I CONCLUDE with the statement of a coalbacker, or coalporter—a class to which the term coalheaver is usually given by those who are unversed in the mysteries of the calling. The man wore the approved fantail, and welltarred short smock-frock, black velveteen knee breeches, dirty white stockings, and lace-up boots.

I am a coalbacker," he said. "I have been so these twenty-two years. By a coalbacker, I mean a man who is engaged in carrying coals on his back from ships and craft to the waggons. We get 2 1/4d. for every fifth part of a ton, or 11 1/4d. per ton among five men. We carry the coals in sacks of 2 cwt., the sack usually weighs from 14 lbs. to 20 lbs., so that our load is mostly 238 lbs. We have to carry the load from the hold of the ship, over four barges, to the waggon. The hold of a ship is from sixteen to twenty feet deep. We carry the coals this height up a ladder, and the ship is generally from sixty to eighty feet from the waggon. This distance we have to travel over planks, with the sacks on our backs. Each man will ascend this height and travel this distance about ninety times in a day; hence he will lift himself, with 2 cwt. of coals on his back, 1460 feet, or upwards of a quarter of a mile high, which is three times the height of St. Paul"s, in twelve hours. And besides this, he will travel 6300 feet, or 1 1/4 miles, carrying the same weight as he goes. The labour is very hard—there are few men who can continue at it." My informant said it was too much for him; he had been obliged to give it up eight months back; he had overstrained himself at it, and been obliged to lay up for many months. "I am forty-five years of age," he continued, "and have as many as eight children. None of them bring me in a sixpence. My eldest boy did, a little while back, but his master failed, and he lost his situation. My wife made slop-shirts at a penny each, and could not do more than three a-day. How we have lived through all my illness, I cannot say. I occasionally get a little job, such as mending the hats of my fellowworkmen: this would sometimes bring me in about 2s. in the week, and then the parish allowed four quartern loaves of bread and 2s. 6d. a-week for myself, wife, and eight children. Since I have overstrained myself, I have not done more than two days" work altogether. Sometimes my mates would give me an odd seven tons to do for them, for I was not able to manage more." Such accidents as overstraining are very common among the coalbackers. The labour of carrying such a heavy weight from the ship"s hold is so excessive, that after a man turns forty he is considered to be past his work, and to be very liable to such accidents. It is usually reckoned that the strongest men cannot last more than twenty years at the business. Many of the heartiest of the men are knocked up through the bursting of blood-vessels and other casualties, and even the strongest cannot continue at the labour three days together. After the second day"s work, they are obliged to hire some unemployed mate to do the work for them. The coalbackers work in gangs of five men, consisting of two shovel-men and three backers, and are employed to deliver the ship by the wharfinger. Each gang is paid 11 1/4d. per ton, which is at the rate of 2 1/4d. per ton for each of the five men. The gang will do from thirty to forty tons in the course of the day. The length of the day depends upon the amount of work to be done, according to the wharfinger"s orders. The coalbackers are generally at work at five o"clock in the morning, winter and summer. In the winter time, they have to work by the light of large fires in hanging caldrons, which they call bells. Their day"s work seldom ends before seven o"clock in the evening. They are paid every night, and a man after a hard day"s work will receive 6s. Strong, hearty men, who are able to follow up the work, can earn from 25s. to 30s. per week. But the business is a fluctuating one. In the summer time there is little or nothing to do. The earnings during the slack season are about one half what they are during the brisk. Upon an average, their earnings are 1l. a-week all the year round. The class of coalbackers is supposed to consist of about 1500 men. They have no provident or benefit society. Between seventeen and eighteen years ago, each gang used to have 1s. 0 1/2d. per ton, and about a twelvemonth afterwards it fell to the present price of 11 1/4d. per ton. About six weeks back, the merchants made an attempt to take off the odd farthing; the reason assigned was the cheapness of provisions. They nearly carried it; but the backers formed a committee among themselves, and opposed the reduction so strongly that the idea was abandoned. The backers are paid extra for sifting, at the rate of 2d. per sack. For this office they usually employ a lad, paying him at the rate of 10s. per week. Upon this they will usually clear from 2s. to 4s. per week. The most injurious part of the backer"s work is carrying from the ship"s hold. That is what they object to most of all, and consider they get the worst paid for. They do a great injury to the coalwhippers, and the backers say it would be as great a benefit to themselves as to the coalwhippers, if the system was done away with. By bringing the ships up alongside the wharf, the merchant saves the expense of whipping and lightering, together with the cost of barges, &c. Many of the backers are paid at the public-house; the wharfinger gives them a note to receive their daily earnings of the publican, who has the money from the merchant. Often the backers are kept waiting an hour at the public-house for their money, and they have credit through the day for any drink they may choose to call for. While waiting, they mostly have two or three pots of beer before they are paid; and the drinking once commenced, many of them return home drunk, with only half their earnings in their pockets. There is scarcely a man among the whole class of backers, but heartily wishes the system of payment at the public-house may be entirely abolished. The coalbackers are mostly an intemperate class of men. This arises chiefly from the extreme labour and the over-exertion of the men, the violent perspiration and the intense thirst produced thereby. Immediately a pause occurs in their work, they fly to the public-house for beer. One coalbacker made a regular habit of drinking sixteen half-pints of beer, with a pennyworth of gin in each, before breakfast every morning. The sum spent in drink by the "moderate" men varies from 9s. to 12s. per week, and the immoderate men on the average spend 15s. a-week. Hence, assuming the class of coalbackers to be 2000 in number, and to spend only 10s. a-week in drink each man, the sum that would be annually expended in malt liquors and spirits by the class would amount to no less than 52,000l. The wives and children of the coalbackers are generally in great distress. Sometimes no more than one quarter of the men"s earnings is taken home at night.

When I was moderate inclined," said one of them to me, "I used to have a glass of rum the first thing when I came out of a morning, just to keep the cold out—that might be as early as about five o"clock in the morning, and about seven o"clock I should want half a pint of beer with gin in it, or a pint without. After my work I should be warm, and feel myself dry; then I should continue to work till breakfast-time; then I should have another half pint with gin in it, and so I should keep on through the day, having either some beer or gin every two hours. I reckon that unless a man spent about 1s. 6d. to 2s. in drink, he would not be able to continue his labour through the day. In the evening, he is tired with his work, and being kept at the public-house for his pay, he begins drinking there, and soon feels unwilling to move, and he seldom does so until all his wages are gone." My informant tells me that he thinks the class would be much improved if the system of paying the men at the public-house was done away, and the men paid weekly instead of daily. The hard drinking he thinks a necessity of the hard labour. He has heard, he says, of coalbackers being teetotalers, but none were able to keep the pledge beyond two months. If they drink water and coffee, it will rather increase than quench their thirst. Nothing seems to quench the thirst of a hard-working man so well as ale.

