THE FIRST SIGN OF WINTER.

North Otago Times, 21 October 1905, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE FIRST SIGN OF WINTER.

LONDON, August S6tfi, Summer is waning fast, and with tho shortened days tho cry of the unemployed increases a volume, They are always with ns in London, but the approach of winter brings back to tho metropolis the vast army of tramps, wastrels, and unemployablcs, who, during the slimmer aro dispersed over the face of tho country picking up a precarious livelihood a la "Weary Willie." This year as last, and always West Ham and tho immediate neighbourhood of the Docks, is to bo tho central rendezvous of the unemployed, tho loafers and cadgers of London. And the army is already mobilising rapidly, During tho past week there has been much wild talk in West Ham, designed evidently to "put tho fear o' Gawd inter tho Hnppcr clarsses," as one shrieking "leader" said, and to attract t-lio attention of tho newspapers so that relief funds may be started quickly and charity's tap set flowing freely lest evil befal. The "leaders" have teen very threatening in their language, direct invitations to West End looting excursions and suggestive references to tho inadvisability of "'avin' empty bellies when there's butchers' an' bakers' shops to 'and," being plentiful. But it is "all talk," and wo should hear a good deal less of it if only our newspapers would refuse to take it seriously, There is, wo know, much very real distress in tho East End of London, particularly in tho winter season, but tho real deserving poor suffer for tho tho most part in silence. It is tho unI employable who make all tho-noise, and who parade the streets in procession to tho music of rattling cash-boxes, The newspapers by reporting with startling headlines all tho wild nonsense uttered by the unwashed orators of Tower Hill or Beckton road corner only assist to attract tho ne'er-do-wells of all London, who make a harvest out of tho sufferings of tho deserving poor, for once

tho tap of charity io really started it i 3 allowed to run io waste in an almost criminal fashion. Last winter hundreds of pounds were distributed among people who had 110 more claim to charity than I have. Woilien with no sense of shame, and whose husbands were in full work, applied for relief tickets and sold them openly for half their face value for drink. A regular trade indeed was done in these tickets, and local bootmakers often found their customers buying expensive boots for their children by means of relief tickets eked out with cash, One woman who, en the strength of ft pitiable yarn managed to got four shilling tickets out of one institution, had her pocket picked before sho left the building, and in her rage at her loss inadvertently let out her piiT.sc contained "six*andtwenty hob! 1 ' She was not prosecuted for obtaining the tickets under fab pretences because, it was explained to me, "Police Court- proceedings would havo had a very bad effect on the chanty." The highly coloured pictures of the descriptive writers detailed to investigate West Ham's misery last year, culminated in an unprecedented flow of contributions to the hundred and one philanthropic institutions started by wellmoaning if misguided individuals for tho relief oE tlie distress in that'(listrict. "Overlapping" was the inevitable consequence, and as "investigation'' .into individual cases was chielly confined to a few perfunctory questions to applicants for relief many fathers of families found it quite unnecessary to work either for their children's food or their own, And in addition to the large sum's privately contributed Io tho support of tho "starving of West Ham" the poor rate for the district showed an inoreaso of nearly sixpence in the £ for tho period.