THE BITTER CRY OF POVERTY IN MELBOURNE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2059, 10 August 1893, Page 21

THE BITTER CRY OF POVERTY IN MELBOURNE.

In an article headed ~" Poorer than the Poor,", the Melbourne Age," describing the poverty existing at present among a large Section of the population, says : — It .only needs fco select a few typical cascß from the m»ny (hat present themselves to show how heartrending is the misery of many of' these people. Here, for instance, is the plight^ of a widow who lives in Edward street. She; occupies a damp cottage, for which bhe has to pay 5s a week, and on entering the front room; one sees at a glance that nearly every piece of pawnable furniture has been disposed of. Phe, has four children, and her sole income is the wages of her eldest girl, who earns 63 6d a week"; at a paper factory, whilst, the woman herself; occasionally makes a few shillings at charmg 1 ", work. . , . The case of a woman in Victoria street is harder still. The other day the very bed on I which the and her children had been sleeping j was seized and told by the bailiffs. The^whole' amount of the debt— rent— did not come to £2, and the few wretched articles of furniture would not have fetched more than a few shillings. A charitable policeman living in the district hearing of the affair, redeemed the poor creature's bed, and she has been supplied with partial relief since. In a house tvff one of the lanes running from Victoria atrtet there are three families who cannot boast enough furniture amongst them all to fit out one room. The husbands tramp the city each day in hopes of work, which will not turn up, and the women and children are enabled to just keep body and soul together by presents of -food from their neighbours, a shade, less straitened than themselves. The charity of the very poor to the very poor is found through all these inquiries to be active and generous, that is to say, within the very circumscribed limits of possibility. In some of the streets off the Syduey road there seem to be whole terraces which the direst kind of want has Claimed for its own. Pome of these houses are comfortable, and evidently in better times were the homes of prosperous working people ; and even now it is not safe to judge by externals only, for many of the occupants, in their proper pride, are at pains to keep their sufferings secret. At 'one house neat curtains are drawn across -the windows of the fnmt room, though one is assured that^the rooms in6ide are as bare of furniture as an unoccupied house. You may knock and ring as lorg as you like at this house, but will get no response. If your mission is a charitable one, the occupants do. not care to see you ; if,

as is more likely, you are a creditor, you are still more unwelcome. There are many cases like this, where people enduring the bitterest privations would ratker die than ask or receive assistance. These, of coffrse, are the most difficult to assist, for they must live, but they will not beg or steal. Work is the only thing that can possibly bring a ray of lightness into their, very dark days. ; The woman says, when at length by a species of stratagem you enter her cheerless room, " I have had three. houses Bold over my head, but . I am doing pretty well now, a? I am making 7s ta week at charing. There are lots worse off han me " ; and she directs you to one of them. This proves to be a wretchedly thin young woman, who lives in a bare cottage higher up the street. Her thinness strikes you unpleasantly at first sight, -for it is evident that it is the result of hunger. Her bones show sharply out from her bare arms, and in the pinched features of the face is a look there is no mistiking. Her husband is away np country, looking for^ .work, but meanwhile her'experiences have'been of the most pitiable kind. She ' \a» a baby and a" little girl, yet she would not g^'tothe soup kibohen, nor to bhe large-hearted bqtcher on the Sydney road for assistance, until th& last gasp. She has been forced to, though ; forj as she says, "a mother can't see her children starve before her very eyes," . As one goes from house bo house in this distressed neighbourhood the monotony of the stories of suffering becomes painful in the • extreme. There is scarcely any variation. The .husband, or the' brother, or the mother, has been without work for weeks or months ; the furniture has been ' sold or the bailiffs have taken it: -there is absolutely no immediate prospect of a release. In very many instances it. is only during the last few weeks that the ' most crucial pressure has been brought to bear !,ori some families. In good times they had saved- against a' rainy day, and their houses i were well fnrnished. Then work became so desperately scarce some months ago, they drew on their little stocks of ready money at the savings b'ajik till the fUnds'were exhausbed; and afterwards, bib by bib, the furniture was disposed of. It really seems as if the last few weeks had brought the most careful amongst the working classes to the .stage where, unaided, they can no- longer fight against circumstances. /The bailiffs .have been for -many months- past a standing terror to the people. Wherever one goes one hears that the " home was sold np," or that ' "the .very bed was taken from under us." Of course, many of the landlords of these small cottages and houses are themselves being severely pressedftfrom outside ; but ib ought not to be necessary to remind property owners that to eject starving people into the street ifl *a district where there are hundreds of empty houses already is a very shert-sighted policy. In too many cases there has been a heartlessness displayed- in dealing with these poor people which, ib would have been thought, in times like these, would never have been exercised.' Trumpery little articles of furniture have been seized.by distraining landlords, and bedding and clothing taken which can scarcely have been of any value to the creditor, but were of incalculable service to the debtor. More distressing,' if possible, than the grinding privations of the labouring classes ,are the hardships of the many clerks and shopmen who are without work. Thiß class of sufferers, it is .always found* }}& amongst the last to make known its wants; but these are nonetheless intolerable for such self-respecting independency. 'It is believed that in Brunswick alone there are numerous families enduring tbe misery of the acufest form of genteel poverty. They do not come within the scope of the ordinary relieving committees, and they are just the sort of people who carefully attend to the front garden, and Keep the outside of their houses olean and comfortable-looking, whilst inside are bare boards, and empty cupboards. For stme time past relief committees have been distributing^ food and clothing, but the resources at their command are entirely inadequate to cope with! ail the poverty of the neighbourhood- Mr Warne, of Sydney road, has for many weeks past been giving meat away to hundreds of people ; and, as he carries on an extensive butchering business in the neighbourhood, he is able to form a very reliable estimate of the extent of tae distress. He knows exacbly I how many o| his customers who dealb wibh him \ in'more prosperous bimes now cease to- visit his shop at all;, and he estimates that last Sunday there were ableast 500 families who.^ad no meaL during the day. This means,' ab the lowest estimate, that 1000 persons went hungry ; and such a state of affairs eurely needs no comment. v ' .„ - .