5 A.M.
Of course there was the vice , but while drink causes poverty , poverty causes drink . Joe found intemperance among women ; he found little children running to the saloon for cans of beer ; he found plenty of men drunkards . But what things to offset these ! The woman who bought three bushels of coal a week for seventy-five cents , watched her fires , picked out the half-burned pieces , reused them , and wasted no heat ; the children foraging the streets for kindling-wood ; the family in bed to keep warm ; the wife whose husband had pawned her wedding-ring for drink , and who had bought a ten-cent brass one , `` to keep the respect of her children '' ; the man working for ten dollars a week , who once had owned his own saloon , but , so he said , `` it was impossible to make money out of a saloon unless I put in gambling-machines or women , and I would n't stand for it '' ; the woman whose husband was a drunkard , and who , therefore , went to the Battery 5 A.M. to 10 , then 5 P.M. to 7 , every day to do scrubbing for twenty dollars a month ; the wonderful Jewish family whose income was seven hundred and ninety-seven dollars and who yet contrived to save one hundred and twenty-three dollars a year to later send their two boys to Columbia University . And everywhere he found the miracle of miracles : the spirit of charity and mutual helpfulness -- the poor aiding the poorer ; the exquisite devotion of mothers to children ; the courage that braved a terrible life . For a week the canvass went on . Joe worked feverishly , and came home late at night too tired almost to undress himself .