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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Danger! A True History of a Great City's
+Wiles and Temptations, by William Howe and Abraham Hummel
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations
+       The Veil Lifted, and Light Thrown on Crime and its Causes,
+       and Criminals and their Haunts. Facts and Disclosures.
+
+Author: William Howe
+        Abraham Hummel
+
+Release Date: February 29, 2008 [EBook #24717]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DANGER! ***
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+DANGER!
+
+_A TRUE HISTORY OF A GREAT CITY'S_
+
+WILES AND TEMPTATIONS
+
+_THE VEIL LIFTED, AND LIGHT THROWN ON_
+
+CRIME AND ITS CAUSES,
+
+_AND_
+
+CRIMINALS AND THEIR HAUNTS.
+
+_FACTS AND DISCLOSURES_
+
+BY
+
+HOWE & HUMMEL.
+
+BUFFALO:
+THE COURIER COMPANY, PRINTERS.
+1886
+
+
+(Scanned by someone at Lehigh University,
+OCRed/proofread/formatted by DIzzIE,
+Carriage return mule: Gaz,
+Direct all correspondence to DIzzIE,
+xcon0 @t yahoo d0.t c.0m
+
+Copy-text page scans available at:
+www.dizzy.ws/dangerscans.zip and
+www.rorta.net/textfiles/dangerscans.zip)
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+It may not be amiss to remark, in explanation of the startling and
+sensational title chosen for this production, that logic has not yet
+succeeded in framing a title-page which shall clearly indicate the
+nature of a book. The greatest adepts have frequently taken refuge in
+some fortuitous word, which has served their purpose better than the
+best results of their analysis. So it was in the present case. "DANGER!"
+is a thrilling and warning word, suggestive of the locomotive headlight,
+and especially applicable to the subject matter of the following pages,
+in which the crimes of a great city are dissected and exposed from the
+arcanum or confessional of what we may be pardoned for designating the
+best-known criminal law offices in America.
+
+So much for the title. A few words as to the _motif_ of the publication.
+Despite the efficiency of our police and the activity of our many
+admirable reforming and reclaiming systems, crime still abounds, while
+the great tide of social impurity continues to roll on with unabated
+velocity. Optimists and philanthropic dreamers in every age have
+pictured in glowing colors the gradual but sure approach of the
+millennium, yet we are, apparently, still as far from that elysium of
+purity and unselfishness as ever. Whenever the wolf and the lamb lie
+down together, the innocent bleater is invariably inside the other's
+ravenous maw. There may be--and we have reason to know that there is--a
+marked diminution in certain forms of crime, but there are others in
+which surprising fertility of resource and ingenuity of method but too
+plainly evince that the latest developments of science and skill are
+being successfully pressed into the service of the modern criminal.
+Increase of education and scientific skill not only confers superior
+facilities for the successful perpetration of crime, but also for its
+concealment. The revelations of the newspapers, from week to week, but
+too plainly indicate an undercurrent of vice and iniquity, whose depth
+and foulness defy all computation.
+
+We are not in accord with those pessimists who speak of New York as a
+boiling caldron of crime, without any redeeming features or hopeful
+elements. But our practice in the courts and our association with
+criminals of every kind, and the knowledge consequently gained of their
+history and antecedents, have demonstrated that, in a great city like
+New York, the germs of evil in human life are developed into the rankest
+maturity. As the eloquent Dr. Guthrie, in his great work, "The City, its
+Sins and its Sorrows," remarks: "Great cities many have found to be
+great curses. It had been well for many an honest lad and unsuspecting
+country girl that hopes of higher wages and opportunities of fortune,
+that the gay attire and gilded story of some acquaintance, had never
+turned their steps cityward, nor turned them from the simplicity and
+safety of their country home. Many a foot that once lightly pressed the
+heather or brushed the dewy grass has wearily trodden in darkness, guilt
+and remorse, on these city pavements. Happy had it been for many had
+they never exchanged the starry skies for the lamps of the town, nor had
+left their quiet villages for the throng and roar of the big city's
+streets. Weil for them had they heard no roar but the river's, whose
+winter flood it had been safer to breast; no roar but ocean's, whose
+stormiest waves it had been safer to ride, than encounter the flood of
+city temptations, which has wrecked their virtue and swept them into
+ruin."
+
+By hoisting the DANGER signal at the mast-head, as it were, we have
+attempted to warn young men and young women--the future fathers and
+mothers of America--against the snares and pitfalls of the crime and the
+vice that await the unwary in New York. Our own long and extensive
+practice at the bar has furnished most of the facts; some, again, are on
+file in our criminal courts of record; and some, as has already been
+hinted, have been derived from the confidential revelations of our
+private office. With the desire that this book shall prove a useful
+warning and potent monitor to those for whose benefit and instruction it
+has been designed, and in the earnest hope that, by its influence, some
+few may be saved from prison, penitentiary, lunatic asylum, or suicides'
+purgatory, it is now submitted to the intelligent readers of America,
+
+By the public's obedient servants,
+HOWE & HUMMEL.
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+CHAPTER I.
+Ancient and Modern Prisons--Some of the City's Ancient Prisons--How
+Malefactors were Formerly Housed--Ancient Bridewells and Modern Jails,
+
+CHAPTER II.
+Criminals and their Haunts--The Past and Present Gangs of the City--How
+and Where they Herd--Prominent Characters that have passed into
+History,
+
+CHAPTER III.
+Street Arabs of Both Sexes--The Pretty Flower and News Girls--The Young
+Wharf Rats and their eventful Lives--How they all Live, where they Come
+From, and where they finally Finish their Career,
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+Store Girls--Their Fascinations, Foibles and Temptations,
+
+CHAPTER V.
+The Pretty Waiter Girl--Concert Saloons and how they are Managed--How
+the Pretty Waitresses Live and upon Whom, and how the Unwary are Fleeced
+and Beguiled--A Midnight Visit to one of the Dives,
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+Shoplifters--Who they are and how they are made--Their Methods of
+Operating and upon whom--The Fashionable Kleptomaniac and her
+Opposite--The Modern Devices of Female Thieves,
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+Kleptomania--Extraordinary Revelations--A Wealthy Kleptomaniac in the
+Toils of a Black-mailing Detective,
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+Panel Houses and Panel Thieves--The Inmates--The Victims--The
+Gains--Complete Exposure of the Manner of Operation, and how
+Unsuspecting Persons are Robbed,
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+A Theatrical Romance--Kate Fisher, the Famous Mazeppa, involved--Manager
+Hemmings charged by Fast paced Mrs. Bethune with Larceny,
+
+CHAPTER X.
+A Mariner's Wooing--Captain Hazard's Gushing Letters--Breakers on a
+Matrimonial Lee Shore--He is Grounded on Divorce Shoals,
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+The Baron and "Baroness"--The Romance of Baron Henry Arnous de Reviere,
+and "The Buckeye Baroness," Helene Stille,
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+The Demi-monde,
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+Passion's Slaves and Victims--A Matter of Untold History--The Terrible
+Machinery of the Law as a Means of Persecution--Edwin James's Rascality,
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+Procuresses and their Victims--Clandestine Meetings at Seemingly
+Respectable Resorts--The "Introduction House,"
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+Quacks and Quackery--Specimen Advertisements--The Bait Held Out, and the
+Fish who are Expected to Bite,
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+Abortion and the Abortionists--The Career of Madame
+Restell--Rosenzweig's Good Luck,
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+Divorce--The Chicanery of Divorce Specialists--How Divorce Laws Vary in
+Certain Slates--Sweeping Amendments Necessary--Illustrative Cases,
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+Black-mail--Who Practice it, How it is Perpetrated, and Upon Whom--The
+Birds who are Caught, and the Fowlers who Ensnare them--With other
+Interesting Matters on the same Subject,
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+About Detectives--The "Javerts," "Old Sleuths" and "Buckets" of Fiction
+as Contrasted with the Genuine Article--Popular Notions of Detective
+Work Altogether Erroneous--An Ex-detective's Views--The Divorce
+Detective,
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+Gambling and Gamblers--The Delusions that Control the Devotees of
+Policy--What the Mathematical Chances are Against the Players--Tricks in
+French Pools--"Bucking the Tiger"--"Ropers-in"--How Strangers are
+Victimized,
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+Gambling made Easy--The Last Ingenious Scheme to Fool the
+Police--Flat-houses Turned into Gambling Houses--"Stud-horse Poker" and
+"Hide the Heart,"
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+Slumming--Depravity of Life in Billy McGlory's--A Three-hours' Visit to
+the Place--Degraded Men and Lost Women who are Nightly in this Criminal
+Whirlpool,
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+Our Waste Basket--Contemporaneous Records and Memoranda of Interesting
+Cases,
+        Miss Ruff's Tribulations,
+        Astounding Degradation,
+        Fall of a Youthful, Beautiful and Accomplished Wife,
+        A French Beauty's Troubles,
+        Life on the Boston Boats,
+        An Eighty-year-old "Fence,"
+        Shoppers' Perils,
+
+
+
+AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL
+
+It is to be presumed that the readers of this book will expect a few
+words on a subject "on which," as Lord Byron somewhere remarks, "all men
+are supposed to be fluent and none agreeable--self." However much the
+inclination and, I might add, temptation may run in the direction of
+fluency and diffuseness in this case, my utterance shall be as brief as
+possible. I, William F. Howe, founder of the law firm of Howe & Hummel,
+was born in Shawmut street, in Boston, Mass., on the seventh day of
+July, 1828. My father was the Rev. Samuel Howe, M. A., a rather
+well-known and popular Episcopal clergyman at the Hub in those days. Our
+family removed to England when I was yet very young, and consequently my
+earliest recollections are of London. I remember going to school, where
+I speedily developed a genius for mischief and for getting into scrapes.
+I received a liberal allowance of the floggings then fashionable, and I
+can recall the _hwhish_ of the implement of torture to this day. We are
+all young but once, and when memory calls up the lively pitched battles,
+and the pummelings I got and gave at school, I am young again--only my
+waist is a good deal more expansive, my step is not so elastic or my
+sight so clear. I could recall the names of some of those boys with whom
+I fought in those happy school days, and tell how one now adorns the
+British bench, how another holds a cabinet portfolio, how another fell
+bravely fighting in Africa, and how several, striving neither for name
+or fame,
+
+        "Along the cool, sequestered vale of life
+        Pursue the noiseless tenor of their way";
+
+but it would be useless, as would also my experiences at church,
+listening to my good father's sermons, and falling constantly asleep.
+
+My youthful reminiscences of events which happened, and of which I heard
+or read in my youth, are mostly chaotic and incongruous; but it is
+otherwise with the murders. I remember with what thrilling interest I
+read the story of Greenacre, who cut up the body of his victim, carrying
+the head wrapped up in a handkerchief, on his knees in the omnibus, and
+who was supposed to have nearly fainted with fright when, on asking the
+conductor the fare, received the answer, "Sixpence a _head!_" Then there
+was the horrible Daniel Good, the coachman at Roehampton, and the
+monster Courvoisier, the Swiss valet, who murdered his master, Lord
+William Russell. These atrocities and the trials at Old Bailey, no
+doubt, gave my mind the bent for the criminal law, not that I was in any
+sense conscious of the possession of superior powers. It was merely the
+selective tendency of a fresh and buoyant mind, rather vigorous than
+contemplative, and in which the desire for a special field of action is
+but the symptom of health.
+
+At the age of twenty, I entered King's College, London, with the son of
+the great American statesman and historian, Edward Everett, and
+succeeded in graduating with some distinction. Soon after, I entered the
+office of Mr. George Waugh, a noted barrister. 1 had the good fortune to
+meet the commendation of Mr. Waugh, and I was consequently placed at the
+head of his corps of assistants, and frequently appeared in the English
+courts in place of my employer. My connection with this office lasted
+about eight years, and then, in pursuance of an intention long prior
+formed and never relinquished, I returned to the country of my birth. My
+earliest essays at the American bar have been fairly and impartially
+told by another pen, and, as the autobiographical form of narrative has
+its limitations as well as its advantages, the reader will pardon me if
+in this place I drop the "ego" and quote:
+
+
+"On arriving here, Mr. Howe entered the office of E. H. Seeley, Esq.,
+one of our oldest legal practitioners. Here he remained one year,
+studying American law and practice with persistent assiduity, and
+frequently appearing in our courts, 'by grace,' until he was fully
+licensed. And it may be here stated that out of a list of over one
+hundred candidates for admission to the bar only eighteen passed, and in
+that number was included the young lawyer from London.
+
+"His first case of importance in this city was one of extreme delicacy,
+being a test question as to whether Col. Walter W. Price, a wealthy
+brewer, was entitled to the position of Colonel of the First Cavalry
+Regiment, N. G. S. N. Y., he having received the _second_ highest number
+of votes. Mr. Howe took the ground that his client was entitled to the
+office, being a resident of this city, while his competitor, Smith, the
+founder of the great umbrella house, who had received the largest number
+of ballots, resided in Brooklyn. This question was argued before the
+Brigade Court, and, its decision being adverse, Mr. Howe carried the
+case to the Court of Appeals, where a favorable decision was rendered,
+and Mr. Price duly installed in the position. This was the young
+lawyer's first technical victory of note, and it brought him almost at
+once into considerable prominence.
+
+"He soon after opened an office at the corner of Chambers and Centre
+streets, devoted his entire time and energy to civil matters, was highly
+successful, and soon achieved a considerable share of popularity. In
+1859, finding himself crowded with business, he removed to his present
+large suite of offices on the corner of Centre and Leonard streets,
+which had formerly been occupied by the late Judge Russell, and from
+that time down to the present he has made criminal matters a specialty.
+
+"Mr. Howe's first appearance in the New York courts as a criminal lawyer
+was in 1859. A man, by the name of Devine, had been tried and convicted
+in the Court of Special Sessions on a charge of larceny. He took
+Devine's case to the General Term of the Supreme Court, contending that
+the conviction was illegal, inasmuch as the statute provides that
+_three_ justices should sit, whereas at the trial of Devine but _two_
+had attended. Many members of the bar laughed at him, declaring his
+position untenable. In this he was opposed by Assistant District
+Attorney, the present Chief Justice, Sedgwick. The Court decided the
+point well taken and ordered the discharge of the prisoner, Devine.
+
+"In defending a German named Jacob Weiler, indicted for the murder of
+his wife, by shooting, in 1862, Mr. Howe took the ground that the
+deceased shot herself, a discharged pistol being found by her side. This
+case was very thoroughly canvassed by the entire press of the city, and
+occasioned the greatest excitement among the German population. The
+trial lasted eight days, and resulted in a disagreement of the jury. At
+this stage of the proceedings, owing to a misunderstanding (which it
+would hardly be in good taste to explain at this late day), Mr. Howe
+withdrew from the defense. Other counsel were substituted, when the case
+was re-tried, and the prisoner was convicted and sentenced to state
+prison for life.
+
+"Mr. Howe has tried more capital cases than any six lawyers in America
+combined. There has not been a murder case of note for the past
+twenty-five years in which he has not appeared as counsel. The records
+of the Courts of Oyer and Terminer and General Sessions show that he has
+tried more than three hundred homicide cases since the year 1860. Mr.
+Howe, as a specialist in diseases of the brain, is regarded by
+physicians as the peer of the most eminent alienists in practice."
+
+
+The circumstances under which Mr. A. H. Hummel became associated with
+me, first as an office boy, in 1863, at a salary of two dollars per
+week, and subsequently, in May, 1869, as my partner, have been told more
+than once in the public press. Mr. Hummel was born in Boston, July 27,
+1849; came, with his parents, to this city at an early age; attended
+Public School No. 15, on East Fifth street, and made my acquaintance on
+a January morning before he was fourteen years old. I have at hand a
+newspaper clipping, taken from the Rochester, N. Y., _Democrat and
+Chronicle_ of March 25, 1877, in which is printed an elaborate notice of
+the law firm of Howe & Hummel, in which the junior partner is thus
+characterized:
+
+
+"Soon after Mr. Howe opened his office, a bright lad, conversant with
+foreign languages, applied on a cold January morning, in the year 1863,
+for employment, and was accepted. His duties as office boy were to
+answer questions, make fires, do errands, and do copying
+andtranslations. Such was his winning address, his ready tact, his quick
+perceptions, his prudence and discretion, that he not only performed his
+duties to perfection but, in his few spare moments, learned law. While
+he grew but little in stature, he made great progress in his chosen
+profession. As he had fluent command of the German language--a useful
+adjunct to the practice of a criminal lawyer in New York--and gave
+promise of attaining a high rank as an advocate, Mr. Howe made him his
+partner before he was admitted to the bar. To-day, in stature, he is
+probably the smallest professional man in America; but size is not 'the
+standard of the man,' and if Abe's stature were in proportion to his
+merit he would be a veritable giant indeed."
+
+
+With this sentiment I most cordially coincide, and at the same time
+bring these somewhat rambling and discursive reminiscences to an end.
+
+WILLIAM F. HOWE.
+
+
+
+DANGER!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+ANCIENT AND MODERN PRISONS.
+
+_Some of the City's Ancient Prisons--How Malefactors were Formerly
+Housed--Ancient Bridewells and Modern Jails._
+
+From old Dutch and Knickerbocker records it appears that as far back as
+the year 1600 there existed a place for the confinement of malefactors
+in the City of New York. At that early date in its history the town must
+certainly have been restricted to a half dozen or so of narrow, crooked
+streets, in the immediate vicinity of what is now known as the Bowling
+Green. The population did not, probably, number more than a few
+thousands; but, nevertheless, we find from these same records that, even
+in that small community, criminals were so numerous and crime so rife
+that a jail or Bridewell had already been established for the
+safe-keeping and punishment of evildoers, and a system of citizen-police
+inaugurated for the preservation of the local peace.
+
+It was not, however, until some years later, 1642, that the "Staat Huys"
+was built, a municipal building, with a portion of it erected especially
+for the housing of dangerous criminals. Thus it would seem that for
+upwards of two centuries crime and criminals have had their haunts in
+this city, and, it is safe to say, while the more ancient cities of
+Europe have, unquestionably, originated more felons of every grade,
+there are few places that can rival New York in the number of actual
+crimes committed during its comparatively brief existence on the earth's
+map.
+
+During the earlier history of the embryo city, the nature of the
+offenses perpetrated on the then small community, and the type of men
+who boldly executed the crimes, were undoubtedly of the same pattern as
+those which obtain among us to-day, but with this difference, that with
+the onward march of Improvement, hand-in-hand with the progress of
+Science and Civilization, have also grimly stalked fashionably-clothed
+and modernly-equipped Crime and the scientifically-perfected
+law-breaker, with his modern and improved methods. Man's villainies,
+like his other passions, remain the same to-day as when the murderous
+club of Cain crushed the skull of his brother Abel, and the maiden earth
+was crimsoned with the first blood that appealed for vengeance. They
+differ only in the manner of commission, and the commission would appear
+to be assisted by modern invention and appliances.
+
+To expect large civilized communities dwelling together to be free from
+crime would be to imagine an elysium on earth, for where poverty exists
+crime will assuredly be found, and poverty will never be divorced from
+civilization. It would also appear that, in accordance with the growth
+and expansion of the young city in other respects, vice and crime kept
+pace, while youthful depravity early began to trouble the good people
+then as it worries the same class of persons to-day, for in 1824 we find
+that a House of Refuge, for the reformation of juvenile delinquents, was
+built, ostensibly superseding the old "Society for the Prevention of
+Pauperism." To follow in detail the history of crime in this city, from
+so early a date, would be of very little service here, but a simple
+chronicle, referring to the periods at which prisons were found to be
+necessary, may be briefly touched upon as tending to show how crime
+increased and criminals multiplied, as the city grew in wealth and
+population.
+
+The new "Staat Huys," before alluded to, was erected on the corner of
+Pearl street and Coenties Slip, a locality then considered the most
+central in the infant town, and as offering the best facilities for
+securely keeping prisoners. It served its double purposes of jail and
+city hall until 1698, when it was decided by the authorities to build
+another--a larger and more commodious structure; while, in the meantime,
+the old military block-house in the immediate neighborhood of the
+Governor's residence was conscripted and made use of, additionally to
+the "Staat Huys," for the accommodation of the constantly-increasing
+number of culprits.
+
+The new building--City Hall--was erected on Broad street, on the ground
+now covered by the sub-treasury building, and was finished in 1699, but
+was not used as a jail until five years subsequent. In the winter of
+1704 the sheriff was required to have the city jail prepared for the
+reception of felons. Crime, however, would appear to have become a
+monster of terrible mien in those days, far exceeding all the efforts of
+the authorities to restrict or even to limit the number of malefactors,
+aside from the apparent impossibility of diminishing them, for again, in
+1758, another new jail was found absolutely necessary to the needs of
+the inhabitants, and was erected on what was then known as "The Fields,"
+now City Hall Park, and where, tradition has it, the prisoners were most
+barbarously treated. This new place of confinement, together with those
+previously in use, served their purpose very well until 1775, when the
+new Bridewell was erected, when all were converted into military prisons
+during the occupancy of the city by the British. The frightful cruelties
+that were then practiced upon the patriot soldiers, unfortunate enough
+to be inmates of those prisons, are too familiar to every one to need
+mention here.
+
+Shortly after the Revolution, the Penitentiary was established at
+Bellevue. In 1816, a portion of the almshouse was set apart for the
+punishment of felons, by the institution of the treadmill. This was on
+Twenty-sixth street, near First avenue, the present site of Bellevue
+Hospital, and its part occupancy as a prison somewhat relieved the
+overcrowded condition of the jail. The city jail still continued in City
+Hall Park, and was used as a debtors' prison, remaining so until 1832,
+when it was entirely converted into the Register's Office, the present
+Hall of Records, and is such to this day. It stands opposite the _Staats
+Zeitung_ building in old Tryon Row.
+
+The Penitentiary was soon found to be too small for the keeping of the
+greatly-increased number of prisoners, and so, in 1836, the buildings on
+Blackwell's Island were constructed, and two years later, again, the
+Tombs, the sombre, miasmatic, Egyptian edifice on Centre street, was
+completed; which latter had been in course of construction for some
+years.
+
+In addition to the prisons previously alluded to, there was begun, in
+1796, a state prison, which was erected in the Village of Greenwich,
+about West Tenth street, near the North River, and which is still in
+existence to-day (1886), being occupied by, and known as, the Empire
+Brewery. It was used as a state prison until the completion of the
+present extensive buildings at Sing Sing, on the Hudson.
+
+Such is, briefly, a history of the establishment of the prisons of this
+city, but of the unfortunate class of criminals that have, from time to
+time, occupied them, much remains to be said, and will be found in the
+succeeding pages.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+CRIMINALS AND THEIR HAUNTS.
+
+_The Past and Present Gangs of the City--How and Where They
+Herd--Prominent Characters that Have Passed into History._
+
+New York, from being the largest city on the western hemisphere; in
+almost hourly communication with every part of the known world; the vast
+wealth of its merchants; elegant storehouses crowded with the choicest
+and most costly goods, manufactured fabrics, and every kind of valuable
+representing money; with its great banks, whose vaults and safes contain
+more bullion than could be transported by the largest ship afloat; its
+colossal establishments teeming with diamonds, jewelry and precious
+stones gathered from all parts of the known and uncivilized portions of
+the globe; with all this countless wealth, these boundless riches, in
+some cases insecurely guarded, in all temptingly displayed, is it any
+wonder, then, that this city should always have proved the paradise of
+thieves? The fact of its being the chief city of the New World, alone
+caused it to be the principal magnet of attraction for all the expert
+criminals of the Old World, in addition to those who were "to the manner
+born."
+
+What trouble they proved to the police of some years ago, and the
+frequency with which crimes of every kind were committed, is best
+evidenced by referring to the records of that time, when jails and
+prisons were crowded and courts and judges were kept busy trying
+offenders against the laws, while the entire police and detective force
+was unable and inadequate to successfully reduce the occurrence of the
+one or diminish the number of the other. It was at that time
+appropriately styled the "Thieves' Paradise," for even after some daring
+and expert felon had been captured by the authorities and securely
+lodged in jail, the meshes of the law, as it then existed, were so
+large, and the manner of administering justice (?) so loose, that the
+higher class of criminal, possessed of political influence, or, better
+still, of money, invariably escaped the punishment his crime deserved.
+The very police themselves were, in many cases, in league with the
+thieves and shared in the "swag" of the successful burglar, expert
+counterfeiter, adroit pickpocket, villainous sneak and panel thief, or
+daring and accomplished forger; hence crime, from being in a measure
+"protected," increased, criminals multiplied and prisons were made
+necessarily larger.
+
+But this was years ago, and under a far different police system than
+that now in vogue, the merits and efficacy of which it will be both a
+duty and a pleasure hereafter to fully mention. The collusion between
+the police and the criminals, at the times of which we speak, became a
+very serious matter, in which the public early began to exhibit its
+temper. So late as the year 1850 it was an anxious question whether the
+authorities or the lawless classes should secure the upper hand and
+possess the city, and this condition of affairs, this triangular strife
+of supposed law and order on one side, protection to law-breakers on the
+other, and the protests of an indignant, outraged and long-suffering
+people on the third, prevailed until the year that Bill Poole was
+murdered by Lew Baker on Broadway, which notable event marked an epoch
+in the city's history, and to some extent improved the then existing
+state of affairs, as it occasioned the dispersal of a notorious gang of
+swell roughs, whose power was felt in local politics, and directed the
+attention of every lover of peace and justice to the enactment of better
+laws and a sterner method of executing them.
+
+About the year 1855, two classes of "toughs," or, as they were dubbed in
+those days, "rowdies," appear to have had and maintained some control of
+the city, overawing the regularly constituted authorities, intimidating
+the police by their numbers, and carrying things with a high hand
+generally. One class consisted of the individuals comprehended in the
+title of "Bowery Boy"--a term which included that certain, or rather
+uncertain, element of New Yorker residing in the streets running into
+the Bowery and adjacent to it, below Canal street, and the other, a
+rival gang, called "Dead Rabbits," which unsavory distinction was
+adopted by an equally questionable portion of humanity dwelling in the
+Fourth and Sixth wards and streets in the vicinity of Catherine and
+Roosevelt. There were among these two gangs of the city's representative
+"toughs," materials of a far different kind from the actual felon, but
+who were none the less dangerous, and among them may be classed many
+leaders of ward politics and volunteer fire companies, and from which
+Lew Baker and his victim, Bill Poole, "The Paudeen," "Reddy, the
+Blacksmith," and numerous others were afterwards developed; but they
+were oftener far more guilty than the real criminals, for they aided and
+abetted, and in cases of arrest befriended them, causing their
+subsequent escape from the penalties justly due for their crimes.
+
+As a type of the veritable "Bowery Boy" may be taken the leader of that
+gang of notorious "toughs," one who, from his well-earned reputation as
+a bar-room and street rough-and-tumble fighter, has become a historical
+personage, under the sobriquet of "Mose." His faithful lieutenant,
+"Syksey," of "hold de butt" fame, will not soon be forgotten either, as
+both figured prominently in the terrible pitched battles the two rival
+gangs frequently indulged in, to the terror and consternation of all New
+York. Of the rival mob, known as "Dead Rabbits," Kit Burns, Tommy Hedden
+and "Shang" Allen are names long to be remembered by the terror-stricken
+citizens who lived in the days when the fights between these notorious
+aspirants for pugilistic and bloody honors were often of the deadliest
+and most sanguinary character, lasting for days at a time; when entire
+streets were blockaded and barricaded, and the mobs were armed with
+pistols and rifles. Even cannons were sometimes used, and the police,
+even when aided by the military, were powerless to suppress these
+battles until many were killed and wounded on both sides. In these
+desperate conflicts it was no unusual sight to see women, side by side
+with men, fighting as valiantly as their husbands, sons or fathers, and
+the records of the courts and prisons of those days tell dreadful
+stories of murders, robberies and other crimes done under cover of these
+periodical street fights.
+
+At this time the locality known as the "Five Points" was probably the
+worst spot on the face of the civilized globe. In and around it
+centered, perhaps, the most villainous and desperate set of savage human
+beings ever known to the criminal annals of a great city. To pass
+through it in daylight was attended by considerable danger, even when
+accompanied by several officers of the law. Woe to the unfortunate
+individual who chanced to stray into this neighborhood after dark. A
+knock on the head, a quick rifling of pockets, a stab if the victim
+breathed, a push down some dark cellar, were frequently the skeleton
+outlines of many a dreadful tragedy, of which the victim was never
+afterwards heard. The name "Five Points," was given to that particular
+spot formed by the junction or crossing of Worth, Baxter and Park
+streets, but nearly embraced all the neighborhood comprised in the
+locality bounded by Centre, Chatham, Pearl and Canal streets in the
+Sixth ward, and was frequently afterwards mentioned as the "Bloody
+Sixth," from the many daily conflicts eventuating there.
