There’s an enduring myth that the Victorians’ inhibitions about sex were so extreme that they actually covered up piano legs to discourage any association with the female ankle, but the truth is the Victorians had a powerful, if repressed, sexual appetite. After all, this was a time when prostitution was legal and the perusal of erotica was many a gentleman’s discreet pastime and pleasure.
On the game
In 1841, when London had a population of two million, the Police Department put the number of prostitutes at 7,000, but the Society for the Suppression of Vice set the figure at 80,000. Elsewhere, it has been estimated that there was one prostitute for every 12 males. By 1857, The Lancet reported a figure of 6,000 brothels in London. Virgins could earn a lucrative £25 for being ‘deflowered’ at a time when the annual wage for a skilled worker was £62.
FROM HARRIS’S LIST OF COVENT GARDEN LADIES,
A PUBLICATION THAT ADVERTISED HIGH-CLASS
PROSTITUTES:
‘Miss B. Number 18 Old Compton Street, Soho.
This accomplished nymph has just attained her eighteenth year, and fraught with every perfection, enters a volunteer in the field of Venus. She plays on the pianoforte, sings, dances, and is the mistress of every manoeuver in the amorous contest that can enhance the coming pleasure; is of middle stature, fine auburn hair, dark eyes and very inviting countenance, which ever seems to beam delight and love. In bed she is all the heart can wish, or eyes admires every limb is symmetry, every action under cover truly amorous; her price two pounds.’
Torture chamber
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Maty Jeffries, a London madame, used to abduct children at stations while their parents were distracted. She catered to every vice. The Pall Mall Gazette reported, ‘Flogging or birching goes on in brothels to a much greater degree than is generally believed. One of Mrs Jeffries’ rooms was fitted up like a torture chamber; there were rings in the ceiling for hanging women and children up by the wrists, ladders for strapping them down at any angle, as well as the ordinaiy stretcher to which the victim is fastened so as to be unable to move. The instruments of flagellation included the ordinaiy birch, whips, holly branches and wire-thonged cat-o’-nine tails.’
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VICTORIAN VALUES