The Orange Girl

Tom Shirley came, with Alice, to visit me in my new lodging.

He looked about him cheerfully. 'The new place,' he said, 'is more airy and spacious than the old prison on the other side of the road, where I spent a year or two. This is quite a handsome court: the Building is a Palace: the Recreation ground is a Park, but without trees or grass: the three passages painted green remind me somehow of Spring Gardens: the numbers of people make me think of Cheapside or Ludgate Hill: the shops, no doubt contain every luxury: the society, if mixed, is harmonious…'

'In a word, Tom, I am very lucky to get here.'

'There might be worse places. And hark ye, lad, if there is not another fiddler in the Bench, you will make in a week twice as much in the Prison as you can make out of it. Nothing cheers a prisoner more than the strains of a fiddle.

This gave me hope. I began to see that I might live, even in this place.

'There are one or two objections to the place,' this optimist philosopher went on. 'I have observed, for instance, a certain languor which steals over mind and body in a Prison. Some have compared it with the growth they call mildew. Have a care, Will. Practise daily. I have known a musician leave this place fit for nothing but to play for Jack in the Green. Look at the people as they pass. Yonder pretty fellow is too lazy to get his stockings darned: that fellow slouching after him cannot stoop to pull up his stockings: that other thrusts his feet into his slippers without pulling up the heels: there goes one who has worn, I warrant you, his morning gown all day for years: he cannot even get the elbows darned: keep up thy heart, lad. Before long we will get thee into the Rules.'

He visited my room. 'Ha!' he said, 'neat, clean, commodious. With a fine view of the Parade; with life and activity before one's eyes.' He forgot that he had just remarked on the languor and the mildew of the Prison. 'Observe the racquet players: there are finer players here than anywhere else, I believe. And those who do not play at racquets may find recreation at fives: and those who are not active enough for fives may choose to play at Bumble puppy. Well, Will, Alice will come back to me, with the boy. She can come here every morning if you wish. Patience, lad, patience. We will get thee, before long, within the Rules.'

It is possible, by the Warder's permission, to go into the Rules. But the prisoner must pay down £10 for the first £100 of his debts, and £5 for every subsequent £100. Now I had not ten shillings in the world. When I look back upon the memory of that time: when I think of the treatment of prisoners: and of the conduct of the prison: and when I reflect that nothing is altered at the present day I am amazed at the wonderful apathy of people as regards the sufferings of others – it may become at any time their own case: at their carelessness as concerns injustice and oppression – yet subject every one to the same oppression and cruelty.

What, for instance, is more monstrous than the fact that a man who has been arrested by writ, has to pay fees to the prison for every separate writ? If he has no money he is still held liable, so that even if his friends are willing to pay his debts with the exorbitant costs of the attorney, there are still the fees to be paid. And even if the prisoner's friends are willing to release him there is still the warden who must be satisfied before he suffers his prisoner to go.

Again what can be more iniquitous than the license allowed to attorneys in the matter of their costs? Many a prisoner, originally arrested for a debt of four or five pounds or even less, finds after a while that the attorney's costs amount to twenty or thirty pounds more. He might be able to discharge the debt alone: the costs make it impossible: the creditor might let him go: the attorney will never let him go: the friends might club together to pay the debt: they cannot pay the costs: the attorney abates nothing, hoping that compassion will induce the man's friends to release him. In some cases they do: in others, the attorney finds that he has overreached himself and that the prisoner dies of that incurable disease which we call captivity.

At first sight the Parade and the open court of the Prison present an appearance of animation. The men playing racquets have a little crowd gathered round them, there are others playing skittles: children run about shouting: there are the shrill voices of women quarrelling or arguing: the crowd is always moving about: there are men at tables smoking and drinking: the tapsters run about with bottles of wine and jugs of beer. There are women admitted to see their friends, husbands and brothers, and to bring them gifts. Alas! when I remember – the sight comes back to me in dreams – the sadness and the earnestness in their faces and the compassion and the love – the woman's love which endures all and survives all and conquers all – I wish that I had the purse of Crœsus to set these captives free, even though it would enrich the attorney, whose wiles have brought them to this place.

