12 While my God has thou forsaken me, not so my mother, for behold and see she steadfast stands. Oh, Father, shall it be that she abides when now forsake is. Three days of frost had brought the customary London fog dense, yellow and choking. Londoners groped their way about with set patient faces, breaking out, however, into wild jubilation in the bowels of the earth, where the comparative purity and brightness of the atmosphere of the tube railway seemed to rush to their heads like cheap champagne. In the open-air ward of the workhouse infirmary, the sufferers coughed and choked away their last strength in the poisonous atmosphere. The cold was very great, but the fever in their veins kept the patients warm, though the nurses went about in blue and shivering, and on the side of the ward open to the elements the snow had drifted in, melted and frozen again, making a perilous slide for the unwary. The sky was black as at midnight, but according to the clock the long night had ended, the long day had begun. The patients were washed, the breakfast was served, and a few who were well enough got up, dressed themselves, and occupied themselves with a book or paper. One man worked furiously at rug-making, his knotted fingers dragging the hanks of wool through the canvas as if his life depended on speed. By the side of the ward open to the fog lay a young man so wasted and shrunken that he looked almost like a child. When the nurses brought him his breakfast, he raised his head eagerly. Has mother come? Why, Teddy, you're dreaming. Your mother has only just gone. It's morning, my dear, and she had to get back to the factory. But she'll be here again this evening, never fear. You have a mother and ten thousand, lucky boy. Now get your breakfast. Teddy's head fell back again, an apathetic indifference, and he listened for longly to a dispute between two men who had been playing dominoes. One had accused the other of cheating, and an awful wrangle had arisen. Till at length the nurses stepped in and stopped the game. Later on the same man began to dispute about horse racing, and the world were now names of Gladys and Persimmon and Minoru, etc., figured largely. I tell you, Persimmon was the king's arse, and he won the Derby in 1898. I know I'm right, because it was the year I got the Scripture Prize at Netherwood Street. No, that warrant till nine hundred, and I'll tell you why. I tell you it war. I tell you it warrant. Again the nurse intervened and tried to distract the disputants with a copy of a newspaper. But the warfare was renewed after her back was turned to the amusement or irritation of the sufferers. In the farther corner of the ward, a man in delirium raved in blaspheme, casually giving rapid character sketches of some woman, not complimentary either to her taste or morals. Then he would relapse into semi-inconsciousness and wake with a loud agonized cry for his mother. In the afternoon a visitor came to see Teddy Wilson. Teddy had sung in the choir and his vicar called often to visit him. Teddy had been a prize scholar of the LCC schools. From scholarship to scholarship he had passed to a lawyer's office in the city. And then one day he had begun to cough and to shiver. In the hospital to which he had been taken, had seen that Pisces was galloping him to the grave. They did not keep incurable cases and Teddy had been passed on to die in the workhouse infirmary. When Teddy found himself a pauper, he had raged furiously and futilely in the gallop to the grave, went at double pace. He lifted his head eagerly when the nurse brought the clergyman to his bedside. As mother come he asked and then fell back apathetically. Yes, he was getting better. It was only the remains of pleurisy. Would he like prayers read? Oh yes, he didn't mind. Teddy was always docile. Screens were fetched and the clergyman knelt down by his bedside. The two men noisily resumed their quarrel about horse racing in order to show their contempt for the church, till the nurse stuck their mometers in their mouths to secure some silence. The man in delirium raged on, cursing in picturesque variety the woman of his love and hate. All around the sick and dying coughed and choked in their agonized struggle for breath. Consider his contrition, accept his tears, assuage his pain. We humbly commend the soul of this thy servant, our dear brother, into thy hands. Wash it, we pray thee, in the blood of the immaculate lamb. That whatsoever defilements it may have contracted, in the midst of this miserable and gnawy world, it may be presented pure and without spot before thee. As the vicar read on, silence fell upon the ward. The question of persimmon was dropped and even the delirious man ceased to blaspheme and lay quiet for a time. It seemed to the young priest as if the peace of God for which he had prayed had fallen upon this place of pain and terror. Before he won, he stopped for a word or a handshake with the patients and settled the vexed question of persimmon's victory. Fancy as knowing that, said the first disputant. Not so bad for a devil-dodger. They aren't all quite fools. There was a bloke down at Bethnal Green, a real good cricketer and sportsman. They made him a bishop now, and as I always says, there's bigger liars knocking about London than that there bishop. After tea, visitors began to arrive. Most of the patients in the open-air ward were on the danger list and could see their friends at any time. And now at the close of the day, fathers and mothers and wives and sweethearts were coming straight from factory and workshop to comfort their sick. Teddy Wilson, propped up with pillows, watched the door and, presently when a frail little woman entered, the faces of both mother and son lit up with the light of joy and love ineffable.  I came straight from the factory, dear. I did not even wait for a cup of tea or to get washed. Here are some grapes for you. The grapes were best hot-house. The poor always give recklessly. And Mrs. Wilson and a bright-eyed little girl who was sweepy up scholarships and qualify as a typist and Tisica would go short of food for a week. Ten years ago Mr. Wilson had grown weary of monogamy and had disappeared. His wife's scorning charity and the parish had starved and fought her own way. Laterally she had found employment at the Tooth Factory. But food was not abundant on a weekly wage varying from seven to fifteen shillings. And the LCC had worked the brains of the growing child on a diet chiefly of dry bread and tea. Through the long night she sat by her son, the long night of agony and suffering, which she was powerless to relieve. And the nurse who was reputed a hard woman looked at her with tearful eyes and muttered to herself, Thank God I never bore a child. And the early hours of morning Teddy began to sing in strange raucous fashion, fragments of oratorios. My God, my God, sank Teddy in the recitative of Bach's passion music. Why hast thou forsaken me? Oh mother, don't leave me.  He stopped coughing, she said. I think I am glad. CHAPTER XIII OF WORKHOUSE CHARACTERS This is a LibriVox recording. While LibriVox recordings are in the public demand. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. WORKHOUSE CHARACTERS By Margaret Nevenson CHAPTER XIII. In Irish Catholic. Godliness is great riches if a man be content with that which he have. God bless all the kind rape pears for my good dinner and a good cup of tea to wash it down with, and a nice bit of fire this cold day. You paupers never give thanks unto the Lord, a nasty Protestant blot without a hot pourth of manners between you, a cursing and swearing and blaspheming. They have not the grace of God. Say good afternoon to the lady, Betsy Brown, and don't be so rude. They never do have a word of thanks to the kind ladies and gentlemen who come visiting them, and we don't get many visitors just now. All the dear ladies are away a paddling in the ocean. The gentlemen guardians come sometimes, but they are not so chatty as the ladies. Don't seem to know what to say to us old women. You don't happen to have a bit of snuff about you, my lady. Excuse me, asking you, but some of the ladies carries a bit for me. I ain't allowed my pipe in here, and I missus a cruel. At first I had gripped the season my vitals through, missing the comfort of a bit of backy. And the doctor he seemed much gratified with the symptoms of my suffering, and says I was attacked by the penses. I think he termed it the royal diseases of the king, and he was all for cutting me up at once, but I up and says young man, don't talk to your elders. It's nothing but my poor innards are craving for a pipe in a drop of Irish, and you'll kind of keep your knives and hatchets off me. The king can be cut up if he likes, but I'll go before my judge on the resurrection morning when my poor old body, undisfigured by gaping holes and wounds. Yes, I fret cruel in the workouts, lady. If I could only get away back to Kensington, where I belong, I'd be all right. I have no friends here, only you and the Almighty God. I'm a poor old blind Irish woman, lady, and my son's is out in America and seems to have forgotten the mother that bore them. And my husband's been dead these 40 years, and he was not exactly one to thank God for on bare knees.  Yes, I've been blind now these 30 years. I was 90 on the Feast of the Blessed Lady of Mount Carmel, and one day in the winter we'd just been saying mass for the soul of the Cardinal Newman, and when I got back home I put up a bit of gunpowder to claim the chimbley, which smoked cruel. I always was a decent, clean body, and the wicked stuff turned round on me, very vindictious, and blew down into the room, burning a red hot into my poor innocent eyes. They cut one out at St. Bartholomew's hospital, and they hoped to say the other, but it took to weeping itself away, voluntarious, and a throbbing like steam engine, and the young chaps fetched it out a few weeks later. But I'm a very happy blind woman. Yes, lady, it was dreadful at first, and I'll not deny that the cross seemed too heavy for my poor back, as if God himself had forsaken me. Great black, thundering darkness all around as I couldn't cut a peep show and know-how.  