TRAMPS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIII, Issue 17, 21 August 1885, Page 23

TRAMPS.

("From the American Correspondent of United Ireland,.') Mr. T. V. Powdebly, Mayor of Scranton, Pa., in an article on the two millions of diseoaployed men now in the United States, published in the North American Review, quotes the following paragraph among others : * "Mrs. Barah Jane Geary, an Englishwoman, residing in this city committed suicide a few days sinc3. Her husband is a miner aiid owing to the frequent suspension of business in the mines during the' past winter, his meagre earnings were insufficient to support the family. The fact p. eyed on Mrs. Geary's mind, and she resolved to end her life, that 7ier chi'dren might receive Mr share of the food otherwise they would go hungry ." These are not the suicides of devil-may-cares, of drunkards of ne'er-do-weela, of sentimentalists, of half-witted or insane people or of mstt " labouring under temporary insanity." They are the suicidi s of fathers and mothers of families, cf honest, hardworking men, of men who cling to dear life and deirer children, but who are driven to despair by want of work and food in this land to which five thousand people per day are emigrating in search of work and food I

What an awful phenomenon it must be that produces such a crop of suicides ! It is only the few who commit suicide. Behind the few are the million whom the same cause impels in the same direction, but whose duller nerves, or coaiaer fibre, or whose faith have kept them hesitating near the precipice's ragged edge. ' It is possible that some of these people, if they were in Ireland and aa badly off, would not have committed suicide. la Irish cabins starvation has bjen endured unto death, shining Faith standing by to drive Despair from the door, hut something aided Faith in keen ing th« thought of suicide from the Irish peasant's cabin : the placidity of thj euvirontne it, and n-ighboura' love. In Americi the strain of livii'g is such a fr.ghtful thing at the best of time?, the struggle for existence is such a cruel, hearties?, selfish, murderous stru«Me that from mere contemplation ot it or nearness to it many a man has grown gray before his time, and many another has lushed into a madhouse. I find I have run to quite a length with this note, and have not space for the other paragraphs, those which do not relat* to suicide, culled from the week's papers. No matter. The foregoine aff jrds foo i enough for reflection for rational people. With those who, haviug read it, are infatuated enough to come careering over to Castle Garden, it is useless to reason. They are insane. By the way, it is to be noted that large numbers of emigrants who are landing at Castle Garden these days are being hired by farmeis for spring work. Here is a chance for a criticiser " Men are getting employment the moment they land," cries out the crimD "Jf there be so many men out of work in the United States, why is

there such a demand on Castle Garden ? " queries thecritioiser. Ah t delutive suggestion !— Why ?— Because of tfad moat horrible of all the facts of American destitution— the Tramp is the moat disreputable person in the American social fabric. In Ireland or England the Tramp may be quite an honourable tradesman, who chooses to bo from town to town in search of work. In America the tramp is an outcast, an unoonvicted felon. H<s is an institution here— the most feared and abhorred in the country. He goes about the roads, intimidating women to give him food and drink. It is easier for the ex-convict to set on in the United States than the man who has been a tramp ; and the man who has been out of work for a few month*, and who onae takes to travelling about in search of it, is ranked as a Tramp. He joins that great and ever-increasing army ; its brand is upon his forehead, and a Tiatnp he is doomed to remain, by force of circumstances, till bis days are ended. There are hundreds of thousands of agricultural labourers, among the 2,000,000 of unemtroyed. But they are Trampi. The far mer does not wait to bring Tramps about his place when he can go down to Castle Garden, and hire healthy and unsophisticated rustics to do his spring work. Thai is the emigrant of to-day pushing the emigrant of yesterday into the Outcast Sea. And the emigrant of to-day, what beoomea of him to-morrow ? An unsophisticated rustic from the old crantry will be similarly elbowiag him over the edge. When the spring work is over and the harvest is gathered in, the farmer will send ths deluded creature about his business, and— God help him! —winter will see him committing suicide about the docks of New York, or picked up starving, at the least, with haggard face, bleared eye, and shiftless gait, in the ragged uniform of that mighty army that is tramping, tramping, tramping aimless, over the length and breadth qf the hind. Oh, ever swelling army of Tramps, what menace do your rsgs and dare-devilry hold for these United States I