“My father,” said Jemima, “seduced my mother, a pretty girl, with whom
he lived fellow-servant; and she no sooner perceived the natural, the
dreaded consequence, than the terrible conviction flashed on her—that
she was ruined. Honesty, and a regard for her reputation, had been the
only principles inculcated by her mother; and they had been so forcibly
impressed, that she feared shame, more than the poverty to which it
would lead. Her incessant importunities to prevail upon my father to
screen her from reproach by marrying her, as he had promised in the
fervour of seduction, estranged him from her so completely, that her
very person became distasteful to him; and he began to hate, as well as
despise me, before I was born.
“My mother, grieved to the soul by his neglect, and unkind treatment,
actually resolved to famish herself; and injured her health by the
attempt; though she had not sufficient resolution to adhere to her
project, or renounce it entirely. Death came not at her call; yet
sorrow, and the methods she adopted to conceal her condition, still
doing the work of a house-maid, had such an effect on her constitution,
that she died in the wretched garret, where her virtuous mistress had
forced her to take refuge in the very pangs of labour, though my
father, after a slight reproof, was allowed to remain in his
place—allowed by the mother of six children, who, scarcely permitting a
footstep to be heard, during her month’s indulgence, felt no sympathy
for the poor wretch, denied every comfort required by her situation.
“The day my mother, died, the ninth after my birth, I was consigned to
the care of the cheapest nurse my father could find; who suckled her
own child at the same time, and lodged as many more as she could get,
in two cellar-like apartments.
“Poverty, and the habit of seeing children die off her hands, had so
hardened her heart, that the office of a mother did not awaken the
tenderness of a woman; nor were the feminine caresses which seem a part
of the rearing of a child, ever bestowed on me. The chicken has a wing
to shelter under; but I had no bosom to nestle in, no kindred warmth to
foster me. Left in dirt, to cry with cold and hunger till I was weary,
and sleep without ever being prepared by exercise, or lulled by
kindness to rest; could I be expected to become any thing but a weak
and rickety babe? Still, in spite of neglect, I continued to exist, to
learn to curse existence, [her countenance grew ferocious as she
spoke,] and the treatment that rendered me miserable, seemed to sharpen
my wits. Confined then in a damp hovel, to rock the cradle of the
succeeding tribe, I looked like a little old woman, or a hag
shrivelling into nothing. The furrows of reflection and care contracted
the youthful cheek, and gave a sort of supernatural wildness to the
ever watchful eye. During this period, my father had married another
fellow-servant, who loved him less, and knew better how to manage his
passion, than my mother. She likewise proving with child, they agreed
to keep a shop: my step-mother, if, being an illegitimate offspring, I
may venture thus to characterize her, having obtained a sum of a rich
relation, for that purpose.
“Soon after her lying-in, she prevailed on my father to take me home,
to save the expense of maintaining me, and of hiring a girl to assist
her in the care of the child. I was young, it was true, but appeared a
knowing little thing, and might be made handy. Accordingly I was
brought to her house; but not to a home—for a home I never knew. Of
this child, a daughter, she was extravagantly fond; and it was a part
of my employment, to assist to spoil her, by humouring all her whims,
and bearing all her caprices. Feeling her own consequence, before she
could speak, she had learned the art of tormenting me, and if I ever
dared to resist, I received blows, laid on with no compunctious hand,
or was sent to bed dinnerless, as well as supperless. I said that it
was a part of my daily labour to attend this child, with the servility
of a slave; still it was but a part. I was sent out in all seasons, and
from place to place, to carry burdens far above my strength, without
being allowed to draw near the fire, or ever being cheered by
encouragement or kindness. No wonder then, treated like a creature of
another species, that I began to envy, and at length to hate, the
darling of the house. Yet, I perfectly remember, that it was the
caresses, and kind expressions of my step-mother, which first excited
my jealous discontent. Once, I cannot forget it, when she was calling
in vain her wayward child to kiss her, I ran to her, saying, ‘I will
kiss you, ma’am!’ and how did my heart, which was in my mouth, sink,
what was my debasement of soul, when pushed away with—‘I do not want
you, pert thing!’ Another day, when a new gown had excited the highest
good humour, and she uttered the appropriate dear, addressed
unexpectedly to me, I thought I could never do enough to please her; I
was all alacrity, and rose proportionably in my own estimation.
