Time and Tide by Weare and Tyne Part 11

APPENDIX IV.

Page 76.--_Drunkenness as the Cause of Crime._

The following portions of Mr. Dixon's letter referred to, will be found interesting:--

"DEAR SIR,--

"Your last letter, I think, will arouse the attention of thinkers more than any of the series, it being on topics they in general feel more interested in than the others, especially as in these you do not a.s.sail their pockets so much as in the former ones. Since you seem interested with the notes or rough sketches on gin, G * * * of Dublin was the man I alluded to as making his money by drink, and then giving the results of such traffic to repair the Cathedral of Dublin. It was thousands of pounds. I call such charity robbing Peter to pay Paul!

Immense fortunes are made in the _Liquor Traffic_, and I will tell you why; it is all paid for in cash, at least such as the poor people buy; they get credit for clothes, butchers' meat, groceries, etc., while they give the gin-palace keeper _cash_; they never begrudge the price of a gla.s.s of gin or beer, they never haggle over _its_ price, never once think of doing that; but in the purchase of almost every other article they haggle and begrudge its price. To give you an idea of its profits--there are houses here whose average weekly takings in cash at their bars is 50_l._, 60_l._, 70_l._, 80_l._, 90l_._, to 150_l._, per week. Nearly all the men of intelligence in it, say it is the curse of the working cla.s.ses. Men whose earnings are, say 20_s._ to 30_s._ per week, spend on the average 3_s._ to 6_s._ per week (some even 10_s._).

It's my mode of living to supply these houses with corks that makes me see so much of the drunkenness; and that is the cause why I never really cared for _my trade_, seeing the misery that was entailed on my fellow men and women by the use of this stuff. Again, a house with a license to sell spirits, wine, and ale, to be consumed on the premises, is worth two to three times more money than any other cla.s.s of property. One house here worth nominally 140_l._ sold the other day for 520_l._; another one worth 200_l._ sold for 800_l._ I know premises with a license that were sold for 1,300_l._, and then sold again two years after for 1,800_l._; another place was rented for 50_l._, now rents at 100_l._--this last is a house used by working men and laborers chiefly! No, I honor men like _Sir W. Trevelyan_, that are teetotalers, or total abstainers, as an example to poor men, and, to prevent his work-people being tempted, will not allow any public-house on his estate. If our land had a few such men it would help the cause. We possess one such a man here, a banker. I feel sorry to say the progress of temperance is not so great as I would like to see it. The only religious body that approaches to your ideas of political economy is Quakerism as taught by George Fox. Carlyle seems deeply tinged with their teachings. _Silence_ to them is as valuable to him. Again, why should people howl and shriek over the law that the Alliance is now trying to carry out in our land called the Permissive Bill? If we had just laws we then would not be so miserable or so much annoyed now and then with cries of Reform and cries of Distress. I send you two pamphlets;--one gives the working man's reasons why he don't go to church; in it you will see a few opinions expressed very much akin to those you have written to me. The other gives an account how it is the poor Indians have died of _Famine_, simply because they have destroyed the very system of Political Economy, or one having some approach to it, that you are now endeavoring to direct the attention of thinkers to in our country. The _Sesame and Lilies_ I have read as you requested. I feel now fully the aim and object you have in view in the Letters, but I cannot help directing your attention to that portion where you mention or rather exclaim against the Florentines pulling down their _Ancient Walls_ to build a _Boulevard_. That pa.s.sage is one that would gladden the hearts of all true _Italians_, especially men that love _Italy and Dante_!"

APPENDIX V.

Page 78.--_Abuse of Food._

Paragraphs cut from 'Manchester Examiner' of March 16, 1867:--

"A PARISIAN CHARACTER.--A celebrated character has disappeared from the Palais Royal. Rene Lartique was a Swiss, and a man of about sixty.

He actually spent the last fifteen years in the Palais Royal--that is to say, he spent the third of his life at dinner. Every morning at ten o'clock he was to be seen going into a restaurant (usually Tissat's), and in a few moments was installed in a corner, which he only quitted about three o'clock in the afternoon, after having drunk at least six or seven bottles of different kinds of wine. He then walked up and down the garden till the clock struck five, when he made his appearance again at the same restaurant, and always at the same place.

His second meal, at which he drank quite as much as at the first, invariably lasted till half-past nine. Therefore, he devoted nine hours a day to eating and drinking. His dress was most wretched--his shoes broken, his trousers torn, his paletot without any lining and patched, his waistcoat without b.u.t.tons, his hat a rusty red from old age, and the whole surmounted by a dirty white beard. One day he went up to the _comptoir_, and asked the presiding divinity there to allow him to run in debt for one day's dinner. He perceived some hesitation in complying with the request, and immediately called one of the waiters, and desired him to follow him. He went into the office, unb.u.t.toned a certain indispensable garment, and, taking off a broad leather belt, somewhat startled the waiter by displaying two hundred gold pieces, each worth one hundred francs. Taking up one of them, he tossed it to the waiter, and desired him to pay whatever he owed. He never again appeared at that restaurant, and died a few days ago of indigestion."

"REVENGE IN A BALL-ROOM.--A distressing event lately took place at Castellaz, a little commune of the Alpes-Maritimes, near Mentone. All the young people of the place being a.s.sembled in a dancing-room, one of the young men was seen to fall suddenly to the ground, whilst a young woman, his partner, brandished a poniard, and was preparing to inflict a second blow on him, having already desperately wounded him in the stomach. The author of the crime was at once arrested. She declared her name to be Marie P----, twenty-one years of age, and added that she had acted from a motive of revenge, the young man having led her astray formerly with a promise of marriage, which he had never fulfilled. In the morning of that day she had summoned him to keep his word, and, upon his refusal, had determined on making the dancing-room the scene of her revenge. She was at first locked up in the prison of Mentone, and afterwards sent on to Nice. The young man continues in an alarming state."

