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remains  over.  Other  goods  still  made  at  home  in  Elberfeld  are  pattern  cards,
button  stuffs,  and  especially  silk  ribbons.  In  some  houses  the  ribbon  frame  is
run  by  a  small  motor,  driven  by  electricity  or  gas,  and  here  and  there  a  ribbon
weaver  keeps  two  or  more  frames,  employing  youths  to  assist  him.  In  such
cases  the  earnings  are  larger,  yet  the  home  ribbon  weaving  industry  is  likewise
subject  to  the  uncertainties  of  employment,  and  the  general  return  for  a
complete  year’s  work  hardly  exceeds  £l  or  25s.  a  week.

Housing  and  Rents.
It  is  characteristic  of  Elberfeld  that  the  working  classes  are  scattered
throughout  the  town  to  a  far  greater  extent  than  in  most  German  towns,  and
there  are  no  districts  (though  many  streets)  of  a  purely  working-class  character.
In  some  measure  this  diffusion  of  the  industrial  element  of  the  population  is  due
to  the  survival  of  a  great  many  houses  of  the  Berg  type  of  architecture,  already
described.  These  houses  are  found  in  all  save  the  newer  parts  of  the  town,  and
their  decadent  condition  and  the  restricted  character  of  their  accommodationlow
  rooms,  narrow  staircases,  and  small  courts—have  caused  them  to  be  occupied
by  people  of  slender  means.  In  addition  to  this,  however,  the  conformation  of  the
land  has  proved  an  insuperable  obstacle  to  any  deliberate  laying  out  of  the  town
on  what  may  be  termed  class  lines.  Houses  have  been  built  as  space  has  been
found  or  made  for  them.  Undesirable  sites  have  naturally  been  allotted  to  the
less  discriminating  class  of  tenants,  with  the  result  that,  save  in  a  few
situations  high  up  the  valley  sides,  people  of  all  conditions  find  themselves  living
in  contiguity.  Further,  the  very  industrial  character  of  Elberfeld  has  encouraged
this  mingling  of  the  population.
In  describing  the  normal  homes  of  the  working  classes,  the  old  Berg
dwellings  may  be  disregarded.  They  are  numerous  still,  yet  they  are  gradually
giving  place  to  larger  structures,  especially  in  the  busy  parts  of  the  town,  where
the  value  of  living  space  advances  every  year  and  makes  small  houses  an
increasingly  unremunerative  form  of  investment.  Hence  they  can  hardly  be
regarded  as  typical  from  the  modern  housing  standpoint,  and  for  present
purposes  they  may  be  passed  over.
Two  genuine  types  remain,  the  house  of  the  early  modern  period  and  the
house  of  the  present  day.  The  former  is  found  in  all  parts  of  the  town,  the  latter
for  the  most  part  in  the  outer  districts.  The  early  modern  house,  going  back  any
period  beyond  the  last  25  years,  generally  has  three  or  four  rooms  downstairs,
let  as  one  dwelling  if  consisting  of  three  only  ;  and  in  the  upper  stories—two  or
three  as  the  case  may  be—four  rooms,  let  as  two  dwellings.  Sometimes,  however, ­
  three  rooms  upstairs  go  together,  and  one  is  let  to  a  widow  or  a  married
couple  without  children.  The  lower  story  is  approached  by  a  passage,  at  the
end  of  which  are  the  stairs  leading  to  the  higher  stories,  while  right  or  left  a
door  opens  direct  into  the  kitchen  of  the  dwelling.  \\  here  four  rooms  below
are  divided  into  two  tenements  the  passage  runs  between  the  two  front  rooms,
and  entrance  is  gained  right  and  left  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs.  Here  the  space
occupied  by  the  passage  below  allows  either  of  the  rooms  above  being  larger  or
of  a  small  room  being  added,  making  five  rooms  in  all,  which  are  let  in  two
dwellings  of  three  and  two  rooms  respectively.
As  representing  the  later  dwellings,  which  conform  more  faithfully  to  the
municipal  building  regulations  now  in  operation  (see  pp.  228,  229),  two  types
may  be  taken—the  house  of  four  or  five  rooms  below  and  five  on  each  of  the
three  upper  stories,  with  the  usual  courtyard  or  open  space  behind,  and  the  house
of  equal  accommodation  whose  courtyard  leads  to  a  second  block  at  Hie  rear,  known
as  the  “  back  house  ”  (“  Hinterhaus  ”),  similar  in  arrangement  and  number  of  rooms.
Here  the  passage  downstairs  is  in  the  centre,  forming  a  division  between  the  two
tenements,  which  are  entered  on  the  right  and  left  of  the  stairs.  The  rents
of  the  tenements  in  the  “  back  house  ”  are  always  somewhat  lower  than  those  in
the  front  block.  It  is  characteristic  of  these  houses  that  the  rooms  in  the  upper
stories  almost  invariably  open  one  into  the  other,  so  that  a  locked  door  is  the
only  division  between  two  tenements.  The  object  is  to  facilitate  the  letting  of  the
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