CHAPTER IV.
THE DAY OF MY RESIGNATION.

SATURDAY morning was the busiest time of all the week. The ironing was to be finished, and the clothes folded, packed in hampers, and delivered. It was a day of little rest for the horses, but they probably enjoyed the pulling and hauling in the fresh air much better than breathing the steam-laden atmosphere of their so-called “stable.”

The skill displayed by Miss Stebbins and Janie in telling at a moment’s inquiry just which numbers were meant for each of the customers was a source of wonder to me. The Y—— and Z—— Laundry had a good “trade,” not only in the various parts of London, but in several of the surrounding suburbs. Between four and five hundred regular customers were enrolled on the books, so that the numbers which marked the clothes ranged all the way from one upwards. To be able to know five hundred people by number as well as by name seemed as marvellous a matter to me as the much-discussed dexterity of the head waiters in Chicago hotels, who can hand out the hat that belongs to each of two or three hundred men, and never make a mistake, though the hats are all alike.

When one of the loads was nearly ready for delivery, I heard rather an interesting discussion between Mrs. Morris and John, the driver. I learned that the securing of credit with his laundryman depended much upon the neighbourhood in which a man lived, the number of servants he kept, and, above all, the quantity and the quality of the shirts he sent to the wash. The customer who soiled fourteen shirts in a week was trusted implicitly, while he who sent only seven or less, with the brand of a less fashionable furnishing house upon them, was not given so long a time. Then there was the customer who wore coloured shirts during the week and white ones on Sundays and Bank Holidays, who must needs pay for his goods on delivery. Some of the accounts were allowed to run from three months to a year, others were required to be settled monthly, and with still others the rule was “pay down.”

“Shall I leave this ‘amper, ma’am, if they doesn’t pay?” asked John of Mrs. Morris, as he shouldered a large basket and started for the waggon.

“Well, it’s a new customer,” said Mrs. Morris ; “but they live in a good street, and all the clothes are of the finest quality. Yes, just leave them, and ask if they want a laundry-book.”

“But they rents their ‘ouse furnished, ma’am ; the ‘ousemaid told me so,” persisted John.

“Oh, that’s different! Better collect the money, then. There’s no knowing how long they’ll stop there!” answered Mrs. Morris.

It seemed that the people who rented furnished houses were allowed no quarter at the Y—— and Z—— Laundry.

I also discovered that the keepers of laundries knew quite as much about the private affairs of their customers as do the butcher and baker and other tradespeople. John had many a tale to tell of certain strange things that housemaid, cook, and butler related to him concerning the home-life of master and mistress. The kitchen-door confidences that passed between him and the servants, when he made his weekly “rounds,”sometimes made entertaining gossip for the laundry-girls. When I heard some of this interesting talk, it occurred to me that it might be as well if all areas were fitted up with some sort of patent lifts, by which transactions with tradesmen could be carried on at a distance. It would certainly save much time, and family affairs might then be kept more closely at home.

But, so far as Mrs. Morris was concerned, the only personal interest she took in her customers was in regard to the question of their ability to pay their accounts. She was one of the most clever and indefatigable business women I had ever seen. No one in the laundry worked as hard or as many hours in the day as herself. She inspected every department, and there was not a branch of the business with which she was not familiar. She had piercing black eyes, that showed her capabilities in the way of bargain-getting, and her nose was of the kind that physiognomists say denotes acquisitiveness. She was short and wiry, and, though under thirty years of age, she was more round-shouldered than many women of sixty. However, in this respect she resembled her employees, for there was not a straight-backed girl among them, and in some instances their shoulders were so bent that it amounted almost to a deformity. A few of the women were positively humped, and they made an uncanny sight as they stood over the ironing-boards. I spoke of it one day to Janie, and she replied, “Yes, Miss Barnes, all laundry-girls gets that waiy;” and I have since observed that stooping shoulders are a peculiarity among them.

