Poverty in Chicago. It is a terrible thing to be poor in any part of the world. In Chicago poverty is simply a living death. The city is full of suffering and misery. Some of the wretched people who endure it have, no doubt, brought it upon themselves by drink, by idleness, or by other faults, but a large majority are simply unfortunate. Their poverty has come upon them through no fault of their own; they struggle bravely against it, and would better their condition if they could only find employment. They are held down by an iron hand, however, and vainly endeavor to rise out of their misery. They dwell in wretched tenement houses, in cellars of buildings in the more thickly populated parts of the city, and in shanties, and hovels in almost every quarter of the city. A few families, even in the midst of their sufferings, manage to keep their poor quarters clean and neat, but the majority live in squalor and filth. But little furniture is to be seen in the rooms of the poor. Everything that can bring money has been sold for the means with which to buy food. Many of these wretched homes have been stripped of all their contents for this purpose. A cooking stove sometimes constitutes the only article of furniture in a room, and the inmates sleep upon the floor. Not a chair or table is to be seen. Often there is no stove, and the only food that passes the lips of the occupants of these rooms is what is given them in charity. The inmates of these wretched homes are often families who have seen better days. Once the husband and father could give those dependent upon him a comfortable home, and provide at least the necessaries of life. But sickness came upon him, or death took him, and the little family was deprived of his support. In vain the mother sought to procure work to keep her children in comfort. What work she could procure was at intervals, and the little she earned barely sufficed to keep a roof over their heads. Little by little they sank lower and lower, until poverty in its worst form settled upon them. The city is full of such cases, and missionaries, whose labors among the poor bring them in constant contact with scenes of suffering, confess that they do not know how these poor people manage to live. Whole blocks are filled with families on the verge of starvation. They would gladly work if they could get employment; but the city is so full of sufferers like themselves that they cannot escape from their wretched condition. The so-called Ghetto and other localities present scenes of misery which almost surpass belief. Many of the dwellers here pick up a bare subsistence.