But no one heard, and the darkness continued dark. But glory be to the saints, it's astonishing how used you get to things. At the end of a couple of months you seems to forget as there was ever anything else but darkness round, and by the grace of God and the favor of the angels, I get about most nimblest. No, I don't belong to this parish at all. That's why I hopes one day to get six pence and get back to Kensington. But, you see, lady, it was like this. I came up to call on my poor sister at the top of the hill. And when I got there they told me she was dead and buried. God, rest your soul. And the shock was so great I fell down overcome, as you may say, by emotion. And a kind gentleman picked me up and brought me in here, and there I lay stretched out on a bed of pain, with the great bruise all down my poor side. And my poor innards are struggling amongst themselves for a bit of comfort, which they've never got since I've been here. And the young chap of a doctor talking in long and in decent words to the nurses. I hear you inmates are smiling again. But I was not in liquor, lady. Self-mits God's truth. May your lips stiffen forever, sitting there grinning and mucking at God's truth. I've always been a sober woman, and I've always conducted myself.  Yes, my lady, I know it's not a prison, and I can take my discharge. But, you see, I don't know the way to the bus, as will take me to Kensington. And I ain't got six pence, a most distressful and unpleasant circumstance not to have six pence. May the holy mother preserve you in wealth and prosperity, so that you may never know it. If I had six pence of my own, do you think I'd stay in this wicked bus-steel, ordered about by the ladies of the bar?  Yes, my lady, I know as they call themselves noses, but when you're ninety you won't like to be ordered about by a parcel of girls. Oh, my lady, if you would only put me in the bus that goes to Kensington, and give me a six pence here in my old poor hand. Then may the blessed mother keep you forever, you and your good children, and may the crown of glory that is waiting for you before the great white throne be studded with diamonds and rubies brighter than the stars. How could I get on? I'd be all right if I only got to Kensington. There's the price. God love them, they knows me and helps me and kind ladies who give me the tickets for meat and groceries, and there's the landlord of the fish and court. He'll be near you, lady, before the great white throne, and on wet days, when the quality don't come out, I go round to him and there's always a bite and a sup for old Bridget. I hear you, pauper, smiling again, but believe me, lady, it is the black wickedness of their iniquitous hearts. Ask the police, lady. God bless the boys for leaving the old pauper over many a tumultuous street. They will tell you my excellent character for temperance and sobriety and cleanliness. They give me a paper from Scotland Yard, which lets me walk in the high street. I sells nothing and I ask nothing, but I just stands and the ladies and gentlemen reigns, pennies in my hand, thick as hail and maytime. And do I get enough to live on? I should think so, and enough to fill the belly of another woman who claims my room and cooks my food and leads me about. No, I shan't get run over by no motor-car. The Lord may have taken the sight of my eyes, but he has left me an uncommon sharp pair of ears and a nose like a ferret, and by this special mercy I can hear the things stinking and rampaging long for there near me. You needn't be a feared for me, lady, old Bridget can take care of herself, being always a sober and temperate woman.  Matrin says I've no clothes, does she, and after the beautiful dress says I came up to see my poor sister with? Yes, I know as I must have a decent gown on in a fashionable neighborhood. I like to be in the fashion, even if I am blind, but you'll find me an old one of yours, lady, and I shall look so beautiful in it, the boys will all be for a lopin' with me as I stand. Most peculiar, joyful feeling there is about a sixpence if you've not felt one these fowl months. The other night I'd been warreting my poor old head, shocking all day how to get sixpence in this den of paupers, and when I fell asleep I had a vision of our blessed lady, a swyling most gracious like, in a stretchy out of silver sixpence, bright as the glory round her most blessed head. I cried cruel when I woke. Sixpence seemed so far off, but now thanks be to God and to all his holy angels my dream is true. End of Chapter 13 Chapter 14 of Workhouse Characters This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by LaSanne LaVoy of Swansea, Illinois. Workhouse Characters by Margaret Nebbetson Chapter 14, an obscure conversation list Out of the night that covers me Black as the pit from pole to pole I thank whatever gods may be for my unconquerable soul. It matters not how straight the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul. Hi LaS, but you ain't been to see me for a long time and me been that queer and quite a fixture in bed all along of catching a cold at that funeral. Been abroad have you? Ah well, you're welcome. For I've been a bit upset about not seeing you and because of a dream I had. I dreamt I was up in heaven all along of the great white throne and the great gates with only angels all around are singing most vigorous. Mrs. Curtis was there and my blessed mother and my niece Nellie and the reverent walker. You know the reverent walker, ma'am. Him as I sits under? Yes, I like little walker what there is of him to like for I wish he was bigger. But he was all right in my dream larger than life with a crown on him. But I miss some of you and I says to myself Mrs. Nivenson, I ain't here. So I'm glad LaS as you're safe like. Yes, I've been that queer I couldn't know myself and though I'm better I'm that bone lazy I can't move. But I'll be all right again soon and I'll get those pedicodes of your own finish which I am ashamed of having cluttering about still. I've had what's called brown chardis. Mrs. Goethe sped the doctor when I took bed and they brought me up a sort of tent with a sheet and a kettle spitting steam at me through a roll of brown paper that fixed on the spout and I have killed myself with laughing at such goings on. I was that odd and smothered I had to get up in the middle of the night and get to the open window and take a breath of fog for you can't call it air. I felt just like a boiled lobster. I ain't had nothing to do with doctors before and I don't understand their ways. This young chap he got old on a piece of wood and planks it down on my chest with his ear clapped to the other end. Say 99 he says as grave as a judge. Sir I says I'm not an imbecile and not having much breath to spare I'll keep it to talk sense. He bursts himself with laughing and then he catches old on my and has men do when they go a curtain. Sir I says a fine young chap like you would better hang on with some young wench.  It's a treat to come and see you he says but you're really ill this time you know and you ought to go into the infirmary and get properly nursed up. Never I says never. Anyone away cowed like.  I've kept myself to myself free and independent all my life and free and independent all die. Little Walker catched it up the other day sending a sort of visiting lady here. The organization lady she calls herself so Mrs Curtis said well she asked so many questions and wanted to know why I had not had frift as she called it. Then I turned on her and I says I think you've made a little mistake in the number. I ain't got nowhere to crime on my conscience but I'm a lady of independent means and must ask for peace and quiet which is due to wealth. I was that angry with the Reverend Walker. Did it for the best he said. Thought as I might have got a little help from the organization if I hadn't been so rude. The very idea. I ain't help. I've hung by my own like every proper airing and human ought to and when I can't hang no longer I'll drop quiet and decent into my grave. No I never got married. What I saw of men in service did not exactly set me to coveting my neighbor's husbands instead of big babies as must of the moon if they want it to say nothing at a whine and the women and the trot and horses and the betting on them silly cards besides to tell the truth last no man of decent stature ever asked me to read being a big woman all the little scrubs come following me but I would not go with any of them always like grenadier guards six foot at least perhaps it was as well I should never have had patience to put up with a man about the place being so masterful myself besides ain't I been sort of father and husband to my sister Cordelia mother died when Cordelia was born and she says to me roof take care this helpless baby and God help me I've done my best build a poor girl's made a poor bargain with life her husband getting queerer and more cantankerous wandering the country up and down as fast as they bought him own and having to be shut up and conely atch at the end I was not going to satisfy that organization ladies curiosity and both how I helped to bring up that family and a deal of thrift that lady would have managed on the two shillings a week I kept the my wages the missus often passing the remark that considering the good money she paid she liked her servants better dressed Cordelia was left with three little ones and I couldn't abide the thought of her coming to the parish and having them nice little kids took from her and brought up in them workout schools so I agreed to give her eight shillings a week out of my wages and that with the 12 shillings she got cooking at the pig and whistle kept them together poor lass she's had no luck with her boys either poor Tim's going off weak in his head and having to be pulled away and Jonathan killed straight off that egglings starter with a bullet through his brain yes there's Ambrose no I don't ask Ambrose to help me he's got his mother to help and her ebby family besides no I don't take food out of the stomachs of little children a sudden their growth as nothing can be done for them later and a starving of their brains I pulls my belt a bit tighter thank you yes I know what I'm talking about didn't I spend nearly every Sunday afternoon for nine on 20 years at Conley Hatch well the will of the Lord be done but why if he be almighty he lets folks be mad when he might strike him dead as always puzzled and tried my faith yes I lives on my five shilling pension and what my last master left me half a crown rent doesn't leave me with much for food I always had a good appetite I'm sorry to say and I often dream of grilled steaks not since the Brachitis though I'm all for lemons and fizzy drinks the folks here are very kind and often bring me some of their dinner but Lord they are poor cooks and if they're husband's drink I for one ain't surprised I could grill a steak with anyone and I attribute my independent income to my steaks and my last place the master fought the world of them and when there was a rumpus in the kitchen I used to hear him say set the old blooming lot but remember Brock Stase and stays I did till the old gentleman died and remember the steaks in his wheel well I was going to tell you how I caught this cold only you will keep on interrupting of me I saw how there was going to be a funeral at St. Paul's and I thought I'd go I always was one for looking at men