The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1875-10-14
LETTER FROM BOSTON.
CorreSnnndnnce of the Journal

shakes ones faith in a Divine Providence, that
a young and innocent life should be cut off
in such a shocking and sacrilegious manner
When we have reached such a state that pa
rents dare not trust their children out of their
sight, we may well be convinced that cyiliza-
ton is failure and wish ourselves back in the
tunes when simplicity, honesty and honor were
not virtues of minor consideration. The feel
ing Is quite general that the criminal in this
case Will be detected quite as quickly without
the assistance of Boston officials. They have
unrayelled criminal mysteries enough ON their
hands if they choose to try to solve Them The
trial OF Piper, the supposed murderer Of little
Mabel Young is again deferred till January.
and the murdered child's mother, who it has
been incorrectly stated is insane, is about to go
to Europe for the benefit of her health. There
is the murder of Bridget Lantregan, the Joyce
children, and the man supposed to have been
killed by John B. AlIey-al of which crimes
are no nearer explanation than ever. Alley,
by the way, may be seen any day at his old eX-
press stand on Washington street, with the
very team that probably carried the body of
the murdered man across the Cambridge bridge
to the river. With these blood stains on her
record, Boston cannot enjoy very high repu-
tatlon for the maintenance of the law. The
worst phase of the subject is the fear with
which it inspires women. Why, a woman
living alone now has no peace. She is tortured
from morning till night with il dread of thieves
and reckless tramps. Young girls who have
never thought of harm are becoming tmid and
will scarcely venture to do what thcy have
often done with impunity. The idea Of not be-
ing able to go every where alone in the day
time is simply humiliating to woman of indie
pendencc; and rs to young ladies without bro
Tiers, what they are TO do is a.puzzle, though
perhaps girls with brothers are not so well pro-
ylded for rs those might suppose who do not
know the perversity of the brotherly mind
The only thing for girl to do who loves free
dom ana will have it. is to take up pistol prac-
tice. TO be sure we should have several men
shot at first, who only looked at girls to see if
they were pretty; but that would only be CON
duciye 10 the righting of this unnatural order
of affairs. Perhaps harmless .pop~gun that
would make great noise and 90 but little
damage might better suit the more tlmid and
lNtiltl LGdTttN tliSS VI WDIlltnklllU. VI course
the necessity for seitprctecton has its comic
side. | heard the other day of three confirmed
old maids-all on the other side of fifty, and all
very good, but very homely. They started out
for a ride in search of autumn leaves, and with
the fear of an encounter with tramps in the
woods in their minds, they provided themselves
with three iron bars, each one of which requir-
ed the united strength of all three to place in
the bottom of the carriage. However inetfect-
ual these weapons might have proved in the
case of any such meeting, they served the good
purpose Of quoting their. fears which u mis-
chlevous man who heard the story declared Il
looking glass might have done equally well.
!! That however | pronounce a base insinuation.
Now that have said so much about the timd-
lty of women, | feel called upon to cite a case
of moral courage and enterprise on the part of
one woman whose example ought to infect
others. She Is Il widow, and became 50 about
two years ago. One of her sons is twenty
three, and carries on his fathers business of
brick making. Mother and children together
own little house, but the elder son is engaged
and may be married at any time, and conse-
quently the mother wished to provide for her
self. Accordingly, with the little money her
husband left her she bought Il COW. What milk
she could spare she sold, and from this little
beginning she branched out and bought another
cow. All this milk she managed to dispose of
readily. Finally she made up quite route.
Then she bought Il horse and wagon, and hired
a lad. Every morning she is up bctmes, help
ing TO milk and fill her cans--which, by the
way, glisten on her pantry shelves like so many
new silver dollars-and starts OFF her cart in
the wee small hours, that her customers may
have milk for breakfast Nobody who sees the
team and the unpretendng sign with no prefix
to the name but initials, would guess that the
miitnadN was 4 woman; but all the ustomcrs
who get pure milk without the subtraction of
cream, or the addition of water, or the multi
plication Of the ordinary price, know it and
wish that more honest women We're in business.
This woman says she is doing very well indeed,
and her son can get married when he pleased
though, of course, mother-like, she thinks he
is still too young-and she will never be de-
pendent on him.
The retail book trade is being consi derably
damaged by the Lowering sale, which is sort
of lottery. You get ordinary books at low
prices - lower than the regular retail prices,
and you have 4 chance of drawing Il prize be-
side. Many of the prizes are very cheap and
some very good saw one of the gold watches
drawn, and it was quite a fair one; at least tie
case was good, and it was Palmer a. Batchel-
der make. A jeweller pronounced it worth
$50. This Lowering announces that he has Il
million books which he has bought at various
auction sales all over the country, and can thus
afford to sell as low as he does and throw in
the prizes, and still make handsome profit
This Is true, Il book man told me, with the eX-
ceptlon of the number. A million books il an
immense stock, and probably five or ten times
| as many as the man really has, though he has
had a great cellar under the Marlborough house
1u!l for years 1t is funny to go into the store.
A nice class of people are seen there, because
books never draw vulgar crowd. 1t is i'm
possible not to catch the fever TO try your luck,
especially if you are coyetOus of books. con-
fess | myself was not satisfied till ] had drawn
half dozen silver plated knives, none of which
would cut any thing of less resistance than Il
boiled potato that would fall to pieces of itsclf
note book, too cheap for anything except to
chronicle its own value, and a huge gilt buckle
that no one but the Shah of Persia could make
pass for gold. But the young lady who drew
one of the gold watches so spread the cantagion
at home, that her brother could scarcely wait
to finish his supper before starting out to in
vest his bottom dollar. He drew Il silver watch,
and two more punctual persons than himself
and sister are not to be met with. l have come
to the conclusion that we take as naturally to
the game of chance as dogs TO bones, and that
those of us who never had any desire to see So
made into $40 in the twinklng of an eye, have
had something left out of their composition,
Mr.. Redpath, the pioneer chief of lecture
bureaus in this city. has disposed of most of
his interest in the Lyceum Bureau to Major
Pond, the agent of Ann Eliza Young, and a Mr..
Hathaway, former clerk TO Mr.. Redpath. The
latter is suffering from threatened congestion
of the brain pauspu Inv over work The lecture