Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1875-12-29

suffering from the want OF proper nourshment
the farm laborer plods through the fields Of Eng
land lat he only wants proper conditions to be-
come one Of the finest physical types and best
workers In the world with such homes as they
have Il is not to be wondered that lahorers spend
whatever little money they can in the village
beer-house Their lives are unloyey; there is no
silver lining to the cloud hanging over them.
What wonder that they seek their only pleasure
In the sensual cxoltation Of strong drink Yet
the drunkenness among farm-lahorers IL very
slight; the poor fellows cannot " they would,
afford that luxury.
Space will not allow us to enlarge our OK
tracts. After this glance at our brethren on
the farms Of England, whose labor furnishes
the means by which the nobility and gentry
of that nation roll and riot in every luxury
of sense, Of intellect, of soul-let us turn to
the workmen who equally support the great
manufacturers and merchants Of the same
land in an almost equal wantonness Of life
In large proportion Of their homes family COM
fort is totally unknown The tenements Of the
laboring-class are but poor apologies for homes
in multitudcs Of cases their whole furniture not
being worth more than few shillngs Pawn
brokers do thriving business, and the only part
OF the week when comforts are introduced is ON
Saturday evening and Sunday, after the wages Of
the week come in. Monday usually begins with
the poverty and pawning Of the previous week
and thus the perpetual round continues.
The unhappy people seem to know none OF the
comiortsa and few Of the dccences fife, and wide
spread habits OF drunkenness aud consequent
,suut n fo,d afd tltoir ,rrnt.beI b,frns Ia 1a
stroying their health
II may b. question rheder his condition Of
Meir homes promotes the rice Of drunkenness or
ichciicr drunkenness tsslf be The primary uld orig
inaiiag Gauss oftiai hrjftcss inprorii,ncs ichich
iedds 10 porcry and rant But there is another
phase OF the habits engendered by the single
room tenements Of our suh-let houses, which is
no. without interest in all future measures for the
education and improvement Of the people
Ia sixty-two instances adult sons and daughters
slept in the same room with their parents. and In
three instances in the same bed. In one hundred
and ffty-two instances adult daughters slept in
the same room, and in ffty-six instances in the
same bed, with their parents In two hundred
and fourteen instances adult SONS slept in the
same room, and in one hundred and tiity-eight
instances in the same bed, with their mothers
In thirty instances adult daughters slept in
/ the same room, and in twcuty-scycn instances in
the same bed, with their fathers In ify-nine
instances the mother with her adult sons and
daughters slept in the same room, and in twenty
one instances in the same bed together. In twelve
instances the father, with his adult sons and
daughters, slept in the same room. and in sis in
stances in the same bed together Al in one
town
These extracts are from the pens Of
| English writers themselves We now give
a paragraph or two from American writer's.
] Dr. Young, the author OF this report, says :
In some OF the manufacturing towns Of England
( there is downcast look which indicates hopeless
ness, il not despair, on the part Of tho working
I classes They seem to have sunk into a coudi-
ton Of dependency from which nothing can
rouse them No ray OF hope gumcrs in their
/ pathway, reckoning them to higher position.
/ They seem to regard their social condition as
/ fixed They have no hope, and apparently little
desire, to rise superior to their present state
/ What their fathers were they are aud their IONS
] will be. Many OF them seem destitute alike Of
/ hope for increased happiness here or hereafter
Professor Shepard, Of Chicago, quoted by
/ DR.. Young, says:
Bradford is a thoroughly English manufactur-
/ ing town. You do not know what faces saw, II
/ you never saw the faces Of the English working
/ classes
/ O., the wretched faces OF weary children. the
/ faces lit up with forced ninth, the faces that
have been feeling the grinding and grinding for
/ genemtions-the inherited faces Of the English
working people, men and women and children,
father and son, mother and babe. don't believe
there is such looking lot Of people on the face Of
| this earth the working classes Of England
/ They have no manners, or customs, or costumes
no games or frolics with which 10 animate the
spectacle they present TO the eye Of the foreigner
/ They work and work and work, they drink and
/ drink and drink; they smoke aud smoke aud
smoke
/ They do ~ their fathers did their children do
a. they do Father and mothcrand child 20 forth
/ to their labor until the evening, and go forth To-
1 the beer-shop when the evening comes That
| shop, with its blaze Of gas its sparkling brass
/ hoops on the gin-casks, its FURNISHED ornaments
on the beer-fountains, It's row OF tidy tumhlers
its clatter Of coppors the counter, its jingle OF
| glasses, its turgid apology for humur, and its
ceaseless sound of booty dscontent-tlat grog-
/ shop contrasts fatally with that working man =
home. That is his only home, iudeed-his home
and theater recreation aud education, social life
mental life and animal life, all in one Is it any
wonder that the one candle-lt, dingy room up
the court is unable to hold its own against IT,
What has all this to do with our title of
rramps and Millionaires 2" Can't you
see it These big fortunes of Aston, Van
derbilt and Stewart, and this irruption Of
tramps among our farm houses, are the be-
ginnings in our country of the very state of
things which makes even these few scraps
from dry "pub doc such horrible reading
Our fathers saw it, and when they eradi-
Gated primogeniture, entail, mortmain and
a state religion from our institutions, they
did what they could to protect their children
from like evils. But eternal vigilance is
indeed the price OF liberty. Power every
where, is constantly stealing from the many
to the few. Our legislatures and our ma
tional Congress are becoming, more and more
every year, but the tools of the great capt
talsts who have sprung up among us, and
who are already beginning to bind their fet-
ters about us, We see them engineering
their periodic "pinches" "pauics and
"hard times, ont of which we emerge always
with the rich richer and the poor poorer.
The war gave them an opportunity by which
they made a greater advance in few years
than they could have made in a century of
peace. They were enabled to lend their cap
ital inflated into paper worth about forty
or fifty per cent. of its face, to the nation,
to be repaid in gold and as a last feather to
break this camel's back, they exacted that
it should not be taxed, We believe in do
ing exactly as we agreed with these rich
men. And We believe, too, that We ought TO
have sense enough TO see whittier they are
leading us, and to try and save ourselves and
our children from the future they have pre-
| pared for our benefit, As England is to-day,
America will be a hundred years hence-un-
less something is doue about it, and done by
the working men of this generation. The
| tramps that infest us are but the advance
guard OF the universal pauperism of labor
TO come, unless something be done to break
the back of the money power. The least
industrious, the least proyident, the least
moral of the working classes are, of course