One has not to look long before the misery of it is too plainly apparent above the show of cheerful carelessness. One sees the wives of the prisoners: their husbands play racquets and drink about and of an evening sit in the tavern bawling songs; the poor women, ragged and draggled, come forth carrying their babes to get a little air: their faces are stamped with the traces of days and weeks and years of privation. The Prison has destroyed the husband's sense of duty to his wife: he will not, if he can, work for his family; he lives upon such doles as he can extract from his family or hers. Worse still, men lose their sense of shame: they say what they please and care not who hears: they introduce companions and care not what is said or thought about them: things are said openly that no Christian should hear: things are done openly that no Christian should witness or should know. There are many hundreds of children within these accursed walls. God help them, if they understand what they hear and what they see!

In the prison there are many kinds of debtors: there is the debtor who is always angry at the undeserved misery of his lot: sometimes his wrongs drive him mad in earnest: then the poor wretch is removed to Bedlam where he remains until his death. There is, next, the despairing debtor who sits as one in a dream and will never be comforted. There is the philosophical debtor who accepts his fate and makes the best of it: there is the meek and miserable debtor – generally some small tradesman who has been taught that the greatest disgrace possible is that which has actually fallen upon him; there is the debtor who affects the Beau and carries his snuff-box with an air. There is the debtor who was a gentleman and can tell of balls at St. James's; there is the ruffler who swaggers on the Parade, looking out for newcomers and inviting those who have money to play with him. As for the women they are like the men: there are the wives of the prisoners who fall, for the most part, into a draggled condition like their husbands; there are ladies who put on sumptuous array and flaunt it daily on the Parade: stories are whispered about them; there are others about whom it is unnecessary to tell stories; in a word it is a place where the same wickedness goes on as one may find outside.

There is a chapel in the middle of the great Building. Service is held once a week but the attendance is thin; there is a taproom which is crowded all day long: here men sit over their cups from morning till evening; there is a coffee-room where tea and coffee can be procured and where the newspapers are read; this is a great place for the politicians of whom there are many in the Prison. Indeed, I know not where politics are so eagerly debated as in the King's Bench.

The King's Bench Prison is a wonderful place for the observation of Fortune and her caprices. There was a society – call it not a club – consisting entirely of gentlemen who had been born to good estates and had suffered ruin through no fault of their own. These gentlemen admitted me to their company. We dined together at the Ordinary and conversed after dinner. One of them, born to an easy fortune, was ruined by the discovery of a parchment entitling him to another estate. There was a lawsuit lasting for twenty years. He then lost it and found that the whole of his own estate had gone too. Another, a gentleman of large estate, married an heiress. Her extravagancies ran through both her own fortune and her husband's. She lived with him in the Prison and daily, being now a shrew as well as a slattern, reproached him with the ruin she herself had caused. There was a young fellow who had fallen among lawyers and been ruined by them. He now studied law intending as soon as he got out to commence attorney and to practise the tricks and rogueries he had learned from his former friends. Another had bought a seat in the House of Commons and a place with it. But at the next election he lost his seat and his place, too. And another was a great scholar in Arabic. His captivity affected him not one whit because he had his books and could work in the Prison as well as out.

With such companions, I endeavoured to keep aloof from the drinking and roystering crew which made the Prison disorderly and noisy. Yet, as I will show you directly, I was the nightly servant of the roysterers.

