New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1879-07-30
LEFT TO DIE,

These last days of July find very few chill
dren of well-to-do people IN town. Even the
class who are not wel-tO-dO, to whom the
few dollars of additional expense is a serious
item in the years outlay, manage to send the
boys and girls to some cheap resort, where
they can escape the heat and foul air of town.
The prcttiest and most cheerful feature per-
haps in every Summer landscape just now is
the faces OF the happy, healthy little folks,
who are laying in a supply of vitality which
will last them throughout the year. At least
we may be sure that their mothers think so.
We wish that every mother who has taken
her own children to a place of safety this
Summer could come back TO the city for one
day, and go through the long streets where
there are thousands of little ones who never
saw the country in their whole lives, nor
once drew a breath OF pure, imprisoned
air. We know no sight more pathetic
than is offered every Sunday afternoon on
these streets, when the whole wretcLcd popu-
atiOn come out on the doOrsteps. However
ragged the man and his wife may be- there is
sure to be some bit of tnery OH the thin little
child or wan baby, who, though he was born
in a garrett, is rs much the pride, the one
J
people as though he were heir to kingdom
The coarse white dress, carefully washed by
the tired mother late on Saturday night; the
cheap string of beads, the wagon made Of a
candle-box set on wheels, where the baTefo0ted
little urchin sits while his father hauls him
proudly along the crowded pavement-at every
turn there is some such hint, plain enough to
n womans eyes, OF the tender, eager hopeful
love spent on these poor babies, born to an
almost certain heritage of want and death.
How certain this is we need only look at our
death-rates to know. OF the whole annual
number of deaths i'll the city more than one
fourth are those of babes under year old.
More than a half are children under five years
The mortality among the little ones is douby
great during July aud August. although those
of the wealthier classes are out of town. In
one week in 1875 more than 1000 of these
children in the streets and alleys, at whom we
have just been looking. died from diseases for
which week or two of pure air would have
been a certain remedy. Since then, through
the efforts of kindly folk in establishing sea-
side homes and sanitariums, the death-rato
among them has been reduced in the follow
ing ratio The mortality among this class for
the fourth week IN July, 1873, reached $50 ;
in July, 1875, it was 523 in 1877 it had
fallen to 432, while last week it was 341.
The good results of charity are there in dry
figures, and in thousands of happy homes from
which no little coffin has gone out, leaving that
gap which is never filed.
over 1000 human lives have been saved
each year by these cheap and simple chart
ties. But they are not yet sufficient for the
work. The number of children's deaths in
these close, foul neighborhoOds each week Of
the Summer serves as an accurate thermOme-
ter to mark the ebb and flow of each hot
wave. The mother who is watching her chill
drcn to-day playing in the surf or growing
brown in tho cold mountain air, takes heed
of the hot wave only by n change of gown.
She does not think what it is to that other
mother, whose darling it sweeps away into
the grave. Two or three dollars she knows
would have saved it but all the gold III the