were sewing,
others knitting; some busy at their supper, others lying asleep,
crouching with their arms on the tables.
On going into another lodging-house we saw a number of people of both
sexes, and of various ages, similar to those described. There we saw
a woman about thirty, also engaged knitting, and another reading
Reynolds’ Miscellany. A number of young lads of about seventeen years
were smoking their pipe; another youth, a pickpocket, was reading a
volume he had got from a neighbouring library. Most of the persons here
were prostitutes, pickpockets, and sneaks. There were about fifteen
present, chiefly young people.
On passing through Flower-and-Dean Street we saw a group of young lads
and girls, all of them thieves, standing in the middle of the street.
We passed into another lodging-house, and entered the kitchen, which
is about 30 feet long and 18 feet broad. A large fire was burning
in the grate. On the one side of the kitchen were tables and forms,
and the people seated around them at supper on bread and herring, tea
and coffee. There were a number of middle-aged women among them. On
the other side of the kitchen were stalls as in a coffee-shop. We saw
several rough-looking men here. There was a rack on the wall covered
with plates, ranged carefully in order. The tables were littered with
heaps of bottles, jugs, books, bonnets, baskets, and shirts, like a
broker’s shop.
An old gray-headed man sat at one of the tables with his hand on his
temples, a picture of extreme misery, his trowsers old, greasy, and
ragged, an old shabby ragged coat, and a pair of old torn shoes. His
face was furrowed with age, care, and sorrow; his breast was bare, and
his head bald in front. He had a long gray beard. His arms were thin
and skinny, and the dark blue veins looked through the back of his
hands. He was a poor vagrant, and told us he was eighty-eight years
of age. There were about forty persons present of both sexes, and of
various ages; many of them young, and others very old.
We passed on to Lower Keat Street, and on going into a low
lodging-house there we saw a number of young prostitutes, pickpockets,
and sneaks.
We visited another lodging-house of the lowest description, belonging
to an infamous man whom we have already referred to. We were shown
upstairs to a large room filled with beds, by a coarse-featured
hideous old hag, with a dark moustache. Her hair was gray, and her
face seamed and scarred with dark passions, as she stood before us
with her protruding breasts and bloated figure. Her eyes were dark and
muddy. She had two gold rings on one of her fingers, and was dressed
in a dirty light cotton gown, sadly tattered, a red spotted soiled
handkerchief round her neck, and a dirty light apron, almost black.
On observing us looking at her, she remarked, “I am an old woman, and
am not so young as I have been. Instead of enjoying the fruit of my
hard-wrought life, some other person has done it.”
On examining one of the beds in the room, we found the bedding to
consist of two rugs, two sheets and a flock bed, with a pillow and
pillow case, let at 3_d._ a night. This house is registered for thirty
lodgers. Young and middle-aged women, the lowest prostitutes, and
thieves frequent this house; some with holes cut with disease into
their brow. D----bl----n B----ll is the proprietor of this infamous
abode. We saw him as we passed through the house: a sinister-looking,
middle-aged man, about 5 feet 7 inches in height. On leaving the house,
the old hag stood at the foot of the stair, with a candle in her hand,
a picture of horrid misery.
In this locality we went into another infamous lodging-house, a haunt
of prostitutes and thieves, mostly young. There was a very interesting
boy here, respectably dressed, with a dark eye and well-formed placid
countenance, a pickpocket. He told us his parents were dead, and he
had no friends and no home. He did not show any desire to leave his
disreputable life. Several of them were seated at their supper on
herrings, plaice, butter, bread, and coffee.
We visited several of the more respectable lodging-houses in George
Yard, to have a more complete view of the dwellings of the poor in this
locality. We entered one lodging-house, and passed into the kitchen, 33
feet long by 18 feet broad. There were tables and forms planted round
the room, as in the other lodging-houses noticed, and on the walls
were shelves for crockery ware. There was a sink in the corner of the
kitchen for washing the dishes, and a gasburner in the centre of the
apartment. The kitchen was well ventilated at the windows. There was
a large fire burning, with a boiler on each side of the fire-place.
Over the mantelpiece was a range of bright coffee and tea pots. Coats
were hung up on pegs against the wall, and a fender before the fire.
Decent-looking men were seated around, some smoking, some writing,
others eating a plain, but comfortable supper, others lounging on
the seat, exhausted with the labours of the day. In out-houses were
ample washing accommodation, and water-closets. Attached to this
lodging-house was a reading-room. We went to the bed-rooms, and saw
the accommodation and furniture. There were iron bedsteads with flock
mattress and bed; on each bed were two sheets, one blanket, and a
coverlet, a pillow-case, and a pillow. The bed-rooms were ventilated by
a flue.
There is here accommodation for eighty-nine persons at 3_d._ a night,
and there are on an average sixty lodgers each night. The rector of
Christ Church visits and supplies the lodgers with tracts and religious
services. A register is kept of all the people who lodge here. In this
house Karls was apprehended, concerned with another party in the murder
of Mrs. Halliday at Kingswood Rectory.
We visited another lodging-house in the same neighbourhood. The
kitchen was large, with spacious windows in front. There was a large
fireplace, with boiler and oven with a large hot plate. The lodgers
had a respectable appearance--some in blue guernseys, and others in
respectable dark dresses. There was also a reading-room here, with a
dial over the mantelpiece. Some of the men were reading, and others
engaged in writing. There was accommodation for washing, water-closets,
and excellent beds. This house belongs to the same proprietor as the
one already described. It is closed at 12 o’clock, while the others are
kept open all night, and is generally frequented by respectable lodgers.
We also inspected another lodging-house in Thrall Street of a superior
kind, where beds are to be had at 3-1/2_d._ a night. There are two
superior lodging-houses of the same character, kept by Mr. Wilmot and
Mr. Argent, in Thrall Street and Osborne Place, at 3-1/2_d._ and 4_d._
a night.
We thus find that alongside those low lodging-houses and brothels,
in the very bosom of that low neighbourhood, there are respectable
lodging-houses of different gradations in price and position, where
working-people and strangers can be accommodated at 3_d._, 3-1/2_d._,
and 4_d._ a night, in which decency, cleanliness, and morality prevail.
In the course of our visits to Spitalfields we found two institutions
of high value and special interest--a ragged school and a reformatory
for young women. The ragged school was instituted by the Rev. Hugh
Allen, the incumbent of St. Jude’s, in 1853. There are at present
350 ragged children of both sexes attending it, averaging from four
to fifteen years of age. They are taught by Mr. Holland, a most
intelligent and devoted teacher, who is exercising a powerful influence
for good in that dark and criminal locality.
A female reformatory was lately instituted by the Rev. Mr. Thornton,
the present incumbent of St. Jude’s, who labours with unwearied energy
in this district. This asylum is in Wentworth Street, and is fitted to
accommodate eighteen persons.
NARRATIVE OF A PICKPOCKET.
The following recital was given us by a young man who had till lately
been an adroit pickpocket in various districts of London, but has now
become a patterer for his livelihood. He is about the middle height,
of sallow complexion, with a rich dark, penetrating eye, a moustache
and beard. He is a man of tolerably good education, and has a most
intelligent mind, well furnished with reading and general information.
At the time we met him, he was rather melancholy and crushed in
spirit, which he stated was the result of repeated imprisonments,
and the anxiety and suspense connected with his wild criminal life,
and the heavy trials he has undergone. The woman who cohabits with
him was then in one of the London prisons, and he was residing in a
low lodging-house in the west end of the metropolis. While giving us
several exciting passages in his narrative, his countenance lightened
up with intense interest and adventurous expression, though his general
mien was calm and collected. As we endeavoured to inspire him with hope
in an honest career, he mournfully shook his head as he looked forward
to the difficulties in his path. He was then shabbily dressed in a
dark frock-coat, dark trousers, and cap. We give his narrative almost
verbatim:--
“I was born in a little hamlet, five miles from Shrewsbury, in the
county of Shropshire, in October 1830, and am now thirty-one years of
age. My father was a Wesleyan minister, and died in 1854, after being
subject to the yellow jaundice for five or six years, during which time
he was not able to officiate. My mother was a Yorkshire woman, and her
father kept a shoemaker’s shop in the town of Full Sutton. I had two
brothers, one of them older and the other younger than I, and a sister
two years younger.
“I went to school to learn to write and cipher, and had before this
learned to read at home with my father and mother. We had a very happy
home, and very strict in the way of religion. I believe that my father
would on no account tolerate such a thing as stopping out after nine
o’clock at night, and have heard my mother often say that all the time
she was wedded to him, she never had known him the worse of liquor. My
father had family worship every night between 8 and 9 o’clock, when the
curtains were drawn over the windows, the candle was lighted, and each
of the children was taught to kneel separately at prayer. After reading
the Bible and half an hour’s conversation, each one retired to their
bed. In the morning my father would get up and attend to a small pony
he had, and when I was very young we had a stout girl who milked the
cow and did the dairy and household work. The house we lived in was my
grandfather’s property, but being a man very fond of money, my father
paid him the rent as if he had been a stranger.
“There were two acres of land attached to the house, as nearly as I can
recollect; about half an acre was kept in cultivation as a garden, and
the other was tilled and set apart for the pony and cow.
“Our people were much respected in the neighbourhood. If there were any
bickerings among the neighbours, they came to my father to settle them,
and anything he said they generally yielded to without a murmur. In
the winter time, when work was slack among the poor labouring people,
though my father had little himself to give, he got money from others
to distribute among those who were the most deserving. I lived very
happy and comfortable at home, but always compelled, though against my
own inclination, to go twice to service on the Sunday, and twice during
the week (Tuesday and Friday). I always seemed to have a rebellious
nature against these religious services, and they were a disagreeable
task to me, though my father took more pains with me than with my
brothers and sister. I always rebelled against this in my heart, though
I did not display it openly.
“I was a favourite with my father, perhaps more so than any of the
others. For example, if Wombwell’s menagerie would come to Shrewsbury
for a short time, he would have taken me instead of my brothers to
visit it, and would there speak of the wonders of God and of his
handiwork in the creation of animals. Everything that he said and did
was tinged with religion, and religion of an ascetic argumentative
turn. It was a kind of religion that seemed to banish eternally other
sects from happiness and from heaven.
“My mind at this time was injured by the narrow religious prejudices
I saw around me. We often had ministers to dinner and supper at our
house, and always after their meals the conversation would be sure
to turn into discussions on the different points of doctrine. I can
recollect as well now as though it were yesterday the texts used on
the various sides of the question, and the stress laid on different
passages to uphold their arguments. At this time I would be sitting
there greedily drinking in every word, and as soon as they were gone
I would fly to the Bible and examine the different texts of Scripture
they had brought forward, and it seemed to produce a feeling in my
mind that any religious opinions could be plausibly supported by it.
The arguments on these occasions generally hinged on two main points,
predestination and election. My father’s opinions were those of the
Wesleyan creed, the salvation of all through the blood of Christ.
“These continual discussions seemed to steel my heart completely
against religion. They caused me to be very disobedient and unruly,
and led to my falling out with my grandfather, who had a good deal of
property that was expected to come to our family. Though I was young,
he bitterly resented this. In 1839 he was accidentally drowned, and it
was found when his will was opened that I was not mentioned in it. The
whole of his property was left to my father, with the exception of four
houses, which he had an interest in till my brothers and sister arrived
at the age of twenty-one. Again the property that was left to my father
for the whole of his life he had no power to will away at his death, as
it went to a distant relative of my grandfather’s.
“This was the first cause of my leaving home. It seemed to rankle in
my boyish mind that I was a black sheep, something different from my
brothers and sister.
“After being several times spoken to by my father about my quarrelsome
disposition with my brothers and sister, I threatened, young as I was,
to burn the house down the first opportunity I got. This threat, though
not uttered in my father’s hearing, came to his ear, and he gave me a
severe beating for it, the first time he ever corrected me. This was
in the summer of 1840, in the end of May. I determined to leave home,
and took nothing away but what belonged to me. I had four sovereigns of
pocket money, and the suit of clothes I had on and a shirt. I walked
to Shrewsbury and took the coach to London. When I got to London I had
neither friend nor acquaintance. I first put up in a coffee-shop in
the Mile End Road, and lodged there for seven weeks, till my money was
nearly all spent.
“During this time my clothes had been getting shabby and dirty, having
no one to look after me. After being there for seven weeks I went to a
mean lodging-house at Field Lane, Holborn. There I met with characters
I had never seen before, and heard language that I had not formerly
heard. This was about July, 1840, and I was about ten years of age the
ensuing October. I stopped there about three weeks doing nothing. At
the end of that time I was completely destitute.
“The landlady took pity on me as a poor country boy who had been well
brought up, and kept me for some days longer after my money was done.
During these few days I had very little to eat, except what was given
me by some of the lodgers when they got their own meals. I often
thought at that time of my home in the country, and of what my father
and mother might be doing, as I had never written to them since the day
I had first left my home.
“I sometimes was almost tempted to write to them and let them know the
position I was in, as I knew they would gladly send me up money to
return home, but my stubborn spirit was not broke then. After being
totally destitute for two or three days, I was turned out of doors, a
little boy in the great world of London, with no friend to assist me,
and perfectly ignorant of the ways and means of getting a living in
London.
“I was taken by several poor ragged boys to sleep in the dark arches
of the Adelphi. I often saw the boys follow the male passengers when
the halfpenny boats came to the Adelphi stairs, _i.e._, the part of
the river almost opposite to the Adelphi Theatre. I could not at first
make out the meaning of this, but I soon found they generally had one
or two handkerchiefs when the passengers left. At this time there was a
prison-van in the Adelphi arches, without wheels, which was constructed
different from the present prison-van, as it had no boxes in the
interior. The boys used to take me with them into the prison-van. There
we used to meet a man my companions called ‘Larry.’ I knew him by no
other name for the time. He used to give almost what price he liked
for the handkerchiefs. If they refused to give them at the price he
named, he would threaten them in several ways. He said he would get
the other boys to drive them away, and not allow them to get any more
handkerchiefs there. If this did not intimidate them, he would threaten
to give them in charge, so that at last they were compelled to take
whatever price he liked to give them.
“I have seen handkerchiefs, I afterwards found out to be of the value
of four or five shillings, sold him lumped together at 9_d._ each.
“The boys, during this time, had been very kind to me, sharing what
they got with me, but always asking why I did not try my hand, till
at last I was ashamed to live any longer upon the food they gave me,
without doing something for myself. One of the boys attached himself
to me more than the others, whom we used to call Joe Muckraw, who
was afterwards transported, and is now in a comfortable position in
Australia.
“Joe said to me, that when the next boat came in, if any man came out
likely to carry a good handkerchief, he would let me have a chance at
it. I recollect when the boat came in that evening: I think it was the
last one, about nine o’clock. I saw an elderly gentleman step ashore,
and a lady with him. They had a little dog, with a string attached
to it, that they led along. Before Joe said anything to me, he had
‘fanned’ the gentleman’s pocket, _i.e._, had felt the pocket and knew
there was a handkerchief.
“He whispered to me, ‘Now Dick, have a try,’ and I went to the old
gentleman’s side, trembling all the time, and Joe standing close to me
in the dark, and went with him up the steep hill of the Adelphi. He had
just passed an apple-stall there, Joe still following us, encouraging
me all the time, while the old gentleman was engaged with the little
dog. I took out a green ‘kingsman,’ (handkerchief) next in value to a
black silk handkerchief. (They are used a good deal as neckerchiefs by
costermongers). The gentleman did not perceive his loss. We immediately
went to the arches and entered the van where Larry was, and Joe said
to him ‘There is Dick’s first trial, and you must give him a “ray” for
it,’ _i.e._ 1_s._ 6_d._ After a deal of pressing, we got 1_s._ for it.
“After that I gained confidence, and in the course of a few weeks I
was considered the cleverest of the little band, never missing one
boat coming in, and getting one or two handkerchiefs on each occasion.
During the time we knew there were no boats coming we used to waste
our money on sweets, and fruits, and went often in the evenings to the
Victoria Theatre, and Bower Saloon, and other places. When we came out
at twelve, or half-past twelve at night, we went to the arches again,
and slept in the prison-van. This was the life I led till January, 1841.
“During that month several men came to us. I did not know, although I
afterwards heard they were brought by ‘Larry’ to watch me, as he had
been speaking of my cleverness at the ‘tail,’ _i.e._, stealing from
the tails of gentlemen’s coats, and they used to make me presents.
It seemed they were not satisfied altogether with me, for they did
not tell me what they wanted, nor speak their mind to me. About the
middle of the month I was seized by a gentleman, who caught me with his
handkerchief in my hand. I was taken to Bow Street police-station, and
got two months in Westminster Bridewell.
“I came out in March, and when outside the gate of Westminster
Bridewell, there was a cab waiting for me, and two of the men standing
by who had often made me presents and spoken to me in the arches.
They asked me if I would go with them, and took me into the cab. I
was willing to go anywhere to better myself, and went with them to
Flower-and-Dean Street, Brick Lane, Whitechapel. They took me to their
own home. One of them had the first floor of a house there, the other
had the second. Both were living with women, and I found out shortly
afterwards that these men had lately had a boy, but he was transported
about that time, though I did not know this then. They gave me plenty
to eat, and one of the women, by name ‘Emily,’ washed and cleansed me,
and I got new clothes to put on. For three days I was not asked to do
anything, but in the meantime they had been talking to me of going with
them, and having no more to do with the boys at the Adelphi, or with
the ‘tail,’ but to work at picking ladies’ pockets.
“I thought it strange at first, but found afterwards that it was
more easy to work on a woman’s pocket than upon a man’s, for this
reason:--More persons work together, and the boy is well surrounded by
companions older than himself, and is shielded from the eyes of the
passers-by; and, besides, it pays better.
“It was on a Saturday, in company with three men, I set out on an
excursion from Flower-and-Dean Street along Cheapside. They were young
men, from nineteen to twenty-five years of age, dressed in fashionable
style. I was clothed in the suit given me when I came out of prison, a
beaver-hat, a little surtout-coat and trousers, both of black cloth,
and a black silk necktie and collar, dressed as a gentleman’s son. We
went into a pastry-cook’s shop in St. Paul’s Churchyard about half-past
two in the afternoon, and had pastry there, and they were watching the
ladies coming into the shop, till at last they followed one out, taking
me with them.
“As this was my first essay in having anything to do in stealing from
a woman, I believe they were nervous themselves, but they had well
tutored me during the two or three days I had been out of prison.
They had stood against me in the room while Emily walked to and fro,
and I had practised on her pocket by taking out sometimes a lady’s
clasp purse, termed a ‘portemonnaie,’ and other articles out of her
pocket, and thus I was not quite ignorant of what was expected of me.
One walked in front of me, one on my right hand, and the other in the
rear, and I had the lady on my left hand. I immediately ‘fanned’ her
(felt her pocket), as she stopped to look in at a hosier’s window,
when I took her purse and gave it to one of them, and we immediately
went to a house in Giltspur Street. We there examined what was in the
purse. I think there was a sovereign, and about 17_s._, I cannot speak
positively how much. The purse was thrown away, as is the general rule,
and we went down Newgate Street, into Cheapside, and there we soon got
four more purses that afternoon, and went home by five o’clock, P.M.
I recollect how they praised me afterwards that night at home for my
cleverness.
“I think we did not go out again till the Tuesday, and that and the
following day we had a good pull. It amounted to about 19_l._ each.
They always take care to allow the boy to see what is in the purse,
and to give him his proper share equal with the others, because he is
their sole support. If they should lose him, they would be unable to
do anything till they got another. Out of my share, which was about
19_l._, I bought a silver watch and a gold chain, and about this time
I also bought an overcoat, and carried it on my left arm to cover my
movements.
“A few weeks after this we went to Surrey Gardens, and I got two purses
from ladies. In one of them were some French coins and a ring, that
was afterwards advertised as either lost or stolen in the garden. We
did very well that visit, and were thinking of going again, when I
was caught in Fleet Street, and they had no means of getting me away,
though they tried all they could to secure my escape. They could not do
it without exposing themselves to too much suspicion. I was sentenced
to three months’ imprisonment in Bridge Street Bridewell, Blackfriars,
termed by the thieves the Old Horse.
“This was shortly before Christmas, 1840. During my imprisonment I did
not live on the prison diet, but was kept on good rations supplied
to me through the kindness of my comrades out of doors bribing the
turnkeys. I had tea of a morning, bread and butter, and often cold
meat. Meat and all kinds of pastry was sent to me from a cook-shop
outside, and I was allowed to sit up later than other prisoners. During
the time I was in prison for these three months I learned to smoke, as
cigars were introduced to me.
“When I came out we often used to attend the theatres, and I have
often had as many as six or seven ladies’ purses in the rear of the
boxes during the time they were coming out. This was the time when
the pantomimes were in their full attraction. It is easier to pick a
female’s pocket when she has several children with her to attract her
attention than if she were there by herself.
“We went out once or twice a week, sometimes stopt in a whole week,
and sallied out on Sunday. I often got purses coming down the steps at
Spitalfields’ Church. I believe I have done so hundreds of times. This
church was near to us, and easily got at.
“We went to Madame Tussaud’s, Baker Street, and were pretty lucky
there. At this time we hired horses and a trap to go down to Epsom
races, but did not take any of the women with us.
“I was generally employed working in the streets rather than at places
of amusement, &c., and was in dread that my father or some of my
friends might come and see me at some of these.
“When at the Epsom races, shortly after the termination of the race for
the Derby, I was induced, much against my will, to turn my hand upon
two ladies as they were stepping into a carriage, and was detected by
the ladies. There was immediately an outcry, but I was got away by two
of my comrades. The other threw himself in the way, and kept them back;
was taken up on suspicion, committed for trial, and got four months’
imprisonment.
“I kept with the other men, and we got another man in his place. When
his time was expired they went down to meet him, and he did not go out
for some time afterwards--for nearly a fortnight. After that we went
out, and had different degrees of luck, and one of the men was seized
with a decline, and died at Brompton in the hospital. Like the other
stalls, he usually went well-dressed, and had a good appearance. His
chief work was to guard me and get me out of difficulty when I was
detected, as I was the support of the band.
“About this time, as nearly as I can recollect, when I was two months
over thirteen years of age, I first kept a woman. We had apartments,
a front and back room of our own. She was a tall, thin, genteel girl,
about fifteen years of age, and very good-looking. I often ill-used her
and beat her. She bore it patiently till I carried it too far, and at
last she left me in the summer of 1844. During the time she was with
me--which lasted for nine or ten months--I was very fortunate, and was
never without 20_l._ or 30_l._ in my pocket, while she had the same in
hers. I was dressed in fashionable style, and had a gold watch and gold
guard.
“Meantime I had been busy with these men, as usual going to Cheapside,
St. Paul’s Churchyard, and Fleet Street. In the end of the year 1844 I
was taken up for an attempt on a lady in St. Martin’s Lane, near Ben
Caunt’s. The conviction was brought against me from the City, and I got
six months in Tothill-fields Prison.
“This was my first real imprisonment of any length. At first I was
a month in Tothill Fields, and afterwards three months in the City
Bridewell, Blackfriars, where I had a good deal of indulgence, and did
not feel the imprisonment so much. The silent system was strict, and
being very wilful, I was often under punishment. It had such an effect
on me, that for the last six weeks of my imprisonment I was in the
infirmary. The men came down to meet me when my punishment expired, and
I again accompanied them to their house.
“During the time I had been in prison they had got another boy, but
they said they would willingly turn him away or give him to some other
men; but I, being self-willed, said they might keep him. I had another
reason for parting with them. When I went to prison I had property
worth a good deal of money. On coming out I found they had sold it, and
they never gave me value for it. They pretended it was laid out in my
defence, which I knew was only a pretext.
“Before I was imprisoned my girl had parted from me, which was the
beginning of my misfortunes.
“I would not go to work with them afterwards. I had a little money, and
at a public-house I met with two men living down Gravel Lane, Ratcliffe
Highway. I went down there, and commenced working with two of them
on ladies’ pockets, but in a different part of the town. We went to
Whitechapel and the Commercial Road; but had not worked six weeks with
them before I was taken up again, and was tried at Old Arbour Square,
and got three months’ imprisonment at Coldbath Fields. If I thought
Tothill Fields was bad, I found the other worse.
“When I got out I had no one to meet me, and thought I would work by
myself. It was about this time I commenced to steal gentlemen’s watches.
“The first I took was from the fob of a countryman in Smithfield on a
market day. It was a silver watch, which we called a ‘Frying Pan.’ It
had not a guard, but an old chain and seals. It fetched me about 18_s._
I took off one of the seals which was gold, which brought me as much
as the watch, if not more. I sold it to a man I was acquainted with in
Field Lane, where I first lodged, after leaving the coffee-shop when
I first came to London, and where the landlady gave me several nights’
lodging gratuitously. I repaid her the small sum due her for her former
kindness to me.
“I lodged there, and shortly after cohabited with another female.
She was a big stout woman, ten years older than I; well-made, but
coarse-featured. I did not live with her long--only three or four
months. I was then only fifteen years of age. During that time I
always worked by myself. Sometimes she would go out with me, but she
was no help to me. I looked out for crowds at fairs, at fires, and on
any occasion where there was a gathering of people, as at this time I
generally confined myself to watches and pins from men.
“I was not so lucky then, and barely kept myself in respectability. My
woman was very extravagant, and swallowed up all I could make. I lived
with her about four months, when I was taken up in Exmouth Street,
Clerkenwell, and got four months’ imprisonment in Coldbath Fields
Prison.
“When my sentence was expired she came to meet me at the gate of the
prison, and we remained together only two days, when I heard reports
that she had been unfaithful to me. I never charged her with it, but
ran away from her.
“When I left her I went to live in Charles Street, Drury Lane. I
stopped there working by myself for five or six months, and got
acquainted with a young woman who has ever since been devoted to me.
She is now thirty-three years of age, but looks a good deal older than
she is, and is about the middle height. We took a room and furnished
it. I soon got acquainted with some of the swell-mob at the Seven
Dials, and went working along with three of them upon the ladies’
purses again. At this time I was a great deal luckier with them than
I had been since I had left Tothill-fields Prison. I worked with them
till April 1847, visiting the chief places of public resort, such
as the Surrey Gardens, Regent’s Park, Zoological Gardens, Madame
Tussaud’s, the Colosseum, and other places. Other two comrades and I
were arrested at the Colosseum for picking a lady’s pocket. We were
taken to Albany Street station-house, and the next day committed for
trial at the sessions. I had twelve months’ imprisonment for this
offence, and the other two got four years’ penal servitude, on account
of previous convictions. I had only summary convictions, which were not
produced at the trial.
“At this time summary convictions were not brought against a prisoner
committed for trial.
“We were frequently watched by the police and detectives, who followed
our track, and were often in the same places of amusement with us.
We knew them as well as they knew us, and often eluded them. Their
following us has often been the means of our doing nothing on many of
these occasions, as we knew their eye was upon us.
“I came out of prison three or four days before the gathering of the
Chartists on Kennington Common. My female friend met me as I came out.
“I went to this gathering on 10th April, 1848, along with other three
men. I took several ladies’ purses there, amounting to 3_l._ or
4_l._, when we saw a gentleman place a pocketbook in the tail of his
coat. Though I had done nothing at the tail for a long time, it was too
great a temptation, and I immediately seized it. There was a bundle
of bank-notes in it--7 ten-pound notes, 2 for twenty pounds, and 5
five-pound notes. We got from the fence or receiver 4_l._ 10_s._ for
each of the 5_l._, 8_l._ 10_s._ for the tens, and 18_l._ for the 20_l._
notes.
“The same afternoon I took a purse in Trafalgar Square with about
eighteen sovereigns in it. I kept walking in company with the same men
till the commencement of 1849, when I was taken ill and laid up with
rheumatism. I lost the use of my legs in a great measure, and could not
walk, and paid away my money to physicians. Before I got better, such
articles as we had were disposed of, though my girl helped me as well
as she could.
“In the early part of 1849, when I was not able to go out and do
anything, Sally, who cohabited with me, went out along with another
girl and commenced stealing in omnibuses. She was well-dressed, and had
a respectable appearance. I did not learn her to pick pockets, and was
averse to it at first, as I did not wish to bring her into danger. I
think she was trained by my pals. She was very clever, and supported me
till I was able to go out again. I had to walk with a crutch for some
time, but gradually got better and stronger. Some time after that I got
into a row at the Seven Dials, and was sent for a month to Westminster
prison for an assault.
“When I came out I was sorry to find that Sally was taken up and
committed for trial for an omnibus robbery, and had got six months’
imprisonment at Westminster. This was in 1850. I succeeded very well
during the time she was in prison in picking ladies’ pockets during the
time of the Great Exhibition at Hyde Park.
“When she came out, I had nearly 200_l._ by me. I did not go out for
some time, and soon made the money fly, for I was then a cribbage
player, and would stake as much as 2_l._ or 3_l._ on a game.
“In the end of the year 1851 I was pressed for the first time to have a
hand at a crack in the City along with other two men. I was led through
their representations to believe they were experienced burglars, but
found afterwards, if they _were_ experienced they were not very clever.
Though they got a plan, they blundered in the execution of it in
getting into the place, and went into the wrong room, so that they had
to get thro’ another wall, which caused us to be so late that it was
gray in the morning before we got away; and we did not find so much as
we expected.
“At the back of the premises we cut our way into the passage, and,
according to the directions given to us in the plan that had been
drawn, we had to go up to the second floor, and enter a door there.
We found nothing in the room we had entered but neckties and collars,
which would not have paid us for bringing them away. We then had to
work our way through a back wall, before we got into the apartment
where the silks were stored. They cut through the brick wall very
cleverly. We had all taken rum to steady our nerve before we went to
the work.
“We had gone up the wrong staircase, which was the cause of our having
to cut through the wall. There was only one man that slept in the
house, and he was in a room on the basement. We at last, after much
labour and delay, got into the right room, pressed the bolt back,
and found we could get away by the other staircase. We got silks,
handkerchiefs, and other drapery goods, and had about 18_l._ each after
disposing of them--which was about two-thirds of their value. We had a
cab to carry away the things for us to the ‘fence’ who received them.
“We went to another burglary at Islington, and made an entrance into
the house, but were disturbed, and ran away over several walls and
gardens.
“We attempted a third burglary in the City. As usual we had a plan of
it through a man that had been at work there, who put it up for us.
This was a shop in which there were a great many Geneva watches. We
got in at this time by the back window, and went upstairs. We were
told that the master went away at 11 o’clock. On this occasion he
had remained later than usual, looking over his business books. On
seeing us, he made an outcry and struggled with us. Assistance came
immediately. Two policemen ran up to the house. In the scramble with
the man in the house, we tried to make for the door. The police could
not get in, as the door was bolted. We were determined to make a rush
out. I undid the chain and drew back the bolt. I got away, and had fled
along two or three streets, when I was stunned by a man who carried
a closed umbrella. Hearing the cry of ‘Stop thief!’ he drew out the
umbrella, and I fell as I was running. I was thereupon taken back by
one of the police, and found both of the others in custody. We were
committed for trial next day, and sent to Newgate in the meantime for
detention.
“My former convictions were not brought against me. My two companions
had been previously at Newgate, and were sentenced the one to ten
years’ and the other to seven years’ penal servitude, while I got
eighteen months’ imprisonment in Holloway prison. I was the younger of
the party, and had no convictions. I never engaged in a burglary after
this. At this time I was twenty-two or twenty-three years of age.
“I came out of prison in 1853, and was unnerved for some time, though
my health was good. This was the effect of the solitary confinement.
“When I came out, I wrote home for the first time since I had been in
London, and received a letter back, stating that my father was dead
after an illness of several years, and that I was to come home, adding
that if I required money, they would send it me. Besides, there were
several things they were to give me, according to my father’s wishes.
“I went home, and had thoughts of stopping there. My mother was not in
such good position as I expected, the property left by my grandfather
having gone to a distant relative at my father’s death. She was and is
still in receipt of a weekly sum from the old Wesleyan fund for the
benefit of the widows of ministers.
“I went home in the end of 1853, and had the full intention of stopping
there, though I promised to Sally to be back in a few weeks. I soon got
tired of country life, though my relations were very kind to me, and
after remaining seven weeks at home, came back to London again about
the commencement of 1854, and commenced working by myself at stealing
watches and breast-pins. I did not work at ladies’ pockets, unless I
had comrades beside me. I went and mingled in the crowds by myself.
“In the end of 1854 I got another six months’ imprisonment at Hicks’s
Hall police court, and was sent to Coldbath-Fields, and was told that
if I ever came again before the criminal authorities, I would be
transported.
“I came out in 1855, and have done very little since; acting
occasionally as a stall to Sally in omnibuses, and generally carrying a
portmanteau or something with me. I would generally sit in the omnibus
on the opposite side to her, and endeavour to keep the lady, as well
as I could, engaged in conversation, while she sat on her right hand.
She got twelve months for this in 1855, and during the time she was
in Westminster prison I first commenced pattering in the streets. I
did not again engage in thieving till the time of the illumination for
the peace in 1856. In Hyde Park on this occasion I took a purse from
a lady, containing nine sovereigns and some silver; and was living on
this money when Sally was discharged at the expiry of her sentence.
“When she came out, I told her what I had been doing, and found she was
much altered, and seemed to have a great disinclination to go out any
more. She did not go for some time. I made a sufficient livelihood by
pattering in the streets for nearly two years, when I got wet several
times, and was laid up with illness again. She then became acquainted
with a woman who used to go on a different game, termed shoplifting.
While the one kept the shopman engaged, the other would purloin a piece
of silk, or other goods. At this time she took to drink. I found out
after this she often got things, and sold them, before she came home,
on purpose to get drink. News came to me one day that she had been
taken up and committed for trial at Marylebone police court. I paid the
counsel to plead her case, and she was acquitted.
“I then told her if she was not satisfied with what I was doing as
patterer, that I would commence my former employment. So I did for some
time during last year, till I had three separate remands at the House
of Detention, Clerkenwell. The policeman got the stolen property, but
was so much engrossed taking me, he had lost sight of the prosecutor,
who was never found, and I got acquitted.
“On this occasion I told Sally I would never engage in stealing again,
and I have kept my word. I know if I had been tried at this time, and
found guilty, I should have been transported.
“I have since then got my living by pattering in the streets. I earn
my 2_s._, or 2_s._ 6_d._ in an hour, or an hour and a half in the
evening, and can make a shift.
“For six or seven years, when engaged in picking pockets, I earned
a good deal of money. Our house expenses many weeks would average
from 4_l._ to 5_l._, living on the best fare, and besides, we went to
theatres, and places of amusement, occasionally to the Cider Cellars,
and the Coal Hole.
“The London pickpockets are acquainted generally with each other, and
help their comrades in difficulty. They frequently meet with many of
the burglars. A great number of the women of pickpockets and burglars
are shoplifters, as they require to support themselves when their men
are in prison.
“A woman would be considered useless to a man if she could not get him
the use of counsel, and keep him for a few days after he comes out,
which she does by shoplifting, and picking pockets in omnibuses, the
latter being termed ‘Maltooling.’
“I have associated a good deal with the pickpockets over London, in
different districts. You cannot easily calculate their weekly income,
as it is so precarious, perhaps one day getting 20_l._, or 30_l._,
and another day being totally unsuccessful. They are in general very
superstitious, and if anything cross them, they will do nothing. If
they see a person they have formerly robbed, they expect bad luck, and
will not attempt anything.
“They are very generous in helping each other when they get into
difficulty, or trouble, but have no societies, as they could not be
kept up. Many of them may be in prison five or six months of the year;
some may get a long penal servitude, or transportation; or they may
have the steel taken out of them, and give up this restless, criminal
mode of life.
“They do not generally find stealing gentlemen’s watches so profitable
as picking ladies’ pockets, for this reason, that the purse can be
thrown away, some of the coins changed, and they may set to work again
immediately; whereas, when they take a watch, they must go immediately
to the fence with it: it is not safe to keep it on their person. A good
silver watch will now bring little more than 25_s._, or 30_s._, even
if the watch has cost 6_l._ A good gold watch will not fetch above
4_l._ I have worked for two or three hours, and have got, perhaps, six
different purses during that time, the purses I threw away, so that the
robbery may not be traced. Suppose you take a watch, and you place it
in your pocket, while you have also your own watch, if you happen to be
detected, you are taken and searched, and there being a second watch
found on you, the evidence is complete against you.
“The trousers-pockets are seldom picked, except in a crowd. It is
almost impossible to do this on any other occasion, such as when
walking in the street. A prostitute may occasionally do it, pattering
with her fingers about a man’s person when he is off his guard.
“I believe a large number of the thieves of London come from the
provinces, and from the large towns, such as Leeds, Birmingham,
Sheffield, Manchester, and Liverpool; from Birmingham especially, more
than any other town in England. There are no foreigners pickpockets in
London so far as I know. The cleverest of the native London thieves, in
general, are the Irish cockneys.
“I never learned any business or trade, and never did a hard day’s work
in my life, and have to take to pattering for a livelihood. When men in
my position take to an honest employment, they are sometimes pointed
out by some of the police as having been formerly convicted thieves,
and are often dismissed from service, and driven back into criminal
courses.
“I am a sceptic in my religious opinions, which was a stumbling-block
in the way of several missionaries, and other philanthropic men
assisting me. I have read Paine, and Volney, and Holyoake, those
infidel writers, and have also read the works of Bulwer, Dickens, and
numbers of others. It gives a zest to us in our criminal life, that
we do not know how long we may be at liberty to enjoy ourselves. This
strengthens the attachment between pickpockets and their women, who,
I believe, have a stronger liking to each other, in many cases, than
married people.”
HORSE AND DOG STEALERS.
_Horse-stealing._--These robberies are not so extensive as they used to
be in the metropolitan districts. They are generally confined to the
rural districts, where horses are turned out to graze on marshes and in
pasture-fields. Horses are stolen by a low unprincipled class of men,
who travel the country dealing in them, who are termed “horse coupers,”
and sometimes by the wandering gipsies and tinkers. They journey from
place to place, and observe where there is a good horse or pony, and
loiter about the neighbourhood till they get an opportunity to steal
it. This is generally done in the night time, and in most cases by one
man.
After removing it from the park, they take it away by some by-road,
or keep it shut up in a stable or outhouse till the “hue and cry”
about the robbery has settled down. They then trim it up, and alter
the appearance as much as possible, and take it to some market at a
distance, and sell it--sometimes at an under price. This is their
general mode of operation. Sometimes they proceed to London, and
dispose of it at Smithfield market. The party that steals it, does not
generally take it to the market, but leaves it in a quiet stable at
some house by the way, till he meets with a low horse-dealer. The thief
is often connected with horse-dealers, but may not himself be one.
Some Londoners are in the habit of stealing horses. These often
frequent the Old Kent-road, and are dressed as grooms or stablemen.
They are of various ages, varying from twenty to sixty years.
The person who sells the horses gets part of the booty from the
horse-stealer.
The mode of stealing by gipsies is somewhat similar. They pitch their
tents on some waste ground by the roadside, or on the skirt of a wood,
and frequently steal a horse when they get an opportunity. One will
take it away who has been keeping unobserved within the tent, and the
rest will remain encamped in the locality as if nothing had happened.
They may remove it to a considerable distance, and get it into the
covert of a wood, such as Epping Forest, or some secluded spot, and
take the first opportunity to sell it.
Another class of persons travel about the country, dealing in
small wares as Cheap Johns, who occasionally steal horses, or give
information to abandoned characters who steal them.
These robberies of horses are generally committed in rural districts,
and are seldom done in the metropolis, as horses are in general looked
after, or locked up in stables. They are occasionally stolen in the
markets in and around the metropolis, such as Smithfield and the new
market at Islington.
Sometimes horses in carts, and cabs, and other vehicles are removed by
thieves in the streets of the metropolis; but this is only done for
a short time until they have rifled the goods. So soon as they have
secured them, they leave the horse and vehicle, which come into the
hands of the police, and are restored to the owner.
The horses stolen are generally light and nimble, such as those used in
phaetons and light conveyances, and not for heavy carts or drays.
These robberies are detected in various ways. For example, sometimes a
valuable horse is offered for sale at a reduced price in some market,
which excites suspicion. At other times the appearance of the person
selling the horse is not consistent with the possession of such an
animal. On some occasions these robberies are detected by the police
from descriptions forwarded from station to station, and are stopped on
the highway.
Horse-stealers generally take the horses through backroads, and never
pass through tollbars, if they can avoid it, as they could be traced.
The keeper of the toll might give information to the police, and give a
clue to the way they had gone.
London thieves have been known to go considerable distances into the
country to steal horses--after having learned that horses could easily
be taken away. These robberies are generally committed in the spring
and summer, when horses are turned out to grass.
Number of cases of horse-stealing in the
metropolitan districts for 1860 23
Ditto ditto in the City 0
--
23
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the metropolitan districts £649
_Dog-stealing._--These robberies are generally committed by
dog-fanciers and others who confine their attention to this class of
felonies. They are persons of a low class, dressed variously, and are
frequently followed by women. They steal fancy dogs ladies are fond
of--spaniels, poodles, and terriers, sporting dogs, such as setters and
retrievers, and also Newfoundland dogs. These robberies are generally
committed by men of various ages, but seldom by boys. Their mode of
operation is this:--In prowling over the metropolis, when they see a
handsome dog with a lady or gentleman they follow it and see where the
person resides. So soon as they have ascertained this they loiter about
the house for days with a piece of liver prepared by a certain process,
and soaked in some ingredient which dogs are uncommonly fond of. They
are so partial to it they will follow the stranger some distance in
preference to following their master. The thieves generally carry small
pieces of this to entice the dog away with them, when they seize hold
of it in a convenient place, and put it into a bag they carry with them.
Another method of decoying dogs is by having a bitch in heat. When
any valuable dog follows it is picked up and taken home, when they
wait for the reward offered by the owner to return it, generally from
1_l._ to 5_l._ The loss of the dog may be advertized in the Times or
other newspapers, or by handbills circulated over the district, when
some confederate of the thief will negociate with the owner for the
restoration of the dog. Information is sent if he will give a certain
sum of money, such as 1_l._, 2_l._, or 5_l._ the dog will be restored,
if not it will be killed. This is done to excite sympathy.
Some dogs have been known to be stolen three or four times, and taken
back to their owner by rewards. Sometimes when they steal dogs they
fancy, they keep them and do not return them to the owner.
There is a class termed dog-receivers, or dog-fanciers, who undertake
to return stolen dogs for a consideration. These parties are connected
with the thieves, and are what is termed “in the ring,” that is, in
the ring of thieves. Dogs are frequently restored by agencies of this
description. These parties receive dogs and let the owners have them
back for a certain sum of money, while they receive part of the price
shared with the thief.
Dog-stealing is very prevalent, particularly in the West-end of the
metropolis, and is rather a profitable class of felony. These thieves
reside at the Seven Dials, in the neighbourhood of Belgravia, Chelsea,
Knightsbridge, and low neighbourhoods, some of them men of mature years.
They frequently pick up dogs in the street when their owners are not
near. But their general mode is to loiter about the houses and entice
them away in the manner described. Sometimes they belong to the felon
class, sometimes not. They are often connected with bird-fanciers,
keepers of fighting-dogs, and persons who get up rat matches.
Some of those stolen are sent to Germany, where English dogs are sold
at a high price.
Number of cases of dog-stealing in the
metropolitan districts for 1860 15
Ditto ditto in the City 1
--
16
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the metropolitan districts £134
HIGHWAY ROBBERS.
The highway robbers of the present day are a very different set from
the bold reckless brigands who infested the metropolis and the highways
in its vicinity in former times. There was a bold dash in the old
highwaymen, the Dick Turpins and Claud Du Vals of that day, not to be
found in the thieves of our time, whether they lived in the rookeries
of St. Giles’s, Westminster, and the Borough, nestling securely amid
dingy lanes and alleys, densely-clustered together, where it was unsafe
for even a constable to enter; or whether they roamed at large on
Blackheath and Hounslow Heath, or on Wimbledon Common, and Finchley
Common, accosting the passing traveller pistol in hand, with the stern
command, ‘Stand and deliver.’
The highwaymen of our day are either the sneaking thieves we have
described, who adroitly slip their hands into your pockets, or low
coarse ruffians who follow in the wake of prostitutes, or garotte
drunken men in the midnight street, or strike them down by brutal
violence with a life-preserver or bludgeon.
These felonies are generally committed in secluded spots and
by-streets, or in the suburbs of the metropolis. Many robberies
are committed on the highway by _snatching with violence from the
person_. These are generally done in the dusk, and rarely during the
day. When committed early in the evening, they are done in secluded
places, intersected with lanes and alleys, where the thieves have a
good opportunity to escape, such as in the Borough, Spitalfields,
Shoreditch, Whitechapel, Drury-lane, West-minster, and similar
localities. These are often done by one person, at other times by two
or more in company, and generally by young men from nineteen years
and upwards. The mode of effecting it is this. They see a person
respectably dressed walking along the street, with a silver or gold
chain, who appears to be off his guard. One of them as he passes by
makes a snatch at it, and runs down one of the alleys or along one of
the by-streets.
Sometimes the thief breaks the chain with a violent wrench. At other
times the swivel, or ring of the watch may give way; or a piece of the
guard breaks off. The thief occasionally fails to get the watch. In
these cases he can seldom be identified, because the party may not have
had his eye on him, and may lose his presence of mind; and the thief
may have vanished swiftly out of his sight.
Should the person to whom the watch belongs run after him, his
companions often try to intercept him, and with this view throw
themselves in his way. The thief is seldom caught at the time, unless
he is pursued by some person passing by, who has seen him commit the
robbery, or who may have heard the cry, “Stop thief.”
These felonies are committed by men living in low neighbourhoods, who
are generally known thieves; and are in most cases done during some
disturbance in the street, or in a crowd, or upon a person the worse of
liquor.
In September, 1859, Thomas Dalton, alias Thomas Davis, a stout-made
man of about thirty years of age, and 5 ft. 6 inches high, in company
with another man, went to the regatta at Putney, near London, when
Dalton snatched the watch of Mr. Friar, formerly the ballet-master
at Vauxhall-gardens. Mr. Friar, being aware of the robbery, suddenly
seized hold of both the men, when they wrestled with him. The other man
got away, but he retained his hold of Dalton. On a policeman coming
up Dalton dropped the watch. He was committed to the Surrey Sessions,
tried on 15th September, 1859, and sentenced to ten years’ penal
servitude.
Dalton was one of five prisoners tried at the Central Criminal Court
in December, 1847, for the murder of Mr. Bellchambers, at Westminster,
having beaten in his brains with an iron bar in Tothill-street,
Westminster during the night. Dalton was then acquitted. Sales, one of
the parties charged, was found guilty and hanged at Newgate.
They were seen in the company of the deceased in a public-house in
Orchard-street, Westminster on the night of the murder, and had
followed him out and robbed him of his money, watch, and seals. Dalton
had been several times in custody, for being concerned with other
persons in plate robberies; sneaking down into areas and opening the
doors by means of skeleton keys, and carrying off the plate. One of the
thieves went, dressed as a butcher, with an ox’s tail, pretending the
lady of the house had ordered it. While the servant went upstairs he
put the plate into a basket he carried with him, and carried it away.
On the 23rd of March, 1850, he was in custody with other three
notorious housebreakers for attempting to steal plate in Woburn-square
by skeleton keys along with other four thieves, when he was found
guilty and got three months’ imprisonment. One of them opened an area
gate about 10 o’clock in the morning, carrying a green-baize cloth
containing three French rolls. Finding the servant in the kitchen,
cleaning the plate, he told her he had brought the French rolls from
the baker. The servant, who was an intelligent shrewd person, refused
to go upstairs to her mistress. Meantime two detective officers, who
had been on the look-out, arrested the four thieves and prevented the
robbery.
On the 6th February, 1854, he was tried at Westminster, for snatching
a watch from a gentleman in Parliament-street, while her Majesty was
proceeding to open the Houses of Parliament. The gentleman feeling the
snatch at his watch laid hold of Dalton, when he threw it down an area
in front of the Treasury buildings.
As we have already said, Dalton was afterwards sentenced to
transportation.
Another remarkable case of highway robbery took place several years
ago by a man of the name of George Morris. He was above five feet
nine inches high, stout made, with dark whiskers, and of gentlemanly
appearance. He snatched a watch from a man near the Surrey Theatre.
Immediately on seizing hold of the watch he ran round St. George’s
Circus into the Waterloo-road, with the cry of stop thief ringing
in his ears. In running down Waterloo-road he threw himself down
intentionally into a heap of dirt in the street, when several people
who were chasing him, and also a policeman, stumbled over him. He
then got up as they lay on the ground and run down a turning called
Webber-row, down Spiller’s-court, and got over a closet, then mounted
the roof of some low cottages, and jumped off this into the garden at
the other side belonging to lofty houses there under repair. Finding a
crowd of people and the police close at his heels in the garden below,
and being exceedingly nimble, he ran up the ladder like lightning,
to the roof of the house. As the policemen were about to follow him
he took hold of the ladder and threw it back, preventing all further
chase. He disappeared from the top of this house and got to the roof
of the Magdalen Institution, and would have made his escape but for
the prompt exertions of the police. Some of them ran into a builder’s
yard and got several ladders and climbed up at different parts of the
building and pursued him on the roof of the house--between the chapel
and the governor’s house. He stood at bay, and threatened to kill the
first policeman who approached him, and kept them at defiance for
half-an-hour.
Meantime several other policemen had mounted the back part of the
chapel by means of a ladder, unperceived by Morris, while the others
were keeping him in conversation. On seeing them approach he found all
hope of escape was vain, and surrendered himself into the hands of the
officers. He was tried at the Central Criminal Court, and sentenced to
transportation for ten years.
Not long before he had assaulted a woman in the Westminster-road.
There was a cry for the police, and he ran down Duke-street,
Westminster-road. On turning the corner of the street he popped into a
doorway. This was in the dusk of the evening. His pursuers ran past,
thinking he had gone into one of the adjoining streets. As soon as
they had passed by he was seen to come out and coolly walk back, as if
nothing had occurred. A neighbour who had seen this gave him into the
custody of the police about half-an-hour afterwards, and he was fined
40_s._ for assaulting the woman.
About this time a woman complained to a policeman at the Surrey Theatre
that a tall, gentlemanly man had picked her pocket. The constable told
her he had seen a well-known thief go into a neighbouring coffee-shop
dressed in black. He took the woman over, and she immediately said
that was not the man. She was not able to identify him, as he had
turned his coat inside out. The coat he had on was black in the inside,
and white on the exterior, and could be put on upon either side. He had
in the meantime changed the coat, and the woman was thereby unable to
recognize him. This enabled him on this occasion to escape the ends of
justice.
Highway robberies are also effected by garotting. These are done in
similar localities at dusk, frequently in foggy nights at certain
seasons of the year, and seldom in the summer time. They are generally
done in the by-streets, and in the winter time. A ruffian walks up and
throws his arm round the neck of a person who has a watch, or whom he
has noticed carrying money on his person. One man holds him tightly
by the neck, and generally attacks from behind, or from the side. The
garotter tries to get his arm under his chin, and presses it back,
while with the other hand he holds his neck firmly behind. He does it
so violently the man is almost strangled, and is unable to cry out.
He holds him in this position perhaps for a minute or two, while his
companions, one or more, rifle his pockets of his watch and money.
Should the person struggle and resist he is pressed so severely by the
neck that he may be driven insensible. When the robbery is effected
they run off. In general they seize a man when off his guard, and
it may be some time before he recovers his presence of mind. These
are generally a different class of men from the persons who snatch
the watch-chain. They have more of the bull-dog about them, and are
generally strong men, and brutal in disposition. Many of them are
inveterate thieves, returned convicts, ruffians hardened in crime.
Their average age is from twenty-five and upwards, and they reside in
low infamous neighbourhoods. Most of these depredations are committed
in the East-end of the metropolis, such as Whitechapel and its
neighbourhood, or the dark slums in the Borough.
A remarkable case of garotting occurred in the metropolis in July,
1856. Two men went to a jeweller’s shop in Mark Lane during the day,
when the street was thronged with people. One of them was stout-made,
about five feet six inches high, of dark complexion, and about
forty-five years of age. The other, named James Hunter, alias Connell,
was about five feet ten inches high, of robust frame, with dark
whiskers, dressed in the first of fashion. One of the thieves kept
watch outside while the other slipped in and laid hold, in the absence
of the jeweller, of a lot of valuable jewellery. The shopman, who
happened to be in the back parlour, ran into the shop and seized him.
On seeing this his companion came in from the street to assist him,
knocked the shopman down and gave him a severe wound on the head, when
both hastily made their escape. One of them was taken when he had got
a small distance off with some of the jewellery on his person, such as
watches, rings, brooches, &c., but the other got away. This robbery was
daringly done in the very middle of the day, near to the Corn Exchange,
while in the heat of business. One of the robbers was taken and tried
at the Central Criminal Court in July, 1856, and sentenced to ten
years’ transportation, having been previously convicted for felony.
From information received by the police, James Hunter alias Clifford
alias Connell, the other person concerned in this robbery, was taken
afterwards. A good-looking young applewoman swore distinctly he was
one of those parties. In running away he had thrown down her stand of
apples, and also threw her down when she for a short time had seized
hold of him.
He was tried at the Central Criminal Court in August 1856, the
following sessions, when the prisoner’s counsel proved an alibi by
calling his convicted confederate as a witness. His two sisters also
swore he was in their house at Lambeth Walk on the day the robbery
occurred, and had dinner and tea with his mother, who was an honest and
respectable woman.
Other robberies are perpetrated _by brutal violence with a
life-preserver or bludgeon_. It is usually done by one or more brutal
men following a woman. The men are generally from thirty to forty
years of age--some older--carrying a life-preserver or bludgeon. This
is termed “swinging the stick,” or the “bludgeon business.” The woman
walks forward, or loiters about, followed by the men, who are hanging
in the rear. She walks as if she was a common prostitute, and is often
about twenty-six or thirty years of age. She picks up a man in the
street, possibly the worse of liquor; she enters into conversation,
and decoys him to some quiet, secluded place, and may there allow him
to take liberties with her person, but not to have carnal connection.
Meantime she robs him of his watch, money, or other property, and at
once makes off.
In some instances she is pursued by the person, who may have discovered
his loss; when he is met by one of the men, who runs up, stops him,
and inquires the direction to some part of London, or to some street,
or will ask what he has been doing with his wife, and threaten to
punish him for indecent conduct to her. During this delay the woman may
get clear away. In some cases a quarrel arises, and the victim is not
only plundered of his money, but severely injured by a life-preserver
or bludgeon.
Cases of this kind occasionally occur in the East-end and the suburbs
of London. These women and men are generally old thieves, and, when
convicted, are often sentenced to transportation, being in most cases
well known to the police.
Sometimes these robberies are committed by men without the connivance
of women, as in a case which occurred in Drury Lane in August last,
when a man was decoyed by several men from sympathy to accompany a
drunken man to a public-house, and was violently robbed.
In the month of July 1855 a woman stopt a man in the London-road,
Southwark, one evening about twelve o’clock at night, and stole his
watch. The party immediately detected the robbery, and laid hold of
her. Upon this two men came up to her rescue, struck him in the face,
and cut his cheek. They then gave him another severe blow on the head,
and knocked him down senseless, while calling out for the police.
A policeman came up at this juncture, and laid hold of Taylor, one of
the men, and took him into custody with a life-preserver in his hand.
Taylor was tried on 20th August, 1855, at the Central Criminal Court,
and was sentenced to fourteen years’ penal servitude.
Highway robberies by the pistol are seldom committed, though
occasionally such instances do occur. These are seldom committed by
professional thieves, as they generally manage to effect their object
by picking pockets, and in the modes we have just described.
The old rookeries of thieves are no longer enveloped in mystery as
formerly. They are now visited by our police inspectors and constables,
and kept under strict surveillance. Our daily press brings the
details of our modern highway-men and other thieves clearly to the
light of day; and their deeds are no longer exaggerated by fictitious
embellishments and exaggerations. Our railways and telegraphs, postal
communications and currency arrangements, have put an end to mounted
highwaymen, such as Dick Turpin and Tom King. Were such to appear
now, they would furnish a rare piece of sport to our bold and adroit
detectives, and would speedily be arrested.
Number of felonies by highway robbery in
the metropolitan districts for 1860 21
Ditto ditto in the City 1
--
22
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the metropolitan districts £98 0
Ditto ditto in the City 2 10
--------
£100 10
A RAMBLE AMONG THE THIEVES’ DENS IN THE BOROUGH.
Leaving the police-office at Stones-end, along with a
detective-officer, we went one afternoon to Gunn Street, a narrow
by-street off the Borough Road, inhabited by costermongers, burglars,
and pickpockets.
Here one of the most daring gangs of burglars and pickpockets in London
met our eye, most of them in the dress of costermongers. A professional
pickpocket, a well-attired young man, was seated on a costermonger’s
barrow. He was clothed in a black cloth coat, vest, and trousers, and
shining silk hat, and was smoking a pipe, with two or three “pals”
by his side. It was then about seven o’clock, P. M., and as clear as
mid-day. About forty young men, ranging from seventeen to thirty-five
years of age, were engaged around a game of “pitch and toss,” while
others were lounging idle in the street.
We went forward through the crowd, and stood for some time alongside.
At first they may have fancied we were come to arrest one or more of
them, and were evidently prepared to give us a warm reception. On
seeing us standing by smiling, they recovered their good-humour, and
most of them continued to cluster together, but numbers sneaked off to
their houses out of sight.
Here we saw a tall, robust man, with a dissipated and ruffian look,
smoking a long pipe, who had been an accomplice in an atrocious
midnight murder.
He had narrowly escaped the gallows by turning Queen’s evidence on
his companions. He is a determined burglar. We could observe from the
brutal, resolute, bull-dog look of the man that he was fit for any
deed of heartless villany when inflamed with strong drink.
Three burglars stood in the middle of the crowd, who soon after left
it and entered a beershop in the street. One of them was dressed like
a respectable mechanic. He was rather beneath the middle height,
stout-made, with his nose injured and flattened, possibly done in some
broil. Another was more brutal in appearance, and more degraded. The
third burglar was not so resolute in character, and appeared to be an
associate of the band.
Ten of the persons present had been previously convicted of robberies.
The greater part, if not the whole of them, were thieves, or associates
of thieves.
We next directed our way to the Mint, a well-known harbour of
low characters, passing knots of thieves at the corners of the
different streets as we proceeded along. Some were sneaks, and others
pickpockets. In the neighbourhood of the Mint we found a number of
children gamboling in the streets. One in particular arrested our
attention, an interesting little girl of about five years of age,
with a sallow complexion, but most engaging countenance, radiant with
innocence and hope. Other sweet little girls were playing by her side,
possibly the children of some of the abandoned men and women of the
locality. How sad to think of these young innocents exposed to the
contamination of bad companionships around them, and to the pernicious
influence of the bad example of their parents!
We went into Evans’s lodging-house, noted as a haunt for thieves.
Passing through a group of young women who stood at the doorway, we
went downstairs to an apartment below and saw about a dozen of young
lads and girls seated around a table at a game of cards. One of these
youths was a notorious pickpocket, though young in years, and had twice
escaped out of Horsemonger Lane gaol. We were informed there was not a
fourth of the persons present who usually frequent the house. After the
first panic was over the young people resumed their game, some looking
slyly at us, as if not altogether sure of our object. Others were lying
extended on the benches along the side of the room. As we were looking
on this curious scene the women in the flat above had followed us down
and were peering from the staircase into the apartment to try and learn
the object of our visit. As we left the house we took a glance over our
shoulder and saw them standing at the door, following our movements.
We bent our steps to Kent Street and entered a beershop there. There
were a number of thieves and “smashers” (utterers of base coin)
hovering round the bar. The “smashers” were ordinary-looking men and
women of the lower orders. We saw a party of thieves in the adjoining
tap-room, and seated ourselves for a short time among them. One of them
was a dexterous swell-mobsman, who has been several times convicted
and imprisoned. A dark-complexioned little man, about twenty-one years
of age, an utterer of base coin, was lounging in the seat beside us.
The swell-mobsman was evidently the leading man among them. He was a
good-looking fair-haired youth, about twenty years of age, smart and
decided in his movements, and with a good appearance, very unlike
a criminal. He occasionally dresses in high style, in a superfine
black suit, with white hat and crape, and occasionally drives out in
fashionable vehicles.
We also visited Market Street, a narrow by-street off the Borough
Road, a well-known rookery of prostitutes. A great number of simple,
thoughtless young girls, from various parts of London and the country,
leave their homes and settle down here and live on prostitution. Here
we saw an organist performing in the street, surrounded by a dense
crowd of young prostitutes, middle-aged women, and children of the
lower class. Two young women, one with her face painted, and the other
a slender girl about seventeen, with an old crownless straw bonnet on
her head, and with the crown of it in one hand, and a stick in the
other, were dancing in wild frolic to the strains of the organ, amid
the merriment of the surrounding crowd, and to the evident amazement of
the poor minstrel, while other rough-looking young dames were skipping
gaily along the street.
In a brothel in this street an atrocious crime was perpetrated a few
days ago by George Philips, a young miscreant, termed the Jew-boy, who
resided there. A sailor, recently returned from India, happened to
enter this foul den. The inmates consisted of the Jew-boy’s sister,
a common prostitute, who cohabited with Richard Pitts, a well-known
burglar, recently sentenced to transportation for ten years, another
prostitute named Irish Julia, and this young villain, the Jew. After
remaining for some time the sailor told them he was to leave their
company. On hearing this, Philips’s sister told her brother to stab him
to the heart. He instantly took out a knife from his pocket, opened
it, and stabbed the sailor beneath the collar-bone. After committing
this atrocious crime he coolly wiped the knife on the cuff of his
guernsey, at the same time stating, if the sailor had not got enough he
would give him the other end of the knife. The sailor fell, apparently
mortally wounded, and was removed to St. Thomas’s Hospital.
His sister, on seeing what her brother had done by her order,
desperately seized a bottle of laudanum in the room, and drank off part
of the contents, and still lies in a precarious state.
In this portion of Market Street we understand every house, from
basement to attic, is occupied by prostitutes and thieves.
We entered an adjoining public-house, where three of these young women
followed us to the bar, anxious to know the object of our visiting
the district. They called for a pint of stout, which they drank off
heartily, and stood loitering beside us to hear our conversation, so
that they might have something to gossip about to their companions. The
girl who frolicked in the street with the old bonnet was one of them,
and had now laid this aside. She was fair-haired, and good-looking, but
was very foolish and immodest in her movements. One of her companions
was taller and more robust, but her conduct showed she was debased in
her character, and lost to all sense of propriety. The other girl was
tall and dark-eyed, and more quiet and calculating in her manner as she
stood, in a light cotton dress, silently leaning against the door-post.
One evening in September, about eight o’clock, we took another ramble
over the criminal district of the Borough.
As we went along Kent Street the lamps were lit, and the shops in the
adjoining streets were illuminated with their flaring gas lights. On
passing St. George’s church we saw a crowd collected around a drunken
middle-aged Irishwoman. It was one of those motley scenes one often
meets in the streets of London. Young people and middle-aged, old women
and children were clustered together, some well-dressed, others in
mechanics’ dress, begrimed with dust and sweat, and others hanging in
rags and tatters. They were collected around this woman, who stood on
the pavement, while the mass were gathered in the street, many of them
looking on anxiously with eyes and mouth open, others grinning with
delight, and some with sinister countenance, while she gesticulated
wildly, yet in good humour, in a strong Irish accent, amid the applause
of the auditory.
We could not hear the subject of her oration. On our coming up to her
and remaining for a short time, curious to know the nature of the
comedy, the woman went away, followed by part of the crowd, when she
appeared to take her station again in the midst of them. We had no time
to lose, and passed on.
On our proceeding farther into Kent Street, a good-looking girl,
evidently belonging to the lower orders, stood in a doorway, with
beaming smile, and beckoned us to enter. She had accosted us in like
manner in the light of open day on our previous visit to Kent Street,
while another young woman, of her own age and size, apparently her
sister, stood by her side. As on the former occasion we did not trust
ourselves to these syren sisters, but again passed on, notwithstanding
urgent solicitations to enter.
Farther along the street we saw a small group of men and boys--thieves
and utterers of base coin. A young woman of about twenty-five years
of age stood among them, who was a common prostitute and expert
thief, although we could scarcely have known this from her heavy,
stupid-looking countenance, which was bloated and dissipated. One of
the group was a burglar. He was under the middle size, pockpitted, and
had a callous, daring look about him. We had time to study the lines of
his face. They soon divined our purpose, and skulked off in different
directions, as we found the generality of such persons to do in the
course of our visits. The men were of different ages, varying from
seventeen to thirty, dressed similar to costermongers.
We bent our way to St. George’s New Town, a by-street off Kent Street.
On turning the corner from Kent Street, leading into St. George’s New
Town, we saw a cluster of men and women, varying in age from seventeen
to forty, also dressed like those just described. Most of them were
convicted thieves.
We then came back to Mint Street, leading out of High Street in the
Borough to Southwark Bridge Road, which, as we have said, is very low
and disreputable.
Leaving Mint Street and its dark, disreputable neighbourhood, we
directed our way to Norfolk Street, a very narrow street, leading
into Union Street in the Borough. This locality is much infested with
pickpockets and also with “dragsmen,” _i. e._ those persons who steal
goods or luggage from carts and coaches. At one corner of this street
we saw no less than seven or eight persons clustered together, several
of them convicted thieves. They were dressed similar to those in the
low neighbourhoods already described.
We then went into Little Surrey Street, Borough Road, where we entered
a beershop. Here we found four men, from twenty-five to thirty-five
years of age--expert burglars. One of them appeared to be a mechanic.
He told us he was an engraver. This was the same burglar, with his nose
flattened, we had seen on the previous occasion referred to. He was an
intelligent, determined man, and acted as the head of the gang. The
other two were the companions we had seen with him in Gunn Street. All
of them were rather under the middle size. They were now better dressed
than formerly, and apparently on the eve of setting out to commit
some felony. They appeared trimmed up in working order. A prostitute,
connected with them, with her eye blackened, stood by the bar. She was
also well-attired, and ready to accompany them. Burglars of this class
often have a woman to go before them, to carry their housebreaking
tools, to the house they intend to enter, as they might be arrested
on the way with the tools in their own possession. The woman was
tolerably good-looking, and on setting out, was possibly getting primed
with gin. The engraver has been convicted several times for picking
pockets as well as for burglary. The other two are convicted burglars.
There was a man of about forty years of age seated beside them in the
beershop, whom we learned was in a decline. The burglars are often
liberal in supporting the invalids connected with them, and the latter
lend a subordinate hand occasionally in their nefarious work, such
as in assisting to dispose of the stolen property. One of their old
“pals” died lately, and the burglars in his neighbourhood raised a
subscription between them to defray his funeral expenses.
We proceeded to Market Street, Borough Road, where we had on the
former occasion observed the scene of merriment with the organist and
the young girls. But the street had now a very different appearance.
Instead of the locality ringing with the light-hearted merriment and
buffoonery of the young girls and groups of children, the dark pall of
night was stretched over it. At every door as we passed we saw a female
standing on the outlook for persons to enter their dens of prostitution
and crime. They solicited us in whispers to enter, or tapped us gently
on the shoulder, or seized us by the skirts of the coat. Some of them
were young and good-looking, while others were old and bloated. We
looked into several of the houses as we went along, and saw numbers
of young prostitutes in their best attire, seated by the tables, or
lolling on the seats. This part of Market Street is one of the lowest
rookeries of prostitutes and thieves in London. Many a young girl has
been ruined by entering these low brothels. She may have been a servant
out of place, or she may have left her home in the metropolis, and
betaken herself here to a life of infamy.
These prostitutes assist to maintain the burglars, pickpockets, and
other thieves, when they are not successful in their lawless calling.
Some of them are well-dressed and remarkably good-looking. They
occasionally come home with men in cabs from the different theatres,
and rob them in their dwellings, and turn them unceremoniously into the
street, but do not strip them of their clothing. When their cash is
done, they wish their company no longer.
In other low districts in the vicinity of Kent Street, prostitutes have
been convicted for stealing the clothes of the unfortunates who have
entered their dismal abodes.
Leaving Market Street and the alleys and slums of that locality
behind us, we went along Newington Causeway, a far brighter and more
salubrious scene. This is a wide business street, and one of the main
streets on the Surrey side of the river, where, especially in the
evenings, a good deal of shopping is carried on.
The south side of Newington Causeway, from Horsemonger Lane gaol to the
Elephant and Castle, is crowded with shops, the street being lit up
nearly as clear as day. There are several splendid gin-palaces in this
locality, generally crowded with motley groups of people of various
ranks and pursuits; and milliners’ shops, with their windows gaily
furnished with ladies’ bonnets of every hue and style, and ribbons
of every tint; and drapers’ shops with cotton gown pieces, muslins,
collars, and gloves of every form and colour. There are many boot-
and shoe-shops, with assortments of fancy shoes as well as plain.
Upholsterers’ shops, with carpets and rugs of every pattern, and
chemists, with their gay-coloured jars, flaming like globes of red,
blue, green, and yellow fire. The street is filled with incessant tides
of mechanics, tradesmen’s wives, milliners, dressmakers, and others,
going shopping or returning from their daily toil; and many respectable
people take their evening’s walk along this cheerful and bustling
thoroughfare, which is a favourite place for promenading.
In walking along we noticed many young men and women in respectable
attire. Here we saw some young, genteel milliners and dressmakers,
and girls from other places of business, returning to their homes or
lodgings, at the close of the day, and taking an occasional glance at
the shop windows, as they passed along. By their side we saw apparently
some married women, out shopping with a new bonnet, or other article
of dress, carefully wrapt up. In another part of the street we saw a
shopman making love to a pretty girl, with clustering ringlets, who
looked serenely upon him as he stood bareheaded outside the door of a
drapery establishment.
Among the busy throng of people passing to and fro we observed two
young women, pickpockets, dressed in brown cloaks, like milliners, and
in fancy bonnets, passing quietly along. A person who did not know
them personally, could not have detected their criminal character. On
following them a short way, they passed over to the other side of the
street. From their features and from the similarity of their dress
we could have guessed them to be sisters. They were apparently about
twenty-five years of age.
As is generally the case with such persons, on being noticed they
separated on the other side of the street to prevent our following
their movements. One went off in one direction, and the other in
another; but meantime they had probably arranged to meet each other
when out of the officer’s sight.
The Borough is chiefly the locality of labouring people and small
shopkeepers--the masses of the people--and has low neighbourhoods in
many of the by-streets, infested by the dangerous classes. It contains
specimens of almost all kinds of thieves, from the lowest to the most
expert, though for the most part few of the swells reside here. Many of
them prefer to live about the Kingsland Road.
They occasionally leave their own dwellings in other parts of the city,
and come here, and live retired to be away from the surveillance of the
police of their own district.
There are some expert “cracksmen” (burglars) here, dressed in
fashionable style, who indulge in potations of brandy and champagne,
and the best of liquors. In their appearance there is little or no
trace of their criminal character. They have the look of sharp business
men. They commit burglaries at country mansions, and sometimes at shops
and warehouses, often extensive, and generally contrive to get safely
away with their booty.
These crack burglars generally live in streets adjoining the New
Kent Road and Newington Causeway, and groups of them are to be seen
occasionally at the taverns beside the Elephant and Castle, where they
regale themselves luxuriously on the choicest wines, and are lavish
of their gold. From their superior manner and dress few could detect
their real character. One might pass them daily in the street, and not
be able to recognize them.
HOUSEBREAKERS AND BURGLARS.
The expert burglar is generally very ingenious in his devices, and
combines manual dexterity with courage. In his own sphere the burglar
in manual adroitness equals the accomplished pickpocket, while in
personal daring he rivals our modern ruffians of the highway, who
perpetrate garotte robberies, or plunder their victims with open
violence.
Many of our London burglars have been trained from their boyhood. Some
are the children of convicted thieves; some have for a time lived as
sneaks, committing petty felonies when residing in low lodging-houses;
others are the children of honest parents, mechanics and tradesmen, led
into bad company, and driven into criminal courses.
In treating of sneaks we alluded to the area-sneak, and lobby-sneak,
watching a favourable opportunity and darting into the kitchen and
pantry, and sometimes entering the apartments on the first floor and
stealing the plate. We alluded to the lead-stealer finding his way to
the house-top, and to the attic-thief adroitly slipping downstairs to
the apartments below, and carrying away valuables, jewellery, plate,
and money. Here we see the points of transition, from the petty felon
to the daring midnight robber plundering with violence.
We shall in the outset offer a few general remarks on the manner in
which housebreaking and burglaries are effected in London, and then
proceed to a more detailed account of the various modes pursued in the
different districts.
_Breaking into houses, shops, and warehouses_ is accomplished in
various ways, such as picking the locks with skeleton keys; inserting
a thin instrument between the sashes and undoing the catch of the
windows, which enables the thieves to lift up the under sash; getting
over the walls at the back, and breaking open a door or window which
is out of sight of the street, or other public place; lifting the
cellar-flap or area-grating; getting into an empty house next door,
or a few doors off, and passing from the roof to that of the house
they intend to rob; entering by an attic-window, or trap-door, and if
there are neither window nor door on the roof, taking off some of the
tiles and entering the house. Sometimes the thieves will make an entry
through a brick wall in an adjoining building, or climb the waterspout
to get in at the window. These are the general modes of breaking into
houses.
Sometimes when doors are fastened with a padlock outside, and no
other lock on the door, thieves will get a padlock as near like it
as possible. They will then break off the proper lock, one of them
will enter the house, and an accomplice will put on a lock as like
it as possible to deceive the police, while one or more inside will
meantime pack up the goods. Sometimes a well-dressed thief waylays a
servant-girl going out on errands in the evening, professes to fall
in love with her, and gets into her confidence, till she perhaps
admits him into the house when her master and mistress are out. Having
confidence in him she shows him over the house, and informs him where
the valuables are kept. If the house is well secured, so that there
will be difficulty of breaking in by night, he manages to get an
accomplice inside to secrete himself till the family has gone to bed,
when he admits one or more of his companions into the house. They pack
up all they can lay hold of, such as valuables and jewels. On such
occasions there is generally one on the outlook outside, who follows
the policeman unobserved, and gives the signal to the parties inside
when it is safe to come out.
In warehouses one of the thieves frequently slips in at closing-time,
when only a few servants are left behind, and are busy shutting up.
He secretes himself behind goods in the warehouse, and when all have
retired for the night, and the door locked, he opens it and lets in his
companions to pack up the booty. Should it consist of heavy goods, they
generally have a cart to take it away. They are sometimes afraid to
engage a cabman unless they can get him to connive at the theft, and,
besides, the number of the cab can be taken. They get the goods away in
the following manner. If consisting of bulky articles, such as cloth,
silks, &c., they fill large bags, similar to sacks, and get as much as
they think the cart can conveniently hold, placed near the door. When
the policeman has passed by on his round, the watch stationed outside
gives the signal; the door is opened, the cart drives up, and four or
five sacks are handed into it by two thieves in about a minute, when
the vehicle retires. It is loaded and goes off sooner than a gentleman
would take his carpet-bag and portmanteau into a cab when going to a
railway-station. The cart proceeds with the driver in one way, while
the thieves walk off in a different direction. They close the outer
door after them when they enter a shop or warehouse, most of which have
spring locks. When the policeman comes round on his beat he finds the
door shut, and there is nothing to excite his suspicion. The cart is
never seen loitering at the door above a couple of minutes, and does
not make its appearance on the spot till the robbery is about to be
committed, when the signal is given.
Lighter goods, such as jewellery, or goods of less bulk, are generally
taken away in carpet bags in time to catch an early train, often about
five or six o’clock, and the robbers being respectably-dressed, and
in a neighbourhood where they are not known, pass on in most cases
unmolested. Sometimes they pack up the goods in hampers, as if they
were going off to some railway-station. When there is no one sleeping
on the premises, and when they have come to learn where the party
lives who keeps the keys, they watch him home at night after locking
up, and set a watch on his house, that their confederates may not be
disturbed when rifling the premises. If they are to remove the goods in
the morning they do it about an hour before the warehouse is usually
opened, so that the neighbours are taken off their guard, supposing
the premises are opened a little earlier than usual in consequence of
being busy. Sometimes they stand and see the goods taken out, and pay
no particular attention to it. In the event of the person who keeps
the keys coming up sooner than usual, the man keeping watch hastens
forward and gives the signal to his companions, if they have not left
the warehouse.
It often happens when they have got an entry into a house, they
have to break their way into the apartments in the interior to
reach the desired booty, such as wrenching open an inner door with a
small crowbar they term a jemmy, cutting a panel out of a door, or a
partition, with a cutter similar to a centrebit, which works with two
or three knives; this is done very adroitly in a short space of time,
and with very little noise. At other times, when on the floor above,
they cut through one or more boards in the flooring, and frequently cut
panes of glass in the windows with a knife or awl.
They get information as to the property in warehouses from porters
and others unwittingly by leading them into conversation regarding
the goods on the premises, the silks they have got, &c., and find out
the part of the premises where they are to be found. Sometimes they
go in to inspect them on the pretence of looking at some articles of
merchandise.
It occasionally happens servants are in league with thieves, and give
them information as to the hour when to come, and the easiest way to
break in. Sometimes servants basely admit the thieves into the premises
to steal, and give them impressions of the keys, which enables them to
make other keys to enter the house. Thieves sometimes take a blank key
without wards, cover it with wax, work it in the keyhole against the
wards of the lock, and by that means the impression is left in the wax.
They then take it home and make a similar key. When looking into the
lock they frequently strike a match on the doorway, and pretend to be
lighting a pipe or cigar, which prevents passers by suspecting their
object.
These are the general modes of housebreaking and burglary over the
metropolis, but in order that we may have a more vivid and thorough
conception of the subject, we shall give a more graphic detail of these
felonies. We shall first advert to breaking into shops and warehouses,
and then proceed to describe burglaries in various parts of the
metropolis.
It frequently occurs that a thief enters a warehouse, or large
shop, and secretes himself behind some goods, or in the cellar, or
up the chimney. This could be done at any hour of the day, but is
frequently managed when the servants or shopmen are out dining at
mid-day, or towards evening, when the places of business are about to
be closed. The thief may be respectably dressed, or not, according
to the nature of the place of business. A person may call with some
fictitious message, and keep one or more of the servants or shopmen in
conversation while a confederate could meantime slip into the shop or
warehouse, and if detected would seldom be suspected of being connected
with this party. They sometimes hover for days in the neighbourhood
of shops and warehouses they intend to plunder, and watch the most
favourable opportunity to effect this object.
Towards evening when the servants are all gone, and the place of
business closed, the rest of his companions come to the spot,
consisting of one or more men, a woman being occasionally employed.
While they are aware that one of their gang is secreted on the
premises, as a precaution they sometimes knock at the door or ring the
bell to ascertain if the servants or shopmen are gone. Should they be
lingering in the premises, arranging the goods, engaged with their
business-books, accounts, or otherwise, they ask for Mr. So-and-so, or
have some other fictitious message.
On the departure of the people belonging to the shop, the thief inside
generally opens the door to his companions on the given signal, when
they proceed to rifle the premises of Manchester goods, cottons, silks,
shawls, satins, or otherwise, and to store them into large bags they
bring with them, which they place beside the door, when filled, to be
conveniently carried away. They wrench open the desks, money-drawers,
and other lockfasts with a jemmy, chisel, or screw-driver, as well as
any doors which may be locked, occasionally using the cutter and saw,
or other tools, and pierce through brick and other partition walls with
an auger or other instrument. In many cases the doors of the apartments
in warehouses are left open so that the thief has free access to the
property.
Meantime a man or woman is watching outside while the thieves are
busy plundering within, keeping a special look-out for the policeman
proceeding on his beat. They have many ingenious expedients to decoy
him away, by conversation or otherwise. The policeman is generally from
fifteen to twenty minutes in going round his beat, so that they have
ample time to carry off the booty.
While the thieves are busy collecting their spoil, the door is shut
with a spring lock, or fastened with a padlock by means of a key they
may have made for the purpose, so that the policeman has no suspicion
of what is passing within. The former frequently remain for several
hours on the premises, while a person outside is keeping watch, waiting
to hear their signal when they have got the booty packed and ready.
Should the coast be clear outside, notice is conveyed to the cart or
cab, loitering somewhere in the vicinity, or which drives up at a
certain hour, when the door opens. The plunder is quickly handed into
the vehicle, which drives smartly away. The door is then shut, and the
robbers walk off, possibly in a different direction to that in which
the conveyance is gone.
Burglaries from _jewellers’ shops_ are frequently effected by means
of skeleton keys, or otherwise, by one or more men. A woman often
carries the tools to the shop, and keeps watch. So soon as a favourable
opportunity occurs they unlock the door and enter the premises, while
a man or woman watches outside, the woman perhaps walking along the
street as though she were a common prostitute, or familiarly accosting
the policeman or other persons she meets, and decoying them away
from the shop. In some cases, when she has not succeeded in getting
the policeman away, she pretends to fall down in a fit, when he has
possibly to take her to the nearest surgeon. Sometimes the woman feigns
to be drunk, and is taken to the police station, which takes him off
his beat. In the meanwhile the parties inside, with jemmy, chisel, saw,
or other tools, and with silent lights and taper or dark lantern, break
open the glass cases and boxes, and steal gold and silver watches, gold
chains, brooches, pins, and other jewellery, which they deposit in a
small carpet-bag, as well as rifle money from the desk.
Jewellers’ shops are sometimes entered by the thief getting into an
unoccupied house next door, or two or three houses off, and proceeding
along the roofs to the attic or roof of the house to be robbed, and
going in by the attic window, or removing a few of the slates. The
thieves then go downstairs and cut their way through the door or
partition, and effect an entry into the shop.
Most of the robberies in jewellers’ shops have of late years been
committed by means of false keys, or by cutting out a hole in the door
or shutter with a cutter, which is done in a short space of time, and
when the instrument is moistened it makes very little noise. This hole
is covered with a piece of paper painted of the same colour as the
door, and is pasted on, which prevents the police having any suspicion.
Sometimes jewellers’ shops are entered by persons lodging in the floor
above, or having access to it, and then cutting through the flooring
and descending into the jeweller’s shop by means of a rope-ladder they
attach to the floor. At other times they are entered by cutting through
the solid brick wall at the back of the shop.
Several years ago a very remarkable burglary took place at Mr.
Acutt’s large linen-drapery establishment in the Westminster Road.
About four o’clock in the morning the policeman on duty heard a man
give the signal at a shop-door. The constable believing thieves to be
on the premises sprung his rattle, roused up the inmates, and got the
assistance of several other constables. When they entered the shop they
found upwards of 30_l._ worth of silks and satins, and other valuables
packed up in bundles ready to be carried off. They found two thieves
who had gained an entrance by getting over some closets, scaling a wall
by means of the rain-spout, and walking along a high wall about nine
inches thick. They then removed the sky-light at the back, and let
themselves down into the shop by a rope-ladder. By this means they got
into the shop of Mr. Acutt.
On being scared by the police they jumped from one house to another,
eight feet apart, over a height of about fifty feet, and there
concealed themselves behind a stack of chimneys. Several policeman
mounted to the roofs, but could not find them; and no one would venture
to leap to the adjoining houses, whither the thieves had gone. An
inspector of police ordered two men in plain clothes to be on the
watch, believing they must be concealed somewhere on the housetops.
About eight o’clock in the morning a man of the name of Fitzgerald
was out in a back court of an adjoining house washing himself, when
the thieves came down by a spout twenty feet long communicating with
the water cistern. On getting down one of them jumped on the back of
Fitzgerald. He shouted out “murder and police,” when two constables
came up and took both of the thieves into custody.
On the trial it was said the prisoners’ women had given several pounds
to bribe this man, and he pretended he could not identify them, and
they were acquitted. They have since been transported for other
burglaries.
One of them was a man of thirty years of age, about five feet nine
inches high, slim made, with a most daring countenance. The other
was of middle stature, about twenty-six years of age, with pleasing
appearance.
Another burglary took place in a silk warehouse in Cheapside in 1842.
The burglars were admitted into an adjoining carpet warehouse by one of
the warehousemen on a Saturday night, and broke through a brick-wall
eight or nine inches thick, and made an entry into the silk warehouse.
They did not steal any carpets, as they were too bulky. Goods were
seen to be taken away by a cab on the Sunday afternoon. The padlock was
meantime secure on the outdoor, so that the police had no suspicion.
The robbery was discovered on the Monday morning, when it was found
from 1500_l._ to 2000_l._ had been carried off, and that a 100_l._ bank
note had also been taken from the desk of the carpet warehouse.
Soon after the foreman of the latter business establishment absconded,
and has not since been heard of, and there is strong suspicion he had
connived with the burglars.
Number of cases of breaking into shops,
&c., in the Metropolitan districts for
1860 104
Ditto ditto in the City 20
---
124
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the Metropolitan districts £1,899 0
Ditto ditto in the City 461 10
---------
£2,360 10
We shall now treat of the _burglaries_ in the metropolis, commencing
with the lower, and proceeding to notice the higher burglars, termed
the “cracksmen.”
Burglaries in the working districts of the metropolis are effected in
various ways--by one man mounting the shoulders of another and getting
into a first-floor window, similar to acrobats, by climbing over walls
leading to the rear of premises, cutting or breaking a pane of glass,
and then unfastening the catch; or by pushing back the catch of the
window with a sharp instrument, or by cutting a panel of a door with
a sharp tool, such as an American “auger.” Frequently they force the
lock of the door with a jemmy. The lower class of burglars who have not
proper tools sometimes use a screw-driver instead of a jemmy. In the
forcing of the locks of drawers or boxes, in search of property, they
use a small chisel with a fine edge, and occasionally an old knife.
There are frequently three persons employed in these burglaries--two to
enter a house, and one to keep watch outside, to see that there is no
person passing likely to detect. This man is generally termed a “crow.”
Sometimes a woman, called a “canary,” carries the tools, and watches
outside.
These low burglars carry off a booty of such small value that they are
necessitated frequently to commit depredations. They steal male and
female wearing apparel, and small articles of plate or jewellery, such
as teaspoons or a watch.
They are from seventeen years of age and upwards, and reside in the
Borough, Whitechapel, St. Giles, Shoreditch, and other low localities.
There is another kind of burglary committed by persons concealing
themselves on the premises, which is often done in public-houses. The
parties enter before the house is closed, by concealing themselves
in the coal-cellar, skittle-ground, or other place where they are
unobserved by those in charge of the house. These burglaries are done
by low people, with whose previous mode of living the police are
generally not acquainted. Very frequently they steal cigars, money in
the till or on the shelves of the bar, left to give change to customers
in the morning. There is another mode of entering public-houses, by
the cellar flaps from the pavement in front of the house, or by going
through the fanlight, and stealing property as before described, and
returning the same way, sometimes letting themselves out by the front
door, which has often a spring lock.
These burglaries are generally done at midnight, or between 1 and 5
o’clock.
There is a higher class of burglaries committed at fashionable
residences over the metropolis, and at the mansions of the gentry and
nobility, many of them in the West-end districts.
The houses to be robbed are carefully watched for several weeks,
sometimes for months, before the burglary is attempted. The thieves
take great precautions in such cases. They glean information secretly
as to the inmates of the house; where they sleep, and where valuable
property is kept. Sometimes this is done by watching the lights over
the house for successive nights. These burglaries are often “put up” by
the persons who execute them. They frequently get some of their more
engaging companions to court one of the servant girls, give her small
presents, and gain her favour, with the ultimate object of gaining
access to the house and plundering it. At other times, though more
rarely, they endeavour to become acquainted with the male servants of
the house--the butler, valet, coachman, or groom. Sometimes they try to
learn from the servants through other parties becoming acquainted with
them, if they cannot succeed themselves. At other times they gather
information from tradesmen who are called to the house on jobbing work,
such as painters, plumbers, glaziers, bell-hangers, tinsmiths, and
others, some of whom live near the burglars in low neighbourhoods, or
are frequently to be seen in the evenings in their company. We can
point our finger at three of these base wretches. One of them lives in
Whitefriars, Fleet Street, another in Tottenham-court Road, and a third
in Newell Street, Wardour Street, Oxford Street. These three persons
get up many of the burglaries in the West-end and other parts of the
metropolis, where they have work to do, when they find a suitable
place. Some of them have put up burglaries for thirteen or fourteen
years, and none of them have been detected, though suspected by the
police. They never have a hand in the burglaries themselves, but secure
a part of the booty. These “putters up” are from thirty to thirty-five
years of age, and one of them has been convicted of a felony.
If the burglars cannot enter by the back of the premises, they go
to the first-floor window in front, where there are no shutters. It
matters not whether it be public or not; they will enter in a couple of
minutes the premises by cutting the glass and undoing the catch.
The dwelling-houses in the West-end have often been entered by the
first-floor window; and servants have many times been wrongfully
charged with these burglaries, and lost their places in consequence.
Burglars generally leave their haunts to plunder about twelve o’clock
at midnight, often driving up in a cab to a short distance from the
spot where the burglary is to be attempted; but they frequently do
not enter the house till one or two in the morning. In general, they
take some liquor, such as gin and brandy, to keep up their spirits, as
they call it. The one who is to watch outside generally takes up his
position first, and the others follow. This is arranged so that the
persons who enter--generally two, sometimes three--should not be seen
by the policeman or others near the house.
When the latter come up, and find their companion at his post, and see
the coast clear, they instantly proceed to enter the house, in front or
behind, by the door or windows. Expert burglars go separate, to avoid
suspicion.
On entering the house, they go about the work very cautiously and
quietly, taking off their shoes, some walking in their stockings, and
others with India-rubber overalls. If disturbed they very seldom leave
their shoes or boots behind them.
Their chief object is to get plate, jewellery, cash, and other
valuables. The drawing-room is usually on the first-floor in front;
sometimes the whole of the first-floor is a drawing-room. They often
find valuables in the drawing-room. They search parlour, kitchen, and
pantry, and even open the servant’s workbox for her small savings.
When they cannot get enough jewellery and plate they carry off wearing
apparel. They often take money in the drawing-room from writing-desks
and ladies work-boxes. Experienced burglars do not spare time and
trouble to look well for their plunder.
This is the general course adopted on entering a dwelling-house. In
entering a shop, if they can find sufficient money to satisfy them,
they do not carry off bulky property, but if there is no money in the
desk or tills they rifle the goods, if they are of value.
In West-end robberies there are often two good cracksmen, one to keep
watch outside, while another is busy at his work of plunder within.
The person outside has to be on the alert, as he has generally to keep
watch over an experienced officer, and to let his companions know when
it is safe for them to work or to come out.
When a catch is in the centre of the window it is opened with a knife.
If there should be one on each side they will cut a pane of glass in
less than fifteen seconds, and undo them. The burglars seldom think of
carrying a diamond with them, but generally cut the glass with a knife,
as the starglazers do.
The shutters behind the window frame are often cut with what the
burglars term a cutter. It cuts with two knives, with a centrebit
stock, and makes a hole sufficiently large to admit the burglar’s arm.
When the shutters are opened there are often iron bars to guard the
window. The burglars tie a piece of strong cord or rope about two of
the bars, and insert a piece of wood about a foot in length between
this rope, and twist the wood. The bar is thereby bent sufficient to
allow them to enter, or it gives way in the socket. These bars are
sometimes forced asunder by a small instrument called a jack, by which
a worm worked by a small handle displaces them. The rope and stick are
used when they have not a jack. The latter can be conveniently carried
in the trousers pocket.
Woodwork, such as shutters, doors, and partitions, is often cut in late
years with the cutter, instead of the jemmy, as the former is a more
effective tool, and makes an opening more expeditiously. With this
instrument a door or shutter can be pierced sufficiently large to
admit the arm in a few minutes.
A brick wall requires more time. If there are no persons within
hearing, an opening can be made sufficiently large for a man to pass
through, in an hour. If there are people near the apartment, it
requires to be more softly done, and frequently occupies two or three
hours, even when done by an expert burglar. They generally pierce one
brick with an auger, and displace it; after the first brick is out,
they work with a jemmy, and take the mortar out, then pierce a brick on
the other side of the wall.
Burglars cannot pick Chubb’s patent locks. The best way to secure
premises where no person sleeps is to have a good patent lock on the
outer door, with an iron bar outside fastened by a patent Chubb lock.
This acts with double safety. If they break it off on the outside, the
policeman easily detects it when he comes round on his beat, which he
is sure to do before they have got the other lock opened, and this
prevents them getting in that way. If they break in from the roof, or
from the back, by cutting round the lock of an inside door, they do
not get the outside door opened, and cannot get away any bulky goods.
By this means the warehouse is more safe than if it were fastened any
other way.
Common locks on doors are so easily picked by thieves that no warehouse
ought to be left fastened in this way, unless there is a watchman over
it.
Some cracksmen have what is called a petter-cutter, that is, a cutter
for iron safes; an instrument made similar to a centrebit, in which
drills are fixed. They fasten this into the keyhole by a screw with a
strong pressure outside. The turning part is so fixed that the drills
cut a piece out over the keyhole sufficiently large to get to the wards
of the lock. They then pull the bolt of the lock back and open the door.
