The new North-west. [volume] (Deer Lodge, Mont.) 1869-1897, 1886-07-09
THE POOR OF THE CITY.
STATISTICS OF THE CHEAP LODG-
lNG-HOUSES OF NEW YORK.

Different Grades of Tramps and Sitters-
Evils of the Tenement House System
Ratio of Inmates to Dwellings in Sew.
eral of Our Large Cities.
1t is always easy to find interesting sta
tistics in relation to the poor people of a
country like ours There are over 200
cheap lodging houses in New York. Most
OF them are below Fourteenth street. The
sanitary laws fix their legal sheltering ca
pacity at about 5000 dodgers per night,
but almost every night from 10000 to H.
600 dismal souls are crowded into them
1t is estimated that there are from LOCO to
5000 poor males and females who find
shelter at the free-lunch saloons, the stale
beer dives and the police stations About
Chatham square and in the streets which
traverse the slums and sloughs of New
York these unfortunates have show by
working as sitters in the low saloons They
cluster around the stove in cold weather
and excite the sympathy of transient Gus
toners. During the holiday season, about
election time, and when great parades are
going on, this dodge of the needy worker
and the saloon-keeper works to the advan-
tage of both. AT such times the sitters
are enabled to keep comfortably filled uD.
to the advantage of the house.
In some saloons which encourage sitters
they are let in in relays By working up
regular route tramp can manage to
fill up his time all night The way many
OF these people keep clothed is study.
One that have heard of has pretensions
in this direction. Every day he watches
the death notices in the papers, and when
ever the demise of a man is announced he
promptly calls at the house with a pteous
appeal for cast-off clothing. People are
tender-hearted with death in the house,
and ne rarely goes away empty-handed. A
student of the tramp question has classi-
he'd the different grades of cheap dodgers
and sitters. He finds from long expert
ence that 80 per cent. of them are victims
OF intemperance, 25 per cent. are vagrants
from sheer laziness 20 per cent are will
ing to work but can't get it to do, and
per cent are unable to WORK on account of
some mental or physical defect. Upon
this basis of say 1900 out-and-out out
casts in New York city, $500 are drunk
ards, 1,750 are indolent knaves, 5000 de-
cent poverty-stricken people out of work,
and $50 invalids and unfortunates.
IN THE RoOKERIEs AND sHANTIEs.
The next class of poor people, but little
better off, are the dwellers in the rookeries
and shanties and meanest tenement
houses. There the condition becomes
somewhat better, but never satisfactory.
The evils of the tenement-house system
are apparent. This budding together of
large numbers of men, women and chill
dren under one roof breeds vice and dissi-
patton. But the growth of this system in
rIro \ Tl
first tenement house was erected in 1888
on Cherry street. In 1865 there were IL, 800
tenements in this city. Now there are at
least 10000, including apartment houses
and flats In quarter Of century the
system developed, and during the last
twenty-five years has more than doubled
in extent. In 1855 the average number of
inhabitants in each tenement house was
thirty-fve. The average to-day is fifty.
New York has double the number of in
mates to house of any other city in the
Union, Philadelphia the least Out of the
1922 houses in the Quaker city, there
are only six inmates to each dwelling; in
the &c, e33 houses which make I'D Balti-
more there are are six and one-half people
to each residence; St. Louis, with 43, ,O26
houses, has eight people to each home;
Chicago, with 81 ,069 houses, has eight and
quarter people; Brooklyn, with 62,233
houses, has nine people to house; New
York, with 70, ,6S4 houses, has sixteen and
and half people The figures as to this
city are deceptive, because there are fully
10000 tenements proper which accommo-
date fifty people on an average, or total
of 1,OO0,00 souls. This demonstrates that
more than two-thirds of the population of
New York are dwellers of tenement houses
proper, ameng which flats and apartment
houses are not included. What singular
study these figures are No city in the
Union has half as many houses as Phila-
delphia, aud yet Boston has nearly two
thirds as many as New York, and Chicago
almost as many Truly these statistics
justify Philadelphia in it's claim of being
the city of homes, and Chicago and Boston
follow very closely.-Frank Burr in Chi
cago News.
Picking Up a Broken Submarine Cable.
The ends of broken submarine telegraph
cables are picked up with an instrument
called a grapnel iron It is stout bar of
iron about two feet long, with five prongs
or hooks about six inches long at one end
and swivel at the other A rope long
enough to lower this grapneI iron to the
bottom of the ocean is attached to the |
swivel, and the iron is then dragged along |
on the bottom by a steamer, which steers |
directly across the place where the broken |
cable lies, and two or three miles, as near |
as may be, from the broken end. BY |
means of two wires, which run down the
rope and simple device on the
grapnel iron, an electric circuit is |
completed whenever the hook catches
on anything and bell on board
ship begins to ring, and continues
to do so until the strain on the hook is re-
lieved. If the hook should catch on
rock the strain on a dynamometer at
tached to the drag-rope suddenly in
creases, and the strain when the cable is
hooked gradually increases. A ship may
have to steam across the line of the cable
many times before success is attained.
When the cable is hooked the end is
brought on board the ship and dispatch
sent to the office on shore to test that part
of the cable. The end is then buoyed and
sent adrift until the other end is secured.
When this is done new piece of cable is
spliced in between the two ends and after
through testing the whole is lowered over
board-New York Sun.
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Besieged by Matrimonial Schemes
The unmarried president has a
harder time in the White House
than people imagine He is no.