esirable region, I next looked for rooms,
unfurnished rooms, in which I could store my wife and babies and
chattels. There were not many, but I found them, usually in the
singular, for one appears to be considered sufficient for a poor man's
family in which to cook and eat and sleep. When I asked for two rooms,
the sublettees looked at me very much in the manner, I imagine, that a
certain personage looked at Oliver Twist when he asked for more.

Not only was one room deemed sufficient for a poor man and his family,
but I learned that many families, occupying single rooms, had so much
space to spare as to be able to take in a lodger or two. When such rooms
can be rented for from three to six shillings per week, it is a fair
conclusion that a lodger with references should obtain floor space for,
say, from eightpence to a shilling. He may even be able to board with
the sublettees for a few shillings more. This, however, I failed to
inquire into--a reprehensible error on my part, considering that I was
working on the basis of a hypothetical family.

Not only did the houses I investigated have no bath-tubs, but I learned
that there were no bath-tubs in all the thousands of houses I had seen.
Under the circumstances, with my wife and babies and a couple of lodgers
suffering from the too great spaciousness of one room, taking a bath in a
tin wash-basin would be an unfeasible undertaking. But, it seems, the
compensation comes in with the saving of soap, so all's well, and God's
still in heaven.

However, I rented no rooms, but returned to my own Johnny Upright's
street. What with my wife, and babies, and lodgers, and the various
cubby-holes into which I had fitted them, my mind's eye had become narrow-
angled, and I could not quite take in all of my own room at once. The
immensity of it was awe-inspiring. Could this be the room I had rented
for six shillings a week? Impossible! But my landlady, knocking at the
door to learn if I were comfortable, dispelled my doubts.

"Oh yes, sir," she said, in reply to a question. "This street is the
very last. All the other streets were like this eight or ten years ago,
and all the people were very respectable. But the others have driven our
kind out. Those in this street are the only ones left. It's shocking,
sir!"

And then she explained the process of saturation, by which the rental
value of a neighbourhood went up, while its tone went down.

"You see, sir, our kind