“As her daughter grew up, she was pampered with cakes and fruit, while
I was, literally speaking, fed with the refuse of the table, with her
leavings. A liquorish tooth is, I believe, common to children, and I
used to steal any thing sweet, that I could catch up with a chance of
concealment. When detected, she was not content to chastize me herself
at the moment, but, on my father’s return in the evening (he was a
shopman), the principal discourse was to recount my faults, and
attribute them to the wicked disposition which I had brought into the
world with me, inherited from my mother. He did not fail to leave the
marks of his resentment on my body, and then solaced himself by playing
with my sister.—I could have murdered her at those moments. To save
myself from these unmerciful corrections, I resorted to falshood, and
the untruths which I sturdily maintained, were brought in judgment
against me, to support my tyrant’s inhuman charge of my natural
propensity to vice. Seeing me treated with contempt, and always being
fed and dressed better, my sister conceived a contemptuous opinion of
me, that proved an obstacle to all affection; and my father, hearing
continually of my faults, began to consider me as a curse entailed on
him for his sins: he was therefore easily prevailed on to bind me
apprentice to one of my step-mother’s friends, who kept a slop-shop in
Wapping. I was represented (as it was said) in my true colours; but
she, ‘warranted,’ snapping her fingers, ‘that she should break my
spirit or heart.’
“My mother replied, with a whine, ‘that if any body could make me
better, it was such a clever woman as herself; though, for her own
part, she had tried in vain; but good-nature was her fault.’
“I shudder with horror, when I recollect the treatment I had now to
endure. Not only under the lash of my task-mistress, but the drudge of
the maid, apprentices and children, I never had a taste of human
kindness to soften the rigour of perpetual labour. I had been
introduced as an object of abhorrence into the family; as a creature of
whom my step-mother, though she had been kind enough to let me live in
the house with her own child, could make nothing. I was described as a
wretch, whose nose must be kept to the grinding stone—and it was held
there with an iron grasp. It seemed indeed the privilege of their
superior nature to kick me about, like the dog or cat. If I were
attentive, I was called fawning, if refractory, an obstinate mule, and
like a mule I received their censure on my loaded back. Often has my
mistress, for some instance of forgetfulness, thrown me from one side
of the kitchen to the other, knocked my head against the wall, spit in
my face, with various refinements on barbarity that I forbear to
enumerate, though they were all acted over again by the servant, with
additional insults, to which the appellation of bastard, was commonly
added, with taunts or sneers. But I will not attempt to give you an
adequate idea of my situation, lest you, who probably have never been
drenched with the dregs of human misery, should think I exaggerate.
“I stole now, from absolute necessity,—bread; yet whatever else was
taken, which I had it not in my power to take, was ascribed to me. I
was the filching cat, the ravenous dog, the dumb brute, who must bear
all; for if I endeavoured to exculpate myself, I was silenced, without
any enquiries being made, with ‘Hold your tongue, you never tell
truth.’ Even the very air I breathed was tainted with scorn; for I was
sent to the neighbouring shops with Glutton, Liar, or Thief, written on
my forehead. This was, at first, the most bitter punishment; but sullen
pride, or a kind of stupid desperation, made me, at length, almost
regardless of the contempt, which had wrung from me so many solitary
tears at the only moments when I was allowed to rest.
