BOOKS.
THE literary world is at this moment feeling after an expression of that sympathy with the lives of the poor which only comprehension can give. This being so, it is impossible for the critic altogether to avoid comparing some of the many books which appear on the subject. Between Lady Bell's book and the able and sympathetic works which have recently been given to the world by Miss Loane there is much the same difference as that between a photograph and a picture. The picture primarily reveals the standpoint of the artist who painted it, while the photograph gives accurately, if a little baldly, the details of the scene which it portrays. Although Lady Bell is sincerely anxious to show to us the lives of the workers, her imagina- tion is also strongly seized by the romance of the works. Her book falls naturally into two parts. First comes a vivid description of the rapid growth of a centre of industry. This picture is painted in vigorous strokes, and all the lights and shadows are finely contrasted. The other half of the book shows a sympathetic insight into the lives of the people; and here what Lady Bell especially understands is the hearts of the women. She shows us the tragedies and the rewards of life, and if the tragedies are in greater number than the rewards, who shall say that the picture is not true to its model P In the first part of the book—the romance of the iron trade —Lady Bell gives an extraordinarily striking picture of the breathless energy which has created a large town in a place in which less than a hundred years ago there were only forty inhabitants. Her readers are stirred to excitement by her story of "the hardy, strenuous life of the North, the seething vitality of enterprise with which the town began." Middles- brough, she tells us, as far as the prosperous inhabitants are ES• At the Works. By Lady Bell (lara. Hugh Bell). London, Edward Arnold. a
concerned, " is designed for the working hears of the people who live in it and not for their leisure "; and therefore to people whose idea of life is simply the best occupation of leisure her accounts of the physical conditions will be found to be appalling. The works in the centre of the town, the hundreds of little streets "in which lives the struggling, striving population," a few fine public buildings, and the whole surrounded by detached villas with gardens,—all this conveys an impression of not unagreeable energy and activity. But the atmospheric conditions are truly appalling. In the chapter on the process of iron-making Lady Bell gives the following account of the dust, an account which reads like the description of a place of torture :—
" And besides the fumes and the gases, every breath of wind at the ironworks carries dust with it, whirling, through the air in a wind, dropping through it in a calm, covering the ground, flung the cabins, settling on the clothes of those who are within reach, filling their eyes and their mouths, covering their hands and their faces. The calcined ironstone sends forth red dust, the smoke from the chimneys and furnaces is deposited in white dust, the smoke from the steel-rolling mills fall in black dust : and, most constant difficulty of all, the gases escaping from the furnaces are charged with a fine, impalpable brownish duet, which is shed everywhere, on everything, which clogs the interior of the stoves and of the flues, and whose encroachments have to be constantly fought against. One of the most repellent phenomena at the ironworks to the onlooker is the process of expelling the dust from the stoves, for which purpose the valves of the stove are closed, the stove is filled with air at high pressure, and then one of the valves is opened and the air is forcibly expelled. A great cloud of red dust rushes out with a roar, covering everything and everybody who stands within reach, with so intolerable a noise and effluvium that it makes itself felt even amidst the incessant reverberation, the constant smells, dust, deposits, that surround the stoves and the furnaces. That strange, grim street formed by the kilns, the furnaces, and the bunkers, darkened by the iron platforms overhead between the kilns and the gantry, a street in which everything is a dull red, is the very heart of the works, the very stronghold of the making of iron, a place unceasingly filled by glare, and clanging, and vapours, from morning till night and from night till morning."
Lady Bell suggests in the same chapter what quality it is in the work of iron-making that makes it attractive, and often enthralling, to the workmen. This quality is danger. There is no moment in the day in which the workman at the ironworks can hold himself to be absolutely free from the danger of a violent and painful death. All the man's faculties must be engaged during the whole of his working day, and there are very few Englishmen who do not respond to this call, and who do not enjoy a life of incessant struggle in which all their faculties are on guard every second in each minute. To illustrate this she gives the following account of the work of a "scaxrer " :—
"He spends most of the eight-hours day standing at the bottom of the kiln, the iron rod in his hand, ready to thrust it into the kiln whenever the obstacle shows itself. By him is standing another man ready to add his weight to the thrust if the strength of the first one is not enough to deal with the obstacle. For whatever operation is being carried on at the iron- works, there are always a number of men standing round in a state of watchful concentration, their attention on the alert, ready to lend a hand in a case of emergency. The spectator receives an overpowering impression of what that watchfulness needs to be, of what sudden necessities may arise, of what may be the deadly effect of some swift, dangerous variation, some unexpected development in the formidable material which the men are handling."