Chubb’s locks on iron safes are now made drill proof, so that they
cannot be pierced.
Any person sleeping in a room, with valuable property in his
possession, ought to have a chain on the door, like a street-door
chain, as the common locks are so easily picked, and the masked thief,
with dark lantern, can creep into the room without being heard. The
rattling of the chain is sure to awaken the person sleeping.
Expert burglars are generally equipped with good tools. They have a
jemmy, a cutter, a dozen of betties, better known as picklocks, a jack
to remove iron bars, a dark lantern or a taper and some silent lights,
and a life-preserver, and sometimes have a cord or rope with them,
which can be easily converted into a rope ladder. A knife is often used
in place of a chisel for opening locks, drawers, or desks. They often
carry masks on their face, so that they might not be identified. The
dark lantern is very small, with oil and cotton wick, and sometimes
only shows a light about the size of a shilling, so that the reflection
is not seen on the street without. Burglars often use the jemmy in
place of picklocks. When they go out with their tools, they usually
carry them wrapped up with list, so that they can throw them away
without making a noise, should a policeman stop them, or attempt to
arrest them. These are easily carried in the coat pocket, as they are
not bulky. There are parties--sometimes old convicts--who lend tools
out on hire.
When discovered by the inmates they are generally disposed to make
their escape rather than to fight, and try to avoid violence unless
hotly pursued. If driven to extremity, they are ready to use the
life-preserver, jemmy, or other weapon.
Sometimes they carry a life-preserver of a peculiar style, consisting
of a small ball attached to a piece of gut, that fastens round the
wrist. With this instrument, easily carried in the palm of the hand,
they can strike the persons who oppose them senseless, and severely
injure them.
In going up and down stairs, they often creep up not in the centre but
the side of the stair, to avoid being heard, as it is apt to creak
beneath the footstep, and they generally take off their shoes to move
more stealthily along.
They often use the cutter to make an opening in the middle of the panel
sufficiently large to admit the arm, to undo locks or bolts they cannot
reach outside.
Sometimes when the key is inside, and the door locked, they open it
with a small pair of plyers; others use a long piece of wire, with a
hoop put through the keyhole to lay hold of the bowl of the key. When
the hook is fastened in it, they can as easily undo the lock as if they
turned the key from the inside. Some burglars prefer the wire, others
use the plyers. They generally prefer the cutter to the centre-bit in
removing any woodwork. It resembles the centre-bit, but takes a much
larger piece out, and does so more speedily. The cutter costs from
15_s._ to 1_l._ In the absence of a cutter, they sometimes work with a
couple of gimlets and a knife, but this requires more time and makes
more noise, though not sufficient to disturb the inmates of the house,
if used expertly.
At the back of the house they enter through the kitchen window on the
basement, or by the parlour window above it on the first floor, or by
the window of the staircase alongside of the latter.
If experienced burglars, they listen at the doors of the apartments,
and know by the breathing in general if the inmates are sound asleep.
They sometimes begin their operations by going up to the highest
floor, and work their way down, carrying off the plunder. After having
finished what they call their work, they await the signal from the
“watch” set outside. These signals are sometimes given by one or more
coughs; some give a whistle, or sing a certain song, or tap on the door
or shutter, or make a particular cry, understood between the parties.
Should the plunder be bulky, they will have a cart or a cab, or a
costermonger’s barrow, ready on a given signal to carry it away. They
in general wait for the time when the police are changed, if the
inmates are not getting up, sometimes coming out at the front door, but
oftener at the back.
A remarkable case of burglary was committed in a dwelling-house in
a fashionable square in the West-end about twelve months ago, and
was effected in this manner. One day a well-dressed young man passed
by an area and took special notice of the cook, who happened to be
looking out of the window. Another day the same young man in passing
by accosted this servant, and made an appointment to meet her on a
certain occasion to go out to walk. This correspondence lasted for a
short time, when the young man was invited to tea at the house, to
spend a social evening. He was accompanied by a “pal” of his, a young
Frenchman, who courted the housemaid, while the other made love to the
cook. During their visit to the house, the family being then absent,
one of the young men pretended to be very unwell, and thought a walk in
the garden at the back of the house would be beneficial to him, and was
accompanied there by one of the servant girls.
Meanwhile the housemaid and her friend had adjourned to one of the
upper rooms. It was proposed by the Frenchman that his lady-love should
partake of some gin or brandy as refreshment, to which she consented.
He went out for the purpose of purchasing it, while she went down
stairs to the kitchen. On his going out he left the front-door open, by
which one of his confederates, a third party, entered the house, and
passed upstairs, broke open several lockfasts, and stole the whole of
the plate.
The Frenchman, meanwhile, returned with the liquor, and went downstairs
to the kitchen, where he made merry with his fair lady and her
companions. When they were seated regaling themselves over this liquor
the door-bell rang. One of the girls went to the door and found no
person there. This was a signal agreed on between the thieves. One
of the young men still pretending to feel unwell proposed to go home
with his companion, promising to call on a future occasion, when they
would be able to spend a more comfortable evening than they had done on
account of his illness.
One of the servants, on going upstairs after their departure, found the
plate stolen. Information was given to the police, when these agreeable
young men and their unknown friend were found to belong to a gang of
most expert thieves. They were tried at Westminster Sessions for this
offence, and sentenced to three years’ penal servitude.
About eighteen months ago, two desperate burglars attempted to enter a
fashionable dwelling-house at Westbourne Park, Paddington, belonging
to a merchant in the City. One of them was a tall, raw-boned, muscular
man, of about twenty-five years of age, dressed in a blue frock coat,
dark cord trousers, black vest and beaver hat. The other was a man
of thirty years of age, short and stout, nearly similarly attired.
The first had the appearance of a blacksmith, with a determined
countenance; the other had a more pleasing aspect, yet resolute. They
were armed with a long chisel and heavy crowbar.
They got over several walls, and came up along the back to this
dwelling-house in the centre of these villas, situated on the edge of
the Great Western Railway. On reaching the garden they went direct to
the window of the dining-room on the ground-floor.
As there had been several burglaries committed in the neighbourhood of
those villas about this time, an experienced and able detective officer
was sent out to watch.
While the detective, a tall, powerful, resolute man, was sitting alone
in the dusk under a tree in an adjoining garden, and another criminal
officer was stationed a short distance off, at about two o’clock in the
morning the former officer heard the shutters crash in the windows of
an adjoining house nearly in front of where he stood. The burglars had
approached so softly he did not hear their footsteps, and was not aware
of their presence till then. On hearing this noise he drew close to
the house, and was seen by one of the thieves--the shortest one called
Jack. The detective officer immediately sprung his rattle, rushed on
this man and seized him. His companion on this ran from the end of the
house and struck the officer across the back with a heavy crowbar. By
a sudden movement of his body the latter partially avoided the force
of the blow. Had it struck him on the head it would have killed him on
the spot; and being a strong muscular man he knocked the shorter man
down with a heavy walking-stick he had in his hand, and at the same
time rushed on his taller companion, seized him by the throat, and
endeavoured to wrench the iron bar from his grasp.
The other burglar had meantime made his escape into an adjoining
garden, and was captured, after a desperate struggle, by the other
criminal officer, who had come up.
During the scuffle between the officers and burglars the proprietor of
the house, in a panic, threw up his bedroom window looking into the
garden at the back of the house, and, without giving any call, fired
off a pistol. He did this to alarm the neighbourhood, not being aware
that the officers were so near him, and supposing that the burglars
were in his house.
The other burglar was secured after a determined struggle, and both
were with difficulty conveyed to the Marylebone police station by five
strong officers. They were next day taken before the magistrates, and
charged with attempting to enter this house, and with assaulting the
officers in the execution of their duty. They were sentenced to three
months each in Clerkenwell prison, with hard labour for the former
offence, and with a similar punishment for the latter.
About two years ago a burglary was committed in Charles Street,
Gloucester Terrace, Paddington, opposite the Cleveland Arms, by two
men and a woman. One of the men was about forty-six years of age, an
old desperate burglar, who had been twice transported, and was then
on ticket-of-leave. Shortly before, he had been apprehended in St.
George’s burying-ground, at the rear of some houses in the Bayswater
road, with a screw-driver, jemmy, and dark lantern, when he was
sentenced to three months’ imprisonment as a rogue and vagabond.
He was a stout man, with very bushy whiskers, of a coarse appearance.
The other was a young man about nineteen, dressed as a mechanic, of
a cheerful countenance, with brown hair and moustache. The woman was
about twenty-three years of age, short and stout, with an engaging
appearance.
During the night, they had forced open an iron grating in front of a
house in Charles Street, Paddington, and had let themselves down into
the area. They bored three holes with a centre-bit in the door of the
house, then cut the panel, and put their arm through, and undoing
the fastening of the door, got into the kitchen. From this they went
up to a door leading to the staircase, which was locked. They cut
several holes with the centre-bit, and made an opening in this door in
like manner. They then went upstairs to the first-floor, and stole a
quantity of wearing apparel, and some jewellery, such as rings, studs,
&c., and also a watch.
The inmates were sleeping at the top of the house, and had not been
disturbed by these operations. The property rifled amounted to about
15_l._
One of the burglars left his hat behind him and a pair of old boots.
The detective officer sent after them knew the hat to belong to this
old-returned convict; went to Lisson Grove and arrested both the men,
who happened to be together, and found part of the wearing apparel upon
them. The remaining part of the property was traced as having been
pledged by the woman, who was also apprehended. They were committed for
trial for the burglary, and tried at the Old Bailey. The old man being
an inveterate offender was sentenced to fifteen years’ penal servitude;
the others, who had been previously convicted, to four years’; and the
girl to twelve months’ imprisonment.
In the month of October, 1850, a burglary was committed by three men
in the Regent’s Park, which attracted considerable attention. One of
them, named William Dyson, called the Galloway Doctor, was five feet
six inches high, pockpitted, with pale face and red whiskers, and
about thirty-two years of age; James Mahon, alias Holmsdale, five feet
ten inches high, was robust in form, and aged thirty-four years; John
Mitchell was five feet six inches high, stout made, with a pug nose,
and aged forty years. They entered the house of Mr. Alford, an American
merchant, in Regent’s Park, at two o’clock in the morning. They climbed
over a back wall into the garden, and got in through a back parlour
window by pushing back the catch with a knife. They then forced the
shutters open with a jemmy, got into the back-parlour where the butler
was lying asleep, and unlocked the door to go through the house, as
it was known that Mr. Alford was very wealthy. When they got on the
staircase one of their feet slipped, which awoke the butler, who jumped
up, and seized Dyson and Mahon, and wrestled with them, at the same
time alarming the other inmates of the house. He was knocked down by a
blow from a life-preserver, on which the burglars made their escape by
jumping out of the back-parlour window again. The butler, on getting
up, seized his fowling-piece, which lay loaded beside him, and told
them as they were running away to stop, or he would fire upon them. He
fired, and shot Mitchell in the back near the shoulder with goose shot,
as he was getting over a back wall to make his escape.
The police, on hearing the report of the gun, came up and secured
Holmsdale and Dyson in the garden, when they were taken to Marylebone
police office.
Soon after an anonymous letter was sent to the police-station of the M
division stating there was a man in Surrey Street, Blackfriars Road,
lying in bed in a certain house, who had been shot in the back when
attempting a burglary in Regent’s Park. He had on a woman’s nightcap
and nightgown, so that if any one went into the room they would fancy
him to be a female. Inspector Berry of the M division went to the above
house, and found Mitchell in bed in female disguise. He was taken into
custody, and made to dress in his own clothes. On examining them there
were holes in his fustian frock-coat where the shot had passed through.
He was taken to Marylebone police court and put alongside the other
two prisoners, and identified as having been seen in the neighbourhood
of the Regent’s Park on the morning before the burglary was committed.
He had been seen by the police to leave a notorious public-house
frequented by burglars, at the Old Mint in the Borough. They were
committed at the Central Criminal Court, tried on 25th November, 1850,
convicted, and sentenced to be transported for life. Holmsdale having
been previously transported for ten years, and Mitchell and Dyson also
having been formerly convicted.
We took the particulars of the following burglary from the lips of a
man who was a few years ago one of the most experienced and expert
burglars in the metropolis, and give it as an instance of the ingenuity
and daring of this class of London brigands:--
In the year 1850 a burglary was attempted to be committed at a
furrier’s at the corner of Regent Street near Oxford Street by
three cracksmen. One of them, Henry Edgar, was about five feet seven
inches high, of fair complexion, with large features, brown hair, and
gentlemanly appearance, dressed in elegant style, with jewellery,
rings, and chain, and frilled shirt. A second party, Edward Edgar
Blackwell, was the son of a respectable cutler in Soho, about five feet
two inches high, of fair complexion, teeth out in front, with sullen
look, also fashionably dressed, though inferior to the other. The third
person was slim made, about five feet six inches high, dark complexion,
with dark whiskers and genteel appearance, a gentle, but keen dark eye,
and elegantly dressed.
They went to a public-house between ten and eleven o’clock, when the
two former went back into a yard with the pretence of going to the
water-closet. The publican did not miss them. The house was closed at
twelve o’clock, and they were not discovered. The third party went
out to give them their signals at the time formerly arranged between
them. He did not give them any signal, but they, being impatient and
accustomed to the work, thought they would try it themselves. They
went up by a fire-escape, and got on to the parapet of the furrier’s
house, at the corner of Regent Street. Here they cut two panes of
glass in a garret window, with a knife, at the same time removing the
division between them. The servant going to bed in the dark, discovered
the two men. Giving no alarm, she went down stairs to her master. The
master came up, with two loaded pistols in his hand, presented them at
the garret-window, telling them if they attempted to escape he would
shoot them. Edward Edgar Blackwell was so frightened that he lost his
presence of mind, and fell from the parapet into the yard, a height
of three storeys, and was killed on the spot. Henry Edgar, being more
courageous, made a desperate leap to the top of a house in Regent
Street, and got through a trap-door, and made his way into a second
floor front in Argyle Street, where people were sleeping, and alarmed
them. To prevent their taking him, he leaped from a second floor
window. Some people, passing-by, saw him jump from the window, and gave
information to the police. He was, thereupon, arrested, and conveyed in
a cab, with the dead body of his “pal,” to Vine Street police station.
It was afterwards ascertained that his ankle was dislocated, and he
was removed to Middlesex Hospital, where he was watched eight hours
by successive policemen. His friends were allowed to see him, and
by ingenious means one of them contrived to effect his escape. They
conveyed him from the hospital in a cab to Green Street, Friars Street,
Blackfriars Road; then removed him in a cab to the Commercial Road
near Whitechapel. Soon after, his companions took a house for him in
Corbett’s Place, Spitalfields, when he was given into the hands of
the police by a brother of one of his “pals,” who went to Vine Street
station, and lodged information. He was arrested before he could lay
his hand on his pistols, committed for trial, and sentenced to penal
servitude.
We give the following as an illustration of the ingenuity and
perseverance of the cracksmen of the metropolis--
A burglary was committed some years since, at a warehouse in the City,
where the premises were securely fastened in front, and the servants
were let out by a strong door at the back, secured by three strong
locks. There was no one sleeping on the premises. The burglars had
first to make keys to get through the outer door into the premises, and
had then to get a key to a patent lock for an iron door into a private
counting-house. They made another key for a very strong safe which,
when opened, had a recess at the bottom enclosed with folding doors
also secured by a patent lock. Before they got to the booty they had to
make six keys of patent locks.
Not satisfied with this, they made a key for the patent lock of another
iron door, leading to another portion of the premises where there was a
second iron safe.
They were occupied four months getting the whole of these keys to fit,
and had to watch favourable opportunities when the police were absent
from that portion of their beat.
The thieves, during the night, carried off two iron boxes containing
railway-shares, bills, and similar property to the extent of
13,000_l._, besides other valuable articles.
Through the ingenuity of certain police-officers employed to trace the
robbery, the whole of the scrip and documents were recovered while
certain unprincipled Jews were negotiating to purchase them.
Some burglars, after they have secured valuable booty, do not attempt
another burglary for a time. Others go out the very next night, and
commit other depredations, as they are avaricious for money. Some of
them lose it by keeping it loosely in the house, or placing it in the
bank, when the women they cohabit with reap the benefit. These females
often try to induce them to save money and place it in their name in
the bank, so that if their paramour gets apprehended, they have the
pleasure of spending his ill-gotten wealth.
Some cracksmen succeed occasionally in rifling large quantities of
valuable property or money. In such instances they live luxuriously,
and spend large sums on pleasure, women, wine, and gambling. Some
of them keep their females in splendid style, and live in furnished
apartments in quiet respectable streets. Others are afraid to keep
women, as the latter are frequently the cause of their being brought to
justice.
There are some old burglars at present, keeping cabs, omnibuses, and
public houses, whose wealth has been secured chiefly from plunder
they have rifled from premises with their own hands, or received from
burglars since they have abandoned their midnight work. They had the
self-command to abandon their criminal courses after a time, while the
most of the others have been more shortsighted. Some of these persons,
though abounding in wealth, receive stolen goods, and are ready to open
their houses at any hour of the night.
There are great numbers of expert cracksmen known to the police in
different parts of the metropolis. Many of these reside on the Surrey
side, about Waterloo Road and Kent Road, in the Borough, Hackney
and Kingsland Roads, and other localities. Some of them have a fine
appearance, and are fashionably dressed, and would not be known, except
by persons personally acquainted with them.
A number of most expert cracksmen belonging to the felon class of
Irish cockneys, have learned no trade, and have no fixed occupation.
Others come to their ranks who have been carpenters and smiths,
brass-finishers, shoemakers, mechanics, and even tailors. Sometimes
fast young men have taken to this desperate mode of life. Some
pickpockets, daring in disposition, or driven to extremity have become
burglars. In a short time they learn to use their tools with great
expertness; great numbers have been trained by a few leading burglars;
some are as young as sixteen or seventeen years; others as old as forty
or forty-five--incorrigible old convicts.
Tools are secretly made for them in London, Sheffield, Manchester,
Birmingham, and other places. Some burglars keep a set of fine tools of
considerable value. Others have indifferent instruments, and are not so
expert.
They find very convenient agents in some of the cab-drivers of the
metropolis, who for a piece of money are very ready to assist in
conveying them at night to the neighbourhood of the houses where they
perpetrate their burglaries, and in carrying off the stolen property,
and some of the employers of these cab-drivers are as willing to
receive it at an underprice.
They have no difficulty in finding unprincipled people to open their
houses to receive the stolen property temporarily or otherwise. There
are many houses of well-known receivers; then there are hundreds of low
public-houses, beer-shops, coffee-shops, brothels, and other places
of bad character, where they can leave it for a few hours, or for
days, placing one of their gang in the house for a time, until they
have arranged with the receivers to purchase it. There are certain
well-known beer-shops and public-houses where the burglars meet
with the receivers. They meet them in beer-shops in the purlieus of
Whitechapel, and in the quieter public-houses and splendid gin-palaces
of the West-end.
There are a number of French burglars in London, who are as ingenious,
daring, and expert as the English. There are also some Germans and a
few Italians, but who are not considered so clever.
Few of the cracksmen in the metropolis are married--though some are.
They often live with prostitutes, or with servants, and other females
they have seduced. Some have children whom they send to school, but
many of them have none. They frequently train up some of their boys to
enter the fanlights or windows, and to assist them in their midnight
villanies.
While most of the burglars are city-trained, a number come from
Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, Sheffield, and Bristol. These
occasionally work with the London thieves, and the London thieves go
occasionally to the provinces to work with them. This is done in the
event of their being well known to the police.
For example, a gang of Liverpool thieves might know a house there
where valuable property could be conveniently reached. Their being in
the neighbourhood might excite suspicion. Under these circumstances
they sometimes send to thieves they are acquainted with in London,
who proceed thither and plunder the house. Sometimes, in similar
circumstances, the London burglars get persons from the provinces to
commit robberies in the metropolis--both parties sharing in the booty.
In a place where they are not known, they do it themselves.
[Illustration: CELL, WITH PRISONER AT “CRANK-LABOUR,” IN THE SURREY
HOUSE OF CORRECTION.]
The burglars in our day are not in general such desperate men as those
in former times. They are better known to the police than formerly,
and are kept under more strict surveillance. Many of the cracksmen have
been repeatedly subjected to prison discipline, and have their spirits
in a great measure subdued. The crime of our country is not so bold
and open as in the days of the redoubtable men whose dark deeds are
recorded in the Newgate Calendar. It has assumed more subtle forms,
instead of bold swagger and defiance--and has more of the secret,
restless, and deceitful character of our great arch-enemy.
Number of burglaries in the Metropolitan
districts for 1860 192
Ditto ditto in the City 12
---
204
Value of property abstracted in the Metropolitan
districts £2,852
Ditto ditto in the City 332
------
£3,184
NARRATIVE OF A BURGLAR.
The following narrative was given us by an expert burglar and returned
convict we met one evening in the West-end of the metropolis. For a
considerable number of years he had been engaged in a long series of
burglaries connected with several gangs of thieves, and had been so
singularly cunning and adroit in his movements he had never been caught
in the act of plunder; but was at last betrayed into the hands of the
police by one of his confederates, who had quarrelled with him while
indulging rather freely in liquor. He was often employed as a putter up
of burglaries in various parts of the metropolis, and was generally an
outsider on the watch while some of his pals were rifling the house.
We visited him at his house in one of the gloomiest lanes in a very
low neighbourhood, inhabited chiefly by thieves and prostitutes, and
took down from his lips the following recital. In the first part of his
autobiography he was very frank and candid, but as he proceeded became
more slow and calculating in his disclosures. We hinted to him he was
“timid.” “No,” he replied, “I am not timid, but I am cautious, which
you need not be surprised at.” He was then seated by the fire beside
his paramour, a very clever woman, whose history is perhaps as wild and
romantic as his own. He is a slim-made man, beneath the middle size,
with a keen dark intelligent eye, and about thirty-six years of age.
He is good-looking, and very smart in his movements, and was in the
attire of a well-dressed mechanic.
“I was born in the city of London in the year 1825. My father was
foreman to a coach and harness-maker in Oxford Street. My mother,
before her marriage, was a milliner. They had eleven children, and
I was the youngest but two. I had six brothers and four sisters. My
father had a good salary coming in to support his family, and we lived
in comfort and respectability up to his death. He died when I was only
about eight years old. My mother was left with eleven children, with
very scanty means. Having to support so large a family she soon after
became reduced in circumstances. My eldest brother was subject to fits,
and died at the age of twenty-four years. He occupied my father’s place
while he lived. My second brother went to work at the same shop, but
got into idle and dissipated habits, and was thrown out of employment.
He afterwards got a situation in a lacemaker’s shop, and had to leave
for misconduct. He then went to a druggist’s, and had to leave for the
same cause. After this he got a situation as potman to a public-house,
which completed his ruin. He took every opportunity to lead his younger
brothers astray instead of setting us a good example.
“My brother next to him in age did not follow his bad courses, but
I was not so fortunate. I went to school at Mr. Low’s, Harp Alley,
Farringdon Street, but I did not stay there long. At nine years of
age I was sent out to work, to help to support myself. I went to work
at cotton-winding, and only got 3_s._ a week. I sometimes worked all
night, and had 9_d._ for it, in addition to my 3_s._, and often gained
3_s._ a week besides the six days’ wages. I was very happy then to
think I could earn so much money, being so young. At this time I was
only nine years of age. My brother tried to tempt me to pilfer from
my master, but he failed then. I afterwards got a better situation at
a trunkmaker’s in the City. There my mistress and young master took
a liking to me. I was earning 7_s._ a week, and was only ten years
of age. At this time my brother succeeded in tempting me to rob my
employers after I had been two months in their service. I carried off
wearing apparel and silver plate to the value of several pounds, which
my brother disposed of, while he only gave me a few halfpence. I was
suspected to be the thief, and was discharged in consequence. I got
another situation in a bookbinder’s shop, and was not eleven years old
then. My brother did not succeed for two or three months to get me to
plunder my master, although he often tried to prevail on me to do so.
My master had no plate to lose.
“I used to take out boards of books; one night my brother met me
coming from the binder’s with a truck loaded with books, stopt me, and
pretended to be very kind by giving me money to go and buy a pie at a
pie-shop. When I came out I found the books were gone and the truck
empty. My brother was standing at the door waiting me, but he had
companions who meantime emptied the truck of the whole of the contents.
I told him he must know who had taken them, but he told me he did not.
He desired me to say to my master that a strange man had sent me to get
a pie for him and one for myself, and when I came back the books and
the man had both disappeared. He told me if I did not say this I would
get myself into trouble and him too. I went and told my master the tale
my brother had told me. He sent for a policeman, and tried to frighten
me to tell the truth. I would not alter from what I had told him,
though he tried very hard to get me to do so. He kept me till Saturday
night and discharged me, but endeavoured in the meanwhile to get me to
unfold the truth, so I was thrown out of employment again.
“I then went to work at the blacking trade, and had a kinder master
than ever. My wages were 7_s._ a week. I then made up my mind that
my brother should not tempt me to steal another time. I was in this
situation a year and nine months before my brother succeeded in
inducing me to commit another robbery. My master was very kind and
generous to me, increased my wages from 7_s._ to 16_s._ a week as I was
becoming of more service to him.
“We made the blacking with sugar-candy and other ingredients. I was the
only lad introduced into the apartment where the blacking was made and
the sugar-candy was kept. My brother tempted me to bring him a small
quantity of sugar-candy at first. I did so, and he threatened to let
my mother know if I did not fetch more. At first I took home 7lbs. of
candy, and at last would carry off a larger quantity. I used to get a
trifle of money from my brother for this. Being strongly attached to
him, up to this time he had great influence over me.
“One day, after bringing him a quantity of sugar-candy, I watched him
to see where he sold it. He went into a shop in the City where the
person retailed sweets. After he came out of the shop I went in and
asked the man in the shop if he would buy some from me, as I was the
brother of the young man who had just called in, and had got him the
sugar-candy. He told me he would buy as much as I liked to bring.
“I used to bring large quantities to him, generally in the evening,
and carried it in a bag. The sugar-candy I should have mixed in the
blacking I laid aside till I had an opportunity of carrying it to the
receiver. My master continued to be very fond of me, and had strong
confidence in me until I got a young lad into the shop beside me, who
knew what I had been doing, and informed him of my conduct. He wanted
to get me discharged, as he thought he would get my situation, which he
did. He told my master I was plundering him; but my master would not
believe him until he pointed out a low coffee-house where I used to go,
which was frequented by bad characters. My master came into this den
of infamy one evening when I was there, and persuaded me to come away
with him, which I did. He told me he would forget all I was guilty of,
if I would keep better company and behave myself properly in future. I
conducted myself better for about a week, but I had got inveigled into
bad company through my brother. These lads waited about my employer’s
premises for me at meal-times and at night. At last they prevailed on
me again to go to the same coffee-house. The young lad I had got into
the shop beside me soon found means to acquaint my master. He came to
see me in the coffee-house again; but I had been prevailed on to drink
that evening, and was the worse of intoxicating liquor, although I was
not fourteen years of age. My master tried all manner of kind means to
persuade me to leave that house, but I would not do so, and insulted
him for his kindness.
“On the following morning he paid a visit to my mother’s house while I
was at breakfast. My mother and he tried to persuade me to go back and
finish my week’s work, but I was too proud, and would not go back. He
then paid my mother my fortnight’s wages, and said if I would attend
church twice each week he would again take me back into his service. I
never attended any church at all, for I had then got into bad habits,
and cared no more about work.
“I lived at home with my mother for a short time, and she was very kind
to me, and gave me great indulgence. She wished me to remain at home
with her to assist in her business as a greengrocer, and used to allow
me from 1_s._ to 1_s._ 3_d._ of pocket-money a day. My old companions
still followed me about, and prevailed on me to go to the Victoria
Theatre. On one of these occasions I was much struck with the play of
Oliver Twist. I also saw Jack Sheppard performed there, and was much
impressed with it.
“Soon after this I left my mother’s house, and took lodgings at the
coffee-house, where my master found me, and engaged in an open criminal
career. About this time ladies generally carried reticules on their
arm. My companions were in the habit of following them and cutting the
strings, and carrying them off. They sometimes contained a purse with
money and other property. I occasionally engaged in these robberies for
about three months. Sometimes I succeeded in getting a considerable sum
of money; at other times only a few shillings.
“I was afterwards prevailed on to join another gang of thieves, expert
shoplifters. They generally confined themselves to the stationers’
shops, and carried off silver pencil-cases, silver and gold mounted
scent-bottles, and other articles, and I was engaged for a month at
this.
“Being well-dressed, I would go into a shop and price an article of
jewellery, or such like valuable, and after getting it in my hand would
dart out of the shop with it. I carried on this system occasionally,
and was never apprehended, and became very venturesome in robbery.
“I was then about sixteen years of age. A young man came from sea of
the name of Philip Scott, who had in former years been a playmate of
mine. He requested me to go to one of the theatres with him, when Jack
Sheppard was again performed. We were both remarkably pleased with the
play, and soon after determined to try our hand at housebreaking.
“He knew of a place in the City where some plate could be got at. We
went out one night with a screw-driver and a knife to plunder it.
I assisted him in getting over a wall at the back of the house. He
entered from a back-window by pushing the catch back with a knife.
He had not been in above three quarters of an hour when he handed me
a silver pot and cream-jug from the wall. I conveyed these to the
coffee-shop in which we lodged, when we afterwards disposed of them.
The young man was well acquainted with this house, as his father was
often employed jobbing about it.
“After this I cohabited with a female, but my ‘pal’ did not, although
we lived in the same house.
“Soon after we committed another burglary in the south-side of the
metropolis, by entering the kitchen window of a private house at the
back. I watched while my comrade entered the house. He cut a pane of
glass out, and drew the catch back. After gathering what plate he could
find lying about, he went up-stairs and got some more plate. We sold
this to a receiver in Clerkenwell for about 9_l._ 18_s._ From this
house we also carried off some wearing apparel. Each of us took three
shirts, two coats and an umbrella.
“Some time after this we made up our minds to try another burglary in
the city. We secreted ourselves in a brewer’s yard beside the house we
intended to plunder, about eight o’clock in the evening, before it was
shut up. We cut a panel out of a shutter in the dining-room window on
the first floor, but were disturbed when attempting this robbery. I ran
off and got away. My companion was not so fortunate; he was captured,
and got several months’ imprisonment.
“A week after I joined two other burglars. We resolved to attempt a
burglary in a certain shop in the East-end of the metropolis. There
happened to be a dog in the shop. As usual I kept watch outside,
while the other two entered from the first-floor window, which had no
shutters. So soon as they got in the dog barked. They cut the dog’s
throat with a knife, and began to plunder the shop of pencil cases,
scent-bottles, postage-stamps, &c., and went up-stairs, and carried
off pieces of plate. The inmates of the house slept in the upper part
of the house. The property when brought to the receiver sold for about
42_l._
“Another burglary was committed by us at a haberdasher’s shop in the
West-end. While I kept watch, the other two climbed to the top of a
warehouse at the back of the shop, wrenched open the window on the
roof, and having tied a rope to an iron bar, they lowered themselves
down, broke open the desks and till, and got a considerable sum
of money, nearly all in silver. They then went to the first-floor
drawing-room window over the shop, and entered. The door of this room
being locked, they cut out a panel, put their arm through and forced
back the lock. They found only a small quantity of plate along with
a handsome gold watch and chain. The few articles of plate sold for
38_s._, and the watch and chain for 7_l._ 15_s._
“The thieves entered about one o’clock at midnight, and went out about
a quarter past five in the morning.
“These are the only jobs I did with these two men, until my comrade
came out of prison, when we commenced again. We committed burglaries
in different parts of London, at silk-mercers, stationers’ shops, and
dwelling-houses--some of considerable value; in others the booty was
small.
“In these burglaries numbers of other parties were engaged with
us--some of them belonging to the Borough, others to St. Giles’s,
Golden Lane, St. Luke’s, and other localities.
“In 1850 I took a part in a burglary in a shop in the south-side of
the metropolis along with two other parties. One went inside, and the
others were on the watch without. We got access to the shop by the
back-yard of a neighbouring public-house, which is usually effected
in this way. One person goes to the bar, and gets into conversation
with the barmaid, while one or more of their ‘pals’ takes a favourable
opportunity of slipping back into the yard or court behind the house.
This is often done about a quarter of an hour, or half an hour, before
the house is shut up. The party who kept the barmaid in conversation,
would go to the back of the house, and assist the other burglar who
was to enter the house in getting over the wall. So soon as this is
effected, his other ‘pal’ comes out again. If the wall can be easily
climbed, the party who enters lurks concealed in the water-closet, or
some of the outhouses, till the time of effecting the burglary.
“The house intended to be entered is sometimes five or six houses away
from this public-house, and sometimes the next house to it.
“When all is ready, the outside man gives the signal. The signal given
from the front, such as a cough or otherwise, can be heard by his
confederate behind the house. On hearing it the latter begins his work.
In this instance the burglar entered the premises by cutting open the
shutters of a window in the first floor to the back. He then cut a
pane of glass, and removed the catch, and went down stairs into the
shop, and took from a desk about 60_l._ in money, with several valuable
snuff-boxes and other articles. He had to wait till the morning before
he could get out. The police seemed to have a suspicion that all was
not right, but he got out of the shop about the time when the police
were changed.
“I was connected with another burglary, committed in the same year
in the West-end in a linendraper’s shop. It was entered from a
public-house in the same manner as in the one described. The same
person was engaged inside, while the others were stationed outside.
The signal to begin work was given about one o’clock. He had first
to remove an iron bar at the first floor landing window to the back,
which he did with his jack. (The bars had been seen in the day-time,
and we brought this instrument to remove them.) He removed the bar in
ten minutes, cut a pane of glass, and removed the two catches. By this
means he effected an entry into the house, and to his surprise found
the drawing-room was left unlocked. He proceeded there, and got nearly
a whole service of plate. After he had gathered the plate up, he made
his way toward the shop, cutting through the door which intercepted
him. He went to the desk and found 72_l._ in silver money, and 12_l._
in gold. He also packed up half a dozen of new shirts and half a dozen
of silk handkerchiefs.
“He was ready to come out of the house, but a coffee-stall being
opposite, and the policeman taking his coffee there, the outside man
could not give him the signal for some time. To the great surprise of
the burglar in the shop, he heard the servant coming down stairs, when
he opened the door, and rushed suddenly out, while the policeman was on
the kerb near by. He bade the policeman good morning as he passed along
with two large bundles in his hands.
“He had not gone fifty yards round the corner of the street, before the
servant appeared at the door and asked the policeman as to the person
who had just come out. Along with other two constables he gave chase to
the burglar, but, being an active, athletic man, he effected his escape.
“I was engaged with two others in another burglary in the West-end
soon afterwards. Three persons were engaged in it: one to enter, and
other two ‘pals’ to keep watch. We got access to the house by a mews,
and got on the top of a wall, when I gave the end of a rope to my
companion to hold by while he slid down on the other side. The house
was entered at the kitchen window by removing two narrow bars with the
jack, and sliding back the catch. There was no booty to be found in
the kitchen. On going up-stairs our ‘pal’ got several pieces of plate,
and other articles. On coming down into the shop, he got a quantity of
receipt-stamps with a few postage-stamps.
“The putter up of this robbery was a connection of the people of the
house.
“I was connected with another burglary in the south-side of the
metropolis. A man who frequented a public-house there put up a burglary
in a stationer’s shop. Two persons were engaged in it, and got access
to the premises to be plundered from the public-house. He then climbed
several walls, and got access to the shop by a fanlight from behind.
Here we found a large sum of money in gold and silver, which had been
deposited in a bureau, some plate, and other articles. His ‘pal’ went
to him at half past three, and gave him the signal. He came out soon
after, and had only gone a short distance off when he heard a call for
the police, and the rattle of the policeman was sprung.
“After a desperate struggle with two constables, he was arrested and
taken to the station, with the stolen property in his possession.
He was tried and found guilty of committing the burglary, and for
assaulting the constables by cutting and wounding them, and was
sentenced to fourteen years’ transportation, having been four times
previously convicted.
“I have been engaged in many depredations from 1840 to 1851, many of
which were ‘put up’ by myself.
“In the year 1851 I was transported several years for burglary. I
returned home on a ticket of leave in 1854, and was sent back in the
following year for harbouring an escaped convict. I returned home in
1858, at the expiry of my sentence, and since that time have abandoned
my former criminal life.”
NARRATIVE OF ANOTHER BURGLAR.
One evening as we had occasion to be in a narrow dark by-street in
St. Giles’s, we were accosted by a burglar--a returned convict whom
we had met on a former occasion in the course of our rambles. We had
repeatedly heard of this person as one of the most daring thieves in
the metropolis, and were on the look-out for him at the very time
when he fortunately crossed our path. He is a fair-complexioned man,
of thirty-two years of age, about 5 feet 2 inches in height, slim
made, with a keen grey eye. He was dressed in dark trousers, brown
vest, and a grey frock coat buttoned up to the chin, and a cap drawn
over his eyes. We hesitated at first as to whether this little man
was capable of executing such venturesome feats; when he led us along
the dark street to an adjoining back-court, took off his shoes and
stockings, and ran up a waterspout to the top of a lofty house, and
slid down again with surprising agility. Before we parted that evening,
he was recommended to us by another burglar, a returned convict, and
by another most intelligent young man, whom we are sorry to say has
been a convicted criminal. He afterwards paid us a visit, when we were
furnished with the following recital:--
“I was born in the parish of St. Giles’s in the Fields, in the year
1828. My father was a soldier in the British service; after his
discharge he lived for some time in the neighbourhood of St. Giles’s.
He was an Irishman from the county of Limerick. My mother belonged
to Cork. My eldest sister was married to a plasterer in London; my
second sister has been sentenced to four years, and another sister to
five years’ transportation, both for stealing watches on different
occasions. I have another sister, who lately came out of prison after
eighteen months’ imprisonment, and is now living an honest life.
“I was never sent by my parents to school, but have learned to read
a little by my own exertions; I have no knowledge of writing and
arithmetic. I was sent out to get my living at ten years of age by
selling oranges in the streets in a basket, and was very soon led into
bad company. I sometimes played at pitch and toss, which trained me to
gamble, and I often lost my money by this means.
“I often remained out all night, and slept in the dark arches of
the Adelphi on straw along with some other boys--one of them was a
pickpocket who learned me to steal. It was not long before I was
apprehended and committed at the Middlesex Assizes, and received six
months’ imprisonment.
“At this time I learned to swim, and was remarkably expert at it:
when the tide was out I often used to swim across the Thames for
sport. I continued to pick pockets occasionally for two years,
and was at one time remanded for a week on a criminal charge and
afterwards discharged. I used to take ladies’ purses by myself, and
stole handkerchiefs, snuff-boxes, and pocketbooks from the tails of
gentlemen’s coats.
“I left my home on the expiry of my six months’ imprisonment for
stealing a pocketbook. My parents would gladly have taken me back, but
I would not go. At this time I associated with a number of juvenile
thieves. I had a good suit of clothes, which had been purchased before
I went to prison, and having a respectable appearance I took to
shop-lifting. I worked at this about seven months, when I was arrested
for stealing a coat at a shop in the Borough Road, and was sentenced to
three months in Brixton Prison.
“When I got out of prison I went to St. Giles’s and cohabited with a
prostitute. I was then about seventeen years of age. She was a fair
girl, about five feet three inches in height, inclined to be stout,--a
very handsome girl, about seventeen years of age. Her people lived
in Tottenham Court Road, and were very respectable. She had been led
astray before I met her, through the bad influence of another girl,
and was a common prostitute. She was very kind-hearted. She was not
long with me when I engaged with other two persons in a housebreaking
in the West-end of the metropolis. On the basement of the house we
intended to plunder was a counting-house, while the upper floors were
occupied by the family as a dwelling-house. Our chief object was to get
to the counting-house, which could be entered from the back. Our mode
of entering was this.--At one o’clock in the morning, one of the party
was set to watch in the street, to give us the signal when no one was
near--a young man was on the watch, while I and another climbed up by a
waterspout to the roof of the counting-house. There was no other way of
getting in but by cutting the lead off the house and making an opening
sufficient for us to pass through.
“The signal was given to enter the house, but at this time the
policeman saw our shadow on the roof and sprung his rattle. The party
who was keeping watch and my ‘pal’ on the roof both got away, but I
hurt myself in getting down from the house-top to the street. I was
apprehended and lodged in prison, and was tried at Middlesex Assizes
and sentenced to nine months’ imprisonment.
“So soon as the time was expired, I met with another gang of burglars,
more expert than the former. At this time I lived at Shoreditch, in
the East-end of the metropolis. Four of us were associated together,
averaging from twenty-two to twenty-three years of age. We engaged
in a burglary in the City. It was hard to do. I was one of those
selected to enter the shop; we had to climb over several walls before
we reached the premises we intended to plunder. We cut through a panel
of the back door. On finding my way into the shop I opened the door to
my companions. We packed up some silks and other goods, and remained
there very comfortable till the change of the policeman in the morning,
when a cart was drawn up to the door, and the outside man gave us
the signal. We drew the bolts and brought out the bags containing the
booty, put them into the cart, and closed the door after us. We drove
off to our lodgings, and sent for a person to purchase the goods. We
got a considerable sum by this burglary, which was divided among us.
I was then about twenty-two years of age. Our money was soon expended
in going to theatres and in gambling, and besides we lived very
expensively on the best viands, with wines and other liquors.
“We perpetrated another burglary in the West-end. Three of us were
engaged in it; one was stationed to watch, while I and another pal had
to go in. We entered an empty house by skeleton-keys, and got into the
next house; we lifted the trap off and got under the roof, and found
an under-trap was fastened inside. We knew we could do nothing without
the assistance of an umbrella. My comrade went down to our pal on the
watch, and told him to buy an umbrella from some passer-by, the night
being damp and rainy. We purchased one from a man in the vicinity for
2_s._; my comrade brought it up to me under the roof. Having cut away
several lathes, I made an opening with my knife in the plaster, and
inserted the closed umbrella through it, and opened it with a jerk,
to contain the falling wood and plaster. I broke some of the lathes
off, and tore away some of the mortar, which fell in the umbrella.
We effected an entry into the house from the roof. On going over the
apartments we did not find what we expected; after all our trouble we
only got 35_l._, some trinkets, and one piece of plate.
“Burglars become more expert at their work by experience. Many of them
are connected with some of the first mechanics in the metropolis.
Wherever a patent lock can be found they frequently get a key to fit
it. In this way even Chubbs and Bramahs can be opened, as burglars
endeavour to get keys of this description of locks. They sometimes give
5_l._ for the impression of a single key, and make one of the same
description, which serves for the same size of such locks on other
occasions. An experienced burglar thereby has more facilities to open
locks--even those which are patented.
“I was connected with two pals in another burglary in a dwelling-house
at the West-end. It was arranged that I should enter the house. I was
lifted to the top of a wall about sixteen feet high, at the back of
the premises, and had to come down by the ivy which grew on the garden
wall; I had to get across another wall. The ivy was very thick, so
that I had to cut part of it away to allow me to get over. I entered
the house by the window without difficulty, having removed the catch in
the middle with my knife. On a dressing-table in one of the bedrooms I
found a gold watch, ring and chain, with 3_l._ 15_s._ in money, and a
brace of double-barrelled pistols, which I secured. In the drawing-room
I found some desert-spoons, a punch-ladle, and other pieces of silver
plate--I looked to them to see they had the proper mark of silver; I
found them to be silver, and folded them up carefully and put them
into my pocket. On looking into some concealed drawers in a cabinet I
found a will and other papers, which I knew were of no use to me; I put
them back in their place and did not destroy any of them. I also found
several articles of jewellery, and a few Irish one-pound notes. I put
them all carefully in my pocket and came to the front-door. The signal
was given that the cab was ready; I went out, drew the door close after
me, and went away with the booty.
“I entered about half-past eleven o’clock at night, and came out
at half-past two o’clock. I saw a servant-girl sleeping in the
back-kitchen, and two young ladies in a back-parlour. I did not go up
to the top-floors, but heard them snoring. They awoke and spoke two or
three times, which made me be careful.
“I went along the passage very softly, in case I should have awakened
the two young ladies in the back parlour as well as the servant in the
kitchen. All was so quiet that the least sound in the world would have
disturbed them.
“I opened the door gently, and came out when the signal was given by my
comrades. It was a cold, wet morning, which was favourable to us, as
no one was about the street to see us, and the policeman was possibly,
as on similar occasions, standing in some corner smoking his pipe. I
jumped into the cab along with my two pals, and went to Westminster.
The booty amounted to a considerable sum, which was divided among us.
We spent the next three or four weeks very merrily along with our
girls. On this occasion we gave the cabman two sovereigns for his
trouble, whether the burglary came off or not, and plenty of drink.
“A short time after, a person came up to me with whom I had associated,
and played cards over some liquor in the West-end. He was a young man
out of employment. He thus accosted me, ‘Jim, how are you getting on?’
I answered, ‘Pretty well.’ He asked me if I had any job on hand. I
said I had not. I inquired if he had anything for me to do. He said
he would give me a turn at the house of an old mistress of his. He
told me the dressing-case with jewels lay in a back room on a table,
but cautioned me to be very careful the butler did not see me, as he
was often going up and down stairs. Two of us resolved to plunder the
house. My companion was on the outside to watch, while I had to enter
the house.
“I got in with a skeleton key while they were at supper, and got up
the stairs without any one observing me. On going to the back room
I was disturbed by a young lady coming up stairs. I ran up to the
second floor above to hide myself, and found a bed in the apartment.
I concealed myself underneath the bed, when the lady and her servant
came into the room with a light. They closed the door and pulled the
curtains down, when the lady began to undress in presence of the
servant. The servant began to wash her face and neck. The lady was a
beautiful young creature. While lying under the bed I distinctly saw
the maid put perfume on the lady’s under linen. She then began to dress
and decorate herself, and told the servant she was going out to her
supper. She said she would not be home till two or three o’clock in
the morning, and did not wish the servant to remain up for her, but to
leave the lamp burning. As soon as she and the waiting-maid had left
the room, I got out of my hiding-place, and on looking around saw but
a small booty, consisting of a small locket and gold chain; a gold
pencil-case, and silver thimble. As I was returning down stairs with
them in my pocket to get to the first floor back, I got possession of a
case of jewels, which I thought of great value. I returned to the hall,
and came out about twelve o’clock without any signal from my comrade.
“On taking the jewels to a person who received such plunder, he told
us they were of small value, and were not brilliants and emeralds as
we fancied. They were set in pure gold of the best quality, and only
brought us 22_l._
“To look at them we fancied they would have been worth a much higher
sum, and were sadly disappointed.
“Soon after we resolved on another burglary in the West-end. One kept
watch without while two of us entered the house by a grating underneath
the shop window, and descended into the kitchen by a rope. We got a
signal to work. The first thing we did was to lift up the kitchen
window. When we got in we pulled the kitchen window down, drew down the
blind, and lighted our taper. We looked round and saw nothing worth
removing. We went to the staircase to get into the shop. As we were
wrenching open a chest of drawers, a big cat which happened to be in
the room was afraid of us. We got pieces of meat out of the safe and
threw them to the cat. The animal was so excited that it jumped up on
the mantelpiece, and broke a number of ornaments. This disturbed an
old gentleman in the first-floor front. He called out to his servant,
‘John, there is somebody in the house.’ We had no means of getting the
door open, and had to go out by the window. The old gentleman came
down stairs in his nightgown with a brace of pistols, just as we were
going out of the window. He fired, but missed us. I jumped so hastily
that I hurt my bowels, and was conveyed by my companions in a cab to
Westminster, and lay there for six weeks in an enfeebled condition. My
money was spent, and as my young woman could not get any, my companions
said you had better have a meeting of our “pals.” A friendly meeting
was held, and they collected about 8_l._ to assist me.
“When I recovered, to my great loss, my companion was taken on account
of a job he had been attempting in Regent’s Park. He was committed to
the Old Bailey, tried, and transported for life. He was a good pal of
mine, and for a time I supported his wife and children. On another
occasion, I and another comrade met a potman at the West-end. He asked
us for something to drink, as he said he was out of work. We did so,
and also gave him something to eat. We entered into conversation with
him. He told us about a house he lately served in, and said there could
be a couple of hundreds got there or more before the brewer’s bill was
paid. We found out when the brewer’s bill was to be paid. We asked the
man where this money was kept. He told us that we would find it in the
second-floor back.
“We made arrangements as to the night when we would go. Three of us
went out as usual. We found the lady of the house and her daughter
serving at the bar. We had to pass the bar to go upstairs. There was
a row got up in the tap-room with my companions. While the landlady
ran in to see what was the matter, and the daughter ran out for the
policeman, I slipped upstairs, and got into the room. The policeman
knew one of my companions when he came in, and at once suspected there
was some design. He asked if there had been any more besides these
two. The landlady said there was another. I was coming down stairs
with the cash-box when I heard this conversation. The constable asked
leave to search the house. I ran with the cash-box up the staircase,
and looked in the back room to see if there was any place to get away,
but there was none. I took the cash-box up to the front garret, and was
trying to break it open, but in the confusion I could not.
“I fled out of the garret window and got on the roof to hide from the
policeman. My footsteps were observed on the carpet and on the gutters
as I went out and slipped in the mud on the roof. I intended to throw
the cash-box to my companions, but they gave me the signal to get away.
I had just time to take my boots off, when another constable came out
of the garret window of the other house. I had no other alternative but
to get along the roof where they could not follow me, and besides I was
much nimbler than they. I went to the end of the row of houses, and did
not go down the garret window near me. Seeing a waterspout leading to a
stable-yard, I slipt down it, and climbed up another spout to the roof
of the stable. I lay there for five hours till the police changed.
“I managed to get down and went into the stable-yard, when the
stable-man cried out, ‘Hollo! here he is.’ I saw there was no
alternative but to fight for it. I had a jemmy in my pocket. He laid
hold of me, when I struck him on the face with it, and he fell to
the ground. I fled to the door, and came out into the main street,
returned into Piccadilly, and passed through the Park gates. On coming
home to Westminster I found one of my comrades had not come home. We
sent to the police-station, and learned he was there. We sent him some
provisions, and he gave us notice in a piece of paper concealed in some
bread that I should keep out of the way as the police were after me,
which would aggravate his case.
“I then went to live at Whitechapel. Meantime some clever detectives
were on my track, from information they received from the girls we
used to cohabit with. We heard of this from a quarter some would not
suspect. He told us to keep out of the way, and that he would let
us know should he get any further information. At last my companion
was committed for trial, tried, and sentenced to seven years’
transportation. I did not join in any other burglary for some time
after this, as the police were vigilantly looking for me. I kept
myself concealed in the house of a cigar-maker in Whitechapel.
“Another pal and I went one evening to a public-house in Whitechapel.
My pal was a tall, athletic young fellow, of about nineteen years,
handsomely dressed, with gold ring and pin, intelligent and daring. We
had gone in to have a glass of rum-and-water, when we saw a sergeant
belonging to a regiment of the line sitting in front of the bar. He
asked us if we would have anything to drink. We said we would. He
called for three glasses of brandy-and-water, and asked my companion if
he would take a cigar. He did so. The sergeant said he was a fine young
man, and would make an excellent soldier. On this he pulled out a purse
of money and looked at the time on his gold watch. My comrade looked
to me and gave me a signal, at the same time saying to the soldier,
‘Sergeant, I’ll ‘list.’ He took the shilling offered him, and pretended
to give him his name and address, giving a false alias, so that he
should not be able to trace him.
“He called for half a pint of rum and water, and put down the shilling
he received, from the sergeant. We took him into the bagatelle-room,
and tried to get him to play with us, as we had a number of counterfeit
sovereigns and forged cheques about us. He would not play except for a
pint of half-and-half. On this he left us, and went in the direction
of the barracks in Hyde Park. My comrade said to me, ‘We shall not
leave him till we have plundered him.’ I was then the worse for
liquor. We followed him. When he reached the Park gates I whispered
to my companion that I would garotte him if he would assist me. He
said he would. On this I sprung at his neck. Being a stronger man than
I, he struggled violently. I still kept hold of him until he became
senseless. My companion took his watch, his pocket-book, papers, and
money, consisting of some pieces of gold, and a 5_l._ note. We sold the
gold watch and chain for 8_l._
“Along with my pal, I went into a skittle-ground in the City to have a
game at skittles by ourselves, when two skittle-sharps who knew us well
quarrelled with us about the game. My companion and I made a bet with
them, which we lost, chiefly owing to my fault, which irritated him. He
said, ‘Never mind; there is more money in the world, and we will have
it ere long, or they shall have us.’ One of the skittle-sharps said
to us insultingly, ‘Go and thieve for more, and we will play you.’
On this we got angry at them. My pal took up his life-preserver, and
struck the skittle-sharp on the head.
“A policeman was sent for to apprehend him. I put the life-preserver
in the fire as the door was shut on us, and we could not get away.
On the policeman coming in my pal was to be given in charge by the
landlord and landlady of the house. The skittle-sharp who had been
struck rose up bleeding, and said to the landlord and landlady, ‘What
do you know of the affair? Let us settle the matter between ourselves.’
The policeman declined to interfere. We took brandy-and-water with the
skittle-sharps, and parted in the most friendly terms.
“One day we happened to see a gentleman draw a pocket-book out of
his coat-pocket, and relieve a poor crossing-sweeper with a piece
of silver. He returned it into his pocket. I said to my pal, ‘Here
is a piece of money for us.’ I followed after him and came up to
him about Regent’s Park, put my hand into his coat-pocket, seized
the pocket-book, and passed it to my comrade. An old woman who kept
an apple-stall had seen me; and when my back was turned went up and
told the gentleman. The latter followed us until he saw a policeman,
while I was not aware of it; being eager to know the contents of
the pocket-book I had handed to my comrade, he being at the time in
distress. We went into a public-house to see the contents, and called
for a glass of brandy-and-water. We found there were three 10_l._ notes
and a 5_l._ note, and two sovereigns, with some silver. The policeman
meantime came in and seized my hand, and at the same time took the
pocket-book from me before I had time to prevent him.
“The gentleman laid hold of my companion, but was struck to the ground
by the latter. He then assisted to rescue me from the policeman. By the
assistance of the potman and a few men in the taproom, they overpowered
me, but my comrade got away. I was taken to the police court and
committed for trial, and was afterwards tried and sentenced to seven
years transportation.
“On one occasion, after my return from transportation, I and a
companion of mine met a young woman we were well acquainted with who
belonged to our own class of Irish cockneys. She was then a servant in
a family next door to a surgeon. She asked us how we were getting on,
and treated us to brandy. We asked her if we could rifle her mistress’s
house, when she said she was very kind to her, and she would not
permit us to hurt a hair of her head or to take away a farthing of her
property. She told us there was a surgeon who lived next door--a young
man who was out at all hours of the night, and sometimes all night. She
informed us there was nobody in the house but an old servant who slept
up stairs in a garret.
“The door opened by a latch-key, and when the surgeon was out the gas
was generally kept rather low in the hall. We watched him go out one
evening at eleven o’clock, applied a key to the door, and entered the
house. The young woman promised to give us the signal when the surgeon
came in. We had not been long in when we heard the signal given. I got
under the sofa in his surgical room; the gas used to burn there all
night while he was out. My companion was behind a chest of drawers
which stood at a small distance from the wall. As the surgeon came in I
saw him take his hat off, when he sat down on the sofa above me.
“As he was taking his boots off, he bent down and saw one of my feet
under the sofa. He laid hold of it, and dragged me from under the sofa.
He was a strong man, and kneeled on my back with my face turned to
the floor. I gave a signal to my companion behind him, who struck him
a violent blow on the back, not to hurt him, but to stun him, which
felled him to the floor. I jumped up and ran out of the door with my
companion. He ran after us and followed us through the street while I
ran in my stockings. Our female friend, the servant, had the presence
of mind and courage to run into the house and get my boots. She carried
them into the house of her employer, and then looked out and gave the
alarm of ‘Thieves!’ We got a booty of 43_l._
“One night I went to an Irish penny ball in St. Giles’s, and had a
dance with a young Irish girl of about nineteen years of age. This
was the first time she saw me. I was a good dancer, and she was much
pleased with me. She was a beautiful and handsome girl--a costermonger,
and a good dancer. We went out and had some intoxicating liquor, which
she had not been used to. She wished me to make her a present of a
white silk handkerchief, with the shamrock, rose, and thistle on it,
and a harp in the middle, which I could not refuse her. She gave me
in exchange a green handkerchief from her neck. We corresponded after
this for some time. She did not know then that I was a burglar and
thief. She asked me my occupation, and I told her I was a pianoforte
maker. One night I asked her to come out with me to go to a penny Irish
ball. I kept her out late, and seduced her. She did not go back to her
friends any more, but cohabited with me.
“One night after this we went to a public singing-room, and I got
jealous by her taking notice of another young man. I did not speak to
her that night about it. Next morning I told her it was better that she
should go home to her friends, as I would not live with her any more.
“She cried over it, and afterwards went home. Her friends got her a
situation in the West-end as a servant, but she was pregnant at the
time with a child to me. She was not long in service before her young
master fell in love with her, and kept her in fashionable style, which
he has continued to do ever since. She now lives in elegant apartments
in the West-end, and her boy, my son, is getting a college education. I
do not take any notice of them now.
“One night on my return from transportation I met two old associates.
They asked me how I was, and told me they were glad to see me. They
inquired how I was getting on. I told them I was not getting along very
well. They asked me if I was associated with any one. I told them I was
not, and was willing to go out with them to a bit of work. These men
were burglars, and wished me to join them in plundering a shop in the
metropolis. I told them I did not mind going with them. They arranged
I should enter the shop along with another ‘pal,’ and the other was to
keep watch. On the night appointed for the work we met an old watchman,
and asked him what o’clock it was. One of our party pretended to be
drunk, and said he would treat him to two or three glasses of rum.
Meantime I and my companion entered the house by getting over a back
wall and entering a window there by starring the glass, and pulling
the catch back. When we got in we did not require to break open any
lockfast. We packed up apparel of the value of 60_l._ We remained in
the shop till six o’clock, when the change of officers took place. The
door was then unbolted--a cab was drawn up to the shop. I shut the door
and went off in one direction on foot, while one ‘pal’ went off in a
cab, and the other to the receiver at Whitechapel.
“I have been engaged in about eighteen burglaries besides other
depredations, some of them in fashionable shops and dwelling-houses in
the West-end. Some of them have been effected by skeleton keys, others
by climbing waterspouts, at which I am considered to be extraordinary
nimble, and others by obtaining an entry through the doors or windows.
I have been imprisoned seven times in London and elsewhere, and have
been twice transported. Altogether I have been in prison for about
fourteen years.
“My first wife died broken-hearted the second time I was transported.
Since I came home this last time I have lived an honest, industrious
life with my second wife and family.”
PROSTITUTE THIEVES.
On taking up this subject, although it is treated comprehensively in
another part of this work, we found it impossible to draw an exact
distinction between prostitution and the prostitute thieves. Even at
the risk of a little repetition we now give a short resumé of the whole
subject, dwelling particularly on the part more especially in our
province--the Prostitute Thieves of London.
The prostitution of the metropolis, so widely ramified like a deadly
upas tree over the length and breadth of its districts, may be divided
into four classes, determined generally by the personal qualities,
bodily and mental, of the prostitute, by the wealth and position of the
person who supports her, and by the localities in which she resides and
gains her ignoble livelihood.
The first class consists of those who are supported by gentlemen in
high position in society, wealthy merchants and professional men,
gentry and nobility, and are kept as _seclusives_.
The second class consists of the better educated and more genteel
girls, who live in open prostitution, some of them connected with
respectable middle-class families.
The third class is composed of domestic servants and the daughters of
labourers, mechanics, and others in the humbler walks in life.
The fourth class comprises old worn-out prostitutes sunk in poverty and
debasement.
We may take each class of prostitutes and illustrate it in the order
set down, extending our field of observation over the wide districts
of the metropolis; or we may select several leading districts as
representatives of the whole, and proceed in more minute detail. We
adopt the latter plan, as it presents us with a fuller and more graphic
view of the subject.
The first class consists of young ladies, in many cases well-educated
and well-connected, such as the daughters of professional men,
physicians, lawyers, clergymen, and military officers, as well as
of respectable farmers, merchants, and other middle-class people,
and governesses; also of many persons possessed of high personal
attractions--ballet-girls, milliners, dressmakers and shop-girls,
chambermaids and table-maids in aristocratic families or at first-class
hotels. Many of them are brought from happy homes in the provinces
to London by fashionable villains, military or civilian, and basely
seduced, and kept to minister to their lust. Others are seduced in the
metropolis while residing with their parents, or when pursuing their
avocations in shops, dwelling-houses, or hotels.
Many a young lady from the provinces has been entrapped by wealthy
young men, frequently young military officers, who have met them at
ball-rooms, where they may have shone in all the beauty of health and
innocence, the darlings of their home, the pride of their parents’
hearts, and the “cynosure of every eye,” or these fashionable rakes may
have got introduced to their families, and been shown marked kindness.
But in return they entice the poor girls from their parents, dishonour
them, and destroy the peace of their homes for ever.
Many young ladies possessing fair accomplishments are also entrapped
in the metropolis--at the Argyle Rooms, Holborn Assembly-room, and
other fashionable resorts. In many cases pretty young girls, servants
in noblemen’s families, barmaids, waiting-maids in hotels, and
chambermaids, may have attracted the attention of gay gentlemen who had
induced them to cohabit with them, or to live in apartments provided
for them, where they are kept in grand style. Some are maintained at
the rate of 800_l._ a year, keep a set of servants, drive out in their
brougham, and occasionally ride in Rotten Row. Others are supported at
still greater expense.
As a general rule they do not live in the same house with the
gentleman, though sometimes they do. Such women are often kept by
wealthy merchants, officers in the army, members of the House of
Commons and House of Peers, and others in high life.
As a rule gay ladies keep faithful to the gentlemen who support them.
Many of them ride in Rotten Row with a groom behind them, attend the
theatres and operas, and go to Brighton, Ramsgate, and Margate, and
over to Paris.
When the young women they fancy are not well educated, tutors and
governesses are provided to train them in accomplishments, to enable
them to move with elegance and grace in the drawing-room, or to travel
on the Continent. They are taught French, music, drawing, and the
higher accomplishments.
Sometimes these girls belong to the lower orders of society, and may
have been selected for their beauty and fascination. The daughter of
a labouring man, a beautiful girl, is kept by a gentleman in high
position at St. John’s Wood at the rate of 800_l._ a year. She has
now received a lady’s education, rides in Rotten Row, has a set of
servants, moves in certain fashionable circles, keeps aloof from the
gaiety of the Haymarket, and lives as though she were a married woman.
Let us take another illustration. A young girl was brought up to London
several years ago by a military man. He kept her for three weeks, and
then left her in a coffee-shop in Panton Street as a dressed lodger.
She has since been kept at Chelsea by a gentleman in a Government
situation, and occasionally drives out in her chaise with her groom
behind. She frequents the Argyle Rooms and the cafés, the Carlton
supper-rooms, and Sally’s. She was brought away from the provinces when
she was seventeen, and is now about twenty-five years of age.
These females are kept from ages varying from sixteen and upwards, and
live chiefly in the suburbs of the metropolis--Brompton, Chelsea, St.
John’s Wood, Haverstock Hill, and on the Hampstead Road.
This class of ladies are often kept by elderly men, military, naval, or
otherwise, some of them having wives and families. In such cases the
former sometimes have a younger fancy-man. They visit him by private
arrangement, and keep it very quiet. Occasionally such things do come
to light, and the elderly gentlemen part with them.
They dress very expensively in silks, satins, and muslins, in most
fashionable style, glittering with costly jewellery, perhaps of the
value of 150_l._, like the first ladies in the land. Sometimes they
become intemperate, and are abandoned by their paramours, and in the
course of a short time pawn their jewels and fine dresses, and betake
themselves to prostitution in the Waterloo Road, and ultimately go with
the most degraded labouring men for a few coppers.
Many of them are very unfortunate, and are discarded by the gentlemen
who support them on the slightest caprice, perhaps to give way to some
other young woman. To secure his object he occasionally maltreats
her, and attempts to create a misunderstanding between them, or he
absents himself from her for a time, meantime taking care to introduce
some person stealthily into her company to ensnare her, and find some
pretext to abandon her, so that her friends may have no ground for an
action at law against him.
In some instances these females after having run their fashionable
career, get married; in others they may have managed to save some money
to provide for the future. But in too many cases they are heartlessly
abandoned by the men who formerly supported them, and glide down
step by step into lower degradation, till many of them come to the
workhouse, or the hospital, or to some secluded garret, or it may be
rush into a suicide’s grave. Volumes might be written on this tragical
theme, where fact would far transcend the heart-rending recitals of
fiction.
Having briefly adverted to the higher order of prostitutes, kept as
seclusives by men of wealth, high station, and title, we shall now
turn our attention to the open prostitutes who traverse the streets
of the metropolis for their livelihood. With this view, we shall not
treat first of the lower order of prostitutes, and proceed to the
higher, but keeping in mind the principle with which we started--the
progressive downward nature of crime,--we shall commence at the higher
order of prostitutes, and afterwards notice the more debased. At the
same time we shall select several of the more prominent localities
as a sample of the whole districts of this vast metropolis. We shall
notice the Haymarket, Bishopgate Street, and Waterloo Road, the Parks,
Westminster, and Ratcliff Highway. We shall first advert to
THE PROSTITUTES OF THE HAYMARKET.
A stranger on his coming to London, after visiting the Crystal Palace,
British Museum, St. James’s Palace, and Buckingham Palace, and other
public buildings, seldom leaves the capital before he makes an evening
visit to the Haymarket and Regent Street. Struck as he is with the
dense throng of people who crowd along London Bridge, Fleet Street,
Cheapside, Holborn, Oxford Street, and the Strand, perhaps no sight
makes a more striking impression on his mind than the brilliant gaiety
of Regent Street and the Haymarket. It is not only the architectural
splendour of the aristocratic streets in that neighbourhood, but
the brilliant illumination of the shops, cafés, Turkish divans,
assembly halls, and concert rooms, and the troops of elegantly dressed
courtesans, rustling in silks and satins, and waving in laces,
promenading along these superb streets among throngs of fashionable
people, and persons apparently of every order and pursuit, from the
ragged crossing-sweeper and tattered shoe-black to the high-bred
gentleman of fashion and scion of nobility.
Not to speak of the first class of kept women, who are supported by
men of opulence and rank in the privacy of their own dwellings, the
whole of the other classes are to be found in the Haymarket, from
the beautiful girl with fresh blooming cheek, newly arrived from the
provinces, and the pale, elegant, young lady from a milliner’s shop in
the aristocratic West-end, to the old, bloated women who have grown
grey in prostitution, or become invalid through venereal disease.
We shall first advert to the highest class who walk the Haymarket,
which in our general classification we have termed the second class of
prostitutes.
They consist of the better educated and more genteel girls, some of
them connected with respectable middle-class families. We do not say
that they are well-educated and genteel, but either well-educated or
genteel. Some of these girls have a fine appearance, and are dressed
in high style, yet are poorly educated, and have sprung from an humble
origin. Others, who are more plainly dressed, have had a lady’s
education, and some are not so brilliant in their style, who have come
from a middle-class home. Many of these girls have at one time been
milliners or sewing girls in genteel houses in the West-end, and have
been seduced by shopmen, or by gentlemen of the town, and after being
ruined in character, or having quarrelled with their relatives, may
have taken to a life of prostitution; others have been waiting maids
in hotels, or in service in good families, and have been seduced by
servants in the family, or by gentlemen in the house, and betaken
themselves to a wild life of pleasure. A considerable number have come
from the provinces to London, with unprincipled young men of their
acquaintance, who after a short time have deserted them, and some of
them have been enticed by gay gentlemen of the West-end, when on their
provincial tours. Others have come to the metropolis in search of work,
and been disappointed. After spending the money they had with them,
they have resorted to the career of a common prostitute. Others have
come from provincial towns, who had not a happy home, with a stepfather
or stepmother. Some are young milliners and dressmakers at one time in
business in town, but being unfortunate, are now walking the Haymarket.
In addition to these, many of them are seclusives turned away or
abandoned by the persons who supported them, who have recourse to a gay
life in the West-end. There are also a considerable number of French
girls, and a few Belgian and German prostitutes who promenade this
locality. You see many of them walking along in black silk cloaks or
light grey mantles--many with silk paletots and wide skirts, extended
by an ample crinoline, looking almost like a pyramid, with the apex
terminating at the black or white satin bonnet, trimmed with waving
ribbons and gay flowers. Some are to be seen with their cheeks ruddy
with rouge, and here and there a few rosy with health. Many of them
looking cold and heartless; others with an interesting appearance.
We observe them walking up and down Regent Street and the Haymarket,
often by themselves, one or more in company, sometimes with a gallant
they have picked up, calling at the wine-vaults or restaurants to get
a glass of wine or gin, or sitting down in the brilliant coffee-rooms,
adorned with large mirrors, to a cup of good bohea or coffee. Many of
the more faded prostitutes of this class frequent the Pavilion to meet
gentlemen and enjoy the vocal and instrumental music over some liquor.
Others of higher style proceed to the Alhambra Music Hall, or to the
Argyle Rooms, rustling in splendid dresses, to spend the time till
midnight, when they accompany the gentlemen they may have met there
to the expensive supper-rooms and night-houses which abound in the
neighbourhood.
In the course of the evening, we see many of the girls proceeding with
young and middle aged, and sometimes silver-headed frail old men, to
Oxenden Street, Panton Street, and James Street, near the Haymarket,
where they enter houses of accommodation, which they prefer to going
with them to their lodgings. Numbers of French girls may be seen in
the Haymarket, and the neighbourhood of Tichbourne Street and Great
Windmill Street, many of them in dark silk paletots and white or dark
silk bonnets, trimmed with gay ribbons and flowers, or walking up
Regent Street in the neighbourhood of All Souls’ Church, Langham Place,
and Portland Place, or coming down Regent Street to Waterloo Place and
Pall Mall, and hovering near the palatial mansions or the Clubs; or
they might be seen decoying gents to their apartments in Queen Street,
off Regent’s Quadrant, from which locality they were lately forcibly
ejected by the police. Most of these French girls have bullies, or what
they term by a softer term ‘fancy men,’ who cohabit with them. These
base wretches live on the prostitution of these miserable girls,--hang
as loafers in their houses or about the streets, and many of them, as
we might expect, are gamblers and swindlers. Several of them, we blush
to say, are political refugees, exiles for fighting at the barricades
of Paris, for the liberty of their country; while they live here with
courtesans in the purlieus of Haymarket, in the most infamous and
degrading of all bondage.
The generality of the girls of the Haymarket have no bullies, but
live in furnished apartments--one or more--in various localities
of the metropolis. Many live in Dean Street, Soho, Gerrard Street,
Soho, King Street, Soho, and Church Street, Soho, in Tennison Street,
Waterloo Road, at Pimlico and Chelsea, several of the streets leading
into Fitzroy Square, and other neighbourhoods, and pay a weekly rent
varying from seven shillings to a guinea, which has to be regularly
paid on the day it is due. In many cases little forbearance is shown
by their heartless landladies. Many of these girls have gentlemen who
statedly visit them at their lodgings, some of whom are married men.
Most of them are very thoughtless and extravagant, with handfuls of
money to-day, and in poverty and miserable straits to-morrow, driven to
the necessity of pawning their dresses. Hence there are many changes
in their life. At one time they are in splendid dress, and at another
time in the humblest attire; occasionally they are assisted by men who
are interested in them, and restored to their former position, when
they get their clothes out of the hands of the pawnbroker. Their living
is very precarious, and many of them are occasionally exposed to
privation, degradation, and misery, as they are very improvident. They
are frequently treated to splendid suppers in the Haymarket and its
vicinity, where they sit surrounded with splendour, partaking of costly
viands amid lascivious smiles; but the scene is changed when you follow
them to their own apartments in Soho or Chelsea, where you find them
during the day, lolling drowsily on their beds, in tawdry dress, and in
sad dishabille, with dishevelled hair, seedy-looking countenance, and
muddy, dreary eyes--their voices frequently hoarse with bad humour and
misery.
Large sums of money are spent in luxurious riot in the Haymarket; but
it has not been so much frequented by the gentry and nobility for
several years past, although considerable numbers are to be seen in the
summer and winter seasons.
Strange midnight scenes were wont to be seen occasionally in Queen
Street, Regent Street, where the French girls reside. Let us take an
illustration. Some fast man--young or middle aged--goes with them to
the cafés and music halls, perhaps proceeds to the supper rooms, and
after an expensive supper, retires with them to their domicile in Queen
Street. Meantime their bully keeps out of sight, or sneaks behind the
bed-room door. In many cases, not contented with the half-guinea or
guinea given them, their usual hire for prostitution, they demand more
money from their victim. On his declining to give it, they refuse to
submit to his pleasure, and will not return him his money. The bully is
then called up, and the silly dupe is probably unceremoniously turned
out of doors.
There are few felonies committed by this class of prostitutes, as
such an imputation would be fatal to their mode of livelihood in this
district, where they are generally known, and can be easily traced.
The second class of prostitutes, who walk the Haymarket--the third
class in our classification--generally come from the lower orders of
society. They consist of domestic servants of a plainer order, the
daughters of labouring people, and some of a still lower class. Some of
these girls are of a very tender age--from thirteen years and upwards.
You see them wandering along Leicester Square, and about the Haymarket,
Tichbourne Street, and Regent Street. Many of them are dressed in a
light cotton or merino gown, and ill-suited crinoline, with light
grey, or brown cloak, or mantle. Some with pork-pie hat, and waving
feather--white, blue, or red; others with a slouched straw-hat. Some
of them walk with a timid look, others with effrontery. Some have a
look of artless innocence and ingenuousness, others very pert, callous,
and artful. Some have good features and fine figures, others are
coarse-looking and dumpy, their features and accent indicating that
they are Irish cockneys. They prostitute themselves for a lower price,
and haunt those disreputable coffee-shops in the neighbourhood of the
Haymarket and Leicester Square, where you may see the blinds drawn
down, and the lights burning dimly within, with notices over the door,
that “beds are to be had within.”
Many of those young girls--some of them good-looking--cohabit with
young pickpockets about Drury Lane, St. Giles’s, Gray’s Inn Lane,
Holborn, and other localities--young lads from fourteen to eighteen,
groups of whom may be seen loitering about the Haymarket, and often
speaking to them. Numbers of these girls are artful and adroit thieves.
They follow persons into the dark by-streets of these localities, and
are apt to pick his pockets, or they rifle his person when in the
bedroom with him in low coffee-houses and brothels. Some of these
girls come even from Pimlico, Waterloo Road, and distant parts of the
metropolis, to share in the spoils of fast life in the Haymarket.
They occasionally take watches, purses, pins, and handkerchiefs from
their silly dupes who go with them into those disreputable places, and
frequently are not easily traced, as many of them are migratory in
their character.
The third and lowest class of prostitutes in the Haymarket--the fourth
in our classification--are worn-out prostitutes or other degraded
women, some of them married, yet equally degraded in character.
These faded and miserable wretches skulk about the Haymarket,
Regent Street, Leicester Square, Coventry Street, Panton Street and
Piccadilly, cadging from the fashionable people in the street and from
the prostitutes passing along, and sometimes retire for prostitution
into dirty low courts near St. James’ Street, Coventry Court, Long’s
Court, Earl’s Court, and Cranbourne Passage, with shop boys, errand
lads, petty thieves, and labouring men, for a few paltry coppers. Most
of them steal when they can get an opportunity. Occasionally a base
coloured woman of this class may be seen in the Haymarket and its
vicinity, cadging from the gay girls and gentlemen in the streets. Many
of the poor girls are glad to pay her a sixpence occasionally to get
rid of her company, as gentlemen are often scared away from them by
the intrusion of this shameless hag, with her thick lips, sable black
skin, leering countenance and obscene disgusting tongue, resembling a
lewd spirit of darkness from the nether world.
Numbers of the women kept by the wealthy and the titled may
occasionally be seen in the Haymarket, which is the only centre in the
metropolis where all the various classes of prostitutes meet. They
attend the Argyle Rooms and the Alhambra, and frequently indulge in
the gaieties of the supper rooms, where their broughams are often seen
drawn up at the doors. In the more respectable circles they may be
regarded with aversion, but they here reign as the prima-donnas over
the fast life of the West-end.
Occasionally genteel and beautiful girls in shops and workrooms in
the West-end, milliners, dressmakers, and shop girls, may be seen
flitting along Regent Street and Pall Mall, like bright birds of
passage, to meet with some gentleman _on the sly_, and to obtain a few
quickly-earned guineas to add to their scanty salaries. Sometimes a
fashionable young widow, or beautiful young married woman, will find
her way in those dark evenings to meet with some rickety silver-headed
old captain loitering about Pall Mall. Such things are not wondered at
by those acquainted with high life in London.
We now come to take a survey of the general state of prostitution
which prevails over the metropolis, having Bishopgate, Shoreditch, and
Waterloo Road more particularly in our eye as a sample of the other
districts. These prostitutes in general reside in the dingy lanes
and courts off the main streets in these localities, and have small
bed-rooms poorly furnished, for which they pay four shillings and
upwards a-week. They live in disreputable houses, occupied from the
basement to the attics by prostitutes--some young, others more elderly;
some living alone, others cohabiting with some low wretch of a man, a
“tail” pickpocket, labourer, or low mechanic.
The prostitutes of these localities generally belong to the third
and fourth class. The better educated and more genteel girls who
live by prostitution in most cases go to the Haymarket. Numbers may
occasionally be seen in the neighbourhood of the Bank of England, at
Islington, near the Angel tavern, in the City Road, New North Road,
Paddington, at the Elephant and Castle, and other localities; though
in most cases they only come out occasionally _on the sly_, and are
engaged in shops, factories, warerooms, and workrooms, during the
day, or secluded in their houses, supported by tradesmen, mechanics,
shopmen, clerks, or others, and only live partially by prostitution.
We shall refer to the two classes of open prostitutes generally to
be seen over the various districts of the metropolis, such as those
residing in the disreputable neighbourhoods we have mentioned.
Some of the better class have the appearance of girls who serve in
coffee-houses, barmaids, and servants, and others of the lower orders.
Numbers of them are good-looking and tolerably well dressed. Some have
been ironing girls, and others have sold small wares on the streets,
and been engaged in similar employment.
Many of these unfortunate girls have redeeming traits in their
character. Some are kind-hearted and honest, and not a few are even
generous and self-denying. The great mass, however, are unprincipled
and base, ever ready to take an advantage when an opportunity occurs.
The vast majority of them are thieves, similar to the third class we
have sketched in the Haymarket. They not only steal from the persons
they meet on the street under the dark cloud of night in by-streets and
courts, but take men to their houses, and plunder them. They rifle the
pockets of those who go for a short time with them, and steal their
gold pins, watches, and money. This is generally done in low houses of
accommodation. They frequently decamp with the clothes of their victim,
who has taken a bed with them for the night, and leave him in a strange
house in a state of nudity. Married men frequently get into this sad
predicament, but the matter is in most cases hushed up. When it does
get abroad, the party robbed, to screen his profligacy from his wife
and relatives, pretends in many cases that he has been drugged.
These prostitutes, some of them good-looking and handsome, often accost
men in the street, retire with them into some by-lane or by-street, and
patter about their pockets, while they encourage him to use indecent
freedoms with their persons; and while they inflame his passions, rifle
his pockets, and decamp with his money. This is frequently done in
cases where the man does not have carnal connection with them.
They are generally dressed in a light cotton or merino gown, a light or
brown mantle, a straw bonnet trimmed with gaudy ribbons and flowers,
and sometimes with a pork-pie hat and white or red feather.
Some of these girls in those lower localities have better traits in
their character than many of the more brilliant-dressed girls in the
Haymarket, and are sometimes better looking. Not a few of them are very
sedate, and will not go with any man whom they do not like. But there
are many others more unscrupulous.
When they meet a man the worse of liquor, they decoy him into a brothel
and get his money from him, when they try to get up a quarrel with
him, and run off crying out they are ill-used by the man. They do this
frequently where they do not allow the drunken man to have carnal
dealings with them--not from a lustful purpose, but to get his money or
other property.
These girls are fifteen years of age and upwards. Some of them,
if good-looking, get married, and are rescued from the jaws of
prostitution. Others linger on for a time with shattered constitutions,
wasted by grief, want, anxiety, and irregular life, and glide into
premature graves. Others are sheltered in workhouses, while a
considerable number become withered or brutal, and degenerate into the
lowest class of abandoned women.
We come now to treat of the lowest class of prostitutes--those old
women of the town who prowl about the thoroughfares and main streets,
chiefly in the evenings and at midnight. They are often dressed in
a shabby, dirty cotton skirt, faded dark bonnet, and old shoes;
some bloated, dissipated, and brutal in appearance; others pale and
wasted by want and suffering. Many of them resort to “bilking” for a
livelihood, that is, they inveigle persons to low houses of bad fame,
but do not allow them to have criminal dealings with them. Possibly
the bodies of some may be covered with dreadful disease, which they
take care to conceal. While in these houses they often indulge in
the grossest indecencies, too abominable to be mentioned, with old
grey-headed men on the very edge of the grave. Many of these women
are old convicted thieves of sixty years of age and upwards. Strange
to say, old men and boys go with these withered crones, and sometimes
fashionable gentlemen on a lark are to be seen walking arm in arm
with them, and even to enter their houses. Few of these old women are
married, though many of them cohabit with low coarse fellows, who wink
at their conduct, and live on the proceeds of their obscenities.
For example, in Granby Street, Waterloo Road, there were orgies
occasionally indulged in by such women, with persons having the
appearance of gentlemen, too abominable to be mentioned.
These belong to the same class of degraded women who walk the
Haymarket, and whom we have described as the most abandoned of their
sex, who go about cadging and occasionally prostituting themselves to
boys and degraded labouring men. They live in the lowest neighbourhoods
in the east end of the metropolis, such as Lower Whitecross Street,
Wentworth Street, and the low by-streets in Spitalfields, and in the
lowest slums and by-streets about the New Cut, Drury Lane, Westminster,
and other low localities, with dirty, low fellows, dock-labourers,
bricklayers’ labourers, and labourers at the workyards and wharfs.
They are in general too ugly to come out during the day with their
unwashed slatternly dress, and in the evenings are often seen prowling
as cadgers about the streets, and even in the dead of night waylaying
and plundering drunken men; sometimes sneaking about alone, at other
times two in company, and occasionally with a young simple girl by
their side to screen their villainy.
They often resort to prostitution in the dark by-streets and courts
with the boys and men who resort to them, which is seldom or never done
by the younger girls, except by a few outcast or debased creatures
among them, who might justly be comprised in the lowest class.
We now have to notice the “picking-up” women, who generally cohabit
with pickpockets, burglars, clerks, shopmen, and others. Their
object is to get liquor and money from persons as though they were
prostitutes, without resorting to prostitution. For example, we see
two well-dressed young women in the attire of milliners or dressmakers
proceeding along the City Road in the direction of the Angel tavern,
Islington. They see a gentleman pass, and cast a wistful look at him.
He returns the glance. They walk on a short distance, and look round.
The gentleman in many cases turns round likewise. He will then get a
nod or bow from one of them. They will walk slowly, and look round
again. On his going up to them, they will enter into conversation.
They ask the gentleman to treat them, if he should not first offer
to do so. They will then proceed to a gin-palace, where he will give
them possibly a glass of wine. He will ask one of them where she
lives. She will perhaps reply: “I am afraid to tell you. If you were
to come to my house, it might come to the knowledge of my husband, and
he would nearly kill me;” adding “I don’t mind seeing you again, and
we will then get better acquainted!” Ultimately it may be arranged
to go to some place which she has chanced to know, for the purpose of
prostitution, leaving the other young woman to wait for her outside.
The gentleman will then possibly give a sum of money. She will either
say it is not sufficient, and will not allow him to have connection
with her, or she may say she cannot allow him for certain reasons;
or she may make an excuse that she requires to go down-stairs on a
pressing errand for a moment, or to speak to the landlady, when she
decamps. Sometimes robbing him of his watch, or purse, in addition to
the sum he gave her.
If he should raise an alarm the occupier of the house will request him
to give her a sum of money for the use of the room, and if there is any
objection made to pay it, he receives ill-treatment and is turned into
the street.
On other occasions a young woman will pretend she is unmarried, and
will, in a similar ingenious way, endeavour to get money from parties
she meets in the street, and try to escape in a similar way, without
allowing him to have connection with her. She frequently manages to
steal his watch and to rifle his pockets while he may be off his guard.
The object of these women is to get the wages of prostitution and an
opportunity of stealing, without incurring the anger of their paramour
by prostituting their bodies to other men. It happens occasionally they
are outwitted, as their schemes are beginning to be pretty well known.
Their pretexts are sometimes evaded, and cases occur where they yield
to prostitution rather than give back the money they have received,
which classes them among prostitutes and thieves. Some women resort to
this as a shift in case of necessity, while others pursue it as a mode
of livelihood in different localities of London.
These persons are to be found over the chief districts of the
metropolis; miserable, poorly-dressed females, as well as
respectable-looking young women. Some of the poorer sort are to be
found about Shoreditch, Whitechapel, Lambeth, and the Borough. Others
of the better sort, in appearance, are to be met with in the City Road,
New North Road, King’s Cross, and Paddington.
* * * * *
_Hired Prostitutes._--There are a number of female prostitutes kept by
Jewesses and English women of low character. These girls are dressed
in good style, in silks and light muslin and cotton dresses, with
their hair put up in ringlets or in fancy nets. They are mostly from
seventeen to twenty-two years of age, some younger and others older,
some with false hair and ringlets. The brothels we refer to are chiefly
about the West-end. There is often a cigar-shop attached to them, and
the best looking girls are generally found standing by the doors, or
ogling through the windows to decoy the passers-by into their infamous
dens. Some of these girls have been prostitutes from their girlhood,
and belong to the lowest class in society, their mothers having been
prostitutes before them. Several have been in these houses for a
considerable number of years, who have kept their appearance better
than other prostitutes who have had a more changeable and precarious
mode of livelihood. Strange to say, some look nearly as young and as
fresh as they did ten years ago.
You seldom see the old execrable hags who keep these houses loitering
about the doors or standing at the windows. They generally keep out
of sight, but are sometimes to be seen peering through the edge of
the window-blinds, which are generally drawn down, in the first floor
above; or you may occasionally see them in the back parlour, skulking
about. They are often very stout, and look like matrons in the maturity
of life. They take gentlemen into their houses during the day as well
as during the evening, but mostly in the evening.
The girls are then dressed in gaudy finery, with shining head-dresses
and jewellery glittering on their breast over their light dresses. Yet
there is a low vulgarity in their appearance which repels and disgusts;
they look, in many cases, so sensual and debased. They use no art to
conceal the life they are leading, as some other prostitutes do, who
try so far to screen the baseness of their profligacy.
They generally keep old female servants they call “slaveys” to do the
drudgery work of the house. These degraded women live in the house
with them, wash their clothes, get their meals ready, clean their
boots, brush their clothes, run errands for them out of doors, and show
gentlemen into the bed-rooms.
There is often a man in these brothels, a paramour of the old bawd,
who is a loafer about the house, and is occasionally employed to act
as a bully. These men are in general rough-looking men, dressed in
black shabby clothes, and in many cases look more degraded than common
thieves. Some are dissipated and pale, others are bloated, their faces
covered with pimples and blotches.
As we pass along Wych Street, Strand, in the dark evenings, we see
several of the brothels we refer to. There the cigar shops are lit up,
and the girls are arrayed in their best attire, and beaming their most
inviting smiles to entrap the unwary. We may see brilliant lights in
the rooms on the flat above through chinks in the shutters and blinds,
where orgies are nightly transacted too gross and disgusting to mention.
Brothels of the same kind are to be found in Exeter Street and Chandos
Street, Strand, and other localities of the metropolis.
These girls occasionally walk the Strand and Holborn to decoy gentlemen
into their dwellings. They generally belong to the third class of
prostitutes and the lowest class of society. Some may have come down
through dissipation from the second class, and have formerly been in
better positions. They do not steal from persons when sober, as they
could be so easily detected, and as this would injure the brothel; but
they occasionally pilfer from drunken men, where they are able to do it
with impunity. Some of them occasionally get as much money as many of
the more genteel girls in the Haymarket.
They never take clothes from the gentlemen who enter their houses,
but occasionally give him rough treatment should he enter their house
without plenty of money in his purse.
They chiefly confine their pilfering depredations to drunken men. As
they walk in the evenings along the crowded thoroughfares lighted up by
the street lamps, and the bright illumination of the shop windows, the
“slaveys” walk frequently at a short distance behind them, to see that
they do not receive gentlemen without the knowledge of the keepers of
the brothel, and to watch that they do not run away with the clothes.
The slaveys are paid something additional for every gentleman the girls
go with, which stimulates them to look better after them, and promotes
the selfish ends of the execrable old bawd who hires them.
* * * * *
_Park Women._--There are three kinds of women who usually resort to the
parks. We find numbers of kept women of the highest class maintained by
persons in high life, such as have been governesses, ladies-maids, and
the daughters of respectable tradesmen and others, promenading in Hyde
Park. They live in fashionable style at Brompton and other localities.
In summer they come to the park about half-past five or six in the
afternoon. There are not so many in the winter time, when the season
is cold, and the landscape faded. While gentlemen and ladies are taking
their evening’s ride, these ladies often walk along Rotten Row as far
as Kensington Gardens, and frequently have a little pet dog, with a
ribbon or string attached to it.
These females are dressed in the most fashionable and expensive style,
in silk and satin dresses, with expensive shawls, mantles, or paletots,
and have light muslin dresses in summer. On such occasions there are
great numbers of fashionable gentlemen riding on horseback and walking
along the side of the drive.
There are a great many seats placed on the grass at Rotten Row in
the summer, where these ladies sit and talk with gentlemen. They are
generally from eighteen to twenty-four years of age, in the full bloom
of life and beauty. The gentlemen consist of blooming youths and old
tottering gallants of sixty, civilians and military, professional men,
gentry, and nobility.
These ladies sit chatting together with hundreds of people seated
around them in this gay promenade. Many assignations are thus made
as to when and where to meet. They are sometimes seated close by the
Serpentine under the trees in the dusk of the summer evenings, and
middle-aged gentlemen--sometimes elderly--often come and meet them, and
sit and converse beside them under the starlit gloom of the park, with
few persons near them.
There is another class of females who visit the parks, consisting of
servants and the daughters of labouring men and poor mechanics. In
general, they are poorly educated, but respectably dressed, and belong,
according to our classification, to the third class of prostitutes.
They generally come out in the evening for the purpose of prostitution.
Many of them are fresh-looking, averaging in age from fifteen to
twenty-five, and are to be found all over the park, chiefly from
Stanhope Gate to Victoria Gate, where they sit on the seats with men
of respectable appearance--tradesmen and others. These females often
use indecent liberties with gentlemen without having connexion with
them. This is done in the evening from dusk up to the time of shutting
the park, and during this sensual excitement robberies are frequently
effected by the women of purses, watches, pins, and other property.
Information is sometimes given to the police, but these felonies
are often concealed by the persons plundered, as they are ashamed
to make it known. Many of these dupes are married men, who would be
sadly disgraced were the news to come to the ears of their wives and
families.
A third class of females who attend the parks are the lowest old
prostitutes, dissipated, debased wretches, from twenty-five to fifty
year’s of age. They generally frequent the Lovers’ Walk, from Grosvenor
Gate to the statue of Achilles, and are to be seen in other parts of
the park near the Marble Arch.
They are miserably dressed, many of them having barely rags to cover
their wretchedness. They are utterly shameless in their habits. We
find them dressed in a dirty cotton gown, nearly black, an old faded
ragged shawl and tattered old boots, with scarcely a sole to them. Some
are blotched in appearance; others are pale, shrivelled, and haggard,
miserable spectacles.
They may sometimes be seen sitting on the settles in the parks from
dusk till the time of closing the gates of the park. These women
indulge in the same obscene practices as the girls we have already
mentioned, with a lower class of people, such as gentlemen’s servants,
labouring men, and low mechanics, and sometimes have connexion with
them in the park. On such occasions, these filthy hags are busy rifling
the pockets of their victims.
* * * * *
_Soldiers’ Women._--There is only one class of prostitutes termed
soldiers’ women, who live in Westminster. They chiefly reside in the
courts leading out of Orchard Street, St. Ann Street, Old Pye Street,
New Pye Street, Castle Lane, Gardener’s Lane, York Street, and Blue
Anchor Yard. They are from sixteen to thirty years of age, and several
even older. Some have been in the streets for seventeen years and
upwards. They live in the greatest poverty, covered with rags and
filth, and many of them covered with horrid sores, and eruptions on
their body, arms, and legs, presenting in many cases a revolting
appearance. Many of them have not the delicacy of females, and live
as pigs in a sty. This is not exaggeration. On the officers of police
entering their houses, they often find them in a state of nudity. They
have no feeling of shame, and conduct themselves with the greatest
indifference. Two of them generally occupy a room. They often take two
other lodgers into their room, and lie on the floor. Their furniture
consists of an old deal table, one or two old rickety chairs, a few
broken cups and saucers, a wooden table, a wash-hand basin and chamber
utensil, and an old shattered bedstead with scarcely any bedding.