+
+The "Five Points," from being the hiding-place and residence of the most
+bloodthirsty set of criminals, vagabonds and cut-throats, has, through
+the influence of the Five Points Mission House and the gradual
+encroachments of business houses, become quite respectable, and while
+now sheltering a large number of the foreign element, has ceased, to a
+great extent, to longer excite terror in the community. Still, it has
+not entirely lost its former well-merited title of "Thieves' Nest." It
+is comparatively a safe thoroughfare in daylight, and after dark, if one
+is on constant guard, he may safely pass unharmed.
+
+In the Fourth ward, just beyond the locality written about, was another
+terrible rendezvous for an equally desperate set of men. It was known as
+Slaughter-house Point, and a criminal here was, for a time, safe from
+the police, as its many intricate streets and tumble-down houses offered
+a safe hiding-place for every kind of outlaw, even up to very recent
+years. Here the terrible garroter dwelt for a long time; aye, and
+throve, too, until our criminal judges began sentencing every one of
+them convicted before them to the extreme penalty of twenty years in
+Sing Sing, which largely suppressed that class of criminals in this
+city.
+
+The methods of the garroter were quick, sure and silent. At
+Slaughter-house Point and its environs many a returned East India sea
+captain, whose vessel was moored to one of the docks at the foot of a
+contiguous street, has either strayed or been beguiled into this
+neighborhood, drugged and robbed. Others, whose business or chance
+brought them within the reach of this set of desperadoes, have fared
+similarly. Sad has been the fate of many an individual unfortunately
+falling into the clutches of these murderous villains. A stealthy step,
+an arm thrown under the chin of the unsuspecting victim, a bear-like
+clasp, and total unconsciousness. To rifle the pockets of the unlucky
+man--sometimes stripping him and throwing him off the dock--and escape
+into one of the many dark and dismal passages abounding in the
+neighborhood, was but a few minutes' work, and nothing remained to tell
+how the drama, perhaps tragedy, was enacted.
+
+Another class of dangerous criminals haunted the precincts of Water and
+Cherry streets, and that immediate locality. They were all frequenters
+of the well-known establishments presided over by such eminent lights of
+the profession as Kit Burns, Jerry McAuley, Johnny Allen, etc., but all
+three of whom afterwards forswore their evil ways and died in the odor
+of piety.
+
+These various gangs inhabiting the portions of the city already
+indicated were eventually succeeded by others in widely separated
+localities. The succeeding gangs were quite as numerous, but not quite
+as ferocious or formidable, so far as numbers were concerned, but more
+dangerous and daring individually; for while the former type lived in
+communities by themselves, and dwelt in certain well-known streets and
+houses, using their bloodthirsty propensities occasionally against
+themselves in their street fights, the latter at all times waged an
+indiscriminate and perpetual war on the respectable element of society.
+To the latter and more modern gangs, which were really worse, so far as
+the higher classes of crimes were concerned, belonged such men as
+"Reddy, the Blacksmith," "Dutch Heinrich." Chauncey Johnson, "Johnny,
+the Mick," and their favorite places were "Murderers' Row," and other
+notorious localities on Broadway, Houston, Crosby and adjacent streets.
+
+The war did much to bring these latter into prominence. They made money
+when money was in the hands of every one, when bounty-jumpers were as
+thick as berries on the bushes, and the leading streets of the city were
+a blaze of light at night, from the myriads of colored lamps displayed
+by the pretty waiter-girl saloons and other notorious and questionable
+dives. When the war ceased these and kindred gangs of "toughs" were
+again superseded by those at present to be found in various parts of the
+metropolis, but which, thanks to an excellent system of police, are all
+or nearly all under complete espionage of the local authorities.
+
+It now becomes our duty, as faithful chroniclers, to point out the
+localities at present occupied by that class of the population, and tell
+the secret of their lives and how they exist. The region which most
+engrosses the attention of the police is that conspicuously known as
+"Mackerelville," which for some years past has borne rather an unsavory
+reputation. While there are many deserving and worthy persons dwelling
+in the locality, quite a different type of humanity also makes its home
+there. The neighborhood in question is comprised in Eleventh, Twelfth
+and Thirteenth streets, and First avenue, and Avenues A, B and C. It
+harbors a wild gang of lawbreakers, ready and willing to commit any kind
+of lawless act, in which the chances of escape are many and detection
+slight. Notwithstanding the decimation of its ranks by frequent and
+well-deserved trips to the penitentiary of its members, for every crime
+from murder down, it appears to survive, to the terror of the
+respectable poor living in the neighborhood and the constant dread of
+the police officer. It is a locality and a gang much dreaded at night,
+but not nearly so much now as formerly, for when a member commits a
+crime of any importance now he is invariably ferreted out, arrested and
+punished.
+
+The Tenth Avenue gang is a chance affair, owing its existence to the
+successful and bold express robbery occurring some years ago, but which
+is still fresh in the minds of most people from the skillful manner in
+which it was executed, and from the number of prominent rascals
+participating in it. The robbery referred to, at the time of its
+occurrence, was current talk, and continued a subject of conversation
+for many weeks afterwards. A number of ingenious, daring and
+highly-cultured train robbers, under the leadership of the notorious Ike
+Marsh, among whom was one who has since attained celebrity as an actor,
+boarded a train on the Hudson River Railroad, near Spuyten Duyvil, the
+spot immortalized by Washington Irving, and, entering the express car,
+bound and gagged the messenger in charge, threw the safe off and jumped
+after it. The iron box contained a large amount of greenbacks and
+government bonds, which the thieves succeeded in appropriating. Some of
+these daring robbers were subsequently arrested and lodged in the White
+Plains jail, but on the day set for the trial, the sheriff discovered
+that his prisoners of the night before, whom he imagined quite secure,
+had left, without waiting to say good-bye. Some friends and confederates
+came to their assistance, released them and drove them down to the city,
+from whence they finally reached our sister Kingdom, recently made
+famous as the abode of the fashionable defaulter.
+
+The successful perpetration of this bold robbery suggested to a number
+of idle men the idea of robbing the freight cars as they remained
+apparently unguarded on the tracks in the vicinity of the West Thirtieth
+street station, and led to the formation of the notorious Tenth Avenue
+gang. The cars arriving from the west and other points loaded with
+valuable goods and merchandise, offered facilities of a most tempting
+kind to the members of this gang, and large quantities nightly
+disappeared until, week after week, the goods stolen aggregated
+thousands of dollars loss to the railroad company. The proximity of the
+river aided the operations of this gang very materially, for much of the
+goods were spirited away with the assistance of the river thieves and
+their boats, both sets of thieves acting, of course, in collusion.
+
+It is a very difficult thing to map out just the precise localities
+where criminals reside now, owing, in a great measure, to the efficiency
+of the present police, who keep evil-doers under constant surveillance,
+preventing them remaining long in any one place. Of course, such streets
+as are contained in wards of the city where the poorest people dwell
+will invariably have their quota of questionable characters; but the
+days when gangs of roughs, "toughs" or thieves can flourish in one
+particular section, it is to be hoped, are matters of the past.
+
+It is a matter of surprise to other nations, and of congratulation to
+ourselves, that at the present such crimes against persons and property
+as burglary, pocket-picking and highway robbery are much rarer in
+proportion than in any other cosmopolitan city in the world.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+STREET ARABS OF BOTH SEXES.
+
+_The Pretty Flower and News Girls--The Young Wharf Rats and their
+Eventful Lives--How they all Live, where they Come From, and where they
+finally Finish their Career._
+
+To the wealthy resident of Fifth avenue and other noted fashionable
+thoroughfares, the incidents of actual every-day life that are here
+revealed will read like a revelation. To the merchant and the business
+man they may probably read like romance. To the thrifty mechanic,
+however, who occupies a vastly different social sphere, who hurries to
+his work in the morning, and with equal haste seeks to reach his home at
+night, this chapter may, perhaps, cause a tear to glisten in his manly
+eye when the facts, here written for the first time, meet his gaze, and,
+may be, are associated with some young male or female relation or friend
+who has "gone wrong." But to the officers of the Society for the
+Suppression of Vice, and other kindred useful societies, newspaper men,
+the police, and others whose daily vocations happen to keep them out
+late o' nights, the truths here unfolded are of too frequent occurrence
+and are too familiar sights to need any other corroborative evidence
+than is supplied by their own experience and the exercise of their own
+observation.
+
+Youthful vice and depravity, of all grades, is, unfortunately, the
+natural result of that civilization which finds its outgrowth in large
+and necessarily closely-packed communities. Where ground is dear, poor
+people must seek rooms in dwellings where the rent is cheap, and these
+dwellings are, for the most part, erected in cheap neighborhoods--and
+cheap neighborhoods mean questionable companionships and associations,
+and bad associations beget a familiarity with immorality of all kinds.
+No one can question the truth of this. For instance, the honest and
+industrious mechanic, receiving fair wages for his work, must hire
+lodgings or rooms in some tenement; he goes to work during the day,
+leaving his wife, if he happens to have one, at home to perform those
+hard household duties which fall to the lot of her class; the
+children--and there are generally several, for one of the chief luxuries
+within the reach of the poor is children--are allowed to take care of
+themselves as best they can between times; they naturally go to the
+streets to play; they have no gardens, with shady graveled walks running
+between beds of bright flowers; no nursery, no governesses, no nurses
+with French caps, and, shame be it said, hardly any public parks; there
+are not even trees in this great city to cast a shade for these little
+creatures in summer nor to help break the force of the wind in
+winter--but they play in the streets just the same, and are under no
+restraint whatever, and therein lies their temptation. What wonder that
+they afterwards people the gilded palaces of vice "up-town," or fill the
+prisons of the city and state?
+
+They may be approached by any one, and they are led away by many.
+Sometimes the ever-watchful and lynx-eyed Chinaman singles out some
+pretty little girl, on the pretense that he has some curious things to
+show her in his laundry. Sometimes an old, eminently respectable
+gentleman (?) has a package of candy for the little girls. Sometimes,
+again, bright-eyed young girls are attracted, like butterflies to bright
+flowers, to the gaudy signs of the Bowery museums. Sometimes there are
+other inducements, in the way of store windows, or a chance acquaintance
+(and they are always around, too, these obliging acquaintances), and the
+purchase of some trinkets, then a hotel, a room, and our little friend
+has eaten of the apple. But this is premature.
+
+The unconstrained freedom of the street, therefore, is undoubtedly one
+great source of danger to the young but there are many others which, in
+varying degrees, conspire to ensnare and corrupt them. So that the
+wonder is that so many escape rather than that so many are
+contaminated.
+
+The manner in which poor people--the very poor--live in this city is, of
+itself, fearfully demoralizing in its effects upon their children.
+Oftener than otherwise, a family, in some cases six or seven in number,
+will occupy but _two_ rooms; one, a kitchen, the other, a _sleeping_
+apartment. In the latter room are sometimes the father, mother, one or
+two daughters, say ten, twelve or fifteen years of age, and as many
+sons, younger or older, as the case may be. Just think of it! think of
+the tender age at which these children are familiarized with what should
+be as a sealed book. Think of--what frequently happens--a drunken father
+reeling to the marriage bed in such a room! Think of brothers and
+sisters of such ages lying side by side, and think of the mistakes that
+might occur when--which is possible--the whole family may have taken
+liquor and the floor is one common bed. There are hundreds of families
+living in this big, charitable city in this degrading manner. Is it any
+surprise that children here are bad and criminally vicious at five years
+of age and upwards?
+
+It not infrequently happens that the parents of families so
+circumstanced are sent to the "Island," in which case the children are
+then, indeed, upon the streets. Yet they are so precocious and
+resourceful that they generally are able to take care of themselves, and
+so become flower girls, news girls, wharf rats, etc.
+
+There are yet other causes which go to affect the lives of the children
+of the poor. It sometimes happens that the happy and virtuous home of a
+comparatively well-to-do mechanic is broken up by unforeseen
+circumstances, against which no provident provision, except a life
+insurance policy, could guard. The head of the family meets with some
+serious accident, incapacitating him for labor, and straightway, instead
+of being the breadwinner and family support, he becomes a care and a
+burden. The poor wife is thrown upon her resources, and she naturally
+invokes the assistance of her children in the desperate endeavor of
+maintaining a roof over their heads. In this way the ranks of the flower
+and news girls are frequently recruited.
+
+Through the cursed effects of drink, the heads of many families are
+frequently sent to the "Island" for from ten days to six months, and
+when the sheltering arms of some beneficent society, or the kindly
+offices of some good Samaritan, are not directed to the forlorn and
+destitute condition of the children, the unfortunate young creatures are
+forced upon the streets to beg, steal, sell papers, flowers, etc., and
+also visit the offices of bankers and brokers, doing anything, in short,
+to get the means to live. They live in the streets, sleep in hallways,
+alleyways, anywhere, a prey to the first evil-disposed man that meets
+them. It is a common sight to see children on the streets in all parts
+of the metropolis--boys and girls--aged from five to fifteen years,
+selling papers, shoplifting, stealing, and,--worse. Have they parents?
+Who knows, who inquires, who cares? Some of them are very pretty girls,
+too. All the worse for them.
+
+The same causes which conspire to throw girls upon their own resources
+to gain a livelihood, operate with the brothers; but the latter are more
+fertile in means of accomplishing that end. Girls can only sell papers,
+flowers or themselves, but boys can black boots, sell papers, run
+errands, carry bundles, sweep out saloons, steal what is left around
+loose everywhere, and gradually perfect themselves for a more advanced
+stage and higher grade of crimes, finally developing into fully-fledged
+and first-class criminals.
+
+So much for the causes which help to create this class of street Arabs,
+whom it is almost a labor of supererogation to describe, especially to
+those who daily hear the familiar cries, "Telegram!" "News!" "Telegram!"
+"New-es!" "Mail 'n' Express!" uttered chiefly by young girls, all over
+the town. Pretty girls they are, too, many of them, with large, lustrous
+eyes, long, well-oiled hair, nice shoes upon their feet, short dresses,
+disclosing evidences of graceful forms, ruddy complexions, and armed
+with many winsome little actions calculated to conciliate patronage.
+They are to be seen on Park Row, the Bowery, Chatham street, around the
+post-office, hotels, elevated railroad stations, the ferries leading to
+Brooklyn, Jersey City and Staten Island--everywhere, in fact, where
+there is a chance of disposing of the afternoon newspaper.
+
+The larger number of these little girls emerge from their hiding-places
+about eleven o'clock in the morning. Their hiding-places may have been a
+hotel, an assignation house, their parents' homes, some hallway, the
+News Girls' Lodging House, resorts in North William, Bayard, Hester, New
+Bowery, or any other street in which cheap rooms can be obtained. It is
+not to be presumed that all news-girls are bad; on the contrary, many
+are very good, respectable little things, but a few only remain so, for
+their associations are bad, and many men who purchase papers from them
+are constantly tempting them, so that it is very difficult for any of
+them to remain good for any length of time.
+
+Be that as it may, however, the news girl in this case arrives down-town
+about noon. She strolls down among the brokers and bankers, and in many
+cases is winked at, conversed with and asked to visit different offices,
+which invitation is generally accepted, for a little money is to be made
+by the call, with which the afternoon papers are purchased. Sometimes
+the selling of papers is merely a pretext under which a better
+opportunity is afforded of conversing with men. The papers are hawked in
+saloons, upon the streets, in cars, and other places. If any one should
+chance to buy a paper and offers a nickel, the girl invariably has no
+change; when the purchaser, nine times out of ten, tells her to keep the
+change. They are extremely shrewd, smart, intelligent and wide awake.
+
+Their papers all sold, about nine or ten o'clock at night they saunter
+up Chatham street, the Bowery and other thoroughfares; or, if it is the
+summer season, they will be found in the City Hall park, playing,
+sitting on the benches, or accosting passing pedestrians. The Battery,
+too, has its frequenters, and the piers and docks at night are crowded
+with them. This life they pursue until they engage regularly in a life
+of shame, by becoming regular boarders in some one of the many dives in
+the cellars of Chatham street, the houses of prostitution in Forsyth,
+Hester, Canal, Bayard and other streets. Or, again, they may be found
+in the various pretty-waiter-girl saloons of the Bowery, or such
+notorious resorts as Hilly McGlory's, Owney Geoghegan's, and so on. The
+public parks, however, are favorite places, and they may be found even
+in Union Square and Madison Square, and sometimes in Central Park. They
+enjoy themselves, too, for they are often seen on picnics in summer and
+at balls during the winter. They have their favorites among the opposite
+sex, too, just as have more favored and aristocratic females. For the
+love of one of these little girls--Mary Maguire--a member of the
+notorious Mackerelville gang met a tragic end, at the hands of a jealous
+rival in City Hall park, by being stabbed to death. Little Mary was only
+fourteen years of age. She was afterwards sent to the House of the Good
+Shepherd.
+
+Newsboys are largely responsible for leading girls of this class into
+the tempting paths of vice. In purchasing their papers at the newspaper
+offices, generally in cellars, they are subjected to many indignities
+and familiarities, which, at first resented, are gradually accepted as a
+matter of course. Once the descent is begun, the journey is completed by
+outsiders, until the girls become corrupt and unscrupulous, with a
+knowledge of the ways of the world that would surprise many a matronly
+head.
+
+In many cases, girls of five and six years are sent out as decoys by the
+larger ones to "rope in" customers; for detectives and agents of the
+various societies, on the lookout for depraved girls, teach those young
+Messalinas caution. When one of these smaller girls has secured a
+customer she pilots the way to the place where the larger ones are to be
+found. In one instance this was a cellar, under ground, not fifty feet
+from the corner of Chatham and William streets; outwardly an oyster
+saloon, but a door opened in a wooden partition, through which one
+entered another room, and in which, at one time, there were actually no
+less than nine small girls, ranging in age from ten to sixteen years.
+
+There are a few places where these girls resort in the day-time and
+remain all day, and where they are visited by regular frequenters of the
+houses. Here, also, may be found those young girls who, leaving home in
+the morning and telling their parents they are going to work, remain all
+day; returning home again in the evening with, perhaps, a couple of
+dollars in their pockets, and at the end of the week hand their parents
+what the old people innocently suppose is the week's wages of their
+daughters, honestly obtained.
+
+There are old-time procuresses, who, having once been news-girls
+themselves, know just how to proceed to capture recruits for Hester
+street boarding-houses, and they obtain them, too, from the ranks
+mentioned. Parents that drive their children in the streets to get
+money, and beat them if they fail to fetch it home, are generally sure
+to either make prostitutes of their little ones or have them run away
+entirely, particularly when a tempting offer is made them by male or
+female. There are thousands of men in this city, as well as there are in
+London, who employ procuresses, whose efforts and operations,
+unfortunately, are not confined to news-girls, but include the pretty
+daughters of well-to-do mechanics and trades people.
+
+Many of these girls become closely identified with the lives of
+Chinamen, and it is astonishing how fond some of these girls become of
+their almond-eyed protectors.
+
+Should any observant individual pass through Elizabeth, Bleecker, Canal,
+Hester, Bayard, Dover, Pell, Mott, Baxter, Rose, Chambers streets, and
+the other localities mentioned, at night, he will see what becomes of
+the pretty news-girls. But there are instances in which they have
+obtained work in various factories and wholesale houses and remained
+respectable.
+
+Thus far, the news-girl. Of the pretty flower girl--she with the
+engaging manner, and interesting face above a tray of flowers--not much
+remains to be said, for she has almost become an institution of the
+past. Thrown upon her own resources, from like causes affecting others
+of her sex, she was once to be met with in the lobby of every theatre in
+town, every resort where gentlemen were supposed to frequent,
+club-houses, drinking saloons, omnibuses, cars, and the streets. Even
+houses of ill fame found her gently and firmly looking for trade.
+Wherever there was a chance to intercept a gentleman, there was she, and
+her importunities to purchase were redoubled when a lady accompanied a
+gentleman. They did a thriving business in the pretty-waiter-girl
+saloons, for men could hardly escape them, and nearly all bought
+bouquets for their favorites in those places.
+
+It is safe to say that very few of the flower girls were virtuous. They
+remained out until all hours of the night and plied a double trade,
+selling both their flowers and themselves. There was one well-known
+house in Thirteenth street which these little girls made a headquarters.
+It was between Broadway and University place. The proprietress had no
+other "ladies" but flower girls, as she found them more profitable,
+charged them higher prices for accommodations, whether by the day or
+week, and as but few places would assume the risk of harboring the
+waifs, they were compelled to pay her extortionate rates.
+
+Some time since a man could hardly pass along Fourteenth street or Union
+Square, at night, without his being accosted by one of these girls, who,
+instead of asking him to purchase flowers, would invariably remark,
+"Give me a penny, mister?" by which term, afterwards, all these girls of
+loose character were known to ply their trade. Many of these girls were
+so exceedingly handsome as to be taken by gentlemen of means and well
+cared for, and one instance is known where a flower girl married a very
+wealthy man of middle age.
+
+As a class, they were excessively immoral. They purchased their flowers,
+out and out, from the florists and made handsome profits, amounting to
+as much as two and three dollars a night when the weather was fine; but
+their habits and immoralities became so patent that the societies put a
+stop to their selling, by sending some to the House of the Good
+Shepherd, and arresting others for soliciting and other unlawful acts;
+so that to-day it is very much to be doubted if there are more than half
+a dozen in the city.
+
+"Wharf rats," street gamins, Arabs, and other euphonious terms are
+applied to that class of boys, who, having no homes, make one for
+themselves in the streets. They black boots--some of them--in the
+day-time, sell newspapers in the afternoons, lie in wait for incoming
+travelers from the trains to carry satchels, etc., and make a little
+money from all sources to supply themselves with food and raiment. The
+balance, if any is left, they spend in going to the gallery of some
+theatre, visiting some museum, or adjourning to their favorite haunt--
+which frequently is a low beer-dive in some obscure street, play pool or
+cards or dice for drinks, and otherwise contrive to kill time, until
+their "business" of the next day begins.
+
+It used to be a familiar sight to see the saloons of Baxter, Mott and
+Mulberry streets filled with these boys. It was only a few years ago
+that they had their own theatre, yclept "The Grand Duke's Theatre," at
+21 Baxter street, in the cellar under a stale beer dive, where really
+clever performances were given of an imitative character, by a company
+of boys; and which, by the way, was the only theatre which for years
+defied the efforts of the authorities to collect the license. The
+admission fee was ten cents, and curiosity seekers came from all parts
+of the city to witness the really laughable and, in many cases,
+meritorious character-sketches given within its damp walls. It was
+subsequently broken up by the police.
+
+Boys and girls appear to be alike in one respect--the streets of the
+city are full of them at all hours of the day and night. The water,
+however, would appear to act like a magnet upon the needle, having
+peculiar attractions for them at all times, and to which vicinity, at
+night in summer, they naturally gravitate. On the piers which jut out
+into the rivers on all sides of the city, any one can see troupes of
+gamins every warm, pleasant day. Some are fishing, others are pitching
+pennies, others, again, playing various apparently harmless games, but
+all with eyes for the main chance--an opportunity to steal anything
+come-at-able. To the policeman who, from curiosity or to get a sniff of
+sea breeze, chances to stroll upon the pier, he finds them all engaged
+as described. Ships are unloading cargoes of assorted merchandise, which
+is being placed upon the dock. Bags of coffee are in one place, chests
+of tea in another, hogsheads of molasses and sugar, and various other
+kinds of goods are distributed all over the place. Some boys are playing
+"tag," and they run around and over the bags of coffee, behind the
+hogsheads of sugar, ostensibly in play, but all the while keeping a
+sharp eye on the watchmen, police and people employed there. A favorable
+chance occurring, a boy drops behind one of the bags of coffee and
+quickly and expeditiously rips it open with a sharp knife and bounds
+away. The coffee thus loosened freely discharges itself upon the dock in
+a little heap. In like manner a knot in the wood forming a head in a
+barrel of sugar is knocked out, leaving a round hole, into which the
+Arab thrusts a long, thin stick and, dexterously withdrawing it,
+contrives to pull out considerable sugar. The bung of a molasses barrel
+is burst in, a stick inserted, which, when pulled out, has some of the
+contents thickly adhering to it. Thus much accomplished, every boy
+provides himself with an old tomato or other can, and it would surprise
+anyone not familiar with these things, to see how rapidly and
+ingeniously these dock rats will fill those cans to overflowing with all
+kinds of goods, from the openings thus made in the vessel containing
+them.
+
+These same tactics are employed by the street gamins in front of those
+grocery stores where barrels, boxes and cases are placed upon the
+sidewalk, and it is almost an impossibility for any one but the sharpest
+to catch them thus stealing, so clever and adroit are they. One of their
+very neat tricks is for a boy to place himself in view of the proprietor
+of a store, who, knowing the youth is after some of the goods outside,
+keeps a sharp eye on him. Suddenly, the boy makes a dash for some
+oranges and flies up the street, the proprietor in full chase. At the
+distance of, perhaps, half a block, the boy stops, allowing himself to
+be caught, when the irate shopkeeper roughly clutches him and, looking
+for the oranges stolen, is considerably chopfallen to find the boy has
+taken nothing. Upon being asked why he run away, the boy says he
+"thought he saw his brother and ran after him to speak to him." It seems
+plain enough, and the grocery man returns to find that, in his absence,
+twenty boys have plenteously helped themselves to everything within
+reach. It is now too late to re-catch the boy that he first ran after.
+It is a piece of strategic cleverness that rarely fails to succeed; and
+if any one underrates the _finesse_ of the street Arabs of New York, he
+will stand a very good chance some day of being a sufferer from them.
+
+The operations of these embryo professionals are not confined to any one
+kind of theft. They are adepts in all the ways of petty thieving.
+Sometimes, a drunken sailor or 'longshoreman will stagger out of a
+saloon and, unsteadily navigating along, will fall, or seat himself on a
+door-step and, either falling asleep or into a semi-conscious condition,
+will be surrounded by a gang of these playful boys, while one, the
+leader, probably, will sneak up to the unlucky man and relieve him of
+all he has about him, when they will scamper off.
+
+These boys are often taken in hand by professional burglars, who use
+them to keep watch, posting one of them as a sentry, perhaps employing
+another to squeeze through some small aperture and open the doors of the
+place to be burglarized, for the fact of their whole lives being passed
+upon the streets their education is of that character which tends to
+make them quick, bright, smart and skillful in all things, and, when
+added to natural gifts of intelligence, render them very dangerous as
+thieves or thieves' assistants. Readers of Charles Dickens will recall,
+in this connection, the use to which burglar Bill Sykes applied little
+Oliver Twist.
+
+Many of these gamins have houses under the docks. The floor is laid just
+above high-water mark. It is boarded in on all sides with lumber stolen,
+day by day, from adjoining yards. Here they pass their leisure time in
+comparative safety and quiet, and considerable comfort, as the whole
+gang contribute to furnishing up the club-rooms. Stoves, chairs, tables,
+benches, and other evidences of taste, are to be found there, and an
+occasional cheap picture, circus bill or flash theatrical poster
+ornaments the sides of this not uncomfortable place. Here the members
+play cards, dice and other games, drink beer, smoke and otherwise enjoy
+themselves. These houses sometimes exist for years unknown to the
+police, and many a boy, detected in the commission of some petty theft,
+has run along the pier, pursued by the policeman, when, suddenly
+scrambling over the pier, he has disappeared, leaving the wondering
+officer to guess what had become of him.
+
+In some portions of the town, garrets are made use of as club-rooms and
+places of rendezvous, and are exceedingly well arranged. These places
+are used as storehouses, too, for the safe-keeping of stolen articles of
+all kinds.
+
+An instance of the daring and ingenuity of these "wharf rats," as well
+as an illustration of some of their methods, is furnished in the
+following: Procuring a boat--loaned frequently with the owner's
+knowledge of what it is to be used for--these boys will row, with
+muffled oars, under some dock having valuable goods upon it. The only
+sound that disturbs the silence of the night is the dull splash, splash
+and swish of the waters against the dock or some vessel moored there.
+Everything is quiet, while the night watchman slowly paces along his
+narrow beat, at the one end of which are the dancing, moonlit waters and
+at the other the sleeping city. A favorable chance offering, the heads
+of the boys appear above the string-piece, and a bag or sack is
+hurriedly lowered into the boat. Other goods follow until, sufficient
+having been taken, the boat moves off as silently as it appeared.
+Sometimes, a boat is rowed under the pier where barrels of whisky or
+other spirits lie, and, by inserting an auger between the planks of the
+dock, a hole is bored in the barrel, when the liquor which escapes is
+guided into a barrel. In this way many goods are stolen right under the
+noses, apparently, of the watchmen and guardians.
+
+Sometimes these wharf rats are captured in the act, when fierce fights
+ensue. They know there is no escaping punishment, and they fight
+desperately. Having no homes or parents there is no escape for them,
+for, even if not convicted of the theft, they must go to the House of
+Refuge.
