Dickens's England (12 page)

Henry Mayhew,
London Labour and the London Poor
(2 vols 1851–2;

4 vols 1861–2)

A LIKELY GIRL

A former brothel madam:

‘Every woman who has an eye to business is constantly on the lookout for likely girls. Pretty girls who are poor, and who have either no parents or are away from home, are easiest picked up. How is it done? You or your decoy find a likely girl, and then you track her down. I remember I once went a hundred miles and more to pick up a girl. I took a lodging close to the board school, where I could see the girls go backwards and forwards every day. I soon saw one that suited my fancy. She was a girl of about thirteen, tall and forward for her age, pretty and likely to bring business. I found out she lived with her mother. I engaged her to be my little maid at the lodgings where I was staying. The very next day I took her off with me to London and her mother never saw her again. What became of her? A gentleman paid me £13 for the first of her, soon after she came to town. She was asleep when he did it – sound asleep. To tell the truth, she was drugged. It is often done . . . with laudanum . . . Next morning she cries a great deal from pain, but she is 'mazed, and hardly knows what has happened except that she can hardly move from pain. Of course we tell her it is all right; all girls have to go through it some time, that she is through it now without knowing it, and that it is no use crying. It will never be undone for all the crying in the world. She must now do as the others do. She can live like a lady, do as she pleases, have the best of all that is going, and enjoy herself all day. If she objects, I scold her and tell her she has lost her character, no one will take her in; I will have to turn her out on the streets as a bad and ungrateful girl . . . In a week she is one of the attractions of the house.'

[Stead's scandalous articles helped Josephine Butler's campaigns against brothels and for the raising of the age of consent.]

W.T. Stead, ‘The Maiden Tribute to Modern Babylon',
Pall Mall Gazette
(6 July 1885)

THE OLDEST PROFESSION

A.J. Munby meets a girl formerly known as a maid-of-all-work:

‘I met her in Regent Street arrayed in gorgeous apparel. How is this? said I. Why, she had got tired of service, wanted to see life and be independent; and so she had become a prostitute, of her own accord and without being seduced. She saw no harm in it: enjoyed it very much, thought it might raise her and perhaps be profitable. She had taken it up as a profession, and that with much energy: she had read books, and was taking lessons in writing and other accomplishments, in order to fit herself to be a companion of gentlemen. And her manners were improved – she was no longer vulgar: her dress was handsome and good.'

Derek Hudson,
Munby, Man of Two Worlds
(1974)

‘THE RUINED MAID'

‘O 'Melia, my dear, this does everything crown!

Who could have supposed I should meet you in Town?

And whence such fair garments, such prosperi -ty?' –'

O didn't you know I'd been ruined?' said she.

‘You left us in tatters, without shoes or socks,

Tired of digging potatoes, and spudding up docks;

And now you've gay bracelets and bright feathers three!' –

‘Yes: that's how we dress when we're ruined,' said she.

‘At home in the barton [farmyard, cattle-shed] you said “thee” and “thou”,

And “thik oon”, and “theäs oon”, and “t'other”; but now

Your talking quite fits 'ee for high compa -ny!' –

'Some polish is gained with one's ruin,' said she. . . .

‘I wish I had feathers, a fine sweeping gown,

And a delicate face, and could strut about Town!' –

‘My dear – a raw country girl, such as you be,

Cannot quite expect that. You ain't ruined,' said she.

Thomas Hardy (1866)

THE DINING ANIMAL

(II)

An unemployed fifteen-year-old girl:

She said, ‘I buy things to eat; I can't eat what mother gives us. She is poor, and works very hard; she'd give us more, but she can't; so I buy foods, and give the others what mother gives me; they don't know no better – if mother's there, I eat some; sometimes we have only gruel and salt; if we have a fire we toast the bread, but I can't eat it if I'm not dreadfully hungry.' ‘What do you like?' ‘Pies and sausage-rolls,' said the girl, smacking her lips and laughing. ‘Oh! my eye, ain't they prime – oh!' ‘That's what you went gay [prostitute] for?' ‘I'm not gay,' said she sulkily. ‘Well, what do you let men f— you for? Sausage rolls?' ‘Yes, meat-pies and pastry too.'

