Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1891-11-19
Tn1 LAND1oRD cAprrunArED.
Thin Division Walls One of the Night
workers. Bug-bears.

New York Tribune.
One of the many provoking things
with which the night-worker has to con-
tend in his daily struggle for sleep is the
thin dividing wall between houses. The
writer has been in fine looking four.
story brown stone front houses where q
man could hear his neighbor picking
his teeth next door, and all because the
builder wanted to save a few dollars
and erect u dividing wall one brick
thick, instead of putting up double or
hollow wall. The difference in cost is
slight, but the difference in comfort is
vast.
This night-worker rented little
house in Brooklyn not long ago and
had his landlord for next-door neigh
Dor. To the landlord he explained that
he was a night-worker and needed quiet
by day in order to get sleep. The lanG-
lord assured him that the dividing wall
was sound proof or nearly so. The first
morning that the night-worker came
home and went to his bed to sleep he
thought there must be baby in the
house. Its squall seemed to come from
the next room. 1t did, but that next
room was in the next house and the
night-worl.er realized that he had been
duped.
lie arose and had an interview with
that landlord before breakfast. He got
no satisfaction beyond that afforded by
free expression Of his feelings. "Any
man who is fool enough to work by
night said the landlord, "must accus-
tom himself to sleeping In all the noise
that hfa NJ IA n,olrs, h,r
day." Then the night-worker decided
to look up another house.
lie could not afford to pay the rent
of two houses, however, and his land
lord threatened to sue him for every
months rent Of the thin walled house,
as it came due, for year How could
he escape the obligation? One of his
friends was a lawyer. To him he went
for advice. The lawyer told him that
his plea of Misrepresentation would not
stand in law, because no guarantee of
the sound-proof condition of the divi-
sion wall was included in the written
lease. So he went away sorrowful.
After considerable pondering, a bril-
liant thought struck him. Another of
his friends was a jeweler. From him
he hired lot of cheap but noisy alarm
CLOCKS, which he arranged on brackets
along his side of the division wall.
These were set 10 go off at frequent IN
teryals between 10 D. m, the hour ut
which the landlord went TO bed, and 3
a. M, the hour at which the night
worker got home. Then the night
worker went to his office, and his wife
went to pass the night with her mother.
Nv hon tho r.ifrl,t trf,rl,at
next morning the landlord, with bag
gard eyes and indignant looks, was
waiting for him.
There's been the most Internal noise
going on in your house all night, sir, =
he calculated angrily. "What on earth
is itfn
"Oh, that probably was ms wife's
collection Of clocks" answered the
night-worker pleasantly. "She has a
fad that way, you know. Her colec-
ton contains over 100 different kinds
This was lie, but the case was des-
perate.
"Don'tthey keep her awake at night"
asked the landlord.
"She always sits up for me-" said the
night-worker. Lie No. O.. "When l
come home we have breakfast, and
about the time you get up we go 10 bed,
Working as we do by night, we have
accustomed ourselves to sleep amid all
the noises that our neighbors choose to
make by day, you know; SO that the
clocks do not bother us at all" Lie
No, 81
The landlord considered moment
and then said: "You We're talking of
moving next month. Have you found IL
house yet?n
Yes" said the night-worlSer. "But
can't pay rent for two houses"
III release you" said the landlord,
And the collection of clocks was re-
| turned.