The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1902-12-20
STILL MORE REGG Ans.
The Coal story Is Used MOst-SchO Oigiris
Now Appealed To.

Beggars are always plentiful in the street
Of New York. especially in the shopping
districts and as the Christ mas holiday
season approaches; but this year the crop
seems to be larger than usual The open
ing of new shopping district, too, has
supplied a new field for them
Very few of the beggars who have fire.
quen,ed the downtown shopping districts
and whose faces and tales Of woe are ia
miliar to half the women in New York have
changed their fields of labor. and most Of
the people who ask for aims in the new
district are strangers. Where the new ones
come from nobody seems to know but
just now they are doing a land Office
business
The scarcity of &C al has furnished a new
and potent plea with which to draw cents
and dimes from the pocket books of women,
and there are more tales now of cold be-
cause Of the high price OF anthracite than
there are of the pinching hunger that was
50 long the mainstay Of the heggarS The
plea is successful. too. in a great proportion
Of cases II one afternoons ubservati ion
goes for ANYTHING coal might he $50 ton
and the majority OF hcggars would still
be able TO buy it
A few days ago one woman appealed 10
ehv.I persons successfully in the hour be-
tween and p. NJ. on Broadway between
Ihirty-fourth and Thirty-tiith streets and /,
presumably. got dime from each, because
that is the amount for which she asked
She wa, porrly dressed but was not ragged
her story WAS glib and she quite looked
the part that she bad u'dert ken "a ulav
She was, she said, the wife Of driver
OF coal wagon who was out OF work be-
cause his boss could not get coal enough for
him to deliver. What she wanted was a
dime to buy some coal to warm the room
in which her three children sat -hivering.
In every case during the hour in which
she came under the observation Of a Sun
reporter she approached woman who
was accompanied by man. II was To the
woman she told her story, but the man
Usually gave the coin.
With a word of hearty thanks the baggar
would turn and hurry away, a. though
glad to get the dime and be able TO hasten
home to warm the children She never
went more than few yards. though. before
she slowed up and watched for new
victim.
Schoolgirls have been free from the i'm
portunities OF beggarS further downtown;
but the new beggars are. evidently, deter
mined to try them for a few cents each.
Four girls. whose ages range from II TO II,
went 10 see the Christmas display uptown
the other day. While they were looking
through the windows they got five coal
stories and three hunger tales, to each Of
which they contributed one cent each.
While the beggars in the new shopping
districts are insistent they lack whatever
there is of pictureequeness in the downtown
crowd. There are no lame persons sitting
on the cold sidewalk waving hats and empty
hands al the passers no crippled men
stumping along on abbreviated legs or
hobbling on crutches, and no women
stumbling along with babies in their arms
staggering from seeming weakness super
induced by hunger
The new beggars may be actually new
at the business. or they may believe that
just at this time Of year any old story Of
privation, and especially the coal story,
will touch peoples pocketbooks.