The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1896-10-22

lome, the curtains come down at the !
windows. The children are kept from
The day school, from the Sunday
school, and from association with play
mates on the streets. Frequently, the
little cottage is offered for sale with
out awaiting for the foreclosure of the I
mortgage, or the lease is given up. The
family moves hurriedly, and almost at
random, to another place. Their con-
duct does not invite acquaintance.
The children are restrained from find
ing associates. Calls are not returned.
Schools are stunned. An impression
quickly gains footing in the neighbor-
hood, that there is something strange
about this new family. Soon will
come rumor, followed by confirma
ton, of the crime and disgrace. Ex-
aggravate the account;
gossips toss their heads at each other,
and say they had known something
all the time; and there is general
agreement by all parties to give this
family a wide distance. Children
learn of it, some of them think it is
brave to throw it up to the children of
that household, and there is sorrow
and weeping at night, and more shrink
ing by day. Recklessness may super
vene, which probably leads some of the
family into crime and infamy; or the
misery may simply be borne, with some
relief through frequent removals, only
to incur the same in each succeeding
A woman said to me:
at has followed us, wherever we have
gone; not person before has come to
talk kindly to me; and only the other
day a neighbor called and said she
wished 1 would keep my children in;
she did not wish hers to play with
them, for reasons which she presumed
she need not NAME" She added: II don't
know what to do
Add to this the common element of
poverty. Before the crime, they were
generally poor, their possessions scant,
their income small and probably heav
lily taxed for the benefit of the saloon.
But now their support is gone. The
care of the family comes upon the
worse than widowed wife and mother,
while the boys and girls must work or
beg to aid her.
Their new sorrows, toll, and asSOcia-
tions often most unavoidably open the
way for the downfall of some other
member of the comparatively helpless
family. The death, instead of the i'm
prisonment of the criminals, would, in
many cases, be mercy to the home.
A convict with whom l was once con-
versing, Whose family / had learned
were living not far from my Own,)
when l asked him how his wife sup
ported herself, burst into tears and re-
piled: God only knows, sir. Just read
her last letter." 1t was not a kindly
letter, because she had to tell him of
her starving condition. Being then on
my way for an absence from home, l
telegraphed lady where she would
find the suffering woman, and asked
her to be quick with relief. She was
in tenement house, third story, with
babe seven months old, with not a
stick or shred of furniture in her one
bare room, except sofa so in pieces
that it could not be sold. The woman,
barefoot, had supported herself for
days by watching until the hall was
quiet, and then slipping to garbage
barrel under stairway for such bits
as her miserable neighbors had thrown
away, which she had cleaned from
sweepings and ashes, and eaten. She
had no friends and could obtain no EN-.
ployment. She would not telegraph
her respectable family in the state of
New York, because she did not want
them to know of her disgrace. And
here, in this century, in town of ten
thousand inhabitants, she was found
sick and starving, with dozen church
bells ringing Justify in her ears, and
the clatter of Christian commerce
about the walls of her worse than
prison.
AS to Christianity, its followers must
certainly be ready to visit those who
are in prison, to heal the broken-heart-
ed, and to set at liberty those who re-
side in these bruised homes. The great
missionary enterprises have none too
much attention bestowed upon them,
but the heather and sinful who gather
about our very doors, hungry for life
, for better life, must surely not be
overlooked.
! THE AIM OF PRISON SUNDAY.
The end sought in the observance OF