The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists

by Robert Tressell

  ‘The poor of Mugsborough had lost a kind and sympathetic friend’, ‘One who had devoted his life to helping the needy’, and so on and so forth. (As a matter of fact, most of the time of the defunct had been passed in helping himself, but Rushton said nothing about that.)

  Mr Didlum seconded the vote of condolence in similar terms, and it was carried unanimously. Then the Chairman said that the next business was to elect a successor to the departed paragon; and immediately no fewer than nine members rose to propose a suitable person – they each had a noble-minded friend or relative willing to sacrifice himself for the good of the poor.

  The nine Benevolent stood looking at each other and at the Chairman with sickly smiles upon their hypocritical faces. It was a dramatic moment. No one spoke. It was necessary to be careful. It would never do to have a contest. The Secretary of the OBS was usually regarded as a sort of philanthropist by the outside public, and it was necessary to keep this fiction alive.

  For one or two minutes an awkward silence reigned. Then, one after another they all reluctantly resumed their seats with the exception of Mr Amos Grinder, who said he wished to propose his nephew, Mr Sawney Grinder, a young man of a most benevolent disposition who was desirous of immolating himself upon the altar of charity for the benefit of the poor – or words to that effect.

  Mr Didlum seconded, and there being no other nomination – for they all knew that it would give the game away to have a contest – the Chairman put Mr Grinder’s proposal to the meeting and declared it carried unanimously.

  Another considerable item in the expenditure of the society was the rent of the offices – a house in a back street. The landlord of this place was another very deserving case.

  There were numerous other expenses: stationery and stamps, printing, and so on, and what was left of the money was used for the purpose for which it had been given – a reasonable amount being kept in hand for future expenses. All the details were of course duly set forth in the Report and Balance Sheet at the annual meetings. No copy of this document was ever handed to the reporters for publication; it was read to the meeting by the Secretary; the representatives of the Press took notes, and in the reports of the meeting that subsequently appeared in the local papers the thing was so mixed up and garbled together that the few people who read it could not make head or tail of it. The only thing that was clear was that the society had been doing a great deal of good to someone or other, and that more money was urgently needed to carry on the work. It usually appeared something like this:

  HELPING THE NEEDY

  Mugsborough Organized Benevolence Society

  Annual Meeting at the Town Hall

  A Splendid record of Miscellaneous and Valuable Work.

  The annual meeting of the above Society was held yesterday at the Town Hall. The Mayor, Alderman Sweater, presided, and amongst those present were Sir Graball D’Encloseland, Lady D’Encloseland, Lady Slumrent, Rev. Mr Bosher, Mr Cheeseman, Mrs Bilder, Mrs Grosare, Mrs Daree, Mrs Butcher, Mrs Taylor, Mrs Baker, Mrs Starvem, Mrs Slodging, Mrs M. B. Sile, Mrs Knobrane, Mrs M. T. Head, Mr Rushton, Mr Didlum, Mr Grinder and (here followed about a quarter of a column of names of other charitable persons, all subscribers to the Society).

  The Secretary read the annual report which contained the following amongst other interesting items:

  During the year, 1,972 applications for assistance have been received, and of this number 1,302 have been assisted as follows: Bread or grocery orders, 273. Coal or coke orders, 57. Nourishment 579.* (Applause.)

  Pairs of boots granted, 29, Clothing, 105. Crutch granted to poor man, 1. Nurses provided, 2. Hospital tickets, 26. Sent to Consumption Sanatorium, 1. Twenty-nine persons, whose cases being chronic, were referred to the Poor Law Guardians. Work found for 19 persons. (Cheers.) Pedlar’s licences, 4. Dispensary tickets, 24. Bedding redeemed, 1. Loans granted to people to enable them to pay their rent, 8. (Loud cheers.) Dental tickets, 2. Railway fares for men who were going away from the town to employment elsewhere, 12. (Great cheering.) Loans granted, 5. Advertisements for employment, 4 – and so on.