Anon,
My Secret Life;
in Steven Marcus,
The Other Victorians
(1966)

‘And what is the spirit of the Age?' asked Coningsby.

‘The Spirit of Utility,' said Lord Everingham.

Benjamin Disraeli,
Coningsby
(1844)

J
eremy Bentham's principle of Utilitarianism – the idea of the supremacy of ‘the greatest good of the greatest number' – was indeed probably the driving force in Victorian society. Individual ‘happiness' had to be subordinated to the ‘happiness' (usually understood in rather material terms) of the majority; discriminating between, and ensuring, happinesses led inevitably to an interventionist, even authoritarian approach, subordinating individual liberty to social efficiency. As a force for social reform it influenced developments in both education and the churches.

The early part of the century showed little of an educational system: a few ‘public' schools, dame schools, a scattering of private, voluntary schools and governesses. Increasingly important were the Sunday schools, providing evangelistic-toned religious and limited literacy instruction, and induction into behaviour acceptable to future employers. There was apprehension at the risks of educating the poor, but evangelical and utilitarian principles together brought recognition of the benefits of a more skilled, socially-integrated workforce. Factory Acts compelled limited education for working children; for the very poor, there were the aptly-named, very basic ‘Ragged Schools'; ambitious parents seeking ‘useful learning' (a very Utilitarian concept, applicable at all levels) paid modest fees to voluntary day-schools. Between 1851, when fewer than half the school-age children attended school, and 1870, when compulsory education for all under-tens was introduced, rates of illiteracy dropped sharply (31 per cent of males and 45 per cent of females, to 19 per cent and 26 per cent).

For the aristocracy and gentry, the public schools provided training in the classics, and in gentlemanly manners and principles; from the 1840s on, more came on-stream, training the sons of the professional and aspirant business classes: by the mid-1860s there were some 7,500 boarders in 34 public schools. There were also more governesses and day or boarding schools for girls, and in 1847 the Queen's College for Young Ladies opened in London, while in the 1870s Cambridge and then Oxford introduced their first women's colleges. The universities, though by the 1870s giving more attention to the sciences, were more concerned with the classics, theology and encouraging class bonding; in an address at St Andrew's in 1867, J.S. Mill claimed, ‘Youths come to the Scottish universities, and are there taught. The majority of those who come to the English universities come still more ignorant, and ignorant they go away.' Not until 1871 could college fellows marry and religious tests (for membership of the Anglican church) be discontinued. It was for the new London University to be of educational use.

‘I call this gross, steam-engine Utilitarianism an approach towards new Faith,' thundered Carlyle. Certainly there was a ‘crisis of faith' produced by the whole cultural system. The early years of the century saw the Anglican church – associated with the existing social order, the upper classes and gentry, and neglectful particularly of the growth of the urban working classes – struggling against the Dissenting churches, such as Baptists and Methodists, and the Evangelical Revival, that emphasised the subjective experience of conversion, Bible-reading, preaching, and an active, ‘do-gooding' laity. By the middle of the century, Roman Catholic numbers also increased (chiefly due to Irish immigration) and there were important defections by distinguished Anglicans such as John Henry Newman and Henry Manning, which all helped provoke anti-Popery anxieties. The Anglican church itself was divided, between the Low Church, evangelical party, the Catholic-sympathetic High Church, and the liberal Broad Church. A famous Sunday census in 1851 showed less than half the population attending church at all, of whom barely half were Anglican (and few of those from the lower orders). Considerable efforts at reform were made, improving organisation, finances and stipends, and building and renovating hundreds of churches. The third quarter of the century saw a vigorous Revivalist movement, with American involvement, and hymn-singing becoming more important and popular (
Hymns Ancient and Modern
first appeared in 1861, and sold 3,000 copies each week for thirty-five years).