“Thus was I the mark of cruelty till my sixteenth year; and then I have
only to point out a change of misery; for a period I never knew. Allow
me first to make one observation. Now I look back, I cannot help
attributing the greater part of my misery, to the misfortune of having
been thrown into the world without the grand support of life—a mother’s
affection. I had no one to love me; or to make me respected, to enable
me to acquire respect. I was an egg dropped on the sand; a pauper by
nature, hunted from family to family, who belonged to nobody—and nobody
cared for me. I was despised from my birth, and denied the chance of
obtaining a footing for myself in society. Yes; I had not even the
chance of being considered as a fellow-creature—yet all the people with
whom I lived, brutalized as they were by the low cunning of trade, and
the despicable shifts of poverty, were not without bowels, though they
never yearned for me. I was, in fact, born a slave, and chained by
infamy to slavery during the whole of existence, without having any
companions to alleviate it by sympathy, or teach me how to rise above
it by their example. But, to resume the thread of my tale—
“At sixteen, I suddenly grew tall, and something like comeliness
appeared on a Sunday, when I had time to wash my face, and put on clean
clothes. My master had once or twice caught hold of me in the passage;
but I instinctively avoided his disgusting caresses. One day however,
when the family were at a methodist meeting, he contrived to be alone
in the house with me, and by blows—yes; blows and menaces, compelled me
to submit to his ferocious desire; and, to avoid my mistress’s fury, I
was obliged in future to comply, and skulk to my loft at his command,
in spite of increasing loathing.
“The anguish which was now pent up in my bosom, seemed to open a new
world to me: I began to extend my thoughts beyond myself, and grieve
for human misery, till I discovered, with horror—ah! what horror!—that
I was with child. I know not why I felt a mixed sensation of despair
and tenderness, excepting that, ever called a bastard, a bastard
appeared to me an object of the greatest compassion in creation.
“I communicated this dreadful circumstance to my master, who was almost
equally alarmed at the intelligence; for he feared his wife, and public
censure at the meeting. After some weeks of deliberation had elapsed, I
in continual fear that my altered shape would be noticed, my master
gave me a medicine in a phial, which he desired me to take, telling me,
without any circumlocution, for what purpose it was designed. I burst
into tears, I thought it was killing myself—yet was such a self as I
worth preserving? He cursed me for a fool, and left me to my own
reflections. I could not resolve to take this infernal potion; but I
wrapped it up in an old gown, and hid it in a corner of my box.
“Nobody yet suspected me, because they had been accustomed to view me
as a creature of another species. But the threatening storm at last
broke over my devoted head—never shall I forget it! One Sunday evening
when I was left, as usual, to take care of the house, my master came
home intoxicated, and I became the prey of his brutal appetite. His
extreme intoxication made him forget his customary caution, and my
mistress entered and found us in a situation that could not have been
more hateful to her than me. Her husband was ‘pot-valiant,’ he feared
her not at the moment, nor had he then much reason, for she instantly
turned the whole force of her anger another way. She tore off my cap,
scratched, kicked, and buffetted me, till she had exhausted her
strength, declaring, as she rested her arm, ‘that I had wheedled her
husband from her.—But, could any thing better be expected from a
wretch, whom she had taken into her house out of pure charity?’ What a
torrent of abuse rushed out? till, almost breathless, she concluded
with saying, ‘that I was born a strumpet; it ran in my blood, and
nothing good could come to those who harboured me.’
“My situation was, of course, discovered, and she declared that I
should not stay another night under the same roof with an honest
family. I was therefore pushed out of doors, and my trumpery thrown
after me, when it had been contemptuously examined in the passage, lest
I should have stolen any thing.
“Behold me then in the street, utterly destitute! Whither could I creep
for shelter? To my father’s roof I had no claim, when not pursued by
shame—now I shrunk back as from death, from my mother’s cruel
reproaches, my father’s execrations. I could not endure to hear him
curse the day I was born, though life had been a curse to me. Of death
I thought, but with a confused emotion of terror, as I stood leaning my
head on a post, and starting at every footstep, lest it should be my
mistress coming to tear my heart out. One of the boys of the shop
passing by, heard my tale, and immediately repaired to his master, to
give him a description of my situation; and he touched the right
key—the scandal it would give rise to, if I were left to repeat my tale
to every enquirer. This plea came home to his reason, who had been
sobered by his wife’s rage, the fury of which fell on him when I was
out of her reach, and he sent the boy to me with half-a-guinea,
desiring him to conduct me to a house, where beggars, and other
wretches, the refuse of society, nightly lodged.
