Hints for the Working Classes.

Manawatu Standard, Volume X, Issue 1, 29 May 1885, Page 2

Hints for the Working Classes.

[Bruce Herald.] Although our Dmiediu contemporary the Citizen is oihi\\ too radical m its politics for our ttu>te t its piquaut articles on social matters are general' ly m our opinion most excel lent.' We cannot, however, quite follow oar co»» temporary m its remark* ia last week* issue aneot the homes and hoclil custom* of working men, nor do we think that because their homes Hve.Nraall ami inconvenient, and as a cousequeuce they get little comfort m them, Unit ia any excuse fop spending theii tinie and their money m hotels, or, «tn the Citizen jmU it— *•- Every uudigeeted meal, every airiest room, makes a man le.is capable of effort, and more iuclineJ «.<• seek temporary forgetfulnti^H m drink. ) A man caunot read a t*».>k m tho midst of noise.disorder, w\ dideomfiofc." Granted that there nr<» slovenly wm* who are utterly iin;ainible of making a horn* comfortable and attractive, these are tho exception and prove nothing. As for the small and inoonvenient homes, these are not a neoes~ s»iiy. It one half the money expended m the search for comfort and jollity outside those homes were laid oat ia a; proper manner, there i*. scarcely »~ workman m Otago but might dwell ia a roomy house and sit down every day to a wholesome well-cooked meat, and surround hiamlf with such attractions that his own "ingle neuk " would be to him the happiest place m all the world, and he woald, realise that home is what some poet has well* ■ described it, "Heaven**, fallen sister." I Working men, as a rale, get good wage.-*, the necessarian of life an* cheap, many luxuries are easily procurable, and if m the larger centres hou«e rent is somewhat high, it ia not im)»O3Bibl* for working men to have comfortablo ' dwellings. In fact, many such men of stead/ and industrious habits have comfottable, well-f ttrnfched homes of their own, but m tiyery wuch caw* they spend their evenings with their families and their friends, and not m dissipation about the' town. We are writing not m the interests of the Blue Ribbon movement, nor us special pleaders for teetotaiism; but m the name of common sensa, and contend that while the workman obtains such wageM an he does, and equanders them m the manner so common, it Is no wonder if his home is small, and life mit scarcely endurable. Such a man is not entitled to sympathy.