chapter xiv) he was chummed on "27 in the third," whose door was to be

distinguished by the likeness of a man being hung and smoking a pipe the while, done in chalk upon the panel. Not liking his company of three here he, as may be recalled, rented the room of a chancery prisoner, in which he settled down. For the use of this room he paid L1 a week, and for the furniture, which he hired from a keeper, L1 3s. more. These figures may serve as an indication of the rates prevailing in the Fleet fifteen years before it was demolished. The episode of Mr. Pickwick's investigatory experiences in this connection is worth quoting, as a part of the panorama of prison life. There was only one man in the room upon which he was chummed, and he "was leaning out of the window as far as he could without overbalancing himself, endeavoring, with great perseverance, to spit upon the crown of the hat of a personal friend upon the parade below." He expressed his disgust at having had the newcomer chummed upon him, and summoned his two room-mates, who were a bankrupt butcher and a drunken chaplain out of orders, the expectoratory gentleman himself being a professional blackleg.

"'It's an aggravating thing, just as we got the beds so snug,' said the chaplain, looking at the dirty mattresses, each rolled up in a blanket, which occupied one corner of the room during the day, and formed a kind of slab on which were placed an old cracked basin, ewer and soap-dish of common yellow earthenware with a blue flower; 'very aggravating.'

"Mr. Martin (the butcher) expressed the same opinion, in rather stronger terms.

"Mr. Simpson (the 'leg) after having let a variety of expletive adjectives loose upon society, without any substantive to accompany them, tucked up his sleeves and began to wash greens for dinner.

"While this was going on Mr. Pickwick had been eyeing the room, which was filthily dirty and smelt intolerably close. There was no vestige of either carpet, curtain or blind. There was not even a closet in it. Unquestionably, there were but few things to put away if there had been one, but, however few in number, or small in individual amount, still, remnants of loaves, and pieces of cheese, and damp towels, and scraps of meat, and articles of wearing apparel, mutilated crockery, and bellows without nozzles, and toasting-forks without prongs, do present somewhat of an uncomfortable appearance when they are scattered about the floor of a small apartment, which is the common sitting and sleeping room of three idle men.

"'I suppose that this can be managed somehow,' said the butcher, after a pretty long silence. 'What will you take to go out?'

"'I beg your pardon,' replied Mr. Pickwick, 'what did you say? I hardly understood you.'

"'What will you take to be paid out?' said the butcher. 'The regular chummage is two-and-six; will you take three bob?'

"'And a bender,' suggested the clerical gentleman.

"'Well, I don't mind that; it's only a twopence apiece more,' said Mr. Martin; 'What do you say now? We'll pay you out for three-and-sixpence a week; come!'

"'And stand a gallon of beer down,' chimed in Mr. Simpson. 'There!'

"'And drink it on the spot,' said the chaplain; 'NOW!'

"After this introductory preface the three chums informed Mr. Pickwick, in a breath, that money was in the Fleet just what money was out of it; that it would instantly procure him almost anything he desired; and that supposing he had it, and had no objection to spend it; if he only signified his wish to have a room to himself, he might take possession of one, furnished and fitted to boot, in half an hour's time.

"With this the parties separated, very much to their mutual satisfaction, Mr. Pickwick once more retracing his steps to the lodge, and the three companions adjourned to the coffee-room, there to expend the five shillings which the clerical gentleman, with admirable prudence and foresight, had borrowed of him for the purpose.

"'I knowed it,' said Mr. Roker with a chuckle, when Mr. Pickwick stated the object with which he had returned. 'Lord, why didn't you say at first that you was willing to come down handsome?'"

