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^. DEPT. OF ECONOMICS i
E L I E F
A PRIMER
•OR THE FAMILY REHABILITA- '
■"ION WORK OF THE BjJfgALTJ-'
KHARITY ORGANIZATION
fOCIETY PREPARED BY ITS
SECRETARY
FREDERIC ALMY
■rTs-
■F-
REPRINTED BY
CHARITY ORGANIZATION DEPARTMENT
F THE RUSSELL SAGF. FOUNDATION
No Male Support:
Widows 9
Deserted Wives 12
.Shiftless Husbands, ... 14
Unemployment 16
Disability:
Sickness 17
Handicaps 19
Old Age 19
Children 21
Volunteer Visitors, .... 2}
The Churches 24
City Aid, 25
New Applications 27
Pensions and Budgets, ... 27
Loans 32
Pauperizing 32
Prevention, $5
"'12273
PREFACE
THIS little Primer was originally
written for the Charity Or-
ganization Society of Buffalo,
and some of its paragraphs do
not represent the methods in use in other
cities. Experts differ as to principles
of relief, and there are statements in
this pamphlet which are not universally
accepted, but probably no one could
draw up a brief treatise on this subject
which would be universally acceptable.
The Primer is suggestive, but in no
sense authoritative.
Nevertheless, there is so much con-
fusion in the minds of many that some
outline of principles is needed. There
are experienced workers, for instance,
who have no conception of the differ-
ence of treatment for widows and for
deserted wives. Slight as this pamphlet
is, it may stimulate thought, and help in
cases of doubt. F. A.
SOME GENERAL PRINCIPLES
OF RELIEF
THIS statement of some general
principles with regard to relief
is printed with great diffi-
dence. Modern charity has
its rules, but all its rules are made
to be broken on occasion. In families
that need help there is apt to be a
complication of disorders, and one
principle of relief will get in the way
of another. A brief primer like this
may be as dangerous or as misleading to
an amateur as handbooks like "Every
Man His Own Lawyer," or "Every
Man His Own Doctor." Neverthe-
less, if used with caution it should be
useful. A committee making decisions
about families in distress must never
forget that it is dealing with human
lives, and that human beings cannot
be moved about like chess pieces. For
one. thing, :they will not stay put; and
unHke:£Hess : men, they have ideas of
thejrpwn, which are often better than
• tjioSSqf the -committee.
A family must often be given time
before coming to even a wise decision,
such as going to a hospital, or moving to
cheaper rooms, or giving up a losing
business. In other words, interim re-
lief, as it is called, must be given while
inquiry is being made and a plan is
forming, and even, in some instances,
while the family is coming to a wise
plan. It takes long patience to deal
with balky families. The best success is
apt to come when the family can be
made to consider your plan its own.
Interim relief should not, however, be
allowed to delay constructive action
unduly.
Remember also that in a charity or-
ganization society there is never any
such thing as an unworthy family,
though some cannot be helped wisely
with material relief. The word un-
worthy is uncharitable.
A few general principles follow:
NO MALE SUPPORT
(a) widows
WIDOWS should be helped
on a different basis from
deserted wives, or wives
with shiftless husbands.
Widowhood will not increase on account
of unwise charity, though wife desertion
may, and so may neglect of widows by
relatives. Help widows with both
hands; deserted wives with one hand;
wives with able-bodied husbands with
neither. If you help a widow, make the
pension for six months or for a year at a
time, and do not leave her to worry her-
self sick each month with fear for the
next month. Of course, as the children
grow to earning age, the pension will
gradually decrease.
It is a mighty poor hen that cannot
scratch for one chicken; but a widow
with several children will need help to
keep the family together. It is ele-
mentary that a home should never be
broken up on account of poverty only.
This should be done for immorality, or
perhaps for cruelty and abuse, or even
where the parents are too weak and
shiftless to make a safe home for the
children. Sometimes, also, a home must
be broken up temporarily while a
mother goes to the hospital or is dis-
abled at home, or because of a conta-
gious disease, but no family, no matter
how large or what the cost, should be
broken up on account of poverty only.
The home is the best place for the child
if it is a good home, and this Society has
taken the position that no mother, mere-
ly because of poverty, shall be deprived
of the care and custody of -her child.