These rooms--generally about ten feet square--are let under the name
of furnished apartments, and there is generally a deputy employed to
collect the rents of the house. These girls pay on an average 3_s._
6_d._ or 4_s._ of weekly rent. Many of them pay 8_d._ or 10_d._ for the
room per day, as the landladies do not trust them a week’s rent. They
often come home drunk about twelve or one o’clock at midnight.
They generally get up in the morning about eight or nine o’clock. If
they have any coppers they get in something to eat. Food is seldom
seen in their cupboards, as they generally have only enough for the
occasion. After they have had their breakfast--a cup of tea or coffee
and bread--they chat with each other over the past night’s adventures,
and pass the time till evening.
In the middle of the day they sometimes wash their skirt, the only
decent garment many of them have--their under clothing being a tissue
of rags--starch and iron it, and get it ready towards the evening, when
they wash themselves and sally forth again.
In the evening, most of them go to some low public-house, and sit in
company with soldiers, who drink and carouse with them. The soldiers
who sit with them generally belong to the Foot Guards, Scots Fusileers,
Coldstream, and Grenadier Guards.
The Life Guardsmen do not generally associate with this class. If a
stray soldier of the line in other regiments should happen to come on a
furlough to this district, some of the prostitutes decoy him to their
house, and get money from him professedly for prostitution. They slip
out of the room while he is asleep in bed, and spend the money they
have got with the Foot Guards. Sometimes they bring one of the Foot
Guards to bully him out of the room. They treat civilians in a similar
manner.
Some of them dress and go out and walk with the soldiers during the
day, but this is seldom. In general they do not go out till the evening
at dusk.
In some instances the soldiers remain absent in the evening, and manage
to avoid the patrols, and stop carousing with these girls till the
public-houses close at four o’clock in the morning, when they go with
these prostitutes to their dens, and often remain the whole of next
day--sometimes remaining for a fortnight with them.
Some of these females are young, strong, healthy girls. When they
have been for some years in this mode of life, they become dissipated
in appearance, and their constitution is often broken up by their
irregular wild life. The younger girls keep themselves more reserved
for a time, but the bad example of the others very soon induces them to
abandon themselves to all kinds of dissipation.
If a young woman is so unfortunate as to come among them and to keep
herself reserved, the others bully her out of it, unless she go to the
same excess of dissipation as themselves.
Their mode of stealing is to get people to their houses, where they
plunder them. A sober man seldom thinks of going to their infamous
abodes. In most cases the persons who go are the worse for liquor. On
their way home they go into a public-house with the girls, after which
they accompany them to their room, where they get some more liquor.
The companions of a girl may see her coming home with a man, and may
suppose him, from his appearance, to have money. They come into the
house, and get a portion of the drink. In some instances the drunken
person gives the woman money to go out for drink, when she decamps, and
gets some of the prostitutes in the adjoining room to bully him out of
the place. In other instances the girls wait their time till he goes to
sleep, when they plunder him.
There are seldom fastenings on their doors, which are never locked.
There is an understanding between parties in the same house, and some
persons in the adjoining rooms enter while the man is in bed, and carry
away his clothes and money. He cannot accuse the girl in the room, as
she is lying in bed beside him.
In some cases the girl disappears during the night, and leaves the man
naked in the room. She may remove to some other neighbourhood if the
booty is of value, and live in some other part of Westminster. The dupe
is seldom or never able to identify her, as he may have been much the
worse for liquor while in her company.
These prostitutes chiefly look out for drunken men, whom they decoy
to their houses, and afterwards plunder. They prowl along Parliament
Street and Whitehall Place, and other streets in the vicinity. A great
number of them go as far as Knightsbridge, where there are concert
rooms. They loiter about these localities till these places close, and
are to be seen about the doors of those public-houses where persons
resort after leaving the concert rooms. When they pick up a drunken man
they bring him home in the manner already described.
Many of these girls come from different parts of the country, and have
formerly been servants in town. A good number have been orphans left
without friends, and have been basely seduced. The relatives of some
have taken them home into the provinces, but they have come back again
to London.
The police constables often find as many as four girls in one small
room at night--two lying on a miserable bed, and two lying on the hard
floor, with scarcely any covering but their petticoat thrown over them.
Two soldiers are frequently found lying in the room with them, or one
is seen lying between two girls.
It is surprising that any soldiers, however poor, who have an ordinary
regard to decency, should lie down among such heaps of filthy rags; far
less should we expect such base and unmanly conduct from the Queen’s
Foot Guards, when we look to the fine appearance and manly bearing of
many of them on parade. It kindles our indignation when we learn that
not a few of those poor degraded females were formerly in the service
of respectable families, and were there seduced and driven to open
prostitution by some of these unprincipled soldiers, who still add to
their villainy the despicable crime of basely plundering the poor girls
they have ruined of the wretched earnings of their dishonour and crime.
To the honour of the regiments of Foot Guards, we are happy to say
there are many noble and excellent men in their ranks, who reflect
high credit on our army by their exemplary character, and who are as
benevolent in heart as they are brave on the battle-field. Some of
these go to the other side of the street to avoid meeting with their
fellow-soldiers when associated with degraded women. The others we
refer to are heartless ruffians in their conduct, and a disgrace to the
British service.
* * * * *
_Sailors’ Women._--There are two classes of prostitutes termed sailors’
women to be found in Ratcliff Highway, near the London Docks, at the
east end of the metropolis. These belong to the third and fourth
classes in our classification of the prostitutes of London.
The better of the two classes are generally composed of younger
and more respectable-looking girls, most of them residing in the
neighbourhood, others coming from a distance. The generality of them
reside in the Highway and in Palmer’s Folly, Albert Square, Albert
Street, Seven Star Alley, and other adjacent streets and alleys. A few
strange girls come occasionally from the Surrey side, such as Kent
Street and other localities in the Borough, and remain for a few
days only, as they may have committed some depredation in their own
district, and wish to be away for a short time from the surveillance
of the police. In like manner some of the girls residing in the
neighbourhood of Ratcliff Highway, when they have plundered a sailor,
leave the locality for a short time, till the ship to which he belonged
has set sail, when they return again. There are a number of very
good-looking girls of this class, most of them Irish cockneys. There
are also a few German and Dutch prostitutes who frequent the Highway
who live in Albert Street. These foreign girls do not have bullies
or fancy men. Some of them are good looking, and some are not. They
generally frequent the German and Dutch music and dancing saloons in
Ratcliff Highway. Both of them attend the public-house with the Swedish
flag. This class of girls frequents the various saloons in the Highway.
They do not generally steal money or watches when they are well paid,
and but few steal the sailor’s clothes.
They dress tolerably well, in silk and merino gowns with crinolines,
and bonnets gaily attired with flowers and ribbons. Many of them have
velvet stripes across the breast and back of their gowns, and large
brooches with the portrait of a sailor encased in them. They generally
lay their hair back in front in the French style.
Some of them have fancy men, and others have not. Their fancy men in
many cases are watermen, but being lazy in inclination they hang about
as loafers, and live on the prostitution and crime of the girls they
cohabit with. These females take their dupes to their own houses or
into low coffee-houses and brothels, or other houses of accommodation.
Some of them allow the sailors to have connexion with them; others who
cohabit with watermen and others, pretend to be prostitutes, and allow
men to take indecent liberties with them, but seldom or never allow
them to proceed farther.
There is another class of prostitutes to be found in Ratcliff Highway,
more dissipated and abandoned than those we have noticed. They reside
in or near Bluegate Fields, Angel Gardens, and other streets and lanes
in that neighbourhood. Many of them have a robust, coarse, masculine
frame, some of them with great protruding breasts. A few of the same
class come from a distance, followed by a low, brutal man. The latter
are termed “cross-girls.” They pick up a sailor, take him into some
dark by-street as if for the purpose of prostitution, get all the money
they can from him, and seldom allow carnal connexion. If possible, so
soon as they have effected their purpose, they run away; this is termed
“bilking.”
The rough-looking prostitutes of this class seldom attend the music
saloons, as they would be far outshone in personal appearance by the
younger girls of the other class referred to. We see them late in the
evening skulking about the dark lanes, or patrolling the streets, on
the watch for drunken sailors, whom they take into low coffee-houses
and beer-shops, and sometimes drug by putting snuff, or other
ingredients--sometimes laudanum--in his liquor. They look out for
north country sea-captains and sailors just come ashore, and sometimes
visit their ships lying in the river, at King James’s Stair, Wapping,
Ratcliff Gross, Horseferry, Regent’s Canal Dock, Stone Stairs, or New
Crane Stairs, Shadwell.
Some of these brutal women have bullies, convicted thieves, who are
sometimes dressed as sailors; some of them are river pirates, and from
their childhood have led a criminal life.
The average age of these prostitutes is from twenty to thirty-four.
Many are slovenly dressed, and very dissipated, and callous in
appearance. Some of them are women of colour, whom we have seen brought
to the police station at King David’s Lane, charged with plundering
coloured sailors of their money and clothes.
Number of felonies in the metropolitan
districts, by prostitutes, during
1860 692
Ditto, ditto, in the City 102
---
794
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the metropolitan districts £2,651
Ditto, ditto, in the City 323
------
£2,974
FELONIES ON THE RIVER THAMES.
There are a great number of robberies of various descriptions committed
on the Thames by different parties. These depredations differ in value,
from the little ragged mudlark stealing a piece of rope or a few
handfuls of coals from a barge, to the lighterman carrying off bales of
silk several hundred pounds in value. When we look to the long lines
of shipping along each side of the river, and the crowds of barges and
steamers that daily ply along its bosom, and the dense shipping in its
docks, laden with untold wealth, we are surprised at the comparatively
small aggregate amount of these felonies.
THE MUDLARKS.
They generally consist of boys and girls, varying in age from eight
to fourteen or fifteen; with some persons of more advanced years. For
the most part they are ragged, and in a very filthy state, and are a
peculiar class, confined to the river. The parents of many of them are
coalwhippers--Irish cockneys--employed getting coals out of the ships,
and their mothers frequently sell fruit in the street. Their practice
is to get between the barges, and one of them lifting the other up will
knock lumps of coal into the mud, which they pick up afterwards; or
if a barge is ladened with iron, one will get into it and throw iron
out to the other, and watch an opportunity to carry away the plunder in
bags to the nearest marine-storeshop.
They sell the coals among the lowest class of people for a few
halfpence. The police make numerous detections of these offences. Some
of the mudlarks receive a short term of imprisonment, from three weeks
to a month, and others two months with three years in a reformatory.
Some of them are old women of the lowest grade, from fifty to sixty,
who occasionally wade in the mud up to the knees. One of them may be
seen beside the Thames Police-office, Wapping, picking up coals in the
bed of the river, who appears to be about sixty-five years of age. She
is a robust woman, dressed in an old cotton gown, with an old straw
bonnet tied round with a handkerchief, and wanders about without shoes
and stockings. This person has never been in custody. She may often be
seen walking through the streets in the neighbourhood with a bag of
coals on her head.
In the neighbourhood of Blackfriars Bridge clusters of mudlarks of
various ages may be seen from ten to fifty years, young girls and old
women, as well as boys.
They are mostly at work along the coal wharves where the barges
are lying aground, such as at Shadwell and Wapping, along Bankside,
Borough; above Waterloo Bridge, and from the Temple down to St. Paul’s
Wharf. Some of them pay visits to the City Gasworks, and steal coke and
coal from their barges, where the police have made many detections.
As soon as the tide is out they make their appearance, and remain till
it comes in. Many of them commence their career with stealing rope or
coals from the barges, then proceed to take copper from the vessels,
and afterwards go down into the cabins and commit piracy.
These mudlarks are generally strong and healthy, though their clothes
are in rags. Their fathers are robust men. By going too often to the
public-house they keep their families in destitution, and the mothers
of the poor children are glad to get a few pence in whatever way they
can.
SWEEPING BOYS.
This class of boys sail about the river in very old boats, and go on
board empty craft with the pretext of sweeping them. They enter barges
of all descriptions, laden with coffee, sugar, rice, and other goods,
and steal anything they can lay their hands on, often abstracting
headfasts, ropes, chains, &c. In some instances they cut the bags and
steal the contents, and dispose of the booty to marine-store-dealers.
They are generally very ragged and wretched in appearance, and if
pursued take to the water like a rat, splashing through the mud, and
may be seen doing so when chased by the police. In general they are
expert swimmers. Their ages range from twelve to sixteen. They are
dressed similar to the other ragged boys over the metropolis. The
fathers of most of them are coalwhippers, but many of them are orphans.
They are strong, healthy boys, and some of them sleep in empty barges,
others in low lodging-houses at 3_d._ a night. Some live in empty houses,
and many of them have not had a shirt on for six months, and their rags
are covered with vermin.
In the summer many sleep in open barges, and often in the winter, when
they cover themselves with old mats, sacks, or tarpaulins. Their bodies
are inured to this inclement life. They never go to church, and few of
them have been to school.
Two little boys of this class, the one nine and the other eleven
years of age, lived for six months on board an old useless barge at
Bermondsey, and for other five months in an old uninhabited house, and
had not a clean shirt on during all that time. At night they covered
themselves with old mats and sacks, their clothes being in a wretched
state. Seeing them in this neglected condition, an inspector of police
took them into custody and brought them before a magistrate, with
the view to get them provided for. The magistrate sent them to the
workhouse for shelter.
These boys are of the same class with the mudlarks before referred to,
but are generally a few years older.
SELLERS OF SMALL WARES.
Felonies are occasionally committed by boys who go on board vessels
with baskets containing combs, knives, laces, &c., giving them in
exchange for pieces of rope, sometimes getting fat and bones from the
cooks. In many instances the owners are robbed by the crew giving away
ropes belonging to the ship for such wares. These parties occasionally
pilfer any small article they see lying about the ship, sometimes
carrying off watches when they have an opportunity. They generally try
to get on board foreign vessels about to sail, so that when robberies
are committed the parties do not remain to prosecute them, and the
thieves are consequently discharged.
They are generally from fourteen to eighteen years of age, and many
of them reside with their parents in Rosemary Lane and other low
neighbourhoods about the East-end.
This is a peculiar class of boys who confine their attention to the
ships, barges, and coasting vessels, and do not commit felonies in
other parts of the metropolis.
LABOURERS ON BOARD SHIP, &C.
These men are employed to discharge cargoes on board steam vessels
arriving from the coast, and also foreign vessels. They are frequently
detected pilfering by the police, and secreting about their clothes
small quantities of tallow, coffee, sugar, meat, and other portable
goods. These parties abstract articles from the hold, but do not go
down into the cabins. They have ample opportunity of breaking open some
of the boxes and packages, and of extracting part of the contents. As
they have no facility to get large quantities on shore, they confine
themselves to petty pilfering. Most of their booty is kept for their
own consumption, unless they succeed in carrying off a large quantity,
which rarely occurs. In these cases they dispose of it at a chandler’s
shop.
DREDGEMEN OR FISHERMEN.
These are men who are in the habit of coming out early in the morning,
as the tide may suit, for the purpose of dredging from the bed of the
river coals which are occasionally spilled in weighing when being
transferred into the barges. If these parties are not successful in
getting coals there, they invariably go alongside of a leaded barge
and carry off coals and throw a quantity of mud over them, to make it
appear as if they had got them from the bed of the river. The police
have made numerous detections. Some have been imprisoned, and others
have been transported. The same class of men go alongside of vessels
and steal the copper funnels and ropes, and go to the nearest landing
place to sell them to marine-store-dealers, who are always in readiness
to receive anything brought to them. The doors are readily opened to
them, early and late.
To deceive the police these unprincipled dealers have carts calling
every morning at their shops to take away the metals and other goods
they may have bought during the previous day and night.
SMUGGLING.
Numerous articles of contraband goods are smuggled by seamen on
their arrival from foreign ports, such as tobacco, liquors, shawls,
handkerchiefs, &c.
Several years ago an officer in the Thames police was on duty at five
in the morning. While rowing by the Tower he saw in the dusk two
chimney sweeps in a boat leaving a steam vessel, having with them two
bags of soot. He boarded the boat along with two officers, and asked
them if they had anything in their possession liable to Custom-house
duty. They answered they had not. Upon searching the bags of soot he
found several packages of foreign manufactured tobacco, weighing 48lbs.
The parties were arrested and taken to the police station, and were
fined 100_l._ each, or six months’ imprisonment. Not being able to pay,
they were imprisoned.
These two sweeps had no doubt carried on this illegal traffic for some
time, being employed on the arrival of the boats to clean the funnels
and the flues of the boilers.
Some time ago a sailor came ashore late at night at the Shadwell Dock,
who had just arrived from America. According to the usual custom he was
searched, when several pounds of tobacco were found concealed about his
person. He was tried at the police court, and sentenced to pay a small
fine.
In July, 1858, about midnight, a police constable was passing East
Lane, Bermondsey, when he saw a bag at the top of a street, containing
something rather bulky, which aroused his suspicions. On proceeding
farther he saw a man carrying another bag up the street from a boat in
the river. He got the assistance of another constable, and apprehended
the man carrying the bag, and also the waterman that conveyed it
ashore. The two bags were found to contain 229 lbs. of Cavendish
tobacco. Both persons were detained in the Thames police station, and
taken before a magistrate at Southwark police court. Prosecution was
ordered by the Board of Customs, and both were fined 100_l._ each, and
in default sentenced to six months’ imprisonment. Being unable to pay
the fine, they suffered imprisonment.
In February, 1860, information was given to an inspector of the
Thames police of a smuggling traffic which was being carried on in
the Shadwell Basin, London Docks, from an American vessel named the
Amazon. The steward was in the practice of carrying the tobacco about
a certain hour in the morning from the vessel through a private gate
at the Shadwell Basin. Vigilant watch was kept over this gate by the
inspector, with the assistance of a constable. About eight o’clock
in the morning he saw a man coming up who answered the description
given him. He followed him into a tobacconist’s shop in King David
Lane, Shadwell. The officer on going in saw a carpet bag handed over
the counter. He seized it, and brought the man with him to the police
station. A communication was then made to the Board of Customs, who
sent an officer to the Thames police station. On making search on board
the ship, they found about two cwt. of tobacco. The man was tried, and
sentenced to pay a fine of 100_l._, or suffer six months’ imprisonment.
FELONIES BY LIGHTERMEN.
Numerous depredations are perpetrated by lightermen, employed to
navigate barges by the owners of various steam-vessels in the river
or in the docks, and are intrusted with valuable cargoes, the value
varying from 20_l._ to 20,000_l._ They have been assisted in these
robberies by persons little suspected by the public, but well known to
the police.
They have got cargoes from vessels in the wharves, or docks, to convey
for trans-shipment and delivery along different parts of the river,
and manage on their way to abstract part of the cargo they are in
charge of. Sometimes these robberies are effected on the way, sometimes
when they are waiting outside the dock for the tide to go in. When
they have not such articles on board their own barges, they remove
cargoes from other craft while the crew may be on shore at supper, or
otherwise. Sometimes they carry away articles about their person, such
as tobacco, brandy, wine, opium, tea, &c.
They occasionally steal an empty barge, and go alongside of another
barge as if they were legally employed to put the cargo into another
craft, and turn the barge into some convenient place, where they may
have a cart or van in readiness to remove the property. Sometimes they
have a cab for this purpose. Two days often elapse before the police
get information of these robberies.
In one instance a barge was taken up Bow Creek, with about twenty
bundles of whalebone and twenty bags of saltpetre, which were conveyed
away in a van to the city. The police traced the booty to a marine
store-dealer. The value of the property was 400_l._ Two well-known
thieves were tried for the robbery, but were acquitted.
In April, 1858, Thomas Turnbull and Charles Turnbull, brothers, both
lightermen and notorious river thieves, were charged with a robbery
from two barges at Wapping. Two lightermen were in charge of two barges
laden, the one with lac dye, and the other with cases of wire, near
to the entrance of the London Docks. These men having gone on shore
for refreshment, the two thieves rowed an empty barge alongside the
two barges, and took one chest of lac dye from one of them, and a
case of wire card from the other, in value about 25_l._ They took the
barge with the stolen property over to Rotherhithe, and landed at the
Elephant Stairs, where it was conveyed away in a cart. The property
was never recovered, but the police, after making great exertions,
got sufficient evidence to convict the parties, who were sentenced to
eighteen months each at the Central Criminal Court.
These unprincipled lightermen could get a good livelihood by honest
labour, varying from 30_s._ to 2_l._ a week; but they are dissipated
and idle in their habits, and resort to thieving. They often spend
their time in dancing and concert-rooms, and are to be seen at the
Mahagony Bar at Close Square and Paddy’s Goose, Ratcliffe Highway.
They generally cohabit with prostitutes. They are a different class
of men from the tier-rangers, or river pirates, who also live
with prostitutes. The lightermen’s women are generally smart and
well-dressed, and do not belong to the lowest order as those of the
tier-rangers do. The ages of this class of thieves generally range from
twenty to thirty years.
THE RIVER PIRATES.
This class of robberies is committed among the shipping on both sides
of the river, from London Bridge to Greenhithe, but is most prevalent
from London Bridge to the entrance of the West India Dock. The
depredations are committed in the docks as well as on the river, but
not so much in the former, as they are better protected. Robberies in
the docks are generally done in the daytime. In the river, the chief
object the thieves have in view is to enter the vessel at midnight, as
they know that when vessels arrive the seamen are often fatigued and
worn out, and they get a favourable opportunity of getting on board
and stealing. They steal from all classes of vessels, but chiefly from
brigs and barges. They take any boat from the shore and go on board the
vessels, as if they were seamen, being dressed as watermen and seamen.
When they get on board they go to the cabin or forecastle. Their chief
object is to secure wearing apparel and money. Watches are often to be
found hanging up in the cabin, and clothes are also to be found there.
In the forecastle the clothes are generally contained in a bag hanging
up by the side or bow of the ship. After they have effected their
purpose they row ashore and turn the boat adrift.
There is another mode of stealing they adopt. They get on board the
ships as if they belonged to some of them, and represent they belong
to a certain ship in a line of vessels commonly called a “tier.” They
proceed to the forecastle, where if they find no one moving about, they
go down and plunder. If they are seen by any of the crew they pretend
they belong to some other ship, and ask if this ship is named so and
so. They then say they cannot get on board their own ship, and wish the
crew to allow them to remain for the night.
In many instances the stolen property is found on their person, such
as coats, vests, trousers, boots, &c., and their own clothes are left
behind. They are generally from eighteen to thirty years of age, and
are powerful athletic men.
These robberies are greatly on the decrease, owing to the vigilance of
the police.
Several years ago there was a cry of police between twelve and two
o’clock midnight on board a vessel lying in Union Tier, Wapping. The
crew of a police galley proceeded to the spot, and ascertained that two
thieves had been on board a vessel there, and had concealed themselves
somewhere in it, or in the barges alongside. After searching some time
they discovered a notorious river thief in one of the barges. He was a
stout made man, about five feet nine inches in height, and twenty-two
years of age. A desperate struggle ensued between him and the police.
He struck the inspector with a heavy iron bar on the back a very severe
blow, which rendered him henceforth unfit for active duty. The pirate
resisted with great desperation, and defied the police for some time.
At last they drew their cutlasses, and succeeded in taking him. He
was brought to the police station, convicted, and sentenced to three
months’ imprisonment. He was afterwards indicted for the assault on the
inspector, and sentenced to fifteen months’ hard labour. Since that
time he has been transported twice for similar offences.
A few years since several river pirates were suspected of being on
board a vessel at Bermondsey, where they had stolen a silver watch
from the cabin. One of the gang was detected by the crew of the vessel
and detained. The crew shouted out for the police, when three of their
pals drew up to the side of the vessel in a small boat, representing
themselves to be policemen, with numbers chalked on their coats. The
captain of the vessel gave the man into their custody, and handed
over the watch to one of them. Next morning the captain went to the
police-station to see if the party was there. It was then the police
heard of the robbery, when it was found the supposed officers and the
thief were a party of river pirates who had infested the river for a
long time. As the ship was just setting sail the case was dropped.
Some time ago three constables went on duty at midnight in consequence
of a number of midnight robberies having been committed all over the
river, especially at Deptford, from the ships lying there. They went
out in a private boat in plain clothes. On getting to Deptford they
proceeded up the creek. After remaining there in the dusk about an hour
they heard a loud knocking, and suspected that some one was taking the
copper from the bottom of a vessel lying there.
The constables drew up to the vessel with their boat, and found two
men with a quantity of copper in a boat, with chisels and a chopper
they had been using. They arrested them, and were coming out of the
creek with the two boats when they discovered two other notorious river
thieves climbing down the chains of a vessel lying alongside the wharf.
They had been down in the forecastle, and having disturbed the crew
were making their escape when the officers saw them.
The officers thereupon made for the vessel, and succeeded in
apprehending them, and took them into their boat after a desperate
resistance.
The first two were convicted and sentenced, one to three months, and
the other to six months’ imprisonment, and the latter were sentenced to
three months each in Maidstone gaol.
The Commissioners of Police rewarded the constables with a gratuity for
their vigilance and gallant conduct.
Many of these tier-rangers or river pirates have a ruffianly
appearance, and generally live with prostitutes, on both sides of the
river, at St. George’s, Bluegate-fields, the Borough, and Bermondsey.
They confine themselves to robberies on the river, and are frequently
transported by the time they are thirty years of age. Occasionally a
returned convict comes back for a time, when he generally resumes his
former villanies, and is again sent abroad.
These tier-rangers in most cases have sprung from the ranks of the
mudlarks, and step by step have advanced further in crime, until they
have become callous brutal ruffians, living as brigands on the sides of
the river.
Number of felonies, &c., on the river
Thames in the metropolitan districts for
1860 203
Value of property abstracted thereby £712
NARRATIVE OF A MUDLARK.
The following narrative was given us by a mudlark we found on a float
on the river Thames at Millwall, to the eastward of Ratcliffe Highway.
He was then engaged, while the tide was in, gathering chips of wood
in an old basket. We went to the river side along with his younger
brother, a boy of about eleven years of age, we saw loitering in the
vicinity. On our calling to him, he got the use of a boat lying near,
and came toward us with alacrity. He was an Irish lad of about thirteen
years of age, strong and healthy in appearance, with Irish features and
accent. He was dressed in a brown fustian coat and vest, dirty greasy
canvas trousers roughly-patched, striped shirt with the collar folded
down, and a cap with a peak.
“I was born in the county of Kerry in Ireland in the year 1847, and am
now about thirteen years of age. My father was a ploughman, and then
lived on a farm in the service of a farmer, but now works at loading
ships in the London docks. I have three brothers and one sister. Two
of my brothers are older than I. One of them is about sixteen, and
the other about eighteen years of age. My eldest brother is a seaman
on board a screwship, now on a voyage to Hamburg; and the other is a
seaman now on his way to Naples. My youngest brother you saw beside
me at the river side. My sister is only five years of age, and was
born in London. The rest of the family were all born in Ireland. Our
family came to London about seven years ago, since which time my
father has worked at the London Docks. He is a strong-bodied man of
about thirty-four years of age. I was sent to school along with my
elder brothers for about three years, and learned reading, writing,
and arithmetic. I was able to read tolerably well, but was not so
proficient in writing and arithmetic. One of my brothers has been about
three years, and the other about five years at sea.
“About two years ago I left school, and commenced to work as a mudlark
on the river, in the neighbourhood of Millwall, picking up pieces of
coal and iron, and copper, and bits of canvas on the bed of the river,
or of wood floating on the surface. I commenced this work with a little
boy of the name of Fitzgerald. When the bargemen heave coals to be
carried from their barge to the shore, pieces drop into the water among
the mud, which we afterwards pick up. Sometimes we wade in the mud to
the ancle, at other times to the knee. Sometimes pieces of coal do not
sink, but remain on the surface of the mud; at other times we seek for
them with our hands and feet.
“Sometimes we get as many coals about one barge as sell for 6_d._ On
other occasions we work for days, and only get perhaps as much as
sells for 6_d._ The most I ever gathered in one day, or saw any of my
companions gather, was about a shilling’s worth. We generally have a
bag or a basket to put the articles we gather into. I have sometimes
got so much at one time, that it filled my basket twice--before
the tide went back. I sell the coals to the poor people in the
neighbourhood, such as in Mary Street and Charles Street, and return
again and fill my bag or basket and take them home or sell them to the
neighbours. I generally manage to get as many a day as sell for 8_d._
“In addition to this, I often gather a basket of wood on the banks of
the river, consisting of small pieces chipped off planks to build the
ships or barges, which are carried down with the current and driven
ashore. Sometimes I gather four or five baskets of these in a day. When
I get a small quantity they are always taken home to my mother. When
successful in finding several basketfuls, I generally sell part of them
and take the rest home. These chips or stray pieces of wood are often
lying on the shore or among the mud, or about the floating logs; and
at other times I seize pieces of wood floating down the river a small
distance off; I take a boat lying near and row out to the spot and pick
them up. In this way I sometimes get pretty large beams of timber. On
an average I get 4_d._ or 6_d._ a-day by finding and selling pieces of
wood; some days only making 2_d._, and at other times 3_d._ We sell the
wood to the same persons who buy the coals.
“We often find among the mud, in the bed of the river, pieces of iron;
such as rivets out of ships, and what is termed washers and other
articles cast away or dropped in the iron-yards in building ships and
barges. We get these in the neighbourhood of Limehouse, where they
build boats and vessels. I generally get some pieces of iron every day,
which sells at 1/4_d._ a pound, and often make 1_d._ or 2_d._ a-day,
sometimes 3_d._, at other times only a farthing. We sell these to the
different marine store dealers in the locality.
“We occasionally get copper outside Young’s dock. Sometimes it is new
and at other times it is old. It is cut from the side of the ship when
it is being repaired, and falls down into the mud. When the pieces are
large they are generally picked up by the workmen; when small they do
not put themselves to the trouble of picking them up. The mudlarks wade
into the bed of the river and gather up these and sell them to the
marine store dealer. The old copper sells at 1-1/2_d._ a pound, the new
copper at a higher price. I only get copper occasionally, though I go
every day to seek for it.
“Pieces of rope are occasionally dropped or thrown overboard from the
ships or barges and are found embedded in the mud We do not find much
of this, but sometimes get small pieces. Rope is sold to the marine
store dealers at 1/2_d._ a pound. We also get pieces of canvas, which
sells at 1/2_d._ a pound. I have on some occasions got as much as three
pounds.
“We also pick up pieces of fat along the river-side. Sometimes we
get four or five pounds and sell it at 3/4_d._ a pound at the marine
stores; these are thrown overboard by the cooks in the ships, and after
floating on the river are driven on shore.
“I generally rise in the morning at six o’clock, and go down to the
river-side with my youngest brother you saw beside me at the barges.
When the tide is out we pick up pieces of coal, iron, copper, rope and
canvas. When the tide is in we pick up chips of wood. We go upon logs,
such as those you saw me upon with my basket, and gather them there.
“In the winter time we do not work so many hours as in the summer;
yet in winter we generally are more successful than in the long days
of summer. A good number of boys wade in summer who do not come in
winter on account of the cold. There are generally thirteen or fourteen
mudlarks about Limehouse in the summer, and about six boys steadily
there in the winter, who are strong and hardy, and well able to endure
the cold.
“The old men do not make so much as the boys because they are not so
active; they often do not make more than 6_d._ a day while we make
1_s._ or 1_s._ 6_d._
“Some of the mudlarks are orphan boys and have no home. In the
summer time they often sleep in the barges or in sheds or stables or
cow-houses, with their clothes on. Some of them have not a shirt,
others have a tattered shirt which is never washed, as they have no
father nor mother, nor friend to care for them. Some of these orphan
lads have good warm clothing; others are ragged and dirty, and covered
with vermin.
“The mudlarks generally have a pound of bread to breakfast, and a pint
of beer when they can afford it. They do not go to coffee-shops, not
being allowed to go in, as they are apt to steal the men’s ‘grub.’ They
often have no dinner, but when they are able they have a pound of bread
and 1_d._ worth of cheese. I never saw any of them take supper.
“The boys who are out all night lie down to sleep when it is dark, and
rise as early as daylight. Sometimes they buy an article of dress, a
jacket, cap, or pair of trousers from a dolly or rag-shop. They got a
pair of trousers for 3_d._ or 4_d._, an old jacket for 2_d._, and an
old cap for 1/2_d._ or 1_d._ When they have money they take a bed in a low
lodging-house for 2_d._ or 3_d._ a night.
“We are often chased by the Thames’ police and the watermen, as the
mudlarks are generally known to be thieves. I take what I can get as
well as the rest when I get an opportunity.
“We often go on board of coal barges and knock or throw pieces of coal
over into the mud, and afterwards come and take them away. We also
carry off pieces of rope, or iron, or anything we can lay our hands on
and easily carry off. We often take a boat and row on board of empty
barges and steal small articles, such as pieces of canvas or iron,
and go down into the cabins of the barges for this purpose, and are
frequently driven off by the police and bargemen. The Thames’ police
often come upon us and carry off our bags and baskets with the contents.
“The mudlarks are generally good swimmers. When a bargeman gets hold of
them in his barge on the river, he often throws them into the river,
when they swim ashore and then take off their wet clothes and dry them.
They are often seized by the police in boats, in the middle of the
river, and thrown overboard, when they swim to the shore. I have been
chased twice by a police galley.
“On one occasion I was swimming a considerable way out in the river
when I saw two or three barges near me, and no one in them. I leaped
on board of one and went down into the cabin, when some of the Thames’
police in a galley rowed up to me. I ran down naked beneath the deck
of the barge and closed the hatches, and fastened the staple with a
piece of iron lying near, so that they could not get in to take me.
They tried to open the hatch, but could not do it. After remaining for
half-an-hour I heard the boat move off. On leaving the barge they rowed
ashore to get my clothes, but a person on the shore took them away, so
that they could not find them. After I saw them proceed a considerable
distance up the river I swam ashore and got my clothes again.
“One day, about three o’clock in the afternoon, as I was at Young’s
Dock, I saw a large piece of copper drop down the side of a vessel
which was being repaired. On the same evening, as a ship was coming out
of the docks, I stripped off my clothes and dived down several feet,
seized the sheet of copper and carried it away, swimming by the side of
the vessel. As it was dark, I was not observed by the crew nor by any
of the men who opened the gates of the dock. I fetched it to the shore,
and sold it that night to a marine store dealer.
“I have been in the habit of stealing pieces of rope, lumps of coal,
and other articles for the last two years; but my parents do not know
of this. I have never been tried before the police court for any
felony.
“It is my intention to go to sea, as my brothers have done, so soon as
I can find a captain to take me on board his ship. I would like this
much better than to be a coal-heaver on the river.”
RECEIVERS OF STOLEN PROPERTY.
When we look to the number of common thieves prowling over the
metropolis--the thousands living daily on beggary, prostitution, and
crime--we naturally expect to find extensive machineries for the
receiving of stolen property. These receivers are to be found in
different grades of society, from the keeper of the miserable low
lodging-houses and dolly shops in Petticoat Lane, Rosemary Lane, and
Spitalfields, in the East-end, and Dudley Street and Drury Lane in the
West-end of the metropolis, to the pawnbroker in Cheapside, the Strand,
and Fleet Street, and the opulent Jews of Houndsditch and its vicinity,
whose coffers are said to be overflowing with gold.
* * * * *
_Dolly Shops._--As we walk along Dudley Street, near the Seven
Dials,--the Petticoat Lane of the West-end,--a curious scene presents
itself to our notice. There we do not find a colony of Jews, as in
the East-end, but a colony of Irish shopkeepers, with a few cockneys
and Jews intermingled among them. Dudley Street is a noted mart for
old clothes, consisting principally of male and female apparel, and
second-hand boots and shoes.
We pass by several shops without sign boards--which by the way is
a characteristic of this strange by-street--where boots and shoes,
in general sadly worn, are exposed on shelves under the window, or
carefully ranged in rows on the pavement before the shop. We find a
middle-aged or elderly Irishman with his leathern apron, or a young
Irish girl brushing shoes at the door, in Irish accent inviting
customers to enter their shop.
We also observe old clothes stores, where male apparel is suspended
on wooden rods before the door, and trousers, vests, and coats of
different descriptions, piled on chairs in front of the shop, or
exposed in the dirty unwashed windows, while the shopmen loiter before
the door, hailing the customers as they pass by.
Alongside of these we see what is more strictly called dolly or leaving
shops,--the fertile hot-beds of crime. The dolly shop is often
termed an unlicensed pawn-shop. Around the doorway, in some cases of
ordinary size, in others more spacious, we see a great assortment of
articles, chiefly of female dress, suspended on the wall,--petticoats,
skirts, stays, gowns, shawls, and bonnets of all patterns and sizes,
the gowns being mostly of dirty cotton, spotted and striped; also
children’s petticoats of different kinds, shirt-fronts, collars,
handkerchiefs, and neckerchiefs exposed in the window. As we look into
these suspicious-looking shops we see large piles of female apparel,
with articles of men’s dress heaped around the walls, or deposited in
bundles and paper packages on shelves around the shop, with strings of
clothes hung across the apartment to dry, or offered for sale. We find
in some of the back-rooms, stores of shabby old clothes, and one or
more women of various ages loitering about.
In the evening these dolly shops are dimly lighted, and look still more
gloomy and forbidding than during the day.
Many of these people buy other articles besides clothes. They are
in the habit of receiving articles left with them, and charge 2_d._
or 3_d._ a shilling on the articles, if redeemed in a week. If not
redeemed for a week, or other specified time, they sell the articles,
and dispose of them, having given the party a miserably small sum,
perhaps only a sixth or eighth part of their value. These shops are
frequented by common thieves, and by poor dissipated creatures living
in the dark slums and alleys in the vicinity, or residing in low
lodging-houses. The persons who keep them often conceal the articles
deposited with them from the knowledge of the police, and get punished
as receivers of stolen property. Numbers of such cases occur over the
metropolis in low neighbourhoods. For this reason the keepers of these
shops are often compelled to remove to other localities.
The articles they receive, such as old male and female wearing apparel,
are also resetted by keepers of low coffee-houses and lodging-houses,
and are occasionally bought by chandlers, low hairdressers, and others.
They also receive workmen’s tools of an inferior quality, and cheap
articles of household furniture, books, &c., from poor dissipated
people, beggars, and thieves; many of which would be rejected by the
licensed pawnbrokers.
They are frequently visited by the wives and daughters of the poorest
labouring people, and others, who deposit wearing apparel, or
bed-linen, with them for a small piece of money when they are in want
of food, or when they wish to get some intoxicating liquor, in which
many of them indulge too freely. They are also haunted by the lowest
prostitutes on like errands. The keepers of dolly shops give more
indulgence to their regular customers than they do to strangers. They
charge a less sum from them, and keep their articles longer before
disposing of them.
It frequently occurs that these low traders are very unscrupulous, and
sell the property deposited with them, when they can make a small piece
of money thereby.
There is a pretty extensive traffic carried on in the numerous
dolly-shops scattered over the metropolis, as we may find from the
extensive stores heaped up in their apartments, in many cases in such
dense piles as almost to exclude the light of day, and from the groups
of wretched creatures who frequent them--particularly in the evenings.
The principal trade in old clothes is in the East-end of the
metropolis--in Rosemary Lane, Petticoat Lane, and the dark by-streets
and alleys in the neighbourhood, but chiefly at the Old Clothes
Exchange, where huge bales are sold in small quantities to crowds
of traders, and sent off to various parts of Scotland, England, and
Ireland, and exported abroad. The average weekly trade has been
estimated at about 1,500_l._
_Pawnbrokers, &c._--A great amount of valuable stolen property passes
into the hands of pawnbrokers and private receivers. The pawnbrokers
often give only a third or fourth of the value of the article deposited
with them, which lies secure in their hands for twelve months.
A good many of them deal honestly in their way, and are termed
respectable dealers; but some of them deal in an illegal manner, and
are punished as receivers. Many of those who are reputed as the most
respectable pawnbrokers, receive stolen plate, jewellery, watches, &c.
When _plate_ is stolen, it is sometimes carried away on the night
of the robbery in a cab, or other conveyance, to the house of the
burglars. Some thieves take it to a low beershop, where they lodge for
the night; others to coffee-shops; others to persons living in private
houses, pretending possibly to be bootmakers, watchmakers, copper-plate
printers, tailors, marine store-dealers, &c. Such parties are private
receivers well-known to the burglars. The doors of their houses are
opened at any time of the night.
Burglars frequently let them know previously when they are going to
work, and what they expect to get, and the crucible or silver pot
is kept ready on a slow fire to receive the silver plate, sometimes
marked with the crest of the owner. Within a quarter of an hour a large
quantity is melted down. The burglar does not stay to see the plate
melted, but makes his bargain, gets his money, and goes away.
These private receivers have generally an ounce and a quarter for
their ounce of silver, and the thief is obliged to submit, after he
has gone into the house. The former are understood in many cases to
keep quantities of silver on hand before they sell it to some of the
refiners, or other dealers, who give them a higher price for it,
generally 4_s._ 10_d._ per ounce. The burglar himself obtains only from
3_s._ 6_d._ to 4_s._ an ounce.
The receivers we refer to--well-known to the cracksmen of the
metropolis--live at White Hart Yard, Catharine Street, Strand; Vinegar
Yard, Catharine Street, Strand; Russell Street, Covent Garden; Gravel
Lane; Union Street; Friars Street, Blackfriars’ Road; Oakley Street,
Westminster Road; Eagle Street, Holborn; King Street, Seven Dials;
Wardour Street, Oxford Street; Tottenham Place, Tottenham Court Road;
Upper Afton Place, Newport Market; George’s Street, Hampstead Road;
Clarendon Street, Somers Town; Philip’s Buildings, Somers Town;
New North-Place and Judd Street, Gray’s Inn Road; Red Lion Street,
Clerkenwell; Wilderness Row, Clerkenwell; Golden Lane; Banner Street;
Banner Row; Long Alley; Tim Street; Middlesex Street, Whitechapel;
Brick Lane, Whitechapel; Halfmoon Passage, Union Street, Spitalfields;
Whitechapel Road; Commercial Road; Rosemary Lane, and other localities.
These persons receive plate, silk, satins, and other valuable booty.
There are also several refiners in different parts of the metropolis
who generally have silver pots or crucibles on the fire ready to melt
whatever plate may be taken in. Some of them are German Jews, others
are English people.
These furnaces are generally in a small workshop or parlour at the back
of the shop. These receivers profess to sell jewellery, lace, and other
articles, which are exposed in the shop windows. They are licensed to
buy gold and silver, and offer to give fair value for precious stones.
The _jewellery_ stolen is taken to these same fences and sold at
less than a third of its value. The names are then erased, and the
articles are taken to pieces, and sold to different jewellers over the
metropolis. Stolen bank notes and jewellery are often sent abroad by
these fences to avoid detection.
The following prices are generally received from the fences for stolen
bank-notes:--
For a £5 bank-note, from £4 to £4 10_s._
„ 10 do. „ £8 15_s._ to £9.
„ 20 do. about £16 10_s._
„ 50 do. „ £35.
As the notes rise in value they give a smaller proportionate sum for
them, as they may have more trouble in getting them exchanged.
_Silks and satins_, and such like goods, are often conveyed to the
fence in a cab on the night or morning the robbery is effected; the
dealer generally gets previous notice, and expects to receive them.
In addition to the watch set at the house where the robbery is to be
committed, there is often a watch stationed near the house of the
receiver to look after the movements of the policeman in his locality.
One of the burglars goes in the cab direct from the shop or warehouse
where the robbery has been committed to the house of the receiver, and
possibly at a short distance from the house gets a quiet signal from
the watch as to whether it is safe to approach. If not, he can make a
detour with the cab, and come back a little afterwards when the coast
is clear. The burglar and the cabman remove the bags of goods into the
house of the receiver, when the vehicle drives off. The driver of the
cab is generally paid according to the value of the booty.
Sometimes these goods are taken to a coffee-house, where the people are
acquainted with the burglars, and where one of the burglars remains
till the booty is sold and removed, or otherwise disposed of. The
fence, who has got notice of the plunder from some of the thieves,
often comes and takes it away himself. The keeper of the coffee-house
is well paid for his trouble.
Silks and satins are generally sold to the fence at 1_s._ a yard,
whatever the quality of the fabric. Silk handkerchiefs of excellent
quality are sold at 1_s._ each; good broadcloth from 4_s._ to 5_s._ a
yard, possibly worth from 1_l._ 1_s._ to 1_l._ 5_s._; neckties, sold
in the shops from 1_s._ 6_d._ to 2_s._ each, are given away for 4_d._
to 6_d._ each; kid-gloves, worth from 2_s._ to 3_s._ 6_d._, are sold
at 6_d._ a pair; and women’s boots, worth from 6_s._ 6_d._ to 10_s._
6_d._, are given for 2_s._
Silks and satins of the value of 4,500_l._ have been sold for 515_l._,
the chief proportion of the spoil thus coming into the hands of the
unprincipled receiver.
Numerous cases of receiving stolen property are tried at our
police-courts and sessions, as well as at the Old Bailey. We shall only
adduce one illustration.
Some time ago a bale of goods was stolen from a passage in a warehouse
in the City. The case was put in the hands of the police. They were
a peculiar class of goods. Information was given to persons in that
line of business. A few weeks after it was ascertained that the stolen
property had been offered for sale by a person who produced a sample.
They were ultimately traced to a place in the City, not far distant
from where they had been stolen. They were seized by two officers of
police. The man who was selling them was an agent, and had no hand in
the robbery. He would not give up the name of the person who had sent
them to him. He was taken into custody, and he and the goods were sent
to the police station.
Seeing the dilemma in which he was placed, this man, when in custody,
stated that he had received the goods from a well-known Jewish dealer,
who was thereupon arrested. On searching his premises the officers
found a great part of the booty of twelve burglaries, and of three
other robberies, one of them being a quantity of jewellery of great
value, the whole of the property amounting to from 2000_l._ to 3000_l._
He was tried, convicted, and sentenced to fourteen years’
transportation.
From the statistics of the metropolitan police we find the number of
houses of bad character, which may be used to receive stolen property,
to be as follows:--
163 houses of receivers of stolen goods.
255 public-houses. }
103 beer-shops. } The resort of thieves
154 coffee-shops. } and prostitutes.
101 other suspected }
houses. }
1,706 brothels and houses of ill-fame.
361 tramps’ lodging-houses.
-----
2,843
NARRATIVE OF A RETURNED CONVICT.
We give the following brief autobiography of a person who has recently
returned from one of our penal settlements, having been transported
for life. In character he is very different from the generality of
our London thieves, having hot African blood in his veins and being
a man of passionate, unbridled character. He was formerly a daring
highway robber. He was introduced to us accidentally in Drury-lane, by
a Bow-street police officer, who occasionally acts as a detective. On
this occasion the latter displayed very little tact and discretion,
which made it exceedingly difficult for us to get from him even the
following brief tale:--
“I was born in a tent at Southampton, on the skirts of a forest, among
the gipsies, my father and mother being of that stock of people. We
had generally about seven or eight tents in our encampment, and were
frequently in the forest between Surrey and Southampton. The chief
of our gang, termed the gipsey king, had great influence among us.
He was then a very old, silver-headed man, and had a great number of
children. I learned when a boy to play the violin, and was tolerably
expert at it. I went to the public-houses and other dwellings in the
neighbourhood, with three or four other gipsey boys, who played the
triangle and drum, as some of the Italian minstrels do. We went during
the day and often in the evening. At other times we had amusement
beside the tents, jumping, running, and single-stick, and begged from
the people passing by in the vehicles or on foot.
“During the day some of the men of our tribe went about the district,
and looked out over the fields for horses which would suit them, and
came during the night and stole them away. They never carried away
horses from the stables. They generally got their booty along the
by-roads, and took them to the fairs in the neighbourhood and sold
them, usually for about 10_l._ or 12_l._ The horses they stole were
generally light and nimble, such as might be useful to themselves. They
disfigured them by putting a false mark on them, and by clipping their
mane and tail. When a horse is in good order they keep it for a time
till it becomes more thin and lank, to make it look older. They let
the horse generally go loose on the side of a road at a distance from
their encampment, till they have an opportunity to sell it; and it is
generally placed alongside one or two other horses, so that it is not
so much observed. The same person who steals it frequently takes it to
the fair to be sold.
“The gipsies are not so much addicted to stealing from farms as is
generally supposed. They are assisted in gaining a livelihood by their
wives and other women going over the district telling fortunes. Some of
them take to hawking for a livelihood. This is done by boys and girls,
as well as old men and women. They sell baskets, brushes, brooms, and
other articles.
“I spent my early years wandering among the gipsies till I was thirteen
years of age, and was generally employed going about the country with
my violin, along with some of my brothers.
“My father died when I was about six years of age. A lady in
Southampton, of the Methodist connexion, took an interest in my
brothers and me, and we settled there with our mother, and afterwards
learned coach-making. I lived with my mother in Southampton for five or
six years. My brothers were well-behaved, industrious boys, but I was
wild and disobedient.
“The first depredation I committed was when thirteen years old. I
robbed my mother of a box of old-fashioned coins and other articles,
and went to Canterbury, where I got into company with prostitutes and
thieves. The little money I had was soon spent.
“After this I broke the window of a pawnbroker’s shop as a cart was
passing by, put my hand through the broken pane of glass, and carried
off a bowl of gold and silver coins, and ran off with them and made my
way to Chatham.
“Some time after this I was, one day at noon, in the highway between
Chatham and Woolwich, when I saw a carriage come up. The postillion was
driving the horses smartly along. A gentleman and lady were inside,
and the butler and a female servant were on the seat behind. I leaped
on the back of the conveyance as it was driving past, and took away
the portmanteau with the butler’s clothes, and carried it off to the
adjoining woods. I sold them to a Jew at Southampton for 3_l._ or 4_l._
“Shortly after I came up to London, and became acquainted with a gang
of young thieves in Ratcliffe Highway. I lived in a coffee-house there
for about eighteen months. The boys gained their livelihood picking
gentlemen’s pockets, at which I soon became expert. After this I joined
a gang of men, and picked ladies’ pockets, and resided for some time at
Whitechapel.
[Illustration:
COMPARTMENT ON THE SIDE FOR VISITORS. COMPARTMENT ON THE SIDE FOR PRISONERS.
FRIENDS VISITING PRISONERS.]
“Several years after I engaged with some other men in highway
robbery. I recollect on one occasion we learned that a person was in
the habit of going to one of the City banks once a week for a large sum
of money--possibly to pay his workmen. He was generally in the habit
of calling at other places in town on business, and carried the money
with him in a blue serge bag. We followed him from the bank to several
places where he made calls, until he came to a quiet by-street, near
London bridge. It was a dark wintry night, and very stormy. I rushed
upon him and garotted him, while one of my companions plundered him
of his bag. He was a stout old man, dressed like a farmer. I was then
about twenty-two years of age.
“At this time I went to music and dancing saloons, and played on my
violin.
“Soon after I went to a fair at Maidstone with several thieves,
all young men like myself. One of us saw a farmer in the market, a
robust middle-aged man, take out his purse with a large sum of money.
We followed him from the market. I went a little in advance of my
companions for a distance of sixteen miles, till we came to a lonely
cross turning surrounded with woods. The night happened to be dark. I
went up to him and seized him by the leg, and pulled him violently off
his horse, and my companions came up to assist me. While he lay on the
ground we rifled his pockets of a purse containing about 500_l._ and
some silver money. He did not make very much resistance and we did not
injure him. We came back to London and shared the booty among us.
“About the time of the great gathering of the Chartists on Kennington
Common, in 1848, I broke into a pawnbroker’s shop in the metropolis,
and stole jewellery to the amount of 2,000_l._, consisting of watches,
rings, &c., and also carried off some money. I sold the jewels to a
Jewish receiver for about 500_l._ I was arrested some time after, and
tried for this offence, and sentenced to transportation for life.
“I returned from one of the penal settlements about a year ago, and
have since led an honest life.”
COINING.
This class of felonies is as prevalent as ever in the metropolis, and
is carried on in many of the low neighbourhoods.
It is generally effected in this way. Take a shilling, or other
sterling coin, scour it well with soap and water; dry it, and then
grease it with suet or tallow; partly wipe this off, but not wholly.
Take some plaster of Paris, and make a collar either of paper or tin.
Pour the plaster of Paris on the piece of coin in the collar or band
round it. Leave it until it sets or hardens, when the impression will
be made. You turn it up and the piece sticks in the mould. Turn the
reverse side, and you take a similar impression from it; then you have
the mould complete. You put the pieces of the mould together, and then
pare it. You make a channel in order to pour the metal into it in a
state of fusion, having the neck of the channel as small as possible.
The smaller the channel the less the imperfection in the “knerling.”
You make claws to the mould, so that it will stick together while you
pour the metal into it. But before doing so, you must properly dry it.
If you pour the hot metal into it when damp, it will fly in pieces.
This is the general process by which counterfeit coin is made. When you
have your coin cast, there is a “gat,” or piece of refuse metal, sticks
to it. You pair this off with a pair of scissors or a knife--generally
a pair of scissors--then you file the edges of the coin to perfect the
“knerling.”
The coin is then considered finished, except the coating. At this time
it is of a bluish colour, and not in a state fit for circulation, as
the colour would excite suspicion.
You get a galvanic battery with nitric acid and sulphuric acid,
a mixture of each diluted in water to a certain strength. You
then get some cyanide and attach a copper wire to a screw of the
battery. Immerse that in the cyanide of silver when the process of
electro-plating commences.
The coin has to pass through another process. Get a little lampblack
and oil, and make it into a sort of composition, “slumming” the
coin with it. This takes the bright colour away, and makes it fit
for circulation. Then wrap the coins up separately in paper so as
to prevent them rubbing. When coiners are going to circulate them,
they take them up and rub each piece separately. The counterfeit
coin will then have the greatest resemblance to genuine coin, if
well-manufactured.
While this is the general mode by which it is made, a skilful
artificer, or keen-eyed detective can trace the workmanship of
different makers.
Counterfeit coin is manufactured by various classes of
people--costermongers, mechanics, tailors, and others--and is generally
confined to the lower classes of various ages. Girls of thirteen years
of age sometimes assist in making it.
It is made in Westminster, Clerkenwell, the Borough, Lambeth, Drury
Lane, the Seven Dials, Lisson Grove, and other low neighbourhoods of
the metropolis, at all hours of the day and night.
There are generally two persons engaged in making it--sometimes four.
In nine cases out of ten, men and women are employed in it together.
The man generally holds the mould with an iron clamp, that is an iron
hook doubled in the shape of plyers or tongues to prevent the heat from
burning their hands. The women generally pour the metal into it. One
person could make the coin alone, but this would be too tedious. While
engaged in this work, they fasten the doors of their room or dwelling,
and have generally a person on the look-out they term a “crow,” in case
the officers of justice should make their appearance, and detect them
in the act.
The officers make a simultaneous rush into the house after having
forced open the door with a blow from a sledge-hammer, so as to detect
the parties in the very act of coining. On such occasions the men
endeavour to destroy the mould, while the women throw the counterfeit
coin into the fire, or into the melted metal, which effectually injures
it. This is done to prevent the officers getting these articles into
their possession, as evidence against them.
The coiners frequently throw the hot metal at the officers, or the
acids they use in their coining processes, or they attempt to strike
them with a chair or stool, or other weapon that comes in their way. In
most cases they resist until they are overpowered and secured.
Counterfeit coin is generally made of Britannia metal spoons and other
ingredients, and very seldom of pewter pots, though formerly this was
the case.
Sometimes four impressions are cast from each mould at the same
instant; in other cases two or three. If too near each other the
powerful heat of the metal in casting half-crowns or crowns would make
the mould fly. Hence there must be spaces between each impression.
Smaller coins, such as sixpences or shillings, can be placed nearer
each other in the mould. On each occasion when they cast the coin they
blow the dust off the mould to keep it perfectly clear, so as not to
injure in the slightest degree the impression. When the latter is
imperfect a new mould must be made. The coiner can use the same mould
again in less than a minute to make other counterfeit coins.
Sometimes a quart basinful is made on a single occasion; at other times
a very small quantity only.
The coiners have agents at different public-houses to dispose of their
counterfeit coin, and some of them stand in the street to sell it.
Sometimes it is sold to their private agents in their own dwellings,
or sent out to parties who purchase it from them. The latter parties
generally pay 1_d._ for a shilling’s worth. Then these agents sell
it to the utterers for 2_d._ a shilling, 3_d._ for two shillings,
3-1/2_d._ for a half-crown, and 4_d._ a crown. Some coiners charge
5_d._ for five shillings’ worth.
The detection of counterfeit coin in the metropolis is under the able
management of Mr. Brennan, a skilful and experienced public officer,
who keeps a keen surveillance over this department of crime.
In 1855 Mr. Brennan, along with Inspector Bryant of G division, and
other officers, went to the neighbourhood of Kent Street for the
purpose of apprehending a person of the name of Green, better known by
the cognomen of “Charcoal.” The street door was open, and the officers
proceeded to the top floor up a winding staircase. The house consisted
of three floors. On passing upstairs they were met by three men on the
top landing, very robust, their ages averaging from twenty-four to
thirty-six. One of them, named Brown, was a noted Devonshire wrestler,
and a powerful-bodied man.
These men attempted to force their way down. Mr. Brennan manfully
resisted and tried to keep them up, and force them back into the room.
Brown leaped over him while struggling with the other two. On Mr.
Brennan’s son and Inspector Bryant coming up to his assistance, the
other two men were arrested and secured in the yard.
A third man came out of the room and was passing by Mr. Brennan, and in
doing so hit him on the head with a saucepan, and forced him against
the staircase window. His son came up to his assistance, when he struck
this new assailant on the arm with a crowbar, and partially disabled
him. At this time the frame of the staircase window gave way, and he
fell into the court.
One of the men in the house jumped from the window of the staircase
on the roof of a shed, and fell right through it, and was followed
by Constable Neville of the G division, who jumped after him and
secured him. The former was a man of about five feet eight inches
high, powerfully built. Other two men were beat back into the room and
secured along with two women. Five out of a party of seven men were
arrested, and the other two effected their escape. The officers only
expected to see one man and a woman coining in this house.
After they succeeded in forcing the two men back into the room, the man
named “Charcoal” struggled desperately, and used every effort to smash
the mould. They found sufficient fragments of it as evidence against
them that they had been making half-crowns, shillings, and sixpences,
besides a large quantity of counterfeit coin.
The officers were obliged to remain in the house and yard until they
sent to the police station for additional assistance. The prisoners
were tried at the Old Bailey and sentenced to various terms of
imprisonment, from six months to fourteen years. The Recorder from the
bench recommended to Mr. Brennan a compensation of 10_l._ for the manly
and efficient part he had acted on this trying occasion.
In 1845 Mr. Brennan received information that a man who resided at
Bath Place, Old Street Road, was making counterfeit coin. This house
consisted of two rooms, the one above the other. Mr. Brennan went
there, accompanied by Sergeant Cole of the G division, leaving a police
constable at the end of the court. He broke open the door with a
sledge-hammer, and attempted to run upstairs, and was met at the door
by the coiner, who tried to rush back into the room, when the former
seized him by a leathern apron he had on. In the struggle both he and
Mr. Brennan were hurled down to the bottom of the staircase, a distance
of eleven steps. The officer was severely injured on the back of the
head, and the coiner’s knee struck against his belly, yet this brave
officer, though severely injured, kept hold of the coiner.
At this time Cole was struggling with the coiner’s wife and daughter,
while their bull-dog seized him by the leg of his trousers. The dog
kept hold of him for about twenty-five minutes. Latterly the three
parties were secured.
Meanwhile the constable whom he had left at the end of the court heard
the disturbance, and entered and assisted in securing the prisoners.
The woman was tall and masculine in appearance, and the girl was
thirteen years of age.
On securing this desperate coiner Mr. Brennan proceeded upstairs, and
found four galvanic batteries in full play, and about five hundred
pieces of counterfeit coin in various stages of manufacture--crowns,
half-crowns, shillings, and sixpences. The prisoner was committed to
Newgate for trial. His wife was acquitted, she having acted under his
direction. He was sentenced to fifteen years’ transportation. The girl
was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for the exceedingly active
part she had taken in the affair.
Mr. Brennan on this occasion was severely injured in his gallant
struggle.
Several years ago Mr. Brennan went to apprehend a man of the name of
Morris near Westminster. The street-door of the house, which consisted
of three stories, was shut, but was suddenly burst open by the blow of
a sledge-hammer. On running up to the top floor he found his hat struck
against something, and found there was a flap let down over the “well”
of the staircase, which was dreadfully armed with iron spikes of about
three or four inches long, and about the same distance apart, and it
seemed utterly impossible to force it up.
The man meantime effected his escape through the roof, and ran along
the roofs and jumped a depth of twenty-five feet on the roof of a shed,
and was much injured. He was carried away by his friends to Birmingham,
and kept in an hospital till he recovered. He then left London for two
years.
Afterwards he made his appearance in the neighbourhood of Kent Street
in the Borough, where Mr. Brennan went to apprehend him, assisted by
several other officers. He paid him a visit at seven o’clock on a
winter’s evening. The coiner was sitting in the middle of the floor
making half-crowns. One of the windows of the house was open. On
hearing the officers approach he jumped clean out of the window on
the back of an officer who was stationed there to watch--the height
of one story. Mr. Brennan followed him as he ran off without his coat
along some adjoining streets, and caught sight of him passing through
a back door that led into some gardens. Here he fled into a house, the
floor of which went down a step. There was a bed in the room with three
children in it. Mr. Brennan missed his footing, and fell across the
bed, and narrowly escaped injuring one of the children by the fall. The
father and mother of the children were standing at the fire. The man
stepped forward to the officer and was about to use violence, when Mr.
Brennan told him who he was and his errand, which quieted him.
Meantime Mr. Brennan tripped up the coiner as he was endeavouring to
escape, and threw him on the floor, secured him and put him into a
cab, where a low mob, which had meantime gathered in this disreputable
neighbourhood, tried to rescue the coiner from the hands of the
officers. They threw brickbats, stones, and other missiles to rescue
the prisoner.
While the officers were conveying him to the police-station this coiner
while handcuffed endeavoured to throw himself in a fit of frantic
passion beneath the wheels of a waggon to destroy himself, but was
prevented by the officers. When in Horsemonger Gaol he refused for a
time to take any food.
He was tried at the Old Bailey, and sentenced to thirty years’
transportation for coining and assaulting the officers in the execution
of their duty.
Number of cases of coining in the metropolitan
districts for 1860 6
Ditto ditto in the City 0
--
6
Number of cases of putting or uttering
base coin, &c., in the metropolitan districts 616
FORGERS.
Forgery is the fraudulent making or altering a written instrument, to
the detriment of another person. To constitute a forgery it is not
necessary that the whole instrument should be fictitious. Making an
insertion, alteration, or erasure, on any material part of a genuine
document, by which any of the lieges may be defrauded; the insertion of
a false signature to a true instrument, or a real signature to a false
one, or the altering of the date of a bill after acceptance, are all
forgeries. There are different classes of these. For example, there are
forgeries of bank notes, of cheques, of acceptances, wills, and other
documents.
_Bank Notes._--There are many forgeries of Bank of England notes,
executed principally at Birmingham. In the engraving and general
appearance the counterfeit so closely resembles the genuine note,
that an inexperienced eye might be easily deceived. The best way to
detect them is carefully to look to the water-mark embossed in the
paper, which is not like a genuine note. When the back of the former is
carefully inspected, the water-mark will be found to be indented, or
pressed into the paper. The paper of a forged note is generally of a
darker colour than a good one. To take persons off their guard, forgers
frequently make the notes very dirty, so as to give them the appearance
of a much-worn good note. They are frequently uttered by pretended
horse-dealers, in fairs and markets, and at hotels and public-houses
by persons who pretend to be travellers, and who order goods from
tradespeople in the provincial towns, and pay them with forged notes.
This is often done before banking-hours on the Monday, when they might
be detected, but by this time the person who may have offered them has
left the town. This is the common way of putting them off in London
and the other towns in England. Sometimes they utter them by sending a
woman, dressed as a servant, to a public-house or to a tradesman for
some article, and in this manner get them exchanged--perhaps giving the
address of her master as residing in the vicinity, which is sure to be
false. Tradesmen are frequently taken off their guard by this means,
and give an article, often of small value, with the change in return
for a note. They sometimes do not discover it to be false till several
days afterwards, when it is taken to the bank and detected there.
An experienced banking clerk or a keen-eyed detective, accustomed to
inspect such notes, know them at once. It sometimes happens they are
so well executed that they pass through provincial banks, and are not
detected till they come to the Bank of England.
They generally consist of 5_l._ or 10_l._ notes, and are given to
agents who sell them to the utterer, and the makers are not known to
them. Knowingly to have in our possession a forged bank note, without a
lawful excuse, the proof of which lies on the party charged, or to have
forging instruments in our possession, is a criminal offence.
There are also forged notes of provincial banks, but these are not so
numerous as those of the Bank of England. The provincial banks have
generally colours and engine-turned engraving on their notes. Some have
a portion of the note pink, green, or other colours, more difficult and
expensive to forge than the Bank of England note, which is on plain
paper with an elaborate water-mark.
Numerous cases occur before the criminal courts, where utterers of
forged notes are convicted and punished.
A case of this kind was tried at Guildhall, in October, 1861. A
marine-store dealer in Lower Whitecross-street was charged with
feloniously uttering two forged Bank of England notes for 5_l._ and
10_l._, with the intent to defraud Mr. Crouch, the proprietor of the
“Queen’s Head” tavern, in Whitecross Street.
The store-dealer had waited on him to get them exchanged. Mr. Crouch
paid them to his distiller, who took them to the Bank of England, when
they were sent back, detected as forgeries.
The prisoner was committed to Newgate.
Many forged notes of the Bank of England are now in circulation. They
may be detected by wetting them, when the water-mark disappears. The
vignette is often clumsily engraved. In other respects the forgery is
cleverly executed.
_Cheques._--A cheque is a draft or order on a banker, by a person
who has money in the bank, directing the banker to pay the sum named
therein to the bearer or the person named in the cheque, which must be
signed by the drawer. Cheques are generally payable to the bearer, but
sometimes made payable to the person who is named therein. The place
of issue must be named, and the check must bear the date of issue. A
_crossed_ cheque has the name of a banker written across the face of
it, and must be paid through that banker. If presented by any other
person it is not paid without rigid inquiry. The word banker includes
any person, corporation, or Joint-Stock Company, acting as bankers.
The form of the cheque is seldom forged; it is generally the signature.
Sometimes the body of the cheque that contains the genuine signature
is forged. For instance, in a cheque for eight pounds the letter “y”
may be added to the word “eight,” which makes it “eighty;” and a
cypher appended to the figure “8” making it “80,” to correspond with
the writing. The forms of cheques are frequently obtained by means of
a forged order, such as A knowing B to have an account at a bank, A
writes a letter to the banker purporting to come from B, asking for
a cheque-book, which the banker frequently sends on the faith of the
letter being genuine. Sometimes cheque-books are stolen by burglars and
other thieves who enter business premises. By some device they get the
signature of a person who has money in that bank, and forge it to the
stolen cheques. It has been known for forgers who wanted to obtain
money from a bank, to go to a solicitor whom they knew kept a bank
account. One of them would instruct the solicitor to enter an action
against one of his confederates for a pretended debt. After proceedings
had been instituted the party would pay the amount claimed to the
solicitor; and his companion, who had given instructions in reference
to the action, then goes and gets a cheque for the amount, and by
that means obtains the genuine signature, and is enabled to insert a
facsimile of it in forged cheques. By this means he obtains money from
the bank. Cases of this kind very frequently occur.
Sometimes forgeries are done by clerks and others who have an
opportunity of getting the signature of their employer. They forge his
name, or alter the body of the cheque. In many commercial houses the
body of the cheque is filled up by the confidential clerk and taken to
the head of the firm, who signs it. These forgeries are sometimes for a
small sum, at other times for a large amount.
Several cases of uttering forged cheques were lately tried before the
police-courts.
A respectable-looking young woman, who described herself as a domestic
servant, was brought before the Lord Mayor, charged with uttering a
cheque for 5_l._ 18_s._, purporting to be signed by Mr. W. P. Bennett,
with intent to defraud a banking firm in London. She had recently been
on a visit to London, and had been lent a small sum of money by another
servant in town, along with some dresses, amounting to 10_s._ 6_d._
On the 30th October the latter young woman received a letter from the
prisoner, enclosing a forged cheque, and at the same time stating that
a young man with whom she had been keeping company had died, and had
given her this cheque to get cashed. If the servant could not get away
to get the cheque cashed, the prisoner wished her to lend her what she
was able, to go to the young man’s funeral. On presenting the cheque at
the banker’s the forgery was discovered.
It appeared from the evidence that the prisoner had been lodging in the
same house with Mr. Bennett, whose signature she forged.
A young man of respectable appearance residing in the neighbourhood of
Fleet Street, was tried at Guildhall lately, charged with uttering a
cheque for 6_l._, well knowing the same to be a forgery. He had gone
to the landlord of a public-house in Essex Street, Bouverie Street,
and asked him to cash it. It was drawn by Josiah Evans in favour of
C. B. Bennett, Esq., and indorsed by the latter. The cheque was on Sir
Benjamin Hayward, Bart., & Co., of Manchester. When presented at the
bank, it was returned with a note stating that no such person had an
account there, and they did not know any of the names. The criminal was
then arrested, and committed for trial.
_Forged Acceptance._--A bill of exchange is a mercantile contract
written on a slip of paper, whereby one person requests another to pay
money on his account to a third person at the time therein specified.
The person who draws the bill is termed the drawer, the party to whom
it is addressed before acceptance is called the drawee--afterwards
the acceptor. The party for whom it is drawn is termed the payee, who
indorses the bill, and is then styled the indorser, and the party to
whom he transfers it is called the indorsee. The person in possession
of the bill is termed the holder.
An acceptance is an engagement to pay the bill, the person writing
the word accepted across the bill with his name under it. This may be
_absolute_ or _qualified_. An _absolute_ acceptance is an engagement
to pay the bill according to its request. A _qualified_ acceptance
undertakes to do it conditionally.
Bills are either inland or foreign. The inland bill is on one piece of
paper; foreign bills generally consist of three parts called a “set;”
so that should the bearer lose one, he may receive payment for the
other. Each part contains a condition that it shall be paid provided
the others are unpaid. These bills require to have a stamp of proper
value to make them valid.
Forgeries of bills seldom consist of the whole bill, but either the
acceptor’s signature, or that of the drawer, or the indorser. Sometimes
the contents of the bill is altered to make it payable earlier.
These forgeries are not so numerous, and are frequently done by parties
who get the bills in a surreptitious way. It often happens that one
party draws the bill in another name, forging the acceptance, and
passes it to a third party who is innocent of the forgery. If the
person who forged the acceptance, pays the money to the bank where the
bill is payable when it is due, the forgery is not detected. When he is
not able to pay in the money it is discovered. It happens in this way:
A B and C are commercial men, A stands well in the commercial world;
B draws a bill in his name, and without his knowledge. The name of A
being good, the bill passes to C without any suspicion. If B can meet
it at the time it is due, A does not know that his name has been used.
If the bill is not paid at the proper time, C takes it to A, and thus
discovers the forgery.
_Forged Wills._--A will is a written document in which the testator
disposes of his property after his death. It is not necessary that
it should be written on stamped paper, as no stamp duty is required
till the death of the testator, when the will is proved in court in
the district where he resided. The essentials are that it should be
legible, and so intelligible, that the testator’s intention can be
clearly understood.
If the will is not signed by the testator, it must be signed by some
other person by his direction, and in his presence; two or more
witnesses being present who must attest that the will was signed, and
the signature acknowledged by the testator in their presence.
No will is valid unless signed at the foot of the page, or at the end
by the testator, or by some other person in his presence, and by his
direction. Marriage revokes a will previously made.
A codicil is a supplement, or addition to the will, altering some
part, or making an addition. It may be written on the same document,
or on another paper, and folded up with the original instrument. There
can only be one will, yet there may be a number of codicils attached
to it, and the last is equally binding as the first, if they are not
contradictory.
Forgeries of wills are generally done by relations, who get a
fictitious will prepared in their favour contrary to the genuine will.
On the death of the supposed testator, the forged will is put forth as
the genuine one, and the other is destroyed.
All parties expecting property on the death of a relative or friend,
and finding none, should be careful to have the signatures of the
witnesses examined, to test whether they are genuine; and also the
signature of the testator.
Every will can be seen at the district court, where they are proved,
on the payment of a shilling. Such an examination is the only likely
method of detecting the forgery.
There are several other classes of forgery in addition to those already
noticed, such as forging certificates of character, and bills of lading.
A case of the latter kind was recently tried at Guildhall. A merchant,
near the Haymarket, and an artist also in the West-end, were arraigned
with having feloniously forged and altered certain bills of lading;
one of these represented ten casks of alkali amounting to the value of
84_l._, and another, twenty-six casks of alkali worth 140_l._, with the
intention of defrauding certain merchants in London. All the bills of
lading were with one exception to a certain extent genuine, that is,
were filled up in the first instance. But after being signed by the
wharfinger, they were altered by the introduction of words and figures,
to represent a larger quantity of goods than had been shipped. The
prisoners were committed for trial.
Number of cases of forgery in the metropolitan
districts for the year 1860 27
Ditto ditto in the City 20
--
47
Amount of loss thereby in the metropolitan
districts £254
Ditto ditto in the City 736
----
£990
CHEATS.
EMBEZZLERS.
This is the crime of a servant appropriating to his own use the money
or goods received by him on account of his master, and is perpetrated
in the metropolis by persons both in inferior and superior positions.
Were a party to advance money or goods to an acquaintance or friend,
for which the latter did not give a proper return, the case would be
different, and require to be sued for in a civil action.
Embezzlement is often committed by journeymen bakers entrusted by
their employers with quantities of bread to distribute to customers
in different parts of the metropolis, by brewer’s draymen delivering
malt liquors, by carmen and others engaged in their various errands. A
case of this kind occurred recently. A carman in the service of a coal
merchant in the West-end was charged with embezzling 6_l._ 1_s._ 6_d._
He had been in the habit of going out with coals to customers, and was
empowered to receive the money, but had gone into a public-house on his
return, got intoxicated, and lost the whole of his cash. He was tried
at Westminster Police Court, and sentenced to pay a fine of 10_l._ with
costs. This crime is frequent among this class. The chief inducements
which lead to it are the habits of drinking, prevalent among them,
gambling in beer-shops, attending music-saloons, such as the Mogul,
Drury Lane, and Paddy’s Goose, Ratcliffe Highway, and attending running
matches. Their pay is not sufficient to enable them to indulge in those
habits, and this leads them to commit the crime of embezzlement.
Persons in trade frequently send out their shopmen to receive orders,
and obtain payment for goods supplied to families at their residence,
and are occasionally entrusted with goods on stalls. In June, 1861, a
respectable-looking young man, was placed at the bar of the Southwark
Police Court, charged with having embezzled 39_l._, the property of
a bookselling firm in the Strand. He had been entrusted with a stall
where he sold books and newspapers, and was called to account for
the receipts daily. One day he neglected to send 8_l._, the receipts
of the previous Saturday, and for other seven days he had given no
proper count and reckoning. He admitted the neglect, and confessed he
had appropriated the money. He was paid at the rate of 1_l._ 10_s._ a
month, which with commission amounted to about 6_l._ or 7_l._
A clerk and salesman in the service of a draper in Camberwell, was
charged with embezzling various sums of money belonging to his
employer. It was his duty each night to account for the goods he
disposed of, and the money he received. One morning he went out with
a quantity of goods, and did not return at the proper time, when his
employer found him in a beershop in the Blackfriars Road. On asking
him what had become of the goods, he replied he had left them at a
public-house in the Borough, which was untrue. In the account-book
found upon him it was ascertained that he had received several sums of
money he had not accounted for.
A robbery by a young man of this class was very ingeniously detected a
few weeks ago, and brought before the Marlborough Police Court.
A shopman to a cheesemonger in Oxford Street was charged with stealing
money from the till. He had been in his employer’s service for ten
months, and served at the counter along with three other shopmen. The
cheesemonger having found a considerable deficiency in his receipts
suspected his honesty, especially as he was in the habit of attending
places of amusement, and indulging in other extravagances he knew were
beyond his means. He marked three half-crowns, and put them in the till
to which the young man had access. Soon after he saw the latter put
in his hand, and take out a piece of money. He made an excuse to send
the shopman out for a moment, and on examining the till, missed one
of the marked pieces of money. He thereupon gave information to the
police, and again placed money in the till similarly marked, leaving
a police-officer on the watch. The shopman was again detected, he was
then arrested, and taken to the police-station.
Many young men of this class are wretchedly paid by their employers,
and have barely enough to maintain them and keep them in decent
clothing. Many of them spend their money foolishly on extravagant
dress, or associating with girls, attending music-saloons, such as
Weston’s, in Holborn; the Pavilion, near the Haymarket; Canterbury
Hall; the Philharmonic, Islington; and others. Some frequent the
Grecian Theatre, City Road, and other gay resorts, and are led into
crime. In one season eighteen girls were known to have been seduced
by fast young men, and to become prostitutes through attending
music-saloons in the neighbourhood of Tottenham Court Road.
Embezzlements are occasionally committed by females of various classes.
Some of them, by fraudulent representations, obtain goods from various
tradesmen, consisting of candles, soap, sugar, as on account of their
customers. Some women of a higher class, such as dressmakers, and
others, are entrusted with merinos, silks, satins, and other drapery
goods which they embezzle.
A young married woman was lately tried at Guildhall, on a charge of
disposing of a quantity of silk entrusted to her. It appeared from
the evidence of the salesman of the silk manufacturer, that this
female applied to him for work, at same time producing a written
recommendation, purporting to come from a person known by the firm.
Materials to the value of 5_l._ 15_s._ were given her to be wrought up
into an article of dress. On applying for it at the proper time, he
found she had sold the materials, and had left her lodging. While the
work was supposed to be in progress, the firm had also given her 2_l._
13_s._, on partial payment. She pleaded poverty as the cause of her
embezzling the goods.
Parties connected with public societies occasionally embezzle the money
committed to their charge. The secretary of a friendly society in the
east-end, was brought before the Thames Police Court, charged with
embezzling various sums of money he had received on account of the
society. The secretary of another friendly society on the Surrey side,
was lately charged at Southwark Police Court with embezzling upwards
of 100_l._ This society has branches in all parts of the kingdom, but
the central office is in the metropolis. The secretary had been in
their service for upwards of two years, at a fixed salary. It was his
duty to receive contributions from the country, and town members; and
to account for the same to the treasurer. He recently absconded, when
large defalcations were discovered amounting to upwards of 100_l._
A considerable number of embezzlements are committed by commercial
travellers, and by clerks in lawyers’ offices, banks, commercial firms,
and government offices. Some of them of great and serious amounts.
Tradesmen and others in the middle class, and some respectable
labouring men, and mechanics, place their sons in counting-houses, or
other establishments superior to their own position; these foolishly
try to maintain the appearance of their fellow-clerks who have ampler
pecuniary means. This often leads to embezzling the property of the
employer or firm.
Crimes of this class are occasionally committed by lawyers’ clerks, who
are in many cases wretchedly paid, as well as by some who have handsome
salaries. Numerous embezzlements are also perpetrated in commercial
firms, by their servants; some of them to the value of many thousand
pounds.
A commercial traveller was lately brought up at the Mansion House,
charged with embezzlement. It appears he travelled for a firm in
the City, and had been above ten years in their service at a salary
of 1_l._ 1_s._ per day. It was his duty to take orders and collect
accounts as they became due. Some days he received from the customers
certain sums and afterwards paid a less amount to the firm, keeping the
rest of the money in his hands, which he appropriated. Another day he
received a sum of money he never accounted for. He was committed for
trial.
An embezzlement was committed by a cashier to a commercial firm in the
City. It appeared from the evidence, he had been in the service of his
employers for ten years, and kept the petty cash-book; with an account
of all sums paid. He had to account for the amounts given him as petty
cash, and for disbursements whenever he should be called.
From the extravagant style in which he was living, which reached
the ear of the firm, their suspicions were aroused, and one of them
asked him to bring his books into the counting-house, and render the
customary account of the petty cash. His employer discovered the
balance of some of the pages did not correspond with the balance
brought forward, and asked the cashier to account for it; when he
acknowledged that he had appropriated the difference to his own use.
Several items were then pointed out, ranging over a number of months,
in which he had plundered his employers of several hundred pounds.
This was effected in a very simple way; by carrying the balance of the
cash in hand to the top of next page 100_l._ less than it was on the
preceding page, and by calling the disbursements when his employers
checked the accounts, 100_l._ more than they really were.
The books of commercial firms are frequently falsified in other modes,
to effect embezzlements.
These defalcations often arise from fast life, extravagant habits,
and gambling. Many fashionable clerks in lawyers’ offices, banks, and
Government offices, frequent the Oxford and Alhambra music halls,
the West-end theatres, concerts, and operas. They attend the Holborn
Assembly-room and the Argyle Rooms, and are frequently to be seen
at masked balls, and at Cremorne Gardens during the season. They
occasionally indulge in midnight carousals in the Turkish divans and
supper-rooms. Some Government clerks have high salaries, and keep a
mistress in fashionable style, with brougham and coachman, and footman;
others maintain their family in a style their salary is unable to
support, all of which lead them step by step to embezzlement and ruin.
Number of cases of embezzlement in the
Metropolitan districts for 1860 223
Ditto ditto in the City 70
---
293
Value of money and property abstracted
thereby in the Metropolitan districts-- £5,271
Ditto ditto in the City 2,660
------
£7,931
MAGSMEN, OR SHARPERS.
This is a peculiar class of unprincipled men, who play tricks with
cards, skittles, &c. &c., and lay wagers with the view of cheating
those strangers who may have the misfortune to be in their company.
Their mode of operation is this: There are generally three of them in
a gang--seldom or never less. They go out together, but do not walk
beside each other when they are at work. One may be on the one side of
the street, and the other two arm-in-arm on the other. They generally
dress well, and in various styles, some are attired as gentlemen,
others as country farmers. In one gang, a sharper is dressed as a
coachman in livery, and in another they have a confederate attired as a
parson, and wearing green spectacles.
Many of them start early in the morning from the bottom of Holborn
Hill, and branch off in different directions in search of dupes.
They frequent Fleet Street, Oxford Street, Strand, Regent Street,
Shoreditch, Whitechapel, Commercial Road, the vicinity of the railway
stations, and the docks. They are generally to be seen wandering about
the streets till four o’clock in the afternoon, unless they have
succeeded in picking up a stranger likely to be a victim. They visit
the British Museum, St. Paul’s, Westminster Abbey, and the Crystal
Palace, &c., and on market days attend the fairs.
The person who walks the street in front of the gang, is generally the
most engaging and social; the other two keep in sight, and watch his
movements. As the former proceeds along he keenly observes the persons
passing. If he sees a countryman or a foreigner pass who appears to
have money, or a person loitering by a shop-window, he steps up to him
and probably enters into conversation regarding some object in sight.
For instance, in passing Somerset House in the Strand, he will go
up to him and ask what noble building that is, hinting at the same
time that he is a stranger in London. It frequently occurs that the
individual he addresses is also a stranger in London. Having entered
into conversation, the first object he has in view is to learn from
the person the locality to which he belongs. The sharp informs him he
has some relation there, or knows some person in the town or district.
(Many of the magsmen have travelled a good deal, and are acquainted
with many localities, some of them speak several foreign languages.) He
may then represent that he has a good deal of property, and is going
back to this village to give so much money to the poor. It sometimes
occurs in the course of conversation he proposes to give the stranger
a sum of money to distribute among the poor of his district, as he is
specially interested in them, and may at the same time produce his
pocket-book, with a bundle of flash notes. This may occur in walking
along the street. He will then propose to enter a beer-shop, or
gin-palace to have a glass of ale or wine. They go in accordingly. When
standing at the bar, or seated in the parlour, one of his confederates,
enters, and calls for a glass of liquor.
This party appears to be a total stranger to his companion. He soon
enters as it were casually into conversation, and they possibly speak
of their bodily strength. A bet is made that one of them cannot throw a
weight as many yards as the other. They make a wager, and the stranger
is asked to go with them as a referee, to decide the bet. They may call
a cab, and adjourn to some well-known skittle-alley. On going there
they find another confederate, who also pretends to be unacquainted
with the others. One of the two who made the wager as to throwing the
weight may pace the skittle-ground to find its dimensions, and pretend
it is not long enough.
They will then possibly propose to have a game at skittles, and will
bet with each other that they will throw down the pins in so many
throws.
The sharp who introduced the stranger, and assumes to be his friend,
always is allowed to win, perhaps from 5_s._ to 10_s._, or more, as the
case may be. He plays well, and the other is not so good. Up to this
time the intended victim has no hand in the game. Another bet is made,
and the stranger is possibly induced to join in it with his agreeable
companion, and it is generally arranged that he wins the first time.
He is persuaded to bet for a higher amount by himself, and not in
partnership, which he loses, and continues to do so every time till he
has lost all he possessed.
He is invariably called out to the bar by the man who introduced him
to the house, when they have a glass together, and in the meantime the
others escape.
The sharp will say to the victim after staying there a short time, “I
believe these men not to be honest; I’ll go and see where they have
gone, and try and get your money back.” He goes out with the pretence
of looking after them, and walks off. The victim proceeds in search of
them, and finds they have decamped leaving him penniless.
They have a very ingenious mode of finding out if the person they
accost has money in his pocket. This is done after he is introduced
into the public-house when getting a glass of ale. The second
confederate comes in invariably. The two magsmen begin to converse as
to the money they have with them. One pretends he has so much money,
which the other will dispute. They possibly appear to get very angry,
and one of them makes a bet that he can produce more money than any in
the company. They then take out their cash, and induce the stranger
to do so, to find which of them has got the highest amount. They thus
learn how much money he has in his possession.
When they find he has a sufficient sum, they adjourn to a house they
are accustomed to use for the purpose of paying the sum lost by the
wager. It generally happens the stranger has most, and wins the bet.
On arriving at this house they wish a stamped receipt for the cash.
Being a stranger he is asked as a security to leave something as a
deposit till he returns. At the same time this sharp takes out a bag of
money containing medals instead of sovereigns, or a pocket-book with
flash notes.
He soon comes back with a receipt stamp, but a dispute invariably
arises whether it will do. He suggests that some one else should go and
get one. The stranger is urged to go for one. In the same manner he
leaves money on the table as a security that he will return.
He may not know where to get the receipt stamp, and one of them
proposes to accompany him. They walk along some distance together, when
this man will say, “I don’t much like these two men you have left your
money with; do you know them?” He will then advise him to go back, and
see if his cash is all right. On his return he finds them both gone,
and his money has also disappeared.
We shall now notice several of the tricks they practise to delude their
victims.
[Illustration: LIBERATION OF PRISONERS FROM COLDBATH FIELDS HOUSE OF
CORRECTION.]
_The Card tricks._--These are not often practised in London but
generally at racecourses and country fairs, or where any pastime is
going on. Only three cards are used. There is one picture card along
with two others. They play with them generally on the ground or on
their knee. There are always several persons in a gang at this game.
One works the cards, shuffling them together, and then deals them on
the ground. They bet two to one no one will find the picture card (the
Knave, King, or Queen). One of the confederates makes a bet that he can
find it, and throws down a sovereign or half-sovereign, as the case
may be.
He picks up one of the cards, which will be the picture card, or the
one they propose to find. The sharp dealing the cards bets that no
one will find the same card again. Some simpleton in the crowd will
possibly bet from 1_l._ to 10_l._ that he can find it. He picks up
a card, which is not the picture card and cannot be, as it has been
secretly removed from the pack, and another card has been substituted
in its place.
_Skittles._--They generally depend on the ability of one of their
gang when engaged in this game, so that he shall be able to take the
advantage when wanted. When they bet and find their opponent is expert,
he is expected to be able to beat him. In every gang there is generally
one superior player. He may pretend to play indifferently for a time,
but has generally superior skill, and wins the bet.
_Thimble and Pea._--It is done in this way. There are three thimbles
and a pea. These are generally worked by a man dressed as a countryman,
with a smock-frock, at country fairs, race-courses, and other places
without the metropolitan police district. They commence by working the
pea from one thimble to another, similar to the card trick, and bet in
the same way until some person in the company--not a confederate--will
bet that he can find the pea. He lifts up one of the thimbles and
ascertains that it is not there. Meantime the pea has been removed. It
is secreted under the thumb nail of the sharp, and is not under either
of the thimbles.
_The Lock._--While the sharps are seated in a convenient house with
their dupe, a man, a confederate of theirs, may come in, dressed as
a hawker, offering various articles for sale. He will produce a lock
which can be easily opened by a key in their presence. He throws the
lock down on the table and bets any one in the room they cannot open
it. One of his companions will make a bet that he can open it. He takes
it up, opens it easily, and wins the wager.
He will show the stranger how it is opened; after which, by a swift
movement of his hand, he substitutes another similar lock in its place
which cannot be opened. The former is induced possibly to bet that he
is able to open it.
The lock is handed to him; he thinks it is the same and tries to open
it, but does not succeed, and loses his wager.
There are various other tricks somewhat of a similar character, on
which they lay wagers and plunder their dupes. They have a considerable
number of moves with cards, and are ever inventing new dodges or
“pulls” as they term them.
They chiefly confine themselves on most occasions to the tricks we have
noticed. Sometimes, however, they play at whist, cribbage, roulette,
loo, and other card games, and manage to get the advantage in many
ways. One of them will look at the cards of his opponent when playing,
and will telegraph to some of the others by various signs and motions,
understood among themselves, but unintelligible to a stranger.
The same sharpers who walk the streets of London attend country fairs
and race-courses, in different dress and appearance, as if they had no
connexion with each other.
It often happens one of them is arrested for these offences and is
remanded. Before the expiry of the time his confederates generally
manage to see the dupe, and restore his property on the condition he
shall keep out of the way and allow the case to drop. The female who
cohabits with him, or possibly his wife, may call on him for this
purpose, and give him part or the whole of his money.
Their ages average from twenty to sixty years. Many of them are married
and have families; others cohabit with well-dressed women--pickpockets
and shoplifters.
Some are in better condition than others. They are occasionally
shabbily dressed and in needy condition; at other times in most
respectable attire--some appear as men of fashion.
They are generally very heartless in plundering their dupes.
Not content with stripping him of the money he may have on his
person--sometimes a large sum--they try to get the cash he has
deposited in the bank, and strip him of his watch and chain, leaving
him without a shilling in his pocket.
There is no formal association between the several gangs, yet from
their movements there appears to be an understanding between them. For
example, if a certain gang has plundered a victim in Oxford Street, it
will likely remove to another district for a time, and another party of
magsmen will take their place.
Magsmen are of various grades. Some are broken-down tradesmen, others
have been brokers and publicans and french-polishers, while part of
their number are convicted felons. Numbers of them are betting-men and
attend races; indeed most of them are connected with this disreputable
class. Many of them reside in the neighbourhood of Waterloo Road and
King’s Cross, and in quiet streets over the metropolis.
They are frequently brought before the police-courts, charged with
conspiracy with intent to defraud; but the matter is in general
secretly arranged with the prosecutor, and the case is allowed to drop.
Sometimes when the sharps cannot manage to defraud the strangers they
meet with, they snatch their money from them with violence.
In the beginning of November, 1861, two sharps were brought before the
Croydon police-court, charged with being concerned, with others not in
custody, in stealing 116_l._, the property of a baker, residing in the
country.
As the prosecutor, a young man, was going along a country road he met
one of the sharps and a man not in custody. At this time there were
four men on the road playing cards. He remained for a few minutes
looking at them. The man who was the companion of the sharp asked him
to accompany him to a railway hotel, and ordered a glass of ale for
himself.
A man not in custody then asked a sharp to lend him some money, saying
he would get him good security; upon which the latter offered to lend
him the sum of 50_l._ at five per cent. interest. On the stranger being
represented to this person as a friend, he offered to lend him as
large a sum of money as he could produce himself, to show that he was
a respectable and substantial person. The sharp then told the baker to
go home and get 100_l._ and he would lend him that sum. He did so, one
of the sharps accompanying him nearly all the way to his house. The
dupe returned with a 10_l._ note. They told him it was not enough, and
wished him to leave it in their hands and to bring 100_l._ He went out
leaving the 10_l._ on the table as security for his coming back with
more money.
He returned with 100_l._ in bank notes and gold and counted it out on
the table. The sharp pretended then to be willing to lend 100_l._ at
five per cent., but added that he must have a stamped receipt. The dupe
left his money on the table covered with his handkerchief, and went out
to get a stamp, and on his return found the sharps and his money had
disappeared.