“This night was spent in a state of stupefaction, or desperation. I
detested mankind, and abhorred myself.
“In the morning I ventured out, to throw myself in my master’s way, at
his usual hour of going abroad. I approached him, he ‘damned me for a
b——, declared I had disturbed the peace of the family, and that he had
sworn to his wife, never to take any more notice of me.’ He left me;
but, instantly returning, he told me that he should speak to his
friend, a parish-officer, to get a nurse for the brat I laid to him;
and advised me, if I wished to keep out of the house of correction, not
to make free with his name.
“I hurried back to my hole, and, rage giving place to despair, sought
for the potion that was to procure abortion, and swallowed it, with a
wish that it might destroy me, at the same time that it stopped the
sensations of new-born life, which I felt with indescribable emotion.
My head turned round, my heart grew sick, and in the horrors of
approaching dissolution, mental anguish was swallowed up. The effect of
the medicine was violent, and I was confined to my bed several days;
but, youth and a strong constitution prevailing, I once more crawled
out, to ask myself the cruel question, ‘Whither I should go?’ I had but
two shillings left in my pocket, the rest had been expended, by a poor
woman who slept in the same room, to pay for my lodging, and purchase
the necessaries of which she partook.
“With this wretch I went into the neighbouring streets to beg, and my
disconsolate appearance drew a few pence from the idle, enabling me
still to command a bed; till, recovering from my illness, and taught to
put on my rags to the best advantage, I was accosted from different
motives, and yielded to the desire of the brutes I met, with the same
detestation that I had felt for my still more brutal master. I have
since read in novels of the blandishments of seduction, but I had not
even the pleasure of being enticed into vice.
“I shall not,” interrupted Jemima, “lead your imagination into all the
scenes of wretchedness and depravity, which I was condemned to view; or
mark the different stages of my debasing misery. Fate dragged me
through the very kennels of society: I was still a slave, a bastard, a
common property. Become familiar with vice, for I wish to conceal
nothing from you, I picked the pockets of the drunkards who abused me;
and proved by my conduct, that I deserved the epithets, with which they
loaded me at moments when distrust ought to cease.
“Detesting my nightly occupation, though valuing, if I may so use the
word, my independence, which only consisted in choosing the street in
which I should wander, or the roof, when I had money, in which I should
hide my head, I was some time before I could prevail on myself to
accept of a place in a house of ill fame, to which a girl, with whom I
had accidentally conversed in the street, had recommended me. I had
been hunted almost into a fever, by the watchmen of the quarter of the
town I frequented; one, whom I had unwittingly offended, giving the
word to the whole pack. You can scarcely conceive the tyranny exercised
by these wretches: considering themselves as the instruments of the
very laws they violate, the pretext which steels their conscience,
hardens their heart. Not content with receiving from us, outlaws of
society (let other women talk of favours) a brutal gratification
gratuitously as a privilege of office, they extort a tithe of
prostitution, and harrass with threats the poor creatures whose
occupation affords not the means to silence the growl of avarice. To
escape from this persecution, I once more entered into servitude.
“A life of comparative regularity restored my health; and—do not
start—my manners were improved, in a situation where vice sought to
render itself alluring, and taste was cultivated to fashion the person,
if not to refine the mind. Besides, the common civility of speech,
contrasted with the gross vulgarity to which I had been accustomed, was
something like the polish of civilization. I was not shut out from all
intercourse of humanity. Still I was galled by the yoke of service, and
my mistress often flying into violent fits of passion, made me dread a
sudden dismission, which I understood was always the case. I was
therefore prevailed on, though I felt a horror of men, to accept the
offer of a gentleman, rather in the decline of years, to keep his
house, pleasantly situated in a little village near Hampstead.
