Page:McClure's Magazine v9 n3 to v10 no2.djvu/187

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The average annual death rate from 1882 to 1894, inclusive, was 25.78 per thousand persons living, equal to more than fifty thousand deaths in the year, on the basis of the present population. Eye and throat diseases, due to dust, and especially to putrid dust, were rife. No effort was made to remove snow for the comfort of the people, only for the convenience of traffic. But little more than twenty miles of streets were cleared after a snow-storm. As a result, the people, especially the poorer people who could not change their wet clothing and could not buy rubber shoes, suffered to an alarming degree from colds and their results.

The department itself was such as its work would indicate. Like all large bodies of men engaged in any stated duty, its force had much good material, but it was mainly material gone to waste for lack of proper control. It was hardly an organization; there was no spirit in it; few of its members felt secure in their positions; no sweeper who was not an unusually powerful political worker knew at what moment the politician who had got him his place would have him turned out to make room for another. A ledger account of patronage was kept with each Assembly district, and district leaders are even said to have had practically full con- trol of the debit and credit columns, so that they could deposit a dismissal and check out an appointment at will. Useful service can be had from no force thus controlled.

Nearly every man in the department was assessed for the political fund. I have seen