_Above the Average._
Button-makers, one individual in every 7·2
Tool-makers 10·1
Surveyors 11·8
Paper-makers and Stainers 12·1
Brass-founders 12·4
Gold-beaters 14·5
Millers 16·6
French Polishers 17·3
Cutlers 18·2
Corkcutters 19·7
Musicians 22·0
Opticians 22·3
Bricklayers 22·6
Labourers 22·8
General and Marine-store Dealers 23·2
Brushmakers 24·4
Fishmongers 28·2
Coach and Cabmen 28·7
Glovers 29·4
Smiths 29·5
Sweeps 32·2
Hairdressers 42·3
Tailors 43·7
Tinkers and Tinmen 45·7
Saddlers 49·3
Masons 49·6
Glassmakers, &c. 50·5
Curriers 50·6
Printers 52·4
Hatters and Trimmers 53·1
Carpenters 53·8
Ironmongers 56·0
Dyers 56·7
Sawyers 58·4
Turners 59·3
Engineers 59·7
Butchers 63·7
Laundresses 63·8
Painters 66·1
Brokers 67·7
Medical Men 68·0
Brewers 70·2
Clerks 73·4
Shopkeepers 77·1
Shoemakers 78·0
Coachmakers 78·8
Milliners 81·4
Bakers 82·0
Pawnbrokers 84·7
Gardeners 97·6
Weavers 99·3
Drapers 102·3
Tobacconists 103·4
Jewellers 104·5
Artists 106·3
Publicans 108·0
Average 113·8
_Below the Average._
Carvers and Gilders 125·2
Artificial Flower Makers 128·1
Bookbinders 148·6
Greengrocers 157·4
Watchmakers 204·2
Grocers 226·6
Clockmakers 286·0
Parish officers 373·0
Clergymen 417·0
Servants 585·7
The above calculations have been made from the Official Returns of
the Metropolitan Police. The causes of the different degrees of
intemperance here exhibited, I leave to others to discover.
After the meeting of coalwhippers just described, I requested some of
the men who had expressed the various opinions respecting the necessity
for drinking some kind of fermented liquor during their work to meet
me, so that I might take down their sentiments on the subject more
fully. First of all, came two of the most intelligent, who believed
malt liquor to be necessary for the performance of their labour. One
was a basketman or fireman, and the other an “up-and-down” man, or
whipper; the first doing the lighter, and the second the heavier kind
of work. The basketman, who I afterwards discovered was a good Greek
and Latin scholar, said: “If I have anything like a heavy day’s work to
do, I consider three pints of porter a-day necessary. We are not like
other labouring men, having an hour to dinner. Often, to save tide, we
take only ten minutes to our meals. One thing I wish to remark is, that
what renders it necessary to have the three pints of beer in winter,
and two pots in summer, is the coal-dust arising from the work, which
occasions great thirst. In the summer time the basketman is on the
plank all day, and continually exposed to the sun, and in the winter to
the inclemency of the weather. What with the labour and the heat, the
perspiration is excessive. A basketman with a bad gang of men has no
sinecure. In the summer he can wear neither coat nor waistcoat; very
few can bear the hat on the head, and they wear nightcaps instead. The
work is always done, in summer time, with only the shirt and trousers
on. The basketman never takes off his shirt, like the whippers. The
necessity for drink in the summer does not arise so much from the
extent of the labour, as from the irritation caused by the coal-dust
getting into the throat. There is not so much dust from the coals in
the winter as in the summer, the coals being more damp in wet than in
fine weather. It is merely the thirst that makes the drink requisite,
as far as the basketman is concerned. Tea would allay the thirst, but
there is no opportunity of having this on board ship. If there were an
opportunity of having tea at our work, the basketman might manage to
do with it as well as with beer. Water I don’t fancy, especially the
water of the river; it is very impure, and at the time of the cholera
we were prohibited from drinking it. If we could get pure water, I
do not think it would do as well for us, especially in winter time.
In winter time it would be too cold, and too great a contrast to the
heat of the blood. It would, in my opinion, produce stagnation in
the circulation. We have had instances of men dying suddenly through
drinking water when in a state of excitement.” [He distinguishes
between excitement and perspiration: he calls the basketman’s labour
an exciting one, and the whipper’s work a heating one.] “The men who
died suddenly were whippers. I never heard of a basketman dying from
drinking cold water when at his work; I don’t think they ever tried the
experiment. The whippers have done so through necessity, not through
choice. Tea is a beverage that I don’t fancy, and I conceive it to be
equally expensive, so I prefer porter. When I go off to my work early
in the morning, I take about a pint of coffee with me in a bottle, and
warm it up on board at the galley-fire for my breakfast; that I find
quenches my thirst for the time as well as porter. Porter would be too
insipid the first thing in the morning; I never drank coffee through
the day while at my work, so I cannot say what the effect would be. I
drink porter when at my work, not as giving me greater strength to go
through my labour, but merely as a means of quenching my thirst, it
being as cheap as any other drink, with the exception of water, and
less trouble to procure. Water I consider dangerous at our work, but I
can’t say that it is so from my own experience. I was in the hospital
about seven years ago, and the doctor there asked me how many pints
of beer I was in the habit of drinking per day. This was before the
office was established. I told him, on the lowest calculation, six or
seven; it was the case then under the old system; and he then ordered
me two pints of porter a-day, as I was very weak, and he said I wanted
a stimulus. I am not aware that it is the habit of the publicans to
adulterate their porter with salt and water. If such is the case, it
would, without a doubt, increase rather than diminish the thirst. I
have often found that the beer sold by some of the publicans tends more
to create than allay thirst. I am confident, that if the working men
generally knew that salt and water was invariably mixed with the porter
by the publicans, they would no longer hold to the notion that it could
quench their thirst; but, to convince them of that, it would be almost
necessary that they should see the publican adulterating the beer with
their own eyes. If it really is the case that beer is adulterated with
salt and water, it must be both injurious and heating to the labouring
man. Some of the men who are in the habit of drinking porter at their
work, very probably attribute the thirst created by the salt and water
in the porter to the thirst created by the coal-dust or the work, and
continue drinking it from the force of habit. The habit of drinking is
doubtlessly the effect of the old system, when the men were forced to
drink by the publicans who paid them. A most miraculous change, and one
unparalleled in history, has been produced by altering the old mode
of employing and paying the men. The reformation in the morals and
character of the men is positively wonderful. The sons are no longer
thieves, and the daughters are no longer prostitutes. Formerly it was
a competition who could drink the most, for he who could do so got the
most work. The introduction for a job was invariably, ‘You know, Mr. So
and So, I’m a good drinking man.’ Seeing the benefit that has resulted
from the men not drinking so much as formerly, I am of opinion that,
though I take my beer every day myself, a great good would ensue if the
men would drink even less than they do now, and eat more; it would be
more conducive to their health and strength. But they have not the same
facility for getting food over their work as there is for getting beer.
You see, they can have credit for beer when they can’t get a morsel of
food on trust. There are no floating butchers or bakers, like there are
floating publicans or purlmen. If there were, and men could have trust
for bread and meat while at their work on the river, I am sure they
would eat more and drink less, and be all the better for it. It would
be better for themselves and for their families. The great evil of the
drink is, that when a man has a little he often wants more, and doesn’t
know where to stop. When he once passes the ‘rubi-can,’ as I call
it, he is lost. If it wasn’t for this evil, I think a pint or two of
porter would make them do their work better than either tea or water.