+
+After all, but little blame can be attached to these unfortunate boys
+and girls, for they are just precisely what their associations have made
+them. They learn to swear, smoke, chew, steal, before they can walk, and
+grow up to be what they are. The House of Refuge only serves to confirm
+them in their viciousness and evil propensities by herding them with
+other criminals; so that, by the time they are released they are ready
+and willing to take greater chances in securing larger results, when the
+end invariably is the State prison--probably for life.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+STORE GIRLS.
+
+_Their Fascinations, Foibles and Temptations._
+
+Since the time when Mary Rogers, the beautiful cigar girl of Broadway,
+met her sad fate over in Hoboken, the pretty shop girls of New York have
+contributed more than their full quota to the city's contemporaneous
+history. They have figured in connection with many of its social
+romances and domestic infelicities, as well as with its scandals and its
+crimes--secret and revealed. In Gotham's grave and gay aspects--in its
+comedy, its tragedy, and its melo-drama, we are perpetually running
+across the charming face, graceful form, and easy, gay demeanor of the
+pretty shop girl.
+
+As a rule, the temptress of the store is pretty--frequently quite
+beautiful, and almost invariably handsomer than those fortunate
+daughters of Mammon whom she is called upon to serve, and who often
+treat her with such top-lofty hauteur. And how stylish she frequently
+is, and how difficult it is to describe this incommunicable quality of
+_style_, which those artful setters of baits--the dealers in ready-made
+fabrics--understand so well! Who has not noticed how the tall,
+slender-framed girls, with their graceful movements and flexible spines,
+their long, smooth throats and curved waists, are drafted off to stand
+as veritable decoy-ducks? Who has not observed the grace and ease with
+which they wear risky patterns and unusual _facons_, and so delude the
+arrogant but ungraceful customer into buying, in the belief that she
+will look just as well as the pretty model? The average well-to-do
+woman, with some pretensions to good looks, sees a beautiful young
+creature with Junoesque air parading before her in bold
+color-combinations and doubtful harmonies, and she imagines she can
+venture the same thing with like effect. But alas! what a travesty the
+experiment frequently is!
+
+Many of the New Yorkers who read this page will recall the Original
+Dollar Store on Broadway and its fascinating young salesladies. Some of
+these were perfect sirens with their loveliness of feature and delicacy
+of color; their luxuriant hair, made amenable to the discipline of the
+prevailing fashion; the gown stylish and perfect, and frequently not at
+all reticent in its revelations of form; the countenance calm, watchful
+and intelligent--frequently mischievous; the walk something akin to the
+serene consciousness of power which we are told that Phryne exemplified
+before her judges, and accompanied with that grace which is the
+birthright of beauty in every age and under any circumstances.
+
+For many reasons the tone of morality, in some instances, among store
+girls in this city is not high. A variety of obvious causes contribute
+to this result, among which may be mentioned their generally poor
+salaries: their natural levity, and the example of their companions;
+their love of dress and display, coupled with a natural desire for
+masculine attentions; long hours in close, impure air; sensational
+literature; frequent absence of healthy or adequate home influence; and
+the many temptations which beset an attractive girl in such a position.
+
+Many of them enter stores as mere children in the capacity of cash
+girls. They are the children of poor parents, and as they grow up to
+young maidenhood, they acquire a sort of superficial polish in the
+store, and are brightened without being educated. Some grow up and take
+their places as full-blown salesladies, and begin to sigh for the gayety
+of the streets, for freedom from restraint, and for amusements that are
+not within their reach. Naturally _au fait_ in style, with taste and
+clever fingers, they dress in an attractive manner, with the hope of
+beguiling the ideal hero they have constructed from the pages of the
+trashy story paper. It is a sort of voluntary species of sacrifice on
+their part--a kind of suicidal decking with flowers, and making
+preparation for immolation. Full of pernicious sentimentality, they are
+open to the first promising flirtation. They see elegantly-dressed and
+diamonded ladies, and their imagination is fed from the fountains of
+vulgar literature until they dream that they, too, are destined to be
+won by some splendid cavalier of fabulous wealth. Learning from the
+wishy-washy literature that their face is their fortune, and so, reading
+what happened to others, and how perfectly lovely and romantic it all
+was, they are ready for the wiles of the first gay deceiver. Waiting in
+vain for their god-like ideal, they are finally content to look a little
+lower, and favorably receive the immodest addresses of some clerk in
+their own store, or succeed in making a street "mash."
+
+Sometimes the pretty girl rushes impetuously into marriage, repents and
+separates from her husband. She is still good looking, and her marital
+experience has given her an air of easy assurance, and she readily finds
+employment as a saleslady. Her influence afterwards, among girls
+comparatively innocent and without her experience, cannot but be
+pernicious, and at the same time must exert a certain formative and
+shaping process in determing the peculiar character of the whole class
+of girls in the store.
+
+Very frequently she does not attain even to the questionable dignity of
+a marriage ceremony. Flattered by the attentions of some swell, the
+pretty shop girl will be induced to accompany him to the theatre and to
+supper in a concert saloon. Her vanity is kindled by his appearance. She
+rejoices in the style of his clothes, in the magnificence of his
+jewelry, and she thinks her mission in life is to walk beside the
+splendid swell, amid rose gardens, theatres and supper rooms, for the
+remainder of her life. Finally she yields to his soft solicitations, and
+her prospects are forever blighted. She becomes an incorrigible flirt,
+meets her "fellows" on the corner of the street near the store, spends a
+certain number of evenings and nights with them at hotels where no
+course of catechism takes place at the clerk's desk. She goes to Coney
+Island or local beer gardens on Sundays, manifesting a vivid animal
+pleasure in her enjoyment, with little manifestation of gratitude
+towards her escort who is supplying the money.
+
+Sometimes, again, an exceptionally pretty girl will fall a victim to the
+proprietor, the manager or some of the superintendents of the store; and
+there have been cases of this kind heard in the courts, in one of which
+the proprietor not only seduced the girl, but married her, afterwards
+obtaining a divorce because of her incontinence. Sometimes the lapse of
+these girls from the paths of virtue is accompanied with exceptional
+hardships. The young lady is beautiful as well as good perhaps, and the
+pride of her idolizing parents, who have taught her that she is fit to
+be the wife of a duke. She attracts the eye of a man about town, and the
+process of courting and flattery--of sapping and mining--begins, with
+the result that he has had in view since the inception of the
+acquaintance. He is not a bad fellow as the world goes; but providence
+and society have made it very hard for single men to show kindness to
+single women in any way but one. He is sorry at her situation; but she
+is hardly the person for him to marry, even with her blooming,
+flower-like face. In such a situation--and such situations are far too
+common with the class--Byron's lines, slightly altered, seem peculiarly
+applicable to the pretty shop girl:
+
+
+"'Twas thine own beauty gave the fatal blow,
+And help'd to plant the wound that laid thee low."
+
+
+Sometimes it happens that the pretty girl, wearied of waiting for her
+knightly deliverer, comes across the advertisement of a gifted
+seeress--the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, perchance, or "the
+only English prophetess who has the genuine Roman and Arabian talismans
+for love, good luck, and all business affairs;" or the wonderful
+clairvoyant who can be "consulted on absent friends, love, courtship and
+marriage." Not infrequently she falls into the toils of those
+advertising frauds, who frequently combine the vile trade of procuress
+with the ostensible trade of fortune-telling. When the girl is drawn to
+this den, the trump card offered her is, of course, the young gentleman,
+rich as Croesus and handsome as Adonis, with whom she is to fall in
+love. He is generally described with considerable minuteness, and the
+time and place of meeting foretold. This may be fictitious, and it is
+fortunate for her if it is so. Rut the seeress too frequently needs no
+powers of clairvoyance or ratiocination to make these disclosures, for
+some _roue_; who has exhausted the ordinary rounds of dissipation, or
+some fast young fellow seeking a change, has made a bargain with the
+prophetess for a new and innocent victim--the amount of the fee to
+depend on the means and liberality of the libertine and the
+attractiveness of the victim. The vain, silly girl is dazzled with the
+wily woman's story, and readily promises to call again. At her next
+visit the man inspects her from some place of concealment, and if she
+meets his views, either an introduction takes place or a rendezvous is
+perfected. Thus the acquaintance begins, with the result which every
+intelligent reader can see for himself. Sometimes the picture of the
+scamp is shown, but in every case there is but one end in view on the
+part of the seeress, and that end is almost invariably achieved. The
+girl thus becomes clandestinely "gay," and spreads the influence of her
+evil example and impure associations among her shopmates. Pope has told
+us in four immortal lines the effects of a constant contact with vice.
+In the second epistle of his Essay on Man, he writes:
+
+
+"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien,
+As, to be hated, needs but to be seen;
+Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,
+We first endure, then pity, then embrace."
+
+
+In the case of the class of young girls under consideration this truth
+is peculiarly applicable. In consequence of their associations they hear
+and see things whose influence is almost wholly bad and pernicious.
+Those disguised advertisements in the newspapers called "Personals" are
+of this evil character. To young girls, with minds imperfectly
+disciplined, there is a fatal fascination in the mystery of
+surreptitious appointments and meetings. Mystery is so suggestive and
+romantic, and the young girl who, from piqued curiosity, is tempted to
+dally with a "Matrimonial" or a "Personal," is an object of
+commiseration. From dallying and reading and wondering, the step is easy
+to answer such notices. She believes that she has a chance of getting a
+rich and handsome husband, who will take her to Europe, and, in other
+respects, make her life a sort of earthly paradise. The men who write
+such advertisements know this besetting female weakness and bait their
+trap accordingly. And so a young girl, too frequently, walks alone and
+unadvised into the meshes of an acquaintanceship which leads to her
+ruin. It is perhaps as useless to ask the men who are base enough to
+conceive these things to refrain from publishing them, as it is to urge
+the mercenary proprietors of certain newspapers to refrain from printing
+them in their columns. Yet it must be perfectly clear to all
+right-thinking minds, that it is in vain for parents to warn, parsons to
+preach, friends to advise, for the good to deplore, and the ignorant to
+wonder, at the increasing deterioration of our metropolitan morals,
+while these tempting lures to feminine destruction are so alluringly
+displayed.
+
+It would be doing very imperfect justice to this theme did we fail to
+record our conviction that some of the salesladies and shop girls of the
+city are thoroughly good, virtuous, honest and respectable. Many of
+them, amid unhealthy influences and corroding associations, preserve the
+white flower of a blameless life, and become the honored wives of
+respectable citizens. But these are a small minority. At the same time
+it is useless to disguise the fact that there are others whose character
+needs stronger colors for proper delineation than have hitherto been
+employed. There are those among pretty shop girls who simply give up
+their leisure time to surreptitious appointments. This is the worst and
+most dangerous form in which this prevalent vice stalks abroad, and it
+more clearly stamps the character of a community than does its more open
+and brazen manifestations. Many causes may lead to a woman's becoming a
+professional harlot, but if a girl "goes wrong" without any very cogent
+reason for so doing, there must be something radically unsound in her
+composition and inherently bad in her nature to lead her to abandon her
+person to the other sex, who are at all times ready to take advantage of
+a woman's weakness and a woman's love. Seduction and clandestine
+prostitution have made enormous strides in New York, and especially
+among the young women and girls connected with stores, within the last
+decade.
+
+Not long ago a woman, who then occupied a prominent position in a Sixth
+avenue store, was met up-town in the evening. She is very good
+looking--strong and lithe and tall, with a cloud of handsome hair that
+glistens like bronze; large dreamy eyes that flash and scintillate
+witchingly; a handsome, pouting, ruddy mouth; while her neck, white and
+statuesque, crowns the full bosom of a goddess. She said that she came
+out evenings occasionally to make money, not for the purpose of
+subsistence, but to meet debts that her extravagance had caused her to
+contract. She said in substance: "You see my appetite is fastidious, and
+I like good eating and drinking. I have the most expensive suppers
+sometimes. I am engaged to be married to a young fellow who works on a
+daily newspaper and who is busy at night. We shall be married some day,
+I suppose. He does, not suspect me to be 'fast,' and you don't suppose I
+am going to take the trouble to undeceive him. This is not a frequent
+practice of mine; I only come out when I want money, and I always have
+an appointment before I come out. I always dress well of course, and can
+pick up a gentleman anywhere when I like. Yes, I know I have good feet,
+and I know how to use them. I have hooked many a fifty dollars by
+showing a couple of inches of my ankle. Of course, I hate being in the
+store, but my fellow is rather jealous, and I keep going there as a
+blind. Will I reform when I am married? Perhaps so--if he gives me heaps
+of money. I am no worse than thousands of girls, single and married, who
+put on airs of purity and church-going. I know plenty of ladies who pay
+five hundred dollars at the store for silks and finery, which they
+persuade their husbands they bought for one-fourth of the price. And,
+for my part, I am going to eat well, dress well, and enjoy myself as
+long as ever I can get the money, by hook or by crook."
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+THE PRETTY WAITER GIRL.
+
+_Concert Saloons and how they are Managed--How the Pretty Waitresses
+Live and upon Whom, and how the Unwary are Fleeced and Beguiled--A
+Midnight Visit to one of the Dives._
+
+Readers of the works of Le Sage will recall the polite devil which the
+ingenious novelist releases from his captivity in a vial, for the
+purpose of disclosing to the world the true inwardness of society in
+Spain. Something of the role of this communicative imp we purpose to
+enact in this chapter, the subject matter of which, we may safely
+venture to assert, is new to at least nine-tenths of the residents of
+this great city. And if people, to the manner born, are unacquainted
+with the form and manifestations of this particular phase of crime, how
+much more ignorant must be those casual visitors, who only, at long
+intervals, are called by business, or impelled by anticipations of
+pleasure, to visit the Empire City?
+
+The mode of life of the merchant or business man does not bring him in
+contact with crime or the haunts of criminals. He may pass down Sixth
+avenue, or Third avenue and the Bowery, on the Elevated railroad; or
+through Greene, Wooster, and Bleecker streets, the Bowery, Fourth
+avenue, Forsythe, Canal, Thirty-fourth, Houston, Twenty-third and
+Chatham streets, and other thoroughfares, in a street car, knowing
+nothing about the inmates of the houses lining either side of those same
+streets, or their manner of life, or anything about those inhabiting the
+basement beneath. It is only when the startling head-lines in his
+favorite morning paper call his attention to some frightful crime
+committed, that he learns either of its character, or location, or the
+causes which produced it. To this lack of knowledge on the part of the
+respectable portion of the community of the location of questionable
+places and the haunts of felons, is to be attributed many of the
+robberies which, from time to time, are chronicled in the newspapers. In
+the case of "the stranger within our gates" the danger of straying into
+the sloughs of vice and consequent victimization, is of course greatly
+increased. And just here it is worthy of remark that there appears to be
+some mysterious fatality by which strangers, greenhorns and "innocents,"
+generally, contrive to wander by unerring though devious ways, straight
+into the talons of vigilant night-hawks.
+
+Concert saloons and pretty waiter girls are treacherous things to meddle
+with. Neither can be depended upon and generally both have unsavory
+reputations. The only thing pretty about the girls is a pretty bad
+record.
+
+During the war for the Union, when enlistments for the army were lively,
+and bounty jumpers flourished, and money was nearly as plentiful as
+salt, concert saloon proprietors made enormous fortunes. They were then
+a new sensation in this country; indeed, it may be said the war brought
+them into being. Broadway, from Fourteenth street to the Battery was
+literally lined on both sides with them, and when at night the lamps in
+front of these places were lighted, it rendered the street almost as
+bright as day. Then, as now, they were principally confined to the
+basements or cellars of buildings, but while some of them were known to
+be the rendezvous of thieves and other criminals, there were a few which
+enjoyed a better reputation, and were frequented by people of
+comparative respectability.
+
+The pretty waiter girl, of course, was the principal magnet used to draw
+customers to these saloons. She was and is to-day, in fact, the only
+attraction. Music of a coarse description is used to attract the
+passer-by, who, glancing at the place from whence it proceeds, sees
+flaring lights, gaudy and brilliant signs--generally the figure of some
+female in tights--and is allured in by the unusual appearance, and the
+picture his imagination forms of a jolly time to be had within. Still,
+the girl is the feature. It is a safe conclusion, that no waiter girl in
+a concert saloon is virtuous, nor was there ever a really good girl
+engaged in any such saloon. They are there to be bought by any one
+fancying them, and therein lies the charm--if charm it can be called--of
+these places. A stranger has nothing to do but walk down the steps,
+enter the saloon, seat himself at a table, and he will immediately be
+besieged by a crowd of girls--if that be what he is seeking. As the
+stranger knows not the locality of other places of entertainment, he
+accommodates himself to circumstances and takes what he sees before him.
+Hence concert saloons thrive--but chiefly upon out-of-town
+people--countrymen, in fact.
+
+There are various causes which conspire to make pretty waiter girls.
+They belong to three classes: First, the young girl who, but recently
+fallen into sin, is placed there by "her friend," which appellation more
+frequently than otherwise stands for "her seducer"; second, the young
+female who naturally seeks a position as waitress, because it pays her
+best, the proprietors of some saloons paying a weekly salary, in others
+a percentage upon the drinks sold; and third, an older kind of female
+who, having run the gauntlet of nearly all forms of feminine
+degradation, and losing most of the charms belonging to her sex, sees a
+chance, upon the percentages allowed by the "boss," and the overcharge
+squeezed from frequenters, of making a living, with a prospect of once
+in a while finding a man so drunk as not to have any choice in a
+companion for the night. To this sort of individual, all females are
+beautiful and the ancient and faded siren has as good a chance for
+patronage as her younger and more favored rival. Hence the concert
+saloon has its advantages for all kinds of women, as well as its uses
+for all kinds of men. The price of drinks in these places varies
+according to the tact of the pretty waiter girl, the sobriety of the
+customer, or the "rules of the house." In all cases, however, drinks are
+higher than at ordinary bars, for the musicians have to be paid, the
+girls to receive a percentage, as well as the proprietor to reap his
+harvest. Besides, the smiles of lovely women must be reckoned at
+something. In the Chatham street and Bowery dives, the worst and
+cheapest of liquors and beers are dispensed to customers. In many of
+these concert saloons "private rooms" have been arranged, where anyone
+so disposed may choose his female companion and retire to quaff a bottle
+of wine (?) at five dollars a bottle--a customer who indulges in such a
+luxury as wine being too important and consequential to associate with
+the common visitors. Money here as elsewhere has its worshipers.
+
+With this preface we shall now introduce the reader to the inside of one
+of these concert saloons, and show him the pretty waiter girl as his
+fancy pictures her, and as she really is: Chancing to walk along the
+street, the ears are assailed by the clash of music emanating from some
+basement, down perhaps a half a dozen steps. A number of red globes,
+surrounding as many gas jets, serve to show the entrance, on either side
+of which are full length paintings of women in short skirts. The door is
+of green leather or oil-cloth. Pushing this open, we enter and seat
+ourselves at one of the many round tables with which the place is
+plentifully supplied. In a second--not longer--several girls are beside
+us, and some sit down at our table. One--perhaps two at once--will
+immediately ask if we are not going to treat, and, in response, drinks
+are ordered. While one of the girls proceeds to supply the order, and
+before the drinks are brought, we glance around the saloon. On one side
+is the bar, at which several persons are standing, drinking with some of
+the sweet-voiced houris. The barkeeper and proprietor, both in their
+shirt sleeves, are behind it. On one side of the bar is a
+slightly-raised platform, upon which is a piano-player, a violinist and
+a shrill fifer. This is the music that charms and attracts. Around the
+room are men of all kinds, sailors, laboring men, seedy individuals,
+lovers, thieves, a few poor gamblers, fellows in hard luck and waiting
+for "something to turn up." Sprinkled over the place, talking, laughing,
+joking and striving to induce them to buy drinks, are a number of the
+waiter girls. The floor is plentifully and generously covered with plain
+sawdust, which answers the double purpose of effectually hiding the
+large cracks, and of absorbing the expectorations and spilled beer. The
+time is yet early and business is not very brisk, so we chat with the
+prettiest and youngest of the girls for a second only, when we are again
+importuned to drink by another of the fair ones, even before the first
+round is brought, for it must be understood that only the girl ordering
+the drinks gets any percentage. The drinks brought, the price is asked
+and the amount paid, as follows: Two beers, two lemonades with a stick
+in it for two girls, and two brandies for two others; total, one dollar
+and forty cents. Now the girls don't drink brandy, they have a little
+colored water, but they charge for brandy all the same, and pay the
+proprietor in pasteboard tickets, which are supplied by him to the girls
+in packages of five dollars worth and upwards. For that which she
+charged one dollar and forty cents she pays in checks forty cents, thus
+making a clear one dollar--five cents each for two beers, ten cents each
+for lemonades, and five cents each for the colored water. The customer
+pays ten cents for each glass of beer, twenty cents each for lemonade
+and forty cents each for brandy. When the customer fails to call for
+drinks fast enough to suit the girls, they will leave for some other
+table where they may be more liberally patronized. It is getting later,
+and as we are about to leave, an unsteady and heavy foot is heard
+descending the steps outside, the doors are pushed violently open and a
+big, burly man reels into the place. He is not entirely intoxicated, but
+just enough so not to care for anything or anybody, and as he shuffles
+independently along he is approached by a couple of girls, who, taking
+an arm each, affectionately guide him to a chair. Being seated, he
+smiles benignly upon his fair captors and asks them to drink. He is
+evidently, from his dress, a successful butcher or saloon-keeper and has
+plenty of money about him. The drinks brought, he takes a roll of money
+from his pocket, and, thinking it is a five-dollar bill, gives a
+fifty-dollar bill to the girl. She immediately leaves and in a few
+seconds returns, giving him change for a five, saying quite pleasantly,
+"Here's your change," and, as he is about to place it in his pocket,
+asks him for "a quarter for luck." Several girls now gather around the
+man, and by smiles, caresses, and other affectionate and flattering
+demonstrations, finally persuade him into one of the private rooms, when
+he is lost to our sight, but we distinctly hear the order, "bottle of
+wine."
+
+Soon another man enters very drunk, and, seating himself, is soon
+similarly surrounded. In about a minute one of the girls leaves and
+whispers to the proprietor, who, emerging from behind his rampart,
+catches the unlucky visitor by the collar, and with the aid of a club
+compels him to ascend the steps again to the street. The man not having
+any money was an unwelcome guest, and they had no use for him.
+
+Several others now enter, many of whom are personally known to the
+girls, and mutual glances of recognition pass between them. These pass
+on down to the further and privileged part of the place and are lost to
+view. The den is now pretty full and business is brisk. The bartender
+and proprietor are hurriedly passing out ordered drinks. The girls are
+flying around, executing orders and pocketing change. The piano-player
+bangs and thumps his hideously-wiry instrument. Glasses are clinking,
+chairs and tables moving, and altogether there is a discordant tumult
+well calculated to bewilder the coolest kind of a head.
+
+Suddenly there is a scream--a piercing scream. Everybody starts and
+looks towards the spot from whence it proceeded. One of the girls
+quickly says, "Oh, it's nothing, Jimmy is only licking Hattie." The
+lover has only beaten the poor creature who is supporting him, and,
+strange as it may appear, she will think all the more of him for this
+brutality. It is a pretty generally known fact, so far as females of
+this class are concerned, that if a man occasionally severely beats his
+mistress, she regards it as a proof that he entertains for her an ardent
+affection. It is now getting late, and several of the girls are leaving
+for home with their new-made male friends, and indications point towards
+the place being closed for the night. The butcher comes forth from his
+"private room," followed by a number of the girls who have been his
+companions, and is led to the door and assisted out. We leave also, and
+as we ascend the steps to the street we discover our butcher in the
+hands of a policeman who is dragging him off to the station, where we
+shall leave him for the night.
+
+Now, most of these girls live in what are called furnished rooms, and it
+is to those that they take their male friends when they leave the
+saloon, stopping on the way, of course, for "supper." In some cases the
+girls are panel thieves--but that is rare. In nearly all cases they have
+lovers and generally provide home comforts for their masters, but in all
+cases they are for hire. The nature of the business they follow demands
+their attention at night, so that they sleep nearly all the day. The
+great majority of them are veritable thieves. To drug a man who carries
+money, or ply him with liquor until he is unconscious and then rob him
+of all he has, is a very common proceeding, particularly when afterwards
+he is put out on the street and left, when the chances are more than a
+hundred to one that he neither recollects the place where he was nor the
+girl who stole his money or his valuables. The proprietor, if he can,
+divides the stolen amount with the girl--with the lover always. Many
+instances are known of half-intoxicated men leaving valuables with the
+bar-tender of some of these places, for supposed security, but when
+requested to be returned were met with a denial that the valuables were
+ever intrusted to him. With an air of insulted innocence the bartender
+declares that he never saw the articles or the man before.
+
+We shall now return to our butcher acquaintance, and follow the incident
+to its ending. So we proceed to the Tombs the next morning, and there in
+the pen with the other prisoners we find our man. Upon his arraignment
+in court he tells the following story, which is the truth _verbatim_:
+
+
+"I was wandering through Chatham street, when my attention became
+attracted by a bevy of gaudily-dressed girls, who asked me to while away
+my spare hours in a concert saloon. Smitten with the charms of the
+tempters I was loth to part with them, and after some preliminary
+conversation they enticed me to their lair. I had at this time about
+five hundred dollars in my possession, and after some hours carousal,
+they robbed and sent me away penniless. This is how it was done: I
+entered the saloon and was taken to a private room, when I called for
+some wine, of which we all partook. I may say here that the wine, so
+called, was really nothing but cider. The girls sat on the sofa in this
+room with me. We continued to drink and I was the recipient of more
+caresses than I ever was before in my life. After the lapse of perhaps
+three hours, some of the girls left me, and when I called for more wine,
+I found that my money was gone. I was not so drunk at this time that I
+could not understand that I had been robbed. I asked for the girls that
+had left, and was told that they had gone home. I paid ninety dollars
+for wine in this room, but they gave me sometimes cider and whisky
+mixed, and then when I became really unconsciously intoxicated they put
+me out, after having taken all my money from my clothes.
+
+"I had made an arrangement to go home with two of the girls, but I
+suppose when they saw that some of their number had taken all my money,
+they left me. There was a sofa in this room and one of the girls
+intimated to me that I had assaulted her and wanted some money. Another
+said she could not afford to spend her time there unless she was paid.
+Another induced me to give her money to buy a hat, and then when I lost
+consciousness they robbed me of all I had, my watch and chain,
+scarf-pin, ring and the remainder of my money. Many times during the
+hours I was there, drinks and wine were brought in that I did not order,
+but the girls would insist that I had ordered it. Once in a while the
+'madame' of the place would call in the room, and coming up to me would
+embrace me and tell me I was a jolly fellow. I could not now recognize
+any of the girls and do not know which saloon I went into. I live in
+this city."
+
+
+As a matter of custom, detectives were placed upon the case after the
+discharge of the prisoner, but that was the last ever heard of the
+matter, as he was unable to identify any of the parties arrested.
+
+The foregoing is only a sample of hundreds of similar cases constantly
+taking place, in some of which the sufferer, if he is a stranger, and
+has no friends, is oftentimes sent to the Island for ten days for being
+drunk, while the pretty waiter girl who has drugged, robbed and finally
+discarded him is never even arrested. There are many other cases,
+however, in which the pretty waiter girl does not fare so well, and
+after conviction has to serve out her time, thereby losing her lover and
+her liberty.
+
+What has been written applies more especially to the concert-saloon
+waiter girl, and does not in the least pertain to that other class of
+girls who are found in what are called dance houses, of which latter
+there are not a few in this city. There are some very peculiar kinds of
+females to be found in dance houses and not to be met with outside the
+abodes of Terpsichore. The term, dance house, itself, is susceptible
+of various interpretations. It may mean anything from Harry Hill's, at
+Crosby and Houston streets, to an Italian gathering in Mott or Mulberry
+street. But the performances carried on are precisely alike in all. In
+the sporting dance house, a series of boxing matches, small theatrical
+sketches may be acted, a song or two interspersed, and some piano
+playing, winding up afterwards with a dance, in which all so inclined
+may indulge, taking either the regular girls employed in the house as
+partners, or others who have strayed in from the streets.
+
+In the regular dance houses, such as the Haymarket on Sixth avenue,
+"ladies" are admitted free, but "gentlemen" are charged twenty-five
+cents admittance, and here regular dancing takes place, such as
+quadrilles, waltzes, etc. In the French Madame's on Thirty-first street,
+which is ostensibly a restaurant, the girls come in from the street, and
+while sipping black coffee, are ready to accept an engagement to dance
+the _cancan_, which is performed up-stairs in rooms paid for by those
+desiring to see the questionable performance. It is not infrequently
+danced by the females in an entirely nude state, with various other
+concomitants not to be mentioned here, but of such a nature as to
+horrify any but the most _blase roue_. There is also the well-known
+Billy McGlory's, in Hester street, near the Bowery, where general
+dancing is indulged in until an early hour of the morning, when a
+universal _cancan_ takes place upon the public floor, and where each
+female boldly exposes just enough of her person to excite desire in the
+beholder. These girls dance in ordinary street costumes, and in many
+cases are paid by the proprietor for their services. It is a wild
+debauch, and needs but to be seen once, to be ever afterward remembered
+with disgust and loathing.
