A Week's Record in Paris. CRIME AND POVERTY.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 245, 10 March 1888, Page 3

A Week's Record in Paris.

CRIME AND POVERTY.

A paris correspondent, writing on the 7th January lasb, says :—": — " The week has been a week of crimes. It began with the suicide a la Chatfcerton of a once distinguished litterateur, who died of cold and hunger in, his garret, too proud to ask for aid. I, ends with the suicide of two girls. Durin the week another inventor has attempted to revenge his failure in life by shooting at a most estimable post-office official named Raynavd. The victim lies in danger of death. Two men wore asphyxiated in the the night by the furaes of a portable stove which they had placed in their common bedroom. Three people have been condemned to death. It has been a hard week for the poor. Crowds of shivering wretches hang nightly about the stage door, anxious to serve as supers. The papers are full of appeals tocharity. The mouthful of bread booths are besieged every morning by starving people, ready for the sake of a piece of bread and a glass of water dashed with vinegar to stand waiting for three or four hours until their lurn comes. Hearing that charitable people in America have asked for information on the system of bouchee de pain, or mouthful of bread charity, I called the other day on its founder, an elderly gentleman of small means. He told me that during the last two years the charity at it 3 various booths throughout Paris has distributed upwards of $20,000 worth of bread. " That ia to say," he added, " we have given a piece of bread weighing half a pound to each of 2,000,000 persons. Bread costs us 2 cents, a pound. In winter each person receives a drink of coffee made by pouring hot water on coffee grounds which we get for nothing" from the cafe-keepers. In summer we give water flavoured with vinegar. Our booths are divided into two rooms, separated by wooden screens. In one room the people wait and in the other they are fed. They come in by batches of forty. One woman distributes bread and another drinks. Afc each booth we relieve about 5,000 daily, bufc we are forced to turn numbers of hungry away. We have only subsidy from the Municipal Council."