The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1874-03-24

Class DISTINCTIONS IN BosToN. While
newspapers aui individuals are asserting
thai appointments to Office iu Boston are
enlistiug social opposition, we desire to
give expression to our opinion that there
is far less Of obnoxious class distinction
in Boston than the dispute about col
lector has given occasion for certain per-
SOUS to charge upon it. We present it as
an absolute fact that there is no barrier
to the rise Of any person to the highest
social ranks Of this city, if he has cbarac-
ter industry and tact for accumulation,
The possession of wealth is, Of course,
here. as elsewhere, great adjunct of
distinctive social position but to say
that it is all.essential is to falsify past
history and present facts. The richest
men Of Bosioo, to-day, generally speak
ing, are those who began life poor-the
exceptions being those whose fathers, and
10 few cases whose graudfatheTs. thus
began and bequeathed wealth to their
descendants. In no city is there mora
re6nem mt, courtesy, hospitality and sub
staDtal excellence among those possessing
wealth. by inheritance than here. And
Of those who have acquired competence
within the last thirty gears there are few
who are to be taken out of this category.
The suddenly rich, the "shoddy' prosper
Gus, are they who put on the airs Of
superiority, rather than those whose
accumuations have been regular and
legitimate. 1t is our pride that Boston
is full of men, who came to the city from
the country poor boys, who are now COM
parativelY rich from energy,integrity and
the exercise of good common sense.
Mechanics as well as merchants share in
this prosperity Boston Commonwealth
WoMEN's WAoEs.-The New York
Star, noting the fact that the highest
wages paid to women in the better class
of employments into which they are
crowded is 81 week, admits that upon
this SUN a woman with no one depending
upon her, and with health and strength,
can find home, wholesome food, and
have enough left for modest clothing
But she must be attractively clothed,
and economies, therefore. where it will
least show.
She goes without clothing sufficient for
decency or warmth, the editor says; she
wears altered underclothes or noue, reg
ged stockings or worn.ont shoes. Shs
does not do this without shame aud con
cealment, at least at first; but in every
struggle which enables her to do it she
loses that which she never can regain
A widow woman with children, on the
same sum, abandons at the outset every
thing beyond nero existence, and e homs
in dark, greasy tenement house, sur.
rounded by low and vicious inmates.
The extra penny on pail of coal, a
frozen potato in the measure, brings
tears to her eyes. She is not clothed
she is only covered. If she has hus.
band and he at homo idle, her fate is
only so much the worse; there is another
mouth TO feed-thst Of strong though
helpless man. To keep ones faith ir
God, to hold ones sclfrespect, to be true
to the better instincts of true womauhood,
is all that the strongest can do. He who
helps the widow and the fatherless IN
times like these, says the Star, takes the
place Of the Divine master be who lays
a straw in the path of any serves well
and faithfully the devil himself