“‘But how do you spend the sixpence that you earn here?’ I asked.
“‘Well, sir,’ she said, ‘sometimes, when very hard-up, I spend part of it this way:— I buy a hap’orth o’ tea, a hap’orth o’ sugar, a hap’orth o’ drippin’, a hap’orth o’ wood and a penn’orth o’ bread. Sometimes when better off than usual I get a heap of coals at a time, perhaps quarter of a hundredweight, because I save a farthing by getting the whole quarter, an’ that lasts me a long time, and wi’ the farthing I mayhap treat myself to a drop o’ milk. Sometimes, too, I buy my penn’orth o’ wood from the coopers and chop it myself, for I can make it go further that way.’
“So, you see, Welland,” continued Brisbane, “your glass of sherry would have gone a long way in the domestic calculations of a poor old woman, who very likely once had sons who were as fond of her and as proud of her, as you now are of your own mother.”
“It is very sad that any class of human beings should be reduced to so low an ebb,” returned the young man seriously.
“Yes, and it is very difficult,” said Sir Richard, “to reduce one’s mental action so as to fully understand the exact bearing of such minute monetary arrangements, especially for one who is accustomed to regard the subject of finance from a different standpoint.”
“But the saddest thing of all to me, and the most difficult to understand,” resumed Brisbane, “is the state of mind and feeling of those professing Christians, who, with ample means, give exceedingly little towards the alleviation of such distress, take little or no interest in the condition of the poor, and allow as much waste in their establishments as would, if turned to account, become streamlets of absolute wealth to many of the destitute.”
This latter remark was a thrust which told pretty severely on the host—all the more so, perhaps, that he knew Brisbane did not intend it as a thrust at all, for he was utterly ignorant of the fact that his friend seldom gave anything away in charity, and even found it difficult to pay his way and make the two ends meet with his poor little five thousand a year—for, you see, if a man has to keep up a fairly large establishment, with a town and country house, and have his yacht, and a good stable, and indulge in betting, and give frequent dinners, and take shootings in Scotland, and amuse himself with jewellery, etcetera, why, he must pay for it, you know!
“The greatest trouble of these poor women, I found,” continued Brisbane, “is their rent, which varies from 2 shillings to 3 shillings a week for their little rooms, and it is a constant struggle with them to keep out of ‘the House,’ so greatly dreaded by the respectable poor. One of them told me she had lately saved up a shilling with which she bought a pair of ‘specs,’ and was greatly comforted thereby, for they helped her fading eyesight. I thought at the time what a deal of good might be done and comfort given if people whose sight is changing would send their disused spectacles to the home of Industry in Commercial Street, Spitalfields, for the poor. By the way, your sight must have changed more than once, Sir Richard! Have you not a pair or two of disused spectacles to spare?”
“Well, yes, I have a pair or two, but they have gold rims, which would be rather incongruous on the noses of poor people, don’t you think?”
“Oh! by no means. We could manage to convert the rims into blue steel, and leave something over for sugar and tea.”