+
+There are other places, not particularly dance houses nor yet
+concert saloons, such as the Empire, Star and Garter, Gould's, etc.,
+which are used as general places of resort by all classes of males and
+Magdalenes. Here may be found the professional prize fighter, men about
+town, gamblers, merchants, clerks, politicians, bankers, officials of
+all kinds, and all classes of females, mistresses, _nymphs du pave_,
+inmates of assignation houses, all intent on fun and dissipation, and a
+desire to not only see the elephant, but pull it by the tail. Some of
+the girls-haunting these places have been pretty waiter girls, but find
+it more profitable to ply their trade as Cyprians. The bars are the
+chief sources of profit in these as in kindred establishments. Hence
+females are encouraged to visit them, for when they congregate in force
+men will follow, and men who enter these places do so for the purpose of
+finding congenial temporary mates and spending money for drinks.
+
+Of the females who make these places their resort for the best part of
+the night, and participate in the recklessness and debauchery that has
+its ending only in an early death and the "Potter's Field," nothing
+remains to be said, except that they are the same as thousands leading
+similar lives in other cities of the world. The victims first of man's
+perfidy, through a too-confiding reliance on his promises, they become
+so afterwards as a matter of business and livelihood. Each has her
+lover, of course--what woman of the town has not?--and if she should
+happen to make a little money in the way of her questionable business,
+she divides it with him, for generally he has his eyes upon her during
+the entire course of the evening. Very few of them will leave any of
+these places with strange men without first notifying their lovers of
+where they are going and how long they will be away. In return for these
+services the lover sees to her, helps her to customers, prevents her
+being imposed upon by others of her sex when in the dance houses or
+concert saloons, and occasionally acts as her _cavalier servante_ to
+various places for pleasure. There are many girls to be seen in these
+dance houses who are not over fifteen years of age--and they have
+lovers, too. In Billy McGlory's, one night, a desperate fight took place
+there over two rival claimants for the regard of a girl not yet entered
+on her teens.
+
+It is considered one of the sights of the great city to visit these
+up-town resorts. Here all the young swells who desire to show country
+cousins the city, commercial travelers, chaperoned by city salesmen of
+various business houses, chorus girls from the theaters, and a mixed
+company generally, are to be found sitting around the various tables,
+drinking. The atmosphere is foggy with cigar smoke. The saloon is all
+ablaze with light. On the stage is some fourth-rate performer rendering
+a popular song. There is a long lunch counter, upon which is placed the
+materials for manufacturing all kinds of sandwiches. There is the flower
+girl, with her tray of fresh pansies and roses, casting a reflected
+bloom upon her otherwise pale face. There are the negro waiters ready to
+pounce upon the first glass that is half-emptied of its contents, so
+that its owner seeing no glass before him feels it incumbent to order
+again. There are crowds of females--girls and women in street
+costumes--some smoking cigarettes sitting poised on men's knees; others
+at the tables quaffing stimulants like their male companions. There are
+voices loud, mingled with the constant succession of orders for drinks
+shouted out unpleasantly by the waiters. There is the sound of clinking
+and jingling of glasses, the constant rapping on tables, boisterous
+laughter, an occasional oath, and once in a while an hysterical scream,
+as some unfortunate woman succumbs to the influence of rum. Above all
+this is heard at intervals, the sound of music, as it squeezes itself
+through the thick and sticky air. Men and women are continuously going
+and coming, and all this drags on until daylight appears, and the
+persons in the place, from sheer fatigue and exhaustion, seek some place
+to sleep until the next night, when the females go through the same
+scenes, with a new lot of the same kind of men. That is the up-town
+place as it is to-day. The stories one hears are the same as those told
+two thousand years ago. Woman's fall, man's perfidy, woman's frailty,
+man's inhumanity form the themes, with drunkeness, depravity and
+debauchery thrown in parenthetically.
+
+Most of the proprietors of these up-town resorts are very prosperous and
+would not countenance theft of any kind, nor permit any woman guilty of
+it to come into their saloons if they knew them to be thieves. Persons
+and property are comparatively as safe here as they can reasonably be
+expected to be; but there are lots of persons who visit these places who
+are known to be professional thieves and pickpockets, and while
+apparently in the place for amusement, are really watching for some
+unfortunate who, under the influence of drink, attempts to find his way
+home alone. Such an individual is followed, and by one pretext or
+another is robbed. Danger lurks in all these places for the man who
+drinks. The temperate man is safe almost anywhere, but the temperate man
+is not in the habit of visiting such places as have been described,
+except--once in a while.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+SHOP-LIFTERS.
+
+_Who they are and how they are made--Their Methods of Operating and upon
+whom--The Fashionable Kleptomaniac and her opposite--The Modern Devices
+of Female Thieves._
+
+Many persons contend that certain kinds of criminals inherit their
+law-breaking propensities. There are others, less charitably disposed,
+perhaps, who strenuously insist that all criminals, without exception,
+are simply born with a natural desire to be bad, and would not be
+otherwise if they could; that they are prone and susceptible to the
+worst influences because they incline that way. There are others, again,
+who as strongly and vigorously urge that felons, of whatever grade,
+class or character, are made so by circumstances, in which poverty,
+idleness, inability to obtain work, temptation, and a thousand other
+things, conspire to be either the direct or indirect causes of the
+individual falling from the straight path and entering the crooked path
+of crime. But, from whatever motive, by whatever temptation, whether
+forced or led, certain it is that both male and female criminals have
+some peculiar ideas of crime, entertained, perhaps, for reasons only
+known to themselves. The chances of escape from detection are, no doubt,
+seriously weighed and carefully considered by the persons bent upon
+committing felony as a mode of livelihood, and, undoubtedly, some
+special line is selected, as the particular branch of the profession to
+be followed, in accordance with the physical and mental fitness of the
+man or woman to succeed in it.
+
+In other words, they gradually become "specialists," like other
+professional persons in the respectable walks of life. It may be safely
+said, however, that a thief in one thing is a thief in all things. He
+would be callow, indeed, who would predicate that a professional burglar
+would hesitate to commit highway robbery because his weapon was a jimmy,
+or that a panel thief would turn up his nose at picking an inviting
+pocket. It is all in the line of business, and neither professional
+would lose caste. No doubt both men and women select the peculiar line
+of crime for which they imagine they are physically and mentally best
+adapted, and which, in each particular case, seems to offer the most
+facilities and immunities. For these considerations, shop-lifting has
+its obvious attractions and temptations for women.
+
+For years past, the newspapers of our large cities almost daily have
+chronicled the arrests of men and women, in stores, who have been caught
+in the act of appropriating articles that have been temptingly displayed
+on the counters. Yet it is very doubtful if there has yet appeared one
+published account of the exact manner in which such goods have been
+stolen, or an explanation given of the _finesse_ by which, in spite of
+the Argus eyes of the watchers, clerks, visitors and customers, the
+thief generally contrives to escape detection. It goes without saying
+that there are adroit and dexterous shop-lifters of both sexes, while
+the manner of conducting their operations is as diverse as can well be
+conceived.
+
+The annual thefts of goods from the retail stores of this city alone
+aggregate an almost fabulous sum. It is very difficult to reach a
+reliable approximation of the total amount thus stolen, because
+store-keepers are naturally averse to having their losses from this
+source known. As a prominent Sixth-avenue gentleman once remarked, "If I
+should tell how much I annually lost through thieves, or suffered by
+shop-lifters, I would have the entire band occasionally paying me
+visits, thinking I had not provided myself with the usual safe-guards
+against them." Nevertheless, it can be stated as an absolute fact that
+not less than half a million dollars' worth of goods yearly disappear
+from the stores through shop-lifters, embracing all kinds of articles,
+from diamonds to penny fans.
+
+The professional diamond and jewelry thief, however, is not to be
+confounded with the shop-lifter, for the former employs quite a
+different _modus operandi_ in capturing his illicit goods. The diamond
+thief has been known to display the most fertile ingenuity in devising
+schemes to rob the unwary though generally alert jeweler. An instance is
+recorded of a thief entering a jewelry store, leaving his "pal" outside
+to look in through the window, asking to see some diamond rings. While
+pretending to examine them with severe criticism, and keeping the
+salesman engaged, he cleverly attached one end of the string, held by
+his confederate outside, to several of the most valuable, and quietly
+dropped them at his feet. His "pal" then quietly pulled them along the
+floor, out through the door, into the street and decamped. A search of
+the thief who remained behind disclosed nothing and, as proof was thus
+wanting, he had to be discharged.
+
+The female shop-lifter is generally a woman well known to the police, as
+her picture will, in nearly every case, be found in the Rogues' Gallery
+at Police Headquarters. Usually, when she discovers that her actions are
+watched and her movements shadowed, she quietly folds her tent and
+proceeds to some other city where she is comparatively a stranger, and
+where, unsuspected, she can ply her nefarious occupation with less risk
+of detection and capture. She is often either the wife of a gambler,
+professional burglar, forger or other criminal; or she may be the wife
+of some reputable mechanic whose income is insufficient to supply her
+with the furbelows her vanity craves; or, again, she is one of those
+women who, having a natural aversion to labor, seek to support
+themselves by petty thefts.
+
+The fact is notorious, and easily demonstrated by the records of the
+police courts, that "a shop-lifter once, a shop-lifter always." It is a
+lamentable psychological idiosyncrasy that, despite the most earnest and
+apparently sincere resolutions to lead an honest life, the female
+shop-lifter, intent on making a legitimate purchase, is incapable of
+withstanding the temptation offered by a display of fancy articles. She
+will usually attempt to purloin some trinket or other and be caught
+again. Perhaps the leniency with which crimes of this character have
+been treated by the authorities has tended to increase the number of
+persons engaged in committing them. For, heartless as man is at times,
+he detests the idea of prosecuting a woman for the commission of a petty
+theft, when the end, for her, means the penitentiary. In very many,
+perhaps the majority of, cases he will be satisfied if his goods are
+recovered, and permit the thief to go unpunished. This is very
+frequently the case with that class of shop-lifters called, by courtesy,
+the "kleptomaniac,"--the wealthy lady who steals what she could easily
+have purchased. This is a phase of female character only accounted for
+upon the Christian hypothesis that her thieving propensities are a
+disease, while they are really a manifestation of the same base desires
+which actuate less fortunate women who expiate their misdemeanor in the
+penitentiary.
+
+Most of the rich kleptomaniacs are well known to the various
+store-keepers. A woman of this kind is watched from the moment she
+enters an establishment until she leaves it. Usually, a trusty employee
+or detective follows her from counter to counter, unobserved, noting all
+the articles purloined. When the fair and aristocratic thief enters her
+carriage and is driven to her palatial residence a bill of the goods so
+"lifted," addressed to the husband, follows her and, in nearly every
+case, is paid upon presentation and without questioning. Thus the
+transaction ends, until another visit from the lady occasions another
+bill. If the "blue-blooded" thief enters a store, however, where she is
+not known, and to the proprietor of which her "disease" is unsuspected,
+she often escapes with her "swag," like the unfortunate female who
+adopts stealing as a means of subsistence. There should be no
+distinction made between the wealthy and aristocratic female thief and
+her less fortunate sister, for the crime is the same in both cases; the
+only difference being that the latter cannot claim the possession of
+riches in extenuation of her guilt.
+
+The frequency with which thefts by shop-lifters occur, and the amount of
+valuable goods stolen, has rendered store-keepers more suspicious and
+cautious, probably, than any other class of men in the world. Nearly all
+the large stores on Sixth avenue, Twenty-third street, Broadway,
+Fourteenth street, and others, where ladies do most of their shopping,
+and which are perfectly jammed with people nearly all day long, employ
+either male or female detectives (and in some instances both are used),
+who are constantly on the alert for the detection of female
+shop-lifters. Such stores as McCreery's, Lord & Taylor's, O'Neill's,
+Macy's, Simpson, Crawford & Simpson's, Hearn's, Altman's, Koch's,
+Kaughran's, Ehrich's, Denning's, Stern's and Le Boutillier's are
+examples. Some stores have had seats erected near the ceiling, where,
+secreted among shawls and other pendant goods, the detectives are
+securely hidden from the sight of all persons, and can thus watch the
+actions of every woman making a purchase. Other detectives are posted at
+the different entrances; while still others, having the appearance of
+buyers, are constantly walking and circulating through the various
+departments, on the lookout for thieves. During the holidays all these
+precautions are doubled, and some officers are even posted on the
+sidewalk, in front of the windows.
+
+Before Christmas these stores carry enormous stocks of every kind of
+fancy goods, and their lavish display, added to their crowded condition
+at all times, renders theft easier than usual. So that, try as they may,
+the proprietors cannot prevent a certain amount of thieving, and
+thousands of dollars worth of goods are annually lost to each store by
+the depredations of shop-lifters. Even the small shops of Third and
+Eighth avenues, and Avenues A and B, are not free from the visits of
+this class of thieves, and no stores are exempt from the imposition of
+their tribute.
+
+Before leaving home on a thieving excursion to the stores the female
+shop-lifter carefully and systematically prepares her clothing, and sees
+that it is in proper form and ready for business. This she does by first
+putting on a corset made especially for the purpose, with broad, strong
+bands which pass over the shoulders. Between her legs she arranges a
+large bag or receptacle made of some extremely strong cloth, which is
+suspended from the corset by a stout band running around the waist. Her
+dress or frock covers this, and in front of the dress is an opening or
+slit, nicely arranged in the folds so as not to be noticed, which leads
+into the suspended bag. Over this, in winter, is worn a sealskin sacque,
+cloth cloak, fur circular, or other garment, according to the means of
+the wearer. In summer she wears a light shawl, which completely hides
+the slit in the dress from view. She now takes her muff, which, to the
+uninitiated eye, has nothing to distinguish it, outwardly, from
+thousands of other muffs, but which is a master-piece of ingenious
+contrivance. It is covered with any kind of fur, just as honest muffs
+are, with the significant exception that, instead of being padded with
+cotton, the fur rests upon a framework of wire. Between the fur covering
+and the wire supporting frame, the space usually filled with cotton is
+left vacant, thus providing accommodation for quite a stock of valuable
+lace, articles of jewelry, gloves, or anything small and valuable. In
+the bottom of the muff there is a small slide, on the inside, worked by
+the hand of the wearer, who, after introducing the stolen article into
+the muff, presses back this slide and drops the plunder into the cavity
+between the frame and the fur.
+
+With one of these muffs, shop-lifting is so easy as to be successfully
+practiced by novices, as not one store-walker in a thousand would
+suspect that his counters could be worked through a muff worn as these
+are when in action. Thus equipped, the expert female shop-lifter sallies
+out. Generally, she dresses rather expensively. Sometimes she uses a
+carriage, but more frequently walks, stopping to gaze in the store
+windows as she saunters along; and in no particular can she be
+distinguished from others of her sex, except, perhaps, that in some
+cases she is rather more richly and attractively clothed. Upon
+selecting a store that suits her, she walks boldly in, going at once,
+and without noticeable hesitation, to the lace or other department,
+before the counter of which she seats herself, adroitly arranging her
+dress and the slit. Asking the saleswoman to be shown some kinds of
+lace, she examines it critically, and, laying it down upon the counter,
+asks to see another kind, or some feathers, or something else, and so
+contrives to have several articles just before her, one covering the
+other, if possible. Having accumulated a number of articles upon the
+counter in an eligible position, she points to some things high up on a
+shelf behind the counter, thus getting the saleswoman's back turned
+towards her for an instant, when, with soft dexterity, she conveys
+anything that happens to be handily in the way through the slit in her
+dress into the bag between her legs. The goods examined and priced, "not
+suiting" her, and other customers coming up, she takes the opportunity
+of moving to another counter, where the same tactics are repeated, and
+so on, till she is satisfied with her haul or exhausted her stowage
+capacity.
+
+The muff is worked in this way: The operator rests her hand, with the
+muff on it, on the goods which she proposes to sample, and a moment of
+diverted attention on the part of the salesman or saleswoman is ample
+for her to transfer to her ingenious warehouse such samples as she can
+conveniently and quickly pick up with one hand. The movement of
+concealing the stolen articles is instantaneously executed, and, however
+well the muff may be stuffed, it cannot be bulged out to attract
+attention. It is surprising to know the vast quantities of material
+these bags and muffs will contain. At police headquarters, once, in
+examining the contents of one of these bags, it was found to actually
+hold a piece of satin, several cards of lace, a camel's-hair shawl, two
+large china ornaments, a number of spools of silk, several elegant fans,
+expensive ostrich plumes, and numberless smaller articles, feathers,
+artificial flowers and some minor trinkets. Shop-lifters are the terror
+of the shop-keepers, for the thefts embrace everything of convenient
+character lying about. With one dexterous sweep they will frequently put
+out of sight a dozen small articles.
+
+All the articles stolen are carried home, the trade-marks upon them
+destroyed, and then subsequently sold to some "fence" for about
+one-third their value, to finally be resold again over the counter of
+some other store in another city. It is seldom the female shop-lifter
+uses a male confederate, but it frequently happens that they travel in
+couples, one engaging the attention of the seller while the other fills
+her bag or muff, taking turn about until both have stolen sufficient for
+the day. Sometimes several trips are made to the same store, but
+generally one is enough.
+
+It often happens that store-keepers make mistakes and wrongfully accuse
+respectable ladies of shop-lifting, and in such cases the over-zealous
+vender suffers greatly, both in loss of custom and, oftentimes, in heavy
+damages in a court of law. All stores are provided with what are called
+examination rooms. When a person is suspected of being a thief, some of
+the attaches of the store, or a detective, as the case may be, taps the
+person lightly upon the shoulder, and politely invites them into this
+examination room. Here their bundles and packages are searched and, if
+warranted, their clothing is personally inspected by some female
+attendant. Here is where some very curious scenes are enacted. The
+professional thief will resort to tears, expostulations, explanations,
+excuses of all kinds, finally begging to be allowed to depart. The
+discovery of the bag or the muff, however, invariably settles the case
+and the offender is marched off to jail.
+
+In the case of a mistake, as stated, the store-keeper generally makes
+the explanations, excuses, and so forth, supplementing them afterwards
+by payment in a suit for damages.
+
+Men shop-lifters--or, more properly, store thieves--pursue an entirely
+different method, and confine their operations to a far different kind
+of store. They go into the thieving business to make it pay, and are not
+tempted by the display of merely pretty things. They prefer to operate
+in the wholesale stores, and how ingeniously and systematically they
+accomplish their object, under the very eyes of people, borders on the
+marvelous.
+
+It has often been said that the same amount of ingenuity, thought, care
+and planning, which is bestowed by criminals upon the perpetration of
+felony, if directed properly upon some legitimate business would render
+them successful and rich. Undoubtedly, this is true. What inventive
+faculties they must have to devise such a convenient contrivance as the
+shop-lifter's muff, the various burglar's implements, the safe-robber's
+tools, their delicate files, saws, etc., made from the best of steel,
+and thousands of other things used in various ways, including the store
+thief's satchel, must be manifest to the most ordinary comprehension.
+
+As this latter article is used by the class of thief about to be spoken
+of, a short description of it will not be amiss. To all outward
+appearance it is a very unpretentious traveling-bag. It looks honest,
+and does not differ, apparently, from any other bag of its kind. A
+careful scrutiny hardly discloses any variation from the ordinary
+valise; but, nevertheless, it has a false side, so ingeniously arranged
+as to open and close noiselessly, being caught with a well-oiled spring
+or fastening. The hinges of this false side are made on the iron which,
+in ordinary satchels, contains the lock, and it opens upwards, when
+placed in the usual manner upon a table, instead of downwards--just the
+reverse of the honest one. It is the simplest thing in the world, then,
+for an expert, carrying a valise of this description by the handle, to
+place it over a piece of valuable cloth, open the slide, which works
+with a spring; at the precise moment slip the goods in, and, taking his
+valise by the handle, walk off undiscovered. To any one who may be
+watching, the action of the thief is the most natural one in the world,
+and if the goods themselves are not missed no one would ever suspect
+they were in the valise carried by the gentleman who merely let it rest
+for a second on the table. But it is captured all the same, although you
+cannot see it. It has changed from one place to the other under the
+magical "presto" of the thief.
+
+The store thief saunters down-town to the dry goods district, watches
+the wholesale houses, notes the interior of the stores, and carefully
+makes his selection of some one suitable to his purpose. The next
+morning, bright and early, he attires himself like a country
+store-keeper, and, taking his satchel in his hand, he makes haste to
+reach the store he intends to work, appearing to the quietly-observant
+porter like an out-of-town buyer, just come off some early incoming
+train. Asking the porter or clerk, who, probably, about this time, is
+sweeping out, in expectation of the arrival of some of the salesmen or
+proprietors, if Mr. Smith, a salesman, is in, he is informed that none
+of the clerks or salesmen are down yet. Remarking in answer that he will
+wait a moment or two, as he has just arrived from Schenectady, he deftly
+places his gripsack upon the counter, over some valuable piece of goods,
+and saunters around the store, coming back to where his valise is, when,
+embracing a favorable opportunity, he slips the one, two or three pieces
+of cloth through the false portion of the valise, and, taking it by the
+handle in the usual careless manner, "guesses he will go to his hotel
+and have a wash and return later," and leaves the store not only
+undetected but entirely unsuspected. Very probably the theft remains
+undiscovered until the next taking of stock, when it is impossible to
+tell how the goods were lost, and in many cases some attache of the
+store is discharged, never knowing for what sin of omission or
+commission he was suspected. The success of this mode of theft is best
+shown by the infrequency with which such cases are ever brought to light
+or its perpetrator ever caught and arrested.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+KLEPTOMANIA.
+
+_Extraordinary Revelations--A Wealthy Kleptomaniac in the Toils of a
+Black-mailing Detective._
+
+In the issue of the New York _World_, bearing date Saturday, May 11,
+1867, appeared a long article criticising, exposing, and severely
+condemning the methods of the city's detective police. "A detective,"
+said the writer, "is presumed to be alike active, capable and honest,
+and were he such, he would be a public benefactor; but as he is too
+often either ignorant, indolent, or positively dishonest, he becomes a
+public pest. That detectives are in league with thieves; that they
+associate with them publicly and privately on the most intimate terms;
+that they occasionally 'put up' jobs with them by which the people are
+alike fleeced and astonished; that although the perpetrators of great
+robberies are generally known to them, the said perpetrators almost
+invariably escape punishment; that far more attention is paid to the
+sharing of the plunder, or the obtaining of a large percentage on the
+amount of money recovered, than to the furtherance of the ends of
+justice--all these statements are undeniably true."
+
+Coming to specific charges, the writer said further on: "A handsome
+female, a Broadway shop-lifter, recently testified that although she had
+been desirous of reforming her life for a year past, she had been
+totally prevented from so doing by the extortions of certain members of
+the detective force, who threatened to reveal her former history unless
+she 'came down handsomely,' and in order to 'come down,' as they styled
+it, she was obliged to resort to her old disgraceful business."
+
+The foregoing reference to a concurrent incident was presented to the
+reader as coldly and curtly as a historic hailstone, striking him but to
+glance off, and not like a real, breathing story, as it was, appealing
+strongly to his heart. The following facts, which have been kept
+inviolate in this office for nearly twenty years, and only brought to
+light here because those most concerned have passed away, will show what
+a stirring and pathetic narrative lay beneath the newspaper chronicler's
+dry words.
+
+Early in the spring of the year above named, an elderly gentleman of
+undoubted respectability was shown into our private office. He was
+exceedingly nervous and flurried, and his wan, colorless face looked
+like an effaced page. In a tortuous, round-about way, he intimated that
+his married daughter was in great trouble, in consequence of the
+operation of a great weakness or defect in character which was
+apparently hereditary. Her mother, his wife, he said, an excellent,
+kind-hearted, conscientious, truthful woman, had occasionally manifested
+the kleptomania impulse and had been detected. Happily the crime had
+been committed under circumstances which obviated exposure; it had been
+charitably overlooked upon his paying the bill for the purloined goods.
+Up to the date of her marriage, he had not observed or otherwise become
+cognizant of the development of the unfortunate trait in his only
+daughter. Her husband was a noble-minded man who devotedly loved her,
+and whom she idolized. Two years after her marriage she was caught
+shop-lifting in an establishment where she was known. By a merciful
+stroke of fortune, the information and the bill were sent to the father
+instead of the husband. Great moral and religious influence had been
+brought to bear on her, and for several years there was cause to believe
+that she had overcome her weakness. Unfortunately there had been another
+lapse into temptation. At present she was suffering the tortures of the
+damned, but in what particular respect she had refused to explain to
+him. "Father, find me an active, bold and energetic lawyer," she had
+said in a paroxysm of tears, "and I will tell him what I _cannot_ tell
+you."
+
+The lady came to the office next morning, alone. She was pale as a lily,
+and she bore on her forehead that shadow of melancholy which tells all
+the world that a woman is suffering and unhappy. Her eyes were dark and
+soft as the darkest and softest violet, and she was dressed with the
+utmost simplicity. She was in a most desponding mood. She said nothing
+was worth striving for any more. There was no good under the sun for
+her. The splendor had gone from the grass--the glory from the flower.
+Life, affection, family ties, love of good name--all these had ceased to
+appeal to her.
+
+In the _sanctum sanctorum_ of a criminal lawyer's office the extremes of
+mental agony and poignant suffering are sometimes revealed in all their
+phases; but it would be hard to imagine any one suffering more than this
+fair, prepossessing woman, as she told how that sleepless and merciless
+vulture of remorse, aided by the machinations of a licensed fiend in
+human form, dogged her steps by day and made night horrible. The recital
+recalled the picture suggested by the lines:
+
+
+"Lean abstinence, pole grief and haggard care,
+The dire attendants of forlorn despair."
+
+
+With pale, quivering lips, she told the story of her humiliation.
+Primarily, some two years after she became a happy wedded wife, she was
+impelled by an irresistible impulse to take some article, almost
+valueless in itself, from the counter of a dry-goods store. She had been
+making several purchases and had plenty of money in her pocket at the
+time. Afterwards, as opportunity offered, the wretched larceny was
+repeated. Then came discovery, and her father's awakening to the
+realization that his daughter was a thief. He summoned a minister and
+some worthy Christian women--relatives of his--to talk to her and to
+urge her to seek strength from that source where it is never withheld
+when earnestly and penitently invoked. She became a church-member,
+zealous and earnest in the path of righteousness, partaking regularly of
+the Sacred Elements, visiting the sick, relieving the distressed, and
+comforting the afflicted. To use Milton's language,
+
+
+"Such a sacred and homefelt delight,
+Such sober certainty of waking bliss,"
+
+
+she had never felt till then. Under these happy conditions five years
+passed, and then again during the holiday season, temptation assailed
+her and was stronger than she. The person who discovered her theft was a
+detective. He did not arrest and expose her. He did worse. He followed
+her, obtained an interview and promised to keep her secret if she made
+it worth his while. She willingly gave him a sum of money, and expected
+to hear no more of him or of her transgression. But this newer edition
+of Fagin, who was as vile as the sewers, and who lied like a prospectus,
+dogged her movements and systematically shadowed her wherever she went,
+again and again demanding money and threatening her with newspaper
+publicity. She gave this rapacious vampire all the money she could
+procure, even borrowing from her father. The pawnbrokers had in safe
+keeping her diamonds, jewels, and some of her furs and laces. They had
+been pledged to furnish this licensed black-mailer with money, and still
+he was insatiate and unappeased. Her husband's suspicions meanwhile had
+been aroused. She spent so much money in occult ways that he had been
+impelled to ask her father what he thought L---- was doing with so much
+money. Fettered thus, with the torments both of Prometheus and
+Tantalus--the vulture gnawing at her vitals, and the lost joys mocking
+her out of reach--she had at last in sheer desperation been driven to
+request her father to procure her the assistance of a fearless lawyer.
+
+It is not expedient to reveal the _modus operandi_ used in emancipating
+this unfortunate lady from her worse than Egyptian bondage. But the
+reader may rest assured that through the co-operation of the police
+commissioners the shameless scoundrel was dismissed from the police
+force. Afterwards, he served a term in a Western state prison, and up to
+this hour has been heard no more of in New York.
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+PANEL HOUSES AND PANEL THIEVES.