Mr. Morris, with the assistance of a small boy, attended to the management of the engine and the machinery, while his wife overlooked everything else. She was even able to take his place if he was absent for a day. Both, though of somewhat better education than those who served them, had evidently sprung from the ranks of the lower classes, and their ambition to get on in the world was boundless. Believing in the proverb, “If you want anything done, do it yourself,” they worked early and late, scarcely taking time to eat. Every morning, at seven o’clock, Mrs. Morris was in the laundry to see that all was in readiness for the girls to commence at eight. She breakfasted at half-past seven, and fifteen minutes later she was again at her post, where she remained until dinner-time. She ate dinner in twenty minutes, and was back before any of the girls had returned. At night, when the laundry was closed, she took her books to the house, and it was sometimes as late as one or two o’clock in the morning when she had them settled. On one occasion, during the week I was there, she told me she had run thirty pairs of curtains through the ironing-machine after ten o’clock at night. She was not in any way unkind or unjust with the women she employed, rather putting herself on an equality with them, and demanding no work from them that she was not able and willing to perform herself. If any heavy lifting was to be done, she was always foremost in the fray.

On Saturday, I noticed that she examined every piece of clothes before it was returned to the customers, and, if any article was badly gotten up, it was washed and ironed over again, even though she was obliged to do it herself. She was scrupulously conscientious as to the manner in which the most unimportant part of the work was performed, and she would not, under any consideration, allow injurious chemicals to be used in the washing, no matter how much they might lighten the labour or lessen time. She carefully measured the amount of soda that was put into the washers, and the soap used was of the best quality. Any articles from which the colour had been taken out in the washing or boiling were laid aside for her special attention, and she restored lost blues, pinks, and other colours by dipping them into a solution of acetic acid. If, through careless handling in the laundry, spots of iron-rust got on the linen, she immediately applied salts of lemon to remove them. When goods already iron-rusted were brought to her, she charged a penny for each treatment.

However, there was one thing she allowed that rather surprised me : that was the stringing of several collars and cuffs together before putting them in the washer. It was a good plan for keeping each person’s collars separated from the others, but it had a tendency to tear out the button-holes.

The girls at the Y—— and Z—— Laundry, unlike those employed in most places, were allowed to have their own work done at a slightly cheaper rate than that of the ordinary customers. Saturday afternoon I watched Janie hand to the women the small parcels containing their own personal property, and I wondered how girls earning from three to twenty shillings a week could be willing to pay out four or five pence for the doing up of a white skirt or ruffled blouse. Some of their bills amounted to over a shilling.

Mrs. Bruckerstone had taken to the laundry, early in the week, a baby’s bonnet, which was supposed to belong to someone in her family, so that the usual reduction was made in the price of it. Over the ironing of that bonnet there had been a near approach to a fight. The bonnet, with several others, was given to one of the women to iron, and when it was finished and hung on the horse the appearance did not please Mrs. Bruckerstone, so she got out her own bonnet-board and re-ironed it, saying it belonged to a neighbour of hers, and therefore must be done up extra well. The woman who had at first ironed it took the insult so much to heart that she turned informer, and reported to Mrs. Morris that Mrs. Bruckerstone had given out that she was the only proper “bunnit-hironer” in the place, and that, moreover, Mrs. Bruckerstone had been attempting to get reduced rates for her neighbours by passing off their goods as her own.

Then Mrs. Morris announced that all neighbours must be charged full price, and Mrs. Bruckerstone’s face wore a crestfallen look, when, as she was paying: her bill, an additional penny was charged for the unlucky bonnet.

At a little after two o’clock there was a lull in the motions of the machinery, which showed that no more washing would be done that week. Each ironer continued to work until her particular lot of things was finished, and at about half-past three, all the girls were paid off for the week. The lowest wages were those earned by the smaller girls of about fifteen or sixteen years of age, who attended to the smoothing of towels and table-linen by putting them in and pulling them out of the large ironing-machine. Their portion was from three to six shillings a week. Agnes, the preparer, received eleven shillings ; Annie Martin, who stood at the collar-machine, was paid fourteen shillings; Mrs. Bruckerstone had three shillings a day for the time she had worked, which amounted to about five days ; Janie’s sister and her companions in shirt-ironing drew from fifteen to

twenty-three shillings, according to their talents ; the girl who presided over the washtub received twelve shillings, and Miss Stebbins had fifteen shillings. Miss Stebbins was the only girl among them who did not live “home.” She resided in apartments near the laundry, and for board and lodging paid out ten of the fifteen shillings. Saturday nights she went to the country to stop until Monday, the train fare costing her another shilling, so she had four shillings left over for clothes and extras. When paid off, all the women, except Janie and Miss Stebbins, left the laundry to remain away until the following Tuesday, and as they went out of the door they were talking of various plans for Bank Holiday.

