,■: ^Ik 
 
 WKm 
 
 ^J^•^
 
 LIE) RARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N I VERS ITY 
 
 or 1 LLI NOIS
 
 WORKHOUSES 
 
 WOMEN'S WORK. 
 
 BEPEINTED FBOM 
 
 %\t €\uxt\ d ^nglnnb Itoittljlg "^thitk 
 
 ALSO, 
 
 A PAPER 
 
 ON THE CONDITION OF WORKHOUSES, 
 
 READ IN THE SOCIAL ECONOMY DEPARTMENT OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION 
 FOR THE PROMOTION OF SOCIAL SCIENCE, AT BIRMINGHAM, 
 OCTOBER, 1857. 
 
 " If any lady, either in town or country, with charitable instincts, witli a vague desire after good 
 will look round in search of some practical starting point, let her turn her eyes towards the Union 
 Workhouse, and begin her ministrations there." — North British Review, February, 1867. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 LONGMAN, BEOWN, GEEEN, LONGMANS, & EOBEETS. 
 
 1858. 
 
 Price Sixpence.
 
 J. & W. IliDEU, Printers, 14, Bartholomew Close, London.
 
 WORKHOUSES AND WOMEN'S WORK. 
 
 Sunshine in the Workhouse. By Mrs. G. W. Sheppard. Lon- 
 don: Nisbet. 
 
 MetrojJolitan Workhouses and their Inmates. London : Longman. 
 
 Report on the Accommodation in St. Pancras Workhouse. By 
 Henry Bence Jones, M.D., F.R.S. Presented to both 
 Houses of Parliament by command of Her Majesty. 
 
 The Communion of Lahour. By Mrs. Jameson. London : 
 Longman. 
 
 The Institution of Kaiserswerth on the Rhine, for the Practical 
 Training of Deaconesses. (Not Published.) 
 
 Two Letters oti Girls' Schools, and on the Training of Working 
 Women. By Mrs. Austin. London: Chapman and Hall. 
 
 TWENTY-THREE years ago the Old Poor Law was super- 
 seded by "An Act for the Amendment and better Adminis- 
 tration of the Laws relating to the Poor in England and Wales," 
 and people in general are satisfied with the great advantages that 
 have been gained by the exchange. The abuses of the former 
 system had become so glaring, that some alteration seemed to be 
 urgently called for, if the poor of this country were not to become 
 pauperized. To such an extent was relief afforded, that the able- 
 bodied labourer was in the habit of applying for it to eke out his 
 weekly wages ; and should they fail altogether, he was encouraged 
 to enter the workhouse, where we are told that he fed upon 
 the fat of the hind and indulged in luxurious idleness. It is
 
 4 Workhouses and Wameit's Work. 
 
 stated on the authority of an assistant poor-law commissioner, 
 writing at the time of the change,* — 
 
 " The English pauper is better fed than the independent labourer; 
 the suspected thief receives in gaol considerably more food than the 
 pauper ; the convicted thief receives still more ; and the transported 
 felon receives every day very nearly three times as much food as the 
 honest, independent peasant. The Kentish pauper has what are called 
 three meat days a week, in many cases four, and in some five ; his 
 bread is many degrees better than that given to our soldiers; he has 
 vegetables at discretion; and especially in the larger workhouses it is 
 declared with great pride ' that there is no stinting,' but that ' we gives 
 'em as much victuals as ever they can eat.' " 
 
 Of course they lived better than many of the ratepayers. The 
 description of the old poor-law system is concluded with these 
 words : — 
 
 " As a national jest-book, the history of our parishes and the con- 
 tents of their ledgers stand, we must confess, unrivalled; but when we 
 reflect that the sum total of this expenditure has annually exceeded 
 seven millions, that the poor rates of any country are the symbol of 
 its improvidence, and the sure signal of its distress, we must also 
 admit that there exists in the history of our kingdom nothing more 
 sorrowful, more discreditable, than our late poor-law system." 
 
 It will hardly be suspected that we are lamenting the close of 
 such a state of things, or advocating in any respect a return to 
 it. Nothing that we are at present about to suggest as a remedy 
 or a reform was attempted under the former routine, or is incom- 
 patible with the present one. 
 
 It was no wonder that such a system came to an end, and that 
 its gross injustice, as well as its injurious tendency, loudly de- 
 manded an alteration. An amendment was accordingly made, 
 and has been the law in England sufficiently long for its results 
 to be examined and fairly judged at the present day. When 
 flagrant abuses are found to exist, it is hardly to be wondered 
 at that a somewhat violent reaction frequently takes place in 
 redressing them; and if over-indulgence was the fault of the 
 old poor law, it can hardly be denied that harshness has been 
 the characteristic of the new one. We have no doubt that it 
 was originally framed with all due caution and deliberation, and 
 that in the main its rules have worked beneficially for the 
 country. But of late years a suspicion has begun to arise, that 
 along with great benefits there exist also many evils which 
 demand attention and remedy ; evils, perhaps, not inherent in the 
 system itself, but which have developed themselves and grown 
 up around it in the course of years ; unforeseen at the beginning, 
 
 * Sir F. B. Head — Essays Contributed to the Quarterly Review : see " English 
 Charity."
 
 Workhouses and Womms Work. 5 
 
 and hardly then admitting of a remedy, but becoming apparent 
 in the progress of events and of experience. 
 
 To these evils and their proposed remedies it is now our task 
 to direct the attention of our readers, referring them to the pub- 
 lications at the head of this article for fuller information upon 
 the subject of the management of our dependent poor, — a sub- 
 ject strangely neglected by the public till a very recent period, 
 considering that the well-being of more than 600,000 of our 
 fellow- creatures is involved in tbe management of the workhouses 
 of England. 
 
 The existence of a poor law, or a national provision for the 
 poor, has been an established fact in England ever since the 
 reign of Queen Elizabeth. It was called into existence when 
 the system of providing for the helpless poor was done away 
 with by the abolition of the monastic institutions of the countrv. 
 Other countries have continued to manage their poor without the 
 aid of a law, and we beheve there are some persons who think 
 these plans are preferable to our own, and hold out less en- 
 couragement to pauperism. They believe that such a state is 
 not a necessary and unavoidable one, but the invariable con- 
 sequence of improvidence and \ice, and that with regard to these 
 undesirable quahties our country is pre-eminent amongst the 
 nations of Europe. This fact is taken as a proof that the 
 existence of a poor law does not work favourably on the 
 national character, but tends to lower its independence and 
 energy. How far this is in reality the case we are not prepared 
 to say. The poor law is at all events an acknowledged necessity 
 in England, and without it we should find ourselves in a state of 
 great pei^plexity at the present day. We will assume it to have 
 been originally established for the relief of what we may call 
 unavoidable misfortune, and as long as every class of society 
 occasionally claims the assistance of its more fortunate members, 
 the lowest class alone is not to be blamed for requiring aid. In 
 our large and overcrowded towns especially, the numerous causes 
 wliich produce loss of health, and the temporary or permanent 
 failure of wages from that and other causes, may surely account 
 for a large proportion of misery which may be called unavoidable; 
 and if so, we can hardly deny that it is the duty of a Christian 
 state to provide help for it. That prudence and foresight are to 
 be encouraged by every means in our power (especially by the 
 more careful education of the young of both sexes) cannot be 
 denied ; but to wait till such a consummation is attained, which 
 would result in the absence of all poverty requiring the sys- 
 tematic help of the more fortunate classes, were as hopeless as 
 to wait for the day when sanitary measures and the progress of 
 medical science for the prevention of disease should render the 
 erection of hospitals unnecessary, and as unreasonable as to 
 
 B 2
 
 G Workhouses and Woinens ]Vork. 
 
 expect that the increase of reformatories should enable ns to 
 close our prisons. To mark the exact line of avoidable and 
 unavoidable poverty will ever remain an impossibility ; the 
 utmost we can hope to do is to approach towards it, and by a 
 vigilant supervision of those who are relieved, discourage as 
 much as possible the idle and undeserving. Such an attempt 
 seems hardly to have been made under the old system, and it is 
 not surprising that the inti'oduction of changes and the sup- 
 pression of many abuses should have been hailed with unmixed 
 satisfaction, and for a time all defects in the new system were 
 overlooked. Some of the administrators of the old regime of 
 course looked coldly upon innovations of any kind, but the 
 change was generally welcomed as the means of ridding the 
 country of a great and ever-increasing burden. 
 
 We will now proceed to make some remarks upon the different 
 classes of misfortune, for the relief of which tlie poor law is 
 intended, and which are supposed to have a right to claim its 
 assistance. We hope to be able to shew that there is a class of 
 deserving poor who are entitled to a better treatment than 
 they at j)resent receive in the administration of our public 
 charity ; and also, that a more efficient and discriminating 
 management would not tend to increase, but rather to diminish, 
 pauperism. 
 
 With regard to the persons for whom the provision of a home 
 in the workhouse is afforded, we may quote the words of Mrs. 
 Jameson, in her book on the Communion of Labour. She says, 
 " The purpose of a workhouse is to be a refuge to the homeless, 
 houseless, helpless poor ; to night-wanderers ; to orphan children ; 
 to the lame and blind ; to the aged, who here lie down on their 
 last bed to die. The number of inmates varies in diflferent 
 parishes at different seasons, from 400 to 1,000. In the great 
 London unions it is generally from 1,500 to 2,000."* Assuming- 
 then that all these are not impostors or otherwise undeserving 
 of compassion and help, we will briefly consider what is their 
 present general condition, and what measures are taken for 
 their welfare. 
 
 In the first place, whatever the management of workhouses 
 may be, it is stated to be a fact, that they are less comfortable 
 than prisons, and that the latter are preferred as places of abode 
 by the lower classes. Magistrates and chaplains and visitors to 
 prisons acknowledge this to be the case. The preference is 
 
 * The following list gives the number of inmates in some of the metropolitan 
 unions on Christmas Day, 1856: — Marylebone, 1,966; St. Pancras, 1,639; 
 Lambeth, 1,056; St. George-in-tbe-East, 1,205; St. Matthew, Bethnal Green, 
 1,110 ; Whitechapel, 1,044 ; Stepney, 1,006. Others contain numbers varying 
 between 200 and 1,000. 
 
 " Of the 11,310 who thus closed their career not in their own homes, 6,552 died 
 jn workhouses."— i?p_9'Mfrar GeneraTx Report^ 1856.
 
 Workhouses and Women's Work. 7 
 
 openly avowed by men and women, especially the latter. What 
 does it matter to them if the degradation of the prison is greater 
 than the workhouse, if indeed there is much difference between 
 the two in this respect ?* The prison offei's a clean and comfort- 
 able lodging, food far superior to the usual fare of the criminal, 
 and to that of workhouses ;t kind and attentive officers of a 
 grade above those provided for the non-criminal poor. Such 
 treatment as is too commonly received even from the porter at 
 the workhouse-gate, would not be suffered in prison establish- 
 ments, which are governed by a bench of magistrates, gen- 
 tlemen by character and position, who regularly visit and 
 inspect the buildings. With them rests the appointment 
 of a governor, a gentleman of education and intelligence, 
 who has the supreme command over the establishment, and, 
 generally speaking, this important office is filled with discretion 
 and zeal. The chaplain's is an important and cojispicuous post, 
 and lady visitors have long since been permitted to visit th« 
 female inmates. 
 
 The Report of the Visiting Justices of the Westminster House 
 of Correction shews that the number of commitments from 
 that prison to workhouses in the year 1856 was 273, and to the 
 Ooldbath Fields Prison 221. With regard especially to the boys 
 
 * In fact, the difference is rather the other way. Persons going to prison, 
 and confessing that it was for the sake of obtaining i-eHef, have been asked, 
 why they did not apply for it at tlie workhouse ? They have actually replied, 
 " They did not like the disgrace of doing so." Yet they could commit an oifence 
 against the laws, and enter a prison, without feeling that they had contracted any 
 degradation ! We are strongly inclined to believe that it is the general manage- 
 ment of prisons being felt to be so superior to that of workhouses, that raises 
 them in the estimation of the lower classes, who, even the worst amoiig them, are 
 keenly alive to justice and fair treatment. One of the most refractory female 
 prisoners in a large prison told the magistrates, " she knew she should receive 
 justice from them." 
 
 The following are the salaries given respectively in prisons and workhouses : — • 
 
 Frison for 900 Fr 
 
 soners. 
 
 WorkhoKsefor 
 
 500 
 
 ar 600 Inmate-?, 
 
 
 PER 
 
 ANNUM. 
 £ 
 
 
 
 PER ANNUM. 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 Governor . 
 
 
 GOO 
 
 Master . 
 
 
 . 80 
 
 Matron 
 
 
 125 
 
 Matron . 
 
 
 . 50 
 
 Chaplain (witli residence) 
 
 
 250 
 
 Chaplain . 
 
 
 . 100 
 
 Assistant Cliaplain, ditto 
 
 
 180 
 
 Surgeon . 
 
 
 . 78 15 
 
 Surgeon 
 
 
 220 
 
 Taskmaster 
 
 
 . 25 
 
 Gate Porter 
 
 
 70 
 
 Gate Porter 
 
 
 . 25 
 
 And 45 paid officials besides. 
 
 No other paid official, 
 
 The salaries in workhouses vary considerably. Sometimes it is £80 for mas-ler 
 and matron together. We believe the highest salary given is £150 for a master. 
 A chaplain receives in some cases as little as £30. 
 
 t Whether the dietaiy is actually better or not, there is no doubt that the 
 cooking is far supfrior, owing to the better class of officers aud the more careful 
 supervision of prisons.
 
 8 Workhouses and Wome?ts Wo7k._ 
 
 and girls thus committed, the magistrates speak as follows : — 
 " Your committee cannot but believe, if more attention were paid 
 in workhouses to classification and other important arrangements 
 of a reformatory character, there would be much less necessity 
 for sending so many of the inmates to prison ; and the visiting 
 justices are strengthened in this belief from the fact of the very 
 great difference in the numbers that are sent from some of the 
 workhouses in comparison with others." They believe that " an 
 increase in the criminal population must arise from familiarizing 
 so many destitute persons with the interior of the prison;" and 
 they further suggest, " that offences against workhouse rules 
 should be punished by other means than imprisonment in a 
 criminal prison ; and that greater facilities should be offered to 
 the poor and destitute, as well as to discharged prisoners, to 
 prevent their committing offences in order to obtain an asylum." 
 Surely if there is no other argument in favour of an amended 
 administration of our workhouses, this alone would be sufficient. 
 Either our prisons for criminals must be made less comfortable 
 and attractive, or our workhouses for the non-criminal poor more 
 so. The progress from the workhouse to the prison is a very 
 easy and natural one. A girl who has lost her place and has no 
 home, enters the union, and is placed with many other women, 
 old as well as young, some of whom are far worse than herself, 
 and is put to the usual employment of oakum picking. There is 
 no one to give kindly advice or counsel to her; the matron is 
 far too busy wuth her various household occupations; the 
 chaplain confesses that she and her companions are beyond 
 his reach. Such elements thrown together can hardly do other- 
 wise than ferment, and ultimately explode. The "taskmaster" 
 is appointed to be superintendent over this department of labour, 
 and is virtually the only person who exercises any sort of 
 supervision thei'e. The treatment received from him, as may be 
 imagined, not unfrequently leads to rebellion and abusive 
 language ; then comes the " black hole," this being the authorized 
 means of punishment committed to masters of workhouses. If 
 during the confinement there riotous conduct is indulged in (even 
 singing or making noises are sometimes sufficient causes of 
 offence), an increase of punishment is resorted to by a removal 
 to prison, which, being found to be a more comfortable abode 
 than the workhouse (for the reasons above stated), it is no longer 
 an object of terror and dread, but rather of desire, to those 
 members of our youthful population who have thus made trial 
 of it. A more mischievous result than this, either from our mis- 
 placed philanthropy or impolitic harshness, can hardly be 
 imagined, yet it is one that is of constant, almost weekly, occur- 
 rence. 
 
