I have not had a good word to fling at the married vagabond so r. In closing, I would say a word for him by way of extenuation. have often been forced to notice how people of his class get their ew of life as a whole (in so far as they can be said to have any) om very slight and insignificant items. I remember one man, hose view of what the municipality ought to do for him had been ermanently settled by a free pass from Washington to New York. Vashington is lavish of passes, and what seemed to her right and ust very naturally seemed so to him. Now, the married vagabond 3, to a certain extent, the victim of sentimentality and gush: he has een taking himself at the charitable valuation; and the last remedy which I have to offer for his complaint is this, let us get a clear-cut nd vigorous opinion about him, and then — through our churches, ur laws, our newspapers, our charity agents, our friendly visitors et us make it perfectly clear to him what that opinion is. REMARKS OF G. W. SWAN, NORWICH, CONN. In taking up my work over eight years ago, I found everything comparatively easy to dispose of except these married vagabonds, who hid behind the wife and flock of little children. I consulted he law, and found there was plenty of law; but the application was not such as to remedy the evil. Such men are often willing to enter a jail, and be well fed and kept warm, and, as a general thing, have nothing to do but read trashy literature, leaving their families to starve or be supported by towns or by benevolent people. I awoke one morning with a determination to see what I could do toward making the law a means to an end. I visited the judge of our city court, and laid my plan before him. I said to him: "I find that in your administration of justice in this court, from time to time, you suspend judgment in the cases of certain men. I want these men to understand that the next time they are presented to this court for non-support of their families, instead of giving them from thirty to sixty days, you will give them the full penalty of the law, and then allow me to give them an opportunity to choose between two things." "Go ahead," said the judge, "and we will see what we can accomplish." The first case to come up was a Scotchman. I had seen him in the prisoner's dock time and again. He had a wife and four little children, was a skilled workman, and able to earn three dollars a day. He expected to get his usual thirty days. His wife would get two dollars and a half a week in coal, and they would try to work the Charity Organization Society for some help. The man was proved guilty, and it was then the opportunity to try my experiment. I walked over to him, and said: "Dave, you are here again; and I will engage that you will get six months this time." He changed color: he did not like that. “Now,” I said, “wouldn't you like to turn round and be a better man, support yourself respectably and take care of your family?" "What can a fellow do,” he asked, “when every one hates him?” “Well,” I said, "if I will stand by and be your friend, will you do as I want you to?" He said that he would. I had had some blanks printed that read: “Mr. ——: Piease pay to G. W. Swan the money due me for wages for the next six months," or "a year,” or "during my employment." I filled that out, "Pay all the wages due David -,” and he signed it. I presented the signed document to the judge of the court, and made a plea for the suspension of judgment for sixty days. I gave a little bond for the man's appearance, and he went to work. When pay-day came, I took his money; and that money did not go into the family, to be got away from the wife by threats or coaxing. I adopted the system of tickets, sending her to the grocery store, allowing a limited amount of groceries to be received,—so many dollars' worth a week. A similar arrangement was made with the butcher and with all those from whom David's necessaries were bought. If something were wanted from the dry-goods store, a special order was given for that. We kept a strict book account, and at the end of each month we called the man in and rendered an account to him of what had been spent. That man to-day is the best man in the employ of C. F. Rogers & Co. His home at that time was anything but cheerful. The condition of affairs had made his wife a scold. There were no carpets on the floors, the furniture was broken, there was only an apology for a stove, and the equipment of the larder was mainly empty whiskey bottles. Go in to-day, and you will find five rooms nicely furnished, five children - for another one has come into the home well cared for, well clothed, and four of them in school; and, above all, you will find a happy wife. They attend church, and the children go to Sunday-school; and the man has a snug little bank account. We have handled between four and five hundred such men in the last four years; and I have personally received over fifty thousand dollars of the earnings of these men, and have applied it to the needs of their families. It has been an interesting experience to step into the court-room Saturday morning, and see the men in line waiting for their cases to be called as the sixty days expired. If I ask for further suspension of judgment, it is always granted. When a man sees the advantage of the better way of living, and applies himself to follow that way, keeping away from the saloon and caring for his family, he is again trusted with his own wages; and we have very few that lapse into the old way. What has been the result with regard to the dispensing of charities in the town? That is an important part. Take the report of our selectmen, and I will show you that in 1887 the amount of aid to the outside poor was almost twenty-three thousand dollars. You know what the past two or I do not think the shiftless wite has entered as largely into our field as the shiftless husband. is kept in jail, possibly thirty days, and comes home to find his wite taking care of herself and the children without charity. When he comes back, he immediately gets hold of the money she has earned, course, the fundamental trouble is the saloon. next thing to be done, then? Why, to do away with that monstrous a hundred, a hundred and twenty-five times, to a jail, where there is the jail to their wretched home they piss twenty saloons. I once heard a woman say, "I can go by eight liquor saloons, but the ninth fetches me." Well, the poor wretch was not so much to blame as she might be, REVARKS BY MAN AGA is the motto of the Churacan and the wor I am very glad to say a word in regard to the dy muy and hook of service. "I serve It is because in the kind of work I am interested, w It is never "Oh, why are you her agon! friends. That is why the work is so very pleasant. I have had some tenants for fifteen years, and I should be very much surprised if they were not as much interested in anything that happens to me as I am in anything that happens to them. Again and again, when anything has been said publicly concerning matters in which they knew I was interested, they have saved the papers for me to see the next day, saying, "Did you see this?" with the greatest zeal and interest, knowing I would care for it. When I went to Europe, one of my tenants kept a number of daily papers while I was gone, because she thought I wouldn't know what was happening while I was away. I think I was asked especially to speak about tenement-house work, but I want to speak also of work in connection with public institutions. Some of my tenants became paupers through no fault of their own; and, when I went to see them in the almshouse, and found they were unhappy there, I felt that other people like them might also be unhappy in almshouses. I thought I would tell you a little story that I have told once before in Boston, of a poor woman who, when I was going through the ward of our almshouse at Long Island, called me to her hurriedly, saying, "I want to speak to you"; and this is what she said: "I know I am dying, but I don't want to die here." She asked me if I could get her moved. I told her it was a difficult matter, because she was in the extreme stages of consumption, but I would see what I could do. I went to the Channing Home, a most excellent private institution in Boston; and they consented to receive that woman. She was perfectly happy there, notwithstanding all the suffering occasioned by her dreadful disease. She was happy because she was treated with kindness and consideration. She had been all her life a self-supporting woman; and it was because she longed for this loving, tender service at the last that she appreciated it so much. At Christmas she sent for me, saying, “I want to ask you for something." I wondered what it was, and felt that I should be only too delighted to get it for her. When I found out what it was, it was this: she said, "The matron and the nurses have been so kind to me here, and I cannot make any return to them; but I wish you would get me some little thing that I might give to them for Christmas." The week before she died she sent for me again, and told me how perfectly happy she had been in this institution because of the kindness and love shown to her there. added, "I want you to think of me always as a grateful woman am sure one such experience as that shows what the person ment may be in the lives of people who perhaps haven't. much of it in their downward path, especially if it ends in a institution. She I Before I close, I cannot help referring to a man who of all oti. seems to me in England to stand as a representative of the value or personal service, the Earl of Shaftesbury. I do not can remember the record of his life without feel nk any of us + was de |