Treats Of Oliver Twist’s Growth, Education, And
Board.
For the next eight or ten months, Oliver was the victim of a
systematic course of treachery and deception. He was
brought up by hand. The hungry and destitute situation of
the infant orphan was duly reported by the workhouse authorities
to the parish authorities. The parish authorities inquired with
dignity of the workhouse authorities, whether there was no female
then domiciled in “the house” who was in a situation to impart to
Oliver Twist the consolation and nourishment of which he stood in
need. The workhouse authorities replied with humility, that there
was not. Upon this, the parish authorities magnanimously and
humanely resolved, that Oliver should be “farmed” or, in other
words, that he should be despatched to a branch workhouse some
three miles off, where twenty or thirty other juvenile offenders
against the poor-laws rolled about the floor all day, without the
inconvenience of too much food or too much clothing, under the
parental superintendence of an elderly female, who received the
culprits at and for the consideration of sevenpence-halfpenny per
small head per week. Sevenpence-halfpenny’s worth per week is a
good round diet for a child; a great deal may be got for
sevenpence-halfpenny—quite enough to overload its stomach, and
make it uncomfortable. The elderly female was a woman of
wisdom and experience; she knew what was good for children;
and she had a very accurate perception of what was good for
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herself. So, she appropriated the greater part of the weekly
stipend to her own use, and consigned the rising parochial
generation to even a shorter allowance than was originally
provided for them. Thereby finding in the lowest depth a deeper
still; and proving herself a very great experimental philosopher.
Everybody knows the story of another experimental
philosopher who had a great theory about a horse being able to
live without eating, and who demonstrated it so well, that he got
his own horse down to a straw a day, and would most
unquestionably have rendered him a very spirited and rampacious
animal on nothing at all, if he had not died, four and twenty hours
before he was to have had his first comfortable bait of air.
Unfortunately for the experimental philosophy of the female to
whose protecting care Oliver Twist was delivered over, a similar
result usually attended the operation of her system; for at the very
moment when a child had contrived to exist upon the smallest
possible portion of the weakest possible food, it did perversely
happen in eight and a half cases out of ten, either that it sickened
from want and cold, or fell into the fire from neglect, or got half-
smothered by accident; in any one of which cases, the miserable
little being, was usually summoned into another world, and there
gathered to the fathers it had never known in this.
Occasionally, when there was some more than usually
interesting inquest upon a parish child who had been overlooked
in turning up a bedstead, or inadvertently scalded to death when
there happened to be a washing—though the latter accident was
very scarce, anything approaching to a washing being of rare
occurrence in the farm—the jury would take it into their heads to
ask troublesome questions, or the parishioners would rebelliously
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affix their signatures to a remonstrance. But these impertinences
were speedily checked by the evidence of the surgeon, and the
testimony of the beadle; the former of whom had always opened
the body and found nothing inside (which was very probable
indeed) and the latter of whom invariably swore whatever the
parish wanted; which was very self-devotional. Besides, the Board
made periodical pilgrimages to the farm, and always sent the
beadle the day before, to say they were going. The children were
neat and clean to behold, when they went; and what more would
the people have!
It cannot be expected that this system of farming would
produce any very extraordinary or luxuriant crop. Oliver Twist’s
ninth birthday found him a pale, thin child, somewhat diminutive
in stature, and decidedly small in circumference. But nature or
inheritance had implanted a good sturdy spirit in Oliver’s breast.
It had had plenty of room to expand, thanks to the spare diet of
the establishment; and perhaps to this circumstance may be
attributed his having any ninth birthday at all. Be this as it may,
however, it was his ninth birthday; and he was keeping it in the
coal-cellar with a select party of two other young gentlemen, who,
after participating with him in a sound thrashing, had been locked
up for atrociously presuming to be hungry, when Mrs. Mann, the
good lady of the house, was unexpectedly startled by the
apparition of Mr. Bumble, the beadle, striving to undo the wicket
of the garden gate.
“Goodness gracious! Is that you, Mr. Bumble, sir?” said Mrs.
Mann, thrusting her head out of the window in well-affected
ecstasies of joy. “(Susan, take Oliver and them two brats upstairs,
and wash ’em directly.) My heart alive! Mr. Bumble, how glad I am
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to see you, surely!”
Now, Mr. Bumble was a fat man, and a choleric; so, instead of
responding to this open-hearted salutation in a kindred spirit, he
gave the little wicket a tremendous shake, and then bestowed
upon it a kick which could have emanated from no leg but a
beadle’s.
“Lor, only think,” said Mrs. Mann, running out—for the three
boys had been removed by this time—“only think of that! That I
should have forgotten that the gate was bolted on the inside, on
account of them dear children! Walk in, sir, walk in, pray, Mr.
Bumble, do, sir.”
Although this invitation was accompanied with a curtsey that
might have softened the heart of a church-warden, it by no means
mollified the beadle.