Nevertheless, two deadly, intellectual forces threatened faith. One was the development of scholarly analysis of Biblical texts, seriously questioning their authenticity, historicity and coherence. The other was the growth of science, especially geology, biology and archaeology, which seriously undermined Biblical accounts of creation and history. Most significant was, of course, Charles Darwin's
The Origin of Species
(1859), followed by the populariser T.H. Huxley (‘Darwin's bulldog'), and Herbert Spencer's development of evolutionism into social analysis and theories of remorseless ‘progress' and, in Spencer's phrase, ‘the survival of the fittest' (i.e., in social terms, ‘might is right'). Despite desperate rear-guard activity, scepticism spread widely, helping in the disabling of faith generally, and of the Church in particular; increasingly, the Church seemed a hollow social form.

Good God, what nonsense! As if anyone inquired what an English parson believed nowadays, so long as he performs all the usual antics decently.

Mrs Humphrey Ward,
Robert Elsmere
(1888)

* * *

FROM ‘ROYAL EDUCATION'

[On the Duke of Cumberland being voted £6,000 a year for the education of his son.]

I am a babe of Royalty;

Queen Charlotte was my grannam,

And Parliament has voted me

Six thousand pounds per annum,

To teach me how to read and write,

To teach me elocution,

To teach me how to feast and fight

For the King and Constitution,

As a well-taught Prince should do,

Who is taught by contribution. . . .

And when my coach and six shall jog,

With horns, hussars and banners,

To some gaunt German pedagogue,

Who teaches Greek and manners,

How very ready I shall be

To show that I'm fit for ruling,

By gaming and by gallantry,

And other kinds of fooling,

Which a well-taught Prince should learn,

Who costs so much in schooling. . . .

Winthrop Mackworth Praed, in the
Morning Chronicle
(1825)

A RAGGED SCHOOL

Among other institutions for the improvement of the juvenile poor, Ragged Schools rank deservedly high. That known as the Field Lane Ragged School has been established some years, in an extremely low neighbourhood in London. . . . We had the good fortune to pass an hour one evening in company with the Schoolmaster . . . It was on a week-night, and there were about 100 boys present. Some were very little fellows, with scarcely clothes sufficient to keep them warm; others were tolerably well clad. All the boys were engaged during the day in some kind of work, in the neighbourhood or not far away. . . . One Master teaches the whole; and he not only knows the names and faces of the regular attendants, but can detect the truants very readily. . . . They all work, however, and in school, though the discipline is mild, they are not idle. One group is arranged on one side of the spacious, warm and well-lighted room with slates in hand, engaged in attempts at writing. They sit and chat very agreeably together, as if they were under no severe restraint. When, however, any one raises his voice needlessly high, so as to distract the attention of the class, the eye of the Master is immediately upon him, and a mild but firm rebuke at once silences the delinquent. A large number of the boys write in Darnell's copybooks, than which none can be better or cheaper. . . .

Hitherto we have been speaking of the Evening School. . . . The Day Schools, for boys and girls, present, perhaps, the most interesting feature of the establishment. The large room . . . is then generally occupied by about 300 or 350 of the most ragged and destitute children in London. Much skill is required in handling such a mass of degraded humanity. Skilful teachers have altogether failed in the attempt to conduct some of the classes into which the whole are divided. Mr Fraser never seems to fail. He picks out from the scholars some of the elder ones to act as monitors; and, with the aid of female teachers for the girls, he manages to get on very comfortably. . . . Need we say, that the boys and girls we saw there were mostly
very
ragged? A small knot of the girls were engaged in a corner at needlework. The girls were ranged on the left-hand side of the room, and the boys on the right and up the middle. Good order prevailed. There were, perhaps, 350 children present, many without shoes and stockings. Some of them can read and write well, particular attention being paid to those essential branches of education. Others were no mean proficients in arithmetic, considering their opportunities. The Master had a collection of twenty or thirty tops, balls, &c., &c., which the boys had found, and brought to the school to play with: these were scrambled for after school time.