 One of the most important branches of this subject is
 
 Workhouses and Women's Work. 9 
 
 undoubtedly the education of the children.* The sepai'ation of 
 the young from all possible contamination from those who are 
 already trained in vice is one of the imperative duties of all who 
 have the management of the poor in their hands ; and this seems 
 to be a point on which some additional legislation is called for. 
 The question has its difficulties, but they are not such as should 
 prevent the enforcing of some compulsory regulations with regard 
 to it. The chief difficulty in the case of the entire separation of 
 schools from the workhouse, seems to lie in providing for the 
 education of the children who may enter the house with their 
 parents for a short time. Yet it is as important to separate those 
 children who are undergoing a course of systematic training in 
 the schools from the children of the workhouse, as from the 
 adults. The children of low and vicious parents who may 
 enter for a temporary refuge would be a source of the greatest 
 mischief, and undo much of the influence which had in the 
 course of time been gained over the others. If there must be a 
 choice between the two, it would be better to leave the few 
 children without the regular instruction of a school, than to 
 subject numbers to the evils of an education within the work- 
 house walls, and the many injurious influences which must arise 
 from such a position. There is abundant evidence at all events 
 as to the necessity of a separation in the case of unions in large 
 towns. In Mrs. Austin's Two Letters on Girls' Schools and on 
 the Training of Working Women, a very strong opinion is 
 expressed on this point, and an interesting account given of the 
 successful working of an attempt which has been carried on i'or 
 some years in connexion with the Norwich workhouse. The 
 advocates of these schools or " homes," as they are called, have 
 had a great struggle both in establishing and maintaining them, 
 and an alteration in the law which would make such separate 
 schools compulsory, would be gladly hailed by them. Want of 
 sufficient accommodation in the workhouse led to the establishment 
 of these schools in the years 1850 and 1853, and the following 
 is an extract containing an account of them by the gentleman 
 with whom the plan originated : — f 
 
 " Many years since I was deeply impressed with the importance of 
 industrial training for the children of my poor neighbours, especially 
 for those who inhabited our workhouse. The system to which they 
 were subjected was injurious to their bodily health, deleterious to their 
 
 mental vigour, fatal to their souls' salvation Against the 
 
 cost of the home Ave must place the cost of the same children in the 
 workhouse ; from the former they invariably go to service ; we could 
 dispose of twice the number. From the latter they would never go, 
 
 * In Marcb, 1856, there were 51,586 children in the workhouses of England 
 and Wales ; of these 12,083 were orphans, 
 t Anpeiidix, p. 37.
 
 10 Workhouses and IVo/iicu's Work. 
 
 except for self-indulgence ; a vicious career of short duration, ending^ 
 in despair or in a return to the workhouse, to become perpetual or 
 thoroughly vicious paupers ; so that in the case of such a girl, the cost 
 
 of a life of pauperism must be carried to account Nor let 
 
 it be forgotten that we secure to these orphan and destitute children 
 spiritual instruction, free from the distraction of ungodly companions; 
 moral supervision, moral training and example ; a knowledge of every- 
 day duties; a comprehension of the value of well-employed hours; a 
 perception of the evil consequences of a temporary indulgence in sin; 
 the difference between a dwelling like this and the workhouse. We try 
 to make this a home, and the matron a parent. The children feel that 
 they are free agents; they learn the value of self-exertion and of an 
 earned subsistence." * 
 
 Mrs. Austin adds : — 
 
 " Mr. G. Johnson concludes with an earnest wish that the attempt to 
 rescue the children of workhouses from the contagion of bad example 
 might become more general. I am told from high authority that the 
 ratepayers almost universally resist any such attempt. This is a 
 deplorable fact, and only shews more clearly the necessity for earnest 
 endeavours to convince them that parsimony is, in such a case, the 
 worst thrift." 
 
 Such " homes" as these, containing, perhaps, not more than 
 forty girls or boys, must be far more hopeful attempts for 
 educating the destitute children of the lowest classes than the 
 large establishments now spreading in the neighbourhood of 
 London for the reception of children from the various unions, 
 and where many hundreds are congregated together in masses 
 too great to constitute in any sense a " family." f Such numbers 
 collected under one roof must be managed by a machinery exer- 
 cised by a few paid persons, who, however efficient, can ill supply 
 the place of relations and home affections. This want is indeed 
 a very difficult one to be supplied, for it must be remembered that 
 these poor children have no homes. There is for them no going 
 home for the holidays, none of the happy, joyous objects for 
 thought which fill the hearts of most children. And here, when 
 
 * Lest the plan should be objected to on the score of expense, we will subjoin a 
 statement of the comparative cost of maintenance in the Norwich homes and in 
 the workhouse, including washing and firing : — "In the latter, 2s. lOd. per week ; 
 in the boys' home, 2s, S^d., which the earnings of the boy reduce by Q^d., leaving 
 the real weekly expense Is. 6id. The earnings, however, are brought in by only 
 15 working boys out of 64 inmates, the rest being schoolboys ; so that if the 
 earnings of the 15 boys were appropriated only to themselves, they would more 
 than pay for then* maintenance. The girls' home is 2s. 9f d., a little less than the 
 workhouse. There is thus a decided direct pecuniary saving effected by the estab- 
 lishment of institutions, of which the indirect saving, even in a temporary and 
 worldly point of view, is incalculable." 
 
 t The numbers in the largest Metropolitan District Union Schools in the fii-st 
 week of January, 1856, were as follows:— Central London, 1,178 ; North Surrey, 
 667; South Metropolitan, 748 ; St. Gcorgc-in-tlic-East, 404; Whitechapel, 2,992 ; 
 Lambeth, 507 ; Stepney, 450.
 
 WorkhomeH and Women's Work. 11 
 
 judging harshly of these classes, we should do well to remember 
 the want of all the advantages which are usually considered 
 essential to the well-being of children. Such reflections would 
 go far to lessen the wonder so often expressed at the results 
 apparent in the after lives of those who have been trained in 
 circumstances so dissimilar, and at the fact that so many act as 
 if they were outcasts from that world and that society which has 
 shewn so little love to them. It is a fearful and significant fact 
 that many of the most hopeless and hardened inmates of work- 
 houses are girls who have been brought up in the pauper 
 schools.* 
 
 Mrs. Jameson mentions the case of a large parish union where 
 it was reckoned that about fifty per cent, of the girls were re- 
 turned to them ruined and depraved ; and she gives the following 
 testimony of a workhouse chaplain, Mr. Brewer : — 
 
 " The disorderly girls and boys in our streets are mainly the produce 
 of the workhouse and the woi'khouse schools. Over them society has 
 no hold, because they have been taught to feel that they have nothing 
 in common with their fellow-men. Their experience is not of a home 
 or of parents, but of a Avorkhouse and a governor — of a prison and a 
 gaoler as hard and rigid as either." — Communion of Labour, p. 113. 
 
 This was probably said of girls trained under the workhouse 
 roof, but the result of district schools is at present less satisfac- 
 tory than we should expect. 
 
 We would venture here to make the suggestion that ladies 
 should be appointed to visit and inspect the schools, as well as 
 the gentlemen appointed by the guardians and the Poor Law 
 Board, and this would be an important part of the work of ladies' 
 committees connected with workhouses. They would endeavour 
 to gain a hold on the aflPections of the children by means of a 
 personal knowledge and interest, which would not cease when 
 they left the school, but would follow them out into their respec- 
 tive situations ; and as these establishments must be homes as 
 well as schools, an infusion of some kindly and cheerful elements 
 would be most desirable. Who can tell what might be the value 
 of a friend to many of these poor friendless ones, of whom boards 
 of guardians are but too often the sole protectors ? and how 
 
 * Extract from the Rej)ort of an inspector of pauper schools for 1855 : — " I have 
 been assui*ed that the number of Kirkdale children (the district school for Liver- 
 pool) who after their discharge from the school have become inmates of the 
 Liverpool workhouse, amounts to some himdreds, and that many of these were 
 females under the most disgraceful circumstances. There were at one time, in the 
 Liverpool penitentiaiy for fallen females, eleven Kirkdale girls, out of whom it was 
 
 found necessary to dismiss fom" for bad conduct More, assuredly, is 
 
 practicable than has hitherto been accomphshed; hit it remains to he proved 
 whether any person can exercise a sufficient moral influence over so large a number 
 of girls allowed to associate together in the same huilding. As far as I know at 
 present, no girls' school appears to be morally more uusuccessfid in this district 
 than the largest."
 
 12 Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 many might it not be the means of rescuing from sin aud misery, 
 or an early return to the workhouse ? If such a result were 
 attainable, it would be wise in boards of guardians to encourage 
 rather than check a system of inspection, which women alone are 
 able and willing to undertake.* It is well known that a large 
 proportion of women prisoners have been reared in workhouses ; 
 and the master of a large union has stated that the pauper 
 schools furnish a large number of the unhappy women who are 
 abandoned to the most vicious lives. The reason is, not that 
 they are ill cared for in these schools, but that parish children are 
 generally orphans, or the children of profligate parents ; and 
 that after they are placed in service by their respective parishes, 
 they, having no person to whom they can look with affection and 
 respect, leave the places to which they have been consigned, and 
 gradually are lost among the crowd of profligates who throng our 
 streets, t 
 
 The possibility of carrjdng out an industrial system of training 
 is the great advantage of the schools on a large scale, and the 
 entire separation of the children from the associations of pau- 
 perism and from intercourse with their relations is insured. To 
 some persons this last reason has appeared to be an objection, but 
 we hardly think that it can be so considered by those who know 
 what their relations (generally speaking) are, and what an influ- 
 
 * We cannot refrain from remarking here how important it is to secure the 
 services of really superior and lady-hke women to supermtend these large establish- 
 ments ; — persons who woivld be capable of managing the household, and yet who 
 would be looked up to with respect by the teachers, male and female (who now feel 
 themselves the superiors in education), as well as by the guardians and other 
 inspectors. 
 
 t Extract from Mr. Gr. Bowyer's Heport on Fauper Schools for 1855 : — " I 
 have, ever since I have been an inspector, endeavoured to ascertain what was the 
 subsequent conduct of the children who have left the school in which they were 
 educated and trained. In some workhouses, where either the workhouse master, 
 the schoolmaster, or the chaplain happened to take an interest in the same question 
 (and these were generally well-condvicted estabhshments in regard to the education 
 and training of the cliildren), the answers I received to my questions were definite 
 and satisfactory. But, in the majority of instances, the only thing that was known 
 on the subject was, whether the childi-en returned to the workhouse or not, and 
 what situations some of them occupied." In some of the district schools it is part 
 of the chaplain's work to visit the children in their different situations for two 
 years after they leave. We cannot help thinking that this is a portion of the work 
 which might well be performed by women. Why should not ladies in each parish 
 of the union be appointed to visit the gu'ls, and keep up a friendly intercourse with 
 them, which surely could be done by them as efficiently as by the chaplain, whose 
 time must be fuUy occupied in the schools ? Many of the boys sent out from 
 district schools are said to be doing very well in Australia, in good situations. A 
 proposal has been made to receive the boys and girls from these schools into our 
 colonies, where thousands of them would be gladly employed. It would be a more 
 hopeful experiment than that lately tried of sending out grown-up girls from our 
 unions, after they have afready been a considerable expense to their parishes, and 
 have, many of them, acquii-ed a sad experience of vice. The complete industrial 
 training given to both boys and girls in these schools would fit them admirably lor 
 life in the colonies, and it would surely be a wise policy to adopt such a measure.
 
 Workhouses and Women's Work. 13 
 
 ence for evil they possess over the children. The occasional visits 
 that they receive from their parents when in separate schools, 
 must he veiT different from frequent association with persons who 
 are living in the workhouse, the effects of which cannot be other- 
 wise than evil. The ojjportunities of industrial training in a 
 workhouse schools are also small ; the cooking, washing, &c., for 
 the children being performed in the "house." The cleaning of 
 the schools is, therefore, almost the only part of industrial work 
 that is left to be done by the girls. There are some instances 
 where the children living in the workhouse are sent out to the 
 national schools, and the plan is said to work well; but here 
 again there must be the disadvantages of a home in the workhouse, 
 and, except in a few well-managed instances, the effect of this 
 must be injurious. These poor children, notwithstanding their 
 many disadvantages both of mind and body, are not insensible to 
 kindly influences, and, generally speaking, from their weakly 
 constitutions require tender treatment. In visiting one of the 
 largest of these establishments lately, we were told some touching 
 anecdotes of these unfortunate little ones. In the infirmary were 
 several in bed, victims of sad disease and neglect ; one of them, 
 almost at the close of his short life, begged for a bit of the 
 superintendent's dinner, and added, " Please, sir, let me have it 
 on your plate !" The sight of a different and a coloured plate 
 was something that this poor child felt to be a pleasure, and it 
 spoke to us strongly in favour of humanizing and kindly in- 
 fluences over even the outcasts of society. We hardly think that 
 any sermon could be preached which would so eloquently plead 
 the cause of labouring for the welfare and the elevation of the 
 lowest classes, both physically, morally, and spiritually, as a visit 
 to these homes of pauper children. Their ill-grown bodies, low 
 and debased countenances, weak eyes, and all the other various 
 signs of disease, the dulness of many, almost approacliing to 
 idiocy, speak but too plainly of the condition of those masses of 
 our population from which they have sprung, — of the homes unfit 
 for human habitation, of the drunken habits, induced probably 
 by the state of those homes, and of all the sin and misery of the 
 parents which are thus entailed upon a new generation, and which 
 years of training and wholesome li^ang are unable wholly to 
 eradicate. 
 
 The evils of the employment of pauper nurses is dwelt upon by 
 all who have considered the subject of workhouse management. 
 When we consider the persons to whom such extensive power 
 and responsibility are intrusted, in the care of 50,000 sick 
 persons in the London workhouses alone, we can hardly wonder 
 at what is told of the results of the system. The only way in 
 which an employment of the inmates could be successfully carried 
 out, would be under the constant supervision of superior persons;
 
 14 Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 but in the present system that is an impossibihty. Even then 
 the nurses to be obtained would be, generally speaking, only the 
 worn-out remains of lives whose strength had been spent else- 
 where. Efficient nurses, who could gain a living in any of our 
 hospitals, would not be likely to offer themselves for a post in 
 which it is nearly all work of the hardest kind, and no pay.* In- 
 capacitated in some way, either morally or physically, they are 
 most likely to be. One of these nurses boldly stated that she 
 had been sixteen times in the House of Correction, and she was 
 not ashamed of it ; she was a woman given to drink, and of a 
 violent, ungovernable temper, causing great misery to the aged 
 people under her control. Can these women be fit to attend on 
 the sick, the infirm, and the dying ? Of course such labour is 
 cheap, and it is desirable, if possible, to employ those who must 
 be maintained at the cost of the parish ; but in no case should 
 they be left with the sole charge and responsibility of sick wards, 
 as they continually are at present, without any other control than 
 the occasional visit of the matron, bestowed at the utmost once 
 a day, in some cases only once a week. 
 
 In the intervals the patients are absolutely and helplessly at 
 the mercy of these women, of whom they dare not complain, 
 knowing what treatment would be visited upon them in revenge 
 if they did. From the complete equality of the pauper nurses 
 and their patients, no respect is felt for them, and no authority 
 can be exercised. Obedience, therefore, is obtained through feai 
 and terror, and those only who have witnessed the wrangling and 
 abuse that but too often are carried on by patients and nurses (who 
 are sometimes girls of bad character), can imagine so sad and 
 painful a scene. When position and character are both wanting, 
 it is difficult to see how it should be otherwise. Seeing how 
 careful boards of guardians are in all matters of expense, it 
 would have been well if the recommendation of the poor law 
 with regard to the employment of at least one paid nurse had 
 been a law ; as it is, many workhouses are without one. That 
 such a person would always be all we could desire for so im- 
 portant a post we could hardly hope, from what we know of the 
 paid nurses in hospitals, but at any rate there would be a better 
 chance of efficiency and character than in the present plan. A 
 suggestion was made some years ago for the training of some of 
 the able bodied women in workhouses to the office of nurses for 
 the sick poor ; it received the sanction of the Poor Law Board, 
 and efforts were made by the proposer. Dr. Sieveking, to give 
 
 * And it is a fact, that when able women are by chance found as nurses, the 
 guardians often do not choose to keep them as inmates ; indeed, it is not likely 
 they will remain without more encouragement than is held out to ihem. If even 
 gome distinction were made in their di'oss, there would be more chance of theii" 
 being respected by their fellow-mmates.
 
 WorkhouHcs (ind Women's JVork. 15 
 
 publicity to tlie plan ; but it has not yet been carried into effect. 
 Independently of the great doubt that must exist as to the 
 possibility of forming these persons into efficient nurses, there is 
 no machinery at present in our workhouses by which the plan 
 could possibly be carried out. When a more numerous and 
 efficient staff of superintendents is provided, the attempt may 
 be made with some partial hope of success. 
 
 The want of trained and kind superintendence is as much felt 
 in those departments called the " insane wards," as in the in- 
 firmary. Though tbe violently insane are not allowed to be kept 
 for a time exceeding fourteen days, yet there are many who are 
 considered to be sufficiently harmless to be permanent inmates. 
 Imbeciles, and those afflicted with fits, are to be found in every 
 workhouse. What a call there is here for all the tenderness of 
 woman's care amongst the nurses of this most heavily-afflicted 
 portion of the great human family ! Yet what reason is there to 
 suppose that these suflFerers meet with the treatment which the 
 utmost devotion, Christian love, and self-denying zeal alone can 
 give ? An old woman, between seventy and eighty years of age, 
 worn out by her own hard and troubled life both in body and 
 mind, is not the most likely person to act with tenderness and 
 skill in such an arduous and trying post. The very incapacity 
 of the patients to speak for themselves and complain of their 
 grievances is a terrible temptation to tyranny and harshness on 
 the part of those who have the care of them, and it is only a 
 high principle of love and conscientiousness that can be a safe- 
 guard against such conduct. The asylums for idiots which 
 already exist are found to be utterly incompetent to receive that 
 portion of the 30,000 idiots of our population which calls for 
 our Christian help and charity.* The burden of them in the 
 crowded homes of poor families can hardly be conceived by 
 those who are not personally acquainted with the circumstances, 
 and we therefore feel that a more suitable refuge ought to be pro- 
 vided for them in our unions than at present exists, or is possible 
 imder the present system of nursing and inspection. f In con- 
 
 * Besides these there are the diseased and iueapacitated children leaving the 
 schools, who, unable to gain a living, must find a home in the workhouse after 
 the age of fourteen or sixteen. 
 