Our labour is peculiar. The air is always full of coal-dust, and every
nerve and muscle of the body is strained, and every pore of the body
open, so that he requires some drink that will counteract the cold.”
The next two that I saw were men who did the heaviest work; that is,
“up-and-down men,” or coalwhippers, as they are usually called. They
had both of them been teetotalers. One had been so for eight years,
and the other had tried it for three months. One who stood at least
six feet and a half high, and was habited in a long blue great coat
that reached to his heels, and made him look even taller than he was,
said,--“I was a strict teetotaler for many years, and I wish I could
be so now. All that time I was a coalwhipper at the heaviest work,
and I have made one of a gang that have done as many as 180 tons in
one day. I drank no fermented liquor the whole of the time; I had
only ginger-beer and milk, and that cost me 1_s._ 6_d._ It was in the
summer time. I didn’t ‘buff it’ on that day; that is, I didn’t take
my shirt off. I did this work at the Regent’s Canal; and there was a
little milk-shop close on shore, and I used to run there when I was
dry. I had about two quarts of milk and five bottles of ginger-beer, or
about three quarts of fluid altogether. I found that amount of drink
necessary. I perspired very violently; my shirt was wet through, and
my flannels wringing wet with the perspiration over the work. The rule
among us is, that we do 28 tons on deck, and 28 tons filling in the
ship’s hold. We go on in that way throughout the day, spelling at every
28 tons. The perspiration in the summer time streams down our foreheads
so rapidly, that it will often get into our eyes before we have time
to wipe it off. This makes the eyes very sore. At night, when we get
home, we cannot bear to sit with a candle. The perspiration is of a
very briny nature, for I often taste it as it runs down to my lips.
We are often so heated over our work that the perspiration runs into
the shoes; and often, from the dust and heat, jumping up and down,
and the feet being galled with the small dust, I have had my shoes
full of blood. The thirst produced by our work is very excessive; it
is completely as if you had a fever upon you. The dust gets into the
throat, and very nearly suffocates you. You can scrape the coal-dust
off the tongue with the teeth; and do what you will it is impossible to
get the least spittle into the mouth. I have known the coal-dust to be
that thick in a ship’s hold, that I have been unable to see my mate,
though he was only two feet from me. Your legs totter under you, both
before and after you are a teetotaler. I was one of the strongest men
in the business; I was able to carry 7 cwt. on my back for fifty yards,
and I could lift nine half-hundreds with my right-arm. After finishing
my day’s work I was like a child with weakness. When we have done 14 or
28 tons, we generally stop for a drop of drink, and then I have found
that anything that would wet my mouth would revive me. Cold tea, milk,
or ginger-beer, were refreshing, but not so much as a pint of porter.
Cold water would give a pain in the inside, so that a man would have to
lie down and be taken ashore, and, perhaps, give up work altogether.
Many a man has been taken to the hospital merely through drinking cold
water over his work. They have complained of a weight and coldness
in the chest; they say it has chilled the fat of the heart. I can
positively state,” continued the man, “that during the whole of eight
years I took no fermented drink. My usual drink was cold tea, milk,
ginger-beer, or coffee, whichever I could catch: the ginger-beer was
more lively than the milk; but I believe I could do more work upon
the milk. Tea I found much better than coffee. Cold tea was very
refreshing; but if I didn’t take it with me in a bottle, it wasn’t to
be had. I used to take a quart of cold tea with me in a bottle, and
make that do for me all day, as well as I could. The ginger-beer was
the most expensive, and would cost me a shilling, or more than that
if I could get it. The milk would cost me sixpence or eightpence.
For tea and coffee the expense would be about twopence the day. But
often I have done the whole day’s work without any drink, because I
would not touch beer, and then I was more fit to be carried home than
walk. I have known many men scarcely able to crawl up the ladder out
of the hold, they were so fatigued. For myself, being a very strong
man, I was never so reduced, thank God. But often, when I’ve got home,
I’ve been obliged to drink three pints of milk at a stretch, before I
could touch a bit of victuals. As near as I can guess it used to cost
me, when at work, a shilling a-day for ginger-beer, milk, and other
teetotal drinks. When I was not at work my drink used to cost me little
or nothing. For eight years I stuck to the pledge, but I found myself
failing in strength and health; I found that I couldn’t go through a
day’s work as clever as I used before I left off drink, and when first
I was a teetotaler. I found myself failing in every inch of my carcase,
my limbs, my body and all. Of my own free-will I gave it up. I did
not do it in a fit of passion, but deliberately, because I was fully
satisfied that it was injuring my health. Shortly after taking the
pledge I found I could have more meat than I used to have before, and
I found that I neither got strong nor weak upon it. After about five
years my appetite began to fail, and then I found my strength leaving
me; so I made up my mind to alter the system. When I returned to beer,
I found myself getting better in health and stronger daily. Before I
was a teetotaler I used to drink heavy, but after teetotalism I was a
temperate man. I am sure it is necessary for a hard-working man that he
should drink beer. He can’t do his work so well without it as he can
with it, in moderation. If he goes beyond his allowance he is better
without any. I have taken to drinking beer again within the last twelve
months. As long as a man does not go beyond his allowance in beer, his
drink will cost him quite as much when he is teetotaler as it will
when he has not taken the pledge. The difference between the teetotal
and fermented drinks I find to be this:--When I drank milk it didn’t
make me any livelier; it quenched my thirst, but didn’t give me any
strength. But when I drank a pint or a quart of beer, it did me so much
good after a day’s labour, that after drinking it I could get up and go
to my work again. This feeling would continue for a considerable time;
indeed, I think the beer is much better for a hard-working man than any
unfermented drink. I defy any man in England to contradict me in what I
say, and that is--a man who takes his reasonable quantity of beer, and
a fair share of food, is much better with it than without.”
Another man, who had been a teetotaler for three months at one time,
and seven years at another, was convinced that it was impossible for
a hard-working man to do his work as well without beer as with. “He
had tried it twice, and he spoke from his own experience, and he would
say that a little--that is, two pints, or three for a very hard day’s
labour,--would never hurt no man. Beyond that a man has no right to go;
indeed, anything extra only makes him stupid. Under the old system, I
used to be obliged to buy rum; and, over and over again, I’ve had to
pay fifteen-pence for half-a-pint of rum in a ginger-beer bottle; and
have gone into the street and sold it for sixpence, and got a steak
with the money. No man can say drink has ruined my constitution, for
I’ve only had two pennyworth of antibilious pills in twenty-five years;
and I will say, a little beer does a man more good than harm, and too
much does a man more harm than good.”
