waiting at the entrance to a fold. There is no particular zeal in this
effort which they are making to live. Hunger for life they have, but
it is a rundown hunger, dispirited by lack of encouragement. They have
been kicked and pushed about the world in an effort to live until, as
a rule, they are comparatively heartbroken and courage-broken. This
storm, which spells comfort and indoor seclusion and amusement for
many, spells a rough opportunity for them--a gutter crust, to be sure,
but a crust.
[Illustration: The Men in the Snow]
And so they are here early in the morning, in the dark. They stand in
a long file outside the contractors’ stable door, waiting for that
consideration which his present need may show. A man at a little glass
window cut in a door receives them. He is a hearty, material,
practical soul who has very little to suggest in the way of mentality
but much in the spirit of acquisitiveness. He is not interested in the
condition of the individuals before him. It does not concern him that
in most cases this is a last despairing grasp at a straw. Will this
fellow work? Will he be satisfied to take $1.75 in place of the $2.00
which the city pays? He does not ask them that so clearly; it is done
in another way.
“Got a shovel?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, it’ll cost you a quarter to get one.”
“I ain’t got no quarter.”
“Well, that’s all right. We’ll take it out o’ your pay.”
Not for to-day only, mind you, but for every day in which work is done,
the quarter comes out for the shovel. It is suggested in some sections
that the shovel is sometimes stolen, but there are gang foremen, and no
money is paid without a foreman’s O. K., and he is responsible for the
shovels.... Hence----
But these men are a bit of dramatic color in the city’s life, whatever
their sufferings. To see them following in droves through the
bitter winter streets the great wagons which haul the snow away is
fascinating, at times pitiful. I have seen old men with white beards
and uncut snowy hair shoveling snow into a truck. I have seen lean,
unfed strips of boys without overcoats and with long, lean, red hands
protruding from undersized coat sleeves, doing the same thing. I have
seen anæmic benchers and consumptives following along illy clad but
shoveling weakly in the snow and cold.
It is a sad mix-up at best, this business of living. Fortune deals so
haphazardly at birth and at death that it is hard to criticize. It so
indifferently smashes the dreams of kings and beggars, dealing the
golden sequins to the sleeping man, taking from the earnest plodder the
little which he has gained, that one becomes, at last, confused. It
is easy for many to criticize, for one reason and another, and justly
mayhap, but at the same time it is so easy to see how it all may have
come about. Wit has not always been present, but sickness, a perverted
moral point of view, an error in honesty, and the climbing of years is
over; the struggling toad has fallen back into the well. There is now
nothing but struggle and crumb-picking at the bottom. And these are
they.
And so these storms, like the bread-line, like the Bowery Lodging,
offer them something; not much. A few days, and the snow will be over.
A few days, and the sun of a warm day will end all opportunity for
work. They will go back again into the gloomy adventuring whence they
emerged. Only now they are visible collectively, here in the cold and
the snow, shoveling.
I like to think of them best and worst, though, as I have seen them
time and time again waiting outside the wagon barns at night, the
labor of the day over. It is something even to be a “down-and-out” and
stand waiting for a pittance which one has really earned. You can see
something of the satisfaction of this even in this gloomy line. In the
early dark of a winter evening, the street’s lamps lighted, these men
are shuffling their feet to keep warm. They are waiting to be paid, as
they are at the end of each work day, but in their hearts is a faint
response to the thought of gain--one dollar and seventy-five cents for
the long day in the cold. The quarter is yielded gladly. The contractor
finds a fat profit in the many quarters he can so easily garner. But
these? To them it is a satisfaction to get the wherewithal to face
another day. It is something to have the money wherewith to obtain
a lodging and a meal for a night. That one-seventy-five--how really
large it must look, like fifty or a hundred or a thousand to some.
Satisfactions and joys are all so relative. But they have really earned
one dollar and seventy-five cents and can hurry away to that marvelous
table of satisfaction which one dollar and seventy-five cents will
provide.
