London's Underworld [34]
healthy, the sound in body and mind, are emigrated; but the smitten, the afflicted, the feeble and the worthless are kept at home to go through the same life, to endure the same conditions as their parents, and in their turn to produce a progeny that will burrow in warrens or scuttle out of them even as their parents did before them.
But the feebler the life, the greater the progeny; this we cannot escape, for Nature will take care of herself. We, may drive out the rabbits, we may imprison and punish them, we may compel them to live in Adullam Street or in lazar houses, we may harry them and drive them hither and thither, we may give them doles of food on the Embankment or elsewhere. We may give them chopping wood for a day, we may lodge them for a time in labour homes; all this we may do, but we cannot uplift them by these methods. We cannot exterminate them. But by ignoring them we certainly give them an easy chance of multiplying to such a degree that they will constitute a national danger.
CHAPTER VI
THE DISABLED
In this chapter I want to speak of those who suffer from physical disabilities, either from birth, the result of accident, or disease. If this great army of homeless afflicted humanity were made to pass in procession before us, it would, I venture to say, so touch our hearts that we should not want the procession repeated.
Nothing gives us more pleasure than the sight of a number of people who, suffering from some one or other physical deprivation, are being taught some handicraft by which they will be able to earn a modest living.
Probably nothing causes us greater sadness than the sight of deformed and crippled men and women who are utterly unable to render any useful service to the community, and who consequently have to depend upon their wits for a miserable living. It is a very remarkable thing that an accident which deprives a man of a leg, of an arm, or of eyesight, not only deprives him of his living, but also frequently produces a psychological change. And unless some counterbalancing conditions serve to influence in an opposite direction he may become dangerous. It was not without reason that our older novelists made dwarfs and hunchbacks to be inhuman fiends. Neither was it without reason that Dickens, our great student of human nature, made of Quilp a twisted dwarf, and Stagg a blind man his most dangerous characters. Some years ago I was well acquainted with a very decent man, a printer; he had lived for years beyond reproach; he was both a good workman, husband and father. But he lost his right arm, the result of an accident at his work, and his character changed from that day. He became morose, violent and cruel, and obsessed with altogether false ideas. He could not reason as other men, and he became dangerous and explosive. Time after time I have seen him committed to prison, until he became a hopeless prison habitue. My experience has also shown me that physical deprivations are equally likely to lead to sharpened wits and perverted moral sense as to explosive and cruel violence. Probably this is natural, for nature provides some compensation to those who suffer loss.
This is what makes the army of the physically handicapped so dangerous. The disabled must needs live, and their perverted moral sense and sharpened wits enable them to live at the expense of the public.
Very clever, indeed, many of these men are; they know how to provoke pity, and they know how to tell a plausible tale. Many of them can get money without even asking for it. They know full well the perils that environ the man who begs. I am not ashamed to say that I have been frequently duped by such fellows, and have learned by sad experience that my wits cannot cope with theirs, and that my safety lies in hasty retreat when they call upon me, for I have always found that conversation with them leads to my own undoing.
Witness the following. One winter night my eldest son, who lives about a mile away, went out to post a letter at midnight. After dropping his letter in the pillar-box,
But the feebler the life, the greater the progeny; this we cannot escape, for Nature will take care of herself. We, may drive out the rabbits, we may imprison and punish them, we may compel them to live in Adullam Street or in lazar houses, we may harry them and drive them hither and thither, we may give them doles of food on the Embankment or elsewhere. We may give them chopping wood for a day, we may lodge them for a time in labour homes; all this we may do, but we cannot uplift them by these methods. We cannot exterminate them. But by ignoring them we certainly give them an easy chance of multiplying to such a degree that they will constitute a national danger.
CHAPTER VI
THE DISABLED
In this chapter I want to speak of those who suffer from physical disabilities, either from birth, the result of accident, or disease. If this great army of homeless afflicted humanity were made to pass in procession before us, it would, I venture to say, so touch our hearts that we should not want the procession repeated.
Nothing gives us more pleasure than the sight of a number of people who, suffering from some one or other physical deprivation, are being taught some handicraft by which they will be able to earn a modest living.
Probably nothing causes us greater sadness than the sight of deformed and crippled men and women who are utterly unable to render any useful service to the community, and who consequently have to depend upon their wits for a miserable living. It is a very remarkable thing that an accident which deprives a man of a leg, of an arm, or of eyesight, not only deprives him of his living, but also frequently produces a psychological change. And unless some counterbalancing conditions serve to influence in an opposite direction he may become dangerous. It was not without reason that our older novelists made dwarfs and hunchbacks to be inhuman fiends. Neither was it without reason that Dickens, our great student of human nature, made of Quilp a twisted dwarf, and Stagg a blind man his most dangerous characters. Some years ago I was well acquainted with a very decent man, a printer; he had lived for years beyond reproach; he was both a good workman, husband and father. But he lost his right arm, the result of an accident at his work, and his character changed from that day. He became morose, violent and cruel, and obsessed with altogether false ideas. He could not reason as other men, and he became dangerous and explosive. Time after time I have seen him committed to prison, until he became a hopeless prison habitue. My experience has also shown me that physical deprivations are equally likely to lead to sharpened wits and perverted moral sense as to explosive and cruel violence. Probably this is natural, for nature provides some compensation to those who suffer loss.
This is what makes the army of the physically handicapped so dangerous. The disabled must needs live, and their perverted moral sense and sharpened wits enable them to live at the expense of the public.
Very clever, indeed, many of these men are; they know how to provoke pity, and they know how to tell a plausible tale. Many of them can get money without even asking for it. They know full well the perils that environ the man who begs. I am not ashamed to say that I have been frequently duped by such fellows, and have learned by sad experience that my wits cannot cope with theirs, and that my safety lies in hasty retreat when they call upon me, for I have always found that conversation with them leads to my own undoing.
Witness the following. One winter night my eldest son, who lives about a mile away, went out to post a letter at midnight. After dropping his letter in the pillar-box,