The next two “whippers” that I saw were both teetotalers. One had taken
the pledge eight months before, and the other four years; and they had
both kept it strictly. One had been cellarman at a public-house, and
he said, “I neither take spruce nor any of the cordials: water is my
beverage at dinner.” The other had been an inveterate drunkard. The
cellarman is now a basketman, and the other an up-and-down man, or
whipper, in the same gang. The basketman said, “I can say this from my
own experience,--that it is not necessary for a working man, doing the
very hardest labour, to drink fermented liquors. I was an up-and-down
man for two years, without tasting a drop of beer or spirits. I have
helped to whip 189 tons of coal in one day, without any; and that in
the heat of summer. What I had with me was a bottle of cocoa; and I
took with that plenty of steak, potatoes, and bread. If the men was
to take more meat and less beer, they would do much better. It’s a
delusion to think beer necessary. Often, the men who say the beer is
necessary will deliver a ship, aye, and not half-a-dozen half-pints
be drank aboard. The injury is done ashore. The former custom of our
work--the compulsory system of drinking that we were under,--has so
imbedded the idea of drink in the men, that they think it is actually
necessary. It’s not the least to be wondered at, that there’s so many
drunkards among them. I do not think we shall ever be able to undo the
habit of drinking among the whippers in this generation. As far as I am
concerned, since I’ve been a teetotaler, I have enjoyed a more regular
state of health than I used before. Now that I am a basketman, I drink
only water with my dinner; and during my work I take nothing. I have
got a ship in hands--going to work on Monday morning. I shall have to
run backwards and forwards on a one-and-twenty-foot plank, and deliver
300 tons of coals: and I shall do that upon water. That man,” pointing
to the teetotaler who accompanied him, “will be in it, and he’ll have
to help to pull the coals twenty foot above the deck; and he’ll do
it all upon water. When I was a coalwhipper myself, I used to drink
cocoa. I took it cold with me of a morning, and warmed it aboard. They
prophesied it would kill me in a week; and I know it’s done me every
good in life. I have drunk water when I was a-working up-and-down, and
when I was in the highest perspiration, and never found it injure me.
It allays the thirst more than anything. If it didn’t allay the thirst
I should want to drink often: but if I take a drink of water from the
cask I find my thirst immediately quenched. Many of the men who drink
beer will take a drink of water afterwards, because the beer increases
their thirst, and heats them. That, I believe, is principally from the
salt water in it: in fact, it stands to reason, that if beer is half
brine it can’t quench thirst. Ah! it’s shocking stuff the purlmen make
up for them on the river. When I was drinking beer at my employment, I
used seldom to exceed three pints of beer a-day: that is what I took
on board. What I had on shore was not, of course, to help me to do my
labour. I know the beer used to inflame my thirst, because I’ve had
to drink water after it over and over again. I never made a habit of
drinking,--not since the establishment of the office. Previous to that,
of course, I was obliged to drink. I’ve got ‘jolly’ now and then, but
I never made a habit of it. It used to cost me about two shillings
or two shillings and sixpence a-week, on the average, for drink, at
the uttermost; because I couldn’t afford more. Since I’ve taken the
pledge, I’m sure it hasn’t cost me sixpence a-week. A teetotaler feels
less thirst than any other man. I don’t know what natural thirst is,
except I’ve been eating salt provisions. I belong to a total abstinence
society, and there are about a dozen coalwhippers, and about the same
number of coalbackers, members of it. Some have been total abstainers
for twelve years, and are living witnesses that fermented drinks are
not necessary for working men. There are about two hundred to two
hundred and fifty coalwhippers, I have been given to understand, who
are teetotalers. Those coalwhippers who have been total abstainers
for twelve years, are not weaker or worse in health for the want of
beer.” [This statement was denied by a person present; but a gentleman,
who was intimately acquainted with the whole body, mentioned the
names of several men who had been, some ten years, and some upwards
of twelve years, strict adherents to the principles of teetotalism.]
“The great quantity of drinking is carried on ashore. I should say the
men generally drink twice as much ashore as they do afloat. Those who
drink beer are always thirsty. Through drinking over their work, a
thirst is created aboard, which they set to drinking, when ashore, to
allay; and, after a hard day’s labour, a very little overcomes a man.
One or two pots of beer, and the man is loth to stir. He is tired; and
the drink, instead of refreshing him, makes him sleepy and heavy. The
next morning after drinking he is thirstier still; and then he goes to
work drinking again. The perspiration will start out of him in large
drops, like peas. You will see it stream down his face and his hands,
with the coal-dust sticking to them, just like as if he had a pair of
silk gloves on him. It’s a common saying with us, about such a man,
that ‘he’s got the gloves on.’ The drunkards always perspire the most
over their work. The prejudice existing among the men in favour of
drink is such, that they believe they would die without it. I am quite
astonished to see such an improvement among them as there is; and I do
think that, if the clergymen of the neighbourhood did their duty, and
exerted themselves, the people would be better still. At one time there
were as many as five hundred coalwhippers total abstainers; and the men
were much better clothed, and the homes and appearance of the whippers
were much more decent. What I should do if I drank, I don’t know. I
got 1_l._ for clearing a ship last week, and shan’t get any more till
Monday night; and I have six children and a wife to keep out of that.
For this last fortnight I have only made 10_s._ a-week, so I am sure I
couldn’t even afford a shilling a-week for drink, without robbing my
family.”
The second teetotaler, who had been an inveterate drunkard in his time,
stated as follows. Like most of the coalwhippers, he thought once that
he could not do his work without beer. He used to drink as much as he
could get. He averaged two pots at his work, and when he came on shore
he would have two pots more.
“He had been a coalwhipper for upwards of twenty years, and for
nineteen years and three months of that time he was a hard drinker,--a
regular stiff ’un,” said he; “I not only used,” he added, “to get
drunk, but I taught my children to do so,--I have got sons as big as
myself, coalbackers, and total abstainers. Often I have gone home on
a Sunday morning drunk myself, and found two of my sons drunk,--they’d
be unable to sit at the table. They were about fourteen then, and when
they went out with me I used to teach them to take their little drops
of neat rum or gin. I have seen the youngest ‘mop up’ his half-quartern
as well as I did. Then I was always thirsty; and when I got up of a
morning I used to go stalking round to the first public-house that was
open, to see if I could get a pint or a quartern. My mouth was dry and
parched, as if I had got a burning fever. If I had no work that day I
used to sit in a public-house and spend all the money I’d got. If I
had no money I would go home and raise it somehow. I would ask the old
woman to give me the price of a pint, or perhaps the young uns were
at work, and I was pretty safe to meet them coming home. Talk about
going out of a Sunday! I was ashamed to be seen out. My clothes were
ragged, and my shoes would take the water in at one end and let it
out at the other. I keep my old rags at home, to remind me of what I
was--I call them the regimentals of the guzzler. I pawned everything
I could get at. For ten or twelve years I used a beer-shop regularly.
That was my house of call. Now my home is very happy. All my children
are teetotalers. My sons are as big as myself, and they are at work
carrying 1-3/4 cwt. to 2 cwt. up a Jacob’s ladder, thirty-three steps
high. They do this all day long, and have been doing so for the last
seven days. They drink nothing but water or cold tea, and say they find
themselves the better able to do their work. Coalbacking is about the
hardest labour a man can perform. For myself, too, I find I am quite
as able to do my work without intoxicating drinks as I was with them.
