The record-union., 1891-08-01
from s in the morning until s, and some-

from s in the morning until S, and some-
times 10 o'clock, at night.
Looking at the great army of more
lowly toilers and home servants, the
study is certainly not a pleasant one.
There are large gangs OF girls known as
cotton pickers,' - who may be seen at the
noon hour wandering bareheaded through
the streets, their beggarly garments COW
cred with cotton lint. Those who are not
barefooted wear heavy clogs without
stockings, and they will kick shins with
any rough III Liverpool for pot of beer.
Many cargoes of damaged cotton arrive
here. 1t is sold by auction to class of
dealers who dry it, and prepare il a sec
ond time for the market. Two or three
thousand of the hoodlum class of young
women sort or ''pick" this stuff in filthy
noisome pens. The employment is not
steady, and they get what the renovators
have mind to pay; all the way from
four TO ten shillings per week. These
girls and women are about as respectable
as men would be under like circum-
stances; drink gallons of beer per day
while at work, clubbing" their pennies
for its purchase; ferociously beat those
who do not "drinl< fair" and live in any
manner they may, there being absolutely
no effort on the part of any person or so
ciety to better their condition.
Plain cooks in houses, restaurants and
the common grade of inns, Will earn eight
shillings per week. a general house SER
want receives six shillings. A housemaid,
nurse and waitress combined, who is re-
garded as the highest grade of house ser
want, may receive eight shillings. Char
women, or scrubwomen, receive three
shillings per day and breakfast, that is,
tea and bread and butter, and they may
possibly secure two engagements per
week. Washerwomen are very glad to
earn, altogether. ten shillings per week,
and, perhaps, their assistants may get
from shilling to one and four-pence q
day and tea" or three ha'p'worth of
bitter" which, translated, means three
cents worth of bitter beer. Girls in to-
bacco, confectionery and statiOners' shops
will receive from four to six shillings
per week; and mattresses in restaurants,
considering the severity and hours of
their labor, are the poorest paid of all.
Many of these girls arc required to serve
meals in gentlemen's chambers and liz
offices, at all hours, after the manner Of
the Havana coolie cantineTS, and are sub
ject to all manner of insult, which they
endure with dogged bravery and CHEEKY
invulnerability, emitting them to be re-
garded as real heroines in any other
land.
There is very fine cafe at the head Of
bdlG SlIGCJ, NltlS Il IuOuSGll Ctlt-
ployers and clerks, from the Cotton Ex-
change and neighboring offices, lunch or
dine daily. 1t will rank with our better
class American restaurants. The entire
service is by women. There are from
twenty-five to thirty as comely, cleanly,
bright, well educated and thoroughly re-
spectacle young women here as could be
found at any aristocrauc levee in New
York or London. Having often been
served at the place, at the same table
and by the same waitress, ! asked her
the amount of wages per week she was
paid.
six shillings," she replied cheerily.
Cannot you find service at better
wages in Liverpool" / inquired.
"Oh, no, sir. That is very good pay
here"
do you get any tips besides?"
'Very seldom, sir. Only occasionally
from strangers. The clerks who come
here can't afford it. And the masters
never do that in Liverpool
And this six shillings per week is all
you do earn, or can earn, after a good ed
ucation, and while using the best years of
your life2'
''Oh, but you must remember, sir
and this striumphantly-"we get our own
food besides. And very good food it is,
siri"
There was no use Of continuing the in
QUESTION. Here was the absolute limit of
a handsome, capable, well educated and
respectable woman's possibilities and as
pirationS, because of her own absolute
knowledge in the matter, in this second
city Of Britain.
''Ah, but money has twice the pur-
chasing power In Great Britain than it
has in America" some one remarks.
There never was crueler political or
other falsehOod coined. It is absolutely
tRr,rN ft.s,tT II,
not say luxury, which cannot be as
cheaply, or more cheaply, purchased III
America than in England, barring the
one item of habitation. The burning
fact is that the lowly of this country are
forced to live twice or thrice as meagerly
as our own toilers. Here capital has, with
deviliSh ingenuity, as il may do with us,
in time, if immigration be not soon
whOlesOmely restricted, ascertaned TO 8
farthing on how little human beings,
who labor, may be made to exist, and
BritainS who never, never will be
slaves" are slaves of the most hopeless
character from the cradle to the grave.
But what may be the amusements and
diversions of the Liverpool lowly is a
natural inquiry. They are drink, drink,
drink and ''scampingn the rents. Not
all are drunkards. Most of them are reg
ular drinkers. The horror of it all is,
women predominant. From Saturday
noon until II at night, and again from
Sunday noon until 10 at night, except
ing closing hour between half-past2 and
O'Clock, in the bar, smoking
''snugs" and parlors of each OF the about
1900 licensed public houses of the city
and environs, an average of fifty persons
may be found in all conditions of ''ch eer-
mess" and semi-cousciousness. That will
account for about 100000 persons. ] do
not know how often these gatherings Will
wholly change their personnel, But be-
Heve quarter of q million people in Liv-
erpool drink whenever they can get it.
and that onehalf of that number are con-
firmed tipplers and drunkards. The
homes of most of these are bare walls and
squalid belongings. The public house is
the only cheerful place they know in their
lives. Rent collectors assert that over
10000 Of such families scamp the rents;"
that is, get possession of any sort of habi-
tation and remain rent free until warned
out, or thrown out, by a bailiff. There is
not in any ten leading American cities as
much actual squalor and beastly hope
lessness as may be found in this one.
And yet nearly everyone of this class
does something and earns something here.
Whatever may be the purchasing power"
OF money in America, it is good thing
to remember that American laborers are
not yet the subjects of such studies as
these EDGAR L. WAKEMAN.