Conversely, the Society takes the
position that no child, merely because
of poverty, shall be deprived of the care
and custody of its mother. It has been
well said that there is no greater cruelty
than to compel a widow to neglect her
children in order to support them, and
the mother of a large family who is a
breadwinner cannot be also a good
home-maker. If the children are cared
for by a child, who is often kept home
from school for the purpose, they are apt
to be ill-fed and to run the streets, and
the reformatories and charitable soci-
eties pay the bill in the next generation.
A mother with little children can use the
day nurseries, but where this is imprac-
t icable, the mother should stay at home,
and the rule of this Society is to deny aid
unless she does so. The day nurseries
should be used as much as possible, and
work in the home should be used also.
Relatives or neighbors can sometimes
care for the children, and sometimes we
can dovetail two families and have a
dependent woman of one family come
daily to care for the children of another,
so that one family will be relieved with
work instead of two with alms.
It is well, however, to remember that
the mother's industry and self-sacrifice
is a good object lesson for the children.
In short, the mother should have the
opportunity to earn as much as she can
without injury to her family, but should
never be allowed to let the children get
their own meals, get themselves to
school, and roam at will after school
hours. Relief is cheaper in the end.
The results of unwise charity would ap-
pall us if seen.
The Society goes into psychology and
tries to estimate the comparative value
of mothers. If a mother is slatternly
and keeps a poor home, the Society
will not pay out much money to keep
her there. But a good, busy mother
should not be allowed to work herself to
death until "instead of six children she
has six orphans. "
Widowers do not fit under the title
"No male support," but are most con-
veniently considered with widows. Un-
less relatives can come in to care for the
children, it is usually necessary for the
father to place his children in an asy-
lum, and he should pay the bill.
NO MALE SUPPORT
(b) DESERTED WIVES
NEARLY one-tenth of the families
dealt with by this Society are
those of deserted wives. The
evil has grown so serious that
men drop their families upon charity
with confidence whenever there is
fresh baby or a family jar, and return
when convenient. The " intermittent
husband" is one of our chief problems.
We have many families who have been
deserted half a dozen times.
Until 190; wife desertion was not
even a misdemeanor in New York. It
was merely disorderly conduct, like
stealing a dog. It is now by state law a
felony, punishable by two years' im-
12
prisonment. (The law in other states
varies, but is easily ascertainable.)
We do not help a deserted wife until she
swears out a warrant for the arrest of
her husband, and our city overseer of
the poor follows the same rule. We
have brought home for punishment from
California and Texas worthless husbands
who were not worth the cost of trans-
portation, for the sake of the example.
Probation of the man in the home on
good behavior, supporting the family,
should usually precede imprisonment.
It is cheaper and better. Sometimes the
wife tries to reject a disagreeable hus-
band after his return and wants to live
on our charity instead.
It will not do to help a wife merely
because she says she is deserted. The
husband is often around the corner.
Second or third desertions have a
different rule of treatment. Wherea
wife has been deserted, has been aided,
has taken her man back, and has been
deserted again, the rule is to give no aid
to keep the family together. She should
be told this when aided the first time.
A breaking up of the family for even a
few weeks will often bring the husband
back to his burden, and show him that
'3
charity means business, besides having
a remarkably deterrent effect on other
intending deserters. Many weak men
love their children and would not desert
them if no help were near.
All charity rules have their excep-
tions, and each family problem must be
dealt with individually. The deserted
wife problem is only less difficult than
that of the wife with a shiftless husband.
NO MALE SUPPORT
(c) SHIFTLESS HUSBANDS
THIS problem is almost insoluble.
It includes, of course, the in-
temperate husband. The ordi-
nary rule is for the wife to have
the husband sent up for non-support,
but with a timid wife and a beast of a hus-
band this is not easily arranged. Proba-
tion on good behavior under promise to
support the family is better than im-
prisonment with its stigma and waste,
if the probation officer is a good one and
makes the probation mean something.
Drunkards who promise to do better
may often be helped by medical advice,
by church connections, or by enlarging
their recreational opportunities.
Cruel as it seems, it is seldom wise
to put material relief into a family
where there is an able-bodied man.
Money given to a drunkard does not
feed him but his drunkenness. Money
given to an idler or a spendthrift feeds
the idleness and the improvidence. It
is a wise rule that the wives and chil-
dren of such marriages must suffer, and
it is not well to interfere lightly with
the divine laws of providence. To do
so is to assume a very grave responsi-
bility.
