'Them Boots.'

Front matter

By WILLIAM GILBERT t author of "de profundis,'-* " shirley hall asylum," "contrasts, etc. " There is some soul of goodness in things evil, Would men observingly distil it out." Shakespere, Henry V. Act 4, Scene I. LONDON DALDY, ISBISTER & CO. 56, LUDGATE HILL LONDON PRINTED BY VIRTUE AND CO., LIMITED, CITY ROAD. CONTENTS. CHAP. PACK INTRODUCTORY I I. MRS. RIGTON'S CONFESSION 8 II. THE BILL-HOOK 35 III. MRS. BARKER'S FAMILY' ... -59 IV. IN WHICH MRS. RIGTON IMPROVES THE OCCA SION 85 V. MRS. WATSON 107 VI. A COSTERMONGER'S FAMILY 12; VII. MR. MORDECAI MOSS 152 VIII. MRS. MOSS WEARS "THEM BOOTS" . . -174 IX. MR. MOSS IN TROUBLE 200 X. THE FOUNDLING'S DEATH 223 XI. CONCLUSION INTRODUCTORY. QHOULD the reader be an admirer of the *— ' style of novels and tales now so much in fashion, representing almost exclusively the habits and manners of the so-called upper or genteeler classes, he is recommended at once to throw aside the little book which we now offer to the public, for without the slightest hesitation we admit that he will find it utterly repugnant to his tastes.

Not only is there not a single element of even respectable life to be found in it, but the portraits and characters we shall attempt to depict, though taken from real life, are, with one solitary exception, drawn from the lowest and most degraded class of society — a class in fact in which Moll Flagon might almost be considered H a lady and Jack Shepherd a gentleman. At the same time, let not the reader imagine that the author has intended to make vice palat able or dishonesty heroic, for such has been far from his intention. Nor has he written with out a moral in view ; but, unlike most narra tives of the present day, intending to inculcate a good lesson, his moral is left to the last, unless, indeed, the reader in his progress through the work discovers it before he arrives at the end. Although our headquarters and base of operations are situated on the Surrey side of the water, it must not be imagined that we intend definitely to point out the locality ; and this determination on our part may appear the more extraordinary inasmuch as the building, though in itself unpretending in the extreme, is the centre of a philanthropic operation unsurpassed in pure charitable design by any benevolent establishment in the kingdom.

Our reason for this secrecy arises solely from the fact that the ladies who originated, and now superintend it, are INTRODUCTORY. 3 of those " who do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame," and yet the while carrying on a work than which nobler was never effected by human beings or performed in a more admirable manner. The Institution we allude to is one for the reception, comfort, and reformation of the female ticket-of-leave convict, and even of those too old to obtain employment in families of respectability, where personal appearance is considered, to a certain extent, a necessary attribute in every applicant wishing for em ployment. As from long habits of idleness these poor creatures are unequal to any skilled labour, a somewhat extensive range of washhouses and ironing rooms has been erected at the back part of the premises, in which they are employed, the patronesses of the institution having with great diligence secured an ex tensive circle of customers ; and the women are thus enabled to obtain almost sufficient wages to gain the bare means of existence — nothing more.

Chapter I. Mrs

RIGTON'S CONFESSION. ABOUT seven o'clock on a cold, wet evening, at the latter end of the month of November, the duties of the day being over, the Lady Superintendent of the Home, or Refuge, or Institution, or by whatever other name it may be termed, was seated comfortably in her easy chair before a good fire, deeply absorbed in a book she was reading, when her attention was attracted by a tap at the door which led to the washhouses as well as to the rooms occupied by the few workwomen who resided in the house. On being told to come in, the door opened, and Mary Rigton (at least that was the name under which she had been last convicted) entered. She was a strong, tall, bony woman, of some fifty years of age. Her appearance, on the whole, was singularly unattractive, and the expression of her coun tenance might almost be termed repulsive.

She was deeply marked with the smallpox, her hair was coarse and of a fiery red, and her shaggy eyebrows were of the same colour. Her history was one which bore a strong resemblance to many others of those em ployed in the Refuge. She had been several times in prison for violent assaults, often connected with robberies, and had escaped still more frequently from some justly merited punishment by quibbles in the law or errors in the indictment. Her last imprisonment had been one of several years duration, and she had three months before been liberated on an eighteen months' " ticket-of-leave," fifteen of which were yet unexpired. During the time she had been under the protection of the Refuge her behaviour had been un exceptionable in every sense of the word. For the last three days, however, she had not returned to her work — she being one of those who were allowed to live out — and it was only on the morning of the evening in question that she had returned.

