Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1847-12-17


wretches were fully ripe for the frightrul de-
s%truction that visited them. This Baker
street is but half a dozen squares from the
State House, and although the veriest ex-
tremes of human life lie within so easy a
distance, not one in a thousand Of our citi-
zcns have ever seen the utter destitution and
beastly degradation which infests that horri-
Bile place. It's cellars, garrets, and novels,
defy all description. The first view we had
at 1t impressed upon rs the reply of Mr..
Dickens, made to the suggestion that he had
ovcrdrawn the horrors Of low life in London.
IN his novels. "O%vetdmwn! overdrawn ="
said he, "hutnan language at best, can only
family depict it," There is one building In
Baker street, called the Astor House; the
front part Of it is occupied and used as a rum
shop and grocery by the owner ia the rear,
which is reached through an avenue. of about
two feet wide, a row Of rooms, five or six in
number, and certainly not more than ten feet
square, forms the lower story. Above this
there Is a second story, consisting of another
row OF similar rooms of the same dimensions;
access to this upper tier is obtained by stair
way and a corridor. porch or scafTold, of, say
three feet wide, along the front. Behind
this, In a transverse direction, stands anoth-
- 'i'E VI NV tChhbIAoilllltiNs
built after the same model. with an equal
number of rooms or cells. Eachtof these has
"A door opening, Downstairs, upon the pave
ment, and upstairs, upon the corridor. There
Is not a window or a pane of glass in either
OF them; a hole in the upper part Of the door
is lett to admit such pestiferous air as the
vicinity supplies, and so much light as can
find its way through the cleft-like space, of
four or five feet between them and the walls
of the nearest houses. Every. one of these
holes is crowded with ragged, wretched, bru-
tallzed beings, of both sexes and all colors.
They lie upon the floors without beds. but
few Of them have any fire, and we did not
see any furniture in any room, except per-
haps, a stool, a bottle and a tin cup, and in
one OF them, two or three pewter plates and
a table three feet square. Each of these rooms
are rented Tor eight or ten cents a night, TO
as many casual tenants MS can find enough
room TO sleep in them. -Four or five persons
thus obtain lodgings for about two cents
each. At this rate a building covering as
much ground as a building thirty-fve feet
square would do, two stories, or about four
teen feet high, built Of boards, and rotten
with age and filth, yields the proprietor sew
en- hundred dollars per annum to say moth
ing of the hundred fold profits of grog, bread,
meat and olfdl of all sorts, sold to a hundred
tenants at a hundred fold profit. We learn
that the owner Of this Astor House and two
other landlords in the same street, realize 10.
gether about four thousand two hundred dol
lars a year out Of property which cost them
Just two thousand seven hundred dollars.-
None OF these places is supplied with water;
1t is carried in whlskey bottles, and such
other utensils as the wretched inmates man
age to preserve from the pawnbroker and
grog vender, from hydrants in the neiohhor-
hood. In this dismal region are huddled to-
gether hundreds Of bone and rag CATERERS,
gutter scrapers, and beggars, of every hue
and grade below that Of thieves and prosti-
tuies. And here a hundred rum-sellcrs,
as many lottery vendors, and Il %yullure. gang
OF pawnbrokers, eN-Coustables, squires. and
other licensed and unlicensed thieves, man
age to wiring fortunes ont Of this les,etinp
mass OF putrid humanity. The wretches that
herd here live more abolninably than beasts
are capable of, and the harries that prey up-
on them, have a horrible fitness for the he'll
In which they reign. rIa
IL was among these poor people that Doc
tor Mullen established his house of Industry,
with so much success last winter. Women
10 the number Of sixty or seventy, earned
ABOUT hi'eeh cents a day by sewing carpet
rags supplied to them, and on that sum sun
ported themselves and their families better
IMAM the largest practicable charity could
nave Afforded. During the prevalence Of the
fever among them he had a hundred indiyid-
uaIs under his care, until houses could be
found for them; day and night he worked
among them, exposed to the contagion, and
to the mob that resisted his efforts in fear of
the fever when he procured places to bestow
lhe SICK and suffering, and in constant peril
from the grog-sellers and their allies, whose
crimes and c%rueltles he was exposing.
W make no effort to describe the horrors
of the place; we have neither the talent nor
the heart for the task. One sentence vii! ex-
plain 1t as well as a %volume,' o. There are
three hundred rum shops in the first ward of
the District of Moyamensing. 90 In these
rum Is sold by the cents worth, and lottery
policies as low as three cents a share III
Ph7adcPhm Liberty Herah.