"The Haunted Lady, or "The Ghost" in the Looking-Glass by John Tenniel" by John Tenniel. Punch. 4 July 1863. The caption reads, "Madame La Modiste. "We would not have disappointed your Ladyship, at any sacrifice, and the robe is finished à merveille." However, the fashionable woman looking at herself in the mirror is startled, it seems, as she glimpses the ghost of the dead seamstress slumped back, mouth open, in the corner of the glass.
The plight of cruelly exploited seamstresses had been known for years (witness Thomas Hood's well-known "Song of the Shirt" in 1843. But a short while before this cartoon appeared (clearly in response to it), the death of Mary Anne Walkley, a young seamstress working for a Regent Street establishment run by a certain Madame Elise, was widely reported in the newspapers. She had died, evidently from exhaustion, after having been set to work on a Court dress for 23 hours, prompting a columnist in the Spectator to describe the letter of justification written by the proprietor, Madame Elise's husband, as simply "grotesque," and to suggest that: "to inflict suffering in order to secure luxury is the most devilish form that contempt for humanity can assume" (10).
Tenniel's cartoon for Punch was accompanied by the following commentary, delivered in the voice and with the imagined faux-posh mispronunciations of the proprietor (or slave-driver) himself. Details given here, such as the long hours works, and the seamstresses's sleeping arrangements, are just as reported in the Spectator, and no doubt in many other contemporary reports.
It is interesting to see Tenniel creating a "looking-glass" cartoon, about two very different worlds, long before his illustrations of Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There (1871). He would meet Lewis Carroll in 1864.
OUR SUFFOCATED SEMPSTRESSES.
THERE are no slaves in England, oh dear no, certainly not. It is true we make our milliners work fifteen hours a day, and twenty-four upon emergencies, but then of course you know their labour is quite voluntary. That is to say, the girls — we beg pardon, the “young ladies” who slave — we mean to say, who serve in these establishments, are obliged, that is “expected,” to do what is required of them, and this means, as we have said, to work for fifteen hours a day, and to work all day and night whenever press of business calls for it - This is the trade rule, which has but very few exceptions, and the slaves, that is apprentices, are “expected” to conform to it. But then of course you know there’s no compulsion in the matter. This is a free country, and the “ladies” who “assist" at our great millinery establishments of course are quite at liberty to leave off working when they like, only if they do so they must also leave their places. And as they most of them are orphans and have no one to look after them, and see no likelihood elsewhere of getting easier employment, they seldom find the courage to resort to this alternative, and so — quite willingly of course — they submit to being worked to death, instead of being starved to it.
For, bless you, yes, our slaves — we should say, our young ladies, have the best of food provided them, and as far as mere good living goes there’s no fear of their dying. Perhaps they don’t get turtle soup and venison as a rule, but of wholesome beef and mutton they’ve as much as they can eat, in fact a good deal more, for they have not much time for eating. The only food they are short of is the food that feeds the lungs, and for want of this it happens now and then, that they are suffocated. After working all day long in close and crowded rooms, they sleep two in a bed, with the beds jammed close together; and so they should get used to stifling, for they have certainly enough of it. But somehow now and then they are found dead in their beds, in spite of all the care that has been taken for their comfort. It is very ungrateful of them, to say the very least: because, when such mishaps occur, there is sure to be a fuss made at that stupid Coroner’s Inquest. And then their dear good kind employers, of whom they always speak so well, (as do schoolboys of their masters, in the usual holiday letter) — these tender-hearted Christians, or Hebrews it may be, are called all sorts of horrid names, and almost accused of manslaughter! But poor dear injured men, how can they help such accidents? Why, M’m, they take the greatest care of their young people, and always have a doctor handy for emergencies. Yes, M’m, fresh air is the thing, but how are you to get it? Rents you know, M’m, is hawful ’igh, and every hinch of ’ouseroom is uncommon precious. We do hevery-thing, we can, M’m, we do assure you that we does, and as far as morals go, combined with every hother luxury, our young ladies is most comfortable, you may take our honest word for it. But you see, M’m, There’s a deal of competition now in trade, and when one ’ires expensive ’ouses, one ’as to make the most of ’em. And so you see, M’m, our young ladies must sleep pretty thick; but for cleanliness and comfort their rooms is quite a pictur!
So the tale is told, and so will it be repeated, and when another slave is stifled, good MR. MANTALINI will heave a sigh of sympathy, and say he’s reelly very sorry, but — but how can he help it? Of course by increasing the number of his work women, which would lessen his profits, and hiring extra houses, he might give his slaves more sleeping room and prevent their being stifled. But, dear kind thoughtless creature, he will never dream of this, until an Act of Parliament obliges him to do so, and the spectres of his work-rooms have a Government Inspector.
Links to Related Material
- Thomas Hood's "The Song of a Shirt" (published nearly twenty years previously)
- "Slaves of the Needle": The Seamstress in the 1840s
Image capture, text and transcription of commentary by Jacqueline Banerjee. [You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the Internet Archive and (2) link your document to this one in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]
Bibliography
"Mary Anne Walkeley." The Spectator 27 June 1863: 10-11. The Spectator Archive (subscription needed). Web. 17 February 2025.
Punch. Vol. 45 (1863): 4. Internet Archive. Web. 17 February 2025.
Created 17 February 2025