and having been a kitchen maid at York Palace I took on a taste for cathedrals and stained windows and music and such like as a sort of respite from the troubles and trials of life oh it was beautiful to hear the organ play and to see the gold cross carried in front of the dear little chorister boys and I says to myself their Mars are proud of them today then came the young chaps who sing ten on bass fine upstanding young men and then the cure rates were the ugly faces but at the end were the bishops and deans and such like and they were that old and ugly I was quite ashamed well I thought I'd treat myself to a motor bus after my long walk the young chap says don't go up on top mother you'll catch cold thank you kindly I says but I ain't our houseplant being born on the moors and if I went but Lord I hadn't reckoned out a wind cut going through the galloping pace we went it petrified to the negriggy as poor mother used to say now I don't know where the negriggy is but take off your fur coat top of a motor bus and a vehement east wind and perhaps you'll feel yes that's little walker's bell are going it ain't a wedding and it ain't a funeral it's a kind of prayers that he says chiefly to itself at five o'clock easy church must you be going well come again soon be in country yourself you understand fresh air as folks brought up among chimblies can't be expected to but don't worry me know about infirmaries for I ain't a going so there mrs. Curtis has her orders and when I'm took worse she's to put me in the long train at whistles and goes to York yes I saved up the railway fare and from there I can get home and die comfortable on the moor with plenty of air and the peace of God all around the landlady came to open the door for me as I went down the well scrub staircase yes ma'am mrs. Brooks is better but she's very frail the doctor thinks that she can't last much longer but a conversation continues as good as ever my old man or one of my sons goes up to sit with her every evening she's such good company she saves them the money from the oars and makes them laugh as much as little titch we'll take care of her ma'am the reverent walker told me to get whatever she wants and eat pay and all the folks are real fond of her in the house she's that quick with her tongue no ma'am she'll never go back to York she's too weak but the doctor told me to humor her end of chapter 14 recording by LaSanne LaVoy chapter 15 of workhouse characters this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by LaSanne LaVoy of Swansea Illinois workhouse characters by Margaret Nevenson chapter 15 mothers for the hurt of the daughter of my people and my hurt astonishment have taken hold on me is there no balm in Gilead is there no physician there why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered every first Monday of the month a trainload of shabby half-starved women move southward from London to one of our great poor law schools and perhaps in the whole world spite of poverty hunger and rags there is no more joy is banned for two blessed hours they meet their children again and though later they return weary hungry and heart sore nothing is allowed to mar the joy of the present for the poor are great philosophers and hold in practice as well as in theory that an ounce of pleasure is worth a peck of pain humor exudes from every poor triumphs are related on all sides triumphs over civil authorities triumphs over boards of guardians triumphs over organization ladies and cruelty men and methods are discussed as to the best way of triumphing over the school authorities and conveying sweets and cakes to the children yes he kept his word and add me up but I said as I was a winner and had to keep the girl at home to mind the sick children and the big dismiss the summons and I came out and there's the jig under his nose done you again old chap I says and he looked fit to eat me he's a good sort our chairman with a terrible soft spot in his heart for widows we always says you have only got to put on a widow's crate and you can get what you like out of him so mrs. james upstairs she's been a milliner you know she rigged me out with a little bonnet and a long crate fall and a white muslin collar and she pulled my air out loose around my ears and gave me a anchor chip with an inch border of black and she says there mrs. evans there ain't a bloke on the board as won't say you are a deserving case and sure enough they went and did just as I told him as good as gold if I'd add my time over again I'd come into the world a widow born just as I says when springs was alive we were half-climbed but nothing could we get from the parish because they said he was an able-bodied man springs wasn't a lazy man and he didn't try for work and he wasn't a drunken though he did fall down under the motor bus one of his mates standing him a drink on an empty stomach which we all know flies quicker than he had it don't seem right as married ladies are carrying the kitties should always go hungry but it's the fact since sprigs was took and the inquest sat on him we've had enough but it's too late to say the little one was born silly and earnest was put away in Darnth and I always says it was being starved and the teacher always a canine of him because he couldn't learn on an empty stomach best not to marry I says and then if he falls out of work we can go to the parish and get took in on our own and you don't have to keep them later on did you hear about Mrs. Moore? Mrs. Moore was our landlady and her husband went off about three years ago with the bar maid at the bell the police tells her she must come in the house whilst they look for him but she said she wouldn't not if it was ever so and she was glad to be rid of bad rubbish so she went to her old Mrs. who then had money to set up a lodging house and being a good cook she soon had a house full and brings up the three little ones clean and well behaved like little lighties children then the guardians sent the other day to say as Moore had been taken off to the cold in the ash mad with drink and wickedness and she had to pay for him in there well Mrs. Moore went to appear afford a board Lord we have split ourselves with life and when she was telling us about it she got a tongue in her head as cooks have I notice date affects their tempers and she went off and one of her tantrums and Fair Friday them I'm sure you'd like to pay for your husband Mrs. Moore says the little man what sits in the big chair I'm sure I shouldn't says Mrs. Moore he's never been a husband to me born in the home and drinking and carrying on with other women shocking he promised to support me he did with all my worldly goods I the endow and lies of that sort but I may no such promise and I won't do it working hard as I can I just keep a roof and get food for the four of us and if you take a penny out of me I don't pay it and I drops the job and I comes into the house with Claude and Ruby and Esmeralda and lives on the rate payers same as other women which I as a right to being a deserted woman for three years while he kept his bar made or they kept him which is probable if I knows more and my young Claude being a cripple for life as far to kicking him when he was a crawler and one of his drunken feats you may find me and imprison me and aim me by the neck till I'm dead but not a penny shall you get out of me they told her to be quiet but she wouldn't and they pushed her out of the room and into the street still talking and quite a crowd came around and listened to her and they all says quite right don't pay it my gal and she didn't and no one ain't asked her any more about it she fair-fried that board of guardians she says she's a fine talker Mrs. Moore and nothing stops her when she's once started I'm another who's done better since mine died said a frail little lady on crutches with a red gash across her throat from ear to ear and he was a real good husband as came on regular and did his duty to all till he lost his work through the firm bankrupting and not a job could he get again and somehow walking about all day with nothing in his inside and hearing the kids always crying for bread seemed to turn him savage and queer in his head they took to sleep with a carving knife under the pillow and hit me about cruel I know it was only trouble and didn't think wrong at a man but I went to ask the magistrate for advice just what to do as I thought his brain was queer and yet didn't want him put away and the beef said he didn't think much of a black eye night better go home and make the best of him just what I did put he got worse and the organization lady said as we must go to the house or she'd have the cruelty man on us and Jack got wild and said he wasn't so cruel as to a bread poppers and they should go with him to a better land far far away that night he blazed out shocking as you know for it was all in Lloyd's news and cut little Daisy's throat and rushed at Albert killing them dead I had an awful struggle with them but I jumped out of the window just in time though my throat was bleeding fearful and I broke both legs in the fall the police came but it was too late egg done for himself and the two children though I always give thanks to Mrs. Dore who came in whilst he was wrestling with me and took off with the little ones and locked them up in the top floor back I'd done better since then the boards took Amy and Leonard and I managed nicely on my 12th shillings week with only Chole Mandalay and the baby to look after it don't seem right somehow now it ain't right married ladies ought not to go short but we always do boards and organization ladies thinks as men keeps us Granny says they most always did in her day and rich people does still I suppose but it ain't the fashion down our street and it falls heavy on the woman what with earning short money and being most always confined my son says as it's the law as is old and ought to be swept somewhere into limbo not as I understand it being no scullard here we are at last I needed a joyful sight to see the heavens and the earth and no houses in between it always feels like sunday in the country end of chapter 15 recording by listen la voy chapter 16 of workhouse characters this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by John Brandon workhouse characters by Margaret Nevenson chapter 16 your son's your son my little son is my true lover it seems no time ago since he was born I know he will be quick and happy to discover the world of other women and leave me forlorn sometimes I think that I'll be scarcely human if I can brook his chosen woman Anna Wickham oh dear oh dear well the old lady burying her face in her pocket handkerchief you think as I've lived to see the day I've always lived with Oris and I've always prayed that the Lord would take me unto