+
+_The Inmates--The Victims--The Gains--Complete Exposure of the Manner of
+Operations, and how Unsuspecting Persons are Robbed._
+
+Some years since respectable New York was startled and horrified by the
+recitals of criminal life, which, in the fulfillment of a disagreeable
+public duty, the daily newspapers printed in their news columns. The
+stirring appeal for the suppression of the evil then made by the press
+to the moral sentiment of the community, was backed by the judiciary, by
+the money and influence of wealthy and patriotic citizens, by the
+various charitable organizations, and by the whole police force.
+Consequently, the foul Augean stable of vice and iniquity, for the time
+being, at least, was in a great degree cleansed and purified. The
+leaders of that foul army of vicious men and women were gradually rooted
+out and driven away from their noxious haunts. Some found a congenial
+haven in the State prison, a few reformed, and many died in want. The
+plague being temporarily stayed, and popular indignation a matter of
+record, New York, as is its invariable custom, permitted its vigilance
+to go quietly to sleep, with a fair prospect of it being rudely awakened
+to find history repeating itself. That this awakening cannot safely be
+much longer deferred, it is partly the mission of the present chapter to
+show. For it is useless to deny that we have in this city to-day, a
+condition of affairs very similar to that which aroused the indignation
+and called for the severe repressional measures of our immediate
+predecessors. Up-town, in many instances closely contiguous to the
+dwellings of people of the highest respectability, there are dens as
+vile and infamous as ever disgraced any civilized community. Hardly a
+street, however apparently exclusive and fashionable, can boast that it
+is free from gambling, prostitution or panel houses.
+
+Some time since, a journalist connected with a prominent morning paper,
+took great pains to collect statistics concerning houses of prostitution
+in New York. The article in which the results of his investigation were
+given, estimates that over $15,000,000 was invested in that business,
+and that the yearly amount spent in those houses averaged over
+$10,000,000. In this chapter, however, the reader's attention is more
+particularly invited to the class of assignation and prostitution
+bagnios, known as panel houses.
+
+The name "panel house" was originally derived from a false impression
+prevalent in the community, that the rooms occupied by the inmates were
+fitted with sliding panels in the walls and partitions, through and by
+means of which most of the robberies were committed. But, as will be
+seen hereafter, the term is a misnomer, so far as the fact is concerned.
+But they had to have some distinctive appellation, and "panel house" is
+a convenient generic term.
+
+The proprietors of panel houses, in years gone by, were nearly all
+professional gamblers, a fact which is more or less true to-day, where
+the real, genuine house of that character exists, but there are hundreds
+of women who work the "panel game" upon their victims, who hire a simple
+room in some furnished-room house. If detected the entire house has
+conferred upon it the name of panel house, and is ever afterwards
+described and known as such in police and court records.
+
+The real, Simon-pure panel thief is generally a young and pretty female,
+who has been initiated into the mysteries of the game by either a
+gambler or a lover, and of whom she is the mistress. It is the
+conception of a man's brain, needing the assistance of an attractive
+woman to carry out the scheme, and was probably originally devised by
+some broken-down gambler to secure enough funds wherewith to resume
+play. No woman would ever have dreamt of practicing such an intricate
+and bold robbery, for she could never have carried it out. There are
+many women engaged in these robberies who are neither young nor
+handsome, but they are adepts and make up in knowledge and experience
+what they lack in charms; but the most successful are young and
+attractive. They succeed better when they are winsome, for reasons which
+require no explanation.
+
+Strange as it may appear, there are instances on record in which some of
+the professional females engaged in this panel game have preserved
+intact their virtue, so far as men generally were concerned, and have
+remained steadfast and true to their lovers, through all vicissitudes.
+They have solicited and accompanied men to their rooms, yet still have
+so contrived and maneuvered, as to have their male companion robbed
+without indulging in any of the other apparently necessary concomitants
+to the success of the undertaking. But these women are rare--very rare
+indeed. The fact of their occasional existence merely proves that the
+sole object of all women engaged in the nefarious game of panel thieving
+is robbery--first, last and all the time.
+
+From the well-known dislike of the victims of this game to making their
+names and losses known by figuring prominently in a court of justice,
+panel-house thieves escape the punishment they justly deserve and thrive
+more successfully, perhaps, than other professional robbers. Besides,
+the game is practiced more particularly upon the most respectable
+element of the community. Men of families, strangers visiting the city,
+men of advanced years, and even clergymen are sometimes caught in the
+net. As may be imagined, people of this class prefer to lose their money
+rather than have their names made public, and so long as such victims
+are to be found, panel houses will thrive and thieves become rich.
+Instances are on record where as much as eight thousand dollars have
+been secured from a single victim, who, from his prominence in social
+and business circles, allowed the matter to drop, although he was
+acquainted with the thief.
+
+A man and a woman are essential to the execution of the panel game. The
+woman's part consists in "cruising," a term applied to walking the
+streets to pick up men. The man has two parts to enact, as "runner" and
+"robber." The first role consists in being on the street watching his
+female decoy. If he sees a man partially under the influence of liquor,
+he informs the decoy, who places herself in the way of the obfuscated
+citizen. Or, in the event of the woman securing a customer herself, the
+"runner" observes it, and when she and her new-found friend proceed
+towards the house, the "runner" rapidly goes ahead and unobserved slips
+in first to make arrangements for the second role in the drama, and
+which in some cases has ended in a tragedy.
+
+The foregoing more particularly concerns panel thieves, that is,
+"couples" who adopt the business on their own account. There are regular
+panel houses, by which is meant houses of ill-fame, with perhaps from
+ten to twenty girl inmates, where nearly every room in the house is
+perfectly arranged for systematically pursuing this kind of robbery, and
+where the moment a girl retires to a room with a gentleman, the
+proprietor is notified, and when the chance occurs, completely cleans
+the unconscious victim of every cent he may have about him. These
+houses, however, are not now as plentiful as they were immediately after
+the close of the war. The victims of these houses were many, for
+outwardly they did not differ from ordinary gilded palaces of sin, and,
+being situated in streets well known to contain respectable seraglios,
+were frequently visited in the orthodox way by gentlemen in search of
+the "elephant."
+
+The game, however, is played in precisely the same way in all cases,
+whether by a "loving couple" on their own account or by one of the many
+girls in a regular house instituted for the sole purpose. And this is
+the way it is done: A pretty female, young, with entrancing eyes, an
+elegant form, richly and fashionably attired, is noticed daintily
+picking her steps on a street crossing. She is more frequently noticed
+in the act of crossing a street, as it affords her an opportunity of
+rendering herself still more attractive and seductive by practicing
+those apparently aimless little feminine arts that prove so fascinating
+to the coarser sex. The skirts are just lifted high enough to discover a
+beautiful foot; perhaps a glimpse of an ankle bewitchingly smothered in
+lace frills is revealed; while a warm scintillant glance of invitation
+is thrown at the interested beholder, who, perhaps, follows and engages
+her in conversation. More than likely he is agreeably surprised to find
+how lady-like and attractive her manners are, and by his own suggestion
+or her invitation he readily accompanies her to her home; not, however,
+without being previously warned that she is married, that her husband is
+very ugly and jealous, and a big, strong, quarrelsome fellow, to boot.
+
+The room to which she conducts him is apparently an ordinary room,
+furnished in an ordinary way. It is, however, usually a front room,
+separated by folding doors from the room in the rear. It is in
+connection with these folding doors that mystery and danger lurk. These
+folding doors are a study. Some are so constructed that instead of
+opening in the center, one of them opens upon hinges which are placed on
+that portion of the doors where the lock is usually situated, so that it
+opens at the woodwork on the side. If a chance visitor to one of these
+rooms should have his suspicions aroused by any act of his companion,
+and should closely examine the doors, he would find a bolt on the inside
+securely fastened, but he would not be likely to see that it barely
+rested in the socket, and thinking everything was all right, his
+suspicions would be disarmed. As there would be but one other door in
+the room--that by which he entered--and as he locked that himself,
+privacy would apparently be insured.
+
+In the folding doors are several minute holes, through which a person
+behind them can watch all that goes on in the front room. These holes,
+however, are frequently dispensed with, and a cough or other understood
+signal by the female gives the thief warning when all is ready for his
+entrance.
+
+After the lapse of perhaps five minutes the female coughs or makes some
+understood signal, the door noiselessly opens at the side, a man enters
+unseen, secures the victims clothing, disappears into the next room,
+takes the money out of a pocket-book or pocket, replaces the pocket-book
+in the clothes, takes the watch, the studs out of the shirt, everything,
+in fact, of any value, and replacing the clothing, softly closes the
+door again. Now comes the scene: A knock is heard on the other
+door--that by which the victim entered. With a slight scream the female
+remarks, that the person knocking is her husband, and with great haste
+proceeds to dress, all the while telling her now frightened companion
+that he will kill him if he sees him, hurriedly assists him to dress and
+half pushing him, forces him out of the room, down the stairs into the
+street.
+
+Another phase of this trick is when, in the absence of folding doors,
+the lock or bolt is so arranged that socket and bolt are both upon the
+door. Another is to fill the socket with some substance, a cork for
+instance, so that when the bolt is pushed forward, it fails to enter the
+socket.
+
+An instance is related of an elderly man coming into one of these rooms,
+and casually remarking to his female friend, "I hope I won't be rapped
+out of this room by anyone, for I have been in two places to-night and
+was rapped out of both." That gentleman was robbed in the first house he
+entered, and must have remarked in the second one that he was "rapped
+out" of the first, for his companion in this last affair knew what had
+happened in the other cases, and that he would not have been treated in
+that manner unless they had secured his money. And so his remark being
+again overheard, he was unceremoniously "rapped out" of this third and
+last house. Here is a case from the records which probably illustrates
+the method as well as any other:
+
+An elderly man, about sixty years of age, entered a panel-room with a
+dark-haired, flashily-dressed woman, who immediately requested him to
+bolt the door. This he did, but he might have saved himself the trouble,
+for the door was no more closed then than it was before. These bolts are
+very ingenious. The catch on the jamb of the door into which the bolt
+slides has three false screw-heads in it. In reality it is not attached
+to the door-casing at all, but is fastened to the body of the bolt by an
+unseen plate. Consequently, when the door is opened, the catch goes
+forward with the remainder of the bolt. This, of course, was not noticed
+by the man, as the gas was not turned up by the woman till after the
+door was closed. While the man was bolting the door the woman hurried to
+the dressing-table and hastily laid her hat on one chair and her cloak
+on the other. This action compelled the man to place his clothes on the
+couch or on one of the chairs by the folding doors. When all was ready,
+one of the operators scratched lightly on the door with his finger-nail,
+to warn the woman he was about to enter the room. The next moment the
+man boldly opened the door wide, removed the chair out of his way, and
+glided rapidly to the other chair, on which the man's clothes lay. At
+this moment the woman redoubled her fascinations, for the purpose of
+distracting the attention of her companion, in which intent she was
+eminently successful. The work of going through the man's pockets, and
+what is technically known as "weeding" his pocket-book, was quickly
+over, the chair was quietly replaced, the panel-door closed, and the
+thief appeared with a roll of bills in his hand. The whole thing was
+done in from twenty to twenty-five seconds. Immediately after the
+closing of the door the man went outside, and, knocking on the
+passage-door of the bedroom, said in a loud whisper.
+
+"Jenny, here's Joe; hurry up."
+
+"My God!" exclaimed the girl, jumping up, "you must get away as fast as
+you can. That's my lover. He's dreadful jealous, and would shoot you as
+soon as look at you."
+
+It is needless to say that the victim required no urging. He jumped into
+his clothes as fast as possible, only too glad to get out of the way
+before the appearance of the terrible imaginary lover, and apparently
+without the slightest notion that he had been robbed.
+
+The victims of these thefts have really no redress. It is so hard to
+find the guilty woman afterwards, or even to locate the house, for
+unless the pleasure hunter suspects some trap he pays no particular
+attention to the kind of house, its situation, or its number. In the
+case of a stranger he never seeks the thieves again, but "pockets his
+loss." If an elderly man, he does likewise. But if he be really an
+obstinate man, determined upon catching the thieves and prosecuting
+them, he will invariably be approached and his money and valuables will
+be returned to him upon condition that he withdraws his complaint.
+Convictions are very rarely obtained in any case from the difficulty of
+identifying the parties.
+
+Many of these women never see a penny of the plundered money, the man,
+in most cases, retaining the whole of the loot. It sometimes happens
+that a victim discovers that he has been robbed before he leaves, and
+makes what is called in the vernacular a "kick"; if so, it also
+sometimes happens that he is unmercifully beaten by the lover and his
+pals, but it has occurred that when "the kicker" was a man about town,
+that he has gotten away with his assailant in a manner calculated to
+make the heart of a Sullivan beat with pleasure.
+
+There is quite a different feature of this panel-game, but which more
+properly belongs to black-mail, in which, through the peep-holes in the
+doors, the face of the man or woman in the adjoining room is studied,
+waited for on the outside, followed to his or her home, and in a few
+days threatened with exposure, if the sum demanded is not forthcoming.
+
+Couples have been known to ply the panel-game very successfully in some
+of the most prominent hotels in the city. The lady would make her
+conquest upon the streets in the ordinary manner and the game would be
+worked in two rooms of the hotel as already described. This enterprise
+was carried on successfully by a scoundrel and his wife at one time in
+one of the best hotels, and although it was generally known, there never
+was any one to complain against them. It was only by the proprietor
+specially employing several detectives that they were finally
+discovered, arrested and punished.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+A THEATRICAL ROMANCE.
+
+_Kale Fisher, the Famous Mazeppa, involved--Manager Hemmings charged
+by Fast-paced Mrs. Bethune with Larceny._
+
+A good many years since, at a fashionable boardinghouse in Philadelphia,
+a handsome Adonis-shapen young man, well and favorably known by the name
+of George Hemmings, became acquainted with a member of the fairer sex
+who had scarcely passed "sweet sixteen," and was accredited with a
+bountiful supply of beauty, named then Eliza Garrett. An intimacy at
+once sprung up between the two, which at length ripened into a mutual
+attachment.
+
+A series of journeys were undertaken by Miss Garrett and Hemmings, and
+for some time they lived together enjoying all the pleasures and sweets
+of love; but for some cause the pair separated, and for a number of
+years saw nothing of each other. Meantime, many changes had occurred in
+the circumstances of both. Eliza had been transformed into Mrs. Bethune
+and lived in a fashionable part of Gotham, her reputed husband, John
+Bethune, Esquire, being a gentleman of wealth and sporting
+proclivities.
+
+George Hemmings, who, by the way, was very respectably connected, had
+migrated from the "City of Brotherly Love" to "Gotham," and filled a
+position as superintendent in a dry-goods establishment.
+
+It was whilst in this city, when "walking down Broadway" one afternoon,
+Hemmings' attention was attracted by a lady who seemed to have been
+previously pleased with his acquaintance, and in whom he recognized his
+former inamorata, Miss Garrett. A grand recapitulation of the
+pleasantries of by-gone days ensued, and the damsel informed her "once
+dear George" that she was now Mrs. Bethune, but prevailed upon him to
+accompany her to her home. Here a hearty welcome was accorded him, and,
+if his statement be correct, it is said that the intimacy of former
+times was renewed.
+
+Matters continued in this manner, and Hemmings was induced to leave his
+former situation and take up his abode at the residence of Mrs. Bethune
+as general superintendent of that household, inasmuch as Mr. Bethune
+himself was occasionally absent from the city.
+
+On one occasion, as Mr. Hemmings alleged, the beauteous Mrs. Bethune was
+violently assaulted by her better-half for some alleged indiscretion,
+and it was her early lover who played the part of Good Samaritan on the
+occasion, comforting her as well as he was able himself, and calling in
+a physician to bind up her wounds. During her sickness, the relationship
+between Hemmings and the lady seems to have been of the most intimate
+character. She gave him a pair of diamond ear-rings to pledge for four
+hundred dollars, which money was a portion of an amount which was to be
+called into requisition for the necessary engagements and other expenses
+incurred at the opening of a theatre in Pittsburg, the management to be
+assumed by Miss Kate Fisher, the well-known "Mazeppa" and equestrienne
+actress, and George Hemmings. A troupe was thereupon engaged, and the
+entire company, including Miss Fisher and Hemmings, started for
+Pennsylvania, where they intended to delight the inhabitants with the
+drama of the "fiery, untamed steed" order.
+
+Soon after "Cupid George" departed for the West, Mrs. Bethune became a
+prey to the "green-eyed monster." She realized the temptations that
+would surely beset George as he basked in the smiles of the alluring and
+classically modeled equestrienne. Other troubles beset Mrs. Bethune at
+this juncture. Her husband asked her one day what had become of her
+diamond ear-rings, and she was seized with confusion and dismay. To
+disclose the truth would be to incur Bethune's jealousy, natural
+indignation and too probable violence, and so the convenient idea seems
+to have occurred to her that by accusing Hemmings of the theft of the
+jewelry, she would achieve a two-fold success; namely, the one of
+concealing her own frailty, and the other of snatching her beloved one
+from a hated supposed rival. Bethune, believing her story, obtained a
+requisition from Governor Fenton and procured Hemmings' arrest in
+Pittsburg, and he was accordingly brought to this city. The services of
+Howe & Hummel were called into requisition, and Hemmings brought into
+court for trial.
+
+The greatest excitement was aroused amongst theatrical and sporting
+celebrities, and long before the opening of the court every seat was
+filled by eager and expectant spectators, and when the prisoner was
+called to the bar an immense throng surged to and fro to obtain a
+glimpse at his features, and those of the accusing beauty.
+
+City Judge Russel presided, and the Hon. Robert C. Hutchings, afterwards
+Surrogate, conducted the prosecution.
+
+Mr. Hutchings opened the case for the people in a fair and temperate
+speech, stating that he was instructed that he should be enabled to
+establish a clear case of larceny against the defendant, who then stood
+indicted for having, on the 19th of October, 1868, at the city of New
+York, feloniously stolen, taken, and carried away, one pair of diamond
+ear-rings of the value of $400, the property of one James A. Lynch.
+
+Mr. Hutchings then called Mrs. Eliza Bethune, who, amidst breathless
+silence, was sworn, and testified that Hemmings was observed by her
+daughter purloining the ear-rings from her boudoir drawer on the day in
+question, and that immediately she was informed of the larceny she had
+sought out Hemmings and ascertained that he had fled to Pittsburgh. On
+inquiry, she had also traced the missing jewelry to a pawn-office kept
+by Mr. Barnard, at No. 404 Third avenue, where the articles were pledged
+by Hemmings. She also went to Pittsburg with Detective Young, and the
+pawn-ticket of the ear-rings was found on Hemmings, which she took from
+him. Mrs. Bethune further stated that the officer then handcuffed the
+prisoner and brought him on to this city.
+
+The witness was then subjected to a rigid cross-examination by Mr. Howe,
+who propounded questions as follows:
+
+Mr. Howe: Are you married to Mr. Bethune?
+
+Mrs. Bethune (imploringly to Judge Russel): Am I compelled to answer
+that question?
+
+Judge Russel: Mr. Howe, I have already ruled that these kind of
+questions are improper.
+
+Mr. Howe (with pertinacity): Your honor, I desire to show that this
+witness is not the wife of Mr. Bethune; and I contend that, in justice
+to my client, the question should be answered.
+
+Judge Russel: I rule it out.
+
+Mr. Howe: I take exception to the ruling of the court, and will now put
+another question, namely:
+
+Is Mr. Bethune your husband? (Sensation in court.)
+
+Judge Russel ruled the question inadmissible, and exception was taken.
+
+Detective John Young, of the Eighteenth Precinct Police, was next
+called, and deposed: I am connected with the Metropolitan Police of this
+city; I was sent with a requisition issued by Governor Fenton to
+Pittsburgh to arrest George Hemmings for grand larceny; I went there
+with Mr. and Mrs. Bethune; I took Hemmings into custody at the
+Pittsburgh Theatre; he made a violent resistance, and scuffled with me;
+I was necessitated to handcuff him in the cars; he became very abusive
+and threatening; in fact, so much so, that I was compelled to hit him on
+the head with the butt-end of my pistol; at the time of his arrest he
+had upon him the ticket of the ear-rings.
+
+Alexander Barnard, a pawnbroker at No. 404 Third avenue, was the next
+witness, and said: I know the prisoner at the bar; he pledged me with
+two diamond ear-rings on the 20th of last October, which Mr. Lynch
+subsequently identified as his property.
+
+Cross-examined by Mr. Howe: Hemmings has frequently pawned articles of
+jewelry with me; he pledged them in the name of Mrs. Bethune.
+
+Mr. Howe here requested that the pawnbroker should be directed to
+produce his book in order that the jury might see the dates, the
+production of which the counsel insisted would entirely contradict Mrs.
+Bethune's testimony.
+
+The book was subsequently produced, and Mr. Barnard testified, on
+further cross-examination by Mr. Howe, that Hemmings had pledged with
+him a watch belonging to Mrs. Bethune on the 17th of November, being
+_nearly one month_ after the date the ear-rings were pledged.
+
+Mrs. Lynch proved that the ear-rings were her property, and that she had
+loaned them to Mrs. Bethune.
+
+Mrs. Bethune now took the witness stand, and she was asked by Mr. Howe
+how long she had known Hemmings, the prisoner at the bar?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: About twelve years.
+
+Mr. Howe: Where did you first become acquainted with him?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: At Philadelphia; I was employed in the United States Mint,
+and we boarded together in the same house.
+
+Mr. Howe: Did you subsequently come on to New York with him?
+
+Witness (hesitatingly): I did.
+
+Mr. Howe: Were you on terms of peculiar intimacy with him?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: I was not (sensation in the court): we were friends.
+
+Mr. Howe: Was it not at your solicitation that he was taken to live in
+the same house with yourself and Mr. Bethune?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: Yes, it was; but I merely took him in out of charity, as
+he was poor and had no clothes (sensation in court).
+
+Mr. Howe: Did you ever stay at the Washington Hotel in this city with
+him?
+
+Judge Russel here interposed, and informed Mrs. Bethune that she need
+not answer that question.
+
+Mr. Howe: Did you not visit him when he was employed at A. T. Stewart's
+store in this city?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: I did; but I got him employed there.
+
+Mr. Howe (aside): Compassionate woman (laughter). Now, Mrs. Bethune,
+through whom did you get him employed at that store?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: Through Mr. Griswold, a gentleman of my acquaintance.
+
+Mr. Howe: Did you not know at the time you had Hemmings in your house
+that he was a married man?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: I did. (Sensation.)
+
+Mr. Howe: Have you not been to the Whitney House with Hemmings?
+
+The court also decided that witness need not answer that question,
+whereupon counsel took exception.
+
+Mr. Howe: Have you not frequently been to the Chanler House in this city
+with Mr. Hemmings?
+
+Question overruled.
+
+Mr. Howe: Did you not receive visits from Hemmings in East Fourth
+street, in this city?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: Am I bound to answer that question?
+
+Judge Russel: I overrule that question, and you need not answer it.
+
+Mr. Howe: Did you ever live in a house in Lombard street, Philadelphia,
+kept by a Miss Graham, and did you ever meet Hemmings there.
+
+Mrs. Bethune (indignantly): I did not.
+
+Mr. Howe: Did you ever introduce Hemmings to any person at Saratoga as
+your brother?
+
+Mrs. Bethune (reluctantly): Yes, I have. (Sensation.)
+
+Mr. Howe: How many times have you given Hemmings your jewelry to pledge
+that he might have money?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: I never gave him permission to pledge any of my jewelry.
+
+Mr. Howe: Do you mean to swear that he has never pledged any of your
+jewelry prior to the present occasion?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: Yes, he has, but not with my consent. (Sensation.)
+
+Mr. Howe: Was that whilst he was living in your house?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: It was.
+
+Mr. Howe: Why did you not have him arrested for so doing?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: Because he cried, and I forgave him. (Sensation.)
+
+Mr. Howe: Yes, you forgave your "BROTHER" (roars of laughter). Now,
+madam! will you swear that you did not give Hemmings your watch to
+pledge on the 17th of November last, nearly one month after he pledged
+the ear-rings?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: I did not; I will swear that I never gave him anything to
+pledge after he pawned the ear-rings; I did not give him the ear-rings;
+I paid Kate Fisher the money with which to open the theatre, and not to
+Hemmings; I did not pay her in the Chanler House, in Hemmings' presence;
+I paid her on the street, the reason Hemmings went to Saratoga with me,
+was to take care of Mr. Bethune's horses (immoderate laughter); I will
+swear that I had not seen Hemmings since he took the ear-rings until I
+had him arrested; I did not arrest him right away, because I was sick;
+the ear-rings were not mine, they belonged to Mr. Lynch; I borrowed them
+from Mrs. Lynch.
+
+Mr. Howe: What was your name when you became acquainted with Hemmings?
+
+Mrs. Bethune: Eliza Garrett.
+
+This closed the case for the prosecution, and Mr. Howe, for the defense,
+called Dr. J. Kennedy, who testified as follows:
+
+I am a physician, and reside in East Tenth street in this city; I have
+seen the prisoner before. In October last, I saw him in a house in East
+Fourth street.
+
+Mr. Howe: What were you doing at that house?
+
+Dr. Kennedy: I was attending a lady there, professionally.
+
+Mr. Howe: Would you know that lady again?
+Dr. Kennedy: I should.
+Mr. Howe (to Mrs. Bethune): Madam, will you oblige me by standing up and
+raising your veil?
+
+The lady complied with Mr. Howe's request, and amidst breathless silence
+Mr. Howe, addressing Dr. Kennedy, said, "Doctor, is that the lady?"
+
+Dr. Kennedy: It is. (Flutter in the court-room.)
+
+Mr. Howe: How many times did you visit her?
+
+Dr. Kennedy: Eight or ten times.
+
+Mr. Howe: Was Hemmings in the room with her?
+
+Dr. Kennedy: He was. (Sensation.)
+
+Mr. Howe then applied for attachments against two witnesses who had been
+subpoenaed to prove that Mrs. Bethune had been at the Whitney House and
+the Washington Hotel with Hemmings, but Judge Russel declined to grant
+any time, and peremptorily ordered Mr. Howe to proceed with his defense
+to the jury.
+
+Mr. Howe then arose and addressed the court. He said:
+
+Gentlemen of the Jury: I approach the consideration of this case with
+some degree of embarrassment, which is necessarily forced upon me, from
+the fact, that whilst discharging, as I shall endeavor to do, to the
+best of my ability, my duties as an advocate to the young man accused of
+this larceny, I regret that I am called upon to animadvert in terms of
+censure and reproach, upon one who leaves a name which is dear and
+hallowed to us all--the originator of our being--a name that we all
+revere and respect when we view it in the beauteous and lovely purity
+which is thrown around it. But I think, gentlemen, it is not unfair when
+that name is divested of its purity, and becomes shrouded with that
+which is base and vile--when the guard which we naturally and
+intuitively throw around it is dispelled, and, instead of the beauteous
+statue of monumental alabaster, we see a black, foetid, loathsome thing
+before us, from which we shrink with indignation and horror, knowing it
+is that which drags our young men down to degradation, disgrace and
+death--I say, in entering upon this prisoner's defense, such is the
+distinction between pure and hallowed and virtuous women (against whom
+none dare point) and her who forgets herself--forgets the holy ties due
+to her sex, and her own self-respect: and who assumes the place of wife
+to a man without that sanction which God has instituted and commanded,
+and who, entrapping others, comes to court to-day--not the pure being to
+demand your respect--but one whom we can but contemplate with loathing
+and disgust, and who has proved herself utterly unworthy of belief.
+Gentlemen, I simply wish to direct your attention to the proven facts. I
+have thus ventured to allude to the distinction I have endeavored to
+draw, not for the purpose of warping your minds, or in any degree
+throwing an unfair prejudice around this case; but, in view of the
+solemnity of the oaths you have taken, to do justice between the People
+of the State of New York and the prisoner at the bar, and to see upon
+what testimony you are asked to consign an innocent, but foolish young
+man, for a long term of years to the state prison.
+
+I find in the book before me, gentlemen, to my surprise--and when it
+will be handed to you I think you will agree with me and share my
+astonishment--that on the first day of October last Mr. Lynch has sworn
+that _his_ diamond ear-rings were stolen. I find that from the first day
+of October until the 8th day of December--a long lapse of nearly two
+months--no steps are taken by those who are alleged to have sustained
+the loss, and nothing is done until the latter date. I will show you why
+this demand is made upon the Executive--a novel proceeding altogether,
+without any indictment being preferred in this office--and a journey is
+made to Pittsburgh, not by the officers alone, but as we have it on the
+sworn testimony of the woman in this case, that she, without her
+protector, without the man Bethune (who is with her now as her husband,
+and who professed to be so then), proceeded alone to Pittsburgh, and is
+subsequently followed by Mr. Bethune. That is the first era, the first
+of October. We next find Mrs. Bethune detailing to you that these
+ear-rings were taken (how she does not know), but only what she was told
+by a little girl whom we have not seen. So her story runs. It is pretty
+for the present; but I hope to destroy the poetry of it very shortly.
