Charity organization; Housing -- England -- London; Poor -- England -- London; Working class -- Dwellings
"Well, and how do you find yourself, Miss?" a big Irish laborer in a
flannel jacket will say, entering afterwards; "I just come in to say I
shall be knocked off Monday; finished our job across the park: and if
so be there's any little thing in whitewashing to do, why, I'll be glad
to do it."
"Presently," we reply, nodding to a thin, slight woman at the door. She
has not spoken, but we know the meaning of that beseeching look. She
wants us to go up and get her husband's rent from him before he goes
out to spend more of it in drink.
The eager, watchful eyes of one of our little scrubbers next attract
attention; there she stands, with her savings' card in her hand,
waiting till we enter the sixpence she has earned from us during the
week. "How much have I got?" she says, eying the written sixpences with
delight, "because mother says, please, I'm to draw out next Saturday;
she's going to buy me a pair of boots."
"Take two shillings on the card and four shillings rent," a proudly
happy woman will say, as she lays down a piece of bright gold, a rare
sight this in the court, but her husband has been in regular work for
some little time.
"Please, Miss," says another woman, "will you see and do something for
Jane? She's that masterful since her father died, I can't do nothing
with her, and she'll do no good in this court. Do see and get her a
place somewheres away."
A man will enter now: "I'll leave you my rent to-night, Miss, instead
o' Monday, please; it'll be safer with you than with me."
A pale woman comes next, in great sorrow. Her husband, she tells us,
has been arrested without cause. We believe this to be true; the man
has always paid his way honestly, worked industriously, and lived
decently. So my assistant goes round to the police-station at once
to bail him, while I remain to collect the savings. "Did he seem
grateful?" I say to her on her return. "He took it very quietly," is
her answer; "he seemed to feel it quite natural that we should help
him."
Such are some of the scenes on our Savings' evenings; such some of the
services we are called upon to render; such the kind of footing we are
on with our tenants. An evening such as this assuredly shows that our
footing has somewhat changed since those spent in Blank Court during
the first winter.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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