himself before I was left alone with my gray hairs a poor pretty thing she is too with a pair of blue eyes and frizzled yellow curls dressed out beyond her station in cheap and decencies of lace showing her neck and arms as no proper minded girl should and she won't have me to live with them I who have never been parted from Oris not one day since he was born thirty year ago come Sunday yes I've got asked her she's away in service she's Johnson's child I've buried two husbands both of them railway men and both of them dying violent deaths Johnson was an engine driver on the great northern and he smashed himself to a jelly in that accident near York nigh on forty years ago now I said I'd never marry on the line again hating accidents and blood about the place however it's a bit lonesome being a widow when you're young and Thompson courted me so faithful at last I gave in he was Oris's father a guard on the Midland and he went to step on his van after the train was off as is the habit of guards none of them ever getting killed as I ever heard of except Thompson who must needs Mrs. Footing and fall on the line a smashing of his skull fearful yes I drew two prizes in the matrimonial market good steady men as always came home punctual and looked after the jennies and the window boxes and played with the children but as Mrs. Wells says them is this sort as gets killed if a woman gets old on a brute she may be quite sure he'll come home safe through all perils both on land and water and live to torture several unfortunate women into their graves Oris was a toddling babe then an Esther just ten years older fortunately I was a good hand at the waistcoat making and so I managed to keep the ome going Oris was always very clever and he got a scholarship and worked his self up as an electrical engineer one of the ladies got Esther a place had copped Hall Northamptonshire when she was only 13 and she's done well ever since being cooked now to lady mannering at 36 pounds a year no she's never got married Esther a chap she walked out with wasn't as faithful as he should have been a carrion on with another at the same time and Esther took on awful I believe though she's one as holes her tongue is Esther at all events she's never had ought to do with chaps since she's a good girl is Esther but Oris and me were always together and he always was such a one to sit at home with me working at his wires and currents and it taken me to see all the exhibitions explaining to me about the positives and negatives and the volts and amps he never went after girls and I always hoped as he would never fall in love with mortal woman only with a current so it knocked all the heart out of me when he took to stay and out in the evenings and then brought the girl in one night as his future wife Oris was the prettiest baby you ever see and when he used to sit on my knee with his head all over golden curls like a picture book I used to hate to think that somewhere a girl child was growing up to take him from me and to think it's come now just when I thought I was safe and he no more likely to marry than the Pope of Rome being close on 30 and falling in love for the first time and she won't have me to live with them Mrs. Wells has been telling me I mustn't stand in the young people's way of course I don't want to stand in their way but I'm wondering how I'll shift without Oris he always made the fire and brought me a cup of tea before he went to his work and when the romantics took me bad it helped me dress and be as handy as a woman I can't get the work I used to my eyesight isn't what it was and my fingers are stiff no I ain't what I was and I suppose I mustn't expect it being turned 67 and I ain't old enough either for them pensions well if it ain't Esther you're early lass and it's not your evening out neither I've just been telling this lady how Ruby won't have me to live with them it's upset me shocking the thought of leaving Oris after all these years I'm trying not to complain and I know Oris has been a son in ten thousand but I'm a feared of the lonesomeness and I don't know how I'll live Mrs. Wells says if the guardians see my hands they won't give me no outdoor relief but they'll force me into the house and I'd sooner be in my berry hole and again the poor old lady sobbed into her pocket handkerchief don't cry mother it's all right you shan't go on the parish never fear neither for outdoor relief nor indoor relief I've left my place and I'm coming to live with you and take care of you to the end of your days I'm not Oris I know but I'm your daughter and after the courtons over Oris will be your son again left your place Esther what do you mean lass what I say mother Oris wrote and told me what Ruby said and I was that sorry I went and gave notice Oris is awful upset too but there it is no good talking to a man in love and perhaps Ruby will get nicer she's a young thing yet so when I told my lady all about it she let me come away at once the family is going to the Riviera next week and the housekeeper can manage quite well you've left your good place Esther all for me yes all right old dear I've got a 14-year character from my lady and I'll soon find something to do I'm not the sort as stars and Esther rolled up her sleeves made up the fire and poured the contents of the indignant kettle into the little black teapot oh dear wailed the old lady you must not do this for me lass your heaping coals of fire on my head for as Mrs. Wells often said to me don't be so set on Oris remember you have a girl too I was always set on the boys and not on the girls women's life is a poor game and when I heard of them even Hindus who killed the girl babies I thought it a very sensible thing too better than letting them grow up to slave for a pittance but it is you now who are the faithful one and she drew Esther's face down to hers and kissed her fondly tears rose in the daughter's eyes she seemed to remember with a sense of loss that her mother had never kissed her like that since she was a little child before Horace was born end of chapter 16 recording by John Brandon chapter 17 of Workhouse Characters this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by John Brandon Workhouse Characters by Margaret Nevenson chapter 17 too old at 40 I had no place to flee unto and no man careth for my soul Mrs. Allison sat at her desk in the classroom where she had sat for over 20 years and gazed dreamily out of the window into the courtyard below with the girls of the high school were at play in her hand she held a letter which had brought the white rigid look to her face like that of a soldier who has received his death wound perhaps she ought to have been prepared for the shock the system of too old at 40 has long been in working order in girls' schools possibilities had been freely discussed in the mistresses room but nevertheless the blow had struck her dumb and senseless the note was very polite owing to changes on the staff her valuable services would be no longer required after the summer vacation but Miss Allison had seen enough of the inner workings of high schools to know the changes on the staff meant that the old and incompetent were to be crushed out to make room for the young and fresh Miss Allison was not incompetent her worst enemy could not accuse her of that but she was getting just a little tired just a little irritable above all her 42nd birthday had come and gone teaching is well known to affect the nerves and in Miss Allison's case nervous exhaustion caused her tongue to run away with her her sharp speeches to the idlers of her form were reported at home losing nothing in the telling and duly retailed by a captious parents to the headmistress the constant complaints were becoming a nuisance moreover a young mistress who would take interest in the sports and could bowl round arm was badly wanted on the staff Miss Allison belonged to an older generation when athletics were not a sine qua non she had never been a cricketer at hockey her pupils easily outran her and she had lost her nerve for high diving all together she had lived past her age the queer part was it had all taken it had all taken such a little time it seemed only yesterday that she had come to the school the youngest on the staff and now she was the oldest there far older than the young girl from Gertin who resigned as head and yet life was not nearly over yet Miss Allison remembered with dismay that women went on living for 50 60 70 and even 80 and 90 years it might be that half the journey still lay before her she made a rapid calculation in her brain of her little capital in the savings bank which yielded her after the income tax had been recovered an annual sum of 10 pounds 13 shillings nine pence though too old to teach she was too young to buy much of an annuity with the capital and she knew the state of the labor market too well to cherish any illusions as to the possibility of obtaining work perhaps she ought to have saved more but for some years she had her invalid mother mainly dependent upon her and illness runs away with money she grudged nothing to the dead but she remembered almost with shame the amount she had spent in holiday tours her eyes rested with a sense of coming loss on the crowd in the playground a kaleidoscopic scene of flying legs and whirling draperies the sun shining on bright frocks and on the loose locks of gold and alburn till the dreary courtyard seemed to blossom like a flower garden how she had loved all these girls toiled and slaved for them rejoiced in their success and mourned for their disappointments but the children of the higher education unlike Saturn devour the mothers of the movement and suddenly these very young girls had turned into rivals and enemies beating her down in the dust with cricket bats and hockey sticks an hour of bitter atheism fell upon Miss Allison all her life had been spent in serving the cause the higher education of women had been her creed but now in middle life it had failed and she was left helpless and superfluous as the poor women of an earlier generation who hung so forlornly around the neck of their nearest male relation a dry sob half choked her as she rose mechanically in obedience to the bell to take her class in geometry End of Chapter 17 Recording by John Brandon Chapter 18 of Workhouse Characters This is a LibriVox Recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by John Brandon Workhouse Characters by Margaret Nevenson Chapter 18 In the Lunatic Asylum Oh Father, we beseech thee, sustain and comfort thy servants who have lost the powers of reason and self-control suffer not the evil one to vex them and in thy mercy deliver them from the darkness of this world Prayer for Lunatics I pass through the spacious grounds of a asylum on my way to visit the patients chargeable to