Men chopping kindling in the 'Casual Ward' of a British Workhouse. If you couldn't pay for a bed, you worked for it. (c. 1900) If you were homeless in Victorian/Edwardian England, you could admit yourself here for a night. In exchange, you received a bath (often in filthy water), a plank bed, and a breakfast of bread and "skilly" (watery porridge). But you weren't free to go in the morning. You had to "pay" for your stay with labor. The task in the photo is wood-chopping; men were often required to chop and bundle a specific quota (often 4 cwt or roughly 448 lbs) of firewood. Another common punishment was "oakum picking"unravelling old, tarred ropes until your fingers bled. Because they were detained until the work was done, they often missed the chance to find paid work for that day, trapping them in the system. George Orwell wrote vividly about this in Down and Out in Paris and London.