Nevertheless extreme suffering must
be averted, and food and clothes, not
money, can sometimes be given in such
a family, but it should be bread-arid-
water relief, disciplinary relief, so to
speak, and of the shortest duratioi. It
is certainly permissible to give the chil-
dren clothing if doing this really insures
regular school attendance.
One trouble is that husbands are not
bad or good all the time. The man does
not absolutely refuse to support his
family, but supports it three days out
of four; or half supports it all the time.
Often he is "sick"; or is looking for
work which he does not want to find. He
would rather work others than himself.
'5
Any large charity organization so-
ciety has problems daily that would tax
the wisdom of Solomon and the patience
of job.
NO MALE SUPPORT
(d) UNEMPLOYMENT
UNEMPLOYMENT is fortu-
nately a vanishing problem
at the present time (1910)
for the industrial situation
is fast becoming normal. Ordinarily
the Society gives no aid to the families
of able-bodied men except through
work, but during the last two winters
it could not find work. Artificial relief
work, or "made work, " was disapproved
of as humiliating and wasteful, but a
few men were tested out with legitimate
work at a fair wage for which they were
paid ostensibly by the employer, but
really by the Society, which furnished
employers with a little free labor, not
of the best quality. The men did not
know they were being tested. When
any considerable quantity of work was
found, it was divided among as many
families as possible in lieu of relief.
When material relief was given it was
16
intentionally meager, partly from finan-
cial necessity and partly in order not to
delay the return to employment by
giving the comfortable relief which dis-
abled families receive.
Various men of influence gave a Spe-
cial agent of the Society letters of in-
troduction to employers, with which he
canvassed for jobs.
The Society endeavored to make such
able-bodied relief educational. Some
effort was made to have men attend
night schools where English was taught,
or manual training schools, as a condi-
tion of the relief. Similar efforts were
made with some of the women.
DISABILITY
(a) SICKNESS
IN case of sickness it is obvious that
after all proper sources of aid from
relatives, lodges, etc., have been ex-
ploited the Society should give ade-
quate relief, and this means that every
effort should be made to effect a cure,
even if the cost is large. When a hos-
pital is essential and the patient is
balky, patience should be shown and
interim relief may in some cases be given
17
while the patient is being persuaded, but
all relief should sometimes be denied, in
exceptional cases, to compel treatment
which is unquestionably necessary.
It is important to know as definitely
as possible how long the sickness may
endure. Where the sickness is inter-
mittent, or only partially disabling, it
is important to keep in close touch with
the physician and know just how much
work can properly be required. It is
as wrong to let a willing sick man work
who should not, as to compel an unwill-
ing sick man to work when he should
not. The volunteer physician and the
district committee can often question
the city poor physician or the family
physician on this point more success-
fully than the district visitor can.
Nothing is said here in regard to
tuberculosis, the treatment of which is
now being pretty fully presented to the
public. It may be said, however, in
regard to relief, that where the father
is able to pay but unwilling, the Society
will buy a cot, a tent, or a reclining
chair for a tuberculous child when it
would not think of buying food or
clothes, for the reason that the disease
is contagious and a social menace. Each
18
advanced case of tuberculosis breeds at
least five more.
DISABILITY
(b) HANDICAPS
FOR the blind, for the crippled, for
the partially disabled,occupation
supplemented by relief if neces-
sary is a kinder gift than relief
outright. An artificial leg, or education
for a suitable employment, may cost- a
large sum and yet be cheaper in the end
than continuous support. Peddling is
a most undesirable occupation for handi-
capped men, and usually ends in mere
begging.
DISABILITY
(c) OLD AGE
THE chief danger with old age is
that charity will relieve chil-
dren from their proper burden.
We know how much easier it is
for one mother to support six children
than for six children to support one
mother. The Society has several times
sued children to compel support, and
has shamed many more into support
by threatening suit.
19
The county almshouse is a comfort-
able and suitable home for shiftless, im-
provident old age, or for dissolute old
age which has earned this bed and should
die on it.
The private Home has dangers for
the reason that it does not bring rela-
tives out from cover as the threat of
the almshouse will. Moreover, most pri-
vate Homes have a waiting list and
an entrance fee of I250 or more which
must be raised; but nothing worse than
the private Home should be considered
for self-respecting old people of the bet-
ter sort, whether the relatives will help
or not. Sometimes the county poor
officer will commit to a private Home on
a weekly payment.
