The Washington herald., 1919-01-16


New York, Jan. 15-woe has come
TO the New York mendicants. The
war has put a curse on street beg
glng. The holiday season is the time
they reap a harvest, but a healthy,
one EARNED street beggar who sits be-
fore Fifth avenue church told me
that he did not average more than
y day for ten days.
In previous years he has reaped a
harvest of $50 a day and more. Shop
pers were not generous with their
loose change. They believed that
such change should go to men dis
abled by the war.
However, the reason goes deeper.
The fact is that there Is no excuse
Tor begging. To encourage begging
Is simply hiring these men to sit
around on the curbs when they might
be engaged in useful occupations.
One-armed and one-legged men can
NIL certain positions now as capably
as the able-bodied. 1t is not an in
spring sight for young soldiers who
are returning. some of them disabled
to see crippled mendicants. One leg
less soldier admitted that it threw
him into a fit OF nervousness to see
crippled beggar.
The truth is that there are no
crtpples-in the sense that the cripple
should become a beggar. In New
York there is a school to train dis
abled men for trades in which they
can compete with the able-bodied
This school has taken cripples, some
VINO were beggars, taught them me-
chanical drafting. oxy-acetylene weld
ing or motion picture operating and
has secured employment for them as
sef-supporting. self-respecting work.
ers.
This school is the Red Cross In
stitute for Crippled and Disabled
Men. Cripples are quickly becoming
self-supporting, taking a new lease
on life and in turn the public is taxi
ing new view OF the cripple There
Is less sympathy and more of a
meeting on common ground.
There is an impecunious actor on
Broadway who is a chronic borrower
he Is lovable fellow with apparently
only this weakness. Nobody refuses
him a small loan and they do not
expect it to be returned. Borrowers
are invariably neglectfuI.
The other day the actor approached
a fellow actor. noted for his mean
ness, for a loan. Say" he said in
refusing the loan, why don't you hire
the Hippodrome some day and give a
party for your creditors"
That is good idea" said the bor-
rover. and the same day | suggest
you rent a telephone booth and invite
all your friends
a movie producer has dipped into
the medical fields again for a jazZy
topic to thrill a blase New York pub
lie. He calls it THE Scarlet Trail.
and, Of course, 1t deals with vcnercaI
diseases. The first day audience was
composed OF white-faCed. wide-eycd
young girls and equally nervous young
men. The producers OF these nauseOu5
plays always insult average inteII-
gence. They take it for granted that
every young man and every young
girl is going to go wrong and hand
down taint to coming generations.
ilH Ideas are always far-fetched i'm
probable and appealing only to all
tfa' Is degraded in thought. The in
ference Is that every man or woman
acquires these diseases through i'm
morality, and yet a New York physi-
clan stated in a paper read at a medi-
cal meeting this week that the larger
percentage of cases he had treated
were innocently acquired. He also
stated that the large majority were
cured and living useful lives.
At dinner to soldiers the other night
at private club I served in the ca
pacity of waiter. know now why
walters go on strike.