The age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1897-1902, 1897-10-31
HOW SOME PEOPLE LIVE.
Queer Ways of Eking Out insufficient Regular
Incomes.

| From Casselrs Saturday Journal.
| In the struggle for life, which is so
| l1ean at this end of the century, some
people resort to strange lexpedients to ger
| bread and cheese or 60 increase pit
| lance to comfortable income. In
| spector Livingstone, who was formerly
| in charge of the police at the law courts,
| tells a tragic story of poor and brief
| less bauIdster who fought q long and
| grim battle with fate. and was beaten
| in the end. In the early hours of the
morning he worked as a market porter
at Covent Garden, and then at 10 O'clock
adjourned to his chambers in the Temple,
donned wig and gown, and attended the
courts, waiting day after day to grasp
the skirts of happy change. Others as
unknown to the world and friendfess as
he had thetr opportunity, but none pre-
scented itself to him. and in hope ever
deferred his race was run.
A Somerset House clerk, who rushed
into matrimony before he had properly
counted the cost, and found IT difficult
to run even a modest household on f150
year, especially after, the arrival of a
little stranger, got over the embarraiss-
ment by starting a coffee stall near
Smithfield market in the early morning.
He kept his truck in the neighborhood
but brought down his stock of comesti-
bfas from his home in Camden Town.
Fortunately, his wife, who did her best
to help on the enterprise, was a capital
plain cook, and his mutton pies and buns
had great reputation in the market.
He'was generally cleared out by o'clock
and no one would have thought of :den-
tifying him with the smart young man,
slk-hatted and top-coated, who two
hours later crossed the Strand to Som
erset House.
A rising author who is now sought by
the publishers, but had particularly
hard struggle to find acceptance tided
over the worst period by acting aus a
brokers man. Taken as a whole, he
found Ut most unpleasant experience,
but he declares that he wouldn't have
missed it for the world, for it has sup
piled him with material for numbers of
sketches and short stories A Christ
mas story which brought him lot of
praise for instance, was a chapter from
that experience, and well deserved the
encomium of very realistic" from. the
critics.
A friend of the wrh.er who rejoices in
what the police reports call "a very aris-
tocratic appearance" land has in addi-.
ton excellent manners, adds enough to
a slender income to pay for the summer
holiday for himself and family, his tail
or's and bootmaker's bills, and even his
rent, by acting as a private detective
at balls and receptions in Belguayia and
Mayfair. Chance threw him in con-
tact with the manager of a detective
agency which does a great deal of bust
ness of this kind, and his first job was,
in fact, simply as nights diversion at
the invitation of the manager aforesaid.
But so pleased was the lady of the
house with his appearance and obliging
courtesy that she made special mention
of it to the manager, who accordingly
proposed to my friend that he should &C
cept regular paid employment. He was
nothing loGth and now has engagements
almost every night during the season.
Another curious case is that of a Nom
conformist minister in the south of Lon
don, who doubles his slender salary by
| the profits of a fiourishing photography
business on the othsr side of the Thames.
| Originally he took up photography as a
| pastime, but acquiring considerable skill
| in the work, was pestered by people who
| wanted to get their portraits taken on
| the cheap. So ne determined to gain
| instead of lose by his work, and taking
| convenient rooms at some distance from
the scene of his ministerial labors, set up
| as Photographic artist" under another
name, his daughter acting as his assist
| ant. Fortune favored him, and before
| the secret of his constant absence from
| home was fathomed blythe curious of his
| flock ne had made so promising a. busf-
| ness that he stood in no awe of deacons
| or church. though, indeed, the former
| have taken a very sensible view or the
matter, and admire rather than con-
| denim his enterprise.