The people stay in these houses year after year. A bill never appears on them. The arbitrary restriction as to the use of the yard is not counted against the property, because it is so clean, kept in such good repair, and the character of the people scrutinized before they are accepted as tenants. It is generally understood that the renting of furnished rooms is not approved. The housekeeper finds a tenant who rents rooms objectionable. In a neighborhood where every house shows year after year a loss of character, people poorer and more ignorant becoming tenants, these four houses retain the appearance of comfort and respectability. Among the tenants there is but little intimacy; they appear to have little in common. The women are never heard in the halls, nor do they loiter about the doorways. The men are all skilled workmen, earning good wages--clerks on small salaries, or in city departments, all natives of New York. The wives were all wage-earners before they were married. They dress well; most of them are fairly good housekeepers. All buy their children's clothes ready made; two make their own dresses. For their children they are ambitious, and expect to keep them in school until they are sixteen. This the children defeat. The boys get places during the summer vacations in their fourteenth year, refusing to go back to school. The girls are contented until fourteen, and then they grow restless, becoming wage-earners; all that they earn is spent for their clothes. The wages of the father may no more than meet the expenses of the family, but this is not considered. Clothes are the essentials. A man having a salary of $1,400, living in one of these houses, had to go in debt the first week of a serious illness of his wife. He did not have a dollar in advance to meet emergencies. He was a proud, indulgent, tender husband and father. This type of house and this class of tenants are disappearing from the East Side. The remnant of this class who remain are held by political affiliations or family ties. The men enjoy the sense of power that comes from this connection, and realize fully that to leave the district would mean a loss of social prestige, or, if minor politicians, a loosening of their hold on the people to whom they represent political power. Many of this class remain in the section because they hold positions in the city departments in return for active service in the interest of the political machines.