The Honeymoon Experiment

       There are no slums in Rochester!  There are no tenements in Rochester with the exception of one street. It is a city as clean, as orderly, as spacious as Washington, yet with none of the alleys and hovels which disgrace the capital. It is infinitely astonishing to wander through a great city and find no trace of reeking alleys, crowding tenements, doorways abutting on the sidewalk with drunken stair- ways leading to dim, plaster-wounded mysteries beyond. There are plenty of poor in Rochester, but the majority live like civilized beings, each in a little single home with a tiny plot of green about it. Only the lodging-houses approach the tenement plan in any respect, and these are scattered about the entire city, and never converge into one district. 
     Rochester, with its quarter of a million people, its one hundred different industries, its amazing commercial activity, forever gives the lie to the axiom that poverty necessarily means crowded living. It gives the lie to the axiom that it is impossible to legislate benefactions. Building restrictions, civic foresight, a practical idealism behind the words "Garden City," have combined to rescue this astonishing municipality from the curse of slums. 
     We returned to the station at last, greatly impressed with our environment (the street-lamps would have rejoiced the Greeks), a little surer of our welcome, but still very uncertain what to do. It was all so new and strange. We felt that we waited on the verge of great discoveries. Yet we had no idea how to proceed. 
     In this predicament we encountered a saving institution and we made a friend. We saw a sign in the station, "Travelers' Aid," and approached inquiringly. A sweet-faced woman greeted us. We told our story the bookkeeper story and waited almost with trembling for her denunciation. 
     "You poor dear," she took Margaret's hands. She turned to me. "You look strong. I'm sure you can find something to do." She tore a leaf from her notebook and began to write. "Here are the addresses of two factory foremen I know; go and see them and tell them I sent you." She thrust the paper into my hand. 
     "And yes wait a minute. I'll telephone to a friend, and see if she will take you to board." She went with a smile to the booth at the far end of the station.    
     We faced each other in amazement. Rochester had welcomed us and already was endeavoring to find us work and a home! We settled a little more easily into our new roles. Yet we were not altogether at home. It was like diving into deep water and groping with one's hands among the misty stones that line the bottom of the pool. 
     We were to find that our story was always accepted without question as in this, the first telling of it. We were universally received as a homeless, jobless couple. Margaret's desire to work was always regarded as genuine. Any ideas that we or our friends may have entertained as to a certain quality of distinction in our bearing, that might perhaps be difficult to hide such ideas collapsed with alarming suddenness. We were from this time on nobodies, without standing, without influence, without dignity, save that which accrues to any self-respecting tramp. We had no position to con- serve. We had no appearances to maintain. We came, at last, fairly to revel in the immeasurable freedom of our position. We had no obligations whatsoever, except those that we owed to all society and to ourselves. We came and went at any hour of the day or night, well or ill clad, in the blaze of the arc lights or at high noon, and no sense of shame to say us nay! In some respects it was like stepping out of prison. 
     Miss Welborn came back to us with more addresses the friend unfortunately could not take us in until later. We thanked her, and came away deeply grateful for the "Travelers’ Aid." 
     We walked uncounted miles that first afternoon following all manner of impulses, as well as the addresses which Miss Welborn had given us. We were introduced to "light-housekeeping" rooms, and knew, even as we were introduced, that here lay our destiny. We walked mainly through the foreign district Jewish and Italian.  
     I shall never forget the first house that we entered. An old gray-haired woman, dirty and disheveled, answered our knock. 
     "We are looking for rooms," I said. 
     She peered at us suspiciously, then with ap- parent reluctance gave way before our entrance into the dingy hall. There rushed to greet us that faint, stuffy, sour smell that every house, under a certain minimum of income, seems to possess. The floor was bare, and an uncarpeted stairway led abruptly into an enveloping dimness above…..