THE FRESHNESS OF THE UNIVERSE
The freshness of the world’s original forces is one of the wonders
which binds me in perpetual fascination. My own strength is a little
thing. I am sometimes sick and sometimes well; some days I am bounding
with enthusiastic life, at other times I am drooping with weariness and
ill feeling. But these things, the great currents of original power
which make the world, are fresh and forever renewing themselves.
Every morning I rise from my sleep restored and go out of doors, and
there they are. At the foot of my garden is a river which has been
running all night long, a swift and never-resting stream. It has been
running so every day and every night for centuries and centuries--and
thousands of centuries, for all I know--and yet here it runs. People
have come and gone; nations have risen and fallen; all sorts of puny
strengths have had their day and have perished; but this thing has
never weakened nor modified itself nor changed,--at least not very
much. Its life is so long and so strong.
[Illustration: The Freshness of the Universe]
And another thing that strikes me is the force and persistency of the
winds. How sweet they are, how refreshing to the wearied body! I rise
with sluggishness, and a sense of disgust with the world, mayhap, and
yet here are the winds, fresh as in the beginning, to run me through
and cool my face and hands and fill my breast with pure air and make me
think the world is good again. I step out of my doorway, and here
they are, blowing across the garden, shaking the leaves of the trees,
rustling in the grass, fluttering at my coat-sleeves and my hair; and
I am no whit the wiser as to what they are. Only I know that they are
old, old, and yet as strong and invigorating as they ever were, and
will be when my little strength is wasted and I am no more.
And here is the sun, bright, golden thing of the sky, which I may not
even look at directly but which makes my day just the same. It is so
invigorating, so healing, so beautiful. I know it is a commonplace,
the thing that must have been before I could be, and yet it is so
novel and fresh and new, even now. I rise, and this old sunlight is
the newest thing in the world. Beside this day, which it makes, all
things are old--my little house, which after all has stood only a few
years; my possessions, dusty with standing a little while, and fading;
myself, who am less young and strong by a day, getting older. And yet
here it is, new after a million years--and a billion years, for aught
I know--pouring this golden flood into my garden and making it what I
wish it to be, new. The wonder of this force is appealing to me. It
touches the innermost strangeness of my being.
And then there is the earth upon which I stand, strange chemic dust,
here covered with grass but elsewhere covered with trees and flowers
and hard habitations of men, yielding its perennial toll of beauty.
We cannot understand the ground, but its newness, the perennial force
with which it produces our food and beauty, this is so patent to all.
I look at the ground beneath my feet, and lo, the agedness of it does
not occur to me, only its freshness. The good ground! The new earth!
This thing which is old, old--old as Time itself--must always have been
and must always be. Where was it before it was here? What stars did it
make, and moons? What ancient lives have trod this earth, this ground
beneath my feet, and now make it? And yet how comes it that I who am
so young find it so new to me and myself old as compared with its
tremendous age! That is the wonder of this original force to me.
And in my yard are trees and little things such as vines and stone
walls, which, for all their newness and briefness, have so much more
enduring power than have I. This tree near my door is fully a hundred
years old, and yet it will be young, comparatively speaking, and
strong, when I am no longer in existence. Its trunk is straight, its
head is high, and here am I who, looking upon it now as old, will soon
be older in spirit, unable to bear the too-heavy burden of a short
existence and tottering wearily about when it will still be strong and
straight, good for another life the length of mine--a strange contrast
of forces. That is but one of the wonders of the forces of life: their
persistence.
Yet it is this morning waking that impresses the marvel of their
greatness upon me. It is this new day, this new-old river, this new-old
tree, the new earth, so old and yet so new, which point the frailty of
my physical and mental existence and make me wonder what the riddle of
the universe may be.
[Illustration: The Cradle of Tears]
THE CRADLE OF TEARS
There is a cradle within the door of one of the great institutions of
New York before which a constant recurring tragedy is being enacted. It
is a plain cradle, quite simply draped in white, but with such a look
of cozy comfort about it that one would scarcely suspect it to be a
cradle of sorrow.