The only difference between the pay of the basketman and the whipper is the 1 1/2d. in the pound which the former receives for carrying the money from the captain of the ship to the clerk of the pay-office. He has also for this sum to keep a correct account of the work done by the men every day, and to find security for his honesty to the amount of 10l. To obtain this, they usually pay 2s. 6d. a-year to the Guarantee Society, and they prefer doing this to seeking the security of some baker or publican in the neighbourhood, knowing that if they did so, they would be expected to become customers of the parties.

I now resume my inquiry whether stimulating drinks are necessary for the performance of severe labour.

I have already published the statement of a coalbacker, who declared that it was an absolute necessity of that kind of labour that the men engaged in backing coals from the hold of a ship should, though earning only per week, spend at least weekly in beer and spirits, to stimulate them for their work. This sum, the man assured me, was a moderate allowance, for was the amount ordinarily expended by the men in drink every week. Now if this quantity of drink be a necessity of the calling, it follows that the men pursuing the severest labour of all—doing work that cripples the strongest in from to years —are the worst paid of all labourers, their actual clear gains being only from to per week. This struck me as being so terrible a state of things that I could hardly believe it to be true, though I was assured by several coalwhippers who were present on the occasion, that the coalbacker who had made the statement had in no way exaggerated the account of the sufferings of his fellow-workmen. I determined, nevertheless, upon inquiring into the question myself, and ascertaining, by the testimony and experience of different classes of individuals engaged in this, the greatest labour, perhaps, performed by any men, whether drink was really a necessity or luxury to the working man.

Accordingly, I called a meeting of the coalwhippers, that I might take their opinion on the subject, when I found that out of individuals only were satisfied that fermented liquors could be dispensed with by the labouring classes. I was, however, still far from satisfied upon the subject, and I determined, as the question is of the greatest importance to the working men,—being more intimately connected with their welfare, physical, intellectual, and moral, than any other,—to give the subject my most patient and unbiassed consideration. I was anxious, without advocating any opinion upon the subject, to collect the sentiments of the coal labourers themselves; and in order that I might do so as impartially as possible, I resolved upon seeing— , such men as were convinced that stimulating liquors were necessary to the labouring man in the performance of his work; ndly, such men as once thought differently, and, in- deed, had once taken the pledge to abstain from the use of all fermented liquors, but had been induced to violate their vow in consequence of their health having suffered; and rdly, such men as had taken the pledge and kept it without any serious injury to their constitutions. To carry the subject out with the fulness and impartiality that its importance seemed to me to demand, I further determined to prosecute the inquiry among both classes of coal labourers—the coalwhippers and coalbackers as well. The result of these investigations I shall now subjoin. Let me, however, in the place, lay before the reader the following

The above calculations have been made from the Official Returns of the Metropolitan Police. The causes of the different degrees of intemperance here exhibited, I leave to others to discover.

After the meeting of coalwhippers just described, I requested some of the men who had expressed the various opinions respecting the necessity for drinking some kind of fermented liquor during their work to meet me, so that I might take down their sentiments on the subject more fully. of all, came of the most intelligent, who believed malt liquor to be necessary for the performance of their labour. was a basketman or fireman, and the other an "up-and-down" man, or whipper; the doing the lighter, and the the heavier kind of work. The basketman, who I afterwards discovered was a good Greek and Latin scholar, said: "If I have anything like a heavy day"s work to do, I consider pints of porter a-day necessary. We are not like other labouring men, having an hour to dinner. Often, to save tide, we take only minutes to our meals. thing I wish to remark is, that what renders it necessary to have the pints of beer in winter, and pots in summer, is the coal-dust arising from the work, which occasions great thirst. In the summer time the basketman is on the plank all day, and continually exposed to the sun, and in the winter to the inclemency of the weather. What with the labour and the heat, the perspiration is excessive. A basketman with a bad gang of men has no sinecure. In the summer he can wear neither coat nor waistcoat; very few can bear the hat on the head, and they wear nightcaps instead. The work is always done, in summer time, with only the shirt and trousers on. The basketman never takes off his shirt, like the whippers. The necessity for drink in the summer does not arise so much from the extent of the labour, as from the irritation caused by the coal-dust getting into the throat. There is not so much dust from the coals in the winter as in the summer, the coals being more damp in wet than in fine weather. It is merely the thirst that makes the drink requisite, as far as the basketman is concerned. Tea would allay the thirst, but there is no opportunity of having this on board ship. If there were an opportunity of having tea at our work, the basketman might manage to do with it as well as with beer. Water I don"t fancy, especially the water of the river; it is very impure, and at the time of the cholera we were prohibited from drinking it. If we could get pure water, I do not think it would do as well for us, especially in winter time. In winter time it would be too cold, and too great a contrast to the heat of the blood. It would, in my opinion, produce stagnation in the circulation. We have had instances of men dying suddenly through drinking water when in a state of excitement." [He distinguishes between excitement and perspiration: he calls the basketman"s labour an exciting , and the whipper"s work a heating .] "The men who died suddenly were whippers. I never heard of a basketman dying from drinking cold water when at his work; I don"t think they ever tried the experiment. The whippers have done so through necessity, not through choice. Tea is a beverage that I don"t fancy, and I conceive it to be equally expensive, so I prefer porter. When I go off to my work early in the morning, I take about a pint of coffee with me in a bottle, and warm it up on board at the galley-fire for my breakfast; that I find quenches my thirst for the time as well porter. Porter would be too insipid the thing in the morning; I never drank coffee through the day while at my work, so I cannot say what the effect would be. I drink porter when at my work, not as giving me greater strength to go through my labour, but merely as a means of quenching my thirst, it being as cheap as any other drink, with the exception of water, and less trouble to procure. Water I consider dangerous at our work, but I can"t say that it is so from my own experience. I was in the hospital about years ago, and the doctor there asked me how many pints of beer I was in the habit of drinking per day. This was before the office was established. I told him, on the lowest calculation, or ; it was the case then under the old system; and he then ordered me pints of porter a-day, as I was very weak, and he said I wanted a stimulus. I am not aware that it is the habit of the publicans to adulterate their porter with salt and water. If such is the case, it would, without a doubt, increase rather than diminish the thirst. I have often found that the beer sold by some of the publicans tends more to create than allay thirst. I am confident, that if the working