 + At a recent visit of the Commissioner of Lunacy to a London workhouse, he 
 recommended that pictures and other objects of an enlivening character should be 
 added to the ward for the insane. We suppose this would hardly be objected to 
 even by those who fear to make the workhouse "too comfortable." Another 
 recommendation in the same direction was given lately by the committee of St. 
 Luke's Hospital, that visitors, both ladies and gentlemen, should be admitted to 
 the patients ; it is encouraging to our cause to find that the following resolution 
 was passed. These visits, it was said, " would prove a comfort to the inmates at 
 the time, and materially assist in the united labours for the amelioration of their 
 condition. Recent events had plainly shewn what the women of England would 
 imdertake when the objects in view were the relief of miseiy and the succour of 
 the distressed."
 
 16 Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 eluding our remarks upon this portion of the subject we mav 
 quote the statistics given by Mrs. Jameson* as to the ages of 
 pauper nurses employed in London workhouses : — 
 
 " There are seventy paid nurses, and five hundred pauper nurses and 
 assistants. One-lialf of these nurses are above fifty, one-quarter above 
 sixty, many not less than seventy, and some more than eighty years old. 
 An extra allowance of tea or beer is the reward given for their services; 
 but the propensity to drink is so strong, that it is with the utmost 
 difficulty that they are kept from indulging it." 
 
 We can hardly wonder at this when we find that the habit is 
 encouraged rather than checked by those in authority. In many 
 workhouses it is the custom to allow the nurses a glass of gin 
 daily, besides their portion of beer. Can we wonder that a habit 
 thus acquired grows into drunkenness when the opportunity 
 offers ? — indeed it is inevitable that it should do so. If the 
 nurses are so worn out by ill-health and poverty that they 
 require such stimulants to enable them to perform their duty, 
 it is argument enough against their efficiency. But their 
 powers are not strengthened by a process which, it is well 
 known, undermines health and vigour. Let them have good 
 food and tea and coffee in sufficient quantities, and if this will 
 not enable them to perfonn their work they are not fit to under- 
 take it. Living night and day in sick wards, ill- ventilated as 
 they generally are, may well impair powers both of body and 
 mind, and nurses should not be required to do so. Mrs. Jame- 
 son may well remark, after an enumeration of such facts, " These 
 are the sisters of charity to whom our sick poor are confided !" 
 
 An amended management of our workhouses is demanded 
 chiefly on the grounds that the persons who are, and under the 
 present state of things must be, received into them, are not all 
 degraded and worth less. f But supposing they were of such a 
 character, at any rate they are deserving of treatment at least 
 as good as that bestowed upon criminals. The testimony of 
 visitors and chaplains may be received upon this point. One of 
 the latter says: — 
 
 " The inmates of our workhouses are not generally the dregs and 
 refuse of the population, although of course a great many of these are 
 mixed with the rest. In our workhouse of two hundred and twenty 
 inmates only two come under the class of able-bodied men. This is 
 probably below the general average, but it proves the mistake of treat- 
 ing the entire number of inmates of a workhouse with harshness, as if 
 it was hte invariable rule that they enter it through their own fault. A 
 
 * Communion of Labour, p. 91. 
 
 t May we not account for the prevailing impression as to the character of 
 workhouse inmates, by the fact that the pubhc hear nothing of the dreary existence 
 of the quiet and decent old people, biit only of those younger inmates, whose con- 
 duct not unfrequently causes their removal to a court of justice, and thence to 
 prison ?
 
 Workhuusen and Womms Work. 17 
 
 great portion of every workhouse should be regarded as appropriated 
 to the reception of those aged or disabled persons who have spent their 
 health and strength for the benefit of the community, and therefore 
 have a claim upon it when that health and strength are gone. If, from 
 the want of friends or relations, they are obliged to enter the work- 
 house, they ought to be treated with as much kindness and considera- 
 tion as is compatible with their station. Experience tells me that they 
 yearn for this more than for an increase of bodily comforts." 
 
 The public in general are but little aware of the condition in 
 which a large portion of their fellow- creatures live; too often it 
 is but a bare existence in which saving is aii impossibility. The 
 skilled artisan, mechanic, or labourer may indeed earn such wages 
 as should provide against the evil day, and here it is where care 
 and forethought should be diligently inculcated. But over and 
 above these classes, there is a very large number of the miserably 
 underpaid (perhaps educated in the first instance to no regular 
 occupation), whose earnings cannot even suffice for their present 
 wants. The sufferings and hardships of tailors and needlewomen, 
 and the whole army of " slop-workers," were loudly proclaimed 
 a few years ago, but, we fear, without much good resulting from 
 the exposure. The system of excessive division of labour in all 
 large establishments leads to the miserable under-payment of the 
 employed, till the actual makers of clothing and other articles, even 
 for Government purposes, receive such compensation as may well 
 be considered a disgrace to a Christian nation.* We need scarcely 
 
 * The following is the testimony of a medical oiScer on the subject of the 
 under-payment of needlewomen : — " Mr. Burch said he had been connected with 
 the London Hospital for eleven years, and for five years with the Whitechapel 
 Union. A large number of patients had been under his care, and he had carefully 
 investigated a considerable number of cases, and was satisfied that needlewomen 
 were the most ill-paid class of people, and the most hardworking on earth. He 
 knew that numbers of them, with constitutions broken down, earned from 3s. to 
 4s. per week only, and for that very scanty pittance were compelled to work from 
 three o'clock in the morning till ten at night." 
 
 A fact which will confirm the above testimony is taken from the Times of the 
 22nd January, 1858 : — " A young woman was brought up for pledging trousers 
 intrusted to her to make by Ellas Mears. A wholesale dealer in clothes gave 
 materials for trousers to a man named Harris, who undertook to return them 
 finished at Is, per pair. Harris has a machine which effectually performs the 
 stitching portion of the labour, and for that he received one-half of the Is., giving 
 Mears the remainder to complete the work. Mears in turn engaged the prisoner, 
 and furnished her witli twist, thread, &c., on the understanding tliat she was to 
 receive 3Jd. for finishing the job; but she, as alleged, having a child to support, 
 and a husband who had deserted her, found the pittance accruing from her labours 
 at this price insufficient to purchase necessaries, yielded to temptation and pledged 
 the trousers, after finishing them, for 7s. A tailor in court observed that the 
 materials probably cost from 8s. to 9s., and would be sold at ISs. Mears, whose 
 cadaverous features and ill-clad body indicated an equal state of poverty with the 
 prisoner's, said he only got about three-halfpence for his share after purchasing the 
 small materials, and he had not any money to redeem the trousers." The magis- 
 trate may well have observed that " it was clear that this was a system which 
 gradually ground to the dust the workpeople." The following cases of distress 
 are selected from several in Soutliwark : — " A widow, making shirts at 4d. each,
 
 18 Workhouses and Wometis Work. 
 
 wonder that the end of lives so employed is spent in the receipt 
 of charity or in the workhouse. 
 
 We have no douht that in very many cases the fearful hahit of 
 intemperance aggravates the evils of poverty, if it is not the cause 
 of them, but it cannot account for all the misery of the world, as 
 long as such facts as these stand forth against us. For destitu- 
 tion resulting from this state of things the workhouse is the 
 appointed refuge ; no other asylum is provided on a scale adequate 
 to meet it. In other countries the help is supplied, not by private 
 benevolence alone, but by the assistance of Government also, for 
 the need exists there as well as here. In the pamphlet entitled 
 Metropolitan Workhouses and their Inmates,'^' a description is 
 given of the " hospices " in Paris for the incurably sick and aged, 
 which appear in a great measure to take the place of our work- 
 houses ; the management of them seems to be admirable. The 
 following is an account of a similar institution in Malaga, shewing 
 that even in ill-governed Spain these things are better managed 
 than with us : — f 
 
 " There is a sort of large workhouse in this place, supported by 
 voluntary contributions : it is called the ' Casa de Mendicidad, de 
 Socorro, e de Maternidad.' The 'Mendicidad' department is for obsti- 
 nate and notorious beggars, who are taken there by the police; the 
 * Socorro ' for any poor who like to enter it voluntarily ; the ' Ma- 
 ternidad ' for foundlings or orphans, or for any children whose parents 
 like to send them there. There are four sisters of mercy, belonging to 
 the order of St. Vincent de Paul, They attend to the babies, teach the 
 girls, and go out to nurse the sick. It Avas quite delightful to see the 
 terms on which the sisters and the children were ; the respect, entirely 
 devoid of fear, that the latter have. The difference between this and 
 that focus of corruption, an English workhouse, struck me. I know 
 an English child of only six, who has learnt such evil habits in a 
 workhouse and become so rooted in them, that if she had remained 
 there a year longer I should say she must have been ruined for life. 
 These Spanish children when they grow up go out into service, but if 
 their mistresses do not like them, they are to be sent back to the 
 house. If any of them wish to remain and become sisters, they may 
 do so ; but I believe the general end is they marry or go into service. 
 Altogether, instead of being a prison like our workhouses, it was a 
 happy home." 
 
 It is somewhat strange that English benevolence, so widely 
 
 by hard work earns 3s. a week. Another earns a scanty subsistence by converting 
 strips of leather into buttons for leather gaiters, being paid Ijd. per gross, con- 
 sisting of thirteen dozen. By her iitmost efforts she can make two gross a day, 
 earning Is. 6d. per week. Another makes a dozen collars for 7id." In cases of 
 private employment the remuneration is in many instances as bad ; a poor widow, 
 trying to maintain her family, is occupied in the making of paper bags for a large 
 warehouse, receiving 6d. for a thousand of tliem, providing the paste ; and when 
 they are finished, she has to pay for their conveyance to their destmation. 
 
 * P. 36. t Fractical WorUng of the Church in Spain. Eev. J. Meyrick.
 
 IVoy/i/iousi'ii and IVuntr/i's Work. 19 
 
 extended over every form of sorrow and sickness that oau befal 
 human nature, has not till late years thought of the incurably sick. 
 It was probably supposed that our workhouses took this class of 
 persons under their care, for it was known that they were not 
 maintained in hospitals. Yet it is pitiable to think of the large 
 number of hopelessly sick and bed-ridden who are shut up in our 
 "workhouses as they are at present constituted. The strict rules 
 enforced in many of them as to receiving the visits of friends, is 
 one of the reasons which causes them to be deemed little better 
 than prisons. It has been repeatedly alleged, that if it were other- 
 wise persons would be attracted to them, tempted to give up 
 their homes, and thus impose upon the public charity. But at 
 the best, and with all the improvements that can be made, there 
 must always be a certain degree of restraint imposed upon the 
 inmates by the rules necessary for every large establishment, 
 which would prove a cheek upon any temptation to desert their 
 homes. And it is said that in France the institutions which 
 maintain many hundreds of the aged and infirm in greater com- 
 fort than is enjoyed in our workhouses, do not attract persons 
 from their homes.* In England, therefore, where the love of 
 home is pre-eminently strong, we need hardly fear that it would 
 be the case. The regularity of hours will always be distasteful 
 to those who have enjoyed independence all their lives; and even 
 were the food made more palatable than it is at present, it would 
 not be preferred to the self-chosen fare, for the sameness unavoid- 
 able in such places will always be disliked. So great is the love 
 of liberty and choice in these matters, that working women have 
 been known to prefer bringing their own scanty meals to their 
 "workrooms, to sharing in one general fare, though of a superior 
 quality. In former days some provision was made for the more 
 decent poor by the founding of almshouses, which was what may 
 be called a "fashionable" mode of charity with our ancestors. 
 The remarks on this subject by the late Bishop Armstrong are 
 full of interest as bearing upon this point,t and give a very true 
 and touching picture of what the piety of our ancestors accom- 
 plished, and what we, their descendants, are neglecting. But, like 
 other regrets for the past, it is useless and utterly vain as regards 
 a remedy for present evils, and in as far as it proposes to bring 
 back a former state of things. We cannot revive the habits of 
 bygone ages if we would, and we may, therefore, believe it to be 
 undesirable, in the order of God's providence, to do so. Another 
 condition of affairs is come into existence, and our present work 
 is to see that we make the best of it, checking as far as possible 
 the evil, and encouraging and calling out the good in it. A sys- 
 tem incapable of such a process as this ought not to belong to a 
 Christian society. There may still be here and there persons who 
 * See Mefropolifcm Workhouses, p. 44. f ^/^ of Bishop Armstrong, Tp. 191, 
 
 C
 
 20 Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 will act in the spirit Bishop Armstrong describes, and, moved by 
 the memory of the past, will found almshouses for the refuge of 
 the deserving poor. 
 
 " Where, I often ask, are the modern almshouses; where that old 
 spirit of love for the poor, which those who have risen in the Avorld 
 ought to feel for those who are at the bottom of the hill? Where are 
 those grateful offerings of the thriving tradesman, the prosperous mer- 
 chant, who has carved out his own fortune, and by a good strong head 
 has made his way upwards in the world? Wliere the love of the vil- 
 lage, or the native town, and any goodly proofs of care for the worn- 
 out, the infirm, the decrepid, who have now to be dragged from their 
 old haunts and homes, and crowded into the dismal unions? Alas! 
 it is but here and there, few and far between, that modern almshouses 
 rise up, or that successful men think of providing for the last days of 
 the destitute. It is more common to see the ' villas,' and the ' man- 
 sions,' and the ' places in the country,' absorbing the wealth amassed 
 in the shop or the merchant's office, and the poor are left to boards of 
 guardians and relieving officers, to that legal provision which, how- 
 ever well managed on the whole, does not pretend to do more than 
 keep body and soul together in the cheapest way. 
 
 " It always strikes me as a very sad thing, to see old folks packed 
 off from the place where they have spent their hves ; and a quantity of 
 old people from a multitude of places, each uprooted and torn from his 
 accustomed home, huddled together, with all the physical and mental 
 infirmities of age, strikes me as one of the most painful spectacles in 
 the land. A place stripped of its old folks is a melancholy place, and 
 a place filled with them equally melancholy. A park filled with nothing 
 but young trees is but a poor concern to look at, and one filled with 
 nothing but old and decayed ones equally wanting in excellence. What 
 one likes is the mixture of the two ; here and there the old oak, with 
 its topmost branches bare, and its trunk hollow, and then some stalwart 
 timber, middle aged trees, rich in foliage, spreading their broad sha- 
 dows over the grass. So with towns or villages. We want all sorts 
 among us, young cheeks and wrinkled ones, the curly-headed lads and 
 white-haired old men. This makes up the goodly picture of human 
 life. But to weed out the old, to rend away all the hoary heads of the 
 poor, to pack off the stooping forms of the aged, to bundle them into 
 one great workhouse, as if they were so much waste material, choking 
 up the way of younger life, to tell them, in so many words, we 
 have no reverence for them, no care, no love or compassion, but 
 that they are in the way, and must be done for as cheaply as can be, is 
 sad, sad work, which will make, at last, trade wither, and our wealth 
 turn into poverty, and all our commercial successes to be without a 
 blessing. 
 
 " We want a different state of things from this ; and those thriving 
 men, who have well-filled purses tinkling in their pockets, who have 
 got on in life, who have risen from being shopmen to be shopkeepers, 
 who have the highest stool in merchants' offices, and are now sitting in 
 bankers' parlours, and have become partners in good substantial firms, 
 whose name is worth so much money, and who * stand high ' among 
 
 A
 
 Workhouses and Women s Work. 'X\ 
 
 business men, would do well to consider what is here said to them 
 about almshouses." — Pp. 191 — 193. 
 