There’s my basketman,” said he, pointing to the other teetotaler,
“and he can tell you whether what I say is true or not. I have helped
to whip 147 tons of coal in the heat of summer. The other men were
calling for beer every time they could see or hear a purlman, but I
took nothing--I don’t think I perspired so much as they did. When I was
in the drinking custom, I have known the perspiration run down my arms
and legs as if I’d been in a hot bath. Since I’ve taken the pledge I
scarcely perspire at all. I’ll work against any man that takes beer,
provided I have a good teetotal pill--that is, a good pound of steak,
with plenty of gravy in it. That’s the stuff to work upon--that’s what
the working man wants--plenty of it, and less beer, and he’d beat a
horse any day. I am satisfied the working man can never be raised
above his present position until he can give over drinking. That is
the reason why I am sticking to the pledge, that I may be a living
example to my class that they can and may work without beer. It has
made my home happy, and I want it to make every other working man’s
as comfortable. I tried the principle of teetotalism first on board a
steam-boat. I was stoker, and we burnt 27 cwt. of coals every hour
we were at sea--that’s very nearly a ton and a-half per hour. There,
with the heat of the fire, we felt the effects of drinking strong
brandy. Brandy was the only fermented drink we were allowed. After a
time I tried what other stimulants we could use. The heat in the hold,
especially before the fires, was awful. There were nine stokers and
four coal-trimmers. We found that the brandy that we drank in the day
made us ill, our heads ached when we got up in the morning, so four
of us agreed to try oatmeal and water as our drink, and we found that
suited us better than intoxicating liquor. I myself got as fat as a
bull upon it. It was recommended to me by a doctor in Falmouth, and we
all of us tried it eight or nine voyages. Some time after I left the
company I went to strong drink again, and continued at it till the 1st
of May last, and then my children’s love of drink got so dreadful that
I got to hate myself as being the cause of it. But I couldn’t give up
the drinking. Two of my mates, however, urged me to try. On the 1st of
May I signed the pledge. I prayed to God on the night I went to give me
strength to keep it, and never since have I felt the least inclination
to return. When I had left off a fortnight I found myself a great deal
better; all the cramps that I had been loaded with when I was drinking
left me. Now I am happy and comfortable at home. My wife’s about one
of the best women in the world. She bore with me in all my troubles,
and now she glories in my redemption. My children love me, and we club
all our earnings together, and can always on Sunday manage a joint of
sixteen or seventeen pounds. My wife, now that we are teetotalers, need
do no work; and, in conclusion, I must say that I have much cause to
bless the Lord that ever I signed the teetotal pledge.
“After I leave my work,” added the teetotaler, “I find the best thing
I can have to refresh me is a good wash of my face and shoulders in
cold water. This is twice as enlivening as ever I found beer. Once
a fortnight I goes over to Goulston-square, Whitechapel, and have a
warm bath. This is one of the finest things that ever was invented for
the working man. Any persons that use them don’t want beer. I invited
a coalwhipper-man to come with me once. ‘How much does it cost?’
he asked. I told him, ‘A penny.’ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’d sooner have
half-a-pint of beer. I haven’t washed my body for these twenty-two
years, and don’t see why I should begin to have anything to do with
these new-fangled notions at my time of life.’ I will say, that a good
wash is better for the working man than the best drink.”
The man ultimately made a particular request that his statement
might conclude with a verse that he had chosen from the Temperance
Melodies:--
“And now we love the social cheer
Of the bright winter eve;
We have no cause for sigh or tear,
We have no cause to grieve.
Our wives are clad, our children fed;
We boast where’er we go--
’Twas all because we sign’d the pledge,
A long, long time ago.”
At the close of my interview with these men I received from them an
invitation to visit them at their own houses whenever I should think
fit. It was clearly their desire that I should see the comforts and
domestic arrangements of their homes. Accordingly on the morrow,
choosing an hour when there could have been no preparation, I called
at the lodgings of the first. I found the whole family assembled in
the back kitchen, that served them for a parlour. As I entered the
room the mother was busy at work, washing and dressing her children
for the day. There stood six little things, so young that they seemed
to be all about the same height, with their faces shining with the
soap and water, and their cheeks burning red with the friction of the
towel. They were all laughing and playing about the mother, who, with
comb and brush in hand, found it no easy matter to get them to stand
still while she made “the parting.” First of all the man asked me to
step up-stairs and see the sleeping-room. I was much struck with the
scrupulous cleanliness of the apartment. The blind was as white as
snow, half rolled up, and fastened with a pin. The floor was covered
with patches of different coloured carpet, showing that they had been
bought from time to time, and telling how difficult it had been to
obtain the luxury. In one corner was a cupboard with the door taken
off, the better to show all the tumblers, teacups, and coloured-glass
mugs, that, with two decanters, well covered with painted flowers,
were kept more for ornament than use. On the chimneypiece was a row of
shells, china shepherdesses, and lambs, and a stuffed pet canary in a
glass-case for a centre ornament. Against the wall, surrounded by other
pictures, hung a half-crown water-colour drawing of the wife, with a
child on her knee, matched on the other side by the husband’s likeness,
cut out in black paper. Pictures of bright-coloured ducks and a print
of Father Moore the teetotaler completed the collection.
“You see,” said the man, “we manages pretty well; but I can assure
you we has a hard time of it to do it at all comfortably. Me and my
wife is just as we stands--all our other things are in pawn. If I was
to drink I don’t know what I should do. How others manage is to me a
mystery. This will show you I speak the truth,” he added, and going
to a secretary that stood against the wall he produced a handful of
duplicates. There were seventeen tickets in all, amounting to 3_l._
0_s._ 6_d._, the highest sum borrowed being 10_s._ “That’ll show you
I don’t like my poverty to be known, or I should have told you of it
before. And yet we manage to sleep clean;” and he pulled back the
patchwork counterpane, and showed me the snow-white sheets beneath.
“There’s not enough clothes to keep us warm, but at least they are
clean. We’re obliged to give as much as we can to the children.
Cleanliness is my wife’s hobby, and I let her indulge in it. I can
assure you last week my wife had to take the gown off her back to get
1_s._ on it. My little ones seldom have a bit of meat from one Sunday
to another, and never a bit of butter.”
I then descended into the parlour. The children were all seated on
little stools that their father had made for them in his spare moments,
and warming themselves round the fire, their little black shoes resting
on the white hearth. From their regular features, small mouths,
large black eyes, and fair skins, no one would have taken them for a
labouring man’s family. In answer to my questions, he said: “The eldest
of them (a pretty little half-clad girl, seated in one corner) is ten,
the next seven, that one five, that three, and this (a little thing
perched upon a table near the mother) two. I’ve got all their ages
in the Bible up-stairs.” I remarked a strange look about one of the
little girls. “Yes, she always suffered with that eye; and down at the
hospital they lately performed an operation on it.” An artificial pupil
had been made.
The room was closed in from the passage by a rudely built partition.
“That I did myself in my leisure,” said the man; “it makes the room
snugger.” As he saw me looking at the clean rolling-pin and bright tins
hung against the wall, he observed: “That’s all my wife’s doing. She
has got them together by sometimes going without dinner herself, and
laying out the 2_d._ or 3_d._ in things of that sort. That is how she
manages. To-day she has got us a sheep’s head and a few turnips for our
Sunday’s dinner,” he added, taking off the lid of the boiling saucepan.
Over the mantelpiece hung a picture of George IV., surrounded by four
other frames. One of them contained merely three locks of hair. The
man, laughing, told me, “Two of them are locks of myself and my wife,
and the light one in the middle belonged to my wife’s brother, who died
in India. That’s her doing again,” he added.
