The Mt. Sterling advocate., 1891-09-15
Queer Ways Of Getting a Living.

N Well-knOWu anu Dealen lfdCkS Oi art
trade and commerce. Nowhere are
:, these methods to be better studied
than along the river front. Although
Brooklyn possesses no character like
Z Dickens Rogue Riderhood or his part
ner, who picked up living by finding
dead bodies in the swirling eddies OF
the Thames, more than a few men
here live on the river which has been
+ a nurse and home to them. Some,
9 but not all Of these, make an honest
Z living by legitimate purchase of worn
out cable, chain and all that flotsam
and ietsam that inevitably accumu-
lates on board ship. Day after day
keen-eyed, tough-looking men, specu-
lators, as they are mildly called, pull
slips. The police eye them jealously,
and, instead of speculators, designate
them as river thieves. They accuse
them ofbuying anything they can buy
on board ship, either new or old, from |
mate or sailor who will sell to them,
and nothing comes amiss, whether il |
is bale Of cotton, bag of sugar, coils
of rope or cable, a!l is welcome, AID al
is fish that comes to their net. Ware
houses have been entered, sugar stolen
frnpn tbop, o,YJ .b,o,u,, ;n4o ,l,o -, ,.oo4
to be picked up by confederates on the
outside. just how il is possible for
a river thief or speculator TO dispose
of bales of stolen cotton or bags Of un-
refined SUGARS not very obvious, but
when they arc stolen they are dis
posed of somehow and somewhere.
1t was to guard against these gentry
that police patrol boats were estab-
lished by New York and Brooklyn,
and the results have not been brilliant.
Many dollar is picked up along ,
the docks too, by these strange fisher I
men, whose game is floating wood. :
Armed with sort of harpoon, TO ]
which cord is attached, numbers of
men, generally Italians, may be seen q
at high tide, spearing the. hpatlng
Lumber that the set of the tide carries
into certain slips, which are as well
known to these men as favorite fish
ing grounds are known to the ordi-
nary angler, The wood so recovered '
is dried and sold at intervals as fire a
wood. Sometimes, but not often, ,
valuable log is found by them. {
On Hicks street, in the Twelfth
ward, peculiar industry nourishes- '
the purchase or collection of used-up c
orr emptied fruit, fish or vegetable q
cans. Wagons go all over the city |
collecting them, and on Hicks street q
miniature mountains of them may be !
seen. Sheets of iron are spread on /
the earth, fire is lit and into it the 7
cans are thrown; when red-hot they
are taken out and others take their
place, and so the work goes on. When
the fire is out large quantity of the
solder used in the manufacture Of the .
tins is found to have collected. This
is sold, and the business is said TO be =
a profitable one and is undoubtedly
increasing in volume. A man who
died recently in New York amassed a
large fortune on Hamilton avenue.
near the ferry, by the sale of anchors. l
On the same avenue, opposite Fif- l
teenth street, there is collection OF /
some hundreds of rusty looking old L
boilers; the accumulation never seems \
to grow less, but the owner has made [
a large fortune by the sale of these \
same boilers, which are of every '
shape, size and pattern known TO \
engineering science. {
Not a few people labor day after =
day on the dumps, picking up bottles,
old shoes, cans and the thousand and !
one apparently useless articles that are
in these receptacles daily by y
a great city. The familiar italian !
who from years end TO
years end finds occupation and liv- I
ing in diving into ash barrels, is one ;
of the mysteries of city life. but he
makes money in the pursuit and then
retires to Italy and spends the rest of
his days at ease under the shade of
his own tig-tree. How do the myriad ]
fruit dealers, shoestring sellers candy I
sellers and scores of other Inherent
venders make a living? 1t is about
as abstruse a problem as to tell what {
becomes of mules and donkeys, none L
of which ever seem To die of aoe 7