Out of his own observation, Hermann told her of the saloons that were in reality the clubs of these procurers. He sketched the methods of procuring false bail-bonds, of influencing magistrates, juries, and even judges, and of turning upon the few conscientious policemen with suits charging oppression and false arrest. "O'Malley und dese ozzer mens like him ofer here make sometimes all of sixty dousand a year," he declared, "und de people lofe dem because dese O'Malleys take deir daughters durin' twelve mont's und gif dem coal fur four." "An' no one person is to blame?" asked Violet in amazement. "I vish dere vas, but dere ain't." "So there ain't no way out of it?" "Von vay--und only von. For de single time badness makes poverty, ninety-nine times poverty it makes badness. Do avay vith poverty. Reorganize de whole of de industrial system; gif effery man und voman a chance to vork; gif effery man und voman effery penny dey earns. So only you do avay vith poverty, so only you do avay vith unhappy und discontented homes und unhappy und discontented people, und so only you do avay vith badness." He was in the midst of his subject when Katie served the scanty supper, and he would have had neither time nor inclination for the mere eating had not his sweetheart sternly ordered him to be silent. But, as soon as the meal was over and the few dishes washed, he continued his talk to Violet as, with the two girls ahead of her, she leaned heavily on his arm all the way to Rivington Street. The concert was, it must be confessed, interesting chiefly to the women that had promoted it, the young people that took part in it, and the relatives of the performers, who succeeded or failed vicariously. Stiffly seated in the cleared gymnasium, a little ashamed and wholly ill at ease, the audience, drawn from the neighborhood and from among the friends of the settlement-workers, bore it, however, with commendable fortitude. They heard an amateur orchestra play "La Paloma" out of time; they heard Eva Aaronsohn read an essay on "A Day in Central Park"; they heard a promising soprano solo spoiled by fright, and a promising baritone not yet escaped from the loosening leash of boyhood. Morris Binderwitz delivered a hesitating oration upon Abraham Lincoln, as culled from his former debate regarding the great emancipator, and Luigi Malatesta, having consulted the same original sources, repeated by rote a ten-minute tribute to the military genius of George Washington. There was a duet, a piano solo--a simplified version of "O Du Mein Holder Abendstern." Everything was conscientiously applauded, nearly everything was encored and then, amid a scraping of chairs and more strains from the amateur orchestra, the ordeal came to an end.