A few days after, the victim happening to be in London, saw one of them
in the street, and gave him into custody.
A few weeks ago three skittle-sharps, well-dressed men, were brought
before the Southwark police court, charged with robbing a country
waiter of 40_l._ in Bank of England notes. It appeared from the
evidence, that the prosecutor met a man in High Street, Southwark, on
an afternoon, who offered to show him the way to the Borough Road.
They entered a public-house on the way, when the other prisoners came
in. One of them pulled out a number of notes, and said he had just
come into possession of a fortune. It was suggested, in the course of
conversation, they should go to another house to throw a weight, and
the prosecutor was to go and see they had fair play.
They accordingly went to another house, but instead of throwing the
weight, skittles were introduced, and they played several games. The
prosecutor lost a sovereign, which was all the money he had with
him. One of the sharps bet 20_l._ that the waiter could not produce
60_l._ within three hours. He accepted the bet and went with two of
them to Blackheath, and returned to the public house with the money,
amounting to 40_l._ in bank notes and 20_l._ in gold. They went to the
skittle-ground, when one of them snatched the notes out of his hand,
and they all decamped.
They were apprehended that night by Mr. Jones, detective at Tower
Street station.
The statistics of this class of crime will be given when we come to
treat of swindlers.
SWINDLERS.
Swindling is carried on very extensively in the metropolis in different
classes of society, from the young man who strolls into a coffeehouse
in Shoreditch or Bishopsgate, and decamps without paying his night’s
lodging, to the fashionable rogue who attends the brilliant assemblies
in the West-end. It occurs in private life and in the commercial world
in different departments of business. Large quantities of goods are
sent from the provinces to parties in London, who give orders and are
entirely unknown to those who send them, and fictitious references are
given, or references to confederates in town connected with them.
We select a few illustrations of various modes of swindling which
prevail over the metropolis.
A young man calls at a coffeehouse, or hotel, or a private lodging, and
represents that he is the son of a gentleman in good position, or that
he is in possession of certain property, left him by his friends, or
that he has a situation in the neighbourhood, and after a few days or
weeks decamps without paying his bill, perhaps leaving behind him an
empty carpet bag, or a trunk, containing a few articles of no value.
An ingenious case of swindling occurred in the City some time since.
A fashionably attired young man occupied a small office in White Lion
Court, Cornhill, London. It contained no furniture, except two chairs
and a desk. He obtained a number of bracelets from different jewellers,
and quantities of goods from different tradesmen to a considerable
amount, under false pretences. He was apprehended and tried before the
police court, and sentenced to twelve months’ imprisonment with hard
labour.
At the time of his arrest he had obtained possession of a handsome
residence at Abbey Wood, Kent, which was evidently intended as a place
of reference, where no doubt he purposed to carry on a profitable
system of swindling.
Swindlers have many ingenious modes of obtaining goods, sometimes to
a very considerable amount, from credulous tradesmen, who are too
often ready to be duped by their unprincipled devices. For example,
some of them of respectable or fashionable appearance may pretend they
are about to be married, and wish to have their house furnished. They
give their name and address, and to avoid suspicion may even arrange
particulars as to the manner in which the money is to be paid. A case
of this kind occurred in Grove Terrace, where a furniture-dealer
was requested to call on a swindler by a person who pretended to be
his servant, and received directions to send him various articles
of furniture. The goods were accordingly sent to the house. On a
subsequent day the servant called on him at his premises, with a
well-dressed young lady, whom she introduced as the intended wife of
her employer, and said they had called to select some more goods. They
selected a variety of articles, and desired they should be added to the
account. One day the tradesman called for payment, and was told the
gentleman was then out of town, but would call on him as soon as he
returned. Soon after he made another call at the house, which he found
closed up, and that he had been heartlessly duped. The value of the
goods amounted to 58_l._ 18_s._ 4_d._
Swindling is occasionally carried on in the West-end in a bold and
brilliant style by persons of fashionable appearance and elegant
address. A lady-like person who assumed the name of Mrs. Gordon, and
sometimes Mrs. Major Gordon, and who represented her husband to be
in India, succeeded in obtaining goods from different tradesmen and
mercantile establishments at the West-end to a great amount, and gave
references to a respectable firm as her agents. Possessing a lady-like
appearance and address, she easily succeeded in obtaining a furnished
residence at St. John’s Wood, and applied to a livery stable-keeper for
the loan of a brougham, hired a coachman, and got a suit of livery for
him, and appeared in West-end assemblies as a lady of fashion. After
staying about a fortnight at St. John’s Wood she left suddenly, without
settling with any of her creditors. She addressed a letter to each of
them, requesting that their account should be sent to her agents, and
payment would be made as soon as Captain Gordon’s affairs were settled.
She expressed regret that she had been called away so abruptly on
urgent business.
She was usually accompanied by a little girl, about eleven years of
age, her daughter, and by an elderly woman, who attended to domestic
duties.
She was afterwards convicted at Marylebone police court, under the name
of Mrs. Helen Murray, charged with obtaining large quantities of goods
from West-end tradesmen by fraudulent means.
A considerable traffic in commercial swindling in various forms is
carried on in London. Sometimes fraudulently under the name of another
well-known firm; at other times under the name of a fictitious firm.
A case of this kind was tried at the Liverpool assizes, which
illustrates the fraudulent system we refer to. Charles Howard and John
Owen were indicted for obtaining goods on false pretences. In other
counts of their indictment they were charged with having conspired with
another man named Bonar Russell--not in custody--with obtaining goods
under false pretences. The prosecutor Thomas Parkenson Luthwaite, a
currier at Barton in Westmoreland, received an order by letter from
John Howard and Co. of Droylesden, near Manchester, desiring him to
send them a certain quantity of leather, and reference was given as to
their respectability. The prosecutor sent the leather and a letter by
post containing the invoice. The leather duly arrived at Droylesden;
but the police having received information gave notice to the railway
officials to detain it, until they got further knowledge concerning
them. Howard and Russell went to the station, but were told they could
not get the leather, as there was no such firm as Howard and Co. at
Droylesden. Howard replied that there was--that he lived there. It was
subsequently arranged that the goods should be delivered, on the party
producing a formal order. On the next day, Owen came with a horse and
cart to Droylesden station, and asked for the goods, at the same time
producing his order.
They were delivered to him, when he put them in his cart and drove off.
Two officers of police in plain clothes accosted him, and asked for a
ride in his cart which he refused. The officers followed him, and found
he did not go to Droylesden, but to a house at Hulme near Manchester,
as he had been directed. This house was searched, and Howard and
Russell were arrested. Howard having been admitted to bail, did not
appear at the trial.
On farther inquiries it was found there was no such firm as John
Howard and Co. at Droylesden, but that Howard and Russell had taken a
house there which was not furnished, and where they went occasionally
to receive letters addressed to Howard and Co., Droylesden. Owen was
acquitted; Howard was found guilty of conspiracy with intent to defraud.
A number of cases occur where swindlers attempt to cheat different
societies in various ways. Two men were tried at the police court a few
days ago for unlawfully attempting to cheat and defraud a loan society
to obtain 5_l._ The prisoners formed part of a gang of swindlers,
who operated in this way:--Some of them took a house for the purpose
of giving references to others, who applied to loan societies for an
advance of money, and produced false receipts for rent and taxes.
They had carried on this system for years, and many of them had been
convicted. Some of the gang formerly had an office in Holborn, where
they defrauded young men in search of situations by getting them to
leave a sum of money as security. They were tried and convicted on this
charge.
There is another heartless system of base swindling perpetrated by a
class of cheats, who pretend to assist parties in getting situations,
and hold out flaming inducements through advertisements in the
newspapers to working men, servants, clerks, teachers, clergymen, and
others; and contrive to get a large income by duping the public.
A swindler contrived to obtain sums of 5_s._ each in postage stamps, or
post-office orders, from a large number of people, under pretence of
obtaining situations for them as farm bailiffs. An advertisement was
inserted in the newspaper, and in reply to the several applicants,
a letter was returned, stating that although the applicant was among
the leading competitors another party had secured the place. At the
same time another attempt was made to inveigle the dupe, under the
pretence of paying another fee of 5_s._, with the hope of obtaining a
similar situation in prospect. The swindler intimated that the only
interest he had in the matter was the agent’s fee, charged alike to the
employer and the employed, and generally paid in advance. He desired
that letters addressed to him should be directed to 42, Sydney Street,
Chorlton-upon-Medlock. He had an empty house there, taken for the
purpose, with the convenience of a letter-box in the door into which
the postman dropped letters twice a day. A woman came immediately after
each post and took them away.
On arresting the woman, the officers found in her basket 87 letters,
44 of them containing 5_s._ in postage stamps, or a post-office order
payable to the swindler himself. Nearly all the others were letters
from persons at a distance from a post office, who were unable to remit
the 5_s._, but promised to send the money when they got an opportunity.
On a subsequent day, 120 letters were taken out of the letter-box, most
of them containing a remittance. This system had been in operation
for a month. One day 190 letters were delivered by one post. It was
estimated that no fewer than 3000 letters had come in during the
month, most of them enclosing 5_s._; and it is supposed the swindler
had received about 700_l._, a handsome return for the price of a few
advertisements in newspapers, a few lithographed circulars, a few
postage-stamps, and a quarter of a year’s rent of an empty house.
Another case of a similar kind, occurred at the Maidstone assizes.
Henry Moreton, aged 43, a tall gentlemanly man, and a young woman aged
19 years, were indicted for conspiring to obtain goods and money by
false pretences. The name given by the male prisoner was known to be an
assumed one. It was stated that he was well connected and formerly in a
good position in society.
At the trial, a witness deposed that an advertisement had appeared in
a Cornish newspaper, addressed to Cornish miners, stating they could
be sent out to Australia by an English gold-mining company, and would
be paid 20_l._ of wages per month, to commence on their arrival at the
mines. The advertisement also stated that if 1_s._ or twelve postage
stamps were sent to Mr. Henry Moreton, Chatham, a copy of the stamped
agreement and full particulars as to the company, would be given.
The prisoner was arrested, and 41 letters found in his possession,
addressed to “Mr. H. Moreton, Chatham:” 25 of the letters contained
twelve postage stamps each and some of them had 1_s._ inside. It was
ascertained the female cohabited with him. It appeared that he had
pawned 482 stamps on the 14th February, for 1_l._ 15_s._, 289 on the
21st, for 1_l._, and 744 on another day.
Eighty-two letters came in one day chiefly from Ireland and Cornwall.
On searching a box in his room they found a large quantity of Irish and
Cornish newspapers, many of them containing the advertisement referred
to.
He was found guilty, and was sentenced to hard labour for fifteen
months. The young woman was acquitted.
The judge, in passing sentence, observed that the prisoner had been
convicted of swindling poor people, and his being respectably connected
aggravated the case.
We give the following illustration of an English swindler’s adventures
on the Continent.
A married couple were tried at Pau, on a charge of swindling. The
husband represented himself to be the son of a colonel in the English
army and of a Neapolitan princess. His wife pretended to be the
daughter of an English general. They said they were allied to the
families of the Dukes of Norfolk, Leinster, and Devonshire. They
came in a post-chaise to the Hotel de France, accompanied by several
servants, lived in the style of persons of the highest rank, and run
up a bill of 6000 francs. As the landlord declined to give credit
for more, they took a château, which they got fitted up in a costly
way. They paid 2500 francs for rent, and were largely in debt to the
butcher, tailor, grocer, and others. The lady affected to be very
pious, and gave 895 francs to the abbé for masses.
An English lady who came from Brussels to give evidence, stated that
her husband had paid 50,000 francs to release them from a debtors’
prison at Cologne, as he believed them to be what they represented. It
was shown at the trial that they had received letters from Lord Grey,
the King of Holland, and other distinguished personages. They were
convicted of swindling, and condemned to one year’s imprisonment, or to
pay a fine of 200 francs.
On hearing the sentence the woman uttered a piercing cry and fainted
in her husband’s arms, but soon recovered. They were then removed to
prison.
The assumption of a variety of names, some of them of a high-sounding
and pretentious character, is resorted to by swindlers giving orders
for goods by letter from a distance--an address is also assumed of a
nature well calculated to deceive: as an instance, we may mention that
an individual has for a long period of time fared sumptuously upon the
plunder obtained by his fraudulent transactions, of whose aliases and
pseudo residences the following are but a few:--
Creighton Beauchamp Harper; the Russets, near Edenbridge.
Beauchamp Harper; Albion House, Rye.
Charles Creighton Beauchamp Harper; ditto.
Neanberrie Harper, M. N. I.; The Broadlands, Winchelsea.
Beauchamp Harper; Halden House, Lewes.
R. E. Beresford; The Oaklands, Chelmsford.
The majority of these residencies existed only in the imagination of
this indefatigable cosmopolite. In some cases he had christened a
paltry tenement let at the rent of a few shillings per week “House;”
a small cottage in Albion Place, Rye, being magnified into “Albion
House.” When an address is assumed having no existence, his plan is to
request the postmaster of the district to send the letters, &c., to
his real address--generally some little distance off--a similar notice
also being given at the nearest railway station. The goods ordered are
generally of such a nature as to lull suspicion, viz., a gun, as “I am
going to a friend’s grounds to shoot and I want one immediately;” “a
silver cornet;” “two umbrellas, one for me and one for Mrs. Harper;” “a
fashionable bonnet with extra strings, young looking, for Mrs. Harper;”
“white lace frock for Miss Harper, immediately;” “a violet-coloured
velvet bonnet for my sister,” &c., &c., &c., ad infinitum.
A person, pretending to be a German baron, some time ago ordered and
received goods to a large amount from merchants in Glasgow. It was
ascertained he was a swindler. He was a man of about forty years
of age, 5 feet 8 inches high, and was accompanied by a lady about
twenty-five years of age. They were both well-educated people, and
could speak the English language fluently.
A fellow, assuming the name of the Rev. Mr. Williams, pursued a
romantic and adventurous career of swindling in different positions
in society, and was an adept in deception. On one occasion, by
means of forged credentials, he obtained an appointment as curate in
Northamptonshire, where he conducted himself for some time with a most
sanctimonious air. Several marriages were celebrated by him, which
were apparently satisfactorily performed. He obtained many articles of
jewellery from firms in London, who were deceived by his appearance and
position. He wrote several modes of handwriting, and had a plausible
manner of insinuating himself into the good graces of his victims.
He died a very tragical death. Having been arrested for swindling he
was taken to Northampton. On his arrival at the railway station there,
he threw himself across the rails and was crushed to death by the train.
There is a mode of extracting money from the unwary, practised by a
gang of swindlers by means of _mock auctions_. They dispose of watches,
never intended to keep time, and other spurious articles, and have
confederates, or decoys, who pretend to bid for the goods at the
auctions, and sometimes buy them at an under price; but they are by
arrangement returned soon after, and again offered for sale.
We have been favoured with some of the foregoing particulars by the
officials of Stubbs’ Mercantile Offices; the courtesy of the secretary
having also placed the register of that extensive establishment at our
service.
Number of cases of fraud and conspiracy
with intent to defraud in the Metropolitan
districts for 1860 325
Ditto ditto in the City 51
---
376
Value of property thereby abstracted in
the Metropolitan district £3,443
Ditto ditto in the City 2,429
------
£5,872
BEGGARS AND CHEATS.
In primitive times beggars were recognised as a legitimate component
part in the fabric of society. Socially, and apart from state
government, there were, during the patriarchal period, three states of
the community, and these were the landowners, their servants, and the
dependants of both--beggars. There was no disgrace attached to the name
of beggar at this time, for those who lived by charity were persons who
were either too old to work or were incapacitated from work by bodily
affliction. This being the condition of the beggars of the early ages,
it was considered no less a sacred than a social duty to protect them
and relieve their wants. Many illustrious names, both in sacred and
profane history, are associated with systematic mendicancy, and the
very name of “beggar” has derived a sort of classic dignity from this
circumstance. Beggars are frequently mentioned with honour in the Old
Testament; and in the New, one of the most touching incidents in our
Lord’s history has reference to “a certain beggar named Lazarus, which
was laid at the rich man’s gate.” Nor must it be forgotten that the
father of poetry, the immortal Homer, was a beggar and blind, and went
about singing his own verses to excite charity. The name of Belisarius
is more closely associated with the begging exploits ascribed to him
than with his great historical conquests. “Give a halfpenny to a poor
man” was as familiar a phrase in Latin in the old world as it is to-day
in the streets of London. It would be tedious to enumerate all the
instances of honourable beggary which are celebrated in history, or
even to glance at the most notable of them; it will be enough for the
purpose we have in view if I direct attention to the aspects of beggary
at a few marked periods of history.
It will be found that imposture in beggary has invariably been the
offspring of a high state of civilization, and has generally had its
origin in large towns. When mendicancy assumes this form it becomes
a public nuisance, and imperatively calls for prohibitive laws. The
beggar whose poverty is not real, but assumed, is no longer a beggar in
the true sense of the word, but a cheat and an impostor, and as such
he is naturally regarded, not as an object for compassion, but as an
enemy to the state. In all times, however, the real beggar--the poor
wretch who has no means of gaining a livelihood by his labour, the
afflicted outcast, the aged, the forsaken, and the weak--has invariably
commanded the respect and excited the compassion of his more fortunate
fellow-men. The traces of this consideration for beggars which we
find in history are not a little remarkable. In the early Saxon times
the relief of beggars was one of the most honourable duties of the
mistress of the house. Our beautiful English word “lady” derives its
origin from this practice. The mistress of a Saxon household gave
away bread with her own hand to the poor, and thence she was called
“_lef day_” or bread giver, which at a later period was rendered into
_lady_. A well-known incident in the life of Alfred the Great shows
how sacred a duty the giving of alms was regarded at that period. In
early times beggary had even a romantic aspect. Poets celebrated the
wanderings of beggars in so attractive a manner that great personages
would sometimes envy the condition of the ragged mendicant and imitate
his mode of life. James V. of Scotland was so enamoured of the life of
the gaberlunzie man that he assumed his wallet and tattered garments,
and wandered about among his subjects begging from door to door, and
singing ballads for a supper and a night’s lodging. The beggar’s
profession was held in respect at that time, for it had not yet become
associated with imposture; and as the country beggars were also
ballad-singers and story-tellers, their visits were rather welcome than
otherwise. It must also be taken into account that beggars were not
numerous at this period.
It would appear that beggars first began to swarm and become
troublesome and importunate shortly after the Reformation. The
immediate cause of this was the abolition and spoliation of the
monasteries and religious houses by Henry VIII. Whatever amount of
evil they may have done, the monasteries did one good thing--they
assisted the poor and provided for many persons who were unable to
provide for themselves. When the monasteries were demolished and their
revenues confiscated, these dependent persons were cast upon the world
to seek bread where they could find it. As many of them were totally
unaccustomed to labour, they had no resource but to beg. The result was
that the country was soon overrun with beggars, many of whom exacted
alms by violence and by threats. In the course of the next reign we
hear of legislative enactments for the suppression of beggary. The
first efforts in this direction wholly failed to abate the nuisance,
and more stringent acts were passed. In the reign of Charles II.
begging had become so profitable that a great many Irish came over to
this country to pursue it as a trade.
The evil then became so intolerable that a royal proclamation was
issued, specially directed to check the importation of beggars from
Ireland. It is intituled “A Proclamation for the speedy rendering away
of the Irishe Beggars out of this Kingdome into their owne Countrie and
for the Suppressing and Ordering of Rogues and Vagabonds according to
the Laws,” which recites that: “Whereas this realme hath of late been
pestered with great numbers of Irishe beggars who live here idly and
dangerously, and are of ill example to the natives of this kingdome;
and, whereas the multitude of English rogues and vagabonds doe much
more abound than in former tymes--some wandering and begging under the
colour of soldiers and mariners, others under the pretext of impotent
persons, whereby they become a burthen to the good people of the land,
all which happeneth by the neglect of the due execution of the lawes,
formerly with great providence made, for relief of the true poore and
indigent, and for the punishment of sturdy rogues and vagabonds; for
the reforming therefore of soe great a mischiefe, and to prevent the
many dangers which will ensue by the neglect thereof, the king, by
the advice of his privy council and of his judges, commands that all
the laws and statutes now in force for the punishment of rogues and
vagabonds be duly putt in execution; and more particularly that all
Irishe beggars, which now are in any part of this kingdome, wandering
or begging, under what pretence soever, shall forthwith depart this
realme and return to their owne countries, and there abide.” And it
is further directed that all such beggars “shall be conveyed from
constable to constable to Bristoll, Mynhead, Barstable, Chester,
Lyrepool, Milford-haven, and Workington, or such of them as shall be
most convenient.”
We see by this that the state of mendicancy in 1629, was very much what
it is now, and that the artifices and dodges resorted to at that period
were very similar to, and in many cases, exactly the same, as the more
modern impostures which I shall have to expose in the succeeding pages.
THE ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE POOR LAWS.
An Act passed in 1536 (27 Henry VIII. c. 25) is the first by which
voluntary charity was converted into compulsory payment. It enacts that
the head officers of every parish to which the impotent or able-bodied
poor may resort under the provisions of the Act of 1531, shall receive
and keep them, so that none shall be compelled to beg openly. The
able-bodied were to be kept to constant labour, and every parish making
default, was to forfeit 20_s._ a month. The money required for the
support of the poor, was to be collected partly by the head officers
of corporate towns and the churchwardens of parishes, and partly
was to be derived from collections in the churches, and on various
occasions where the clergy had opportunities for exhorting the people
to charity. Alms-giving beyond the town or parish was prohibited on
forfeiture of ten times the amount given. A “sturdy beggar” was to be
whipped the first time he was detected in begging; to have his right
ear cropped for the second offence; and if again guilty of begging
was to be indicted for “wandering, loitering, and idleness,” and if
convicted was “to suffer execution of death as a felon and an enemy of
the Commonwealth.” The severity of this act prevented its execution,
and it was repealed by 1 Edward VI. c. 3 (1547). Under this statute,
every able-bodied person who should not apply himself to some honest
labour, or offer to serve for even meat and drink, was to be taken for
a vagabond, branded on the shoulder and adjudged a slave for two years
to any one who should demand him, to be fed on bread and water and
refuse meat and made to work by being beaten, chained, or otherwise
treated. If he ran away during the two years, he was to be branded on
the cheek and adjudged a slave for life, and if he ran away again he
was to suffer death as a felon. If not demanded as a slave he was to be
kept to hard labour on the highway in chains. The impotent poor were to
be passed to their place of birth or settlement from the hands of one
parish constable to those of another.
The statute was repealed three years afterwards and that of 1531 was
revived. In 1551 an Act was passed which directed that a book should
be kept in every parish containing the names of the householders and
of the impotent poor; that collectors of alms should be appointed who
should “gently ask every man and woman what they of their charity
will give weekly to the relief of the poor.” If any one able to give
should refuse, or discourage others from giving, the ministers and
churchwardens were to exhort him, and failing of success, the bishop
was to admonish him on the subject. This Act, and another made to
enforce it, which was passed in 1555, were wholly ineffectual, and in
1563 it was re-enacted (5 Elizabeth c. 3), with the addition that any
person able to contribute and refusing should be cited by the bishop to
appear at the next sessions before the justices, where if he would not
be persuaded to give, the justices were to tax him according to their
discretion, and on his refusal he was to be committed to gaol until the
sum taxed should be paid, with all arrears.
The next statute on the subject, which was passed in 1572 (14 Eliz. c.
5), shows how ineffectual the previous statutes had been. It enacted
that all rogues, vagabonds and sturdy beggars, including in this
description “all persons whole and mighty in body, able to labour,
not having land or master, nor using any lawful merchandise, craft or
mystery, and all common labourers, able in body, loitering and refusing
to work for such reasonable wage as is commonly given,” should “for the
first offence be grievously whipped and burned through the gristle of
the right ear with a hot iron of the compass of an inch about;” for the
second should be deemed felons; and for the third should suffer death
as felons without benefit of clergy.
For the relief and sustentation of the aged and impotent poor, the
justices of the peace within their several districts were “by their
good discretion” to tax and assess all the inhabitants dwelling
therein. Any one refusing to contribute was to be imprisoned until he
should comply with the assessment. By the statutes 39 of Elizabeth,
c. 3 and 4 (1598), every able-bodied person refusing to work for the
ordinary wages was to be “openly whipped until his body should be
bloody, and forthwith sent from parish to parish, the most strait way
to the parish where he was born, there to put himself to labour as a
true subject ought to do.”
The next Act, the 43 Elizabeth, c. 2, has been in operation from the
time of its enactment in 1601 to the present day. A change in the mode
of administration was, however, effected by the Poor Law Amendment Act
(4 and 5 Wm. IV. c. 76) which was passed in 1834. During that long
period many abuses crept into the administration of the laws relating
to the poor, so that in practice their operation impaired the character
of the most numerous class, and was injurious to the whole country. In
its original provisions the Act of Elizabeth directed the overseers
of the poor in every parish to “take order for setting to work the
children of all such parents as shall not be thought able to maintain
their children,” as well as all such persons as, having no means to
maintain them, use no ordinary trade to get their living by. For this
purpose they were empowered to raise weekly, or otherwise, by “taxation
of every inhabitant, parson, vicar, and other; and of every occupier
of lands, houses, tithes, mines, &c., such sums of money as they shall
require for providing a sufficient stock of flax, hemp, wool and other
ware, or stuff to set the poor on work; and also competent sums for
relief of lame, blind, old and impotent persons, and for putting out
children as apprentices.” Power was given to the justices to send to
the house of correction or common gaol all persons who would not work.
The churchwardens and overseers were further empowered to build poor
houses at the charge of the parish for the reception of the impotent
poor only. The justices were further empowered to assess all persons of
sufficient ability for the relief and maintenance of their children,
grandchildren, and parents. The parish officers were also empowered to
bind as apprentices any children who should be chargeable to the parish.
These simple provisions were in course of time greatly perverted, and
many abuses were introduced into the administration of the poor law.
One of the most mischievous practices was that which was established
by the justices for the county of Berks in 1795, when, in order to
meet the wants of the labouring population, caused by the high price
of provisions, an allowance in proportion to the number of his family
was made out of the parish fund to every labourer who applied for
relief. This allowance fluctuated with the price of the gallon loaf of
second flour, and the scale was so adjusted as to return to each family
the sum which in given number of loaves would cost beyond the price
in years of ordinary abundance. This plan was conceived in a spirit
of benevolence; but the readiness with which it was adopted in all
parts of England clearly shows the want of sound views on the subject.
Under the allowance system the labourer received a part of his means
of subsistence in the form of a parish gift, and as the fund out of
which it was provided was raised from the contributions of those who
did not employ labourers, as well as of those who did, their employers
being able in part to burthen others with the payment for their labour
had a direct interest in perpetuating the system. Those who employed
labourers looked upon the parish contribution as part of the fund out
of which they were to be paid, and accordingly lowered their rate of
wages. The labourers also looked on the fund as a source of wage. The
consequence was, that the labourer looked to the parish, and as a
matter of right, without any regard to his real wants, and he received
the wages of his labour as only one and a secondary source of the means
of subsistence. His character as a labourer became of less value, his
value as a labourer being thus diminished, under the combined operation
of these two causes.
In 1832 a commission was appointed by the Crown, under whose direction
inquiries were made through England and Wales, and the actual condition
of the labouring classes in every parish was ascertained, with the view
of showing the evils of the existing practice and of suggesting some
remedy.
The labour of this inquiry was great; but in a short time a report
was presented by the commissioners, which explained the operation of
the law as administered, with its effects upon different classes, and
suggested remedial measures. This report was presented in 1834, and was
followed by the passing of the Poor Law Amendment Act (4 and 5 Wm. IV.
c. 76) in August of the same year. This Act was again amended by the 7
and 8 Victoria, c. 101 (9th August 1844).
The chief provisions of this law are the appointment of a central
board of three commissioners in London for the general superintendence
and control of all bodies charged with the management of funds for
the relief of the poor. There are nine assistant commissioners; each
of whom has a district; the assistant commissioners are appointed
by and removable by the commissioners; and the whole is under the
direction of the President of the Poor Law Board. The administration
of relief to the poor is under the control of the commissioners, who
make rules and regulations for the purpose. They are empowered to
order workhouses to be built, hired, altered, or enlarged, with the
consent of a majority of a board of guardians. They have the power
of uniting several parishes for the purposes of a more effective and
economical administration of poor relief, but so that the actual
charge in respect to its own poor is defrayed by each parish. These
united parishes or unions are managed by Boards of Guardians, annually
elected by the rate-payers of the various parishes; but the masters
of the workhouses and other paid officers are under the orders of the
commissioners, and removable by them. The system of paying wages partly
out of poor-rates is discontinued, and, except in ordinary cases, of
which the commissioners are the judges, the relief is only to be given
to able-bodied persons, or to their families, within the walls of the
workhouse.
A glance at some of the clauses of the Act 7 and 8 Victoria will show
the present condition of the machinery of the Poor Law, as regards the
latest reforms.
Chapter 101, sect. 12, empowers the Poor Law Commissioners to prescribe
the duties of the masters to whom poor children may be apprenticed, and
the terms and conditions of the indentures of apprenticeship: and no
poor children are in future to be apprenticed by the overseers of any
parish included in any union, or subject to a Board of Guardians under
the provisions of the 4 and 5 Wm. IV. c. 76; but it is declared to be
lawful for the guardians of such union or parish to bind poor children
apprentices. The 13th section abolishes so much of the 43 Eliz., c. 2,
and of the 8 and 9 William III. c. 3, and of all other Acts, as compels
any person to receive any poor child as an apprentice.
The 14th and following sections make some new regulations as to the
number of votes of owners of property and rate-payers in the election
of guardians and in other cases where the consent of the owners and
rate-payers is required for any of the purposes of the 4 and 5 Wm. IV.
c. 76.
The 18th section empowers the commissioners, having due regard to the
relative population or circumstances of any parish, included in a
union, to alter the number of guardians to be elected for such parish
without such consent as is required by the Act of William.
This section also empowers the commissioners to divide parishes which
have more than 20,000 inhabitants, according to the census then last
published, into wards for the purpose of electing guardians, and to
determine the number of guardians to be elected for each ward.
The 25th section provides that so long as any woman’s husband is
beyond the seas, or in custody of the law, or in confinement in a
licensed house or asylum as a lunatic or idiot, all relief given to
such a woman, or to her child or children, shall be given in the same
manner, and subject to the same conditions as if she was a widow; but
the obligation or liability of the husband in respect of such relief
continues as before.
The 26th section empowers the guardians of a parish or union to give
relief to widows under certain conditions, who at the time of their
husband’s death were resident with them in some place other than the
parish of their legal settlement, and not situated in any union in
which such parish is comprised.
The 32nd section provides that the commissioners may combine parishes
and unions in England for the audit of accounts. By the 40th section
the commissioners may, subject to certain restrictions there mentioned,
combine unions or parishes not in union, or such parishes and unions,
into school districts for the management of any class or classes of
infant poor not above the age of 16 years, being chargeable to any such
parish or union, or who are deserted by their parents, or whose parent,
or surviving parent, or guardians are consenting to the placing of such
children in the school of such district.
By the 41st section the commissioners are empowered to declare
parishes, or unions, or parishes and unions within the district of the
metropolitan police, or the city of London, &c., to be combined into
districts for the purpose of founding and managing asylums for the
temporary relief and setting to work therein of destitute homeless poor
who are not charged with any offence, and who may apply for relief, or
become chargeable to the poors’ rates within any such parish or union.
STATISTICS OF THE POOR LAWS.
The salaries and expenses of the commissioners for carrying into
execution the Poor Law Acts in England and Ireland amount to about
56,000_l._
The following statements will show the number of paupers, and the
amounts expended in relieving their wants at various periods since the
year 1783.
The average sum expended for the years 1783,
1784, and 1785, was £1,912,241
1801 4,017,871
1811 6,656,105
1821 6,959,249
1831 6,798,888
1832 7,036,969
1833 6,790,799
1834 6,317,254
1835 5,526,418
1836 4,717,630
1837 4,044,741
1838 4,123,604
1839 4,421,714
1840 4,576,965
1841 4,760,929
1842 4,911,498
1843 5,208,027
1844 4,976,093
1860 5,454,964
Number of indoor and outdoor paupers relieved during the following
years:
Paupers. Proportion per cent.
to Population.
1803 1,040,716 12
1815 1,319,851 13
1832 1,429,356 9
1844 1,477,561 9·3
1860 844,633 4·3
In the last report of the Poor Law Board (that for 1860) it is stated
that for twenty-two years preceding the Poor Law Amendment Act in
1834 the average annual disbursement for the relief of the poor
was 6,505,037_l._, while for the subsequent 25 years it has only
been 5,169,073_l._, the supposed annual saving by the new law being
1,335,964_l._ The average annual cost of the new union-workhouses has
been about 200,000_l._, and the salaries of the paid Union-officers
about 600,000_l._
The strikes of 1860 told severely upon the returns. On July 1st, 1860,
there were 1,751 able-bodied men receiving relief more than on the same
day of the previous year. On new year’s day of 1860 there were 40,972
more persons of all classes in receipt of relief than on the first day
of the preceding year. There were 6,720 more able-bodied men in receipt
of relief, and 7,026 more able-bodied women.
REPORT OF THE POOR LAW BOARD (1860).
The usual statistics of this report show that in the year 1860 the sum
of 5,454,964_l._ was expended for the relief of the poor in England and
Wales, being at the rate per head of the estimated population, of 5_s._
6_d._ The net annual value of the rateable property at the present time
(1860) is 71 millions.
The inefficiency of the Poor Law to meet the wants of the destitute in
times of great and prevailing distress has been demonstrated over and
over again, and at no period more pointedly and decisively than during
the year 1860. On this subject we subjoin the remarks of a writer in
the _Times_ (Feb. 11, 1861). “It is an admitted and notorious fact,
that after a fortnight’s frost the police courts were besieged by
thousands who professed to be starving; the magistrates and officers
of the court undertook the office of almoners in addition to their
other laborious duties; the public poured in their contributions as
they would for the victims of a terrible disaster; for a time we had in
a dozen places a scene that rather took one back to the indiscriminate
dole before the convent door, or the largess flung by the hand among
the crowd at a royal progress than to an institution or custom of
this sensible age. To some it naturally occurred that the Poor Law
ought to have dispensed with this extraordinary exhibition; to others
that no law could meet the emergency.... It was the saturnalia if
not of mendicancy, at least of destitution. The police stood aside
while beggars possessed the thoroughfares on the sole plea of an
extraordinary visitation. There was a fortnight’s frost, so it was
allowable to one class to hold a midnight fair on the Serpentine, and
to another to insist on being maintained at the expense of the public.
Was all this right and proper? We had thought that the race of sturdy
vagrants and valiant beggars was extinct, or at least that they dared
no longer show themselves. But here they were in open day like the
wretches which are said to emerge out of darkness on the day of a
revolution.... When such is the fact, and when it is now admitted by
all to have been not only exceptional, but highly exceptionable, we
may leave others to find out the right shoulders on which the blame
should be laid. For our part we hold that a Poor Law ought to be as
proof against a long frost, or any other general visitation--and there
are many more serious--as a ship ought to be against a storm, or an
embankment against an inundation.”
On the occasion here referred to the Poor Law gave relief to 23,000;
but sent away 17,000 empty-handed, who would have starved but for the
open-handed charity of the public, dispensed in the most liberal spirit
by the metropolitan magistrates.
Mendicancy has always increased to an alarming extent after a war, and
during the time of war, if it has been protracted. There is no doubt
that the calamities of war reduce many respectable persons to want; but
at the same time the circumstances which attend a period of commotion
and trouble always afford opportunities to impostors. Mendicancy had
reached a fearful pitch during the last great war with France; and in
1816, the year after the battle of Waterloo, the large towns were so
infested by beggars of every description that it was deemed necessary
to appoint a select committee of the House of Commons to consider what
could be done to abate the nuisance. The report of this committee
furnishes some interesting particulars of the begging impostures of the
time and of the gains of beggars.
STREET BEGGARS IN 1816.
It was clearly proved that a man with a dog got 30_s._ in one day.
Two houses in St. Giles’s frequented by from 200 to 300 beggars. It
was proved that each beggar made on an average from 3_s._ to 5_s._ a
day. They had grand suppers at midnight, and drank and sang songs until
day-break.
A negro beggar retired to the West Indies, with a fortune of 1,500_l._
The value of 15_s._ 20_s._ and 30_s._ found upon ordinary street
beggars. They get more by begging than they can by work; they get so
much by begging that they never apply for parochial relief.
A manufacturer in Spitalfields stated that there were instances of his
own people leaving profitable work for the purpose of begging.
It was proved that many beggars paid 50_s._ a week for their board.
Beggars stated that they go through 40 streets in a day, and that it is
a poor street that does not yield 2_d._
Beggars are furnished with children at houses in Whitechapel and
Shoreditch; some who look like twins.
A woman with twins who never grew older sat for ten years at the corner
of a street.
Children let out by the day, who carried to their parents 2_s._ 6_d._ a
day as the price paid by the persons who hired them.
A little boy and a little girl earned 8_s._ a day. An instance is
stated of an old woman who kept a night school for instructing children
in the street language, and how to beg.
The number of beggars infesting London at this time (1816) was computed
to be 16,000, of which 6,300 were Irish. We glean further from the
report respecting them.
It appears by the evidence of the person who contracts for carrying
vagrants in and through the county of Middlesex, that he has passed as
many as 12,000 or 13,000 in a year; but no estimate can be formed from
that, as many of them are passed several times in the course of the
year. And it is proved that these people are in the course of eight or
ten days in the same situation; as they find no difficulty in escaping
as soon as they are out of the hands of the Middlesex contractor.
A magistrate in the office at Whitechapel, thinks there is not one who
is not worthless.
The rector of Saint Clement Danes describes them as living very well,
especially if they are pretty well maimed, blind, or if they have
children.
Beggars scarify their feet to make the blood come; share considerable
sums of money, and get scandalously drunk, quarrel, and fight, and
one teaches the other the mode of extorting money; they are the worst
of characters, blasphemous and abusive; when they are detected as
impostors in one parish they go into another.
They eat no broken victuals; but have ham, beef, &c.
Forty or fifty sleep in a house, and are locked in lest they should
carry anything away, and are let out in the morning all at once.
Tear their clothes for an appearance of distress.
Beggars assemble in a morning, and agree what route each shall take.
At some of the houses, the knives and forks chained to the tables, and
other articles chained to the walls.
MENDICANT PENSIONERS.
Some who have pensions as soldiers or sailors were among those who
apply by letters for charity; one sailor who had lost a leg is one of
the most violent and desperate characters in the metropolis.
Among beggars of the very worst class there are about 30 Greenwich
pensioners, who have instruments of music, and go about in parties.
A marine who complained that he had but 7_l._ a year pension, said he
could make a day’s work in an hour in any square in London.
A pensioner who had 18_l._ a year from Chelsea, when taken up for
begging had bank-notes concealed in his waistcoat, and on many of that
description frequently 8_s._ 10_s._ or 12_s._ are found, that they have
got in a day.
Chelsea pensioners beg in all directions at periods between the
receipts of their pensions.
A Chelsea pensioner who receives 1_s._ 6_d._ a day is one of the most
notorious beggars who infest the town.
A Greenwich pensioner of 7_l._ a year, gets from 5_s._ to 10_s._ for
writing begging letters.
BEGGING LETTER WRITERS IN 1816.
Some thousand applications by letters are made for charity to ladies,
noblemen, and gentlemen in the metropolis; two thousand on an average
were within the knowledge of one individual who was employed to make
inquiries. Several persons subsist by writing letters; one woman
profits by the practice, who receives a guinea a week as a legacy from
a relation, and has laid out 200_l._ in the funds. Letters have been
written by the same person in five or six different hands.
Persons who write begging letters are called twopenny-post beggars.
A man who keeps a school writes begging letters for 2_d._ each.
* * * * *
These extracts, culled here and there from a voluminous report, will
suffice to give an idea of the state of mendicancy in the metropolis at
the beginning of the century. The public were so shocked and startled
by the systematic impostures that were brought to light that an effort
was made to protect the charitable by means of an organized system of
inquiry into the character, and condition of all persons who were found
begging. The result of this effort was the establishment in 1818 of the
now well-known
MENDICITY SOCIETY.
The object of this Society was to protect noblemen, gentlemen, and
other persons accustomed to dispense large sums in charity from being
imposed upon by cheats and pretenders, and at the same time to provide,
on behalf of the public, a police system, whose sole and special
function should be the suppression of mendicancy.
The plan of the Society is as follows:--The subscribers receive printed
tickets from the Society, and these they give to beggars instead of
money. The ticket refers the beggar to the Society’s office, and
there his case is enquired into. If he be a deserving person relief
is afforded him from funds placed at the disposal of the Society by
its subscribers. If he is found to be an impostor he is arrested and
prosecuted at the instance of the Society. Governors of this Society
may obtain tickets for distribution at any time. The annual payment of
one guinea constitutes the donor a governor, and the payment of ten
guineas at one time, or within one year, a governor for life. A system
of inquiry into the merits of persons who are in the habit of BEGGING
BY LETTER has been incorporated with the Society’s proceedings, and
the following persons are entitled to refer such letters to the office
for investigation, it being understood that the eventual grant of
relief rests with the subscriber sending the case:--
I. All contributors to the general funds of the Society to the amount
of twenty guineas.
II. All contributors to the general funds of the Society to the amount
of ten guineas, and who also subscribe ONE GUINEA annually.
III. All subscribers of two guineas and upwards per annum.
So successful have been the efforts of this Society in protecting the
charitable from the depredations of begging-letter writers and other
mendicants, that now almost every public man whose prominent position
marks him out for their appeals, contributes to the Society, either
by subscriptions or donation. The Queen herself is the Patron; the
President is the Marquis of Westminster, and among the Vice-Presidents
may be counted three dukes, three marquises, eight earls, one viscount,
a bishop, and a long list of lords and members of parliament.
Altogether the Society has about 2,400 subscribers, whose donations
and subscriptions range from 100_l._ and 50_l._ to 2_l._ and 1_l._ The
total amount of the Society’s income for 1860 was 3,913_l._ 14_s._
2_d._, of which 3,010_l_ 13_s._ 9_d._ was derived from subscriptions
and donations, the remainder being derived from legacies, interest on
stock and the profits of the Society’s works. The expenditure for the
same year was 3,169_l._ 16_s._ 10_d._, and the amount expended in the
relief of mendicants, 906_l._ 9_s._
The meals given in 1860 to persons who were found to be deserving were
42,192.
The unregistered cases (that is, those not thought to require a special
investigation) were 4,224, and the registered cases 430.
The vagrants apprehended were 739; of whom 350 were convicted.
The following Table sets forth the whole of the cases that came under
the notice of the Society in 1860.
Number of registered cases in 1860 430
Of which there appeared to belong--
To parishes in London 151
Country 142
Ireland 82
Scotland 0
Wales 8
France 2
East Indies 7
West Indies 2
America 1
Italy 5
Africa 1
China 1
Switzerland 2
Germany 2
Poland 1
Unknown 7
-- 430
Alleged causes of distress.
Want of employment 395
Age and infirmity 1
Failure in business 1
Foreigners and others desirous of returning
home 22
Sickness and accidents 2
Want of clothing 3
Loss of stock, tools, &c. 1
Loss of character 1
Loss of relations and friends by death,
desertion, imprisonment, &c. 4
-- 430
The various cases were disposed of as follows:--
Referred to London parishes; most of whom
were admitted into workhouses, or obtained
relief through the interference of the Society,
some being previously relieved with money,
food, and clothing 15
Relieved with clothing and sent to their respective
parishes 9
Provided with situations, clothing, tools, goods,
or other means of effectually supporting
themselves 8
New apprehended cases by the Society’s constables
during 1860: a large number of whom
were committed by the magistrates as vagrants;
others were referred to the Society,
and sent to work, the men at the mill, and
stone-breaking, and the women at oakum-picking;
and several were assisted with the
means of returning home 376
Proved on investigation to be undeserving 4
Employed at the mill and oakum picking (not
apprehended cases) 1
Placed in hospitals and assisted with clothing 4
Relieved weekly, where distress appeared temporary,
and clothes, blankets, shoes, &c.
given 13
---
Total 430
The following Table exhibits a statement of the Society’s proceedings
from the first year of its formation to the year 1860:--
Years. Cases registered. Vagrants Meals given.
committed.
1818 3,284 385 16,827
1819 4,682 580 33,013
1820 4,546 359 46,407
1821 2,339 324 28,542
1822 2,235 287 22,232
1823 1,493 193 20,152
1824 1,441 195 25,396
1825 1,096 381 19,600
1826 833 300 22,972
1827 806 403 35,892
1828 1,284 786 21,066
1829 671 602 26,286
1830 848 -- 105,488
1831 1,285 -- 79,156
1832 1,040 -- 73,315
1833 624 -- 37,074
1834 1,226 652 30,513
1835 1,408 1,510 84,717
1836 946 1,004 68,134
1837 1,087 1,090 87,454
1838 1,041 873 155,348
1839 1,055 962 110,943
1840 706 752 113,502
1841 997 1,119 195,625
1842 1,233 1,306 128,914
1843 1,148 1,018 167,126
1844 1,184 937 174,229
1845 1,001 868 165,139
1846 980 778 148,569
1847 910 625 239,171
1848 1,161 979 148,661
1849 1,043 905 64,251
1850 787 570 94,106
1851 1,150 900 102,140
1852 658 607 67,985
1853 419 354 62,788
1854 332 326 52,212
1855 235 239 52,731
1856 325 293 49,806
1857 354 358 54,074
1858 329 298 43,836
1859 364 305 40,256
1860 430 350 42,192
------ ------ ---------
51,016 24,773 3,357,834
Total number of apprehended cases in 1860:--
Committed 350
Discharged 389
--- 739
Non-registered cases during the year 4,224
Registered cases 430
----- 4,654
I will now give a few examples of the cases which ordinarily come under
the notice of the Society.
A DESERVING CASE.
A. L. and her sister, the one a widow, 70, the other a single woman,
55, applied for relief under the following circumstances. They had
for many years been supporting themselves by making children’s
leather-covered toy balls, at one time earning a comfortable living;
but their means were reduced from time to time by the introduction of
India-rubber and gutta-percha, until at last five pence per dozen was
all they could obtain for their labour; and it required both to apply
themselves for many hours to earn that small amount; still, to avoid
the workhouse, they toiled on, until the destruction of Messrs. Payne’s
toy warehouse in Holborn, which threw them entirely out of work, and
reduced them to absolute want. It was thus they were found in the
winter having been frequently without food, fire, or candle, nearly
perishing with cold, and in fear of being turned into the streets for
arrears of rent. Inquiry having been instituted as to their character,
which was found to be exceedingly good, they were relieved for three
months with money and food weekly, besides bedding and clothing being
given to them from the Society’s stores.
ANOTHER.
E. W., the applicant, a widow of a journeyman carpenter, who, in
consequence of his protracted illness and want of employment, was at
the time of his death destitute, and in her confinement at the time
she was visited by the Society. She had three young children incapable
of contributing to their own support, and the parish officers in
consequence were relieving her with a trifle weekly; but she was in a
very low state for want of nourishment. The referee expressed it as
his opinion that she was a very deserving woman, and that on two or
three occasions he had afforded her assistance, and had much pleasure
in recommending her case. Assistance was in consequence given her for
several weeks, for which she appeared very grateful.
AN IMPOSTOR.
J. C. This man, who has been seventeen times apprehended by the
Society’s constables, and as many more by the police, was taken into
custody for begging. He is an old man, and his age usually excites the
sympathy of the public; but he is a gross impostor, and for the last
fifteen years has been about the streets, imposing upon the benevolent.
He has been convicted of stealing books, newspapers, and on one
occasion an inkstand from a coffee house. His appeals to the benevolent
in the streets are very pertinacious, and persons frequently give him
money for the purpose of getting rid of him. He had, when last taken
into custody, 2_l._ 9_s._ 4_d._ secreted about his person, part in
his stockings, which he stated had been given to him to enable him to
leave the country, and a variety of what he represented to be original
verses was found in his possession and produced before the magistrate,
to whom he appealed to sympathise with a poor author. “Pray, sir,” said
he, “look at my verses; you will find that they are such as would be
written by a man of scholastic attainments; they breathe a sentiment
of love and charity, and of generosity to the poor; they are of
scientific interest, and fit for the perusal of royalty.” His sentence
to a month’s imprisonment only evidently surprised him, for which he
thanked the magistrate; but he continued in a suppressed tone of voice:
“But, sir, what about my money?” On being informed that, on account of
his age, it should be returned to him when his time of imprisonment
expired, he indulged in a rhapsody of delight, but begged that his
emotion might not be misconstrued. “It is not the love of money, sir,”
addressing the magistrate, “that moves me thus; it is a far higher
feeling; I have an affectionate heart, sir,--it is gratitude.”
ANOTHER IMPOSTOR.
E. M. C. This man applied for relief during the severity of the
winter of 1860-1, representing himself as in much distress for want
of employment; that he had a wife ill at home, confined to her bed,
and having been for a long time out of work, his three children were
wanting food. Work was accordingly given to him at the Society’s mill,
and he was supplied with food for the immediate wants of his family,
pending inquiry into the truthfulness of his story. It was found that
he was a single man, who, for deceptive purposes, had adopted the name
of a woman with whom he was living, and who had separated from her
husband but a short time previously, and was tutoring her children in
all imaginable kinds of vice. It was also ascertained that the police
had strict orders to watch the man’s movements, for he was known as an
associate of characters of the worst description. He was consequently
discharged from the Society’s works, with a caution against applying to
the benevolent for their sympathy in the future.
* * * * *
The following is the case of a person who applied for charity by
letter, whose case was found to be a deserving one:--
J. W. A middle-aged man of creditable appearance, who had for many
years obtained a livelihood for himself and family (consisting of his
wife and six children) as a clerk and salesman to a respectable firm,
being thrown out of his situation through his employer’s embarrassed
circumstances, became gradually reduced to destitution, and therefore
made application for assistance to a subscriber to the Society. It
appeared upon investigation that he had been most regular in his
attention to his duties, strictly honest, industrious, and sober,
and just at the time of the inquiry it fortunately happened that he
procured another situation, but was hampered with trifling debts
which he incurred while out of employment, which it was necessary to
discharge, as well as procure suitable clothing. His character having
proved satisfactory, the subscriber applied to directed a handsome
donation to be appropriated to his assistance, whereby he was enabled
to overcome his difficulties. He showed himself most grateful for the
assistance.
I shall now, by way of contrast, give the case of two beggars by
letter, who were found to be rank impostors:--
H. G. This man and his wife have been known to the Society for
many years as two of the most persevering and impudent impostors
that ever came under its cognizance. The man, although possessing
considerable ability, and having a respectable situation as a clerk
in a public institution, had become such an habitual drunkard as to
be quite reckless as to what false representations he put forth to
obtain charitable assistance; and finding himself detected in his
various fabricated tales of distress, had the impudence to apply to a
subscriber by letter, wherein he represented that his wife had died
after several months’ severe affliction, which upon inquiry turned
out untrue, his wife being alive and well, and they were living
together at the very time the letter was written. Notwithstanding he
was thus foiled in his endeavours to impose, a few weeks afterwards
the wife had the assurance to send a letter to another subscriber,
craving assistance on account of the death of her husband, and in
order to carry out the deception she dressed herself in widow’s weeds.
The gentleman applied to, however, having some misgivings as to her
representations, fortunately forwarded her appeal to the Society, where
it was ascertained that her husband was also alive and well.
A WELL-EDUCATED BEGGAR.
J. R. P. F. A man about 45 years of age, the son of a much respected
clergyman in Lancashire, who had received a good classical education,
and was capable of gaining an excellent livelihood, applied to various
persons for aid, in consequence, as he said, of being in great distress
through want of a situation. He carefully selected those gentlemen who
were well acquainted with, and respected, his father, some of whom,
mistrusting his representations, forwarded the letters to the Mendicity
Society for inquiry, which proved the applicant to be a most depraved
character, who had been a source of great trouble to his parents for
many years, they having provided him with situations (as teacher
in various respectable establishments) from time to time, and also
furnished him with means of clothing himself respectably; but on every
occasion he remained in his employment but a very short time, before he
gave way to his propensity to drink, and so disgraced himself that his
employers were glad to get rid of him; whereupon he made away with his
clothing to indulge his vicious propensity.
I will now proceed to give an account of the beggars of London, as they
have come under my notice in the course of the present inquiry.
BEGGING-LETTER WRITERS.
Foremost among beggars, by right of pretension to blighted prospects
and correct penmanship, stands the Begging-Letter Writer. He is the
connecting link between mendicity and the observance of external
respectability. He affects white cravats, soft hands, and filbert
nails. He oils his hair, cleans his boots, and wears a portentous
stick-up collar. The light of other days of gentility and comfort casts
a halo of “deportment” over his well-brushed, white-seamed coat, his
carefully darned black-cloth gloves, and pudgy gaiters. He invariably
carries an umbrella, and wears a hat with an enormous brim. His once
raven hair is turning grey, and his well-shaved whiskerless cheeks
are blue as with gunpowder tattoo. He uses the plainest and most
respectable of cotton pocket-handkerchiefs, and keeps his references as
to character in the most irreproachable of shabby leather pocket-books.
His mouth is heavy, his under-lip thick, sensual, and lowering, and
his general expression of pious resignation contradicted by restless,
bloodshot eyes, that flash from side to side, quick to perceive the
approach of a compassionate-looking clergyman, a female devotee, or a
keen-scented member of the Society for the Suppression of Mendicity.
Among the many varieties of mendacious beggars, there is none
so detestable as this hypocritical scoundrel, who, with an
ostentatiously-submissive air, and false pretence of faded fortunes,
tells his plausible tale of undeserved suffering, and extracts from the
hearts and pockets of the superficially good-hearted their sympathy and
coin. His calling is a special one, and requires study, perseverance,
and some personal advantages. The begging-letter writer must write a
good hand, speak grammatically, and have that shrewd perception of
character peculiar to fortune-tellers, horoscopists, cheap-jacks, and
pedlars. He “must read and write, and cast accounts;” have an intuitive
knowledge of the “nobility and landed gentry;” be a keen physiognomist,
and an adept at imitation of handwritings, old documents, quaint
ancient orthography, and the like. He must possess an artistic eye
for costume, an unfaltering courage, and have tears and hysterics at
immediate command.
His great stock-in-trade is his register. There he carefully notes down
the names, addresses, and mental peculiarities of his victims, and the
character and pretence under which he robbed them of their bounty. It
would not do to tell the same person the same story _twice_, as once
happened to an unusually audacious member of the fraternity, who had
obtained money from an old lady for the purpose of burying his wife,
for whose loss he, of course, expressed the deepest grief. Confident in
the old lady’s kindness of heart and weakness of memory, three months
after his bereavement he again posted himself before the lady’s door,
and gave vent to violent emotion.
“Dear me!” thought the old lady, “there’s that poor man who lost his
wife some time ago.” She opened the window, and, bidding the vagabond
draw nearer, asked him what trouble he was in at present.
After repeated questioning the fellow gurgled out, “That the wife
of his bosom, the mother of his children, had left him for that
bourne from which no traveller returns, and that owing to a series of
unprecedented and unexpected misfortunes he had not sufficient money to
defray the funeral expenses, and--”
“Oh, nonsense!” interrupted the old lady. “You lost your wife a quarter
of a year ago. You couldn’t lose her twice; and as to marrying again,
and losing again in that short time, it is quite impossible!”
I subjoin some extracts from a Register kept by a begging-letter
writer, and who was detected and punished:--
_Cheltenham._ _May 14, 1842._
REV. JOHN FURBY.--Springwood Villa.--Low Church.--Fond of
architecture--Dugdale’s Monastica--Son of architect--Lost his life in
the “Charon,” U.S. packet--£2, and suit of clothes--Got reference.
MRS. BRANXHOLME.--Clematis Cottage--Widow--Through Rev. Furby, £3 and
prayer-book.
_Gloucester._ _May 30._
MRS. CAPTAIN DANIELS.-- ---- Street.--Widow--Son drowned off Cape, as
purser of same ship, “The Thetis”--£5 and old sea-chest. N.B.: Vamosed
next day--Captain returned from London--Gaff blown in county paper.
Mem.: Not to visit neighbourhood for four years.
_Lincoln._ _June 19._
ANDREW TAGGART.-- ---- street.--Gentleman--Great abolitionist of slave
trade--As tradesman from U.S., who had lost his custom by aiding slope
of fugitive female slave--By name Naomi Brown--£5. N.B.: To work him
again, for he is good.
_Grantham._ _July 1._
CHARLES JAMES CAMPION.--Westby House.--Gentleman--Literary--Writes
plays and novels--As distant relative of George Frederick Cooke, and
burnt-out bookseller--£2 2_s._ N.B.: Gave me some of his own books to
read--Such trash--· Cadger in one--No more like cadger than I’m like
Bobby Peel--Went to him again on 5th--Told him thought it wonderful,
and the best thing out since Vicar of Wakefield--Gave me £1 more--Very
good man--To be seen to for the future.
_Huntingdon._ _July 15._
MRS. SIDDICK.-- ---- Street.--Widow--Cranky--Baptist--As member of
persuasion from persecution of worldly-minded relatives--£10--Gave
her address in London--Good for a £5 every year--Recognized
inspector--Leave to-night.
There are, of course, many varieties of the begging-letter writer;
but although each and all of them have the same pretensions to former
respectability, their mode of levying contributions is entirely
different. There are but few who possess the versatility of their
great master--Bampfylde Moore Carew; and it is usual for every member
of the fraternity to chalk out for himself a particular “line” of
imposition--a course of conduct that renders him perfect in the part
he plays, makes his references and certificates continually available,
and prevents him from “jostling” or coming into collision with others
of his calling who might be “on the same lay as himself, and spoil his
game!” Among the many specimens, one of the most prominent is the
DECAYED GENTLEMAN.
The conversation of this class of mendicant is of former greatness,
of acquaintance among the nobility and gentry of a particular
county--always a distant one from the scene of operations--of hunting,
races, balls, meets, appointments to the magistracy, lord-lieutenants,
contested elections, and marriages in high life. The knowledge of the
things of which he talks so fluently is gleaned from files of old
county newspapers. When at fault, or to use his own phrase, “pounded,”
a ready wit, a deprecating shrug, and a few words, such as, “Perhaps
I’m mistaken--I used to visit a good deal there, and was introduced
to so many who have forgotten me now--my memory is failing, like
everything else”--extricate him from his difficulty, and increase his
capital of past prosperity and present poverty. The decayed gentleman
is also a great authority on wines--by right of a famous sample--his
father “laid down” in eighteen eleven, “the comet year you know,” and
is not a little severe upon his past extravagance. He relishes the
retrospection of the heavy losses he endured at Newmarket, Doncaster,
and Epsom in “forty-two and three,” and is pathetic on the subject
of the death of William Scott. The cause of his ruin he attributes
usually to a suit in the Court of Chancery, or the “fatal and
calamitous Encumbered Irish Estates Bill.” He is a florid impostor,
and has a jaunty sonorous way of using his clean, threadbare, silk
pocket-handkerchief, that carries conviction even to the most sceptical.
It is not uncommon to find among these degraded mendicants one who
has really been a gentleman, as far as birth and education go, but
whose excesses and extravagances have reduced him to mendicity. Such
cases are the most hopeless. Unmindful of decent pride, and that true
gentility that rises superior to circumstance, and finds no soil upon
the money earned by labour, the lying, drunken, sodden wretch considers
work “beneath him;” upon the shifting quicksands of his own vices
rears an edifice of vagabond vanity, and persuades himself that, by
forfeiting his manhood, he vindicates his right to the character of
gentleman.
The letters written by this class of beggar generally run as follows.
My readers will, of course, understand that the names and places
mentioned are the only portions of the epistles that are fictitious.
“_Three Mermaids Inn, Pond Lane._
_April--, 18 ._
“SIR, or MADAM,
“Although I have not the honour to be personally acquainted with
you, I have had the advantage of an introduction to a member of your
family, Major Sherbrook, when with his regiment at Malta; and my
present disadvantageous circumstances emboldens me to write to you,
for the claims of affliction upon the heart of the compassionate
are among the holiest of those kindred ties that bind man to his
fellow-being.
“My father was a large landed proprietor at Peddlethorpe, ----shire.
I, his only son, had every advantage that birth and fortune could
give me claim to. From an informality in the wording of my father’s
will, the dishonesty of an attorney, and the rapacity of some of my
poor late father’s distant relatives, the property was, at his death,
thrown into Chancery, and for the last four years I have been reduced
to--comparatively speaking--starvation.
“With the few relics of my former prosperity I have long since parted.
My valued books, and, I am ashamed to own, my clothes, are gone. I am
now in the last stage of destitution, and, I regret to say, in debt
to the worthy landlord of the tavern from which I write this, to the
amount of eight and sixpence. My object in coming to this part of the
country was to see an old friend, whom I had hoped would have assisted
me. We were on the same form together at Rugby--Mr. Joseph Thurwood of
Copesthorpe. Alas! I find that he died three months ago.
“I most respectfully beg of you to grant me some trifling assistance.
As in my days of prosperity I trust my heart was never deaf to
the voice of entreaty, nor my purse closed to the wants of the
necessitous; so dear sir, or madam, I hope that my request will not be
considered by you as impertinent or intrusive.
“I have the honour to enclose you some testimonials as to my character
and former station in society; and trusting that the Almighty Being
may never visit you with that affliction which it has been His
all-wise purpose to heap on me, I am
“Your most humble and
“Obliged servant,
“FREDERICK MAURICE STANHOPE,
“Formerly of Stanhope House, ----shire.”
THE BROKEN-DOWN TRADESMAN
is a sort of retail dealer in the same description of article as the
decayed gentleman. The unexpected breaking of fourteen of the most
respectable banking-houses in New York, or the loss of the cargoes of
two vessels in the late autumnal gales, or the suspension of payment
of Haul, Strong, and Chates, “joined and combined together with the
present commercial crisis, has been the means of bringing him down to
his present deplorable situation,” as his letter runs. His references
are mostly from churchwardens, bankers, and dissenting clergymen, and
he carries about a fictitious set of books--day-book, ledger, and
petty-cash-book, containing entries of debts of large amounts, and
a dazzling display of the neatest and most immaculate of commercial
cyphering. His conversation, like his correspondence, is a queer jumble
of arithmetic and scripture. He has a wife whose appearance is in
itself a small income. She folds the hardest-working-looking of hands
across the cleanest of white aprons, and curtseys with the humility
of a pew-opener. The clothes of the worthy couple are shabby, but
their persons and linen are rigorously clean. Their cheeks shine with
yellow soap, as if they were rasped and bee’s-waxed every morning.
The male impostor, when fleecing a victim, has a habit of washing his
hands “with invisible soap and imperceptible water,” as though he were
waiting on a customer. The wedded pair--and, generally, they are really
married--are of congenial dispositions and domestic turn of mind, and
get drunk, and fight each other, or go half-price to the play according
to their humour. It is usually jealousy that betrays them. The husband
is unfaithful, and the wife “peaches;” through her agency the police
are put upon the track, and the broken-down tradesman is committed. In
prison he professes extreme penitence, and has a turn for scriptural
quotation, that stands him in good stead.
On his release he takes to itinerant preaching, or political lecturing.
What becomes of him after those last resources it is difficult to
determine. The chances are that he again writes begging letters, but
“on a different lay.”
THE DISTRESSED SCHOLAR
is another variety of the same species, a connecting link between the
self-glorification of the decayed gentleman and the humility of the
broken-down tradesman. He is generally in want of money to pay his
railway-fare, or coach-hire to the north of England, where he has a
situation as usher to an academy--or he cannot seek for a situation for
want of “those clothes which sad necessity has compelled him to part
with for temporary convenience.” His letters, written in the best small
hand, with the finest of upstrokes and fattest of downstrokes, are
after this fashion:
“_Star Temperance Coffee House_,
“_Gravel Walk_.
“SIR, or MADAM,
“I have the honour to lay my case before you, humbly entreating your
kind consideration.
“I am a tutor, and was educated at St. ----’s College, Cambridge.
My last situation was with the Rev. Mr. Cross, Laburnum House, near
Dorking. I profess English, Latin, Greek, mathematics, and the higher
branches of arithmetic, and am well read in general literature,
ancient and modern. ‘Rudem esse omnino in nostris poetis est
inertissimæ signitiæ signum.’
“I am at present under engagement to superintend the scholastic
establishment of Mr. Tighthand of the classical and commercial academy
----, Cumberland, but have not the means of defraying the expenses
of my journey, nor of appearing with becoming decency before my new
employer and my pupils.
“My wardrobe is all pledged for an amount incommensurate with its
value, and I humbly and respectfully lay my case before you, and
implore you for assistance, or even a temporary accommodation.
“I am aware that impostors, armed with specious stories, often
impose on the kind-hearted and the credulous. ‘Nervi atque artus est
sapientiæ--non temere credere.’ I have therefore the honour to forward
you the enclosed testimonials from my former employers and others as
to my character and capacity.
“That you may never be placed in such circumstances as to compel you
to indite such an epistle as the one I am at present penning is my
most fervent wish. Rely upon it, generous sir--or madam--that, should
you afford me the means of gaining an honourable competence, you shall
never have to repent your timely benevolence. If, however, I should be
unsuccessful in my present application, I must endeavour to console
myself with the words of the great poet. ‘Ætas ipsa solatium omnibus
affert,’ or with the diviner precept: ‘And this too shall pass away.’
“I have, sir--or madam--the honour to be
“Your humble and obedient servant,
“HORACE HUMM.”
A gracefully flourished swan, with the date in German text on his left
wing, terminates the letter.
THE KAGGS FAMILY.
This case of cleverly organized swindling fell beneath the writer’s
personal observation.
In a paved court, dignified with the name of a market, leading into
one of the principal thoroughfares of London, dwelt a family whom,
from fear of an action for libel which, should they ever read these
lines, they would assuredly bring, I will call Kaggs. Mr. Kaggs, the
head of the family, had commenced life in the service of a nobleman.
He was a tall, portly man, with a short nose, broad truculent mouth,
and a light, moist eye. His personal advantages and general conduct
obtained him promotion, and raised him from the servants’ hall to the
pantry. When he was thirty years of age, he was butler in the family
of a country gentleman, whose youngest daughter fell in love, ran away
with, and--married him. The angry father closed his doors against
them, and steeled his heart to the pathetic appeals addressed to him
by every post. Mr. Kaggs, unable to obtain a character from his last
place, found himself shut out from his former occupation. His wife gave
promise of making an increase to the numbers of the family, and to use
Mr. Kaggs’s own pantry vernacular, “he was flyblown and frostbitten
every joint of him.”
It was then that he first conceived the idea of making his wife’s birth
and parentage a source of present income and provision for old age. She
was an excellent penwoman, and for some months had had great practice
in the composition of begging letters to her father. Mr. Kaggs’s
appearance being martial and imposing, he collected what information
he could find upon the subject, and passed himself off for a young
Englishman of good family, who had been an officer in the Spanish army,
and served “under Evans!” Mrs. Kaggs’s knowledge of the county families
stood them in good stead, and they begged themselves through England,
Scotland, and Wales, and lived in a sort of vulgar luxury, at no cost
but invention, falsehood, and a ream or so of paper.
It was some few years ago that I first made their acquaintance. Mrs.
Kaggs had bloomed into a fine elderly woman, and Mr. Kaggs’s nose and
stomach had widened to that appearance of fatherly responsibility and
parochial importance that was most to be desired. The wife had sunk
to the husband’s level, and had brought up her children to tread in
the same path. Their family, though not numerous, was a blessing to
them, for each child, some way or other, contrived to bring in money.
It was their parents’ pride that they had given their offspring a
liberal education. As soon as they were of an age capable of receiving
instruction, they were placed at a respectable boarding-school, and,
although they only stayed in it one half-year, they went to another
establishment for the next half-year, and so managed to pick up a good
miscellaneous education, and at the same time save their parents the
cost of board and lodging.
James Julian Kaggs, the eldest and only son, was in Australia, “doing
well,” as his mamma would often say--though in what particular business
or profession was a subject on which she preserved a discreet silence.
As I never saw the young man in question, I am unable to furnish any
information respecting him.
Catherine Kaggs, the eldest daughter, was an ugly and vulgar girl,
on whom a genteel education and her mother’s example of elegance
and refinement had been thrown away. Kitty was a sort of Cinderella
in the family, and being possessed of neither tact nor manner to
levy contributions on the charitable, was sentenced to an out-door
employment, for which she was well fitted. She sold flowers in the
thoroughfare, near the market.
The second daughter, Betsey, was the pride of her father and mother,
and the mainstay of the family. Tall, thin, and elegant, interesting
rather than pretty, her pale face and subdued manners, her long
eyelashes, soft voice, and fine hands, were the very requisites for the
personation of beggared gentility and dilapidated aristocracy. Mrs.
Kaggs often said, “That poor Kitty was her father’s girl, a Kaggs all
over--but that Bessie was a Thorncliffe (her own maiden name) and a
lady every inch!”
The other children were a boy and girl of five and three years old, who
called Mrs. Kaggs “Mamma,” but who appeared much too young to belong to
that lady in any relation but that of grand-children. Kitty, the flower
girl, was passionately fond of them, and “Bessie” patronized them in
her meek, maidenly way, and called them her dear brother and sister.
In the height of the season Miss Bessie Kaggs, attired in shabby black
silk, dark shawl, and plain bonnet, would sally forth to the most
aristocratic and fashionable squares, attended by her father in a white
neck-cloth, carrying in one hand a small and fragile basket, and in
the other a heavy and respectable umbrella. Arrived at the mansion of
the intended victim, Miss Bessie would give a pretentious knock, and
relieve her father of the burthen of the fragile basket. As the door
opened, she would desire her parent, who was supposed to be a faithful
retainer, to wait, and Mr. Kaggs would touch his hat respectfully and
retire meekly to the corner of the square, and watch the placards in
the public-house in the next street.
“Is Lady ---- within?” Miss Betsey would inquire of the servant.
If the porter replied that his lady was out, or that she could not
receive visitors, except by appointment, Miss Betsey would boldly
demand pen, ink, and paper, and sit down and write, in a delicate,
lady’s hand, to the following effect:--
“Miss Thirlbrook presents her compliments to the Countess of ----, and
most respectfully requests the honour of enrolling the Countess’s name
among the list of ladies who are kindly aiding her in disposing of a
few necessaries for the toilette.
“Miss Thirlbrook is reduced to this extreme measure from the sad
requirements of her infirm father, formerly an officer in his Majesty’s
--d Regiment, who, from a position of comfort and affluence, is now
compelled to seek aid from the charitable, and to rely on the feeble
exertions of his daughter: a confirmed cripple and valetudinarian, he
has no other resource.
“The well-known charity of the Countess of ---- has induced Miss
Thirlbrook to make this intrusion on her time. Miss T. will do
herself the honour of waiting upon her ladyship on Thursday, when she
_earnestly entreats_ the favour of an interview, or an inspection of
the few articles she has to dispose of.”
_Monday._
This carefully concocted letter--so different from the usual
appeals--containing no references to other persons as to character or
antecedents, generally had its effect, and in a few days Miss Betsey
would find herself tête-à-tête with the Countess ----.
On entering the room she would make a profound curtsey, and, after
thanking her ladyship for the honour, would open the fragile basket,
which contained a few bottles of scent, some fancy soaps, ornamental
envelopes, and perforated note-papers.
“Sit down, Miss Thirlbrook,” the Countess would open the conversation.
“I see the articles. Your note, I think, mentioned something of your
being in less fortunate----”
Miss Betsey would lower her eyelashes and bend her head--not _too_
deferentially, but as if bowing to circumstances for her father--her
dear father’s sake--for this was implied by her admirably concealed
histrionic capability.
The lady would then suggest that she had a great many claims upon her
consideration, and would delicately inquire into the pedigree and
circumstances of Lieutenant Thirlbrook, formerly of his Majesty’s --d
Regiment.
Miss Betsey’s replies were neither too ready nor too glib. She suffered
herself to be drawn out, but did not advance a statement, and so
established in her patroness’s mind the idea that she had to deal
with a very superior person. The sum of the story of this interesting
scion of a fallen house was, that her father was an old Peninsular
officer--as would be seen by a reference to the Army List (Miss Betsey
had found the name in an old list); that he had left the service
during the peace in 1814; that a ruinous lawsuit, arising from railway
speculations, and an absconding agent, had reduced them to--to--to
their present position--and that six years ago, an old wound--received
at Barossa--had broken out, and laid her father helpless on a sick
bed. “I know that these articles,” Betsey would conclude, pointing to
the fancy soaps and stationery, “are not such perhaps as your ladyship
is accustomed to; but if you would kindly aid me by purchasing some
of them--if ever so few--you would materially assist us; and I hope
that--that we should not prove--either undeserving or ungrateful.”
When, as sometimes happened, ladies paid a visit to Lieut. Thirlbrook,
everything was prepared for their reception with a dramatic regard
for propriety. The garret was made as clean and as uncomfortable
as possible. Mr. Kaggs was put to bed, and the purpled pinkness of
his complexion toned down with violet powder and cosmetics. A white
handkerchief, with the Thirlbrook crest in a corner, was carelessly
dropped upon the coverlid. A few physic bottles, an old United Service
paper, and a ponderous Bible lay upon a ricketty round table beside
him. Mrs. Kaggs was propped up with pillows in an arm-chair near the
fireplace, and desired to look rheumatic and resigned. Kitty was sent
out of the way; and the two children were dressed up in shabby black,
and promised plums if they would keep quiet. Miss Betsey herself, in
grey stuff and an apron, meek, mild, and matronly beyond her years,
glided about softly, like a Sister of Mercy connected with the family.
My readers must understand that Mr. Kaggs was the sole tenant of the
house he lived in, though he pretended that he only occupied the
garrets as a lodger.
During the stay of the fashionable Samaritans Lieut. Thirlbrook--who
had received a wound in his leg at Barossa, under the Duke--would say
but little, but now and then his mouth would twitch as with suppressed
pain. The visitors were generally much moved at the distressing
scene. The gallant veteran--the helpless old lady--the sad and silent
children--and the ministering angel of a daughter, were an impressive
spectacle. The ladies would promise to exert themselves among their
friends, and do all in their power to relieve them.
“Miss Thirlbrook,” they would ask, as Miss Betsey attended them to the
street-door, “those dear children are not your brother and sister, are
they?”
Betsey would suppress a sigh, and say, “They are the son and daughter
of my poor brother, who was a surgeon in the Navy--they are orphans. My
brother died on the Gold Coast, and his poor wife soon followed him.
She was delicate, and could not bear up against the shock. The poor
things have only us to look to, and we do for them what little lies in
our power.”
This last stroke was a climax. “She never mentioned them before!”
thought the ladies. “What delicacy! What high feeling! These are not
common beggars, who make an exaggerated statement of their griefs.”
“Miss Thirlbrook, I am sure you will pardon me for making the offer;
but those dear children upstairs do not look strong. I hope you will
not be offended by my offering to send them a luncheon now and then--a
few delicacies--nourishing things--to do them good.”
Miss Betsey would curtsey, lower her eyelids, and say, softly, “They
_are not_ strong.”
“I’ll send my servant as soon as I get home. Pray use this trifle for
the present,” (the lady would take out her purse,) “and good morning,
Miss Thirlbrook. I must shake hands with you. I consider myself
fortunate in having made your acquaintance.”
Betsey’s eyes would fill with tears, and as she held the door open,
the expression of her face would plainly say: “Not only for myself, oh
dear and charitable ladies, but for my father--my poor father--who was
wounded, at Barossa, in the leg--do I thank you from the depths of a
profoundly grateful heart.”
When the basket arrived, Miss Betsey would sit down with her worthy
parents and enjoy whatever poultry or meat had not been touched; but
anything that had been cut, anything “second-hand,” that dainty and
haughty young lady would instruct her sister Kitty to give to the poor
beggars.
This system of swindling could not, of course, last many years,
and when the west end of London became too hot to hold them, the
indefatigable Kaggses put an advertisement into the _Times_ and
_Morning Post_, addressed to the charitable and humane, saying that “a
poor, but respectable family, required a small sum to enable them to
make up the amount of their passage to Australia, and that they could
give the highest references as to character.”
The old certificates were hawked about, and for more than two years
they drove a roaring trade in money, outfits, and necessaries for a
voyage. Mr. Kaggs, too, made a fortunate hit. He purchased an old
piano, and raffled it at five shillings a head. Each of his own family
took a chance. At the first raffle Miss Betsey won it, at the second,
Miss Kitty, on the third, Mr. Kaggs, on the fourth, his faithful
partner, and on the fifth and last time, a particular friend of Miss
Kitty’s, a young lady in the green-grocery line. This invaluable piece
of furniture was eventually disposed of by private contract to a dealer
in Barret’s Court, Oxford Street, and, a few days after, the Kaggs
family really sailed for Melbourne, and I have never since heard of
them.
* * * * *
Among the begging-letter fraternity there are not a few persons who
affect to be literary men. They have at one time or another been
able to publish a pamphlet, a poem, or a song--generally a patriotic
one, and copies of these works--they always call them “works”--they
constantly carry about with them to be ready for any customer who
may turn up. I have known a notable member of this class of beggars
for some years. He was introduced to me as a literary man by an
innocent friend who really believed in his talent. He greeted me as
a brother craftsman, and immediately took from the breast-pocket of
his threadbare surtout a copy of one of his works. “Allow me,” he
said, “to present you with my latest work; it is dedicated, you will
perceive, to the Right Honourable the Earl of Derby--here is a letter
from his lordship complimenting me in the most handsome terms;” and
before I could look into the book, the author produced from a well-worn
black pocket-book a dirty letter distinguished by a large red seal.
Sure enough it was a genuine letter beginning “The Earl of Derby
presents his compliments,” and going on to acknowledge the receipt
of a copy of Mr. Driver’s work. Mr. Driver--I will call my author
by that name--produced a great many other letters, all from persons
of distinction, and the polite terms in which they were expressed
astonished me not a little. I soon, however, discovered the key to
all this condescension. The work was a political one, glorifying the
Conservative party, and abounding with all sorts of old-fashioned Tory
sentiments. The letters Mr. Driver showed me were of course all from
tories. The “work” was quite a curiosity. It was called a political
novel. It had for its motto, “Pro Rege, Lege, Aris et Focis,” and the
dedication to the Right Honourable the Earl of Derby was displayed over
a whole page in epitaph fashion. At the close of our interview Mr.
Driver pointed out to me that the price of the work was two shillings.
Understanding the hint, I gave him that amount, when he called for pen
and ink, and wrote on the fly leaf of the work, “To ---- ----, Esq.,
with the sincere regards of the author.--J. Fitzharding Driver.” On
looking over the book--it was a mere paper-covered pamphlet of some
hundred pages--I found that the story was not completed. I mentioned
this to Mr. Driver the next time I met him, and he explained that he
meant to go to press--that was a favourite expression of his--to go to
press with the second volume shortly. Ten years, however, have elapsed
since then, and Mr. Driver has not yet gone to press with his second
volume. The last time I met him he offered me the original volume
as his “last new work,” which he presumed I had never seen. He also
informed me that he was about to publish a patriotic song in honour of
the Queen. Would I subscribe for a copy--only three-and-sixpence--and
he would leave it for me? Mr. Driver had forgotten that I had
subscribed for this very song eight years previously. He showed me
the selfsame MS. of the new national anthem, which I had perused so
long ago. The paper had become as soft and limp and dingy as a Scotch
one-pound note, but it had been worth a good many one-pound notes
to Mr. Fitzharding Driver. Mr. Driver has lived upon this as yet
unpublished song, and that unfinished political novel, for ten years
and more. I have seen him often enough to know exactly his _modus
operandi_. Though practically a beggar Mr. Driver is no great rogue.
Were you to dress him well, he might pass for a nobleman. As it is,
in his shabby genteel clothes he looks a broken-down swell. And so in
fact he is. In his young days he had plenty of money, and went the pace
among the young bloods of Bond Street. Mr. Driver’s young days were
the days of the Regent. He drove a dashing phaeton-and-four then, and
lounged and gambled, and lived the life of a man about town. He tells
you all that with great pride, and also how he came to grief, though
this part of the story is not so clear. There is no doubt that he had
considerable acquaintance among great people in his prosperous days. He
lives now upon his works, and the public-house parlours of the purlieus
of the west-end serve him as publishing houses. He is a great political
disputant, and his company is not unwelcome in those quarters. He
enters, takes his seat, drinks his glass, joins in the conversation,
and, as he says himself, shows that he is a man of parts. In this way
he makes friends among the tradesmen who visit these resorts. They
soon find out that he is poor, and an author, and moved both to pity
and admiration, each member of the company purchases a copy of that
unfinished political novel, or subscribes for that new patriotic song,
which I expect will yet be in the womb of the press when the crack of
doom comes. I think Mr. Driver has pretty well used up all the quiet
parlours of W. district by this time. Not long ago I had a letter from
him enclosing a prospectus of a new work to be entitled “Whiggery,
or the Decline of England,” and soliciting a subscription to enable
him to go to press with the first edition. I have no doubt that every
conservative member of both houses of Parliament has had a copy of that
prospectus. Mr. Fitzharding Driver will call at their houses for an
answer, and some entirely out of easy charity, and others from a party
feeling of delight at the prospect of the Whigs being abused in a book
even by this poor beggar, will send him down half-crowns, and enable
the poor wretch to eat and drink for a few months longer. On more than
one occasion while I have known him, Mr. Driver has been on the point
of “being well off again,” to use his own expression. His behaviour
under the prospect was characteristic of the man, his antecedents,
and his mode of life. He touched up his seedy clothes, had some
cotton-velvet facings put to his threadbare surtout, revived his hat,
mounted a pair of shabby patent-leather boots, provided himself with a
penny cane, adorned with an old silk tassel, and appeared each day with
a flower in his button-hole. In addition to these he had sewn into the
breast of his surtout a bit of parti-coloured ribbon to look like a
decoration. In this guise he came up to me at the Crystal Palace one
day, and appeared to be in great glee. His ogling and mysterious manner
puzzled me. Judge of my astonishment when this hoary, old, tottering,
toothless beggar informed me, with many self-satisfied chuckles, that a
rich widow, “a fine dashing woman, sir,” had fallen in love with him,
and was going to marry him. The marriage did not come off, the pile is
worn away from the velvet facings, the patent-leather boots have become
mere shapeless flaps of leather, the old broad-brimmed hat is past the
power of reviver, and the Bond Street buck of the days of the Regent
now wanders from public-house to public-house selling lucifer-matches.
He still however carries with him a copy of his “work,” the limp and
worn MS. of his anthem, and the prospectus of “Whiggery, or the Decline
of England.” These and the letters from distinguished personages stand
him in better stead than the lucifer-matches, when he lights upon
persons of congenial sympathies.
ADVERTISING BEGGING-LETTER WRITERS.
Among many begging-letter writers who appealed to sentiment, the most
notorious and successful was a man of the name of Thomas Stone, alias
Stanley, alias Newton. He had been in early life transported for
forgery, and afterwards was tried for perjury; and when his ordinary
methods of raising money had been detected and exposed, he resorted to
the ingenious expedient of sending an advertisement to the _Times_, of
which the following is a copy:--
“To the Charitable and Affluent.
“At the eleventh hour a young and most unfortunate lady is driven by
great distress to solicit from those charitable and humane persons
who ever derive pleasure from benevolent acts, some little _pecuniary
assistance_. The advertiser’s condition is almost hopeless, being,
alas! friendless, and reduced to the last extremity. The smallest aid
would be most thankfully acknowledged, and the fullest explanation
given. Direct Miss T. C. M., Post-office, Great Randolph St., Camden
New Town.”
This touching appeal was read by a philanthropic gentleman, who sent
the advertiser 5_l._, and afterwards 1_l._ more, to which he received
a reply in the following words:--
“SIR,--I again offer my gratitude for your charitable kindness. I
am quite unable to speak the promptings of my heart for your great
goodness to me, an entire stranger, but you may believe me, sir, I am
very sincerely thankful. You will, I am sure, be happy to hear I have
paid the few trifling demands upon me, and also obtained sufficient of
my wearing apparel to make a decent appearance; but it has swallowed
up the whole of your generous bounty, or I should this day have moved
to the Hampstead Road, where a far more comfortable lodging has been
offered me, and where, sir, if you would condescend to call I would
cheerfully and with pleasure relate my circumstances in connexion
with my past history, and I do hope you might consider me worthy of
your further notice. But it is my earnest desire to support myself
and my dearest child by my own industry. As I mentioned before, I
have youth and health, and have received a good education, but alas!
I fear I shall have a great difficulty in obtaining employment such
as I desire, for I have fallen! I am a mother, and my dear poor boy
is the child of sin. But I was deceived--cruelly deceived by a base
and heartless villain. A licence was purchased for our marriage; I
believed all; my heart knew no guile; the deceptions of the world I
had scarcely ever heard of; but too soon I found myself destroyed
and lost, the best affections of my heart trampled upon, and myself
infamous and disgraced. But I did not continue to live in sin. Oh no!
I despised and loathed the villain who so deceived me. Neither have
I received, nor would I, one shilling from him. I think I stated in
my first letter I am the daughter of a deceased merchant; such is the
case; and had I some friends to interest themselves for me, I do think
it would be found I am entitled to some property; however, it would
be first necessary to explain personally every circumstance, and to
you, sir, I would unreservedly explain all. And oh! I do earnestly
hope you would, after hearing my sad tale, think there was some little
palliation of my guilt.
“In answer to the advertisement I had inserted, I received many offers
of assistance, but they contained overtures of such a nature that I
could not allow myself to reply to any of them. You, sir, have been
my best friend, and may God bless you for your sympathy and kindness.
I am very desirous to remove, but cannot do so without a little money
in my pocket. Your charity has enabled me to provide all I required,
and paid that which I owed, which has been a great relief to my mind.
I hope and trust that you will not think me covetous or encroaching
upon your goodness, in asking you to assist me with a small sum
further, for the purpose named. Should you, however, decline to do so,
believe me, I should be equally grateful; and it is most painful and
repugnant to my feelings to ask, but I know not to whom else to apply.
Entreating your early reply, however it may result, and with every
good wish, and the sincerest and warmest acknowledgments of my heart,
believe, sir, always your most thankful and humble servant,
“FRANCES THORPE.
“Please direct T. C. M., Post-office, Crown Street, Gray’s Inn Road.”
With the same sort of tale, varying the signature to Fanny Lyons, Mary
Whitmore, and Fanny Hamilton, &c., Mr. Stone continued to victimize the
public, until the Society for the Suppression of Mendicity laid him
by the heels. He was committed for trial at Clerkenwell Sessions, and
sentenced to transportation for seven years.
I must content myself with these few specimens of the begging-letter
impostors; it would be impossible to describe every variety. Sometimes
they are printers, whose premises have been destroyed by fire; at
others, young women who have been ruined by noblemen and are anxious to
retrieve themselves; or widows of naval officers who have perished in
action or by sickness. There was a long run upon “aged clergymen, whose
sands of life were fast running out,” but the fraud became so common
that it was soon “blown.”
The greatest blow that was ever struck at this species of imposition
was the establishment of the Begging-Letter Department by the Society
for the Suppression of Mendicity. In the very first case they
investigated they found the writer--who had penned a most touching
letter to a well-known nobleman--crouching in a fireless garret in
one of the worst and lowest neighbourhoods of London. This man was
discovered to be the owner and occupier of a handsomely-furnished house
in another part of the town, where his wife and family lived in luxury.
The following is a specimen of a most artful begging letter from
America.
_Ellicot’s Mills, Howard Co., Maryland,
United States_,
_June_ 6, 1859.
“MY DEAREST FRIEND,
“Why--why have you not written, and sent me the usual remittances?
Your silence has caused me the greatest uneasiness. Poor dear
Frederick is dying and we are in the extremest want. The period to
hear from you has past some time, and no letter. It is very strange!
What can it mean?
“In a short time your poor suffering son will be at rest. I shall then
trouble you no more; but--oh! I beseech you, do not permit your poor
son to die in want. I have expended my last shilling to procure him
those little necessaries he must and shall have. Little did I think
when, long, long years ago, I deserted all, that you might be free and
happy, that you would fail me in this terrible hour of affliction--but
you have not--I know you have not. You must have sent, and the letter
miscarried. Your poor dying son sends his fondest love. Poor dear
fellow!--he has never known a father’s care; still, from a child,
he has prayed for, revered, and loved you--he is now going to his
Father in heaven, and, when he is gone my widowed heart will break.
When I look back upon the long past, although broken-hearted and
crushed to the earth, yet I cannot tutor my heart to regret it, for
I dearly loved you. Yes, and proved it, dearest friend, by forsaking
and fleeing with my poor fatherless boy to this strange and distant
land, that you might be free and happy with those so worthy of you;
and, believe me when I say, that your happiness has been my constant
prayer. In consequence of poor dear Frederick’s sickness we are in
the greatest distress and want. I have been compelled to forego all
exertion, and attend solely upon him; therefore, do, I pray you, send
me, without an instant’s delay, a 10_l._ note. I must have it, or I
shall go mad. Your poor suffering boy must not die in misery and want.
Send the money by return mail, and send a Bank of England note, for I
am now miles away from where I could get a draught cashed. I came here
for the benefit of poor dear Frederick, but I fear it has done him no
good. We are now among strangers, and in the most abject distress,
and unless you send soon, your afflicted unoffending boy will starve
to death. I can no longer bear up against poverty, sickness, and your
unkindness; but you must have sent; your good, kind heart would not
permit you to let us die in want. God bless you, and keep you and
yours. May you be supremely happy! Bless you! In mercy send soon, for
we are in extremest want.
“Remaining faithfully,
“Your dearest friend,
“KATE STANLEY.
“Pay the postage of your letter to me, or I shall not be able to
obtain it, for I am selling everything to live.”
The above affecting letter was received by the widow of a London
merchant six months after his death. The affair was investigated and
proved to be an imposture. The moral character of Mr. ---- had been
irreproachable. American begging-letter writers read the obituaries in
English newspapers and ply their trade, while the loss of the bereaved
relatives of the man whose memory they malign is recent.
ASHAMED BEGGARS.
By the above title I mean those tall, lanthorn-jawed men, in seedy
well-brushed clothes, who, with a ticket on their breasts, on which
a short but piteous tale is written in the most respectable of
large-hand, and with a few boxes of lucifer-matches in their hands,
make no appeal by word of mouth, but invoke the charity of passers-by
by meek glances and imploring looks--fellows who, having no talent
for “patter,” are gifted with great powers of facial pathos, and make
expression of feature stand in lieu of vocal supplication. For some
years I have watched a specimen of this class, who has a regular “beat”
at the west end of London. He is a tall man, with thin legs and arms,
and a slightly-protuberant stomach. His “costume” (I use the word
advisedly, for he is really a great actor of pantomime,) consists of an
old black dress-coat, carefully buttoned, but left sufficiently open
at the top to show a spotlessly white shirt, and at the bottom, to
exhibit an old grey waistcoat; and a snowy apron, which he wears after
the fashion of a Freemason, forgetting that real tradesmen are never
seen in their aprons except behind the counter. A pair of tight, dark,
shabby trousers, black gaiters without an absent button, and heavy
shoes of the severest thickness, cover his nether man. Round his neck
is a red worsted comforter, which neatly tied at the throat, descends
straight and formally beneath his coat, and exhibits two fringed ends,
which fall, in agreeable contrast of colour, over the before-mentioned
apron. I never remember seeing a beggar of this class without an apron
and a worsted comforter--they would appear to be his stock-in-trade, a
necessary portion of his outfit; the white apron to relieve the sombre
hue of his habiliments, and show up their well-brushed shabbiness; the
scarlet comforter to contrast with the cadaverous complexion which
he owes to art or nature. In winter the comforter also serves as an
advertisement that his great-coat is gone.
The man I am describing wears a “pad” round his neck, on which is
written--
Kind Friends and Christian Brethren!
I was once a
Respectable Tradesman,
doing a Good Business;
till Misfortune reduced me to
this Pass!
Be kind enough to Buy
some of the Articles I offer,
and you will confer a
Real Charity!
In his hands, on which he wears scrupulously-darned mittens, he carries
a box or two of matches, or a few quires of note-paper or envelopes,
and half-a-dozen small sticks of sealing-wax. He is also furnished
with a shabby-genteel looking boy of about nine years old, who wears
a Shakesperian collar, and the regulation worsted comforter, the ends
of which nearly trail upon the ground. The poor child, whose features
do not in the least resemble the man’s, and who, too young to be his
son, is too old to be his grandson, keeps his little hands in his large
pockets, and tries to look as unhappy and half-starved as he can.
But the face of the beggar is a marvellous exhibition! His acting is
admirable! Christian resignation and its consequent fortitude are
written on his brow. His eyes roll imploringly, but no sound escapes
him. The expression of his features almost pronounces, “Christian
friend, purchase my humble wares, for _I scorn to beg_. I am starving,
but tortures shall not wring the humiliating secret from my lips.” He
exercises a singular fascination over old ladies, who slide coppers
into his hand quickly, as if afraid that they shall hurt his feelings.
