Evening capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1888-1893, 1891-04-14

For the most part, these two and three
hundred thousand lodgings are fur
nished to able bodied men and women
people as able to work as you and
are. When they are received no longer
at one police station, because they are
"repeaters," " they go to some otlrer sta
ton, and so they keep moving around.
They get their food at house doors,
stealing what they can lay their hands
on In the front basement while the ser
want is spreading the bread in the back
basement. They will not work. Time
and again, in the country districts,
| they have wanted hundreds and thou
sands Of laborers. These men will not
go. They do not want to work.
have tried them. have set them to
saving wood in my cellar to see
whether they wanted to work. I of
fered to pay them well for it. 1 have
heard the saw going for about three
minutes, and then / went down, and
10, the wood, but no saw! They are
the pest of society, and they stand in
the way of the Lords poor, who ought
to be helped, and must be helped, and
will be helped.
While there are thousands of indus
trious men who cannot get any work,
these men who do not want any work
come in and make that plea am in
favor of the restoration of the old
fashioned whipping post for just this
one class of men who will not work.
sleeping at night at public expense in
the station house, during the day get
ting their food at your doorstep. I'm
prisonment does not scare them. They
would like it, Blackwell's Island or Sing
Sing would be a comfortable home for
them. They would have no objection
to the almshouse, for they like thin
soup, If they cannot get mock turtle.
| propose this for them On one side
of them put some healthy work; on the
other side put a rawhide and let them
take their choice. like for that class
of people the scant bill of fare that
Paul wrote out for the Thessalonian
loafers, 'Ifany work not, neither should
he eat" BY what law of God or man
is it right that you and l should toll
day in and day out, until our hands are
blistered and our arms ache and our
brain gets numb, and then be called |
upon to support what in the United
States are about two million loafsrs
They are a very dangerous class. Let
the public authorities keep their eyes
on them.
Again, among the uprooting classes
place the oppressed poor Poverty |
to certain extent is chastening; but
after that, when it drives q man to the
wall, and he hears his children cry in |
vain for bread, it sometimes makes
him desperate. think that there are
thousands of honest men lacerated into |
vagabondism. There are men crushed |
under burdens for which they are not |
half paid. While there is no excuse |
for criminality, even in oppression, |
state it as simple fact that much Of the
scoundrelism of the community is con
sequent upon ill treatment. There are
many men and women battered and |
bruised and stung until the hour of de.
spair has come, and they stand with
the ferocity of wild beast Which, pur-
sued until it can run no longer, turns
round, foaming and bleeding, to fight
the hounds.
LIFE IN THE CELLARS,
There is vast underground New
York and Brooklyn life that is appall
ing and shameful. 1t wallows and
steams with putrefaction. You go down
the stairs, which are wet and decayed
with filth, and at the bottom you find
the poor victims on the floor. cold,
sick, three-fourths dead, sinking into
a still darker corner under the CLEAN
of the lantern of the police There has
not been breath of fresh air in that
room for five years, literally. The
broken sewer empties its contents upon
them, and they lie at night in the
swimming filth. There they are, men,
women, children; blacks, whites; Mary
without her repentance
and Lazarus without his God. These
are 'the dives" into which the pick
pockets and the thieves go, as well as
a great many who would like a differ
ent life but cannot get it, These places
are the sores of the city, which bleed
corruption
They are the underlying volcano
that threatens us with a Caracas
earthquake. 1t rolls and roars and
surges and heaves and rocks and bias.
phemes and dies. And there are only
two outlets for 1.-THE police court and
the Potter's field. In other words,
they must either so to prison or to hell.
Oh, you never saw it, you say. You
never will see it until on the day when
those staggering wretches shall come
up in the light OF tho judgment throne,
and while all hearts are being revealed.
God will ask you what You did TO help
them.
There is another layer of poverty and
destitution, not SO slualid, b,it almost
as helpless, You hear the incessant
wailing for bread aud clothes and fire.
Their eyes are sunken. Their cheek
bones stand out Their hands are
damp with slow consumption. Their
hesh Is pulled up with dropsies. Their
breath is like that of the charnel house.
They hear the roar of the wheels of
fashion overhead, and the gay laughter
of men and maidens, and wonder why
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