Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1901-01-19

don. and installing model village, with a
park and recreation ground in its place.
DR.. Jays Work in the Sums.
This district was known as the "Boun-
Diary Street Area" and it came to be puri-
fed largely through the efforts OF a single
remarkable clergyman of the Church OF
england, named A. Osborne Jay. Almost
fresh from Oxford, he took this living, IN
which every one of his predecessors had
cen absolutely HELPLESS. Those worthy
len had organized culture cubs dis
ributed soup tickets with liberaity, and
done what parish visiting they dared, put
they never got nearer to the people of the
district than was necessary to be most
humiiatingly victimZed by them. 1t was
a tough place. The last policeman who had
entered it alone, while in pursuit of a
sneak thief. had had his skull crushed In
by an iron grating deftly dropped from q
second -story window.
The first thing that DIR. Jay did when
he took over" his new parish was to
show its inhabitants that he wasn't afraid
of them-that he could, on occasion. be a
militant Christian. Then he set to work
TO find out what sport they liked best of
any and discovered that 1t was boxing
So he opened large room with every IA
cility for the practice of the manly art, in
Guiding gloves. and invited the men to come
there and spar. They hocked to 1t. an
honor which they never had paid to the
old Club rooms" where dominoes, check.
ers and chess constituted the attractions.
1t was no drawing room boxing that SUBJ
sequently reigned In that room. A bloody
nose was among the preliminaries; no one
regarded the loss Of a tooth or two, and
the bouts almost always went till the
knockout came. Even the parsons strict
rule of no swearing or bad language scarce
ly affected the popularity of the place. He
was always there. and as time went on.
even the most hardened men in the dis
trict recognized the fact that their preacher
was no ''softy," as they put it. And so he
got his first hold on them The story of
how he won the whole district to respect
and almost love him is too long to be told
here, but now in the spot where stood the
worst part Of the "Old Nicho," stands DR..
Jays famous church-with boxing room
in its basement! DR.. Jay 1t was who egged
the London county council on to rebuild
ing the slum. The story Of his long fight
was told by Arthur Morrison in his novel,
"a Child Of the Jago," Of which DR.. Jay.
or Father Jay as he Is now afrectionate-
ly known in the "Jago" Is a prominent
figure, and which Is dedicated to him.
What a Typical Stun is Like.
A picture Of this part Of Shoreditch as 1t
was before Dr. Jays crusade gives a fair
idea Of the other congested London districts
with which the county council is either
dealing or getting ready to deal. The houses
were built so that their ground floors were
sometimes more than a foot below the
street level. and in building them cheap
sort Of mortar known as "Billy sweet" had
been used distinguishing feature of this
substance being that it never dried. In the
twenty-eight feet wide. Most Of the thor
oughfares were mere alleys. No house
boosted front door, no house was ever re-
paired and such back yards as had once
existed had been rooted over to make new
dwellings. People slept out on the side
walks to avoid one kind of verm!n in the
houses. and burned candle stumps to scare
off another kind.
The death rate In the district was forty per
thousand and it is no exaggeration to say
that every man in the Stun was some kind
Of a criminal. At one time there were
sixty-four ticket-of-leave men there, and
murderer. had slipped between the two
posts that marked the entrance to what
Arthur Morrison called the "Jago" the po-
lice gave up the pursuit. In the slum there
was what was known as a royal family"
who HINGED It over the district. but there
was also a pretender and his gang, and
when the two clioues met In battle. which
they often did. the district literally ran
with blood.
Terrible Conditions.
In one of the slum districts there are
ffty-four dwellings In which 1900 people
live or die. In the rooms of such novels
the principal article of furniture is general
ly the bed, which nearly fills the apart
ment, and which serves for the whole fam
lily. no matter how numerous 1t may be-
AS many as can, generally the father.
mother and any guest who may be en-
1oying their hospitality. with. say, three of
the older children, occupy the top of the
bed. The rest of the family sleeps under
It. Generally every article of bed clothing
reeks with filth. The windows of the room.
behind griny curtains, are never
washed, and the room is in practical dark
ness. Sometimes two families Ego snooks''
on the same room and bed. the first using |
II from until midnight and then decamp-
Ing. when the second retires in the warm |
bed. Three rooms in such a dwelling were |
visited. In the first lived a man, womao |
board of an annex to two more grown ner. |
IONS: In the second lived a father mother |
knd three grown-aln chfIdrnn vrhJIa ar