The Carbon advocate. [volume] (Lehighton, Pa.) 1872-1924, 1886-08-21
BrOadbrimS New York Letter.

manizing effect of our socalled modern
civilization. Cruelty to men and women
is bal enough; awful when it falls upon
the aged and the sick, but particularly
dreadful when the victim is little help
less orphan girl.
Several Instances have been before the
courts in the past few years where little
children have been tortured for months
with fendish ferocity which reminds
one of the Indian stories which we read
with terror long years ago. In this
special crime Of cruelty TO children l
think Brooklyn surpasses New York,
and only last week two fathers were
sent to States Prison for outraging their
own daughters, both of the children
being under thirteen years of age. But
the case which has given a shock to the
cummunitv is that of little orphan girl
by the name of Melville. From the best
evidence that can beprocured it appears
that the female devil, her aunt, kept
the poor child tied to the floor by
strong rope attached to staple, and
there the poor creature lay all through
the freezing winter and so far through
the summers torrid heat on the bare
floor with a wooden box for her pillow
fed like beast with the husks that fell
from her aunt's table, till in her dread
ful emaciation the bones cat through the
skin that was too poor to hold them.
can hardly believe it while write if the
appalling evidence were not before me.
The Indian tortured his enemies; l never
heard of them torturing the children of
their own flesh and blood. The woman
was childless, she had meyer felt or
known a mothers love for her children,
she would make no allowance for their
little childish faults; with her every in
fraction was a crime, and she correc ted
1t with an iron hand. Last fall the poor
child picked few grapes and strung
them into necklace; this little playful
mischief, which would have made an
ordinary mother laugh, awakened the
direst vengeance of the fiendish aunt,
and she forthwith tied her to the floor
of a miserable little den, and kept her
tied through long and terrible months
of suffering till released by the officers
of the Society for the Prevention of
Cruelty to Children. There have been
times, | confess, when l have felt in
clined to find fault with the Society for
what considered its superserviceable
zeal, but when think of the holy work
they have accomplished in rescuing
thousands of poor children from the
most dreadful suffering and misery, l
bow in reverence before them and feel
that men will rise up and call them
blessed.
This poor little girl is now under the
protection of the Society, and her cruel
relatives will have the opportunity to
torture her no more.
The case was shocking one, and will
serve to detract from the fair fame of
the so-called City of Churches. One
particularly dreadful feature of this case
is that two men, the husband of the
woman and an adopted son aged twenty
two, sat by for months and never
stretched out a hand to save the poor
helpless little orphan. Many of the
neighbors, too, had talked the matter
oyer for months among themselves, but
what was everybody's business was
nobody's, and the poor child was left to
suffer. The wretch who was the cause
of all this misery is one of those self
righteous women who imagnes h erself
right and everybody else wrong. She
defended iier course of punishment and
seemed quite unconscious of her un-
paralleled infamy. 1t is to hoped that
an extended residence in the peniten-
tiary will give her time for reflection,
and render such atrocious crimes as
hers impossible for some time to come
in New York and Brooklyn.
The evil of money was never better
eXemplified than ir the case of John
Baird, late chief-engineer of our system
of elevated roads Mr.. Baird came to this
country from Scotland many years ago,
his only capital being his industry and
his genius, and for years it was a hand
to hand struggle for life. The necessi-
ties of large family kept John Baird
hard at work till his conspicuous ability
made him chief-engineer in charge of
our elevated roads. While John Baird
was battling with fate and accumulating
millions, no one thought he was crazy;
when the owner of hundreds of thous-
ands of dollars went about in a shabby
coat and a shocking bad hat, no one
questioned his sanity; if he walked two
miles to save FIVE cents on horse car,
it was regarded as an evidence of his
thrift, and his prospective heirs satisfied
themselves by saying that father was a
very careful man. But his life-work
was about completed, and honest old
John Baird, figuring up the result, found
the trial balance-sheet on the right side
several millions. Not bad for John
Baird, say you. Then John Baird, feel
ing that he had made so much money,
thought he had right TO spend some,
and straightway there was hitch in
John Baird's family. He ordered good
dinners, and what is more, he paid for
them; then he gave some money to a
poor boy, and this was the father that
broke the camels back. He did not
play draw-poker, faro nor seven-up; he
never bet oil horse races nor took flyer
on stocks, but he did not like any of his
family to get up from the table before
he was through, and he would insist on
reading his Bible. lie read 1t at night