After this I paid a visit to the other teetotaler at his home, and
there saw one of his sons. He had six children altogether, and also
supported his wife’s mother. If it wasn’t for him, the poor old thing,
who was seventy-five, and a teetotaler too, must have gone to the
workhouse. Three of his six children lived at home; the other three
were out at service. One of the lads at home was a coalbacker. He was
twenty-four years of age, and on an average could earn 17_s._ 6_d._ It
was four years since he had taken to backing. He said, “I am at work at
one of the worst wharfs in London; it is called ‘the slaughter-house’
by the men, because the work is so excessive. The strongest man can
only last twelve years at the work there; after that he is overstrained
and of no use. I do the hardest work, and carry the coals up from
the hold. The ladder I mount has about thirty-five steps, and stands
very nearly straight on end. Each time I mount I carry on my back 238
pounds. No man can work at this for more than five days in the week.
I work three days running, then have a day’s rest, and then work two
days more. I myself generally do five days’ work out of the six. I
never drink any beer, and have not for the last eight months. For three
years and four months I took beer to get over the work. I used to have
a pint at eleven, a pot at dinner, a pint at four o’clock, and double
allowance, or a couple of pots, after work. Very often I had more than
double allowance. I seldom in a day drank less than that; but I have
done more. I have drunk five pots in four minutes and a-half. So my
expenditure for beer was 1_s._ 4_d._ a-day regularly. Indeed, I used
to allow myself three half-crowns to spend in beer a-week, Sundays
included. When a coal-worker is in full work, he usually spends 2_s._
a-day, or 12_s._ a-week, in beer. The trade calls these men temperate.
When they spend 15_s._ the trade think they are intemperate. Before
I took the pledge I scarcely ever went to bed sober after my labour.
I was not always drunk, but I was heavy and stupid with beer. Twice
within the time I was a coalbacker I have been insensibly drunk. I
should say three-fourths of the coalbackers are drunk twice a-week.
Coalbacking is as heavy a class of labour as any performed. I don’t
know any that can beat it. I have been eight months doing the work, and
can solemnly state I have never tasted a drop of fermented liquor. I
have found I could do my work better and brisker than when I drank. I
never feel thirsty over my work now; before, I was always dry, and felt
as if I could never drink enough to quench it. Now I never drink from
the time I go to work till the time I have my dinner; then my usual
beverage is either cold coffee or oatmeal and water. From that time I
never drink till I take my tea. On this system I find myself quite as
strong as I did with the porter. When I drank porter it used to make me
go along with a sack a little bit brisker for half-an-hour, but after
that I was dead, and obliged to have some more. There are men at the
wharf who drink beer and spirits that can do six days’ labour in the
week. I can’t do this myself. I have done as much when I took fermented
liquors, but I only did so by whipping myself up with stimulants. I was
obliged to drink every hour a pint of beer to force me along. That was
only working for the publican; for I had less money at the week’s end
than when I did less work. Now I can keep longer and more steadily at
my work. In a month I would warrant to back more coals than a drunkard.
I think the drunkard can do more for a short space of time than the
teetotaler. I am satisfied the coalbackers as a class would be better
off if they left off the drinking; and then masters would not force
them to do so much work after dark as they do now. They always pay at
public-houses. If that system was abandoned, the men would be greatly
benefited by it. Drinking is not a necessity of the labour. All I want
when I’m at work is a bit of coal in the mouth. This not only keeps
the mouth cool, but as we go up the ladder we very often scrunch our
teeth--the work’s so hard. The coal keeps us from biting the tongue,
that’s one use; the other is, that by rolling it along in the mouth it
excites the spittle, and it moistens the mouth. This I find a great
deal better than a pot of porter.”
In order to complete my investigations concerning the necessity of
drinking in the coalwhipping trade, I had an interview with some of the
more intelligent of the men who had been principally concerned in the
passing of the Act that rescued the class from the “thraldom of the
publican.”
“I consider,” said one, “that drink is not a necessity of our labour,
but it is a necessity of the system under which we were formerly
working. I have done the hardest work that any labouring man can do,
and drank no fermented liquor. Nor do I consider fermented liquors
to be necessary for the severest labour. This I can say of my own
experience, having been a teetotaler for sixteen months. But if the
working man don’t have the drink, he must have good solid food,
superior to what he is in the habit of having. A pot of coffee and a
good beef dumpling will get one over the most severe labour. But if
he can’t have that he must have the stimulants. A pint of beer he can
always have on credit, but he can’t the beef dumpling. If there is an
excuse for any persons drinking there is for the coalwhippers, for
under the old system they were forced to become habitual drunkards to
obtain work.”
I also questioned another of the men, who had been a prime mover in
obtaining the Act. He assured me, that before the “emancipation” of
the men the universal belief of the coalwhippers, encouraged by the
publicans, was, that it was impossible for them to work without liquor.
In order to do away with that delusion, the three principal agents in
procuring the Act became teetotalers of their own accord, and remained
so, one for sixteen months and another for nine years, in order to
prove to their fellow workmen that drinking over their labour could be
dispensed with, and that they might have “cool brains to fight through
the work they had undertaken.”
Another of the more intelligent men who had been a teetotaler:--“I
performed the hardest labour I ever did, before or after, with more
ease and satisfaction than ever I did under the drinking system. It
is quite a delusion to believe that with proper nutriment the health
declines under principles of total abstinence.”
After this I was anxious to continue my investigations among the
coalporters, and see whether the more intelligent among them were
as firmly convinced as the better class of coalwhippers were, that
intoxicating drinks were not necessary for the performance of hard
labour. I endeavoured to find one of each class, pursuing the same plan
as I had adopted with the coalwhippers: viz. I sought first, one who
was so firmly convinced of the necessity of drinking fermented liquors
during his work, that he had never been induced to abandon them;
secondly, I endeavoured to obtain the evidence of one who had tried the
principle of total abstinence and found it fail; and thirdly, I strove
to procure the opinion of those who had been teetotalers for several
years, and who could conscientiously state that no stimulant was
necessary for the performance of their labour. Subjoined is the result
of my investigations.
Concerning the motives and reasons for the great consumption of beer
by the coalporters, I obtained the following statement from one of
them:--“I’ve been all my life at coalportering, off and on, and am now
thirty-nine. For the last two years or so I’ve worked regularly as a
filler to Mr. ----’s waggons. I couldn’t do my work without a good
allowance of beer. I can’t afford so much now, as my family costs me
more; but my regular allowance one time was three pots a-day. I have
drank four pots, and always a glass of gin in the morning to keep
out the cold air from the water. If I got off then for 7_s._ a-week
for drink I reckoned it a cheap week. I can’t do my work without my
beer, and no coalporter can, properly. It’s all nonsense talking about
ginger-beer, or tea, or milk, or that sort of thing; what body is there
in any of it? Many a time I might have been choked with coal-dust, if
I hadn’t had my beer to clear my throat with. I can’t say that I’m
particularly thirsty like next morning, after drinking three or four
pots of beer to my own work, but I don’t get drunk.” He frequently,
and with some emphasis, repeated the words, “But I don’t get drunk.”
“You see, when you’re at such hard work as ours, one’s tired soon, and
a drop of good beer puts new sap into a man. It oils his joints like.