A little white bed, with a neatly turned-back coverlet, is made up
within it. A long strip of white muslin, tied in a tasteful bow at
the top, drapes its rounded sides. About it, but within the precincts
of warmth and comfort of which it is a part, spreads a chamber of
silence--a quiet, small, plainly furnished room, the appearance of
which emphasizes the peculiarity of the cradle itself.
If the mind were not familiar with the details with which it is so
startlingly associated, the question would naturally arise as to
what it was doing there, why it should be standing there alone. No
one seems to be watching it. It has not the slightest appearance of
usefulness. And yet there it stands day after day, and year after year,
a ready-prepared cradle, and no infant to live in it.
And yet this cradle is the most useful, and, in a way, the most
inhabited cradle in the world. Day after day and year after year it is
a recipient of more small wayfaring souls than any other cradle in the
world. In it the real children of sorrow are placed, and over it more
tears are shed than if it were an open grave.
It is a place where annually twelve hundred foundlings are placed, many
of them by mothers who are too helpless or too unfortunately environed
to be further able to care for their children; and the misery which
compels it makes of the little open crib a cradle of tears.
The interest of this cradle is that it has been the silent witness
of more truly heartbreaking scenes than any other cradle since the
world began. For nearly sixty years it has stood where it does to-day,
ready-draped, open, while almost as many thousand mothers have stolen
shamefacedly in and after looking hopelessly about have laid their
helpless offspring within its depths.
For sixty years, winter and summer, in the bitterest cold and the
most stifling heat, it has seen them come, the poor, the rich, the
humble, the proud, the beautiful, the homely; and one by one they have
laid their children down and brooded over them, wondering if it were
possible for human love to make so great a sacrifice and yet not die.
And then, when the child has been actually sacrificed, when by the
simple act of releasing their hold upon it and turning away, they have
allowed it to pass out from their loving tenderness into the world
unknown, this silent cradle has seen them smite their hands in anguish
and yield to such voiceless tempests of grief as only those know who
have loved much and lost all.
The circumstances under which this peculiar charity comes to be a part
of the life of the great metropolis need not be rehearsed here. The
heartlessness of men, the frailty of women, the brutality of all those
who sit in judgment in spite of the fact that they do not wish to be
judged themselves, is so old and so commonplace that its repetition is
almost wearisome.
Still, the tragedy repeats itself, and year after year and day after
day the unlocked door is opened and dethroned virtue enters--the victim
of ignorance and passion and affection--and a child is robbed of a home.
I think there is a significant though concealed thought here, for
nature in thus repeating a fact day after day and year after year
raises a significant question. We are so dull. Sometimes it requires
ten thousand or ten million repetitions to make us understand. “Here is
a condition. What will you do about it? Here is a condition. What will
you do about it? Here is a condition. What will you do about it?” That
is the question each tragedy propounds, and finally we wake and listen.
Then slowly some better way is discovered, some theory developed. We
find often that there is an answer to some questions, at least if we
have to remake ourselves, society, the face of the world, to get it.
WHEN THE SAILS ARE FURLED
The waters of the open sea as they rush past Sandy Hook strike upon the
northeasterly shore of Staten Island, a low-lying beach overshadowed by
abruptly terminating cliffs. Northeastward, separated by this channel
known as The Narrows, lies Long Island. As the waters flow onward,
following the trend of the shoreline of Staten Island, they become less
and less exposed to the winds of the sea, and soon, as they pass the
northernmost end of the island, they make a sharp bend to the west,
passing between it and Liberty Statue, where the tranquil Kill von Kull
separates the island from New Jersey.
Long ere they reach this region the sea winds have spent their force,
and the billows, which in clear weather are still visible far out, have
sunk to ripples so diminutive that the water is not even disturbed.
And here, in Staten Island, facing the Kill von Kull, still stands in
almost rural quiet and beauty Sailors’ Snug Harbor. Long ago this was
truly a harbor, snug and undisturbed, a place where the storm-harried
mariner, escaping the moods and dangers of the seven seas, found a
still and safe retreat. To-day they come here, weary from a long
life voyage, to find a quiet home. And truly it is restful in its
arrangements. The grounds are kempt and green, the buildings pleasingly
solemn, and the view altogether lovely, a mixture of land and sea.