  There was about another quarter of a column of these details, the reading of which was punctuated with applause and concluded with: ‘Leaving 670 cases which for various reasons the Society was unable to assist’. The report then went on to explain that the work of inquiring into the genuineness of the applications entailed a lot of labour on the part of the Secretary, some cases taking several days. No fewer than 649 letters had been sent out from the office, and 97 postcards. (Applause.) Very few cash gifts were granted, as it was most necessary to guard against the Charity being abused. (Hear, hear.)

  Then followed a most remarkable paragraph headed ‘The Balance Sheet’, which – as it was put – ‘included the following’. ‘The following’ was a jumbled list of items of expenditure, subscriptions, donations, legacies, and collections, winding up with ‘the general summary showed a balance in hand of £178.4.6’. (They always kept a good balance in hand because of the Secretary’s salary and the rent of the offices.)

  After this very explicit financial statement came the most important part of the report: ‘Thanks are expressed to Sir Graball D’Encloseland for a donation of 2 guineas. Mrs Grosare, 1 guinea. Mrs Starvem, Hospital tickets. Lady Slumrent, letter of admission to Convalescent Home. Mrs Knobrane, 1 guinea. Mrs M.B. Sile, 1 guinea. Mrs M.T. Head, 1 guinea. Mrs Slodging, gifts of clothing – and so on for another quarter of a column, the whole concluding with a vote of thanks to the Secretary and an urgent appeal to the charitable public for more funds to enable the Society to continue its noble work.

  Meantime, in spite of this and kindred organizations the conditions of the under-paid poverty stricken and unemployed workers remained the same. Although the people who got the grocery and coal orders, the ‘Nourishment’, and the cast-off clothes and boots, were very glad to have them, yet these things did far more harm than good. They humiliated, degraded and pauperized those who received them, and the existence of the societies prevented the problem being grappled with in a sane and practical manner. The people lacked the necessaries of life: the necessaries of life are produced by Work: these people were willing to work, but were prevented from doing so by the idiotic system of society which these ‘charitable’ people are determined to do their best to perpetuate.

  If the people who expect to be praised and glorified for being charitable were never to give another farthing it would be far better for the industrious poor, because then the community as a whole would be compelled to deal with the absurd and unnecessary state of affairs that exists today – millions of people living and dying in wretchedness and poverty in an age when science and machinery have made it possible to produce such an abundance of everything that everyone might enjoy plenty and comfort. If it were not for all this so-called charity the starving unemployed men all over the country would demand to be allowed to work and produce the things they are perishing for want of, instead of being – as they are now – content to wear their masters’ cast-off clothing and to eat the crumbs that fall from his table.

  37

  A Brilliant Epigram

  All through the winter, the wise, practical, philanthropic, fat persons whom the people of Mugsborough had elected to manage their affairs – or whom they permitted to manage them without being elected – continued to grapple, or to pretend to grapple, with the ‘problem’ of unemployment and poverty. They continued to hold meetings, rummage and jumble sales, entertainments and special services. They continued to distribute the rotten cast-off clothing and boots, and the nourishment tickets. They were all so sorry for the poor, especially for the ‘dear little children’. They did all sorts of things to help the children. In fact, there was nothing that they would not do for them except levy a halfpenny rate. It would never do to do that. It might pauperize the parents and destroy parental responsibility. They evidently thought that it would be better to destroy the health or even the lives of the ‘dear little children’ t
han to pauperize the parents or undermine parental responsibility. These people seemed to think that the children were the property of their parents. They did not have sense enough to see that the children are not the property of their parents at all, but the property of the community. When they attain to manhood and womanhood they will be, if mentally or physically inefficient, a burden on the community; if they become criminals, they will prey upon the community, and if they are healthy, educated and brought up in good surroundings, they will become useful citizens, able to render valuable service, not merely to their parents, but to the community. Therefore the children are the property of the community, and it is the business and to the interest of the community to see that their constitutions are not undermined by starvation. The Secretary of the local Trades Council, a body formed of delegates from all the different trades unions in the town, wrote a letter to the Obscurer, setting forth this view. He pointed out that a halfpenny rate in that town would produce a sum of £800, which would be more than sufficient to provide food for all the hungry schoolchildren. In the next issue of the paper several other letters appeared from leading citizens, including, of course, Sweater, Rushton, Didlum and Grinder, ridiculing the proposal of the Trades Council, who were insultingly alluded to as ‘pothouse politicians’, ‘beer-sodden agitators’ and so forth. Their right to be regarded as representatives of the working men was denied, and Grinder, who, having made inquiries amongst working men, was acquainted with the facts, stated that there was scarcely one of the local branches of the trades unions which had more than a dozen members; and as Grinder’s statement was true, the Secretary was unable to contradict it. The majority of the working men were also very indignant when they heard about the Secretary’s letter: they said the rates were quite high enough as it was, and they sneered at him for presuming to write to the papers at all:

  ‘Who the bloody ’ell was ’e?’ they said. ‘’E was not a Gentleman! ’E was only a workin’ man the same as themselves – a common carpenter! What the ’ell did ’e know about it? Nothing. ’E was just trying to make ’isself out to be Somebody, that was all. The idea of one of the likes of them writing to the papers!’

  One day, having nothing better to do, Owen was looking at some books that were exposed for sale on a table outside a second-hand furniture shop. One book in particular took his attention: he read several pages with great interest, and regretted that he had not the necessary sixpence to buy it. The title of the book was: Consumption: Its Causes and Its Cure. The author was a well-known physician who devoted his whole attention to the study of that disease. Amongst other things, the book gave rules for the feeding of delicate children, and there were also several different dietaries recommended for adult persons suffering from the disease. One of these dietaries amused him very much, because as far as the majority of those who suffer from consumption are concerned, the good doctor might just as well have prescribed a trip to the moon:

  ‘Immediately on waking in the morning, half a pint of milk – this should be hot, if possible – with a small slice of bread and butter.

  ‘At breakfast: half a pint of milk, with coffee, chocolate, or oatmeal: eggs and bacon, bread and butter, or dry toast.

  ‘At eleven o’clock: half a pint of milk with an egg beaten up in it or some beef tea and bread and butter.

  ‘At one o’clock: half a pint of warm milk with a biscuit or sandwich.

  ‘At two o’clock: fish and roast mutton, or a mutton chop, with as much fat as possible: poultry, game, etc., may be taken with vegetables, and milk pudding.

  ‘At five o’clock: hot milk with coffee or chocolate, bread and butter, watercress, etc.

  ‘At eight o’clock: a pint of milk, with oatmeal or chocolate, and gluten bread, or two lightly boiled eggs with bread and butter.

  ‘Before retiring to rest: a glass of warm milk.

  ‘During the night: a glass of milk with a biscuit or bread and butter should be placed by the bedside and be eaten if the patient awakes.’

  Whilst Owen was reading this book, Crass, Harlow, Philpot and Easton were talking together on the other side of the street, and presently Crass caught sight of him. They had been discussing the Secretary’s letter re the halfpenny rate, and as Owen was one of the members of the Trades Council, Crass suggested that they should go across and tackle him about it.

  ‘How much is your house assessed at?’ asked Owen after listening for about a quarter of an hour to Crass’s objection.

  ‘Fourteen pound,’ replied Crass.

  ‘That means that you would have to pay sevenpence per year if we had a halfpenny rate. Wouldn’t it be worth sevenpence a year to you to know that there were no starving children in the town?’

  ‘Why should I ’ave to ’elp to keep the children of a man who’s too lazy to work, or spends all ’is money on drink?’ shouted Crass. ‘’Ow are yer goin’ to make out about the likes o’ them?’

  ‘If his children are starving we should feed them first, and punish him afterwards.’

  ‘The rates is quite high enough as it is,’ grumbled Harlow, who had four children himself.

  ‘That’s quite true, but you must remember that the rates the working classes at present pay are spent mostly for the benefit of other people. Good roads are maintained for people who ride in motor cars and carriages; the Park and the Town Band for those who have leisure to enjoy them; the Police force to protect the property of those who have something to lose, and so on. But if we pay this rate we shall get something for our money.’

  ‘We gets the benefit of the good roads when we ’as to push a ’andcart with a load o’ paint and ladders,’ said Easton.

