Page:The Destruction of Poland - Toynbee - 1916.djvu/34

 even the bedding, the most precious possession of the poor.

"All the factories at Lodz are closed, but some of the rich manufacturers are nobly supporting their employees. They give them a rouble (2s.) a week. The poor creatures, who have been subsisting many months now on that pittance alone, are growing anaemic and consumptive; but they are rich in comparison with the families to which the Town Committee allows 40 kopecks (10d.) for each adult and 6d. for every child. There are about 60,000 of these families in the care of the Committee, for everyone is economising on account of the general high prices, and many artisans, tailors and servants have lost employment. Those who own any property do not receive any support from the Committee, and consequently the owners of the houses in the suburbs where nobody pays any rent, are sometimes worse off than the workmen. I shall never forget a mother with five small children. As she held in her arms the youngest, who was only two years old and who already resembled a corpse, she said to me with desperate resignation: ' I do not ask for any medicine for him at the hospital,' for the doctor told me to give him nourishing food, and I can give him nothing but water.'

"In a radius of a few miles round the town there is a regular procession of starving paupers fetching wood or potatoes. I have met a number of people who are devoting their services to the relief of this misery. They have instituted cheap kitchens, homes for children and orphans, free dinners for school children,