Soft carpets, thick curtains—satin, and velvet, and silk—downy beds beneath gorgeous canopies—warm clothing, and cheerful fires, combined to defy the approach of winter, and to render the absence of genial summer a matter of small regret.
Then, when the occupants of these palaces went abroad, there was no bold exertion required for them to face the nipping cold, for they stepped from their thresholds into carriages thickly lined with wool, and supplied with cushions, soft, luxurious, and warm.
But that cold which was thus expelled from the palaces of the rich took refuge in the dwellings of the poor; and there it remained, sharp as a razor, pitiless as an executioner, inexorable as a judge, and keen as the north-western wind that blows from the ice-bound coasts of Labrador.
No silks, nor satins, nor velvets, nor carpets, nor canopies, nor curtains, had the dwellings of the poor to defy, or even mitigate the freezing malignity of that chill which, engendered in the arctic regions of eternal snow, and having swept over the frozen rivers and the mighty forests of America, had come to vent its collected spite upon the islands of Europe.
Shivering, starving, in their miserable hovels, the industrious many, by the sweat of whose brow the indolent few were supplied with their silks, and their satins, and their velvets, wept bitter—bitter tears over their suffering and famished children, and cursed the day on which their little ones were born.
For the winter was a very hard one; and bread—bread was very dear!
Yes—bread, which thou, Almighty God! hast given to feed those whom thou didst create after thine own image—even bread was too dear for the starving poor to buy!
How long, O Lord! wilt thou permit the few to wrest every thing from the many—to monopolize, accumulate, gripe, snatch, drag forth, cling to, the fruits of the earth, for their own behoof alone?
How long shall there exist such spells in the privilege of birth? how long must all happiness and all misery be summed up in the words—
WEALTH. | POVERTY.
We said that it was New Year's Day, 1839.
In the palaces of the great were rejoicings, and music, and festivity; and diamonds glittered—and feathers waved—and silks rustled;—the elastic floors bent beneath the steps of the dancers; the wine flowed in crystal cups; and the fruits of summer were amongst the dainties spread to tempt the appetite of the aristocracy.
Ah! there was happiness indeed, in thus welcoming the new year; for those who there greeted its presence, were well assured that it would teem with the joys and blandishments which had characterized the one that had just sunk into the grave of Time!
And how was it with the poor of this mighty metropolis—the imperial city, to whose marts whole navies waft the commerce of the world!
The granaries were full; the pastures had surrendered up fat oxen to commemorate the season; the provision-shops teemed with food of the most luxurious and of the humblest kinds alike. A stranger walking through this great city would have wondered where the mouths were that could consume such vast quantities of food.
And yet thousands famished for want of the merest necessaries of life.
The hovels of the poor echoed not to the sounds of mirth and music—but to the wail of hunger and the cry of misery. In those sad abodes there was no joviality to welcome a new year;—for a new year was a curse—a mere prolongation of the acute and poignant horrors of the one gone by.
Alas! that New Year's Day was one of strange contrasts in the social sphere of London.
And as London is the heart of this empire, the disease which prevails in the core is conveyed through every vein and artery over the entire national frame.
The country that contains the greatest wealth of all the territories of the universe, is that which also knows the greatest amount of hideous, revolting, heart-rending misery.
In England men and women die of starvation in the streets.
In England women murder their children to save them from a lingering death by famine.
In England the poor commit crimes to obtain an asylum in a gaol.
In England aged females die by their own hands, in order to avoid the workhouse.
There is one cause of all these miseries and horrors—one fatal scourge invented by the rich to torture the poor—one infernal principle of mischief and of woe, which has taken root in the land—one element of a cruelty so keen and so refined, that it outdoes the agonies endured in the Inquisition of the olden time.
And this fertile source of misery, and murder, and suicide, and crime, is—
THE TREATMENT OF THE WORKHOUSE.
Alas! when the bees have made the honey, the apiarist comes and takes all away, begrudging the industrious insects even a morsel of the wax!
Let us examine for a moment the social scale of these realms:
The lowest step in the ladder is occupied by the class which is the most numerous, the most useful and which ought to be the most influential.
The average annual incomes of the individuals of each class are as follows:—
| The Sovereign | £500,000. |
| The member of the Aristocracy | £30,000. |
| The Priest | £7,500. |
| The member of the middle classes | £300. |
| The member of the industrious classes | £20. |
Is this reasonable? is this just? is this even consistent with common sense?
It was New Year's Day, 1839.
The rich man sate down to a table crowded with every luxury: the pauper in the workhouse had not enough to eat. The contrast may thus be represented:—
| Turtle, venison, turkey, hare, pheasant, perigord-pie, plum-pudding, mince-pies, jellies, blancmanger, trifle, preserves, cakes, fruits of all kinds, wines of every description. | ½ lb. bread. 4 oz. bacon. ½ lb. potatoes. 1½ pint of gruel. |
And this was New Year's Day, 1839!
But to proceed.
It was five o'clock in the evening. Three persons were conversing together on Constitution Hill, beneath the wall of the Palace Gardens.
Two of them, who were wrapped up in warm pilot coats, are well known to our readers: the third was a young lad of about sixteen or seventeen, and very short in stature. He was dressed in a blue jacket, dark waistcoat of coarse materials, and corduroy trousers. His countenance was effeminate and by no means bad-looking; his eyes were dark and intelligent; his teeth good. The name of this youth was Henry Holford.
"Well, my boy," said the Resurrection Man, for he was one of the lad's companions, the other being the redoubtable Cracksman—"well, my boy, do you feel equal to this undertaking?"
"Quite," answered Holford in a decided tone.
"If we succeed, you know," observed the Cracksman, "it will be a jolly good thing for you; and if you happen to get nabbed, why—all the beaks can do to you will be to send you for a month or two upon the stepper. In that there case Tony and