London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 4

by Henry Mayhew

OF THE PROSTITUTE CLASS GENERALLY.

We have now seen that the two modes of obtaining a living other than by working for it are, by forcibly or stealthily appropriating the proceeds of another’s labour, or else by seducing the more industrious or thrifty to part with a portion of their gains. Prostitution, professionally resorted to, belongs to the latter class, and consists, when adopted as a means of subsistence without labour, in inducing others, by the performance of some immoral act, to render up a portion of their possessions. Literally construed, prostitution is the putting of anything to a vile use; in this sense perjury is a species of prostitution, being an unworthy use of the faculty of speech; so, again, bribery is a prostitution of the right of voting; while prostitution, specially so called, is the using of her charms by a woman for immoral purposes. This, of course, may be done either from mercenary or voluptuous motives; be the cause, however, what it may, the act remains the same, and consists in the base perversion of a woman’s charms—the surrendering of her virtue to criminal indulgence. Prostitution has been defined to be the illicit intercourse of the sexes; but illicit is unlicensed, and the mere sanctioning of an immoral act could not dignify it into a moral one. Such a definition would make the criminality of the act to consist solely in the absence of the priest’s licence.

In Persia there are no professional prostitutes permitted; but though the priest’s sanction there precedes the surrendering of the woman’s virtue in every instance, still the same immoral perversion takes place—it being customary for couples to be wedded for a small sum by the priest in the evening, and divorced by him, for an equally small sum, in the morning. Here, then, we find the licensed intercourse assuming the same immoral cast as the unlicensed; for surely none will maintain that these nuptial ephemeræ are sanctified, because accompanied with a priestly licence. Nor can we, on the other hand, assert that the mere fact of continence in the association of the sexes, the persistence of the female to one male, or the continued endurance of an unsanctioned attachment, can ever be raised into anything purer than cohabitation, or the chastity of unchastity.

Prostitution, then, does not consist solely in promiscuous intercourse, for she who confines her favours to one may still be a prostitute; nor does it consist in illicit or unsanctioned intercourse, for, as we have seen, the intercourse may be sanctioned and still be prostitution to all intents and purposes. Nor can it be said to consist solely in the mercenary motives so often prompting to the commission of the act; for fornication is expressly that form of prostitution which is the result of illicit attachment.

In what, then, it may be asked, does prostitution consist? It consists, I answer, in what the word literally expresses—putting a woman’s charms to vile uses. The term whore has, strictly, the same signification as that of prostitute; though usually supposed to be from the Saxon verb hyrian, to hire, and, consequently, to mean a woman whose favours can be procured for a reward. But the Saxon substantive hure, is the same word as the first syllable of hor-cwen, which signifies literally a filthy quean, a har-lot. Now the term hor, in hor-cwen, is but another form of the Saxon adjective horig, filthy, dirty, the Latin equivalent of which is sor-didus; hence the substantive horines means filthiness, and horingas, adulterers (or filthy people), and hornung, adultery, fornication, whoredom (or filthy acts). Prostitution and whoredom, then, have both the same meaning, viz., perversion to vile or filthy uses; and consist in the surrendering of a woman’s virtue in a manner that excites our moral disgust. The offensiveness of the act of unchastity to the moral taste or sense constitutes the very essence of prostitution; and it is this moral offensiveness which often makes the licensed intercourse of the sexes, as in the marriage of a young girl to an old man, for the sake of his money, as much an act of prostitution as even the grossest libertinism.

The next question consequently becomes, what are the invariable antecedents which excite the moral disgust in every act of prostitution? or are there any such invariable antecedents characterizing each offensive perversion of a woman’s charms? Is the offensiveness a mere matter of taste, differing according as the moral palates of the individuals or races may differ one from the other, and ultimately referable to some peculiar form of organization, convention, fashion, or geography? or is it a part of the inherent constitution of things?—in a word, is there an abstract chastity and unchastity; an erotic τὸ καλὸν and τὸ κακὸν; an universal standard of moral beauty and ugliness in woman—that, go where you will, is the same to all natures and in all countries? or is the vice of one set of people the virtue of another, as this race admires white teeth and that black?

This is a matter lying, as it were, across the very threshold of the subject, and which must necessarily, according as one or other view be taken, give a wholly different cast, not only to all our thoughts in connection with the evil, but to all our plans for the remedy of it. If prostitution be loathsome to us, merely because it is the moral fashion of our people that it should be so, then by popularizing new forms of thought and feeling among us may we remove all opprobrium from the act, and so put an end to all the moral evil in connection with it; but if it be naturally and innately offensive to every healthy mind, then can it be remedied solely by improving the tone of the thoughts and feelings of the depraved, and restoring the lost moral sense, as well as directing the perverted taste to more wholesome and beautiful objects.

To solve this part of the problem, then, it will be necessary that we should take as comprehensive a view of the subject as possible, collecting a large and multifarious body of facts, and examining the matter from almost every conceivable point of view. It will be necessary that we should regard it by the light of the early ages of society—that we should contemplate it amid all the primitive rudeness of barbaric life—and ultimately that we should study it under the many varied phases that it assumes in civilized communities.

For the better performance of this task I have availed myself of the services and assistance of my friend, Mr. Horace St. John, whom I shall now leave to lay before the reader the many curious and interesting facts which he has collected at my request in connection with the ancient and foreign part of the subject, after which I shall return to the consideration of that branch of the general inquiry connected more immediately with the prostitution of this country.