In the early days this pleasantly quiet harbor was a long distance
from New York proper. Staten Island was but thinly settled, and the
Kill von Kull a passageway seldom used. To-day craft speed in endless
procession like glorious birds over the great expanse of water. On a
clear day the long narrow skyline of New York is visible, and when fogs
make the way of the pilot uncertain the harbor resounds with endless
monotony of fog-horns, of vessels feeling an indefinite way.
Though the surroundings are pastoral, the appearance of the inmates
of this retreat, as well as their conversation, is of the sea, salty.
Housed though they are for the remainder of their days on land, they
are still sailors, vain of their service upon the great waters of
the world and but little tolerant of landlubbers in general. To the
passer-by without the walls they are visible lounging under the trees,
their loose-fitting blue suits fluttering light with every breeze
and their slouch hats pulled rakishly over their eyes, an abandon
characteristic of men whose lives have been spent more or less in
direct contact with wind and rain. You may see them in fair weather
pacing about the paths of the grounds, or standing in groups under the
trees. Upon a long bench, immediately in front of the buildings, others
are sitting side by side, smoking and chatting. Many were captains, not
a few common sailors. But all are now so aged that they can scarcely
totter about, and hair of white is more often seen than that of any
other shade.
For a period of nearly a year--a spring, summer and fall--I lived in
the immediate vicinity of this retreat and was always interested by
the types of men finally islanded here. They came, so I was told, from
nearly all lands, France, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland,
Spain, Austria, Russia, and elsewhere, though the majority chanced
to be of English and American extraction. Also, I was told and can
well believe they are, a restless if not exactly a troublesome lot,
and take their final exile from the sea, due to increasing years and
in most instances poverty, with no very great equanimity. Yet the
surroundings and the provision made for them by the founder of this
institution, who, though not a sea-faring man himself, acquired his
fortune through the sea over a century ago, are charming and ample; but
the curse, or at least the burden of age and the ending of their vigor
and activities, rests heavily upon them, I am sure. I have watched them
about the very few saloons of the region as well as the coffee-houses,
the small lunch counters and the moving picture theaters, and have
noted a kind of preferred solitude and spiritual irritability which
spells all too plainly intense dissatisfaction at times with their
state. Among the quondam rovers are rovers still, men who pine to be
out and away and who chafe at old age and the few necessary restraints
put upon them. They would rather travel, would rather have the money
it costs to maintain them annually as a pension, outside, than be in
the institution. Not many but feel a sort of weariness with days and
with each other, and I am quite convinced that they would be happier if
pensioned modestly and set free. Yet this is a great institution and
indeed a splendid benefaction, but it insists upon what is the bane
and destruction of heart and mind: conformity to routine, a monotonous
system which wears as the drifting of water and eats as a worm at the
heart.
And yet I doubt if a better conducted institution than this could
be found, or one more suited to the needs and crotchets of so many
men. They have ample liberty, excellent food, clothing and shelter,
charming scenery, and all the leisure there is. They are not called
upon to do any labor of any kind other than that of looking after their
rooms and clothes. The grounds are so ample and the buildings so large
that the attention of every one is instantly taken. As you enter at
the north, where is the main entrance, there is a monument to Robert
Richard Randall, the founder of the institution. This marks his final
resting-place; the remains of the philanthropist were brought here from
St. Mark’s Church in New York, where they had lain since 1825.
The facts concerning the founding of this institution have always
interested me. It seems that the father of “Captain” Robert Randall,
the founder of the Harbor, was a Scotchman, who came to America in
1776 and settled in New Orleans. The Spanish Governor and Intendant of
that city, Don Bernardo de Galvez, having declared the port open for
the sale of prizes of Yankee privateers, Mr. Randall took an active
interest in that great fleet of private-armed vessels whose exploits
on the high seas, and even upon the coast of Great Britain itself, did
much to contradict the modest assertion of the “British Naval Register”
that:
“The winds and the seas are Britain’s wide domain,
And not a sail but by permission spreads.”
