The Jasper weekly courier. [volume] (Jasper, Ind.) 1858-1922, 1872-07-12
The Neither Side or Paris-A Modern
SOtlOm

MWIeVI)
SOdOm.
A correspondent of the New York
Home Journal gives the following sad
picture Of the moral and social cor.
ruption pervading the French capital :
What manner Of sights and sounds
and creatures are likely to surround
the path of modest American mat.
ron who may happen to speak and an.
derstand French, and who wishes TO
show her young daughter the wonders
OF that city which claims to be the me-.
tropolis of the civilized world? The
pair may promenade Broadway and
Chestnut street for years and never
meet with anything calculated to dis
gust or annoy them, provided only that
they choose the hours Of daylight for
their rambles. Miss Anonyma might,
1t is true, brush past them and aston.
ish them with the splendor Of her rouge
and the grandness Of her sttire, and
Mr.. Deuceace might possibly stare at
the pretty face OF the younger lady !;
but there all annoyance would end. But
in Paris it is not SO. An atmosphere
of evil hovers over all things, and un-
der its influence there spring to light
horrors from which modesty and limo.
cence can neither veil their faces nor
avert their eyes. Let the careful moth.
er, if she will, continue her daily walks
to such elegant and frequented places
Of resort as the Boulevards, the Rue de
la Paix, the Rue de Rivoli, or the
Palais Royal, yet shall she not escape
from the vileness which surrounds her
like sea. Acts of the grossest indie
cency, perpetrated by the well.dressed
strollers on the asphalt, or by the ele.
gantly dressed children that frequent
the gardens of the Tuileries and the
Palais Royal, will assail her gaze. Let
her strive to take refuge from such
sights by turning to the windows of
a fashionable print-shop, and her eyes
will rest on pictures of indescribable
indelicacy, daintily engraved and col.
ored pictorial double entendres, and many
where the entendre is not double at all,
but where the purport Of the pictured
scene is perfectly unquestionable. She
flies for escape to the photographers
next door, and portraits of shameless
women in attire BETTING their charac.
tiers are the leading attractions of the
window. The image shop across the
way looks innocent enough, and she
turns to that only to behold the inn cod
esty Of print and photograph surpassed
in the marvelously executed little group
of clay figures which stand side by side
with statuettes of the Virgin and our
Saviour. She enters a bookstore and
purchases some of the works of the
leading novel writer's of France, and
she sees upon the title.page the names
of such large and well.known publish
ing houses as Hachette or Michel Levy
but on opening the pages she finds her.
self seeking for amusement and in
struction by perusing minute descrip-
tions of scenes of atrocious vice, if, in.
deed, the story does not turn upon the
of some crime too horrible
for her even to have imagined its exist.
ence. She goes to the theater, and
froA her box at the Gymnase or the
Coincide Franchise she beholds unfold.
ed before her scenes of unbridled and
unpublished prcfigacy from which is to
be learned the moral lesson that to be
virtuous is to be stupid and uninterest.
ing, and that to be vicious is to be bril-. |
liant, charming and successful in So
ciety. She takes up newspaper, the
Figaro, for instance, and the anecdotes
which crowd its columns will bring
bushes to her already burn.
ing cheeks. The trail of the serpent
IS over everything. The vice, which
N other large cities is like an ulcerous
'ore on an otherwise healthy body, is
lere, like scrofulous faint, pervading
he entire system. Woe to the careful
mother il she suffers her daughter to
walk the distance of half a block in
right daylight in the most fashit nable
Iuarter of Paris, for French politeness
will be at hand to insult her youth and
innocence by foul words and looks and
touch. Such is Paris; such,
doubt not, was Sodom.