No questions as to the cause of her absence had been asked by the Lady Superintendent, possibly judging that had it been of an unsatisfactory description she would only receive some plausible lie in excuse. For some moments after her entrance Mrs. Rigton stood demurely with her hands under her apron before the Lady Superintendent, as if afraid to begin. " What is it you want ? " said the latter, in a kindly tone. " Oh ! if you please ma'am," said Mrs. Rigton, respectfully, " I'm come to ask you to do me a great favour. You see, ma'am, it's a very wet night, and as I live in Shore ditch it's a long way to go. I've got no umbrella, ma'am, and my shawl's very thin, so I shall be soaked through and through before I get home, and it's a good four miles, ma'am ; and so I've come to ask you, ma'am, as there's an empty bed upstairs, if you'd let me have it for to-night."

"Certainly, you can have it," said the Lady Superintendent. Then noticing that the woman still remained in the room, she asked her if she wanted anything else. " Well, ma'am, I won't deceive you, ma'am, there is. I want to ask you to do me another favour." " What is it ? " said the Lady. "Would you have any objection, ma'am," the woman replied, taking a pair of thick ankle boots from under her apron and placing them on the table, " would you have any objection to lock up - them boots ' for me . " " I will certainly do it if you wish it. But why should I lock them up ? You're surely not afraid of their being stolen, are you r " " Oh, no, ma'am ! I'm not at all afraid of that," said Mrs. Rigton ; " but, you see, if the temptation came over me to put them on in the night, and you'd locked them up, I couldn't do it."

"Why do you fear any temptation of the kind ? " said the Lady Superintendent. " Have you any children at home r " " No, ma'am ; I've got no children." " Now there's something wrong about those boots, I'm sure," said the Lady Superinten dent, who was perfectly well aware of the peculiarities of those under her management. " There's something wrong, I'm sure, about those boots. Now let me know at once what it is." The woman looked silently and impres sively at the Lady Superintendent for some moments, and then said to her slowly, and in a serious tone — " You've guessed it, ma'am. There is something wrong with * them boots.' I wish I'd never set my eyes on them, handsome as they are." (The reader must be cautioned not to receive the word " handsome " in Mrs. Rigton's acceptation of the term, for it is more than probable he would, could he have seen them, have considered them exactly the reverse.

The soles were thick and the upper leather strong. The cloth on the sides and front was a sort of grey plaid material. They had a row of globular, round, black glass buttons up the front, which were intended solely for ornamentation, as they were kept tight to the ankle by elastics inserted in the sides.) " Come, let me hear all about those boots," said the Lady Superintendent persua sively. " Don't conceal anything." "Well, ma'am, I'll tell you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so " — Here she stopped suddenly short in the sentence, probably thinking the conclusion would not have merited the approbation of the Lady Superintendent. "You know, ma'am," Mrs. Rigton continued, "I haven't been here for the last three days, although I was very regular before that, and ' them boots ' has been the cause.

Last Monday morning, just as I was about leaving home to come here to my work, I looked into Mrs. Murphy's room (she is a fellow lodger of mine, ma'am, and a very respectable woman), and saw she was putting on her bonnet and shawl to go to her work somewhere near our house, but I don't know where, and I wished her good morning. ' Come in, my dear,' she says, so I went in, ma'am, and then I saw upon the table a glass of gin which she had just poured out from a little flat bottle ; but she's a charwoman, ma'am, and that accounts for it. ' No, thank you, Mrs. Murphy,' I says. ' Well, if you don't taste it,' says she, ' I shall be angry with you.' Well, ma'am, as I did not like to offend her, I just put my lips to the glass, and then I wished her good-bye, and came away." " But I thought you had taken the pledge ?" said the Lady Superintendent.

" And so I did, ma'am, and I kept it too, till that morning, and then I only took a drop that would'nt have hurt a new-born baby, and I should'nt have done that, only I did'nt want to be uncivil. Well, ma'am, then I bid Mrs. Murphy good-bye, and started off to come here, feeling very sorry for what I had done ; and then, ma'am, the thought crossed my mind that if I had drank more I should not have felt as sorry as I did, and I kept on thinking in that way till I got into High Street, Shoreditch, when I saw them boots hanging outside a shop door. Now, ma'am, it had been very wet in the night, and as my own boots let water I wished ' them boots ' was mine, and then I looked at them again, ma'am, and it struck me they would just fit me, and then, ma'am, I looked up and down the street to see if there was a policeman in sight, and I'm sorry to say, ma'am, there was'nt."

