The Labor enquirer., 1885-02-07

|est degree. owing to warm clothes thas
ars paid for. For these blessings offer
thanks to the Supreme Power that made
$1,000 OF my fellow-townsmen shiver
during the cold snap, 80 that they would
better appreciate the mild weather which
was sure to come in time. They knew
it Was coming, yet they shivered just the
same.
Our street cars are many degrees colder
than the weather. Stoves, or some other
heating arrangements are demanded by
certain unreasonable persons, but their
preposterous demands have been re.
jected with scorn. The reason is, that
on the lowest estimate, stove would
occupy as much room as two passengers
at least, packed in the usual way. This
would cause loss 10 cents per trip, be-
sides the cost of fuel. As the street
rail ways are now sustained by the COM
pany at a loss, for the benefit of the pub
lie. .stoves.cannot be thought Of. Only
one daily paper has the manliness to up
hold the poor company in resisting these
reckless demands. It saws there are but
twenty-five days in a winter when heat
is needed in the cars, hence it is not
worth while to fire up. Surely people
can stand fifty trips with cold feet.
We hear much about the $4,000 unem-
ployed men in Chicago. Now / am not
naturally skeptical, but have not seen
any such number, possibly because my
scope Of observation is limited to small
portion Of the city. They ought to be
labeled on the back UNEMPLoYED, for I
may have seen many of them and not
know it. Sometimes the cold water
finds them nnerringly and marks them
permanently. As ] started home one
evening found that kind Providence
had placed the mercury at IL below zero,
and German young man on the side
walk where Boreas could fan him to in
sensibility, no doubt to punish him for
past sins. I was one of four men who
grasped each corner of him and took
him into a beer saloon, the only place
afforded by Our Civilization. He was
not drunk, but appeared to be tobacco
user. Here was the solution to his
troubles Many men who do not use
tobacco have come to be worth ST ,000, 900.
This young man spent his 81 900, 900 for
tobacco and was reduced to want. His
hands were frozen stiff. He wore thin
clothes with not many buttons on them.
They wrapped him in blanket and
took him to the hospital in an open pat
rol wagon, in which he would probably
be lucky enough to freeze entirely be
fore the end of his ride and thus avoid
the pain of being thawed out. He had
no .overcoat. Providence had been all
piled up in stores down town and they
were called Our Production. | don't
pretend to say that the coats should be
distributed free, but here is the dilemma:
Warm coats piled up and cold men on
the pavement. Solve it somebody.
Lucky is the man or woman in Chicago
who is so fortunate as to be blind, OF can
boast broken arm, or can sport first.
class cancer or something, or is gene
rally played out, or can afford a few sick
children. These are pitied by generous
people and fare very we'll. But the able
bodied-they get no pity, nor work, nor
food.
AS number may starve to death it is
mete, that some provision should be
made for2their eternal welfare. For that
purpose we have Boy Preacher Harrison
holding meetings every evening in which
grace and conviction abounds. Why he
is called "Boy" Is mystery unless it be
cloak of innocence coveringsa mercen-
arv, hypocritical, malicious, scheming,
contemplate man forty years old.
Since Paddy Ryan, pugilist, moved to
New York the complaint is that all the
culture is centering in that city and Bos,
ton, the latter place being the residence
of John L. Sullivan. Now, think it
wrong to rank Chicago second to either,
for have we not Joe Mackin, Mike Nc,
Donald and boy" Harrison ZENo