The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1880-12-25

New York Correspondent philadelphia Times ]
Imagine me just this side of the ferry gate
the gate which opens on the bridge to which
Jersey City ferry-boat is chained. The
dramatis persona are your humble servant
and black-eyed girl, about seven years old
Says she to me: Customer, buy telegram"
Says to her: "No, 1 thank you" She cries.
1 miss boat and the following follows:
Suppose 1 buy all your papers, what will you
do?"
"I'll go home"
and get good supper and nice, warm
bed?''
81 guess not. 1 don't get no supper, and 1
well, suppose I don't buy any of your
papers-what them"
"I'll stay till 1 do sell em.''
But what if no one buys them?"
Then III get licked"
Honest"
In other words, while the Society for the
Prevention with capital p of Cruelty to
Children is arresting well-dressed, well-fed,
well-paid children on the stage of the Academy
of Music, it permits little seven-year-old
girls to be starved, exposed, and outraged on
the public streets at an hour when every phil
anthropist in the city is abed and asleep.
For years 1 have endeavored to solve this lit
tie girl problem. Our streets are filled with
them. Our offices are infested by them.
They sell papers, matches apples, nuts and
oranges, and encounter not alone the pitiless
heat of the summer and the fierce blasts of the
winter, but the terrible temptations of
city where wolves might be considered mis-
sionaries and wilder beasts might pass for
Christians This humbug society with the
long name has a suite of convenient offices
az nd 1icf of fokJ
officers. 1t has patrons, a patronage, and
money enough to purchase palaces. But so
far as l can discover IL never touches a child
in rags, 1t never succors girl in distress, it
never helps boy in trouble. But it is ever
lsstingly sending men to the back doors of
theatres, always hauling up managers who
hire and pay children by the week, and never
wearies in making happy children miserable.
This society permits school exhibitions, for
which children are tortured and winks at
academic sho s, for which children are
crammed, as other geese are for Christmas.
But it never goes to Fulton ferry, where little
girls are trained in the vices that our docks
are noted for; where girls of tender years con-
sort with drunken sailors, and are the sportive
companions of inebriated contrabands, and
where language of which the hottest Hotten-
tot never dreamed is the constant argot of the
babies on that block. si .I...- i-s,f-
Isn't it shame that these little girls should
be stepped in vice and saturated with vulgar
ity before they reach their teens? We have all
seen and heard bold, bad girls of 16, but here
are little ones Of seven, eight and ten who can
discount the veriest loafer in language and
are familiar with the lowest phases of semi
crime. 1t is useless to call the attention of the
society with the long name to this abuse.
ty in self sacrifice, daily vigls, nightly atten-
ton and would secure no publicity The
deviltries in which these little apple vendors
are versed would amaze the Christian women
of the land. The infamies practiced towards
these children by men and boys cannot be ex-
But surely that will not be urged as an argu-
ment against interference. That child is
stepped in sin aud finds pleasure in its com
mission is proof positive that she needs a
strong arm to pull her from the pit and to pro-
tect her afterwards. Please don't put me
down as poser in morals. 1 am simply an
observer. L love children and would gladly
help any one of these little girls to a plane as
comfortable as that on which my own stand.
l meet them every night-cold, wretched,
pulsive. 1 don't bring them before the public
in any churchly sense I take them BY the
hand and show them to you as fit subjects for
this ridiculous society which ignores its proper
field OF duty and seeks notoriety by interfering
with children who would be far better off If
they were left alone. 1 do not envy the man
who insults one of these girls. / don't care to
smoke. drink live or die with cur who dares
utter words to them he would never use in the
presence OF his own. That there is God
never doubted. Whether He really takes
cognizance of us as individuals is an open
question. If He does not He must regard with
peculiarly jolly eye the operations Of the So
called charitable societies of Gotham. Huger
shams were never known. Grosser frauds
were never exposed. More successful beggars
never dourished.
But there is society here which, for the
sake OF its name, hope and believe is all
right 1t is known as Braces .sChildren's
Aid Society" aud during many years has had
a prosperous and useful career. That Brace
and his family and lot more get a Jolly coed
living from its manipulation 1 dare saw, but if
the balance is in favor of the children it's
commendable and deserves assistance. In
this inclement season-and heaven knows it's
cold enough to freeze the tail off brass dog
there are hundreds of boys and girls who liter
ally sleep in barrels and garbage boxes, be-
hind bill-boards and in Railways, to whom one
hot meal day would be an unheard of LUXURY
As for warm stockings, whole shoes, under
clothing, of caps, of course little things like
these are not expected.
square, noticed half dozen boys huddled to-
gether in the middle of the street, near the
World office. Naturally 1 stopped moment.
and investigation showed that the group was
gathered over the steam escape from the press
hurricane and great clouds of dust filed ali
the air. The city hall clock showed half an
hour after midnight, and there for hours vet
would be that shivering, Scant-clad gang,
quietly taking turns over the curing steam I
tell you it made SILVER start from the outside
Of my heavy ulster, pierce its thick, double
lolds, pierce its comfortable lining, pierce my
nouble-breasted coat, pierce my vest, pierce my
linen shirt, and undershirt, and cuticle, and |
stab the innermoSt cookie of nv heart. Tn |
about minute up walks Mr.. Policeman: chi |
you there; get on, move off, stir your stumps!
get on, or III run you in" and the boys scat
lered IN a twinkling, and mingling with the |
] ust that filed the air were lost to sight as |
they damned their luck and wondered what in |
he name of heaven and earth they were born |
Tor. Mr.. Brace tells me that during the cur |
'ent year 13.463 different boys and girls have |
lad lodging in the six homes; that 252, 327 |
meals and 1902! lodgings have been given;
hat in 81 schools 1862 children have been |
aught and partly fed and clothed, and that |
%. 472 warm meals were supplied, and that |
,T64 were sent to good homes, mainly in the |
vest. don't exactly understand his arithme- |
ic, for in one sentence he says that about S15 |
would be about the cost of sending one home
ess child to home, and in another says that |
GOV wlil send three homeless children to
ZONES IN the country. But have no desire to
avil. 1 much prefer to aid. This great city |
low chilled to its marrow-is overrun with |
poverty and crime, and the the little ones have |
o bear the horrors of perjury and the terrors of |
hunger. 1t would almost seem to warrant |
lew reading Of the Saviour's sentence and to
ave forth with divine authority the mandate
Suffer little children" For none of these
oes Mr. Gerrys society do thing To none
! these does 1t extend hand or give smile.
FOR stage children who can easily earn from ST.
$50 week, it has the rod and the discipline
4 the law, but for the poor and friendless the
tumble and despalring, it has no comfort, no