The next that I saw were men who did the heaviest work; that is, "up-and-down men," or coalwhippers, as they are usually called. They had both of them been teetotalers. had been so for years, and the other had tried it for months. who stood at least feet and a half high, and was habited in a long blue great coat that reached to his heels, and made him look even taller than he was, said,—"I was a strict teetotaler for many years, and I wish I could be so now. All that time I was a coalwhipper at the heaviest work, and I have made of a gang that have done as many as tons in day. I drank no fermented liquor the whole of the time; I had only ginger-beer and milk, and that cost me It was in the summer time. I didn"t "buff it" on that day; that is, I didn"t take my shirt off. I did this work at the Regent"s Canal; and there was a little milk-shop close on shore, and I used to run there when I was dry. I had about quarts of milk and bottles of ginger-beer, or about quarts of fluid altgether. I found that amount of drink necessary. I perspired very violently; my shirt was wet through, and my flannels wringing wet with the perspiration over the work. The rule among us is, that we do tons on deck, and tons filling in the ship"s hold. We go on in that way throughout the day, spelling at every tons. The perspiration in the summer time streams down our foreheads so rapidly, that it will often get into our eyes before we have time to wipe it off. This makes the eyes very sore. At night, when we get home, we cannot bear to sit with a candle. The perspiration is of a very briny nature, for I often taste it as it runs down to my lips. We are often so heated over our work that the perspiration runs into the shoes; and often, from the dust and heat, jumping up and down, and the feet being galled with the small dust, I have had my shoes full of blood. The thirst produced by our work is very excessive; it is completely as if you had a fever upon you. The dust gets into the throat, and very nearly suffocates you. You can scrape the coal-dust off the tongue with the teeth; and do what you will it is impossible to get the least spittle into the mouth. I have known the coal-dust to be that thick in a ship"s hold, that I have been unable to see my mate, though he was only feet from me. Your legs totter under you, both before and after you are a teetotaler. I was of the strongest men in the business; I was able to carry cwt. on my back for yards, and I could lift half-hundreds with my right-arm. After finishing my day"s work I was like a child with weakness. When we have done or tons, we generally stop for a drop of drink, and then I have found that anything that would wet my mouth would revive me. Cold tea, milk, or gingerbeer, were refreshing, but not so much as a pint of porter. Cold water would give a pain in the inside, so that a man would have to lie down and be taken ashore, and, perhaps, give up work altogether. Many a man has been taken to the hospital merely through drinking cold water over his work.

Another man, who had been a teetotaler for months at time, and years at another, was convinced that it was impossible for a hard-working man to do his work as well without beer as with. "He had tried it twice, and he spoke from his own experience, and he would say that a little—that is, pints, or for a very hard day"s labour,— would never hurt no man. Beyond that a man has no right to go; indeed, anything extra only makes him stupid. Under the old system, I used to be obliged to buy rum; and, over and over again, I"ve had to pay fifteenpence for half-a-pint of rum in a ginger-beer bottle; and have gone into the street and sold it for sixpence, and got a steak with the money. No man can say drink has ruined my constitution, for I"ve only had pennyworth of antibilious pills in years; and I will say, a little beer does a man more good than harm, and too much does a man more harm than good."

The next "whippers" that I saw were both teetotalers. had taken the pledge months before, and the other years; and they had both kept it strictly. had been cellarman at a public-house, and he said, "I neither take spruce nor any of the cordials: water is my beverage at dinner." The other had been an inveterate drunkard. The cellarman is now a basketman, and the other an up-and-down man, or whipper, in the same gang. The basketman said, "I can say this from my own experience,—that it is not necessary for a working man, doing the very hardest labour, to drink fermented liquors. I was an up-and-down man for years, without tasting a drop of beer or spirits. I have helped to whip tons of coal in day, without any; and that in the heat of summer. What I had with me was a bottle of cocoa; and I took with that plenty of steak, potatoes, and bread. If the men was to take more meat and less beer, they would do much better. It"s a delusion to think beer necessary. Often, the men who say the beer is necessary will deliver a ship, aye, and not half-a-dozen half-pints be drank aboard. The injury is done ashore. The former custom of our work—the compulsory system of drinking that we were under,— has so imbedded the idea of drink in the men,

The teetotaler, who had been an inveterate drunkard in his time, stated as follows. Like most of the coalwhippers, he thought once that he could not do his work without beer. He used to drink as much as he could get. He averaged pots at his work, and when he came on shore he would have pots more.

