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Here, then, we have a fact on which a calculation is easy to make, and which, when made, forces us to see that the workman cannot keep his family as well as the pauper is kept. Even on this simple fare it would cost him close on 8s. a week to support himself so as to give him the strength to earn his daily bread; while, if we imagine his family to consist of a wife and six children, we find that his weekly food-bills would amount to 1l.8s., calculating his requirements on the same basis as in the previous instances.

If we take, therefore, the case of a skilled workman earning his 2l. a week, we still find that, even when adequately fed (and keep in mind the plainness and unattractiveness of the diet), he has only 12s. a week to supply all other necessaries and out of which to lay by, not only against old age and sickness, but against that ‘rainy day’ and ‘out of work from slackness’ which so often occur for weeks together in the weather chart of our artisan population.

Or take another case, that of Mr. and Mrs. Stoneman, excellent folk: the wife, a woman of such force and originality of character, such patience and sweet persistency, as would make her an ornament in any class; the husband an honest, steady man, not, perhaps, so clever as his wife, but loving and admiring her none the less for that. They have six children: the two eldest at work; the youngest a sweet tiny thing, as spotlessly clean as water and care can keep it in this mud-coloured atmosphere of Whitechapel. Her husband earns 23s. a week, excepting when bad illness, lasting sometimes six and eight weeks, reduces his wages to nothing; and then the sick man, his wife, and four children have to live, pay rent, firing, and ‘doctor’s stuff’ on the club-money of 14s. a week, for the boys’ earnings can only support themselves.