APPENDIX VI.

Page 94.--_Regulations of Trade._

I print portions of two letters of Mr. Dixon's in this place; one referring to our former discussion respecting the sale of votes:--

"57, Nile Street, Sunderland, March 21, 1867.

"I only wish I could write in some tolerable good style, so that I could idealize, or rather realize to folks, the life and love, and marriage of a working man and his wife. It is in my opinion a working man that really does know what a true wife is, for his every want, his every comfort in life depends on her; and his children's home, their daily lives and future lives, are shaped by her. Napoleon wisely said, 'France needs good mothers more than brave men. Good mothers are the makers or shapers of good and brave men.' I cannot say that these are the words, but it is the import of his speech on the topic. We have a saying amongst us: 'The man may spend and money lend, if his wife be _ought_,'--_i. e._ good wife;--'but he may work and try to save, but will have _nought_, if his wife be nought,'--_i. e._ bad or thriftless wife.

"Now, since you are intending to treat of the working man's parliament and its duties, I will just throw out a few suggestions of what I consider should be the questions or measures that demand an early inquiry into and debate on. That guilds be established in every town, where masters and men may meet, so as to avoid the temptations of the public-house and _drink_. And then, let it be made law that every lad should serve an apprenticeship of not less than seven years to a trade or art, before he is allowed to be a member of such guild; also, that all wages be based on a rate of so much _per hour_, and not day, as at present; and let every man prove his workmanship before such a guild, and then allow to him such payment per hour as his craft merits. Let there be three grades, and then let there be trials of skill in workmanship every year; and then, if the workman of the third grade prove that he has made progress in his craft, reward him accordingly.

Then, before a lad is put to any trade, why not see what he is naturally fitted for? Combe's book, ent.i.tled _The Const.i.tution of Man_, throws a good deal of truth on to these matters. Now, here are two branches of the science of life that, so far, have never once been given trial of in this way. We certainly use them after a _crime_ has been committed, but not till then.

"Next to that, cash, payment for all and everything needed in life.

_Credit is a curse_ to him that gives it, and that takes it. He that lives by credit lives in general carelessly. If there was no credit, people then would have to live on what they earned! Then, after that, the Statute of Limitations of Fortune you propose. By the hour system, not a single man _need be idle_; it would give employment to all, and even two hours per day would realize more to a man than _breaking stones_. Thus you would make every one self-dependent--also no fear of being out of work altogether. Then let there be a Government fund for all the savings of the working man. I am afraid you will think this a wild, discursive sort of a letter.

"Yours truly, "THOMAS DIXON."

"I have read your references to the _Times_ on 'Bribery.' Well, that has long been my own opinion; they simply have a vote to sell, and sell it the same way as they sell potatoes, or a coat, or any other salable article. Voters generally say, 'What does this gentleman want in Parliament? Why, to help himself and his family or friends; he does not spend all the money he spends over his election for pure good of his country! No: it's to benefit his pocket, to be sure. Why should I not make a penny with my vote, as well as he does with his in Parliament?' I think that if the system of canva.s.sing or election agents were done away with, and all personal canva.s.sing for votes entirely abolished, it would help to put down bribery. Let each gentleman send to the electors his political opinions in a circular, and then let papers be sent, or cards, to each elector, and then let them go and record their votes in the same way they do for a councillor in the Corporation. It would save a great deal of expense, and prevent those scenes of drunkenness so common in our towns during elections. _Bewick's opinions_ of these matters are quite to the purpose, I think (_see page 201 of Memoir_). Again, respecting the Paris matter referred to in your last letter, I have read it. Does it not manifest plainly enough that Europeans are also in a measure possessed with that same _demoniacal spirit like the j.a.panese_?"

APPENDIX VII.

The following letter did not form part of the series written to Mr.

Dixon; but is perhaps worth reprinting. I have not the date of the number of the _Gazette_ in which it appeared, but it was during the tailors' strike in London.

"TO THE EDITOR OF THE _Pall Mall Gazette_.

"Sir,--

"In your yesterday's article on strikes you have very neatly and tersely expressed the primal fallacy of modern political economy--to wit, that 'the value of any piece of labor cannot be defined'--and that 'all that can be ascertained is simply whether any man can be got to do it for a certain sum.' Now, sir, the 'value' of any piece of labor, that is to say, the quant.i.ty of food and air which will enable a man to perform it without losing actually any of his flesh or his nervous energy, is as absolutely fixed a quant.i.ty as the weight of powder necessary to carry a given ball a given distance. And within limits varying by exceedingly minor and unimportant circ.u.mstances, it is an ascertainable quant.i.ty. I told the public this five years ago--and under pardon of your politico-economical contributors--it is not a 'sentimental,' but a chemical fact.

"Let any half-dozen of recognized London physicians state in precise terms the quant.i.ty and kind of food, and s.p.a.ce of lodging, they consider approximately necessary for the healthy life of a laborer in any given manufacture, and the number of hours he may, without shortening his life, work at such business daily, if so sustained.

"And let all masters be bound to give their men a choice between an order for that quant.i.ty of food and lodging, or such wages as the market may offer for that number of hours' work.

"Proper laws for the maintenance of families would require further concession--but, in the outset, let but _this_ law of wages be established, and if then we have any more strikes you may denounce them without one word of remonstrance either from sense or sensibility.

"I am, Sir, "Your obedient servant, "JOHN RUSKIN."