+That this man stole, not on the first of October, but on the 19th of
+October, and subsequently corrected to-day, by the lady of treacherous
+memory, to the date of the 20th. At all events, it is perfectly clear,
+now, according to her last amended allegation, that on the 20th of
+October she claims a larceny to have been committed. But a Mr. Lynch is
+supposed to be the owner of the earrings, and not Mrs. Bethune! It
+transpires that she had merely borrowed them for a while, as she tells
+you; and then on the 20th of October she learns the loss. Why,
+gentlemen, did not Mrs. Bethune tell you, that nearly a month after that
+and in November, she had met this man on the street with Miss Kate
+Fisher? That they had business transactions, that she knew him--the
+theatrical manager--that he was to open a theatre--that money was
+supplied by her for that express purpose? Did not she know within one
+month after this transaction the same state of facts which she deposes
+to-day? Why not have had the prisoner arrested on the street then?
+
+No, gentlemen, I will give you my theory of this case; I will render to
+you what this man has told me, and if it be not a common-sense view of
+it, no logic--no metaphysics--then discard every word uttered and
+condemn this man. The pawnbroker throws additional light upon this
+transaction, and, gentlemen, if you will refer to the date in his book
+of the 17th of November (a month after his alleged larceny), you will
+find an important fact which I beseech you to hold, pointedly, in your
+own estimation. You will remember that she contradicts herself, and
+stated that she had had no transactions with Hemmings after the alleged
+larceny. One of the gentlemen on the jury put the very pertinent
+question (seeing the force of this), whether she had transactions with
+the prisoner after this alleged stealing. You will remember for
+yourselves, gentlemen, and I point to it without fear of contradiction,
+that at first she stated the ear-rings were taken on the 19th of
+October, but, seeing, with a woman's keen perception, the fatal error
+she had made in stating that admission, seeing that you, as common-sense
+men, would have at once said: "Why not have had him arrested then?" she
+quickly drew back, like a snail when the crashing foot is coming upon
+it, and drew the horns within the shell which covered it; and,
+yesterday, corrected the date. She changed the date and put it back from
+November to October. I congratulate her upon the change! For all the
+trickery and malice which were embodied in it, only enured to the
+prisoner's benefit. It was here sworn, to-day, that on the 17th of
+November last, her watch and chain (her watch and chain, gentlemen) not
+Mr. Lynch's, but Eliza Bethune's, was pledged in New York at Mr.
+Barnard's, the identical pawnbroker with whom the earrings were pledged.
+By whom? By Mrs. Bethune? Oh no! gentlemen! but by Hemmings, the man
+here. If he accomplished this ubiquitous feat, like the ghost in Hamlet,
+to be in two places at one time, he is one of the most wonderful
+performers of the modern day. (Laughter.) He could not be in Barnard's
+pawn-shop in New York pledging Mrs. Bethune's watch on the 17th of
+November, a month after the larceny, and be, as she would have you
+believe, with Kate Fisher performing in Pittsburgh. Why, look at that
+contradiction! I invoke that book (pointing to the pawnbroker's record),
+as in other temples I appeal to the Holy one, for my protection. In your
+hands I place it. Upon your altar do I offer it up; and I believe that
+you will grant my prayers, that this will be taken as the strongest
+evidence of the prisoner's innocence. Records cannot lie here. The
+testimony is that this man had subsequent transactions with Mrs.
+Bethune, supporting, beyond a doubt, my theory that she gave him the
+ear-rings to pledge. Now let us see. She tells you (and there are other
+circumstances of greater peculiarity still around this case)--she tells
+you that she became acquainted with this man some twelve years since;
+and although I was prohibited (perhaps properly) by the court from
+putting other questions, I think I am not saying too much, when I urge
+that I did elicit from that lady sufficient to justify any one of you in
+forming an opinion as to the immoral terms of intimacy subsisting
+between Hemmings and that lady who was upon the witness stand. I can
+only say that I think there is not one of you composing that jury who
+would be pleased to have a wife of yours detailing circumstances in any
+way similar. I think that not only jealousy, but indignation of the
+strongest character, would be aroused in each of you, and you would
+unhesitatingly brand her as an adulteress.
+
+Now, gentlemen, we find they have known each other for twelve years, and
+what besides? Why, she takes him into her house; she gives him an
+apartment there. Nay, she does more, according to her confession. She
+saw that he was poor and had no clothes (to use her own expression.) I
+do not think, gentlemen, that she exactly meant that, when she said it,
+in its literal signification (laughter), but she certainly said that he
+had no clothes, and that she clothed him and she "took him in" (loud
+laughter). She went to A. T. Stewart's (kind-hearted charitable woman!)
+and saw Mr. Griswold. She interceded with Griswold and got Hemmings a
+situation in A. T. Stewart's. What relation was Hemmings to her, at this
+time, to induce her to take this kind and charitable interest in him? I,
+gentlemen, am not so charitable as she professed to be; neither do I
+think you will be, gentlemen. I apprehend that the motive which actuated
+the taking in, the clothing and the obtaining a situation at Stewart's,
+was another motive altogether (immoderate laughter). What it was, I will
+leave you to conjecture. Look a little further. Hemmings is no relation
+to her, and yet we find her taking him to Saratoga! In what capacity?
+Why, she tells you, to attend Bethune's horses at Saratoga (laughter).
+Yes, gentlemen, and this hostler, this stable boy, in the same breath,
+is introduced by this lady as what--a lover! oh, no, she dare not do
+that--but as a relation--a blood relation! She makes him, for that
+occasion, her brother at Saratoga! Well, so far, there is no
+impropriety, you will say; but coupled with several other facts--coupled
+with the act that that book (the pawnbrokers book) teems with the name
+of Bethune, as pledging jewelry pledged by Hemmings, and belonging to
+the lady, you must see the intimacy which unquestionably existed. She
+admitted to you that time and again he had pledged what? Why, he had
+pledged her studs, her brooches and God knows what all! What did she?
+Why not have him arrested then? Oh! well, she says, "he cried--my
+brother cried." (Loud laughter.) "I did not like to hurt my brother."
+She forgave him, and I will tell you why.
+
+You know the quotation that "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned."
+Mr. Hemmings, who is a fine, healthy, fashionable, well-rounded and
+vigorous, and, some women might say, good-looking young man, had
+migrated from the city of New York to spend some time in Pittsburgh, and
+he was in dangerous proximity to a very enticing and attractive actress,
+Miss Kate Fisher. (Loud laughter).
+
+Gentlemen, in the play of Othello, which many of you have doubtless seen
+and read, you will find the episode of the handkerchief, which you will
+remember belonged to Desdemona; being the gift of her husband, the Moor.
+You remember Iago (in that case it was a man, however,) instigated his
+wife to purloin the handkerchief, and to deposit it in the chamber of
+Cassio, if I am correct; and Cassio, unfortunately, not seeing the
+little trap that was prepared for him, wound that spotted piece of
+cambric around his knee to stop the blood flowing from the wound he had
+received in a drunken brawl. Upon Othello seeing that, he states, that
+not being jealous, he "was perplexed in the extreme," and the sequel was
+the murder about which we have so often heard. I say, gentlemen, if ever
+there was the play of Othello reduced to private life and reacted, it is
+here. These ear-rings are the handkerchief, and Mrs. Bethune is the
+Iago. (Laughter.) This young man tells me, that in accordance with
+ancient usage and time-honored customs existing between this gentleman
+and lady, she had given him, as she narrated here, money to enable Kate
+Fisher to open a theatre at Pittsburgh, and that Hemmings was to be the
+manager. She had given them, from time to time, money obtained from
+Barnard's pawn office, through the instrumentality of the unfortunate
+Hemmings.
+
+That is the history; that is all before you, and it cannot be gainsayed.
+Then why the arrest this time more than at the others? It explains
+itself. You have it in testimony that these ear-rings were the property
+of Mr. Lynch, and that Mrs. Lynch had loaned them to Mrs. Bethune.
+Hemmings alleges, and I believe with truth, that Mrs. Bethune, whilst
+riding in a coach with him, and after a "love encounter" (laughter) gave
+to him these jewels to hypothecate in the place to which he had been a
+frequent visitor for Mrs. Bethune. He goes to this pawnbroker's not in
+his own name, but, as the pawnbroker tells you (and I point to that fact
+as one of the strong points in the defense), that he panned them with
+him, telling him at the time that they belonged to Mrs. Bethune. Would a
+thief who stole your property or mine go to a place where he was known,
+that is if he stole them with the intention of keeping them? There was
+no larceny here, no dishonest motive about the transaction. Would he go
+to the pawnbroker to whom he was known and say, "Here is some property;
+it is not mine, it is Mrs. Bethune's?" On the contrary, you know,
+gentlemen--you must know--that there are a thousand other pawnbroker's
+establishments in New York City; and if this had been a felonious taking
+of these ear-rings, Hemmings could have gone to Simpson's across the way
+from this court house, or to another place at the Battery, or east,
+west, north or south, upon any corner in New York to a strange
+pawnbroker, who did not know him, had there been any felony about the
+transaction. Another point is, that a felon who steals invariably covers
+up his crime. The Prosecution brought out this fact, and I appeal to it
+as their own destruction, why in the name of Heaven did this man, if he
+intended to appropriate these ear-rings to his own use, carry about him
+the evidence of his guilt? Why, they told you when they got to
+Pittsburgh, after the altercation, that he produced the pawn-ticket! Did
+that look like stealing?
+
+But to revert to the ownership. Mr. Lynch, in a moment of kindness,
+loaned these ear-rings to his wife. Mrs. Lynch again loaned them to Mrs.
+Bethune; and, as Hemmings says, whilst riding in a coach, she (Mrs.
+Bethune) gave him those ear-rings to pledge. He did so pledge them. Mind
+you, gentlemen, there has been no dispute about that since the
+commencement; he has never denied the pledging. Having pledged them, as
+he represents, a request was made to Mrs. Bethune for the return of the
+ear-rings. She could not produce them, and for the best possible reason;
+and not until nearly two months after the occurrence is the complaint
+made before the police magistrate. She wished to hide from Mr. Bethune
+(the gentleman who sustained the relation of husband to her) what had
+become of the ear-rings; and, necessarily, she had no resort but to turn
+round and say: "It is not very pleasant to tell my husband (or the man
+who stands in that capacity) that I have given those ear-rings to a
+lover! I cannot, without offending you, tell you the true cause of this
+affair, but I must, in order to save myself, say, O, this George stole
+them, and he is in Pittsburgh with Kate Fisher." This is _two months_
+after the occurrence! And then, on the first of December, a requisition
+is gotten out, and the more marvelous part of it is, that she goes on
+alone in the first instance while Mr. Bethune followed subsequently. Now
+see what occurred in Pittsburgh. She told you she did not know whether
+he was arrested or not. She "believed" there was a form gone through of
+getting out some papers. She "believes" she was taken before the mayor;
+and what became of the case she did not know. But Mr. Bethune, who could
+not shield himself in this way, very promptly answered that he was
+arrested at the suit of this man; and Hemmings could not make idle
+charges there. He was a theatrical manager in Pittsburgh, a public man!
+and, as they told you, boasted that he was intimate with the members of
+the press and police force, who were dead-heads at his theatre, and who
+witnessed the performance gratuitously; so that you perceive he was very
+well known. Do you believe, will any sane man of common sense credit the
+statement, that a man who was as well known in Pittsburgh as G. L. Fox
+is in this city, could afford to arrest a citizen and have the matter
+made public unless he had reasons to do so?
+
+I say, gentlemen, that the entire case, from the commencement to the
+end, abounds in doubts suggestive of this man's innocence, especially
+the fact which cannot be denied, that this lady, _she is not like
+Caesar's wife_, above suspicion, shields herself, as no honest woman
+would, behind that protection which the judge afforded.
+
+Good God, gentlemen, in a court of justice, where jurors are empanelled
+to decide upon the future prospects and the life of this young man,
+would your wife or mine refuse to answer such a question? Is it a
+_shame_ for us to acknowledge that the holy bonds of matrimony have
+united us with a being--the mother of our offspring? Would you deny that
+you were the husband of a lady, placed upon the witness stand to support
+a charge against a thief for having stolen your watch? Why, I think,
+gentlemen, that honor, affection, duty and every obligation known to
+society, demands, in imperious tones, that instead of denying the wife
+of your bosom, you stand forward as her champion and say, "Thank God,
+she is my wife and I am proud of it!" That is what you or I would have
+answered. But the gauzy curtain that was covered over this foul tableau,
+has been lifted up, and you see it in all it hideous deformity. As I
+have before stated, you have seen, gentlemen, the flimsy evidence upon
+which is attempted to predicate a conviction for grand larceny. I am
+confident that in spite of all the attempts that have been made by a
+shameless wanton and her pretended husband, to crush this man, despite
+the meretricious trickery and villainous conspiracy which instigated,
+concocted and carried out this _persecution_, relying as I do, on your
+sense of justice, your strict integrity, and the independence of an
+American jury, that you will not permit our temples erected to justice,
+to be prostituted to the accomplishment of the designs of the polluted
+and the infamous and that innocence will triumph, and your verdict be
+"Not guilty."
+
+At the conclusion of Mr. Howe's address, Mr. Hutchings summed up for the
+people. Judge Russel proceeded to charge the jury. After recapitulating
+very carefully the whole of the testimony, told them that if they were
+satisfied that the prisoner Hemmings had taken these ear-rings from Mrs.
+Bethune, and had pledged them without her consent, then they should
+convict; but if they had any well-founded doubt arising from the
+testimony itself, and not engendered by the eloquent speech of the
+prisoner's counsel, then they should give the prisoner the benefit of
+the doubt and acquit him.
+
+The jury then retired, and after a quarter of an hour's absence returned
+into court and rendered a verdict of NOT GUILTY.
+
+Hemmings was accordingly discharged, and he quitted the court amidst the
+congratulations of his friends.
+
+Mrs. Bethune also brought a charge of theft against Kate Fisher, which
+was heard at Essex Market Police Court. The New York _Herald_ reported
+the proceedings next day as follows:
+
+Essex Market court-room was this afternoon densely crowded with
+theatrical personages of all grades, apparently deeply interested in the
+progress of the case which concerns the position and honor of an actress
+so well known as Kate Fisher. The seats of the court would not contain
+more than half the number of the persons present, the remainder being
+compelled to stand around against the walls and in the nooks of the
+doors, etc. Among those present were W. B. Freligh, manager of the
+Bowery Theatre; John Jones, the treasurer; Clark, the stage manager;
+Deane, leader of the orchestra, and others. The court-room was at last
+found to be too small, and the whole party adjourned to examine the room
+on the second floor of the building, which was also found to be rather
+small, but yet more convenient for the purposes of an examination.
+
+Justice Shandley then took his seat on the bench, and the parties
+concerned appeared in court. Mrs. Bethune was rather flashily dressed,
+and evidently intended to make a show. Kate Fisher was quietly dressed
+in black, and was very modest in her demeanor; attracting no attention,
+except from those who were acquainted with her. Mr. Bethune accompanied
+the complainant, and Messrs. Howe and Hummel, appeared for Miss Kate
+Fisher.
+
+Having taken their respective seats, the case of Eliza Bethune, of
+Centreville, Long Island, against Kate Fisher, for the larceny of a gold
+watch and chain, valued at $200, was then called on.
+
+Mrs. Bethune, the first witness, was then examined by her counsel. She
+stated that her name was Eliza Bethune, and that she resided at
+Centreville, L. I. She knew Kate Fisher, and knew her on the 16th of
+last November. She was then living in East Fourth street. On that day
+she missed her watch, and her daughter told her that Miss Fisher had
+taken it. Acting on this information, she sent for Kate Fisher on the
+afternoon of that day. Mrs. Bethune then asked her where her watch was.
+Kate Fisher was very much intoxicated at the time, but understood all
+that was said to her. She answered that she had taken it, and had given
+it to Hemmings. The watch and chain was worth $200. Mrs. Bethune
+subsequently learned that the watch had been pledged. Some time after,
+she, Mrs. Bethune, caused the arrest of Kate Fisher at Pittsburgh, but
+the case was dismissed for want of jurisdiction.
+
+Mr. Howe then asked if the counsel had closed his case, but received an
+answer in the negative, as there were more witnesses to be examined. Mr.
+Howe stated that he was sorry that the case was not closed, as before he
+desired to commence a cross-examination he would take all the evidence
+to be exhausted. His case was a revival of one which had already been
+settled at the General Sessions, and bore on its very face the evidence
+of a malicious prosecution to injure the character and spotless
+reputation of a lady whose profession brought her constantly before the
+public, and whose good name became thereby part of her business capital.
+He regretted it, therefore, that the counsel for the complainant would
+not exhaust his case, as it made it necessary to adopt a course of
+procedure in his cross-examination that he should have preferred not to
+have done.
+
+The counsel for Mrs. Bethune persisting that the cross-examination of
+each witness should go on in regular order as each witness appeared on
+the stand, Mr. Howe then proceeded by asking the witness her name.
+
+My name is Eliza Bethune.
+
+Are you married?
+
+I am.
+
+To whom?
+
+Mr. Bethune.
+
+What is his first name?
+
+That is not your business.
+
+Counsel appealed to the court, when the magistrate said the question was
+a proper one, and she answered:
+
+My husband's name is Bethune. His first name I do not choose to give.
+
+After further questioning, she at last replied:
+
+My first husband's name was John Bethune.
+
+What is the name of your present husband?
+
+That is not your business.
+
+Is he here in court.
+
+He is. He represents me here.
+
+What is his first name?
+
+After a great deal of cross-firing the answer was elicited that it was
+George Bethune.
+
+Were you ever married to George Bethune, the one who is now in court?
+
+Objected to by counsel.
+
+Justice Shandley: That is a proper question, and must be answered.
+
+That is my business. He has been my husband for over ten years.
+
+Were you ever married to him?
+
+Objected to. Objection overruled.
+
+I have answered already. I have answered all I am going to do.
+
+Justice Shandley insisted that she must answer the questions, but when
+she still refused, almost in a defiant manner, he rose from the bench,
+and declared the case dismissed. His action was received with rounds of
+applause from the persons assembled.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+A MARINER'S WOOING.
+
+_Captain Hazard's Gushing Letters--Breakers on a Matrimonial Lee
+Shore--He is Grounded in Divorce Shoals_.
+
+Aforetime, when the mariner was entirely dependent on the winds and the
+tides to make his voyage, he was, as everybody knows, a peculiarly
+impulsive, generous, faithful and credulous mortal in his love affairs.
+Once ashore, he spliced the main-brace, sneered oathfully at
+land-lubbers, hitched up his trousers and ran alongside the first
+trim-looking craft who angled for his attentions--and his money. These
+fine salt-water impulses, begotten of a twelve or fifteen-months'
+voyage, have mostly vanished. Steam has greatly revolutionized Jack's
+sweet-hearting. He comes to port every fortnight, or so; he wears dry
+goods and jewelry of the latest mode; and he marries a wife, or divorces
+a wife, with the same conventional _sangfroid_ of any mercantile
+"drummer" who travels by railroad. The conjugal history of that
+distinguished son of Neptune, Captain Oliver Perry Hazard, now to be
+related, haply has a delectable smack of mercantile jack's old-time
+methods, mingled with the shrewder utilitarianism of the steamship Jack
+of to-day.
+
+Up in the estuary called the Y, and at the mouth of the river Amstel,
+lay, some years ago, the good American ship which had safely borne young
+Hazard across the Atlantic. He was a handsome, a tall, and a lively
+young man of five and twenty; and, with a vivacious young mariner's
+curiosity, he went ashore to sample the "Holland," for which the Dutch
+are so famous, to stroll across the two hundred and ninety-odd bridges,
+and to take an observation of the pretty girls that loomed up in sedate
+but ample old Amsterdam. There, in a saloon where the gin was a most
+divine Hippocrene, and the cigars fragrant, Oliver beheld a tight little
+craft, and straightway ran up his flag as a salute. She was a brunette,
+with as pretty a form as the sun had ever kissed. Her dark, dark eyes
+were large, lustrous and superb. Oliver shares Lord Byron's weakness for
+handsome eyes. He's very fond of them. The name of the Amsterdam
+divinity was Marie. He resembled the same illustrious poet in his
+predilection for the name of Mary or Marie. He thought there was a
+sweetness in it. And so he sank into the quicksands of Eros, right over
+his tarry toplights, and, nothing loth, Marie accompanied him in the
+Avernian descent. Every morning that he lay in the Dutch port our
+mariner squared his yard-arms and trimmed himself for bringing-to
+alongside Marie. Every night the tics were getting tauter, and when he
+proposed that she should cross with him to England there was no pitching
+on her part worth speaking of. And so they voyaged to Albion and to
+several ports in Gaul; and there was no lee-way in their love, but still
+the tics were getting tauter, evidencing strong probabilities of a life
+cruise together.
+
+A year or two after, both Oliver and Marie were in New York, and,
+according to the affidavit of Captain Hazard's mother, Marie called upon
+the matron and told her "that she had been living with her son Oliver;
+that she had first met him in Amsterdam, and had traveled with him as
+his wife in England and in France, and that he had brought her to
+America." Marie assured the old lady that she loved him dearly, that she
+had been faithful and true to him ever since their intimacy, and hence
+she was anxious that Oliver should marry her and make her an honest
+woman in the eyes of the law and of the world. Whereupon, the mother
+persuaded the son to marry the pretty, young, gazelle-eyed girl, who
+could speak American and write like a born citizen.
+
+Oliver's own account of this momentous event, as chronicled in his
+affidavit, is not materially different. He affirms that he first met
+Marie in a liquor store in Amsterdam, "which she was in the habit of
+frequenting. At this time she was of loose character;" she "lived with
+him and traveled to England and France, and he was going to send her
+back to Holland, when his mother urged him to marry her, which he did
+reluctantly."
+
+In what way or to what extent, if any, the relations between the young
+mariner and his wife were affected after Hymen had stepped in and
+chained them together, there are data for determining. If we are to
+unqualifiedly accept the averments of the captain's affidavit we should
+come to the conclusion that Marie's nature and disposition were woefully
+transformed when she could legally designate herself, "Mrs. Captain
+Oliver P. Hazard." She then discovered "a jealous disposition" and "an
+ungovernable temper." When he returned from his various voyages she "did
+not receive him kindly;" but, contrariwise, sometimes received him on
+the side of "a poker," on the end of "a dirk" or at the muzzle of
+"pistol." Moreover--and this is dolefully comic--"she repeatedly left
+this deponent imprisoned in the house for hours under lock and key!"
+What a situation for a foaming mariner, accustomed to roam the vastness
+of the majestic, the free, the uncontrollable deep! Probably the next
+arraignment is still more exasperating. "She kept a servant to act as a
+spy and treat this deponent with disrespect." With the lapse of years,
+and with the peculiar hue which strife assumes in its backward
+prospective, his once happy-home and connubial comforts wore a jaundiced
+and sickly aspect. He ceased to recall the days when his heart was
+linked unto Marie's as a rosebud is linked to its stem.
+
+Mrs. Hazard possessed some letters, written to her by her whilom amorous
+husband, which will enable the reader to form a pretty correct idea of
+the estimation in which, until quite recently, the captain held his
+pretty wife. For example, one Fourth of July, he writes from "On board
+the U. S. Steamer John Rice," from Fortress Monroe to "My own dear and
+precious wife," informing her that the ship has been landing troops,
+that he feels rather seedy and low-spirited, and wishes he was at home
+to spend "the glorious Fourth" in her company. In a postscript he blazes
+into amorous enthusiasm and exclaims, "Write your dear Olly!" and in the
+bottom left-hand corner, within a sort of fairy circle, about the size
+of the orifice of a quart-bottle neck, appeared the gushing invitation,
+("Kiss me.")
+
+Nearly a year afterward he writes from Havana, "On board the steamer
+Liberty, May 6, 1865," to "My own dear precious wife," informing her
+that he is safe from New Orleans, with other personal matters not
+necessary to rehearse. He subscribes himself, "Your affectionate and
+loving Olly." Over ten years afterward we find the captain writing
+another letter from on board the same steamer, October 13, 1875, lying
+in Savannah, to "My darling beloved wife," in which he graphically tells
+her the sort of dog Jocko is. "Jocko came on board all serene," writes
+the captain, "He is asleep under my sofa all the time when he is not
+hunting beef, and I keep my room very warm. So that is the kind of dog
+Jocko is. If he was a half decent dog I would keep him on board, but he
+is asleep all the day under my sofa, and hates to be on deck. So he is
+good for nix, the worse cur I ever saw. I will leave him with a good
+keeper, and glad to lose sight of him."
+
+At this period Mrs. Captain Hazard was in the habit of sub-letting a
+portion of her house; and in the tail-end of the letter from which we
+have just quoted reference is made thereto. "Have you advertised in the
+_Tribute_ yet? Try fifty cents' worth for two days, you may catch a
+sucker. May God, in his infinite mercy, ever bless, protect and make you
+well and successful, my darling wife, is the prayer of your ever-loving
+and affectionate husband, Oliver P. Hazard." In the usual corner appears
+the magic circle, with the imperative ("Kiss me.")
+
+In the early portion of the year 1876, he had so persistently coaled up
+the fires of his love boilers that he couldn't wait until the steamer
+sailed, but plunges into glowing correspondence as soon as he reaches
+"Pier 2." He is now the captain of the Ocean Steam Navigation Company's
+vessel, San Jacinto, and on April 22 he writes, "My own darling good
+wife," before sailing, advising her to take good care of herself. The
+usual circular, hieroglyphic and osculatory invitation appears at the
+lower left-hand corner.
+
+Four brief days afterwards our Strephon has reached Savannah. Again he
+writes, April 26, 1876, "On board the steamship San Jacinto." To "My
+blessed good darling wife," informing her that he has "no aches, no
+pains," and assures her that he is "growing stronger." Then he rushes
+into particulars in the following unique manner: "I still keep my
+oatmeal diet and Pepson. God's blessing and infinite mercies on you, my
+darling. . . . I have had all kinds of horable imaginations
+about you. . . . I hope Mr. C. K. Garrison will permit you to
+make next trip with me. Eat no salt smoked meats or fish, or
+drink no strong tea, but cat oatmeal and what will easily digest,
+to keep your bowels open. . . . I will, with God's help, be with
+my dear Marie on Tuesday. I have the Harriet Beecher Stowe
+and Crane family to bring North this trip, about the last of the
+crowd. I wish they were landed in New York, as I don't like any of
+them, but will fight through in a quiet way." This epistle occupies six
+closely-written and carefully-numbered pages of note-paper, and the lip
+sign-manual is emblazoned in the usual corner. It ought to be remarked
+that the captain is an admirable penman, moderately seaworthy as to
+syntax, but in need of overhauling in an orthographical aspect.
+
+While we are busy with the correspondence, it may be _apropos_ to quote
+the last amorous letter he penned to his Marie before a cyclonic storm
+from the nor'east struck the Hymeneal ship, and carried away her masts
+and rigging, leaving a pair of plunging, leaky bulk-heads on the weary
+waste of the censorious world's waters. The envelope of this letter is
+indorsed in a female hand--evidently the forlorn hand of Marie: "Last
+letter received from my husband." It purports to have been written "On
+board the steamship Herman Livingston, Savannah, Jan. 5, 1878." It
+begins, in a modified form, thus: "My darling wife," and takes a
+flatulent turn almost immediately, "we had a fair wind all the way; a
+few passengers, and only one lady, which was Lydia. She was very
+pleasant and no trouble, as she was not sea-sick, and sat in the
+pilot-house most of the time. I am feeling very well now. . . . It is not
+necessary to say that I have not drank any strong drinks; that, of
+course, is finished. I am all right now, you know. . . . I hope, my darling
+good wife, that you are feeling much better than when I left you, and
+that your sore throat is quite well by this time. . . . I hope you will
+take good care of yourself and not get cold. I shall take good care of
+myself. Little Maria sent me a pretty mug for my New Year's. I will not
+use my new napkin ring, as it is too nice to be lost or broken here. May
+God ever bless and protect you, and ever make you well and happy, is my
+ever prayer of your loving husband,        OLLY."
+
+Let not the reader imagine that Olly's love was all of the
+lip-and-epistolary cheap style. Even as faith without works is dead,
+being alone, so professions of affection without exemplification would
+be simply worth "Jocko," and that worthless creature, according to the
+mariner, was good for "nix." No; the captain had presented his darling
+with diamonds--a cross, for example, which cost $1,000, and a watch and
+chain and other jewelry, amounting in the whole to $2,800.
+
+The impartial reader, therefore, from the excerpts of his correspondence
+and the summary of the jewelry, will be enabled to form a pretty fair
+idea of the esteem in which the captain formerly held his wife. Ah! but
+then the reader is not aware that Olly is very handsome, and so very,
+very gay! Olly's immaculate shirt-bosom was in the habit of bristling
+with diamonds, in the midst of which, like a headlight at the
+mizzen-top, coruscated a diamond cluster pin.
