PALATIAL POVERTY.

Otago Witness, 1 June 1910, Page 80

PALATIAL POVERTY.

POOR MEN’S HOTELS. ■ (By William Maxwell, in the Daily j Mail.) ' | Hew to live on 10a 6d a -week and mat* a profit of £17,000 a year. This is not a riddle, but a sober fact, as you will .see if you accompany me to the Rowton Houses. When the late Lord Rowton conceived the idea of providing clean, comfortable, and attractive accommodation for working men of irregular occupation and without ; settled homes, he was looked upon as an idealist with “money to burn.” That was 18 years ago. To-day “Rowton Houses” is- a company with six houses, an income j of £64,000, and 5151 beds, which were let j last year 1,639,976 times. This amazing success, which makes the annual I'eport i and balance sheet almost a romance, has not diminished the philanthropy of the en- j terprise. On the contrary, it has strengthened and extended the original purpose of the Rowton Houses. To be convinced, of this you have only to compare the first Rowton House, opened at ; Vauxhall in 1892, with the last Rowton | House, opened at Camden Town in 1905. | The taxicab in which Mr Dulake, the I managing director, drove me to Camden | Town stoped in front of an imposing red j brick building that might have been a j block of expensive flats in a fashionable I part of London. We were greeted at the entrance by the superintendent, ■whose 1 bearing proclaimed the old non-commis-sioned officer, and stepping over the marble pavement into a broad corridor of | glazed bricks we found ourselves in the i reading room—a spacious, airy, and well- | lighted room with seats and tables of i polished teak, at which no fewer than 300 may be seated. Round the blazing open fires were drawn easy chairs, where men sat ; reading newspapers, magazines, and books ! just like member’s of a well-appointed | club. What struck me at once—and the impression, deepened with every step—was the general air of sedate respectability. It was hard to realise that these were homeless men who paid sevenpence or nine- i pence for lodging, a penny for a bath, and fivepence for a dinner of roast beef and vegetables. “What books do they read?” I asked. Mr Dulake led me to the bookcases, and I had a vision of boyhood when my literary heroes were Mayine Reid, Kingston, Fenimore Cooper, Captain Marryat, and Charles Dickens. They have worshippers still, these great romancers. Strange that J they should be men who have failed in i life. “ They like books of adventure,” said | Mr Dulake. “Dumas’ ‘ Count of Monte j Cristo’ is the greatest favourite. We have to keep several copies. They won’t read novels that end unhappily.” Here you have the whole philosophy of life in Rowton House. Dreams of fabulous wealth realised in fiction. Sorrow and care banished from the written page. I have often thought that it should be made a penal offence to end a novel unhappily. Now 1 am sure of it. The reading room. is a good place in which to take stock of the inhabitants of Rowton Houses. Here is a doctor in full vigour of manhood. What brought him to the poor man’s home? Here are two solicitors, whose certificates are deposited in the safe. Why are thev seeking lodgings at sevenpence a night? “One of them,” replies Mr Dulake, “simply cannot keep money. He .appears to have no vices, but money burns holes in his pocket.” Here is a venerable, whitehaired gentleman whose place at the fireis always reserved for him by tacit consent. His name is familiar to reader’s of serious magazines. “ I cannot imagine why he lives in Rowton House.” observes Mr Dulake, “unless he seeks isolation.” Yon must not imagine that the Rowton Houses are peopled with brilliant failures or with men who have “seen better days.” These are the exceptions, not the rule. The majority are genuine working men, v/ho find here a cheap and comfortable home. This is the record of one who de- | scribes himself as “the oldest live-brick in | the building”: Came January 6, 1900; i ten years, or 520 weekly tickets without one break ; mid-dav meals from the bar, 3512 ; cubicle No. 68 all the time. The writing room adjoins the reading

room, and is provided with ink and pens. At one table sits a Dutchman in velveteen coat, busy at his typewriter. He is writing circulars for the client who engages him in conversation. At another table is a draughtsman bending over a sheet of tracing paper. "He earns in two days enough to keep him a month," said Mr Dulake, "and he works only two days a month." The common employment in this room i 6 directing circulars and envelopes.

Wie must pass rapidly through the smoking lounge, the looker rooms —where for a nominal rent lodgers have a cupboard with lock and key,—and the parcel room, where you find the rifle of a Territorial keeping company with a navvy's shovel and pick-axe, and a leather dressing case that has seen better days reposing near a wayfarer's bundle. Close at hand are the shoemaker's, tailor's, and barber's shops, run by men who pay a rent and make a good living, though they do charge prices that would make the ordinary cobbler, tailor, and barber drop dead with fright. On the ground floor, too, are splendid lavatories and footbaths, with unfailing supply of hot water; washhouse with troughs and wringing machine and racks and stove —all free to the lodger —as well as baths with hot and cold water and soap and towels, for which a charge of one penny is made. The bedrooms are divided into two classes—cubicles with iron bedstead and a chair, and special rooms as well furnished as the ordinary hotel bedroom. The linen is fresh from the company's own laundry, and the covers are warm and abundant. For a cubicle the charge is 7d a night, or ■3s 6d a week ; and for a special bedroom 9d a night, or 5s a week. Each rooms gives privacy, i.s light and well aired, and opens on to a longcorridor to which access may be had only at certain hours.

At noon we descended to the first floor, and found men laying white cloths on tables in the great dining room. At one •end of the refectory is a bar, at which neatly-dressed maids are serving the mid- ! day meal. Here is the bill of fare: ! Tomato soup, l^d; pea soup, Id; fried : cod, ham, 4d ; ; Irish stew, 3d and 4d; steak pudding, 3d; potatoes, or cabbage, or | Haricot / beans, Id ; plum pudding, rice, ! tapioca, stewed rhubarb, or jam roll, Id ; apple tart, l£d; butter, cheese, beetroot, 1 Id ; tea or coffee, £d, or Id a large cup. Special dish for the day; Stewed steak, I 4d. The food, as I can testify, is excellent ; the service is admirable; and the kitchens and larders are worthy of a first class hotel. For those who prefer to provide and cook their own food there ■ are ranges and coppers and utensils. | I came away from Camden Town : amazed at what half a guinea a week can | purchase. Thousands of working men are I making the discovery. Many who come i to London for the week-end to attend a 1 cricket or a football match go to the ! Rowton Houses as to an hotel. Many make the houses their homes. Not a few are sent as pensioners of their former em- , ployers. Lord Rowton had banished the terrors of the common lodging house. He I had shown that philanthopy can be pracj tical and profitable. I wonder if it would i be possible to use the houses occasionally i as schools in which to demonstrate to ! women of the working class what comfort and cleanliness and economy and efficiency i mean?