He had been a coalwhipper for upwards of twenty years, and for nineteen years and three months of that time he was a hard drinker,—a regular stiff "un," said he; "I not only used," he added, "to get drunk, but I taught my children to do so,—I have got sons as big as myself, coalbackers, and total abstainers. Often I have gone home on a Sunday morning drunk myself, and found two of my sons drunk,—they"d be unable to sit at the table. They were about fourteen then, and when they went out with me I used to teach them to take their little drops of neat rum or gin. I have seen the youngest "mop up" his half-quartern as well as I did. Then I was always thirsty; and when I got up of a morning I used to go stalking round to the first public-house that was open, to see if I could get a pint or a quartern. My mouth was dry and parched, as if I had got a burning fever. If I had no work that day I used to sit in a public-house and spend all the money I"d got. If I had no money I would go home and raise it somehow. I would ask the old woman to give me the price of a pint, or perhaps the young uns were at work, and I was pretty safe to meet them coming home. Talk about going out of a Sunday! I was ashamed to be seen out. My clothes were ragged, and my shoes would take the water in at one end and let it out at the other. I keep my old rags at home, to remind me of what I was—I call them the regimentals of the guzzler. I pawned everything I could get at. For ten or twelve years I used a beer-shop regularly. That was my house of call. Now my home is very happy. All my children are teetotalers. My sons are as big as myself, and they are at work carrying 1 3/4 cwt. to 2 cwt. up a Jacob"s ladder, thirty-three steps high. They do this all day long, and have been doing so for the last seven days. They drink nothing but water or cold tea, and say they find themselves the better able to do their work. Coalbacking is about the hardest labour a man can perform. For myself, too, I find I am quite as able to do my work without intoxicating drinks as I was with them. There"s my basketman," said he, pointing to the other teetotaler, "and he can tell you whether what I say is true or not. I have helped to whip 147 tons of coal in the heat of summer. The other men were calling for beer every time they could see or hear a purlman, but I took nothing—I don"t think I perspired so much as they did. When I was in the drinking custom, I have known the perspiration run down my arms and legs as if I"d been in a hot bath. Since I"ve taken the pledge I scarcely perspire at all. I"ll work against any man that takes beer, provided I have a good teetotal pill—that is, a good pound of steak, with plenty of gravy in it. That"s the stuff to work upon—that"s what the working man wants—plenty of it, and less beer, and he"d beat a horse any day. I am satisfied the working man can never be raised above his present position until he can give over drinking. That is the reason why I am sticking to the pledge, that I may be a living example to my class that they can and may work without beer. It has made my home happy, and I want it to make every other working man"s as comfortable. I tried the principle of teetotalism first on board a steam- boat. I was stoker, and we burnt 27 cwt. of coals every hour we were at sea—that"s very nearly a ton and a-half per hour. There, with the heat of the fire, we felt the effects of drinking strong brandy. Brandy was the only fermented drink we were allowed. After a time I tried what other stimulants we could use. The heat in the hold, especially before the fires, was awful. There were nine stokers and four coal-trimmers. We found that the brandy that we drank in the day made us ill, our heads ached when we got up in the morning, so four of us agreed to try oatmeal and water as our drink, and we found that suited us better than intoxicating liquor. I myself got as fat as a bull upon it. It was recommended to me by a doctor in Falmouth, and we all of us tried it eight or nine voyages. Some time after I left the company I went to strong drink again, and continued at it till the 1st of May last, and then my children"s love of drink got so dreadful that I got to hate myself as being the cause of it. But I couldn"t give up the drinking. Two of my mates, however, urged me to try. On the 1st of May I signed the pledge. I prayed to God on the night I went to give me strength to keep it, and never since have I felt the least inclination to return. When I had left off a fortnight I found myself a great deal better; all the cramps that I had been loaded with when I was drinking left me. Now I am happy and comfortable at home. My wife"s about one of the best women in the world. She bore with me in all my troubles, and now she glories in my redemption. My children love me, and we club all our earnings together, and can always on Sunday manage a joint of sixteen or seventeen pounds. My wife, now that we are teetotalers, need do no work; and, in conclusion, I must say that I have much cause to bless the Lord that ever I signed the teetotal pledge.

After I leave my work," added the teetotaler, "I find the best thing I can have to refresh me is a good wash of my face and shoulders in cold water. This is twice as enlivening as ever I found beer. Once a fortnight I goes over to Goulston--square, Whitechapel, and have a warm bath. This is one of the finest things that ever was invented for the working man. Any persons that use them don"t want beer. I invited a coalwhipperman to come with me once. "How much does it cost?" he asked. I told him, "A penny." "Well," he said, "I"d sooner have half-a-pint of beer. I haven"t washed my body for these twentytwo years, and don"t see why I should begin to have anything to do with these new-fangled notions at my time of life." I will say, that a good wash is better for the working man than the best drink.

The man ultimately made a particular request that his statement might conclude with a verse that he had chosen from the Temperance Melodies:—

And now we love the social cheer,

Of the bright winter eve;

We have no cause for sigh or tear,

We have no cause to grieve.

We boast where"er we go— "Twas all because we sign"d the pledge,

A long, long time ago.

At the close of my interview with these men I received from them an invitation to visit them at their own houses whenever I should think fit. It was clearly their desire that I should see the comforts and domestic arrangements of their homes. Accordingly on the morrow, choosing an hour when there could have been no preparation, I called at the lodgings of the . I found the whole family assembled in the back kitchen, that served them for a parlour. As I entered the room the mother was busy at work, washing and dressing her children for the day. There stood little things, so young that they seemed to be all about the same height, with their faces shining with the soap and water, and their cheeks burning red with the friction of the towel. They were all laughing and playing about the mother, who, with comb and brush in hand, found it no easy matter to get them to stand still while she made "the parting." of all the man asked me to step up-stairs and see the sleeping-room. I was much struck with the scrupulous cleanliness of the apartment. The blind was as white as snow, half rolled up, and fastened with a pin. The floor was covered with patches of different coloured carpet, showing that they had been bought from time to time, and telling how difficult it had been to obtain the luxury. In corner was a cupboard with the door taken off, the better to show all the tumblers, teacups, and coloured-glass mugs, that, with decanters, well covered with painted flowers, were kept more for ornament than use. On the chimneypiece was a row of shells, china shepherdesses, and lambs, and a stuffed pet canary in a glass-case for a centre ornament. Against the wall, surrounded by other pictures, hung a half-crown watercolour drawing of the wife, with a child on her knee, matched on the other side by the husband"s likeness, cut out in black paper. Pictures of bright-coloured ducks and a print of Father Moore the teetotaler completed the collection.

You see," said the man, "we manages pretty well; but I can assure you we has a hard time of it to do it at all comfortably. Me and my wife is just as we stands—all our other things are in pawn. If I was to drink I don"t know what I should do. How others manage is to me a mystery. This will show you I speak the truth," he added, and going to a secretary that stood against the wall he produced a handful of duplicates. There were seventeen tickets in all, amounting to 3l. 0s. 6d., the highest sum borrowed being 10s. "That"ll show you I don"t like my poverty to be known, or I should have told you of it before. And yet we manage to sleep clean;" and he pulled back the patchwork counterpane, and showed me the snow-white sheets beneath. "There"s not enough clothes to keep us warm, but at least they are clean. We"re obliged to give as much as we can to the children. Cleanliness is my wife"s hobby, and I let her indulge in it. I can assure you last week my wife had to take the gown off her back to get 1s. on it. My little ones seldom have a bit of meat from one Sunday to another, and never a bit of butter.

