Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1878-01-30
Pride and Poverty.

The spectacle is not strange in history,
however it may be TO common sense, of a
nation ready at moments notice to appro-
pirate five or six million pounds to repel a
threatened indignity thousands OF miles
away, while multitudes of people are starry
ing in her very streets.
While there has always been poverty
enough in England visible to the casual OBJ
server, it has been until late years mostly
confined to the improvident, the idle and the
Incorporate. Now, however, class hitherto
Exempt is the subject Of want aud distress
The sober and industrious suffer equally
with the unworthy, until cry Of distress
goes up which is appalling. We are in
lined to think that in this country, hard as
the times are, we know little of distress com
Dared to that which is now visible in
England
The shocking famine in South Wales does
rot stand alone. Its misery is on a more ex-
ensive scale than that of London, but the
offering in the metropolis is piLiful. The
distress falls where it has been unknown be-
ore, in the families of the skilled workmen
md the sober. The want III the suburbs Of
London is pitiful. At Woolwich, the seat
If the great arsenal and of the dock-yard.
the center of important industries, four or
five thousand people are in deep distress.
vi along both banks of the Thames, where
the cable factories, and the shipyards re-
emily gave employment to large numbers of
men, who supported their families in COM
fort, the depression of trade has caused alb.
olute stagnatou. Most of the factories
nave been closed. Families which a year
ago occupied little cottages of four rooms,
which they took pride in making respecta.
lie, have been compelled by the shrinkage
10 sell their furniture hit by bit; to give up
their four rooms and content themselves
with one. The consequence has been the
,rowding of the lower parts of the city and
increased ravages of diphtheria, measles and
bronchitis, which break out in the i'll.
drained and ill.ventilated tenements. "In
one house, says a London journal, sour re.
porter found three yOuLg children all lying
dead together in wretched chamber, which
had been stripped of nearly every hit OF fur.
niture it had contained. The father, mother
and single surviving child had been received
by the occupant of the next room, himself
having a wife and two little ones to provide
for, and there, separated only by thin par
titon from the three tiny corpses, were pass
ing both day aud night. The man, rivetel
by trade, had been able to earn in the past
nine months barely nine pounds, or between
ten and eleven shilliugs, out of which he
had to pay two shilings a week for rent, and
to feed six persons. And his case we are
told, is but a sample of multitudes Of Others
in the same neighborhood."
The calamity in South Wales is more ex
tensive aud apparently irremediable. Tn,
iron industry, and consequently the Goa
trade there is utterly prostrate Collierie'
are closed some of them because the pro
prietors cannot afford the cost of pumping
out the water More and more iron anC
coal workers are thrown out of employment
And of course the suffering is not confined
to the workmen and their innocent wive,
and children; the lack of wages reduces tn,
local trade, and the whole community is Al
once involved. The suff ring aud want hav,
risen to the dignity of famine" The dis
trcts where it prevails are unabl- to relieve
it, and appeals are made to London to conn
promptly to the rescue.
In the dismal prospect of II revival of tn,
English iron industry, we should say tina
emigration on "A large scale is the only rem
edy for the poor people. If they can get t.
America or Australia they can certainly di,
living out of the ground The earth l.
about the only thing that is not bankrupt.