Much Sympathy Was Expressed For Her, And
For Those Who, Like Her, Lived In This Poor Quarter.
Yet the room was
tolerably large, lofty, and airy, and had a window of the ordinary size of
those in English dwelling-houses.
For this room she paid four dollars or
16s. per month, a very high rent. It was such a room as in London many a
respectable clerk, with an income of 150l. a year, would think himself
fortunate in possessing.
I could not enter into the feelings of the benevolent people of New York
when they sympathised with the denizens of this locality. I only wished
that these generous people could have seen the dens in which thousands of
our English poor live, with little light and less water, huddled together,
without respect to sex or numbers, in small, ill-ventilated rooms. Yet New
York has a district called the Five Points, fertile in crime, fever, and
misery, which would scarcely yield the palm for vice and squalor to St.
Giles's in London, or the Saltmarket in Glasgow. A collection of dwellings
called the Mud Huts, where many coloured people reside, is also an
unpleasing feature connected with the city. But with abundant employment,
high wages, and charities on a princely scale for those who from
accidental circumstances may occasionally require assistance, there is no
excuse for the squalid wretchedness in which a considerable number of
persons have chosen to sink themselves.
It is a fact that no Golden Age exists on the other side of the water;
that vice and crime have their penalties in America as well as in Europe;
and that some of the worst features of the Old World are reproduced in the
New. With all the desire that we may possess to take a sanguine view of
things, there is something peculiarly hopeless about the condition of this
class at New York, which in such a favourable state of society, and at
such an early period of American history, has sunk so very low. The
existence of a "dangerous class" at New York is now no longer denied. One
person in seven of the whole population came under the notice of the
authorities, either in the ranks of criminals or paupers, in 1852; and it
is stated that last year the numbers reached an alarming magnitude,
threatening danger to the peace of society. This is scarcely surprising
when we take into consideration the numbers of persons who land in this
city who have been expatriated for their vices, who are flying from the
vengeance of outraged law, or who expect in the New World to be able to do
evil without fear of punishment.
There are the idle and the visionary, who expect to eat without working;
penniless demagogues, unprincipled adventurers, and the renegade
outpourings of all Christendom; together with those who are enervated and
demoralised by sickness and evil associates on board ship. I could not
help thinking, as I saw many of the newly-arrived emigrants saunter
helplessly into the groggeries, that, after spending their money, they
would remain at New York, and help to swell the numbers of this class.
These people live by their wits, and lose the little they have in drink.
This life is worth very little to them; and in spite of Bible and Tract
societies, and church missions, they know very little of the life to come;
consequently they are ready for any mischief, and will imperil their
existence for a small bribe.
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