I then descended into the parlour. The children were all seated on little stools that their father had made for them in his spare moments, and warming themselves round the fire, their little black shoes resting on the white hearth. From their regular features, small mouths, large black eyes, and fair skins, no would have taken them for a labouring man"s family. In answer to my questions, he said: "The eldest of them (a pretty little halfclad girl, seated in corner) is , the next , that , that , and this (a little thing perched upon a table near the mother) . I"ve got all their ages in the Bible up-stairs." I remarked a strange look about of the little girls. "Yes, she always suffered with that eye; and down at the hospital they lately performed an operation on it." An artificial pupil had been made.

The room was closed in from the passage by a rudely built partition. "That I did myself in my leisure," said the man; "it makes the room snugger." As he saw me looking at the clean rolling-pin and bright tins hung against the wall, he observed: "That"s all my wife"s doing. She has got them together by sometimes going without dinner herself, and laying out the or in things of that sort. That is how she manages. To-day she has got us a sheep"s head and a few turnips for our Sunday"s dinner," he added, taking off the lid of the boiling saucepan. Over the mantelpiece hung a picture of George IV., surrounded by other frames. of them contained merely locks of hair. The man, laughing, told me, " of them are locks of myself and my wife, and the light in the middle belonged to my wife"s brother, who died in India. That"s her doing again," he added.

After this I paid a visit to the other teetotaler at his home, and there saw of his sons. He had children altogether, and also supported his wife"s mother. If it wasn"t for him, the poor old thing, who was seventyfive, and a teetotaler too, must have gone to the workhouse. of his children lived at home; the other were out at service. of the lads at home was a coalbacker. He was years of age, and on an average could earn It was years since he had taken to backing. He said, "I am at work at of the worst wharfs in London; it is called "the slaughter-house" by

In order to complete my investigations concerning the necessity of drinking in the coalwhipping trade, I had an interview with some of the more intelligent of the men who had been principally concerned in the passing of the Act that rescued the class from the "thraldom of the publican."

"I consider," said , "that drink is not a necessity of our labour, but it is a necessity of the system under which we were formerly working. I have done the hardest work that any labouring man can do, and drank no fermented liquor. Nor do I consider fermented liquors to be necessary for the severest labour. This I can say of my own experience, having been a teetotaler for months. But if the working man don"t have the drink, he must have good solid food, superior to what he is in the habit of having. A pot of coffee and a good beef dumpling will get over the most severe labour. But if he can"t have that he must have the stimulants. A pint of beer he can always have on credit, but he can"t the beef dumpling. If there is an excuse for any persons drinking there is for the coalwhippers, for under the old system they were forced to become habitual drunkards to obtain work."

I also questioned another of the men, who had been a prime mover in obtaining the Act. He assured me, that before the "emancipation" of the men the universal belief of the coalwhippers, encouraged by the publicans, was, that it was impossible for them to work without liquor. In order to do away with that delusion, the principal agents in procuring the Act became teetotalers of their own accord, and remained so, for months and another for years, in order to prove to their fellow workmen that drinking over their labour could be dispensed with, and that they might have "cool brains to fight through the work they had undertaken."

Another of the more intelligent men who had been a teetotaler:—"I performed the hardest labour I ever did, before or after, with more ease and satisfaction than ever I did under the drinking system. It is quite a delusion to believe that with proper nutriment the

After this I was anxious to continue my investigations among the coalporters, and see whether the more intelligent among them were as firmly convinced as the better class of coalwhippers were, that intoxicating drinks were not necessary for the performance of hard labour. I endeavoured to find of each class, pursuing the same plan as I had adopted with the coalwhippers: viz. I sought , who was so firmly convinced of the necessity of drinking fermented liquors during his work, that he had never been induced to abandon them; secondly, I endeavoured to obtain the evidence of who had tried the principle of total abstinence and found it fail; and thirdly, I strove to procure the opinion of those who had been teetotalers for several years, and who could conscientiously state that no stimulant was necessary for the performance of their labour. Subjoined is the result of my investigations.

Concerning the motives and reasons for the great consumption of beer by the coalporters, I obtained the following statement from of them:—"I"ve been all my life at coalportering, off and on, and am now . For the last years or so I"ve worked regularly as a filler to Mr. ——"s waggons. I couldn"t do my work without a good allowance of beer. I can"t afford so much now, as my family costs me more; but my regular allowance time was pots a-day. I have drank pots, and always a glass of gin in the morning to keep out the cold air from the water. If I got off then for a-week for drink I reckoned it a cheap week. I can"t do my work without my beer, and no coalporter can, properly. It"s all nonsense talking about ginger-beer, or tea, or milk, or that sort of thing; what body is there in any of it? Many a time I might have been choked with coal-dust, if I hadn"t had my beer to clear my throat with. I can"t say that I"m particularly thirsty like next morning, after drinking or pots of beer to my own work, but I don"t get drunk." He frequently, and with some emphasis, repeated the words, "But I don"t get drunk." "You see, when you"re at such hard work as ours, "s tired soon, and a drop of good beer puts new sap into a man. It oils his joints like. He can lift better and stir about brisker. I don"t care much for beer when I"m quiet at home on a Sunday; it sets me to sleep then. I once tried to go without to please a master, and did work day with only half-pint. I went home as tired as a dog. I should have been soon good for nothing if I"d gone on that way—half-pinting in a day. Lord love you! we know a drop of good beer. The coalporters is admitted to be as good judges of beer as any men in London—maybe, the best judges; better than publicans. No salt and water will go down with us. It"s no use a publican trying to gammon us with any of his cag-mag stuff. Salt and water for us! Sartainly, a drop of short (neat spirit) does good in a cold morning like this; it"s uncommon raw by the waterside, you see. Coalporters doesn"t often catch cold—beer and gin keeps it out. Perhaps my beer and gin now cost me a-week, and that"s a deal out of what I can earn. I dare say I earn a-week. Sometimes I may spend That"s a of my earnings, you say, and so it is; and as it"s necessary for my work, isn"t it a shame a poor man"s pot of beer, and drop of gin, and pipe of tobacco, should be so dear? Taxes makes them dear. I can read, sir, and I understand these things. Beer— pots a-day of it doesn"t make me step unsteady. Hard work carries it off, and so doesn"t feel it that way. Beer"s made of corn as well as bread, and so it stands to reason it"s nourishing. Nothing"ll persuade me it isn"t. Let a teetotal gentleman try his hand at coal-work, and then he"ll see if beer has no support in it. Too much is bad, I know, but a man can always tell how much he wants to help him on with his work. If beer didn"t agree with me, of course I wouldn"t drink it: but it does. Sartainly we drops into a beer-shop of a night, and does tipple a little when work"s done; and the old women (our wives) comes for us, and they get a sup to soften them, and so they may get to like it overmuch, as you say, and "s bit of a house may go to rack and manger. I"ve a good wife myself, though. I know well enough all them things is bad—drunkenness is bad! All I ask for is a proper allowance at work; the rest is no good. I can"t tell whether too much or no beer at coal-work would be best; perhaps none at all: leastways it would be safer. I shouldn"t like to try either. Perhaps coalporters does get old sooner than other trades, and mayn"t live so long; but that"s their hard work, and it would be worse still without beer. But I don"t get drunk."

