2IO DEGENERACY. 



evening I was called to marry a couple. I found them in a small 

 room with two beds. In all eleven people lived in it. The bride 

 was dressing, the groom washing. Another member of the family 

 filled a coal-oil lamp while burning. The groom offered to haul 

 ashes for the fee. I made a present to the bride. Soon after I 

 asked one of the family how they were getting along. 'Oh, Elisha 

 don't live with her any more.' 'Why?' 'Her husband came back 

 and she went to him. That made Elisha mad, and he left 

 her.' * * * * 



m'cullock's deductions. 



"A few deductions from these data are offered for your consid- 

 eration. First, this is a study into social degeneracy, or degrada- 

 tion, which is similar to that sketched by Mr. Lankester. As in the 

 lower orders, so in society, we have parasitism, or social degrada- 

 tion. There is reason to believe that some of this comes from old 

 convict stock which England threw into this country in the seven- 

 teenth centurv. We find the wandering tendency so marked in the 

 case of 'Cracker' and the 'Pike' here. 'Movin' on.' There is scarcely 

 a day that the wagons are not to be seen on our streets ; cur dogs ; 

 tow-headed children. They camp outside the city and then beg. 

 Two families as I write have come by, moving from north to south 

 and from east to west 'hunting work,' and yet we can give work to 

 a thousand men on our gas trenches. 



"Next, note the general unchastity that characterizes this class. 

 The prostitutions and illegitimacies are large; the tendency shows 

 itself in incests and relations lower than the animals go. This is 

 due to the deprivation of Nature, to crowded conditions, to absence 

 of decencies and cleanliness. It is an animal reversion which can 

 be paralleled in lower animals. The physical depravity is followed 