“He was a man of great talents, and of brilliant wit; but, a worn-out
votary of voluptuousness, his desires became fastidious in proportion
as they grew weak, and the native tenderness of his heart was
undermined by a vitiated imagination. A thoughtless career of
libertinism and social enjoyment, had injured his health to such a
degree, that, whatever pleasure his conversation afforded me (and my
esteem was ensured by proofs of the generous humanity of his
disposition), the being his mistress was purchasing it at a very dear
rate. With such a keen perception of the delicacies of sentiment, with
an imagination invigorated by the exercise of genius, how could he sink
into the grossness of sensuality!
“But, to pass over a subject which I recollect with pain, I must remark
to you, as an answer to your often-repeated question, ‘Why my
sentiments and language were superior to my station?’ that I now began
to read, to beguile the tediousness of solitude, and to gratify an
inquisitive, active mind. I had often, in my childhood, followed a
ballad-singer, to hear the sequel of a dismal story, though sure of
being severely punished for delaying to return with whatever I was sent
to purchase. I could just spell and put a sentence together, and I
listened to the various arguments, though often mingled with obscenity,
which occurred at the table where I was allowed to preside: for a
literary friend or two frequently came home with my master, to dine and
pass the night. Having lost the privileged respect of my sex, my
presence, instead of restraining, perhaps gave the reins to their
tongues; still I had the advantage of hearing discussions, from which,
in the common course of life, women are excluded.
“You may easily imagine, that it was only by degrees that I could
comprehend some of the subjects they investigated, or acquire from
their reasoning what might be termed a moral sense. But my fondness of
reading increasing, and my master occasionally shutting himself up in
this retreat, for weeks together, to write, I had many opportunities of
improvement. At first, considering money (I was right!” exclaimed
Jemima, altering her tone of voice) “as the only means, after my loss
of reputation, of obtaining respect, or even the toleration of
humanity, I had not the least scruple to secrete a part of the sums
intrusted to me, and to screen myself from detection by a system of
falshood. But, acquiring new principles, I began to have the ambition
of returning to the respectable part of society, and was weak enough to
suppose it possible. The attention of my unassuming instructor, who,
without being ignorant of his own powers, possessed great simplicity of
manners, strengthened the illusion. Having sometimes caught up hints
for thought, from my untutored remarks, he often led me to discuss the
subjects he was treating, and would read to me his productions,
previous to their publication, wishing to profit by the criticism of
unsophisticated feeling. The aim of his writings was to touch the
simple springs of the heart; for he despised the would-be oracles, the
self-elected philosophers, who fright away fancy, while sifting each
grain of thought to prove that slowness of comprehension is wisdom.
“I should have distinguished this as a moment of sunshine, a happy
period in my life, had not the repugnance the disgusting libertinism of
my protector inspired, daily become more painful.—And, indeed, I soon
did recollect it as such with agony, when his sudden death (for he had
recourse to the most exhilarating cordials to keep up the convivial
tone of his spirits) again threw me into the desert of human society.
Had he had any time for reflection, I am certain he would have left the
little property in his power to me: but, attacked by the fatal apoplexy
in town, his heir, a man of rigid morals, brought his wife with him to
take possession of the house and effects, before I was even informed of
his death,—‘to prevent,’ as she took care indirectly to tell me, ‘such
a creature as she supposed me to be, from purloining any of them, had I
been apprized of the event in time.’
“The grief I felt at the sudden shock the information gave me, which at
first had nothing selfish in it, was treated with contempt, and I was
ordered to pack up my clothes; and a few trinkets and books, given me
by the generous deceased, were contested, while they piously hoped,
with a reprobating shake of the head, ‘that God would have mercy on his
sinful soul!’ With some difficulty, I obtained my arrears of wages; but
asking—such is the spirit-grinding consequence of poverty and
infamy—for a character for honesty and economy, which God knows I
merited, I was told by this—why must I call her woman?—‘that it would
go against her conscience to recommend a kept mistress.’ Tears started
in my eyes, burning tears; for there are situations in which a wretch
is humbled by the contempt they are conscious they do not deserve.