He pockets the money, heaves a sigh, and darts an abashed and grateful
look at them that makes them feel how keenly he appreciates their
delicacy. When the snow is on the ground he now and then introduces a
little shiver, and with a well-worn pocket-handkerchief stifles a cough
that he intimates by, a despairing dropping of his eyelids, is slowly
killing him.
THE SWELL BEGGAR.
A singular variety of this sort of mendicant used to be seen some years
ago in the streets of Cambridge. He had been a gentleman of property,
and had studied at one of the colleges. Race-courses, billiard-tables,
and general gambling had reduced him to beggary; but he was too proud
to ask alms. As the “Ashamed Beggar” fortifies himself with a “pad,”
this swell-beggar armed himself with a broom. He swept a crossing.
His clothes--he always wore evening-dress--were miserably ragged and
shabby; his hat was a broken Gibus, but he managed to have good and
fashionable boots; and his shirt collar, and wrist-bands were changed
every day. A white cambric handkerchief peeped from his coat-tail
pocket, and a gold eye-glass dangled from his neck. His hands were
lady-like; his nails well-kept; and it was impossible to look at him
without a mingled feeling of pity and amusement.
His plan of operations was to station himself at his crossing at
the time the ladies of Cambridge were out shopping. His antics were
curiously funny. Dangling his broom between his fore-finger and thumb,
as if it were a light umbrella or riding-whip, he would arrive at his
stand, and look up at the sky to see what sort of weather might be
expected. Then tucking the broom beneath his arm he would take off his
gloves, fold them together and put them into his coat-pockets, sweep
his crossing carefully, and when he had finished, look at it with
admiration. When ladies crossed, he would remove his broken hat, and
smile with great benignity, displaying at the same time a fine set
of teeth. On wet days his attentions to the fair sex knew no bounds.
He would run before them and wipe away every little puddle in their
path. On receiving a gratuity, which was generally in silver, he would
remove his hat and bow gracefully and gratefully. When gentlemen walked
over his crossing he would stop them, and, holding his hat in the true
mendicant fashion, request the loan of a shilling. With many he was a
regular pensioner. When a mechanic or poor-looking person offered him a
copper, he would take it, and smile his thanks with a patronising air,
but he never took off his hat to less than sixpence. He was a jovial
and boastful beggar, and had a habit of jerking at his stand-up collar,
and pulling at his imperial coxcombically. When he considered his day’s
work over, he would put on his gloves, and, dangling his broom in his
careless elegant way, trip home to his lodging. He never used a broom
but one day, and gave the old ones to his landlady. The undergraduates
were kind to him, and encouraged his follies; but the college dons
looked coldly on him, and when they passed him he would assume an
expression of impertinent indifference _as if he cut them_. I never
heard what became of him. When I last saw him he looked between forty
and fifty years of age.
CLEAN FAMILY BEGGARS.
Clean Family Beggars are those who beg or sing in the streets, in
numbers varying from four to seven. I need only particularize one
“gang” or “party,” as their appearance and method of begging will do as
a sample of all others.
Beggars of this class group themselves artistically. A broken-down
looking man, in the last stage of seediness, walks hand-in-hand with
a pale-faced, interesting little girl. His wife trudges on his other
side, a baby in one arm; a child just able to walk steadies itself
by the hand that is disengaged; two or three other children cling
about the skirts of her gown, one occasionally detaching himself or
herself--as a kind of rear or advanced guard from the main body--to cut
off stragglers and pounce upon falling halfpence, or look piteously
into the face of a passer-by. The clothes of the whole troop are in
that state when seediness is dropping into rags; but their hands
and faces are perfectly clean--their skins literally shine--perhaps
from the effect of a plentiful use of soap, _which they do not wash
off before drying themselves with a towel_. The complexions of the
smaller children, in particular, glitter like sandpaper, and their
eyes are half-closed, and their noses corrugated, as with constant and
compulsory ablution. The baby is a wonderful specimen of washing and
getting-up of ornamental linen. Altogether, the Clean Family Beggars
form a most attractive picture for quiet and respectable streets, and
“pose” themselves for the admiration of the thrifty matrons, who are
their best supporters.
Sometimes the children of the Clean Family Beggars sing--sometimes the
father “patters.” This morning a group passed my window, who both sang
and “pattered.” The mother was absent, and the two eldest girls knitted
and crochetted as they walked along. The burthen of the song which the
children shrieked out in thin treble, was,
“And the wild flowers are springing on the plain.”
The rest of the words were undistinguishable. When the little ones had
finished, the man, who evidently prided himself upon his powers of
eloquence, began, in a loud, authoritative, oratorical tone:--
“My dear friends,--It is with great pain, and affliction, and trouble,
that I present myself and my poo--oor family before you, in this
wretched situation, at the present moment; but what can I do? Work I
cannot obtain, and my little family ask me for bread! Yes, my dear
friends--my little family ask me for bread! Oh, my dear friends,
conceive what your feelin’s would be, if, like me, at the present
moment your poo--oor dear children asked for bread, and you had it
not to give them! What then could you do? God send, my dear friends,
that no individual, no father of a family, nor mother, nor other
individual, _with_ children, will ever, or ever may be drove to do
what--or, I should say, that which I am now a-doing of, at the present
moment. If any one in this street, or in the next, or in any of the
streets in this affluent neighbourhood, had found theirselves in the
situation, in which I was placed this morning, it would be hard to
say what they could, or would have done; and I assure you, my dear
friends,--yes, I assure you, from my heart, that it is very possible
that many might have been drove to have done, or do worse, than what
I am a doing of, for the sake of my poo--oor family, at the present
moment, if they had been drove, by suffering, as I and my poo--oor wife
have been the morning of this very day. My wife, my kind friends, is
now unfortunately ill through unmerited starvation, and is ill a-bed,
from which, at the present moment, she cannot rise. Want we have known
together, my dear friends, and so has our poo--oor family, and baby,
only eight months old. God send, my dear friends, that none of you, and
none of your dear babes, and families, that no individual, which now is
listening to my deep distress, at the present moment, may ever know the
sufferin’s to which we have been reduced, is my fervent prayer! All I
want to obtain is a meal’s victuals for my poo--oor family!”
(Here the man caught my eye, and immediately shifted his ground.)
“You will ask me, my dear friends,” he continued, in an argumentative
manner, “you will ask me how and why it is, and what is the reason,
which I cannot obtain work? Alas! my dear friends, it is unfortunately
so at the present moment. I am a silk-weaver in Bethnal Green, by
trade, and the noo International Treaty with France, which Mr.
Cobden--” (here he kept his eye on me, as if the political reason were
intended for my especial behoof)--“which _Mr. Cobden_, my dear friends,
was depooted to go to the French emperor, Louis Napoleon, to agree
upon, betwixt this country and France, which the French manufacturers
sends goods into this country, without paying no dooty, and undersells
the native manufacturers, though, my dear friends, our workmanship
is as good, and English silk as genuine as French, I do assure you.
Leastways, there is no difference, except in pattern, and, through the
neglect of them as ought to look after it better, that is, to see we
had the best designs; for design is the only thing--I mean design and
pattern--in which they can outdo us; and also, my dear friends, ladies
as go to shops will ask for foreign goods--it is more to their taste
than English, at the present moment; and so it is, that many poo--oor
families at Bethnal Green and Spitalfields--and Coventry likewise,
is redooced to the situation which I myself--that is, to ask your
charity--am a doing of--at the present moment.”
I gave a little girl a penny, and the man, still fixing me with his
eye, continued--
“You will ask me, my dear friends, praps, how it is that I do not apply
to the parish? why not to get relief for myself, my de--ar wife, and
little family? My kind friends, you do not know the state in which
things is with the poor weavers of Bethnal Green, and, at the present
moment, Spitalfields likewise. It comes of the want of knowledge of
the real state of this rich and ’appy country, its material prosperity
and resources, which you, at this end of the town, can form no idea
of. There is now sixteen or seventeen thousand people out of work.
Yes, my dear friends, in about two parishes, there is sixteen or
seventeen thousand individuals--I mean, of course, counting their
poo--oor families and all, which at the present moment, cannot obtain
bread. Oh, my dear friends, how grateful ought you be to God that you
and your dear families, are not out of work, and can obtain a meal’s
victuals, and are not like the sufferin’ weavers of Bethnal Green--and
Spitalfields, and Coventry likewise, through the loss of trade; for, my
dear friends, if you were like me, forced to what I am doing now at the
present moment, &c., &c., &c.”
NAVAL AND MILITARY BEGGARS
are most frequently met with in towns situated at some distance from
a seaport or a garrison. As they are distinct specimens of the same
tribe, they must be separately classified. The more familiar nuisance
is the
TURNPIKE SAILOR.
This sort of vagabond has two lays, the “merchant” lay, and the
“R’yal Navy” lay. He adopts either one or the other according to
the exigencies of his wardrobe, his locality, or the person he is
addressing. He is generally the offspring of some inhabitant of the
most notorious haunts of a seaport town, and has seldom been at sea,
or when he has, has run away after the first voyage. His slang of
seamanship has been picked up at the lowest public-houses in the
filthiest slums that offer diversion to the genuine sailor.
When on the “merchant lay” his attire consists of a pair of tattered
trousers, an old guernsey-shirt, and a torn straw-hat. One of his
principal points of “costume” is his bare feet. His black silk
handkerchief is knotted jauntily round his throat after the most
approved models at the heads of penny ballads, and the outsides of
songs. He wears small gold earrings, and has short curly hair in the
highest and most offensive state of glossy greasiness. His hands and
arms are carefully tattooed--a foul anchor, or a long-haired mermaid
sitting on her tail and making her toilette, being the favourite
cartoons. In his gait he endeavours to counterfeit the roll of a true
seaman, but his hard feet, knock-knees, and imperceptibly acquired
turnpike-trot betray him. His face bears the stamp of diabolically low
cunning, and it is impossible to look at him without an association
with a police-court. His complexion is coarse and tallowy, and has none
of the manly bronze that exposure to the weather, and watching the
horizon give to the real tar.
I was once walking with a gentleman who had spent the earlier portion
of his life at sea, when a turnpike sailor shuffled on before us. We
had just been conversing on nautical affairs, and I said to him--
“Now, there is a brother sailor in distress; of course you will give
him something?”
“_He_ a sailor!” said my friend, with great disgust. “Did you see him
spit?”
The fellow had that moment expectorated.
I answered that I had.
“He spit to wind’ard!” said my friend.
“What of that?” said I.
“A regular landsman’s trick,” observed my friend. “A real sailor never
spits to wind’ard. _Why, he could’nt._”
We soon passed the fellow, who pulled at a curl upon his
forehead, and began in a gruff voice, intended to convey the
idea of hardships, storms, shipwrecks, battles, and privations.
“God--bless--your--’onors--give--a--copper--to--a--poor--sailor--
as--hasn’t--spliced--the--main--jaw--since--the--day--’fore--
yesterday--at--eight--bells--God--love--yer--’onors--do!--I--
avent--tasted--sin’--the--day--’fore--yesterday--so--drop--a--
cop--poor--seaman--do.”
My friend turned round and looked the beggar full in the face.
“What ship?” he asked, quickly.
The fellow answered glibly.
“What captain?” pursued my friend.
The fellow again replied boldly, though his eyes wandered uneasily.
“What cargo?” asked my inexorable companion.
The beggar was not at fault, but answered correctly.
The name of the port, the reason of his discharge, and other questions
were asked and answered; but the man was evidently beginning to be
embarrassed. My friend pulled out his purse as if to give him something.
“What are you doing here?” continued the indefatigable inquirer. “Did
you leave the coast for the purpose of trying to find a ship _here_?”
(We were in Leicester.)
The man stammered and pulled at his useful forelock to get time to
collect his thoughts and invent a good lie.
“He had a friend in them parts as he thought could help him.”
“How long since you were up the Baltic?”
“Year--and--a--arf,--yer--’onor.”
“Do you know Kiel?”
“Yes,--yer--’onor.”
“D’ye know the ‘British Flag’ on the quay there?”
“Yes,--yer--’onor.”
“Been there often?”
“Yes,--yer--’onor.”
“Does Nick Johnson still keep it?”
“Yes,--yer--’onor.”
“Then,” said my friend, after giving vent to a strong opinion as to the
beggar’s veracity, “I’d advise you to be off quickly, for there’s a
policeman, and if I get within hail of him I shall tell him you’re an
impostor. There’s no such house on the quay. Get out, you scoundrel!”
The fellow shuffled off, looking curses, but not daring to express them.
On the “R’yal Navy” lay, the turnpike sailor assumes different
habiliments, and altogether a smarter trim. He wears coarse blue
trousers symmetrically cut about the hips, and baggy over the foot. A
“jumper,” or loose shirt of the same material, a tarpaulin hat, with
the name of a vessel in letters of faded gold, is struck on the back
of his neck, and he has a piece of whipcord, or “lanyard” round his
waist, to which is suspended a jack-knife, which if of but little
service in fighting the battles of his country has stood him in good
stead in silencing the cackling of any stray poultry that crossed his
road, or in frightening into liberality the female tenant of a solitary
cottage. This “patter,” or “blob,” is of Plymouth, Portsmouth, Cawsen’
Bay, Hamoaze--ships paid off, prize-money, the bo’sen and the first
le’tenant. He is always an able-bodied, never an ordinary seaman, and
cannot get a ship “becos” orders is at the Hadmiralty as no more isn’t
to be put into commission. Like the fictitious merchant-sailor he calls
every landsman “your honour,” in accordance with the conventional rule
observed by the jack tars in nautical dramas. He exhibits a stale plug
of tobacco, and replaces it in his jaw with ostentatious gusto. His
chief victims are imaginative boys fresh from “Robinson Crusoe,” and
“Tales of the Ocean,” and old ladies who have relatives at sea. For
many months after a naval battle he is in full force, and in inland
towns tells highly-spiced narratives of the adventures of his own ship
and its gallant crew in action. He is profuse in references to “the
cap’en,” and interlards his account with, “and the cap’en turns round,
and he says to me, he says--” He feels the pulse of his listener’s
credulity through their eyes, and throws the hatchet with the
enthusiasm of an artist. “When we boarded ’em,” I heard one of these
vagabonds say--“oh, when we boarded ’em!” but it is beyond the power of
my feeble pen to relate the deeds of the turnpike true blue, and his
ship and its gallant, gallant crew, when they boarded ’em, I let him
run out his yarn, and then said, “I saw the account of the action in
the papers, but they said nothing of boarding. As I read it, the enemy
were in too shallow water to render that manœuvre possible; but that
till they struck their flag, and the boats went out to take possession,
the vessels were more than half a mile apart.”
This would have posed an ordinary humbug, but the able-bodied liar
immediately, and with great apparent disgust, said, “The papers! the
noo--o--o--s-papers! d----n the noo--o--o--s--papers. You don’t believe
what they says, sure_ly_. Look how they sarved out old Charley Napier.
Why, sir, _I was there, and I ought to know_.”
At times the turnpike sailor roars out a song in praise of British
valour by sea; but of late this “lay” has been unfrequent. At others
he borrows an interesting-looking little girl, and tying his arm up in
a sling, adds his wounds and a motherless infant to his other claims
upon the public sympathy. After a heavy gale and the loss of several
vessels, he appears with a fresh tale and a new suit of carefully
chosen rags. When all these resources fail him he is compelled to turn
merchant, or “duffer,” and invests a small capital in a few hundred
of the worst, and a dozen or two of the very best, cigars. If he be
possessed of no capital he steals them. He allows his whiskers to grow
round his face, and lubricates them in the same liberal manner as his
shining hair. He buys a pea-coat, smart waistcoat, and voluminous
trousers, discards his black neckerchief for a scarlet one, the ends
of which run through a massive ring. He wears a large pair of braces
over his waistcoat, and assumes a half-foreign air, as of a mariner
just returned from distant climes. He accosts you in the streets
mysteriously, and asks you if you want “a few good cigars?” He tells
you they are smuggled, that he “run” them himself, and that the
“Custom-’us horficers” are after him. I need hardly inform my reader
that the cigar he offers as a sample is excellent, and that, should he
be weak enough to purchase a few boxes he will not find them “according
to sample.” Not unfrequently, the cigar-“duffer” lures his victim to
some low tavern to receive his goods, where in lieu of tobacco, shawls,
and laces, he finds a number of cut-throat-looking confederates, who
plunder and illtreat him.
It must not be forgotten that at times a begging sailor may be met, who
has really been a seaman, and who is a proper object of benevolence.
When it is so, he is invariably a man past middle age, and offers for
sale or exhibition a model of a man-of-war or a few toy yachts. He has
but little to say for himself, and is too glad for the gift of a pair
of landsmen’s trousers to trouble himself about their anti-nautical
cut. In fact, the real seaman does not care for costume, and is as
frequently seen in an old shooting-coat as a torn jacket; but despite
his habiliments, the true salt oozes out in the broad hands that dangle
heavily from the wrists, as if wanting to grip a rope or a handspike;
in the tender feet accustomed to the smooth planks of the deck, and in
the settled, far-off look of the weather-beaten head, with its fixed
expression of the aristocracy of subordination.
In conclusion, a real sailor is seldom or never seen inland, where he
can have no chance of employment, and is removed from the sight of the
sea, docks, shipmates, and all things dear and familiar to him. He
carries his papers about him in a small tin box, addresses those who
speak to him as “sir” and “marm,” and never as “your honour” or “my
lady;” is rather taciturn than talkative, and rarely brags of what he
has seen, or done, or seen done. In these and all other respects he is
the exact opposite of the turnpike sailor.
STREET CAMPAIGNERS.
Soldier beggars may be divided into three classes: those who really
have been soldiers and are reduced to mendicancy, those who have been
ejected from the army for misconduct, and those with whom the military
dress and bearing are pure assumptions.
The difference between these varieties is so distinct as to be easily
detected. The first, or soldier proper, has all the evidence of drill
and barrack life about him; the eye that always “fronts” the person
he addresses; the spare habit, high cheekbones, regulation whisker,
stiff chin, and deeply-marked line beneath from ear to ear. He carries
his papers about him, and when he has been wounded or seen service,
is modest and retiring as to his share of glory. He can give little
information as to the incidents of an engagement, except as regards
the deeds of his own company, and in conversation speaks more of the
personal qualities of his officers and comrades than of their feats of
valour. Try him which way you will he never will confess that he has
killed a man. He compensates himself for his silence on the subject of
fighting by excessive grumbling as to the provisions, quarters, &c.,
to which he has been forced to submit in the course of his career. He
generally has a wife marching by his side--a tall strapping woman, who
looks as if a long course of washing at the barracks had made her half
a soldier. Ragged though he be, there is a certain smartness about the
soldier proper, observable in the polish of his boots, the cock of his
cap, and the disposition of the leather strap under his lower lip. He
invariably carries a stick, and when a soldier passes him, casts on him
an odd sort of look, half envying, half pitying, as if he said, “Though
you are better fed than I, you are not so free!”
The soldier proper has various occupations. He does not pass all his
time in begging: he will hold a horse, clean knives and boots, sit as
a model to an artist, and occasionally take a turn at the wash-tub.
Begging he abhors, and is only driven to it as a last resource.
If my readers would inquire why a man so ready to work should not be
able to obtain employment, he will receive the answer that universally
applies to all questions of hardship among the humbler classes--the
vice of the discharged soldier is intemperance.
The second sort of soldier-beggar is one of the most dangerous and
violent of mendicants. Untamable even by regimental discipline,
insubordinate by nature, he has been thrust out from the army to prey
upon society. He begs but seldom, and is dangerous to meet with after
dark upon a lonely road, or in a sequestered lane. Indeed, though he
has every right to be classed among those who will not work, he is not
thoroughly a beggar, but will be met with again, and receive fuller
justice at our hands, in the, to him, more congenial catalogue of
thieves.
The third sort of street campaigner is a perfect impostor, who being
endowed, either by accident or art, with a broken limb or damaged
feature, puts on an old military coat, as he would assume the dress
of a frozen-out gardener, distressed dock-yard labourer, burnt-out
tradesman, or scalded mechanic. He is imitative, and in his time plays
many parts. He “gets up” his costume with the same attention to detail
as the turnpike sailor. In crowded busy streets he “stands pad,” that
is, with a written statement of his hard case slung round his neck,
like a label round a decanter. His bearing is most military; he keeps
his neck straight, his chin in, and his thumbs to the outside seams of
his trousers; he is stiff as an embalmed preparation, for which, but
for the motion of his eyes, you might mistake him. In quiet streets and
in the country he discards his “pad” and begs “on the blob,” that is,
he “patters” to the passers-by, and invites their sympathy by word of
mouth. He is an ingenious and fertile liar, and seizes occasions such
as the late war in the Crimea and the mutiny in India as good distant
grounds on which to build his fictions.
I was walking in a high-road, when I was accosted by a fellow dressed
in an old military tunic, a forage-cap like a charity boy’s, and
tattered trousers, who limped along barefoot by the aid of a stick. His
right sleeve was empty, and tied up to a button-hole at his breast, _à
la_ Nelson.
“Please your honour,” he began, in a doleful exhausted voice, “bestow
your charity on a poor soldier which lost his right arm at the glorious
battle of Inkermann.”
I looked at him, and having considerable experience in this kind of
imposition, could at once detect that he was “acting.”
“To what regiment did you belong?” I asked.
“The Thirty --, sir.”
I looked at his button and read Thirty --
“I haven’t tasted bit o’ food, sir, since yesterday at half-past four,
and then a lady give me a cruster bread,” he continued.
“The Thirty --!” I repeated. “I knew the Thirty --. Let me see--who
was the colonel?”
The man gave me a name, with which I suppose he was provided.
“How long were you in the Thirty --?” I inquired.
“Five year, sir.”
“I had a schoolfellow in that regiment, Captain Thorpe, a tall man with
red whiskers--did you know him?”
“There was a captain, sir, with large red whiskers, and I think his
name was Thorpe; but he warn’t captain of my company, so I didn’t know
for certain,” replied the man, after an affected hesitation.
“The Thirty -- was one of the first of our regiments that landed, I
think?” I remarked.
“Yes, your honour, it were.”
“You impudent impostor!” I said; “the Thirty -- did not go out till the
spring of ’55. How dare you tell me you belonged to it?”
The fellow blenched for a moment, but rallied and said, “I didn’t like
to contradict your honour for fear you should be angry and wouldn’t
give me nothing.”
“That’s very polite of you,” I said, “but still I have a great mind to
give you into custody. Stay; tell me who and what you are, and I will
give you a shilling and let you go.”
He looked up and down the road, measured me with his eye, abandoned the
idea of resistance, and replied:
“Well, your honour, if you won’t be too hard on a poor man which finds
it hard to get a crust anyhow or way, I don’t mind telling you I never
was a soldier.” I give his narrative as he related it to me.
“I don’t know who my parents ever was. The fust thing as I remember was
the river side (the Thames), and running in low tide to find things. I
used to beg, hold hosses, and sleep under dry arches. I don’t remember
how I got any clothes. I never had a pair of shoes or stockings till I
was almost a man. I fancy I am now nearly forty years of age.
“An old woman as kep a rag and iron shop by the water-side give me a
lodging once for two years. We used to call her ‘Nanny;’ but she turned
me out when she caught me taking some old nails and a brass cock out of
her shop; I was hungry when I done it, for the old gal gi’ me no grub,
nothing but the bare floor for a bed.
“I have been a beggar all my life, and begged in all sorts o’ ways and
all sorts o’ lays. I don’t mean to say that if I see anything laying
about handy that I don’t mouch it (_i. e._ steal it). Once a gentleman
took me into his house as his servant. He was a very kind man; I had a
good place, swell clothes, and beef and beer as much as I liked; but I
couldn’t stand the life, and I run away.
“The loss o’ my arm, sir, was the best thing as ever happen’d to me:
it’s been a living to me; I turn out with it on all sorts o’ lays, and
it’s as good as a pension. I lost it poaching; my mate’s gun went off
by accident, and the shot went into my arm, I neglected it, and at
last was obliged to go to a orspital and have it off. The surgeon as
ampitated it said that a little longer and it would ha’ mortified.
“The Crimea’s been a good dodge to a many, but it’s getting stale; all
dodges are getting stale; square coves (_i. e._, honest folks) are so
wide awake.”
“Don’t you think you would have found it more profitable, had you taken
to labour or some honester calling than your present one?” I asked.
“Well, sir, p’raps I might,” he replied; “but going on the square is so
dreadfully confining.”
FOREIGN BEGGARS.
These beggars appeal to the sympathies as “strangers”--in a foreign
land, away from friends and kindred, unable to make their wants known,
or to seek work, from ignorance of the language.
In exposing the shams and swindles that are set to catch the unwary,
I have no wish to check the current of real benevolence. Cases of
distress exist, which it is a pleasure and a duty to relieve. I
only expose the “dodges” of the beggar by profession--the beggar by
trade--the beggar who lives by begging, and nothing else, except, as in
most cases, where he makes the two ends of idleness and self-indulgence
meet,--by thieving.
Foreign beggars are generally so mixed up with political events, that
in treating of them, it is more than usually difficult to detect
imposition from misfortune. Many high-hearted patriots have been
driven to this country by tyrants and their tools, but it will not do
to mistake every vagabond refugee for a noble exile, or to accept as
a fact that a man who cannot live in his own country, is necessarily
persecuted and unfortunate, and has a claim to be helped to live in
this.
The neighbourhood of Leicester Square is, to the foreign political
exile, the foreign political spy, the foreign fraudulent tradesman,
the foreign escaped thief, and the foreign convict who has served his
time, what, in the middle-ages, sanctuary was to the murderer. In
this modern Alsatia--happily for us, guarded by native policemen and
detectives of every nation in the world--plots are hatched, fulminating
powder prepared, detonating-balls manufactured, and infernal machines
invented, which, wielded by the hands of men whose opinions are so far
beyond the age in which they live, that their native land has cast them
out for ever; are destined to overthrow despotic governments, restore
the liberty of the subject, and, in a wholesale sort of way, regenerate
the rights of man.
Political spies are the monied class among these philanthropic
desperadoes. The political regenerators, unless furnished with means
from some special fund, are the most miserable and abject. Mr.
Thackeray has observed that whenever an Irishman is in difficulties he
always finds another Irishman worse off than himself, who talks over
creditors, borrows money, runs errands, and makes himself generally
useful to his incarcerated fellow-countryman. This observation will
apply equally to foreigners.
There is a timid sort of refugee, who lacking the courage to arrive
at political eminence or cash, by means of steel, or poison, is a
hanger-on of his bolder and less scrupulous compatriot. This man, when
deserted by his patron, is forced to beg. The statement that he makes
as to his reasons for leaving the dear native land that the majority of
foreigners are so ready to sing songs in praise of, and to quit, must
be, of course, received with caution.
THE FRENCH BEGGAR.
My reader has most likely, in a quiet street, met a shabby little man,
who stares about him in a confused manner, as if he had lost his way.
As soon as he sees a decently-dressed person he shuffles up to him, and
taking off a “casquette” with considerably more brim than body, makes a
slight bow, and says in a plaintive voice. “Parlez Français, m’sieu?”
If you stop and, in an unguarded moment, answer “Oui,” the beggar takes
from his breast-pocket a greasy leather book, from which he extracts
a piece of carefully folded paper, which he hands you with a pathetic
shrug.
The paper, when opened, contains a small slip, on which is written in a
light, foreign hand--
“You are requested to direct the bearer to the place to which he
desires to go, as he cannot speak English!”
The beggar then, with a profusion of bows, points to the larger paper.
“Mais, m’sieu, ayez la bonté de lire. C’est Anglais.”
The larger paper contains a statement in French and English, that the
bearer Jean Baptiste Dupont is a native of Troyes, Champagne, and a
fan-maker by trade; that paralysis in the hand has deprived him of the
power of working; that he came to England to find a daughter, who had
married an Englishman and was dwelling in Westminster, but that when he
arrived he found they had parted for Australia; that he is fifty-two
years of age, and is a deserving object of compassion, having no means
of returning to Troyes, being an entire stranger to England, and having
no acquaintances or friends to assist him.
This statement is without any signature, but no sooner have you read
it than the beggar, who would seem to have a blind credence in the
efficacy of documents, draws from his pocket-book a certificate of
birth, a register of marriage, a passport, and a permission to embark,
which, being all in a state of crumpled greasiness, and printed and
written in French, so startles and confounds the reader, that he drops
something into the man’s hand and passes on.
I have been often stopped by this sort of beggar. In the last case
I met with I held a long talk with the man--of course, in his own
language, for he will seldom or never be betrayed into admitting that
he has any knowledge of English.
“Parlez Français, m’sieu?”
“Yes, I do,” I answered. “What do you want?”
“Deign, monsieur, to have the bounty to read this paper which I have
the honour to present to monsieur.”
“Oh, never mind the papers!” I said, shortly. “Can’t you speak English?”
“Alas, monsieur, no!”
“Speak French, then!”
My quick speaking rather confused the fellow, who said that he was
without bread, and without asylum; that he was a tourneur and ebeniste
(turner, worker in ebony and ivory, and cabinet-maker in general) by
trade, that he was a stranger, and wished to raise sufficient money to
enable him to return to France.
“Why did you come over to England?” I asked.
“I came to work in London,” he said, after pretending not to understand
my question the first time.
“Where?” I inquired.
At first I understood him to answer Sheffield, but I at last made out
that he meant Smithfield.
“What was your master’s name?”
“I do not comprehend, monsieur--if monsieur will deign to read--”
“You comprehend me perfectly well; don’t pretend that you don’t--that
is only shuffling (tracasserie).
“The name of my master was Johnson.”
“Why did you leave him?” I inquired.
“He is dead, monsieur.”
“Why did you not return to France at his death?” was my next question.
“Monsieur, I tried to obtain work in England,” said the beggar.
“How long did you work for Mr. Johnson?”
“There was a long time, monsieur, that--”
“How long?” I repeated. “How many years?”
“Since two years.”
“And did you live in London two years, and all that time learn to speak
no English?”
“Ah, monsieur, you embarrass me. If monsieur will not deign to aid me,
it must be that I seek elsewhere--”
“But tell me how it was you learnt no English,” I persisted.
“Ah, monsieur, my comrades in the shop were all French.”
“And you want to get back to France?”
“Ah, monsieur, it is the hope of my life.”
“Come to me to-morrow morning at eleven o’clock--there is my address.”
I gave him the envelope of a letter. “I am well acquainted with the
French Consul at London Bridge, and at my intercession I am sure
that he will get you a free passage to Calais; if not, and I find he
considers your story true, I will send you at my own expense. Good
night!”
Of course the man did not call in the morning, and I saw no more of him.
DESTITUTE POLES.
It is now many years since the people of this country evinced a strong
sympathy for Polish refugees. Their gallant struggle, compulsory
exile, and utter national and domestic ruin raised them warm friends
in England; and committees for the relief of destitute Poles, balls
for the benefit of destitute Poles, and subscriptions for the relief
of the destitute Poles were got up in every market-town. Shelter and
sustenance were afforded to many gentlemen of undoubted integrity,
who found themselves penniless in a strange land, and the aristocracy
fêted and caressed the best-born and most gallant. To be a Pole, and
in distress, was almost a sufficient introduction, and there were few
English families who did not entertain as friend or visitor one of
these unfortunate and suffering patriots.
So excellent an opportunity for that class of foreign swindlers
which haunt roulette-tables, and are the pest of second-rate hotels
abroad, was of course made use of. Crowds of adventurers, “got up”
in furs, and cloaks, and playhouse dresses, with padded breasts and
long moustachios, flocked to England, and assuming the title of count,
and giving out that their patrimony had been sequestered by the
Emperor of Russia, easily obtained a hearing and a footing in many
English families, whose heads would not have received one of their own
countrymen except with the usual credentials.
John Bull’s partiality for foreigners is one of his well-known
weaknesses; and valets, cooks, and couriers in their masters clothes,
and sometimes with the titles of that master whom they had seen shot
down in battle, found themselves objects of national sympathy and
attention. Their success among the fair sex was extraordinary; and many
penniless adventurers, with no accomplishments beyond card-sharping,
and a foreign hotel waiter’s smattering of continental languages,
allied themselves to families of wealth and respectability. All,
of course, were not so fortunate; and after some persons had been
victimized, a few inquiries made, and the real refugee gentlemen and
soldiers had indignantly repudiated any knowledge of the swindlers or
their pretensions, the pseudo-Polish exiles were compelled to return
to their former occupations. The least able and least fortunate were
forced to beg, and adopted exactly the same tactics as the French
beggar, except that instead of certificates of birth, and passports, he
exhibited false military documents, and told lying tales of regimental
services, Russian prisons, and miraculous escapes.
The “destitute Pole” is seldom met with now, and would hardly have
demanded a notice if I had not thought it right to show how soon the
unsuccessful cheat or swindler drops down into the beggar, and to what
a height the “Polish fever” raged some thirty years ago. It would be
injustice to a noble nation if I did not inform my reader that but few
of the false claimants to British sympathy were Poles at all. They were
Russians, Frenchmen, Hungarians, Austrians, Prussians, and Germans of
all sorts.
The career of one fellow will serve to show with what little ingenuity
the credulous can be imposed on. His real name is lost among his
numerous aliases, neither do I know whether he commenced life as a
soldier, or as a valet; but I think it probable that he had combined
those occupations and been regimental servant to an officer. He came to
London in the year 1833 under the name of Count Stanislas Soltiewski,
of Ostralenka; possessed of a handsome person and invulnerable
audacity, he was soon received into decent society, and in 1837 married
a lady of some fortune, squandered her money, and deserted her. He then
changed his name to Levieczin, and travelled from town to town, giving
political lectures at town-halls, assembly-rooms, and theatres. In 1842
he called himself Doctor Telecki, said he was a native of Smolensk, and
set up a practice in Manchester, where he contracted a large amount
of debts. From Manchester he eloped with one of his patients, a young
lady to whom he was married in 1845, in Dublin, in which place he
again endeavoured to practise as a physician. He soon involved himself
in difficulties, and quitted Dublin, taking with him funds which
had been entrusted to him as treasurer of a charitable institution.
He left his second wife, and formed a connexion with another woman,
travelled about, giving scientific lectures, and sometimes doing feats
of legerdemain. He again married a widow lady who had some four or
five hundred pounds, which he spent, after which he deserted her. He
then became the scourge and terror of hotel-keepers, and went from
tavern to tavern living on every luxury, and, when asked for money,
decamping, and leaving behind him nothing but portmanteaus filled with
straw and bricks. He returned to England and obtained a situation in
a respectable academy as a teacher of French and the guitar. Here he
called himself Count Hohenbreitenstein-Boitzenburg.
Under this name he seduced a young lady, whom he persuaded he could
not marry on account of her being a Protestant, and of his being a
Count of the Holy Roman Empire in the pontifical degree. By threatening
exposure he extracted a large sum of money from her friends, with
which he returned to London, where he lived for some time by begging
letters, and obtaining money on various false pretences. His first
wife discovered him, and he was charged with bigamy, but owing to
some technical informality was not convicted. He then enlisted in the
87th regiment, from which he shortly after deserted. He became the
associate of thieves and the prostitutes who live in the neighbourhood
of Waterloo Road. After being several times imprisoned for petty
thefts he at length earned a miserable living by conjuring in low
public-houses, where he announced himself as the celebrated Polish
professor of legerdemain, Count Makvicz.
He died in August, 1852, and, oddly enough, in a garret in Poland
Street, Oxford Street.
Of modern Polish swindlers and beggars, the most renowned is Adolphus
Czapolinski. This “shabby genteel man of military appearance”--I quote
the daily papers,--“has been several times incarcerated, has again
offended, and been again imprisoned. His fraudulent practices were
first discovered in 1860.” The following is from the _Times_, of June
the 5th of that year:--
“BOW STREET.--A military-looking man, who said his name was Lorenzo
Noodt, and that he had served as captain in one of our foreign legions
during the Crimean war, was brought before Mr. Henry on a charge of
attempting to obtain money by false and fraudulent pretences from the
Countess of Waldegrave.”
Mr. George Granville Harcourt (the husband of Lady Waldegrave), deposed:
“I saw the prisoner to-day at my house in Carlton Gardens, where he
called by my request in reference to a letter which Lady Waldegrave had
received from him. It was a letter soliciting charitable contributions,
and enclosing three papers. The first purported to be a note from
Lady Stafford, enclosing a post-office order for 3_l._ I know her
ladyship’s handwriting, and this is like it, but I cannot say whether
it is genuine. The second is apparently a note from Colonel Macdonald,
sending him a post-office order for 4_l._ on the part of the Duke
of Cambridge. The third is a note purporting to be written by the
secretary of the Duke d’Aumale. This note states that the duke approves
this person’s departure for Italy, and desires his secretary to send
him 5_l._ We were persuaded that it could not be genuine, in the first
place, as we have the honour of being intimate with the Duke d’Aumale.
We perfectly well knew that he would not say to this individual, or to
any one else, that he approved his departure for Italy; in the second
place, there are mistakes in the French which render it impossible that
the duke’s secretary should have written it; in the third place, the
name is not that of the secretary, though resembling it. Under all the
circumstances, I took an opportunity of asking both the secretary and
the Duke d’Aumale whether they had any knowledge of this communication,
and they stated that they knew nothing of it. The duke said that it was
very disagreeable to him that he should be supposed to be interfering
to forward the departure of persons to Italy, which would produce an
impression that he was meddling in the affairs of that country. I wrote
to the prisoner to call on me, in order to receive back his papers. At
first another man called, but on his addressing me in French I said,
‘You are an Italian, not a German. I want to see the captain himself.’
To-day the prisoner called. I showed the papers, and asked him if they
were the letters he had received, and if he had received the money
referred to in those letters. To both questions he replied in the
affirmative. The officer Horsford, with whom I had communicated in the
meanwhile, was in the next room. I called him in, and he went up to
Captain Noodt, telling him he was his prisoner. He asked why? Horsford
replied, for attempting to obtain money by means of a forged letter.
He then begged me not to ruin him, and said that the letter was not
written by him.”
The prisoner’s letter to Lady Waldegrave was then read as follows:--
“MILADY COUNTESS,
“I am foreigner, but have the rank of captain by my service under
English colours in the Crimean war, being appointed by her Majesty’s
brevet. I have struggled very hard, after having been discharged from
the service, but, happily, I have been temporarily assisted by some
persons of distinction, and the Duke of Cambridge. To-day, milady
Countess, I have in object to ameliorate or better my condition,
going to accept service in Italian lawful army, where by the danger
I may obtain advancement. Being poor, I am obliged to solicit of my
noble patrons towards my journey. The Duc d’Aumale, the Marchioness
of Stafford, &c., kindly granted me their contributions. Knowing your
ladyship’s connexion with those noble persons, I take the liberty of
soliciting your ladyship’s kind contribution to raise any funds for my
outfit and journey. In ‘appui’ of my statements I enclose my captain’s
commission and letters, and, in recommending myself to your ladyship’s
consideration, I present my homage, and remain,
“Your humble servant,
“CAPTAIN L. B. NOODT.”
The letter of the pretended secretary was as follows:--
“MONSIEUR LE CAPITAINE,
“Son altesse Monseigneur le Duc d’Aumale approuve votre départ pour
l’Italie, et pour vous aider dans la dépense de votre voyage m’a
chargé de vous transmettre 5_l._, ci inclus, que vous m’obligerez de
m’en accuser la reception.
“Agréez, monsieur le capitaine, l’assurance de ma consideration
distinguée.
“Votre humble serviteur,
“CHS. COULEUVRIER, Sec.”
The prisoner, _who appeared much agitated_, acknowledged the dishonesty
of his conduct, but appealed to the pity of Mr. Harcourt, saying that
he had suffered great hardships, and had been driven to this act by
want. _It was sad that an officer bearing the Queen’s commission should
be so humiliated._ The letter was not written by himself, but by a
Frenchman who led him into it.
Mr. Henry said he had brought the humiliation on himself. He must
be well aware that the crime of forgery was punished as severely in
his own country as here. The prisoner should have the opportunity
of producing the writer of the letter, or of designating him to the
police. On the recommendation to mercy of Mr. Harcourt, he was only
sentenced to one month’s imprisonment.
On July the 9th he was brought up to Marlborough Street by Horsford,
the officer of the Mendicity Society, charged with obtaining by false
and fraudulent pretences the sum of 3_l._ from Lady Stafford. Since his
imprisonment it had been discovered that his real name was Adolphus
Czapolinski, and that he was a Pole. The real Captain Noodt was in a
distant part of the kingdom, and Czapolinski had obtained surreptitious
possession of his commission, and assumed his name. The indefatigable
Mr. Horsford had placed himself in communication with the secretary of
the Polish Association, who had known the prisoner (Czapolinski) for
twenty-five years. It would seem that in early life he had been engaged
under various foreign powers, and in 1835 he came to this country and
earned a scanty maintenance as a teacher of languages; that he was
addicted to drinking, begging, and thieving, and upon one occasion,
when usher in a school, he robbed the pupils of their clothes, and
even fleeced them of their trifling pocket-money. While in the House
of Detention he had written to Captain Wood, the secretary of the
Mendicity Society, offering to turn approver. The letter in question
ran thus:--
“SIR,--Permit me to make you a request, which is, not to press your
prosecution against me, and I most solemnly promise you that for
this favour all my endeavours will be to render you every assistance
for all the information you should require. I was very wrong to not
speak to you when I was at your office, but really I was not guilty
of this charge, because the letter containing the post-office order
was delivered to Captain Noodt. I was only the messenger from Lady
Stafford.
“Look, Captain Wood, I know much, and no one can be so able to render
you the assistance and information of all the foreigners than me.
Neither any of your officers could find the way; but if you charge
me to undertake to find I will, on only one condition--that you will
stop the prosecution. The six weeks of detention were quite sufficient
punishment to me for the first time; and let it be understood that for
your condescension to stop the prosecution all my services shall be at
your orders, whenever you shall require, without any remuneration. My
offers will be very advantageous to you under every respect. Send any
of your clerks to speak with me to make my covenant with you, and you
will be better convinced of my good intentions to be serviceable to
you.
“I am, &c.,
“A. CZAPOLINSKI.”
He was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment and hard labour.
Czapolinski is one of the most extraordinary of the beggars of the
present day. He raises money both by personal application and by
letter. He has been known to make from 20_l._ to 60_l._ per day. He
is a great gambler, and has been seen to lose--and to pay--upwards of
100_l._ at a gambling house in the neighbourhood of Leicester Square in
the course of a single night and morning.
HINDOO BEGGARS
Are those spare, snake-eyed Asiatics who walk the streets, coolly
dressed in Manchester cottons, or chintz of a pattern commonly used for
bed-furniture, to which the resemblance is carried out by the dark,
polished colour of the thin limbs which it envelopes. They very often
affect to be converts to the Christian religion, and give away tracts;
with the intention of entrapping the sympathy of elderly ladies. They
assert that they have been high-caste Brahmins, but as untruth, even
when not acting professionally, is habitual to them, there is not the
slightest dependence to be placed on what they say. Sometimes, in the
winter, they “do shallow,” that is, stand on the kerb-stone of the
pavement, in their thin, ragged clothes, and shiver as with cold and
hunger, or crouch against a wall and whine like a whipped animal;
at others they turn out with a small, barrel-shaped drum, on which
they make a monotonous noise with their fingers, to which music they
sing and dance. Or they will “stand pad with a fakement,” _i. e._
wear a placard upon their breasts, that describes them as natives of
Madagascar, in distress, converts to Christianity, anxious to get to
a seaport where they can work their passage back. This is a favourite
artifice with Lascars--or they will sell lucifers, or sweep a crossing,
or do anything where their picturesque appearance, of which they are
proud and conscious, can be effectively displayed. They are as cunning
as they look, and can detect a sympathetic face among a crowd. They
never beg of soldiers, or sailors, to whom they always give a wide
berth as they pass them in the streets.
From the extraordinary mendacity of this race of beggars--a mendacity
that never falters, hesitates, or stumbles, but flows on in an
unbroken stream of falsehood,--it is difficult to obtain any reliable
information respecting them. I have, however, many reasons for
believing that the following statement, which was made to me by a very
dirty and distressed Indian, is moderately true. The man spoke English
like a cockney of the lowest order. I shall not attempt to describe the
peculiar accent or construction which he occasionally gave to it.
“My name is Joaleeka. I do not know where I was born. I never knew
my father. I remember my mother very well. From the first of my
remembrance I was at Dumdum, where I was servant to a European
officer--a great man--a prince--who had more than a hundred servants
beside me. When he went away to fight, I followed among others--I was
with the baggage. I never fought myself, but I have heard the men
(Sepoys) say that the prince, or general, or colonel, liked nothing so
well as fighting, except tiger-hunting. He was a wonderful man, and his
soldiers liked him very much. I travelled over a great part of India
with Europeans. I went up country as far as Secunderabad, and learned
to speak English very well--so well that, when I was quite a young
man, I was often employed as interpreter, for I caught up different
Indian languages quickly. At last I got to interpret so well that I
was recommended to ----, a great native prince who was coming over to
England. I was not his interpreter, but interpreter to his servants. We
came to London. We stopped in an hotel in Vere-street, Oxford-street.
We stayed here some time. Then my chief went over to Paris, but he
did not take all his servants with him. I stopped at the hotel to
interpret for those who remained. It was during this time that I formed
a connexion with a white woman. She was a servant in the hotel. I broke
my caste, and from that moment I knew that it would not do for me to go
back to India. The girl fell in the family-way, and was sent out of the
house. My fellow-servants knew of it, and as many of them hated me, I
knew that they would tell my master on his return. I also knew that by
the English laws in England I was a free man, and that my master could
not take me back against my will. If I had gone back, I should have
been put to death for breaking my caste. When my master returned from
France, he sent for me. He told me that he had heard of my breaking my
caste, and of the girl, but that he should take no notice of it; that
I was to return to Calcutta with him, where he would get me employment
with some European officer; that I need not fear, as he would order his
servants to keep silent on the subject. I salaamed and thanked him,
and said I was his slave for ever; but at the same time I knew that he
would break his word, and that when he had me in his power, he would
put me to death. He was a very severe man about caste. I attended to
all my duties as before, and all believed that I was going back to
India--but the very morning that my master started for the coast, I ran
away. I changed my clothes at the house of a girl I knew--not the same
one as I had known at the hotel, but another. This one lived at Seven
Dials. I stopped in-doors for many days, till this girl, who could
read newspapers, told me that my master had sailed away. I felt very
glad, for though I knew my master could not force me to go back with
him, yet I was afraid for all that, for he knew the King and the Queen,
and had been invited by the Lord Mayor to the City. I liked England
better than India, and English women have been very kind to me. I
think English women are the handsomest in the world. The girl in whose
house I hid, showed me how to beg. She persuaded me to turn Christian,
because she thought that it would do me good--so I turned Christian. I
do not know what it means, but I am a Christian, and have been for many
years. I married that girl for some time. I have been married several
times. I do not mean to say that I have ever been to church as rich
folks do; but I have been married without that. Sometimes I do well,
and sometimes badly. I often get a pound or two by interpreting. I am
not at all afraid of meeting any Indian who knew me, for if they said
anything I did not like, I should call out “Police!” I know the law
better than I did. Every thing is free in England. You can do what you
like, if you can pay, or are not found out. I do not like policemen.
After the mutiny in 1857 I did very badly. No one would look at a poor
Indian then--much less give to him. I knew that the English would put
it down soon, because I know what those rascals over there are like.
I am living now in Charles Street, Drury Lane. I have been married to
my present wife six years. We have three children and one dead. My
eldest is now in the hospital with a bad arm. I swept a crossing for
two years; that was just before the mutiny. All that knew me used to
chaff me about it, and call me Johnny Sepoy. My present wife is Irish,
and fought two women about it. They were taken to Bow-street by a
policeman, but the judge would not hear them. My wife is a very good
wife to me, but she gets drunk too often. If it were not for that, I
should like her better. I ran away from her once, but she came after
me with all the children. Sometimes I make twelve shillings a week. I
could make much more by interpreting, but I do not like to go among the
nasty natives of my country. I believe I am more than fifty years of
age.”
NEGRO BEGGARS.
The negro beggar so nearly resembles the Hindoo that what I have said
of one, I could almost say of the other. There are, however, these
points of difference. The negro mendicant, who is usually an American
negro, never studies the picturesque in his attire. He relies on
the abject misery and down-trodden despair of his appearance, and
generally represents himself as a fugitive slave--with this exception,
his methods of levying contributions are precisely the same as his
lighter-skinned brother’s.
Some years ago it was a common thing to see a negro with tracts in his
hand, and a placard upon his breast, upon which was a wood-cut of a
black man, kneeling, his wrists heavily chained, his arms held high
in supplication, and round the picture, forming a sort of proscenium
or frame, the words: “Am I not a man and a brother?” At the time that
the suppression of the slave trade created so much excitement, this
was so excellent a “dodge” that many white beggars, fortunate enough
to possess a flattish or turned-up nose, _dyed themselves black_
and “stood pad” as real Africans. The imposture, however, was soon
detected and punished.
There are but few negro beggars to be seen now. It is only common
fairness to say that negroes seldom, if ever, shirk work. Their only
trouble is to obtain it. Those who have seen the many negroes employed
in Liverpool, will know that they are hard-working, patient, and, too
often, underpaid. A negro will sweep a crossing, run errands, black
boots, clean knives and forks, or dig, for a crust and a few pence.
The few impostors among them are to be found among those who go about
giving lectures on the horrors of slavery, and singing variations on
the “escapes” in that famous book ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin.’ Negro servants
are seldom read of in police reports, and are generally found to give
satisfaction to their employers. In the east end of London negro
beggars are to be met with, but they are seldom beggars by profession.
Whenever they are out of work they have no scruples, but go into the
streets, take off their hats, and beg directly.
I was accosted by one in Whitechapel, from whom I obtained the
following statement:--
“My father was a slave, so was my mother. I have heard my father say
so. I have heard them tell how they got away, but I forget all about
it. It was before I was born. I am the eldest son. I had only one
brother. Three years after his birth my mother died. My father was
a shoe-black in New York. He very often had not enough to eat. My
brother got a place as a servant, but I went out in the streets to
do what I could. About the same time that my father, who was an old
man, died, my brother lost his place. We agreed to come to England
together. My brother had been living with some Britishers, and he had
heard them say that over here niggers were as good as whites; and that
the whites did not look down on them and illtreat them, as they do in
New York. We went about and got odd jobs on the quay, and at last we
hid ourselves in the hold of a vessel, bound for Liverpool. I do not
know how long we were hid, but I remember we were terribly frightened
lest we should be found out before the ship got under weigh. At last
hunger forced us out, and we rapped at the hatches; at first we were
not heard, but when we shouted out, they opened the hatches, and took
us on deck. They flogged us very severely, and treated us shamefully
all the voyage. When we got to Liverpool, we begged and got odd jobs.
At last we got engaged in a travelling circus, where we were servants,
and used to ride about with the band in beautiful dresses, but the
grooms treated us so cruelly that we were forced to run away from that.
I forget the name of the place that we were performing at, but it was
not a day’s walk from London. We begged about for some time. At last,
my brother--his name is Aaron--got to clean the knives and forks at a
slap-bang (an eating-house) in the city. He was very fortunate, and
used to save some bits for me. He never takes any notice of me now. He
is doing very well. He lives with a great gentleman in Harewood-square,
and has a coat with silver buttons, and a gold-laced hat. He is very
proud, and I do not think would speak to me if he saw me. I don’t know
how I live, or how much I get a week. I do porter’s work mostly, but I
do anything I can get. I beg more than half the year. I have no regular
lodging. I sleep where I can. When I am in luck, I have a bed. It costs
me threepence. At some places they don’t care to take a man of colour
in. I sometimes get work in Newgate-market, carrying meat, but not
often. Ladies give me halfpence oftener than men. The butchers call me
‘Othello,’ and ask me why I killed my wife. I have tried to get aboard
a ship, but they won’t have me. I don’t know how old I am, but I know
that when we got to London, it was the time the Great Exhibition was
about. I can lift almost any weight when I have had a bit of something
to eat. I don’t care for beer. I like rum best. I have often got drunk,
but never when I paid for it myself.”
* * * * *
The following cases of genuine distress fell under my notice. My
readers will observe the difference of tone, the absence of clap-trap,
and desire to enlarge upon a harrowing fact of those unfortunates who
have been reduced to beggary, compared with the practised shuffle and
conventional whine of the mendicant by profession.
I was standing with a friend at the counter of a tavern in Oxford
Street, when a man came in and asked me to help him with a penny.
I saw at a glance that he was a workman at some hard-working trade. His
face was bronzed, and his large, hard hands were unmistakably the hands
of a labourer. He kept his eyes fixed on me as he spoke, and begged
with a short pipe in his mouth.
I asked him if he would have some beer?
“Thank ye, sir, I don’t want beer so much as I want a penny loaf. I
haven’t tasted since morn, and I’m not the man I was fifteen year ago,
and I feel it.”
“Will you have some bread-and-cheese and beer?” I asked.
“Thank ye, sir; bread-and-cheese and beer, and thank ye, sir; for I’m
beginning to feel I want something.”
I asked the man several questions, and he made the following
statement:--
“I’m a miner, sir, and I’ve been working lately five mile from
Castleton in Darbyshire. Why did I leave it? Do you want me to tell the
truth, now--the real truth? Well then I’ll tell you the real truth.
I got drunk--you asked me for the real truth, and now you’ve got it.
I’ve been a miner all my life, and been engaged in all the great public
works. I call a miner a man as can sink a shaft in anything, barring
he’s not stopped by water. I’ve got a wife and two children. I left
them at Castleton. They’re all right. I left them some money. I’ve
worked in eighteen inches o’ coal. I mean in a chamber only eighteen
inches wide. You lay on your side and pick like this. (Here he threw
himself on the floor, and imitated the action of a coal-miner with his
pick.) I’ve worked under young Mr. Brunel very often. He were not at
all a gentleman unlike you, sir, only he were darker. My last wages
was six shilling a-day. I expect soon to be in work again, for I know
lots o’ miners in London, and I know where they want hands. I could
get a bed and a shilling this minute if I knew where my mates lived;
but to-day, when I got to the place where they work, they’d gone home,
and I couldn’t find out in what part of London they lived. We miners
always assist each other, when we’re on the road. I’ve worked in lead
and copper, sir, as well as coal, and have been a very good man in my
time. I am just forty year old, and I think I’ve used myself too much
when I were young. I knows the Cornish mines well. I’m sure to get work
in the course of the week, for I’m well known to many on ’em up at
Notting Hill. I once worked in a mine where there were a pressure of
fifty pound to the square foot of air. You have to take your time about
everything you do there--you can’t work hard in a place like that.
Thank you, sir, much obliged to you.”
One evening in the parish of Marylebone an old man who was selling
lucifer-matches put his finger to his forehead, and offered me a box.
“Ha’penny a box, sir,” he said.
I told him to follow me; an old woman also accompanied us. He made the
following statement:--
“My name is John Wood--that’s my wife. I am sixty-five years of age;
she’s seventy-five--ten years older than I am. I kept a shop round
this street, sir, four-and-twenty years. I’ve got a settlement in this
parish, but we neither of us like to go into the union--they’d separate
us, and we like to be together for the little time we shall be here.
The reason we went to the bad was, I took a shop at Woolwich, and the
very week I opened it, I don’t know how many hundred men were not
discharged from the Arsenal and Dockyard. I lost £350 there; after that
we tried many things; but everything failed. This is not a living. I
stood four hours last night, and took twopence-ha’penny. We lodge in
Warde’s Buildings. We pay one and ninepence a-week. We’ve got sticks of
our own,--that is a bed, and a table. We are both of us half-starved.
It is hard--very hard. I’m as weak as a rat, and so is my wife. We’ve
tried to do something better, but we can’t. If I could get some of the
folks that once knew me to assist me, I might buy a few things, and
make a living out of them. We’ve been round to ’em to ask ’em, but they
don’t seem inclined to help us. People don’t, sir, when you’re poor. I
used to feel that myself one time, but I know better now. Good night,
sir, and thank you.”
In the same neighbourhood I saw an elderly man who looked as if he
would beg of me if he dared. I turned round to look at him, and saw
that his eyes were red as if with crying, and that he carried a rag in
his hand with which he kept dabbing them. I gave him a few pence.
“Thank you, sir,” he said; “God bless you. Excuse me, sir, but my eyes
is bad--I suffer from the erysipelas--that is what brought me to this.
Kindness rather overcomes me--I’ve not been much used to it of late.”
He made the following statement:
“I have been a gentleman’s servant, sir, but I lost my place through
the erysipelas. I was mad with it, and confined in Bedlam for four
years. The last place I was in service at was Sir H---- H----’s
(he mentioned the name of an eminent banker). Sir H---- was very
kind to me. I clean his door-plate now, for which I get a shilling
a-week--that’s all the dependence I have now. The servants behave bad
to me. Sir H---- said that I was to go into the kitchen now and then;
but they never give me anything. I don’t get half enough to eat, and
it makes me very weak. I’m weak enough naturally, and going without
makes me worse. I lodge over in Westminster. I pay threepence a-night,
or eighteenpence a-week. There are three others in the same room as
me. I hold horses sometimes, and clean knives and forks when I can
get it to do; but people like younger men than me to do odd jobs. I
can’t do things quick enough, and I’m so nervous that I ain’t handy. I
can go into the workhouse, and I think I shall in the winter; but the
confinement of it is terrible to me. I’d like to keep out of it if I
can. My shilling a-week don’t pay my rent, and I find it very hard to
get on at all. Nobody can tell what I go through. I suppose I must go
into the workhouse at last. They’re not over kind to you when you’re
in. Every day the first thing I try to get is the threepence for my
lodging. I pay nightly, then I don’t have anything to pay on Sundays. I
don’t know any trade; gentlemen’s servants never do. I used to have the
best of everything when I was in service. God bless you, sir, and thank
you. I’m very much obliged to you.”
DISASTER BEGGARS.
This class of street beggars includes shipwrecked mariners, blown-up
miners, burnt-out tradesmen, and lucifer droppers. The majority of
them are impostors, as is the case with all beggars who pursue begging
pertinaciously and systematically. There are no doubt genuine cases to
be met with, but they are very few, and they rarely obtrude themselves.
Of the shipwrecked mariners I have already given examples under the
head of Naval and Military Beggars. Another class of them, to which
I have not referred, is familiar to the London public in connection
with rudely executed paintings representing either a shipwreck, or
more commonly the destruction of a boat by a whale in the North Seas.
This painting they spread upon the pavement, fixing it at the corners,
if the day be windy, with stones. There are generally two men in
attendance, and in most cases one of the two has lost an arm or a
leg. Occasionally both of them have the advantage of being deprived
of either one or two limbs. Their misfortune so far is not to be
questioned. A man who has lost both arms, or even one, is scarcely in
a position to earn his living by labour, and is therefore a fit object
for charity. It is found, however, that in most instances the stories
of their misfortunes printed underneath their pictures are simply
inventions, and very often the pretended sailor has never been to sea
at all. In one case which I specially investigated, the man had been a
bricklayer, and had broken both his arms by falling from a scaffold.
He received some little compensation at the time, but when that was
spent he went into the streets to beg, carrying a paper on his breast
describing the cause of his misfortune. His first efforts were not
successful. His appearance (dressed as he was in workman’s clothes) was
not sufficiently picturesque to attract attention, and his story was of
too ordinary a kind to excite much interest. He had a very hard life of
it for some length of time; for, in addition to the drawback arising
from the uninteresting nature of his case, he had had no experience in
the art of begging, and his takings were barely sufficient to procure
bread. From this point I will let him tell his own story:--
A SHIPWRECKED MARINER.
“I had only taken a penny all day, and I had had no breakfast, and I
spent the penny in a loaf. I was three nights behind for my lodging,
and I knew the door would be shut in my face if I did not take home
sixpence. I thought I would go to the workhouse, and perhaps I
might get a supper and a lodging for that night. I was in Tottenham
Court-road by the chapel, and it was past ten o’clock. The people were
thinning away, and there seemed no chance of anything. So says I to
myself I’ll start down the New Road to the work’ouse. I knew there
was a work’ouse down that way, for I worked at a ’ouse next it once,
and I used to think the old paupers looked comfortable like. It came
across me all at once, that I one time said to one of my mates, as we
was sitting on the scaffold, smoking our pipes, and looking over the
work’ouse wall, ‘Jem, them old chaps there seems to do it pretty tidy;
they have their soup and bread, and a bed to lie on, and their bit o’
baccy, and they comes out o’ a arternoon and baskes in the sun, and
has their chat, and don’t seem to do no work to hurt ’em.’ And Jem he
says, ‘it’s a great hinstitooshin, Enery,’ says he, for you see Jem was
a bit of a scollard, and could talk just like a book. ‘I don’t know
about a hinstitooshin, Jem,’ says I, ‘but what I does know is that a
man might do wuss nor goe in there and have his grub and his baccy
regular, without nought to stress him, like them old chaps.’ Somehow
or other that ’ere conversation came across me, and off I started to
the work’ouse. When I came to the gate I saw a lot of poor women and
children sitting on the pavement round it. They couldn’t have been
hungrier than me, but they were awful ragged, and their case looked
wuss. I didn’t like to go in among them, and I watched a while a
little way off. One woman kep on ringing the bell for a long time, and
nobody came, and then she got desperate, and kep a-pulling and ringing
like she was mad, and at last a fat man came out and swore at her and
drove them all away. I didn’t think there was much chance for me if
they druv away women and kids, and such as them, but I thought I would
try as I was a cripple, and had lost both my arms. So I stepped across
the road, and was just agoing to try and pull the bell with my two poor
stumps when some one tapped me on the shoulder. I turned round and saw
it was a sailor-like man, without ne’er an arm like myself, only his
were cut off short at the shoulder. ‘What are you agoing to do?’ says
he. ‘I was agoing to try and ring the work’ouse bell,’ says I. ‘What
for?’ says he. ‘To ask to be took in,’ says I. And then the sailor man
looks at me in a steady kind of way, and says, ‘Want to get into the
work’ouse, and you got ne’er an arm? You’re a infant,’ says he. ‘If you
had only lost one on ’em now, I could forgive you, but--’ ‘But surely,’
says I, ‘it’s a greater misfortune to lose two nor one; half a loaf’s
better nor no bread, they say.’ ‘You’re a infant,’ says he again. ‘One
off aint no good; both on ’em’s the thing. Have you a mind to earn a
honest living,’ says he, quite sharp. ‘I have,’ says I; ‘anything for
a honest crust.’ ‘Then,’ says he, ‘come along o’ me.’ So I went with
the sailor man to his lodging in Whitechapel, and a very tidy place
it was, and we had beefsteaks and half a gallon o’ beer, and a pipe,
and then he told me what he wanted me to do. I was to dress like him
in a sailor’s jacket and trousers and a straw ’at, and stand o’ one
side of a picture of a shipwreck, vile he stood on the ’tother. And I
consented, and he learned me some sailors’ patter, and at the end of
the week he got me the togs, and then I went out with him. We did only
middlin the first day, but after a bit the coppers tumbled in like
winkin’. It was so affectin’ to see two mariners without ne’er an arm
between them, and we had crowds round us. At the end of the week we
shared two pound and seven shillings, which was more nor a pound than
my mate ever did by his self. He always said it was pilin’ the hagony
to have two without ne’er an arm. My mate used to say to me, ‘Enery, if
your stumps had only been a trifle shorter, we might ha’ made a fortun
by this time; but you waggle them, you see, and that frightens the old
ladies.’ I did well when Trafalgar Jack was alive. That was my mate,
sir; but he died of the cholera, and I joined another pal who had a
wooden leg; but he was rough to the kids, and got us both into trouble.
How do I mean rough to the kids? Why, you see, the kids used to swarm
round us to look at the pictur just like flies round a sugar-cask, and
that crabbed the business. My mate got savage with them sometimes, and
clouted their heads, and one day the mother o’ one o’ the brats came up
a-screaming awful and give Timber Bill, as we called him, into custody,
and he was committed for a rogue and vagabond. Timber Bill went into
the nigger line arterwards and did well. You may have seen him, sir.
He plays the tambourine, and dances, and the folks laugh at his wooden
leg, and the coppers come in in style. Yes, I’m still in the old line,
but it’s a bad business now.”
BLOWN-UP MINERS.
These are simply a variety of the large class of beggars who get their
living in the streets, chiefly by frequenting public-houses and whining
a tale of distress. The impostors among them--and they are by far the
greater number--do not keep up the character of blown-up miners all the
year round, but time the assumption to suit some disaster which may
give colour to their tale. After a serious coal-mine accident “blown-up
miners” swarm in such numbers all over the town that one might suppose
the whole of the coal-hands of the north had been blown south by one
explosion. The blown-up miner has the general appearance of a navvy;
he wears moleskin trousers turned up nearly to the knees, a pair of
heavy-laced boots, a sleeved waistcoat, and commonly a shapeless felt
hat of the wide-awake fashion. He wears his striped shirt open at the
neck, showing a weather-browned and brawny chest. The state of his
hands and the colour of his skin show that he has been accustomed to
hard work, but his healthy look and fresh colour give the lie direct to
his statement that he has spent nearly the whole of his life in working
in the dark many hundred feet beneath the surface of the earth. Many
of them do not pretend that they have been injured by the explosion of
the mine, but only that they have been thrown out of work. These are
mostly excavators and bricklayers’ labourers, who are out of employ in
consequence of a stoppage of the works on which they have been engaged,
or more often, as I have proved by inquiry, in consequence of their
own misconduct in getting drunk and absenting themselves from their
labour. These impostors are easily detected. If you cross-question them
as to the truth of their stories, and refer to names and places which
they ought to be acquainted with if their representations were genuine,
they become insolent and move away from you. There are others, however,
who are more artful, and whose tales are borne out by every external
appearance, and also by a complete knowledge of the places whence they
pretend to have come. These men, though sturdy and horny-fisted, have
a haggard, pallid look, which seems to accord well with the occupation
of the miner. They can converse about mining operations, they describe
minutely the incidents of the accident by which they suffered, and they
have the names of coal-owners and gangsmen ever ready on their tongues.
In addition to this they bare some part of their bodies--the leg or
the arm--and show you what looks like a huge scald or burn. These are
rank impostors, denizens of Wentworth-street and Brick-lane, and who
were never nearer to Yorkshire than Mile-end gate in their lives.
Having met with one or two specimens of “real” distressed miners, I
can speak with great certainty of the characteristics which mark out
the impostor. For many years past there has always been an abundance
of work for miners and navigators; indeed the labour of the latter has
often been at a premium; cases of distress arise among them only from
two causes--ill-health and bodily disaster. If they are in health and
found begging it is invariably during a long journey from one part of
the country to another. The look and manner of these miners forbids
the idea of their being systematic mendicants or impostors. They want
something to help them on the road, and they will be as grateful for
a hunck of bread and cheese as for money. If you cross-question these
men they never show an uncomfortable sense of being under examination,
but answer you frankly as if you were merely holding a friendly
conversation with them. Miners are very charitable to each other, and
they think it no shame to seek aid of their betters when they really
need it. Of the device called the “scaldrum dodge,” by which beggars of
this class produce artificial sores, I shall have to treat by-and-bye.
BURNT-OUT TRADESMEN.
With many begging impostors the assumption of the “burnt-out tradesman”
is simply a change of character to suit circumstances; with others it
is a fixed and settled rôle. The burnt-out tradesman does not beg in
the streets by day; he comes out at night, and his favourite haunts
are the private bars of public-houses frequented by good company. In
the day-time he begs by a petition, which he leaves at the houses of
charitable persons with an intimation that he will call again in an
hour. In the evening he is made up for his part. He lurks about a
public-house until he sees a goodly company assembled in the private
bar, and then, when the “gents,” as he calls them, appear to be getting
happy and comfortable, he suddenly appears among them, and moves them
by the striking contrast which his personal appearance and condition
offers to theirs. Like many others of his class he has studied human
nature to some purpose, and he knows at a glance the natures with
which he has to deal. Noisy and thoughtless young men, like clerks
and shopmen, he avoids. They are generally too much occupied with
themselves to think of him or his misfortunes; and having had no
experience of a responsible position, the case of a reduced tradesman
does not come home to them. A quiet and sedate company of middle-aged
tradesmen best suits his purpose. They know the difficulties and
dangers of trade, and maybe there are some of them who are conscious
that ruin is impending over themselves. To feeling men of this class
it is a terrible shock to see a man, who has once been well-to-do
like themselves, reduced to get a living by begging. The burnt-out
tradesman’s appearance gives peculiar force to his appeal. He is
dressed in a suit of black, greasy and threadbare, which looks like the
last shreds of the dress suit which he wore on high days and holidays,
when he was thriving and prosperous. His black satin stock, too, is
evidently a relict of better days. His hat is almost napless; but it is
well brushed--indicating care and neatness on the part of its owner.
His shoes are mere shapeless envelopes of leather, but the uppers are
carefully polished, and the strings neatly tied. When the burnt-out
tradesman enters a bar he allows his appearance to have its due effect
before he opens his mouth, or makes any other demonstration whatever.
In this he seems to imitate the practice of the favourite comedian,
who calculates upon being able to bespeak the favour of his audience
by merely showing his face. The beggar, after remaining motionless
for a moment, to allow the company fully to contemplate his miserable
appearance, suddenly and unexpectedly advances one of his hands, which
until now has been concealed behind his coat, and exposes to view a box
of matches. Nothing can surpass the artistic skill of this mute appeal.
The respectable look, and the poor, worn clothes, first of all--the
patient, broken-hearted glance accompanied by a gentle sigh--and then
the box of matches! What need of a word spoken. Can you not read the
whole history? Once a prosperous tradesman, the head of a family,
surrounded by many friends. Now, through misfortune, cast out of house
and home, deserted by his friends, and reduced to wander the streets
and sell matches to get his children bread. Reduced to sell paltry
matches! he who was in a large way once, and kept clerks to register
his wholesale transactions! It is seldom that this artist requires to
speak. No words will move men who can resist so powerful an appeal.
When he does speak he does not require to say more than--“I am an
unfortunate tradesman, who lost everything I possessed in the world by
a disastrous fire--” Here the halfpence interrupt his story, and he has
no need to utter another word, except to mutter his humble thanks.
There are a great many beggars of this class, and they nearly all
pursue the same method. They are most successful among tradesmen of
the middle class, and among the poor working people. One of them told
me that the wives of working men were, according to his experience,
the most tender-hearted in London. “The upper classes, the swells,
aint no good,” he said; “they subscribe to the Mendicity Society,
and they thinks every beggar an imposture. The half-and-half swells,
shopmen and the likes, aint got no hearts, and they aint got no money,
and what’s the good. Tradesmen that aint over well off have a fellow
feeling; but the workmen’s wives out a-marketing of a Saturday night
are no trouble. They always carries coppers--change out of sixpence or
a something--in their hands, and when I goes in where they are a havin’
their daffies--that’s drops o’ gin, sir--they looks at me, and says,
‘Poor man!’ and drops the coppers, whatever it is, into my hand, and
p’raps asks me to have a half-pint o’ beer besides. They’re good souls,
the workmen’s wives.”
There is a well-known beggar of this class who dresses in a most
unexceptionable manner. His black clothes are new and glossy, his hat
and boots are good, and to heighten the effect he wears a spotless
white choker. He is known at the west end by the name of the “Bishop
of London.” His aspect is decidedly clerical. He has a fat face, a
double chin, his hat turns up extensively at the brim, and, as I have
said, he wears a white neck-cloth. When he enters a bar the company
imagine that he is about to order a bottle of champagne at least; but
when he looks round and produces the inevitable box of matches, the
first impression gives way either to compassion or extreme wonder. So
far as my experience serves me, this dodge is not so successful as the
one I have just described. A person with the most ordinary reasoning
powers must know that a man who possesses clothes like those need not
be in want of bread; but if the power of reasoning were universally
allotted to mankind, there would be a poor chance for the professional
beggar. There never was a time or place in which there were not to
be found men anxious to avoid labour, and yet to live in ease and
enjoyment, and there never was a time in which other men were not, from
their sympathy, their fears, or their superstition, ready to assist the
necessitous, or those who appeared to be so, and liable to be imposed
upon or intimidated, according as the beggar is crafty or bold.
As a rule the burnt-out tradesmen whom I have described are impostors,
who make more by begging than many of those who relieve them earn
by hard and honest labour. The petitions which they leave at houses
are very cleverly drawn out. They are generally the composition of
the professional screevers, whose practices I shall have to describe
by-and-by. They have a circumstantial account of the fire by which the
applicant “lost his all,” and sometimes furnish an inventory of the
goods that were destroyed. They are attested by the names of clergymen,
churchwardens, and other responsible persons, whose signatures are
imitated with consummate art in every variety of ink. Some specimens
of these petitions and begging letters will be found under the head of
“Dependants of Beggars.”
LUCIFER DROPPERS.
The lucifer droppers are impostors to a man--to a boy--to a girl. Men
seldom, if ever, practise this “dodge.” It is children’s work; and the
artful way in which boys and girls of tender years pursue it, shows
how systematically the seeds of mendicancy and crime are implanted in
the hearts of the young Arab tribes of London. The artfulness of this
device is of the most diabolical kind; for it trades not alone upon
deception, but upon exciting sympathy with the guilty at the expense
of the innocent. A boy or a girl takes up a position on the pavement
of a busy street, such as Cheapside or the Strand. He, or she--it is
generally a girl--carries a box or two of lucifer matches, which she
offers for sale. In passing to and fro she artfully contrives to get
in the way of some gentleman who is hurrying along. He knocks against
her and upsets the matches which fall in the mud. The girl immediately
begins to cry and howl. The bystanders, who are ignorant of the trick,
exclaim in indignation against the gentleman who has caused a poor girl
such serious loss, and the result is that either the gentleman, to
escape being hooted, or the ignorant passers by, in false compassion,
give the girl money. White peppermint lozenges are more often used than
lucifers. It looks a hopeless case, indeed, when a trayful of white
lozenges fall in the mud.
BODILY AFFLICTED BEGGARS.
Beggars who excite charity by exhibiting sores and bodily deformities
are not so commonly to be met with in London as they were some years
ago. The officers of the Mendicity Society have cleared the streets
of nearly all the impostors, and the few who remain are blind men
and cripples. Many of the blind men are under the protection of a
Society, which furnishes them with books printed in raised type which
they decipher by the touch. Others provide their own books, and are
allowed to sit on door steps or in the recesses of the bridges without
molestation from the police. It has been found on inquiry that these
afflicted persons are really what they appear to be--poor, helpless,
blind creatures, who are totally incapacitated from earning a living,
and whom it would be heartless cruelty to drive into the workhouse,
where no provision is made for their peculiar wants.
The bodily afflicted beggars of London exhibit seven varieties. 1.
Those having real or pretended sores, vulgarly known as the “Scaldrum
Dodge.” 2. Having swollen legs. 3. Being crippled, deformed, maimed,
or paralyzed. 4. Being blind. 5. Being subject to fits. 6. Being in a
decline. 7. “Shallow Coves,” or those who exhibit themselves in the
streets, half-clad, especially in cold weather.
First, then, as to those having real or pretended sores. As I have
said, there are few beggars of this class left. When the officers of
the Mendicity Society first directed their attention to the suppression
of this form of mendicancy, it was found that the great majority of
those who exhibit sores were unmitigated impostors. In nearly all the
cases investigated the sores did not proceed from natural causes, but
were either wilfully produced or simulated. A few had lacerated their
flesh in reality; but the majority had resorted to the less painful
operation known as the “Scaldrum Dodge.” This consists in covering a
portion of the leg or arm with soap to the thickness of a plaister, and
then saturating the whole with vinegar. The vinegar causes the soap
to blister and assume a festering appearance, and thus the passer-by
is led to believe that the beggar is suffering from a real sore. So
well does this simple device simulate a sore that the deception is
not to be detected even by close inspection. The “Scaldrum Dodge” is
a trick of very recent introduction among the London beggars. It is a
concomitant of the advance of science and the progress of the art of
adulteration. It came in with penny postage, daguerreotypes, and other
modern innovations of a like description. In less scientific periods
within the present century it was wholly unknown; and sores were
produced by burns and lacerations which the mendicants inflicted upon
themselves with a ruthless hand. An old man who has been a beggar all
his life, informed me that he had known a man prick the flesh of his
leg all over, in order to produce blood and give the appearance of an
ulcerous disease. This man is a cripple and walks about upon crutches,
selling stay laces. He is now upwards of seventy years of age. At my
solicitation he made the following statement without any apparent
reserve.
SEVENTY YEARS A BEGGAR.
“I have been a beggar ever since I was that high--ever since I could
walk. No, I was not born a cripple. I was thirty years of age before
I broke my leg. That was an accident. A horse and cart drove over me
in Westminster. Well; yes I was drunk. I was able-bodied enough before
that. I was turned out to beg by my mother. My father, I’ve heard, was
a soldier; he went to Egypt, or some foreign part, and never came back.
I never was learnt any trade but begging, and I couldn’t turn my hand
to nothing else. I might have been learnt the shoemaking; but what was
the use? Begging was a better trade then; it isn’t now though. There
was fine times when the French war was on. I lived in Westminster then.
A man as they called Copenhagen Jack, took a fancy to me, and made me
his valet. I waited upon, fetched his drink, and so forth. Copenhagen
Jack was a captain; no not in the army, nor in the navy neither. He
was the captain of the Pye-Street beggars. There was nigh two hundred
of them lived in two large houses, and Jack directed them. Jack’s word
was law, I assure you. The boys--Jack called them his boys, but there
was old men among them, and old women too--used to come up before the
captain every morning before starting out for the day, to get their
orders. The captain divided out the districts for them, and each man
took his beat according to his directions. It was share and share
alike, with an extra for the captain. There was all manner of “lays;”
yes, cripples and darkies. We called them as did the blind dodge,
darkies,--and “shakers” them as had fits,--and shipwrecked mariners,
and--the scaldrum dodge, no; that’s new; but I know what you mean. They
did the real thing then--scrape the skin off their feet with a bit of
glass until the blood came. Those were fine times for beggars. I’ve
known many of ’em bring in as much as thirty shillings a day, some
twenty, some fifteen. If a man brought home no more than five or six
shillings, the captain would enter him, make a note of him, and change
his beat. Yes, we lived well. I’ve known fifty sit down to a splendid
supper, geese and turkeys, and all that, and keep it up until daylight,
with songs and toasts. No; I didn’t beg then; but I did before, and
I did after. I begged after, when the captain came to misfortune.
He went a walking one day in his best clothes, and got pressed, and
never came back, and there was a mutiny among them in Pye-Street, and
I nearly got murdered. You see, they were jealous of me, because the
captain petted me. I used to dress in top-boots and a red coat when I
waited on the captain. It was his fancy. Romancing? I don’t know what
you mean. Telling lies, oh! It’s true by ----. There’s nothing like it
nowadays. The new police and this b---- Mendicity Society has spoilt it
all. Well, they skinned me; took off my fine coat and boots, and sent
me out on the orphan lay in tatters. I sat and cried all day on the
door steps, for I was really miserable now my friend was gone, and I
got lots of halfpence, and silver too, and when I took home the swag,
they danced round me and swore that they would elect me captain if I
went on like that; but there was a new captain made, and when they had
their fun out, he came and took the money away, and kicked me under
the table. I ran away the next day, and went to a house in St. Giles’s,
where I was better treated. There was no captain there; the landlord
managed the house, and nobody was master but him. There was nigh a
hundred beggars in that house, and some two or three hundred more in
the houses next it. The houses are not standing now. They were taken
down when New Oxford-street was built; they stood on the north side.
Yes; we lived well in St. Giles’s--as well as we did in Westminster.
I have earned 8, 10, 15, ay, 30 shillings a day, and more nor that
sometimes. I can’t earn one shilling now. The folks don’t give as they
did. They think every body an imposture now. And then the police won’t
let you alone. No; I told you before, I never was anything else but a
beggar. How could I? It was the trade I was brought up to. A man must
follow his trade. No doubt I shall die a beggar, and the parish will
bury me.”
HAVING SWOLLEN LEGS.
Beggars who lie on the pavement and expose swollen legs, are very
rarely to be met with now. The imposture has been entirely suppressed
by the police and the officers of the Mendicity Society. This is one
of the shallowest of all the many “dodges” of the London beggars.
On reflection any one, however slightly acquainted with the various
forms of disease, must know that a mere swelling cannot be a normal or
chronic condition of the human body. A swelling might last a few days,
or a week; but a swelling of several years’ standing is only to be
referred to the continued application of a poisonous ointment, or to
the binding of the limb with ligatures, so as to confine the blood and
puff the skin.
CRIPPLES.
Various kinds of cripples are still to be found, begging in the streets
of London. As a rule the police do not interfere with them, unless they
know them to be impostors. A certain number of well-known cripples
have acquired a sort of prescriptive right to beg where they please.
The public will be familiar with the personal appearance of many of
them. There is the tall man on crutches, with his foot in a sling, who
sells stay laces; the poor wretch without hands, who crouches on the
pavement and writes with the stumps of his arms; the crab-like man
without legs, who sits strapped to a board, and walks upon his hands;
the legless man who propels himself in a little carriage, constructed
on the velocipede principle; the idiotic-looking youth, who “stands
pad with a fakement,” shaking in every limb as if he were under the
influence of galvanism. These mendicants are not considered to be
impostors, and are allowed to pursue begging as a regular calling.
I cannot think, however, that the police exercise a wise discretion
in permitting some of the more hideous of these beggars to infest
the streets. Instances are on record of nervous females having been
seriously frightened, and even injured, by seeing men without legs or
arms crawling at their feet. A case is within my own knowledge, where
the sight of a man without legs or arms had such an effect upon a lady
in the family way that her child was born in all respects the very
counterpart of the object that alarmed her. It had neither legs nor
arms. This occurrence took place at Brighton about eleven years ago.
I have frequently seen ladies start and shudder when the crab-like
man I have referred to has suddenly appeared, hopping along at their
feet. I am surprised that there is no home or institution for cripples
of this class. They are certainly deserving of sympathy and aid; for
they are utterly incapacitated from any kind of labour. Impostors are
constantly starting up among this class of beggars; but they do not
remain long undetected. A man was lately found begging, who pretended
that he had lost his right arm. The deception at the first glance was
perfect. His right sleeve hung loose at his side, and there appeared to
be nothing left of his arm but a short stump. On being examined at the
police office, his arm was found strapped to his side, and the stump
turned out to be a stuffing of bran. Another man simulated a broken
leg by doubling up that limb and strapping his foot and ankle to his
thigh. Paralysis is frequently simulated with success until the actor
is brought before the police surgeon, when the cheat is immediately
detected.
A BLIND BEGGAR.
A blind beggar, led by a dog, whom I accosted in the street, made
the following voluntary statement. I should mention that he seemed
very willing to answer my questions, and while he was talking kept
continually feeling my clothes with his finger and thumb. The object of
this, I fancy, must have been to discover whether I was what persons of
his class call a “gentleman” or a poor man. Whether he had any thoughts
of my being an officer I cannot say.
“I am sixty years of age: you wouldn’t think it, perhaps, but I am.
No, I was not born blind; I lost my sight in the small-pox, five and
twenty years ago. I have been begging on the streets eighteen years.
Yes, my dog knows the way home. How did I teach him that? why, when I
had him first, the cabmen and busmen took him out to Camden Town, and
Westminster, and other places, and then let him go. He soon learnt to
find his way home. No, he is not the dog I had originally; that one
died; he was five and twenty years old when he died. Yes, that was a
very old age for a dog. I had this one about five years ago. Don’t get
as much as I used to do? No, no, my friend. I make about a shilling
a-day, never--scarcely never--more, sometimes less--a good deal less;
but some folks are very kind to me. I live at Poole’s-place, Mount
Pleasant. There are a good many engineers about there, and their wives
are very kind to me; they have always a halfpenny for me when I go that
way. I have my beats. I don’t often come down this way (Gower-street),
only once a month. I always keep on this side of Tottenham Court-road;
I never go over the road; my dog knows that. I am going down there,”
(pointing); “that’s Chenies-street. Oh, I know where I am: next turning
to the right is Alfred-street, the next to the left is Francis-street,
and when I get to the end of that the dog will stop; but I know as well
as him. Yes, he’s a good dog, but never the dog I used to have; he used
always to stop when there was anybody near, and pull when there was
nobody. He was what I call a steady dog, this one is young and foolish
like; he stops sometimes dead, and I goes on talking, thinking there is
a lady or gentleman near; but it’s only other dogs that he’s stopping
to have a word with. No, no, no, sir.” This he said when I dropped some
more coppers into his hat, having previously given him a penny. “I
don’t want that. I think I know your voice, sir; I’m sure I’ve heard
it before. No! ah, then I’m mistaken.” Here again he felt my coat and
waistcoat with an inquiring touch: apparently satisfied, he continued,
“I’ll tell you, sir, what I wouldn’t tell to every one; I’ve as nice a
little place at Mount Pleasant as you would desire to see. You wouldn’t
think I was obliged to beg if you saw it. Why, sir, I beg many times
when I’ve as much as sixteen shillings in my pocket; leastwise not in
my pocket, but at home. Why you see, sir, there’s the winter months
coming on, and I lays by what I can against the wet days, when I can’t
go out. There’s no harm in that, sir. Well, now, sir, I’ll tell you:
there’s a man up there in Sussex-street that I know, and he said to me
just now, as I was passing the public house, ‘Come in, John, and have a
drop of something.’ ‘No, thank ye,’ says I, ‘I don’t want drink; if you
want to give me anything give me the money.’ ‘No,’ says he, ‘I won’t
do that, but if you come in and have something to drink I’ll give you
sixpence.’ Well, sir, I wouldn’t go. It wouldn’t do, you know, for the
likes of me, a blind man getting his living by begging, to be seen in
a public-house; the people wouldn’t know, sir, whether it was my money
that was paying for it or not. I never go into a public-house; I has my
drop at home. Oh, yes, I am tired--tired of it; but I’ll tell you, sir,
I think I’ll get out of it soon. Do you know how that is, sir? Well,
I think I shall get on to Day and Martin’s Charity in October; I’m
promised votes, and I’m in hopes this time. God bless you, sir.”
There was for many years in the city a blind man with a dog, who was
discovered to be a rank impostor. The boys found it out long before
the police did. They used to try and take the money out of the little
basket that the dog carried in his mouth, but they never succeeded. The
moment a boy approached the basket the blind man ran at him with his
stick, which proved, of course, that the fellow could see. Some of my
readers may recollect seeing in the papers an account of a respectable
young girl who ran away from her home and took up with this blind man.
She cohabited with him, in fact, and it was found that they lived in
extravagance and luxury on the blind beggar’s daily takings.
BEGGARS SUBJECT TO FITS
are impostors, I may say, wholly without exception. Some of them are
the associates and agents of thieves, and fall down in the street
in assumed fits in order to collect a crowd and afford a favourable
opportunity to the pickpockets, with whom they are in league. The
simulation of fits is no mean branch of the beggar’s art of deception.
The various symptoms--the agitation of the muscles, the turning up of
the whites of the eyes, the pallor of the face and the rigidity of
the mouth and jaw--are imitated to a nicety; and these symptoms are
sometimes accompanied by copious frothing at the mouth. I asked Mr.
Horsford, of the Mendicity Society, how this was done, and received
the laconic answer--“Soap.” And this brought to my memory that I had
once seen an actor charge his mouth with a small piece of soap to
give due _vraissemblance_ to the last scene of _Sir Giles Overreach_.
I was shown an old woman who was in the habit of falling down in
assumed fits simply to get brandy. She looked very aged and poor, and
I was told she generally had her fits when some well-dressed gentleman
was passing with a lady on his arm. She generally chose the scene of
her performance close to the door of a public-house, into which some
compassionate person might conveniently carry her. She was never heard
to speak in her fits except to groan and mutter “brandy,” when that
remedy did not appear to suggest itself to those who came to her aid.
An officer said to me, “I have known that old woman have so many fits
in the course of the day that she has been found lying in the gutter
dead drunk from the effect of repeated restoratives. She has been
apprehended and punished over and over again, but she returns to the
old dodge the minute she gets out. She is on the parish; but she gets
money as well as brandy by her shamming.”
I have heard that there are persons who purposely fall into the
Serpentine in order to be taken to the receiving-house of the Humane
Society, and recovered with brandy. One man repeated the trick so often
that at last the Society’s men refused to go to his aid. It is needless
to say that he soon found his way out of the water unaided, when he saw
that his dodge was detected.
BEING IN A DECLINE.
No form of poverty and misfortune is better calculated to move the
hearts of the compassionate than this. You see crouching in a corner,
a pale-faced, wan young man, apparently in the very last stage of
consumption. His eyes are sunk in his head, his jaw drops, and you can
almost see his bones through his pallid skin. He appears too exhausted
to speak; he coughs at intervals, and places his hand on his chest
as if in extreme pain. After a fit of coughing he pants pitifully,
and bows his head feebly as if he were about to die on the spot. It
will be noticed, however, as a peculiarity distinguishing nearly all
these beggars, that the sufferers wear a white cloth bound round their
heads overtopped by a black cap. It is this white cloth, coupled with
a few slight artistic touches of colour to the face, that produces
the interesting look of decline. Any person who is thin and of sallow
complexion may produce the same effect by putting on a white night-cap,
and applying a little pink colour round the eyes. It is the simple rule
observed by comedians, when they make up for a sick man or a ghost.
These beggars are all impostors; and they are now so well known to the
police that they never venture to take up a fixed position during the
day, but pursue their nefarious calling at night at public-houses and
other resorts where they can readily make themselves scarce should an
officer happen to spy them out.
“SHALLOW COVES.”
This is the slang name given to beggars who exhibit themselves in the
streets half clad, especially in cold weather. There are a great many
of these beggars in London, and they are enabled to ply their trade
upon the sympathies of the public with very little check, owing to
the fact that they mostly frequent quiet streets, and make a point
of moving on whenever they see a policeman approaching. A notorious
“shallow cove,” who frequents the neighbourhood of the Strand and St.
Martin’s Lane, must be well known to many of my readers. His practice
is to stand at the windows of bakers and confectioners, and gaze with
an eager famished look at the bread and other eatables. His almost
naked state, his hollow, glaring eye, like that of a famished dog, his
long thin cheek, his matted hair, his repeated shrugs of uneasiness
as if he were suffering from cold or vermin, present such a spectacle
of wretchedness as the imagination could never conceive. He has no
shirt, as you can see by his open breast; his coat is a thing of mere
shreds; his trousers, torn away in picturesque jags at the knees, are
his only other covering, except a dirty sodden-looking round-crowned
brown felt hat, which he slouches over his forehead in a manner which
greatly heightens his aspect of misery. I was completely taken in when
I first saw this man greedily glaring in at a baker’s window in St.
Martin’s Lane. I gave him twopence to procure a loaf, and waited to see
him buy it, anxious to have the satisfaction of seeing him appease such
extreme hunger as I had never--I thought--witnessed before. He did not
enter the shop with the alacrity I expected. He seemed to hesitate,
and presently I could see that he was casting stealthy glances at me.
I remained where I was, watching him; and at last when he saw I was
determined to wait, he entered the shop. I saw him speak to the woman
at the counter and point at something; but he made no purchase, and
came out without the bread, which I thought he would have devoured
like a wolf, when he obtained the money to procure it. Seeing me still
watching him, he moved away rapidly. I entered the shop, and asked if
he had bought anything. “Not he, he don’t want any bread,” said the
mistress of the shop, “I wish the police would lock him up, or drive
him away from here, for he’s a regular nuisance. He pretends to be
hungry, and then when people give him anything, he comes in here and
asks if I can sell him any bits. He knows I won’t, and he don’t want
’em. He is a regular old soldier, he is, sir.”
I received confirmation of this account from Mr. Horsford, who said
that the fellow had been sent to prison at least thirty times. The
moment he gets out he resorts to his old practices. On one occasion,
when he was taken, he had thirteen shillings in his pocket,--in
coppers, sixpences and threepenny and fourpenny bits. Softhearted old
ladies who frequent the pastry-cooks are his chief victims.
“Shallow coves” have recently taken to Sunday begging. They go round
the quiet streets in pairs, and sing psalm tunes during church hours.
They walk barefooted, without hats, and expose their breasts to show
that they have no under clothing.
The “shallow cove” is a very pitiable sight in winter, standing half
naked, with his bare feet on the cold stones. But give him a suit of
clothes and shoes and stockings, and the next day he will be as naked
and as wretched-looking as he is to-day. Nakedness and shivers are his
stock in trade.
FAMISHED BEGGARS.
The famished beggars, that is, those who “make up” to look as if they
were starving, pursue an infinite variety of dodges. The most common of
all is to stand in some prominent place with a placard on the breast,
bearing an inscription to the effect that the beggar is “starving,” or
that he has “a large family entirely dependent upon him.” The appeal
is sometimes made more forcible by its brevity, and the card bears the
single word, “Destitute.” In every case where the beggar endeavours
to convey starvation by his looks and dress it may be relied upon
that he is an impostor, a lazy fellow, who prefers begging to work,
because it requires less exertion and brings him more money. There are
some, however,--blind men and old persons--who “stand pad,” that is
to say, beg by the exhibition of a written or printed paper, who are
not impostors; they are really poor persons who are incapacitated from
work, and who beg from day to day to earn a living. But these beggars
do not get up an appearance of being starved, and indeed some of them
look very fat and comfortable.
