tenement-house regions throughout the city.

The property secured by the new company at the time it was leased was a part of a large estate, the owner of which during his lifetime had personally cared for it. He was both strict and just, and these two attributes preserved these houses for years after the property in the neighborhood had begun to yield to the character of later residents. This owner kept the alleys and the houses in repair. The semi-privacy the iron gate gave the tenants was for years the reason that the better-paid mechanics remained in the courts or alleys. When the owner died, the property was put in control of an agent, with the usual result—rapid degeneracy. It was now conducted to secure the largest returns at the least outlay. The evils of the absentee landlord are not confined to Ireland. Absenteeism on the part of owners of tenement-house property is one of the causes of the social and civic problems that retard the growth of the highest civilization in New York. Under the management of an agent, the character of the tenants in the courts changed rapidly, and the people who took possession added to the disreputable character of the Fourth Ward. For years before this the largest per cent. of the immigrants settling in New York settled in this section. They came with distorted notions as to their place in the new land. Liberty meant to the majority the right to follow their own will. When hunger and loneliness and nakedness forced them to reconsider their first conception of what America was, resentment, recklessness, or adaptability developed. The difference was a matter of temperament quite as much as of race.

In 1880 the heads of the families living in the courts were day laborers—men who worked along the docks, coal shovelers, hucksters, women who did a day's work, sold newspapers at the ferries, or worked in the factories. Every child in the alley was ready to do anything that would earn money from the time he could walk. The people knew every benefit the city dispensed to the poor: free coal; homes available and how to get in them; free burial; every organization that dispersed charity, and how to get it. Even the children were clever in their extremities, and knew how to get assistance when the Island claimed their parents. From infancy the children looked forward to wage-earning as a time of happiness. School was a prison-house to be avoided, except when its warmth and shelter were preferable to the street, or the home, when intemperance and temper made life unendurable in it; then they attended school willingly. The truant officers in this region were not feared. They were the fags of the "boss," not the officers of a city department. None of the fads of to-day, which so disturb the conservative people who see ruin of mental ability in modern educational systems, were then thought of. The kindergarten, nature study, manual training, were on the educational horizon of New York, in a cloud scarcely so large as a man's hand. The trustee system was in perfect working order. The teachers were what God made them, unhampered by the pressure of superintendent and supervisors to maintain standards.

It was as true in that day as in 1892, when a man, wholly familiar with all the systems of education in the country, to the question, "Why is there such uniformity in the defects of the schools in the tenement-house regions?" replied, "They represent the demands of the people in the district who elect the men who control them. You will find that the public schools always represent the public sentiment and demands of the people interested in them."

This was profoundly true of the schools in this region at this time. To-day there is scarcely any change in the buildings except that of added age. At least two of them are a disgrace to the city. But there is a great change in the system. To-day the civilizing force in this community is the public schools; the remnant does not attract the philanthropist. To the men and women of our public schools who, preserving the highest ideals, work with enthusiasm amid the most discouraging surroundings, the city owes a debt that money cannot repay.

The liquor saloons numbered then about as they do now, occupying every available space. More elaborate now, perhaps, for they represent political headquarters, if not proprietorship, of men identified with the worst forms of political corruption; then, as now, openly used in the interest of these men. There is this great change, that children dare not now, as they did then, enter and leave these places fearlessly at any hour carrying pails, pitchers or bottles. It was then a neighborly kindness to let children thus serve a neighbor; it was a source of revenue to the children.

The gangs were many and notorious in the ward. Frequent were the clashes and loyal the spirit with which assailed and assailants maintained silence if there was danger of arrest because of these conflicts. "To squeal" was to earn the contempt of the community. The number of crimes, the full measure of degradation, reached in this ward will never be known. The dense population of this ward is so hidden by business and traffic that in 1901 the statement was made by some people interested in civic affairs that the region was given over to office buildings. The district of which the Fourth Ward is a part cast 10,000 votes in the mayoralty campaign of that year. Votes that represent a civilization as peculiarly its own as though oceans separated it from the people a mile and a half away.

Target companies were the social clubs of that day, the forerunners of the political organizations of to-day. The climax of their existence were the annual excursions to some near-by grove for shooting matches. These matches were the great social occasions of the many "sets." The question of who was the reigning belle of the locality was settled beyond dispute by selection of one to present the wreath for the target, or a big bunch of flowers, to the captain of the target company on the day of the annual parade. These were always of artificial flowers, and were made gorgeous and splendid by floating strips and fringes of tinsel paper. The greatest feuds in the Ward have grown out of the selection of the fair lady to present these trophies. Her selection changed the political history of her friends often, and her knights' fists fought her cause, and crowned her, their wounds testifying to their devotion. The political "boss" of that period presented the organizations that acknowledged his leadership with silver mugs, castors or pitchers—prizes for the shooters—but he presented money to keep the balance of his popularity. The gifts were carried conspicuously over the route of the procession, which always stopped in front of the house of the lady, who was to express her favor in the gifts of floral trophies—usually paid for by the company, sometimes by her knight, or knights combined for her honor. This house was for the time being the center of interest for the crowd, as she was of envy or pride to the community. The day of the target parade was one that called for great sacrifice, that it might be attended by the requisite formalities and new clothes. Money must be raised to provide barouches for the great political lights of the ward who gave this particular company their favor; to pay the attendant colored men who carried the target and the water and tin cups; for the band with the drum major. All cost money, and money was scarce; but the prominence and pleasure paid; and the Fourth Ward had many of these organizations, which made life exciting, and at times dangerous, when their several groups met, each struggling for supremacy, each with a leader who must be defended.