Here Mrs. Rigton stopped short, apparently to ascertain whether the Lady Superintendent understood the delicate allusion made in her last sentence. The latter, however, merely said — " Go on." "Well, ma'am, I'll tell you the truth as I said I would. I lifted ' them boots.' " "Then you are a very wicked women for ycur pains," said the Lady Superintendent, " a very wicked woman." " Not as bad as you think, ma'am," said Mrs. Rigton remonstratingly, " for when I got home I gave my own boots to a poor woman who had not got a pair to put on her feet. Besides that," she continued, raising the tone of her voice, " I have been well punished for what I did, and you as a lady oughtn't to say anything of the kind." After a moment's pause in the conversation the Lady Superintendent continued — " In what way do you mean the boots have punished you r " " Because, ma'am, they was never made by mortal hands.

No man ever made ' them boots,' I'll swear." " What makes you think so ? " " Well, ma'am, I found it out from the very beginning, though I didn't notice it at the time. The moment I put 'them boots' on my feet they fitted me like my stockings, and I was never able to guess my size before." " Go on," said the Lady Superintendent. " Certainly, ma'am. As soon as I had got them on they felt so comfortable and easy I thought I'd start off here at once and ask your pardon for being so late. Instead of going down Shoreditch High Street, as I generally do, I went down the lanes at the back, as I naturally didn't want to pass the shop again, and when I got near the Worship Street Police Court I met an old friend of mine, Mary O'Flaherty, and I won't deceive you ma'am, she has been in trouble as well as myself, and more than once too.

She'd nearly got into trouble the night before, charged with taking a gentleman's purse out of his pocket. Half an hour before I met her she'd been brought before the magistrate, who on hear ing the case said, 'that from the helpless state of intoxication the gentleman had been in the night before he hardly liked to believe him on his oath,' and so Mary was discharged with a caution." "Well, ma'am, we were naturally pleased to see each other, and she said to me ' Come in here, my dear, and let's have a drop of something, and talk over old times together, and I'll stand treat.' So, ma'am, as I had already broken the pledge, I went in and we c talked there very friendly together, till all the liquor was drunk, and then, as I'd got a shilling in my pocket, I said I'd stand treat in my turn, as of course I wished to behave like a lady.

At last when my shilling was all spent ma'am, Mary said to me, 'Now I have had my turn and you have had your turn, and now it's my turn again, my dear.' ' No, Mary,' says I, ' I've got no money,' for I wanted to behave honestly. ' Never mind, my dear,' says she, 'you shall have a drop for love, then,' and she ordered another quartern, and we continued there drinking till it was getting late, and then ma'am — I don't know how it was, but I think it was the fault of ' them boots,' — I began to quarrel. Mary at first took it quite quietly, but then she fired up and said something which offended me. I forget what it was, but I remember drawing myself up and calling her ' Irish ! ' ' Carrots ! ' says she, in return. Well ma'am, you know no lady likes to be called 'Carrots ;' you would not like it yourself; and so I gave her such a lick on the side ofthe head I knocked her over."

" Then you behaved in a very disgraceful manner," said the Lady Superintendent, " and you ought to be ashamed of yourself." " I know it, ma'am," said Mrs. Rigton, " I know it well, ma'am, but I've repented of it, so to speak, in sackcloth and ashes, and so nothing more ought to be said about it." "Goon." " Yes, ma'am. Mary then got up, and we'd a regular set-to, and, I own it, everyone said I treated her shameful. And then the police was called in, and I was given in charge and locked up in a cell, and Mary promised to appear against me the next morning to pro secute me. But when I was locked up my temper didn't get down, and I kept on kicking at the door, with all my might. At last two policemen came in and took off my boots and locked the door again, telling me I might go on kicking as much as I liked.

But no sooner was ' them boots ' off my feet, ma'am, than I sat down on the bench and began crying, and I kept on crying, and the more I cried the more sorry I was. I saw how wicked I'd been and how kind you'd been to me, and had taken me by the hand when I'd not another friend in the world ; and then I remembered I'd got on pretty well for nigh three months without a stain on my character, and now all my good works was likely to be knocked on the head. And then I began to think what could have induced me to have done it, when all of a sudden the truth started up before me — it was my original sin ! " " Don't talk such nonsense," said the Lady Superintendent. "Yes, ma'am, I maintain I'm right," said Mrs. Rigton dogmatically ; — " it was my original sin." " Let me hear what you understand by your ' original sin,' " said the Lady Superinten dent.