Often it is best to keep an old man
or woman to the end in the home in
which many years have been spent. Any
institution, either public or private,
usually separates an old couple. We
need more institutions where old people
can be kept together. When relatives
will take care of old people, but without
kindness, it is unkind to insist always on
such support. A hard child-in-law can
be very hard. So can own sons and
daughters, but reconciliations of dis-
affected children are often accomplished.
In fact, family reconciliations are a part
of the trade of a charity organization
visitor. Good relatives in other cities
are often willing to give a home, but it is
not always well to transplant an old
tree.
CHILDREN
THE treatment of children is
almost the whole of charity,
and yet only the barest out-
line can be sketched here.
One of the commonest mistakes is to
suppose that the welfare of children can
be separated from that of the rest of the
family. There must be separate treat-
ment for all of the family group who re-
quire it, and adults are not hopeless.
The best of all gifts to children is op-
portunity, — for pure air, pure milk, pure
water; for health, education, and mor-
ality. We use constantly the settle-
ments, the playgrounds, the juvenile
court and probation, the child labor
laws, the truancy force, the schools and
libraries. The over-worked, underfed
child makes the spent man.
A reformatory for difficult children
is a last resort, too often used. Even
the George Junior Republic, so invalu-
able to Buffalo, involves association
with offenders. Home under probation
through the juvenile court should be
tried out first.
We should seek to obtain medical
inspection of all of our children in order
to remove physical defects which would
handicap them in later life and lessen
their earning power. A diagnosis for
incipient tuberculosis is always asked
for where there has been exposure.
The Society conditions all its pension
relief on absolutely regular school at-
tendance by the children. If the weekly
school report from the public or paro-
chial school shows slack attendance,
unexcused, the pinch of hunger the fol-
lowing week is voluntary. It is not
an unkind or humiliating condition of
aid. The committees of the Society do
not enforce this policy sufficiently. We
find it necessary to warn the teachers
with every request for school reports
that they must not disclose their knowl-
edge of the situation either to the child
or to its schoolmates.
A father who does not make his child
go regularly to school can be fined five
dollars for the first offense, and fifty
dollars for the second, and Judge Nash
has been good about enforcing this.
There are similar provisions in other'
states besides New York.
Under a new law passed in 1910, par-
ents are subject to the jurisdiction of the
juvenile court in Buffalo, and can be
punished in that court for the offenses
of their children.
If a shiftless father will not provide
fit shoes and clothes for a child to wear
to school, both moral and legal coercion
should be brought to bear, but in addi-
tion to this the child should be got to
school, and, where necessary, clothes
should be provided.
By all means observe the child labor
laws. Relief for the mother is always
better than child labor.
VOLUNTEER VISITORS
VOLUNTEER friendly visitors
are a cardinal part of our work,
but a discussion of their finding
and guidance is not pertinent
to this article on relief.
The relation of friendly visitor is not
one to be lightly entered into. It is not
for a temporary crisis, but involves con-
33
tinuous oversight, perhaps for a long
time, by the same visitor. The Society
stands for the principle of individual
visitors, and a pastor or church worker
who visits a group of families is not
rated as a friendly visitor by this Soci-
ety. Noone visitor should be given more
than two or at the very most four fam-
ilies, and each family should be seen at
least once a fortnight in the earlier
stages of acquaintance.
It is not to be supposed that volunteer
friendly visitors will lighten the work
of the paid visitors of the Society. On
the contrary, they increase it, but the
results may be well worth the cost.
Volunteer visitors unguided are very
likely to do more harm than good.
THE CHURCHES
THE churches, even in Buffalo,
are not used as they should
be, but they are not under-
valued.
Faults of character are largely the
cause of poverty, and the church is the
chief agent for building character. In
trying to lift delinquent families to a
better life we should use continually the
influence of the priest or pastor, and of
the church connection, although like
the public schools we cannot ourselves
teach religion.
CITY AID
THIS Society has always taken
the position that municipal re-
lief should be given in institu-
tions only, and that outdoor
relief, or relief to the poor in their homes,
should be left to private charity. This
is partly because indoor or institutional
relief is less open to fraudulent use, but
more because of the attitude of the
poor towards public relief. They have
a feeling of right to it, and fling them-
selves upon it without thrift. New York,
Brooklyn, and Philadelphia abolished
public outdoor relief long ago, and
Washington, San Francisco, St. Louis,
and other large cities have practically
never had it.
