London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 1

by Henry Mayhew

I say thus much, to impress upon the reader a deep and devout sense, that we who have been appointed to another state, are, by the grace of God, what we are, and from no special merit of our own, to which, in the arrogance of our self-conceit, we are too prone to attribute the social and moral differences of our nature. Go to a lady of fashion and tell her she could have even become a fishfag, and she will think you some mad ethnologist (if indeed she had ever heard of the science). Let me not, however, while thus seeking to impress the reader’s mind with a sense of the “antecedents” of the human character, be thought to espouse the doctrine that men are merely the creatures of events. All I wish to enforce is, that the three common causes of the social and moral differences of individuals are to be found in race, organization, and circumstances—that none of us are entirely proof against the influence of these three conditions—the ethnological, the physiological, and the associative elements of our idiosincracy. But, while I admit the full force of external nature upon us all, while I allow that we are, in many respects, merely patients, still I cannot but perceive that, in other respects we are self-agents, moving rather than being moved, by events—often stemming the current of circumstances, and at other times giving to it a special direction rather than being swept along with it. I am conscious that it is this directive and controlling power, not only over external events, but over the events of my own nature, that distinguishes me as well from the brute of the fields as it does my waking from my sleeping moments. I know, moreover, that in proportion as a man is active or passive in his operations, so is his humanity or brutality developed; that true greatness lies in the superiority of the internal forces over the external ones; and that as heroes, or extraordinary men are heroes, because they overcome the sway of one or other, or all, of the three material influences above-named, so ordinary people are ordinary, simply because they lack energy—principle—will (call it what you please) to overcome the material elements of their nature with the spiritual. And it is precisely because I know this, that I do know that those who are bred to the streets must bear about them the moral impress of the kennel and the gutter—unless we seek to develope the inward and controlling part of their constitution. If we allow them to remain the creatures of circumstances, to wander through life principleless, purposeless, conscienceless—if it be their lot to be flung on the wide waste of waters without a “guiding star” above, or a rudder or compass within, how can we (the well-fed) dare to blame them because, wanting bread, they prey and live upon their fellow-creatures?

I say thus much, because I feel satisfied that a large portion of the street-folk—and especially those who have been bred to the business—are of improvable natures; that they crave knowledge, as starving men for “the staff of life;” that they are most grateful for instruction; that they are as deeply moved by any kindness and sympathy (when once their suspicion has been overcome) as they are excited by any wrong or oppression—and I say it moreover, because I feel thoroughly convinced of the ineffectiveness of the present educational resources for the poor. We think, if we teach them reading and writing, and to chatter a creed, that we have armed them against the temptations, the trials, and the exasperations of life, believing, because we have put the knife and fork in their hands that we have really filled with food the empty bellies of their brains. We exercise their memories, make them human parrots, and then wonder that they do not act as human beings. The intellect, the conscience, the taste, indeed all that refines, enlightens, and ennobles our nature, we leave untouched, to shrivel and wither like unused limbs. The beautiful, the admirable, the true, the right, are as hidden to them as at their first day’s schooling. We impress them with no purpose, animate them with no principle; they are still the same brute creatures of circumstances—the same passive instruments—human waifs and strays—left to be blown about as the storms of life may whirl them.

Of the second group, or those who take to the streets, I entertain very different opinions. This class is distinguished from that above mentioned, in being wanderers by choice, rather than wanderers by necessity. In the early chapters of this work, I strove to point out to my readers that the human race universally consisted of two distinct classes: the wanderers and the settlers—the civilized and the savage—those who produced their food, and those who merely collected it. I sought further to show, that these two classes were not necessarily isolated, but that, on the contrary, almost every civilized tribe had its nomadic race, like parasites, living upon it. These nomadic races I proved, moreover, to have several characteristics common to the class, one of the most remarkable of which was, their adoption of a secret language, with the intent of concealing their designs and exploits. “Strange to say,” I then observed, “that despite its privations, dangers, and hardships, those who have once taken to a wandering life rarely abandon it. There are countless instances,” I added, “of white men adopting all the usages of an Indian hunter; but there is not one example of the Indian hunter or trapper, adopting the steady and regular habits of civilized society.” That this passion for “a roving life” (to use the common expression by which many of the street-people themselves designate it), is a marked feature of some natures, there cannot be a doubt in the mind of any one who has contemplated even the surface differences of human beings; and nevertheless it is a point to which no social philosopher has yet drawn attention. To my mind, it is essentially the physical cause of crime. Too restive and volatile to pursue the slow process of production, the wanderers, and consequently the collectors, of subsistence must (in a land where all things are appropriated) live upon the stock of the producers. The nomadic or vagrant class have all an universal type, whether they be the Bushmen of Africa or the “tramps” of our own country; and Mr. Knapp, the intelligent master of the Wandsworth and Clapham Union, to whom I was referred at the time of my investigations touching the subject of vagrancy, as having the greatest experience upon the matter, gave me the following graphic account, which, as I said at the time of its first publication, had perhaps never been surpassed as an analysis of the habits and propensities of the vagabond class:

“Ignorance,” to use the gentleman’s own words, “is certainly not their prevailing characteristic: indeed, with a few exceptions, it is the reverse. The vagrants are mostly distinguished by their aversion to continuous labour of any kind. He never knew them to work. Their great inclination is to be on the move, and wandering from place to place, and they appear to receive a great deal of pleasure from the assembly and conversation of the casual ward. They are physically stout and healthy, and certainly not emaciated or sickly. They belong especially to the able-bodied class, being, as he says, full of health and mischief. They are very stubborn and self-willed. They are a most difficult class to govern, and are especially restive under the least restraint; they can ill brook control, and they find great delight in thwarting the authorities. They are particularly fond of amusements of all kinds. He never knew them love reading. They mostly pass under fictitious names. They are particularly distinguished by their libidinous propensities. They are not remarkable for a love of drink. He considers them to be generally a class possessing the keenest intellect, and of a highly enterprising character. They seem to have no sense of danger, and to be especially delighted with such acts as involve any peril. They are likewise characterised by their exceeding love of mischief. They generally are of a most restless and volatile disposition. They have great quickness of perception, but little power of continuous attention or perseverance. They have a keen sense of the ridiculous, and are not devoid of deep feeling. In the summer they make regular tours through the country, visiting all places that they have not seen. They are perfectly organized, so that any regulation affecting their comforts or interests becomes known among the whole body in a remarkably short space of time.”

Every day my inquiries add some fresh proof to the justice of the above enumeration of the several phenomena distinguishing this class. To the more sedate portion of the human family, the attractions of “a roving life” are inexplicable. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that, to the more volatile, the mere muscular exercise and the continual change of scene, together with the wild delight which attends the overcoming of any danger, are sources of pleasure sufficient to compensate for all the privations and hardships attending such a state of existence.

Mr. Ruxton, one of the many who have passed from settlers to wanderers, has given us the following description of the enjoyments of a life in the wilderness:

“Although liable to an accusation of barbarism, I must confess that the very happiest moments of my life have been spent in the wilderness of the Far West; and I never recall, but with pleasure, the remembrance of my solitary camp in the Bayou Solade, with no friend near me more faithful than my rifle, and no companions more sociable than my good horse and mules, or the attendant cayute which nightly serenaded us. Seldom did I ever wish to change such hours of freedom for all the luxuries of civilized life; and unnatural and extraordinary as it may appear, yet such is the fascination of the life of the mountain hunter, that I believe not one instance could be adduced of even the most polished and civilized of men, who had once tasted the sweets of its attendant liberty and freedom from every worldly care, not regretting the moment when he exchanged it for the monotonous life of the settlements, nor sighing and sighing again once more to partake of its pleasures and allurements.”

To this class of voluntary wanderers belong those who take to the streets, glad to exchange the wearisomeness and restraint of a settled occupation for the greater freedom and license of a nomad mode of life. As a class, they are essentially the non-working, preferring, as I said before, to collect, rather than produce, what they eat. If they sell, they do so because for sundry reasons they fear to infringe the law, and as traders their transactions certainly are not marked by an excess of honesty. I am not aware that any of them are professional thieves (for these are the more daring portion of the same vagrant fraternity), though the majority assuredly are habitual cheats—delighting in proving their cleverness by imposing upon simple-minded citizens—viewing all society as composed of the same dishonest elements as their own tribes, and looking upon all sympathy and sacrifice, even when made for their own benefit, as some “artful dodge” or trick, by which to snare them.

It should be remembered, however, that there are many grades of vagrants among us, and that though they are all essentially non-producing and, consequently, predatory, still many are in no way distinguished from a large portion of even our wealthy tradesmen—our puffing grocers and slopsellers. To attempt to improve the condition of the voluntary street-sellers by teaching of any kind, would be to talk to the wind. We might as well preach to Messrs. Moses, Nicol, and Co., in the hope of Christianising them. Those who take to the streets are not, like those who are bred to it, an uneducated class. They are intelligent and “knowing” enough, and it is this development of their intellect at the expense of their conscience which gives rise to that excessive admiration of mere cleverness, which makes skill the sole standard of excellence with them. They approve, admire, venerate nothing but what is ingenious. Wrong with them is mere folly—right, cunning; and those who think the simple cultivation of the intellect the great social panacea of the time, have merely to study the characteristics of this class to see how a certain style of education can breed the very vice it seeks to destroy. Years ago, I wrote and printed the following passage, and every year since my studies have convinced me more and more of its truth:

“Man, if deprived of his intellect, would be the most miserable and destitute,—if of his sympathy, the most savage and cunning, of all the brute creation: consequently, we may infer that, according as solely the one or the other of these powers is expanded in us, so shall we approximate in our nature either to the instinct of the brute or to the artifice of the demon, and that only when they are developed in an equal degree, can Man be said to be educated as Man. We should remember that the intellect simply executes; it is either the selfish or moral propensity that designs. The intellectual principle enables us to perceive the means of attaining any particular object; it is the selfish or else the moral principle in us, that causes us originally to desire that object. The two latter principles are the springs, the former is merely the instrument of all human action. They are masters, whereas the intellect is but the servant of the will; and hence it is evident that in proportion as the one or the other of these two predominant principles—as either the selfish or the moral disposition is educed in man, and thus made the chief director and stimulus of the intellectual power within him, so will the cultivation of that power be the source of happiness or misery to himself and others.”