The San Francisco call., 1899-10-22

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uaI effort has restored to the bosoms
Of their respective families over 1000
women and girls, and thus given them
q chance to tie the broken threads
broken BY accident, by mistake or by
sheer recklessness-and go on weaving
smoothly ever after, If they so choose, on
the loom Of life.
Detective Abraham Anthony of the San
Francisco Police Department IS the man
who has done this, and because Of his eX-
ploits in this particular line he is known
to his brother officials in every large city
OF the United States as the most success
ful woman huSter' Of our Western
world. For nearly nineteen years Detect
I've Anthony has devoted himself TO the
task Of looking up feminine truants, who,
by their own vOlitiOn or by some trick Of
circumstance, have become lost to the
world that knew them before the black
curtain of mystery fell between them and
their former surroundings.
Detective cambridge says that Tony"
as the woman hunter" IS affectionately
called by his comrades, with all of whom
he is great favorite, is a miracle" in
his own peculiar way.
Tony can find and dig out of hiding e
girl or a woman as surely and almost IS
readily as the German truffle hounds can
unearth those epicurean treasures" Mr..
y
on the track of one he viii find her or die
trying. It's a wonder how he does it, but
he has never been known TO fail yet"
He doesn't look IN the least like a
"sleuth," this quiet. slow-moving, slow
speaking man, who receives you in his
shirt sleeves when he Is enjoying a restful
hour in his home, and in a comfortably
creased business suit when at the Of
fee" With his hat on. Tony appears very
much Ike a well-to-do rancher, but no
confidence man would ever try TO rope
him in after one glance at the sharply"
shrewd. blue-gray eyes, which look out at
the world so keenly from under his well
marked eyebrows. For the rest, he has
rather wide face with high cheek bones,
q long. thin but by no means prominent
nose. a determined, narrow-lipped mouth,
q decidedly obstinate chin and a short but
self-assertive gray-blond mustache. 1t IS
not until he removed his hat that l be-
came aware of the unusual, almost alb
normal. development of his forehead and,
In fact. the entire cerebrum, which to
believer in phrenolOgy would perfectly ec-
count for the miracle Of his peculiar
mental capabilities. His speech is diver
sifed by lingual "reminiscences Of Prussia
still, though he has been thirty-flve years
in this country. spending thirty Of those
years as a resident of San Francisco, and
nearly four Of them-only a boy he was
then-in fighting CALAMITY for the Union,
which he had learned to love even in far
off Nakal his birthplace.
Il Is difficult. indeed, we'll nigh impos-
sible, to persuade Anthony to talk Of his
exploits. but there is a certain over
grown. black-bound volume in which all
these things have been made matters Of
record. and here IS found full substantial
ton of all the stories which his admiring
fellows tell of him.
And what heart-breaking stories they all
are too. considered quite apart from De-
tective Anthony's share in them! They
are, every one Of them, histories Of suffer-
ing wrong or misdoing; Of foOlishness
which is wicked, or wickedness which Is
foolish. And the moral, self-evident, II
never openly expressed is the largest part
Of them; but it will never. while great
cities act as magnets TO unwise humanity
and vice looks more alluring than virtue,
reach the inner consciousness Of those
whom 1t might thus save.
Here are skeleton accounts of hundreds
of mysterious disappearances" from
which our Californian Lecocq has elimin-
ated the factor Of mystery.
Do you realize how many schoolgirls
have, during the past nineteen years left
happy homes without warning or reason,
moved by childish whim or-oh the pity
you know how many girls have been
driven TO disgrace because their homes
were not happy? DO you ever think how
many wives desert their husbands each
year, and why? And what becomes Of
those to whom no kindly friend like De-
tectve Anthony appears, besring a mes
sage Of forgiveness and hope? If you are
unaware Of, or Indifferent to, these
things this book Of Detective Anthony's
Will wake you to a sense Of life's realities,
but If you value your present lightness Of
heart, pray you do not seek to read it,
for 1t is crowded with tragedies from
cover to cover, and the unavailing sorrow
OF it all weighs on one heavily even after
the volume is closed and laid aside.
l net only see these records, but have
the good fortune to find the chief actor
In the occurrences of which they speak
with a spare half hour on his hands,
which he IS, with difficulty, be It ac-
knowledged, persuaded to spend in telling
something Of his work
How do I manage to find these
peopleY' he repeats, when he is asked
this question THAT I cannot tell Won
for 1 do not know myself. If they are
known to have sweethearts. I generally
hunt for them the first thing; but If there
isn't anything Of that kind to get a. clew
from have TO study pretty hard AS for
the descriptions that folks give us do
you realize how widely what is known
as a general description applies? Should
you be sent out to arrest a confidence
man or regular crook. described as
being Short, dark--or light as the case
might be-'well dressed, with a eraytsh
mustache and a habit Of smiling appre-
ciatively and paternally upon young
ladies, you might mistakenly run in, in