You have heard of Tom Shirley's judgment that in every debtors' prison the collegians, if they do not, as many do, go about in filthy rags and tatters, are all slatterns: some can afford to dress with decency and cleanliness, not to speak of fashion, which would be, indeed, out of place in the King's Bench; even those care not to observe the customs of the outside world; the ruffles are no longer white or no longer visible; the waistcoat is unbuttoned; the coat is powdered; the wig is uncurled; those who wear their own hair leave it hanging over the ears instead of tying it neatly with a black ribbon behind. This general neglect of dress corresponds with the universal neglect of morals which prevails throughout the Prison. Everything conspires to drag down and to degrade the unfortunate prisoner: the hopelessness of his lot; the persecution of his enemies; the uncertainty about the daily bread; the freedom with which drink is offered about by those who 'coll it,' i. e., in the language of the place who have money; the temptation to do as others do and forget his sorrows over a bowl of punch; speedily contaminate the prisoner and make him in all respects like unto those around him. I have said already that if it is bad for men it is worse for women. Let me draw a veil over this side of the King's Bench. Suffice it to say that one who has written on the Prisons has declared that if Diana herself and her nymphs were to be imprisoned for twelve months in the King's Bench, at the end of that time they would all be fit companions for Messalina.

It is not only from their rags that the poverty of the prisoners is betrayed; one may learn from their hollow cheeks, their eager eyes, their feeble gait, that many – too many – are suffering from want of food. It is true that the law of the land gives to every prisoner a groat – four-pence a day – to be paid by the detaining creditor: yet the groat is not always paid, and can only be obtained if the creditor refuses it by legal steps, which a man destitute of money cannot take. What attorney will take up the case of a man without a farthing? If the debtor wins his case how is he to pay the attorney and costs out of four-pence a day? If he wishes to plead in formâ pauperis, the law allows the warder to charge six shillings and eight-pence for leave to go to the Court and half a crown for the turnkey to take him there – what prisoner on the poor side can pay these fees? So that when a prisoner is really poor he cannot get his groats at all, for the creditor will not pay them unless he is obliged. Again there are other ways of evading the law. If a debtor surrenders in June there is no Court till November and the creditor need not pay anything till the order of the Court is issued. There are a few doles and charities; but these amount to no more than about £100 a year, say, two pounds a week or six shillings a day. Now there are 600 prisoners as a rule. How many of these are on the poor side? And how far will six shillings a day go among these starving wretches? There are also the boxes into which a few shillings a day are dropped. But how far will these go among so many? It is within my certain knowledge that many would die of sheer starvation every week were it not for the kindness of those but one step above them.

If, for instance, one would understand what poverty may mean he must visit the Common side of the King's Bench Prison. Those who have visited the courts and narrow lanes of Wapping report terrible stories of rags and filth, but the people, by hook or by crook, get food. In the Prison there is neither hook nor crook: the prisoner unless he knows a trade which may be useful in that place: unless he can repair shoes and clothes: unless he can shave and dress the hair, cannot earn a penny. Look at these poor wretches, slinking about the courts, hoping to attract the compassion of some visitor; see them uncombed, unwashed, unshaven; their long hair hanging over their ears; a horrid bristling beard upon their chin; their faces wan with insufficient food, their eyes eagerly glancing here and there to catch a look of pity, a dole or a loan. If you follow them to the misery of the Common side where they are thrust at night you will see creatures more wretched still. These can go abroad even though skewers take the place of buttons; these have shoes – which once had toes; these have beds, of a kind; there are others who have no beds, but lie on the floor; who have no blankets and never take off their rags; who go bare-footed and bare-headed. Remember that their life-long imprisonment was imposed upon them because they could not pay a debt of a pound or two. Their pound or two, by reason of the attorney's costs and the warden's fees, has grown and swelled till it has reached the amount of £20 or £40 or anything you will. No one can release them; the only thing to be hoped is that cold and starvation may speedily bring them to the end – the long sleep in the graveyard of St. George's Church.

I speedily found that I could manage to live pretty well by means of my fiddle. Almost every evening there was some drinking party which engaged my services. I played for them the old tunes to which they sang their songs about wine and women – bawling them at the top of their voices; they paid me as much as I could expect. By good luck there was no other fiddler in the place; a harpist there was; and a flute-player; we sometimes agreed together to give a concert in the coffee-room.

