“I was a grocer’s assistant, but was out of place and had a friend who
got me a timekeeper’s office. I have 21_s._ a week. Mine’s not hard
work, but it’s very tiring. You hardly ever have a moment to call your
own. If we only had our Sundays, like other working-men, it would be
a grand relief. It would be very easy to get an odd man to work every
other Sunday, but masters care nothing about Sundays. Some ’busses do
stop running from 11 to 1, but plenty keep running. Sometimes I am so
tired of a night that I dare hardly sit down, for fear I should fall
asleep and lose my own time, and that would be to lose my place. I
think timekeepers continue longer in their places than the others. We
have nothing to do with money-taking. I’m a single man, and get all my
meals at the ---- Inn. I dress my own dinners in the tap-room. I have
my tea brought to me from a coffee-shop. I can’t be said to have any
home--just a bed to sleep in, as I’m never ten minutes awake in the
house where I lodge.”
The “odd men” are, as their name imports, the men who are employed
occasionally, or, as they term it, “get odd jobs.” These form a
considerable portion of the unemployed. If a driver be ill, or absent
to attend a summons, or on any temporary occasion, the odd man is
called upon to do the work. For this the odd man receives 10_d._ a
journey, to and fro. One of them gave me the following account:--“I
was brought up to a stable life, and had to shift for myself when I
was 17, as my parents died then. It’s nine years ago. For two or three
years, till this few months, I drove a ’bus. I was discharged with
a week’s notice, and don’t know for what--it’s no use asking for a
reason: I wasn’t wanted. I’ve been put to shifts since then, and almost
everything’s pledged that could be pledged. I had a decent stock of
clothes, but they’re all at my uncle’s. Last week I earned 3_s._ 4_d._,
the week before 1_s._ 8_d._, but this week I shall do better, say 5_s._
I have to pay 1_s._ 6_d._ a week for my garret. I’m a single man, and
have nothing but a bed left in it now. I did live in a better place.
If I didn’t get a bite and sup now and then with some of my old mates
I think I couldn’t live at all. Mine’s a wretched life, and a very bad
trade.”