Down and Out in Paris and London - George Orwell

Romton, t'ank God-leastways, dey didn't de last time I

was here. I been up to York and round Wales since."

   "What is skilly?" I said.

   "Skilly? A can o' hot water wid some bloody oatmeal

at de bottom; dat's skilly. De skilly spikes is always de

worst."

   We stayed talking for an hour or two. The Irishman was a

friendly old man, but he smelt very unpleasant, which was

not surprising when one learned how many diseases he

suffered from. It appeared (he described his symptoms

fully) that taking him from top to bottom he had the

following things wrong with him: on his crown, which

was bald, he had eczema; he was shortsighted, and had no

glasses; he had chronic bronchitis; he had some

undiagnosed pain in the back; he had dyspepsia; he had

urethritis; he had varicose veins, bunions and flat feet.

With this assemblage of diseases he had tramped the

roads for fifteen years.

   At about five the Irishmen said, "Could you do wid e

cup o' tay? De spike don't open till six."

   "I should think I could."

   "Well, dere's a place here where dey gives you a free

cup o' tay and a bun.

Good tay it is. Dey makes you say

a lot o' bloody prayers after; but hell! It all passes de

time away. You come wid me."

   He led the way to a small tin-roofed shed in a side-

street, rather like a village cricket pavilion. About

twenty-five other tramps were waiting. A few of them

were dirty old habitual vagabonds, the majority decent-

looking lads from the north, probably miners or cotton

operatives out of work. Presently the door opened and a

lady in a blue silk dress, wearing gold spectacles end a

crucifix, welcomed us in. Inside were thirty or forty hard

chairs, a harmonium, and a very gory lithograph of the

Crucifixion.

   Uncomfortably we took off our caps end sat down. The

lady handed out the tea, and while we ate and drank she

moved to and fro, talking benignly. She talked upon

religious subjects-about Jesus Christ always having e

soft spot for poor rough men like us, and about how

quickly the time passed when you were in church, and

what a difference it made to a man on the road if he said

his prayers regularly. We hated it. We sat against the

well fingering our caps (a tramp feels indecently exposed

with his cap off), and turning pink and trying to mumble

something when the lady addressed us. There was no

doubt that she meant it all kindly. As she came up to one

of the north country lads with the plate of buns, she said

to him:

   "And you, my boy, how long is it since you knelt down

and spoke with your Father in Heaven?"

   Poor lad, not a word could he utter; but his belly

answered for him, with a disgraceful rumbling which

it set up at sight of the food. Thereafter he was so

overcome with shame that he could scarcely swallow his

bun. Only one men managed to answer the lady in her

own style, end he was a spry, red-nosed fellow looking

like a corporal who had lost his stripe for drunkenness.

He could pronounce the words "the dear Lord Jesus"

with less shame then anyone I ever saw. No doubt he had

learned the knack in prison.

   Tea ended, and I saw the tramps looking furtively at

one another. An unspoken thought was running from

man to man-could we possibly make off before the

prayers started? Someone stirred in his chair-not getting

up actually, but with just a glance at the door, as though

half suggesting the idea of departure. The lady quelled

him with one look. She said in a more benign tone than

ever:

   "I don't think you need go

quite yet. The casual ward

doesn't open till six, and we have time to kneel down and

say a few words to our Father first. I think we should all

feel better after that, shouldn't we?"

  The red-nosed man was very helpful, pulling the

harmonium into place and handing out the prayerbooks.

His back was to the lady as he did this, and it was his

idea of a joke to deal the books like a pack of cards,

whispering to each men as he did so, "There y'are, mate,

there's a--- nap 'end for yer! Four aces and a king!" etc.

   Bareheaded, we knelt down among the dirty teacups

and began to mumble that we had left undone those

things that we ought to have done, and done those things

that we ought not to have done, and there was no health

in us. The lady prayed very fervently, but her eyes roved

over us all the time, making sure that we were attending.

When she was not looking we grinned and winked at one

another, and whispered bawdy jokes, just to show that we did

not care; but it stuck in our throats a little. No one except

the rednosed man was self-possessed enough to speak the

responses above a whisper. We got on better with the singing,

except that one old tramp knew no tune but "Onward,

Christian soldiers," and reverted to it sometimes,

spoiling the harmony.

   The prayers lasted half an hour, and then, after a

handshake at the door, we made off. "Well," said

somebody as soon as we were out of hearing, "the

trouble's over. I thought them ----prayers was never goin'

to end."

   "You 'ad your bun," said another; "you got to pay for

it."

   "Pray for it, you mean. Ah, you don't get much for

nothing. They can't even give you a twopenny cup of tea

without you go down on you -----knees for it."

   There were murmurs of agreement. Evidently the

tramps were not grateful for their tea. And yet it was

excellent tea, as different from coffee-shop tea as good

Bordeaux is from the muck called colonial claret, and we

were all glad of it. I am sure too that it was given in a

good spirit, without any intention of humiliating us; so in

fairness we ought to have been grateful-still, we were

not.

