The People of the Abyss

in the evening with four shillings in my pocket. Herein I committed two errors. In the first place, the applicant for admission to the casual ward must be destitute, and as he is subjected

is too late in the day for a

s. It is a building where the homeless, bedless, penniless man, if he be lucky, ma

another friend, and all I had in my pocket was thru'pence. They piloted me to the Whitechapel Workhouse, at which I peered from around a friendly corner. It was

fess it almost unnerved me. Like the boy before the dentist's door, I suddenly discovered a multitude of reasons for being elsewhere

distinctions might be removed, I emptied out the coppers. Then I bade good-bye to my friends, and with my heart going pit-a-pat, slouched down the street

tough and leathery skin produced by long years of sunbeat and weatherbeat, his was the unmi

y shoulder, by the g

have left me, by the

h staring through the

full for se

, and how peculiarly appropriat

dy, a big 'un, an' get run in for fourteen days. Then I'll have a good place to sleep, never fear, an' better grub

kin night before last, an' I can't stand it much longer.

s. I'm tellin' you sure. Seven an' eighty years am I, an' served my country like a man. Three good-conduct stripes and the Vic

an could comfort him, he began to hum a lilting sea song a

old while waiting in line at the workhouse

me to remember them all, for it is not quite in keeping to take notes at the poorhouse door. He had been through the "First War in China," as he termed it; had enlisted with the East India Company and served ten years in India; was

greed with him; or he had been up late the night before; or his debts were pressing; or the commander had spoken brusquely to him.

have been such an altogether bad sort of a sailorman. The lieutenant was irritable; the lieutenant called him a name - well, not a nice sort of name. It referred to his mother. When I

d the sailor had an iron lever or bar in his hands. He promptly struck the li

d over after him, my mind made up to drown us both. An' I'd ha' done it, too, only the pinnace from the flagship was just comin' alongside. Up we came to the top, me a

iscipline and respect to officers not always gentlemen, the punishment of a man who was guilty of manhood. To be reduced to the rank of ordinary seaman; to be debarred all prize-money due him; to forf

o God I had," he concluded, as the line

nesday, none of us would be released till Friday morning. Furthermore, and oh, you tobacco users, take heed: we would not be permitted to take

to a piece of paper. This, snugly and flatly wrapped, went down his sock inside his shoe. Down went my piece

hing the wicket. At the moment we happened to be standing on an iron gra

more do

ur," came

ned upon the faces about me. It is not a nice thing, hungry and penniless, to face a sleepless night in t

at he said, as he

f finding shelter elsewhere. I stood and debated with two other men, wise in the knowledge of casual war

ome by at one o'clock, an' the line was beginnin' to form then - pets, that's