 Such a custom is more common in these days amongst 
 societies than individuals ; members belonging to various trades 
 thus combine to provide for the poorer members of their craft. 
 This, however, can but afford partial relief, and the only remedy 
 for the state of things which Bishop Armstrong laments, is 
 either to give the deserving poor a more comfortable shelter in 
 our workhouses, or to supply the aged with sufficient out-door 
 relief to enable their relations or friends to maintain them at 
 home. This plan is much more practicable in the country 
 than in London, and we do not see why there it should not be 
 universally adopted. It is there chiefly that the attachment to 
 home makes it desirable to do so. The fireside corner of the old 
 cottage inhabited for the greater part of a life, — the village church 
 in which worship has been offered, and in the churchyard of which 
 rest the relations of the aged persons, — all these things have no 
 parallel in our crowded cities, where homes are contained in one 
 dreary room of a narrow street or court, and where the graves of 
 a family are probably scattered in distant cemeteries. In the 
 midst of such families, too, it is often impossible that the sick and 
 aged can be maintained, where father, mother, and numerous 
 children all share the same room for sleeping and living in. 
 For these, therefore, a more comfortable asylum should be pro- 
 vided.* The authoress of Sunshine in the Workhouse gives in- 
 stances in which she has successfully arranged, by the aid of private 
 assistance, to keep aged persons from the workhouse, and this 
 seems to be a very legitimate mode of applying charity, and a 
 likely meaus of encouraging persons to exert themselves in main- 
 taining, at least partly, their aged relations. One shilling a week 
 added to the 2s. Gd. allowed by the parish is found to be sufficient 
 to keep them at home. The Bishop's picture of the assemblage 
 of aged persons in the union is not overdrawn. Those who have 
 not visited workhouses cannot believe how many there are in them 
 who have absolutely no friends or relations. It is sad to see such 
 on the " visiting days," and to hear them lament their loneliness. 
 Are there none, therefore, to care for such as these, none to cheer 
 the lonely heart and forlorn spirit, and be a friend to the friend- 
 
 * Extract from Mr. J. B. Browne's Report of Pauper Schools for 1855 : — "There 
 are many workhouses in which classification is impossible, which are, therefore, 
 necessarily schools of vice, and which, as I conceive, the legislature would not 
 sufier to continue open year after year if all that occurs in them were pubhcly 
 
 known. H workhouse in Lancashire may not be the worst in my district because 
 
 there are many so very bad that it is hard to say which is entitled to that pre- 
 eminence." The inspection does not, therefore, seem to be a sufficient remedy for 
 such cases as these. In some instances it takes place at intervals of one or two 
 years. Even gross outward and material defects could hardly be discovered by 
 such a process, and the moral state of things could not possibly be known. 
 
 c 2
 
 22 Workhouses and Women's ffv?/:. ■ 
 
 less ?* The general impression that exists as to the class of 
 persons who claim parochial relief is no doubt the real cause of 
 whatever harshness may exist in the system. It is supposed that 
 we are called upon to support the idle and able-bodied, who 
 might work for their living, and this belief has brought in the 
 suspicion that all are involved in the same contamination and 
 degradation. And for the management of such persons officials 
 of any sort are thought to be good enough ; none, indeed, but 
 those of a lower order would be connected with the work. The 
 system is, therefore, carried out by boards of guardians (who, 
 generally speaking, are chosen from the lower class of tradesmen 
 in towns, and of farmers in the country) and by relieving officers; 
 and for the internal management of large and difficult establish- 
 ments, masters and matrons also of the lower middle class are 
 selected. t Under these circumstances it is hardly possible that 
 
 * The following description is from the graphic peu of Sii* F. B. Head, and 
 though the scene was one belonging to the state of tilings prior to the new poor 
 law, yet the picture is equally true at the present time, and must be familiar to every 
 one who has visited workhouses. In one room he finds a group of "worn-out men, 
 with nothing to do, with nothing to cheer them, with nothing in this world to hope 
 for, with nothing to fear : gnarled into all sorts of attitudes, they look more like 
 pieces of ship-timber than men. In another room are seen huddled together in 
 similar attitudes, a number of old, exhausted women, clean, tidy, but speechless 
 and deserted. In large, airy bedrooms, we found men and women all bed-ridden. 
 As w-e passed between two ranges of tressels almost touching each other, nothing 
 was to be seen but a set of wrinkled faces, which seemed more dead than alive. 
 Many had been lying there for years ; many had been inmates of the poorhouse for 
 fourteen, fifteen, and eighteen years; few seemed to have any disorder. They were 
 wanting nothing, asking for nothing, waiting for nothing, but their death." Else- 
 where he gives the following suggestions for the treatment of such persons : — " As 
 to the provision for the aged, the commissioner submitted to tlie opinion of the 
 meetings, that, instead of being thrown amongst children and young men and 
 women, their comforts would be materially increased by their being kept together. 
 He asked whether quietness was not one of the kindest cliarities which could be 
 bestowed on age ? Whether a diet as well as a home, might not he provided for 
 them properly suited to their infirmities 1 and last, though not least (if there was no 
 one to deprive them of this benefit), whether many additional comforts and indul- 
 gences might not be granted to old people, beyond what could or should be afibrded 
 for every description of applicants ?" In the last sentence lies one of the chief 
 suggestions which we are now urging upon the attention of our readers. It was 
 thought that the new system would cease to attract the aged poor to the workhouse, 
 as well as the able-bodied. It has not been found, however, that they can be ex- 
 cluded, and notwithstanding the system of repulsion rather than of attraction whicli 
 has been adopted, some urgent necessity seems still to compel a large number of 
 aged poor to seek the shelter of the union. It will be greatly for the interest of 
 those who enter from absolute need, that persons not in such circiunstances should 
 be discouraged or excluded, for then we should lose the suspicion that all are the 
 undesei-ving, or at least such as might otherwise be provided for. In some instances 
 we have seen very praiseworthy and humane arrangements made by boards of 
 guardians for the aged poor ; one ward being set apart for the occupation of the 
 more deserving married couples, or those who have been ratepayers in the parish ; 
 separate compartments are provided for them, and thus those who have spent their 
 lives together are not divided at the close, but are able to nurse and tend each 
 other to the last. It is a miserable sight, when aged couples drag out their dreary 
 existence under the same roof, but are unable to meet or hold any communication. 
 
 t The facts that are continually being brought to light about masters of work-
 
 Workhouses and Women's W(jrk. 23 
 
 the system can be otherwise than a harsh and unfeeling one. The 
 total want of sympathy between the relievers and the relieved can 
 produce no other result. ' The power and authority of masters and 
 matrons may be considered almost unlimited; for, in some cases, 
 they are the sole channels of communication between the poor and 
 the guardians, and have, therefore, the power of giving their own 
 version of everything that happens. How grossly this power is 
 often abused will be gathered from some of the letters in Metro- 
 politan Workhouses. It will hardly be believed, that in one 
 instance the matron never spoke to one poor bed-ridden woman 
 for two years, in revenge for an oflence committed by her in simply 
 answering a question of one of the guardians which was supposed 
 to involve the matron in blame. Yet such a woman was thought 
 to be capable of governing several hundred persons, and of 
 inspiring respect at least, if not love. 
 
 We may remind our readers of the various and numerous 
 classes of persons who come under the personal control of these 
 officials ; and we may here give a description of the first work- 
 house of London, the aim and intention of Avhich was very much 
 what it is, or rather, perhaps, should be, at the present day. 
 " Bridewell Hospital was founded prior to, and in consequence of 
 the want of, a national provision for the poor. It was intended 
 as a provision for certain and specified classes of the poor, as a 
 house of correction for vagrants and other suspected persons, and 
 as an establishment for the training of children, when of proper 
 age, in good occupation or science profitable to the common- 
 wealth. It was, in fact, the Jirst workhouse, the first house of 
 correction, and the first reformatory in the kingdom ; and it was 
 intended as a relief, not only for the city of London, but for the 
 suburbs of the same, and for the whole county of Middlesex." 
 For an undertaking of such magnitude as is here described, some 
 very efficient management is surely demanded. In many respects 
 a supervision superior to that of hospitals is required, for there 
 we have but one class of persons to deal with, viz., the bodily 
 sick; here a variety of minds and characters as great as the 
 
 houses must have enhghtened the public by this time as to the character of many 
 oftliem. Bad ones are passed on from one board of guai-dians to another, just as 
 servants frequently go from one family to another, their true characters concealed 
 by their masters, who are glad to get rid of them. A very general horror is enter- 
 tained by the poor of burial by "the parish." It seems to be a lingering spirit of 
 reverence for the dead -which, though often um^easonable in individual instances, we 
 are unwilling to blame. For who can wonder at it when revelations are occasionally 
 made like those which have recently appeared in tlie newspapers, of the master of 
 a workhouse trafficking with the bodies of the dead, and changing them at the hos- 
 pitals, so that friends and relations cannot be sure who it is they are following to 
 the grave ? It is a very general belief, or at least suspicion, amongst the poor that 
 the bodies of paupers are placed in their coffins without clothing of any kind. We 
 know tliat this was done a few years ago, but we cannot speak with certainty of the 
 present time. There may well be a prejudice against pauper funerals I
 
 24 Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 different classes who are admitted, and all requiring judicious 
 moral treatment. 
 
 The chief aim of those who have considered the subject of 
 workhouse reform is to suggest a remedy for the present state of 
 things in providing other influences that may impart some 
 feeling and sympathy into the system. It is not an alteration of 
 the system itself that is demanded, but rather the introduction of 
 the law of love into it. 
 
 The publications we have named, excepting one, are written 
 by women, and though they are of small dimensions, they may 
 be taken as strong indications of a growing interest in the subject 
 of which they treat. Women, therefore, may be said to have first 
 enlisted public sympathy in behalf of the better management of 
 our workhouses, as they have already done for the better manage- 
 ment of our hospitals. And in matters connected with the poor, 
 the sick, and the aged, it would seem to be especially the mission 
 of women to work a reformation. In so doing, they will not 
 only be blest themselves, but become the means of blessing to 
 countless numbers. The object of Mrs. Jameson's book is to 
 shew the necessity of men and women working together in the 
 " communion of labour," and the truth of this principle is proved 
 by the success of those institutions in which that law is obeyed. 
 It can scarcely be said to be the case in our English workhouses, 
 where the one matron and the pauper nurses are the sole repre- 
 sentatives of the feminine influence so especially needed in every 
 institution for the poor. If the theory is a true one, our disregard 
 of it sufficiently accounts for all the failures and abuses in our 
 institutions for the poor established by law. Poor law commis- 
 sioners did not take this element into consideration in framing 
 their new system of laws. Ladies have hitherto been told 
 triumphantly by masters of workhouses that it is against the law 
 that they should be admitted as visitors. Boards of guardians 
 certainly neither contemplated nor desired the help of women in 
 their ungracious task. They would be too tender-hearted, too 
 sympathizing, or too meddling and interfering with that which 
 belonged to men only. These and such like fears have haunted 
 the minds of officials, and will continue to haunt them, for some 
 time to come, to the exclusion of women from a large portion of 
 what may be considered their proper sphere of work. The follow- 
 ing remarks are made by Mrs. Jameson, in the preface to her first 
 lecture, on " Sisters of Charity," and her wide experience of 
 charitable institutions abroad enables her to write with confidence 
 on the subject. Speaking of the numerous letters she has 
 received on the subject of workhouses, she goes on to say : — 
 
 " Surely it is worth considering whether the administration of these 
 institutions might not be improved by the aid of kindly and intelligent 
 women sharing with the overseers the task of supervision
 
 Workhouses and Women's Work. 25 
 
 Can any one doubt that the element of power, disunited from the 
 element of Christian love, must in the long run become a hard, cold, 
 cruel machine ? and that this must of necessity be the result where the 
 masculine energy acts independent of the feminine sympathies ? Since 
 it is allowed on all hands that we want institutions for the training of 
 efficient ' sisters of charity ' for all offices connected with the sick, the 
 indigent, the fallen, and the ignorant among us, why should not our 
 parish workhouses be made available for the purpose ? In such an 
 application of means and funds already at hand, it appears to me that 
 there would be both good sense and economy, therefore it ought to 
 recommend itself to our so-called practical men." 
 
 The only step hitherto made in this direction has been the 
 appointment of committees of lady visitors in two or three 
 instances, and this, though apparently a small measure in itself, 
 is in fact the introduction of an entirely new principle, which 
 may in time be developed into much good. But " what is 
 wanted," says Mrs. Jameson, "is a domestic, permanent, and 
 ever-present influence, not occasional insjpection^ Then it may 
 be asked. Where are we to find the women trained for such 
 works as these, for we are far from saying that every woman is 
 fitted for them ? Even those most anxious to devote themselves 
 to them require a training before they can enter upon such 
 duties, and this is not easily attainable in England. It is true 
 that there are opportunities now w^hich there never were before in 
 this country for learning in hospitals those duties in the care of 
 the sick which should be taught to all women, and a knowledge 
 of which would render every woman more useful in her station ; 
 but there is hardly yet the opportunity of acquiring that expe- 
 rience in more general matters connected with the poor which 
 can be gained in the institution of Kaiserswerth near Dusseldorf. 
 
 The interesting account of this establishment* is, it is well 
 known, from the pen of Florence Nightingale, who acquired a 
 great part of her practical education in the treatment of the sick 
 within those walls, under the superintendence of the excellent 
 Pastor Fliedner and his wife. At the present time there are one 
 hundred and sixteen deaconesses in the institution, and according 
 to their various inclinations and capacities they are distributed 
 throughout the different departments of the house, devoted seve- 
 rally to the care of the sick, the insane, the fallen, and to the 
 teaching of children. How admirably the plan has been carried 
 out, and how its results have spread into distant lands, will be 
 gathered from the pages of this pamphlet, as well as from the little 
 book entitled, Kaiserswerth Deaconesses.^ Such an institution 
 is urgently required in England, and ere now we had hoped to 
 see it arise under the experienced guidance of one who must be 
 
 * The InsfittUion of Kaiserswerth, on the Rhine. 
 t By a Lady. (Masters.)
 
 2(i IJ^o/k/ioKses a/id Women's Work. 
 
 universally acknowledged to be tlie fittest to undertake so arduous 
 a work. We still hope to see this desire accomplished, and if so, 
 a blessing will indeed have arisen out of the sorrows and cala- 
 mities of war, and one to which all classes of our countrymen and 
 countrywomen will have contributed, by the testimonial offered 
 to Miss Nightingale. But till such an opportunity is offered, 
 what fitter place for learning could be found than our workhouses, 
 which are institutions for all classes and characters amongst the 
 poor, if learners could be admitted into them under the sanction 
 of some intelligent and superior governing power, who would 
 welcome assistance and co-operation, and not reject it with 
 jealousy and fear? It is encouraging to see what a few years 
 have done for the advocates of this cause. Those who, before 
 Miss Nightingale's mission to the Crimea, would have loudly 
 denounced such proceedings as preposterous and impossible, now 
 stand up publicly to uphold them. Women's work is boldly 
 claimed for hospitals, and in many cases earnestly sought for. 
 Not only is a superior class of women demanded for the lower 
 ofi&ces in them (for the Mrs. Gamps are now beginning to be 
 thought undesirable attendants upon the sick and dying), but 
 women of education and refinement are desired, as a religious and 
 humanizing and refining element, amidst scenes of temptation, 
 sorrow, and suffering. Those who have the power of looking 
 behind the scenes, and know the truth, can tell something of the 
 need that exists for the introduction of such a superintending 
 power as this. Hitherto the chief supervision of our hospitals 
 has been exercised by the matron and medical men, who can only 
 visit the wards occasionally, and at long intervals. At other times 
 the nurses reign supreme, and how unfit they are, generally speaking, 
 for a rule involving matters of life and death, is now beginning to 
 be felt, and the true remedy applied. The patients, feeling the 
 kindness and charity which admit them into these asylums, 
 think it ungrateful to make complaints to the medical men, 
 whatever they may hear and see, and so, many evils exist which 
 never reach the ears of the officials. During their presence in 
 the wards of course all is as it should be. 
 