  ‘Of course,’ said Crass, ‘and besides, the workin’ class gets the benefit of all the other things too, because it all makes work.’

  ‘Well, for my part,’ said Philpot, ‘I wouldn’t mind payin’ my share towards a ’appeny rate, although I ain’t got no kids o’ me own.’

  The hostility of most of the working men to the proposed rate was almost as bitter as that of the ‘better’ classes – the noble-minded philanthropists who were always gushing out their sympathy for the ‘dear little ones’, the loathsome hypocrites who pretended that there was no need to levy a rate because they were willing to give sufficient money in the form of charity to meet the case: but the children continued to go hungry all the same.

  ‘Loathsome hypocrites’ may seem a hard saying, but it was a matter of common knowledge that the majority of the children attending the local elementary schools were insufficiently fed. It was admitted that the money that could be raised by a halfpenny rate would be more than sufficient to provide them all with one good meal every day. The charity-mongers who professed such extravagant sympathy with the ‘dear little children’ resisted the levying of the rate ‘because it would press so heavily on the poorer ratepayers’, and said that they were willing to give more in voluntary charity than the rate would amount to: but, the ‘dear little children’ – as they were so fond of calling them – continued to go to school hungry all the same.

  To judge them by their professions and their performances, it appeared that these good kind persons were willing to do any mortal thing for the ‘dear little children’ except allow them to be fed.

  If these people had really meant to do what they pretended, they would not have cared whether they paid the money to a rate-collector or to the secretary of a charity society and they would have preferred to accomplish their object in the most efficient and economical way.

  But although they would not allow the children to be fed, they went to church and to chapel, glittering with jewellery, their fat carcases clothed in rich raiment, and sat with smug smiles upon their faces listening to the fat parsons reading out of a Book that none of them seemed able to understand, for this was what they read:

  ‘And Jesus called a little child unto Him, and set him in the midst of them, and said: Whosoever shall receive one such little child in My name, receiveth Me. But whoso shall
offend one of these little ones, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.

  ‘Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones, for I say unto you that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of My Father.’

  And this: ‘Then shall He say unto them: Depart from me, ye cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels: for I was an hungered and ye gave Me no meat: I was thirsty and ye gave Me no drink: I was a stranger and ye took Me not in; naked, and ye clothed Me not.

  ‘Then shall they answer: “Lord, when saw we Thee an hungered or athirst or a stranger or naked, or sick, and did not minister unto Thee?” and He shall answer them, “Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to Me.”’

  These were the sayings that the infidel parsons mouthed in the infidel temples to the richly dressed infidel congregations, who heard but did not understand, for their hearts were become gross and their ears dull of hearing. And meantime, all around them, in the alley and the slum, and more terrible still – because more secret – in the better sort of streets where lived the respectable class of skilled artisans, the little children became thinner and paler day by day for lack of proper food, and went to bed early because there was no fire.

  Sir Graball D’Encloseland, the Member of Parliament for the borough, was one of the bitterest opponents of the halfpenny rate, but as he thought it was probable that there would soon be another General Election and he wanted the children’s fathers to vote for him again, he was willing to do something for them in another way. He had a ten-year-old daughter whose birthday was in that month, so the kind-hearted Baronet made arrangements to give a Tea to all the school children in the town in honour of the occasion. The tea was served in the schoolrooms and each child was presented with a gilt-edged card on which was a printed portrait of the little hostess, with ‘From your loving little friend, Honoria D’Encloseland’, in gold letters. During the evening the little girl, accompanied by Sir Graball and Lady D’Encloseland, motored round to all the schools where the tea was being consumed: the Baronet made a few remarks, and Honoria made a pretty little speech, specially learnt for the occasion, at each place, and they were loudly cheered and greatly admired in response. The enthusiasm was not confined to the boys and girls, for while the speechmaking was going on inside, a little crowd of grown-up children were gathered round outside the entrance, worshipping the motor car: and when the little party came out the crowd worshipped them also, going into imbecile ecstasies of admiration of their benevolence and their beautiful clothes.