In view of the possible approach of cholera, and the sanitary
precautions that even the most neglectful of authorities are constrained
to take, it is of some interest to us, says the _Building News_, to know
how the poor are housed in the city of Paris, which contains, more than
any city in the world, the opposite poles of luxurious magnificence
and of sordid, bestial poverty. The statistics of the Parisian working
classes in the way of lodgings are not of an encouraging nature, and
reflect great discredit on the powers that be, who can be stern enough
in the case of any political question, but are blind to the spectacle
of fellow creatures living the life of beasts under their very eyes. In
1880, the Prefect of Police gave licenses to 21,219 arrivals in the city
of French origin, and to 7,344 foreigners. In the succeeding year,
the former had increased to 22,061, while the latter had somewhat
diminished, being only 5,493. There was a census taken in 1881, from
which it appeared that Paris contained 677,253 operatives and 255,604
employes and clerks, while out of every 1,000 inhabitants, 322 only
were born in the city, and 565 came from the departments or the French
colonies. The foreign element in the working classes has increased
very rapidly, numbering 119,349 in 1876, to which by 1881 there was an
addition of 44,689. To every 1,000 inhabitants, Paris now numbers 75
foreigners, though in 1876 the proportion was only 60. It may not be
amiss to state that the annual increase of the Paris population is at
the rate of 56,043 persons, and that in the five years 1876-81, the city
received 280,217 additional mouths. The total population of the capital
is 2,239,928, of whom 1,113,326 are males.
Returning to the poorer classes, we find that in 1872 they were
estimated at 100,000; but that in 1873 they had risen to 113,733, and
in 1880 to 123,735. It is unfortunate to be obliged to say that the
majority of these people are housed worse in Paris than in almost any
other great city in the world. There are two classes of lodgings for the
poor--the one where the workman rents one or more rooms for his family,
and, perhaps, owns a little furniture; the other, a single room tenanted
for the night only by the unmarried man who pays for his bed in the
morning and gets his meals anywhere that he can. Readers will remember
how, under the auspices of M. Haussmann, western Paris was almost pulled
down and transformed into a series of palatial boulevards and avenues.
While the work lasted the Paris workman was well pleased; but he did
not like it quite so much when the demon of restoration and renovation
invaded his own quarters, such as the Butte des Moulins, and all that
densely populated district through which the splendid Avenue de l'Opera
now runs. The effect of all this was to drive the workman into the
already crowded quarters at the barriers, such as La Gare, St. Lambert,
Javel, and Charonne, where, according to the last statistics of the
_Annuaire_, the increase was at the rate of 415 per 1,000. Of course the
ill health that always pervaded these quarters increased also; and, from
the reports of Dr. Brouardel and M. Muller, the number of deaths from
typhoid and diphtheria were doubled in ten years. Dr. Du Mesnil, in
making his returns for 1881 of convalescents from typhoid, remarked that
the most unsanitary arrondissements were the 4th, 11th, 15th, 18th, and
19th--precisely those to which the principal migrations of laborers had
taken place. The 18th arrondissement, which in 1876 had only 601 lodging
houses with 8,933 lodgers, had, in 1882, over 850, with 20,816 inmates.
In the 19th arrondissement there were 517 houses in 1876, with 9,074
lodgers, and 752 in 1882, with 17,662 inhabitants.
It is not only the crowded condition of the poor quarters that is such a
standing menace to the health of the city, but also the shocking state
of the rooms, which the unhappy lodgers are obliged to put up with. The
owners of the property are, as happens in other places besides Paris,
unscrupulous and grasping to the last degree, and have not only divided
and subdivided the accommodation wherever possible, but have even raised
the rental in nearly all cases. Whole families are crowded into a small
apartment, icy cold in winter, an oven in summer, the only air and
daylight which reaches the interior coming from a window which looks on
to a dirty staircase or a still fouler court reeking with sewage. There
are at the present time in Paris 3,000 lodgings which have neither stove
nor chimney; over 5,000 lighted only by a skylight; while in 4,282 rooms
there are four children in each below 14 years of age; 7,199 with three
children; and 1,049 with four beds in each. The Parisian population has
augmented only 15 per cent. in seven years; but the district of poor
lodging houses has increased by twenty per cent., and the number of
lodgings by about 80 per cent. It is true that a law was passed in 1850
to provide for the sanitary supervision of this class of property; but
in Paris the law is a dead letter, and, although it is now active in the
provinces and in places like Marseilles, Lyons, Bordeaux, and Nantes, it
is applied, even there, in a jerky and intermittent manner.
Perhaps the worst of the abominable dogkennels called houses was the
group known as the Cité des Kroumirs, in the 13th arrondissement, which,
by a strange irony, was built on land belonging to the Department of
Public Assistance, which was let out by that body to a rich tenant, who
sublet it to these lodging-house owners. This veritable den of infection
and misery has now been demolished; but there are plenty of others quite
as bad. Notably, there is the Cite Jeanne d'Arc (a poor compliment to
have named it after that sturdy heroine), an enormous barrack of five
stories, which contains 1,200 lodgings and 2,486 lodgers. No wonder that
it was decimated in 1879 by smallpox, which committed terrible ravages
here. The Cité Dore is grimly known by the poor-law doctors as the
"Cemetery Gateway." The Cite Gard, in the Rue de Meaux, is inhabited
by 1,700 lodgers, although it is almost in ruins. The Cite Philippe is
tenanted by 70 chiffonniers, and anybody who knows what are the contents
of the chiffonnier's basket, or _hotte_, may easily guess at the
effluvia of that particular group of houses. A large lodging-house in
the Rue des Boulangers is tenanted by 210 Italians, who get their living
as models or itinerant musicians. Both house and tenants are declared to
be unapproachable from the vermin.
It is some satisfaction to know that these houses have lately awakened
the apathy of some of the public bodies, and that more than one
scheme is being put forward with a view of erecting proper industrial
dwellings. The Municipal Council is negotiating with the Credit Foncier
for the erection of a certain number of cheap houses, which, for the
space of twenty years, will be exempt from all taxes, such as
octroi, highway, door and window tax, etc. There are also one or
two semi-private companies, which are occupying themselves with the
question, and it is to be hoped that the rumors of the pestilence in
Egypt may hasten the much-needed reform.
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There can be no doubt, says the _Engineer_, that the inventor who could
supply in a really portable form a machine or apparatus that could give
out two or three horse power for a day would reap an enormous fortune.
Up to the present time, however, nothing of the kind has been placed
in the market. Gas is laid on to most houses now, and gas engines are
plenty enough, yet they do not meet the want which a storage battery may
be made yet perhaps to supply.
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