 It is very desirable that England should possess a training 
 school of her own for those who wish to learn and carry out any 
 of the various works of charity which are calling for the assistance 
 of women.* Each nation must organize its own plans, and 
 
 * Under the present system, matrons undertake the important posts of superin- 
 tending iastitutions containing several hundred inmates, without any previous 
 experience of management, or even of intercourse with the poor generaDy. We 
 shall never have better results till there are training institutions (which might be 
 the workhouses), where both men and women may prepare themselves for their 
 work, as is universally the case abroad. It seems to us that the true method of 
 training for work is now being tried in the North-West London Preventive and 
 Reformatory Institution, where the futm-e masters of similar estabhshments are
 
 Workhouses and Wonte?is Work. 27 
 
 develop them in a national manner, if the result is to be suc- 
 cessful. Germany has her " deaconesses, " France and Italy 
 their "sisters of charity" and of "mercy." In England we have 
 also some institutions of " sisters," but it may be that here no 
 general title will be given to those who volunteer for such works 
 as these. " Lady superintendent," " lady nurses," " nursing 
 sisters," are some of the names which have been already assumed, 
 and which appear to be suited to our English tastes and habits. 
 Those which have too much resemblance to the orders of the 
 Romish Church have been rejected, for obvious reasons, for it is 
 very desirable to avoid all suspicion of imitating the errors of 
 those who carry out these good works abroad. It is clearly 
 shewn, however, in the pamphlet on Kaiserswerth, that the original 
 institution of such societies of w^omen is derived from the primi- 
 tive Church, and that Protestants have since then carried them out. 
 It maybe well to quote the remarks which bear upon this point : — 
 
 '* We see, in the very first times of Christianity, an apostolical insti- 
 tution for the employment of woman's pow'ers directly in the service of 
 God. We find them employed as ' servants of the Church.' We read 
 in the Epistle to the Romans of a * deaconess,' as in the Acts of the 
 Apostles of ' deacons.' Not only men were employed in the service of 
 the sick and poor, but also women. In the fourth century, St. Chrysostom 
 speaks of forty deaconesses of Constantinople. We find them in the 
 
 trained in the midst of the -work, and amongst the persons whom they are here- 
 after to govern. Su* F. B. Head says : — " The central board has no power to 
 punish the vicious, no right to revile the improvident, no authority to neglect the 
 impotent. Their wants alone constitute their legal passport to relief; it is to 
 be administered to them with an equal attention to generosity on the one hand, and 
 justice on the other." Siu-ely, therefore, this being the case, it is more important 
 to provide some government that is capable of exercising a moral influence and 
 discrimination in matters connected with the poor. " It is essential to woman's 
 success in undertaking any higher employment, to wit, that she must undergo 
 special training for her work, as any one of the other sex must undergo special 
 training for his work. Dilettante visiting, desultory fits of charity, must give way 
 to serious apphcation, laborious preparation, and long study." — Industrial and 
 Social Position of Women, p. 280. 
 
 As long as masters and matrons must (generally speaking) be husband and wife, it 
 is hardly probable that both shoidd be well fitted for their work, which, we repeat 
 again, demands an especial training and devotion. Mrs. Jameson* has remarked 
 upon what she calls the " morale of dress," and its influence on all ranks. She 
 justly censures the tawdry and unsuitable attire adopted by nurses when no uniform 
 costume is provided. We cannot help alluding to the no less unsuitable style of 
 dress worn by matrons. The governor of a large prison has expressed his 
 conviction that a great proportion of crime amongst female prisoners has its origin 
 in a love of dress and finery. Can it be wise, therefore, to allow matrons to 
 deck themselves out with gay ribbons and artificial flowers in the eyes of those 
 very persons to whom we wish to make them objects of respect and examples 
 of modesty ? Those who have seen and admhed the perfecjtly neat and simple 
 costume worn by the deaconesses of Kaiserswerth, as well as by their excellent 
 " mother," Madame Fhedner, may understand something of the moral influence 
 which may be exercised even in such apparently trifling matters as these, and make 
 comparisons not flattering to ourselves at home. 
 
 * Communion of Labour, p. 96.
 
 28 Workhouses and Women s Work. 
 
 Western Church as late as the eighth, in the Eastern as the twelfth 
 century. When the Waldenses and the Bohemian and Moravian 
 Brothers began to arise out of the night of the middle ages, we find 
 in these communities, founded after the model of the apostolical insti- 
 tutions, the ofiice of deaconesses, who were called presbyters, established 
 in 1457. In the sixteenth century it is well known how Kobert von 
 der Mark, Prince of Sedan in the Netherlands, revived the institution 
 of Protestant Sisters of Charity, and, instead of appropriating the 
 revenues of the suppressed monasteries in his domains, devoted them 
 to this purpose. In the first General Synod of the Evangehcal Church of 
 the Lower Khine and the Netherlands, at Wesel, 1568, we find the 
 ofiice of deaconesses recommended, and in the Classical Synod of 1580, 
 expressly established. In England they were not wanting. Among 
 the Nonconformists, under Elizabeth, 1578, deaconesses were instituted 
 during Divine service, and received amidst the general prayer of the 
 community. The Pilgrim Fathers of 1602 — 1625, who were driven 
 first to Amsterdam and Leyden, then to North America, carried their 
 deaconesses with them. It thus appears that, long previous to the 
 establishment of the orders of Sisters of Mercy by St. Vincent de 
 Paul in 1633, the importance of the ofiice of deaconess had been 
 recognised by all divisions of Christians, and they accordingly existed 
 free from vows or cloistered cells. 
 
 " So many beUeve this to be an institution borrowed from the Roman 
 Catholic Church exclusively, and on that account are prejudiced against 
 it, that we wish we had space to give the numerous other proofs of the 
 existence of the ofiice at different times, among all Churches, and earliest 
 in those of the Protestant faith." 
 
 The following reason why the institution did not spread and 
 flourish further in those days may equally account for the fact 
 at the present day : — " There were no nursery grounds, prepara- 
 tory schools for deaconesses, so that fitness for their office was, 
 so to speak, accidental." The want has long been supplied in 
 Protestant countries abroad; we trust we may soon be able 
 to say that England has followed their example. Tlie essentially 
 Protestant title of " deaconess " has not been adopted here, 
 though from its having belonged to the early primitive Church, as 
 Avell as to the simple Protestants of later times, it would seem to 
 he very unobjectionable. And there is much in the system 
 carried out by these Protestant societies that would be well 
 worthy of our imitation. The simple but solemn consecration 
 of the deaconess to her work,* involving no vows and no com- 
 pulsion, gives a sanction and a degree of sanctity to it and to 
 the labourer in the eyes of others, that it would be very 
 desirable to cast around those who are exposed to so many 
 temptations as ' the nurses in our public hospitals. It would 
 be very desirable to have such respect shewn to them in the 
 
 * The beautiful service for Ordination is given in the Appendix to Kaiserstvertk 
 Deaconesses, and we eai'nestly recommend it to the attention of our readers.
 
 Workhouses and Women's Work. 20 
 
 exercise of their office as we find abroad, where the physician 
 lifts his hat to the humblest sister in the hospital. Such homage 
 will hardly be yielded here unless more reverence is paid to 
 the office and calling of a nurse than at present. 
 
 It is a good and hopeful sign that we are not disposed to 
 imitate literally the customs of other countries, but rather to 
 frame some mode of action which may be the national expression 
 of the English mind. It is also a natural sign that help should 
 be forthcoming with the need for it; that without any pre- 
 conceived plan or system, workers should arise when they are 
 needed. This has already been the case in emergencies, but 
 the want of systematic training has been felt nevertheless, and 
 spontaneous and zealous efforts alone will not suffice. As long 
 as no systematic training is afforded we cannot wonder if many 
 mistakes are made, and scattered and impulsive efforts here and 
 there start up.* The training which is given in the other 
 countries of Europe j)roves the importance attached to the work, 
 which is not to be undertaken lightly or without a due prepara- 
 tion, lasting for three, five, or even seven years. In England, 
 where no vows or devotion for life would attend this training, it 
 would be most desirable that women in general should be able to 
 avail themselves of it, as well as those who intend to devote 
 themselves exclusively to this work in after life. It might be 
 made supplementary to the common school education, and in 
 many respects it would be the most important part of it. A year 
 spent in learning how to nurse the sick and take care of children, 
 besides other matters of intercourse with the poor, would be 
 a most valuable preparation for after life, wherever it might 
 be spent. To those who were to become the wives of clergymen 
 this training would be especially acceptable, and we might then 
 liope to see fewer of such examples as are exhibited in the clever 
 sketches of the Owlet of Owlstone Edge. There are many 
 others also who would have reason to bless the preparation 
 for their duties which this training would afford. Persons high 
 in position in our colonies, now scattered over the globe, and 
 settlers in new countries everywhere, may be called upon to 
 perform duties for which the usual education of girls' schools in 
 the common routine of learning and accomplishments would be 
 quite useless. But whether at home or abroad, practical know- 
 
 * The following notice of proceedings in the recent meeting of Convocation 
 (February, 1858) gives this proposal, which seems to shew that women's work 
 is beginning to take its place in the minds of the most serious. It was proposed, 
 " That this house do agree to present to his grace the Archbishop and to the 
 Bishops of the Upper House, a respectful address, praying their lordships to 
 dehberate and agree on certain rules by which women, whose hearts God has moved 
 to devote themselves exclusively to works of piety and charity, may be associated 
 on terms and conditions distinctly known as those which the Church of England 
 has sanctioned and prescribed."
 
 30 Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 ledge of this kind "will always be desirable, if not absolutely 
 necessary for the due fulfilment of a large portion of women's 
 duties. It is now become the fashion to advocate the industrial 
 training of girls of the lower classes. The need of it is nearly as 
 great amongst the upper. A woman's life cannot be passed 
 in either acquiring or displaying accomplishments, or even in the 
 higher pursuit of learning for its own sake. A time of longing 
 for practical work comes to all, and is at the root of the 
 strenuous efforts after a married life which are made by the 
 generality of young ladies after leaving school. The most 
 natural field for woman's capacities is without doubt the manage- 
 ment of a household and family, and there are some persons who 
 maintain this to be the only legitimate and natural occupation of 
 woman. It may be so. But there are many unnatural things 
 in this world, things which are diverted from their original 
 design and intention. And amongst them may perhaps be con- 
 sidered the fact that there are no fewer than 500,000 more women 
 than men in this country, and who are not occupied with 
 the care of their own families.* Unnatural as this fact may be, 
 we still ask for work for them to do, believing that many are 
 longing and willing to do it, if it were possible to bring them 
 and it together. Hitherto the customs of our country, and 
 public opinion, the strongest of all barriers, has been against 
 the opening out of any new line of action. But " the Chinese 
 wall of prejudices" has, as Mrs. Jameson observes, at last been 
 broken through, and the field is open to volunteers. Another 
 generation, however, must grow up before it will be fully occupied, 
 for many obstacles still exist, and many habits have to be over- 
 come. None are asked to leave their homes, or the duties which 
 are already placed before them, for the work that we are advo- 
 cating ; but it is offered to those who are standing all the day idle, 
 and whom no man hath yet hired for the great work of life. It 
 is not only to ladies that such employments would be found to be 
 acceptable, but also to that large middle class of women who 
 now go to swell the ranks of underpaid governesses and needle- 
 women. At present this class is widely separated from the poor 
 and from works of charity in general. There is but little 
 sympathy found for such in the daughters of tradesmen, who 
 have it in their power to do so much in this field of work if they 
 had but the inclination. Young women of this class do not now, 
 as formerly, occupy themselves exclusively with household 
 drudgery, as it is called, and no longer follow the good old paths 
 
 * " Take of these 500,000 superfluous women only the one-liundredth part, say 
 5,000 women, who are willing to work for good, to join the communion of labour, 
 under a directing power, if only they knew how — if only they coidd learn how best 
 to do their work, and if employment were open to them, wliat a phalanx it would 
 be if properly organiiied! " — Sislers of Charity, p. 61.
 
 Workhottses and Women's Work. 31 
 
 of their grandmothers in the care of the house and family. 
 It has always seemed to us, therefore, that their time must be in 
 a great measure their o"«-n. What a valuable staff of assistants 
 might they not prove in a parish, if their training had given 
 them some feeling for and sympathy with the poor ! Such 
 a character as is depicted in the beautiful tale of Kat/iari//e 
 Ashton has, we suspect, but few corresponding realities in 
 the world of tradesmen's daughters. Happy would it be for 
 themselves and others if it had more. The education that 
 gives a smattering of learning and accomplishments which can 
 never be of use either in teaching others or in refining their 
 own minds, is all which seems hitherto to have been desired 
 by this class of women. But it must be said in excuse that 
 hardly any other education has been possible for them. The 
 only teachers who have offered themselves w'ere half educated 
 persons of their own class, compelled to earn a precarious 
 and scanty li\dng in this manner ; love and devotion, and 
 even capacity for the work, being generally wholly wanting. 
 We trust, however, that a better day is dawning upon this most 
 important but long-neglected branch of education, and that ere 
 long we may see many efforts successfully carried out in the way 
 of improvement. The gradual advance in middle class schools 
 is as needful amongst boys as girls, if we would look for more 
 enlightenment and intelligent benevolence amongst our future 
 guardians of the poor and ratepayers, who have so much power 
 in their hands as regards the management of the class whose 
 grievances we have been considering. 
 
 At the present time in England we are unable to find workers 
 for the comparatively few spheres in which their help is called 
 for. We have no source to which we can send with the certainty 
 of obtaining a supply. In the other countries of Europe, where 
 orders of women devoted to the care of the poor and sick have 
 long been organized, some " mother house" is always ready to 
 provide the help that is asked from it. And here we are induced 
 to inquire how it is that France and Italy, where the education of 
 women is so greatly inferior to that of our own high standard, 
 produce women of tact, discretion, and mental powers equal to 
 the government of communities of their own sex, and of 
 charitable establishments of the most varied and diflficult 
 character ? Such communities must be as liable to division and 
 dissension arising from the evil tempers of human nature in one 
 country as another, yet they exist, and have done so for centuries. 
 In Mrs. Jameson's Communion of Lahour, accounts are given of 
 hospitals, penitentiaries, and even prisons, which are managed by 
 women. A remarkable prison near Vienna is described, con- 
 taining two hundred of the most degraded female criminals, 
 which was under the government of twelve women, no male 
 officials residins: in the house. And there are numerous
 
 33 Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 establishments in which women are not only the attendants, but 
 the actual heads and governors. At Turin 'is a " Female Com- 
 munity," consisting of four hundred members, women of all ages, 
 maintaining themselves by their united labour, and they are 
 ruled by a superior elected from among themselves; they live in 
 unity and peace under this controlling power, and have existed 
 as a community for a century. Whatever the system may be, 
 there must be great individual power and talent necessary to 
 maintain such a government as this. The common school-girl 
 training would hardly suffice here. The characters that could 
 form and carry on these works will be made in spite of, rather 
 than by, it, for merely benevolent impulses or sentimental charity 
 are not equal to such demands. The difficulty in England will 
 probably be found to be the necessity of obedience to rules and 
 to a supreme power. Obedience implies confidence in, and 
 reverence for, the power which claims it ; a blind submission the 
 best amongst us are not inclined to yield, and till women are 
 duly trained to become the superintendents of others, and fitted 
 for the special work they are to carry on, we cannot hope for 
 success. 
 
 Looking forward into the future, we can picture to ourselves a 
 Model Workhouse ; but whether the vision will be realized in ten, 
 twenty, or fifty years, we cannot say. Mrs. Jameson, in speaking of 
 the progress of such matters in England, says,* " For about ten 
 years, perhaps, the means of caiTying it out may be considered and 
 debated ; in another ten years some plan will be proposed ; and 
 in another ten years perhaps adopted ; for such is the usual pro- 
 gress of any great moral movement in ' that other public,' " whom 
 we must influence. 
 
 We can but endeavour to hasten its advent by shewing the 
 necessity of a change in the present system, not by exaggerating 
 its defects, but by exhibiting its true working. At the head of 
 such a workhouse should be a woman of education, judgment, 
 and, above all, of religious devotion to her work ; with a heart 
 full of love for young and old, sick and poor, because they are a 
 sacred charge committed to her care. And for this superin- 
 tendence a woman would seem to be the fittest person, comprising 
 as it does, the sick and aged, children, the outcast, and the fallen. 
 But in the due adjustment of the " Communion of Labour" (from 
 the forgetfulness of which law our errors hitherto have arisen), 
 the lady superintendent (as she might be fitly called) must have 
 the assistance of the other sex in her arduous labours. We 
 might hope that to such a person gain would not be an object, 
 therefore additional expense would not be incurred here;t but the 
 
 * Sisters of Charity, -p-QQ- 
 
 t We hare no expectation that this will be immediately, or ever universally, 
 possible. Meantime, we may try the plan of placing persons of superior power and
 
 Workhouses and Women's Work. 33 
 
 appointment of one who should correspond to the secretaries of 
 our hospitals, with a salary superior to that which is now given 
 to the masters of workhouses, would prove to be money well 
 spent in the end. He would take the superintendence of financial 
 matters, and exercise authority over the male departments of the 
 house.* Then, as in prisons, the chaplain should be a much 
 more important person than at present, either resident, or at least 
 ■with no other duties to occupy his time, which should be entirely 
 devoted to the inmates in cases where the numbers amount to 
 many hundreds. At present, the chaplain's office is often filled 
 in the most unsatisfactory manner. The wards cannot be visited 
 more than once or twice a week, when he comes in and reads a 
 prayer to all the inmates of a ward at once; he probably then 
 asks the master if " anything particular" is wanted in the popu- 
 lation of seven or eight hundred, or it may be even more, of sick, 
 dying, and vicious persons under his care, and hearing that 
 " nothing particular" is wanted, he hun-ies off to a parish con- 
 taining some thousands, who are also in his charge, and where he 
 probably will find "something particular" to do.f This part of 
 the subject is also beginning to excite attention, and a "rate- 
 payer" has lately written to a country newspaper, to urge the 
 appointment of a chaplain on the same terms, and with the same 
 advantages, as those offered in prisons. Such a task as we have 
 described could not be carried out by any one superintendent 
 alone. There must be many fellow-workers with her, both men 
 and women, who will be the responsible heads of each separate 
 department of the house. Under such a superintendence as this, 
 why should not girls be trained to fulfil all the duties of the 
 laundry and the kitchen, and so be fitted for respectable service, 
 instead of being left the whole day to their own evil and idle 
 gossip, as they sit over their oakum picking, unchecked by any 
 superior authority, or by the presence of any one above them in 
 position ? X -The band of workers within doors would be cheered 
 
 intelligence over these establishments, by raising the salaries given to masters and 
 matrons. 
 
