The Progress., 1893-06-10

collar. Gilt rings. bracelets and ban
giles, !r.12led bangs. cheap trimmings of
every order swallow up her earnings. lt
is an age of cheat and swindlc-it is an
age of imitation She knows 1t and
knows its power She buys an opera
glass and sports manicure set. She
knows that eveh Queen Victoria = horses
have false tails and that tho queens of
society arc tho creations of the tailOr'S
art. In the midst of all her squalor and
wretchedness mt home she dreams Of
this magnificence of which she reads in
the daily press, in the cheap story paper
which is her daily pabulum.
This continues for weeks and months,
and the months lcngthcn into tho ycars.
and life becomes ccasoloss, hopeless
round of deadening toll. Then comes the
tcmpter with his whisper of bright things
to be had for the taking Then comes
the time when the devil puts in his fine
work Life has lost its glamour. Pow
erty i'm all its grim and hidcOus and hell
ish outlines looms up before the tired
vision of the girl. Sickness comes. loss
of work and the terrible alternatives To
steal. TO starve. to beg. to commit sui
eide or sell her body for money. Often
or comes tho temptation to obtain the
fine clothes. 10 answer the aspirations
and warnings of an unfulfilled life in
the ways of sin. God sees IL all and
keeps the account, and / would rather
stand in the poor shopgirrs shoes, even
in sin and shame. than wear the fine
clothes of those who have made these
conditions possible in human society.
Third-Such are the conditions of work
that the body is driven to the point of
exhaustion of all its energies. and in its
weakness it is the prey to every whisper
of evil In the reaction from such grind
ing toll the effort at amusement neCes-
sarily becomes n dissipation. How can we
expect men who work with such unccas-
ing and despairing energy to avoid saloons
and concert halls and dens where they
find the only brightness in human life?
And this is the brightness of the glare of
hell, into which they are soon to fall
Ten. t9. Is and - and even 16 hours
men and women work in this great city
and in other cities. and work at tasks
deadening to every sense-mOnotonOusto TO
the verge of despair.
Fourth-Such poverty is the gateway
to hell. because the children born into it
are doomed before their birth, and the
generation that rises has less Of hope than
the generation that dies. Our statisti-
clans tell us that Y, 900 children work in
the great city of New York. but those
who know the facts tell us that IN the
100000 little pinched forms that work
for daily bread and are glad to get work
work at the period when children
must grow or die. Their little faces are
pinChed and shriveled and wrinkled un-
til they are an army of little old meu
and women. to look into whose pinchcd
faces is enough to draw the tears FROM
the heart Of a stone. What wonderful
little creatur many of them arrl They
never complsin-they take 1T ss a mat
ter of course.
A little fellow discovered m Boston
recently by n charitable institution gave
The matron An account of how he got
along for week after his IrsOther had
lied and his drunken father lad kicked
him ont. Where did You Sleep" she
,sked. I'VE lived out in Roxtnry." said
ne. land knowed place out that way
where man kept three pigs in n real
warm and snng pen. and slept there
three nights" "You slept with the
pigsY' asked the matron. "Oh. yes,
mum; il was real nice and warm there.
But the next night found the man had
moved away and taken the pigs and pen
and all. lost EN-" And what did
You do them" II kind of snooped round
and got into an empty old house. |
found lot of papers ON tho floor and
got into the papers and folded them up.
They were nice and warm. | slept there
two nights. Next night | got in n junk
shop on some rags" "What did you do
for something to eaty" "Why, staid
round the markets and got oranges and
apples and things the fruit stands throw
away, and | knowed where there was
restraints and boarding houses where
they put things into the swill barrels
that's plenty good to eat"
There are from so, 900 to &C, 900 of these
little waits drifting on the black, turbid
waters of this great city's life, and every
city has its proportion. Is it any won
der that we have tramps and idlers, and
that the gang of toughs is soon devel-
oped, and that they graduate into the
hardened criminal, desperate, highway
man and assassin?
PANTS SEVEN CENTS PAIR.
Fifth-It is the gate of hell because
of the hard life of the women. Woman
is the mother of civilization as well as
the mother of man. Womanhood is the
index to life. IL it be degraded, life is
degraded. IL it is stepped in sullen de-
spair, life will show its fruits If it be
hard, life will be hard. IL the life Of
woman leads to hell. hell is nigh to hu
manity. Two hundred and fifty thou
sand women work at hard tasks outside
Of domestic service in this great city.
Three hundred and forty-three trades
are open to women. the census taker