The treasuries of both the United Hebrew Charities, and the Michael Reese Hospital are exhausted. The influx of the poor immigrants from Europe has placed a burden upon the older institutions for which no provision was made. Where ten years ago, five applicants had to be aided, there are now one hundred. The contributions have not grown as the necessities increased. The hospital, prepared to treat seventy-five patients, harbors at present nearly one hundred. The prevailing typhoid epidemic has filled to the utmost both its public and its private wards, and over eighty per cent of the patients are again Russian refugees.

The gravity of the situation, we are afraid, is not grasped by the larger portion of the Jewish population. It is exceedingly easy to argue that there is no need for the existence of these institutions, and that, if the relief office were closed, those that now apply there for aid would manage to get 2along some how. These people would be the very first to raise the voice of protest, if, in any consequence of the closing of the relief office, their stores would be invaded, and the streets in the center of the city would be filled with the needy applicants, who, according to all principles of practical charity, should be taken care of by the Jewish community to the extent of its ability.

There is now no time for argument. May be it would be better if this influx of immigration were regulated now to assume a less rapid tempo. Four months before the close of the fiscal year, our charities are confronted with a condition of affairs, which hardly troubled them at the close of the administrative year. The poor want bread and the sick want attendance. The hospitals cannot be closed. Sickness does not wait for 3resumption of the yearly collections. It is urgent that everyone should once more open his heart and his purse, so that the difficulties may be bridged over.

No one among us has earned the right to claim, that he has done for the United Hebrew Charities his full duty.