 * In large establishments the appointment of a steward or storeteeper would 
 be necessary, and economical in preventing waste. 
 
 t We thankfully admit that there are many honourable exceptions to this 
 description, in devoted and hard-working chaplains of unions, to whom the inmates 
 look as their only friend. But when other and important duties interfere it is im- 
 possible that the time should be given to this work which it requires. Inex- 
 perienced young men, to whom the salary would often be as good as that of 
 a curacy, are not considered fitted for the post. 
 
 X To the idle and able-bodied the workhouse should be reaUy a place of hard 
 work, which can only be enforced amongst the women by an efficient superin- 
 tendence of theii- own sex. Why should the strong girls be allowed to wander up 
 and down passages, or sit about on the stairs gossiping with one another, as every 
 visitor to a workhouse knows they do at present, when the matron's eye is not 
 upon them ? The regular worker's in the different departments of the house do
 
 84 IVorkhouses and IVumen's ll'orl;. 
 
 and encouraged by the addition of " lady visitors," who would 
 infuse new hfe and energy into the work.* Their assistance 
 might also be extended to the out-door department, where it 
 would be most valuable in discovering and checking imposture, 
 as well as in softening the harsh treatment of the reheving officers 
 towards the decent poor. We care not wdiat name be given to such 
 an association of workers, so that the work done be a reality. 
 The fact of several women combining to carry out a task obviously 
 impossible to one person, need not imply any adherence to par- 
 ticular opinions or to a j)arty ; and we believe that it would 
 prove attractive to many who do not wish to devote themselves 
 exclusively either to the care of the sick or to the education of 
 the young. We admit, however, that no such work could be 
 carried out or sustained without it was supported by a strong 
 religious devotion and zeal. 
 
 Until some such plan as this which we have attempted 
 to sketch out is adopted, we shall not w^onder if our great 
 palace or prison-like unions continue to be regarded with scorn 
 by those who see our ostentatious displays of charity, made 
 without a comprehension of the only true principles on which 
 they can be successfully carried out. And let us observe that 
 these abodes of poverty are regarded with hatred and dread, not 
 by the idle and vicious, whom we might wish to deter from 
 partaking of the charity of the nation, but by the decent, the 
 helpless and afflicted poor, who have no other refuge than that 
 which is oifered them within the dreary walls of the union. 
 
 Let there be justice, stern and uncompromising, for the offender 
 and those who will not work, but let there be discrimination 
 between such and the large class of applicants on whose claims 
 we have dealt in the preceding pages. At all events, let it not be 
 made for any a degrading and deteriorating system ; and to prevent 
 this, we must enforce a complete classification and an efficient 
 
 not like to be interrupted by their desultory and imperfect assistance ; there is the 
 more need, therefore, for some special care and training for them. 
 
 * We are glad to hear of instances in which ladies and gentlemen are beginning 
 to visit workhouses on Sundays, for the purpose of reading and praying with those 
 (the larger number in every workhouse) who are unable to attend the chapel 
 services. In one case some young men, under the sanction of the chaplain, attend 
 for this purpose, and much gratitude is expressed for this work, especially by those 
 inmates who have been long deprived of hearing the Church prayers. Where the 
 chaplain has Sunday duties elsewhere, it is impossible for him to visit the wards. 
 We do not yet acknowledge as we ought how highly voluntary worh is appreciated 
 by the poor and afflicted. They know that the clergy in parishes and chaplains 
 in institutions are paid for their ministrations amongst them, but the visit 
 arising solely from the motive of sympathy and love works with greater influence 
 upon the heart. 
 
 At the recent inspection (if we may so call it) of the vast parish of Islington, 
 by the Bishop of London, it was cheering to find that the worlchouse was not 
 forgotten, and that the sick and forlorn inmates had the comfort of seeing, and 
 hearing words of exhortation from, the chief pastor of the diocese.
 
 Workhouses and Women's Work. 35 
 
 superintendence * The subject has been little thought of hitherto, 
 for it has been considered one of the settled facts that the system 
 worked well enough and needed no improvement. Now we have 
 no longer the excuse that its defects are unknown, for at the 
 present day all our social faults and miseries are dragged forth to 
 light ; we regard it as a hopeful sign of increasing interest that a 
 sub-committee has been appointed in the Social Economy 
 Department of the National Association for the Promotion of 
 Social Science, for the special consideration of the subject of 
 workhouse management ; and when once we are convinced of an 
 error, and have in due time attempted to apply a remedy, we do 
 not often relapse into it, A step once made is a step gained, 
 and from it we may hope to advance to another. In this instance 
 the first step may be considered to be the appointment of lady 
 visitors in a few instances, which we may hope will gradually 
 become more numerous. 
 
 This plan may do much, but nothing but all-pervading influ- 
 ence of a higher kind can fully meet the evils we have been 
 considering. A pamphlet entitled the Duty of Workhouse 
 Visitation, and How to do it,\ dwells chiefly on the point of 
 lady visitors for the purpose of spiritual instruction and conso- 
 lation to the inmates, and even this would be a great gain, but it 
 is not all that we would aim at accomplishing in our task of 
 refoim. Such gross neglect and abuse of power as are described 
 in the Report of the St. Pancras workhouse, drawn up by Dr. 
 Bence Jones, call more loudly for redress than any such plan 
 alone could oiFer. A perusal of this paper, or even a glance at 
 it, will convince our readers that we have magnified none of the 
 evils we have stated. It is indeed a disgrace to the history of a 
 Christian country in the nineteenth century to have statements 
 like these displayed to the eyes of the world. Dr. Bence Jones 
 concludes with these words : — " Such a state of things ought not 
 to be tolerated by the Government." The first step to be taken 
 in the correction of evils of such magnitude must be the appoint- 
 ment of guardians who will see and correct abuses ; indeed, tliis 
 seems to be as absolutely necessary to any improvement in the 
 system as the selection of a better class of superintendents. On 
 this point we may direct attention to a suggestion in which the 
 
 * We have hardly left ourselves space to enter on the subject of the employment 
 of inmates of workhouses. The object was treated in a paper sent to the Meeting 
 for Social Science at Birmingham, by Mrs. De Morgan. The plans suggested are 
 partly carried out in some workhouses, where tailors and shoemakers are employed 
 to superintend the work of the inmates, and where the making of bread for the 
 establishment is done in the house ; wood-chopping is also provided as an occupa- 
 tion. Mrs. De Morgan also suggests the practicability of shghtly remunerative 
 employment, and especially urges industrial training for the young, so that " work- 
 houses, from being the lowest step on the downward ladder, might form the first of 
 an ascending scale, and arrest the idle andTicious in their certaki course to prison." 
 
 t Nisbet. 
 
 D
 
 3G Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 ti'ue remedy is pointed out.* If the more respectable inhabitants 
 of a parish would interest themselves in the election of guardians, 
 and moreover would become guardians themselves, the power would 
 no longer be left in the hands of the very incompetent persons who, 
 generally speaking, at present exercise it. And we may ask, 
 why should not gentlemen be found who would devote time to the 
 management of workhouses as well as of hospitals and other 
 charitable institutions ? f 
 
 We have endeavoured to point out some of the remedies which 
 appear to be within our reach ; and in directing the attention of 
 Avomen to the field of work which lies before them, we would 
 remind them that the benefit of their entering it will not be for 
 the poor only. The life spent for others will be at least as happy 
 and as healthful as that of the solitary " old maid," who dwells 
 upon her own petty sorrows and ailments (and perhaps creates 
 them) because she has no other object for her thoughts and no 
 call for her afiections. Here is work waiting for her to do. Let 
 her come forward and claim it. Let it not be said that there are 
 no " sisters of charity" here, as in other lands, but let us prove 
 that we also have hands and hearts willing to serve in the same 
 cause. And there is amj)le variety offered for all tastes and 
 capacities. There are young and old, sick and healthy, pious and 
 vicious, all needing the skilful and judicious care of the well 
 trained and educated mind. It is a sad instance of the ignorant 
 prejudice which is ever opposed to the introduction of change and 
 improvement, that even where help of this kind is oflfered, it is 
 •still obstinately rejected, for men have not yet learnt to see that it 
 is for their own interest to accept it. Every imaginable reason is 
 alleged against admitting ladies to a share in this work. Religious 
 differences are brought forward in some cases as an insuperable 
 objection; and universally, it may be said, the feeling of the 
 guardians is against it, and in favour of closing the workhouse 
 
 * See Letter, p. 54, Metropolitan Workhouses and tJieir Inmates. 
 
 •f Everywhere we hear of gentlemen resigning their posts as guardians, because 
 of the opposition of the majority, whose ignorance and vulgarity cannot be tole- 
 rated by them. It ia the same in the country as in towns, the ill-educated and 
 narrow-minded have the upper hand, and generally succeed in their endeavom-s to 
 get rid of their opponents. The following is the description of the state of things 
 existing in the union of a distant country town : — " I can hardly conceive anything 
 more hopeless than the management of our union. There is not one gentleman in 
 all this country-side who takes any part as guardian in the administration of 
 affairs.. Some did at first^ years ago, but they were defeated by the determined and 
 Bysitematic tactics of the farmers, who wished to get the management entirely into 
 tlxeir own hands, and the consequence was, most unfortunately, that all the gentle- 
 men retired in disgust. From that day to this, the farmers have had it all their 
 own way. The chairman is a small farmer in this parish, and our guardian is a 
 most unfit person, of bad character, but nevertheless is much thought of both by 
 the other guardians and by the Poor Law Board, because he is a capital hand at 
 keeping down the rates. We all know what this means, when appUed to the poor, 
 the aged, and the infirm." It is justly asked, "What co-operation could bo 
 expected in any system of lady visitors from such persons as these ?"
 
 Workhouses and Women's Work. 37 
 
 doors to all but official inspection and management. Whether 
 Government will give its aid and sanction in this matter, or leave 
 the contest with i)ublic opinion, to be fought, step by step, during 
 a gradual process of years, remains to be seen. We have even 
 heard of the wife of a bishop being refused admission as a visitor 
 into a neighbouring union ; and in cases where it is permitted to 
 a few ladies to enter, it is done as it were by stealth, and to be 
 ignored by the guardians is all that is hoped for or expected.* 
 If masters are in the least disposed to dislike the " interference," 
 as it is called, they have full power to make a complaint to the 
 guardians, who invariably listen to their story, and the visitors 
 are probably dismissed.f Even gentlemen have been treated in 
 this manner, without the opportunity of making a defence. We 
 fear, therefore, that the hope expressed a year ago on this point 
 is still far from being realized. J 
 
 The following extract gives the result of one instance in which 
 a lady missionary was permitted to visit the apparently hopeless 
 inmates of a workhouse, and it shews what one loving and disin- 
 terested heart may do, though boards of guardians still desire to 
 ignore the testimony, and deem themselves, or at least one chaplain, 
 all-sufficient for the work : — 
 
 " In the course of the past year eiglity-four visits have been paid to 
 the workhouse, where the Scriptures and religious books have been read 
 to more than a thousand persons, and where the kind reception she meets 
 with shews how highly valued her visits are. There she is enabled not 
 only to visit the sick and aged, but to penetrate into the depths of their 
 sin and misery, and to carry light and hope into the midst of darkness 
 and despair. Softened and brought to their senses by long seclusion, 
 and longing to lead a better life when they leave it, they are ready to 
 
 * Ratepayers have no more privileges of admission than any other visitors, and 
 must keep to the visiting days. 
 
 t We would repeat here that there will be far less reason to dread interference and 
 confusion from the visits of ladies, if they are authorized by the guardians and 
 chaplain, than if they are made, as at present, in a desultory way, without any 
 supervision or co-operation from those in authority. Occasionally, when the visits 
 of ladies have been hinted at, masters have replied that if such were permitted 
 they should resign their posts ! What can more clearly prove that there are some 
 things which women would discover to be wrong ? We do not think it is flattering 
 to the women with whom these men associate that they express so much dread of 
 the " interference" of the other sex. 
 
 X " There is no lack of institutions, the doors of which will be thrown wide open 
 to our English ladies as soon as they knock at them. We are not yet prepared to 
 say that the workhouse is one of them. There may be some prejudice and exclu- 
 siveness to contend against at the outset. Doubtless there are vested interests in 
 misrule, any interference with which will be proclaimed unpardonable heresy. 
 But they cannot last long. The good sense and good feeling of the many must 
 prevail over the selfishness and intolerance of the few. We are becoming every day 
 more and more alive to the fact that what is called ' efiicient control ' is for the 
 most part very inefficient in respect of the practical development of the workhouse 
 system, as every humane person would desire to see it developed." — " Employment 
 of Women :" North British Eeview, Feb. 1857. 
 
 D 2
 
 38 Workhouses and Women's Work. 
 
 listen as little children to the Word of Life, and look for the visits of 
 their teacher, as one of them said, • as if she was our mother.' " 
 
 We may conclude with the hope that many will be induced to 
 *' go and do likewise," and with an earnest desire that guardians 
 may in time learn to see that it is their interest as well as their 
 duty to encourage the visits of those who are able to undertake 
 and carry out a work which, with the best intentions, they would 
 be unable themselves to perform. We trust that a better day has 
 begun to dawn upon the dreary night of workhouse management, 
 and that our non-criminal poor may ere long receive a share of 
 that benevolent zeal and interest which is now so largely bestowed 
 upon the criminal portion of our population. 
 
 i
 
 A PAPER 
 
 CONDITION OF WORKHOUSES, 
 
 Read in the Department of Social Economy, at the Association 
 for the Promotion of Social Science, Birmingham. 
 
 Having very recently collected all the information I could 
 obtain in the form of a pamphlet on the subject of Workhouses 
 and their management, I hardly thought it likely that I could 
 offer any new suggestions for the consideration of the present 
 meeting. I have found, however, such a generally- awakened 
 interest in the cause, and so many persons ready to furnish facts 
 and observations from their own experience, that I am not with- 
 out a hope that these remarks may prove of some value to the 
 important subject of the treatment of our poor under the present 
 poor-law system. It is satisfactory to find that the various 
 opinions I have received from different quarters may be said to 
 be unanimous as to the existing evils, and nearly so as to the 
 suggested remedies. When this is the case, and public feeling 
 is once aroused and expressed, there is much ground for hope 
 that such suggestions will be adopted and carried out. Some 
 few have indeed confessed that they feared the difficulty was an 
 insurmountable one, and the problem insoluble, to make kind- 
 ness and humanity and comfort compatible with tlie strict 
 economy which is necessary when charity is granted and bestowed 
 by law. But I think these remarks were made by persons who 
 were the least acquainted with the subject practically, and I hope 
 to be able to show that increased expenditure is by no means the 
 chief aim of those who are earnest in the cause of workhouse 
 reform, or necessarily involved in their suggestions. Neither do 
 they violently denounce the system itself, which is very probably 
 less to be blamed than the manner in which it is carried out. 
 No extreme measures or alterations in the rules are demanded, 
 but rather a calm and quiet investigation into the workings of
 
 40 0?i the Condition of Worhliouses. 
 
 a system that lias been for more than twenty years on trial ; 
 for, however carefully it may have been framed, it cannot be 
 unreasonable now to look at its results more closely than we have 
 ever done before. Up to this time the whole matter may be said 
 to have been carried on " with closed doors;" and but little was 
 known of the proceedings within, save by the poor inmates them- 
 selves, whom few thought of listening to, and the guardians and 
 officials, who reserved to themselves the entire management, 
 under the impression that whatever influence was forced upon 
 them from without, was an interference with their rights and 
 liberties, and productive of evil rather than of good. 
 