"Well ma'am, my original sin was a quartern of gin and a two-out glass. I remember it as well as if it was yesterday. I was then a young girl in respectable service, and a friend of mine who was in the Guards treated me to it when I was out on an errand. Immediately afterwards I went home, and took a spoon, and bought a bonnet, and that was the first dishonest act I ever committed. And God knows I wish it was the last ! " the woman continued, speaking in a low tone of voice and her lips quivering the while. " I've done a good many since." " That is very likely," said the Lady Super intendent, " and I am very sorry to hear it. Still, that is not what is understood by the term ' original sin.' " " Well, ma'am, that's the way I understand it," said Mrs. Rigton, now recovering herself, " and a good many others that work here will tell you the same thing.

I've heard more than a dozen of them say over their washing tubs, after you or some other of the ladies have been reading to us, that their ' original sin ' was a drop of gin." "Still, that is not the meaning of the word." "I hope you won't think me presuming, ma'am, and I've no wish to offend you when I say it, but all who work here are as likely to know quite as much about sin as you do." "Well, now go on with your narrative," said the Lady Superintendent. " What took place after you were locked up ? " "Well, ma'am," said Mrs. Rigton, in a firm and somewhat triumphant tone of voice, as if she felt certain that she had got the better of the Lady Superintendent in a profound theological argument, "the next morning I was brought before the magistrate, charged with an assault on Mary O'Flaherty.

Mary's name was then called out by the usher, but she did not answer. Then he went outside into the street and called again, up and down, high and low, but still no Mary was to be found. The case was then put off for an hour, but she didn't make her appearance, ma'am, and so, as I had not been wicked enough to assault any of the police, I was discharged ' with a caution.' " I then left the police-court, and as it was too late to come here, I thought I might as well go home, and remain there for the rest of the day. As I was walking sorrowfully along the street somebody touched me on the arm, and on turning round who should it be but Mary O'Flaherty. 'I say, my dear,' said she, 'how pleased I am to find you've got off! You needn't have been afraid of me. I'm not the woman to appear against you.' * It was very kind and just like you, Mary,' I said ; ' but after all it was not me that gave you that black eye ; it was the liquor, and nothing else.' ' I shouldn't have come up here at all,' said Mary, ' only I remembered after you had treated me you said you had no more money left, so as I didn't like an old friend to be in want I have brought you half-a-crown.' ' God bless you, Mary ! ' I said, ' you are a real, good Christian.

I am very thankful to you for the money, for if it hadn't been for you I shouldn't have been able to get a piece of bread to-day, for it is too late to go to the washhouse.' 'Well, never mind, my dear,' said Mary, ' you've got it now ; so give me a kiss and let us part friends.' And I gave her a good one, ma'am, and I blessed her for her kindness. "I now went on my way homewards, ma'am, thinking how good Mary had been to me, and how ungrateful I had been to you, and then, ma'am, I began crying, for the world seemed so desolate like. I didn't know I was crying till a butcher's boy laughed at me, and then I found the tears was running down my face ; so I took up the corner of my shawl to wipe my eyes, and also to keep people from seeing my tears ; but when I'd stopped crying and took away the shawl from my face I found myself standing at the bar."

" What do you mean by ' standing at the bar ' ? " " The bar at the Feathers I mean, ma'am. ' Them boots,' without my being aware of it, had walked me in promiscuous, for how I got there I wish I may drop if I know, more than a new-born child." " I'm afraid your memory must be some what defective to-day." " No, it isn't, I assure you, ma'am ; I know what I'm saying. I found myself standing there, and I've no idea how I got there, so sly had ' them boots ' done it." " Go on." "Well, ma'am, I own before I left the place I was somewhat gone, though I'd only had sixpen'north, but as it had been upon an empty stomach it was very excusable. How ever, somehow or another I managed to get home, and lying down on my bed I remained there for the rest of the day. "When I got up yesterday morning, I determined at once to come here to my work.

After eating a piece of bread-and-butter, which I borrowed of a lodger, and drinking a glass of water, for I determined nothing stronger should pass my lips that day, as a punishment, I put on my boots and started off. Of course I didn't like to go down Shoreditch, nor pass the public-house where I'd had the quarrel with Mary O'Flaherty, so I determined to take another road till I got to Blackfriars Bridge, and then to come straight here. On my way I began thinking about what I should say to you in excuse for my not coming the day before, when all of a sudden I missed my way, and found myself going all wrong ; and then I thought to myself, Can it be the fault of ' them boots ' ? for I ought to have known my way to Black friars Bridge pretty well by this time, seeing that I've had to cross it, night and morning, every day for the last three months.

