THE SLUMS OF MELBOURNE.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXII, Issue XXXII, 9 March 1889, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE SLUMS OF MELBOURNE.

llorsn the corner of Bnurke-strpc-t, which i verybodv know.-, a short walk ahum Swanst.in-street. and I hire is the main channel of the city's slums. Its innocent, looking mouth, its dark and cavernous length" AH below Swanstun-strcet. is business, nil above infamy, ore [it where, in a few instances, tli" iron heel of trade lias forced its way in. Our old friends the Chinese are, just :i> we lemcmberert : them on a previous visit: smoking on their couches, beauty and the beast together, crowding around the fan-tnu tables, or marking tickets for the banks. No sign of useful industry or healthful rest amongst them. Debauched with opium, or demeuted with tho gambling passion, one aud nil. There is a good deal of opium here ; its use and its evil influence show no signs of abatement. Is opium sinoko responsible for that horror, that puzzling and shocking scene—a broad bench in a cupboard of a room, covered with a dingy mattress, a Chinaman on one side, old, hideous, possessed of "the habit," tho opium pot and the lamp bewdo him, the pipe in his hand, which ho languidly prepares. On the other side a woman, who, in other cirstances, would puss for a lady. Young, pale, sickly, dressed in white, spotlessly clean. The pipe, when ready, will be hers. She gets it at last, places the broad bowl over tho lamp, and the mouthpieco well within her lips, inhales, then takes the dense cloud quite into her lungs, and breathes it out through her nostrils. Three inhalations thus, aud then the stem drops and yon notice that her eyes are heavy, and there arc symptoms of relaxation in all her limbs. She may sink into stupor in a few minutes, or may require another pipe. How did she get there ? Why does she stay there ? Are there many similar cases ? Impossible to answer any iiuea tion but the last. There are very many such cases —

We are entering a lane, the lowest public-house in ' Melbourne, perhaps, standing at one cornel'. There was a mixed crowd about the bar—mixed as regards sex, but otherwise to be classed as all bad. One of our olVioial friends noticed a '' wanted" man amongst them, and in an instant his mate barred the , frontdoor, while he himself proceeded to the side. It looked very ugly within. There were about a dozen men and half as many of the other sex. Not one of them all, probably, but was conscious of some offence against the law. The men were young natives of the city, for the most part of Irish parents—furtive, brutal, felonious in appearance, flash and filthy in dress, and defiant in looks. The women had all the deeply-impressed stamp of their class. Which was it ? " 1 want you, Duffy.'' " What do you want with me ?" "Just come outside, and I'll tell you." One must admire the quiet tact of the detective. None of the ordinary policeman's bounce and brutality. " You see, I must lock you up; here is the description ; you cau't yet away from that." " Hut's sec it, I'll swear it ain'c me.' "Gome across here, then.* " Across here " is a Chinese cookshop. And thither goes Duffy with an officer on either hand.' There is no hand on his collar, nor any show of handcuffs. The women stream out iuto the streets, and become noisy ; the men gather in knots, and look savago. The writer would not have attempted to take that man away alono for the greatest reward ever ottered, but tho officers say there is no danger if you keep cool and watchful. Wo seem to be in the deepest depth of the city's crime end squalor, and yet, not more than i! 00 yards away, its great balk towering above tho other buildings, is seen the Palace Hotel in Bourke-street, the promcruders on the roof seen plainly by the electric light, and strains of music comintr down to us with each breath of air. There is no hurry or bustle on the part of tho officer.*. They permit a lengthened farewell, and absolutely conx their man away : consequently there is no disturbance. The next scene is the lockup, and a something unexpected there. While the necessary formilitios are in process a puliug cry is heard. From what can that proceed ? Look down the long dungeon corridor, but nothing is seen there. It is nearer ; down in the corner <sf tho ante-room used by tho constables on guard a little heap of children is seen, two sleeping in prison blankets, one, a girl of about six, sitting up with a sickly baby in her arms. The baby wails continuously. They are not badly clad, but there is lhat "about them which is morn shocking- and shameful than tho foulest rags. The doctor looks closely, and says, " Tho baby cannot live." That perhaps is very well, for on the baby and every other of the little group are the evidences of inherited diseaso and disability. Each ouo might say, and with infinitely more truth than ho who first gave the words utterance, ''Behold I was shaped in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive mo.'' Where is the mother? " Locked up drunk." Yes, you can see her through the grating stretched out on the floor of one of those colls off tho corridor. Where is the father 'i " Don't know; but most likely iu gaol." "Poor little beg-siiirs'' is the official comment, and whal can wo add to it 'i Wo looked through (he windows of a huge room, a whitewashed hall or barn, at Ilia back of an Intel. A mattress and a blanker, for foiirpeiice. It was midnight, and tho place was nearly full. What a tliange collection of human beings >v:i'« 11, ere—just above tho Imini-;.ri-aot.V I loiiio ; just below tho Model J..odgin;;hou.--e. Fifty men who could a I'tord fourpeiioc, but were blocked by the demand for sixpence. It would hardly bo believed that so many and so fine grades of poverty exit-tod in our rich city. New chums and old colonists lie there side by side, men simply hard np, men shivering in the palsy of long-continued but abruptly-ended debauch, men crippled mentally and physically—a sad and a sorry crew. Sad and sorry, indeed, is every memory of that night. Excepting the curtailment of the evil by the intrusion of trade and labour, there is no sign of amelioration or improvement. The same now as two years, and as ten years ago, despite all the banging of .Salvation Army drums, or the milder performances of the numerous adjacent churches. And those who arc crowded out, are they lost to or won from infamy ? " Oh, no," replies the voice of experience, " they re-establish themselves in the suburbs. You may spread them about, if that is any good, but yon cannot wipe them out." " And what about all the Salvation Army work ; do you note any difference in the general total of infamy ?" Practical experience is very sceptical on that point. " They (the criminals and slum folks generally) are so cursedly bad, and so infernally cunning ; they sham religion mostly when it suits thoin, just a3 they do in gaol." Practical experience is singularly and sadly unanimous in this conclusion. One thing even to the casual observer, however, seemed strange to explain, the blood and lire of the Army is not poured fourth most abundantly where devildom is most rampant. Through all that night there was not a soldier, or a tambourine, or servant of the Army in any capacity seen about that central slum, while through the name hours the decent quietude of every bush village in the colony was rudely disturbed hy organised companies. How is this? A vigorous earthquake or an ell'eetive nl:>m- of utter demolition would probably do more than all the "blood and lire" in Australia, but remembering the loud and fivquent advertisement of Army work, one naturally expects to see a little more evidence of achievement, or j at least, of steady and increasing ell'ort. j —Argus. jjjiju|| !