The beggars who chalk on the pavement “I am starving,” in a round
scholastic hand, are not of this class. It does not require much
reflection to discern the true character of such mendicants. As I have
frequently had occasion to observe, the man who begs day after day, and
counts his gains at the rate of from twelve to twenty shillings a week,
cannot be starving. You pass one of these beggars in the morning, and
you hear the coppers chinking on the pavement as they are thrown to him
by the thoughtless or the credulous; you pass him again in the evening,
and there is still the inscription “I am starving.” This beggar adds
hypocrisy to his other vices. By his writing on the pavement he would
give you to understand that he is too much ashamed to beg by word of
mouth. As he crouches beside his inscription he hides his head. The
writing, too, is a false pretence. “I am starving” is written in so
good a hand that you are led to believe that the wretch before you has
had a good education, that he has seen better days, and is now the
victim of misfortune, perhaps wholly undeserved. It should be known,
however, that many of these beggars cannot write at all; they could not
write another sentence except “I am starving” if it were to save their
lives. There are persons who teach the art of writing certain sentences
to beggars, but their pupils learn to trace the letters mechanically.
This is the case with the persons who draw in coloured chalk on the
pavement. They can draw a mackerel, a broken plate, a head of Christ,
and a certain stereotyped sea-view with a setting sun, but they cannot
draw anything else, and these they trace upon a principle utterly
unknown to art. There is one beggar of this class who frequents the
King’s-Cross end of the New Road, who writes his specimens backwards,
and who cannot do it any other way. He covers a large flag-stone with
“copies” in various hands, and they are all executed in the true
“copper-plate” style. They are all, however, written backwards.
The distinction made by the magistrates and the police between those
who draw coloured views and those who merely write “I am starving”
in white chalk, exhibits a nicety of discrimination which is not a
little amusing. When the officers of the Mendicity Society first began
to enforce their powers with rigour (in consequence of the alarming
increase of mendicancy) they arrested these flag-stone artists with
others. The magistrates, however, showed an unwillingness to commit
them, and at length it was laid down as a rule that these men should
not be molested unless they obstructed a thoroughfare or created a
disturbance. This decision was grounded upon the consideration that
these street artists did some actual work for the money they received
from the public; they drew a picture and exhibited it, and might
therefore be fairly regarded as pursuing an art. So the chalkers of
mackerel were placed in the category of privileged street exhibitors.
The “I am starving” dodge, however, has been almost entirely suppressed
by the persevering activity of Mr. Horsford and his brother officers of
the Mendicity Society.
One of the latest devices of famished beggars which has come under my
notice I shall denominate
THE CHOKING DODGE.
A wretched-looking man, in a state of semi-nudity, having the
appearance of being half starved and exhausted, either from want
of food or from having walked a long way, sat down one day on the
door-step of the house opposite mine. I was struck by his wretched
and forlorn appearance, and particularly by his downcast looks. It
seemed as if misery had not only worn him to the bone, but had crushed
all his humanity out of him. He was more like a feeble beast, dying
of exhaustion and grovelling in the dust, than a man. Presently he
took out a crust of dry bread and attempted to eat it. It was easy
to see that it was a hard crust, as hard as stone, and dirty, as if
it had lain for some days in the street. The wretch gnawed at it as
a starved dog gnaws at a bone. The crust was not only hard, but the
beggar’s jaws seemed to want the power of mastication. It seemed as
if he had hungered so long that food was now too late. At length he
managed to bite off a piece; but now another phase of his feebleness
was manifested--he could not swallow it. He tried to get it down, and
it stuck in his throat. You have seen a dog with a bone in his throat,
jerking his head up and down in his effort to swallow: that was the
action of this poor wretch on the door-step. I could not but be moved
by this spectacle, and I opened the window and called to the man. He
took no heed of me. I called again. Still no heed; misery had blunted
all his faculties. He seemed to desire nothing but to sit there and
choke. I went over to him, and, tapping him on the shoulder, gave him
twopence, and told him to go to the public house and get some beer to
wash down his hard meal. He rose slowly, gave me a look of thanks, and
went away in the direction of the tavern. He walked more briskly than I
could have conceived possible in his case, and something prompted me to
watch him. I stood at my door looking after him, and when he got near
the public-house he turned round. I knew at once that he was looking
to see if I were watching him. The next minute he turned aside as if
to enter the public-house. The entrance stood back from the frontage
of the street, and I could not tell, from where I stood, whether he
had gone into the house or not. I crossed to the other side, where I
could see him without being noticed. He had not entered the house, but
was standing by the door. When he had stood there for a few minutes he
peeped out cautiously, and looked down the street towards the place
where he had left me. Being apparently satisfied that all was right, he
emerged from the recess and walked on. I was now determined to watch
him further. I had not long to wait for conclusive evidence of the
imposture which I now more than suspected. The man walked slowly along
until he saw some persons at a first-floor window, when he immediately
sat down on a door-step opposite and repeated the elaborate performance
with the hard crust which I have already described. This I saw him do
four times before he left the street, in each case getting money. It is
needless to say that this fellow was a rank impostor. One of his class
was apprehended some time ago--it might have been this very man--and no
less than seven shillings were found upon him. These men frequent quiet
bye-streets, and never, or rarely, beg in the busy thoroughfares. I
will give another case, which I shall call
THE OFFAL-EATER.
The most notable instance of this variety of the famished beggars which
has come under my notice is that of a little old man who frequents the
neighbourhood of Russell-square. I have known him now for two years,
and I have seen him repeat his performance at least a score of times.
The man has the appearance of a cutler. He wears a very old and worn,
but not ragged, velveteen coat with large side pockets, a pair of
sailor’s blue trousers a good deal patched, a very, very bad pair of
shoes, and a chimney-pot hat, which seems to have braved the wind and
rain for many years, been consigned to a dust-bin, and then recovered
for wear. He is below the average height, and appears to be about
seventy years of age. This little old man makes his appearance in my
street about eleven o’clock in the forenoon. He walks down the pavement
listlessly, rubbing his hands and looking about him on every side in a
vacant bewildered manner, as if all the world were strange to him, and
he had no home, no friend, and no purpose on the face of the earth.
Every now and then he stops and turns his face towards the street,
moving himself uneasily in his clothes, as if he were troubled with
vermin. All this time he is munching and mumbling some food in a manner
suggestive of a total want of teeth. As he pauses he looks about as if
in search of something. Presently you see him pick up a small piece
of bread which has been thrown out to the sparrows. He wipes it upon
his velveteen coat and begins to eat it. It is a long process. He will
stand opposite your window for full ten minutes mumbling that small
piece of bread, but he never looks up to inspire compassion or charity;
he trusts to his pitiful mumblings to produce the desired effect, and
he is not disappointed. Coppers are flung to him from every window,
and he picks them up slowly and listlessly, as if he did not expect
such aid, and scarcely knew how to apply it. I have given him money
several times, but that does not prevent him from returning again and
again to stand opposite my windows and mumble crusts picked out of the
mud in the streets. One day I gave him a lump of good bread, but in an
hour after I found him in an adjacent street exciting charity in the
usual way. This convinced me that he was an artful systematic beggar,
and this impression was fully confirmed on my following him into a low
beer-shop in St. Giles’s and finding him comfortably seated with his
feet up in a chair, smoking a long pipe, and discussing a pot of ale.
He knew me in a moment, dropped his feet from the chair, and tried to
hide his pipe. Since that occasion he has never come my way.
PETTY TRADING BEGGARS.
This is perhaps the most numerous class of beggars in London. Their
trading in such articles as lucifers, boot-laces, cabbage-nets, tapes,
cottons, shirt-buttons, and the like, is in most cases a mere “blind”
to evade the law applying to mendicants and vagrants. There are very
few of the street vendors of such petty articles as lucifers and
shirt-buttons who can make a living from the profits of their trade.
Indeed they do not calculate upon doing so. The box of matches, or the
little deal box of cottons, is used simply as a passport to the resorts
of the charitable. The police are obliged to respect the trader, though
they know very well that under the disguise of the itinerant merchant
there lurks a beggar.
Beggars of this class use their trade to excite compassion and obtain
a gift rather than to effect a sale. A poor half-clad wretch stands by
the kerb exposing for sale a single box of matches, the price being
“only a halfpenny.” A charitable person passes by and drops a halfpenny
or a penny into the poor man’s hand, and disdains to take the matches.
In this way a single box will be sufficient for a whole evening’s
trading, unless some person should insist upon an actual “transaction,”
when the beggar is obliged to procure another box at the nearest
oilman’s. There are very few articles upon which an actual profit is
made by legitimate sale. Porcelain shirt-buttons, a favourite commodity
of the petty trading beggars, would not yield the price of a single
meal unless the seller could dispose of at least twenty dozen in a day.
Cottons, stay-laces, and the like, can now be obtained so cheaply at
the shops, that no one thinks of buying these articles in the streets
unless it be in a charitable mood. Almost the only commodities in which
a legitimate trade is carried on by the petty traders of the streets
are flowers, songs, knives, combs, braces, purses, portmonnaies. The
sellers of knives, combs, &c., are to a certain extent legitimate
traders, and do not calculate upon charity. They are cheats, perhaps,
but not beggars. The vendors of flowers and songs, though they really
make an effort to sell their goods, and often realize a tolerable
profit, are nevertheless beggars, and trust to increase their earnings
by obtaining money without giving an equivalent. A great many children
are sent out by their parents to sell flowers during the summer and
autumn. They find their best market in the bars of public-houses,
and especially those frequented by prostitutes. If none else give
prostitutes a good character, the very poor do. “I don’t know what
we should do but for them,” said an old beggar-woman to me one day.
“They are good-hearted souls--always kind to the poor. I hope God will
forgive them.” I have had many examples of this sympathy for misfortune
and poverty on the part of the fallen women of the streets. A fellow
feeling no doubt makes them wondrous kind. They know what it is to be
cast off, and spurned, and despised; they know, too, what it is to
starve, and, like the beggars, they are subject to the stern “move on”
of the policeman.
The relations which subsist between the prostitutes and the beggars
reveal some curious traits. Beggars will enter a public-house because
they see some women at the bar who will assist their suit. They offer
their little wares to some gentlemen at the bar, and the women will
say, “Give the poor devil something,” or “buy bouquets for us,” or if
the commodity should be laces or buttons, they say, “Don’t take the
poor old woman’s things; give her the money.” And the gentlemen, just
to show off, and appear liberal, do as they are told. Possibly, but
for the pleading of their gay companions, they would have answered
the appeal with a curse and gruff command to begone. I once saw an
old woman kiss a bedizened prostitute’s hand, in real gratitude for
a service of this kind. I don’t know that I ever witnessed anything
more touching in my life. The woman, who a few minutes before had been
flaunting about the bar in the reckless manner peculiar to her class,
was quite moved by the old beggar’s act, and I saw a tear mount in her
eye and slowly trickle down her painted cheek, making a white channel
through the rouge as it fell. But in a moment she dashed it away, and
the next was flaunting and singing as before. Prostitutes are afraid to
remain long under the influence of good thoughts. They recal their days
of innocence, and overpower them with an intolerable sadness--a sadness
which springs of remorse. The gay women assume airs of patronage
towards the beggars, and as such are looked up to; but a beggar-woman,
however poor, and however miserable, if she is conscious of being
virtuous, is always sensible of her superiority in that respect. She is
thankful for the kindness of the “gay lady,” and extols her goodness of
heart; but she pities while she admires, and mutters as a last word,
“May God forgive her.” Thus does one touch of nature make all the world
akin, and thus does virtue survive all the buffets of evil fortune to
raise even a beggar to the level of the most worthy, and be a treasure
dearer and brighter than all the pleasures of the world.
The sellers of flowers and songs are chiefly boys and young girls. They
buy their flowers in Covent Garden, when the refuse of the market is
cleared out, and make them up into small bouquets, which they sell for
a penny. When the flower season is over they sell songs--those familiar
productions of Ryle, Catnach and company, which, it is said, the great
Lord Macaulay was wont to collect and treasure up as collateral
evidences of history. Some of the boys who pursue this traffic are
masters of all the trades that appertain to begging. I have traced one
boy, by the identifying mark of a most villanous squint, through a
career of ten years. When I first saw him he was a mere child of about
four years of age. His mother sent him with a ragged little girl (his
sister) into public-house bars to beg. Their diminutive size attracted
attention and excited charity. By-and-by, possibly in consequence of
the interference of the police, they carried pennyworths of flowers
with them, at other times matches, and at others halfpenny sheets of
songs. After this the boy and the girl appeared dressed in sailor’s
costume, (both as boys,) and sung duets. I remember that one of the
duets, which had a spoken part, was not very decent; the poor children
evidently did not understand what they said; but the thoughtless people
at the bar laughed and gave them money. By-and-by the boy became too
big for this kind of work, and I next met him selling fuzees. After
the lapse of about a year he started in the shoe-black line. His
station was at the end of Endell Street, near the baths; but as he did
not belong to one of the regularly organized brigades, he was hunted
about by the police, and could not make a living. On the death of the
crossing-sweeper at the corner he succeeded to that functionary’s
broom, and in his new capacity was regarded by the police as a useful
member of society. The last time I saw him he was in possession of
a costermonger’s barrow selling mackerel. He had grown a big strong
fellow, but I had no difficulty in identifying the little squinting
child, who begged, and sold flowers and songs in public-house bars,
with the strong loud-lunged vendor of mackerel. I suppose this young
beggar may be said to have pursued an honourable career, and raised
himself in the world. Many who have such an introduction to life finish
their course in a penal settlement.
There are not a few who assume the appearance of petty traders for the
purpose of committing thefts, such as picking a gentleman’s pocket when
he is intoxicated, and slinking into parlours to steal bagatelle balls.
Police spies occasionally disguise themselves as petty traders. There
is a well-known man who goes about with a bag of nuts, betting that
he will tell within two how many you take up in your hand. This man
is said to be a police spy. I have not been able to ascertain whether
this is true or not; but I am satisfied that the man does not get
his living by his nut trick. In the day-time he appears without his
nuts, dressed in a suit of black, and looking certainly not unlike a
policeman in mufti.
Among the petty trading beggars there are a good many idiots and
half-witted creatures, who obtain a living--and a very good one too--by
dancing in a grotesque and idiotic manner on the pavement to amuse
children. Some of them are not such idiots as they appear, but assume a
half-witted appearance to give oddness to their performance, and excite
compassion for their misfortune. The street boys are the avengers of
this imposition upon society.
The idiot performer has a sad life of it when the boys gather about
him. They pull his clothes, knock off his hat, and pelt him with lime
and mud. But this persecution sometimes redounds to his advantage; for
when the grown-up folks see him treated thus, they pity him the more.
These beggars always take care to carry something to offer for sale.
Halfpenny songs are most commonly the merchandise.
The little half-witted Italian man who used to go about grinding an
organ that “had no inside to it,” as the boys said, was a beggar of
this class, and I really think he traded on his constant persecution by
the _gamins_. Music, of course, he made none, for there was only one
string left in his battered organ; but he always acted so as to convey
the idea that the boys had destroyed his instrument. He would turn away
at the handle in a desperate way, as if he were determined to spare no
effort to please his patrons; but nothing ever came of it but a feeble
tink-a-tink at long intervals. If his organ could at any time have been
spoiled, certainly the boys might have done it; for their great delight
was to put stones in it, and batter in its deal back with sticks. I am
informed that this man had a good deal more of the rogue than of the
fool in his composition. A gentleman offered to have his organ repaired
for him; but he declined; and at length when the one remaining string
gave way he would only have that one mended. It was his “dodge” to
grind the air, and appear to be unconscious that he was not discoursing
most eloquent music.
Tract-selling in the streets is a line peculiar to the Hindoos. I find
that the tracts are given to them by religious people, and that they
are bought by religious people, who are not unfrequently the very same
persons who provided the tracts. Very few petty trading beggars take
to tract-selling from their own inspiration; for in good sooth it does
not pay, except when conducted on the principle I have just indicated.
Some find it convenient to exhibit tracts simply to evade the law
applying to beggars and vagrants; but they do not use them if they
can procure a more popular article. In these remarks it is very far
from my intention to speak of “religious people” with any disrespect.
I merely use the expression “religious people” to denote those who
employ themselves actively and constantly in disseminating religious
publications among the people. Their motives and their efforts are most
praiseworthy, and my only regret is that their labours are not rewarded
by a larger measure of success.
AN AUTHOR’S WIFE.
In the course of my inquiry into the habits, condition, and mode of
life of the petty trading beggars of London, I met with a young woman
who alleged that the publications she sold were the production of her
husband. I encountered her at the bar of a tavern, where I was occupied
in looking out for “specimens” of the class of beggars, which I am now
describing. She entered the bar modestly and with seeming diffidence.
She had some printed sheets in her hand. I asked her what they were.
She handed me a sheet. It was entitled the _Pretty Girls of London_.
It was only a portion of the work, and on the last page was printed
“to be continued.” “Do you bring this out in numbers?” I asked. “Yes,
sir,” she replied, “it is written by my husband, and he is continuing
it from time to time.” “Are you then his publisher?” I inquired. “Yes,
sir, my husband is ill a-bed, and I am obliged to go out and sell his
work for him?” I looked through the sheet, and I saw that it was not a
very decent work. “Have you ever read this?” I enquired. “Oh yes, sir,
and I think it’s very clever; don’t you think so, sir?” It certainly
was written with some little ability, and I said so; but I objected to
its morality. Upon which she replied, “But it’s what takes, sir.” She
sold several copies while I was present, at twopence each; but one or
two gave her fourpence and sixpence. As she was leaving I made further
inquiries about her husband. She said he was an author by profession,
and had seen better days. He was very ill, and unable to work. I asked
her, to give me his address as I might be of some assistance to him.
This request seemed to perplex her; and at length she said, she was
afraid her husband would not like to see me; he was very proud. I have
since ascertained that this author’s pretty little wife is a dangerous
impostor. She lives, or did live at the time I met her, at the back of
Clare Market, with a man (not her husband) who was well known to the
police as a notorious begging-letter writer. He was not the author of
anything but those artful appeals, with forged signatures, of which
I have given specimens under the heading of “Screevers.” I was also
assured by an officer that the pretended author’s wife had on one
occasion been concerned in decoying a young man to a low lodging near
Lincoln’s Inn Fields, where the unsuspecting youth was robbed and
maltreated.
DEPENDANTS OF BEGGARS.
The dependants of beggars may be divided into screevers proper; i.e.,
writers of “slums and fakements” for those who live by “screeving,”
and referees, or those who give characters to professional beggars
when references are required. Beggars are generally born and bred to
the business. Their fathers and mothers were beggars before them, and
they have an hereditary right to the calling. The exceptions to this
rule are those who have fallen into mendicancy, and follow it from
necessity, and those who have flown to it in a moment of distress, and
finding it more lucrative than they supposed, adopted it from choice.
Hence it follows that the majority are entirely destitute of education;
and by education I mean the primary arts of reading and writing. Where
there is demand there is supply, and the wants of mendicants who
found their account in “pads,” and “slums,” and “fakements,” created
“screevers.”
The antecedents of the screever are always more or less--and generally
more--disreputable. He has been a fraudulent clerk imprisoned for
embezzlement; or a highly-respected treasurer to a philanthropic
society, who has made off with the funds entrusted to him; or a petty
forger, whose family have purchased silence, and “hushed up” a scandal;
or, more frequently, that most dangerous of convicts, the half-educated
convict--who has served his time or escaped his bonds.
Too proud to beg himself, or, more probably, too well known to the
police to dare face daylight; ignorant of any honest calling, or too
idle to practise it; without courage to turn thief or informer; lazy,
dissolute, and self-indulgent, the screever turns his little education
to the worst of purposes, and prepares the forgery he leaves the more
fearless cadger to utter.
* * * * *
The following are specimens of the screever’s work, copied from the
original documents in the possession of Mr. Horsford, of the Mendicity
Society:--
“Parish of Battersea;
County of Surrey.
“This memorial sheweth that Mr. Alexander Fyfe, a native of Port
Glasgow N.B. and for several years carrying on the business of a
NURSERY and SEEDSMAN in this parish, became security for his son
in law Andrew Talfour of Bay st. Port Glasgow who in October last
privately disposed of his effects and absconded to the colonies,
leaving his wife and six children totally unprovided for and the
said Mr. Alexander Fyfe responsible for the sum of £1350. the sudden
reverse of fortune together with other domestic afflictions so preyed
on the mind of Mr. Fyfe that he is now an inmate of a LUNATIC ASYLUM.
“The said Mr. Fyfe together with his family have hitherto maintained
the character of HONESTY and INDUSTRY in consideration of which I
have been earnestly solicited by a few Benevolent persons to draw up
this statement on behalf of the bereaved family. I have therefore
taken on myself the responsibillity of so doing trusting those whom
Providence has given the means will lend their timely aid in rescuing
a respectable family from the ruin that inevitably awaits them.
“GIVEN under my Hand at the VESTRY in the aforesaid parish of
Battersea and County of Surrey this Twenty-Fourth day of February in
the year of Our Lord 1851.”
John Thomas Freeman, £3
Vestry Clerk,
J. S. Jenkinson £5 0 0
Vicar of Battersea.
Watson and Co. £5
John Forster & Co. £5
Revd. J. Twining 2 2
Alderman J. Humphery 5
Sir George Pollock 5
Southlands.
£.
Henry Mitton 2
Wm. Downs 2
Oak wharf.
Mrs. Broadley Wilson 1
Sir Henry B. Houghton £5
Mrs. Adm^l Colin Campbell 1 1
Col. J. Mc Donall £5 paid.
Anonymous 2
Mrs. Col. Forbes £3
Col. W. Mace paid 5
P. H. Gillespie 5
Minister of the Scotch Church
Battersea Rise
3d March /51
Messrs. Moffat, Gillespie & Co. 5 pd.
My readers will perceive that the above document is written in a
semi-legal style, with a profuse amount of large capitals, and minute
particularity in describing localities, though here and there an
almost ostentatious indifference exists upon the same points. Thus
we are told that the parish of Battersea is in the county of Surrey,
and that Port Glasgow is in North Britain, while on the other hand we
are only informed that the absconding Andrew Talfour, of Bay Street,
Port Glasgow, N.B., made off to the _colonies_, which, considering
the vast extent of our colonial possessions, is vague, to say the
least of it. It must also be allowed that, the beginning the word
“benevolent” in the second paragraph with a capital B is equally to
the credit of the writer’s head and heart. It is odd that after having
spelt “responsible” so correctly, the writer should have indulged
a playful fancy with “responsibi_ll_ity;” but perhaps trifling
orthographical lapses may be in keeping with the assumed character of
vestry-clerk. Critically speaking, the weak point of this composition
is its punctuation; its strong point the concluding paragraph, “the
GIVEN under my hand at the VESTRY,” which carries with it the double
weight of a royal proclamation, and the business-like formality of an
Admiralty contract; but the composition and caligraphy are trifles--the
real genius lies in the signatures.
I wish my readers could see the names attached to this “Memorial” as
they lay before me. The first, “J. S. Jenkinson,” is written in the
most clerical of hands; “Watson and Co.” is round and commercial; “John
Forster & Co.” the same; the “Revd J. Twining” scholarly and easy;
“Alderman J. Humphery” stiff and upright. These names are evidently
copied from the Red Book and Directory; some are purely fictitious;
many are cleverly executed forgeries.
The ingenuity of the concocter and compiler--of the sympathiser with
the woes of Mr. Alexander Fyfe of Port Glasgow, N.B.--was exercised
in vain. The imposture was detected; he was taken to a police-court,
condemned, and sentenced.
Here is the case of another unfortunate Scotchman from the pen of the
same gifted author. The handwriting, the wording, the capitals, and
the N.B.’s, are identical with those of the warm-hearted vestry-clerk
of Battersea.
“These are to certify that Mr. Alexr. Malcolm Ship-Owner and General
Merchant, was on his passage from FRASERBURGH. ABERDEENSHIRE. N.B.
on the night of the 3d. inst when his vessel the Susan and Mary of
Fraserburgh laden with Corn was run down by a “steamer name unknown”
the Crew consisting of Six persons narrowly escaping with their lives.
“Mr. Malcolm sustained a loss of property by the appalling event to
the amount of £370. and being a person of exemplary character with a
numerous family entirely depending upon him for support his case has
excited the greatest sympathy, it has therefore been proposed by a few
of his friends to enter into a subscription on his behalf with a view
of raising by voluntary contributions a sufficient sum to release him
from his present embarrassed situation.
“I have known him for several years a constant trader to this wharf,
and consider him worthy of every sympathy.”
Leith and Glasgow Wharf} Joseph Adams £5 0 0
London May 6th. 1847 } Geo. Carroll 5
A. Nichol & Sons pd. 5
P. Laurie 5
Vivian & Sons 3
J. H. Petty 2 pd
Messrs. Drummond £5 pd.
Cranford Colvin & Co. £3
Baring Brothers 5
Curries & Co. 3
Jono. Price 5 5
Reid, Irving & Co. £5
The signatures attached to this are imitations of the handwriting of
various firms, each distinct, individual, and apparently genuine.
The next “screeve” takes the form of a resolution at a public meeting:--
“Notting-Hill, District
Parish of Kensington
August 6th, 1857
“The Gentry and Clergy of this neighbourhood will no doubt remember
that the late Mr. Edward Wyatt, (for many years a respectable
tradesman in this parish) died in embarrassed circumstances in 1855,
leaving a Widow and Seven Children totally unprovided for, the eldest
of whom a fine Girl 19 years of age having been a Cripple from her
Birth has received a liberal education and is considered a competent
person to superintend a SEMINARY for the tuition of young females
which would materially assist her Mother in supporting a numerous
family.
“A meeting was convened on Monday evening the 3rd inst (the Revd J. P.
Gall, Incumbent of St. Johns, in the Chair) when it was unanimously
proposed to enter into a subscription with a view of raising by
voluntary contributions the sum of £40 in order to establish the
afflicted girl in this praiseworthy undertaking, I have been
instructed by the Parochial Authorities to draw up this statement and
therefore take upon myself the responsibility of so doing knowing the
case to be one meriting sympathy.
“Signed
By order of the Chairman
Reuben Green
Vestry Clerk”
Subscriptions received }
at the Meeting, }
£11 13 6 }
Revd J. P. Gill £1 0 0
Mrs. W. Money 10 0 pd
Chushington £1
Mrs Coventry paid 10/
J. & W. S. Huntley }
Addison Terrace } pd 1 1
Notting Hill }
Mrs. Cribb pd 5 0
The Misses Shorland 7 6
Mrs Harris 5 0
Miss Hall Lansdowne Crescent 10/
W. Atkinson pd 5 0
Thos Jacomb 5 0
Miss J. Robertson paid 5 0
The Misses Howard 5 0
The above letter is written in a better style than those preceding
it. Great talent is exhibited in the imitations of “lady’s-hand.”
The signatures “Mrs. Coventry,” “Mrs. Cribb,” “The Misses Howard,”
and “Mrs. Harris” (surely this screever must have been familiar with
the works of Dickens), are excellently done, but are surpassed by
the clever execution of the letters forming the names, “The Misses
Shorland” and “Miss Hall Lansdowne Crescent,” which are masterpieces of
feminine caligraphy.
The following note was sent to its address, accompanied by a memorial
in one of the House of Commons envelopes, but the faulty grammar,
so unlike the style in which a member of Parliament ought to write,
betrayed it.
“Committee Room No. 3
House of Commons
“Mr. J. Whatman presents his respectful compliments to the Revd. W.
Smith Marriott at the earnest request of the poor families (whose
case will be fully explained on perusal of the accompanying document
in the bearer’s possession), begs to submit it for that gentlemen’s
charitable consideration.
“The persons whom this concerns are natives of Cranbrook Gondhurst,
Brenchley &c and bears unexceptionable characters, they have the
honor of knowing Mr. Marriott at Worsmorden and trust he will add his
signature to the list of subscribers, for which favour they will feel
grateful.
“J. Whatman takes more than ordinary interest in this case having a
knowledge of its authenticity, he therefore trusts that the motives
which actuates him in complying with the request will be deemed a
sufficient apology.
Friday Evening
May 28, 1858”
“This Memorial sheweth that Mr. Henry Shepherd a General Carrier
from EWELL, CHEAM, SUTTON &c. to LONDON VIA Mitchem, Morden, Tooting
and Clapham, was returning home on the Evening of Thursday the 26th
inst when near the Elephant and Castle, his Horse took fright at
a Band of street Musicians and ran off at a furious pace, the Van
coming in contact with a Timber carriage was dashed to pieces, the
Animal received such injuries as caused its death, and Mr. SHEPHERD
endeavouring to save the property entrusted to his care for delivery
had his Right Leg fractured and is now an inmate of GUYS HOSPITAL.
“On further investigation We find his loss exceeds £70. and knowing
him to be an Industrious, Honest man, with a large family depending
upon his exertions for support We earnestly beg leave to recommend
his case to the notice of the Gentry and Clergy of his neighbourhood,
trusting their united Donations in conjunction with our mutual
assistance will release a deserving family from their present
unfortunate position in life.
“GIVEN under Our }
Hands this 30th day of } £
August in the Year of } William Harmer 2
Our Lord 1858” }
Geo. Stone Ewell £2
Sir Geo. L. Glyn 2 2
F. Gosling 2 2
Revd W. H. Vernon £1
Morton Stubbs 1 1
Sutton
Edmund Antrobus £2 2
pd to Bearer
2d/9th/58
W. R. G. Farmer £2 2
pd.
Revd. R. Bouchier £2 pd.
My readers must admire the ingenuity of this letter. The _VIA_ Mitchem
looks so formal and convincing. The grouping of the circumstances--the
“local colouring,” as the critics would call it, which contributed
to the ruin of the ill-fated general carrier Henry Shepherd--is
excellent.--“Near the Elephant and Castle his horse took fright at a
band of street musicians.” What more natural? “Ran off at a furious
pace. The van, coming in contact with a timber carriage, was _dashed to
pieces_. The Animal,” not the horse--that would have been tautological,
and Animal with a capital A. “The Animal received such injuries as
_caused its death_, and Mr. Shepherd, endeavouring to save the property
entrusted to his care--.” Admirable man! Devoted carrier!--leaving
his van to smash--his horse to perish as they might, that the goods
confided to him might receive no hurt. “... endeavouring to save
the property entrusted to his care for delivery, had his _right leg
fractured_, and is now an inmate of Guy’s Hospital.”
This is as well conceived and carried out as Sheridan’s pistol-bullet
that misses its mark, “strikes a bronze Hercules in the mantel-piece,
glances off through the window, and wounds the postman who was coming
to the door with a double letter from Northamptonshire!”
The word “Paid” and its abbreviation pd. is scattered here and there
artistically among the subscriptions. A small note in a different hand,
in a corner of the last page shows the fate of industry and talent
misapplied. It runs:--
“Taken from Thos. Shepherd, Sept. 13. Mansion House. Lord Mayor Sir A.
Carden. Committed for 3 months.
“J. W. HORSFORD.”
The last instance I shall cite is peculiar, from the elaborate nature
of the deception, and from containing a forgery of the signature of
Lord Brougham. The screever, in this case, has taken a regularly
printed Warrant, Execution, or Distress for Rent, filled it up with the
name of Mrs. Julia Thompson, &c., and placed an imaginary inventory to
a fictitious seizure. The word “Patent” is spelt “Pattent,” which might
be allowable in a broker’s man, but when “Ewer” is written “Ure,” I
think he is too hard upon the orthography peculiar to the officers of
the Sheriff of Middlesex, particularly as it is evident from the rest
of the filling-in of the form that the error is intentional. Not only
law but science is invoked in aid of this capital case of sham real
distress. “Pleuro-Pneumonia” looks veterinary and veracious enough to
carry conviction to the hearts of the most sceptical.
~ Removing any goods off the premises to avoid a distress or any
person aiding, assisting, or concealing the same, will subject
themselves to double the value of such effects so removed or
concealed, or suffer imprisonment in the House of Correction, there
to be kept to hard labour without Bail or Mainprize for Six Months,
pursuant to the Act 11th George 2nd.
Sold by G. H. Beckford, Law Stationer, 122, Chancery Lane.~
“TAKE NOTICE, That by the authority and on the behalf of your
Landlord, Thos. Young, I have this Sixteenth day of April in the year
of Our Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-six distrained the
several goods and chattels specified in the Schedule or Inventory
hereinunder written in
19 Praed Street
in the Parish of
Paddington in the County of Middlesex, for Twenty-nine pounds, being
Twelve Months and arrears Rent due to the said Mr. Thos. Young
at Ninth Febry last
and if you shall not pay the said Twelve Months and Arrears Rent so
due and in arrear as aforesaid together with the costs and charges
of this distress or replevy the said goods and chattels within five
days from the date hereof I shall cause the said goods and chattels to
be appraised and sold, pursuant to the statute in that case made and
provided.
“Given under my hand the day and year above written.
“J. W. RUSSELL.
“Sworn Broker, &c.
“To Mrs. Julia Thompson.”
The Schedule or Inventory above referred to:--
Mahogany Drawers
Mahogany Dining Tables
Six Mahogany Seated Chairs
Two Arm Do. Do.
One Eight-Day clock
Six Oil Paintings Gilt Frames
One Large Pier Glass
Carpet and Hearthrug
Fender and Fire-irons
Quantity of Chimney Ornaments
Six Kitchen Chairs
One Long Table Deal
One Large Copper Boiler
Two Copper Kettles
Pattent Mangle
One Large Water Butt
Two Washing Tubs
1-1/2 Doz. of Knifes and Forkes
Quantity of Earthenware &c. &c.
Two Feather Beds & Bedding
One Flock Do Do.
Two Mahogany Bedsteads
One French Do
Washhand stand Ure &c.
Two Hair Mattresses
Three Bedroom Chairs
One set of Bedroom Carpeting
Staircase Carpeting, Brass Rods &c.
One Milch Cow
One Cart Mare
One Dung Cart
One Wheelbarrow
Three Cwt. of Hay
Quantity of Manure
And Sundry Dairy Utensils
&c. &c. &c.
On the back of this legal document is written:
“This memorial sheweth that Mrs. Julia Thompson, widow, Cowkeeper and
Dairywoman has since the demise of her husband which took place in
1849 supported a family consisting of six children by the assistance
of a small Dairy the Pleuro-Pneumonia a disease Among Cattle has
prevailed in the neighbourhood for several weeks during which time
she has lost five Milch Cows estimated at £75. „ „ which will end in
her entire ruin unless aided by the Hands of the Benevolent whose
Donations in conjunction with Our mutual assistance will We trust
enable Mrs. Thompson to realize some part of her lost property to
follow her Business As before.
H. Peters £3 3 0
April 17th, 1856
Chaplin & Horne £2
Mrs. Gore 1
Revd J. W. Buckley 2
Revd John Miles 1
Mrs. J. Shaw 2 paid
C. Lushington 3 3
W. H. Ormsby 2
C. Molyneux 1
Miss Ferrers 2 paid
W. Emmitt 2 2
Anonymous 2 0
Misses Gregg 2 2
Miss Browne 1
J. B. White & Bros 3 pd
Thos Slater 2
W. T. Bird 2 pd.
Miss Hamilton 3 paid
Revd. J. A. Toole 2 paid
Mr. Hopgood 2 Paid
A Friend to the Widow 3 3
Paid to Mr. Pegg
Richd Green £2 pd
Revd A. M. Campbell 3
W. P. France 1
W. M. N. Reilly 2 2
Mrs. Forbes 2 pd
R. Gurney 1
J. Spurling 2 pd
Geo. R. Ward 1
Miss Brown 2
Mrs Needham 2 Paid
Mr Davidson £2
Mrs. H. Scott Waring 3 3
Mrs Hall 1 1
Saml. Venables 2
Revd. A. Taylor 1
Revd. H. V. Le Bas 1
Thomas Bunting 2 pd.
Mrs & Miss Vullamy 3
Revd. C. Smalley 5
Miss Smalley 3
Lord Brougham 2”
The two most notorious “screevers” of the present day are Mr. Sullivan
and Mr. Johnson of Westminster, or as he is proud of being called,
“Johnson the Schemer.”
REFEREES
are generally keepers of low lodging-houses, brothels, &c., or small
tradesmen who supply thieves and beggars with chandlery, &c. When
applied to for the character of any of their friends and confederates,
they give them an excellent recommendation--but are careful not to
_overdo_ it. With that highest sort of artfulness that conceals
artfulness, they know when to stop, and seldom or never betray
themselves by saying too much.
“Mrs. Simmons!” said one of them in answer to an application for
character--“ah, yes, sir, I known her a good many years, and a very
honest, hard-working, industrious, sober sort of a person I always
knowed her to be, at least as far as _I_ see--I never see nothing wrong
in the woman for _my_ part. The earliest-uppest, and downest-latest
woman I ever see, and well she need be, with that family of hers--nine
on ’em, and the eldest girl a idiot. When first I knew her, sir, her
husband was alive, and then Susan--that’s the idiot, sir, were a babe
in arms--her husband was a bad man to her, sir--the way that man drunk
and spent his money among all the lowest girls and corner-coves was
awful to see,--I mean by corner-coves them sort of men who is always a
standing at the corners of the streets and chaffing respectable folks a
passing by--we call them corner-coves about here; but as to poor Mrs.
Simmons, sir, that husband of hers _tret_ her awful--though he’s dead
and gone now, poor man, and perhaps I have no right to speak ill on the
dead. He had some money with her too--two hundred pound I heard--her
father was a builder in a small way--and lived out towards Fulham--a
very deserving woman I always found her, sir, and I have helped her
a little bit myself, not much of course, for my circumstances would
not allow of it; I’ve a wife and family myself--and I have often been
wishful I could help her more, but what can a man do as has to pay
his rent and taxes, and bring up his family respectable? When her last
baby but two had the ring-worm we helped her now and then with a loaf
of bread--poor thing--it ran right through the family, that ring-worm
did--six on ’em had it at the same time, she told us--and then they
took the measles--the most unluckiest family in catching things as goes
about I never saw--but as to Mrs. Simmons herself, sir, poor thing--a
more hard-workinger and honester woman I never, &c., &c., &c.”
DISTRESSED OPERATIVE BEGGARS.
All beggars are ingenious enough to make capital of public events.
They read the newspapers, judge the bent of popular sympathy, and
decide on the “lay” to be adopted. The “Times” informs its readers
that two or three hundred English navigators have been suddenly turned
adrift in France. The native labourers object to the employment of
aliens, and our stalwart countrymen have been subjected to insult
as well as privation. The beggar’s course is taken; he goes to
Petticoat Lane, purchases a white smock frock, a purple or red plush
waistcoat profusely ornamented with wooden buttons, a coloured cotton
neckerchief, and a red nightcap. If procurable “in the Lane,” he also
buys a pair of coarse-ribbed grey worsted-stockings, and boots whose
enormous weight is increased by several pounds of iron nails in their
thick soles; even then he is not perfect, he seeks a rag and bottle
and old iron shop--your genuine artist-beggar never asks for what is
new, he prefers the worn, the used, the ragged and the rusty--and
bargains for a spade. The proprietor of the shop knows perfectly well
that his customer requires an article for show, not service, and they
part with a mutual grin, and the next day every street swarms with
groups of distressed navigators. Popular feeling is on their side, and
halfpence shower round them. Meanwhile the poor fellows for whom all
this generous indignation is evoked are waiting in crowds at a French
port till the British Consul passed them over to their native soil as
paupers.
The same tactics are pursued with manufactures. Beggars read the list
of patents, and watch the effect of every fresh discovery in mechanics
on the operatives of Lancashire and Yorkshire. A new machine is
patented. So many hands are thrown out of work. So many beggars, who
have never seen Lancashire, except when on the tramp, are heard in
London. A strike takes place at several mills, pretended “hands” next
day parade the streets. Even the variability of our climate is pressed
into the “cadging” service; a frost locks up the rivers, and hardens
the earth, rusty spades and gardening tools are in demand, and the
indefatigable beggar takes the pavement in another “fancy dress.” Every
social shipwreck is watched and turned to account by these systematic
land-wreckers, who have reduced false signals to a regular code, and
beg by rule and line and chart and compass.
STARVED-OUT MANUFACTURERS
parade in gangs of four and five, or with squalid wives and a few
children. They wear paper-caps and white aprons with “bibs” to them, or
a sort of cross-barred pinafore, called in the manufacturing districts
a “chequer-brat.” Sometimes they make a “pitch,” that is, stand face
to face, turning their backs upon a heartless world, and sing. The
well-known ditty of
“We are all the way from Manches-ter
And we’ve got no work to do!”
set to the tune of, “Oh let us be joyful,” was first introduced by
this class of beggars. Or they will carry tapes, stay-laces, and
papers of buttons, and throw imploring looks from side to side, and
beg by implication. Or they will cock their chins up in the air, so as
to display the unpleasantly prominent apples in their bony throats,
and drone a psalm. When they go out “on the blob,” they make a long
oration, not in the Lancashire or Yorkshire dialects, but in a cockney
voice, of a strong Whitechapel flavour. The substance of the speech
varies but slightly from the “patter” of the hand-loom weaver; indeed,
the Nottingham “driz” or lace-man, the hand on strike, the distressed
weaver, and the “operative” beggar, generally bear so strong a
resemblance to each other, that they not only look like but sometimes
positively _are_ one and the same person.
UNEMPLOYED AGRICULTURISTS and FROZEN-OUT GARDENERS
are seen during a frost in gangs of from six to twenty. Two gangs
generally “work” together, that is, while one gang begs at one end of
a street, a second gang begs at the other. Their mode of procedure
their “programme,” is very simple. Upon the spades which they carry
is chalked “frozen-out!” or “starving!” and they enhance the effect
of this “slum or fakement,” by shouting out sturdily “frozen out,”
“We’re all frozen-out!” The gardeners differ from the agriculturists
or “navvies” in their costume. They affect aprons and old straw hats,
their manner is less demonstrative, and their tones less rusty and
unmelodious. The “navvies” roar; the gardeners squeak. The navvies’
petition is made loud and lustily, as by men used to work in clay and
rock; the gardeners’ voice is meek and mild, as of a gentle nature
trained to tend on fruits and flowers. The young bulky, sinewy beggar
plays navvy; the shrivelled, gravelly, pottering, elderly cadger
performs gardener.
There can be no doubt that in times of hardship many honest labourers
are forced into the streets to beg. A poor hard-working man, whose
children cry to him for food, can feel no scruple in soliciting
charity,--against such the writer of these pages would urge nothing;
all credit to the motive that compels them unwillingly to ask alms; all
honour to the feeling that prompts the listener to give. It is not the
purpose of the author of this work to write down every mendicant an
impostor, or every almsgiver a fool; on the contrary, he knows how much
real distress, and how much real benevolence exist, and he would but
step between the open hand of true charity, and the itching palm of the
professional beggar, who stands between the misery that asks and the
philanthropy that would relieve.
The winter of 1860-61 was a fine harvest for the “frozen out”
impostors, some few of whom, happily, reaped the reward of their
deserts in the police-courts. Three strong hearty men were brought up
at one office; they said that they were starving, and they came from
Horselydown; when searched six shillings and elevenpence were found
upon them; they reiterated that they were starving and were out of
work, on which the sitting magistrate kindly provided them with both
food and employment, by sentencing them to seven days’ hard labour.
The “profits” of the frozen-out gardener and agriculturist are very
large, and generally quadruples the sum earned by honest labour. In
the February of 1861, four of these “distressed navvies” went into
a public-house to divide the “swag” they had procured by one day’s
shouting. Each had a handkerchief filled with bread and meat and
cheese. They called for pots of porter and drank heartily, and when the
reckoning was paid and the spoils equally divided, the share of each
man was seven shillings.
The credulity of the public upon one point has often surprised me.
A man comes out into the streets to say that he is starving, a few
halfpence are thrown to him. If really hungry he would make for the
nearest baker’s shop; but no, he picks up the coppers, pockets them,
and proclaims again that he is starving, though he has the means of
obtaining food in his fingers. Not that this obvious anachronism stops
the current of benevolence or the chink of coin upon the stones--the
fainting, famished fellow walks leisurely up the street, and still
bellows out in notes of thunder, “I am starving!” If one of my readers
will try when faint and exhausted to produce the same tone in the
open air, he will realize the impossibility of shouting and starving
simultaneously.
HAND-LOOM WEAVERS AND OTHERS DEPRIVED OF THEIR LIVING BY MACHINERY.
As has been before stated, the regular beggar seizes on the latest
pretext for a plausible tale of woe. Improvements in mechanics, and
consequent cheapness to the many, are usually the causes of loss to the
few. The sufferings of this minority is immediately turned to account
by veteran cadgers, who rush to their wardrobes of well-chosen rags,
attire themselves in appropriate costume, and ply their calling with
the last grievance out. When unprovided with “patter,” they seek the
literati of their class, and buy a speech; this they partly commit
to memory, and trust to their own ingenuity to improvise any little
touches that may prove effective. Many “screevers, slum-scribblers, and
fakement-dodgers” eke out a living by this sort of authorship. Real
operatives seldom stir from their own locality. The sympathy of their
fellows, their natural habits, and the occasional relief afforded by
the parish bind them to their homes, and the “distressed weaver” is
generally a spurious metropolitan production. The following is a copy
of one of their prepared orations:
“My kind Christian Friends,
“We are poor working-men from ---- which cannot obtain bread by
our labour, owing to the new alterations and inventions which the
master-manufacturers have introduced, which spares them the cost of
employing hands, and does the work by machinery instead. Yes, kind
friends, machinery and steam-engines now does the work, which formerly
was done by our hands and work and labour. Our masters have turned us
off, and we are without bread and knowing no other trade but that
which we was born and bred to, we are compelled to ask your kind
assistance, for which, be sure of it, we shall be ever grateful. As
we have said, masters now employs machinery and steam-engines instead
of men, forgetting that steam-engines have no families of wives or
children, and consequently are not called on to provide for them. We
are without bread to put into our mouths, also our wives and children
are the same. Foreign competition has drove our masters to this step,
and we working-men are the sufferers thereby. Kind friends, drop your
compassion on us: the smallest trifle will be thankfully received, and
God will bless you for the relief you give to us. May you never know
what it is to be as we are now, drove from our work, and forced to
come out into the streets to beg your charity from door to door. Have
pity on us, for our situation is most wretched. Our wives and families
are starving, our children cry to us for bread, and we have none to
give them. Oh, my friends, look down on us with compassion. We are
poor working-men, weavers from ---- which cannot obtain bread by our
labour owing to the new inventions in machinery, which, &c. &c. &c.”
In concluding this section of our work, I would commend to the notice
of my readers the following observations on alms-giving:--
The poor will never cease from the land. There always will be
exceptional excesses and outbreaks of distress that no plan could have
provided against, and there always will be those who stand with open
palm to receive, in the face of heaven, our tribute of gratitude for
our own happier lot. Yet there is a duty of the head as well as of
the heart, and we are bound as much to use our reason as to minister
of our abundance. The same heaven that has rewarded our labours, and
filled our garners or our coffers, or at least, given us favour in
the sight of merchants and bankers, has given us also brains, and
consequently a charge to employ them. So we are bound to sift appeals,
and consider how best to direct our benevolence. Whoever thinks that
charity consists in mere giving, and that he has only to put his hand
in his pocket, or draw a check in favour of somebody who is very much
in want of money, and looks very grateful for favours to be received,
will find himself taught better, if not in the school of adversity,
at least by many a hard lesson of kindness thrown away, or perhaps
very brutishly repaid. As animals have their habits, so there is a
large class of mankind whose single cleverness is that of representing
themselves as justly and naturally dependent on the assistance of
others, who look paupers from their birth, who seek givers and forsake
those who have given as naturally as a tree sends its roots into new
soil and deserts the exhausted. It is the office of reason--reason
improved by experience--to teach us not to waste our own interest and
our resources on beings that will be content to live on our bounty, and
will never return a moral profit to our charitable industry. The great
opportunities or the mighty powers that heaven may have given us, it
never meant to be lavished on mere human animals who eat, drink and
sleep, and whose only instinct is to find out a new caterer when the
old one is exhausted.
APPENDIX.
MAPS AND TABLES
ILLUSTRATING THE CRIMINAL STATISTICS OF EACH OF THE COUNTIES OF ENGLAND
AND WALES IN 1851.
PAGE
MAP SHOWING THE DENSITY OF THE POPULATION 451
Table of ditto 452
MAP SHOWING THE INTENSITY OF CRIMINALITY 455
Table of ditto 456
MAP SHOWING THE INTENSITY OF IGNORANCE 459
Table of ditto 460
Table of Ignorance among Criminals 462
Table of Relative Degrees of Criminality 464
Comparative Educational Tables 465
MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF ILLEGITIMATE CHILDREN 467
Table of ditto 468
MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF EARLY MARRIAGES 471
Table of ditto 472
MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF FEMALES 475
Table of ditto 476
MAP SHOWING COMMITTALS FOR RAPE 477
Table of ditto 479
MAP SHOWING COMMITTALS FOR CARNALLY ABUSING GIRLS 481
Table of ditto 482
MAP SHOWING COMMITTALS FOR DISORDERLY HOUSES 485
Table of ditto 486
MAP SHOWING CONCEALMENT OF BIRTHS 489
Table of ditto 490
MAP SHOWING ATTEMPTS AT MISCARRIAGE 493
Table of ditto 494
MAP SHOWING ASSAULTS WITH INTENT 497
Table of ditto 498
MAP SHOWING COMMITTALS FOR BIGAMY 499
Table of ditto 500
MAP SHOWING COMMITTALS FOR ABDUCTION 501
Table of ditto 502
MAP SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF FEMALES 503
Table of ditto 504
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS TO EVERY 100 ACRES; OR
THE DENSITY OF THE POPULATION IN EACH OF THE COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES in 1851
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the Population is
_above_ the average density.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the Population is _below_
the average density.
The average has been calculated from the last returns of the
Registrar-General. ]
TABLE SHOWING THE DENSITY OF THE POPULATION IN THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES
IN ENGLAND AND WALES IN 1851.
--------------+-----------------+--------------------------------------------------------------+
| Dimensions. | Houses. |
+------+----------+---------+-----------+---------+---------+---------+----------+
| | | Number | Number | Number | Total | Total | Increase |
|Square| Statute | of | of | of | Number | Number | of |
COUNTIES. |Miles.| Acres. |Inhabited|Uninhabited| Houses | of | of | Houses |
| | | Houses. | Houses. |Building.| Houses, | Houses, |per cent.,|
| | | | | | 1851. | 1841. | 1841-51. |
--------------+------+----------+---------+-----------+---------+---------+---------+----------+
Bedford | 465 | 297,632| 25,694 | 676 | 126 | 26,496| 22,877| 15.8 |
Berks | 741 | 473,920| 39,462 | 1,563 | 211 | 41,236| 39,660| 4.0 |
Bucks | 725 | 463,880| 29,217 | 1,103 | 89 | 30,409| 28,860| 5.4 |
Cambridge | 838 | 536,313| 38,773 | 1,777 | 204 | 40,754| 35,799| 13.8 |
Chester | 1014 | 649,050| 79,849 | 4,248 | 756 | 84,853| 75,103| 13.0 |
Cornwall | 1336 | 854,770| 68,214 | 4,528 | 353 | 73,095| 71,913| 1.6 |
Cumberland | 1515 | 969,490| 36,771 | 1,531 | 238 | 38,540| 37,160| 3.7 |
Derby | 1036 | 663,180| 52,482 | 2,411 | 423 | 55,316| 49,477| 1.2 |
Devon | 2557 | 1,636,450| 99,104 | 6,016 | 765 | 105,885| 102,424| 3.4 |
Dorset | 980 | 627,220| 34,771 | 1,554 | 218 | 36,543| 35,400| 3.2 |
Durham | 1062 | 679,530| 68,989 | 3,030 | 595 | 72,614| 61,940| 17.2 |
Essex | 1530 | 979,000| 68,383 | 3,353 | 364 | 72,100| 65,570| 10.0 |
Gloucester | 1235 | 790,470| 78,385 | 4,961 | 393 | 83,739| 79,953| 4.7 |
Hereford | 850 | 543,800| 20,453 | 983 | 69 | 21,505| 21,119| 1.8 |
Hertford | 626 | 400,350| 33,954 | 1,189 | 214 | 35,357| 32,687| 8.2 |
Hunts | 379 | 242,250| 12,472 | 641 | 62 | 13,175| 11,676| 12.8 |
Kent | 1519 | 972,240| 108,386 | 5,516 | 1290 | 115,192| 101,717| 13.3 |
Lancaster | 1746 | 1,117,260| 356,436 | 17,453 | 3470 | 377,359| 322,148| 17.1 |
Leicester | 799 | 511,340| 49,968 | 1,599 | 198 | 51,765| 49,470| 4.6 |
Lincoln | 2600 | 1,663,850| 79,667 | 3,394 | 579 | 83,640| 74,138| 12.8 |
Middlesex | 280 | 179,590| 242,798 | 12,213 | 3276 | 258,287| 222,443| 16.1 |
Monmouth | 507 | 324,310| 32,901 | 1,473 | 183 | 34,557| 30,099| 4.8 |
Norfolk | 2019 | 1,292,300| 91,143 | 3,312 | 449 | 94,904| 88,378| 7.4 |
Northampton | 1011 | 646,810| 43,945 | 1,478 | 238 | 45,661| 42,358| 7.8 |
Northumberland| 1821 | 1,165,430| 47,509 | 2,060 | 384 | 49,953| 55,337| 10.8[95]|
Nottingham | 822 | 525,800| 59,427 | 1,481 | 267 | 61,175| 57,611| 6.2 |
Oxford | 730 | 467,230| 34,922 | 1,323 | 105 | 36,350| 34,151| 6.4 |
Rutland | 152 | 97,500| 4,961 | 153 | 18 | 5,132| 4,899| 4.8 |
Salop | 1351 | 864,360| 48,842 | 2,184 | 112 | 51,138| 50,131| 2.0 |
Somerset | 1606 | 1,028,090| 87,776 | 5,090 | 396 | 93,252| 90,947| 2.6 |
Southampton | 1591 | 1,018,550| 74,588 | 3,471 | 617 | 78,676| 69,807| 12.7 |
Stafford | 1150 | 736,290| 120,501 | 4,526 | 962 | 125,989| 107,941| 16.7 |
Suffolk | 1436 | 918,760| 69,479 | 3,098 | 424 | 73,001| 67,050| 8.9 |
Surrey | 741 | 474,480| 109,453 | 5,717 | 1663 | 116,838| 101,121| 15.6 |
Sussex | 1419 | 907,920| 59,308 | 2,220 | 609 | 62,137| 58,506| 6·2 |
Warwick | 887 | 567,930| 98,323 | 4,609 | 977 | 103,909| 90,868| 14·4 |
Westmorland | 759 | 485,990| 11,247 | 530 | 94 | 11,871| 11,783| 0·8 |
Wilts | 1356 | 8,060| 49,061 | 2,223 | 171 | 51,455| 49,918| 3·1 |
Worcester | 718 | 9,710| 52,055 | 2,753 | 362 | 55,170| 49,371| 11·8 |
York | 5733 | 3,669,510| 358,694 | 16,469 | 3244 | 378,417| 341,147| 10·9 |
Travelling | | | | | | | | |
North Wales | 3194 | 2,044,160| 83,091 | 3,720 | 522 | 87,333| 85,847| 8·5 |
South Wales | 4231 | 2,707,840| 119,507 | 5,269 | 844 | 125,620| 115,822| 1·7 |
+------+----------+---------+-----------+---------+---------+---------+----------+
TOTAL FOR } | | | | | | | | |
ENGLAND AND} |57,067|36,522,615|3,280,961| 152,898 | 26,534 |3,460,393|3,144,626| 10·0 |
WALES } | | | | | | | | |
--------------+------+----------+---------+-----------+---------+---------+---------+----------+
+------------------------------------------------------+------------------------------------
| Population, 1851. | Density.
+---------+---------+-----------+-----------+----------+----------+-------+-------+---------
| | | | | Increase | No. of | No. of| No. of| No. of
| | | Total | Total | of | Persons | acres | acres | Persons
| Males. | Females.|Population,|Population,|Population| to each |to each|to each| to each
| | | 1851. | 1841. |per cent.,|100 acres.|Person.| House.|Inhabited
| | | | | 1841-51. | | | | House.
+---------+---------+-----------+-----------+----------+----------+-------+-------+---------
| 62,420| 67,369| 129,789 | 112,378 | 16 | 43.5 | 2.3 | 11.2 | 5.1
| 99,227| 99,927| 199,154 | 189,227 | 5 | 41.7 | 2.4 | 11.5 | 5.0
| 70,784| 72,886| 143,670 | 138,248 | 4 | 31.3 | 3.2 | 15.2 | 4.9
| 95,505| 96,351| 191,856 | 169,638 | 13 | 35.8 | 2.8 | 13.1 | 4.9
| 206,715| 216,723| 423,438 | 368,115 | 15 | 65.2 | 1.5 | 7.6 | 5.3
| 171,979| 184,683| 356,662 | 343,265 | 4 | 41.7 | 2.4 | 11.6 | 5.2
| 96,106| 99,381| 195,487 | 177,807 | 10 | 20.0 | 5.0 | 25.1 | 5.3
| 129,379| 131,328| 260,707 | 239,791 | 9 | 40.0 | 2.5 | 11.9 | 5.0
| 271,579| 300,628| 572,207 | 534,883 | 6 | 34.5 | 2.9 | 15.4 | 5.7
| 85,816| 91,781| 177,597 | 167,689 | 6 | 28.6 | 3.5 | 17.1 | 5.1
| 206,666| 204,866| 411,532 | 325,854 | 26 | 62.5 | 1.6 | 9.3 | 5.9
| 172,161| 171,755| 343,916 | 320,605 | 7 | 34.5 | 2.9 | 13.5 | 5.0
| 198,122| 221,353| 419,475 | 395,533 | 6 | 53.0 | 1.9 | 9.4 | 5.3
| 49,694| 49,418| 99,112 | 96,515 | 3 | 18.2 | 5.5 | 25.3 | 4.8
| 86,331| 87,632| 173,963 | 162,394 | 7 | 43.5 | 2.3 | 11.3 | 5.1
| 29,984| 30,336| 60,320 | 55,565 | 9 | 25.0 | 4.0 | 18.3 | 4.8
| 308,115| 311,092| 619,207 | 540,275 | 14 | 63.6 | 1.6 | 8.4 | 5.7
|1,005,627|1,058,286| 2,063,913 | 1,696,377 | 22 | 200.0 | .5 | 2.9 | 5.8
| 115,295| 119,643| 234,938 | 220,263 | 7 | 45.4 | 2.2 | 9.9 | 4.7
| 201,027| 199,239| 400,266 | 356,226 | 12 | 23.8 | 4.2 | 19.9 | 5.0
| 885,614|1,010,096| 1,895,710 | 1,582,538 | 20 | 1059.0 | .09 | .7 | 7.9
| 92,095| 85,070| 177,165 | 150,544 | 17 | 55.5 | 1.8 | 9.3 | 5.4
| 210,360| 223,443| 433,803 | 404,971 | 7 | 33.3 | 3.0 | 13.6 | 4.8
| 106,533| 107,251| 213,784 | 198,518 | 7 | 33.3 | 3.0 | 14.1 | 4.9
| 149,158| 154,377| 303,535 | 265,636 | 13 | 25.6 | 3.9 | 23.3 | 6.3
| 144,428| 150,010| 294,438 | 270,535 | 9 | 55.5 | 1.8 | 8.6 | 5.0
| 85,449| 84,837| 170,286 | 163,216 | 4 | 37.0 | 2.7 | 12.8 | 4.9
| 12,270| 12,002| 24,272 | 23,151 | 5 | 25.0 | 4.0 | 19.0 | 4.9
| 122,022| 122,997| 245,019 | 241,685 | 1 | 28.6 | 3.5 | 16.9 | 5.0
| 216,716| 239,521| 456,237 | 448,793 | 2 | 43.5 | 2.3 | 11.0 | 5.2
| 199,834| 202,199| 402,033 | 348,298 | 13 | 38.4 | 2.6 | 12.9 | 5.3
| 320,394| 310,112| 630,506 | 528,867 | 20 | 83.3 | 1.2 | 5.8 | 5.2
| 165,267| 170,724| 335,991 | 314,467 | 7 | 37.0 | 2.7 | 12.5 | 4.8
| 325,155| 359,650| 684,805 | 586,816 | 17 | 144.0 | .7 | 4.0 | 6.3
| 166,828| 172,600| 339,428 | 302,081 | 12 | 37·0 | 2·7 | 14·6 | 5·7
| 235,263| 244,716| 479,979 | 408,814 | 18 | 83·3 | 1·2 | ·54| 4·9
| 29,064| 29,316| 58,380 | 56,609 | 3 | 12·0 | 8·3 | 40·9 | 5·2
| 118,839| 122,164| 241,003 | 242,772 | 0·7 | 27·7 | 3·6 | 16·8 | 4·9
| 126,739| 132,023| 258,762 | 230,387 | 13 | 55·5 | 1·8 | 8·5 | 5·0
| 886,845| 901,922| 1,788,767 | 1,582,977 | 13 | 48·7 | 2·5 | 9·7 | 4·9
| | | | 5,016 | | | | |
| 200,538| 203,622| 404,160 | 388,106 | 4 | 19· | 5·1 | 23·2 | 4·9
| 300,645| 306,851| 607,496 | 528,849 | 14 | 22·2 | 4·5 | 21·5 | 5·1
+---------+---------+-----------+-----------+----------+----------+-------+-------+-------
| | | | | | | | |
|8,762,588|9,160,180|17,922,768 |15,804,294 | 13 | 49·7 | 2·0 | 10·5 | 5·5
| | | | | | | | |
+---------+---------+-----------+-----------+----------+----------+-------+-------+-------
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THE DENSITY OF THEIR POPULATION, AS
SHOWN BY THE NUMBER OF PERSONS TO EVERY 100 ACRES.
_Counties above the Average._
Middlesex 1059·0
Lancaster 200·0
Surrey 144·0
Stafford 83·3
York, West Riding 83·3
Chester 65·2
Kent 63·6
Durham 62·5
Worcester 55·5
Warwick 83·3
Nottingham 55·5
Monmouth 55·5
Gloucester 53·0
Average for England and Wales 49·7
_Counties below the Average._
Leicester 45·4
Bedford 43·5
Hertford 43·5
Somerset 43·5
Berks 41·7
Cornwall 41·7
Derby 40·0
Southampton 38·4
Oxford 37·0
Suffolk 37·0
Sussex 37·0
Cambridge 35·8
Devon 34·5
Essex 34·5
Norfolk 33·3
Northampton 33·3
York, East Riding 33·3
Bucks 31·3
Dorset 28·6
Shropshire 28·6
Wilts 27·7
Northumberland 25·6
Huntingdon 25·0
Rutland 25·0
Lincoln 23·8
South Wales 22·2
Cumberland 20·0
North Wales 19·6
Hereford 18·2
York, North Riding 15·2
Westmorland 12·0
COMPARISON OF THE DENSITY OF THE POPULATION
IN 1841 and 1851.
---------------------------------------+-------+-------
| 1841. | 1851.
---------------------------------------+-------+-------
_Agricultural Counties._ | |
| |
Lincoln | 21·7 | 23·8
Rutland | 22·7 | 25·0
Huntingdon | 25·0 | 25·0
Cambridge | 30·3 | 35·8
Essex | 35·7 | 34·5
Sussex | 32·2 | 37·0
Hereford | 20·8 | 18·2
| |
_Agricultural and Sub-Manufacturing_ | |
_Counties._ | |
| |
Westmorland | 11·6 | 12·0
Norfolk | 32·2 | 33·3
Suffolk | 33·3 | 37·0
Hertford | 40·0 | 43·5
Bedford | 37·0 | 43·5
Buckingham | 33·3 | 31·3
Northampton | 31·2 | 33·3
Oxford | 34·4 | 37·0
Berks | 34·4 | 41·7
Hants | 47·6 | 38·4
Wilts | 30·3 | 27·7
Dorset | 27·7 | 28·6
Somerset | 41·6 | 43·5
Devon | 32·2 | 34·5
| |
_Sub-Agricultural and Sub-Manufacturing_| |
_County._ | |
| |
Gloucester | 55·5 | 26·1
| |
_Manufacturing Counties._ | |
| |
Lancaster | 166·6 | 200·0
Yorkshire | 42·6 | 48·7
Chester | 58·8 | 65·2
Nottingham | 47·6 | 55·5
Leicester | 43·0 | 45·4
Warwick | 71·4 | 83·3
Worcester | 52·6 | 55·5
| |
| |
| |
+-------------------------------------------+--------+--------
| | 1841. | 1851.
+-------------------------------------------+--------+--------
| | |
| _Mining Counties._ | |
| | |
|Durham | 47·6 | 62·5
|Cornwall | 41·6 | 41·7
| | |
| _Manufacturing and Sub-Mining Counties._ | |
| | |
|Derby | 41·6 | 40·0
|Stafford | 71·4 | 83·3
| | |
| _Agricultural and Sub-Mining Counties._ | |
| | |
|Shropshire | 28·5 | 28·6
|North Wales | 19·3 | 19·6
|South Wales | 19·0 | 22·2
| | |
|_Sub-Agricultural and Sub-Mining Counties._| |
| | |
|Northumberland | 21·2 | 25·6
|Cumberland | 18·5 | 20·0
|Monmouth | 43·0 | 55·5
| | |
| _Metropolitan County._ | |
| | |
|Middlesex | 1000·0 | 1059·0
| | |
| _Sub-Metropolitan Counties._ | |
| | |
|Surrey | 125·0 | 144·0
|Kent | 55·5 | 63·6
| | |
|-------------------------------------------+--------+--------
|
| Note.--An _Agricultural_ county has _more_ than 10 per
| cent., and a _Sub-Agricultural_ county _less_ than 10 per
| cent. of its population employed in agriculture.
|
| A _Manufacturing_ county has _more_ than 15 per cent.,
| and a _Sub-Manufacturing_ county _less_ than 15 per cent.
| of its population employed in manufacture.
|
| A _Mining_ county has _more_ than 5 per cent., and a
| _Sub-Mining_ county _less_ than 5 per cent. of its
| population employed in mining.
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF THE CRIMINAL OFFENDERS TO
EVERY 10,000 OF THE POPULATION; OR THE INTENSITY OF THE CRIMINALITY IN
EACH COUNTY OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number of
Criminals is _above_ the average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number of Criminals is
_below_ the average.
The average has been calculated from the returns for the last ten
years. ]
TABLE SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES IN ENGLAND AND
WALES IN THE UNDERMENTIONED YEARS.
----------------+------------+----------------------------------------------------------------
| Average |
COUNTIES. | Population | Total number of Persons committed for Trial or Bailed.
| from +-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
| 1841-50. | 1841. | 1842. | 1843. | 1844. | 1845. | 1846. | 1847. | 1848. |
----------------+------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
Bedford | 121,083 | 191 | 229 | 202 | 188 | 155 | 185 | 178 | 204 |
Berks | 194,763 | 306 | 333 | 328 | 287 | 260 | 250 | 335 | 360 |
Bucks | 140,959 | 287 | 277 | 313 | 280 | 286 | 283 | 315 | 310 |
Cambridge | 180,747 | 240 | 241 | 257 | 297 | 239 | 276 | 255 | 244 |
Chester | 395,919 | 943 | 1086 | 1018 | 777 | 688 | 767 | 871 | 1070 |
Cornwall | 349,991 | 295 | 282 | 301 | 269 | 272 | 280 | 341 | 272 |
Cumberland | 186,762 | 151 | 115 | 109 | 138 | 118 | 147 | 120 | 130 |
Derby | 250,249 | 277 | 322 | 322 | 279 | 186 | 277 | 214 | 264 |
Devon | 554,738 | 687 | 716 | 740 | 715 | 720 | 721 | 949 | 924 |
Dorset | 172,736 | 284 | 241 | 252 | 203 | 218 | 225 | 307 | 287 |
Durham | 368,787 | 215 | 266 | 300 | 376 | 203 | 249 | 279 | 334 |
Essex | 332,363 | 647 | 758 | 710 | 596 | 554 | 602 | 603 | 689 |
Gloucester | 407,504 | 1236 | 1252 | 1186 | 1071 | 929 | 884 | 1092 | 1042 |
Hereford | 97,813 | 245 | 259 | 238 | 230 | 226 | 158 | 212 | 270 |
Hertford | 168,178 | 319 | 338 | 265 | 271 | 244 | 243 | 291 | 348 |
Hunts | 57,942 | 62 | 68 | 68 | 79 | 88 | 81 | 89 | 104 |
Kent | 585,249 | 962 | 1155 | 977 | 911 | 831 | 815 | 889 | 1020 |
Lancaster | 1,881,261 | 3987 | 4497 | 3677 | 2893 | 2852 | 3072 | 3456 | 3778 |
Leicester | 227,621 | 466 | 492 | 509 | 481 | 328 | 358 | 335 | 346 |
Lincoln | 378,246 | 349 | 507 | 563 | 542 | 389 | 419 | 506 | 504 |
Middlesex | 1,740,814 | 3586 | 4094 | 4260 | 4027 | 4440 | 4641 | 5175 | 4856 |
Monmouth | 164,093 | 364 | 264 | 261 | 278 | 196 | 217 | 282 | 298 |
Norfolk | 419,463 | 666 | 808 | 782 | 788 | 642 | 720 | 751 | 689 |
Northampton | 206,496 | 342 | 346 | 270 | 294 | 302 | 270 | 243 | 307 |
Northumberland | 284,777 | 226 | 245 | 290 | 294 | 189 | 169 | 189 | 201 |
Nottingham | 282,584 | 329 | 374 | 353 | 348 | 267 | 286 | 343 | 364 |
Oxford | 166,751 | 323 | 334 | 328 | 296 | 309 | 228 | 299 | 296 |
Rutland | 23,711 | 14 | 48 | 39 | 23 | 28 | 26 | 41 | 52 |
Salop | 243,352 | 416 | 470 | 534 | 449 | 308 | 227 | 267 | 305 |
Somerset | 452,515 | 991 | 1148 | 967 | 1039 | 873 | 701 | 774 | 888 |
Southampton | 377,040 | 677 | 702 | 676 | 517 | 619 | 608 | 737 | 728 |
Stafford | 579,686 | 1059 | 1485 | 1175 | 885 | 717 | 851 | 1028 | 1120 |
Suffolk | 325,336 | 482 | 527 | 585 | 630 | 407 | 471 | 505 | 495 |
Surrey | 635,917 | 923 | 1017 | 867 | 941 | 942 | 958 | 1315 | 1296 |
Sussex | 320,944 | 539 | 550 | 493 | 409 | 409 | 468 | 522 | 546 |
Warwick | 444,558 | 1046 | 1003 | 1045 | 894 | 769 | 799 | 998 | 1257 |
Westmoreland | 57,494 | 33 | 39 | 44 | 24 | 46 | 74 | 33 | 47 |
Wilts | 241,887 | 506 | 548 | 464 | 432 | 379 | 436 | 502 | 465 |
Worcester | 244,574 | 566 | 609 | 679 | 603 | 563 | 535 | 620 | 681 |
York | 1,686,461 | 1895 | 2598 | 2304 | 1691 | 1417 | 1560 | 1794 | 2036 |
North Wales | 396,161 | 251 | 279 | 294 | 283 | 269 | 220 | 307 | 332 |
South Wales | 568,430 | 377 | 387 | 546 | 514 | 426 | 350 | 471 | 590 |
+------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
TOTAL FOR | | | | | | | | | |
ENGLAND | | | | | | | | | |
AND WALES |16,918,458 |27,760 |31,309 |29,591 |26,542 |24,303 |25,107 |28,833 |30,349 |
================+============+=======+=======+=======+=======+=======+=======+=======+=======+
----------------+-----------+-----------+--------------+----------------
| | | | Number of
| | | Proportion | Criminals to
+-------+-------+ Total for | Average | to the | every 10,000 of
| 1849. | 1850. | 10 years. | per Year. | Population. | Population.
+-------+-------+-----------+-----------+--------------+----------------
| 162 | 161 | 1,855 | 185 | 1 in 654 | 15·2
| 358 | 318 | 3,135 | 313 | „ 622 | 16·0
| 287 | 242 | 2,880 | 288 | „ 489 | 20·4
| 309 | 302 | 2,660 | 266 | „ 679 | 14·7
| 861 | 900 | 8,981 | 898 | „ 440 | 22·6
| 277 | 226 | 2,815 | 281 | „ 1245 | 8·0
| 159 | 146 | 1,333 | 133 | „ 1404 | 7·1
| 245 | 255 | 2,641 | 264 | „ 947 | 10·5
| 893 | 807 | 7,872 | 787 | „ 704 | 14·1
| 326 | 190 | 2,533 | 253 | „ 682 | 14·6
| 321 | 358 | 2,901 | 290 | „ 1271 | 7·8
| 587 | 631 | 6,377 | 638 | „ 520 | 19·1
| 1063 | 920 | 10,675 | 1067 | „ 381 | 26·1
| 242 | 252 | 2,332 | 233 | „ 419 | 23·8
| 318 | 315 | 2,952 | 295 | „ 570 | 17·5
| 93 | 90 | 822 | 82 | „ 706 | 14·1
| 980 | 958 | 9,598 | 960 | „ 609 | 16·4
| 3290 | 3340 | 34,842 | 3484 | „ 539 | 18·5
| 299 | 300 | 3,914 | 391 | „ 582 | 17·1
| 529 | 528 | 4,836 | 484 | „ 781 | 12·8
| 3861 | 3732 | 42,672 | 4267 | „ 407 | 24·5
| 370 | 433 | 2,963 | 296 | „ 554 | 18·0
| 633 | 705 | 7,184 | 718 | „ 584 | 17·1
| 327 | 248 | 2,949 | 295 | „ 699 | 14·2
| 261 | 283 | 2,347 | 235 | „ 1211 | 8·2
| 341 | 325 | 3,330 | 333 | „ 848 | 11·8
| 303 | 252 | 2,968 | 297 | „ 591 | 17·8
| 35 | 27 | 333 | 33 | „ 718 | 13·9
| 347 | 307 | 3,630 | 363 | „ 670 | 14·9
| 885 | 754 | 9,020 | 902 | „ 501 | 19·9
| 751 | 686 | 6,701 | 670 | „ 562 | 17·7
| 1009 | 1053 | 10,382 | 1038 | „ 558 | 17·9
| 537 | 472 | 5,111 | 511 | „ 636 | 15·7
| 1109 | 1030 | 10,398 | 1040 | „ 611 | 16·3
| 502 | 480 | 4918 | 492 | „ 652 | 15·3
| 910 | 880 | 9601 | 960 | „ 463 | 21·6
| 57 | 70 | 467 | 47 | „ 1223 | 8·1
| 452 | 386 | 4570 | 457 | „ 529 | 18·9
| 653 | 607 | 6116 | 612 | „ 399 | 25·0
| 2022 | 1915 | 19,232 | 1923 | „ 876 | 11·4
| 338 | 316 | 2889 | 289 | „ 1370 | 7·2
| 514 | 613 | 4788 | 479 | „ 1186 | 8·4
+-------+-------+-----------+-----------+--------------+-------------
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
|27,816 |26,813 | 278,423 | 27,842 | „ 607 | 16·4
+=======+=======+===========+===========+==============+=============
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY, AS SHOWN BY THE
NUMBER OF CRIMINALS TO EVERY 10,000 OF THE POPULATION.
_Counties above the Average in Crime._
Gloucester 26·1
Worcester 25·0
Middlesex 24·5
Hereford 23·8
Chester 22·6
Warwick 21·6
Bucks 20·4
Somerset 19·9
Essex 19·1
Wilts 18·9
Lancaster 18·5
Monmouth 18·0
Stafford 17·9
Oxford 17·8
Southampton 17·7
Hertford 17·5
Leicester 17·1
Norfolk 17·1
Average for all England and Wales 16·4
_Counties above the Average in Crime._
Kent 16·4
Surrey 16·3
Berks 16·0
Suffolk 15·7
Sussex 15·3
Bedford 15·2
Salop 14·9
Cambridge 14·7
Dorset 14·6
Northampton 14·2
Devon 14·1
Rutland 13·9
Lincoln 12·8
Nottingham 11·8
York 11·4
Derby 10·5
South Wales 8·4
Northumberland 8·2
Westmorland 8·1
Cornwall 8·0
Durham 7·8
North Wales 7·2
Cumberland 7·1
THE YEARS OF CRIME.
-------------------+------------+-------------+----------
| | | Number of
| Number of | | Criminals
Years. | Criminal | Population. | to every
| Offenders. | | 10,000
| | | people.
-------------------+------------+-------------+----------
1811 | 5,337 | 10,150,615 | 5·2
1812 | 6,576 | 10,332,441 | 6·3
1813 | 7,164 | 10,515,267 | 6·8
1814 | 6,390 | 10,689,093 | 5·9
1815 | 7,818 | 10,881,919 | 7·3
1816 | 9,091 | 11,064,745 | 8·2
1817 | 13,932 | 11,247,571 | 11·5
1818 | 13,567 | 11,430,397 | 11·8
1819 | 14,254 | 11,613,223 | 12·2
1820 | 13,710 | 11,796,049 | 11·6
+------------+-------------+----------
Total for 10 years | 97,839 | 109,630,320 |
+------------+-------------+
Average ditto. | 9,783 | 10,963,032 | 8·9
+------------+-------------+----------
1821 | 13,115 | 11,978,875 | 10·9
1822 | 12,241 | 12,170,706 | 10·0
1823 | 12,263 | 12,362,537 | 9·9
1824 | 13,698 | 12,554,368 | 10·9
1825 | 14,437 | 12,746,199 | 11·3
1826 | 16,164 | 12,938,030 | 12·5
1827 | 17,924 | 13,129,861 | 13·6
1828 | 16,564 | 13,321,692 | 12·4
1829 | 18,675 | 13,531,523 | 13·8
1830 | 18,107 | 13,705,354 | 13·2
+------------+-------------+----------
Total for 10 years | 153,188 | 128,421,145 |
+------------+-------------+
Average ditto | 15,318 | 12,842,114 | 11·9
+------------+-------------+----------
1831 | 19,647 | 13,897,187 | 14·1
1832 | 20,829 | 14,098,142 | 14·7
1833 | 20,072 | 14,299,097 | 14·0
1834 | 22,451 | 14,500,052 | 15·4
1835 | 20,731 | 14,701,007 | 14·1
1836 | 20,984 | 14,901,962 | 14·1
1837 | 23,612 | 15,102,917 | 15·6
1838 | 23,094 | 15,303,872 | 15·1
1839 | 24,443 | 15,504,827 | 15·7
1840 | 27,187 | 15,705,782 | 17·3
+------------+-------------+----------
Total in 10 years | 223,050 | 148,114,825 |
+------------+-------------+
Average ditto | 22,305 | 14,811,482 | 15·0
+------------+-------------+----------
1841 | 27,750 | 15,914,148 | 17·4
1842 | 31,309 | 16,115,010 | 19·4
1843 | 29,591 | 16,315,872 | 18·1
1844 | 26,542 | 16,516,734 | 16·0
1845 | 24,303 | 16,717,596 | 14·5
1846 | 25,107 | 16,918,458 | 14·9
1847 | 28,833 | 17,119,320 | 16·8
1848 | 30,349 | 17,320,182 | 17·5
1849 | 27,816 | 17,521,044 | 15·9
1850 | 26,813 | 17,721,906 | 15·1
+------------+-------------+----------
Total for 10 years | 278,413 | 168,180,270 |
+------------+-------------+
Average ditto | 27,841 | 16,818,027 | 16·5
+------------+-------------+----------
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER WHO SIGNED THE MARRIAGE REGISTER
WITH MARKS IN EVERY 100 PERSONS MARRIED; OR THE INTENSITY OF IGNORANCE
IN EACH COUNTY OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number who signed
the Marriage Register with Marks is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number who signed the
Marriage Register with Marks is _below_ the Average.
The Average has been calculated for the ten years from 1839 to 1848. ]
TABLE SHOWING THE IGNORANCE OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES IN ENGLAND AND
WALES, DEDUCED FROM THE NUMBER WHO SIGNED THE MARRIAGE REGISTER WITH
MARKS IN THE UNDERMENTIONED YEARS.
---------------+----------+------------------------------------------------------
| Average | Number of Males and Females who signed
|Annual No.| the Marriage Register with Marks.
COUNTIES. |of Persons+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+
| married, | 1839. | 1840. | 1841. | 1842. | 1843. | 1844. |
| 1839-48. | | | | | | |
---------------+----------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+
Bedford | 1,850 | 1,112 | 1,148 | 956 | 921 | 1,028 | 1,110 |
Berks | 2,588 | 1,036 | 1,131 | 1,061 | 1,063 | 1,111 | 1,079 |
Bucks | 1,920 | 979 | 1,008 | 820 | 918 | 882 | 918 |
Cambridge | 2,784 | 1,269 | 1,372 | 1,495 | 1,389 | 1,281 | 1,330 |
Chester | 5,160 | 2,343 | 2,510 | 2,350 | 2,096 | 2,366 | 2,403 |
Cornwall | 4,894 | 2,150 | 2,148 | 2,128 | 2,312 | 2,284 | 2,141 |
Cumberland | 2,072 | 470 | 563 | 527 | 539 | 506 | 500 |
Derby | 3,652 | 1,521 | 1,490 | 1,321 | 1,061 | 1,351 | 1,455 |
Devon | 8,678 | 2,603 | 1,817 | 2,744 | 2,971 | 2,995 | 3,055 |
Dorset | 2,358 | 725 | 930 | 785 | 852 | 449 | 945 |
Durham | 5,770 | 1,900 | 2,083 | 2,001 | 1,830 | 1,771 | 1,825 |
Essex | 4,228 | 1,964 | 2,215 | 2,103 | 2,062 | 2,110 | 2,157 |
Gloucester | 6,918 | 2,329 | 2,541 | 2,347 | 2,197 | 2,393 | 2,277 |
Hereford | 1,268 | 462 | 463 | 522 | 548 | 609 | 516 |
Hertford | 1,976 | 1,189 | 1,045 | 1,057 | 954 | 1,083 | 1,038 |
Hunts | 904 | 391 | 465 | 453 | 446 | 439 | 413 |
Kent | 8,094 | 2,431 | 2,382 | 2,476 | 2,488 | 2,556 | 2,502 |
Lancaster | 34,068 | 16,411 | 15,793 | 16,096 | 14,626 | 17,820 | 19,850 |
Leicester | 3,460 | 1,494 | 1,504 | 1,281 | 1,189 | 1,416 | 1,505 |
Lincoln | 5,530 | 1,944 | 2,209 | 2,174 | 2,082 | 1,959 | 1,998 |
Middlesex | 31,590 | 5,134 | 5,569 | 5,242 | 5,045 | 5,416 | 6,141 |
Monmouth | 2,562 | 1,646 | 1,697 | 1,283 | 1,091 | 1,110 | 1,228 |
Norfolk | 6,042 | 2,485 | 2,772 | 2,514 | 2,832 | 2,816 | 2,901 |
Northampton | 3,194 | 1,338 | 1,489 | 1,377 | 1,220 | 1,404 | 1,441 |
Northumberland | 4,094 | 1,149 | 1,264 | 1,108 | 965 | 1,013 | 811 |
Nottingham | 4,168 | 1,715 | 1,724 | 1,645 | 1,642 | 1,742 | 1,953 |
Oxford | 2,316 | 826 | 961 | 951 | 957 | 929 | 889 |
Rutland | 216 | 115 | 92 | 125 | 99 | 97 | 69 |
Salop | 3,180 | 1,647 | 1,568 | 1,497 | 1,533 | 1,392 | 1,496 |
Somerset | 6,226 | 2,300 | 2,608 | 2,705 | 2,643 | 2,654 | 2,643 |
Southampton | 5,768 | 1,614 | 1,801 | 2,049 | 1,959 | 1,910 | 1,977 |
Stafford | 8,292 | 3,886 | 4,045 | 3,552 | 3,065 | 3,335 | 3,937 |
Suffolk | 4,738 | 2,173 | 2,353 | 2,342 | 2,057 | 2,124 | 2,304 |
Surrey | 10,374 | 2,128 | 2,260 | 2,180 | 2,129 | 2,205 | 2,185 |
Sussex | 4,268 | 1,452 | 1,480 | 1,400 | 1,364 | 1,443 | 1,427 |
Warwick | 6,494 | 1,512 | 2,470 | 2,294 | 2,052 | 2,415 | 2,516 |
Westmorland | 780 | 195 | 191 | 177 | 185 | 193 | 225 |
Wilts | 3,236 | 1,495 | 1,603 | 1,550 | 1,487 | 1,522 | 1,527 |
Worcester | 5,536 | 3,201 | 3,098 | 2,934 | 2,588 | 2,528 | 2,974 |
York | 26,664 | 11,439 | 11,899 | 10,726 | 10,503 | 11,099 | 12,970 |
North Wales | 5,164 | 3,028 | 3,022 | 2,999 | 2,925 | 2,694 | 2,737 |
South Wales | 8,152 | 4,382 | 4,532 | 4,378 | 4,093 | 4,190 | 4,617 |
+----------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+
Total for | | | | | | | |
England | | | | | | | |
and Wales | 261,340 |100,616 |104,335 | 99,634 | 94,996 |101,235 |107,985 |
===============+==========+========+========+========+========+========+========+
------------------------------------+---------+--------+--------------+----------
| | |No. of Persons| Per Cent.
|Total for| Annual | who signed | above and
+--------+--------+--------+--------+10 years.|Average.| with Marks in| below the
| 1845. | 1846. | 1847. | 1848. | | | every 100 | Average.
| | | | | | | married. |
+--------+--------+--------+--------+---------+--------+--------------+----------
| 1,095 | 1,124 | 957 | 1,003 | 10,454 | 1,045 | 56 | †40·0
| 1,070 | 1,137 | 1,118 | 1,164 | 10,970 | 1,097 | 42 | † 5·0
| 975 | 1,074 | 906 | 999 | 9,479 | 948 | 49 | †22·5
| 1,471 | 1,398 | 1,213 | 1,328 | 13,546 | 1,355 | 45 | †12·5
| 2,777 | 2,608 | 2,121 | 2,503 | 24,017 | 2,408 | 46 | †15·0
| 2,338 | 2,407 | 2,102 | 2,146 | 22,156 | 2,216 | 45 | †12·5
| 581 | 647 | 520 | 350 | 5,203 | 520 | 25 | *37·5
| 1,642 | 1,544 | 1,382 | 1,377 | 14,144 | 1,414 | 39 | * 2·5
| 3,312 | 3,224 | 2,782 | 1,981 | 27,484 | 2,748 | 32 | *20·0
| 1,033 | 905 | 941 | 923 | 8,488 | 849 | 36 | *10·0
| 2,375 | 2,378 | 2,376 | 2,327 | 20,866 | 2,087 | 36 | *10·0
| 2,246 | 2,163 | 1,977 | 1,963 | 20,960 | 2,096 | 50 | †25·0
| 2,578 | 2,698 | 2,215 | 2,304 | 23,879 | 2,388 | 35 | *12·5
| 598 | 576 | 424 | 488 | 5,206 | 521 | 41 | † 2·5
| 1,153 | 1,102 | 947 | 1,013 | 10,581 | 1,058 | 54 | †35·0
| 434 | 466 | 438 | 440 | 4,385 | 439 | 49 | †22·5
| 2,944 | 2,855 | 2,569 | 2,481 | 25,684 | 2,568 | 32 | *20·0
| 22,177 | 20,709 | 16,588 | 18,161 | 178,231 | 17,823 | 52 | †30·0
| 1,518 | 1,579 | 1,329 | 1,441 | 14,256 | 1,426 | 41 | † 2·5
| 2,232 | 2,166 | 2,159 | 2,436 | 21,359 | 2,136 | 39 | * 2·5
| 6,456 | 6,163 | 5,666 | 5,433 | 56,265 | 5,627 | 18 | *55·0
| 1,722 | 1,982 | 1,720 | 1,574 | 15,053 | 1,505 | 59 | †47·5
| 3,120 | 2,964 | 2,783 | 2,855 | 28,042 | 2,804 | 46 | †15·0
| 1,504 | 1,467 | 1,253 | 1,332 | 13,825 | 1,383 | 43 | † 7·5
| 1,214 | 1,244 | 1,190 | 1,328 | 11,286 | 1,129 | 28 | *30·0
| 2,000 | 1,834 | 1,635 | 1,760 | 17,650 | 1,765 | 42 | † 5·0
| 831 | 880 | 869 | 843 | 8,936 | 894 | 39 | * 2·5
| 73 | 99 | 152 | 118 | 1,039 | 104 | 49 | †22·5
| 1,428 | 1,544 | 1,532 | 1,661 | 15,298 | 1,530 | 48 | †20·0
| 2,598 | 2,632 | 2,183 | 2,360 | 25,326 | 2,533 | 41 | † 2·5
| 2,181 | 2,185 | 2,019 | 1,875 | 19,570 | 1,957 | 34 | *15·0
| 5,091 | 4,920 | 6,423 | 5,263 | 43,517 | 4,352 | 52 | †30·0
| 2,436 | 2,389 | 2,325 | 2,354 | 22,857 | 2,286 | 48 | †20·0
| 2,473 | 2,451 | 2,134 | 2,039 | 22,184 | 2,218 | 21 | *47·5
| 1,594 | 1,534 | 1,512 | 1,371 | 14,577 | 1,458 | 34 | *15·0
| 2,670 | 2,958 | 2,870 | 2,855 | 24,612 | 2,461 | 38 | * 5·0
| 237 | 321 | 220 | 135 | 2,079 | 208 | 27 | *32·5
| 1,685 | 1,642 | 1,481 | 1,528 | 15,520 | 1,552 | 48 | †20·0
| 3,744 | 4,192 | 1,871 | 1,643 | 28,773 | 2,877 | 52 | †30·0
| 13,395 | 12,688 | 11,797 | 11,930 | 118,446 | 11,845 | 44 | †10·0
| 2,916 | 3,219 | 2,904 | 1,951 | 28,395 | 2,840 | 55 | †37·5
| 4,978 | 5,565 | 4,703 | 4,811 | 46,249 | 4,625 | 57 | †42·5
+--------+--------+--------+--------+---------+--------+--------------+----------
| | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
|118,894 |117,633 |104,306 |105,937 |1,050,907|105,091 | 40 |
+========+========+========+========+=========+========+==============+==========
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THEIR IGNORANCE, AS SHOWN BY THE
NUMBER WHO SIGNED THE MARRIAGE REGISTER WITH MARKS IN EVERY 100
PERSONS MARRIED.
_Counties above the Average, or most Ignorant._
Monmouth 59
South Wales 57
Bedford 56
North Wales 55
Hertford 54
Lancaster 52
Stafford 52
Worcester 52
Essex 50
Bucks 49
Hunts 49
Rutland 49
Salop 48
Suffolk 48
Wilts 48
Chester 46
Norfolk 46
Cambridge 45
Cornwall 45
York 44
Northampton 43
Berks 42
Nottingham 42
Hereford 41
Leicester 41
Somerset 41
_Counties below the Average, or least Ignorant._
Derby 39
Lincoln 39
Oxford 39
Warwick 38
Dorset 36
Durham 36
Gloucester 35
Southampton 34
Sussex 34
Devon 32
Kent 32
Northumberland 28
Westmorland 27
Cumberland 25
Surrey 21
Middlesex 18
Average for England and Wales 40
THE CRIME AND IGNORANCE OF THE SEVERAL COUNTIES COMPARED.
| Percentage above and below
| the Average.
+-------------+--------+---------
| | In No. |In No. of
| In No. |signing |Criminals
|of Criminals.|Register|unable to
| | with |read and
_Counties having great_ | | Marks. | write.
