DECEMBER 429 



to look on than is the dull appropriate light of this December after- 

 noon. The old men, too, their hands knobbed and knotted with 

 decades of hard work, their backs bent, their faces often almost 

 grotesque, like those caricatures of humanity we see carved upon 

 the handle of a stick, come here at last in reward of their labours 

 well, as the French writer says, ' cela donnefurieusement apenser? 

 It is not the place that is so melancholy, it is this poignant example 

 of the sad end of life and all its toi lings ; it is the forlorn, half-dazed 

 aspect of these battered human hulks who once were young, and 

 strong, and comely. 



Year by year fewer people seem to drift into the House, I 

 suppose because of the shrinkage of the population, coupled with 

 an extension of the system of outdoor relief. This system is one 

 that, without precautions, lends itself to fraud and the waste of 

 public money, although I believe in it myself if it is properly and 

 carefully administered. In some cases, however, when they are 

 alone in the world and too helpless to do much for themselves, the 

 aged poor are doubtless much better off in the House than dragging 

 out the dregs of a miserable existence with the help of two shillings 

 a week and a stone of flour. Here at least they are kept warm and 

 clean, and find suitable nursing and attendance until the end comes. 

 The food also is much better and more plentiful than they can 

 hope to enjoy at home. 



And yet how they hate it, most of them. In this parish dwells 

 a vacuous but amiable old fellow called Turk Taylor, who has no 

 belongings and picks up a living heaven knows how, for beyond a 

 parish cottage which he occupies, and some small allowance from 

 the rates, supplemented by an occasional job of pig-herding, he has 

 no visible means of subsistence. Five or six years ago, in the 

 course of a very hard winter, I heard that poor Turk Taylor had 

 been found lying on the floor of his cottage at death's door from 

 cold and starvation. He was attended to and his wants relieved, 

 and afterwards an attempt was made to remove him to the work- 

 house. If I remember rightly the relieving officer actually came 

 to fetch him, but the poor old man, getting wind of his designs, 