In 1877, when this Society was
formed, it began a crusade against city
outdoor relief, which reduced it in three
years from $100,636 to $28,29; P er
annum. In 1898 it began another cru-
sade which reduced it in three years
from 1104,107 to $38,851 per annum.
In 1908-1909, even with the great indus-
25
trial depression, the amount was only
$47,547. All this aid, since 1877, has
been investigated by the Society as well
as by the city, and approved or disap-
proved by the committees of the Soci-
ety, and when disapproved it has sel-
dom been continued. The saving to
taxpayers through this work has been
enormous.
Even so purged and checked the So-
ciety disapproves of city aid. The
Stigma and humiliation of city aid.
though often salutary, are as often hurt-
ful. Moreover, the city aid is given
with no constructive plan, and with no
follow-up work, such as this Society
relies on to lift families out of their pov-
erty instead of tiding them over into
next week's misery. There is nothing
of which we are so proud as that in
part through our work, there were
fewer dependent families in Buffalo
in 1907 than there were thirty years be-
fore, in 1877, when the city was only
one-third as large.
Since city aid exists, the Society uses
it as follows: It asks the overseer of
the poor to send to it for relief all first
applications where aid is likely to be
temporary; or where there are children
26
of an age to take notice; or where there
is an able-bodied man in the family; or
where there are young couples. If the
aid is continuous, or the family has been
for some time on the poor books so that
the habit has been formed, the Society
seldom seeks to substitute its aid for
the city aid. On the other hand, if a
family comes first to us, or is sent by
the city to us, we very seldom seek to
place it on the city even if the aid is
continuous and heavy.
NEW APPLICATIONS
WITH all new or recurrent
applications for aid two
points which are too often
forgotten should always
be passed on by our committees;
i. Shall a weekly record of the chil-
dren's school attendance be obtained?
2. Is a friendly visitor needed?
PENSIONS AND BUDGETS
WE divide our relief into tem-
porary relief, which does
not seem likely to continue
longer than three months,
and pension relief, which seems likely to
continue three months or more.
27
With pension relief there should al-
ways be:
1 . A good friendly visitor if possible.
2. A weekly report of the school at-
tendance of all the children.
3. A medical examination of all the
children for physical defects (of seeing,
hearing, breathing, etc.) or for incipient
tuberculosis. We do not intend to
spend perfectly good money in bringing
up imperfect children when perhaps a
slight operation would remove their
handicap and give them full earning
power.
4. A budget, including standard
food cost.
This budget, with standard food cost,
should always be figured out in advance,
if pension relief seems probable, in order
to save the time of the committee. It
should be reviewed, of course, by the
committee, and should always be en-
tered on the face card. In figuring a
budget the district visitor should con-
sult with the sub-committee on cases, or
with the secretaries of the Society,
A budget is an estimate of the living
cost of the family under tolerably decen t
conditions. It should be kept clearly
in mind that the budget is the total cost
28
of living without any reference to what
the family is earning, or receiving from
any source.
The budget, less what the family
earns, or rather what it ought to earn,
and less what the relatives give or ought
to give, is the measureof relief. This is a
very simple truth, not always under*
stood.
It is customary to figure the budget
by adding together the standard food
cost per week, the rent per week, and
estimate for coal per week, without
any allowance for clothes or other sun-
dries. This is crude, and often hard,
but it is the highest measure of relief
which this Society has reached as a gen-
eral rule. The more intelligent district
committees of the Society do not limit
themselves to such a budget by rule of
thumb, but make a separate study of
each case. A very rough and ready way
of figuring a budget is to estimate what
the breadwinner of the family would
earn if living and able-bodied, and call
that, minus J1.50 a week for his food,
the budget.
In measuring relief after the budget
has been estimated it is very often
allowable to leave some margin for in-
39
visible sources, such as relatives not
brought from cover, money in a stock-
ing, aid from neighbors, unknown
church charity, etc.
It is often not cruel to wait a while
and see what happens if the aid asked
for is denied; and the results are some-
times surprising.
The budget should be closely watched
for changes. One member of the family
in the hospital for a time instead of at
home may make a difference of a dollar
or more a week.