our parish a group of men were playing rugby football but even to the eye of the Tyro there was something wrong with the game there was no unity no enthusiasm some lurking sinister presence grotesque hideous that made one shudder worse than straight waistcoat and padded room in conversation the lunatic struck me is no worse mentally than the rest of us outside most of them complained of unlawful detention and begged pathetically for freedom it is a dreadful place why should I be kept here we have just had a harvest festival but I'm not thankful what have we to do with harvest festivals I am quite well said a tall powerful looking man I assure you there is nothing to matter with me and as I was chronicling the fact in my notebook a fiendish light blazed in his eyes the hate of hates red gleaming with fury and malice as if all the devils in hell were mocking behind his eyes for a moment it seemed an eternity I watched paralyze and then two stout waters pinioned him from behind and let him away swearing homicidal mania said the doctor shortly we have to be always on the watch I interviewed the man who would be king and hurt his theory as to the illegal usurpation of the throne by the gulf family I saw a new redeemer of the world and the woman who had conducted one of the great lawsuits of last century the women were more talkative and complained voluble of captivity a few were sullen and suspicious and would not come to the roll call and I visited them on the stairs and corridors or wherever they threw themselves down the doctor saw to it that my inspection was thorough I was conducted to the padded rooms where maniacs laughed and shouted and sang and blasphemed some of them throwing themselves frantically against the cushioned walls others lying silently on the floor plucking futilely at their sacking clothing one poor woman lay in bed wasted to a shadow her bones nearly sticking through her skin pray for him she cried oh pray for him his soul is burning in hell night and day he cries to me for a drop of cold water but I may not take it to him look at his poor throat with a rope cut look at his poor starting eyes is there no mercy in heaven poor woman said the doctor her only son was hanged and it has turned her brain she is sinking fast I don't think she can live the day out and we shall all say thank god it is a most pitiful case in the general ward I saw a magnificent growth of golden hair plaited round and round the head of a young girl who sat in a corner her face buried in her hands beside her sat a visitor pressing some hot house grapes upon her just try one able darling don't you know me dear the hands were not withdrawn but as I passed with the doctor she suddenly sprang to her feet has he come the doctor pause and nodded cheerfully at the visitor very good sign Mrs. Foster I will see you later about your daughter at last it was over my report sheet was filled and with great thankfulness I passed into the outer air I gazed at the men and women outside with a sense of comradeship and security whatever their private troubles at least they were uncertified free men not possessed of devils grievously tormented one gets used to everything but that first visit to A. Asylum stands out in letters of flame in my memory and as I waited on the platform for my train I shivered as if with egg and a sense of deadly nausea overpowered me I entered an empty compartment but just as the train was starting the woman whom I had seen visiting at the asylum got in after me and we were all alone together she glanced at me shyly several times as if she wished to say something and then suddenly clutching my hand she burst into tears oh I'm so thankful so thankful did you see my poor girl today yes I know you did for I saw you look at her beautiful golden hair whenever I see the sun shining on cornfields I think of my Mabel's hair well now for three years Mabel has sat in that awful place she has never taken her hands away from her face nor looked up nor spoken a word till this afternoon and then whether it was the doctor or your blue cloak but as you saw she stood up and spoke and after that she ate some grapes and knew me again and grumbled at the way they had done her hair the nurse says that is the best sign of all and so does the doctor oh thank god thank god and the poor woman sobbed in choking spasms of joy I felt that I and my blue cloak were such unconscious agents in the restoration of reason that her gratitude was quite embarrassing yes she has been in there just on three years acute melancholia they call it brought on by nervous shock our doctor at home always gave me some hope but not the people in there I suppose they see such a lot of misery they get into the habit of despair Mabel is my only child my husband died just after she was born so you can guess what she has been to me fortunately I understood the green grocery business so when I lost my husband I went on with the shop just the same and was able to give her a good education she took to her books wonderful and got a scholarship onto the high school she learned French and German and went on to Pittman's college for shorthand and typewriting and at 18 she got an engagement as typist and secretary to a city firm she was a wonderful pretty girl my Mabel just like a lily with her slight figure and golden head and the men came about her like flies but she would never go with any of them she was such a one to come home and spend her evenings quietly with me reading or sewing then suddenly I saw a change had come over my girl one of the gentlemen in the office had been after her and she had fallen in love with him head over heels as girls will I wasn't glad perhaps it was a mother's jealousy perhaps it was second sight a warning of me but I couldn't be pleased know how he came up to tea on Sunday afternoon and I hated him at once if ever liar and scoundrel was written on a man's face it was there playing for all to read except my poor child and she was blind as folks in love always are then though he wasn't a gentleman as I count gentlemen he was above her in station and I could see as he looked down on me and the shop and as I told my poor girl them unequal marriages don't lead to no good but there I saw it was no use of talking we only fell out over the wretch the only time she ever spoke nasty to me was over him I saw she would only marry him on the sly if I said no we must let our children go to their doom when they are in love and so I took my savings out of the bank and gave her a trousseau of the best and all the time my heart was heavy as lead folks used to laugh at me and tell me I looked as if I was getting ready for a funeral instead of a wedding there's many a true word spoken in jest and that was how I felt all the time a great black cloud of horror over everything you should have seen my mable on her wedding day she looked just beautiful in her plain white dress and long veil the two bridesmaids wore white muslin with blue sashes and mrs allen my first floor lodger said as they might have been three angels in heaven I drove in the cab to give my girl away god only knows how I felt folks have told me since that I was white and rigid like a corpse and that I sat in church with my hand held up before mable as if to ward off a blow we sat and waited and waited and waited it was summertime and being in the trade I had not spared the flowers and the church was heavy with the scent of roses and sweet peas I have sickened every summer since at the smell of them the organist played all the wedding tunes through and then began them over again I have hated the sound of them ever since and still we waited the best man went out to telephone for the bridegroom and my eldest nephew took a motor to drive round to fetch him the clock struck three and the vicar looking very troubled for mable came out in his surplus to say the ceremony could not take place that day so we all drove home again mable never spoke but she sat up in her bedroom cold as a stone with her face buried in her hands just as you saw her this afternoon leaning her arms on the little writing table where she used to sit to do her lessons she would not speak nor eat nor move and by sheer force we tore off her wedding finery and got her into bed the doctor came and said she was suffering from nervous shock and if she could cry she might recover we pitied her and called her and the bridesmaids swelled up their eyes with crying hoping to infect her but not a tear could we get out of her not even when my nephew came back with a note the scoundrel had left he was a married man all the time and the crime of bigamy was too much for him at the end my sister and I sat up all night but we could do nothing with her and at the end of the week the doctor said she must be put away as it was not safe for her to be at home ah well we live through terrible things and when I left my pretty clever girl at the lunatic asylum I did not think I could bear it but I went on living that is three years ago now and never once has Mabel looked up or spoken till today I think it was your blue cloak her going away dress was just that color and it seemed to rouse her somehow the train drew up at the terminus and she held out her hand in farewell goodbye please think of Mabel sometimes I don't know what religion you are but if you would sometimes say this prayer for her perhaps god might hear she held out a little bit of paper soiled and smudged as if with many tears and then the crowd surged between us and we parted End of Chapter 18 Recording by John Brandon Chapter 19 of Workhouse Characters This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by John Brandon Workhouse Characters by Margaret Nevenson Chapter 19 The Sweep's Legacy 1900 Most visitors among the poor have come across the person who believes that he has a large fortune kept back from him by the queen aided and abetted by the gentlemen of Somerset House and other public offices I once knew a sweep in Whitechapel who was firmly persuaded that he had a legacy of 500 pounds in the Bank of England Yes, lady, if I had my rights I should not be so poor My Aunt Lady Cable Knight She married a tip-top nobleman she did Left me on her dying bed 500 pounds in gold The money is in the Bank of England I seated there myself on a shelf labeled A.A. Anthony Adams But I ain't no scholar and the gentleman behind the counter said he must have a scholar to speak for me The money is there right enough and I've got my aunt's marriage lines so that proves it clear At first I paid little heed to his story but after a time I got fond of the old sweep and began to wonder if I could not help him to obtain his legacy He was a good old man always serene always trustful in the Lord though he well knew the pangs of hunger and cold for younger and stronger men were crushing