“I returned to the metropolis; but the solitude of a poor lodging was
inconceivably dreary, after the society I had enjoyed. To be cut off
from human converse, now I had been taught to relish it, was to wander
a ghost among the living. Besides, I foresaw, to aggravate the severity
of my fate, that my little pittance would soon melt away. I endeavoured
to obtain needlework; but, not having been taught early, and my hands
being rendered clumsy by hard work, I did not sufficiently excel to be
employed by the ready-made linen shops, when so many women, better
qualified, were suing for it. The want of a character prevented my
getting a place; for, irksome as servitude would have been to me, I
should have made another trial, had it been feasible. Not that I
disliked employment, but the inequality of condition to which I must
have submitted. I had acquired a taste for literature, during the five
years I had lived with a literary man, occasionally conversing with men
of the first abilities of the age; and now to descend to the lowest
vulgarity, was a degree of wretchedness not to be imagined unfelt. I
had not, it is true, tasted the charms of affection, but I had been
familiar with the graces of humanity.
“One of the gentlemen, whom I had frequently dined in company with,
while I was treated like a companion, met me in the street, and
enquired after my health. I seized the occasion, and began to describe
my situation; but he was in haste to join, at dinner, a select party of
choice spirits; therefore, without waiting to hear me, he impatiently
put a guinea into my hand, saying, ‘It was a pity such a sensible woman
should be in distress—he wished me well from his soul.’
“To another I wrote, stating my case, and requesting advice. He was an
advocate for unequivocal sincerity; and had often, in my presence,
descanted on the evils which arise in society from the despotism of
rank and riches.
“In reply, I received a long essay on the energy of the human mind,
with continual allusions to his own force of character. He added, ‘That
the woman who could write such a letter as I had sent him, could never
be in want of resources, were she to look into herself, and exert her
powers; misery was the consequence of indolence, and, as to my being
shut out from society, it was the lot of man to submit to certain
privations.’
“How often have I heard,” said Jemima, interrupting her narrative, “in
conversation, and read in books, that every person willing to work may
find employment? It is the vague assertion, I believe, of insensible
indolence, when it relates to men; but, with respect to women, I am
sure of its fallacy, unless they will submit to the most menial bodily
labour; and even to be employed at hard labour is out of the reach of
many, whose reputation misfortune or folly has tainted.
“How writers, professing to be friends to freedom, and the improvement
of morals, can assert that poverty is no evil, I cannot imagine.”
“No more can I,” interrupted Maria, “yet they even expatiate on the
peculiar happiness of indigence, though in what it can consist,
excepting in brutal rest, when a man can barely earn a subsistence, I
cannot imagine. The mind is necessarily imprisoned in its own little
tenement; and, fully occupied by keeping it in repair, has not time to
rove abroad for improvement. The book of knowledge is closely clasped,
against those who must fulfil their daily task of severe manual labour
or die; and curiosity, rarely excited by thought or information, seldom
moves on the stagnate lake of ignorance.”
“As far as I have been able to observe,” replied Jemima, “prejudices,
caught up by chance, are obstinately maintained by the poor, to the
exclusion of improvement; they have not time to reason or reflect to
any extent, or minds sufficiently exercised to adopt the principles of
action, which form perhaps the only basis of contentment in every
station.”[6]
[6] The copy which appears to have received the author’s last
corrections, ends at this place. [Godwin’s note]
“And independence,” said Darnford, “they are necessarily strangers to,
even the independence of despising their persecutors. If the poor are
happy, or can be happy, _things are very well as they are_. And I
cannot conceive on what principle those writers contend for a change of
system, who support this opinion. The authors on the other side of the
question are much more consistent, who grant the fact; yet, insisting
that it is the lot of the majority to be oppressed in this life, kindly
turn them over to another, to rectify the false weights and measures of
this, as the only way to justify the dispensations of Providence. I
have not,” continued Darnford, “an opinion more firmly fixed by
observation in my mind, than that, though riches may fail to produce
proportionate happiness, poverty most commonly excludes it, by shutting
up all the avenues to improvement.”
