The Grange advance. [volume] (Red Wing, Minn.) 1873-1877, 1876-08-02
*Auntic'' Lucy Porter, the Protector of Help
less Offspring of Sin.
From the Cincinnati Commercial.

"Auntic'' Lucy Porter, the Protector of Help
less Offspring of Sin.
From the Cincinnati Commercial.
Sometimes children are born on the
.ildren of poor outcast women,
to whom maternity is rather 4 curse
than 4 blessing. 1t seems somewhat
born amid such scenes OF reckless
shame and reeking sin, but many lit
tie one has first opened its great black
eyes to the light in some one Of those
gloomy and dilapidated levee buildings,
from whose windows the dark women
wave gaily.hued handkerchiefs to de-
parting vessels. Brown, vigorous,
bright-eyed, pretty waits these infants
oftentimes are; l,nscathed by the sin
of their birth, and exhibiting even in
earliest babyhood the quaintest cum
ming and funniest merriment imagina-
BILE. But the little ones are seldom
long nursed by their own mothers; and
the cry of I. child is seldom heard along
the Rows in the night stiffness. So,
in view.of the fact that these babies
mostly inherit very vigorous consti,u-
lions, one naturally inquiries with a
Mortified expression: What becomes
of them2
Well there is 4 door and heart ev-
Ell open for them-a little door that is
very old and ugly and weak, and a
great heart. that is also very old-in-
deed, much older, but still brave, and
warm, and true. And this open door
and open heart may be found in the
centre Of the negro quarter called
BucktoWn.
If curiosity should ever prompt you
to visit the corner of Sixth and Gull
vert streets, ask some one Of the tall,
dark turbaned women who haunt the
doors Of Kinks underground dance
house, to tell you where t'Aunty Por-
teri lives. Then you will be directed
to the rear of Kinks building, where
the ground is yellow and soft, and the
noisesome air black with flies; and
where you will see a wretched little
hamlet of sooty frame cottages whose
grimy plank walls afford a strange con-
trast to the snowy freight of over
burdened clothes-lines extending in
every direction. Auntie Porter lives
in the lowliest and most ancient Of all
these -colored frames-the best
of fondling hospitals nevertheless, for
the children of the levee. And auntie
herself may generally be seen there,
seated by the door, probably smoking
her old-fashioned briarroot pipe.
Auntie is very old :; she has seen her
eighty-second year. But she is still
strong and hearty, though age has
dimmed her eyes and taught her hands
to tremble a little, when she is filling
that old black pipe. Her dark-brown
face is cast in the most strongly
marked African mold her lips are
very large and long; her nostrils very
fiat; her cheek-bones very high her
broad face is weirdly wrinkled. It
would be a very ugly face but for the
relief of the kindliest of motherly
smiles, and the incessant twinkle of
good-humored fun in her half-blind
eyes. That smile and look have won
the love of motherless little ones more
numerous, perhaps, than even the
years of Auntie Porter. A great white
turban and q huge rusty-colored
wrapper lend Auntie quite a pictu-
rescue appearance. Her little house
is dingy and dark, and sWarms with
flies: her furniture is so old that one
wonders why the chairs and tables do
not fall to pieces and the floor of the
rickety building squeals and groans
under her feet. But she is very con-
tented and happy, and complains Of
nothing, even when the rains beat
through the roof or q northeaster
shrieks through the cracks Of the
sh.lddering doors and windows.
From time to time some levee girl
brings her baby to Auntie Porter and
abandons it forever. to return to the
delirious revelry of the Row, with it's
drunken passion and wild music and
weird debauch. Generally she prom
Uses to pay twenty-five or fifty cents 4
week for the baby's board, and
almost always forgets to keep the
promise. But Auntie cares little for
that, Il becomes 'tached to the little
ones," she says, ssand kent give 'em
mp She has successfully ':raised'' no
less than nineteen Of these motherless
babes, besides having iursed a great
number who died early, despite the
tenderest care. Some Of her found
llngs have grown up to manhood and
womanhood; some are doing well in
other cities; some are running on the
river; some have gone back to the
wild life amid which they were born.
One fine tawny lad still visits his old
ioster-mother, when the boats come
up from New Orleans, and this one al
ways brings her half of his wages.
Auntie used once to be able to sup
ln,t her little ones we'll, when she was
Younger and stronger, and could work
hard for them, but now she is getting
too old TO work. She chiefly manages to
live only by boarding some poor negro
longshovclnen, and once in q while
even this resource fails her, for her