He can lift better and stir about brisker. I don’t care much for beer
when I’m quiet at home on a Sunday; it sets me to sleep then. I once
tried to go without to please a master, and did work one day with only
one half-pint. I went home as tired as a dog. I should have been soon
good for nothing if I’d gone on that way--half-pinting in a day. Lord
love you! we know a drop of good beer. The coalporters is admitted to
be as good judges of beer as any men in London--maybe, the best judges;
better than publicans. No salt and water will go down with us. It’s no
use a publican trying to gammon us with any of his cag-mag stuff. Salt
and water for us! Sartainly, a drop of short (neat spirit) does one
good in a cold morning like this; it’s uncommon raw by the waterside,
you see. Coalporters doesn’t often catch cold--beer and gin keeps it
out. Perhaps my beer and gin now cost me 5_s._ a-week, and that’s a
deal out of what I can earn. I dare say I earn 18_s._ a-week. Sometimes
I may spend 6_s._ That’s a third of my earnings, you say, and so it
is; and as it’s necessary for my work, isn’t it a shame a poor man’s
pot of beer, and drop of gin, and pipe of tobacco, should be so dear?
Taxes makes them dear. I can read, sir, and I understand these things.
Beer--four pots a-day of it doesn’t make me step unsteady. Hard work
carries it off, and so one doesn’t feel it that way. Beer’s made of
corn as well as bread, and so it stands to reason it’s nourishing.
Nothing’ll persuade me it isn’t. Let a teetotal gentleman try his hand
at coal-work, and then he’ll see if beer has no support in it. Too much
is bad, I know, but a man can always tell how much he wants to help him
on with his work. If beer didn’t agree with me, of course I wouldn’t
drink it: but it does. Sartainly we drops into a beer-shop of a night,
and does tipple a little when work’s done; and the old women (our
wives) comes for us, and they get a sup to soften them, and so they may
get to like it overmuch, as you say, and one’s bit of a house may go to
rack and manger. I’ve a good wife myself, though. I know well enough
all them things is bad--drunkenness is bad! All I ask for is a proper
allowance at work; the rest is no good. I can’t tell whether too much
or no beer at coal-work would be best; perhaps none at all: leastways
it would be safer. I shouldn’t like to try either. Perhaps coalporters
does get old sooner than other trades, and mayn’t live so long; but
that’s their hard work, and it would be worse still without beer. But I
don’t get drunk.”
I conversed with several men on the subject of their beer-drinking, but
the foregoing is the only statement I met with where a coalporter could
give any reason for his faith in the virtues of beer; and vague as in
some points it may be, the other reasons I had to listen to were still
vaguer. “Somehow we can’t do without beer; it puts in the strength that
the work takes out.” “It’s necessary for support.” Such was the pith of
every argument.
In order fully to carry out this inquiry, I obtained the address of a
coalbacker from the ships, who worked hard and drank a good deal of
beer, and who had the character of being an industrious man. I saw
him in his own apartment, his wife being present while he made the
following statement:--“I’ve worked at backing since I was twenty-four,
and that’s more than twelve years ago. I limit myself now, because
times is not so good, to two pots of beer a-day; that is, when I’m all
day at work. Some takes more. I reckon, that when times was better I
drank fifteen pots a-week, for I was in regular work, and middlin’
well off. That’s 780 pots, or 195 gallons a-year, you say. Like enough
it may be. I never calculated, but it does seem a deal. It can’t be
done without, and men themselves is the best judges of what suits their
work--I mean, of how much to take. I’ll tell you what it is, sir. Our
work’s harder than people guess at, and one must rest sometimes. Now,
if you sit down to rest without something to refresh you, the rest
does you harm instead of good, for your joints seem to stiffen; but a
good pull at a pot of beer backs up the rest, and we start lightsomer.
Our work’s very hard. I’ve worked till my head’s ached like to split;
and when I’ve got to bed, I’ve felt as if I’ve had the weight on my
back still, and I’ve started awake when I fell off to sleep, feeling
as if something was crushing my back flat to my chest. I can’t say
that I ever tried to do without beer altogether. If I was to think of
such a thing, my old woman there would think I was out of my head.”
The wife assented. “I’ve often done with a little when work’s been
slackish. First, you see, we bring the coal up from the ship’s hold.
There, sometimes, it’s dreadful hot, not a mouthful of air, and the
coal-dust sometimes as thick as a fog. You breathe it into you, and
your throat’s like a flue, so that you must have something to drink.
I fancy nothing quenches you like beer. We want a drink that tastes.
Then there’s the coals on your back to be carried up a nasty ladder, or
some such contrivance, perhaps twenty feet, and a sack full of coals
weighs 2 cwt. and a stone, at least; the sack itself’s heavy and thick:
isn’t that a strain on a man? No horse could stand it long. Then, when
you get fairly out of the ship, you go along planks to the waggon,
and must look sharp, ’specially in slippery or wet weather, or you’ll
topple over, and then there’s the hospital or the workhouse for you.
Last week we carried along planks sixty feet, at least. There’s nothing
extra allowed for distance, but there ought to be. I’ve sweat to that
degree in summer, that I’ve been tempted to jump into the Thames to
cool myself. The sweat’s run into my boots, and I’ve felt it running
down me for hours as I had to trudge along. It makes men bleed at the
nose and mouth, this work does. Sometimes we put a bit of coal in our
mouths, to prevent our biting our tongues. I do, sometimes, but it’s
almost as bad as if you did bite your tongue, for when the strain comes
heavier and heavier on you, you keep scrunching the coal to bits, and
swallow some of it, and you’re half choked; and then it’s no use, you
must have beer. Some’s tried a bit of tobacco in their mouths, but that
doesn’t answer; it makes you spit, and often spit blood. I know I can’t
do without beer. I don’t think they ’dulterate it for us; they may for
fine people, that just tastes it, and, I’ve heard, has wine and things.
But we must have it good, and a publican knows who’s good customers.
Perhaps a bit of good grub might be as good as beer to strengthen you
at work, but the straining and sweating makes you thirsty, more than
hungry; and if poor men must work so hard, and for so little, for rich
men, why poor men will take what they feel will satisfy them, and run
the risk of its doing them good or harm; and that’s just where it is.
I can’t work three days running now without feeling it dreadful. I
get a mate that’s fresher to finish my work. I’d rather earn less at
a trade that would give a man a chance of some ease, but all trades
is overstocked. You see we have a niceish tidy room here, and a few
middling sticks, so I can’t be a drunkard.”
I now give the statement of a coalporter who had been a teetotaler:--“I
have been twenty-two years a coalheaver. When I began that work I
earned 50_s._ a-week as backer and filler. I am now earning, one week
with another, say 15_s._ We have no sick fund among us--no society of
any sort--no club--no schools--no nothing. We had a kind of union among
us before the great strike, more than fourteen years back, but it was
just for the strike. We struck against masters lowering the pay for a
ton to 2-1/4_d._ from 2-1/2_d._ The strike only lasted two or three
weeks, and the men were forced to give way; they didn’t all give way
at once, but came to gradual. One can’t see one’s wife and children
without bread. There’s very few teetotalers among us, though there’s
not many of us now that can be called drunken--they can’t get it, sir.
I was a teetotaler myself for two years, till I couldn’t keep to it any
longer. We all break. It’s a few years back, I forget zactly when. At
that time teetotalers might drink shrub, but that never did me no good;
a good cup of tea freshened me more. I used then to drink ginger-beer,
and spruce, and tea, and coffee. I’ve paid as much as 5_s._ a-week for
ginger-beer. When I teetotaled, I always felt thirsty. I used to long
for a drink of beer, but somehow managed to get past a public-house,
until I could stand it no longer. A clerk of ours broke first, and I
followed him. I certainly felt weaker before I went back to my beer;
now I drink a pint or two as I find I want it. I can’t do without it,
so it’s no use trying. I joined because I felt I was getting racketty,
and giving my mind to nothing but drink, instead of looking to my
house. There may be a few teetotalers among us, but I think not. I
only knew two. We all break--we can’t keep it. One of these broke, and
the other kept it, because, if he breaks, his wife’ll break, and they
were both regular drunkards. A coalporter’s worn out before what you
may call well old. There’s not very old men among us. A man’s done
up at fifty, and seldom lives long after, if he has to keep on at
coalportering. I wish we had some sick fund, or something of that kind.
