The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-04-21
HOW MIGRANTS OF
 PARIS GIT SLEEP Bed and Breakfast Provided for
 Four Cents SAID TO YIELD GOOD PROFIT Supper Furnished for a Cent and Wine Sold at the Same Price.
 No Pillows or Bed Clothes Furnished
SAID TO YIELD GOOD PROFIT
Paris Letter in New York Tribune.

Where the hospitality of the Municipal ends commercial enterprise begins. The five or six hundred who are nightly lodged in Paris for nothing by no means exhaust that proportion of the submerged tenth to be found in the streets of the city. The hooks and corners of the forti- f1cations shelter some; but the majority who can rake together a few cents pre- fer at least roof over their heads. These have recourse to wretehed dens, where neither bath nor vaccination awaits them and where a few sous will purchase a nights rest.
 That excellent organization, the Salva- ton Army, runs a shelter in Paris which offers limited accommodation on a grad uated scale. It's price list describes the 1 place. For 4 cents you can have bed; for cents you can get bed with sheets; for F cents you may aspire to bed with i clean sheets! The twopenny beds are never empty, but there are many who would not lay out cents for the luxury of clean sheets; they go by preference i to fearsome hotel close to the Square l des Innocents, a stones throw from the Hales, or central markets. This neigh borhood is at it's busiest between 3 and a. m During the progress of the work | of unloading the market carts which nightly bring into Paris the days pro- vision of fruit and vegetables the mar ket staff put job into the way ! of many an able-bodied man, and, in fact Josephs hotel is mainly filled with men who are hangers-on of this description. At about p. m. you may see a steady stream of such people shuffing through the narrow doorway and laying their cents down at the desk.
 The Sordid Life,
 glance at Joseph's hotel at any time l of the evening is a revelation of what humanity can do without. There Is no pretense at a bed in this establishment. The lodgers would tell you that they sleep Ion rope Ca la corde). No rope is visible, however. The sole furniture of the rooms consists of long, narrow tables, surrounded with bare benches, or forms, narrow gangway being left run ming from the front door to the kitchen on the right and to the narrow, per- pendioular, winding stair on the left. The bare walls display single small poster, informing the customers that a branch establishment exists In neighboring street and opens at D. m. Joseph does not open till D. m., but by quarter pa, that hour every seat in the three . story house is occupied. There are no formaities such as getting ready for bed. Some people sleep in their hats. and
 
 table before them, and that Is all the pillow Joseph's lodgers know.
 If your curiosity leads you to climb that indescribaly filthy stair which leads to the upper rooms, you will see that each is a replica of the first. Hundreds of shaggy heads are pillowed on ragged coat sleeves; not a sound is heard beyond an occasional snore: the stench of the great unwashed" will induce you to i beat nasty retreat.
 On your way back to the door you should glance in at the kitchen, if Jo- seph will allow you. It is curious sight. l When Ayou have sufficiently recovered from the shock its atmosphere is cal culated to inhict, you will observe that i the kitchen fulfills various functions Near the stove, on which two gigantic copper pans are simmering, there stand l three casks of wine which must be per manenty mulled, and an assistant is drawing 1t off in jugs Behind the stove l are three shelves filled with clean white china bowls. "ENery lodger receives a bowl of soup in the morning, with bread. free. His four sous cover his lodging and ! his breakfast" says the patron. tnd he i lifts the lid of one and then of the other i pan, and with a long spoon stirs up the l boiling liquid, showing cabbage stalks, i carrots and nonedscript vegetables re- mains. The large flat loaves of bread are stacked up at the side.
 Certainly, four cents for nights lodg- ing and breakfast is not dear. The llltch- en stove warns the whole place. and even on this cold February night the temperature must seem luxuriously agreeable to these wretched, homeless creatures But, indeed, it Is probably from his canteen that Joseph draws his profits.
 Supper for a Cent.
 Many of his customers look to Joseph for a supper well as breakfast. Therefore he every night provides some supper dish, of which a portion is served for cent Tonight it is nouilles-a kind oe vegetable resembling small macaroni, nourishing and palatable. You can wash this down with red or white wine. and many 1-cent glasses of Josephs wine are consumed nightly by a ragged host. The only words to be heard in Josephs house are orders for this supper dish and for wine. Otherwise, a rule of silence Is rig l orously enforced. It is very submissive, | craven-spirited crowd. They have q cu- | riously deprecatory, apologetlc attitude l toward their host and toward his visitor; even when expressing a preference to white or red wine their voices have the abject. snufling tone of the professional beggar, and their eyes a downward cast, | like those of a dog expecting a blow. And the women?" you ask. Have l you another house of the kind for wom- | emp But Joseph shakes his head. We men are too troublesome" he says, seri- ously. There is no doing anything with 1 them"
 | Long before the winters dawn, as the clock strikes g. Joseph's lodgers wake up and shake themselves. The little white bowls of soup are hastily served out by the assistants. and as hastily emptied. In few minutes breakfast is dispatched. the door is opened. and all the lodgers | vanish into the darkness of the streets. 1 For the next few hours you will prob ably find them on the outskirts of the markets