him out of his profession A poor, deformed creature lived with him one of those terrible abortions found in the homes of the poor Epileptic, crippled, hydrocephalus whom I took for the son of the house but on an inquiry I found he was no relation We were neighbors up George's yard, lady No, he ain't no son of mine Halbert ain't he's very afflicted poor chap and his own family would have nothing to do with him so I gave him a home the lad don't eat much and the Lord will reward me someday If only I had that money though we might live comfortable Of course it was strictly against the rules of the buildings for Halbert to share the room but even women rent collectors have hearts If you only had some proof of your claim to the money I would try to help you I said one day when the rent had been missed I had noticed the little room getting bearer and shabbier week by week and today the old man, his wife and Halbert look pinched and blue with cold and hunger Already I had secretly paid a visit to Somerset House to inspect the will of Lady Cable Knight Well, I've got my aunts married to Lyons doesn't that prove it? But the Queen she gets old of us poor people's money we've no chance against the rich we're no scholars They never learnt us nothing when I was a boy The man in a paper at that sells welks in Whitechapel knows all about it but he's no scholar neither Touched by the want of scholarship amongst his friends I put my attainments at his service and we went together to claim 500 pounds in gold labeled AA on a shelf in the Bank of England I half hoped that after the habit of his class the old man would not turn up but when I got out of the train at Broad Street our place of rendezvous I saw him waiting at the corner cleaned for the occasion in a strange old swallowtail coat that might have figured at stately court dances when George III was king On his arm he carried a coarse bag of sacking not quite cleansed from soot We attracted no small attention as we passed through the city and it was quite a relief when the classic walls of the bank hit us from the vulgar gaze though it was no smaller deal to face the clerks and explain our errant but I suppose those gentlemen are used to monetary claims of this kind and to their eternal honor be it said that they never smiled not even at the production of the sooty marriage certificate by way of establishing our claim when at last we passed out into the roar and glare of the street the bag provided for the spoil empty as before I saw the old man draw his sleeve across his eyes leaving a long sooty trail it's no good ma'am the poor have no chance against the rich I didn't even see the bag marked A.A. this time most likely the queen and those gentlemen have spent it all long ago but I thank you lady all the same and will you allow me to pay your fare for coming down to speak for me when his offer was refused he wrung my hand in silence and then turned eastwards towards his home I watched him till he disappeared in the crowd a forlorn and pathetic figure not without dignity in his strange old world garb end of chapter 19 recording by John Brandon chapter 20 of workhouse characters this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by John Brandon workhouse characters by Margaret Nevinson chapter 20 an alien no I ain't got it ma'am he says I'm a foreigner I filled up the paper same as you told me and then the gentleman called and asked for the birth certificate same as you said he would I ain't got it I says I suppose when I was born children were too common and folks too busy to go 20 miles down the hillside to crow over a baby at Carlisle Town Hall there were 15 of us all told and my father only a farm laborer if he went abroad the work state at home and he'd no time for gallivanting with 17 mouths to fill but I've got my baptism here all right my mother was a pious body and as soon as she could stand up she went to be churched and take the new stranger to be washed free of original sin in font water here's the date written on it 1837 year Queen Victoria began her most happy reign you'll believe that I suppose in a parson's handwriting stands for reason I was born before I was christened they couldn't put the cross on my forehead now could they tell my face was out in the world silly talk I calls it so now don't say no more but pay me that five shillings and give me the book with the tickets same as other ladies you've lost your domicile he says don't know what that is I says married a foreigner he says well and if I did that ain't no business of yours my lad you weren't born nor thought of and he died a four you come near this wicked world he's been dead well nigh on 50 year so he didn't cross your path to worry you couldn't talk English I says as he talked a deal better than you I understood what he says and it can't make head nor tail of your silly talk my lad so there coverture no I ain't heard of that no no naturalization either you go down and fetch up mrs. Nash she's a rare scholar she is such a one for her books and poetry perhaps she'll make sense of your long words for I can't I lived before the school boards and all the schooling I got I found out for myself sitting up in bed at night I teaching myself to read and write notice I think much of all the Larnan myself the girls can't keep a ohm together as we used and though the boys sit at the school desks a siphon until they're grown young men they seem always had a work at the end of it I says yes yes you needn't hello my lad I am not deaf though I am old and gray headed so I can't have the pension because 50 years ago I fell in love and married a steady young man who worked hard and knew how to treat his wife which AFU Englishmen don't though he was a Frenchman I tell you marriage don't matter husbands are come by a chance sort of people you go a walk in the moonlight and you kisses each other and then before you're clear in your mind you're standing at the altar and the better for worse curse a thunder and over you ah well poor Alphonse didn't live long enough to get worse and his death made me a widow indeed and though I was only 22 and plenty of men came after me I never took none of them I didn't want to know nasty bigam as troubles on the resurrection morning why should five years out of my 72 change me into a Frenchie what counts as my father and mother and my childhood by hell villain I says I'm British born a British parents on British soil I never stirred from my land and I can't speak a word of not but English so stop you silly talk my lad and then I says if my husband made me a Frenchie ain't I English again by my sons it says in the book a woman shall be saved by childbearing two of them in the navy and one of them killed and buried a telic a beer and a dozen grandsons or more a servant of Her Majesty in fern parts yes I always say Her Majesty I've been used to the queen all my life and kings don't seem right in England somehow what stumps me is that you've gone and paid a pension to that woman opposite now she's an alien and a foreigner if you like can't speak a word of English as a body can understand and she hates England always a boastant about Germany and the emperor and their army and how they'll come and smash us to pieces she married an Englishman so that makes her English heavens what rubbish why he died a few years after the wedding and she's only been here a couple of years at the most I remember them coming quite well so she's English with her German tongue in her German ways just because she belonged for a couple of years to an English corpse in the cemetery and I with my English birth and life and sons and French because of my poor alphons rotted to dust 50 years ago well England's a nice place for women a cruel stepdame to our daughters seems as if English girls I'd better get themselves born in another planet where people can behave decent like to them and not make it a crime and a sin at 70 for marrying nice young men who courted them at 18 I pray as God will send a plague of boys in the land and never a girl amongst them so that the English people shall die out by their own wickedness or have to mate only with foreigners footnote since this monologue was spoken the old lady has received her pension by the order of September 1911 20 years of widowhood cleanse from alien pollution end of chapter 20 recording by John Brandon chapter 21 of workhouse characters this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by John Brandon workhouse characters by Margaret Nevenson chapter 21 widows indeed Mrs. Woods had just returned from her search after work worn and weary after a day of walking and waiting about on an empty stomach the educational committee of White Lime had informed her that they had decided to take no deserted wives as school scrubbers only widows need apply outside she heard the voices of her children at play in the fog and mist and remembered with dull misery that she had neither food nor firing for them and she shuddered as she heard the language on their youthful lips she had been brought up in the godly ways of the north country farmhouse and the struggle against evil seemed too hard for her she fitted the key into the lock of her little bear room and lit the evil smelling lamp then she sank into a chair overpowered by deadly nausea strange whirligigs of light flashed before her eyes and then she collapsed on the floor in a dead faint when she came to herself she was sitting by a bright little fire in the next room and friendly neighbors were chafing her hands and pouring a potent spirit down her throat that's right my dear you're coming around nicely have another sip of gin and then a good cup of tea will put you right faint you were my dear i know and i suppose you had no luck at them board schools mrs. woods raised a weary hand to her dazed head and thought duly before she answered they asked me if i was a widow and what i said my husband had deserted me over a month ago they said is they were sorry they could not give me any work they were keeping it for the widows of the borough yes i heard that from mrs. james but why didn't you have the sense to say as you were a widow i never thought of that i'm a truthful woman i am can't afford to be truthful if you are a deserted woman men on boards and committees don't like the breed think she did something to drive the old man away but widows moves the artist arts what you want is a crepe fall and mrs. lee's black bordered anchorchief you'll have to get work my dear all the pack will be loose on you soon school board visitors and sanitaries and cruelty men to say as your children have not enough food there there don't upset her again we'll fix you up all right my dear only you must remember mrs. woods that you are young and ignorant and must be guided by them as knows the world said