The regular hours were from eight until eight, with twenty minutes for eleven-o’clock luncheon, an hour for dinner, and half an hour for tea. I had several times heard the girls discussing the proposed amendment to the Factory Act; but among them the idea seemed to prevail that the new law was to be an eight-hour law, which would reduce their hours of labour from eight in the morning until six at night. Those women who received their wages by the day or the week were in favour of having the hours reduced, while those who did piecework preferred to put in their time as they wished. This feeling was, of course, quite natural, for the ironers did not usually commence work until late Monday afternoon, and finished the week at a little after two on Saturday, thus making only five full days in the week. However, the regular hours at the Y—— and Z—— Laundry were about what the Factory Act demands, so that Mrs. Morris knew she had no cause to trouble herself about that phase of the matter. Quite often many of the girls were obliged to work overtime until nine or ten at night, but I was told that in such cases the overtime was not paid for — most of the employees receiving a weekly wage, and it was expected that they would remain in the place until the work required of them was finished. So far as I could discover, few of them had any complaints to make in regard to the hours. Some of them had been employed in laundries where the hours were much longer, Annie Martin having recently left a situation where the regular hours were from eight in the morning until eleven at night.

Janie and Miss Stebbins were the two most often called upon to stop late, and were always the last to leave. While the other girls had a part, if not all, of the Saturday half-holiday, they were expected to stop with Mrs. Morris until the last parcel of goods was placed in the delivery waggon. On the Saturday preceding Bank Holiday it was after seven o’clock when the two girls quitted their posts, but both of them attended to their duties cheerfully, and took it all as a matter of course. Janie, according to her own statement, was not tired, only a little “muddled,” and she regretted that such a thing as a Bank Holiday should exist, preferring rather to go to her work the next Monday as usual.

On the whole, the girls were a fairly contented set, although the inconveniences under which they did their work was a trial to those who had held situations in more comfortably arranged places. Nearly all of them objected to the cement floor, which, they said, made their feet ache. It certainly would have entailed but little expense on the part of the proprietor to have had at least a portion of the room boarded over ; and the ironers, who were constantly obliged to walk to and from the stove, would have greatly appreciated a wooden floor. Some of the machinery, too, needed fencing in to make it less dangerous to those who were continually passing so very close to it as to make it highly probable that their skirts would be caught when the wheels were in motion. During my first two days I several times very narrowly escaped coming in collision with the hydro-extractor. There should also have been an arrangement for carrying off the steam, the odour from which was most sickening, and the need of an air-propeller, or fanning-machine, was very apparent. The constantly wet floor was another thing that must have been prejudicial to the health of those in the place.

Indeed, taken as a whole, the sanitary conditions of the laundry could hardly have been worse ; and, if the proposed amendment is passed, some of its restrictive clauses will readily apply to the state of things at the Y—— and Z—— Laundry. It is no excuse for Mr. and Mrs. Morris to say that they have only lately gone into business, and cannot be expected to have all the comforts and conveniences of long-established laundries. Decency, as well as the laws of health, would demand that a few pounds be expended in fitting up the place to make it properly habitable for themselves, their workpeople, and their horses. The one large room in which the work is now done should be divided into at least three apartments: wash-house, sorting-room, and ironing-room.

When I engaged at the laundry, I had expected to spend between eight and ten days there; but Saturday brought me such a weariness of the flesh that I decided I had better resign my situation before Mrs. Morris should have time to inform me that she did not consider me up to the mark for a laundry-worker.

“I’m afraid I’m not strong enough for this sort of thing, Mrs. Morris,” I said, as, standing with Janie in the doorway, I bade her good-night.

“I was going to speak of that myself,” she replied. ” Somehow, you don’t seem to have very much energy, and I would advise you to go into an easier kind of business.”

Energy! If she had only known the large amount of that article it had required to keep me in her laundry for five days, I am sure she would have changed her mind.

“Miss Barnes is going to a confectioner’s, Mis’ Morris,” said Janie, in a sort of defensive way, as though she thought I needed a champion.

So my brief and very chequered career as a laundry-girl ended; but, not having yet gained as much knowledge of the work and the workers as I wished, I determined to spend the following week among the laundry-girls in different parts of London, to discover if, after all, they were such a formidable and badly-treated class of individuals.