“And as for the affections,” added Maria, with a sigh, “how gross, and
even tormenting do they become, unless regulated by an improving mind!
The culture of the heart ever, I believe, keeps pace with that of the
mind. But pray go on,” addressing Jemima, “though your narrative gives
rise to the most painful reflections on the present state of society.”
“Not to trouble you,” continued she, “with a detailed description of
all the painful feelings of unavailing exertion, I have only to tell
you, that at last I got recommended to wash in a few families, who did
me the favour to admit me into their houses, without the most strict
enquiry, to wash from one in the morning till eight at night, for
eighteen or twenty-pence a day. On the happiness to be enjoyed over a
washing-tub I need not comment; yet you will allow me to observe, that
this was a wretchedness of situation peculiar to my sex. A man with
half my industry, and, I may say, abilities, could have procured a
decent livelihood, and discharged some of the duties which knit mankind
together; whilst I, who had acquired a taste for the rational, nay, in
honest pride let me assert it, the virtuous enjoyments of life, was
cast aside as the filth of society. Condemned to labour, like a
machine, only to earn bread, and scarcely that, I became melancholy and
desperate.
“I have now to mention a circumstance which fills me with remorse, and
fear it will entirely deprive me of your esteem. A tradesman became
attached to me, and visited me frequently,—and I at last obtained such
a power over him, that he offered to take me home to his
house.—Consider, dear madam, I was famishing: wonder not that I became
a wolf!—The only reason for not taking me home immediately, was the
having a girl in the house, with child by him—and this girl—I advised
him—yes, I did! would I could forget it!—to turn out of doors: and one
night he determined to follow my advice. Poor wretch! She fell upon her
knees, reminded him that he had promised to marry her, that her parents
were honest!—What did it avail?—She was turned out.
“She approached her father’s door, in the skirts of London,—listened at
the shutters,—but could not knock. A watchman had observed her go and
return several times—Poor wretch!—[The remorse Jemima spoke of, seemed
to be stinging her to the soul, as she proceeded.]
“She left it, and, approaching a tub where horses were watered, she sat
down in it, and, with desperate resolution, remained in that
attitude—till resolution was no longer necessary!
“I happened that morning to be going out to wash, anticipating the
moment when I should escape from such hard labour. I passed by, just as
some men, going to work, drew out the stiff, cold corpse—Let me not
recall the horrid moment!—I recognized her pale visage; I listened to
the tale told by the spectators, and my heart did not burst. I thought
of my own state, and wondered how I could be such a monster!—I worked
hard; and, returning home, I was attacked by a fever. I suffered both
in body and mind. I determined not to live with the wretch. But he did
not try me; he left the neighbourhood. I once more returned to the
wash-tub.
“Still this state, miserable as it was, admitted of aggravation.
Lifting one day a heavy load, a tub fell against my shin, and gave me
great pain. I did not pay much attention to the hurt, till it became a
serious wound; being obliged to work as usual, or starve. But, finding
myself at length unable to stand for any time, I thought of getting
into an hospital. Hospitals, it should seem (for they are comfortless
abodes for the sick) were expressly endowed for the reception of the
friendless; yet I, who had on that plea a right to assistance, wanted
the recommendation of the rich and respectable, and was several weeks
languishing for admittance; fees were demanded on entering; and, what
was still more unreasonable, security for burying me, that expence not
coming into the letter of the charity. A guinea was the stipulated
sum—I could as soon have raised a million; and I was afraid to apply to
the parish for an order, lest they should have passed me, I knew not
whither. The poor woman at whose house I lodged, compassionating my
state, got me into the hospital; and the family where I received the
hurt, sent me five shillings, three and six-pence of which I gave at my
admittance—I know not for what.
“My leg grew quickly better; but I was dismissed before my cure was
completed, because I could not afford to have my linen washed to appear
decently, as the virago of a nurse said, when the gentlemen (the
surgeons) came. I cannot give you an adequate idea of the wretchedness
of an hospital; every thing is left to the care of people intent on
gain. The attendants seem to have lost all feeling of compassion in the
bustling discharge of their offices; death is so familiar to them, that
they are not anxious to ward it off. Every thing appeared to be
conducted for the accommodation of the medical men and their pupils,
who came to make experiments on the poor, for the benefit of the rich.
