Smyrna times., 1894-01-03
The WOmen's Work in the Slums.

How dark is the gloom, how oppres.
sive the atmosphere of crime and
misery. none can understand who "gO
Summing" as sight-seers, or who dab
bic for time in slum- work as an ex-
pertinent.
To know all to understand the needs,
and to be able to grasp the awfulness
of the existing state of things, you
must live and work in the slums as
neighbOr to the people, sharing their
poverty, dwelling in their homes, and
dressing in as poor garb as they, that
you may turn your lack on all COM
forts, ease, and refinements of home as
completely as if you were a missionary
in Central Africa or China.
These poor Outcasts" have their
feelings, are sensitive, suspicious, and
sometimes proud. They do not care to
be looked at as phenomena, patronized
and pitied by those who consider them
selves above them, and they will rebuff
those who come as spies or strangers
into their midst.
1t is with love and constant kindly
deeds that the slum-work ers of the Sal
vatiOn Army have won their way from
cellar to garret, from dive to saloon,
making themselves necessary to their
neighbOrs, showing them that real
Christianity is disinterested, intensely
practical, and believes sincerely in the
Fatherhood of God and the brother
hood Of all men.
In New York, Chicago, Brooklyn,
Boston, Philadelphia and Buffalo, day
and night, summer and winter, patient
ly and loving, away out of sight, be-
tween forty and fifty young women,
without salary or worldly recompense,
are passing in and out of the most
wretched homes and haunts Of sin seek
ing, as Christ did, the most needy, the
most debased and most hopeless, and
by their patient toll winning them back
to life and hope aud goodness. Fear
lessly they visit from saloon to saloon,
talking and praying with the rough,
drunken crowds who, gathered therein
are drinking and blaspheming, their
pure earnest faces carrying conviction
of the truth of their words.
They have no male escort with them
to protect them; their own goodness
and purity are about them like a wall
of fire, silencing and impressing the
very lowest and most degraded, and
arousing in the hearts of the men to
whom they 90 with their loving mes
sage the dormant sparks of chivalry
that exist away beneath the hardened
coating created by their tough lives
and many sins.
BY the side of the hopeless fallen
woman in the lowest dives you would
find them talking of the possible purity
and brightness that may yet chase the
dark shadow of death from the future
You could see many poor painted
face wet with tears amid the coarse
laughter, the fetid fumes, and noisy
dance of those night revels as the cir
has been drawn aside and lovingly
talked to of Jesus and the loving mes.
sage He has sent Of pardon, hope, and
| restoration, with tender reminder OF
'mOther" and "home" in the now far.
away past. Down into cellars Gods
messengers haYe grOped their way and
found there human beings sleeping or
the damp ground in places where light
was dim, aud where rats ran around
and scampered over them, and the bit.
ter cold Crept in to start fatal maladies
in their worn and hungry bodies.
To these in the darkness and poverty
and sickness, as messengers of light
these brave, true-hearted girls have
gone, and have brought help and com.
fort. Not there alone, but away up il
the garrets, where the rafters hanj
low, covered with funereal drapings O
soOt-laden cObwebs, their faces haV
brought sunlight brighter than tina
which dirt and old rags have efectuall!
kept out of the window.