I conversed with several men on the subject of their beer-drinking, but the foregoing is the only statement I met with where a coalporter could give any reason for his faith in the virtues of beer; and vague as in some points it may be, the other reasons I had to listen to were still vaguer. "Somehow we can"t do without beer; it puts in the strength that the work takes out." "It"s necessary for support." Such was the pith of every argument.

In order fully to carry out this inquiry, I obtained the address of a coalbacker from the ships, who worked hard and drank a good deal of beer, and who had the character of being an industrious man. I saw him in his own apartment, his wife being present while he made the following statement:—"I"ve worked at backing since I was , and that"s more than years ago. I limit myself now, because times is not so good, to pots of beer a-day; that is, when I"m all day at work. Some takes more. I reckon, that when times was better I drank pots a-week,

I now give the statement of a coalporter who had been a teetotaler:—"I have been twentytwo years a coalheaver. When I began that work I earned a-week as backer and filler. I am now earning, week with another, say We have no sick fund among us—no society of any sort—no club—no schools—no nothing. We had a kind of union among us before the great strike, more than years back, but it was just for the strike. We struck against masters lowering the pay for a ton to from The strike only lasted or weeks, and the men were forced to give way; they didn"t all give way at once, but came to gradual. can"t see "s wife and children without bread. There"s very few teetotalers among us, though there"s not many of us now that can be called drunken —they can"t get it, sir. I was a teetotaler myself for years, till I couldn"t keep to it any longer. We all break. It"s a few years back, I forget zactly when. At that time teetotalers might drink shrub, but that never did me no good; a good cup of tea freshened me more. I used then to drink ginger-beer, and spruce, and tea, and coffee. I"ve paid as much as a-week for ginger-beer. When I teetotaled, I always felt thirsty. I used to long for a drink of beer, but somehow managed to get past a public-house, until I could stand it no longer. A clerk of ours broke , and I followed him. I certainly felt weaker before I went back to my beer; now I drink a pint or as I find I want it. I can"t do without it, so it"s no use trying. I joined because I felt I was getting racketty, and giving my mind to nothing but drink, instead of looking to my house. There may be a few teetotalers among us, but I think not. I only knew . We all break—we can"t keep it. of these broke, and the other kept it, because, if he breaks, his wife"ll break, and they were both regular drunkards. A coalporter"s worn out before what you may call well old. There"s not very old men among us. A man"s done up at , and seldom lives long after, if he has to keep on at coalportering. I wish we had some sick fund, or something of that kind. If I was laid up now, there would be nothing but the parish for me, my wife, and

I saw this man in the evening, after he had left his work, in his own room. It was a large and airy garret. His wife, who did not know previously of my visit, had in her domestic arrangements manifested a desire common to the better disposed of the wives of the labourers, or the poor—that of trying to make her "bit of place" look comfortable. She had to tend a baby months old; elder children were ill clad, but clean; the eldest boy, who is , is in the summer employed on a river steamboat, and is then of great help to his parents. There were beds in the room, and the bedding was decently arranged so as to form a bundle, while its scantiness or worn condition was thus concealed. The solitary table had a faded green cloth cover, very threadbare, but still a cover. There were a few cheap prints over the mantelshelf, and the best description I can give is, in a phrase not uncommon among the poor, that the whole was an attempt to "appear decent." The woman spoke well of her husband, who was kind to her, and fond of his home, and never drank on Sundays.

Last of all, I obtained an interview with coalporters who had been teetotalers for some years:—

I have been a coalporter ever since I have been able to carry coals," said one. "I began at sixteen. I have been a backer all the time. I have been a teetotaler eight years on the 10th of next March. My average earnings where I am now is about 35s. per week. At some wharfs work is very bad, and the men don"t average half that. They were paid every night where I worked last, and sometimes I have gone home with 2 1/2d. Take one with the other, I should say the coalporter"s earnings average about 1l. a-week. My present place is about as good a berth as there is along the waterside. There is only one gang of us, and we do as much work as two will do in many wharfs. Before I was a teetotaler, I principally drank ale. I judged that the more I gave for my drink, the better it was. Upon an average, I used to drink from three to four pints of ale per day. I used to drink a good drop of gin, too. The coalporters are very partial to "dog"s nose"—that is, half a pint of ale with a pennyworth of gin in it; and when they have got the money, they go up to what they term "the lucky shop" for it. The coalporters take this every morning through the week, when they can afford it. After my work, I used to drink more than when I was at it. I used to sit as long as the house would let me have any. Upon an average, I should say I used to take three or four pints more of an evening; so that, altogether, I think I may fairly say I drank my four pots of ale regularly every day, and about half a pint of dog"s nose. I reckon my drink used to cost me 13s. a-week when I was at work. At times I was a drunken, noisy gentleman then.

Another coalporter, who has been a teetaler years on the of last August, told me, that before he took the pledge he used to drink a great deal after he had done his work, but while he was at work he could not stand it. "I don"t think I used to drink above pints and a half and a pennyworth of gin in the daytime," said this man. "Of an evening I used to stop at the publichouse, generally till I was drunk and unfit to work in the morning. I will vouch for it I used to take about pots a-day after I had done work. My reckoning used to come to about a-day, or, including Sundays, about per week. At that time I could average all the year round about a-week, and I used to drink away of it regularly. I did, indeed, sir, more to my shame."

The other coalporter told me his earnings averaged about the same, but he drank more.

