Connecticut western news., 1881-07-20
Is it a ssNlistaken Charity n,


 ED. NEWS :-The article in your issue of the 9th inst, under the above title, is calculated to convey an erroneous impression in refer ence to the subject of which it speaks, and al- so as to the class of children who are or are intended to be the objects of the proposed charity. Some of the charitably and kindly disposed people of this city, have, during the hot season for several consecutive years, made an effort to find places among the charitably disposed people in the country, where free board can be had for two weeks for members of the children of deserving class of the poor of New York. The children thus sought to be furnished with a healthful home in the country for two weeks during the extreme heat of summer are not-as ssAn Observer" in- inmates they are-the ''pduper children" of New York, That class are iberally provided and cared for by the city itself, and afforded cleanly and healthful homes in proper asylums located on the several islands near to and be- longing to the city, and no charitable consider ation is sought for them from without.
 But ill this city of over ], 1000, 900 inhabitants, paupers, but the children of very poor people, who, living in the crowded tenement houses and old rookeries, which still abound here, are able to earn but miserable and scanty sub- sistence by the most laborious toll from years end to years end. This class of people are from necessity compelled to purchase their ar ticles of food from day to day, and at the places where such articles are to be had the cheapest, and within their means. The re- suit of this condition is that many Of the children of such never from year to year, have a full meal of really healthy, strengthening food. Large numbers of this class of children are half orphans, children of widowed washer and sewing women, and chore women, who, during the day are obliged to leave their child reD to take care of themselves as best they can, while they themselves are out from early morn until night, working for the means with which to sustain life: This class of the city's | vdnG and often most filthy streets and tenements, and the rate of mortality among them, and particularly among the children of such during the year, is oft times terrible to contemplate. These people are poor, often extremely poor, but they are not paatpe'.s in the proper sense of that term, and it would be an insult to hon. est poverty to so designate them.
 For this class of fchildren an effort is annual | ly made by few of our charitable people to | send as many as possible into the country for two weeks, where they will have fresh and healthful food, and the equally necessary ben eft of breathing the pure and vitalizing air of the country. The people engaged in this good work here willinglyturnish such children needed expenses of railroh travel. etc. What | they ask of the people i4 the country, is to | give them home and foodS for two weeks. This is the charity to which "An Observer takes an exception, and designates & mistaken charity" and quotes scripture Every inappro- priately) to sustain his idea.
 Those engaged in this work here have no expectation or wish that the children sent out by. them shall be fed upon what the people re- | ceiving them would consider rluxuries-the ob- ject sought is to give them healthful air. and | exercise for body and mind, and such food as ] the people kindly receiving them are disposed \ to provide, which food to such children will | be, if not before unheard of, certainly an unlocked for luxury. Need the extending oi this charity by the generous country families to this class of the city children, in the least degree interfere with the extending of all needed charity to the poor of their own local. ity? If the town of Canaan has twenty five pauper children on it's pauper-roll. as CAT Observer" intimates to be the fact, the daily ration provided by the public for each such child would (unless the people of that town have much changed in charitable character since twenty-five years) be regarded by these children from this city, not only as an over. flowing supply, but as an unusual luxury.
 'An Observer" objects, that the canvassel from the city in the interest ofthese s'sick and indigent children of the streets of New York, the subject: The people here who are willing to, and do furnish all the money needed to carry out their charitable purpose, must necessarily first find specific and certain places sending them away, and to do this. an agent must be employed to visit and canvass the several country places for that purpose. Tkis duty must needs be committed to some person who will engage in it as matter of business, and for pay, but the payment of such an agent 1 imposes no additional tax or call upon the charitably disposed in the country. And this evident fling" by "An Observer at this char ity. certainly does not indicate the possession by 'An Observer of that scriptural charity which "suffereth long and is kind," which "envieth not" which ''never faileth,'
 The promoters of this combined city and country charity are not persons who are actu' ated by ''fs shionable wish for notoriety," nol do
 try to ignore or in any degree neglect theil own poor; they only ask them to extend the surplus of their charitable and willing offer. ings to the city children spoken of. And this upon the Christian principle taught us by Christ in His beautiful and suggestive parable of the traveller to Jericho, and the Samaritan man. c.
 New York, July 9th, 1881.