The difficulty of keeping windows open at night; the impossibility—with the best will in the world—of bathing children more than once a week; the hasty and inadequate cooking in worn-out and cheap utensils; the clumsy, hampering, and ill-arranged clothing—all these things, combined with the housing conditions described in the previous chapter, show how difficult is the path of the woman entrusted, on a few shillings a week, with the health and lives of a number of future citizens. CHAPTER V THRIFT It is just that a short chapter should be devoted to the thrift of such a class of wage-earners and their wives as are described here. It is a common idea that there is no thrift among them. It would be better for their children if this were true. As a matter of fact, sums varying from 6d. a week to 1s. 6d., 1s. 8d., or even 2s., go out from incomes which are so small that these sums represent, perhaps, from 2½ to 10 per cent. of the whole household allowance. The object of this thrift is, unfortunately, not of the slightest benefit to the children of the families concerned. The money is spent or saved or invested, whichever is the proper term, on burial insurance. No living child is better fed or better clothed because its parents, decent folk, scrape up a penny a week to pay the insurance collector on its account. Rather is it less well fed and less well clothed to the extent of 1d. a week—an appreciable amount when it is, perhaps, one of eight persons living on £1 a week. One of the criticisms levelled at these respectable, hard-working, independent people is that they do like to squander money on funerals. It is a view held by everyone who does not know the real circumstances. It is also held by many who do know them, but who confuse the fact that poor people show a great interest in one another’s funerals with the erroneous idea that they could bury their dead for half the amount if they liked. Sometimes, in the case of adult men, this may be so. When alive, the man, perhaps, was a member of a society for burial benefit, and at his death the club or society bury him with much pomp and ceremony. In the case of the young children of people living on from 18s. to 30s. a week, the parents do not squander money on funerals which might be undertaken for half the price.