 It is true that there were dawnings of an interest in the sub- 
 ject, as long ago as the publication of Dickens's tale of the 
 sorrows and sufferings of poor " Oliver Twist," the workhouse 
 boy. But the instances of workhouse management, or rather 
 ?ww-management, given there, fitted on to no one's experience ; 
 no one knew how much of it to believe, and it was deemed at all 
 events a highly-coloured picture. There was, however, much 
 truth for a foundation, and though we may hope that few, if any, 
 exactly resemble Mr. and Mrs. Bumble, they might be considered 
 as types of the class they represented. We cannot have forgotten 
 the outcry of indignation that was raised at the discovery of the 
 iniquities practised upon the pauper children at Tooting not 
 many years ago, and more recently there have been the revela- 
 tions of proceedings at the St. Pancras and Marylebone work- 
 houses, which have perhaps done more than anything else to 
 bring the whole matter forward into light. Up to that time there 
 was no general interest awakened on the subject, and only a few 
 persons here and there thought of the existence of the thousands 
 who were shut up within the walls of buildings close to their 
 own doors ; in old workhouses, dim and dreary looking, still 
 retained for their original purpose, or in new ones, grand and 
 pompous castles or palaces, as repulsive, perhaps, to the humble 
 dwellers in cottages or single rooms, the one as the other. But 
 the subject was already working far down below the surface, and 
 in due time the thoughts germinating there sprung up into the 
 light of day. One of the first publications concerning work- 
 houses, was a pamphlet inquiring " Why our Union Workhouses 
 should not be Houses of Mercy," considering they were intended 
 for the poor of a Christian land. Few persons took notice of 
 this solitary voice raised in behalf of an apparently hopeless 
 subject, and the publishers told me that hardly any copies were 
 sold ; but it was the first thing that directed my attention to it, 
 and it probably did some good. In 1849, Dr. Sieveking wrote a 
 pamphlet on the subject of training nurses from the inmates of 
 workhouses, a point which seems to be again attracting some 
 public notice at the present time, after an interval of eight years. 
 
 k
 
 On the Condition of Workhouses. 41 
 
 On my first visit to a large London workhouse many years ago, 
 I was struck by the hopeless and depressing character of the 
 institution, though at that time a kind and excellent master and 
 matron superintended it. They willingly accepted my offer to 
 go again to visit a poor sick woman to whom I had spoken, and 
 from that time I resolved to do something, if possible, to mend 
 such a state of things. To obtain visitors to the neglected 
 inmates, especially to the ignorant and miserable women, seemed 
 the first and most obvious remedy, and this point has remained 
 my chief object ever since, though five years' endeavours have not 
 succeeded in removing the obstacles to this plan. I cannot 
 further trace the various steps by which the subject has advanced 
 to the present time, when considerable attention is directed 
 towards it. In Parliament it has found some sympathy, and it is 
 now brought before a meeting, the aim and object of which is to 
 discuss the most important questions relating to social science, 
 and from the deliberations of which we may look for great 
 results. 
 
 It may be a fact to be lamented that there should be so large 
 a proportion of our countrymen and women who are compelled 
 to resort to charity for assistance, and even maintenance. But if 
 it is a fact, the only question is how to deal with it, so that it 
 should not become still more lamentable by the manner in which 
 it is treated. " The workhouse " has become a by-word for all 
 that is degraded, scorned, and outcast, and seems to imply a loss 
 of self-respect in every one belonging to it. The humblest 
 school-boy and girl look down upon the " workhouse " child. 
 The poorest women object to certain kinds of clothing for their 
 children, because it is like the " workhouse dress." Some per- 
 sons think this all very right, and desirable that it should be so. 
 It seems to me a great evil, and to imply blame to us in some 
 way that 600,000 persons should be living in a condition which 
 has this sort of feeling attached to it. Is it because it is a crime 
 in itself to be poor, or because the way in which we treat poverty 
 has led persons to think it so ? Or is it because we relieve those 
 who do not need or deserve relief, and so have continually the feel- 
 ing that we are imposed upon ? It is only from some such reason 
 that I can account for the very prevalent state of feeling with 
 regard to workhouses and their inmates. The simple fact that 
 every country has, ever has had, and I suppose ever must have, 
 a certain portion of poor, helpless and unable to maintain them- 
 selves from a variety of causes, is surely too widely acknow- 
 ledged to be doubted. If so, the fact is equally clear that they 
 must be helped. And we do help them, it is true, and boast of 
 the system by which no one in this Christian land can die of 
 want. I may mention here, however, that I believe no winter 
 ever passes witliout our reading in the papers that there are
 
 42 On the Condition of Workhouses. 
 
 persons who do die of destitution in this charitable metropolis. 
 It is true they might no doubt have applied to the workhouse ; 
 but do we never read also of refusals to relieve, and coarse rejec- 
 tion of the destitute when they do apply for parish relief ? And 
 when rehef is bestowed, is it not too often with the hard hand of 
 necessity, not of brotherly love and charity ? " KeHef is flung 
 to the poor by law, not given in love," was the remark once made 
 of our system of pubhc charity. And this seems the more 
 remarkable, when we find no other country so prominent for its 
 endless forms of charity. No kind of sorrow or misfortune or 
 suffering is known to exist, but Englishmen rush forward to its 
 relief. Yet for the wants and sorrows of this one portion of 
 their fellow-creatures, they have seemed neither to think nor 
 care. An interest in them has been limited to those few who 
 have visited inmates of the workhouses, old acquaintances pro- 
 bably, whose prospects in entering have been cheered by the 
 promise of a visit from a friend. In this way only have the 
 visits of ladies here and there been permitted ; for the care of this 
 class has been thought to belong entirely to the " guardians of the 
 poor," who were supposed to be in reality what their name implied. 
 
 I shall now endeavour, as briefly as I can, to put together the 
 opinions and suggestions I have received from various quarters, 
 in the hope that they may fall upon the willing ears of some who 
 may have also the power of carrying them out into practice. 
 
 I have said that the feeling about the existence of grievances 
 seems to be unanimous. They are not imaginary evils that we 
 are dealing with, but such as all thinking and benevolent men 
 and women believe demand earnest attention and speedy remedy. 
 The following opinions of eminent men will confirm this. One 
 says (speaking of a remedy), " That which seems chiefly neces- 
 sary is that kind and degree of publicity in these institutions 
 which is obtained by the free admission of non-official persons. 
 This is one of the chief advantages of medical schools in 
 hospitals, many of which, but for the schools, would soon be as 
 bad as workhouses." Another believes that " workhouses are 
 as much 'habitations of cruelty' as any other recesses where 
 unlimited power prevails, and where the victims have no friends. 
 The officials hate inspection and interference, and every difficulty 
 will be thrown in the way. A good, sustained system of visita- 
 tion would produce most happy eff'ects." Another says, ** You 
 have grappled with an evil which most sorely needs a remedy, 
 and the remedies proposed by you are the only ones which will 
 be effectual." 
 
 In the next place, I may be allowed to give a few instances of 
 mismanagement which have come under my own observation, and 
 that of my friends who have had experience in the matter, to 
 prove that we do not complain of imaginary grievances. And
 
 On the Conditioti of Workhouses. 43 
 
 then I will give a few of the suggestions which would provide 
 remedies for the present state of things. 
 
 First, as to tlie hardships and grievances ^ and their conse- 
 quences. 
 
 Perhaps, the chief grievance of all is the employment of 
 incompetent officials, especially the choice of masters and matrons 
 unfitted for their work hy any previous training, or knowledge of 
 the poor and their ways ; and also the employment of pauper 
 nurses, under no sufficient superintendence or control, for the 
 visit once a day of the matron virtually leaves them to them- 
 selves in their treatment of their patients. Let us hear what the 
 poor-law rule itself says as to this point. " With respect to the 
 use of pauper servants, they require the strictest superintendence 
 on the part of the master and other officers. The employment 
 of paupers in offices of trust is inexpedient, inasmuch as it tends 
 to impair the discipline of the house. In offices of mere lahour, 
 which can he performed under trustworthy superintendence y 
 paupers may he useful. Where responsibility is involved, paid 
 servants should be engaged." Are not the entire charge of a sick 
 ward, the kitchen or laundry for many hundred persons, posts of 
 responsibility ? And if so, why are they left entirely to the 
 management of pauper inmates, as in so many cases ? It is 
 evident that those who framed the poor-law rules contemplated 
 the very possible abuse of power that would ensue ; but even all 
 their precautions and warnings have failed to avert the evil. 
 
 Instances of such are only too numerous. In one infirmary 
 where no paid nurse is employed, the pauper nurse is continually 
 being changed; she has one helper, and no extra person at 
 night. The present nurse has a bad leg, which has disabled her 
 from hospital work; she is continually grumbling at her occupa- 
 tion and situation, and says she would never stay if she could 
 do anything else. 
 
 One poor old woman has been bedridden for years, and her 
 hands are nearly useless, and the fingers bent inwards. A lady 
 observed her long finger nails, and asked why they were not 
 cut ? She said she could not get it done without paying for it. 
 She ofiered to cut them for her, but the old woman would not 
 hear of it, and evidently thought it would make the nurses sus- 
 pect she had been telling tales of them. She said she had to gnaw 
 her potato at dinner like a dog, for no one would cut it up for her. 
 She had been kept awake for two nights by the groans of a dying 
 neighbour in the next bed. She said of the nurse, " You have 
 no idea of the language she uses ; it is so low I could not repeat 
 it." She was many times deterred from receiving the Holy 
 Communion, because she said the conduct of the nurse was so 
 intolerable, both before and directly afterwards, that she could 
 not compose her mind for it.
 
 44 On the Condition of Workhouses. 
 
 The consequence of such treatment is, of course, that the poor 
 naturally avoid the union infinnary, if possible, and prefer the 
 hospitals, which are intended for curable cases, not for those that 
 are hopeless, either from the nature of the illness, or old age. 
 Persons often come for admission to the hospital who are quite 
 suitable for the union, but some say they would rather die than 
 go there. We may be quite sure that persons will never sham 
 illness to be taken into the union infirmary, therefore there, at 
 least, there can be no fear of making things " too comfortable ;" 
 as it is, there is no lack of inmates ; let there, at least, in all 
 cases, be 07ie responsible and paid nurse placed over them. The 
 case of the children whose deaths were occasioned by the nurses' 
 stealing the nourishing food intended for them, has probably 
 l)een read by many in the papers. The following evidence as to the 
 interior of a workhouse was given by a young inmate of a supe- 
 rior class, whose word can be thoroughly trusted. At one time 
 she was in the sick ward for a month, and during that time saw 
 the matron once ; lately she has been in the " insane ward " for 
 a fortnight, because she had fits, such patients being always 
 placed there ; while there a fortnight she saw the matron twice. 
 She described the behaviour of the master and matron as coarse 
 and tyrannical. She was able to occupy herself at intervals, 
 and a kind lady who visited her took some needlework to amuse 
 her weary hours ; it was taken from her by the matron, and she 
 •was not allowed to do anything, nor to receive books from her 
 friend. She heard and saw a good deal of the treatment of the 
 inmates; an old woman of eighty was abused by the master in 
 the coarsest terms, and dragged across the yard, because she 
 answered him ; he ended by sending her off to prison for a fort- 
 night. The searcliing of the inmates is carried on in the most 
 offensive manner, frequently (of the women) in the presence of 
 the master. They are allowed to possess nothing ; the nurses are 
 paid sixpence a week, and when they go out with any savings in 
 their pockets it is taken from them. The master gives his own ver- 
 sion of everything to the guardians, who will not listen to the poor 
 themselves. It was a frequent remark that things were much 
 better in prisons ; cocoa was allowed in them, here hot or cold 
 water for all under sixty ; the, bread was bad, and lumps of alum 
 frequently found in it. Frequently no sitting room is provided 
 for the women after working hours ; so after tea, at five, if they 
 do not choose to go to bed, they must sit in the yard, or on the 
 stairs, as I have often seen them do. Not even a cup or sauce- 
 pan was allowed ; so, though she had tea given her,, she could 
 not use it. And there were no boxes ; so books and tracts lent 
 to the inmates are kept under the mattress — a most unpleasant 
 practice. In one workhouse the warm garments of the inmates 
 are taken away, without others being supplied ; an old man of
 
 On the Condition of Workhouses. 45 
 
 eighty was deprived of flannel, and when his old mistress sup- 
 plied him with new, that was taken away. One dying woman 
 sat up in hed constantly, with no covering on her shoulders, and 
 when something was given her for this purpose, it was taken 
 away by the matron. 
 
 It would he endless to give all the cases of harshness and 
 injustice that have come before me. One of the most pernicious 
 consequences of all this is the preference of the inison to the 
 workhouse. There is generally better diet and better treatment 
 there, the ofl&cials being of a superior class. The present Lady 
 Mayoress says, that she was first led to think about the manage- 
 ment of workhouses, from being one of a committee for visiting 
 prisons, when she frequently was told by the women and young 
 girls, that they would rather be there than in the workhouse. 
 Probably even such degraded characters feel what it is to be 
 treated y^'ith. justice and dignity. 
 
 Surely this is the strongest argument of all for some amend- 
 ment in the management ; either our workhouses must be made 
 more comfortable, or our prisons less so. The chaplain of a 
 prison says, " It is almost heart-breaking to witness the number 
 of poor creatures who come to prison in preference to the union, 
 or because the obtaining what they require from the latter place 
 is beset with so much difficulty and delay. It is not only an 
 anomalous state of things, but highly discreditable to a Chris- 
 tian country, that a poor man should be led, as is frequently the 
 case, to seek necessary food and shelter in a prison. We have 
 frequently men and women suffering under diseases, who come 
 to prison for the express purpose of getting that relief, in the 
 way of medicine and nourishing food, which they have sought 
 in vain from the workhouse, their own parish being, perhaps, 
 miles away, and which they cannot themselves afford. 
 
 Superintendence of a responsible kind is needed, not only in 
 the infirmary, but in every department of the house; in the 
 kitchen more especially. I have just seen a proof of this in an 
 account of proceedings in one of our large London workhouses, 
 which ended in the dismissal of the cook. The broth for the 
 sick was found to be hot water with oatmeal floating on it, and 
 the soup was declared by the guardians to be unfit for use; the 
 bones and meat were nowhere to be found, and had doubtless gone 
 to make soup for others than the inmates for whom it was intended. 
 
 Without any increase of expenditure how much might be done 
 in the cooking department, by one who really understood the 
 matter of cheap and good cookerj*, for the comfort of thousands 
 who now loathe their daily food, and consequently often subsist 
 for days solely upon the tea and bread.* The patience with 
 
 * Many old people are quite unable to oat cither the soup or solid suet pudding.
 
 46 On the Condition of Workhouses. 
 
 which such a fact as this has heen told me, has often surprised 
 me. Several poor creatures have said to me that they were 
 weary of their lives, they had nothing to live for, they even 
 hoped they might not live to see me again on my return from a 
 short absence, and they longed for death to release them from 
 their trials. Who can wonder at this, after spending years help- 
 less on a sick bed, with literally no variety from day to day ? 
 Others, not bed-ridden, sit round the walls, vacant and dreary, 
 with no occupation beyond the two or three well-worn books, 
 which some tell me they know by heart ; and probably in every 
 ward there are several who cannot read at all, from blindness or 
 infirmity. If these things could only be seen it would need little 
 persuasion to touch the hearts of those who hear this, and per- 
 suade them to introduce some element of mercy into these 
 abodes. , 
 
 Then, as to the point of out-door relief, perhaps the most 
 difl&cult of all. The very great reluctance to give it, and the 
 desire to invite persons into the house as a test (as it is said), 
 mainly arises from the conviction that great imposition is prac- 
 tised. The master of a union, a good and conscientious man, 
 who enters into his work with some intelligence, tells me he can- 
 not understand the reason for wishing to incur the far greater 
 expense of entire maintenance rather than bestow partial relief ; 
 it seems to be supposed that persons must be either wholly desti- 
 tute (the only conditions under which any one would enter), or 
 else need no help at all, whereas in the greater number of cases 
 assistance, and not maintenance is needed, and that probably 
 only temporarily, except, of course, in a few cases of helpless 
 widows, &c. All this appears to me to arise from the want of a 
 thorough and trustworthy investigation into the cases requiring 
 aid. Would it not be worth while to try the plan of enlisting 
 some voluntary helps for this work ? Might not district visitors 
 come to the aid of " relieving officers," whose visits are often 
 dreaded by the decent poor? They cannot object to this, 
 because their plan is perfect and successful. The two following 
 cases have just come before a board of guardians. One person 
 had been receiving out-door relief for sixteen months, and was at 
 last discovered to have been in the weekly average receipt of 
 twenty- one shillings ! Another had for some time received six 
 shillings a week relief; he was found to have been receiving a 
 weekly sum of three pounds ! Could not the clergy or district 
 visitors have given help in such cases as these ? A poor woman 
 whom I had long visited was compelled to go into the union at 
 seventy years of age, worn out with weakness and a heart com- 
 plaint, brought on by constant stooping over needlework. When 
 I visited her in the union, to my surprise I found her in the 
 " shed," with the able-bodied, and there she stayed for a fort-
 
 On the Condition of Workhouses. 47 
 
 night before she was removed to the infinn ward. She told me 
 she could not describe her sufferings in this shed, with a brick 
 floor and benches, where hair and oakum are picked ; there were 
 " the sweepings of six parishes," she said, and the language and 
 behaviour were fearful ; she was also placed to sleep with another 
 woman, and she thought she should have died the first night — 
 she did not dare to go to sleep with this fear. Surely this was a 
 case which might have received a little more care and attention, 
 if anything had been known of her previous character, and I 
 had been allowed to say a word about her. 
 