mrs. lee a shrewd idol dame of great wisdom and experience who like some of the curies in britney was consulted by all her friends and neighbors in all problems spiritual and temporal first of all my dear you must get out of this you're getting too well known in this locality go into london street right across the eye road i have a daughter that can give you a room and there you become a widow mrs. spence just buried them in sheffield you're from yorkshire i reckon mrs. woods knotted you talk queer just like my old man did so that'll sound true you take your children from nightingale lane and you send them to that big board school by the docks my muriel knows the name and you enters them as spence not woods mind you tells them they are spent then you start a new life there are cleaners wanted in that idiot school just built by white lime church it i'll be a reference if you want one i'll lend you my crepe fall and i'll wash my blackboard at anchorchief which has mourned a four boards and committees for the last ten years or more mind you use it right and sniff into it when they ask too many questions and be sure and rub it in as how you've buried them in sheffield i've heard all the women talking at the laundries out there refusing work to deserted wives says as the council don't want to make it easy for husbands to dump families on the rates good god as if a man eat a body and soul with a fancy for another woman stops to think of his family and where they will get dumped well i mustn't grumble lee was a good man to me and i miss him sad but there is my gladness the prettiest of the bunch the flower of the flock as her dad used to call her left within three year of her wedding by her husband who was the maddest and silliest lover i ever seen till she said yes to him though dad and i always told her he was no good no my dear i'm afraid as it isn't the truth but if folks play us such dirty tricks we must be even with them think of your little ome and your little kitties and rouse yourself for their sakes you are a strong and arty woman when you stop crying for him and get some vitals into you and you don't want the board to get at him and take him away protecting them against you and sending them to that great Bastille don't give way dearie i'll come with you tomorrow and i'd better be your mother-in-law folks know me round here and now me and the old dad add 15 of them and a daughter-in-law more or less won't matter don't give way i tell you give us another cup of tea mrs haze the next morning a deep crepe veiled mrs spence propped up by an equally funerial mrs lee the blackboarder tankerchief much in evidence sought and obtained work at the new lcc school for the mentally defective and the terrors of the workhouse the poor law schools or even prison were temporarily averted end of chapter 21 recording by john brandon chapter 22 of workhouse characters this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by john brandon workhouse characters by margaret nevinson chapter 22 the runaway he sat alone in a corner of the playing field a white-faced child of the slums in a dumb agony of loneliness and despair he was frightened and appalled at the wide stretches of green woodland around and the great dome of the blue sky above it made him feel smaller and more deserted than ever and his head was sore with homesickness for his mother and mable the sister next to him and the baby his special charge for whose warm weight his little arms ached with longing he had always been his mother's special help he had minded the younger ones when she got a job at washing or charring and helped her to sew sacks with little fingers quickly grown deft with practice they had been very happy even though food was often short and spent many pleasant hours among the graves of their chore-chart playgrounds or sitting on the tower wharf watching the river and the big ships the nightmare of his short life had been a man called daddy who came back when they were all asleep smelling strong and queer and then there would be furious words and the dull thuds of blows falling on his mother's slender body and he would throw himself screaming to protect his beloved against the wild beast that was attacking her once in the fray his arm had got broken and he had seen as in an evil dream a dreaded cop enter the room and daddy had been hailed to prison after which there was a long peace and joy in the little home then the man came out and the quarrels were worse than ever till a kindly neighbor took Percy to sleep on a rag bed with her other children out of the way of daddy who had conceived a violent hatred against his first born then one day daddy was brought home straight and stiff on a stretcher there had been a drunken row at the pig and whistle and daddy had fallen backwards on the pavement and died of a fractured skull an inquest was held and much more interest was shown in daddy's dead body than any one had evinced in his living one a coroner and a doctor and 12 jury men sat gravely on the corpse and decided he had died an accidental death then there was a funeral and a long drive in a carriage with much crepe and black about and daddy was left in a deep yellow hole with muddy water at the bottom and peace came again to the widow and orphans peace but starvation but the mother's wage did not suffice to buy bread for them all the rent got behind and finally with many tears and much pressure from various black coated men who seemed always worrying at the door he and Mabel had been taken to a big terrible place called a workhouse and after some preliminary misery at another place called a receiving home wretchedness had culminated in this strange vastness of loneliness and greenery only two days had passed but they seemed like years and he trembled lest his sentence here should be a life one and he would never see his mother again he had not killed nor robbed nor hurt anyone and he wondered with a bewilderment of seven years why men and women could be so cruel to him then he determined to run away it had not taken him long in the train if he started soon he would be home by bedtime where's london he asked a boy who was hitting a smaller one to pass the time don't know you go on a train i know but which way don't know i tell you near him stood one of the teachers but as a natural enemy the boy felt he was not to be trusted and did not ask him then the bell rang for dinner and they took their seats around the long bare tables in front of a steaming plate of stewed meat and vegetables his pulses were beating with excitement at his secret plot and the food was like sawdust in his mouth afternoon school began and he sat with the resigned boredom of his kind chanting in shrill chorus the eternal truths of the multiplication table then some other subject equally dull was started when suddenly his heart leaped to his mouth and he nearly fell off the bench with the unexpected joy of it for the teacher had brought up the intimate question of his soul which is the way to london the bloodthrobs so loud in his ears that he could scarcely hear the answer london lies south of this school room if you walked out of that window and followed your nose up the white road yonder it would take it to london other strange instruction followed how to find north and south and all about the sun and moon but he purposely refrained from attending by the act of god the position of london had been miraculously revealed to him and he clung fast to that knowledge so that his brain was burning with the effort of concentration at last the bell rang and they flocked out again into the playing field he stood alone with his great knowledge and reconorted the situation like an experienced general a high fence with barbed wire ran around the field clearly boys had run away before but on the left of the square schoolhouse he could see the shrubbery and the big locked gates by which he had been brought in with fellow prisoners two days before clearly there was no escape but by going back to the house and facing perils unspeakable so humming softly to himself he walked back through the long corridors to the entrance hall and out at the front door which was standing open but the day was hot he sneaked along like a cat under the laurel bushes the big gates were locked but further down hidden in the ivy of the wall was a small door which yielded to his push and then by the favor of the angels he stood free and ran for his life up the white road which led to London at the top of the hill he paused and panted for breath the windows of the great schoolhouse glared at him like the eyes of some evil beast and small as he was he was painfully conscious of his conspicuousness on the white highway a farmer's cart passed him and the man turned round and gazed after him curiously a motor bus thundered past in a cloud of white and again it seemed as if every head turned to watch him hot and faint and thirsty he still plotted on London with its beloved chimneys and friendly crowds would soon burst into view and his mother with her cheery what-ho Percy would be welcoming him the new shoes of the school were pinching badly he longed to take them off but funk the knots which some female person had tied that morning with damnable efficiency the sun had suddenly tumbled into a dangerous looking pool of red fire and the shadows which ran beside him had grown so gigantic he felt alarmed such terrifying phenomena were unknown in the blessed streets of London the queer night noises of the countryside had begun around him strange cherubs and cries from unseen beasts which seemed to follow and run beside him and every now and then a horned monster stuck its head over the gate and roared hungrily for its prey at length worried and hungry and terrified by the sinister darkness stealing over the landscape he threw himself down by the wayside he heard the sound of footsteps behind and braced himself to meet the knife of the murderer when a cheerful voice greeted him what hoes sunny you are out late time for little boys to be in bed please sir said the child i'm going home to mother where does your mother live in london london a but you've got a long way to go i saw bros and tore at his throat still a long way to go and darkness was coming on black inky darkness uncaught by familiar street lamps come home with me tommy and my mrs will sleep you for the night with a feeling of perfect confidence the child slipped his small fingers into the horny hand of the farm laborer and half an hour later washed and fed he was sleeping in a big bed amongst a heterogeneous collection of curly heads look here bill said the laborer's wife as she folded up the neat little garments provided by unwilling taxpayers he's running away from that their barrack school i know that said bill knocking the ashes out from his