I shall briefly describe scenes which fell under my personal observation during an afternoon tour through the slums of the North End, confining myself to a few typical cases which fairly represent the condition of numbers of families who are suffering through uninvited poverty, a fact which I have fully verified by subsequent visits to the wretched homes of our very poor. I purposely omit in this paper describing any members of that terrible commonwealth where misery, vice, degradation, and crime are inseparably interwoven. This class belongs to a lower stratum; they have graduated downward. Feeling that society's hand is against them, Ishmael-like they raise their hand against society. They complement the uninvited poor; both are largely a product of unjust and inequitable social conditions. The scenes I am about to describe were witnessed one afternoon in April. The day was sunless and dreary, strangely in keeping with the environment of the exiles of society who dwell in the slums. The sobbing rain, the sad, low murmur of the wind under the eaves and through the narrow alleys, the cheerless frowning sky above, were in perfect harmony with the pathetic drama of life I was witnessing. Everything seemed pitched in a minor key, save now and then there swelled forth splendid notes of manly heroism and womanly courage, as boldly contrasting with the dead level of life as do the full rich notes of Wagner's grandest strains with the plaintive melody of a simple ballad sung by a shepherd lad. I was accompanied in this instance by the Rev. Walter Swaffield, of the Bethel Mission, and his assistant, Rev. W. J. English. [Illustration: INVALID IN CHAIR (SEE NOTE).]