Page:Three Years in Europe.djvu/52

28 the room, presents a sight of misery compared to which the poorest classes of people in our own country are well off. The paterfamilias is troubled out of his wits to support such a large family,—the misery and sufferings he gets familiar with make him callous in his feelings, and a cheerless home impels him to seek comfort elsewhere. Where is he to seek such comfort? Why, London is swamped with public houses, blazing with volumes of gas, with comfortable seats and comfortable fires to invite the poor laborers to a few glasses of beer. These public houses are the resorts of the London laborer, and out of his scanty earning he learns to spend something on intoxication. Thus flying from a cheerless home he learns to become a drunkard. What follows?—A scene, the horrors of which it is difficult to picture. DrunkenessDrunkenness [sic] brings out the most brutal passions of the human mind, and cruelty such as is unheard of among the poorest families of our country, disfigures the conduct of the London "rough" towards his own kith and kin. Pestered and bothered by a hungry wife and starving children, the drunken husband and father often has recourse to violence, the accounts of which emanating every day from the Police Courts, fail to startle the people only on account of their frequency. Death is a frequent visitor of such homes, and little boys willingly leave them to turn "street Arabs," running about with naked feet and uncovered head to beg a few pence from the passers.

In the country the laborers are better off. Drunkenness, though not unknown, is certainly not the rule