At his death his son Robert inherited the estate. Accustomed to come
north to pass the summer months, Robert made, on one of his trips to
New York, the acquaintance of a Mr. Farquhar, a man possessed of means
but broken down by ill health. The mild climate of Louisiana agreed
with the invalid, and a proposition to exchange estates was considered.
After a bonus of five hundred guineas had been sent to Farquhar, this
was effected. Mr. Randall then became a suburban resident of what was
then the little city of New York. His property consisted of real estate
fronting both sides of Broadway and adjacent streets, and extending
from Eighth to Tenth Streets. At a distance of one-half mile to the
westward, namely, near the site of the old Presbyterian Church on
what is now Fifth Avenue, stood the dwelling of the Captain. Upon the
piazza of this house, it is recorded, shaded by a luxuriant growth of
ivy and clematis, the old gentleman was wont to sit in fine weather,
with his dog by his side. Before the door were three rows of gladioli,
which he carefully nurtured. He was a bachelor, and on the first day
of June, 1801, being very ill and feeble but of “sound, disposing mind
and memory,” made his will. Alexander Hamilton and Daniel D. Tompkins
drew up the papers. In this document he directed that his just debts be
paid; that an annuity of forty pounds a year be given to each of the
children of his half-brother until they were fifteen years old; a sum
of one thousand pounds to each of his nephews upon their twenty-first
birthday, and a like sum to his nieces on their marriage. He bequeathed
to his housekeeper his sleeve-buttons and forty pounds, and to another
servant his shoe and knee buckles and twenty pounds. When this had been
recorded he looked up with an expression of anxiety.
“I am thinking,” he said, “how I can dispose of the remainder of my
property most wisely. What do you think, General?” turning to Hamilton.
“How did you accumulate the fortune you possess?”
“It was made for me by my father, and at his death became his sole
heir.”
“How did he acquire it?” asked Hamilton.
“By honest privateering,” responded Randall.
“Then it might appropriately be left for the benefit of unfortunate
and disabled seamen,” volunteered Hamilton, and thereupon it was so
bequeathed.
The early history of Snug Harbor is clouded with legal contests which
covered a period of thirty years. Though at the time of the bequest
Randall’s property was of little value, being mostly farming land,
situated on the outskirts of the populated parts of the city, the
heirs foresaw something of its future value. In the National and State
Courts they long waged a vigorous war to test the validity of the will.
Their surmises as to the future value of the property were correct.
For, although the income of the bequest was not more than a thousand a
year at first, as the population of the city increased the rental rose
by degrees, until in the present year it has reached a sum bordering
$1,500,000, and the rise, even yet, is continuous.
However, the suits were eventually decided against the heirs, the court
holding the will valid. As an institution the Harbor was incorporated
in 1806, and the first building erected in 1831 and dedicated in 1833.
So thirty years passed before the desire of a very plain-speaking
document was carried into effect.
In the beginning there were but three buildings, which are to-day the
central ones in a main group of nine. In toto, however, there are over
sixty, situated in a park.
In a line, in the center of an eighteen hundred-foot lawn, stand the
five main buildings, truly substantial and artistic. The view to
the right and left is superb, tall trees shading walks and dividing
stretches of lawn, with rows of benches scattered here and there. A
statue by St. Gaudens beautifies the grounds between the main building
and the governor’s residence, while in another direction a fountain
fills to the brim a flower-lined marble basin. Everywhere about the
grounds and buildings are seen nautical signs and many interesting
reminders of the man who willed the refuge.
The first little chapel that was built has long since been succeeded
by an imposing edifice, rich in marbles and windows of stained glass.
A music hall of stately dimensions, seating over a thousand people,
graces a once vacant lawn. A hospital with beds for three hundred is
but another addition, and still others are residences for the governor
of the institution, the chaplain, physician, engineer, matron, steward,
farmer, baker, and the buildings for each branch of labor required in
the management of what is now a small city. In short, it has risen to
the dignity of an immense institution, where a thousand old sailors are
quietly anchored for the remainder of their days.
[Illustration: Sailor’s Snug Harbor]