“Do you think this respectful or proper conduct, Mrs. Mann,”
inquired Mr. Bumble, grasping his cane, “to keep the parish
officers a-waiting at your garden gate, when they come here upon
porochial business connected with the porochial orphans? Are you
aweer, Mrs. Mann, that you are, as I may say, a porochial delegate,
and a stipendiary?”
“I’m sure, Mr. Bumble, that I was only a-telling one or two of
the dear children as is so fond of you, that it was you a-coming,”
replied Mrs. Mann, with great humility.
Mr. Bumble had a great idea of his oratorical powers and his
importance. He had displayed the one, and vindicated the other.
He relaxed.
“Well, well, Mrs. Mann,” he replied, in a calmer tone; “it may be
as you say; it may be. Lead the way in, Mrs. Mann, for I come on
business, and have something to say.”
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Mrs. Mann ushered the beadle into a small parlour with a brick
floor; placed a seat for him; and officiously deposited his cocked
hat and cane on the table before him. Mr. Bumble wiped from his
forehead the perspiration which his walk had engendered, glanced
complacently at the cocked hat, and smiled. Yes, he smiled.
Beadles are but men: and Mr. Bumble smiled.
“Now don’t you be offended at what I’m a-going to say,”
observed Mrs. Mann, with captivating sweetness. “You’ve had a
long walk, you know, or I wouldn’t mention it. Now, will you take a
little drop of something, Mr. Bumble?”
“Not a drop. Not a drop,” said Mr. Bumble, waving his right
hand in a dignified but placid manner.
“I think you will,” said Mrs. Mann, who had noticed the tone of
the refusal, and the gesture that had accompanied it. “Just a leetle
drop, with a little cold water, and a lump of sugar.”
Mr. Bumble coughed.
“Now, just a leetle drop,” said Mrs. Mann persuasively.
“What is it?” inquired the beadle.
“Why, it’s what I’m obliged to keep a little of in the house, to
put into the blessed infants’ Daffy, when they ain’t well, Mr.
Bumble,” replied Mrs. Mann, as she opened a corner cupboard,
and took down a bottle and glass. “It’s gin. I’ll not deceive you, Mr.
B. It’s gin.”
“Do you give the children Daffy, Mrs. Mann?” inquired
Bumble, following with his eyes the interesting process of mixing.
“Ah, bless ’em that I do, dear as it is,” replied the nurse. “I
couldn’t see ’em suffer before my very eyes, you know, sir.”
“No,” said Mr. Bumble approvingly; “no, you could not. You are
a humane woman, Mrs. Mann.” (Here she set down the glass.) “I
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shall take an early opportunity of mentioning it to the Board, Mrs.
Mann.” (He drew it towards him.) “You feel as a mother, Mrs.
Mann.” (He stirred the gin-and-water.) “I—I drink your health
with cheerfulness, Mrs. Mann;” and he swallowed half of it.
“And now about business,” said the beadle, taking out a
leathern pocket-book. “The child that was half-baptised, Oliver
Twist, is nine year old today.”
“Bless him!” interposed Mrs. Mann, inflaming her left eye with
the corner of her apron.
“And notwithstanding a offered reward of ten pound, which
was afterwards increased to twenty pound. Notwithstanding the
most superlative, and, I may say, supernat’ral exertions on the
part of this parish,” said Bumble, awe have never been able to
discover who is his father, or what was his mother’s settlement,
name, or condition.”
Mrs. Mann raised her hands in astonishment; but added, after a
moment’s reflection, “How comes he to have any name at all,
then?”
The beadle drew himself up with great pride, and said, “I
inwented it.”
“You, Mr. Bumble!”
“I, Mrs. Mann. We name our fondlings in alphabetical order.
The last was a S—Swubble, I named him. This was T—Twist, I
named him. The next one as comes will be Unwin, and the next
Vilkins. I have got names ready-made to the end of the alphabet,
and all the way through it again, when we come to Z.”
“Why, you’re quite a literary character, sir!” said Mrs. Mann.
“Well, well,” said the beadle, evidently gratified with the
compliment; “perhaps I may be. Perhaps I may be, Mrs. Mann.”
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He finished the gin-and-water, and added, “Oliver being now too
old to remain here, the Board have determined to have him back
into the house. I have come out myself to take him there. So let me
see him at once.”
“I’ll fetch him directly,” said Mrs. Mann, leaving the room for
that purpose. Oliver, having had by this time as much of the outer
coat of dirt which incrusted his face and hands removed, as could
be scrubbed off in one washing, was led into the room by his
benevolent protectress.
“Make a bow to the gentleman, Oliver,” said Mrs. Mann.
Oliver made a bow, which was divided between the beadle on
the chair, and the cocked hat on the table.
“Will you go along with me, Oliver?” said Mr. Bumble, in a
majestic voice.
Oliver was about to say that he would go along with anybody
with great readiness, when, glancing upwards, he caught sight of
Mrs. Mann, who had got behind the beadle’s chair, and was
shaking her fist at him with a furious countenance. He took the
hint at once, for the fist had been too often impressed upon his
body not to be deeply impressed upon his recollection.