I continued this life for about six months, making enough money every week to pay my way at the Ordinary. Perhaps – I know not – the prison was already beginning to work its way with me and to reduce me, as Tom Shirley said, to the condition of a fiddler to Jack in the Green.

I had a visit, after some three months, from Mr. Probus. He came one day into the prison. I saw him standing on the pavement looking round him. Some of the collegians knew him: they whispered and looked at him with the face that means death if that were possible. One man stepped forward and cursed him. 'Dog!' he said, 'if I had you outside this accursed place, I would make an end of you.'

'Sir,' said Mr. Probus, at whose heels marched a turnkey, 'you do me an injustice for which you will one day be sorry. Am I your detaining creditor?'

The man cursed him again, I know not why, and turned on his heel.

Then I stepped forward. 'Did you come here to gloat over your work, Mr. Probus?'

'Mr. William? I hope you are well, Sir. The prison air, I find, is fresh from the fields. You look better than I expected. To be sure it is early days. You are only just beginning.'

'You will be sorry to hear that I am very well.'

'I would have speech in a retired place, Mr. William.'

'You want once more to dangle your bribe before me. I understand, sir, very well, what you would say.'

'Then let me say it here. Your cousin, I may say, deplores deeply this new disgrace to the family. He earnestly desires to remove it. I am again empowered to purchase an imaginary reversion. Mr. William, he will now make it £4,000. Will that content you?'

'Nothing will content me. There is some secret reason for this persecution. You want – you – not my cousin – to get access to this great sum of money. Well, Mr. Probus, my opinion is that my cousin will die before me. And since I am firmly persuaded upon that point, and since I believe that you think so too, my answer is the same as before.'

'Then,' he said, 'stay here and rot.' He looked round the prison. 'It is a pleasant place for a young man to spend his days, is it not? All his days – till an attack of gaol fever or small-pox visits the place. Eh? Eh? Eh? Then you will be sorry.'

'I shall never be sorry, Mr. Probus, to have frustrated any plots and designs of yours. Be assured of that – and for the rest, do your worst.'

He slowly walked away without a word. But all the devil in his soul flared in his eyes as he turned.

'You do wrong,' said the turnkey who had accompanied him. 'Tis the keenest of his kind. Not another attorney in all London has brought us, not to speak of the Fleet and Newgate, more prisoners than Mr. Probus. For hunting up detainers and running up the costs he has no equal.'

'He is my detaining creditor,' I said.

The turnkey shrugged his shoulders.

'Young gentleman,' he said, 'I see that you are a gentleman, although you are a fiddler – take advice. Agree with his terms quickly, whatever they are. He made you an offer – take it, before he lands you in another court with new writs and more costs.'

In fact, the very next day, I heard that there was another writ in the name of one John Merridew, Sheriff's officer, for fifty pounds alleged to have been lent to me by him. As for Mr. John Merridew, I knew not even the name of the man, and I had never borrowed sixpence of anyone.

I showed the writ to my friend the turnkey. He read it with admiration.

'I told you so,' he said, 'what a man he is! And Merridew, too – Merridew! And you never borrowed the money, and never saw the man! What a man! What a man! Merridew, too, under his thumb! There's ability for you! There's resource!'

I murmured something not complimentary. Indeed, I knew nothing, at that time, of Merridew.

'Ah! He means to keep you here until you accept his offer. Better take it now, then he'll let you go for his costs. He won't give up the costs. What a man it is! And you've never set eyes on John Merridew, have you? What a man! He knows John Merridew, you see. Why, between them – 'He looked at me meaningly, and laid his hand upon my shoulder. 'Take my advice, Sir. Take my advice, and accept that offer of his. Else – I don't say, mind, but Merridew – Merridew – 'He placed his thumb upon the left side of my neck, and pressed it. 'Many – many – have gone that way – through Merridew. And Probus rules Merridew.'