| Show THE POOR OF NEW YORK THE STREET REFUGE KEB it was 4 by the bisque timepiece and so hot t that at the puffs of air that came in at the window were like a human ahiman breath from some fevered mouth I 1 liked it the higher the temperature the higher my spirits I 1 must have had an ancestor who was bornander born bor under the equator I 1 was born myself in jidy sione nione sat there in a cane moving herself langu kUy back Q and forth and fluttering flattering her bronze crimps with a palm palmleaf leaf ian fan her great trouble was that the city was on out of town she felt deserted she said new york was a desert and the caravan had gone by an awful sense of loneliness was upon her she halcame had came down broadway and to use her own words iliad had not seen soul this is a peculiar peculia i summer madness that seizes women it develops into a feeling of having been left in a robin kobin son crusoe way upon a barren city there is only one way to treat it and il uis is to COD convince viDeo them that they are suffering from it hallucination s to prove in a word that the city is in town ton that its the carriage for a drive she executed another little yawn how monotonous she said same business same hot empty avenue with its closed shutters abutters same glaring plaza same dusty trees same lover showing shoving the girl the mail samo same police man watching the ramble to see that some lonely wretch commit suicide same iced claret at the casino same long empty st of du dusty 8 ty road and stagnant lak lakes ea why go so tar far to prove the dalness when you can call sit here in your lawn tennis shirt and do it by talking to me my dear I 1 said as a tropical man should 1 I have heard that there are several people left in town I 1 want to show them to you I 1 have heard beard that summer in the city is not a trance but a tragedy get your hat on I 1 believe a woman would come out of a catalepsy at the suggestion ol of a tragedy she stopped stepped fanning herself A little wave of interest rose in her gray eye ye crept down her placid cheek and curled over on her lip in hall half an hour I 1 was heading handing her into the open carri carriage e the piccadilly of of new york abe steaming carri car ri ridden den bowery was un nn usually still the shopkeepers were sprinkling line the abe flags under their windows the men who are away mend ing the tracks in the roadway had s stopped work on account of the heat beat the great thoroughfare shimmered and wavered in a kind of white mirage here and there a crowd stood round a fallen horse but the sidewalks for the most part were deserted returned we turned round eastward at stanton street and went down into an unknown region I 1 do you notice a pd peculiar callar odor 6 the ambient air 1 I asked she said she did and thought it W was you are right I 1 replied it is baked baby she looked incredulous are we amons among cannibals cani bals 11 no christians packed christians in india the mothers used to burn themselves here they roast their children slowly it if the ganges flowed through here be surprised to see how many of them would throw their infants in for relief stanton street is not a fashionable thoroughfare it is narrow choked dirty populous and noisy tte the further farther you go towards the east river elver the noisier dirtier denser it gets it was well on OB to 6 now and the afternoon shadows made the streets that intersected it a little cooler than they had been all day As we crossed them chrystle fore forsyth tn h eldridge allen alien orchard ladlow awe WB looked either way into dense masses of people W what hat were they all doing on the sidewalk and in the roadway escaping from their habitations the street was their only refuge everywhere hert mothers red laced and perspiring carrying babies who were crying and writhing ill 1 I wish ta to make one correction I 1 said baked was not strictly correct parboiled would have been a better word now that I 1 come to look at them why dont they take them in the c country ou asked nione i let aff os a long loud cynical laugh yes I 1 said why dont they take t them liem to newport or ashbury park infatuate tuat a mothers not to hie ble to the mountains and the seashore it ably never occurred to them suppose we stop and suggest it no 11 said paid nione they seen seem to be ill i it might be smallpox nonsense non sense its the prickly heat beat they live in ovens ill ventilated vermia infested many of them disease saturated they do not get water enough they gasp for air and they breakout break out all arver cries go up from thousands of dwellings their mothers are worn out and cross their lathers fathers wuk wak hard bard and must rest when they comelle com elme thin then the family adjourn to thor cooler street for self pro lection tec tion Es ex street suddenly ward into avenue A and gets gels a little relief but here toot loo the thoroughfare presented a strange and trow crowded ded spectacle everybody was outdoors and no nione sud suddenly lenly that in her part of the town penpit went indoors d dors for protection here they came 0 outdoors for it the thai tha cro ss the avenue are all alike narrow ditches between unending rows of tenements six and seven stories high as far as the eye can travel As you yon look down them towards the river an intense picture of life reveals itself one sees what looks like deuse dense myriads of people choking the sidewalks and roadway A wild jargon comes to you yon for these roadways are the playgrounds of countless children the parallel walls of the buildings on either side show every window with a human figure hanging out and watching the mob be low A babel of costermonger costermongers or kaa gan grinders juvenile baseball dabs prize fighters and the unending ven bettas carried on by the claw clans of an neighborhoods deafens you to get through with a carriage was slow and perilous arilous work the driver was assailed assailed with tomatoes dirty urchins climbed into the vehicle behind and ran raa under the horses feet the warning in voices of mothers came at us ns con tiB nally when the coachman tried to pick his bis way through the groups at the corner of avenue B and seventeenth street there was an in riot and es policeman came and asked us it we were looking for anything it turned out that the boys were only teasing a chinese laundryman we drove over some of his linen as we passed on the next block we were stopped by the people and found ourselves in a crowd of curious and impertinent men and women thus detained we had an opportunity of studying the situation at close quarters toe fitense intense life of the place appeared to break over us like a sea and above all the terrible jargon ot of the L treet we could near that plaintive shrill cry ot of the babies COW cowing 0 at us ua from all points ay yes e 1 said the policeman its awfully f rough on the little ones you yon ought augat to come down here at night tand and see lem em sleeping on the walk jammed in pretty tight for hot weather 11 we felt that we were in a foreign city the sights and sounds were all strange toe dense overloaded air was enervating enerva tine toe fumes from the hot stones rose roie in puffs and we could feel the heat rad rachaiel Asted from the brick walls W we e noticed that such an environment viron ment affected the habits babits and manners of ane people most of the women were little more than half ball attired and men showed themselves at the windows naked to the waist it would be a curious study if we could enter into it how far temperature effects the morals of poor people in new york when we crossed fourth avenue and heard beard the plash of the fountain in union square we seemed to have got back from some dreadful dreada al and faraway region so bo you yon see I 1 said the town has not gone out oat of the city by a long along soot 11 no said nione but it would be IL a great deal better it if it had myn crinkle |
