r fear of losing the place, and he has it all his own way.
This department's got a very fair manager, and we all like him. He's
careful about fines, and plans about our dinners and all that, so we're
better off than most. The manager does what he pleases everywhere."

These facts are for the West End, where dealings are nominally fair, and
where wages may, in some exceptional case, run as high as eighteen
shillings or even a pound a week. But the average falls far below this,
from ten to fourteen being the usual figures, while seven and eight may
be the sum. This, for the girl who lives at home, represents dress and
pocket-money, but the great majority must support themselves entirely.
We have already seen what this sum can do for the shirt-maker and
general needlewoman, and it is easy to judge how the girl fares for whom
the weekly wage is less. In the East End it falls sometimes as low as
three shillings and sixpence (84c.). The girls club together, huddling
in small back rooms, and spending all that can be saved on dress.
Naturally, unless with exceptionally keen consciences, they find what is
called "sin" an easier fact than starvation; and so the story goes on,
and out of greed is born the misery, which, at last, compels greed to
heavier poor rates, and thus an approximation to the distribution of the
profit which should have been the worker's.

Here, as in all cities, the place seems to beckon every girl ambitious
of something beyond domestic service. There are cheap amusements,
"penny-gaffs" and the like, the "penny-gaff" being the equivalent of our
dime museum. There is the companionship of the fellow-worker; the late
going home through brightly-lighted streets, and the crowding throng of
people,--all that makes the alleviation of the East End life; and there
is, too, the chance, always possible, of a lover and a husband, perhaps
a grade above, or many grades above, their beginning or their present
lives. This alone is impulse and hope. It is much the same story for
both sides of the sea; and here, as in most cases where woman's work is
involved, it is with women that any change lies, and from their efforts
that something better must come.

CHAPTER XII.

FROM COVENT GARDEN TO THE EEL-SOUP MAN IN THE BOROUGH.

Now and then, in the long search into the underlying causes of effects
which are plain to all men's eyes, one pauses till the rush of
impressions has ceased, and it is possible again to ignore t