The New York herald., 1872-11-22
The Carnival or vico-shail Law Bs
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| VhOO-0M0hh
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hcd tho mighty Founder of Christianity
walked through Broadway six nights ago He
would have ,cept for humanity had Justice
been cognizant Of tshe sickening deed done ip
her name the balance Syould have fallen from
her paralysed hand. Christi. unity and Justice
Dare thinking souls look one .enother in the
face and boast of our Civilization, after the
combination of tragedy and farce that made
last Saturday night hideous? It is g noble
| spectacle that we now recall-so nobld. 70
worthy of the nineteenth century that we ask
the readers of the HERALD to contemplatsi it
with our eyes and swell the chorus of ''Shames'"
that should resound from press and people.
AoT Fmsr-Sce,e FIRST concert hall N
the great thoroughfare of our most Christian
city. Gaslight does its best TO illuminate vice.:
mirrors and lascivious pictures do their best
to reflect it. A stage, before which wretched
orchestra is playing more wretched music.
At the upper end Of the saloon >
bar. at which degraded men and
women are drinking liquor viler than
themselves. Opposite the stage, staircase
l AOuuAu6 W uCuo VI Auiuluys IL tA0 An4 UAO
two hundred men and thirty-6ve women-ths
former pursuing an amusement, the latter .
business. The women are disreputably
dressed, and, by drinking, are keeping them
selves down to the level of the devilish work
exacted from them by their patrons.
Scene Second The descent Of officers of tho
law, who declare all present to be under
arrest Musicians grasp their instruments,
women rush into corners, men grow white or
become scarlet, gray-haired fathers of families
tremble with dismay.
Scene Third Squads of miserable, halt.
clad, shivering women marching through the
cold and snow Of Broadway. led by policemen
and followed by a curious crowd Of ''roughs''
and s1overs."
Scene Fburth.-The interior of u police
station. Women from fourteen to forty,
weeping fainting blaspheming all, even the
most hardened, feeling most Inundated.
Scene FyM.-One by one the women are
called upon to give their names. All lie.
None are SO lost to pride as to make pubic
their own shame and that Of the mothers who
bore them. One by one they are conveyed to
cells, to pass the night in cold and misery.
As numbers lessen those remaining become
more agitated, and, weeping and weiling,
appeal in vain for mercy.
ACT SEooND-Scene FIRST The Tombs P6-
lice Court, Sunday morning. A demoraEzed
mob gazing at hungry, shivering female pris-
oners, who with swollen eyes and choked ut
terance answer to their names. few pro-
prietors of concert halls on being arraigned
speedily give bail and are released. The
women are again locked up in prison.
Scene Second. Before leaving the bench the,
magistrate discharges several women who are
ill or have little children at home. s {"
Now, in the name of decency, in the name
Of humanity, in the name of womanhood, we
ask whether this disgraceful spectacle shall be
repeated2 In the name of morality, we ask
what good has been attained? In the narno'
of justice, we ask how dare the law visit its
rigor and every possible indignity upon the
unfortunate women, while their tempters, the
proprietors of concert saloons, can be bailed
for FIVE hundred dollars or less and the men
who by their patronage keep alive the beastly
traffic are allowed to go free? If this
be law, then is law the work of the
devil, and the sooner justice takes its place
the better for our fame. Which, we ask, is
worse ?-the young girl who, reared in
poverty and vice, sells her soul for the sake of
keeping alive her body for few miserable
years, or the man who, able to gain an honest
living, prefers to make fortune by paying
girls for their prostitution? Again, which is
worse the low,born proprietor Of q concert
saloon who trades in vice or the better born,
patron who seeks it for the qualification of de-
praved passion2 Yet the greater the extenua-
ton the less leniency; and that class whichiis
weakest which needs all the charity that
Christ gave it of old and would give it to-day.
is dragged through public mire only to, be
rendered the more hopeless, the more har.
dened, the moro corrupt. Among older
women with bloated countenances-- few are
the women who can bear the horrors
of an impure life without the per.
petual stimulant of iquor-sat girls overcome
by their abandoned situation. One golden
haired, blue-eyed girl Of sixteen moaned
as if her heart would break. Another refused
made better by the brand burned into their
souls on Saturday night? Do you call them
abandoned2 Amid the wreck Of womanhood
one spark Of divinity is still left-the spark
that redeemed Nancy Sykes Hardly one
among them but turned despairingly to the
man she loved and for whom in many cases,
she erred. The woman capable Of loving,
though it be o Bill Sykes, is not lost; the
woman plying o bad career, who never neg
lects her children, is still woman. And
shall women be treated like beasts of prey2
If they are treated as such win they not be-
come such2 "Why don't they arrest the pro-
prietors and let us alone 2" exclaimed ona