Several years they had lived in that underground room; a street grating was over their only window, and over that grating children played, and hundreds of people tramped daily knowing nothing of the tragedy going on underneath. But I helped her out of the cellar to a first-floor back, where there was a good window. I obtained a pair of spectacles to aid her weakened eyes, and she said she could keep herself, for old women think they can do wonders. I heard no more of her for years, but one day there came a small package to me. There was no letter, but the package contained a silver German coin, nicely mounted and made into a brooch; it was wrapped in a piece of paper, on which was written: ‘In memory. Forlorn hope.’ Either the workhouse or the grave--most probably the latter--has swallowed her.
But the numbers of poor women, devoted sisters, who go hand in hand to the grave is not limited. I have met with many such. About many of them there is nothing picturesque, no story to tell, but their lives are lives of devotion, and one might well marvel and say: ‘Behold, how these sisters love each other!’ The faults of the poor are well known to us; if they are not, ’tis not for the want of telling. The marvel is that they are as good as they are, for of many it may be said, ‘Hope is not for them.’ And yet to go on, month after month, year after year, with their self-imposed duties, with their hard, onerous, and ill-requited toil, uncheered and uninspired by hope, makes the marvel the greater and their lives the more noble. Some, as I have shown, become apathetic, and work on as machines, but still on and on with their drudgery they go, until welcome and well-earned death comes to them. But with others it is far different, for their hope has turned to bitterness, and though they never dream of relinquishing the struggle, and never seem to realize that old age is coming upon them, yet they retain a stern, rugged, and sometimes even a pugnacious independence when, after many weary years, well-meant assistance is offered them. ‘Hope deferred maketh the heart sick.’
But let me tell a story. I have told it before, but I want to tell it again. Standing in the dock of one of our police courts is a tall, spare woman of fifty-five. Her dress is of rusty black, and has done duty for many a year. Her bonnet, surmounted by a veil, is also black, and of ancient type. Her face tells of years of suffering, and bears that wistful look that is generally found on the faces of those that are stone-deaf. The gaoler stands beside her with a slate, on which are written down bits of the evidence for her to read. The officer in the witness-box says that about ten o’clock the previous night--a cold, dark night in February--he was on duty by the Lea, when he heard a splash and a cry. By the aid of his lantern he saw a black object in the water; he swam towards it, and found the prisoner, who said, ‘Let me die! Let me die!’ With difficulty he got her out, for she had tied a satchel round her waist, and in the satchel he found a flat-iron.