1. Old Knickerbocker dwelling. 2. The same made over into a tenement. 3. The rear tenement caves. 4. Packing-box tenement built for revenue only. 5. The limit; the air shaft--first concession to tenant. 6. The double-decker, where the civic conscience began to stir in 1879. 7. Evolution of double-decker up to date. 8. Prize plan of Tenement House Exhibition, 1900 (fifty-foot lot).] [Illustration: Plan of a Typical Floor in Class First of the Competition in the C. O. S. Plans of Model Tenements. Rentable area 2724.94^o = 54.70% of lot Free air-space (courts) 1500.25^o = 30.01% of lot Walls, partitions, and public space 764.81^o = 15.29% of lot Total 5000.00^o = 100.00% = lot 3 two-room apartments 3 three-room apartments 2 four-room apartments 8 apartments. 23 rooms] As for the rents, he will put them as high as he can, no doubt. They were too high always, for what they bought. In the case of the builder the state can add force to persuasion, and so urge him along the path of righteousness. When it comes to the rent collector the case is different. It may yet be necessary for the municipality to enter the field as a competing landlord on the five-per-cent basis; but I would rather we, as a community, learned first a little more of the art of governing ourselves without scandal. With Tammany liable to turn up at any moment--no, no! Political tenements might yet add a chapter to the story of our disgrace to make men weep. I have not forgotten the use Tammany made of the people's baths erected in the Hamilton Fish Park on the East Side--the Ham-fish, locally. They were shut from the day they were opened, I came near saying; I mean from the day they should have been opened; and two stalwart watchmen drew salaries for sitting in the door to keep the people out. That was a perfectly characteristic use of the people's money, and is not lightly to be invited back. Rather wait awhile yet, and see what our bridges and real rapid transit, and the "philanthropy and five per cent" plan, will do for us. When that latter has been grasped so by the tenant that a little extra brass and plate-glass does not tempt him over into the enemy's camp, the usurious rents may yet follow the double-decker, as they have clung to it in the past.