_Crime and great Ignorance._ +-------------+--------+---------
| | |
Worcester | †52·4 | †36·0 | † 8·5
Chester | †37·8 | †15·0 | † 9·4
Hereford | †45·1 | † 2·5 | †41·5
Bucks | †24·4 | †22·5 | † 6·9
Somerset | †21·3 | † 2·5 | † 7·2
Essex | †16·4 | †25·0 | †24·2
Lancaster | †12·8 | †30·0 | †22·0
Hertford | † 6·7 | †35·0 | †29·8
Norfolk | † 4·2 | †15·0 | †19·1
| | |
_Counties having little _ | | |
_Crime and little_ | | |
_Ignorance._ | | |
| | |
Cumberland | *56·7 | *37·5 | *15·4
Westmorland | *50·6 | *32·5 | *38·6
Northumberland | *50·0 | *30·0 | *19·1
Derby | *36·0 | * 2·5 | *23·5
Lincoln | *22·0 | * 2·5 | *14·8
Devon | *14·0 | *20·0 | *12·9
Sussex | * 6·7 | *15·0 | * 4·0
Surrey | * ·6 | *47·5 | *13·8
| | |
_Counties having great _ | | |
_Crime, and in which the_ | | |
_Ignorance Tests_ | | |
_are contradictory._ | | |
| | |
Warwick | †31·7 | * 5·0 | † 9·7
Wilts | †15·2 | †20·0 | *20·4
Monmouth | † 9·7 | †47·0 | *12·2
Stafford | † 9·1 | †30·0 | * 3·4
Leicester | † 4·2 | † 2·5 | *11·6
| | |
_Counties having great Crime_| | |
_and little Ignorance._ | | |
| | |
Gloucester | †59·1 | *12·5 | *11·9
Middlesex | †49·4 | *55·0 | *21·7
Oxford | † 8·5 | * 2·5 | * ·9
Southampton | † 7·9 | *15·0 | *13·5
| | |
_Counties having little _ | | |
_Crime and great Ignorance._ | | |
| | |
North Wales | *56·1 | †37·5 | †20·4
South Wales | *48·7 | †42·5 | †14·7
Hants | *14·0 | †22·5 | † 1·9
Northampton | *13·4 | † 7·5 | † 1·5
Salop | * 9·1 | †20·0 | †25·8
Bedford | * 7·3 | †40·0 | †28·3
Suffolk | * 4·2 | †20·0 | † 8·1
| | |
_Counties having little_ | | |
_Crime,and in which the_ | | |
_Ignorance_Tests are_ | | |
_contradictory._ | | |
| | |
Durham | *51·8 | *10·0 | † 1·5
Cornwall | *51·2 | †12·5 | * 6·9
York | *30·5 | †10·0 | * 8·5
Nottingham | *28·0 | † 5·0 | * 5·6
Berks | *21·4 | † 5·0 | * 4·7
Rutland | *15·2 | †22·5 | * 2·5
Cambridge | *10·3 | †12·5 | * 2·5
Dorset | *10·0 | *10·0 | † 4·7
Kent | | *20·0 | † 6·3
TABLE SHOWING THE AMOUNT OF IGNORANCE AMONGST THE CRIMINALS IN THE
DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES IN THE UNDERMENTIONED YEARS.
---------------+--------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
COUNTIES. |Average Annual|
| Number | Number of Criminals who could
| of Criminals | neither read nor write.
| from +-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
| 1839-1848. | 1839. | 1840. | 1841. | 1842. | 1843. | 1844. |
---------------+--------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
| | | | | | | |
Bedford | 181 | 39 | 72 | 90 | 110 | 80 | 81 |
Berks | 313 | 103 | 121 | 97 | 113 | 48 | 75 |
Bucks | 285 | 89 | 107 | 87 | 112 | 113 | 91 |
Cambridge | 249 | 79 | 65 | 90 | 78 | 80 | 77 |
Chester | 904 | 285 | 370 | 334 | 333 | 336 | 259 |
Cornwall | 294 | 81 | 95 | 82 | 80 | 82 | 65 |
Cumberland | 130 | 39 | 30 | 26 | 45 | 37 | 41 |
Derby | 263 | 74 | 48 | 66 | 92 | 77 | 61 |
Devon | 755 | 143 | 154 | 146 | 144 | 204 | 235 |
Dorset | 258 | 84 | 107 | 96 | 75 | 95 | 73 |
Durham | 260 | 70 | 33 | 56 | 88 | 96 | 138 |
Essex | 638 | 213 | 297 | 302 | 295 | 290 | 219 |
Gloucester | 1067 | 326 | 322 | 370 | 414 | 330 | 211 |
Hereford | 229 | 102 | 120 | 121 | 107 | 107 | 83 |
Hertford | 288 | 147 | 133 | 146 | 119 | 98 | 111 |
Hunts | 77 | 20 | 33 | 21 | 22 | 26 | 27 |
Kent | 942 | 348 | 251 | 353 | 371 | 330 | 301 |
Lancaster | 3462 | 1143 | 1391 | 1556 | 1947 | 1423 | 992 |
Leicester | 419 | 141 | 159 | 135 | 141 | 137 | 135 |
Lincoln | 458 | 117 | 119 | 99 | 133 | 131 | 134 |
Middlesex | 4230 | 927 | 882 | 980 | 800 | 1033 | 933 |
Monmouth | 272 | 83 | 94 | 112 | 73 | 79 | 67 |
Norfolk | 727 | 285 | 266 | 258 | 308 | 284 | 290 |
Northampton | 291 | 96 | 92 | 118 | 111 | 92 | 90 |
Northumberland | 214 | 24 | 57 | 45 | 58 | 75 | 96 |
Nottingham | 333 | 104 | 108 | 91 | 102 | 112 | 115 |
Oxford | 308 | 113 | 134 | 106 | 99 | 117 | 84 |
Rutland | 29 | 4 | -- | 1 | 11 | 13 | 8 |
Salop | 367 | 136 | 176 | 182 | 173 | 215 | 164 |
Somerset | 935 | 281 | 410 | 352 | 363 | 333 | 360 |
Southampton | 664 | 215 | 207 | 188 | 186 | 159 | 126 |
Stafford | 1017 | 233 | 271 | 324 | 465 | 313 | 304 |
Suffolk | 511 | 187 | 201 | 184 | 188 | 195 | 198 |
Surrey | 1026 | 315 | 320 | 274 | 300 | 223 | 233 |
Sussex | 498 | 173 | 173 | 176 | 191 | 143 | 111 |
Warwick | 959 | 293 | 396 | 403 | 363 | 392 | 267 |
Westmorland | 41 | 8 | 6 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 3 |
Wilts | 462 | 132 | 145 | 146 | 127 | 116 | 100 |
Worcester | 594 | 169 | 275 | 244 | 250 | 242 | 204 |
York | 1878 | 553 | 572 | 531 | 776 | 621 | 444 |
North Wales | 274 | 84 | 110 | 92 | 122 | 116 | 107 |
South Wales | 435 | 108 | 136 | 135 | 138 | 174 | 188 |
+--------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
TOTAL FOR | | | | | | | |
ENGLAND | 27,542 | 196 | 9058 | 9220 | 10,128| 9173 | 7901 |
AND WALES | | | | | | | |
+--------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
+-------+-------+-------+-------+---------+---------+----------------+----------------
| | |No. of Criminals|Per Cent. above
| |Average | who can | and below the
|Total for| Number | neither read | Average.
+-------+-------+-------+-------+10 years.|per Year.| nor write |† denotes above.
| 1845. | 1846. | 1847. | 1848. | | | in every 100. |* „ below.
+-------+-------+-------+-------+---------+---------+----------------+----------------
| | | | | | | |
| 64 | 66 | 64 | 79 | 745 | 74 | 40·8 | †28·3
| 79 | 88 | 100 | 127 | 951 | 95 | 30·3 | * 4·7
| 95 | 89 | 105 | 82 | 970 | 97 | 34·0 | † 6·9
| 69 | 78 | 75 | 81 | 772 | 77 | 30·9 | * 2·5
| 230 | 296 | 336 | 371 | 3,150 | 315 | 34·8 | † 9·4
| 90 | 89 | 125 | 86 | 875 | 87 | 29·6 | * 6·9
| 21 | 46 | 32 | 37 | 354 | 35 | 26·9 | *15·4
| 53 | 63 | 41 | 64 | 642 | 64 | 24·3 | *23·5
| 211 | 248 | 307 | 295 | 2,087 | 209 | 27·7 | *12·9
| 83 | 64 | 93 | 84 | 864 | 86 | 33·3 | † 4·7
| 66 | 78 | 97 | 120 | 842 | 84 | 32·3 | † 1·5
| 188 | 242 | 254 | 224 | 2,524 | 252 | 39·5 | †24·2
| 210 | 235 | 293 | 276 | 2,987 | 299 | 28·0 | *11·9
| 96 | 64 | 112 | 115 | 1,027 | 103 | 45·0 | †41·5
| 90 | 82 | 121 | 148 | 1,195 | 119 | 41·3 | †29·8
| 32 | 14 | 21 | 36 | 252 | 25 | 32·4 | † 1·9
| 301 | 267 | 305 | 368 | 3,195 | 319 | 33·8 | † 6·3
| 1023 | 1097 | 1283 | 1389 | 13,444 | 1344 | 38·8 | †22·0
| 87 | 96 | 66 | 82 | 1,179 | 118 | 28·1 | *11·6
| 112 | 125 | 136 | 137 | 1,243 | 124 | 27·1 | *14·8
| 1230 | 1177 | 1280 | 1322 | 10,564 | 1056 | 24·9 | *21·7
| 34 | 45 | 81 | 95 | 763 | 76 | 27·9 | *12·2
| 254 | 271 | 293 | 247 | 2,756 | 276 | 37·9 | †19·1
| 107 | 86 | 56 | 93 | 941 | 94 | 32·3 | † 1·5
| 44 | 45 | 49 | 57 | 550 | 55 | 25·7 | *19·1
| 79 | 88 | 95 | 106 | 1,000 | 100 | 30·0 | * 5·6
| 93 | 64 | 90 | 73 | 973 | 97 | 31·5 | * ·9
| 12 | 8 | 15 | 17 | 89 | 9 | 31·0 | * 2·5
| 104 | 89 | 112 | 119 | 1,470 | 147 | 40·0 | †25·8
| 298 | 224 | 266 | 313 | 3,200 | 320 | 34·1 | † 7·2
| 153 | 193 | 213 | 194 | 1,834 | 183 | 27·5 | *13·5
| 212 | 263 | 354 | 387 | 3,126 | 313 | 30·7 | * 3·4
| 113 | 159 | 159 | 179 | 1,763 | 176 | 34·4 | † 8·1
| 223 | 218 | 348 | 340 | 2,824 | 282 | 27·4 | *13·8
| 97 | 151 | 136 | 168 | 1,519 | 152 | 30·5 | * 4·0
| 237 | 234 | 324 | 440 | 3,349 | 335 | 34·9 | † 9·7
| 11 | 20 | 5 | 9 | 78 | 8 | 19·5 | *38·6
| 85 | 101 | 118 | 104 | 1,174 | 117 | 25·3 | *20·4
| 210 | 195 | 229 | 232 | 2,250 | 225 | 34·5 | † 8·5
| 378 | 453 | 528 | 619 | 5,475 | 547 | 29·1 | * 8·5
| 81 | 79 | 126 | 136 | 1,053 | 105 | 38·3 | †20·4
| 183 | 108 | 187 | 240 | 1,593 | 159 | 36·5 | †14·7
+-------+-------+-------+-------+---------+---------+----------------+----------------
| | | | | | | |
| 7438 | 7698 | 9050 | 9691 | 87,553 | 8755 | 31·8 |
| | | | | | | |
+-------+-------+-------+-------+---------+---------+----------------+----------------
CRIMINALS, AS SHOWN BY THE NUMBER OF PERSONS WHO COULD NEITHER READ NOR
WRITE IN EVERY 100 CRIMINALS.
_Counties above the Average._
Hereford 45·0
Hertford 41·3
Bedford 40·8
Salop 40·0
Essex 39·5
Lancaster 38·8
North Wales 38·3
Norfolk 37·9
South Wales 36·5
Warwick 34·9
Chester 34·8
Worcester 34·5
Suffolk 34·4
Somerset 34·1
Bucks 34·0
Kent 33·8
Dorset 33·3
Hunts 32·4
Durham 32·3
Northampton 32·3
----
Average for England and Wales 31·8
_Counties below the Average._
Oxford 31·5
Rutland 31·0
Cambridge 30·9
Stafford 30·7
Sussex 30·5
Berks 30·3
Nottingham 30·0
Cornwall 29·6
York 29·1
Leicester 28·1
Gloucester 28·0
Monmouth 27·9
Devon 27·7
Southampton 27·5
Surrey 27·4
Lincoln 27·1
Cumberland 26·9
Northumberland 25·7
Wilts 25·3
Middlesex 24·9
Derby 24·3
Westmorland 19·5
THE COUNTIES ARRANGED CRIMINALLY AND TOPOGRAPHICALLY (_to show the
local association of crime_).
DIVISION I.--_Northern, Welsh, and Cornish Counties._
No. of
Criminals
in 10,000.
Cumberland 7·1
Durham 7·8
Westmorland 8·1
Northumberland 8·2
North Wales 7·2
South Wales 8·4
Cornwall 8·0
DIVISION II.--_York and N. Midland Counties._
York 11·4
Derby 10·5
Nottingham 11·8
Lincoln 12·8
Rutland 13·9
DIVISION III.--_S. Midland & Eastern Counties._
Hunts 14·1
Northampton 14·2
Cambridge 14·7
Bedford 15·2
Suffolk 15·7
Norfolk 17·1
Essex 19·1
Oxford 17·8
Herts 17·5
Bucks 20·4
DIVISION IV.--_South Eastern and South Western._
Berks 12·9
Devon 14·1
Dorset 14·8
Sussex 15·3
Surrey 16·3
Kent 16·4
Hants 17·7
Wilts 18·9
Somerset 19·9
Monmouth 18·0
DIVISION V.--_Western and North Western._
Shropshire 14·9
Leicestershire 17·1
Stafford 17·9
Lancaster 18·5
Chester 22·6
Warwick 21·6
Hereford 23·8
Worcester 25·0
Gloucester 26·1
DIVISION VI.--_Metropolitan._
Middlesex 24·5
The Northern, Welsh, and Cornish Counties range in criminality from
7·1 to 8·4 in 10,000.
York and the N. Midland Counties, from 11·4 to 13·9.
The S. Midland and Eastern Counties, from 14·1 to 20·4.
The S. Eastern and S. Western, from 12·9 to 19·9.
The Western and N. Western, from 14·9 to 26·1.
The Metropolitan, 24·5.
TABLE SHOWING THE RELATIVE CRIMINALITY AND IGNORANCE
OF THE SEVERAL COUNTIES, ARRANGED ACCORDING
TO THE OCCUPATION OF THEIR INHABITANTS.
+------------------------------------+-------------------+-----------------+
| |No. of Criminals |No. of Persons |
| |in every |who signed with |
| |10,000 of Pop. |Marks in every |
| | |100 married. |
+ +-------------------+-----------------+
| _Agricultural Counties._ | | |
| | | |
| Lincoln | 12 | 39 |
| Rutland | 13 | 49 |
| Huntingdon | 14 | 49 |
| Cambridge | 14 | 45 |
| Essex | 19 | 50 |
| Sussex | 15 | 34 |
| Hereford | 23 | 41 |
| | | |
|_Agricultural and Sub-Manufacturing_| | |
|_Counties._ | | |
| | | |
| Westmorland | 8 | 27 |
| Norfolk | 17 | 46 |
| Suffolk | 15 | 48 |
| Hertford | 17 | 54 |
| Bedford | 15 | 56 |
| Buckingham | 20 | 49 |
| Northampton | 14 | 43 |
| Oxford | 17 | 39 |
| Berks | 12 | 42 |
| Hants | 17 | 34 |
| Wilts | 18 | 48 |
| Dorset | 14 | 36 |
| Somerset | 19 | 41 |
| | | |
| _Sub-Agricul. and Sub-Manufact._ | | |
| _County._ | | |
| | | |
| Gloucester | 26 | 35 |
| | | |
| _Manufacturing Counties._ | | |
| | | |
| Lancaster | 18 | 52 |
| Yorkshire | 11 | 44 |
| Chester | 22 | 46 |
| Nottingham | 11 | 42 |
| Leicester | 17 | 41 |
| Warwick | 21 | 38 |
| Worcester | 25 | 52 |
| | | |
| _Mining Counties._ | | |
| | | |
| Durham | 7 | 36 |
| Cornwall | 8 | 45 |
| | | |
| _Manufacturing and Sub-Mining_ | | |
| _Counties._ | | |
| | | |
| Derby | 10 | 39 |
| Stafford | 17 | 52 |
| | | |
| _Agricultural and Sub-Mining_ | | |
| _Counties._ | | |
| | | |
| Salop | 14 | 48 |
| North Wales | 7 | 55 |
| South Wales | 8 | 57 |
| | | |
| _Sub-Agricultural and_ | | |
| _Sub-Mining Counties._ | | |
| | | |
| Northumberland | 8 | 28 |
| Cumberland | 7 | 25 |
| Monmouth | 18 | 59 |
| | | |
| _Metropolitan County._ | | |
| | | |
| Middlesex | 24 | 18 |
| | | |
| _Sub-Metropolitan Counties._ | | |
| | | |
| Surrey | 16 | 21 |
| Kent | 16 | 32 |
For definition of Agricultural, Manufacturing, and Mining Counties, see
Table of Density of Population, No. 37.
[Illustration: TABLE SHOWING THE RELATIVE DEGREES OF CRIMINALITY AND
IGNORANCE IN THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES IN ENGLAND AND WALES.
THE AVERAGE TAKEN FOR TEN YEARS.
_The thin line represents Ignorance. The thick line represents Crime._]
EDUCATION OF CRIMINALS (ENGLAND AND WALES).
TABLE SHOWING THE DEGREES OF INSTRUCTION OF PERSONS OF ALL AGES
COMMITTED TO PRISON FROM 1839 TO 1848.
------+---------+------------+----------+------------+------------+--------
Years.|Unable to| Able to | Able to | Superior |Instruction |
| read or | read and | read and |Instruction.| could | Total.
| write. | write | write | | not be |
| |imperfectly.| well. | |ascertained.|
------+---------+------------+----------+------------+------------+--------
1839 | 8,196 | 13,071 | 2462 | 78 | 636 | 24,443
1840 | 9,058 | 15,109 | 2253 | 101 | 666 | 27,187
1841 | 9,220 | 15,732 | 2053 | 26 | 629 | 27,760
1842 | 10,128 | 18,260 | 2121 | 69 | 731 | 31,309
1843 | 9,173 | 17,045 | 2371 | 140 | 862 | 29,591
1844 | 7,901 | 15,735 | 2165 | 111 | 639 | 26,542
1845 | 7,438 | 14,179 | 2037 | 89 | 560 | 24,303
1846 | 7,698 | 14,942 | 1936 | 85 | 446 | 25,107
1847 | 9,050 | 16,980 | 2245 | 82 | 476 | 28,833
1848 | 9,691 | 17,111 | 2984 | 81 | 482 | 30,349
------+---------+------------+----------+------------+------------+--------
TABLE SHOWING THE CENTESIMAL DEGREES OF INSTRUCTION OF PERSONS OF ALL
AGES COMMITTED TO PRISON FROM 1839 TO 1848.
------+---------+------------+----------+------------+------------
Years.|Unable to| Able to | Able to | Superior |Instruction
| read or | read and | read and |Instruction.| could
| write. | write | write | | not be
| |imperfectly.| well. | |ascertained.
------+---------+------------+----------+------------+------------
1839 | 33·53 | 53·48 | 10·07 | 0·32 | 2·60
1840 | 33·32 | 55·57 | 8·29 | 0·37 | 2·45
1841 | 33·21 | 56·67 | 7·40 | 0·45 | 2·27
1842 | 32·35 | 58·32 | 6·77 | 0·22 | 2·34
1843 | 31·00 | 57·60 | 8·02 | 0·47 | 2·91
1844 | 29·77 | 59·28 | 8·42 | 0·42 | 2·41
1845 | 30·61 | 58·34 | 8·38 | 0·37 | 2·30
1846 | 30·66 | 59·51 | 7·71 | 0·34 | 1·78
1847 | 31·39 | 58·89 | 7·79 | 0·28 | 1·65
1848 | 31·93 | 56·38 | 9·83 | 0·27 | 1·59
------+---------+------------+----------+------------+------------
⁂ “The instruction of the offenders,” say the Criminal Returns of
1848, “has been without much variation, exhibiting, on a comparison
of the last ten years, a _decreased_ proportion of those entirely
uninstructed;” and it may be added a corresponding _increase_ of those
who are able to read and write imperfectly.
THE STATE OF EDUCATION AND DENSITY OF THE POPULATION IN THE SEVERAL
COUNTIES COMPARED.
---------------+-------------------+----------------+-------------------
| Percentage | | Percentage
| above and below | | above and below
| the Average. | | the Average.
_Counties_ +---------+---------+ _Counties_ +---------+---------
_having great_ | In No. |In No. of| _having little_| In No. |In No. of
_Ignorance_ | signing | Persons | _Ignorance_ | signing | Persons
_and great_ | register| to 100 | _and great_ | register| to 100
_density of_ | with | Acres. | _density of_ | with | Acres.
_Population._ | Marks. | | _Population._ | Marks. |
+---------+---------+----------------+---------+---------
Monmouth | †47 | † 9 | Middlesex | *55 | †2030
Lancaster | †30 | †270 | Surrey | *47 | † 189
Stafford | †30 | † 72 | Kent | *20 | † 28
Worcester | †30 | † 13 | Gloucester | *12 | † 6
Chester | †15 | † 31 | Durham | *10 | † 21
Nottingham | †5 | † 12 | Warwick | * 5 | † 70
|
_Counties having little Ignorance_ |_Counties having great Ignorance_
_and little density of Population._|_and little density of Population._
|
Cumberland | *37 | *59 | South Wales | †42 | *55
Westmorland | *32 | *75 | Bedford | †40 | *12
Northumb | *30 | *48 | North Wales | †37 | *60
Devon | *20 | *30 | Hertford | †35 | *12
Sussex | *15 | *25 | Essex | †25 | *29
Southampton | *15 | *20 | Bucks | †22 | *37
Dorset | *10 | *43 | Hunts | †22 | *49
Oxford | * 2 | *26 | Rutland | †22 | *49
Lincoln | * 2 | *51 | Salop | †20 | *42
Derby | * 2 | *20 | Suffolk | †20 | *26
| Wilts | †20 | *44
| Norfolk | †15 | *32
| Cambridge | †12 | *28
| Cornwall | †12 | *16
| York | †10 | * 2
| Northampton | † 7 | *33
| Berks | † 5 | *15
| Hereford | † 2 | *63
| Leicester | † 2 | * 7
| Somerset | † 2 | *10
⁂ The rule appears to be, that those counties are the _most_ ignorant
in which the population is the _least_ dense.
THE CRIME AND DENSITY OF THE POPULATION OF THE SEVERAL COUNTIES
COMPARED.
---------------+--------------------+----------------+--------------------
| Percentage | | Percentage
| above and below | | above and below
| the Average. | | the Average.
_Counties_ +---------+----------+ _Counties_ +----------+---------
_having great_ | |In No. of| _having great_ | |In No. of
_Crime_ |In Number | Persons | _Crime_ |In Number | Persons
_and great_ | of | to 100 | _and little_ | of | to 100
_density of_ |Criminals.| Acres. | _density of_ |Criminals.| Acres.
_Population._ | | | _Population._ | |
+----------+---------+----------------+----------+---------
Gloucester | †59·1 | † 6·4 | Hereford | †45·1 | *63·4
Worcester | †52·4 | † 13·3 | Bucks | †24·4 | *37·0
Middlesex | †49·4 | †2030·8 | Somerset | †21·3 | *10·9
Chester | †37·8 | † 31·2 | Essex | †16·4 | *29·6
Warwick | †31·7 | † 70·0 | Wilts | †15·2 | *44·1
Lancaster | †12·8 | † 270·6 | Oxford | † 8·5 | *26·8
Monmouth | † 9·7 | † 9·9 | Southampton | † 7·9 | *20·7
Stafford | † 9·1 | † 72·2 | Hertford | † 6·7 | *12·5
| Leicester | † 4·2 | * 7·4
| Norfolk | † 4·2 | *32·6
_Counties having little Crime and_ | _Counties having little Crime and_
_little density of Population._ | _great density of Population._
|
Cumberland | *56·7 | *59·6 |Durham | *51·8 | † 21·9
North Wales | *56·1 | *60.4 |Nottingham | *28·0 | † 12·7
Cornwall | *51·2 | *16·3 |Surrey | * ·6 | †189·7
Westmorland | *50·6 | *75·9 |Kent | | † 28·0
Northumb | *50·0 | *48·1 |
South Wales | *48·7 | *55·1 |
Derby | *36·0 | *20·9 |
York | *30·5 | * 2·0 |
Lincoln | *22·0 | *51·7 |
Berks | *21·4 | *15·5 |
Hunts | *14·0 | *49·9 |
Devon | *14·0 | *30·0 |
Rutland | *15·2 | *49·9 |
Northampton | *13·4 | *33·4 |
Cambridge | *10·3 | *28·2 |
Dorset | *10·0 | *43·1 |
Salop | * 9·1 | *42·9 |
Bedford | * 7·3 | *12·3 |
Sussex | * 6·7 | *25·0 |
Suffolk | * 4·2 | *26·6 |
⁂ The rule appears to be, that those counties are the least criminal in
which the population is the least dense.
N.B. The † prefixed to a number denotes that it is _above_, the * that
it is _below_ the average by the percentage which it expresses.
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF ILLEGITIMATE CHILDREN IN EVERY
1000 BIRTHS, IN EACH COUNTY OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number of
Illegitimate Births is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number of Illegitimate
Births is _below_ the Average.
The Average is taken for four years (as long as the returns will allow).
_The Average for all England and Wales is 67 in every 1000._]
A TABLE SHOWING THE NUMBER OF ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS IN ENGLAND AND WALES
IN THE UNDERMENTIONED YEARS.
⁂ _The average is calculated for as long a series of years as the
returns of the Registrar General will permit._
--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------+
| | |
| | Number of Illegitimate Births |
| Total Number +---------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
COUNTIES. | of Birth for | Average | | | | |
| 4 Years, from|per Year.| 1845. | 1846. | 1847. | 1848. |
| 1845-48. | | | | | |
--------------+--------------+---------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
Bedford | 17,384 | 4,346 | 355 | 349 | 302 | 338 |
Berks | 23,195 | 5,799 | 463 | 472 | 438 | 470 |
Bucks | 17,984 | 4,496 | 328 | 329 | 296 | 306 |
Cambridge | 25,546 | 6,386 | 441 | 407 | 442 | 404 |
Chester | 51,396 | 12,599 | 1188 | 1190 | 1064 | 1072 |
Cornwall | 45,017 | 11,254 | 576 | 537 | 515 | 508 |
Cumberland | 23,541 | 5,885 | 647 | 641 | 629 | 638 |
Derby | 32,295 | 8,074 | 672 | 670 | 674 | 610 |
Devon | 64,802 | 16,200 | 789 | 889 | 758 | 837 |
Dorset | 20,529 | 5,132 | 364 | 331 | 309 | 366 |
Durham | 54,916 | 13,729 | 804 | 821 | 812 | 859 |
Essex | 41,356 | 10,339 | 588 | 673 | 590 | 634 |
Gloucester | 49,444 | 12,361 | 811 | 855 | 720 | 767 |
Hereford | 10,984 | 2,746 | 273 | 305 | 254 | 263 |
Hertford | 21,590 | 5,397 | 402 | 414 | 368 | 367 |
Hunts | 8,179 | 2,045 | 116 | 100 | 80 | 98 |
Kent | 73,836 | 18,459 | 1015 | 1008 | 976 | 995 |
Lancaster | 293,023 | 73,256 | 5929 | 5897 | 5477 | 5384 |
Leicester | 29,512 | 7,378 | 640 | 624 | 531 | 536 |
Lincoln | 49,546 | 12,386 | 843 | 845 | 773 | 821 |
Middlesex | 217,523 | 54,381 | 2048 | 2254 | 2201 | 2298 |
Monmouth | 21,995 | 5,499 | 247 | 266 | 253 | 309 |
Norfolk | 52,387 | 13,097 | 1424 | 1440 | 1295 | 1336 |
Northampton | 27,674 | 6,918 | 440 | 420 | 395 | 411 |
Northumberland| 37,523 | 9,381 | 668 | 678 | 715 | 679 |
Nottingham | 35,244 | 8,811 | 895 | 827 | 775 | 736 |
Oxford | 20,886 | 5,221 | 368 | 468 | 386 | 361 |
Rutland | 2,825 | 706 | 52 | 34 | 30 | 45 |
Salop | 25,899 | 6,475 | 676 | 658 | 593 | 632 |
Somerset | 53,509 | 13,377 | 903 | 860 | 796 | 830 |
Southampton | 46,726 | 11,681 | 704 | 711 | 688 | 709 |
Stafford | 77,972 | 19,493 | 1240 | 1283 | 1409 | 1433 |
Suffolk | 42,055 | 10,514 | 937 | 950 | 849 | 846 |
Surrey | 81,968 | 20,492 | 855 | 911 | 930 | 915 |
Sussex | 38,454 | 9,613 | 657 | 669 | 695 | 626 |
Warwick | 58,938 | 14,734 | 779 | 835 | 830 | 879 |
Westmorland | 7,073 | 1,793 | 179 | 147 | 149 | 149 |
Wilts | 29,008 | 7,252 | 521 | 549 | 485 | 469 |
Worcester | 40,561 | 10,140 | 768 | 885 | 512 | 553 |
York | 231,444 | 57,861 | 4266 | 4317 | 4030 | 4106 |
North Wales | 43,268 | 10,817 | 872 | 854 | 830 | 832 |
South Wales | 72,188 | 18,047 | 1407 | 1256 | 1271 | 1300 |
+--------------+---------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
Total for | 2,219,170 | 554,792 |38,241 |38,259 |36,125 |36,747 |
England and | | | | | | |
Wales | | | | | | |
--------------+--------------+---------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
+--------+---------+----------+------------+---------------
| | | | | Per Cent.
| | | | | above and
+ Total | |Proportion| Number of | below the
| for 4 | Average | to all |Illegitimate| Average.
| Years. |per Year.| Births, | in every |† denotes above
| | |1 in every|1000 Births.|* „ below
+--------+---------+----------+------------+---------------
| 1,344 | 336 | 12·9 | 77 | †14·9
| 1,843 | 461 | 12·5 | 79 | †17·9
| 1,259 | 315 | 14·2 | 70 | †4·4
| 1,694 | 423 | 15·0 | 66 | *1·5
| 4,514 | 1128 | 11·3 | 89 | †32·8
| 2,136 | 534 | 21·0 | 47 | *29·8
| 2,555 | 639 | 9·2 | 108 | †61·2
| 2,626 | 656 | 12·2 | 81 | †20·9
| 3,273 | 818 | 19·7 | 50 | *25·3
| 1,370 | 342 | 14·9 | 66 | *1·5
| 3,296 | 824 | 16·3 | 60 | *10·4
| 2,485 | 621 | 16·6 | 60 | *10·4
| 3,153 | 788 | 15·6 | 64 | *4·5
| 1,095 | 274 | 10·0 | 100 | †49·2
| 1,551 | 388 | 13·9 | 72 | †7·4
| 394 | 98 | 20·7 | 48 | *28·3
| 3,994 | 998 | 14·8 | 54 | *19·4
| 22,687 | 5672 | 12·9 | 77 | †14·9
| 2,331 | 583 | 12·6 | 79 | †17·9
| 3,282 | 820 | 15·0 | 66 | *1·5
| 8,801 | 2200 | 24·7 | 40 | *40·3
| 1,075 | 269 | 20·4 | 49 | *26·8
| 5,495 | 1374 | 9·5 | 105 | †56·7
| 1,666 | 416 | 16·6 | 60 | *10·4
| 2,740 | 685 | 13·6 | 73 | †8·9
| 3,233 | 808 | 10·9 | 91 | †35·8
| 1,583 | 396 | 13·1 | 76 | †13·4
| 161 | 40 | 17·5 | 56 | *16·4
| 2,559 | 640 | 10·1 | 99 | †47·7
| 3,389 | 847 | 15·7 | 63 | *6·0
| 2,812 | 703 | 16·6 | 60 | *10·4
| 5,365 | 1341 | 14·5 | 69 | †3·0
| 3,582 | 895 | 11·7 | 85 | †26·8
| 3,611 | 903 | 22·6 | 44 | *34·3
| 2,647| 662 | 14·5 | 68 | †1·5
| 3,323| 831 | 17·7 | 56 | *16·4
| 624| 156 | 11·3 | 87 | †29·8
| 2,024| 506 | 14·3 | 69 | †3·0
| 2,718| 679 | 14·9 | 66 | *1·5
| 16,619| 4155 | 13·9 | 71 | †6·0
| 3,388| 847 | 12·7 | 78 | †16·4
| 5,234| 1308 | 13·7 | 72 | †7·4
+--------+---------+----------+------------+---------------
|149,642 |37,410 | 14·8 | 67 |
| | | | |
| | | | |
+--------+---------+----------+------------+---------------
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THEIR ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS, AS SHOWN
BY THE NUMBER OF ILLEGITIMATES IN EVERY 1000 CHILDREN BORN.
_Counties above the Average._
Cumberland 108
Norfolk 105
Hereford 100
Salop 99
Nottingham 91
Chester 89
Westmorland 87
Suffolk 85
Derby 81
Berks 79
Leicester 79
North Wales 78
Lancaster 77
Bedford 77
Oxford 76
Northumberland 73
Hertford 72
South Wales 72
York 71
Bucks 70
Wilts 69
Stafford 69
Sussex 68
_Counties below the Average._
Cambridge 66
Dorset 66
Lincoln 66
Worcester 66
Gloucester 64
Somerset 63
Southampton 60
Northampton 60
Essex 60
Durham 60
Warwick 56
Rutland 56
Kent 54
Devon 50
Monmouth 49
Hunts 48
Cornwall 47
Surrey 44
Middlesex 40
---
Average for England and Wales 67
THE EARLY MARRIAGES AND THE INCREASE OF THE POPULATION
IN EACH COUNTY COMPARED.
----------------------------+--------------+------------------------+
| | Annual No. of |
| Rate of |Early Marriages in every|
_Counties in which the_ | Increase of | 1000 Marriages, from |
_Increase of the _ |the Population| 1844-48. |
_Population and the_ | from +------------------------+
_number of Early_ | 1841 to 1851 | Among | Among |
_Marriages are both_ | per cent. | Males. | Females. |
_above the Average._ +--------------+-----------+------------+
Lancaster | 22 | 50 | 139 |
Stafford | 20 | 62 | 176 |
Bedford | 16 | 109 | 235 |
Chester | 15 | 54 | 151 |
|
_Counties in which the Increase of the Population and the_ |
_number of Early Marriages are both below the Average._ |
|
Northumberland | 13 | 39 | 124 |
Southampton | 13 | 25 | 118 |
Cumberland | 10 | 33 | 105 |
Gloucester | 6 | 42 | 104 |
Devon | 6 | 22 | 82 |
Rutland | 5 | 36 | 128 |
Cornwall | 4 | 32 | 131 |
North Wales | 4 | 27 | 77 |
Hereford | 3 | 17 | 79 |
Westmorland | 3 | 32 | 128 |
Salop | 1 | 29 | 95 |
|
_Counties in which the Increase of the Population and the_ |
_Early Marriages among Females are above the Average and_ |
_those among Males below it._ |
Durham | 26 | 35 | 142 |
Kent | 14 | 46 | 140 |
|
_County in which the Increase of the Population and Early_ |
_Marriages among Females are below the Average, and those_ |
_among Males above it._ |
Warwick | 18 | 46 | 131 |
|
|
|
|
|
+----------------------------+--------------+--------------------------
| | | Annual No. of
|_Counties in which the_ | Rate of |Early Marriages in every
|_Increase of the Population_| Increase of | 1000 Marriages, from
|_is below_ |the Population| 1844-48.
+_the Average, and_ | from +-------------------------
|_the number of_ | 1841 to 1851 | Among | Among
|_Early Marriages is_ | per cent. | Males. | Females.
+_above it._ +--------------+------------+------------
|Cambridge | 13 | 73 | 227
|Worcester | 13 | 56 | 151
|York | 13 | 57 | 187
|Hunts | 9 | 99 | 336
|Nottingham | 9 | 60 | 158
|Derby | 9 | 46 | 138
|Essex | 7 | 57 | 204
|Hertford | 7 | 75 | 210
|Norfolk | 7 | 50 | 148
|Suffolk | 7 | 52 | 1623
|Northampton | 7 | 71 | 190
|Leicester | 7 | 79 | 179
|Berks | 5 | 148 | 143
|Bucks | 4 | 94 | 743
|Oxford | 4 | 46 | 151
|Wilts | 0·7 | 68 | 164
|
| _Counties in which the Increase of Population is above the_
| _Average, and the number of Early Marriages is below it._
|Middlesex | 20 | 18 | 85
|Surrey | 17 | 16 | 91
|Monmouth | 17 | 28 | 105
|South Wales | 14 | 30 | 82
|
| _Counties in which the Increase of the Population and the_
| _Early Marriages among Males are below the Average and_
| _those among Females above it._
|Lincoln | 12 | 39 | 153
|Sussex | 12 | 38 | 160
|
| _Counties in which the Increase of the Population and Early_
| _Marriages among Females is below the Average and those_
| _among Males above it._
|Somerset | 2 | 47 | 112
|Dorset | 6 | 47 | 125
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF EARLY MARRIAGES AMONGST MALES
IN EVERY 1000 MARRIAGES, IN EACH COUNTY OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number of
Improvident Marriages is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number of Improvident
Marriages is _below_ the Average.
The Average is taken for five years (as long as the returns will allow).
_The Average for all England and Wales is 43 in 1,000._]
TABLE SHOWING THE NUMBER OF EARLY MARRIAGES OF MALES AND FEMALES IN THE
SEVERAL COUNTIES FOR THE UNDERMENTIONED YEARS.
⁂ _The returns of the Registrar do not admit of the average being
calculated from a longer series of years._
------------------+---------+---------------------------------------------------------
| Annual | Number of Early Marriages.
| Average +--------------+-------------+-------------+-------------+
COUNTIES. |Number of| | | | |
|Marriages| 1844. | 1845. | 1846. | 1847. |
| from | | | | |
| 1844-48.|-----+--------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
| |Males| Females|Males|Females|Males|Females|Males|Females|
------------------+---------+-----+--------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
Bedford | 960 | 102 | 237 | 103 | 216 | 108 | 238 | 115 | 221 |
Berks | 1,322 | 52 | 186 | 61 | 182 | 62 | 201 | 74 | 204 |
Bucks | 974 | 66 | 181 | 66 | 175 | 87 | 196 | 76 | 179 |
Cambridge | 1,428 | 115 | 324 | 89 | 308 | 112 | 349 | 96 | 311 |
Chester | 2,764 | 153 | 393 | 175 | 427 | 154 | 455 | 132 | 372 |
Cornwall | 2,510 | 86 | 312 | 84 | 348 | 80 | 334 | 86 | 313 |
Cumberland | 1,060 | 31 | 88 | 54 | 145 | 28 | 133 | 23 | 94 |
Derby | 1,954 | 86 | 276 | 76 | 243 | 104 | 289 | 82 | 270 |
Devon | 4,574 | 84 | 324 | 95 | 352 | 104 | 367 | 97 | 401 |
Dorset | 1,209 | 62 | 155 | 64 | 161 | 46 | 130 | 57 | 166 |
Durham | 3,137 | 82 | 353 | 110 | 468 | 118 | 463 | 124 | 462 |
Essex | 2,154 | 125 | 454 | 133 | 436 | 116 | 415 | 123 | 411 |
Gloucester | 3,568 | 133 | 350 | 162 | 378 | 180 | 414 | 114 | 340 |
Hereford | 648 | 15 | 47 | 10 | 61 | 11 | 60 | 14 | 47 |
Hertford | 1,009 | 86 | 218 | 77 | 229 | 83 | 227 | 68 | 193 |
Hunts | 455 | 77 | 370 | 41 | 91 | 29 | 110 | 42 | 94 |
Kent | 4,339 | 98 | 584 | 112 | 614 | 128 | 659 | 108 | 567 |
Lancaster | 18,785 | 831 | 2310 |1040 | 2729 |1005 | 2784 | 773 | 2330 |
Leicester | 1,827 | 160 | 330 | 168 | 359 | 150 | 321 | 125 | 277 |
Lincoln | 2,862 | 112 | 393 | 115 | 430 | 82 | 453 | 110 | 417 |
Middlesex | 16,859 | 249 | 1262 | 360 | 1477 | 329 | 1606 | 322 | 1428 |
Monmouth | 1,395 | 28 | 119 | 38 | 149 | 43 | 147 | 44 | 157 |
Norfolk | 3,189 | 164 | 467 | 173 | 448 | 158 | 472 | 144 | 444 |
Northampton | 1,648 | 109 | 317 | 136 | 354 | 112 | 326 | 110 | 287 |
Northumberland | 2,161 | 68 | 219 | 79 | 283 | 98 | 310 | 97 | 255 |
Nottingham | 2,204 | 148 | 369 | 133 | 365 | 139 | 365 | 113 | 302 |
Oxford | 1,154 | 53 | 172 | 52 | 190 | 56 | 156 | 51 | 163 |
Rutland | 164 | 2 | 10 | 5 | 16 | 4 | 14 | 11 | 34 |
Salop | 1,596 | 36 | 144 | 32 | 118 | 62 | 165 | 52 | 151 |
Somerset | 3,159 | 144 | 375 | 159 | 328 | 166 | 385 | 116 | 319 |
Southampton | 3,085 | 77 | 370 | 81 | 414 | 100 | 370 | 67 | 304 |
Stafford | 4,807 | 215 | 634 | 278 | 818 | 285 | 835 | 391 | 1045 |
Suffolk | 2,453 | 115 | 367 | 133 | 401 | 139 | 420 | 123 | 394 |
Surrey | 5,550 | 84 | 485 | 90 | 523 | 108 | 532 | 86 | 536 |
Sussex | 2,231 | 83 | 320 | 98 | 355 | 95 | 411 | 72 | 345 |
Warwick | 3,650 | 130 | 383 | 158 | 437 | 175 | 482 | 176 | 502 |
Westmorland | 436 | 10 | 44 | 11 | 40 | 22 | 80 | 17 | 64 |
Wilts | 1,681 | 117 | 265 | 108 | 294 | 134 | 308 | 99 | 246 |
Worcester | 2,796 | 151 | 421 | 201 | 583 | 254 | 604 | 93 | 272 |
York | 14,399 | 828 | 2586 | 934 | 2868 | 841 | 2774 | 747 | 2649 |
North Wales | 2,643 | 75 | 200 | 75 | 186 | 65 | 224 | 67 | 207 |
South Wales | 4,337 | 113 | 280 | 118 | 377 | 141 | 417 | 129 | 345 |
+---------+-----+--------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
Total for England | | | | | | | | | |
& Wales |139,146 |5515 |17,410 |6287 |19,376 |6313 |20,001 |5566 |18,118 |
------------------+---------+-----+--------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
--------------+---------------+--------------+--------------+----------------+---------------
| | | | |Per Cent. above
+-------------+ Total | Average |Proportion to | Number of |and below the
| | for 5 years. | per year. |all Marriages,| early Marriages| Average.
| 1848. | | | 1 in every | to every 1000. |† denotes above
| | | | | |* „ below
+-----+-------+-------+-------+-----+--------+------+-------+------+---------+------+--------
|Males|Females| Males |Females|Males| Females| Males|Females| Males| Females | Males| Females
+-----+-------+-------+-------+-----+--------+------+-------+------+---------+------+--------
| 96 | 218 | 524 | 1,130 | 105 | 226 | 9·1 | 4·2 | 109 | 235 | †153 | †74
| 70 | 171 | 319 | 944 | 64 | 189 | 20·6 | 6·9 | 48 | 143 | †12 | †6
| 67 | 213 | 362 | 944 | 72 | 189 | 13·5 | 5·1 | 74 | 194 | †72 | †44
| 115 | 328 | 527 | 1,620 | 105 | 324 | 13·6 | 4·4 | 73 | 227 | †70 | †68
| 136 | 446 | 750 | 2,093 | 150 | 419 | 18·4 | 6·5 | 54 | 151 | †25 | †12
| 68 | 341 | 404 | 1,648 | 81 | 330 | 30·9 | 7·6 | 32 | 131 | *25 | *3
| 38 | 97 | 174 | 557 | 35 | 111 | 30·2 | 9·5 | 33 | 105 | *23 | *22
| 109 | 275 | 457 | 1,353 | 91 | 271 | 21·4 | 7·2 | 46 | 138 | †7 | †2
| 124 | 430 | 504 | 1,874 | 101 | 375 | 45·2 | 12·1 | 22 | 82 | *49 | *39
| 57 | 147 | 286 | 759 | 57 | 152 | 21·2 | 7·9 | 47 | 125 | †9 | *7
| 115 | 489 | 549 | 2,235 | 110 | 447 | 28·5 | 7·0 | 35 | 142 | *19 | †5
| 121 | 462 | 618 | 2,178 | 124 | 436 | 17·3 | 4·9 | 57 | 202 | †33 | †50
| 163 | 372 | 752 | 1,854 | 150 | 371 | 23·7 | 9·6 | 42 | 104 | *2 | *23
| 7 | 42 | 57 | 257 | 11 | 51 | 58·9 | 12·7 | 17 | 79 | *60 | *41
| 68 | 192 | 382 | 1,059 | 76 | 212 | 13·2 | 4·7 | 75 | 210 | †74 | †56
| 37 | 102 | 226 | 767 | 45 | 153 | 10·1 | 2·9 | 99 | 336 | †130 | †149
| 128 | 625 | 574 | 3,049 | 115 | 610 | 37·7 | 7·1 | 26 | 140 | *40 | †4
|1100 | 2864 | 4749 |13,017 | 950 | 2603 | 19·7 | 7·2 | 50 | 139 | †16 | †3
| 124 | 347 | 727 | 1,634 | 145 | 327 | 12·6 | 5·5 | 79 | 179 | †84 | †33
| 138 | 509 | 557 | 2,202 | 111 | 440 | 25·7 | 6·5 | 39 | 153 | *9 | †13
| 286 | 1437 | 1546 | 7,210 | 309 | 1442 | 54·5 | 11·6 | 18 | 85 | *58 | *37
| 44 | 165 | 197 | 737 | 39 | 147 | 35·7 | 9·4 | 28 | 105 | *35 | *22
| 164 | 504 | 803 | 2,335 | 161 | 467 | 19·8 | 6·8 | 50 | 146 | †16 | †81
| 119 | 281 | 586 | 1,565 | 117 | 313 | 14·0 | 5·2 | 71 | 190 | †65 | †41
| 77 | 278 | 419 | 1,345 | 84 | 269 | 24·5 | 8·0 | 39 | 124 | *9 | *81
| 130 | 341 | 663 | 1,742 | 133 | 348 | 16·5 | 6·3 | 60 | 158 | †40 | †17
| 57 | 196 | 269 | 877 | 54 | 175 | 21·3 | 6·5 | 46 | 151 | †7 | †12
| 6 | 33 | 28 | 107 | 6 | 21 | 27·3 | 7·8 | 36 | 128 | *16 | *5
| 55 | 177 | 237 | 755 | 47 | 151 | 33·9 | 10·5 | 29 | 95 | *33 | *30
| 159 | 371 | 744 | 1,778 | 149 | 356 | 21·2 | 8·8 | 47 | 112 | †9 | *17
| 70 | 367 | 395 | 1,825 | 79 | 365 | 39·0 | 8·4 | 25 | 118 | *42 | *13
| 319 | 907 | 1488 | 4,239 | 298 | 848 | 16·1 | 5·6 | 62 | 176 | †44 | †30
| 128 | 420 | 638 | 2,002 | 128 | 400 | 19·1 | 6·1 | 52 | 163 | †21 | †21
| 70 | 462 | 438 | 2,538 | 88 | 508 | 63·0 | 10·9 | 16 | 91 | *63 | *25
| 79 | 356 | 427 | 1,787 | 85 | 357 | 26·2 | 6·2 | 38 | 160 | *12 | †19
| 212 | 597 | 851 | 2,401 | 170 | 480 | 21·4 | 7·6 | 46 | 131 | †7 | *3
| 8 | 50 | 68 | 278 | 14 | 56 | 31·1 | 7·7 | 32 | 128 | *25 | *5
| 115 | 282 | 573 | 1,395 | 115 | 279 | 14·6 | 6·0 | 68 | 164 | †58 | †21
| 89 | 240 | 788 | 2,120 | 158 | 424 | 17·6 | 6·5 | 56 | 151 | †30 | †12
| 794 | 2619 | 4144 |13,496 | 829 | 2699 | 17·3 | 5·3 | 57 | 187 | †33 | †39
| 79 | 211 | 361 | 1,028 | 72 | 206 | 36·7 | 12·8 | 27 | 77 | *37 | *43
| 150 | 372 | 651 | 1,791 | 130 | 358 | 33·3 | 12·1 | 30 | 82 | *30 | *39
+-----+-------+-------+-------+-----+--------+------+-------+------+---------+------+--------
| | | | | | | | | | | |
|6091 |19,336 |29,772 |94,241 |5954 |18,848 | 23·3 | 7·3 | 43 | 135 | |
+-----+-------+-------+-------+-----+--------+------+-------+------+---------+------+--------
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THEIR EARLY MARRIAGES, AS SHOWN BY
THE NUMBER OF MARRIAGES, UNDER TWENTY-ONE YEARS OF AGE, IN EVERY 1000
MARRIAGES.
AMONGST MALES.
_Counties above_ | _Counties below_ |
_the Average._ | _the Average._ |
| |
Bedford 109 | Gloucester 42 |
Hunts 99 | Lincoln 39 |
Leicester 79 | Northumb. 39 |
Hertford 75 | Sussex 38 |
Bucks 74 | Rutland 36 |
Cambridge 73 | Durham 35 |
Northamp. 71 | Cumberland 33 |
Wilts 68 | Cornwall 32 |
Stafford 62 | Westmor. 32 |
Nottingham 60 | S. Wales 30 |
Essex 57 | Salop 29 |
York 57 | Monmouth 28 |
Worcester 56 | N. Wales 27 |
Chester 54 | Kent 26 |
Suffolk 52 | Southamp. 25 |
Lancaster 50 | Devon 22 |
Norfolk 50 | Middlesex 18 |
Berks 48 | Hereford 17 |
Dorset 47 | Surrey 16 |
Somerset 47 | -- |
Derby 46 | Average for |
Oxford 46 | England |
Warwick 46 | and Wales 43 |
AMONGST FEMALES.
_Counties above_ | _Counties below_ |
_the Average._ | _the Average._ |
Huntingdon 336 | Warwick 131 |
Bedford 235 | Cornwall 131 |
Cambridge 227 | Westmor. 128 |
Hertford 210 | Rutland 128 |
Essex 204 | Dorset 125 |
Bucks 194 | Northumb. 124 |
Northamp. 190 | Southamp. 118 |
York 187 | Somerset 112 |
Leicester 179 | Monmouth 105 |
Stafford 176 | Cumberland 105 |
Wilts 164 | Gloucester 104 |
Suffolk 162 | Shropshire 95 |
Sussex 160 | Surrey 91 |
Nottingham 158 | Middlesex 85 |
Lincoln 153 | Devon 82 |
Oxford 151 | S. Wales 82 |
Chester 151 | Hereford 79 |
Worcester 151 | N. Wales 77 |
Norfolk 148 | --- |
Berks 143 | Average for |
Durham 142 | England |
Kent 140 | and Wales 135 |
Lancaster 139 |
Derby 138 |
⁂ The rule is, that where the greatest number of males marry at
an early age, the greatest number of females do so likewise--the
exceptions being Dorset, Somerset, and Warwick, among the males, and
Sussex, Lincoln, Durham, and Kent among the females.
††† There are, on an average, rather more than 3 females married at an
early age to every male.
-----------------------------------------------------------
THE ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS AND EARLY MARRIAGES IN THE SEVERAL
(† denotes _plus_.) COUNTIES COMPARED. (* denotes _minus_.)
--------------------------+--------------------------------
|Percent. above & below the Aver.
|--------------------------------
_Counties in which the_ | In No. |In No. of Early
_Illegitimate Births_ | of | Marriages.
_and the Early_ | Illegitimate +-------+---------
_Marriages are both_ | Births. | Among | Among
_above the Average._ | |Males. |Females.
+--------------+-------+---------
Norfolk | †56 | † 16 | †81
Nottingham | †35 | † 40 | †17
Suffolk | †26 | † 21 | †17
Suffolk | †26 | † 21 | †17
Suffolk | †26 | † 21 | †21
Derby | †20 | † 7 | † 2
Chester | †32 | † 25 | †12
Leicester | †17 | † 84 | †33
Berks | †17 | † 12 | † 6
Lancaster | †14 | † 16 | † 3
Bedford | †14 | †153 | †74
Oxford | †13 | † 7 | †12
Hertford | † 7 | † 74 | †56
York | † 6 | † 33 | †39
Bucks | † 4 | † 72 | †44
Stafford | † 3 | † 44 | †30
Wilts | † 3 | † 58 | †21
_Counties in which the Illegitimate Children and Early_
_Marriages are both below the Average._
Middlesex | *40 | *58 | *37
Surrey | *34 | *63 | *25
Cornwall | *29 | *25 | * 3
Monmouth | *26 | *35 | *22
Devon | *25 | *49 | *39
Rutland | *16 | *16 | * 5
Southampton | *10 | *42 | *13
Gloucester | * 4 | * 2 | *23
_Counties in which the Illegitimate Children and Early_
_Marriages among Males are both below the Average,_
_and those among Females above it._
Kent | *19 | *40 | † 4
Durham | *10 | *19 | † 5
Lincoln | * 1 | * 9 | †13
_Exceptional County._
Sussex | † 1 | *12 | †19
_Counties in which the Illegitimate Births are above_
_the Average and the Early Marriages below it._
+--------------+-------+---------
Cumberland | †61 | *23 | *22
Hereford | †49 | *60 | *41
Salop | †47 | *33 | *30
Westmorland | †29 | *25 | * 5
North Wales | †16 | *37 | *43
Northumberland | † 8 | * 9 | *81
South Wales | † 7 | *30 | *39
⁂ In the majority of these counties some peculiar
form of courtship (as “night courtship” and “bundling”)
prevails.
_Counties in which the Illegitimate Children are below the_
_Average, and the Early Marriages above it._
Hunts | *28 | †130 | †149
Northampton | *10 | † 65 | † 41
Essex | *10 | † 33 | † 50
Worcester | * 1 | † 30 | † 12
Cambridge | * 1 | † 70 | † 68
_Counties in which the Illegitimate Children and the Early_
_Marriages among Females are both below the Average,_
_and those among Males above it._
Warwick | *16 | †7 | * 3
Somerset | * 6 | †9 | *17
Dorset | * 1 | †9 | * 7
⁂ The rule appears to be, that in those counties in which there are
the greatest number of Early Marriages, there are (_generally_) the
greatest number of Illegitimate Children, and _vice versâ_.
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF FEMALES TO EVERY 100 MALES IN
EACH OF THE COUNTIES OF ENGLAND & WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the proportion of
Females to Males is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the proportion of Females
to Males is _below_ the Average.
_The Average for all England and Wales is 105 Females to every 100
Males._]
TABLE SHOWING THE PROPORTION OF FEMALES TO MALES IN THE DIFFERENT
COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
----------------+-----------------------+----------+------------
| 1851. | | Proportion
| | | per Cent.
|-----------+-----------+ Number | above and
| | |of Females| below the
COUNTIES. | | | to every | Average.
| Male | Female |100 Males.| † denotes
|Population.|Population.| | above.
| | | | * below.
----------------+-----------+-----------+----------+------------
Bedford | 62,420 | 67,369 | 108 | †2·9
Berks | 99,227 | 99,927 | 101 | *3·8
Bucks | 70,784 | 72,886 | 103 | *1·9
Cambridge | 95,505 | 96,351 | 101 | *3·8
Chester | 206,715 | 216,723 | 105 |
Cornwall | 171,979 | 184,683 | 107 | †1·9
Cumberland | 96,106 | 99,381 | 103 | *1·9
Derby | 129,379 | 131,328 | 101 | *3·8
Devon | 271,579 | 300,628 | 111 | †5·7
Dorset | 85,816 | 91,781 | 107 | †1·9
Durham | 206,666 | 204,866 | 99 | *5·7
Essex | 172,161 | 171,755 | 100 | *4·8
Gloucester | 198,122 | 221,353 | 112 | †6·7
Hereford | 49,694 | 49,418 | 99 | *5·7
Hertford | 86,331 | 87,632 | 102 | *2·9
Hunts | 29,984 | 30,336 | 101 | *3·8
Kent | 308,115 | 311,092 | 101 | *3·8
Lancaster | 1,005,627 | 1,058,286 | 105 |
Leicester | 115,295 | 119,643 | 104 | *1·0
Lincoln | 201,027 | 199,239 | 99 | *5·7
Middlesex | 885,614 | 1,010,096 | 114 | †8·6
Monmouth | 92,095 | 85,070 | 92 | *12·4
Norfolk | 210,360 | 223,443 | 106 | †1·0
Northampton | 106,533 | 107,251 | 101 | *3·8
Northumberland | 149,158 | 154,377 | 103 | *1·9
Nottingham | 144,428 | 150,010 | 104 | *1·0
Oxford | 85,449 | 84,837 | 99 | *5·7
Rutland | 12,270 | 12,002 | 98 | *6·7
Salop | 122,022 | 122,997 | 101 | *3·8
Somerset | 216,716 | 239,521 | 111 | †5·7
Southampton | 199,834 | 202,199 | 101 | *3·8
Stafford | 320,394 | 310,112 | 97 | *7·6
Suffolk | 165,267 | 170,724 | 103 | *1·9
Surrey | 325,155 | 359,650 | 111 | †5·7
Sussex | 166,828 | 172,600 | 103 | *1·9
Warwick | 235,263 | 244,716 | 104 | *1·0
Westmorland | 29,064 | 29,316 | 101 | *3·8
Wilts | 113,839 | 122,164 | 103 | *1·9
Worcester | 126,739 | 132,023 | 104 | *1·0
York | 886,845 | 901,922 | 102 | *2·9
North Wales | 200,538 | 203,622 | 102 | *2·9
South Wales | 300,645 | 306,851 | 102 | *2·9
+-----------+-----------+----------+------------
TOTAL FOR | | | |
ENGLAND AND | 8,762,588 | 9,160,180 | 105 |
WALES | | | |
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THEIR PROPORTION OF FEMALE TO MALE
POPULATION, AS SHOWN BY THE NUMBER OF FEMALES TO EVERY 100 MALES.
COUNTIES ABOVE THE AVERAGE.
Middlesex 114
Gloucester 112
Devon 111
Somerset 111
Surrey 111
Bedford 108
Cornwall 107
Dorset 107
Norfolk 106
---
Average for England
& Wales 105
COUNTIES BELOW THE AVERAGE.
Chester 105
Lancaster 105
Leicester 104
Nottingham 104
Warwick 104
Worcester 104
Bucks 103
Cumberland 103
Northumb. 103
Suffolk 103
Sussex 103
Wilts 103
Hertford 102
York 102
North Wales 102
South Wales 102
Berks 101
Cambridge 101
Derby 101
Hunts 101
Kent 101
Northampton 101
Salop 101
Southampton 101
Westmorland 101
Essex 100
Durham 99
Hereford 99
Lincoln 99
Oxford 99
Rutland 98
Stafford 97
Monmouth 92
THE EXCESS OF FEMALES AND ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS COMPARED.
-------------------+---------------------+-------------------+---------------------
| Percentage | | Percentage
| above and below | | above and below
| the Average. | | the Average.
| † denotes above | | † denotes above
| and * below. |_Counties in_ | and * below.
_Counties in_ | |_which the_ |
_which the_ +--------+------------+_Number of Females_+--------+------------
_Number of Females_| In No. | In No. |_is above and of_ | In No. | In No.
_and Illegitimate_ | of | of |_the Illegitimate_ | of | of
_Births_ |Females |Illegitimate|_Births_ |Females |Illegitimate
_are both above_ | to | Births. |_is below_ | to | Births.
_the Average._ | Males. | |_the Average._ | Males. |
+--------+------------+ +--------+------------
Bedford | † 3 | †14 | Middlesex | † 8 | *40
Norfolk | † 1 | †56 | Gloucester | † 6 | * 4
| Devon | † 5 | *25
| Surrey | † 5 | *34
| Somerset | † 5 | * 6
| Cornwall | † 2 | *29
| Dorset | † 1 | * 1
|
_Counties in which the Number of_ |_Counties in which the Number of_
_Females and Illegitimate Births_ |_Females is below the Average and_
_are both below the Average._ |_the Illegitimate Births above it._
|
Monmouth | *12 | *26 | Stafford | * 7 | † 3
Rutland | * 6 | *16 | Oxford | * 5 | †13
Lincoln | * 5 | * 1 | Hereford | * 5 | †49
Durham | * 5 | *10 | Westmorland | * 3 | †29
Essex | * 4 | *10 | Salop | * 3 | †47
Hunts | * 3 | *28 | Derby | * 3 | †20
Northampton | * 3 | *10 | Berks | * 3 | †17
Kent | * 3 | *19 | York | * 2 | † 6
Cambridge | * 3 | * 1 | Hertford | * 2 | † 7
Southampton | * 3 | *10 | South Wales | * 2 | † 7
Warwick | * 1 | *16 | North Wales | * 2 | † 6
Worcester | * 1 | * 1 | Northumb. | * 1 | † 8
| Cumberland | * 1 | †61
| Wilts | * 1 | † 3
| Suffolk | * 1 | †26
| Bucks | * 1 | † 4
| Nottingham | * 1 | †35
| Leicester | * 1 | †17
| Sussex | * 1 | † 1
| Lancaster | .. | †14
| Chester | .. | †32
⁂ The rule appears to be, that in those counties in which
the number of females, in proportion to the males, is the _smallest_,
the number of illegitimate births is the _greatest_, and where
it is the _greatest_, the illegitimate births are the _smallest_.
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS COMMITTED FOR RAPE IN
EVERY 10,000,000 OF THE POPULATION, IN THE SEVERAL COUNTIES OF ENGLAND
AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number committed
for Rape is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number committed for
Rape is _below_ the Average.
The Average has been calculated for the ten years from 1841 to 1850.
_The Average for all England and Wales is 68 in every 10,000,000 People._
_Monmouth (the highest) 171 „ „ _
_Nottingham (the lowest) 28 „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES WITH REGARD TO RAPE.
----------------+----------+-----------------------------------------------------------+
| | |
| Average | Total Number Committed for Rape. |
COUNTIES. |Population+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
| from | | | | | | | | | | |
| 1841-50. |1841.|1842.|1843.|1844.|1845.|1846.|1847.|1848.|1849.|1850.|
----------------+----------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
Bedford | 121,083| 2 | 2 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Berks | 194,763| 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | .. | .. | .. | 3 | 1 | 2 |
Bucks | 140,959| 1 | 1 | 2 | 7 | 2 | .. | 2 | .. | 5 | 2 |
Cambridge | 180,747| 1 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
Chester | 395,919| 1 | 9 | 7 | 6 | .. | 7 | 1 | 11 | 2 | 6 |
Cornwall | 349,991| 7 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | .. | 5 | 2 | 2 |
Cumberland | 186,762| .. | .. | .. | 3 | .. | 2 | .. | .. | 2 | .. |
Derby | 250,249| .. | .. | 5 | 2 | .. | 2 | 1 | .. | 1 | 1 |
Devon | 554,738| 1 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 5 | 4 | 4 | .. | 5 |
Dorset | 172,736| .. | 1 | 3 | .. | 2 | .. | 1 | 1 | .. | 1 |
Durham | 368,787| 2 | 2 | 8 | 5 | 1 | 9 | 7 | 4 | 5 | 4 |
Essex | 332,363| 2 | 10 | 2 | 12 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 2 |
Gloucester | 407,504| .. | 1 | 2 | 7 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 7 |
Hereford | 97,813| .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | 1 | 2 | .. | 1 | .. |
Hertford | 168,178| .. | 6 | .. | 5 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 1 |
Hunts | 57,942| 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | 1 |
Kent | 585,249| 1 | 10 | 7 | 8 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
Lancaster | 1,881,261| 8 | 8 | 11 | 12 | 10 | 8 | 12 | 12 | 4 | 9 |
Leicester | 227,621| 1 | 3 | 2 | 2 | .. | 2 | 1 | .. | 4 | 1 |
Lincoln | 378,246| .. | 1 | 2 | 1 | .. | .. | 3 | 4 | .. | 2 |
Middlesex | 1,740,814| 9 | 13 | 11 | 8 | 12 | 12 | 15 | 15 | 11 | 9 |
Monmouth | 164,093| 3 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 4 | 6 | 1 | .. | 1 | 5 |
Norfolk | 419,463| 2 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 7 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 9 |
Northampton | 206,496| 3 | .. | 1 | 2 | 3 | .. | .. | 1 | 2 | 4 |
Northumberland | 284,777| 1 | .. | 6 | 3 | .. | 1 | 2 | .. | 3 | .. |
Nottingham | 282,584| .. | 1 | 2 | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Oxford | 166,751| 1 | .. | 2 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 |
Rutland | 23,711| .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Salop | 243,352| .. | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | .. | .. | 5 |
Somerset | 452,515| 2 | .. | 3 | 6 | .. | 4 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 3 |
Southampton | 377,040| 4 | 1 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 1 |
Stafford | 579,686| 6 | 4 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 17 | 13 |
Suffolk | 325,336| 1 | 3 | 2 | .. | 2 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2 |
Surrey | 635,917| .. | 1 | 6 | 1 | 7 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 4 |
Sussex | 320,944| 5 | 4 | 2 | .. | 3 | 2 | .. | .. | 1 | .. |
Warwick | 444,558| .. | 5 | 1 | 4 | .. | .. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 3 |
Westmorland | 57,494| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 4 | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Wilts | 241,887| 3 | 6 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
Worcester | 244,574| 1 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 8 | 1 | .. | 3 | 3 |
York | 1,686,461| 5 | 12 | 3 | 2 | 12 | 17 | 7 | 14 | 15 | 15 |
North Wales | 396,161| 3 | 2 | .. | .. | 2 | .. | 1 | 2 | .. | 2 |
South Wales | 568,430| .. | 3 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 2 |
+----------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
Total for |16,918,458| 78 |118 |127 |127 | 86 |139 | 97 |124 |121 |137 |
England | | | | | | | | | | | |
and Wales | | | | | | | | | | | |
+-------+---------+-------------+----------------
| | |No. committed| Proportion per
| Total | | annually for| Cent above and
+ for 10| Annual |Rape in every| below the Aver.
| years.| Average.| 10,000,000 |† denotes above.
| | | Persons. |* „ below.
+-------+---------+-------------+----------------
| 8 | ·8 | 66 | *2·9
| 12 | 1·2 | 62 | *8·8
| 22 | 2·2 | 156 | †129·4
| 10 | 1·0 | 55 | *19·1
| 50 | 5·0 | 126 | †85·3
| 24 | 2·4 | 68 |
| 7 | ·7 | 37 | *45·6
| 12 | 1·2 | 48 | *29·4
| 27 | 2·7 | 49 | *27·9
| 9 | ·9 | 52 | *23·5
| 47 | 4·7 | 127 | †86·8
| 42 | 4·2 | 126 | †85·3
| 28 | 2·8 | 69 | †1·5
| 5 | ·5 | 51 | *25·0
| 24 | 2·4 | 143 | †110·3
| 3 | ·3 | 52 | *23·5
| 35 | 3·5 | 60 | *11·8
| 94 | 9·4 | 50 | *26·5
| 16 | 1·6 | 70 | †2·9
| 13 | 1·3 | 34 | *50·0
| 115 | 11·5 | 66 | *2·9
| 29 | 2·9 | 177 | †145·6
| 39 | 3·9 | 93 | †36·8
| 15 | 1·5 | 73 | †7·4
| 16 | 1·6 | 56 | *17·6
| 8 | ·8 | 28 | *58·8
| 15 | 1·5 | 90 | †32·4
| 2 | ·2 | 84 | †23·5
| 15 | 1·5 | 62 | *8·8
| 26 | 2·6 | 57 | *16·2
| 29 | 2·9 | 77 | †13·2
| 81 | 8·1 | 140 | †105·9
| 20 | 2·0 | 61 | *10·3
| 35 | 3·5 | 55 | *19·1
| 17 | 1·7 | 53 | *22·1
| 19 | 1·9 | 43 | *36·8
| 4 | ·4 | 70 | †2·9
| 23 | 2·3 | 95 | †39·7
| 24 | 2·4 | 9 | †44·1
| 102 | 10·2 | 60 | *11·8
| 12 | 1·2 | 30 | *55·9
| 20 | 2·0 | 35 | *48·5
+-------+---------+-------------+----------------
|1154 | 115·4 | 68 |
| | | |
| | | |
⁂ The proportionate number of persons perpetrating this crime has been
calculated with reference to the _entire_ population, instead of the
_male part of it only_, as at the first glance might seem necessary,
males only being capable of committing the above offence. But it
was found, on examination, that the intensity of the criminality in
the several counties in this respect was influenced by the relative
number of females. Monmouth contains the greatest number of males
in proportion to females; so that, were the male population alone
considered, the criminality of that county in the above respect would
be considerably decreased. But the fact of there being more rapes in
Monmouth than elsewhere would appear to be owing to the very excess of
males over females in that county; the average, therefore, has been
calculated from the entire population.
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY WITH REGARD TO
RAPE, AS SHOWN BY THE NUMBER COMMITTED FOR THIS OFFENCE IN EVERY
10,000,000 OF THE POPULATION.
_Counties above the Average._
Monmouth 177
Bucks 156
Hertford 143
Stafford 140
Durham 127
Chester 126
Essex 126
Worcester 98
Wilts 95
Norfolk 93
Oxford 90
Rutland 84
Southamp. 77
Northamp. 73
Leicester 70
Westmor. 70
Gloucester 69
---
Average for
England
and Wales 68
_Counties below the Average._
Cornwall 68
Bedford 66
Middlesex 66
Berks 62
Salop 62
Suffolk 61
Kent 60
York 60
Somerset 57
Northumb. 56
Cambridge 55
Surrey 55
Sussex 53
Dorset 52
Hunts 52
Hereford 51
Lancaster 50
Devon 49
Derby 48
Warwick 43
Cumberland 37
S. Wales 35
Lincoln 34
N. Wales 30
Nottingham 28
THE CRIME OF RAPE COMPARED WITH THE NUMBER OF ILLEGITIMATE CHILDREN
IN EACH COUNTY.
---------------+---------------------+----------------+---------------------
| Percentage | | Percentage
| above and below | | above and below
| the Average. | | the Average.
| † denotes above. | | † denotes above.
_Counties in_ | * „ below. | _Counties in_ | * „ below.
_which the_ +--------+------------+ _which the_ |+--------+-----------
_Number of_ | In | In No. | _Number of_ | In | In No.
_Rapes and the_| Number | of | _Rapes is_ | Number | of
_Number of_ | of |Illegitimate| _above and the_| of |Illegitimate
_Illegitimate_ | Rapes. | Births. | _Number of_ | Rapes. | Births.
_Births are_ | | | _Illegitimate_ | |
_both above_ | | | _Births below_ | |
_the Average._ +--------+------------+_the Average._ +--------+------------
Bucks | †129·4 | † 4·4 | Monmouth | †145·6 | *26·8
Hertford | †110·3 | † 7·4 | Durham | † 86·8 | *10·4
Stafford | †105·9 | † 3·0 | Essex | † 85·3 | *10·4
Chester | † 85·3 | †32·8 | Worcester | † 44·1 | * 1·5
Wilts | † 39·7 | † 3·0 | Rutland | † 23·5 | *16·4
Norfolk | † 36·8 | †56·7 | Southampton | † 13·2 | *10·4
Oxford | † 32·4 | †13·4 | Northampton | † 7·4 | *10·4
Leicester | † 2·9 | †17·9 | Gloucester | † 1·5 | * 4·5
Westmorland | † 2·9 | †29·8 |
_Counties in which the Number of_ |_Counties in which the Number of_
_Rapes and the Number of_ |_Rapes is below and the Number_
_Illegitimate Births are both_ |_of Illegitimate Births above the_
_below the Average._ |_Average._
Lincoln | *50·0 | * 1·5 | Nottingham | *58·8 | †35·8
Warwick | *36·8 | *16·4 | North Wales | *55·9 | †16·4
Devon | *27·9 | *25·3 | South Wales | *48·5 | † 7·4
Hunts | *23·5 | *28·3 | Cumberland | *45·6 | †61·2
Dorset | *23·5 | * 1·5 | Derby | *29·4 | †20·9
Surrey | *19·1 | *34·3 | Lancaster | *26·5 | †14·9
Cambridge | *19·1 | * 1·5 | Hereford | *25·0 | †49·2
Somerset | *16·2 | * 6·0 | Sussex | *22·1 | † 1·5
Kent | *11·8 | *19·4 | Northumb. | *17·6 | † 8·9
Middlesex | * 2·9 | *40·3 | York | *11·8 | † 6·0
Cornwall | * | *29·8 | Suffolk | *10·3 | †26·8
| | | Salop | * 8·8 | †47·7
| | | Berks | * 8·8 | †17·9
| | | Bedford | * 2·9 | †14·9
⁂ The rule appears to be, that the crime of Rape is (in the majority
of cases) the _least_ where the number of Illegitimate Children is the
_greatest_.
THE CRIME OF RAPE COMPARED WITH THE RELATIVE
NUMBER OF FEMALES TO MALES IN EACH COUNTY.
----------------+---------------------+----------------+--------------------
| Percentage | | Percentage
| above and below | | above and below
| the Average. | | the Average.
| † denotes above. | | † denotes above.
_Counties in_ | * „ below. | _Counties in_ | * „ below.
_which the_ +--------+------------+ _which the_ |+--------+----------
_Number of_ | In | In No. | _Number of_ | In | In No.
_Rapes and_ | Number | of | _Rapes is_ | Number | of
_the Number_ | of | Females | _above and_ | of | Females
_of Females are_| Rapes. | to Males. | _the Number of_| Rapes. | to Males.
_both above_ | | | _Females below_| |
_the Average._ +--------+------------+ _the Average._ +--------|+----------
Norfolk | †36·8 | †1·0 | Monmouth | †145·6 | *12·4
Gloucester | † 1·5 | †6·7 | Bucks | †129·4 | * 1·9
_Counties in which the Number of_ | Hertford | †110·3 | * 2·9
_Rapes and the Number of Females_ | Stafford | †105·9 | * 7·6
_are both below the Average._ | Durham | † 86·8 | * 5·7
Nottingham | *58·8 | *1·0 | Chester | † 85·3 | *
North Wales | *55·9 | *2·9 | Essex | † 85·3 | * 4·8
Lincoln | *50·0 | *5·7 | Worcester | † 44·1 | * 1·0
South Wales | *48·5 | *2·9 | Wilts | † 39·7 | * 1·9
Cumberland | *45·6 | *1·9 | Oxford | † 32·4 | * 5·7
Warwick | *36·8 | *1·0 | Rutland | † 23·5 | * 6·7
Derby | *29·4 | *3·3 | Southampton | † 13·2 | * 3·8
Lancaster | *26·5 | * | Northampton | † 7·4 | * 3·8
Hereford | *25·0 | *5·7 | Leicester | † 2·9 | * 1·0
Hunts | *23·5 | *3·8 | Westmorland | † 2·9 | * 3·8
Sussex | *22·1 | *1·9 | _Counties in which the Number of_
Cambridge | *19·1 | *3·8 | _Rapes is below and the Number_
Northumb. | *17·6 | *1·9 | _of Females above the Average._
York | *11·8 | *2·9 | Devon | *27·9 | † 5·7
Kent | *11·8 | *3·8 | Dorset | *23·5 | † 1·9
Suffolk | *10·3 | *1·9 | Surrey | *19·1 | † 5·7
Salop | * 8·8 | *3·8 | Somerset | *16·2 | † 5·7
Berks | * 8·8 | *3·8 | Middlesex | * 2·9 | † 8·6
| | | Bedford | * 2·9 | † 2·9
| | | Cornwall | * | † 1·9
⁂ The rule appears to be, that the number of Rapes is the _greatest_ in
those counties where the number of Females is the _least_.
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS COMMITTED FOR CARNALLY
ABUSING GIRLS BETWEEN THE AGE OF TEN AND TWELVE YEARS IN EVERY
10,000,000 OF THE POPULATION, IN THE SEVERAL COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number committed
for this offence is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number committed for
the same offence is _below_ the Average.
The Average has been calculated for the ten years from 1841 to 1850.
_The Average for all England and Wales is 3 in every 10,000,000 People._
_Westmoreland (the highest) 17 „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES WITH REGARD TO CARNALLY ABUSING GIRLS BETWEEN THE AGE OF 10 AND
12 YEARS.
| Average |
|Population | Total number committed for carnally abusing girls
COUNTIES. | from | between the age of 10 and 12 years.
| 1841-50. +--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+
| | 1841. | 1842. | 1843. | 1844. | 1845. | 1846. | 1847. |
---------------+-----------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+
Bedford | 121,083 | | | | | | | |
Berks | 194,763 | | | 1 | | | | |
Bucks | 140,959 | | | | | | | 2 |
Cambridge | 180,747 | | | 1 | | | | |
Chester | 395,919 | | | | 2 | | 1 | |
Cornwall | 349,991 | | | | | 1 | | |
Cumberland | 186,762 | | | | | | | |
Derby | 250,249 | | | | | | | |
Devon | 554,738 | | | | | | | |
Dorset | 172,736 | | | | | | | |
Durham | 368,787 | | | | | | | |
Essex | 332,363 | | | | | | 1 | |
Gloucester | 407,504 | 1 | | | | | | |
Hereford | 97,813 | | | | | | | |
Hertford | 168,178 | | | | 1 | | | |
Hunts | 57,942 | | | | | | | |
Kent | 585,249 | | | 2 | 1 | 1 | | 1 |
Lancaster | 1,881,261 | | | | | | 1 | |
Leicester | 227,621 | | | | | | | |
Lincoln | 378,246 | | | | | | | |
Middlesex | 1,740,814 | | 1 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2 |
Monmouth | 164,093 | | | | | | | |
Norfolk | 419,463 | | | | | | | |
Northampton | 206,496 | | | | | | | |
Northumberland | 284,777 | | | | | | | |
Nottingham | 282,584 | | | | | | | |
Oxford | 166,751 | | | | | | | |
Rutland | 23,711 | | | | | | | |
Salop | 243,352 | | | | | | | |
Somerset | 452,515 | 1 | | | 1 | | | |
Southampton | 377,040 | | | | | | | |
Stafford | 579,686 | | | | | | | |
Suffolk | 325,336 | | | | | | | |
Surrey | 635,917 | | 1 | | | | | |
Sussex | 320,944 | | | | | | | |
Warwick | 444,558 | | | | | | | |
Westmorland | 57,494 | 1 | | | | | | |
Wilts | 241,887 | | | | 1 | | | |
Worcester | 244,574 | | | | 1 | | 1 | |
York | 1,686,461 | 1 | | 1 | | | | |
North Wales | 396,161 | | | | | | | |
South Wales | 568,430 | | | | | | | |
---------------+-----------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+
Total for |16,918,458 | 4 | 2 | 7 | 8 | 6 | 5 | 5 |
England |
and Wales |
---------------+-----------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+--------+
| | | | Proportion per
| Total | Annual | No. committed |Cent. above and
| for 10|Average.| annually in | below the Aver.
+--------+--------+--------+ years.| |every 10,000,000|† denotes above.
| 1848. | 1849. | 1850. | | | Persons. |* „ below.
+--------+--------+--------+-------+--------+----------------+------------------
| | | | | | | †100·0
| | | | 1 | ·1 | 5 | †66·7
| | | | 2 | ·2 | 14 | †366·7
| | | | 1 | ·1 | 6 | †100·0
| | | | 3 | ·3 | 8 | †166·7
| | | | 1 | ·1 | 3 |
| | | | | | | †100·0
| | | | | | | †100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | 1 | ·1 | 3 |
| | | 1 | 2 | ·2 | 5 | †66·7
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | 1 | ·1 | 6 | †100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| 3 | | | 8 | ·8 | 14 | †366·7
| 1 | 2 | | 4 | ·4 | 2 | *33·3
| | | 1 | 1 | ·1 | 4 | †33·3
| | 1 | | 1 | ·1 | 3 |
| 1 | 2 | | 14 | 1·4 | 8 | †166·7
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| 1 | | | 1 | ·1 | 5 | †66·7
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | 1 | | 3 | ·3 | 7 | †133·3
| | 1 | | 1 | ·1 | 3 |
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| 1 | 1 | | 3 | ·3 | 5 | †66·7
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | 1 | ·1 | 17 | †466·7
| | | | 1 | ·1 | 4 | †33·3
| 2 | | | 4 | ·4 | 16 | †433·3
| | | | 2 | ·2 | 1 | *66·7
| | | | | | | *100·0
| | | | | | | *100·0
+--------+--------+--------+-------+--------+----------------+------------------
| 9 | 8 | 2 | 56 | 5·6 | 3 |
+--------+--------+--------+-------+--------+----------------+------------------
⁂ The proportionate number of persons perpetrating the above crime has
been calculated with reference to the entire population, instead of
the male part of it only, as at the first glance might seem necessary,
males only being capable of committing the above offence. But it was
found, on examination, that the intensity of the criminality in the
several counties in this respect was influenced by the relative number
of females (see comparative table below); the average, therefore, has
been calculated from the entire population.
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY WITH REGARD TO
CARNALLY ABUSING GIRLS BETWEEN THE AGE OF 10 AND 12 YEARS, AS SHOWN
BY THE NUMBER COMMITTED FOR THIS OFFENCE IN EVERY 10,000,000 OF THE
POPULATION.
_Counties above the Average._
Westmor. 17
Worcester 16
Kent 14
Bucks 14
Middlesex 8
Chester 8
Somerset 7
Cambridge 6
Hertford 6
Surrey 5
Gloucester 5
Berks 5
Northamp. 5
Leicester 4
Wilts 4
--
Average for
England
and Wales 3
_Counties below the Average._
Cornwall 3
Essex 3
Lincoln 3
Southamp. 3
Lancaster 2
York 1
Bedford
Cumberland
Derby
Devon
Dorset
Durham
Hereford
Hunts
Monmouth
Norfolk
Northumb.
Nottingham
Oxford
Rutland
Salop
Stafford
Suffolk
Sussex
Warwick
N. Wales
S. Wales
THE CRIME OF RAPE COMPARED WITH THAT OF CARNALLY ABUSING
CHILDREN IN EACH COUNTY.
-----------------+----------------+----------------+----------------
| Percentage | | Percentage
|above and below | |above and below
| the Average. | | the Average.
_Counties in_ |† denotes above.|_Counties in_ |† denotes above.
_which the_ |* „ below. |_which the_ |* „ below.
_Number of_ +----------------+_Number of_ +----------------
_Rapes and the_ | In | In No. |_Rapes is above_| In | In No.
_Number of Cases_|Number |of Cases|_and the Number_|Number |of Cases
_of Carnal_ | of | of |_of Cases of_ | of | of
_Abuse are both_ |Rapes. | Carnal |_Carnal Abuse_ |Rapes. | Carnal
_above the_ | | Abuse. |_is below the_ | | Abuse.
_Average._ +-------+--------+_Average._ +-------+--------
| | | | |
Bucks | †129·4| †366·7 | Monmouth | †145·6| *100·0
Hertford | †110·3| †100·0 | Stafford | †105·9| *100·0
Chester | † 85·3| †166·7 | Durham | † 86·8| *100·0
Worcester | † 44·1| †433·3 | Essex | † 85·3| *
Wilts | † 39·7| † 33·3 | Norfolk | † 36·8| *100·0
Northampton | † 7·4| † 66·7 | Oxford | † 32·4| *100·0
Leicester | † 2·9| † 33·3 | Rutland | † 23·5| *100·0
Westmorland | † 2·9| †466·6 | Southampton | † 13·2| *
Gloucester | † 1·5| † 66·7 |
_Counties in which the No. of_ |_Counties in which the No. of_
_Rapes and the No. of Cases_ | _Rapes is below and the No. of_
_of Carnal Abuse are both below_| _Cases of Carnal Abuses above_
_the Aver._ | _the Aver._
Nottingham | *58·8 | *100·0 | Surrey | *19·1 | † 66·7
North Wales | *55·9 | *100·0 | Cambridge | *19·1 | †100·0
Lincoln | *50·0 | * | Somerset | *16·2 | †133·3
South Wales | *48·5 | *100·0 | Kent | *11·8 | †355·7
Cumberland | *45·6 | *100·0 | Berks | * 8·8 | † 66·7
Warwick | *36·8 | *100·0 | Middlesex | * 2·9 | †166·7
Derby | *29·4 | *100·0 |
Devon | *27·9 | *100·0 |
Lancaster | *26·5 | * 33·3 |
Hereford | *25·0 | *100·0 |⁂ The rule appears to be,
Hunts | *23·5 | *100·0 |that where the Number of
Dorset | *23·5 | *100·0 |Rapes is the _greatest_, the Number
Sussex | *22·1 | *100·0 |of Cases of Carnally Abusing
Northumb. | *17·6 | *100·0 |Children is (generally speaking)
York | *11·8 | * 66·7 |the greatest also; and _vice_
Suffolk | *10·3 | *100·0 |_versâ_, where the Rapes are the
Salop | * 8·8 | *100·0 |least, the carnal abuse of Children
Bedford | * 2·9 | *100·0 |is the _least_ likewise.
Cornwall | * | * |
THE CRIME OF CARNALLY ABUSING CHILDREN COMPARED WITH THE NUMBER OF
FEMALES TO MALES IN EACH COUNTY.
| Percentage | | Percentage
| above and below | | above and below
| the Average. | | the Average.
_Counties in_ | † denotes above. |_Counties in_ | † denotes above.
_which the Carnal_ | * „ below. |_which the Carnal_ | * „ below.
_Abuse of_ +-------------------+_Abuse of_ +-------------------
_Children and_ | In No. | In No. |_Children is_ | In No. | In No.
_the Number of_ |of Cases | of |_above, and the_ |of Cases | of
_Females to Males_ | of | Females |_Number of Females_| of | Females
_are both above_ | Carnal | to |_to Males below_ | Carnal | to
_the Average._ | Abuse. | Males. |_the Average._ | Abuse. | Males.
-------------------+---------+---------+-------------------+---------+---------
Middlesex | †166·7 | †8·6 |Westmorland | †466·6 | *3·8
Somerset | †133·3 | †5·7 |Worcester | †433·3 | *1·0
Gloucester | † 66·7 | †6·7 |Bucks | †366·7 | *1·9
Surrey | † 66·7 | †5·7 |Kent | †366·7 | *3·8
_Counties in which the Carnal_ |Cambridge | †100·0 | *3·8
_Abuse of Children and the No._ |Chester | †166·7 | *
_of Females to Males are both_ |Hertford | †100·0 | *2·9
_below the Average._ |Berks | † 66·7 | *3·8
South Wales | *100·0 | * 2·9 |Northampton | † 66·7 | *3·8
North Wales | *100·0 | * 2·9 |Leicester | † 33·3 | *1·0
Warwick | *100·0 | * 1·0 |Wilts | † 33·3 | *1·9
Sussex | *100·0 | * 1·9 |_Counties in which the Carnal_
Suffolk | *100·0 | * 1·9 |_Abuse of Children is below and_
Stafford | *100·0 | * 7·6 |_the No. of Females to Males_
Salop | *100·0 | * 3·8 |_above the Average._
Rutland | *100·0 | * 6·7 |Norfolk | *100·0 | †1·0
Oxford | *100·0 | * 5·7 |Dorset | *100·0 | †1·9
Nottingham | *100·0 | * 1·0 |Devon | *100·0 | †5·7
Northumb. | *100·0 | * 1·9 |Bedford | *100·0 | †2·9
Monmouth | *100·0 | *12·4 |Cornwall | * | †1·9
Hunts | *100·0 | * 3·8 |
Hereford | *100·0 | * 5·7 |
Durham | *100·0 | * 5·7 |
Derby | *100·0 | * 3·8 |
Cumberland | *100·0 | * 1·9 | ⁂ The rule appears to be,
York | * 66·7 | * 2·9 |that the crime of Carnally
Lancaster | * 33·3 | * |Abusing is (generally speaking)
Southampton | * | * 3·8 |the _greatest_ in those Counties
Lincoln | * | * 5·7 |where the number of Females is
Essex | * | * 4·8 |the _least_.
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS COMMITTED FOR KEEPING
DISORDERLY HOUSES IN EVERY 10,000,000 OF THE POPULATION, IN THE SEVERAL
COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number of persons
committed for keeping disorderly houses is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number of persons
committed for keeping disorderly houses is _below_ the Average.
The Average is calculated for 10 years.
The counties having no number affixed to them are those in which there
have been no committals for the above offence during the last 10 years.
_The Average for England and Wales is 79 in every 10,000,000 of the Population._
_ „ Middlesex (the highest) is 296 „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS COMMITTED FOR KEEPING DISORDERLY HOUSES
IN THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES FOR THE UNDERMENTIONED YEARS.
| | |
| Average | |
|Population| Number Committed for keeping Disorderly Houses. |
COUNTIES. | from +-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
| 1841-50. |1841.|1842.|1843.|1844.|1845.|1846.|1847.|1848.|1849.|1850.|
------------------+----------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
Bedford | 121,083 | | | | | | | | | | |
Berks | 194,763 | 4 | 4 | | 1 | | | | | | |
Bucks | 140,959 | | | | | | | | | | |
Cambridge | 180,747 | | | | | | 4 | | | | |
Chester | 395,919 | 4 | 12 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
Cornwall | 349,991 | 4 | 3 | 7 | 1 | 2 | 6 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 2 |
Cumberland | 186,762 | 7 | 1 | 1 | | | | 2 | | | |
Derby | 250,249 | | | | 2 | | | | | | |
Devon | 554,738 | 2 | 3 | 1 | | | | 4 | 4 | 1 | 1 |
Dorset | 172,736 | 3 | | | | | | | 1 | | 1 |
Durham | 368,787 | | 3 | | | | | 2 | | | 14 |
Essex | 332,363 | | 2 | | | | | | | | |
Gloucester | 407,504 | 5 | 9 | 1 | 5 | 2 | | 1 | | | |
Hereford | 97,813 | 3 | | 2 | 2 | | | 1 | 2 | | |
Hertford | 168,178 | | | | | 4 | | | | | |
Hunts | 57,942 | | | | 2 | | | | | 1 | 1 |
Kent | 585,249 | | 1 | | | | 2 | | | | |
Lancaster |1,881,261 | 85 | 55 | 45 | 27 | 24 | 16 | 14 | 32 | 42 | 4 |
Leicester | 227,621 | | | | | | 2 | | | 1 | |
Lincoln | 378,246 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 2 | | 7 | 1 | 7 | 3 | |
Middlesex |1,740,814 | 36 | 67 | 31 | 114 | 37 | 31 | 51 | 42 | 79 | 27 |
Monmouth | 164,093 | | | | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | | | |
Norfolk | 419,463 | | | | 2 | | | | | 1 | 1 |
Northampton | 206,496 | 8 | 5 | 2 | | | | | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Northumberland | 284,777 | | | | | | 1 | 1 | | | 13 |
Nottingham | 282,584 | | | | | | | | | | |
Oxford | 166,751 | | 1 | | | | 1 | | | | |
Rutland | 23,711 | | | | | | | | | | |
Salop | 243,352 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | | | | | | |
Somerset | 452,515 | 7 | | 1 | 5 | 2 | 1 | | | 1 | 1 |
Southampton | 377,040 | | | | 1 | 2 | | 1 | | | 8 |
Stafford | 579,686 | 1 | 2 | | | 2 | | 1 | 4 | 5 | 2 |
Suffolk | 325,336 | | | | | | | | | | 1 |
Surrey | 635,917 | | 1 | 15 | 3 | 2 | 3 | | | | |
Sussex | 320,944 | 2 | | 1 | | | | | | | |
Warwick | 444,558 | 2 | 6 | | 1 | | 2 | 4 | | | |
Westmorland | 57,494 | | | | | | | | 2 | | |
Wilts | 241,887 | | 1 | | | | 1 | | 1 | | 5 |
Worcester | 244,574 | 1 | 3 | 11 | | | 2 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
York |1,686,461 | 21 | 3 | 21 | 11 | 5 | 3 | 4 | 7 | 4 | 6 |
North Wales | 396,161 | | | | 1 | 1 | | | | | |
South Wales | 568,430 | | | | | | | | | | |
------------------+----------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
Total for England | | | | | | | | | | | |
and Wales |16,918,458| 198 | 186 | 145 | 187 | 86 | 84 | 99 | 190 | 148 | 93|
------------------+----------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
| | | No. committed | Proportion per
| | |annually in every| Cent above and
|Total | Annual | 10,000,000 | below the Aver.
+for 10|Average.| of the |† denotes above.
|Years.| | Population. |* „ below.