+
+Marie was not jealous without a cause. Of this, every lady who has read
+thus far is morally convinced. Marie and her "spy" had discovered the
+cause, just sixteen brief days after Olly had penned that remarkable
+letter, with a benediction and a "kiss-me" lozenge at the end, Mrs.
+Hazard and her maid, Esther Doerner, hied them down and across town
+until they reached a boarding-house on West Ninth street. What happened
+in this high-toned hash dispensary let Miss Margaret Gilman, an
+eye-witness, proclaim by her affidavit:
+
+"At half-past eight in the evening, Mrs. Hazard came in and went to a
+hall bed-room in the front, and knocked at the door of said room. She
+was accompanied by her maid, Esther Doerner. After she knocked, the door
+was opened from within by Lena Kimball. Lena attempted to close the
+door, but Mrs. Hazard's superior strength forced an opening, and she and
+her maid entered." Now let lynx-eyed Esther take up the narrative for a
+brief space: "Lena was but slightly clothed, having only a skirt and a
+sacque on. Lena asked: 'Who is this woman?' Mrs. Hazard replied, 'I
+am his lawful wife--you are his mistress!'" Then ensued a scene which
+Margaret and Esther are in accord in describing: "Lena attacked Mrs.
+Hazard, slapped her in the face and pulled her hair, said captain,
+meantime, holding his wife's hands and thus preventing her defending
+herself!"
+
+Let us hear Miss Margaret C. Gilman, who is a dressmaker, a little
+further: "About the following Thursday I visited No. 106 West Sixteenth
+street, at request of said Lena Kimball, to arrange about a dress for
+her, when I saw said Captain Hazard enter the room of Lena. I left them
+together, alone. Lena told me that the captain would commence
+proceedings for a divorce from his wife."
+
+Progressing chronologically onwards, we come to another day when Olly
+and his wife were quarreling at a great rate in their home up-town. It
+appeared that the captain had between $4,000 and $5,000 deposited in the
+Seamen's Savings Bank, and his wife was anxious that the money should be
+drawn and be equally divided between them. To this Olly demurred,
+whereupon the irate wife locked her faithless lord in the house, and
+kept him a close prisoner till he threw up the sponge and promised to
+accede to her demands. He obtained his liberty, and ostensibly left the
+house for the purpose of drawing the money and transferring $2,000 of it
+to his wife's account. What he did do was to draw the cash, go to his
+brother-in-law's, pay some debts, and then hand $3,000 to Lawrence
+Phillips, an insurance broker, at 85 Beaver street.
+
+Of course, Olly did not return to his "blessed and darling wife" that
+night, nor the next, nor ever again. He had, no doubt, an attack of the
+old "horable imaginations," and deemed it advisable to put himself on an
+oatmeal diet somewhere in New Jersey. What he did do, as Marie's
+detective discovered, was to proceed with Lena to Taylor's Hotel, Jersey
+City, where they registered as Mr. and Mrs. James Peake, of
+Philadelphia. While enjoying this voluptuous seclusion with the
+fascinating young blonde, Olly was plotting mischief and otherwise
+conspiring against the forlorn Marie's peace and happiness. The
+following documents disclose the form their unchaste deliberations
+assumed. On the eleventh of February, the ill-used Olly sent a freezing
+letter to his wife, from which we quote:
+
+"In view of the unhappy relations which exist and have for many years
+existed between us, I have reached the conclusion that it is impossible
+for us longer to live together as man and wife. Your manner of treating
+me has been so outrageous that it is necessary, in order to live with
+you that I should sacrifice my manhood, my independence and my
+self-respect, as well as the respect of all the members of my family and
+of my friends. While I believe your conduct would, in the eyes of the
+law and society, warrant me in refusing you all support, still I am
+inclined to deal liberally with you, and I have clothed Mr. Stanton, my
+counsel, with power to arrange the details of a separation." He then
+goes on to state that, in such an arrangement, certain considerations
+should have full weight, to wit: "That I am at present suspended from my
+situation, and that you assert you brought about my suspension; that you
+have a very comfortable home, for which I pay the rent, with about $5000
+worth of furniture, which I would be willing to turn over to you; that
+you have valuable diamonds, and that I have given you a great deal of
+money of late."
+
+Marie was, no doubt, pondering over her frigid Olly's proposal, and
+making up her mind how to proceed, when another letter reached her. It
+was written in a bold, clear, round hand. It bore no date or
+superscription, but the envelope is stamped: "New York, Feb. 12, 12
+o'c." The letter might have been written by a love-crazed Cassandra. It
+was as follows:
+
+
+"You imagine me in Philadelphia. Not so. I am in the city, and will
+remain here until I accomplish the ruin and destruction of the old fool,
+your husband, and yourself. I have sworn revenge on you and I shall keep
+my oath. I do not care a damn for the old man. You expect him home
+to-night, but you will be disappointed. The old fool is trying to get a
+divorce from you now. My vengeance being accomplished I will leave the
+city, and not until then.
+
+"With hatred and revenge, I am your enemy until death,         LINA
+KIMBALL."
+
+
+Mrs. Hazard had been acting under legal advice, so far as the discovery
+and proof of her husband's unfaithfulness were concerned. But
+determining upon a more active and aggressive warfare, she was prudently
+advised to intrust her interests to Messrs. Howe & Hummel. The conflict
+was speedily begun. On February 16th the first papers in the case were
+served upon Captain Hazard at his lawyer's office, 198 Broadway. On the
+same day Mr. Henry Stanton promptly gave notice of his appearance
+in Olly's behalf. On the twentieth of February, on the application of
+Howe & Hummel, an order of arrest was granted by Judge Donohue,
+on the ground that the defendant intended to leave the city, and that
+any order for alimony would thereby be ineffectual. On the following
+day the captain did leave the city for Boston, and registered at the
+Parker House. It is alleged that he was seen with Lena Kimball in
+the Hub; but the captain explained afterwards that he had not
+vamoosed on purpose--he had gone to inspect a ship, with the
+possible intention of buying a captain's share.
+
+On February 28th, Mr. Stanton served upon Messrs. Howe & Hummel a copy
+of a petition and notice of motion returnable the third Monday in March.
+On the same day the complaint was served upon defendant's lawyer.
+Meantime, detectives were on the _qui vive_ for Olly. They had his
+portrait on tin imperial size, and they had a lock of his hair in an
+envelope. There were certain lager-beer saloons in the vicinage of Sixth
+avenue and Sixteenth street he was said to frequent. A sharp lookout was
+kept on his brother-in-law, Bradbury, as well. On March 19th the sheriff
+tapped the distinguished son of Neptune on the shoulder and exhibited a
+momentous piece of paper. The captain took an observation and hauled
+down his colors as a free man. He was a prisoner and put himself
+promptly in tow. After a short run and a few tackings they ran into
+Ludlow Harbor, and all was made taut for the captain.
+
+Next day the petition and motion was argued for the prisoner, by Mr.
+Stanton, before Judge Lawrence. Mr. Hummel opposed on behalf of Mrs.
+Hazard. It was argued that the alleged acts of adultery had been
+condoned; that the defendant had no intention of leaving the state; that
+when he separated from the plaintiff he went to live with his
+brother-in-law and mother; and that he went to Boston for the purpose
+already stated. The alleged pokerings and dirkings and pistolings were
+dilated upon. Esther, the spy, was denounced. It was affirmed that "on
+one occasion, when he returned," with the odor of the sea fresh upon
+him, "plaintiff had a baby." It has never been claimed that he was the
+father of it. Nor does he know who is the father. He has never been able
+to find out the paternity of that babe, "nor does he know who the mother
+is." Notwithstanding that he has been suffered to swell almost to
+bursting with ignorance of these bottom facts, he "has been forced to
+support it." He showed that Mrs. Hazard possessed diamonds and furniture
+and twenty-one building lots on Long Island; that she had been
+extravagant as to crayon portraits and carriage hire; that for the
+last-mentioned item alone her expenses for February had been about
+eighty-seven dollars. Wherefore, counsel argued, the court ought either
+to dismiss the arrest or reduce the bail from $6,000, at which it had
+been fixed. Mr. Howe had an equally affecting story to rehearse. He
+showed that Mrs. Hazard had been compelled, through her husband's
+neglect to provide her with money, to pay several visits to a relative
+of hers, to whom the adage "Blood is thicker than water" does not apply.
+With this personage she had left, for pecuniary considerations received,
+her diamond cross and other valuables.
+
+The judge took the papers and, a few days afterward, ordered the parties
+to the suit to appear before a referee, who was instructed to take proof
+as to the defendant's ability to pay alimony, and to determine what
+amount should be paid. On the evidence taken before the referee,
+Lamberson, who died before the testimony was all in, both sides agreed
+on the question of alimony.
+
+Thus far Mrs. Hazard's lawyers had carried all before them like an
+irresistible flood. They now turned their attention to Lena Kimball.
+Mrs. Hazard had not forgotten nor forgiven that face-slapping and
+hair-pulling in Ninth street. Lena's maledictory epistle had added
+brimstone to the fire. And so it came to pass that Messrs. Howe & Hummel
+brought an action in the Supreme Court against Lena for the assault and
+battery of their client. An order of arrest was promptly issued by the
+court, holding the ravishing young blonde in bail in the sum of one
+thousand dollars. After she had enjoyed the hospitalities of the warden
+for two days, the captain planked down a thousand dollars in the hands
+of the sheriff, and Lena was free.
+
+Behold, now, how tribulation followed tribulation!
+
+Two days after Lena had breathed the air of freedom, Mrs. Hazard and her
+lawyers went before a police magistrate, and had the fair creature
+arrested criminally for the same offense of assault and battery. Being
+produced, Mrs. Kimball gave the required bail to answer at Special
+Sessions. A fortnight afterwards the case came up. Lena pleaded guilty,
+and was fined.
+
+After a good deal more litigation, an order was entered in the Supreme
+Court referring the many issues of the case to James P. Ledwith, Esq.,
+to take testimony and report thereon to the court. Many hearings were
+had before the referee, and finally his report was in favor of the
+plaintiff, Mrs. Hazard, who was awarded an absolute divorce, with a
+liberal allowance of alimony and costs.
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+THE BARON AND "BARONESS."
+
+_The Romance of Baron Henri Arnous de Reviere, and "The Buckeye
+Baroness," Helene Stille_.
+
+During one October, our offices were visited by a lady who had achieved
+considerable distinction, as well as notoriety, in Parisian society.
+This was Mrs. Helene Cecille Stille, otherwise the "Baroness de
+Reviere," and sometimes designated "The Buckeye Baroness," She came for
+the purpose of prosecuting a charge against the Baron de Reviere of
+"wrongful conversion and unlawful detention of personal property,"
+arising from circumstances which will appear further on.
+
+The "Baroness" was then, as she still is, a handsome woman. She was then
+somewhat on the youthful side of thirty. Highly attractive and
+fascinating, her every movement and gesture bespoke a vigorous physical
+organization and perfect health. While the curves of her fine form
+partook more of Juno's majestic frame than Hebe's pliant youth--while
+the full sweep and outline of her figure denoted maturity and
+completeness in every part, the charming face, the large, gazelle eyes,
+the voluptuous ease of her attitude, the gentle languor of her whole
+bearing, constituted a woman which few susceptible young or even mature
+men could have looked on without misgivings that they might but too soon
+learn to long for the glances, the smiles, the witcheries which had made
+Helene Cecille Stille, in many respects, a counterpart of Helen of
+Troy.
+
+We were not acquainted with the lady's antecedents nor with her
+remarkable history; but she told a plausible story, and was very fluent
+and indignant, as may be gathered from the following extract from the
+affidavit which was drawn under her instructions at the time:
+
+Superior Court of the City of New York: Helene Stille, plaintiff,
+against the Baron Henri de Reviere, defendant. City and County of New
+York, ss.--Helene Stille, of said city being duly sworn, says that she
+is the above-named plaintiff, and that she has a good cause of action
+against said defendant for wrongful conversion and unlawful detention of
+personal property, arising on the following facts, namely:
+
+In the summer of 1865, in the French empire, the above-named defendant,
+giving himself out to be a French nobleman of princely fortune, and then
+representing himself to deponent as an unmarried man, but being in
+truth, as deponent has since discovered, then a married man and a common
+plebeian, swindler and common _chevalier d' industrie;_ by divers arts,
+devices, false pretences and allurements, gained this plaintiff's
+affections and confidence, and did, by false, wicked and fraudulent
+devices, debauch this plaintiff and induce her to live with him as his
+wife; and having thus basely obtained ascendancy over her and won her
+confidence, did, by trick and device, induce this plaintiff to deposit
+with him for safe keeping on the tenth day of September, at the city of
+Paris, in France, the sum of twenty-seven thousand five hundred francs
+in gold coin, and of the value of seven thousand five hundred dollars of
+American money, belonging to this deponent; and said defendant then and
+there promised and agreed to return the same property to this deponent
+on request.
+
+And this deponent says, that having ascertained the defendant's real
+character, she demanded the restoration to her of said money by said
+defendant, when said defendant absconded from France and is now in this
+City and wholly refuses to return said amount of seven thousand five
+hundred dollars to deponent, or any part thereof; but said defendant has
+wrongfully converted said property to his own use, and now unlawfully
+detains the same from this deponent, at said city of New York, and is
+now, as deponent is informed and verily believes, about to quit this
+city, said defendant being only a transient boarder at the New York
+Hotel in this city.
+
+Judge Freedman granted the application for an order of arrest; the
+warrant was placed in the hands of Sheriff O'Brien; and Deputy Sheriffs
+Laurence, Delmore and the present elegant police court clerk, John
+McGowan, proceeded to the New York Hotel, and just as the guests were
+assembling for dinner, the haughty aristocrat was made a prisoner,
+despite his indignant protests.
+
+In the newspapers of the day Mrs. Stille was described as "a beautiful
+woman, twenty-eight years old, who has seen more life all over the globe
+than any woman of her age now living." She was born in Cincinnati, Ohio,
+the daughter of respectable and well-to-do parents. Superbly developed
+and precocious, at a very early age Helene began to sound the chords of
+feeling and to taste the Circean cup that promises gratification and
+excitement, mingled with so much after-bitterness. When she was yet
+seventeen, she was married to George Stille at Philadelphia, after the
+briefest kind of an acquaintance. With him she came to New York, living
+in a style of careless gayety. Early in 1867, she gave birth to a child,
+named George after his father, and in June of that year Mrs. Stille, and
+Georgie, and his nurse, Mrs. Demard, were living in Saratoga. The
+dashing young wife's flirtative proclivities led to a quarrel with her
+husband, and he left her in a huff. His desertion did not perceptibly
+disturb the serene elasticity of her mind. She possessed expansive
+tastes and a capacious heart, and she was speedily consoling herself by
+the attentions of George W. Beers in the gay watering-place. When
+Helene, Mr. Beers, the baby and the nurse returned to New York in
+September, they occupied a suite of rooms at the Prescott House. Not
+unnaturally, the presence of the dashing woman in the hotel created a
+sensation, as such a presence always will, as long as men continue to be
+the weak, erring, susceptible creatures they are. So Helene was
+flattered, and courted, and admired; and as usual, some she fancied,
+some she liked, some she laughed at, and some she reserved for her more
+precious favors. Then, of course, Beers mounted up on his ear, and there
+was a quarrel, which resulted in the party leaving the Prescott House
+for quarters over the club house at the corner of Prince and Mercer
+streets. More quarrels for the same cause eventuated here, and then
+Beers left her for a while. Not at all disconcerted, she took the child
+and his nurse to the St. Denis Hotel, where Beers again returned,
+magnanimous and forgiving. But alas, it was no use. Helene's craving for
+admiration, masculine attention and money were insatiable. So Beers
+became wildly jealous and indignant, and left her for good. When next
+heard of, she was in Paris, where she had succeeded in making the
+acquaintance of the Due de Morny, and sometimes figured as _la
+Duchesse_.
+
+Baron Henri Arnous de Reviere was the eldest son of Baron William Arnous
+de Reviere, Counsellor-general of the Department of the Loire Inferior.
+The title is hereditary; the family estate is situated at Varades; and
+the ancestral records are kept in the archives of the ancient city of
+Rennes in Brittany. The Baron first cropped up in this country about the
+outbreak of the rebellion, when people here and in England were in great
+excitement over the steps taken by the general government in securing
+the arrest of Messrs. Mason and Slidell. He had apparently made one of
+the elder Dumas' heroes his exalted ideal, for at the period we speak of
+he had set the fashionable world of Gotham agog by making a romantic
+conquest of a Mobile belle, who, after becoming thoroughly infatuated
+with him, eloped to a prominent watering-place. The interference of her
+friends prevented the consummation of a wedding; but his escapade formed
+the subject of a book, afterwards dramatized, and acted at Wallack's
+Theatre. Subsequently the Baron married Miss Blount, the daughter of a
+rich Southern lawyer.
+
+When he returned to Paris, his fame had preceded him. Society in the gay
+capital under the empire was of the kind to appreciate his exploits and
+to exalt him into a sort of rivalship of Monte Cristo. He assiduously
+attended the theaters and salons, receiving homage everywhere-even from
+the emperor himself. Finally he mounted the rostrum, and his lectures on
+_L'Amour_ were the talk of the gay city.
+
+Among those who had rushed to listen to the Baron's impassioned
+eloquence was Helene Cecille Stille, now the proprietress of the
+handsomest hotel on the Rue Mont-martre. It need scarcely be premised
+that the wandering and appreciative eyes of the lecturer had rested on
+the beautiful American, as she sat before him in an attitude expressive
+of dormant passion, tinged with an imperious coquetry which was one of
+the most alluring of her charms. The Hotel Montmartre was then the
+fashionable resort of Louis Napoleon's dissolute nobility, and the Baron
+de Reviere soon found himself a worshiper in the luxurious retreat. He
+was not a man who courted by halves. He fell madly in love with the
+voluptuous Helene, and yielding to an irresistible penchant, the soiled
+beauty threw herself and her accumulated francs into his arms.
+
+The Baron was one of those few men whose manners were perfect and whose
+dress never strikes the eye, but which seems to have developed on them
+as the natural foliage of their persons. He had a high appreciation of
+the enjoyments of life--vanity, ostentation, good eating, and even the
+austere joys of the family. At home with his wife he illustrated the
+tender assiduity of the young husband; abroad he was the personification
+of a youth just freed from parental discipline. While his wife was the
+happiest woman in Paris, he was rendering Miss Stille equally
+felicitous. The dinners he gave at home were unexcelled except by those
+banquets which he gave at the hotel in the Rue Montmartre.
+
+So complete had become the Baron's infatuation with the fair Helene in
+September, that he took her to Biarritz, and, according to her own
+story, introduced her to the Emperor Napoleon. "Then," to use her own
+language when examined under oath, "I came back to Paris; stayed there
+about a week, and then went to London with de Reviere. After spending
+ten days in London, we went back to Paris and stopped at the Hotel de
+Louvre. We then went to Bordeaux, where I remained a few days, and
+whence I went to Lisbon, Portugal, staying six weeks, and went back to
+Paris by way of Marseilles, traveling part of the distance in the yacht
+of the Bey of Tunis. From Paris, I went with de Reviere to Nantes,
+thence to Nazarre, where I stayed two days with de Review's sister."
+
+At this time the lady described her possessions as follows: "I had two
+hundred thousand francs worth of furniture, fifty thousand francs of
+_objects de vertu_, nine horses, five carriages, a hundred thousand
+francs worth of jewelry, many India shawls, twenty thousand francs worth
+of furs of every kind and description known in the world, any quantity
+of laces, twelve velvet dresses of different shades, and a toilet-set
+worth eighty-thousand francs, besides an income derived from my family
+in America of sixty thousand dollars," received regularly through the
+hands of her banker Mr. John Monroe of 5 Rue de la Paix.
+
+Helene Stille then disposed of her _maison_ and started with the Baron
+de Reviere on a trip to South America. A full account of that trip would
+read like a supplement to the Arabian Nights. For the purposes of this
+tour the lady became the Baroness de Reviere, and the pair traveled
+through the land of Cortez and Pizarro like some fabled Eastern
+conquerors. A courier rode ahead, and engaged nearly the entire
+apartments of every hotel at which they condescended to stop. Postilions
+and outriders accompanied their entrance. In the hotels the Baron and
+"Baroness" had their magnificent court dresses unpacked to impress and
+bewilder and confound the guests, while the gaping domestics would
+spread the news abroad until the entire population of the town would be
+assembled open-mouthed in front of the Baron's hotel, watching his
+movements and admiring in no stinted terms the statuesque beauty of the
+"Baroness." This extensive triumphal procession cost a lot of money,
+every cent of which is said to have been paid by the infatuated woman.
+
+It was during their progress through Peru that she seems to have first
+made the discovery that the Baron already possessed one legal wife. From
+that hour, it is related to her credit, she stopped all marital
+relations. She parted from her companion then and there, and returned to
+Paris. She had two children by the Baron, as she testified in the legal
+proceedings brought by her. The eldest, a boy, was named "Monsieur le
+Comte Edmond Viel d'Espenilles; the girl, Santa Maria Rosa de
+Lenia--names given them by the Baron; for," added the lady, "he is fond
+of long and sonorous names."
+
+After the separation the Baron and Helene Stille were at daggers drawn.
+They had some virulent litigation in Paris, and when the Baron came to
+New York with his family, consisting of his wife, two children, two men
+servants and three maid servants, she quickly followed. The Baron and
+his establishment were sojourning at the Clarendon Hotel, when he
+received the following letter:
+
+
+"MONSIEUR HENRI DE REVIERE:
+
+I wish to know whether you intend doing anything toward the support of
+your child? She is a poor, delicate little thing, being afflicted with
+curvature of the spine. I have had her under treatment of Dr. Taylor for
+the last three months and his charges are five hundred dollars, which
+for me, with my other expenses, is a great deal. I hope you will
+consider my claim a just one and act accordingly. Rosa de Lenia is one
+of the most beautiful children in the world, and I love her with such a
+love as you could never dream of.
+
+Reply by bearer, or send reply later in the day, just as you feel
+disposed; but a reply I must have. I should think your _amour proper_
+would not allow you to abandon your child, as you have done for nearly
+three years.
+
+HOFFMAN HOUSE, Sept. 26        HELENE DE STILLE"
+
+
+The rejoinder was insulting, and so she had him arrested in order that
+"he might disclose those dreadful things he pretended to know about me."
+
+There was a hearing of the lady's case before Judge Jones of the
+Superior Court, when most of the foregoing particulars of Miss Stille's
+history was drawn from her in cross-examination by the defendant's
+counsel. At a subsequent hearing the Baron contributed an affidavit
+containing many startling assertions accompanied by big figures.
+
+"I left Paris in April for Madrid," he began, giving exactly the same
+route already described by Miss Stille. Continuing, he said, "Further, I
+have had an office as government contractor for artillery and ships of
+war. I also contracted with a Liverpool ship-builder (Laird) for two
+iron-clads and four steam corvettes for twelve million francs. I acted
+as agent and partner of L. Arman of Bordeaux and Vous of Nantes, and
+received in one year for my share eleven hundred thousand francs profit.
+I sold forty guns to the Danish government, receiving as my commission
+forty-five thousand francs. I sold in 1884, to the Prussian government,
+an iron-clad and two steam corvettes for seven million five hundred
+thousand francs, and received five per cent, commission." Then he
+professed to have had gigantic contracts in Chili, Peru and other parts
+of South America for artillery and guano. Altogether his story was of
+the Brobdingnagian type.
+
+The case, however, never came to trial, the friends of both parties to
+the action suggesting an amicable settlement of their differences, which
+being adjusted to everyone's satisfaction, the Baron went his way,
+lecturing on "Love," a theme on which he was most conversant, and the
+fair Helene spent her time flitting between this city and gay Paris, in
+both of which cities she is thoroughly at home. And so the somewhat
+famous episode ended, so far as the office of Howe and Hummel was
+concerned.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+THE DEMI-MONDE.
+
+Reader, did you ever try to estimate the malign influence upon society
+of one single fallen woman? Did you ever endeavor to calculate the evils
+of such a leaven stealthily disseminating its influence in a community?
+Woman, courted, flattered, fondled, tempted and deceived, becomes in
+turn the terrible Nemesis--the insatiate Avenger of her sex! Armed with
+a power which is all but irresistible, and stripped of that which alone
+can retain and purify her influence, she steps upon the arena of life
+ready to act her part in the demoralization of society. As some one has
+remarked, "the _lex talionis_--the law of retaliation--is hers. Society
+has made her what she is, and must now be governed by her potent
+influence." Surely the weight of this influence baffles computation!
+View it in shattered domestic ties, in the sacrifice of family peace, in
+the cold desolation of once happy homes! See the eldest son and hope of
+a proud family, educated in an atmosphere of virtue and principle, who
+has given promise of high and noble qualities. He falls a victim to the
+fashionable vice, and carries back to his hitherto untainted home the
+lethal influence he has imbibed. Another and another, within the range
+of that influence, suffers for his lapse from moral rectitude, and they
+in turn become the agents and disseminators of fresh evils.
+
+This promiscuous association is tacitly regarded as a necessary evil,
+the suppression of which would produce alarming and disastrous effects
+upon the community at large. The passions, indolence, and the love of
+dress and display are the main agents in producing the class of women we
+have under consideration. It is a vulgar error and a popular delusion,
+that the life of a fallen woman is as revolting to herself as it appears
+to the moralist and philanthropist. Authors of vivid imagination love to
+portray the misery that is brought on an innocent and confiding girl by
+the perfidy and desertion of her seducer. The stage presents the picture
+with all its accessories of light, color and morbid emotion. The pulpit
+takes up the theme and howls its evangelical horrors, picturing those
+women as being a continuous prey to "the long-beaked, filthy vulture of
+unending despair." Women who in youth have lost their virtue, often
+contrive to retain their reputation, and even when this is not the case,
+frequently amalgamate with the purer portion of the population, and
+become, to all outward appearance, good members of society.
+
+The love of woman is usually pure and elevated. But when she devotes her
+affections to a man who realizes her ideal, she does not hesitate to
+sacrifice all she holds dear for his gratification. Actuated by a noble
+self-abnegation, she derives a melancholy pleasure from the knowledge
+that she has utterly given up all she had formerly so zealously guarded,
+and she feels that her love has reached its grand climacteric when she
+abandons herself, without redemption, to the idol she has set up in the
+highest place in her soul. This heroic martyrdom is one of the
+recognizable causes of the immorality that insidiously permeates our
+social system.
+
+The crime of prostitution can be witnessed in New York in every phase in
+which it invites or repels the passions of men. There are the splendid
+parlor houses distributed in the most fashionable parts of the city;
+there are the bar houses; there are the dance houses; and there are the
+miserable basements where this traffic is seen in its hideous deformity,
+divested of the gaslight glare and tinsel of the high-toned seraglios.
+The internal arrangements of the palatial bagnios are in many instances
+sumptuous, magnificent and suggestive. The walls of these seductive
+arsenals, too, are frequently of a color calculated to throw the most
+becoming shade over the inmates, while the pictures on the walls usually
+suggest resplendent sensuality. Many of these gilded palaces are
+patronized by prominent citizens, officials in the government, state and
+civic employ. Many of them, already married, keep mistresses in these
+establishments, while others are content to be recognized as "lovers" of
+the inmates. Many of the country merchants who periodically visit New
+York insist on being taken the "grand rounds," as it is termed, before
+they will order goods or attend to business at all. The salesmen in our
+leading houses are expect to be posted, and to act as escorts sad
+chaperones in this wine-guzzling tour. Indeed, so much is this
+disgraceful feature recognized in some large business houses, that the
+proprietors make an allowance to their salesmen for this purpose.
+
+The proprietresses of these houses are all impervious to shame, and
+carry on their trade with the sole ambition of realizing money. Many of
+them have summer establishments and suburban villas at the
+watering-places, and carry on their nefarious business at Saratoga, Long
+Branch, Coney Island, Newport and Cape May during the summer mouths.
+Many of them own handsome equipages, in which, gorgeously attired, with
+liveried menials, they show themselves in Central Park to the envy of
+the virtuous and honest of womankind. It is in the places kept by these
+women, where the inmates are usually handsome young girls between the
+ages of fifteen and thirty, that the precocious and well-to-do young men
+of this city fall an easy prey to vice, and become in time the haggard
+and dissolute man of the town, or degenerate into the forger, the bank
+defaulter or the swindler.