clay pipe it ain't the first time that i've met youngsters on the road and maybe it won't be the last as folks in the village have been before the beak for harboring them poor little devils end of chapter 22 recording by john brandon chapter 23 of workhouse characters this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libra vox dot work recording by john brandon workhouse characters by margaret nevenson chapter 23 a girl god helper the lady kathryn castleton lay dying in a stately bed chamber of castleton hall night and day they had sought for my lord in clubs and gambling dens and well-known haunts of vice and pleasure but they did not know of the rose grown cottage on the tems which he had taken for his latest in a marata when he told my lady the child was a girl she had given a low cry god help her and had turned her face to the wall great obstetricians summoned by telephone had sped in flying motors from town and they stood baffled and helpless by the bedside of the young woman who lay so still and indifferent making no effort to live in the library the family lawyer and the white-haired admiral her father sat signing checks for the great specialist who had done so little and charged so much when they had gone the admiral who loved his daughter swore long and vigorously with the gorgeous powers of the seafaring man and the lawyer listened with fascinated approval i told her what her life would be with a loose living scoundrel like castleton but she would not listen madly in love with him and his handsome face and now he has killed her at twenty two i had a very distressing interview with lady kathryn a few weeks ago she went away in disgust and despair when i had to tell her that i did not think she had sufficient evidence for a divorce and that she must prove cruelty or desertion as well as adultery damn shameful law sir can't think how the country puts up with it but she shall be safe from him if she lives my poor little girl then they were silent with the shadow of death crept nearer outside the bar gates at the end of the village in castleton union another girl lay dying the local practitioner had been called in on his way back from consultation with the great gynecologist and as at the hall so in the workhouse he found his patients sinking she came in late last night sir said the nurse and the child was born almost immediately her pulse is very weak and i can't rouse her she won't even look at the child i hear it is jenny appleton the carpenter's daughter at kingsford very respectable people how did she get here usual thing got into trouble at her situation in london the man promised to marry her but he kept putting it off and then one day he disappeared and wrote to her from glasco saying that he was a married man she came back home but her father drove her out with blows and curses and she walked here from kingsford goodness knows how it is a sad case and the relieving officer tells me she will probably not be able to get any affiliation order enforced as the man has evaded liability by going to scotland abominable said the doctor then he went towards the bedside of his patient shelter pulse glanced at the temperature chart and his face grew grave taking the babe from the cradle he laid it beside the mother you have a pretty little girl the eyelids flickered and as the countess had spoken so spoke the pauper god help her he will said the doctor who was a religious man he didn't help me he let me come to this and i was born respectable she is only a little come by chance made cheer up my lass my wife will help you she knows it has not been your fault the doctor gave a few directions and then left looking puzzled and worried he was a good aquature and hated to lose a case what was the matter with the women that they seem to have lost the will to live three days later in the glory of the may sunshine there was a double funeral in castleton churchyard end of chapter 23 recording by john brandon chapter 24 of workhouse characters this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libra vox.org recording by john brandon workhouse characters by margaret nevinson chapter 24 on the permanent list 1905 now also when i am old and gray-headed oh god forsake me not spend but a few days in the police court says juvenile and then call yourself an unhappy man if you dare and he sat on a board of guardians he would doubtless have included that also as a school of personal contentment all sorts of griefs and tragedies are brought up before us some of them abnormal and even in horror some of them so common that we seem to hear them unmoved an honest man who cannot find employment women with unborn babes kicked starved and deserted children neglected or tortured poor human beings marred in the making the crippled the diseased the defective physically and mentally too often the pitiful scapegoats for the sins of the race all these things seem too terrible for words or tears it is the cheeriness and humor of the poor their pluck and endurance their kindness and generosity one to another that bring a lump to the throat and a dimness to the eyes we are a very careful board and pride ourselves on the strict way in which we administer our small amount of out relief to get it at all one must be as an applicant observed a little higher than an angel and so it is the very aristocracy of labor that files past us this morning men and women against whom even the charity organization society could find no fault a brave old army seventy and eighty odd years of age some of them bent and crippled with rheumatism and weight of years short of breath asthmatic hard of hearing but plucky to the last always in terror of looking too ill or too old and being forced into the workhouse a few like moses do not suffer the usual stigmata of age their eyes not dim nor their natural force abated how do you keep so young said our chairman half enviously to an applicant eighty years of age but upright still with thick hair and untinged with gray i live and does it sir replied the old man as he took his food tickets for the week amounting to three shillings one and three quarter pence one old lady of eighty two runs a private school and in spite of the competition of free education and palatial school buildings she has six pupils whose parents value individual attention and manners at six pins per head a week she is fully qualified and certificated and is a person of strong views and much force of character and not only whole salamans opinions upon corporal punishment in theory but still puts them into practice i wonder which of us would have the conviction and energy to cane boys at eighty two we are a very clean board and every half year the relieving officer brings a report as to the condition of the homes but some of the old people are so withered and shrunken and their span of remaining life is so short that there seems little left both of time and space in which dirt can collect and i always hope death will free them before they are brought into the bleak cleanliness of the house lately in the workhouse one old man took such an affectionate leave of me that i asked him if he felt ill not yet mom but i have got to have a bath tonight and the last one i took turned me so queer i was laid up ten weeks in the infirmary it does you know our mom very likely i've heard say as the gentry is born and bred to it but when they start to bathe in of us poor people for the first time at eighty in them great long coffins full of water no wonder aromatics comes on worse than ever and then mom you forget as you ladies and gentlemen have a drop of something hot to keep the cold out afterwards and i don't blame you for it but that we never gets on the whole the old ladies keep themselves wonderfully clean and smart and the cheap drapery stores in the vicinity of the workhouse do a great trade twice a year in violets and rose buds at one and three quarter pence a dozen for the adornment of bonnets feminine instinct is not atrophied by age and the applicants know the value of good appearance before the gentleman the old men are not so clever and when deprived of the ministrations of a wife they seem to have no idea of mackling for themselves and to often lapse into a fatal condition of dirt and hugger mugger sometimes the reports are brought by daughters nieces or neighbors or sometimes only the landlady that abused class showing often much christian charity and generosity some of the old people have led such blameless lives that members of the c os offered to take them up and save them from the poor law a privilege they do not always fully appreciate no thank you sir i don't want to go there i've heard of the charity organization and the questions as they ask mrs smith told me they sifted and sifted her case and gave her nothing in the end i'd rather have a few rapents from you sir but you'll be a pauper said one of the guardians in a sepulchral voice of horror oh i don't mind that a bit sir my mother was left to widow and on the parish at 40 i'm 67 and i'd work if i could but they turned me off at the laundry because the romantics has stiffened up my fingers i can't wash anymore and i don't see why i shouldn't come on the parish now having no vote and being accustomed to be classed in the category of lunatics criminals and idiots no wonder the term pauper conveys little opprobrium to women bother the house says another spirit at all laundress who complains that a parcel of girls are preferred before her i'm too young to come in here i'm only 70 and i'll wait till i'm 80 one poor old man has his relief stopped because his wife is reported as a drinking woman though he is told he may still draw the money if his wife enters the house thank you sir my wife does not come into the workhouse she has a glass sometimes but she is never the worst for liquor and she has been a good wife to me spiteful gossip sir good morning and he walks out an honorable and loyal gentleman fallen on evil days sometimes cold and starvation is worse than they thought and they do come in sometimes they die the body of an old man was lately fished out of the pond and at the inquest it was stated that he had lost his employment after 30 years at one place the firm had changed hands and the new manager had told him brutally he wanted no old iron about at 75 one is a drag in the labor market and the poor old fellow feeling acutely that he would only be a burden on his son's and his daughter's asked neither for out relief nor indoor relief but stood his mates a drink with his last chilling and took the old roman method however light seems dawning through the darkness and i think many poor law guardians will rest better in their beds knowing that old age pensions seem to have come into the sphere of practical politics end of chapter 24 recording by john brandon