Food was the next essential to our good behavior and well-being. My associate member proposed we try the "Charity" Lodging House again, which we did. Yes, we could have breakfast if we would saw and split wood for an hour or more first. We would certainly do so. Imagine the state we were in from lack of food and sleep. And yet this homeless old gentleman--and he was a gentleman--was eager and willing. After splitting curly birch for over an hour, we were told to come to breakfast. They gave us weak barley soup, poor bread, and the same old "charity coffee." The staying qualities of that breakfast were extremely fleeting, for by the time we had climbed the hill we were no better off in regard to having our hunger appeased than when we went in. As we came out we noticed a sign which read, as I remember it, to this effect: "Persons coming here a second time must be expected to take orders from the city." Not a very encouraging hope for the man who was broke and who was only earning three-fifty per week, which he would not get for six days. Every day while in this city I found (aside from us senators) many men who had secured work or would have gone to work, but who could find no one to trust them. The boarding-house keepers had been imposed upon so many times by penniless people that they were cautious. The contractor or employer will never pay in advance, only at a stated time,--once a week, once in two weeks, or once a month. While there may be exceptions, through all my investigations in the larger cities of our country, I have never found any relief for the penniless worker in this time of need, either in public or private works. If he proves he is a fine worker he is valuable to his employer and he wants to keep him. But he does not know him. He may have unconquerable habits. It would never do to pay him his wage when the day is done. He might not return, so the employer hopes to hold him by offering him nothing, not even a word of inquiry as to his needs, or of encouragement. He forgets that he is an asset to the community, that whether working for the city or the individual, every laborer is just as worthy of respect and esteem as is the privileged owner of Forest Hill. What an appeal for Cleveland's Emergency Home to fill this place of need! Reader, I want you to keep steadily in mind that you are looking at _the man I describe_, not at me. I had multi-millionaire acquaintances in Cleveland who would have granted me any request I might have made. I held credentials on which any bank in that city would have honored my check without question. I could have stepped into the home of the exceedingly prominent lodge of which I was a member in good standing, and could have had my every wish granted. I knew if I fell ill or met with accident, to reveal my identity meant every care and comfort, the speedy coming of a loving wife, kind relatives and friends. And so, after all, while I might endure, I could only assume.