And then I turned right again, ma'am, straight for the bridge, and went on thinking about you, and then I found myself going wrong again. Well, ma'am, I now got angry, and marched off resolutely towards the bridge, and then began thinking about other things, when I found myself going wrong again. Then I turned right again, but it was all of no use, so at last I felt I couldn't keep on quarrelling with ' them boots ' all day, and I determined to let things take their own course, when all of a sudden I found myself near what used to be called Field Lane. " As I knew I'd been a long time on my road, I wanted to know what o'clock it was, as I was afraid it was getting late ; and without thinking of anything wrong I found myself in a public-house, only to see the time by the clock there, although now I am sure it was ' them boots ' that walked me in.

Well, ma'am, when I was inside I saw there a poor, thin, half-starved-looking woman dressed in rags, with a wretched wizened little baby in her arms. As the poor woman was crying bitterly I asked her what was the matter with her, but she couldn't answer me. And then a stout-looking woman came up to me, and she says, ' She's very much to be pitied, ma'am. Before her confinement she was very ill, and she went to the hospital for advice. They wouldn't take her in, as they said she was only ill from poverty, but they gave her some medicine, and told her to keep her strength up, and take half a glass of brandy three times a day ; but she was so very badly off, ma'am, and the brandy cost so much that she couldn't afford to buy good food, and she got still weaker, and then she took more brandy to keep her strength up, and so on till the baby was born.

Well, afterwards she naturally felt weaker, and then she took to gin instead of brandy, as being cheaper — all to keep up her strength, as she wanted to follow the doctors' orders as well as she could ; but this morning when she got up she found she'd only twopence left, and no milk to give the child, so she came here and spent the money in gin. Still she was so weak she couldn't go home, and then somebody treated her to another glass to make her stronger. Well, it did her no good, for she feels weaker than ever. Poor thing ! she's very much to be pitied.' "Well, ma'am," continued Mrs. Rigton, " I then thought of Mary O'Flaherty, and how good she'd been to me, and as the doctors had said that gin was good for the poor creature, I told the barman to put six pen'north of it into a little bottle, and then, by way of giving her strength enough to go home, I gave her another glass to drink at once, and took one myself to wish her good luck.

No sooner, however, had the poor woman swallowed hers and turned round to go, than her legs seemed to sink under her, the baby fell from her arms, and she tumbled flat on the floor, breaking the little bottle of gin I had given her. "The stout woman and me now picked her up, and others came forward to help us. The poor creature was not only stunned and couldn't stand upright, but what hurt me more than anything else was the sight of the poor innocent baby. It's head had been badly cut, and the blood was streaming down its face, and yet it was quiet, for it seemed too weak to cry ; and then they sent for the police, who came and took the woman and the child away. "I felt so faint and weak at the sight of the poor baby that I was then going to leave, when the thought of the poor little dear's face, covered with blood, again came before me, and it made me think of other times, ma'am, of which I won't speak about now ; but the remembrance made me feel fainter than before.

At last I was obliged to seat myself on the bench at the side of the room, and I put some halfpence into the stout woman's hand, and I asked her to get me a glass of gin, as I thought I should drop. I then stooped forward, leaning my head on my hand, for some moments, when I felt the stout woman's hand pressing on my shoulder, and she says to me, 'Well, my dear, do you feel better now ? ' ' No,' I says, 'I don't; give me the gin as soon as you can.' 'The gin, my dear.' she says, 'why, you've drunk it ! ' " Well, ma'am, when I heard her words my faintness passed away, and I started up. * How dare you,' I says to her, ' tell me such a lie?' 'Well, my dear,' she says, 'you did drink it, and there's the empty glass to prove it.' So I said to the barman, ' Did I drink that gin ? ' 'I didn't take any particular notice,' he says, ' which of you drank it, but I'm certain one of you two did, perhaps it was your friend.' ' No,' says I, ' I'll swear I never put my lips to it.' ' Well, then,' says the stout woman, ' if you says you didn't, my dear, I won't contradict you ; I know that one of us drank it, so I wasn't so far wrong after all.' If she'd said this in a chaffing manner, ma'am, I shouldn't so much have minded it ; but she spoke in such a soft, slimy w*ay that it put my blood up, and I began to tell her a bit of my mind, when the barman came round and said he'd have no disturbance there, and pushed us both into the street.