The Sun.
London, England, 1866-02-15 00:00:00

a practical form is, we venture to think, likely to
be of infinitely more benefit to the class concerned
than either £6 franchises, vote by ballot, or an Y,
other of the many schemes promoted for their sped
advantage. The metropolitan railways are charged
with being the cause in a great measure of the evils
complained of, and doubtless a deal of the
overcrowding is due to the demolitions rendered
necessary by the construction of new lines. not
in
fact these evils existed long before railways, and
although aggravated, were not produced by
them.
It has long been the practice to sub-let the poorer
classes of dwellings in batches, and these batches are
often split up again and re-let. The poor are in
fact the victims of a class of middlemen who h!..r,
contrived a scheme of living upon their very poveL'l
and helplessness. The landlord himself is probably
a well-to-do, and possibly a humane person enout
but the middleman or the middleman's man, with
whom the labourer actually comes into contact,
knows no pity or compassion. He lives by squeez
ing blood out of a stone, and, as he has to provide
for two others besides himself, he has to squeeze
three drops where one should suffice. Hence the
labourer has always paid enormous rents in prollar;
tion to the accommodation he has enjoyed, anu
hence, too, the object of those who reap their har-
vest from his labour has been not to keep his dweilli
ing in habitable condition, but to allow it to fa
into the very utmost state of filth and dilapidation
allowed by law, in order to get the highest poosi,
rent at the lowest possible outlay. The remedy ior
such a state of things was not easy to find. For the
philanthropic the subject presented few charal!'
lacking as it does the sensation element so
fully present in most of the schemes of benevolenca
presented to the public. To say that a man is
tic-
tually in want of the necessaries of existence shoex.;
at once the feelings and opens the purse-strings a,
the most indifferent ; to say that he is destitute of
spiritual instruction awakens the zeal of the pious;
but to say that he is simply living in a small an
u
dirty room, overcrowded and evil smelling, avvokel,
no particular sympathy. It is perhaps fortunsw
that it is so, since, after all, it is not an extended
scheme of charitable contributions that is needed, 11
is it advisable or proper that a man who is capable co.
paying for his own home should be even partly
debted to charity for it; but what is wanted for hie
is fair play and the power of obtaining his hovia
for what it is honestly worth—neither less nor more'
Nor would capitalists regard with favour the id°
of investing their money in any scheme for• erecting
dwellings for the poorer classes. When rangil
over the financial world for an investment, with
at.
the glittering baits before them held out by j01.°,1,
stock companies and foreign loans at incredw,
interest, few would bestow a thought upon a....°J
scheme for making a good thing of letting roc'T:,
at half-a-crown a week, or would even believel7i
the possibility of many of the half-crowns belan
paid at all. The event of a trial, however,
proved that the poor pay their rent with a Panto
tuality seldom to be found in classes better
_ll
do, and that, if properly managed, there is
ell
certain a profit to be made out of Bethnal-gr,
lodging-houses as out of Belgravian martat,"
To Mr. Peabody we are indebted for the P—itt
illustration, on a large scale, •of the fact that 4
this particular it is possible to do a positive a'o,
indisputable good without violating sound ea,ta
mical principles, and that those who are so disr—to
may, at one and the same time, do their
their neighbour and make five per cent. by v"of
transaction. Still, there is a lingering suspioi°llo.
a plan bearing so strongly the marks of a Weer
lence not usually associated with commercial; to
tures, and some extraneous aid is still need,,
give stability and permanence to any general sou ore
of the sort. That aid is of a nature which can aloes
properly be given by the State than by any °
means, and it is gratifying to find that the Govetro,
meat has determined to give it. The bill ja
duced by Mr. Childers provides for granting ,
at a low rate of interest to be employed in the aluio
tion of improved lodging-houses, and it is ta, to
hoped that it will give just as much assistance 743,
induce a proper outlay on the part of capita:lhe
and so promote a permanent improvement _
homes of the working class.