The members of this family cannot ride in busses or trams,
cannot write letters, take outings, go to a "tu'penny gaff" for cheap
vaudeville, join social or benefit clubs, nor can they buy sweetmeats,
tobacco, books, or newspapers.
And further, should one child (and there are three) require a pair of
shoes, the family must strike meat for a week from its bill of fare. And
since there are five pairs of feet requiring shoes, and five heads
requiring hats, and five bodies requiring clothes, and since there are
laws regulating indecency, the family must constantly impair its physical
efficiency in order to keep warm and out of jail. For notice, when rent,
coals, oil, soap, and firewood are extracted from the weekly income,
there remains a daily allowance for food of 4.5d. to each person; and
that 4.5d. cannot be lessened by buying clothes without impairing the
physical efficiency.
All of which is hard enough. But the thing happens; the husband and
father breaks his leg or his neck. No 4.5d. a day per mouth for food is
coming in; no halfpennyworth of bread per meal; and, at the end of the
week, no six shillings for rent. So out they must go, to the streets or
the workhouse, or to a miserable den, somewhere, in which the mother will
desperately endeavour to hold the family together on the ten shillings
she may possibly be able to earn.
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