My colleagues did not share my discouragement in regard to the East End.
There was much to hope for, they maintained, from the spread of
information concerning it, from the awakening interest of the upper
classes in its condition, and from all our new and intelligent methods
of doing good.
This was true. Each board-meeting, conference, committee-meeting to
which I went as guest or member, gave me fresh proof of the growth of
knowledge about the destitute, while the practical activity of
individuals and of societies seemed full of promise for the poor.
There was one great Bureau of Inquiry which existed solely for the
purpose of investigating new “cases.” Its agents, visiting the needy,
gleaned innumerable facts that were entered in the books under heads
like these: “Work, How Many? Bad Habits, What? Ill? Rent? Pay? Can Read?
Can Write?”
This vast body was constantly torn in twain between a desire to find out
genuine suffering, and a fear of being deceived.
Closely connected with this Bureau was the Society of Good Samaritans,
who represented, not only the new knowledge concerning the poor, but
also improved methods of relief. The Samaritans always sat in lengthy
conference on Friday night, discussing in friendly fashion (not without
gossip) the domestic affairs of the family in hand, and voting: “No
Aid”; or, “Aid, $2.00 in groceries, visitor please follow up”; or, “Give
Citizen’s Emergency Ticket for snow-shovelling”; and again, “No Aid.”
Another relief-giving society, the Almoners, differed from the Good
Samaritans only in the greater carefulness of its proceedings. All its
action was well considered and most deliberate. Its committee-meetings
were full of anxious discussion of the question, “What do we do with
such cases in District A?” and its most innocent reports were headed
“Confidential!”
For instance:
“The Almoners request that the facts given below be used, especially if
unfavourable, with great care.
In the case of
Abruzzi, Federigo,
No. 10 Mulberry Street.
“Barber. Six children. No work. Gave shoes and stockings.”
These organizations were alike in the business-like quality of their
work, in the wary kindliness with which they treated the poor, and in
their thirst for accurate information. It occasionally happened that
representatives of all three societies met by chance in the one room of
a new “case,” and gravely carried on their investigations together.
Perhaps some of the questions that these agents of organized
philanthropy were authorized to ask passed the line where friendly
interest becomes impertinence. However, they but voiced the popular
opinion, that “people of that sort” do not mind intrusion. Of many this
was doubtless true, and a great corporation can hardly be expected to
engage in character-study.
The intellectual curiosity evinced by these bodies in matters of
practical detail was visible also in their theories of work. New charity
methods, English, German, and Australian, were carefully discussed. On
our boards were men who were familiar with all known schemes of in-door
and outdoor relief, and women who were masters of statistics. We knew
not only the best ways of carrying on investigation, but also the best
ways of co-operating with the Church, with the State, and with one
another.
But here theorizing stopped. These students of social disease did not
seem to doubt the essential soundness of the social constitution.
Criticism of the present industrial system and of the relation between
classes did not, apparently, occur to them. The Altruist’s economic
ideas would have filled them with surprise.
My misgivings concerning all this work did not come from the usual
objections to it, that the proceedings of huge bodies are often too slow
to be of use, because of the time wasted in adjusting formalities, and
that the energy meant for action is dissipated in argument. I was
impressed only by the hopelessness of finding out what to do. After
patient inquiry the gulf between misery and the wish to help was nearly
as wide as before. Facts may be facts without telling the truth, and
with all our knowledge we did not understand.
This was not true of every member of the associations. There were
certain women who possessed a gift of practical kindness, and were
philanthropists by divine right. And surely the effectiveness of an
organized body means the effectiveness of the individuals composing it.
But different attitudes were represented. Side by side with these women
who were quick to help and slow to condemn, were others who allowed
their respect for the ten commandments of the Old Testament to keep them
from obeying the one command of the New. They pronounced judgment on the
unfortunate with the most impressive finality, as if wrong-doing were
doubly wrong in the East End. As I listened to them I sometimes thought
that the ethical standard which the rich try to preserve for the poor is
very high.
I liked to watch these charitable women, and to wonder why they were
doing this work. Some, whose faces had been made sweet by sorrow, were
striving only to find expression for sympathy with human pain. Some, who
looked eager, restless, dissatisfied, were trying, I thought, to find in
the lives of others the absorbing interest they had missed in their own.
A few, I feared, had espoused the cause of the needy for the sake of
social distinction. An interest in the poor was one of the really
important things, like the cut of one’s sleeves, or one’s knowledge of
Buddha.
I discovered a new species of benevolent woman, unlike the old-fashioned
Saint Elizabeth who encouraged pauperism by indiscriminate distribution
of loaves. A call that I made on a fellow-Almoner (for in an interval
when my Cause did not keep me busy I had rashly joined this body) made
me hope that the old Lady Bountiful armed with pity will never quite
give place to this new Lady Bountiful armed with views.
I had given my friend this name because she looked so sympathetic. She
was a blithe little woman, very wealthy and very charitable. On this
occasion I found her just going out. As she came smiling to meet me, in
her light cloth gown with gloves and gaiters of the exact shade, I
thought how charming she was.
My Lady Bountiful had principles. She always performed her full social
duty, and she told me, before I introduced the subject I had come to
discuss, how tired she was. Dinners and receptions and the theatre had
tired her out. Yet she had given up none of her charity work. Her maid
did all the necessary visiting for her.
When I set forth the object of my visit she looked disapproving. I
wanted to change the policy of our Board, of which she was a director,
to meet the distress caused by a sudden financial crisis. But My Lady
interrupted my description of the misery of the unemployed in the East
End.
“I do not believe in voting special relief for these people,” she said.
“Their suffering will be a lesson to them. When they have work they are
improvident; when it stops they starve. They must learn thrift and
economy, even if it has to be taught them in this severe way.”
It was a strange situation,—Dives in his purple and Lazarus in his rags
again. But Dives played a new rôle, no longer standing aloof, but coming
near enough the gate to study Lazarus, and then intimating that his
character was not all it should be.
My Lady went on to speak of work, of how noble it is, and how little
common people appreciate its sacredness. I watched with a certain
feeling of curiosity the dainty figure against the rich background of
the beautiful house. The fingers that were emphasizing the panegyric of
work had never been guilty of a half-hour’s honest toil.
“No,” said my hostess, when I rose to go, “this crisis means discipline
for the poor, and we must not interfere. I think as you investigate
further you will find that poverty is always the result of idleness,
intemperance, or crime.”
“Then this distress is retributive?” I murmured. “It testifies to the
negligence of the poor, and indirectly to our own industry, temperance,
virtue?”
“Yes,” said My Lady, firmly. She was always firm. “Don’t look so
unhappy,” she added, as she took my hand at parting. “It isn’t such a
bad world, after all. I never can see why people insist on crying out
all sorts of unpleasant things about it. I am a thorough optimist, you
see.”
I reflected, after the cool air of the street had soothed my irritation,
that we were all like that. Each one of us had pronounced opinions,
right or wrong. I wondered if it would not be better for the poor if we
knew less about them and cared more.