New-York tribune., 1906-11-17

pawnshop is IN operation for the benent OF
those without money; and the hospitals are
reinforced by q series Of convalescent homes'
under municipal direction, where tuperculous
patients kept by themselves ana oIner IN
mates have special advantages which they coulc
not have in their own dwellings. There is also
d f1ourishing labor colony in one or the northern
suburbs, where any one willing 10 work Is re-
ceived and allowed to remain as long as he
complies with the regulations and discipline OF
this admirable charitable organization. There
is so wide range of handcrafts that any genu-
inc workman in reduced circumstances can find
coneenial employment there; and, since he is
allowed to keep a portion of the wages earned
there after meeting the cost OF board and lodg
ing. it is within his power to lay by small re-
serve. which viii enable him to make fresh
start outside. In these and other institutions
the activities Of municipal reformers and charity
organizers are combined for meeting the crises
Of misfortune arising in the lives of industrious
workers In their extremity they are sheltered
and put in the way Of getting employment;
convalescence is favored when they need to be
taken out Of their own homes; in labor colonies
they are enabled to work out their own saliva
ton; and when the times are bad they are
relief works a large scale
If the professions of the unemployed so com
mon IN London are avoided in Berlin by these
various expedients. also is street begging
abolished and the evils of pauperism are mnim-
lied There are houses Of mercy for those will
ing to work, and there is the wOrkhouse for
beggars and vagrants and it is thorough
and businesslike every other municipal in
stitution in the capital Rummelsburg is the
place Of correction. where Berlin's shiftless
vagabonds, Incorporate Ioafers and shameless
beggars are forced to work during the period
for which they are sentenced. The hours Of
work are long: the discipline is vigorously en-
forced by armed guards; and neither idling nor
talking is tolerated IN any department Of this
immense establishment. 1t is not conducted
like the English workhOuse. as a comfortable
refuge for transient guests who are weary OF
working outside It is distinctively q place Of
punishment. where work is as compulsory as are
obedience and good conduct. The Rummelsb sburg
workhouse is ordinarily recruited from the idle
class of vagrants who are not ashamed to beg
in the streets and are easily convinced that the
Socialist demagogue is right in saying that the
State owes them a living simply because they
happen to have been born. An enforced period
pauperism as a system of life. When their
sentences have been served out, d workaday
world. without armed guard and straitjaCket.
becomes highly satisfactory. The German work
house is not popular institution like the Eng
lish workhouse. Those who leave it are not
anxious TO return TO il. There is a decline of
pauperism under a system which condemns
vagrancy as rnisderneanor which requires pun
ishment. At the same time the resources Of
trades unionism and municipal
administration are fairly exhausted IN assisting
the unemployed and in enabling them to take
heart and to find work INF