If you stand at the entrance of one of our great industrial institutions you may see for yourself. Its walls are like those of a prison, tall, dark, many-windowed; its sound like that of a vast current of water pouring over a precipice. Inside a thousand or a hundred thousand shuttles may be crashing; I know not. Patient figures are hurrying to and fro. You may see them through the brightly lighted windows of a winter’s night. Suddenly the great whistle sounds somewhere in the thick of the city. Then another and another. In a moment a score and a hundred siren voices are calling out the hour of cessation and the rush of the great world of machinery is stilling. The figures disappear from the machines. The tiny doors at the bottom of the walls open. Out they come, hurrying, white-faced, black-shawled, the vast contingent of men and boys, girls and children; into the black night they hurry, the fresh winds sweeping about their insignificant figures. This is but one mill and all over the world as the planet rolls eastward these whistles are blowing, the factories are ceasing, the figures are pouring forth.
It is on such as these, O students of economics, that all our fine-spun fancies of life are based. It is on such as these that our statecraft is erected. Kings sit in palaces, statesmen confer in noble halls, because of these and such as these. The science of government—it is because of these. The art of production—it is by and for these. The importance of distribution—it concerns these. All our carefully woven theories of morals, of health, of property—they have these for their being; without them they are not.
The world runs with a rushing tide of life these days. It has broken forth into a veritable storm of creation. Men are born by the millions. They die in great masses silently. To-day they are here, to-morrow cut down and put away. But in these crowds of workers we see the flower of it all, the youth, the enthusiasm, the color. Life is here at its highest, not death. There are no sick here: they have dropped out. There are no halt, or very few, no lame. All the weaklings have been cut down and there remains here, running in a hurrying, sparkling stream, the energy, the strength, the hope of the world. That they may not be too hardly used is obvious, for then life itself ceases; that they may not be too utterly brutalized is sure, for then life itself becomes too brutal for endurance. That they may only be driven in part is a material truism. They cannot be driven too far; they must be led in part. For that the maxim, “Feed my sheep.”
But in the spectacle of living there is none other like this. It is all that life may ever be, energetic, hungry, eager. It is the hope of the world, and the yearning of the world concentrated. Here are passion, desire, despair, running eagerly away. The great whistles of the world sound their presence nightly. The sinking of the sun marks their sure approach. It is six o’clock, and the work of the day is ended—for the night.
THE TOILERS OF THE TENEMENTS
New York City has one hundred thousand people who, under unfavorable conditions, work with their fingers for so little money that they are understood, even by the uninitiated general public, to form a class by themselves. These are by some called sewing-machine workers, by others tenement toilers, and by still others sweatshop employees; but, in a general sense, the term, tenement workers, includes them all. They form a great section in one place, and in others little patches, ministered to by storekeepers and trade agents who are as much underpaid and nearly as hard-working as they themselves.
Go into any one of these areas and you will encounter a civilization that is as strange and un-American as if it were not included in this land at all. Pushcarts and market-stalls are among the most distinctive features. Little stores and grimy windows are also characteristic of these sections. There is an atmosphere of crowdedness and poverty which goes with both. Any one can see that these people are living energetically. There is something about the hurry and enthusiasm of their life that reminds you of ants.
If you stay and turn your attention from the traffic proper, the houses begin to attract your attention. They are nearly all four-story or five-story buildings, with here and there one of six, and still another of seven stories; all without elevators, and all, with the exception of the last, exceedingly old. There are narrow entrance-ways, dingy and unlighted, which lead up dark and often rickety stairs. There are other alley-ways, which lead, like narrow tunnels, to rear tenements and back shops. Iron fire escapes descend from the roof to the first floor, in every instance, because the law compels it. Iron stairways sometimes ascend, where no other means of entrance is to be had. There are old pipes which lead upward and carry water. No such thing as sanitary plumbing exists. You will not often see a gas-light in a hall in as many as two blocks of houses. You will not see one flat in ten with hot and cold water arrangements. Other districts have refrigerators and stationary washstands, and bath tubs as a matter of course, but these people do not know what modern conveniences mean. Steam heat and hot and cold water tubs and sinks have never been installed in this area.
The houses are nearly all painted a dull red, and nearly all are divided in the most unsanitary manner. Originally they were built five rooms deep, with two flats on a floor, but now the single flats have been subdivided and two or three, occasionally four or five, families live and toil in the space which was originally intended for one. There are families so poor, or so saving and unclean, that they huddle with other families, seven or eight persons in two rooms. Iron stands covered by plain boards make a bed which can be enlarged or reduced at will. When night comes, four, five, six, sometimes seven such people stretch out on these beds. When morning comes the bedclothes, if such they may be called, are cleared away and the board basis is used as a table. One room holds the stove, the cooking utensils, the chairs, and the sewing machine. The other contains the bed, the bed-clothing, and various kinds of stored material. Eating, sleeping, and usually some washing are done there.