“Will she go with me?” inquired poor Oliver.
“No, she can’t,” replied Mr. Bumble; “but she’ll come and see
you sometimes.”
This was no very great consolation to the child. Young as he
was, however, he had sense enough to make a feint of feeling great
regret at going away. It was no very difficult matter for the boy to
call the tears into his eyes. Hunger and recent ill-usage are great
assistants if you want to cry; and Oliver cried very naturally
indeed. Mrs. Mann gave him a thousand embraces, and, what
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Oliver wanted a great deal more, a piece of bread-and-butter, lest
he should seem too hungry when he got to the workhouse. With
the slice of bread in his hand, and the little brown cloth parish cap
on his head, Oliver was then led away by Mr. Bumble from the
wretched home where one kind word or look had never lighted the
gloom of his infant years. And yet he burst into an agony of
childish grief, as the cottage gate closed after him. Wretched as
were the little companions in misery he was leaving behind, they
were the only friends he had ever known; and a sense of his
loneliness in the great wide world, sank into the child’s heart for
the first time.
Mr. Bumble walked on with long strides; little Oliver, firmly
grasping his gold-laced cuff, trotted beside him, inquiring at the
end of every quarter of a mile whether they were “nearly there.”
To these interrogations Mr. Bumble returned very brief and
snappish replies; for the temporary blandness which gin-andwater awakens in some bosoms had by this time evaporated; and
he was once again a beadle.
Oliver had not been within the walls of the workhouse a quarter
of an hour, and had scarcely completed the demolition of a second
slice of bread, when Mr. Bumble, who had handed him over to the
care of an old woman, returned; and, telling him it was a Board
night, informed him that the Board had said he was to appear
before it forthwith.
Not having a very clearly defined notion of what a live Board
was, Oliver was rather astounded by this intelligence, and was not
quite certain whether he ought to laugh or cry. He had no time to
think about the matter, however; for Mr. Bumble gave him a tap
on the head with his cane, to wake him up, and another on the
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back to make him lively, and bidding him follow, conducted him
into a large, whitewashed room, where eight or ten fat gentlemen
were sitting round a table. At the top of the table, seated in an
arm-chair rather higher than the rest, was a particularly fat
gentleman with a very round, red face.
“Bow to the Board,” said Bumble. Oliver brushed away two or
three tears that were lingering in his eyes; and seeing no board
but the table, fortunately bowed to that.
“What’s your name, boy?” said the gentleman in the high chair.
Oliver was frightened at the sight of so many gentlemen, which
made him tremble; and the beadle gave him another tap behind,
which made him cry. These two causes made him answer in a very
low and hesitating voice; whereupon a gentleman in a white
waistcoat said he was a fool. Which was a capital way of raising his
spirits, and putting him quite at his ease.
“Boy,” said the gentleman in the high chair, “listen to me. You
know you’re an orphan, I suppose?”
“What’s that, sir?” inquired poor Oliver.
“The boy is a fool—I thought he was,” said the gentleman in the
white waistcoat.
“Hush!” said the gentleman who had spoken first. “You know
you’ve got no father or mother, and that you were brought up by
the parish, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir,” replied Oliver, weeping bitterly.
“What are you crying for?” inquired the gentleman in the white
waistcoat. And to be sure it was very extraordinary. What could
the boy be crying for?
“I hope you say your prayers every night,” said another
gentleman in a gruff voice, “and pray for the people who feed you,
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and take care of you—like a Christian.”
“Yes, sir,” stammered the boy. The gentleman who spoke last
was unconsciously right. It would have been very like a Christian,
and a marvellously good Christian, too, if Oliver had prayed for the
people who fed and took care of him. But he hadn’t, because
nobody had taught him.
“Well! You have come here to be educated, and taught a useful
trade,” said the red-faced gentleman in the high chair.
“So you’ll begin to pick oakum tomorrow morning at six
o’clock,” added the surly one in the white waistcoat.
For the combination of both these blessings in the one simple
process of picking oakum, Oliver bowed low by the direction of the
beadle, and was then hurried away to a large ward; where, on a
rough, hard bed, he sobbed himself to sleep. What a noble
illustration of the tender laws of England! They let the paupers go
to sleep!
Poor Oliver! He little thought, as he lay sleeping in a happy
unconsciousness of all around him, that the Board had that very
day arrived at a decision which would exercise the most material
influence over all his future fortunes. But they had. And this was
it:—
The members of this Board were very sage, deep, philosophical
men; and when they came to turn their attention to the
workhouse, they found out at once, what ordinary folks would
never have discovered—the poor people liked it! It was a regular
place of public entertainment for the poorer classes; a tavern
where there was nothing to pay, a public breakfast, dinner, tea,
and supper all the year round;—a brick and mortar elysium,
where it was all play and no work. “Oho!” said the Board, looking
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