After her thrilling account of life at the works, Lady Bell goes into the question of the expenditure of the workmen, a chapter which all those who are interested in domestic finance will find well worth reading. But much more interesting from the human point of view is Lady Bell's account of the life of the women. Here we feel that as a woman she is writing from the inside and not from the outside, and that she takes a noble and heroic view of the work that woman is called into the world to do. It is quite obvious, much more obvious than in other classes, that the whole moral and physical well-being of the man in the working class depends on the ability and care of his wife. Over and over again Lady Bell quotes instances of the quiet heroism which is necessary to make even the most prosperous life a success among the wage-earners. The whole burden of family life, as Lady Bell very truly says, is thrown into the bands of the woman, "those hands sometimes strong and capable, often weak and uncertain." She gives a picture, among many, of a Mrs. M., who succeeds in making a model home, and comments on it thus --"The result of having 'a
wife of this kind at the head of the house is that the husband, after he comes home from work, seldom stirs out of the house again." And again:—" Whenever a man says that he does not ' care to turn out again,' one may be sure that the wife understands how to make things comfortable for him." A little careful reflection on the problem which awaits a woman after marriage should make those people who have charge of the education of the country consider their methods very care- fully. The present writer would be glad if certain chapters of this book could be read by every Education Committee in the country. Let those who are settling the synopsis of girls' education reflect on the following quotation:— "The man's wages, which before marriage generally left him a margin after paying his lodging or contributing to his parents' expenses, need careful handling in his own home to make them go far enough for two. The young wife often does not understand how to do it. She does not know much about cooking, she is not skilful at sewing, she does not know how to organise. At first, however, she may be able to encounter life with tolerable success. Then she has a child, and let alone the fact that during the time preceding the birth of the child everything is more difficult to her probably than before, she afterwards, usually long before abe ought to try to do any work, begins struggling with her daily duties again, plus the baby this time, whom she generally nurses, and whom she has to look after entirely. And then, possibly, before this first baby is able to walk, or when it is just able to do so, while she is still having to carry it about and look after it incessantly, another one is coming, or come, the mother herself, perhaps, being still in her teens. As the time goes on her energy slowly ebbs, and with it her courage and her hope."
Can it be seriously said that the present-day education of girls is the very best that can be devised to enable them to cope with the difficulties of their future lives P If the struggle which the young married woman makes is not successful, it means a tragedy for a whole household, and most of all for the husband whose "life at the turning point is turned in the wrong direction by the wife." How long will it be before educationists realise the fact that the successful ordering of a household and the bringing up of children are the ideals to which woman's education should be consciously directed P Lady Bell makes one practical suggestion as to the method in which cooking might be taught by the authorities :—
"It would be an inestimable boon if there were some arrange- ment by which an instructor would go round, actually into the cottages, and cook there with the appliances available, pointing out where these were defective, but at the same time doing the best that could be done with the resources at hand."
Again and again the complaint arises that the present method of teaching cooking is not practical, that too many materials aro used and too much mechanical apparatus is needed. If any system could be devised by which instruction could be given in the home, it would indeed be an inestimable boon to the people.
We have left ourselves no space to deal with many of the interesting things in Lady Bell's book, but we must be allowed to protest against the conclusion which is implied when she tells the story of how a well-meaning visitor had urged a couple to marry who bad lived together for some time, and how the advice resulted in the man going to the bad. Although the result in this case was disastrous to the individual, the visitor was absolutely right in giving it. A sin against the laws of family life cannot be excused by the fact that it makes the sinner happy. The whole chapter on drink and gambling will give rise to a great deal of thoughtful reflection. For instance, the unforeseen result of forbidding bookmakers to ply their trade in the open has been enormously to increase betting among women,—a proof of how difficult it is to make people virtuous by Act of Parliament. Enough has been said to show that Lady Bell's book is well worth reading from two widely different points of view. The student of social problems cannot possibly afford to miss it while the romance of industry has never been more vividly painted than in her pages.
Previous page