The standard food cost as estimated
for Buffalo in 1908 after a study of many
families is fi.50 per week per man.
The cost for the other members of the
family is figured as follows: Woman, .8
as much; boy, 16 to 14 years, .8; girl, 16
to 14 years, .7; child, 13 to 10 years, .6;
child, 9 to 6 years, .5; child, 5 to 2 years,
.3 ; Infant, .2. Have this revised at the
office of the Society's registrar, to pre-
vent mistakes. This standard food cost
is suggestive only, but the Committee
on District Work voted in 1908, that it
should always be entered on the face
card, together with the estimated bud-
get, where relief for three months or
more seems likely. The face card
30
should always show the date when this
computation is made. However super-
ficial this food cost may be, it is based
on careful study, in Buffalo, and is better
than mere guessing.
Sometimes the standard of living is so
low (because of extreme thrift, or low
wages, or dissipation) that the standard
food cost as stated above is more than
the family or its neighbors are used to.
Give a Polish family an American pen-
sion and it will put half of it in the sav-
ings bank. In such cases it is important
to remember that the standard of living
cannot be raised by mere relief. If a
family is to be aided for a few months
only, during disability, it is cruel to give
adequate rooms and food and then leave
the family to its old resources. But
when the relief will last a year at least,
so that a definite impress can be made,
it pays to do a good job according to
normal standards, provided always that
the family seems to be of good type, re-
sponsive to treatment. Weeds should
not have the same culture as flowers.
It should be added that there are
many who disagree with the principle
of the preceding paragraph, and are
opposed to giving a pension larger in
3'
amount than the ordinary income of the
neighbors.
LOANS
THE relief should be either a gift
or a loan, and the loan should
not be a disguised gift, called
so in order to save the feelings
of the recipient. The Committee on
District Work voted in 1909 that all
loans by the Society be secured by a
note at the central office, and collected
if possible when due, unless canceled
or extended by vote of the district
committee which made the loan.
PAUPERIZING
OUR friends will please take
notice that as yet nothing
has been said of the fact that
pauperism is contagious, or
that easy aid kills character. No space
will be given here to these texts of
thirty years ago, though they are as
true and important now as then. The
emphasis of modern charity is laid on
constructive relief. As Joseph Lee
says: "Modern charity gives more in
material support than the old, and it is
32
entitled to do so by its knowledge of
where material support can help. But
it places the accent not upon the mate-
rial, but upon the spiritual side."
PREVENTION
THIS paper is on Relief, but it
should be made perfectly plain
before closing that although
modern charity emphasizes re-
lief, it cares far less for relief than for
cure, and far less for cure than for pre-
vention. Nothing in all this relief work,
beautiful as it is, so fires our imagination
or seems to us so valuable as the pre-
ventive work which strikes at the
causes of poverty.
To abolish poverty we must attack
disease, ignorance, vice and unjust so-
cial conditions. To meet these we have
many weapons. They include work on
tenements, tuberculosis, public play-
grounds and baths, reformatories, pro-
bation, juvenile courts, child labor, tru-
ancy, manual training, pure food, safety
devices, industrial legislation, and so oh
through a long and blessed list.
Most of this is "community work,"
as we call it, dealing not with individuals,
but with groups and classes, and re-
33
quiring legislation and agitation. The
more human and in timate " case work, "
with individual families, is like the Red
Cross work, which should go hand in
hand with an effort to abolish war.
"Case work" is an indispensable basis
for the sympathy and knowledge which
alone will make the mass work either
possible or valuable, and, moreover,
case work must always supplement
mass work at every turn.
APOLOGY
THESE suggestions have been
put together on a hurry call,
so to speak, to accompany a
report on the standardization
of district work which was needed for
immediate publication. There is no
other brief summary of the questions
here touched on, so far as the writer
knows. It should be of service to the
ten district committees of the Buffalo
Society, but the expert secretaries of
other charity organization societies may
find it full of holes.
" The daily work in a charity organi-
sation office, to be well done, demands :
An intelligence that shall not
slumber.
An earnestness thai shall not
tire.
A patience not to be overcome.
A sympathy that will not suf-
fer itself to be chilled.
And none know better than those of
us who have attempted the work bow
miserably easy it is in these respects to
fail, and bow miserably certain we are,
when we fail, to err."
EDWARD T. DEFINE.
