The comet. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1877-1882, 1879-05-17
THE COMET.
. Saturday, May IA, 1879.
Out OF the Depths,
Chicago Times.


''Please, sir, to let mamma go home
with us. If you send her away there I
be no one to take care of little Alice
and then she's so good to all of us.
We won't let her go away again and
and get drunk, and she won't want to-,
we love her so. Please to let her go. "
"But doesen't your mother spend her
money for drink which ought to buy
you bread and butter?"
"Only once in a while, sir; there new
err was better mamma than ours, and
we'll take such good care of her and be
SO good that she won't want any more
whiskey, cause it's that, sir, which
makes her bad once in while. :"
"What have you to say, madam ?
You have been let off so many times on
good promises that 1 am losing faith in
you."
"Your Honor, I know l don't de-
serve any mercy Mt your hands, but for
the sake of these darling children let
me try once more to be the good moth
Ell they think 1 am. God only knows
why can't help drinking and why I
should degrade myself by getting drunk
and then abusing these innocent little
children. l thought this would
be the last time and that they
would be so much better off without
me that l would drown myself,
and l was angry when a policeman
pulled me out of the lake and saved
my miserable life. Idont do anything
to feed and clothe them; why do they
love and pity me so? 1 only spend
their hard-earned money for drink
How much better for them if [
could be dead? 1 have a helpless
little babe at home who was almost
starved, know, and yet none of them
ever complained, My God what
thing I am. You don't know how [ de-
spise myself. Is there any hope for me
do you think, sir ? | wish could de-
serve their kindness and love and your
mercy. If you can let me go again my
broken promises shall be renewed, and
I'll swear by the help of my Maker to
keep them in the future"
''Let the fine be 500, but I will sus-
pend it and try her again"
A scene in the North Side Police
Court on Monday last is only half re-
produced i'll the above narrated colo
guy between Justice Kaufman and
two others-one a woman forty five
years of age, but with an apparent ex-
perience of the saddest kind stamped on
her features, and the other a child not
yet nine years old. There We're other
parties present who did little but somth-
er the sobs which choked off any attempt
to speak. There were other children
of the dissipated mother-a daughter
twenty-one years of age, very neatly
but plainly dressed, and with an intel
igent and cultivated couuteRance a
son two years younger, and another
BOY about seven. This last child and e
5he little girl who pleaded for her l
mother were standing on either side of d
he woman and clinging to her dress 5
md hands The woman was Mary II
-, and she was before Justice Kauf- t(
mann for being drunk and disorderly.
The term ''disorderly'' is well known to tc
over a multitude OF sins and INSIDE Il
neanors, and in this case applied more c,
o an attempt to commit suicide than u
nything else. On the day previous an p
,tlicer had seen her wandering along 81
he lake shore and kept so close Il watch ,
N her movements that he was enabled Il
o be at hand and pull her from the lake 3
Don after she had plunged head fore II
lOst beneath its waves from one of the n
iers. II