+------+--------+-----------------+----------------
| | | | *100·0
| | ·9 | 46 | *41·8
| 9 | | | *100·0
| 4 | ·4 | 22 | *72·2
| 33 | 3·3 | 83 | †5·1
| 38 | 3·8 | 109 | †38·0
| 11 | 1·1 | 59 | *25·3
| 2 | ·2 | 8 | *89·9
| 16 | 1·6 | 29 | *63·3
| 5 | ·5 | 29 | *63·3
| 19 | 1·9 | 52 | *34·2
| 2 | ·2 | 6 | *92·4
| 24 | 2·4 | 59 | *25·3
| 10 | 1·0 | 102 | †29·1
| 4 | ·4 | 24 | *69·6
| 4 | ·4 | 70 | *11·4
| 3 | ·3 | 5 | *93·7
| 344 | 34·4 | 183 | †131·6
| 3 | ·3 | 13 | *83·5
| 26 | 2·6 | 69 | *12·7
| 515 | 51·5 | 296 | †274·7
| 6 | ·6 | 37 | *53·2
| 4 | ·4 | 10 | *87·3
| 18 | 1·8 | 87 | †10·1
| 15 | 1·5 | 53 | *32·9
| | | | *100·0
| 2 | ·2 | 12 | *84·8
| | | | *100·0
| 5 | ·5 | 21 | *73·4
| 18 | 1·8 | 40 | *49·4
| 12 | 1·2 | 32 | *59·5
| 17 | 1·7 | 29 | *63·3
| 1 | ·1 | 3 | *96·2
| 24 | 2·4 | 38 | *51·9
| 3 | ·3 | 9 | *88·6
| 15 | 1·5 | 34 | *57·0
| 2 | ·2 | 35 | *55·7
| 8 | ·8 | 33 | *58·2
| 26 | 2·6 | 106 | †34·2
| 85 | 8·5 | 50 | *36·7
| 2 | ·2 | 5 | *93·7
| | | | *100·0
+------+--------+-----------------+-----------------
| | | |
| 1335 | 133·5 | 79 |
+------+--------+-----------------+-----------------
LIST OF COUNTIES IN THE ORDER OF THEIR BROTHELS, AS SHOWN BY THE
NUMBER OF PERSONS COMMITTED FOR KEEPING DISORDERLY HOUSES IN EVERY
10,000,000 OF THE POPULATION.
_Counties above the Average._
Middlesex 296
Lancaster 183
Cornwall 109
Worcester 106
Hereford 102
Northampton 87
Chester 83
---
Average for England
and Wales 79
_Counties below the Average._
Hunts 70
Lincoln 69
Gloucester 59
Cumberland 59
Northumberland 53
Durham 52
York 50
Berks 46
Somerset 40
Surrey 38
Monmouth 37
Westmorland 35
Warwick 34
Wilts 33
Southampton 32
Devon 29
Dorset 29
Stafford 29
Hertford 24
Cambridge 22
Salop 21
Leicester 13
Oxford 12
Norfolk 10
Sussex 9
Derby 8
Essex 6
Kent 5
North Wales 5
Suffolk 3
Bedford 0
Bucks 0
Nottingham 0
Rutland 0
South Wales 0
THE NUMBER OF DISORDERLY HOUSES COMPARED WITH THE NUMBER OF
ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS IN EACH COUNTY.
-------------------------------------------+-----------------------
| Percentage above
| and below the
| Average.
| † denotes above.
| * „ below.
+-----------------------
| In No. | In No.
_Counties in which the Number of_ | of | of
_Disorderly Houses and the Number of_ |Disorderly|Illegitimate
_Illegitimate Children are both above the_ | Houses. | Children.
_Average._ +----------+------------
| |
Lancaster | †131· | †14
Hereford | † 29· | †49
Chester | † 5· | †32
_Counties in which the Number of Disorderly Houses and the_
_Number of Illegitimate Children are both below the Average._
Rutland | *100· | *16
Kent | * 93· | *19
Essex | * 92· | *10
Cambridge | * 72· | * 1
Dorset | * 63· | * 1
Devon | * 63· | *25
Southampton | * 59· | *10
Warwick | * 57· | *16
Monmouth | * 53· | *26
Surrey | * 51· | *34
Somerset | * 49· | * 6
Durham | * 34· | *10
Gloucester | * 25· | * 4
Lincoln | * 12· | * 1
Hunts | * 11· | *28
⁂ The rule appears to be, that the number of Disorderly
Houses is the _least_ in those Counties where the number of
Illegitimate Births is the _greatest_, and, _vice versâ_, the _greatest_
where the Illegitimates are the _least_.
_Counties in which the Number of Disorderly_
_Houses is above and the Number_
_of Illegitimate Children below the_
_Average._
Lancaster | †131· | †14 |
Middlesex | †274· | *40 |
Cornwall | † 38· | *29 |
Worcester | † 34· | * 1 |
Northampton | † 10· | *10 |
_Counties in which the Number of Disorderly Houses is below_
_and the Number of Illegitimate Children above the Average._
South Wales | *100· | † 7 |
Nottingham | *100· | †35 |
Bucks | *100· | † 4 |
Bedford | *100· | †14 |
Suffolk | * 96· | †26 |
North Wales | * 93· | † 6 |
Derby | * 89· | †20 |
Sussex | * 88· | † 1 |
Norfolk | * 87· | †56 |
Oxford | * 84· | †13 |
Leicester | * 83· | †17 |
Salop | * 73· | †47 |
Hertford | * 69· | † 7 |
Stafford | * 63· | † 3 |
Wilts | * 58· | † 3 |
Westmorland | * 55· | †29 |
Berks | * 41· | †17 |
York | * 36· | † 6 |
Northumberland | * 32· | † 8 |
Cumberland | * 25· | †61 |
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF CASES OF CONCEALING THE BIRTHS
OF INFANTS IN EVERY 10,000 ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS, IN EACH COUNTY OF
ENGLAND & WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number of cases
is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number of cases is
_below_ the Average.
The Average is taken for the last ten years.
_The Average for all England and Wales is 17 in every 10,000 illegitimate births._
_„ „ Surrey (the highest) 39 „ „ _
_„ „ Huntingdon and Rutland (the lowest) 0 „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES WITH REGARD TO THE CONCEALMENT OF THE BIRTHS OF INFANTS.
| | |
| Average | |
|Yearly No. of| |
COUNTIES. | Illegitimate+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
| Births. |1841.|1842.|1843.|1844.|1845.|1846.|1847.|1848.|1849.|1850.|
------------------+-------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
Bedford | 336 | ... | ... | ... | 1 | ... | ... | ... | ... | 1 | ... |
Berks | 461 | ... | ... | ... | 2 | 2 | ... | ... | 1 | 3 | 2 |
Bucks | 315 | ... | ... | 1 | ... | ... | ... | 1 | ... | ... | 1 |
Cambridge | 423 | ... | ... | ... | 2 | 1 | ... | ... | 1 | 3 | ... |
Chester | 1128 | 3 | 2 | 2 | ... | ... | 1 | ... | 3 | ... | 5 |
Cornwall | 534 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | ... | ... | 4 | 1 |
Cumberland | 639 | ... | ... | ... | 1 | 1 | ... | 1 | 1 | ... | 1 |
Derby | 656 | ... | 2 | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | 1 | 1 | 4 |
Devon | 818 | 2 | 1 | 8 | ... | 2 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
Dorset | 342 | 1 | 1 | ... | ... | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Durham | 824 | ... | 1 | 2 | 7 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 2 | ... | ... |
Essex | 621 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 5 | 2 | 1 | ... | ... | 4 | 1 |
Gloucester | 788 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 4 | ... | 4 | 5 | ... | 3 | 2 |
Hereford | 274 | 1 | ... | ... | ... | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | ... | ... |
Hertford | 388 | 2 | ... | ... | ... | ... | 1 | 1 | ... | 1 | ... |
Hunts | 98 | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... |
Kent | 998 | 2 | ... | 2 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 5 | ... | 3 | 2 |
Lancaster | 5672 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 7 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 5 | 3 |
Leicester | 583 | 2 | 1 | 2 | ... | 1 | ... | ... | 2 | 2 | 1 |
Lincoln | 820 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 7 | 2 | 1 | ... | 2 | 1 | 4 |
Middlesex | 2200 | 2 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 5 | 8 | 7 | 5 | 6 | 4 |
Monmouth | 269 | 1 | ... | 2 | ... | 2 | ... | ... | ... | 3 | ... |
Norfolk | 1374 | ... | 2 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 3 | ... |
Northampton | 416 | ... | ... | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 1 | ... | ... | ... |
Northumberland | 685 | 1 | ... | ... | 2 | ... | ... | ... | 1 | 1 | ... |
Nottingham | 808 | ... | 1 | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | 1 | 2 |
Oxford | 396 | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | 1 | ... | ... | ... | ... |
Rutland | 40 | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... |
Salop | 640 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 2 | ... | 2 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2 |
Somerset | 847 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | ... | 3 | 1 | 2 |
Southampton | 703 | 1 | 1 | 5 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 4 | 2 | ... | 2 |
Stafford | 1341 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 6 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2 |
Suffolk | 895 | 3 | ... | 2 | 5 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
Surrey | 903 | 4 | 6 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 3 | 3 |
Sussex | 662 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 | ... |
Warwick | 831 | 1 | ... | 1 | 1 | 1 | ... | 1 | 4 | ... | 2 |
Westmorland | 156 | ... | ... | 1 | ... | ... | ... | ... | ... | 2 | 1 |
Wilts | 506 | ... | ... | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | ... |
Worcester | 679 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | ... | 3 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 |
York | 4155 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 10 | 5 | 7 | 5 |
North Wales | 847 | ... | ... | 2 | 2 | ... | 1 | ... | 1 | 2 | 1 |
South Wales | 1308 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | ... | 3 | 4 |
------------------+-------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
Total for England | | | | | | | | | | | |
and Wales | 37,410 | 51 | 49 | 66 | 87 | 53 | 78 | 65 | 60 | 75 | 66 |
------------------+-------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
| | | No. committed | Proportion per
| | |for concealments |Cent. above and
| Total| Annual | in every 10,000 |below the Aver.
+for 10|Average.| Illegitimate |† denotes above.
|Years.| | Births. |* „ below.
+---------------+-----------------+----------------
| 2 | ·2 | 6 | *64·7
| 10 | 1·0 | 22 | †29·5
| 3 | ·3 | 10 | *41·2
| 7 | ·7 | 17 | .....
| 16 | 1·6 | 54 | *17·6
| 16 | 1·6 | 30 | †76·9
| 5 | ·5 | 8 | *52·9
| 8 | ·8 | 12 | *29·4
| 23 | 2·3 | 28 | †64·8
| 10 | 1·0 | 29 | †70·6
| 19 | 1·9 | 23 | †35·3
| 16 | 1·6 | 26 | †53·0
| 22 | 2·2 | 28 | †64·8
| 7 | ·7 | 26 | †53·0
| 5 | ·5 | 13 | *23·5
| ... | ... | ... | *100·0
| 22 | 2·2 | 22 | †29·5
| 50 | 5·0 | 9 | *47·1
| 11 | 1·1 | 19 | †11·8
| 23 | 2·3 | 28 | †64·8
| 54 | 5·4 | 25 | †47·1
| 8 | ·8 | 30 | †76·9
| 21 | 2·1 | 15 | *11·8
| 9 | ·9 | 22 | †29·5
| 5 | ·5 | 7 | *58·8
| 4 | ·4 | 5 | *70·6
| 1 | ·1 | 3 | *82·4
| ... | ... | ... | *100·0
| 19 | 1·9 | 14 | *17·6
| 16 | 1·6 | 19 | †11·8
| 26 | 2·6 | 37 | †117·7
| 23 | 2·3 | 17 | .....
| 20 | 2·0 | 22 | †29·5
| 35 | 3·5 | 39 | †129·5
| 16 | 1·6 | 24 | †41·2
| 11 | 1·1 | 13 | *23·5
| 4 | ·4 | 26 | †53·0
| 9 | ·9 | 18 | †4·1
| 17 | 1·7 | 25 | †47·1
| 49 | 4·9 | 12 | *29·4
| 9 | ·9 | 11 | *35·3
| 19 | 1·9 | 15 | *11·8
+------+--------+-----------------+----------------
| | | |
| 650 | 65·0 | 17 |
+------+--------+-----------------+----------------
LIST OF COUNTIES, IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY WITH REGARD TO THE
CONCEALMENT OF THE BIRTHS OF INFANTS, AS SHOWN BY THE NUMBER COMMITTED
FOR THIS OFFENCE IN EVERY 10,000 ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS.
_Counties above the Average._
Surrey 39
Southampton 37
Cornwall 30
Monmouth 30
Dorset 29
Devon 28
Gloucester 28
Lincoln 28
Essex 26
Hereford 26
Westmorland 26
Middlesex 25
Worcester 25
Sussex 24
Durham 23
Berks 22
Kent 22
Northampton 22
Suffolk 22
Leicester 19
Somerset 19
Wilts 18
_Counties below the Average._
Cambridge 17
Stafford 17
Norfolk 15
South Wales 15
Chester 14
Salop 14
Hertford 13
Warwick 13
Derby 12
York 12
North Wales 11
Bucks 10
Lancaster 9
Cumberland 8
Northumberland 7
Bedford 6
Nottingham 5
Oxford 3
Hunts O
Rutland O
Average for England and Wales 17
THE ATTEMPTS AT CONCEALING THE BIRTHS OF INFANTS AND ILLEGITIMATE
BIRTHS COMPARED.
| Percentage above
| and below the
| Average.
| † denotes above.
| * „ below.
+------------------------
| In No. of | In No.
_Counties in which the Number of cases_ | Cases of | of
_of Concealing Births and Number of_ |Concealing |Illegitimate
_Illegitimate Births are both above the_ | Births. | Births.
_Average._ +-----------+------------
Hereford | †53·0 | †49·2
Westmorland | †53·0 | †29·8
Sussex | †41·2 | † 1·5
Berks | †29·5 | †17·9
Suffolk | †29·5 | †26·8
Leicester | †11·8 | †17·9
Wilts | † 4·1 | † 3·0
The Average for the whole of the | |
above Counties is | †29·4 | †131·4
(The Number of cases of Concealing Births is 22 in every
10,000 Illegitimate Births, and the Number of Illegitimate
Births 88 in every 1000 Births.)
_Counties in which the No. of cases of Concealing Births and
No. of Illegitimate Births are both below the Average._
Rutland | * ---- | * 1·5
Hunts | * 23·5 | *16·5
Warwick | *100·0 | *28·3
Cambridge | *100·0 | *16·4
The Average for the whole of the | |
above Counties is | * 23·5 | *13·4
(The Number of cases of Concealing Births is 13 in every
10,000 Illegitimate Births, and the Number of Illegitimate
Births 58 in every 1000 Births.)
| Percentage above
| and below the
| Average.
| † denotes above.
| * „ below.
+------------------------
| In No. |In No.
| of Cases |of
_Counties in which the Number of cases_ | of |Illegitimate
_of Concealing Births is above the_ | Concealing|Births.
_Average and the Number of Illegitimate_ | Births. |
_Births below it._ +-----------+------------
Surrey | †129·5 | *34·3
Southampton | †117·7 | *10·4
Cornwall | † 76·9 | *29·8
Monmouth | † 76·9 | *26·8
Dorset | † 70·6 | * 1·5
Devon | † 64·8 | *25·3
Gloucester | † 64·8 | * 4·5
Lincoln | † 64·8 | * 1·5
Essex | † 53·0 | *10·4
Middlesex | † 47·1 | *40·3
Worcester | † 47·1 | * 1·5
Durham | † 35·3 | *10·4
Kent | † 29·5 | *19·4
Northampton | † 29·5 | *10·4
Somerset | † 11·8 | * 6·0
The Average for the above Counties is | † 58·9 | *20·9
|
(The Number of cases of Concealing Births is 27 in every
10,000 Illegitimate Births, and the Number of Illegitimate
Births 53 in every 1000 Births.)
_Counties in which the No. of cases of Concealing Births is
below the Average and the No. of Illegitimate Births above it._
Oxford | *82·4 | †13·4
Nottingham | *70·6 | †35·8
Bedford | *64·7 | †14·9
Northumberland | *58·8 | † 8·9
Cumberland | *52·9 | †61·2
Lancaster | *47·1 | †14·9
Bucks | *29·5 | † 4·4
North Wales | *35·3 | †16·4
York | *29·4 | † 6·0
Derby | *29·4 | †20·9
Hertford | *23·5 | † 7·4
Salop | *17·6 | †47·7
Chester | *17·6 | †32·8
South Wales | *11·8 | † 7·4
Norfolk | *11·8 | †56·7
Stafford | *---- | † 3·0
The Average for the whole of the | |
above Counties is | *29·4 | †17·9
(The Number of cases of Concealing Births is 12 in every
10,000 Illegitimate Births, and the Number of Illegitimate
Births 79 in every 1000 Births.)
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PROVED CASES OF ATTEMPTING TO
PROCURE THE MISCARRIAGE OF WOMEN IN EVERY 10,000 ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS,
IN THE SEVERAL COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the cases are _above_
the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number of cases is
_below_ the Average.
The Average is calculated for ten years.
_The Average for England and Wales is 1 in every 10,000 illegitimate births._
_ „ „ Sussex (the highest) 6 „ „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES, WITH REGARD TO THE ATTEMPTS TO PROCURE THE MISCARRIAGE OF WOMEN.
| | Total number committed for attempting
| Average | to procure the miscarriage of women.
COUNTIES. |Yearly No. of+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
|Illegitimate | | | | | | |
| Births. | 1841. | 1842. | 1843. | 1844. | 1845. | 1846. |
-----------------+-------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
Bedford | 336 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Berks | 461 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 |
Bucks | 315 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Cambridge | 423 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Chester | 1128 | .. | 2 | 1 | .. | .. | .. |
Cornwall | 534 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Cumberland | 639 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Derby | 656 | .. | .. | 2 | .. | .. | .. |
Devon | 818 | .. | .. | .. | 3 | .. | .. |
Dorset | 342 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Durham | 824 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Essex | 621 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Gloucester | 788 | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Hereford | 274 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Hertford | 388 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Hunts | 98 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Kent | 998 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Lancaster | 5672 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Leicester | 583 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | 1 |
Lincoln | 820 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Middlesex | 2200 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. |
Monmouth | 269 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Norfolk | 1374 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 |
Northampton | 416 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Northumberland | 685 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. |
Nottingham | 808 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 |
Oxford | 396 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Rutland | 40 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Salop | 640 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Somerset | 847 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Southampton | 703 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Stafford | 1341 | 1 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Suffolk | 895 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Surrey | 903 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Sussex | 662 | .. | .. | 4 | .. | .. | .. |
Warwick | 831 | .. | 1 | 1 | 1 | .. | .. |
Westmorland | 156 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Wilts | 506 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Worcester | 679 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
York | 4155 | 2 | 1 | 2 | .. | 1 | .. |
North Wales | 847 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
South Wales | 1308 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
-----------------+-------------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+
Total for England| | | | | | | |
and Wales | 37,410 | 3 | 5 | 13 | 6 | 1 | 4 |
| | |No. committed| Proportion per
| Total | Annual | annually in | Cent. above and
+-------+-------+-------+-------+ for 10|Average.| every 10,000|below the Aver.
| | | | | Years.| | Illegitimate|† denotes above.
| 1847. | 1848. | 1849. | 1850. | | | Births. |* „ below.
+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+--------+-------------+----------------
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | ·1 | 2 | †100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 3 | ·3 | 3 | †200·0
| .. | 1 | .. | .. | 2 | ·2 | 4 | †300·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 2 | ·2 | 3 | †200·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 3 | ·3 | 4 | †300·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | ·1 | 1 | ....
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 1 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | ·1 | 3 | †200·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | 1 | .. | .. | 1 | ·1 | 0·2 | †80·0
| .. | .. | .. | 1 | 3 | ·3 | 5 | *400·0
| .. | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | ·1 | 1 | ....
| .. | .. | .. | 1 | 2 | ·2 | 0·9 | *10·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | ·1 | 0·7 | *30·0
| .. | .. | 1 | 1 | 2 | ·2 | 5 | †400·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | ·1 | 1 | ....
| .. | .. | 1 | 1 | 3 | ·3 | 4 | †300·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 2 | ·2 | 1 | ....
| .. | 1 | .. | .. | 1 | ·1 | 1 | ....
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 4 | ·4 | 6 | †500·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 3 | ·3 | 4 | †300·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | .. | 6 | ·6 | 1 | ....
| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 1 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | ·1 | 0·8 | *20·0
+-------+-------+-------+-------+-------+--------+-------------+----------------
| | | | | | | |
| 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 44 | 4·4 | 1 |
LIST OF COUNTIES, IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY WITH REGARD TO
ATTEMPTING TO PROCURE THE MISCARRIAGE OF WOMEN, AS SHOWN BY THE NUMBER
COMMITTED FOR THIS OFFENCE IN EVERY 10,000 ILLEGITIMATE BIRTHS.
_Counties above the Average._
Sussex 6
Leicester 5
Northampton 5
Devon 4
Nottingham 4
Warwick 4
Cornwall 4
Chester 3
Derby 3
Hertford 3
Berks 2
_Counties below the Average._
York 1
Stafford 1
Gloucester 1
Lincoln 1
Northumb. 1
Suffolk 1
Middlesex 0·9
S. Wales 0·8
Norfolk 0·7
Lancaster 0·2
Bedford 0
Bucks 0
Cambridge 0
Cumberland 0
Dorset 0
Durham 0
Essex 0
Hereford 0
Hunts 0
Kent 0
Monmouth 0
Oxford 0
Rutland 0
Salop 0
Somerset 0
Southamp. 0
Surrey 0
Westmor. 0
Wilts 0
Worcester 0
N. Wales 0
Average for England and Wales 1
THE CONCEALMENT OF THE BIRTHS OF INFANTS AND THE ATTEMPTS TO PROCURE
THE MISCARRIAGE OF WOMEN COMPARED.
| Percentage | | Percentage
| above and below | | above and below
| the Average. | | the Average.
| † denotes above. | | † denotes above.
_Counties in which_ | * „ below. |_Counties in which_ | * „ below.
_the Concealment_ +-----------+------------+_the Concealment_ +-----------+------------
_of Births_ | In No. of | In No. |_of Births is above_ | In No. of | In No.
_and attempts to_ |Concealment| of Attempts|_the Average,_ |Concealment| of Attempts
_procure Miscarriage_| of | at |_and the attempts to_| of | at
_are both_ | Births. |Miscarriage |_procure Miscarriage_| Births. |Miscarriage
_above the Average._ | | |_below it._ | |
+-----------+------------+ +-----------+------------
Cornwall | †76·9 | †300·0 |Surrey | †129·5 | *100·0
Devon | †64·8 | †300·0 |Southampton | †117·7 | *100·0
Sussex | †41·2 | †500·0 |Monmouth | † 76·9 | *100·0
Berks | †29·5 | †100·0 |Dorset | † 70·6 | *100·0
Northampton | †29·5 | †400·0 |Gloucester | † 64·8 | * ----
Leicester | †11·8 | †400·0 |Lincoln | † 64·8 | * ----
The Average for | | |Essex | † 53·0 | *100·0
the whole of | | |Hereford | † 53·0 | *100·0
the above | | |Westmorland | † 53·0 | *100·0
Counties is | †41·1 | †300·0 |Middlesex | † 47·1 | * 10·0
(The Number of cases of Concealing |Worcester | † 47·1 | *100·0
Births is 24, and of Attempts |Durham | † 35·3 | *100·0
at Miscarriage 4 in every |Kent | † 29·5 | *100·0
10,000 Illegitimate Births.) |Suffolk | † 29·5 | * ----
|Somerset | † 11·8 | *100·0
|Wilts | † 4·1 | *100·0
_Counties in which the Concealment_ |The Average for | |
_of Births and Attempts to procure_ | the whole of | |
_Miscarriage are both below the_ | the above | |
_Average._ | Counties is | † 53·0 | * 60·0
Rutland | *100·0 | *100·0 |(The Number of cases of Concealing
Hunts | *100·0 | *100·0 |Births is 26, and Attempts
Oxford | * 82·4 | *100·0 |at Miscarriage 0·4 in every 10,000
Bedford | * 64·7 | *100·0 |Illegitimate Births.)
Northumb. | * 58·8 | * ---- |
Cumberland | * 52·9 | *100·0 |
Lancaster | * 47·1 | * 80·0 |_Counties in which the Concealment_
Bucks | * 41·2 | *100·0 |_of Births is below the Average,_
North Wales | * 35·3 | *100·0 |_and the Attempts to procure Miscarriage_
York | * 29·4 | * ---- |_above it._
Salop | * 17·6 | *100·0 |Nottingham | * 70·6 | †300·0
South Wales | * 11·8 | * 20·0 |Derby | * 29·4 | †200·0
Norfolk | * 11·8 | * 30·0 |Warwick | * 23·5 | †300·0
Stafford | * ---- | * ---- |Hertford | * 23·5 | †200·0
Cambridge | * ---- | *100·0 |Chester | * 17·6 | †200·0
The Average for | | |The Average for | |
the whole of | | | the whole of | |
the above | | | the above | |
Counties is | * 29·4 | * 30·0 | Counties is | * 29·4 | †200·0
(The Number of cases of Concealing | (The Number of cases of Concealing
Births is 14, and Attempts |Births is 12, and Attempts
at Miscarriage 0·7 in every 10,000 |at Miscarriage 3 in every 10,000
Illegitimate Births.) |Illegitimate Births.)
THE ATTEMPTS TO PROCURE THE MISCARRIAGE OF WOMEN AND ILLEGITIMATE
BIRTHS COMPARED.
| Percentage
| above and below
| the Average.
_Counties in_ | † denotes above.
_which the Number_ | * „ below.
_of cases of Attempts_+---------------+---------------
_at Miscarriage_ | In No. | In No.
_and Number_ | of Attempts |of Illegitimate
_of Illegitimate_ |at Miscarriage | Births.
_Births are_ | |
_both above the_ | |
_Average._ +---------------+---------------
Sussex | †500·0 | † 1·5
Leicester | †400·0 | †17·9
Nottingham | †300·0 | †35·8
Chester | †200·0 | †32·8
Derby | †200·0 | †20·9
Hertford | †200·0 | † 7·4
Berks | †100·0 | †17·9
The Average for | |
the whole of | |
the above | |
Counties is | †300·0 | †20·9
(The number of cases of Attempts
at Miscarriage is 4 in
10,000 Illegitimate Births, and
Number of Illegitimate Births 81
in every 1000 Births.)
_Counties in which the cases of Attempts_
_at Miscarriage and Number_
_of Illegitimate Births are both_
_below the Average._
Cambridge | *100·0 | * 1·5
Dorset | *100·0 | * 1·5
Durham | *100·0 | *10·4
Essex | *100·0 | *10·4
Hunts | *100·0 | *28·3
Kent | *100·0 | *19·4
Monmouth | *100·0 | *26·8
Rutland | *100·0 | *16·4
Somerset | *100·0 | * 6·0
Southampton | *100·0 | *10·4
Surrey | *100·0 | *34·3
Worcester | *100·0 | * 1·5
Middlesex | * 10·0 | *40·3
Lincoln | * ---- | * 1·5
Gloucester | * ---- | * 4·5
The Average for | |
the whole of | |
the above | |
Counties is | * 60·0 | * 19·4
(The Number of cases of Attempts
at Miscarriage is ·4 in
every 10,000 Illegitimate Births,
and Number of Illegitimate Births
54 in every 1000 Births.)
| Percentage
| above and below
| the Average.
_Counties in_ | † denotes above.
_which the cases_ | * „ below.
_of Attempts at_ +---------------+---------------
_Miscarriage are_ | In No. | In No.
_above the Average_ | of Attempts |of Illegitimate
_and the_ |at Miscarriage | Births.
_Number of _ | |
_Illegitimate Births _| |
_below it._ +---------------+---------------
Northampton | †400·0 | *10·4
Devon | †300·0 | *25·3
Warwick | †300·0 | *16·4
Cornwall | †300·0 | *29·8
The Average for | |
the whole of | |
the above | |
Counties is | †300·0 | *20·9
(The Number of cases of Attempts
at Miscarriage is 4 in
every 10,000 Illegitimate Births,
and Number of Illegitimate Births
53 in every 1000 Births.)
_Counties in which the cases of Attempts_
_at Miscarriage are below_
_the Average and the Number of_
_Illegitimate Births above it._
Bedford | *100·0 | †14·9
Bucks | *100·0 | † 4·4
Cumberland | *100·0 | †61·2
Hereford | *100·0 | †49·2
Oxford | *100·0 | †13·4
Salop | *100·0 | †47·7
Westmorland | *100·0 | †29·8
Wilts | *100·0 | † 3·0
North Wales | *100·0 | †16·4
Lancaster | * 80·0 | †14·9
Norfolk | * 30·0 | †56·7
South Wales | * 20·0 | † 7·4
Suffolk | * ---- | †26·8
Northumb. | * ---- | † 8·9
Stafford | * ---- | † 3·0
York | * ---- | † 6·0
The Average for | |
the whole of | |
the above | |
Counties is | * 40·0 | †16·4
(The Number of cases of Attempts
at Miscarriage is ·6 in
every 10,000 Illegitimate Births,
and Number of Illegitimate Births
78 in every 1000 Births.)
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS COMMITTED FOR
ASSAULTS, WITH INTENT TO RAVISH AND CARNALLY ABUSE, IN EVERY 1,000,000
OF THE POPULATION, IN THE SEVERAL COUNTIES OF ENGLAND & WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number committed
for this offence is _above_ the Average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number committed for
the same offence is _below_ the Average.
The Average has been calculated for the ten years, from 1841 to 1850.
_The Average for all England and Wales is 83 in every 1,000,000 people._
_„ „ Worcester (the highest) 139 „ „ _
_„ „ South Wales (the lowest) 33 „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES, WITH REGARD TO ASSAULTS WITH INTENT TO RAVISH AND CARNALLY ABUSE.
| | Total Number Committed for Assaults, with |
| Average | intent to Ravish and Carnally Abuse. |
COUNTIES. |Population+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 1841-50. | | | | | | | | | | |
| |1841|1842|1843|1844|1845|1846|1847|1848|1849|1850|
-----------------+----------+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Bedford | 121,083| .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | .. |
Berks | 194,763| 1 | .. | 1 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Bucks | 140,959| .. | 1 | 4 | 4 | 1 | .. | 1 | 1 | 1 | .. |
Cambridge | 180,747| 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | .. | 2 | .. | 2 |
Chester | 395,919| 7 | 5 | 2 | 5 | 7 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 5 | 3 |
Cornwall | 349,991| 2 | 3 | 1 | 4 | .. | 2 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 2 |
Cumberland | 186,762| 1 | .. | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | .. | .. | 2 | 3 |
Derby | 250,249| 2 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | .. | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Devon | 554,738| 3 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 5 | 7 | 1 | 7 | 3 |
Dorset | 172,736| .. | .. | 2 | 3 | 3 | 4 | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Durham | 368,787| 1 | 3 | 7 | .. | 1 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 3 |
Essex | 332,363| 2 | 6 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 3 | 2 | .. |
Gloucester | 407,504| 6 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 1 | 6 | 3 | .. | 6 | 5 |
Hereford | 97,813| 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 2 | .. | 4 | .. | 1 |
Hertford | 168,178| .. | .. | 3 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | .. | 2 |
Hunts | 57,942| 1 | .. | 1 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Kent | 585,249| 3 | 8 | 8 | 9 | 7 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 1 | 11 |
Lancaster | 1,881,261| 13 | 19 | 21 | 21 | 26 | 15 | 15 | 15 | 11 | 6 |
Leicester | 227,621| 2 | 5 | 4 | .. | 4 | 3 | .. | .. | 1 | 4 |
Lincoln | 378,246| 2 | 6 | 2 | 6 | 3 | .. | 1 | 4 | 3 | 2 |
Middlesex | 1,740,814| 14 | 10 | 10 | 11 | 9 | 12 | 6 | 20 | 8 | 11 |
Monmouth | 164,093| 1 | 1 | 2 | 4 | .. | 2 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 1 |
Norfolk | 419,463| 3 | 3 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 1 | 3 | 5 |
Northampton | 206,496| .. | 1 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 1 |
Northumberland | 284,777| 1 | .. | 4 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 3 | .. | 1 | .. |
Nottingham | 282,584| 1 | 1 | .. | 3 | 1 | 2 | 2 | .. | .. | .. |
Oxford | 166,751| .. | 4 | .. | 2 | .. | 2 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 2 |
Rutland | 23,711| .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Salop | 243,352| 1 | 3 | 5 | .. | .. | .. | 2 | 3 | .. | .. |
Somerset | 452,515| 5 | 7 | 7 | 6 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 2 | 4 | 2 |
Southampton | 377,040| 2 | 3 | 7 | 7 | 2 | 7 | 1 | 7 | 3 | 1 |
Stafford | 579,686| 4 | 7 | 11 | 4 | 2 | 5 | 7 | 3 | 4 | 11 |
Suffolk | 325,336| 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | .. | 4 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
Surrey | 635,917| 2 | 5 | 2 | 10 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 2 |
Sussex | 320,944| .. | 7 | 1 | .. | 3 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 7 | 4 |
Warwick | 444,558| 5 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 3 | 5 | 3 | 8 |
Westmorland | 57,494| .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | 2 | 1 | .. |
Wilts | 241,887| 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | .. | 5 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 3 |
Worcester | 244,574| 3 | 3 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 1 |
York | 1,686,461| 16 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 12 | 19 | 16 | 6 | 8 | 14 |
North Wales | 396,161| 5 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 7 | 5 | 1 | 4 |
South Wales | 568,430| 1 | 1 | .. | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
-----------------+----------+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Total for England|16,918,458|118 |141 |158 |167 |123 |164 |131 |133 |112 |122 |
and Wales | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | No. | Percentage
|Total for| Annual |Committed |above and below
+10 Years.|Average.| Annually | the Average.
| | | in every |† denotes above.
| | |1,000,000.|* „ below.
+---------+--------+----------+----------------
| 6 | 0·6 | 50 | *39·3
| 13 | 1·3 | 67 | *19·2
| 13 | 1·3 | 92 | †10·8
| 14 | 1·4 | 77 | * 7·2
| 46 | 4·6 | 116 | †39·8
| 23 | 2·3 | 66 | *20·5
| 15 | 1·5 | 80 | * 3·6
| 12 | 1·2 | 48 | *42·2
| 35 | 3·5 | 63 | *24·7
| 13 | 1·3 | 75 | * 9·6
| 26 | 2·6 | 71 | *14·5
| 28 | 2·8 | 84 | † 1·2
| 37 | 3·7 | 91 | † 9·6
| 8 | 0·8 | 82 | * 1·2
| 13 | 1·3 | 78 | * 6·0
| 3 | 0·3 | 52 | *37·4
| 62 | 6·2 | 106 | †27·7
| 162 | 16·2 | 87 | † 4·8
| 23 | 2·3 | 101 | †21·7
| 29 | 2·9 | 80 | * 3·6
| 111 | 11·1 | 64 | *22·9
| 17 | 1·7 | 104 | †25·3
| 50 | 5·0 | 119 | †43·4
| 21 | 2·1 | 102 | †22·9
| 16 | 1·6 | 56 | *32·5
| 10 | 1·0 | 36 | *56·6
| 17 | 1·7 | 102 | †22·9
| 1 | 0·1 | 42 | *49·4
| 14 | 1·4 | 58 | *30·1
| 51 | 5·1 | 115 | †38·6
| 40 | 4·0 | 106 | †27·7
| 58 | 5·8 | 101 | †21·7
| 18 | 1·8 | 56 | *32·5
| 38 | 3·8 | 60 | *27·7
| 32 | 3·2 | 100 | †20·5
| 41 | 4·1 | 92 | †10·8
| 5 | 0·5 | 87 | † 4·8
| 28 | 2·8 | 116 | †39·8
| 34 | 3·4 | 139 | †67·5
| 136 | 13·6 | 81 | * 2·4
| 32 | 3·2 | 81 | * 2·4
| 18 | 1·8 | 33 | *60·2
+---------+--------+----------+----------------
| 1369 | 137·0 | 83 |
| | | |
LIST OF COUNTIES, IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY WITH REGARD TO
ASSAULTS WITH INTENT TO RAVISH AND CARNALLY ABUSE, AS SHOWN BY THE
NUMBER COMMITTED FOR THIS OFFENCE IN EVERY 1,000,000 OF THE POPULATION.
_Counties above the Average._
Worcester 139
Norfolk 119
Chester 116
Wilts 116
Somerset 115
Kent 106
Southampton 106
Monmouth 104
Northampton 102
Oxford 102
Stafford 101
Leicester 101
Sussex 100
Warwick 92
Bucks 92
Gloucester 91
Lancaster 87
Westmorland 87
Essex 84
_Counties below the Average._
Hereford 82
York 81
North Wales 81
Lincoln 80
Cumberland 80
Hertford 78
Cambridge 77
Dorset 75
Durham 71
Berks 67
Cornwall 66
Middlesex 64
Devon 63
Surrey 60
Salop 58
Suffolk 56
Northumberland 56
Hunts 52
Bedford 50
Derby 48
Rutland 42
Nottingham 36
South Wales 33
Average for England and Wales 83
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS COMMITTED FOR BIGAMY
IN EVERY 100,000 MARRIAGES, IN THE SEVERAL COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number committed
for this offence is _above_ the average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number committed for
the same offence is _below_ the average.
The average is calculated for the ten years, from 1841 to 1850.
_The average for all England and Wales is 59 in every 100,000 Marriages._
_ „ „ Chester (the highest) 259 „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES WITH REGARD TO BIGAMY.
| Average | Total Number committed for Bigamy. |
| Marriages | |
COUNTIES. |for 10 years,+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| from | | | | | | | | | | |
| 1830-48. |1841|1842|1843|1844|1845|1846|1847|1848|1849|1850|
-----------------+-------------+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Bedford | 925 | 1 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. |
Berks | 1,294 | 1 | 1 | 2 | .. | .. | .. | 2 | 1 | .. | .. |
Bucks | 960 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Cambridge | 1,392 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | 1 |
Chester | 2,580 | 4 | 7 | 11 | 6 | 2 | 2 | 12 | 6 | 9 | 8 |
Cornwall | 2,447 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Cumberland | 1,036 | 2 | .. | 1 | 3 | 2 | 2 | .. | 1 | 2 | .. |
Derby | 1,826 | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | 3 | .. | .. | .. | 2 |
Devon | 4,339 | 1 | .. | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 3 | .. |
Dorset | 1,174 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Durham | 2,885 | .. | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 2 |
Essex | 2,114 | 2 | .. | 1 | 2 | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Gloucester | 3,459 | 2 | 1 | 5 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | 3 | 2 | .. |
Hereford | 634 | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | 1 | .. | .. |
Hertford | 988 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Hunts | 452 | .. | .. | 2 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Kent | 4,047 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2 | .. | 1 | 1 |
Lancaster | 17,034 | 13 | 11 | 35 | 19 | 20 | 27 | 29 | 19 | 19 | 20 |
Leicester | 1,730 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Lincoln | 2,765 | .. | .. | 1 | 4 | .. | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 2 |
Middlesex | 15,795 | 8 | 8 | 10 | 9 | 16 | 9 | 12 | 10 | 9 | 11 |
Monmouth | 1,281 | .. | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | .. | .. | .. | 2 | 2 |
Norfolk | 3,021 | .. | 1 | 3 | 2 | .. | 1 | .. | 2 | 1 | 2 |
Northampton | 1,597 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Northumberland | 2,047 | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | 3 | 1 | 1 | .. | .. |
Nottingham | 2,084 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | 3 | 1 | .. | .. | .. |
Oxford | 1,158 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Rutland | 158 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Salop | 1,590 | 2 | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Somerset | 3,113 | 1 | 2 | 1 | .. | 1 | 1 | .. | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Southampton | 2,884 | .. | .. | 2 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | 2 |
Stafford | 4,146 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 4 |
Suffolk | 2,369 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. |
Surrey | 5,187 | 2 | 7 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 8 |
Sussex | 2,134 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | 1 | .. | 2 | .. | .. |
Warwick | 3,247 | 3 | 1 | 2 | .. | 1 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 1 |
Westmorland | 390 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Wilts | 1,618 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Worcester | 2,769 | .. | .. | 3 | .. | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 1 |
York | 13,332 | 3 | 6 | 6 | 8 | 4 | 9 | 7 | 14 | 9 | 13 |
North Wales | 2,582 | .. | 1 | 1 | .. | 2 | .. | .. | 2 | 1 | 1 |
South Wales | 4,076 | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | 1 | 2 | .. |
-----------------+-------------+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Total for England| 130,670 | 50 | 65 |107 | 69 | 62 | 82 | 84 | 88 | 83 | 82 |
and Wales | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | |No. committed| Percentage
|Total for| Annual | Annually |above and below
+10 Years.|Average.| in every | the Average.
| | | 100,000 |† denotes above.
| | | Marriages. |* „ below.
+---------+--------+-------------+----------------
| 3 | 0·3 | 32 | * 45·8
| 7 | 0·7 | 54 | * 8·5
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 3 | 0·3 | 22 | * 62·7
| 67 | 6·7 | 259 | †338·9
| 2 | 0·2 | 8 | * 86·4
| 13 | 1·3 | 125 | † 11·2
| 6 | 0·6 | 33 | * 44·1
| 14 | 1·4 | 32 | * 45·8
| 1 | 0·1 | 9 | * 4·8
| 28 | 2·8 | 97 | † 64·4
| 6 | 0·6 | 28 | * 52·5
| 14 | 1·4 | 40 | * 32·2
| 4 | 0·4 | 63 | † 6·8
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 2 | 0·2 | 44 | * 25·4
| 21 | 2·1 | 52 | * 11·9
| 212 | 21·2 | 124 | †110·2
| 1 | 0·1 | 6 | * 89·8
| 14 | 1·4 | 51 | * 13·6
| 102 | 10·2 | 65 | † 10·2
| 10 | 1·0 | 78 | † 32·2
| 12 | 1·2 | 39 | * 33·9
| 1 | 0·1 | 6 | * 89·8
| 7 | 0·7 | 34 | * 42·4
| 5 | 0·5 | 24 | * 59·3
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 5 | 0·5 | 31 | * 47·5
| 9 | 0·9 | 29 | * 50·9
| 5 | 0·5 | 17 | * 71·2
| 19 | 1·9 | 46 | * 22·0
| 2 | 0·2 | 8 | * 86·4
| 43 | 4·3 | 83 | † 40·7
| 4 | 0·4 | 19 | * 67·8
| 20 | 2·0 | 62 | † 5·1
| 2 | 0·2 | 51 | * 13·6
| 2 | 0·2 | 12 | * 79·7
| 12 | 1·2 | 43 | * 27·1
| 79 | 7·9 | 59 | * . ..
| 8 | 0·8 | 31 | * 47·5
| 7 | 0·7 | 17 | * 71·2
+---------+--------+-------------+----------------
| 772 | ·2 | 59 |
| | | |
LIST OF COUNTIES, IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY WITH REGARD TO
BIGAMY, AS SHOWN BY THE NUMBER COMMITTED FOR THIS OFFENCE IN EVERY
100,000 MARRIAGES.
_Counties above the Average._
Chester 259
Cumberland 125
Lancaster 124
Durham 97
Surrey 83
Monmouth 78
Middlesex 65
Hereford 63
Warwick 62
_Counties below the Average._
York 59
Berks 54
Kent 52
Lincoln 51
Westmorland 51
Stafford 46
Hunts 44
Worcester 43
Gloucester 40
Norfolk 39
Northumberland 34
Derby 33
Devon 32
Bedford 32
North Wales 31
Salop 31
Somerset 29
Essex 28
Nottingham 24
Cambridge 22
Sussex 19
South Wales 17
Southampton 17
Wilts 12
Dorset 9
Cornwall 8
Suffolk 8
Leicester 6
Northampton 6
Bucks 0
Hertford 0
Oxford 0
Rutland 0
Average for England and Wales 59
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS COMMITTED FOR
ABDUCTION IN EVERY 10,000,000 OF THE MALE POPULATION, IN THE SEVERAL
COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number committed
for this offence is _above_ the average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number committed for
the same offence is _below_ the average.
The average is calculated for the ten years, from 1841 to 1850.
_The Average for all England and Wales is 3 in every 10,000,000 of the Male Population._
_ „ „ Nottingham and Bucks (the highest) 14 each „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF THE DIFFERENT COUNTIES OF ENGLAND AND
WALES WITH REGARD TO ABDUCTION.
| | |
| Average | Total Number committed for Abduction. |
COUNTIES. | Male |_________________________________________________|
| Population| | | | | | | | | | |
| 1841-50. |1841|1842|1843|1844|1845|1846|1847|1848|1849|1850|
| | | | | | | | | | | |
__________________|___________|____|____|____|____|____|____|____|____|____|____|
| | | | | | | | | | | |
Bedford | 58,372 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Berks | 97,055 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Bucks | 69,226 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .1 | .. | .. | .. |
Cambridge | 89,762 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 |
Chester | 193,728 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Cornwall | 168,854 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Cumberland | 91,199 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Derby | 124,224 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Devon | 263,055 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Dorset | 82,998 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Durham | 183,956 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Essex | 166,255 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Gloucester | 192,960 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Hereford | 48,985 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Hertford | 83,264 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Hunts | 28,761 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Kent | 291,219 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 |
Lancaster | 917,922 | 1 | 6 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Leicester | 111,629 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Lincoln | 189,768 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Middlesex | 815,107 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Monmouth | 85,564 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Norfolk | 202,811 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Northampton | 102,853 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Northumberland | 139,028 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 |
Nottingham | 138,413 | 2 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Oxford | 83,290 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Rutland | 11,937 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Salop | 121,316 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Somerset | 216,177 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Southampton | 186,661 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Stafford | 294,120 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | 1 | .. | .. |
Suffolk | 159,561 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Surrey | 303,083 | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. |
Sussex | 157,915 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Surrey | 303,083 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Warwick | 217,569 | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 |
Westmorland | 28,680 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Wilts | 119,528 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
Worcester | 119,808 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
York | 835,816 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
North Wales | 196,064 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
South Wales | 279,818 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. |
__________________|___________|____|____|____|____|____|____|____|____|____|____|
| | | | | | | | | | | |
Total for England | 8,270,087 | 3 | 7 | .. | 4 | .. | 1 | 2 | 2 | .. | 4 |
and Wales | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | |No. |
| Total | |committed |
| for | |Annually | Percentage above
| 10 |Annual |in every | and below the Average.
| Years.|Average.|10,000,000| † denotes above.
| | |Males. | * „ below.
|_______|________|__________|_______________________
| | | |
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 1 | ·1 | 10 | †233·3
| 1 | ·1 | 14 | †366·7
| 1 | ·1 | 11 | †266·7
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 1 | .1 | 3 | *....
| 7 | ·7 | 8 | †166·7
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 2 | ·2 | 2 | *133·3
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 1 | ·1 | 7 | †133·3
| 2 | ·2 | 14 | †366·7
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 3 | ·3 | 10 | †233·3
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 2 | ·2 | 7 | †133·3
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| 2 | ·2 | 9 |†200·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
| .. | .. | .. | *100·0
|_______|________|__________|_______
| | | |
| 23 | 2·3 | 3 |
| | | |
LIST OF COUNTIES, IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY WITH REGARD TO
ABDUCTION, AS SHOWN BY THE NUMBER COMMITTED FOR THIS OFFENCE IN EVERY
10,000,000 OF THE MALE POPULATION.
_Counties above the Average._
Nottingham 14
Bucks 14
Cambridge 11
Stafford 10
Berks 10
Warwick 9
Lancaster 8
Northumberland 7
Surrey 7
_Counties below the Average._
Kent 3
Middlesex 2
Bedford 0
Chester 0
Cornwall 0
Cumberland 0
Derby 0
Devon 0
Dorset 0
Durham 0
Essex 0
Gloucester 0
Hereford 0
Hertford 0
Hunts 0
Leicester 0
Lincoln 0
Monmouth 0
Norfolk 0
Northampton 0
Oxford 0
Rutland 0
Salop 0
Somerset 0
Southampton 0
Suffolk 0
Sussex 0
Westmorland 0
Wilts 0
Worcester 0
York 0
North Wales 0
South Wales 0
Average for England and Wales 3
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING THE CRIMINALITY OF FEMALES IN EVERY 100,000
OF THE FEMALE POPULATION, IN EACH COUNTY OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
⁂ The counties printed _black_ are those in which the number of
Criminal Females is _above_ the average.
The counties left _white_ are those in which the number of Criminal
Females is _below_ the average.
The average is taken for the last 10 years.
_The Average for all England and Wales is 62 in every 100,000 of the Female Population._
_ „ „ Middlesex (the highest) 110 „ „ _
_ „ „ Derby (the lowest) 23 „ „ _
]
TABLE SHOWING THE RELATIVE AMOUNT OF FEMALE AND MALE CRIMINALITY IN THE SEVERAL COUNTIES OF
ENGLAND AND WALES.
† denotes above the average, * below it.
| Average | Number of Female Criminals in each year. |
COUNTIES. | Female | |
|Population,| |
| 1841-50. |----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| |1841|1842|1843|1844|1845|1846|1847|1848|1849|1850|
-----------------+-----------+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Bedford | 62,711 | 11| 36| 22| 20| 15| 20| 21| 22| 17| 19|
Berks | 97,708 | 45| 55| 43| 44| 42| 37| 55| 43| 52| 39|
Bucks | 71,732 | 20| 23| 31| 17| 25| 21| 22| 21| 27| 16|
Cambridge | 90,985 | 29| 28| 33| 42| 34| 20| 44| 32| 34| 44|
Chester | 202,190 | 195| 171| 170| 147| 139| 183| 197| 209| 169| 184|
Cornwall | 181,137 | 61| 67| 75| 56| 62| 67| 78| 68| 69| 46|
Cumberland | 95,563 | 39| 39| 38| 40| 37| 36| 37| 34| 36| 43|
Derby | 126,025 | 21| 26| 34| 33| 28| 47| 24| 25| 27| 25|
Devon | 291,683 | 171| 194| 177| 151| 184| 184| 206| 226| 224| 193|
Dorset | 89,738 | 46| 34| 42| 41| 33| 35| 51| 53| 61| 38|
Durham | 184,931 | 46| 57| 58| 65| 40| 55| 61| 72| 45| 82|
Essex | 166,108 | 82| 85| 99| 89| 75| 89| 65| 75| 64| 64|
Gloucester | 214,544 | 193| 221| 224| 198| 178| 190| 204| 188| 188| 148|
Hereford | 48,828 | 64| 49| 45| 38| 39| 34| 52| 52| 44| 45|
Hertford | 84,914 | 35| 34| 24| 27| 30| 21| 28| 30| 29| 23|
Hunts | 29,181 | 7| 8| 10| 15| 19| 14| 12| 18| 15| 10|
Kent | 294,029 | 161| 183| 147| 156| 151| 161| 171| 182| 200| 167|
Lancaster | 963,338 | 927| 947| 847| 689| 698| 826| 882| 902| 819| 950|
Leicester | 115,991 | 56| 69| 55| 56| 30| 61| 49| 37| 38| 41|
Lincoln | 188,477 | 74| 100| 86| 92| 71| 78| 106| 87| 91| 72|
Middlesex | 926,007 | 869| 989| 980| 948|1102|1118|1176|1223| 945| 882|
Monmouth | 78,528 | 63| 51| 53| 77| 41| 46| 67| 64| 78| 97|
Norfolk | 216,652 | 112| 127| 117| 127| 101| 120| 143| 78| 100| 89|
Northampton | 103,642 | 45| 38| 25| 34| 47| 41| 32| 38| 24| 38|
Northumb. | 145,749 | 54| 52| 66| 77| 46| 43| 50| 44| 64| 83|
Nottingham | 144,171 | 38| 49| 43| 51| 42| 45| 64| 33| 37| 34|
Oxford | 82,461 | 46| 48| 52| 37| 44| 43| 41| 35| 34| 31|
Rutland | 11,774 | 6| 4| 7| 3| 3| 4| 7| 10| 4| 2|
Salop | 122,035 | 80| 75| 89| 84| 73| 48| 62| 65| 61| 59|
Somerset | 236,337 | 172| 166| 136| 160| 143| 150| 141| 145| 159| 134|
Southampton | 190,379 | 102| 127| 124| 93| 115| 94| 137| 115| 120| 120|
Stafford | 285,566 | 179| 190| 197| 175| 161| 188| 221| 176| 189| 193|
Suffolk | 165,775 | 77| 80| 68| 92| 66| 77| 82| 57| 76| 74|
Surrey | 332,838 | 212| 236| 177| 194| 215| 200| 316| 278| 275| 237|
Sussex | 163,028 | 61| 81| 83| 69| 86| 93| 83| 92| 101| 83|
Warwick | 226,989 | 168| 157| 177| 119| 144| 163| 179| 199| 142| 162|
Westmorland | 28,814 | 9| 9| 10| 6| 7| 8| 4| 6| 9| 8|
Wilts | 122,359 | 65| 57| 65| 57| 52| 60| 86| 59| 78| 47|
Worcester | 124,766 | 75| 102| 104| 87| 121| 105| 128| 116| 112| 109|
York | 850,625 | 331| 380| 375| 323| 290| 294| 351| 344| 347| 321|
North Wales | 200,096 | 60| 56| 48| 45| 49| 47| 68| 65| 63| 62|
South Wales | 288,612 | 93| 79| 84| 117| 84| 91| 127| 145| 134| 151|
-----------------+-----------+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Total for England| 8,648,371 |5200|5569|5340|4993|4962|5257|5930|5763|5401|5265|
& Wales | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | |
| | | Average No. | No. of Female |
| Total Female | Average No. of | of Male | Criminals in |
+Criminals in Ten| Female Criminals|Criminals[96] | every 100,000 of |
| Years. |per year 1841-50.|per year 1841-50.|Female Population.|
+----------------+-----------------+-----------------+------------------+
| 203 | 20·3 | 166 | 32 |
| 455 | 45·5 | 268 | 47 |
| 223 | 22·3 | 266 | 31 |
| 340 | 34·0 | 232 | 37 |
| 1764 | 176·4 | 722 | 87 |
| 649 | 64·9 | 217 | 35 |
| 379 | 37·9 | 95 | 40 |
| 290 | 29·0 | 235 | 23 |
| 1910 | 191·0 | 596 | 31 |
| 434 | 43·4 | 210 | 48 |
| 581 | 58·1 | 232 | 31 |
| 787 | 78·7 | 559 | 48 |
| 1932 | 193·2 | 875 | 90 |
| 462 | 46·2 | 187 | 94 |
| 281 | 28·1 | 267 | 33 |
| 128 | 12·8 | 69 | 45 |
| 1679 | 167·9 | 792 | 57 |
| 8487 | 848·7 | 2635 | 88 |
| 492 | 49·2 | 342 | 42 |
| 857 | 85·7 | 398 | 46 |
| 10232 | 1023·2 | 3244 | 110 |
| 637 | 63·7 | 232 | 81 |
| 1114 | 111·4 | 607 | 51 |
| 362 | 36·2 | 259 | 35 |
| 579 | 57·9 | 177 | 40 |
| 436 | 43·6 | 289 | 31 |
| 411 | 41·1 | 256 | 50 |
| 50 | 5·0 | 28 | 42 |
| 696 | 69·6 | 293 | 57 |
| 1506 | 150·6 | 751 | 64 |
| 1147 | 114·7 | 555 | 60 |
| 1869 | 186·9 | 851 | 65 |
| 749 | 74·9 | 436 | 45 |
| 2340 | 234·0 | 806 | 70 |
| 832 | 83·2 | 409 | 52 |
| 1610 | 161·0 | 799 | 71 |
| 76 | 7·6 | 39 | 28 |
| 626 | 62·6 | 394 | 51 |
| 1059 | 105·9 | 506 | 85 |
| 3356 | 335·6 | 1587 | 40 |
| 563 | 56·3 | 233 | 28 |
| 1105 | 110·5 | 368 | 38 |
+----------------+-----------------+-----------------+------------------+
| 53680 | 5368·0 | 22474 | 62 |
| | | | |
|No. of Male Criminals| Percentage above|Percentage above|No. of Female |Percentage above
| in every | and below the | and below the | Criminals to | and below the
| 100,000 of Male |average of Female| Average of Male|every 100 Male| Average of Female
| Population. | Criminals. | Criminals. | Criminals. |to Male Criminals.
+---------------------+-----------------+----------------+--------------+------------------
| 284 | *48·4 | † 4·4 | 11 | *52·2
| 276 | *24·2 | † 1·5 | 17 | *26·1
| 384 | *50·0 | †41·2 | 8 | *65·2
| 258 | *40·3 | * 5·2 | 14 | *39·1
| 373 | †40·3 | †37·1 | 23 | * --
| 128 | *43·6 | *52·9 | 27 | †17·4
| 104 | *35·5 | *61·8 | 38 | †65·2
| 189 | *62·9 | *30·5 | 12 | *47·8
| 227 | *50·0 | *16·5 | 14 | *39·1
| 253 | *22·6 | * 7·0 | 19 | *17·4
| 126 | *50·0 | *53·7 | 25 | † 8·7
| 336 | *22·6 | †23·5 | 14 | *39·1
| 453 | †45·2 | †66·6 | 20 | *13·0
| 382 | †51·6 | †40·4 | 24 | † 4·4
| 321 | *46·8 | †18·0 | 10 | *56·5
| 240 | *27·4 | *11·8 | 19 | *17·4
| 272 | * 8·1 | * -- | 21 | * 8·7
| 287 | †41·9 | † 5·5 | 31 | †34·8
| 306 | *32·3 | †12·5 | 14 | *39·1
| 210 | *25·8 | *22·8 | 22 | * 4·4
| 398 | †77·4 | †46·3 | 28 | †21·7
| 271 | †30·6 | * O·4 | 30 | †30·4
| 299 | *17·7 | † 9·9 | 17 | *26·1
| 252 | *43·6 | * 7·4 | 14 | *39·1
| 127 | *35·5 | *53·3 | 31 | †34·8
| 209 | *50·0 | *23·2 | 15 | *34·8
| 307 | *19·4 | †12·9 | 16 | *30·4
| 235 | *32·3 | *13·6 | 18 | *21·7
| 242 | * 8·1 | *11·0 | 24 | † 4·4
| 347 | † 3·2 | †27·6 | 18 | *21·7
| 297 | * 3·2 | † 9·2 | 20 | *13·0
| 289 | † 4·8 | † 6·2 | 22 | * 4·4
| 273 | *27·4 | † O·4 | 16 | *30·4
| 266 | †12·9 | * 2·2 | 26 | †13·0
| 259 | *16·1 | * 4·8 | 20 | *13·0
| 367 | †14·5 | †34·9 | 19 | *17·4
| 136 | *54·9 | *50·0 | 21 | * 8·7
| 330 | *17·7 | †21·3 | 15 | *34·8
| 422 | †37·1 | †55·1 | 20 | *13·0
| 190 | *35·5 | *30·1 | 21 | * 8·7
| 119 | *54·9 | *56·3 | 13 | *43·5
| 132 | *38·7 | *51·5 | 29 | †26·1
+---------------------+-----------------+----------------+--------------+------------------
| 272 | | | 23 |
| | | | |
LIST OF COUNTIES, IN THE ORDER OF THEIR CRIMINALITY AMONGST FEMALES,
AS SHOWN BY THE NUMBER OF FEMALE CRIMINALS IN EVERY 100,000 OF THE
FEMALE POPULATION.
_Counties above the Average._
Middlesex 110
Hereford 94
Gloucester 90
Lancaster 88
Chester 87
Worcester 85
Monmouth 81
Warwick 71
Surrey 70
Stafford 65
Somerset 64
_Counties below the Average._
Southamp. 60
Kent 57
Salop 57
Sussex 52
Norfolk 51
Wilts 51
Oxford 50
Essex 48
Dorset 48
Berks 47
Lincoln 46
Suffolk 45
Hunts 45
Leicester 42
Rutland 42
York 40
Northumb. 40
Cumberland 40
S. Wales 38
Cambridge 37
Cornwall 35
Northamp. 35
Hertford 33
Bedford 32
Devon 31
Durham 31
Nottingham 31
Bucks 31
N. Wales 28
Westmor. 28
Derby 23
Average for England and Wales 62
FOOTNOTES
[1] _Meliora_, No. viii., p. 317.
[2] _The City, its Sins and its Sorrows_, p. 8.
[3] Any person wishing for further information respecting these
Societies, may obtain it from a work published by Messrs. Low and Son,
entitled “London Charities.”
[4] The following circumstance may be regarded as an illustration of
this assertion:--
A girl is reported to have applied for admission into one of the older
Institutions in London for the rescue of the fallen. On examination,
however, it was ascertained that she had _not fallen low enough_ to
merit the assistance she craved, and she was accordingly rejected
because her moral character was not sufficiently depraved. Here, at
least, the greater the sinner, the greater the compassion!
[5] The Homes are situated in Nutford Place, Edgware Road; Hatton
Garden, Holborn; Blackfriars Road; and Woodland Terrace, Greenwich. The
Society is very inadequately supported, and is greatly in need of funds
to maintain its efficiency.
[6] Any one desiring further information respecting this truly
admirable movement, will do well to procure a little pamphlet,
entitled, “A Brief Sketch of the Origin, Aim, and Mode of Conducting
the Young Women’s Christian Association, and West London Home for Young
Women engaged in Houses of Business, 49, Great Marlborough-street,
Regent-street, London; in a Letter to the Earl of Roden, President of
the Association.”
[7] “The Magdalen’s Friend and Female Homes’ Intelligencer, No. 12,
vol. ii.”
[8] Those who wish for further information respecting these
Institutions are referred to a handbook containing authentic accounts
of the various Metropolitan Reformatories, Refuges, and Industrial
Schools, published by the Reformatory and Refuge Union. A magazine,
edited by a clergyman, price 3_d._ monthly, designed to awaken and
sustain public sympathy on behalf of the fallen, and to draw attention
to the most prolific causes, contributing to the extension of the
social evil.
[9] “Magdalen’s Friend,” vol. ii. p. 131.
[10] Mr. Mill’s mistake in ranking the Employers and Distributors among
the Enrichers, or those who increase the exchangeable commodities of
the country, arose from a desire to place the dealers and capitalists
among the productive labourers, than which nothing could be more idle,
for surely they do not add, _directly_, one brass farthing, as the
saying is, to the national stock of wealth. A little reflection would
have shown that gentleman that the true function of employers and
dealers was that of the _indirect aiders_ of production rather than the
direct producers. The economical scale of production appears to be as
follows:--(1) The Employer, providing the materials, tools, and shelter
necessary for the due performance of the work, together with the food
for the subsistence of the artificer during the work. (2) The Labourer,
fitting or preparing the materials for the artificer. (3) The Artificer
or workman, positively doing the work and creating a new product. (4)
The Superlative Artizan, engaged in adding to the beauty or utility
of such product. (5) The Distributor or Dealer, engaged in carrying
and disposing of the product in the best market. The functions of Nos.
1 and 2 generally precede production, those of Nos. 4 and 5 usually
succeed it; while No. 3 is the absolute producer. The labours of No.
4, however, are so intimately associated with the produce--sometimes
designing the work, and sometimes “finishing” it--that it seems but
right that the superlative artizan should be ranked with the artificer;
the mere labourer, however, who turns the wheel for the turner, or
carries the bricks to the bricklayer and the like, cannot strictly be
ranked as a _producer_ any more than a porter or dock labourer.
[11] At one time, however, murder became a _trade_ in this country,
namely, when the dead bodies of human beings grew to be of such
value that the burking of the living was resorted to by the
“resurrectionists,” as a means of keeping up the supply.
[12] The word Shoful is derived from the Danish _skuffe_, to shove, to
deceive, cheat; the Saxon form of the same verb is _Scufan_, whence the
English _Shove_.
[13] A Charley Pitcher seems to be one who pitches to the _Ceorla_, or
countryman, and hence is equivalent to the term _Yokel_-hunter.
[14] The titles of the classes as here given do not form part of the
original table.
[15] Those marked thus [15] are of a non-migratory character.
[16] The marriage institution is mentioned early in Genesis vi. 1, 2,
“And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the
earth, and daughters were born unto them,
“That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and
they took them wives of all which they chose.”
[17] The passage here alluded to is as follows:--
“Then said Judah to Tamar his daughter in law, Remain a widow at
thy father’s house, till Shelah my son be grown: for he said, Lest
peradventure he die also, as his brethren did. And Tamar went and dwelt
in her father’s house.
“And in process of time the daughter of Shuah Judah’s wife died; and
Judah was comforted, and went up unto his sheepshearers to Timnath, he
and his friend Hirah the Adullamite.
“And it was told Tamar, saying, Behold thy father in law goeth up to
Timnath to shear his sheep.
“And she put her widow’s garments off from her, and covered her with a
vail, and wrapped herself, and sat in an open place, which is by the
way to Timnath; for she saw that Shelah was grown, and she was not
given unto him to wife.
“When Judah saw her, he thought her to be an harlot; because she had
covered her face.
“And he turned unto her by the way, and said, Go to, I pray thee, let
me come in unto thee; (for he knew not that she was his daughter in
law.) And she said, What wilt thou give me, that thou mayest come in
unto me?
“And he said, I will send thee a kid from the flock. And she said, Wilt
thou give me a pledge, till thou send it?
“And he said, What pledge shall I give thee? And she said, Thy signet,
and thy bracelets, and thy staff that is thine hand. And he gave it her
and came in unto her, and she conceived by him.
“And she arose, and went away, and laid by her vail from her, and put
on the garments of her widowhood.
“And Judah sent the kid by the hand of his friend the Adullamite, to
receive his pledge from the woman’s hand: but he found her not.
“Then he asked the men of that place, saying, Where is the harlot, that
was openly by the way side? And they said, There was no harlot in this
place.
“And he returned to Judah, and said, I cannot find her; and also the
men of the place said, that there was no harlot in this place.
“And Judah said, Let her take it to her, lest we be shamed: behold, I
sent this kid, and thou hast not found her.
“And it came to pass about three months after, that it was told Judah,
saying, Tamar thy daughter in law hath played the harlot; and also,
behold, she is with child by whoredom. And Judah said, Bring her forth,
and let her be burnt.
“When she was brought forth, she sent to her father in law, saying, By
the man, whose these are, am I with child: and she said, Discern, I
pray thee, whose are these, the signet, and bracelets, and staff.
“And Judah acknowledged them, and said, She hath been more righteous
than I; because that I gave her not to Shelah my son. And he knew her
again no more.”--Gen. xxxviii. 11-26.
[18] All this is based on the authority of the Bible. Elucidations also
have been afforded by “The Book of the Religion &c., of the Jews,” from
the Hebrew, by Gamaliel ben Peldahzur; “The Laws and Polity of the
Jews,” Sigonius, “Republica Hebræorum;” and the various commentators.
[19] Mary Magdalene, of Magdala, was not the sinner, the woman of
the city, who washed the feet of Jesus. She appears to have been a
reputable person, while the other had been a prostitute. What a lesson
is read to us by Christ’s behaviour to her!
[20] See Goguet, “Origine des Loix,” with Herodotus, Strabo, and
Quintus Curtius.
[21] Dr. Beloe also takes this view.
[22] Diodorus Siculus, i. 59. See also the Euterpe of Herodotus, and
Sir G. Wilkinson’s Ancient Egypt.
[23] Manners and Customs of Ancient Greece, by J. A. St. John.
[24] Manners and Customs of Ancient Greece, by J. A. St. John.
[25] Mackinnon’s History of Civilization.
[26] This view is chiefly drawn from information collected in Manners
and Customs of Ancient Greece, by J. A. St. John.
[27] Potter’s Antiquities of Greece.
[28] Ibid.
[29] Hase On the Ancient Greeks.
[30] Boeck’s Public Economy of Athens.
[31] Potter’s Antiquities of Greece.
[32] Hase On the Ancient Greeks.
[33] Boeck. Potter. Mitford’s notions of the Hetairæ appear to have
been somewhat fanciful.
[34] Occasional exceptions occurred. At one time there was no connubium
between the plebeian and the patrician; but the Lex Canuleia allowed it.
[35] The sacerdotal functionary, termed _flamen dialis_, like the
high-priest of the Jews, could only wed a virgin of unblemished honour,
and when she died, could not marry again, but was forced to resign his
office.
[36] See Julian Law, Ulpian, Gaius, Tacitus, Suetonius, and Dion
Cassius, from whom, with various others, Smith’s Dictionary is compiled.
[37] Dion. Halicar.; Apuleius; Festus; Lactarra Columna; Tertullian’s
Apolog.; Ambrose’s Hexam.; Lucian, De Syriâ Deâ.
[38] See Satire vi. 121-2.
[39] Taylor’s Elements of the Civil Law; Becker’s Private Life of
the Greeks and Romans; Suetonius, with Burmann’s Notes; the Codes of
Justinian and Constantine; Smith’s Dictionary of Antiquities; Adams’s
Antiquities; Fergusson’s Roman Republic; Niebuhr’s History; Gibbon’s
Decline and Fall, supply facts for the above; while the writings of
Horace, Juvenal, Lactantius, Dion Cassius, the Augustine History, and
numerous other authors, afford scattered notices, not easy to collect
or digest.
[40] To show that a prostitute class existed, among women without means
of support, we might mention instances of wills in which mothers left
property to their daughters, on condition that they should marry or
keep themselves chaste, and not earn money by prostitution.
[41] Consult Sharon Turner; the various old chroniclers; the Leges
Anglo-Saxonicæ, ed. Wilkins; Brand’s Popular Antiquities, &c.
[42] Napier’s Excursions in Southern Africa.
[43] Harriet Ward’s Five Years in Kaffir Land; Barrow’s Travels;
Methuen’s Life in the Wilderness.
[44] Cowries are valued at fifteen pence to the thousand.
[45] Bowdich’s Essay; Thompson and Allen’s Expedition to the Niger;
Laird’s Voyage.
[46] A letter, published in the _Times_ in August last, announces the
disastrous defeat of the celebrated body of fighting women in the pay
of the King of Dahomey. The Amazons had advanced to the attack of
Abbeokuta, a town in the Bight of Benin, with the object of surprising
and carrying off the inhabitants, to supply the demand for slaves; but
the latter, being apprised of the approach of the female warriors,
turned out in force, repulsed them from the town, and in the course of
pursuit effected great slaughter amongst their ranks. More than 1000
are reported to have been left dead on the field.
[47] Dahomey and the Dahomans, by J. E. Forbes; Dalzel’s History of
Dahomey; MʻLeod’s Account; John Duncan’s Travels; Adams’s Remarks on
the West Coast; Adams’s Sketches; Meredith’s Account of the Gold Coast.
[48] Dupuis’ Observations.
[49] Thompson and Allen’s Expedition up the Niger.
[50] Isaacs’ Travels on the East Coast; Captain Owen’s Voyage.
[51] Richardson’s Travels in the Sahara.
[52] Account of Africa, by Jameson, Wilson, and Hugh Murray.
[53] Count St. Marie’s Visit to Algeria.
[54] These views of Abyssinian society are afforded by Bruce, and
lately by Gogat, and have been contradicted by Mr. Salt. They are fully
corroborated, however, by the more recent and valuable authority of Sir
Cornwallis Harris.
[55] Ignatius Palme’s Travels in Kordofan.
[56] Expedition to Dongola and Sennaar.
[57] Werne’s Expedition up the White Nile.
[58] See Sturt’s Two Expeditions, and Sturt’s Expedition to Central
Australia; Westgarth’s Australia Felix; Leichardt’s Expeditions;
Hodgson’s Australian Settlements; Haydon’s Australia Felix; Stoke’s
Discoveries; Angas’ Savage Life and Scenes; Sir George Grey’s Journals;
Eyre’s Expedition; Pridden’s History; Earl, Mackenzie, Mitchell,
Howitt, Mudie, Macconochie, Oxley, Henderson, Cunningham, with the
other travellers and residents, almost innumerable, who have described
the aborigines of Australia.
[59] Tyrone Power’s Pen and Pencil Sketches; Angas’s Savage Life
and Scenes; Handbook of New Zealand, by a Magistrate of the Colony;
Dieffenbach’s Travels; Brown on the Aborigines; Jerningham Wakefield;
Earl’s Travels, &c., &c.
[60] Rovings in the Pacific, by a Merchant long Resident in Tahiti,
1851.
[61] See Stuart’s Voyage to the South Seas; Walpole’s Four Years in the
Pacific; Ellis’s Tour through Hawaii; Ellis’s Polynesian Researches;
Herman Melville’s Omoo and Typee; Progress of the Gospel in Polynesia;
Montgomery’s Narrative of Bennett and Tyerman’s Voyage; Williams’s
Missionary Enterprise; Mariner’s Tonga Islands; Wilkes’s United States
Exploring Expedition; Three Years in the Pacific, by Ruschenberger;
Rovings in the Pacific, by a Merchant; Sir George Simpson’s Voyage
round the World; Coulter’s Travels in South America; and Coulter’s
Voyage in the Pacific.
[62] See Bancroft’s History of the United States; Catlin’s Eight Years’
Travels; Carver’s Travels in North America; Wilkes’s United States’
Exploring Expedition; Mackenzie’s Memoirs, Official and Personal;
West’s Residence in the Red River Colony; West’s Mission to the Indians
of New Brunswick; Hunter’s Memoirs of his Captivity; Drake’s Book
of the Indians; Halkett’s Historical Notes; Buchanan’s Sketches of
History; Sir James Alexander’s Acadie; Maclean’s Twenty-Five Years’
Service in Hudson’s Bay; Sir George Simpson’s Voyage round the World;
Robertson’s History of America; Robertson’s History of Missions to the
Indians; Cleveland’s Voyages and Enterprises.
[63] Short and general as this sketch is, the facts it contains, or
is based upon, are drawn from Dunlop’s Travels in Central America;
Captain Basil Hall’s Journal; King’s Twenty-Four Years in the Argentine
Republic; Robertson’s Letters on Paraguay; Robertson’s Letters on South
America; Stephenson’s Incident of Travel in Central America; Norman’s
Rambles in Yucatan; Waterton’s Wanderings in South America; Southey’s
History of Brazil; Young’s Residence on the Mosquito Shore; Gardiner’s
Travels in Brazil; Hawkshaw’s Reminiscences; Stephenson’s Historical
and Descriptive Narrative; Humboldt’s Personal Narrative; Prince
Adalbert’s Travels; Macgregor’s Progress of America.
[64] Macgregor’s Progress of America; Kidder’s Residence in Brazil;
Walpole’s Four Years in the Pacific; Ruschenberger’s Three Years in
the Pacific; Rovings in the Pacific, by a Merchant; Mayer’s Mexico as
it is; Matheson’s Travels in Brazil; Wilkes’s Exploring Expedition;
Caldcleugh’s Travels in South America; Robertson’s Letters on South
America.
[65] Capadose’s Sixteen Years in the West Indies; Antigua and the
Antiguans; Breen’s Historical Account of St. Lucia; Gurney’s Winter in
the West Indies; Bidwell’s West Indies as they Are; Stewart’s State of
Jamaica; Lloyd’s Letters from the West Indies; Bayley’s Four Years’
Residence; Southey’s History of the West Indies; Washington Irving’s
Life and Voyages of Columbus; Baird’s Impressions of the West Indies,
&c.
[66] Raffles’s History of Java; Crawfurd’s Indian Archipelago;
Stavorinus’s Voyages; Earl’s Eastern Seas, &c.
[67] Marsden’s Sumatra; Anderson’s Mission to the East Coast;
Crawfurd’s Indian Archipelago; Journal of the Indian Archipelago.
[68] Brooke, Keppel, Mundy, Belcher, Low, &c.
[69] Brooke’s Journals; Mundy; Keppel’s Voyage of the Dido; Crawford’s
Archipelago.
[70] Malcolm’s History of Persia; Javler’s Three Years in Persia;
Kotzebue’s Embassy to Persia; Brydges’ Narrative of the Embassy;
Morier’s Second Journey in Persia; Ker Porter’s Travels; Stocqueler’s
Pilgrimage.
[71] See Elphinstone’s Kabul; Vignes’ Visit to Ghuzni; Burnes’ Kabul.
[72] Vigne’s Travels in Kashmir; Hugel’s Travels in Kashmir;
Moorcroft’s Travels in the Himalayan Provinces; Forster’s Travels from
Bengal to England; Hamilton’s East India Gazetteer; Bernier’s Travels
in the Empire of the Mogul.
[73] Hamilton’s East India Gazetteer; Buchanan’s Journey in the Mysore,
&c.; Bishop Heber’s Journal; Hamilton’s Description of Hindustan;
British Friend of India Magazine; Asiatic Researches; Hugh Murray’s
Account of India; Conformité des Coutumes des Indes Orienteaux avec
celles des Juifs; Tod’s Travels in Western India; Tod’s Annals of
Rajasthan; Launcelot Wilkinson’s Second Marriage of Widows in India;
Papers presented to Parliament in 1803, on Infanticide; Grant’s
Observations on Society and Morals among our Asiatic Subjects;
Davidson’s Travels in Upper India; Mayne’s Continental India;
Campbell’s British India; Hough’s Christianity in India; Abbé Dubois’
Letters on the Hindus; Malcolm’s Memoir on Central India; Bevan’s
Thirty Years in India; Crawfurd’s Researches concerning India;
Hoffmeister’s Travels in India; Ward’s Account of the Hindus; Mill’s
History of British India, Notes by Wilson; Ferishta’s Mohammedan
History; Thornton’s History; Penhoen’s Empire Anglais; Xavier; Raymond;
Jaseigny; L’Inde.
[74] Sirr’s Ceylon and the Singhalese; Pridham’s History of Ceylon;
Forbes’s Eleven Years in Ceylon; Davy’s Interior of Ceylon; Campbell’s
Excursions in Ceylon; Knox’s Captivity in Ceylon; Knighton’s History of
Ceylon; Tennent’s Christianity in Ceylon.
[75] Staunton, Tee Tsing Leu Lee, Code of Criminal Law; Davis, the
Chinese; Guttzlaff’s China Opened; Fortune’s Wanderings in the North
of China; Smith’s Visits to the Consular Cities of China; Montgomery
Martin’s China; Forbes’s Five Years in China; Williams’s Survey of the
Chinese Empire; Tradescant Lay’s Chinese as they Are; Morrison’s View
of China; Meadow’s Desultory Notes on China; The Chinese Repository;
Hugh Murray’s Description of China; Thornton’s History of China;
Abeel’s Residence in China; Cunynghame’s Recollections of Service;
Abel’s Embassy to China; Medhurst’s State of China; Auguste Harpman,
Revue des Deux Mondes; Langdon’s China; De Guignes, Voyage à Peking.
[76] Craufurd’s Embassy to Siam; Craufurd’s Embassy to Avar; Tomkin’s
Journals and Letters; Finlayson’s Mission; White’s Journey; Latham’s
Natural History of the Varieties of Man.
[77] Lane’s Modern Egyptians; Poole’s Englishwoman in Egypt; Yates’s
Egypt; St. John’s Egypt and Mohammed Ali; St. John’s Egypt and Nubia;
St. John’s Oriental Album; Cadalvene and Breuvery, l’Égypte; Mugin’s
Histoire de l’Égypte; Burckhardt’s Arabic Proverbs; Expédition
Française à l’Égypte; Niebuhr’s Travels in Egypt, &c.; Thackeray’s
From Cornhill to Cairo; Warburton’s Crescent and the Cross; Bayle St.
John’s Levantine Family; Henniker’s Travels; Minutoli’s Recollections
of Egypt; Boaz’s Modern Egypt; Clot Bey’s Aperçu Général sur l’Égypte;
Pueckler Muskau’s Egypt and Mehemet Ali.
[78] See Kennedy’s Algeria and Tunis in 1845; Russel’s Barbary States;
Jackson’s Account; St. Marie’s Visit to Algeria; Pananti’s Narrative;
Beechey, Blaquière, &c.
[79] The most valuable body of information on the Turkish Empire ever
published was collected by the Rev. Robert Walpole, whose acquirements
as a scholar are equalled by his accomplishments as a writer and a
preacher.
[80] Niebuhr’s Description de l’Arabie; Burckhardt’s Travels in
Arabia; Burckhardt’s Notes on the Bedouins, &c.; Chesney’s Euphrates
Expedition; Farren’s Letters to Lord Lindsay; Perrier’s Syrie sous
Mehemet Ali; Skinner’s Overland Journey; Kinnear’s Cairo, Petra,
and Damascus; Kelly’s Syria and the Holy Land; Walpole’s Memoirs;
Poujolat’s Voyage en Orient; Ainsworth’s Travels in Asia Minor;
Blondel’s Deux Ans en Syrie.
[81] Walpole’s Memoirs of Turkey; Deux Années à Constantinople;
Walpole’s Travels; Sketches of Turkey by an American; Castellan’s
Mœurs des Ottomanes; Macfarlane’s Constantinople in 1828; Porter’s
Philosophical Transactions; Lady M. W. Montague’s Letters; St. John’s
Notes; Thornton; Walsh; Slade’s Travels; Marshall; Marmont’s Turkey;
Arvieux’s Voyages; Russel’s Aleppo, &c.
[82] Spenser’s Western Caucasus; Klaproth’s Voyages dans le Caucase;
Spenser’s Travels in Circassia; Wilbraham’s Travels; Marigny’s Three
Voyages.
[83] Levchine’s Les Kirghiz Kazaks; Spencer’s Travels; Klaproth’s
Travels, &c., &c.
[84] Kohl’s Russia and the Russians; La Russie en 1844--par un Homme
d’État; Russia under Nicolas I.; Clarke’s Travels; Lyall’s Character
of the Russians; Voyages des Deux Français; Granville’s Travels;
Golovine’s Russia under the Autocrat; Venables’ Domestic Manners of
the Russians; Bourke’s St. Petersburgh and Moscow; Thompson’s Life in
Russia; Jesse’s Notes by a Half-Pay; Erman’s Travels.
[85] Wrangell’s Nord de la Siberie; Cottrell’s Recollections of
Siberia; Dobell’s Travels; Hollman’s Travels; Erman’s Travels; Parry’s
Three Voyages; Bache’s Narrative; Bache’s Land Expedition; King’s
Journey to the Arctic Ocean; Fisher’s Voyage of Discovery; Barrow’s
Voyage; Shillinglau’s Arctic Discoveries; Snow’s Arctic Regions;
Scoresby’s Arctic Countries, &c., &c.
[86] Henderson’s Residence in Iceland; Trail’s Letters on Iceland;
Kames’ Sketches of Man; Gaimard’s Voyages en Islande; Hooker’s Tour in
Iceland; Crantz’s History of Greenland; Account of Greenland, Iceland,
&c.; Dillon’s Winter in Greenland; Barrow’s Visit to Iceland; Egede’s
Descriptions of Greenland; Graah’s Voyage to Greenland.
[87] Angelot’s Legislation des États du Nord; Capel Brookes’s Winter in
Lapland and Sweden; Reiçhard’s Guide des Voyageurs; Bramsen’s Letters
of a Prussian Traveller; Laing’s Tour in Sweden; Tryzell’s History of
Sweden; Frankland’s Visits to Courts of Russia and Sweden.
[88] Laing’s Residences in Norway; Wittich’s Western Coast of Norway;
Two Summers in Norway; Latham’s Norway and the Norwegians; Elliot’s
Letters from the North; Mathew Jones’s Travels; Clarke’s Travels;
Count Bjornstyere’s Moral State of Norway; Buch’s Travels in Norway;
Price’s Wild Scenes in Norway; Ross’s Yacht Voyage to Norway;
Kraft’s Topographisk, Statistisk, Bestrifelse-iber Kongeriget Norge,
Christiania, 1820, 5 vols. 8vo.
[89] Angelot’s Legislations des États du Nord; Bremner’s Excursions in
Denmark; Feldborg’s Denmark Delineated, &c., &c.
[90] Rabuteaux, ex Lascher, La Chaus, Layard, Knight, Dulaure,
Chaussard, Jacob, Saint Hilaire, Hugues, Faumin, Sabatier, Beraud, &c.,
&c.
[91] We rely for certain facts, statistics, &c., upon Reports of
the Society for the Suppression of Vice; information furnished by
the Metropolitan Police; Reports of the Society for the Prevention
of Juvenile Prostitution; Returns of the Registrar-General; Ryan,
Duchatelet, M. les Docteurs G. Richelot, Léon Faucher, Talbot, Acton,
&c., &c.; and figures, information, facts, &c., supplied from various
quarters: and lastly, on our own researches and investigations.
[92] Life and Adventures of Col. George Hanger, 1704.
[93] Acton.
[94] Imprisoned for three months.
[95] In 1841 Flats were returned in Northumberland as separate Houses:
this accounts for the decrease in 1851.
[96] The average number of Male Criminals has been arrived at in the
same manner as that for Female Criminals, but the table itself is
reserved for another place.
Transcriber's Note
The following apparent errors have been corrected:
p. vii "City Mission," changed to "City Mission"
p. viii "Houses of Assignation" changed to "Houses of Assignation 258"
p. xx "clasess" changed to "classes"
p. xxxix "But ‘the demand" changed to "“But ‘the demand"
p. 6 "20 years of age" changed to "20 years of age."
p. 6 "iron manufacturers" changed to "iron manufacturers,"
p. 9 "all persone" changed to "all persons"
p. 10 "Army, Navy." changed to "Army, Navy,"
p. 11 "printing bookbinding" changed to "printing, bookbinding"
p. 17 "viii. Breaking (stones)" changed to "ix. Breaking (stones)"
p. 17 "ix. Scouring" changed to "x. Scouring"
p. 20 "Commisioners" changed to "Commissioners"
p. 41 "unto me!’" changed to "unto me!”"
p. 48 "occuption" changed to "occupation"
p. 48 (note) "Antiquities of Greece" changed to "Antiquities of
Greece."
p. 53 "recordered" changed to "recorded"
p. 54 "characters to lose[39]" changed to "characters to lose[39]."
p. 72 "difficul course" changed to "difficult course"
p. 74 "expected. in any general" changed to "expected, in any general"
p. 76 "comnities" changed to "communities"
p. 93 "regions, espepecially" changed to "regions, especially"
p. 111 (note) "Stocqueler’s Pilgrimage" changed to "Stocqueler’s
Pilgrimage."
p. 125 (note) "Hoffmeister’s Travel’s" changed to "Hoffmeister’s
Travels"
p. 135 "says Conyngham" changed to "says Cunynghame"
p. 136 "appaparently" changed to "apparently"
p. 136 (note) "Cunyngham’s Recollections" changed to "Cunynghame’s
Recollections"
p. 137 "cross.”" changed to "cross."
p. 144 "the case" changed to "the ease"
p. 146 "Enggland" changed to "England"
p. 163 "longer period" changed to "longer period."
p. 179 "parents or guardians or guardians" changed to "parents or
guardians"
p. 180 "frighful" changed to "frightful"
p. 183 "heavest punishment" changed to "heaviest punishment"
p. 196 "40 centimes;" changed to "40 centimes."
p. 197 "week of labour," changed to "week of labour."
p. 200 "be estalished" changed to "be established"
p. 203 "with out expressing" changed to "without expressing"
p. 203 "numeous" changed to "numerous"
p. 203 "w-er at Turin" changed to "were at Turin"
p. 203 "prostituion" changed to "prostitution"
p. 204 "sanitary visis" changed to "sanitary visits"
p. 204 "away from him," changed to "away from him."
p. 208 "Ismeria." changed to "Ismeria"
p. 210 "‘Rue Fromenteau”" changed to "“Rue Fromenteau”"
p. 216 "possessed o" changed to "possessed of"
p. 219 "minds o" changed to "minds of"
p. 225 "his divison" changed to "his division"
p. 231 "fron the ashes" changed to "from the ashes"
p. 232 "rapped up" changed to "wrapped up"
p. 233 "which, however" changed to "which, however,"
p. 238 "abound there" changed to "abound there."
p. 249 "disapointment" changed to "disappointment"
p. 250 "nighbourhood" changed to "neighbourhood"
p. 262 "we had supper.," changed to "we had supper,"
p. 264 "Females" changed to "Females."
p. 264 "9 12" changed to "9 3 12"
p. 266 "3 P.M" changed to "3 P.M."
p. 269 "lots of money”" changed to "lots of money’"
p. 270 "sixteen years’ old" changed to "sixteen years old"
p. 272 "come to me!" changed to "come to me!”"
p. 279 "descriptious" changed to "descriptions"
p. 280 "low neigbourhood" changed to "low neighbourhood"
p. 281 "such a street.”" changed to "such a street."
p. 283 "of his property" changed to "of his property"
p. 283 "pinafores towels" changed to "pinafores, towels"
p. 284 "the others’ cap" changed to "the other’s cap"
p. 293 "_Attic or Garret Thieves_" changed to "_Attic or Garret
Thieves._"
p. 295 "neighbourhoood" changed to "neighbourhood"
p. 303 "starving Some" changed to "starving. Some"
p. 306 "to sip the hand" changed to "to slip the hand"
p. 310 "£6 194" changed to "£6,194"
p. 319 "It was on a Saturday" changed to "“It was on a Saturday"
p. 329 "somes cases" changed to "some cases"
p. 330 "seven o’clock, P M." changed to "seven o’clock, P. M."
p. 339 "eater, or it gives" changed to "enter, or it gives"
p. 339 "in wich drills" changed to "in which drills"
p. 343 "police station" changed to "police station."
p. 345 "burglareis" changed to "burglaries"
p. 348 "bought this instrument" changed to "brought this instrument"
p. 356 "fashionable careeer" changed to "fashionable career"
p. 357 "in the West-end" changed to "in the West-end."
p. 360 "thorougfares" changed to "thoroughfares"
p. 360 "want and suffering" changed to "want and suffering."
p. 361 "I don’t mind seeing" changed to "“I don’t mind seeing"
p. 361 "King s Cross, and" changed to "King’s Cross, and"
p. 364 "healthy girls. When" changed to "healthy girls When"
p. 366 "with plunderiug" changed to "with plundering"
p. 368 "pay, they were" changed to "pay they, were"
p. 371 "Ionly get copper" changed to "I only get copper"
p. 372 "jacket for 2_d_" changed to "jacket for 2_d._"
p. 372 "cap for 1/2_d_" changed to "cap for 1/2_d._"
p. 374 "low coffee-house" changed to "low coffee-houses"
p. 375 "515_l_" changed to "515_l._"
p. 375 "in the City" changed to "in the City."
p. 375 "from a well known" changed to "from a well-known"
p. 375 "2 843" changed to "2,843"
p. 378 "shilling’s worth, Then" changed to "shilling’s worth. Then"
p. 380 "than a-good one" changed to "than a good one"
p. 390 "remittance, This system" changed to "remittance. This system"
p. 390 "position in society," changed to "position in society."
p. 395 "c. 3 and 4 (1598,)" changed to "c. 3 and 4 (1598),"
p. 400 "350 were convicted," changed to "350 were convicted."
p. 403 "expenses, and--’" changed to "expenses, and--”"
p. 409 "as to character." changed to "as to character.”"
p. 410 "about town He tells you" changed to "about town. He tells you"
p. 418 "done it ,for" changed to "done it, for"
p. 422 "Waldegrave" changed to "Waldegrave)"
p. 427 "obliged to you." changed to "obliged to you.”"
p. 428 "sitting on the sca fold" changed to "sitting on the scaffold"
p. 428 "arm? Your’e a" changed to "arm? You’re a"
p. 430 "clohes, first of all" changed to "clothes, first of all"
p. 432 "desease. This man" changed to "disease. This man"
p. 435 "small piece of soup" changed to "small piece of soap"
p. 438 "clothes, as as if" changed to "clothes, as if"
p. 445 "Brass Rods &c" changed to "Brass Rods &c."
p. 445 "Lord Brougham 2" changed to "Lord Brougham 2”"
p. 448 "machinery, which, &c. &c. &c." changed to "machinery, which,
&c. &c. &c.”"
p. 453 "_Manufacturing and Sub-Mining Counti_" changed to
"_Manufacturing and Sub-Mining Counties._"
p. 473 "There aer, on an average" changed to "There are, on an average"
p. 477 "841 to 1850" changed to "1841 to 1850"
p. 479 "Females is the _least_" changed to "Females is the _least_."
p. 489 "ENGLAND & WALES" changed to "ENGLAND & WALES."
p. 495 "Middlesex 09" changed to "Middlesex 0·9"
p. 495 "Norfolk 07" changed to "Norfolk 0·7"
p. 495 "Lancaster 02" changed to "Lancaster 0·2"
p. 501 "’ ’" changed to "„ „"
Inconsistent or archaic spelling and punctuation have otherwise have
been left as printed.
The following possible errors have not been changed:
p. 1 the elimination of the truth
p. 139 Mesco
p. 178 Mary Wolstonecroft
p. 180 oath that he had intercourse
p. 185 regulations was
p. 244 expences
p. 366 ladened
p. 377 pair this off
p. 396 except in ordinary cases
p. 413 by, a despairing
p. 440 sell his work for him?
p. 447 The sufferings of this minority is
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