“Well, I don’t know whether there’s any left. If there is by half-past nine or ten you can have one, but you understand you’ll have to work for it.”
I said, “I am not very strong. Will the work be hard?”
“If you’re sick why don’t you go to the hospital?”
“I’m not sick enough for that.”
“Well, I’ll tell you one thing, if you get a bed here you’ll have to work good and hard for it whether you’re sick or well.”
“Could I get anything to eat before going to bed?”
“No, you can’t,” he answered.
I then strolled down to the “Friendly Inn,” supposedly a shelter for destitute men, located on Ninth and Walnut Streets. I asked a pleasant looking young man behind the desk if I could get a free bed. He told me they had no free beds nor any work to do to pay for one, but added, “I have no authority, but if you will wait until half-past ten o’clock, the Manager will be here and he may give you one.”
Remembering my brief encounter with the workingman on the corner, I did not wait but started for the “Lombard Street woodyard.” After reaching Lombard Street I walked for half a mile, and for the entire distance the street was crowded with people, but I did not see a white person until I reached the woodyard. The thrift of the colored people of Philadelphia was markedly noticeable. Saloons were rare in the neighborhood. Their homes were comfortable, they were well dressed and seemingly happy.
I came to a large four-story substantial brick building with a small iron porch at its entrance. There was an iron balcony out from each window and over the entrance door, and on the rear a similar row of balconies, but no fire escape that I could discover. If the building had not been so large it could have been readily taken for a police station, there were so many policemen about the place.