I should say I got rid of nearly one-half of my money. I did like the beer then: I thought I could not live without it. It"s between twelve and thirteen years since the first coalporter signed the pledge. His name was John Sturge, and he was looked upon as a madman. I looked upon him myself in that light. The next was Thomas Bailey, and he was my teetotal father. When I first heard of a coalporter doing without beer, I thought it a thing impossible. I made sure they wouldn"t live long; it was part of my education to believe they couldn"t. My grandfather brewed homebrewed beer, and he used to say to me, "Drink, my lad, it"ll make thee strong." The coalporters say now, if we could get the genuine home-brewed, that would be the stuff to do us good; the publican"s wash is no good. I drank for strength; the stimulation caused by the alcohol I mistook for my own power.

"Richard Hooper! He"s been a teetotaler now about years. He was the of the coaleys as signed the pledge, and he instilled teetotalism on my mind," said the other man. "Where he works now there"s out of men is teetotalers. Seeing that he could do his work much better than when he drinked beer, induced me to become . He was more regular in his work after he had given it up than whenever I knowed him before."

"The way in which Thomas Bailey put it into my head was this here," continued the other. "He invited me to a meeting: I told him I would come, but he"d never make a teetotaler of me, I knowed. I went with the intention to listen to what they could have to say. I was a little bit curious to know how they could make out that beer was no good for a body. The man that addressed the meeting was a tailor. I thought

"I wish to say this much," said the other teetotaler: "it"s a practice with some of the coal-merchants to pay their men in publichouses, and this is the chief cause of a great portion of the wages being spent in drink. I once worked for a master upon as paid his men at a public-house, and I worked a week there, which yearned me and some odd halfpence. When I went on Saturday night the publican asked me what I was come for. In reply, I said "I"m come to settle." He said, "You"re already settled with," meaning I had nothing to take. I had drinked all my lot away, he said, with the exception of I had borrowed during the week. Then I told him to look back, and he"d find I"d something due to me. He did so, and said there was a halfpenny. I had nothing to take home to my wife and children. I asked the publican to lend me a few shillings, saying my young un"s had nothing to eat. His reply was, "That"s nothing to me, that"s your business." After that I made it my business. While I stood at the bar in came the teetotalers, and picked up the each that was coming to them, and I thought how much better they was off than me. The publican stopped all my money for drink that I knowed I"d not had, and yet I couldn"t help myself, "cause he had the paying on me. Then something came over me as I stood there, and I said, "From this night, with the help of God, I"ll never taste of another drop of intoxicating liquors." That"s years ago the of last August, and I"ve kept my pledge ever since, thank God! That publican has been the making of me. The master what discharged me before for getting drunk, when he heard that I was sober sent for me back again. But before that, the teetotalers who was a working along with me was discharged by their master, to oblige the publican who stopped my money. The publican, you see, had his coals from the wharf. He was a "brass-plate coal-merchant" as well as a publican, and had private customers of his own. He threatened to take his work away from the wharf if the teetotalers wasn"t discharged; and sure enough the master did discharge them, sooner than lose so good a customer. Many of the masters now are growing favourable to teetotalism. I can say that I"ve done more on the principle of total abstinence than ever I done before. I"m better in health, I"ve no trembling when I goes to my work of a morning; but, on the contrary, I"m ready to meet it. I"m happier at home. We never has no angry words now," said the man, with a shake of the head, and a strong emphasis on the "My children never runs away from me as they used to before; they come and embrace me more. My money now goes for eatables and clothes, what I and my children once was deprived on through my intemperate habits. And I bless God and the publican that made me a teetotaler—that I do sincerely—every night as I go to bed. And as for men to hold out that they can"t do their work without it, I"m prepared to prove that we have done more work without it than ever we have done or could do with it."

I have been requested by the coalwhippers to publish the following expression of gratitude on their part towards the Government for the establishment of the Coalwhippers" Office:—

The change that the Legislature has produced in us, by putting an end to the thraldom of the publican by the institution of this office, we wish it to be generally known that we and our wives and children are very thankful for.

I shall now conclude with the following estimate of the number of the hands, ships, &c. engaged in the coal trade in London.

There are about wharfs, I am informed, from to , as well as those on the City-canal. A large wharf will keep about horses, waggons, and carts; and it will employ constantly from to gangs of men. Besides these, there will be waggoners, I cart-carman, and about trouncers —in all, from to men. A small wharf will employ gang of men, about horses, waggons, and cart, waggoners, trouncer, and cart-carman. At the time of the strike, years ago, there were more than coalporters, I am told, in London. It is supposed that there is an average of gang, or about men employed in each wharf; or, in all, coalporters in constant employment, and about and odd men out of work. There are in the trade about waggons and cart to each wharf, or waggons and carts, having horses; to these there would be about waggoners and cart-carman upon an average to each wharf, or in all. Each wharf would occupy about trouncers, or in the whole.

Hence the statistics of the coal trade will be as follows:—

I continue my inquiry into the state of the coal-labourers of the metropolis.