 Governors and officials will always look coldly upon any 
 voluntary aid ; but surely there has been proof lately that it is 
 unwise to do so, and that the fears and suspicions of its failure 
 are unjust. 
 
 On the introduction of a spirit of love and devotion into this 
 hard machinery, rest the cliief hopes of those who look for any 
 improvement in the system. Opinions on this point are unani- 
 mous. Amongst the various letters I have received, the following 
 is perhaps one of the most useful, from the clearness and prac- 
 tical nature of its suggestions. It is from a clergyman who was 
 for two years chaplain to the large union of a country town. 
 
 " In the hope that it may prove of some service, I will state 
 what appeared to me defects in the system as carried on at 
 C . 
 
 " The first great defect is in regard to the chaplain. Every 
 union ought to have a chaplain entirely to itself, and not, as is 
 too often the case, share one with a neighbouring parish. The 
 miserable stipend which is offered by the guardians renders it 
 impossible for any man to devote his whole time to the paupers. 
 At tliis time I believe it is 50/. per annum ; when I was first 
 elected it was but 40/., and previously only 30/. It is, there- 
 fore, absolutely necessary that the chaplain should have some 
 other cure, which prevents his giving more than one Sunday 
 service in the union ; an arrangement as unfair to the chaplain 
 himself, as to those committed to liis charge. Imagine a man 
 having to look after his parish Sunday schools, with one whole 
 duty, and sharing two others, having, besides, to officiate at the 
 union, situated more than a mile from the church ! and in the 
 week the care of 2,000 souls, besides the union ! Yet this was 
 exactly my case. I maintain, therefore, that the chaplain ought 
 to have no other duty than the union. 
 
 " 2. The second defect I will mention relates to the Lying-in 
 Ward. The causes which make it necessary for persons to apply 
 for admission to our unions are, I expect, mainly these : amongst 
 the able-bodied — drunkenness in the men, sins of unchastity in 
 the women. There are, of course, exceptions to this rule. And 
 the very exceptions prove the evil. Good and bad — honest and
 
 48 On the Conditioit of Workhouses. 
 
 dishonest, are treated exactly alike. The mother of the lawful 
 child, and the mother of the illegitimate one, are confined side 
 by side, which is as injurious to the one as the other. The 
 honest mother feels somewhat of the disgrace, and the other 
 loses all sense of shame. Visitors entering the ward regard them 
 both as mothers of a child of shame. Is this fair to either of 
 them ? Besides, it may be that a young girl, the victim of 
 deceit, enters the house, ashamed of her condition, and sorrowing 
 for her sin. And what happens ? Turned away from her home, 
 she is thrust into a ward full of habitually sinful women, who 
 laugh at her simplicity, and too often shame her out of her 
 repentance. When, therefore, she is transferred to the Lying-in 
 Ward, what hope is there that the ministrations of the chaplain 
 can take effect ? In this, and in other wards where bad women 
 are assembled, the chaplain is well-nigh useless, because he can- 
 not see them one by one, and so, directly his back is turned, his 
 godly exhortations are jeered at, and his advice treated with con- 
 tempt. How, under such circumstances, is it possible to reclaim 
 even one of such outcasts ? 
 
 " 3. With the diet I had but little acquaintance, but it certainly 
 struck me as excessively hard upon the aged inmates, that 
 nothing but ivater was allowed them as their dinner drink. Half 
 a pint of the smallest small beer would help to cheer them up, 
 and make them look forward with pleasure to one meal at least in 
 the day. For some time, indeed, this luxury was allowed them, 
 but was afterwards discontinued by order of the Poor- Law Board. 
 
 " 4. Some difierence of treatment and more liberty, might be 
 given with advantage to the old and infirm. That the place 
 should be made as uncomfortable as possible to the young and 
 able-bodied may be necessary, but to those who are well-nigh 
 worn out, it should surely be a resting-place ! yet even for the 
 younger inmates the union should be at least as comfortable as 
 the county gaol. 
 
 " 6. Lastly, if each union had a resident chaplain, gentlemen 
 as guardians, ladies as authorized visitors, and a master with a 
 higher salary, much good might be brought to pass. I should, 
 besides, like to see it ordered that the master and matron had 
 their meals in the hall with the inmates. This would efiect a 
 change both in regard to the conduct of the poor, and condition 
 of the food. If some useful employments were introduced 
 among the more infirm, and even some innocent games, puzzles, 
 &c., it would tend to relieve the tedium and monotony of their 
 lives. A reading-room and library might be added with great 
 advantage." 
 
 The point of the classification of the inmates is, of course, so 
 fundamentally important, and it has been so strongly enforced 
 by the poor-law rules, that it is sui'prising it should still be so
 
 0)1 the Condition of Workhousea. 49 
 
 imperfectly attended to. The expense in this case for better 
 accommodation, once incurred, would be for ever; and there can 
 be no doubt that an ultimate saving of expense would result^ 
 from the prevention of contamination, and consequent pauperism 
 of many of the inmates. In many London workhouses a better 
 arrangement is earnestly desired, but is impossible from want of 
 space. The following is the desire of the Poor-law Commis- 
 sioners on this point : " It is desirable that females of dissolute 
 and disorderly habits should be separated from those of a better 
 character, inasmuch as it is the duty of the guardians to take all 
 reasonable care that the morals of persons admitted into the 
 house be not corrupted by intercourse with inmates of this 
 description." Yet, I suppose there is hardly a workhouse wheres 
 this advice is strictly obeyed. 
 
 As the point of committees of visiting ladies has been dwelt 
 upon, it may be well to mention that the plan has been adopted 
 in two London workhouses; in that of St. Pan eras (containing 
 2,000 inmates) for nearly two years, and in the West London 
 Union it is just organized. In the first, the plan has met with 
 decided success ; in the other there is every prospect of it. The 
 labours of the former committee are not limited to spiritual 
 matters, but their attention is invited to other points as well, 
 and their suggestions are cordially received by the guardians. 
 At the Jl)-st meeting of the West London Union Committee, the 
 opinion of the ladies was asked by the medical man, and one of 
 the guardians, as to the desirableness of engaging a paid nurse 
 to superintend the sick wards ; and, though in itself a small and 
 trifling matter, I may add that the matron immediately asked the 
 help of the ladies in providing her with rag for the sick, for 
 ■which she was often in great distress. 
 
 As to the employment of the inmates of workhouses, many 
 suggestions have been made, but beyond needlework, and hair 
 and oakum picking, nothing is, I believe, provided. The objec- 
 tion to proposals for further employment will, probably, be the 
 want of space for anything like workshops, in which the men 
 might follow, temporarily, their former occupations or trades. 
 Many would be thankful to be employed in some such way. In 
 Paris I was much struck with the sight of a long workshop in 
 the Hospice or Asylum for Incurable Men (containing 500 
 inmates), filled with persons following their former avocations. 
 Whether much money is gained by their labour or not, it seemed 
 at any rate a merciful arrangement, to give them the opportunity 
 of employing themselves if they are able, which many even of 
 the aged would be. And as to the unfairness of taking work 
 from honest labourers out of doors, I do not see that this can be 
 made an objection, for needlework is already done by the women 
 for the shops as well as for private orders. It cannot be intended
 
 50 On the Condition of Workhouses. 
 
 that any persons who can work, if ever so little, should live in 
 continual idleness, and consequent misery. If there was more 
 time for discrimination and individual knowledge on the part of 
 the matron, there would he many of the aged found able to do 
 small jobs of work, who are not able to go into the work-room. 
 In one London union the master kindly and judiciously employs 
 the men in doing all the work of repairs, &c., required in the 
 house, such as painting, white-washing, carpentering, and a large 
 expense is thus saved to the parish. 
 
 It seems to be always considered a virtue that all are treated 
 alike in workhouses, without distinction of classes or individuals. 
 But is it really right and just that it should be so ? Why should 
 not some difference be made between the mere pauper, and those 
 who have been housekeepers, and therefore ratepayers in the 
 parish ? Such persons are here and there fortunate enough to 
 obtain admission into almshouses, some of which are of a very 
 superior description, but the few only can hope for this refage 
 for their last days. As it is not considered a crime in those who 
 accept the charity of an almshouse, why should not some better 
 treatment be reserved for those of the same class who are reduced 
 to accept the charity of a workhouse, and who have in their twnx 
 contributed to the support of the poor in their parish ? There 
 would be no jealousy caused by such a proceeding, for all would 
 see the justice of it, and know it was those only who had formerly 
 been in the position of householders who received superior privi- 
 leges. I think it is impossible to deny that unavoidable misfor- 
 tune may overtake this class as well as every other of the com- 
 munity. By one of the poor-law rules, " the appointment of an 
 honest and efl&cient porter is of the utmost importance." Of the 
 behaviour of some of these officials, the tales I could tell would 
 hardly be beheved. I have myself been subjected to the rudest 
 treatment when, on the appointment of a new one, I have not 
 been known. Another lady was treated even worse. She asked 
 one day to speak to the chaplain about a patient whom she 
 visited, when she was told by the porter that "the chaplain did 
 not see young women at the workhouse — if she wished to see 
 him she must go to his own house ! " I only mention these 
 instances of coarseness and vulgarity, because I wish to show the 
 tone and spirit which pervade these institutions, and if such is 
 the treatment of ladies, what must that of the poor be ? But 
 such conduct is not confined to porters. In one instance a lady 
 went as usual to visit a poor old friend who was dying, when the 
 master told her she could only go on the visiting days {to the 
 sick such rules are ordered to be dispensed with), and on her 
 remonstrating, he said, *' Mrs, R. might be interesting to her, but 
 she was no more to him than the others, and she could only go 
 once a week to see her."
 
 On the Condilion of Workhouses. 51 
 
 As to the question of removing workhouses out of London, 
 which has lately been suggested in some quarters, I would only 
 remark that from my experience such a change would tend to 
 make them still more dreaded than they are at present ; the main 
 objection being, that the poor would be more out of reach of 
 their friends, whose visits in many cases can be their only conso- 
 lation. And here I cannot help remarking on the cruelty of 
 refusing admission to visitors on Sundays, a very general prac- 
 tice in London, that being the only day on which working 
 people can visit their friends. I have known even a clergyman 
 refused admission to a poor sick woman twice on a Sunday, and 
 the custom leads to great and unnecessary cruelty. In conclu- 
 sion, it may be useful to quote a few of the rules of the Poor- 
 Law Board, that it may be seen how far they are to blame for the 
 many grievances we have been considering, especially in this case 
 of the visiting, for which I think the guardians are clearly 
 responsible. 
 
 " Any person may visit any pauper in the workhouse by per- 
 mission of the master or matron, subject to such conditions and 
 restrictions as the guardians may prescribe," and in a note it is 
 added — " This article allows any pauper to receive the visit of a 
 stranger, but requires that, except in the case of a sick pauper, 
 the interview shall take place in a separate room, and in presence 
 of the master or matron." The reasons for this are then given, 
 and are obvious — such as the fear of the introduction of spirits 
 by visitors — the dangers of male visitors to the women, and of 
 private interviews ; " accordingly this restriction is not intended to 
 offer any obstacle to the innocent and proper visits of relations 
 and friends. It is desirable that there should be fixed days of 
 the week on which visits should be allowed, and that they should 
 not, in general, be visited on other days, except in cases of sick- 
 ness and necessity." Surely these rules could never have been 
 intended to be applied to such cases of refusal as those above 
 mentioned ! Is not a discretion expressly allowed to the officials 
 by the following explanation ? " Under this article the guardians 
 may permit the visit of any person for any lawful purpose to any 
 sick pauper inmate, subject to such conditions and restrictions as 
 they may think fit to impose." And as to the refusal to lend 
 books, it is said that the " prohibition extends otily to books of 
 an improper tendency, or likely to produce insubordination." 
 The rules require the utmost care to be exercised in the selection 
 of officials, especially of the master and matron; it would be 
 instructive and almost amusing in some cases (if the matter were 
 not too serious), to obtain information as to the previous train- 
 ing and occupations of these superintendents of our London 
 workhouses alone ; the variety would be great, but the total 
 unfitness as to habits and education, and formation of character 
 
 E
 
 52 On the Condition of Workhouses. 
 
 in a large proportion, would be apparent to every unprejudiced 
 person.* The poor-law rule warns such officials that " warmth 
 of temper and passionate conduct generally betray a conscious- 
 ness of want of firmness. The commissioners are desirous that 
 all the master's duties should be discharged with the strictest 
 regard to propriety. The habits of many of the inmates will 
 often be coarse and depraved, but the conduct of every officer 
 of such an establishment should correspond with what those 
 habits ought to be, rather than with what they actually are." 
 One of the master's duties is " to take care that no pauper at the 
 approach of death shall be left unattended, either during the day 
 or night." How often all these rules are broken or evaded, 
 every one must be aware who beheves all that has been said of 
 the interiors of workhouses. Passionate temper and abusive 
 language, there is every reason to believe, is a common style of 
 behaviour towards the paupers, and all the rules and injunctions 
 in the world will prove quite ineffectual to guard against such 
 abuses of power, if persons from a vulgar and uneducated class 
 continue to be selected for such posts of responsibility, where 
 " temper and discretion and integrity are required for the judi- 
 cious discharge of its duties." 
 
 Amongst sixteen rules laid down for the guidance of the 
 matron, one of her duties is said to be " to visit the sleeping wards 
 of the female paupers every day at eleven, and all the wards of 
 the females and cliildren every night before nine." Whether this 
 might be done or not by the overworked matron, with many 
 hundreds or thousands under her charge, I cannot say, but I 
 know that often it is not done at all. 
 
 The following words, written with regard to p-ison manage- 
 ment, are equally applicable to that of workhouses, and till the 
 truth they inculcate be heeded, all our hopes of reform will be in 
 vain. "Fallen men, to be elevated and humanized, must be 
 dealt with as men and brothers, not as brutes and slaves. Whe- 
 ther this golden rule has, in all cases, been followed as strictly 
 by the inferior as by the superior officers " — (here, alas ! there 
 are few, if any, " superior officers ") — " and whether there can be 
 sufficient security for its general observance until these offices 
 are occupied by a higher class of men, acting on higher motives, 
 and with a special training for their duties, is an important sub- 
 ject of inquiry, to which it will be needful that public attention 
 should be directed." The lower, the more hopeless and degraded 
 the class we have to manage and elevate, the more zeal, patience, 
 devotion and courage must there be in the governors, and there- 
 
 * It has been suggested that officers, either of the army or navy, would be well 
 fitted for these posts ; but experience has, I beheve, proved that this is not the 
 case ; the strict discipline that is necessary and desirable in prisons, cannot, for 
 obvious reasons, be carried out in workhouses.
 
 0)1 the Condilion of Workhouses 53 
 
 fore all arguments about the low character of our workhouse 
 population, only go to prove the truth of what is now so strongly 
 and earnestly urged upon the attention of all enlightened and 
 benevolent men, who will not turn a deaf ear to the wants and 
 sorrows, and, I may add, rights of the poor and destitute, and of 
 him who hath no helper. 
 
 Political Economists and Poor-Law Commissioners call it 
 " meddling " when any voice is raised in behalf of this neglected 
 class, and we are told that we know nothing of the matter. But 
 it remains to be seen if such is the general feeling of Englishmen, 
 and Englishwomen, many of whom probably know as much of 
 the poor, and their needs and habits, as a few gentlemen of the 
 upper classes who have had little or no personal intercourse with 
 them. In such a cause truth and love will prevail ; and while 
 taking every care to train our youth of both sexes in the strictest 
 principles of economy and prudence, we may at the same time 
 believe that as long as the world lasts, there will ever be the 
 unavoidahle cases of poverty and suffering, and old age, which 
 may claim a tenderer treatment from a Christian nation than 
 they at present receive.
 
 At a Meeting of the Committee of the Social Economy 
 Department of the National Association for the Pro- 
 motion OF Social Science, held at the Office of the 
 Association, 3, Waterloo Place, Pall Mall, on Monday, June 
 7th, 1858, the Eeport of the Sub-Committee on Workhouses 
 having been read — 
 
 1. Eesolved, that the Eeport be received. 
 
 2. That it is desirable to obtain a more efficient superintendence over 
 the internal management of Workhouses than now exists in the great 
 majority of these establishments. 
 
 3. That the inmates of Workhouses ought to be far more carefully 
 classified than at present, as to sex, age, and character, and that 
 children especially should always be entirely separated from adult 
 paupers. 
 
 4. That industrial training and occupation should be more extensively 
 introduced. 
 
 5. That a system of inspection by unpaid, and especially Lady 
 Visitors, sanctioned by the Guardians, would be calculated to improve 
 the internal condition of Workhouses. 
 
 6. That for the furtherance of the views expressed above, the 
 Committee of this department will sanction the establishment of a 
 WoKKHOusE Visiting Societt.
 
 
 ^: '^ :r 
 
 SS: 
 
 m^.