Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-07-30

ments puny, stunted, en1eepled race
born destitute of the energy, the vigor and
the seIf-restraint which are indispensable
to success and civilization. All the envir-
onment is against them. They are thrust
into a world which not only does not
welcome them, but which lays traps for
them at every stage of their existence
Doomed from their birth to breathe pol
soned air, to swallow poisoned food, to
suck disease and torpor with their mother
milk, to become familiar with vice before
they are able to form any judgment OF
their own, to know only the soualld,
mean, sordid, miserable side OF everything,
it would be impossible to say how better
human beings could be prepared for crime
and chronic degradation than are these
products of nineteenth.ce century progress.
They look up, with their pale and sunken faces,
And their look is dread to see,
For they mind you of their angels IN hlgh places,
With eyes turned on Deity =
How long they say, how long, 0 cruel nation,
VIII you stand to move the world, on childs
Strike down with a mailed hand its palpitation,
And tread onward to your throne amid the
marty
Our blood splashes upward, o gold, heaper
And your purple shows your path
But the child's sob in the silence cures deeper
Than the strong man in his wrath"
Inexorable Nature visits its proper pun
ishment upon every breach of her enact
ments, and the nation that ignores the
pauperism and misery and squalo- in its
midst has always to pay dearly for its
neglect, in the scourging curse of epi,
denies and the clustering smart of
crime and lawlessness. The neglected
slums revenge themselves on the apathetic
gold.heapers,' by obliging them to
spend their sorely -grudged wealth in
penitentiaries and houses of correction and
Magdalene asylums. 1t is a very costly
and calamitous neglect which passes
over the condition of the poor, and which
regards them as of no consequence in the
social scheme. The expense of carrying
on government, OF protecting the citizen
by day and by night, OF administering the
laws, of preserving order and peace, is i'm
mensely increased by the presence of the
tenement house districts In our cities.
! They are the haunts of the vicious
and criminal classes the breeding and
training places of our prison-birds. 1t is
| there that the most awful curse that
humanity can suffer is inflicted upon thou
sands of wretches every year-the heredi-
tary transmission of criminal tendencies.
This is disease as hopeless and as certain
as that of inherited insanity. The subtle
faint courses through the blood, and it is
ineradicable. And Society is responsible
for this. Millions upon millions OF dollars
are sqHandered yearly upon frivolities,
which if invested in the erection of whole
some and convenient dwellings for the poor
would eliminate some of the worst evils of
city life for the so-called lower classes at
once Other millions are fooled away
upon coarse and selfish indulgences, and
barbarous sports and vulgar extravaganza,
which might be made to return their own
ers ten thousand fold, in the purest and
highest pleasures attainable.
1t is, however, slowly growing upon the
careless perception of Society that there
are obligations and duties here, and it is
encouraging to see that when once this
truth has been realized it is not long in
bringing forth fruit after its kind. Many
of our wealthy men have sought the praise
of posterity by bequeathing great sums to
educational institutions. We do not say
that this is not proper or benefcent thing
to do. Bat citizen of New York, Mr..
A. B. Stone, has recently made gift
which for the utility and beauty of it
seems to us to surpass all university and
college endowments. He has given noble
park, pleasure ground and mansion as a
Summer Home for the poor children OF
the city. 1t is situated by the sea. 1t is
roomy and capacious. There is everything
that can delight and satisfy the poor little
creatures who are brought out to it. A
benevolent organization - the Children's
Aid Society-has taken charge Of it, and is
to conduct it. And there, year after year,
for all time, thousands of frail and sickly
and stunted little ones will be enabled to
go, and to draw in draughts OF life and
health and mental as well as physical
vigor, and every summer excursion to Bath
Park will be fresh blow at vice and
crime, and fresh gain to the cause of CIV
ilization.
1t is such noble and farsighted benevo-
lence as this that iustifies high hopes of
the future. Mr.. Stone has set an example
to the rich which some OF them at least
will be sure to follow. He has shown
them how the sweetest possible pleasures
of philanthropy may be obtained, not
through the imaginative and faraway
medium of posthumous gratitude, but
during the life of the giver. For what purer
or higher qualification can a man with any
feeling for his kind have, than the con-
slant grateful Joy of the sorrow-stricken
army Vi IoNeTby Shiiufeu lhe ooon
he has bestowed upon these poor children
is priceless, indeed. He has put sunshine
and sweet air, and calm rest and
genuine recreation, into their squalid lives.
He has given them ideals. He has raised
and stimulated all their better parts. He
has made it possible for them to rise out of
the mire in which they were born. And
thisis better than penitentiaries. Itisaclear
indication of the way by which the evil
Installations of the slums-the dssommoirs
of our society-are to be overcome.
Whether the State should undertake this
great work, or whether it should be under
taken by private muni6cence, may be for
the moment left undetermined. The fact