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157
which would go far to remedy the evils now under
discussion. But, as is well known, these buildings
merely provide comfortable homes for well-to-do
artisans; in order to make them pay it is necessary
to ask a rental far beyond the means of those who
(it is assumed) specially need assistance; and in
fact they are occupied by a class of persons that
have always been able to acquire and pay for decent
accommodation. Moreover, the building of these
institutions on sites formerly occupied by so-called
''rookeries" and the destruction of such places by
railway extensions and under Sir Richard Cross's
Acts, have mainly had the effect of driving the
persons dispossessed to other quarters, and of
creating "rookeries" in places were they did not
formerly exist.
The fact is, that do what we will a considerable
proportion of the population of our large towns will
live in filth, and what others term misery; their
habits and tendencies are opposed to all sanitary
principles; and they are certain to remain a discredit
to themselves and us, unless we banish them
from our midst, or employ one half to keep the other
half clean and conversely, or house them and feed
them and keep them in idleness at the public
expense,