"But that within the precincts of wealth, gaiety, and fashion, nigh
the regal grandeur of St. James, close on the palatial splendour of
Bayswater, on the confines of the old and new aristocratic quarters,
in a district where the cautious refinement of modern design has
refrained from creating one single tenement for poverty; which seems,
as it were, dedicated to the exclusive enjoyment of wealth, that
_there_ want, and famine, and disease, and vice should stalk in all
their kindred horrors, consuming body by body, soul, by soul!

"It is indeed a monstrous state of things! Enjoyment the most
absolute, that bodily ease, intellectual excitement, or the more
innocent pleasures of sense can supply to man's craving, brought in
close contact with the most unmitigated misery! Wealth, from its
bright saloons, laughing--an insolently heedless laugh--at the unknown
wounds of want! Pleasure, cruelly but unconsciously mocking the pain
that moans below! All contrary things mocking one another--all
contrary, save the vice which tempts and the vice which is tempted!

"But let all men remember this--that within the most courtly precincts
of the richest city of God's earth, there may be found, night after
night, winter after winter, women--young in years--old in sin and
suffering--outcasts from society--ROTTING FROM FAMINE, FILTH, AND
DISEASE. Let them remember this, and learn not to theorise but to
act. God knows, there is much room for action nowadays." {32}

I have referred to the refuges for the homeless. How greatly overcrowded
these are, two examples may show. A newly erected Refuge for the
Houseless in Upper Ogle Street, that can shelter three hundred persons
every night, has received since its opening, January 27th to March 17th,