                    XXVII

AT about a quarter to six the Irishman led me to the spike.

It was a grim, smoky yellow cube of brick, standing in a

corner of the workhouse grounds. With its rows of tiny,

barred windows, and a high wall and iron gates separating

it from the road, it looked much like a prison. Already a

long queue of ragged men had

formed up, waiting for the gates to open. They were of

all kinds and ages, the youngest a fresh-faced boy of

sixteen, the oldest a doubled-up, toothless mummy of

seventy-five. Some were hardened tramps, recognisable

by their sticks and billies and dust-darkened faces; some

were factory hands out of work, some agricultural

labourers, one a clerk in collar and tie, two certainly

imbeciles. Seen in the mass, lounging there, they were a

disgusting sight; nothing villainous or dangerous, but a

graceless, mangy crew, nearly all ragged and palpably

underfed. They were friendly, however, and asked no

questions. Many offered me tobacco-cigarette ends,

that is.

   We leaned against the wall, smoking, and the tramps

began to talk about the spikes they had been in recently.

It appeared from what they said that all spikes are

different, each with its peculiar merits and demerits, and

it is important to know these when you are on the road.

An old hand will tell you the peculiarities of every spike

in England, as: at A you are allowed to smoke but there

are bugs in the cells; at B the beds are comfortable but

the porter is a bully; at C they let you out early in the

morning but the tea is undrinkable; at D the officials

steal your money if you have any-and so on

interminably. There are regular beaten tracks where the

spikes are within a day's march of one another. I was

told that the Barnet-St. Albans route is the best, and they

warned me to steer clear of Billericay and Chelmsford,

also Ide Hill in Kent. Chelsea was said to be the most

luxurious spike in England; someone, praising it, said

that the blankets there were more like prison than the

spike. Tramps go far afield in summer, and in winter,

they circle as much as possible round the large towns,

where it is warmer and there is more charity. But they

have to keep moving, for you may not enter any one spike,

or any two London spikes, more than once in a month, on pain

of being confined for a week.

   Some time after six the gates opened and we began to

file in one at a time. In the yard was an office where an

official entered in a ledger our names and trades and ages,

also the places we were coming from and going to-this last

is intended to keep a check on the movements of tramps. I

gave my trade as "painter"; I had painted water-colours-

who has not? The official also asked us whether we had

any money, and every man said no. It is against the law to

enter the spike with more than eightpence, and any sum

less than this one is supposed to hand over at the gate. But

as a rule the tramps prefer to smuggle their money in,

tying it tight in a piece of cloth so that it will not chink.

Generally they put it in the bag of tea and sugar that every

tramp carries, or among their "papers." The "papers" are

considered sacred and are never searched.

   After registering at the office we were led into the

spike by an official known as the Tramp Major (his job is

to supervise casuals, and he is generally a workhouse

pauper) and a great bawling ruffian of a porter in a blue

uniform, who treated us like cattle. The spike consisted

simply of a bathroom and lavatory, and, for the rest, long

double rows of stone cells, perhaps a hundred cells in all.

It was a bare, gloomy place of stone and whitewash,

unwillingly clean, with a smell which, somehow, I had

foreseen from its appearance; a smell of soft soap, Jeyes'

fluid and latrines-a cold, discouraging, prisonish smell.

   The porter herded us all into the passage, and then told

us to come into the bathroom six at a time, to be searched

before bathing. The search was for money and tobacco,

Romton being one of those spikes where you

can smoke once you have smuggled your tobacco in, but it

will be confiscated if it is found on you. The old hands

had told us that the porter never searched below the knee,

so before going in we had all hidden our tobacco in the

ankles of our boots. Afterwards, while undressing, we

slipped it into our coats, which we were allowed to keep,

to serve as pillows.

   The scene in the bathroom was extraordinarily re-

pulsive. Fifty dirty, stark-naked men elbowing each other

in a room twenty feet square, with only two bathtubs and

two slimy roller towels between them all. I shall never

forget the reek of dirty feet. Less than half the tramps

actually bathed (I heard them saying that hot water is

"weakening" to the system), but they all washed their

faces and feet, and the horrid greasy little clouts known as

toe-rags which they bind round their toes. Fresh water was

only allowed for men who were having a complete bath,

so many men had to bathe in water where others had

washed their feet. The porter shoved us to and fro, giving

the rough side of his tongue when anyone wasted time.

When my turn came for the bath, I asked if I might swill

out the tub, which was streaked with dirt, before using it.

He answered simply, "Shut yer mouth and get on with yer

bath!" That set the social tone of the place, and I did not

speak again.

   When we had finished bathing, the porter tied our

clothes in bundles and gave us workhouse shirts-grey

cotton things of doubtful cleanliness, like abbreviated

nightgowns. We were sent along to the cells at once, and