One of the physicians, I must not forget to mention, gave me
half-a-crown, and ordered me some wine, when I was at the lowest ebb. I
thought of making my case known to the lady-like matron; but her
forbidding countenance prevented me. She condescended to look on the
patients, and make general enquiries, two or three times a week; but
the nurses knew the hour when the visit of ceremony would commence, and
every thing was as it should be.
“After my dismission, I was more at a loss than ever for a subsistence,
and, not to weary you with a repetition of the same unavailing
attempts, unable to stand at the washing-tub, I began to consider the
rich and poor as natural enemies, and became a thief from principle. I
could not now cease to reason, but I hated mankind. I despised myself,
yet I justified my conduct. I was taken, tried, and condemned to six
months’ imprisonment in a house of correction. My soul recoils with
horror from the remembrance of the insults I had to endure, till,
branded with shame, I was turned loose in the street, pennyless. I
wandered from street to street, till, exhausted by hunger and fatigue,
I sunk down senseless at a door, where I had vainly demanded a morsel
of bread. I was sent by the inhabitant to the work-house, to which he
had surlily bid me go, saying, he ‘paid enough in conscience to the
poor,’ when, with parched tongue, I implored his charity. If those
well-meaning people who exclaim against beggars, were acquainted with
the treatment the poor receive in many of these wretched asylums, they
would not stifle so easily involuntary sympathy, by saying that they
have all parishes to go to, or wonder that the poor dread to enter the
gloomy walls. What are the common run of workhouses, but prisons, in
which many respectable old people, worn out by immoderate labour, sink
into the grave in sorrow, to which they are carried like dogs!”
Alarmed by some indistinct noise, Jemima rose hastily to listen, and
Maria, turning to Darnford, said, “I have indeed been shocked beyond
expression when I have met a pauper’s funeral. A coffin carried on the
shoulders of three or four ill-looking wretches, whom the imagination
might easily convert into a band of assassins, hastening to conceal the
corpse, and quarrelling about the prey on their way. I know it is of
little consequence how we are consigned to the earth; but I am led by
this brutal insensibility, to what even the animal creation appears
forcibly to feel, to advert to the wretched, deserted manner in which
they died.”
“True,” rejoined Darnford, “and, till the rich will give more than a
part of their wealth, till they will give time and attention to the
wants of the distressed, never let them boast of charity. Let them open
their hearts, and not their purses, and employ their minds in the
service, if they are really actuated by humanity; or charitable
institutions will always be the prey of the lowest order of knaves.”
Jemima returning, seemed in haste to finish her tale. “The overseer
farmed the poor of different parishes, and out of the bowels of poverty
was wrung the money with which he purchased this dwelling, as a private
receptacle for madness. He had been a keeper at a house of the same
description, and conceived that he could make money much more readily
in his old occupation. He is a shrewd—shall I say it?—villain. He
observed something resolute in my manner, and offered to take me with
him, and instruct me how to treat the disturbed minds he meant to
intrust to my care. The offer of forty pounds a year, and to quit a
workhouse, was not to be despised, though the condition of shutting my
eyes and hardening my heart was annexed to it.
“I agreed to accompany him; and four years have I been attendant on
many wretches, and”—she lowered her voice,—“the witness of many
enormities. In solitude my mind seemed to recover its force, and many
of the sentiments which I imbibed in the only tolerable period of my
life, returned with their full force. Still what should induce me to be
the champion for suffering humanity?—Who ever risked any thing for
me?—Who ever acknowledged me to be a fellow-creature?”—
Maria took her hand, and Jemima, more overcome by kindness than she had
ever been by cruelty, hastened out of the room to conceal her emotions.
Darnford soon after heard his summons, and, taking leave of him, Maria
promised to gratify his curiosity, with respect to herself, the first
opportunity.