The story of my life ; or, The sunshine and shadow of seventy years / by Mary A. Livermore ... with hitherto unrecorded incidents and recollections of three years' experience as an army nurse in the great Civil War, and reminiscences of twenty-five years' experiences on the lecture platform ... to which is added six of her most popular lectures ... with portraits and one hundred and twenty engravings from designs by eminent artists ...

THE COFFEE HOUSE SYSTEM OF ENGLAND.

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homes, so that there was direct personal contact between the
so-called upper classes of women, and their working sisters.
It seemed impossible that the working women of Birmingham could drop very low, either in morals or the amenities
of daily life, while this wise and kind befriending of them
was maintained.
The Coffee House System of Birmingham, which prevails more or less throughout all England, won my admiration. At the time of my visit there were nineteen of these
houses in Birmingham, which in their appointments ranged
all the way from handsome, well-furnished establishments,
to those m cellars, which the most abject human beings might
feel free to enter. They were all scrupulously clean, and,
practically, run upon the same plan. Coffee, cocoa, and
good tea, with milk, were served from the counters, with a
simple and excellent lunch of bread and meat, and sometimes other eatables, at the lowest possible figures. Connected with each Coffee House was a hall, where its patrons
gathered for social enjoyment, entertainments of their own,
and the maintaining of their "free and easies." There were
also lavatories and smoking rooms for their exclusive use.
At certain times and hours the men were allowed to bring
the women and children of their families, to enjoy with
them the social bccasions. Alcoholic liquors in every form
were tabooed in these Coffee Houses. The patrons were
expected to be clean, orderly, and polite in their behavior,
and to take care of the house property.
At hburs when the workingmen were at leisure, I did
not see a Coffee House that was not well filled with them.
They are managed by a company of stockholders, and the
stock, at the time of my visit, paid so large a per cent. that
the Earl of Derby sent a hundred pounds to Mr. Martineau
for investment in it. The houses established in the best