If I was laid up now, there would be nothing but the parish for me, my
wife, and four childer (here the poor man spoke in a broken voice).
The masters often discharge old hands when they get feeble, and put on
boys. We have no coals allowed for our own firesides. Some masters, if
we buys of them, charges us full price, others a little cheaper.”
I saw this man in the evening, after he had left his work, in his
own room. It was a large and airy garret. His wife, who did not know
previously of my visit, had in her domestic arrangements manifested a
desire common to the better disposed of the wives of the labourers, or
the poor--that of trying to make her “bit of place” look comfortable.
She had to tend a baby four months old; two elder children were ill
clad, but clean; the eldest boy, who is fifteen, is in the summer
employed on a river steamboat, and is then of great help to his
parents. There were two beds in the room, and the bedding was decently
arranged so as to form a bundle, while its scantiness or worn condition
was thus concealed. The solitary table had a faded green cloth cover,
very threadbare, but still a cover. There were a few cheap prints over
the mantelshelf, and the best description I can give is, in a phrase
not uncommon among the poor, that the whole was an attempt to “appear
decent.” The woman spoke well of her husband, who was kind to her, and
fond of his home, and never drank on Sundays.
Last of all, I obtained an interview with two coalporters who had been
teetotalers for some years:--
“I have been a coalporter ever since I have been able to carry coals,”
said one. “I began at sixteen. I have been a backer all the time.
I have been a teetotaler eight years on the 10th of next March. My
average earnings where I am now is about 35_s._ per week. At some
wharfs work is very bad, and the men don’t average half that. They were
paid every night where I worked last, and sometimes I have gone home
with 2-1/2_d._ Take one with the other, I should say the coalporter’s
earnings average about 1_l._ a-week. My present place is about as good
a berth as there is along the waterside. There is only one gang of us,
and we do as much work as two will do in many wharfs. Before I was a
teetotaler, I principally drank ale. I judged that the more I gave for
my drink, the better it was. Upon an average, I used to drink from
three to four pints of ale per day. I used to drink a good drop of
gin, too. The coalporters are very partial to ‘dog’s nose’--that is,
half a pint of ale with a pennyworth of gin in it; and when they have
got the money, they go up to what they term ‘the lucky shop’ for it.
The coalporters take this every morning through the week, when they
can afford it. After my work, I used to drink more than when I was at
it. I used to sit as long as the house would let me have any. Upon an
average, I should say I used to take three or four pints more of an
evening; so that, altogether, I think I may fairly say I drank my four
pots of ale regularly every day, and about half a pint of dog’s nose.
I reckon my drink used to cost me 13_s._ a-week when I was at work. At
times I was a drunken, noisy gentleman then.”
Another coalporter, who has been a teetotaler ten years on the 25th of
last August, told me, that before he took the pledge he used to drink
a great deal after he had done his work, but while he was at work he
could not stand it. “I don’t think I used to drink above three pints
and a half and a pennyworth of gin in the daytime,” said this man. “Of
an evening I used to stop at the public-house, generally till I was
drunk and unfit to work in the morning. I will vouch for it I used to
take about three pots a-day after I had done work. My reckoning used to
come to about 1_s._ 8_d._ a-day, or, including Sundays, about 10_s._
6_d._ per week. At that time I could average all the year round about
30_s._ a-week, and I used to drink away 10_s._ of it regularly. I did,
indeed, sir, more to my shame.”
The other coalporter told me his earnings averaged about the same, but
he drank more.
“I should say I got rid of nearly one-half of my money. I did like the
beer then: I thought I could not live without it. It’s between twelve
and thirteen years since the first coalporter signed the pledge. His
name was John Sturge, and he was looked upon as a madman. I looked
upon him myself in that light. The next was Thomas Bailey, and he was
my teetotal father. When I first heard of a coalporter doing without
beer, I thought it a thing impossible. I made sure they wouldn’t
live long; it was part of my education to believe they couldn’t. My
grandfather brewed home-brewed beer, and he used to say to me, ‘Drink,
my lad, it’ll make thee strong.’ The coalporters say now, if we could
get the genuine home-brewed, that would be the stuff to do us good;
the publican’s wash is no good. I drank for strength; the stimulation
caused by the alcohol I mistook for my own power.”
“Richard Hooper! He’s been a teetotaler now about twelve years. He was
the fourth of the coaleys as signed the pledge, and he first instilled
teetotalism on my mind,” said the other man. “Where he works now
there’s nine out of fifteen men is teetotalers. Seeing that he could do
his work much better than when he drinked beer, induced me to become
one. He was more regular in his work after he had given it up than
whenever I knowed him before.”
“The way in which Thomas Bailey put it into my head was this here,”
continued the other. “He invited me to a meeting: I told him I would
come, but he’d never make a teetotaler of me, I knowed. I went with the
intention to listen to what they could have to say. I was a little bit
curious to know how they could make out that beer was no good for a
body. The first man that addressed the meeting was a tailor. I thought
it might do very well for him; but then, says I, if you had the weight
of 238lbs. of coals on your back, my lad, you couldn’t do it without
ale or beer. I thought this here, because I was taught to believe I
couldn’t do without it. I cared not what any man said about beer, I
believed it was life itself. After the tailor a coalporter got up to
speak. Then I began to listen more attentively. The man said he once
had a happy home and a happy wife, everything the heart could wish for,
but through the intoxicating drinks he had been robbed of everything.
The man pictured the drunkard’s home so faithfully, that the arrows of
conviction stuck fast in my heart, and my conscience said, Thou art a
drunkard, too! The coalporter said his home had been made happy through
the principle of total abstinence. I was determined to try it from that
hour. My home was as miserable as it possibly could be, and I knowed
intoxicating drink was the cause on it. I signed the pledge that night
after the coalporter was done speaking, but was many months before I
was thoroughly convinced I was doing right in abstaining altogether.
I kept thinking on it after going home of a night, tired and fatigued
with my hard work, some times scarcely able to get up-stairs through
being so overwrought; and not being quite satisfied about it, I took
every opportunity to hear lectures upon the subject. I heard one on the
properties of intoxicating drinks, which quite convinced me that I had
been labouring under a delusion. The gentleman analysed the beer in my
presence, and I saw that in a pint of it there was 14 ozs. of water
that I had been paying 2_d._ for, 1 oz. of alcohol, and 1 oz. of what
they call nutritious matter, but which is the filthiest stuff man ever
set eyes upon. It looked more like cobblers’ wax than anything else.
It was what the lecturer called the--residyum, I think was the name
he gave it. The alcohol is what stimulates a man, and makes him feel
as if he could carry two sacks of coal while it lasts, but afterwards
comes the depression; that’s what the coalporters call the ‘blues.’
