Chapter II: The Beggars

Begging is a profession in New York. The deserving poor rarely come on the streets to seek aid, but the beggars crowd them, as they know the charitable institutions of the city would at once detect their imposture. A short while ago the "Superintendent of the Out-door Poor," said to a city merchant, "As a rule never give alms to a street beggar. Send them to me when they accost you, and not one in fifty will dare to show his face in my office."

The New York beggars are mainly foreigners. Scarcely an American is seen on the streets in this capacity. Every year the number is increasing. Foreigners who were professional beggars in their own countries, are coming over here to practise their trades, and these make New York their headquarters. It is estimated that there are more professional beggars here than in all the other cities of the country combined.

Broadway, and especially Fourteenth street, Union Square, and the Fifth avenue are full of them. They represent all forms of physical misfortune. Some appear to have but one leg, others but one arm. Some are blind, others horribly deformed. Some are genuine cripples, but the majority are sound in body. They beg because the business is profitable, and they are too lazy to work. The greater the semblance of distress, the more lucrative is their profession. Women hire babies, and post themselves in the thoroughfares most frequented by ladies. They generally receive a considerable sum during the course of the day. Others again provide themselves with a basket, in which they place a wretched display of shoestrings which no one is expected to buy, and station themselves in Broadway to attract the attention of the charitably disposed. The most daring force their way into private houses and the hotels and demand assistance with the most brazen effrontery. They hang on to you with the utmost determination, exposing the most disgusting sights to your gaze, and annoying you so much that you give them money in order to be rid of them. They, in their turn, mark you well, and remember you when you pass them again.

Perhaps the most annoying of the street beggars are the children. They frequent all parts of the city, but literally infest Fourteenth street and the lower part of the Fifth avenue. Many of them are driven into the streets by their parents to beg. They have the most pitiful tales to tell if you will listen to them. There is one little girl who frequents Fourteenth street, whose "mother has just died and left seven small children," every day in the last two years. A gentleman was once accosted by two of these children, whose feet were bare, although the weather was very cold. Seizing each by the arm, he ordered them to put on their shoes and stockings. His manner was so positive that they at once sat down on a door step, and producing their shoes and stockings from beneath their shawls, put them on. Many of these children support drunken or depraved parents by begging, and are soundly beaten by them if they return home at night without money. They grow up to a life of vagrancy. They soon learn to cheat and steal, and from such offences they pass rapidly into prostitution and crime.

Besides these street beggars, there are numbers of genteel, and doubtless well-meaning persons who make it their business to beg for others. They intrude upon you at the most inconvenient times, and venture into your private apartments with a freedom and assurance which positively amaze you. Refuse them, and they are insulting.

Then there are those who approach you by means of letters. They send you the most pitiful appeals for aid, and assure you that nothing but the direst necessity induces them to send you such a letter, and that they would not do so under any circumstances, were not they aware of your well-known charitable disposition. Some persons of known wealth receive as many as a dozen letters of this kind each day. They are, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, from impostors, and are properly consigned to the waste-basket.

Housekeepers have frequent applications every day for food. These are generally complied with, as, in all families of moderate size, there is much that must either be given or thrown away. Children and old people generally do this kind of begging. They come with long faces and pitiful voices, and ask for food in the most doleful tones. Grant their requests, and you will be amused at the cool manner in which they will produce large baskets, filled with provisions, and deposit your gift therein. Many Irish families find all their provisions in this way.