How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New YorkRiis, Jacob A. (Jacob August)
History
How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York
Riis, Jacob A. (Jacob August)
Poor -- New York (State) -- New York; Tenement houses -- New York (State) -- New York
Hardly less aggressive than the Italian, the Russian and Polish Jew,
having overrun the district between Rivington and Division Streets,
east of the Bowery, to the point of suffocation, is filling the
tenements of the old Seventh Ward to the river front, and disputing
with the Italian every foot of available space in the back alleys of
Mulberry Street. The two races, differing hopelessly in much, have
this in common: they carry their slums with them wherever they go, if
allowed to do it. Little Italy already rivals its parent, the "Bend,"
in foulness. Other nationalities that begin at the bottom make a fresh
start when crowded up the ladder. Happily both are manageable, the one
by rabbinical, the other by the civil law. Between the dull gray of the
Jew, his favorite color, and the Italian red, would be seen squeezed
in on the map a sharp streak of yellow, marking the narrow boundaries
of Chinatown. Dovetailed in with the German population, the poor but
thrifty Bohemian might be picked out by the sombre hue of his life
as of his philosophy, struggling against heavy odds in the big human
bee-hives of the East Side. Colonies of his people extend northward,
with long lapses of space, from below the Cooper Institute more than
three miles. The Bohemian is the only foreigner with any considerable
representation in the city who counts no wealthy man of his race, none
who has not to work hard for a living, or has got beyond the reach of
the tenement.
Down near the Battery the West Side emerald would be soiled by a
dirty stain, spreading rapidly like a splash of ink on a sheet of
blotting paper, headquarters of the Arab tribe, that in a single
year has swelled from the original dozen to twelve hundred, intent,
every mother's son, on trade and barter. Dots and dashes of color
here and there would show where the Finnish sailors worship their
djumala (God), the Greek pedlars the ancient name of their race, and
the Swiss the goddess of thrift. And so on to the end of the long
register, all toiling together in the galling fetters of the tenement.
Were the question raised who makes the most of life thus mortgaged,
who resists most stubbornly its levelling tendency--knows how to drag
even the barracks upward a part of the way at least toward the ideal
plane of the home--the palm must be unhesitatingly awarded the Teuton.
The Italian and the poor Jew rise only by compulsion. The Chinaman
does not rise at all; here, as at home, he simply remains stationary.
The Irishman's genius runs to public affairs rather than domestic
life; wherever he is mustered in force the saloon is the gorgeous
centre of political activity. The German struggles vainly to learn
his trick; his Teutonic wit is too heavy, and the political ladder he
raises from his saloon usually too short or too clumsy to reach the
desired goal. The best part of his life is lived at home, and he makes
himself a home independent of the surroundings, giving the lie to the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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