The coalheavers, properly so called, are now no longer known in the trade. The class of coalheavers, according to the vulgar acceptation of the word, is divided into coalwhippers, or those who whip up or lift the coals rapidly from the hold, and the coalbackers, or those who carry them on their backs to the wharf, either from the hold of the ship moored alongside the wharf, or from the lighter into which the coals have been whipped from the collier moored in the middle of the river, or "Pool." Formerly the coals were delivered from the holds of the ships by the labourers shovelling them on to a series of stages, raised above the other till they ultimately reached the deck. or men were on each stage, and hove the coals up to the stage immediately above them. The labourers engaged in this process were termed "coalheavers." But now the coals are delivered at once from the hold by means of a sudden jerk, which "whips " them on deck. This is the process of coalwhipping, and it is performed chiefly in the middle of the river, to fill the "rooms" of the barges that carry the coals from the ship to the wharf. Coals are occasionally delivered immediately from the ship on to the wharf by means of the process of "coalbacking," as it is called. This consists in the sacks being filled in the hold, and then carried on the men"s backs up a ladder from the hold, along planks from the ship to the wharf. By this means, it will be easily understood that the ordinary processes of whipping and lightering are avoided. By the process of coalwhipping, the ship is delivered in the middle of the river, or the "Pool" as it is called, and the coals are lightered, or carried to the wharf, by means of barges, whence they are transported to the wharf by the process of backing. But when the coals are backed out of the ship itself on to the wharf, the preliminary processes are done away with. The ship is moored alongside, and the coals are delivered directly from the ships to the premises of the wharfinger. By this means the wharfingers, or coalmerchants, below bridge, are enabled to have their coals delivered at a cheaper price than those above bridge, who must receive the cargoes by means of the barges. I am assured that the colliers, in being moored alongside the wharfs, receive considerable damage, and strain their timbers severely from the swell of the steamboats passing to and fro. Again, the process of coalbacking appears to be of so extremely laborious a nature that the health, and indeed the lives, of the men are both greatly injured by it. Moreover, the benefit remains solely with the merchant, and not with the consumer, for the price of the coals delivered below bridge is the same as those delivered above. The expense of delivering the ship is always borne by the shipowner. This is, at present, per ton, and was originally intended to be given to the whippers. But the merchant, by the process of backing, has discovered the means of avoiding this process; and so he puts the money which was originally paid by the shipowner for whipping the coals into his own pocket, for the consumer is not a commensurate gainer. Since the merchant below bridge charges the same price to the public for his coals as the merchant above, it is clear that he alone is benefited at the expense of the public, the coalwhippers, and even the coalbackers themselves; for on inquiry among this latter class, I find that they object as much as the whippers to the delivery of a ship from the hold, the mounting of the ladders from the hold being of a most laborious and injurious nature. I have been supplied by a gentleman who is intimately acquainted with the expenses of the processes with the following comparative account:—

By the above account it will be seen, that if a collier of tons is delivered in the Pool, the expense is , but if delivered at the wharf-side the expense is , the difference between the processes being Hence, if the consumer were the gainer, the coals should be delivered below bridge a ton cheaper than they are above bridge. The coalwhippers ordinarily engaged in the whipping of the coals would have gained each man if they had not been "backed" out of the ship; but as the coals delivered by backing below bridge are not cheaper, and the whippers have not re-

Wishing to perfect the inquiry, I thought it better to see of the seamen engaged in the trade. Accordingly, I went off to some of the colliers lying in Mill Hole, and found an intelligent man, ready to give me the information I sought. His statement was, that he had been to sea between and twentyseven years altogether. "Out of that time," he said, "I"ve had or years" experience at the coal-trade. I"ve been to the East Indies and West Indies, and served my apprenticeship in a whaler. I have been to the Mediterranean, and to several parts of France. I think that, take the general run, the living and treatment of the men in the coal-trade is better than in any other going. It"s difficult to tell how many ships I"ve been in, and how many owners I"ve served under. I have been in the same ship for or years, and I have been only voyage in ship. You see, we are obliged to study our own interest as much as we can. Of course the masters won"t do it for us. Speaking generally, of the different ships and different owners I"ve served under, I think the men are generally well served. I have been in some that have been very badly victualled: the small stores in particular, such as tea, sugar, and coffee, have been very bad. They, in general, nip us very short. There is a regular allowance fixed by Act of Parliament; but it"s too little for a man to go by. Some owners go strictly by the Act, and some give more; but I don"t know that gives under. Indeed, as a general rule, I think the men in the trade have nothing to complain of. The only thing is, the wages are generally small; and the ships are badly manned. In bad weather there is not enough hands to take the sail off her, or else there wouldn"t be so many accidents as there are. The average tonnage of a coal-ship is from up to about tons. There are sometimes large ships; but they come seldom, and when they do, they carry but part coal cargo. They only load a portion with coals that they may be able to come across the bar-harbours in the north. If they were loaded altogether with coals, they couldn"t get over the bar: they would draw too much water. For a ship of about from to tons, the usual complement is generally from to hands, boys, captain, and men all included together. There might be men before the mast—a master, a mate, and a boy. This is sadly too little. A ship of this sort shouldn"t, to my mind, have less than hands: that is the least to be safe. In rough weather, you see, perhaps the ship is letting water: the master takes the "hellum," hand, in general, stops on deck to work the pumps, and goes aloft. Most likely of the boys has only been to sea or voyages; and if there"s hands to such a ship, of them is sure to be "green-boys," just fresh from the shore, and of little or no use to us. We haven"t help enough to get the sail off the yards in time,— there"s no on deck looking out,—it may be thick weather,—and, of course, it"s properly dangerous. About half the accidents at sea occur from the ships being badly manned. The ships generally, throughout the coaltrade, have hand in too little. The colliers, mostly, carry double their registered tonnage. A ship of tons carrying , will have hands, when she ought to have or ; and out of the that she does have, perhaps of them is boys. All sailors in the coal-trade are paid by the voyage. They vary from up to for able-bodied seamen. The ships from the same port in the north give all alike for a London journey. In the height of summer, the wages is from to ; and in the winter they are Them"s the highest wages given this winter. The wages are incrcased in the winter, because the work"s harder and the weather"s colder. Some of the ships lay up, and there"s a greater demand for those that are in the trade. It"s true that the seamen of those that are laying up are out of employ; but I can"t say why it is that the wages don"t come down in consequence. All I know is they go up in the winter. This is sadly too little pay, this a journey. Probably, in the winter, a man may make only journeys in months; and if he"s got a wife and family, his expenses is going on at home all the while. The voyage I consider to last from the time of sailing from the north port, to the time of entering the north port again. The average time of coming from the north port to London is from to days. Sometimes the passage has been done in : but I"m speaking of the average. We are generally about days at sea, making the voyage from the north and back. The rest of the time we are discharging cargo, or lying idle in the Pool. On making the port of London, we have to remain in "the Section" till the cargo is sold. "The Section" is between Woolwich and Gravesend. I have remained there as much as weeks. I have

A basketman, who was present whilst I was taking the above statement, told me that the foreman of the coalwhippers had more chances of judging of the state of the provisions supplied to the colliers than the men had themselves; for the basketmen delivered many different ships, and it was the general rule for them to get their dinner aboard, among the sailors. The basketman here referred to told me that he had been a butcher, and was consequently well able to judge of the quality of the meat. "I have no hesitation," said he, "in stating, that half the meat supplied to the seamen is unfit for human consumption. I speak of the pork in particular. Frequently the men throw it overboard to get it out of the way. Many a time when I"ve been dining with the men I wouldn"t touch it. It fairly and regularly stinks as they takes it out of the coppers."