Some “lodgers” wore wisps of sad-looking fur⁠—“perfectly good mog,” as a cheery matchseller described it. I don’t know the origin of the name, but to me, it is an admirable synonym for an article of adornment highly cherished by the most destitute among my sex.

Apart from the flower-seller and a consumptive-looking girl who worked in a slop shop, i.e. , a cheap tailor’s, my fellow lodgers were seasoned veterans. A few took off their hats, if you can so describe the battered objects perched on their matted hair, the rest retained them closely, fearful, I suppose, of losing a vital part of their possessions. Their faces were not clean, though I am sure before their mode of life shifted their perspective, they would have welcomed a wash.