, but they were clean;
and the food, though scanty and of the plainest, was wholesome and
nourishing. In one place, I remember, the bread actually stank, and the
hungriest of the hungry crowd left it uneaten. The broth served out next
morning was nothing more or less than the water in which bacon had been
boiled. The beds were kennels. A long wooden bench was divided into
compartments by upright boards; a quantity of dirty straw which might,
by the look of it, have served already in a stable was spread in each
recess, and was covered with foul sacks which bore the name of a local
miller. Several of these sacks, cut open and stitched together, served
for a counterpane.

'I'd 'eard about this place,' said my neighbour when the able-bodied
pauper who superintended us had trooped us into this abominable chamber,
'and I'd a dam good mind to smash a lamp or summat and get run in
instead o' comin' here. If I'd ha' knowed the truth about it, I'd ha'
done it.'

This was the worst, and by far the worst, of the places I encountered.
Indeed, I met nothing else comparable to it. I made a trifling error in
my description of it at the time. By a slip of the pen I represented the
shed in which the casual paupers were accommodated as being a lean-to
against the body of the workhouse, whereas it was in fact a lean-to
against the outer wall of the workhouse grounds. This was enough in the
minds of the guardians to justify them in denouncing me, through their
chairman, as a liar, and was held to be triumphant proof that I had
never been there, though I proved 'David Vane, compositor,' upon their
books and upon those of the two neighbouring workhouses.

In some country places we went straight to the relieving officer, who
gave us our tickets for the night. In other places of more considerable
population we were allowed to lounge about the outside of the police
station until the hour appointed for distribution. Once inside the
workhouse, we were prisoners until at least eleven o'clock next morning
whether the tale of stones were broken or no, or the strands of rope
were or were not reduced to oakum. In default, men were occasionally
detained to be taken before the Bench; but what became of them I
never had an opportunity of learning apart from the experiences of my
travelling companions, who estimated the punishment at seven or fourteen
days. A good many of these had gaol experiences, and I am forced
to admit that the decent folk on tramp