The morning call., 1891-07-19
A GRUEOOME PICTURE.
Dying, Poor, FTiRldlsS. F0TSakel in the
Heart Of a Big City.

"Old Peg is dyingi"
So l heard girl of 10 say to her mother as
l sat on house-step in Essex street the
other evening and watched the tide of hu-
manity as it suIged back and forth amidst
the landmarks OF poverty, says a writer in
the New York World.
New York hides something of its poverty
while daylight lasts. 1t is when the sun goes
down and night shuts in that the wolf comes
out and you see him in all his gaunt-
ness and hunger and despair Look at these
sullen men these care-faced women-these
ragged, displrited child remand you read
the story as II 1t were printed for you. Tn g
same struggle day after day to exist; the
same surroundings of vice and poverty; the
same feeling in the heart that they have no
show with the rest of the world.
Yes, there is drink, but if you or l were
down in the slums, how would it be with us
If something would make US forget our iden-
tty aud our surroundings for space
wouldn't we graspVat it? Aud it seems a
bit inconsistent to cry out, LET drink
alone" to these people. when four
IS consumed by, the higher classes.
There is vice here, but why shouldn't there
be, when humanity is herded like sheepP
There is desperation here, but are not the
rich and respectable being overhauled every
day for swindling and robbery? "Who is
TX.
"A poor old woman. sir. who has neither
home, money nor relatives. She's had a
bit OF room in house over there for the
last three months, but God knows she's
been hard used. She's been i'll, with no.
body to care for her, and she's been hungry,
with nobody TO feed her.
And now she's dying9"
shes been going all day-poor old soul
but she'll be better off. l must go up.'
III go, too"
At the top of a house, swarming with
ragged and hungry and sweltering hu-
manity-a tenement, with narrow halls and
broken walls-rooms in which children sob.
women weep and men curse the luck which
never turns for them-and we rearh the
smallest and gloomieSt room of all. There
is an old mattress on the bare and dirty
floor and on this lies the dying woman But
for the kindness of one of the women she
would have been lying on the bare boards.
Is 1t a woman-a human being lying there
You nave to look second time to make
sure. 1t is a human body clothed in rags
and patches ana tatters. The eyes are
closed, the gray hair has fallen down to
partly hide the face, and but for heave of
the chest now and then you would say she
was already dead. There is a chair here for
furniture-a decrepit Old chair. There is
no curtain at the small window-no table.
cupboard, crockery-literally nothing but
the chair aud mattress.
Who knows her?" asked.
room, winking their eyes to show the pity in
their hearts, looked at each other for a mo-
ment, and then one of them answered:
We all know her. and vet no one knows
her. We know her to be old and poor and
helpless, but no one knows back of that. |
think she had husband and home, once"
And how has she managed TO liYe?"
BY getting a crust here and a crumb
there. or late she's been almost deaf and
blind"
One of the women went after pillow and
placed 1t under her head, and of sudden the
dying woman opened her eyes. They were
glazed with death. Her face was drawn and
pinched. her cheek bones seemed ready to
break through the wrnkled skin, anu the
hands lying on the rags resembled the taIons
of some great bird. The lamp held by one of
the women fiickered in the draft coming
up the steep stain way. and the wagering
flame threw strange shadows over the face
growing pale in death. As we stood and
watched her vision came to all. II was
that of happy child-of a fair girl-of n
bride at the altar-of a mothsr singing to
her frst-born. We saw a cosy home "a
stout-hearted husband-a wife with smiling
face. That was the beginning of life. Here
was the endl
| What OF the happy home-the husband