And then he feels that he can do no work at all, and he either goes
home and puts another man on in his place, or else he goes and works it
off with more drink. You see, where we coalporters have been mistaken
is believing alcohol was nutriment, and in fancying that a stimulant
was strength. Alcohol is nothing strengthening to the body--indeed, it
hardens the food in the stomach, and so hinders digestion. You can see
as much any day if you go into the hospitals, and look at the different
parts of animals preserved in spirits. The strength that alcohol gives
is unnatural and false. It’s food only that can give real strength to
the frame. I have done more work since I’ve been a teetotaler in my
eight years than I did in my ten or twelve years before. I have felt
stronger. I don’t say that I do my work better, but this I will say,
without any fear of contradiction, that I do my work with more ease to
myself, and with more satisfaction to my employer, since I have given
over intoxicating drinks. I scarcely know what thirst is. Before I took
the pledge I was always dry, and the mere shadow of the potboy was
quite sufficient to convince me that I wanted something. I certainly
haven’t felt weaker since I left off malt liquor. I have eaten more
and drank less. I live as well now as any of the publicans do, and who
has a better right to do so than the man who works? I have backed as
many as sixty tons in a day since I took the pledge, and have done it
without any intoxicating drink, with perfect ease to myself, and walked
five miles to a temperance meeting afterwards. But before I became a
teetotaler, after the same amount of work, I should scarcely have been
able to crawl home; I should have been certain to have lost the next
day’s work at least: but now I can back that quantity of coals week
after week without losing a day. I’ve got a family of six children
under twelve years of age. My wife’s a teetotaler, and has suckled
four children upon the principle of total abstinence. Teetotalism has
made my home quite happy, and what I get goes twice as far. Where I
work now, four out of five of us are teetotalers. I am quite satisfied
that the heaviest work that a man can possibly do may be done without
a drop of fermented liquor. I say so from my own experience. All kind
of intoxicating drinks is quite a delusion. They are the cause of the
working man’s wages being lowered. Masters can get the men who drink at
their own price. If it wasn’t for the money spent in liquor we should
have funds to fall back upon, and then we could stand out against
any reduction that the masters might want to put upon us, and could
command a fair day’s wages for a fair day’s work: but as it is, the
men are all beggars, and must take what the master offers them. The
backing of coals out of the holds of ships is man-killing work. It’s
scandalous that men should be allowed to force their fellow-men to do
such labour. The calves of a man’s leg is as hard as a bit of board
after that there straining work; they hardly know how to turn out of
bed of a morning after they have been at that for a day. I never worked
below bridge, thank God! and I hope I never shall. I’ve not wanted for
a day’s work since I’ve been a teetotaler. Men can back out of a ship’s
hold better without liquor than with it. We teetotalers can do the work
better--that is, with more ease to ourselves--than the drinking men.
Many teetotalers have backed coals out of the hold, and I have heard
them say over and over again that they did their work with more comfort
and ease than they did when they drank intoxicating drink. Coalbacking
from the ship’s hold is the hardest work that it is possible for a man
to do. Going up a ladder 16 feet high with 238 lbs. weight on a man’s
back is sufficient to kill any one; indeed, it does kill the men in a
few years, they’re soon old men at that work: and I do say that the
masters below bridge should be stopped going on as they’re doing now.
And what for? Why, to put the money they save by it into their own
pockets, for the public ain’t no better off, the coals is just as dear.
Then the whippers and lightermen are all thrown out of work by it; and
what’s more, the lives of the backers are shortened many years--we
reckon at least ten years.”
“I wish to say this much,” said the other teetotaler: “it’s a practice
with some of the coal-merchants to pay their men in public-houses, and
this is the chief cause of a great portion of the wages being spent in
drink. I once worked for a master upon Bankside as paid his men at a
public-house, and I worked a week there, which yearned me 28_s._ and
some odd halfpence. When I went on Saturday night the publican asked
me what I was come for. In reply, I said ‘I’m come to settle.’ He
said, ‘You’re already settled with,’ meaning I had nothing to take.
I had drinked all my lot away, he said, with the exception of 5_s._
I had borrowed during the week. Then I told him to look back, and
he’d find I’d something due to me. He did so, and said there was a
halfpenny. I had nothing to take home to my wife and two children. I
asked the publican to lend me a few shillings, saying my young un’s
had nothing to eat. His reply was, ‘That’s nothing to me, that’s your
business.’ After that I made it my business. While I stood at the bar
in came the three teetotalers, and picked up the 28_s._ each that was
coming to them, and I thought how much better they was off than me.
The publican stopped all my money for drink that I knowed I’d not had,
and yet I couldn’t help myself, ’cause he had the paying on me. Then
something came over me as I stood there, and I said, ‘From this night,
with the help of God, I’ll never taste of another drop of intoxicating
liquors.’ That’s ten years ago the 25th of last August, and I’ve kept
my pledge ever since, thank God! That publican has been the making
of me. The master what discharged me before for getting drunk, when
he heard that I was sober sent for me back again. But before that,
the three teetotalers who was a working along with me was discharged
by their master, to oblige the publican who stopped my money. The
publican, you see, had his coals from the wharf. He was a ‘brass-plate
coal-merchant’ as well as a publican, and had private customers of his
own. He threatened to take his work away from the wharf if the three
teetotalers wasn’t discharged; and sure enough the master did discharge
them, sooner than lose so good a customer. Many of the masters now are
growing favourable to teetotalism. I can say that I’ve done more on
the principle of total abstinence than ever I done before. I’m better
in health, I’ve no trembling when I goes to my work of a morning; but,
on the contrary, I’m ready to meet it. I’m happier at home. We never
has no angry words now,” said the man, with a shake of the head, and a
strong emphasis on the _now_. “My children never runs away from me as
they used to before; they come and embrace me more. My money now goes
for eatables and clothes, what I and my children once was deprived on
through my intemperate habits. And I bless God and the publican that
made me a teetotaler--that I do sincerely--every night as I go to bed.
And as for men to hold out that they can’t do their work without it,
I’m prepared to prove that we have done more work without it than ever
we have done or could do with it.”
* * * * *
I have been requested by the coalwhippers to publish the following
expression of gratitude on their part towards the Government for the
establishment of the Coalwhippers’ Office:--
“The change that the Legislature has produced in us, by putting an end
to the thraldom of the publican by the institution of this office, we
wish it to be generally known that we and our wives and children are
very thankful for.”
* * * * *
I shall now conclude with the following estimate of the number of the
hands, ships, &c. engaged in the coal trade in London.
There are about 400 wharfs, I am informed, from Wapping to Chelsea,
as well as those on the City-canal. A large wharf will keep about 50
horses, 6 waggons, and 4 carts; and it will employ constantly from
3 to 4 gangs of 5 men. Besides these, there will be 6 waggoners, 1
cart-carman, and about 2 trouncers--in all, from 24 to 29 men. A small
wharf will employ 1 gang of 5 men, about 10 horses, 3 waggons, and 1
cart, 3 waggoners, 1 trouncer, and 1 cart-carman. At the time of the
strike, sixteen years ago, there were more than 3000 coalporters, I am
told, in London. It is supposed that there is an average of 1-1/2 gang,
or about 7 men employed in each wharf; or, in all, 2000 coalporters in
constant employment, and about 200 and odd men out of work. There are
in the trade about 4 waggons and 1 cart to each wharf, or 1600 waggons
and 400 carts, having 5200 horses; to these there would be about 3
waggoners and 1 cart-carman upon an average to each wharf, or 1600 in
all. Each wharf would occupy about 2 trouncers, or 900 in the whole.