The record-union., 1899-08-21

a small room, armed with pistol and
knife, prepared to settle their difficult
ties by stealthy stabs, instead of by
application to the courts, it was inde-
scribably bad.
"RAGPICKERS ROW" AND BOT
TIE ALLEY
Added to all this there were Jews OF
the lowest type on the Baxter-street
side. Here was "Ragpickers Row" !"
Bottle alley" which held the city's
record for fights for many long year,
was one of the chief inlets from Null
berry street. Another byway led to
Bandits Roost," the refuge of real
bandit mountaineers from Italy. Dirty
stable lanes hemmed it in, as indeed,
they did every spot. What the famous
fights were is too long a story to tell
here.
The BEND went the way of the
older Five Points four years ago. Park
building is slow work. 1t was not un-
til last summer that Mulberry Park
began to show its real charm and to
stamp itself a success. This year the
grass has come out velvety, the seats
are filled day and evening, and after
the colony has finished its supper huge
crowds congregate there. Though these
Italians are growing gradually Ameri-
canized, this is not evident in their
costumes. AS a military band plays In
the pavilion the scene is dellciously
picturesque. Not one single reminder
fingers of the old slum. Even the Null
berry-street houses opposite the park,
now thrust into the broad light of day,
have been forced to be cleaner than
before.
From the Bend" to Cherry Hill is =
long walk through Chinatown, the
lower end of the Jewish quarters and
the haunts of the few Irish yet left on
the far southeast side of New York.
Turning down from Roosevelt street in
to Cherry street one comes across O.
big yard in the midst of the block.
Blocks of sidewalk stones are stored
there huge piles of worm eaten, dirty
lumber wagons stand out in what might
be called the roadway. In one corner
there is tottering she'd made to serve
the purposes of a stable for two old
horses.
The yard is certainly not prepossess-
ing. 1t is utterly uninteresting - a
Junk shop in the open air. But at least
the four winds of heaven can blow over
it and purify it, which was not the case
until two years ago. Until then the
fresh air only filtered in, losing all it's
purity and becoming vitiated before II
had gone a dozen feet In the old days
the air that struck the famous Oak
street police station was laden with
horrible odors, telling the nose only too
plainly that here We're crowding people
who were little better than brutes, per-
haps worse. For this was Double and
Single alley, the Gotham Court of an
earlier day, and Mullins alley, where
the Swamp Angels of years ago ri
oted, stole, fought policemen, commit
ted murder, and, when followed, hid
in the great sewer beneath Double
alley, crouching on the coping, safe in
ten cases out of ten from the iron hand
of the law.
New York never had worse slum
than Double Single and Mullins alleys.
The oyercrowding may be judged from
the fact that dwellers on opposite sides
of these alleys could, by leaning a lit
tie from their windows shake hands
across. Not that they ever wanted to
shake hands under any circumstances.
for war reigned between all the house
holds. In Single alley two men could
hardly walk abreast comfortably. In
Double alley it was little better Heaps
of rotting refuse were in every corner
of the courts, and the odor of stale beer
arose above all.
THE ITALIANS CAME LAST.
The story never changes; each filthy
slum of New York always comes to
Italians for tenants. The last lessee
of these alleys bundled out what Irish
there were remaining. Why should he
not? 1t meant to him at least 90 per
cent. more rent. The Italians merely
accepted the situation. They were get
ting their rents close to nothing, for
each of the small rooms now came TO
be occupied by two or three families
where one Irish household had found it
tight squeeze for themselves alone.
At a bound the population of this slum
came near to doubling. There were
fewer fights now that Italy was in
stalled here, the police reserves did not
have to tumble out of bed and rush
around on the double quick SO often,
but the filth and immortality increased,
and even with the Swamp Angels"
dead and gone these alleys had dropped
a peg lower.
Why they were left standing SO long
is one of the city's mysteries The rear
tenement agitation waxed and waned,
and yet Single and Double alleys re-
mained. Their deathblow came two
years ago this spring, on an order of
the Board of Health. And yet, even
now the old slum is not entirely demol-
ished. The dirty tenement of Single
alley has been left, though it now faces
on the open, broad yard With nearly
every window gone, and everything
that could be torn away out of it, there
is to be seen still an Italian family
or two in some of the rooms. But the
air can now get a chance at the
gloomy, shallow building, for the first
time in it's history.
1t is understood that a big ware
house will rise eventually on this site,
blotting out finally and thoroughly all
traces of one of the vilest of plague
spots. Meanwhile, however, the wood
and stone yard does well. 1t has laid
to rest for all time the ghosts of filth
and crime.
Gone, too, and its site now play
ground for children and a breathing
place for older people of evenings, is
what long was the worst strip of the
Ghetto Hester, Norfolk, Suffolk and
Rutgers streets, poor as they were did
IaI, o. II nfff n