Those who could afford to sleep well in the Fleet, as sleeping went in such places, might feed well enough, too. They could be served in the coffee-room, and if they preferred to eat in privacy, there was a cookshop in the prison; and there were, besides, messengers who could be sent on errands of purchase outside the walls. In every case the charges were extortionate, for the one object of the prison was to squeeze the debtor dry by fair means or foul. But when the law sanctions such outrages as the Fleet itself, the minor offenses by which the greater burden is mitigated to its victims may be condoned. There was a taproom in the prison where beer and wine were to be had, but the traffic in spirits was forbidden, and even the conveyance of them to the prisoners from without prohibited under heavy penalties; "and such commodities being highly prized by the ladies and gentlemen confined therein" ("Pickwick" volume II, chapter xvii), "it had occurred to some speculative turnkey to connive, for certain remunerative considerations, at two or three prisoners retailing the favorite articles of gin for their own profit and advantage." The spirit dispensaries were known in the jargon of the jail as "whistling-shops," and what with the strong waters they provided, and the malt liquors of the taproom, it was safe to assume that the bulk of such prisoners in the Fleet as were not dying for the want of sufficient food were perishing of a superfluity of drink.

The poor debtors who still had the price of "a chamber-pot of coals" and a scrag of mutton, could have it in from the market and cook it for themselves in their rooms or, for a penny or two, at the common kitchen in the prison-yard. In default of sufficient capital to this end they must live off bread and cheese, or cold meat, or hope, or, as many doubtless did, on the porter from the taproom. To secure the means of subsistence and indulgence they begged from the visitors. The sharper old residents borrowed from the shallower newcomers, and, as a matter of course, theft went hand in hand with mendicancy. Of this shadowy side of a picture, dark enough, in all conscience, in its lightest spots, Dickens gives us a glimpse in chapter xiv of volume II, where Mr. Pickwick encounters Mr. Alfred Jingle on the Common Side, and Mr. Jeb Trotter, returning from pawning his master's last coat, with a scrap of meat for his dinner. And Mr. Jingle's own summary of the prevailing state of things at that period and place may serve as a description of the condition and prospects of his neighbors.

"'Lived on a pair of boots--whole fortnight. Silk umbrella--ivory handle--week. Nothing soon--lie in bed--starve--die--inquest--little bone-house--poor prisoner--common necessaries--hush it up--gentlemen of jury--warden's tradesmen--keep it snug--natural death--coroner's order--workhouse funeral--serve him right--all over--drop the curtain.'"

In 1749 the son of the architect, Dance, who built old Buckingham House and Guy's Hospital, was imprisoned in the Fleet for debt. He wrote and published a poem called "The Humors of the Fleet," which has an interest for comparison with what the prison became later. The book had a frontispiece showing the prison-yard, a newcomer treating the jailer and cook and others to drink; racket-players at their game; and in one corner of the yard a pump and a tree. When the Fleet was rebuilt after the riots, there were two exercise grounds within the walls. One, the smaller, was on the side toward Farringdon street, denominated and called "The Painted Ground," from the fact of its walls having once displayed the "semblances of various men-of-war in full sail, and other artistical effects, produced, in bygone days, by some imprisoned draughtsman in his leisure hours." On the other side of the prison was the larger yard where racket was played and games of skittles bowled beneath a shed. Here might be seen the characterless "characters" of the place, in which every prison is sure to abound. Smokers and other idlers loitered about the steps leading to the racket ground, draining their pots as they watched the game. Here Mr. Smangle "made a light and wholesome breakfast on a couple of cigars" Mr. Pickwick had paid for, and here Mr. Weller, with a pint of beer and the day before yesterday's paper, divided his time between dipping into the news and the noggin, the skittle game and the affections of a young lady who was peeling potatoes at one of the jail windows, on that memorable morning when Mr. Stiggins called upon him and sampled the port wine in the coffee-room snuggery. Here you might hear the roar of the great babel without; and from the same point see one or two of its churches aspiring above the 'chevaux-de-frise' of the prison walls. There was a torrent-like fury about the busy hum of the town in contrast with the stagnant life within the brick walls; and, as if to keep up the mockery, they verged upon the yard of the Belle Sauvage Inn, where travelers constantly came and went on their journeys, free, if they chose, to roam around the world. In