+
+The bar and basement brothels, profusely scattered over the lower
+portions of the city, present the most miserable phase of this
+disgusting evil. Nearly all these places are kept by men, though
+nominally under control of their mistresses and wives, who are generally
+hideous specimens of womanhood, and whose features present the traits of
+sensuality, cruelty and avarice as clearly expressed as if traced there
+by Belial himself. The men, flashily dressed and bejeweled, their flabby
+features decorated by a huge dyed mustache, frequent race courses and
+other places of public resort, and loud in appearance as they are
+obscene in talk, are, in the estimation of every self-respecting man,
+eminently fitted by Lucifer for laboring in the State-prison quarries
+for the term of their natural lives.
+
+The inmates of these basement brothels invite the pencil of a Hogarth.
+Their bloated forms, pimpled features and bloodshot eyes are suggestive
+of an Inferno, while their tawdry dresses, brazen leer, and disgusting
+assumption of an air of gay abandon, emphasizes their hideousness and
+renders it more repulsive. Most of them have passed through the
+successive grades of immorality. Some of them have been the queenly
+mistress of the spendthrift, and have descended, step by step, to the
+foul, degraded beings of those human charnel-houses. In some instances
+fresh-looking girls will be seen, and careful inquiry will discover the
+fact that they were either emigrant or innocent country girls, who have
+been inveigled into these dens by the arts of procuresses or brought
+there by their seducers. Unsophisticated and unacquainted with life in a
+great city, without money or friends, they have been entrapped and
+compelled to submit to a life of shame by the coarse words and
+frequently the brutal violence of their captors.
+
+Between the two extremes of unfortunates already described, there is
+another class nomadic in their habits. Some of these are street-walkers,
+some frequent dance houses like The Allen's, Billy McGlory's, Owney
+Geoghegan's and Harry Hill's, while others circulate around such
+up-town, west-side houses as the French Madame's, the Haymarket and Tom
+Gould's. They usually live in furnished rooms, in houses owned by
+wealthy and respectable citizens, let to them by agents who lease them
+at exorbitant rents, paid in advance. In both the eastern, western and
+central portions of the city they may be found occupying rooms on the
+same floors with respectable families. These women seldom conduct the
+prey that they have allured to their home, but to some assignation house
+or fourth-rate hotel, of which there are a large number scattered over
+the city.
+
+Most of this class of unfortunates have a "lover"--a gambler or pimp,
+who occupies their room and assumes the role of husband and protector
+for the nonce, with the privilege of spending the girl's blood money in
+drink or dissipation, and unmercifully beating her when he feels
+inclined that way. The pair call this place their home, and as they are
+shiftless in their habits, and careless of sickness, they are frequently
+in a condition of chronic impecuniosity and are thus liable to be "fired
+out" by the heartless agent. Many of these girls, from their association
+with vicious society, become thieves, and ply their light-fingered
+privateering while caressing their victim. It is a favorite dodge of
+some of the more comely and shapely of this class, especially the
+frequenters of such places as Gould's, the Haymarket, the French
+Ma-dames, the Star and Garter, and the Empire, to ask gentlemen on whom
+they have been unavailingly airing their becks and nods and other
+fascinations to put a quarter into the top of their hosiery "for luck."
+They usually get the quarter, and sometimes the man as well.
+
+The assignation houses are usually located convenient to the great
+arteries of travel, and, as we have already hinted, they are largely
+patronized; while the number of "flash hotels" which are frequented by
+the "soiled doves" and their mates, is also numerous and scarcely less
+notorious than the assignation houses. The proprietors of these
+"convenient" hotels invariably keep the hotel register required by law,
+but agreeably fail to ask their lodgers for the time being to chronicle
+either their own or even a fictitious name, thus, day after day,
+violating a specific statute.
+
+Besides these, there are assignation houses of a far different
+character. By these we mean the introducing houses, such as ostensible
+millinery establishments and the like in fashionable but retired
+streets, where ladies meet their lovers. Married women of the _haut
+ton_, with wealthy, hard-working husbands courting Mammon downtown,
+imitating the custom of Messalina, not uncommonly make use of these
+places. Sometimes the lady will even take along her young child as a
+"blind," and the little innocent will be regaled with sweetmeats in the
+parlor while the mother keeps her appointment up-stairs.
+
+Liberally, every woman who yields to her passions and loses her virtue
+is what Tom Hood would have called "one more unfortunate," but many draw
+a distinction between those who live by promiscuous intercourse, and
+those who merely manifest, like the ladies referred to above, a
+_penchant_ for one man. There is still another denomination of this
+latter kind, whom all the world has heard of as kept mistresses. These
+women exercise a potent influence upon society and contribute largely to
+swell the numbers of well-to-do young men who manifest an invincible
+distaste to marriage. Lais, when under the protection of a prince of the
+blood; Aspasia, whose friend is one of the most influential noblemen in
+the kingdom; Phryne, the _chere ami_ of a well-known officer, or a man
+of wealth known on the stock exchange and in the city--have all great
+influence upon the tone of morality, while the glare of their dazzling
+profligacy falls upon and bewilders those who are in a lower condition
+of life, and acts as an incentive to similar deeds of licentiousness,
+though necessarily on a more limited scale.
+
+The prevalence of the kept mistress surpasses the wildest imagining in
+this city, although in many a home her dire influence has extinguished
+the Hymeneal torch, and left nothing but ashes and desolation. It is a
+great mistake to imagine that these kept women are without friends and
+debarred from society. On the contrary, their acquaintance, if not
+select, is numerous. They are useful, good-looking, piquant, tasteful
+and vivacious. Many of them have more than one lover, and conduct their
+amours with singular _finesse_, generally escaping detection. They are
+rarely possessed of more than a smattering of education, because their
+ranks are recruited from a class where education is not in vogue. They
+are not, as a rule, disgusted with their mode of living--most of them
+consider it as a means to an end, and in no measure degrading or
+polluting. Most of them look forward to marriage and a certain state in
+society as their ultimate lot. Many of these women reside in the most
+fashionable apartment houses up-town, and successfully conceal their
+shame from the inquisitive eye of the respectable matron. They may also
+be seen in the most fashionable hotels and boarding houses, while they
+have even crept in as members of institutions and organizations which
+were incepted solely for the benefit of high-toned and virtuous women.
+Moreover, they are to be seen in boxes at the theatre and the opera, and
+in almost every accessible place where wealthy and fashionable people
+congregate. In point of fact, through the potent influence of their more
+or less wealthy protector, they possess the open sesame to all places
+where admittance is not secured by vouchers, and in many instances those
+apparently insuperable barriers fall before their indorser's tact and
+address.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+PASSION'S SLAVES AND VICTIMS.
+
+_A Matter of Untold History--The Terrible Machinery of the Law as a
+Means of Persecution--Edwin James's Rascality_.
+
+Our practice has furnished many illustrations of Thackeray's shrewd
+remark, that "Most men have sailed near the dangerous isles of the
+Sirens at some time of their lives, and some have come away thence
+wanting a strait-waistcoat." The following is a case in point, which
+occurred in the time of the Tweed _regime_. The position, wealth and
+influence of the somewhat mature Lothario, backed by the more or less
+corrupt judiciary of those days, prevented the ventilation of this most
+remarkable and sensational scandal of our times in the newspapers. Begun
+as a piquant flirtation, the intimacy, so far as the principal actor was
+concerned, traversed all the stages between bliss and rapture on the one
+side, and fear and remorse on the other--between garlands of roses and
+the iron link, forging a clanking manacle of the past. A man of
+singularly graceful presence and attractive mien; a leading member of
+the bar, whose Corinthian taste and princely hospitality nominated him
+as a fitting host of the Queen of England's eldest son, when he visited
+this city; a prominent figure in the returning board that conferred the
+Presidency on Hayes; and finally his country's representative at a
+leading European court; he now sleeps the sleep which sooner or later
+comes to all--to victim as well as to victimizer.
+
+It was about sundown of a beautiful evening in the early autumn of 1865,
+that the aristocratic lawyer first beheld the lady with whom he was to
+become so insanely infatuated. But slightly advanced in the thirties,
+the widow of a leading officer of the Confederate Army Medical Staff,
+and formerly a leading Baltimore belle, she was a fascinating and
+beautiful woman, when meeting the lawyer that evening on Fifth avenue,
+near Delmonico's old place, she met Fate. It seems to have been a mutual
+infatuation--a case of love at first sight, and in a moment of delirium,
+under an impulse which was perhaps uncontrollable, she sacrificed her
+virtue and her self-respect.
+
+The story of her infatuation reads like the distempered dream of an
+opium-eater. It was a case of fervent love on both sides. They met on
+the avenue, looked, spoke and, without more ado, proceeded to
+Delmonico's to sup. The amour thus begun soon assumed a romantic
+intensity. When she left the city, he dispatched ridiculously "spoony"
+telegrams to her in Baltimore, and in his daily letters indulged in a
+maudlin sentimentality that might have inspired the envy of a sighing
+Strephon in his teens.
+
+During the summer of 1866, while his wife was in the country, he brought
+his Baltimore inamoretta to New York, and established her in his
+splendid mansion on the Avenue. With an impudence and infatuation
+perfectly astounding in so shrewd a man, he took no pains to conceal his
+conquest. Jauntily would he pace down Broadway with her on his arm in
+the morning, and in the evening she would be in waiting to accompany him
+home.
+
+Tidings of this open _liaison_ reached the lawyer's wife in her retreat
+among the Vermont hills, and she promptly came to New York and dislodged
+the mistress _pro tem_. Relatives of the infatuated widow also appeared
+at this juncture and strongly urged her to conquer her mad infatuation,
+while a like appeal was made to the lawyer. But he was deaf to reason.
+He refused to give up his idol, and the widow declared her intention, to
+use her own language, "of sticking to him as long as he had a button on
+his coat."
+
+Time sped on. The lawyer's passion began to be exhausted, and the
+unending insistence of her's began to excite his repugnance. As Ouida
+happily remarked, "A woman who is ice to his fire, is less pain to a man
+than the woman who is fire to his ice." There is hope for him in the
+one, but only a dreary despair in the other. In the latter part of 1867,
+the lawyer began to realize the force of this philosophy. The amorous
+widow was then boarding at the Metropolitan Hotel, and he began to take
+the initiatory steps to be rid of her. After two years of madness,
+during which she had sacrificed the respect of every relative she had,
+including her own daughter, a pretty girl in her teens, it was hardly
+likely that he would evince the moral courage to declare openly and
+straightforward to her that their relations must end. On the contrary,
+he invoked the aid of three lawyers--two of them her own cousins, the
+other bearing an historic name--to kidnap and spirit her out of the
+city. First they forcibly conveyed her to police headquarters. Then, in
+spite of tears and protestations, she was kept all night in a dark room.
+Her screams and entreaties might have moved a heart of stone, but they
+were unavailing. In the morning she saw Superintendent Kennedy, and
+demanded the cause of the outrage. He informed her that she had been
+brought there on a charge of being insane about the lawyer. A physician
+was summoned, and by his direction, after he had submitted her to an
+examination, she was sent back to her hotel. During the same afternoon,
+the lawyer called and emphatically denied having had any hand in her
+contemplated imprisonment, and secured her release, conveniently
+imputing the conspiracy to the jealousy of his wife.
+
+Meantime, however, the lawyer and his fellow-accomplices of the law were
+plotting to get the wretched woman placed in some private asylum.
+Bloomingdale and Flushing asylums were full, and as she continued to
+follow her whilom lover and importune him to visit her, he found it
+politic and convenient to renew his attentions and to feign a revival of
+his passion. In a certain sense, he was to be pitied. Love of this kind
+begins as a gift; but a woman of this temperament does not leave it so.
+She promptly turned it into a debt, and the more she loved the debtor,
+the more oppressively and inexorably did she extort the uttermost penny
+from him. About this time she was introduced to an eminent medical
+specialist in mental diseases, who, by some inexplicable means, was
+induced to give a certificate of her insanity. Then her cousins took her
+before a justice, and swore that she was an indigent lunatic, upon which
+showing the court issued an order of committal to an asylum. A few days
+before her contemplated abduction, the lawyer induced her to board at
+the Astor House, and on the morning of February 26, 1868, he being
+engaged in the Federal court, while she was leisurely sauntering along
+Broadway looking for him, as was her wont, she was suddenly seized by
+three hired ruffians, hustled into a carriage, gagged and driven rapidly
+up-town to Central Park, when the bandage was removed from her mouth.
+For four mortal hours she was driven about the park in the company of
+her brutal captors, and afterward placed on board the afternoon train
+for Albany at the old Hudson River depot. "All along the road," as she
+subsequently told the writer, "I implored the conductor to furnish me
+with paper and pencil so that I might telegraph to New York, but it was
+only when we reached the end of the journey that he did so. I gave him
+money to pay for the dispatch, but he probably never sent it. When I
+reached Utica I was placed in a pretty bad ward, and when the physician,
+Dr. Kellogg, saw me he went and reported to Dr. Gray, the director of
+the place. When he came up he said I must not be treated so, and I was
+at once removed to the well ward; I remained there two weeks, when I was
+discharged." Yes, she was discharged, and was received with crocodile
+congratulations by the lawyer and one of her lawyer cousins, and
+triumphantly, as it were, transported back to New York.
+
+She was now placed in elegant apartments in the Hoffman House, and her
+lawyer lover resumed his visits as formerly. During the summer she went
+to the country at his expense, and when, in September, 1868, she
+returned to the city, he finally ceased to visit her. She was frantic
+with disappointment, and her insane infatuation led her into all manner
+of indelicate demonstrations. She dogged him in the streets; she
+followed him into court and interrupted him in his pleadings. Sometimes
+she sat on the stoop of his elegant mansion all night. Once she dressed
+herself as a soldier, and tried to gain access to him. Frequently she
+waylaid him, and sunk upon the pavement in real or assumed paroxysmal
+fits when he approached. There were other demonstrations that no decent
+pen could describe, except in a medical book for purposes of science.
+Naturally the unfortunate lawyer was driven to the brink of desperation,
+and at this time he never went out of doors without being accompanied by
+two detectives to protect him from her indelicate approaches.
+
+On November 16, 1868, he caused her to be arrested for disorderly
+conduct and thrown into the Tombs. The lawyer with the historic name
+appeared against her, and, to use her own language, "without any
+examination, I was committed by Judge Dowling." Her gentle bearing and
+lady-like address again stood her good stead, however, and in a few days
+she was released.
+
+She now consulted the late James T. Brady, the greatest lawyer who ever
+practiced at the American bar, and after listening carefully to her
+statement, he promised to see her "righted." Pending legal action that
+eminent advocate died, and in the beginning of February, 1869, she took
+the opinion of Edwin James, the English barrister, and a suit was
+immediately instituted against her whilom lawyer lover in the Court of
+Common Pleas, damages being laid at $100,000. When the defendant
+received notice of the suit he hastened to see Mr. James, and during
+several conversations offered any reasonable compromise to procure a
+stay of proceedings. The lady's version of the suit and the subsequent
+negotiations is as follows: "The suit was never placed on the calendar.
+It was arranged with Mr. James to allow the case to proceed a certain
+length and then obtain a release. Mr. James got no retainer, but took my
+case on speculation, with the understanding that he was to have one
+thousand dollars at the end of the suit, if there were any proceeds from
+the same. He continuously urged me to go to Europe with my daughter for
+two years, and they would advance the money; but I declined. An order
+was obtained by the defendant's lawyer to examine me; whereupon Mr.
+James advised me to leave the city in order to avoid the examination. On
+my return Mr. James advised me to release the suit on the payment of a
+certain sum by the defendant, he, the defendant, at the same time to
+make an apology for what he had done and to express regret for my
+sufferings."
+
+Accordingly, on May 27, 1868, she wrote a letter by advice of her
+counsel, authorizing him to withdraw the suit on these conditions, and
+early in June she signed a "general release," professing afterwards to
+be entirely ignorant of the nature of the instrument. Indeed the unhappy
+woman cared more for an expression of regret from her enslaver than for
+any pecuniary solace, and she received no money, although her lawyer
+did, when the general release was signed. When she discovered the nature
+of the instrument she was extremely indignant and demanded from Mr.
+James the telegrams and letters in his possession which had been sent to
+her by her worshiper in the heyday of their passion. The lawyer
+hesitated and delayed, and finally, being pressed by a friend and
+kinsman of the unhappy lady, said, "I won't give them up unless I have
+an order from the court." Subsequently he claimed that he had destroyed
+these tell-tale documents, and that the "general release" authorized the
+proceedings.
+
+She now consulted another law firm, but her case came to nothing, and
+meantime her former adorer, now grown fiercely hostile, instituted
+proceedings in the Supreme Court, for the purpose of procuring a
+perpetual injunction to forever restrain her from harassing him with
+such suits. This was in 1870, in the early days of March, when the
+writer saw her last, and conversed with her on her wrongs. Her picture
+lives in his recollection yet: The soft, large brown eyes, half sad and
+half voluptuous in their tenderness; the soft, pleading face, with a
+refinement--even a sort of nobleness--that had outlived the sacrifice of
+her virtue and reputation. To the last she was a lady of extreme
+sweetness of manner, and a fascinating and interesting conversationalist.
+
+Another notable man, now also a member of the "great majority"--a
+renowned Shakespearean critic, author and censor in the domain of
+_belles-lettres_--brought great trouble and humiliation upon himself by
+an amour with a ridiculously plain-looking and by no means young woman.
+He had naturally, perhaps, a _penchant_ in that direction, for on the
+appearance of the Lydia Thompson troupe of original British blondes in
+this city, he wrought himself into a fervor of passionate folly over the
+statuesque Markham, and designated her in his Erosian outpourings as
+"she of the vocal velvet voice." There may have been some excuse for
+this passing delirium, and many others were touched by it, Pauline
+Markham was a singularly beautiful girl, and she never looked so well as
+when she sang; it sent warmth into her lips and took the hardness from
+her face. But the lady with whom he became involved in a scrape, with
+the attendant litigation, payment of damages, danger of publicity and
+total ruin of reputation in the exclusive places where his character was
+respected and his judgment esteemed, was in every respect different from
+the lady of burlesque opera. Bitterly did he regret his follies, for the
+facts were given to a newspaper famous for its sensations, and the great
+_litterateur_ was compelled literally to go down on his marrow bones to
+induce the editor to withhold the particulars of his seduction of the
+lady from publication. The sword of Damocles was suspended for weeks,
+during which the high-toned censor's condition was sometimes pitiable to
+see. His entreaties finally carried the point, and the case became one
+of those scandals of the existence of which the public never dreams.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+PROCURESSES AND THEIR VICTIMS.
+
+_Clandestine Meetings at Seemingly Respectable Resorts--The
+"Introduction House."_
+
+The revelations not long since published in the London _Pall Mall
+Gazette_ revealed fashionable aristocratic depravity in the British
+metropolis in a shamefully disreputable light, and disclosed the
+services of the professional procuress in all their repulsive
+loathsomeness. Although we do not possess titled libertines at elegant
+leisure here, there can be no manner of doubt that the procuress plies
+her vocation among us, and thrives on a liberally perennial patronage.
+Whatever may be her characteristics in other respects, she is invariably
+an elegantly-dressed woman, with persuasive address, suave speech and
+attractive mien. In most cases procuresses possess houses of their own,
+where they procure desirable ladies for their patrons. Sometimes these
+establishments are termed "Introducing houses," and, as may be imagined,
+are exceedingly lucrative to their proprietors. Sometimes ladies are
+boarded and lodged in the house; but they are usually "independent," or,
+in other words, living under the protection of some patron of the
+establishment. Some of these procuresses possess a list of ladies whom
+they can send a messenger for on demand. Take the case of a well-known
+establishment in one of the most fashionable quarters up-town, for
+example:
+
+A wealthy broker, speculator, or attache of Uncle Sam, calls upon the
+lady of the house at a fashionable afternoon hour, orders wine, and
+enters into conversation about indifferent matters, until he is able
+delicately to broach the subject he has in view. He explains that he
+wishes to meet with a quiet lady, whose secrecy he can rely upon, and
+whom he can trust in every possible way. He intimates his preference for
+an elegantly-formed, young and fairly good-looking acquaintance, and
+would like her, in addition, to be vivacious, witty and a little gay.
+The lady of the house listens complacently, and replies that she is
+acquainted with a lady who will suit him to a nicety, and offers to send
+a message for her at once, if he wishes; but he must take his chance of
+her being at home. Should she be out, she intimates an appointment will
+be made for next day. In the meantime, a messenger is dispatched to the
+lady in question, and more wine is ordered and drank. When the lady
+arrives, the introduction takes place, and the business is transacted,
+as far as the procuress is concerned. Sometimes the gentleman pays the
+professional fee, and sometimes the lady gives half the money she
+receives from the patron to the madame of the house.
+
+Not infrequently these procuresses will write to men of means of their
+acquaintance, informing them in some cipher or slang phrase that they
+have a new importation in their house awaiting eligible disposition.
+Large sums are often paid under such circumstances, and the fresh
+importation is usually sold in this way five or six times. In other
+words, she is represented as a maid and imposed upon men as a virgin;
+which fabrication, as it is difficult to disprove, is believed, more
+especially if the girl herself be well instructed.
+
+To the house up-town, to which reference has been made above, both
+married and unmarried ladies repair, in order to meet with and be
+introduced to gentlemen. This sort of clandestine meeting is greatly on
+the increase in New York, as it is also in Paris and in London. Some
+curious facts have come to us in a professional way, to which we can
+only refer in a general manner here. The following is a case in point:
+
+A brilliant and handsome lady, belonging to the best society in Gotham,
+married to a man of wealth, found herself unhappy in his society, and
+after some time unwillingly came to the conclusion that she had formed
+an alliance that was destined to make her miserable. Her passions were
+naturally strong and her education had not been of the kind calculated
+to enable her to control them. She had been, pampered and petted, and
+had been accustomed to have every desire gratified. One day the name of
+the "Introduction-house" madame came up in conversation at a lady
+friend's house, and the naughtiness of the topic was discussed with the
+freedom characteristic of progressive society ladies, safe from
+intrusive masculine ears. A few days after, she ordered a cab and drove
+to the house in question. She was received with _empressement_, and
+informed that it was not necessary to explain the nature of her
+business. That, she was assured, was understood. She was shown into a
+handsome drawing-room, elegantly furnished and upholstered, and
+requested to wait a few minutes.
+
+After waiting, in uneasy suspense, a little time, the door opened and a
+gentleman entered. The heavy curtains of the windows and the thick
+blinds caused only a "dim, religious light" to pervade the apartment,
+preventing the lady from seeing distinctly the features of her visitor.
+He approached her with well-bred politeness, and, in a low tone of
+voice, began a conversation with her about the beautiful weather New
+York was then enjoying. She listened for a brief moment, and then,
+with a cry of astonishment, recognized her husband's voice. He, equally
+confused, discovered that he had accidentally met in a house of ill-fame
+the wife whom he had sworn to love and honor, but whom he had condemned
+to languish at home while he enjoyed himself abroad. This remarkable
+rencontre had a happy termination, for, after a little legal sparring,
+it ended in the reconciliation of husband and wife, who mutually
+admitted that they were both to blame.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+QUACKS AND QUACKERY.
+
+_Specimen Advertisements--The Bait Held Out, and the Fish who are
+Expected to Bite._
+
+The vile practices, the monstrous impudence, the cruel rapacity and
+enormous gains of the obscene tribe of quacks, together with the
+mischief they do, and the ruin they work, would require much more space
+to adequately ventilate than we can devote to it here. The healing art
+is a noble one, and duly qualified men, interested in their profession,
+are public benefactors; but the despicable race of charlatans not only
+rob their victims, but frequently ruin their health, and drive them to
+the verge of insanity. There is probably hardly a reader of this page
+who has not met, within the circle of his or her acquaintance, some
+unfortunate individual whose hopes in life have been wholly or partially
+blighted by the adroitly-worded insinuations of those advertising
+quacks. We all know that "fools are the game that knaves pursue," and no
+well-informed member of the community needs to be informed that the
+victims captured by quack advertisements are not among the wiser portion
+of the community. Many of them, however, lie open to be allured into the
+quack's net, not by mere congenital and absolute folly, but because of
+the inexperience of youth or lack of knowledge of the world, or perhaps
+in some cases from a natural deficiency in the faculty of deciphering
+characteristic expression. There are some who fail to recognize a quack
+advertisement when it meets their eye, from a defect in perception
+similar to that which incapacitates certain persons from distinguishing
+a pocket-book dropper, or a bunco steerer, or a billiard sharp, or a
+sporting "gent."
+
+Of course, there are degrees and varieties of quacks, as well as in the
+character of their announcements. The street-vender of a "magic
+pain-reliever," who, by dint of talk and manipulation, convinces some
+credulous sufferer that his rheumatism is banished, is a quack. So are
+those who advertise such preparations as sarsaparilla, blood-mixtures,
+and a variety of pills, potions and lozenges too numerous to mention. So
+also are those marvelous discoverers of "hair restorers," "removers of
+freckles," and so on. Most of these do little harm beyond lightening the
+purses of the purchasers, and in some cases the administration of an
+inert substance, by exciting the victim's imagination, produces a cure.
+But the great injury, so far as these innoxious preparations are
+concerned, lies in the fact that they prevent the sufferer from seeking
+proper professional treatment. Still this class of quacks is rather to
+be reckoned among swindlers who obtain money under false pretences, than
+among the _bona fide_ medical quacks that we have in view. The great aim
+of this pernicious class is to get people in fair, ordinary health to
+consult them by means of newspaper advertisements, almanacs, pamphlets
+and circulars filled with details of the character and symptoms of
+various diseases, scattered broadcast through the land. We will not
+contaminate our pages in giving samples _in extenso_ of this prurient
+and abominable literature, but a few of the typical advertisements to be
+met in even respectable newspapers, can hardly be omitted if the
+exposure is to be thorough:
+
+
+*MEN ONLY*. A quick, Permanent Cure for Lost Manhood, Disability,
+Nervousness and Weakness. No Quackery.
+
+
+
+*TO WEAK MEN,*
+Suffering from nervous debility, weakness of body and mind, loss of
+memory, mental and physical exhaustion. On receipt of stamp we will send
+you a valuable treatise upon the above diseases, also directions for
+home-cure.        Address
+                         * * * * * *
+
+
+
+*ANY PART OF THE BODY*
+when deprived of growth, weak and undeveloped, lacking in proper size,
+form and vigor, may be enlarged, developed and strengthened by simple
+scientific self-treatment. We will prove this free to any honest person.
+Write for sealed circulars, description, references.
+
+
+
+NERVOUS DEBILITATED MEN.
+You are allowed a free trial of thirty days of the use of -------'s
+Celebrated Voltaic Belt with Electric Suspensory Appliances, for the
+speedy relief and permanent cure of nervous debility, loss of vitality
+and manhood, and all kindred troubles. Also for many other diseases.
+Complete restoration to health, vigor and manhood guaranteed. No risk is
+incurred. Illustrated pamphlet in sealed envelope mailed free by
+addressing Voltaic Belt Co.
+
+
+
+NERVOUS DEBILITY, weakness of body and mind, loss of memory, nervous and
+physical exhaustion permanently and quickly cured. I will send you a
+valuable treatise upon the above diseases, also directions for
+home-cure, free of charge.
+         Address        * * * * * *
+
+
+
+*WEAK MEN*
+Can be promptly and lastingly cured, secretly and without nauseous
+drugging, by the
+FRENCH HOSPITAL TREATMENT.
+Board of six regular physicians. Consultation free. Full restoration to
+vigor and strength, however lost.
+
+
+
+The list of lewd and brazen manifestoes might be indefinitely extended,
+but as they all bear the same disgusting ear-marks, the foregoing must
+suffice. As for the pamphlets sent through the mails in "sealed
+envelopes" by these harpies, the following titles will sufficiently
+indicate their character: "The Friend in Need;" "A Medical Work on
+Marriage;" "The Tonic Elixir;" "The Silent Friend;" "Manhood;" "A Cure
+for All;" "The Self Cure of Nervous Debility;" "The Self-adjusting
+Curative;" "New Medical Guide;" "Debility, its Cause and Cure;" "A
+Warning Voice;" "Second Life," and scores of others of a similar stamp.
+This disgusting literature corrupts and pollutes the mind and morals of
+a large class of people who have not the courage to disbelieve its
+monstrous exaggerations, or the good sense to despise its revolting
+indecencies. Nor is this strange, when we reflect that the reading of
+even a standard medical work has a tendency to excite belief in the
+reader that he is afflicted with the malady whose grim description he is
+perusing. His apprehension being alarmed and his imagination excited, he
+has no difficulty in detecting all or a great many of the symptoms in
+himself, although at the same time none of them may exist. The quack, in
+his advertisements and publications, frequently warns the reader against
+quacks and quackery, as, for instance, take the following cheeky
+extract:
+
+
+"The object in writing these pages is to teach the public at large to
+discriminate between the legitimate, duly-qualified practitioner and the
+legion of charlatans who infest every important city and town of the
+United States, and particularly New York. That this is a subject of the
+gravest importance cannot for a moment be doubted when it is considered
+that, dating from our entrance into the world, 'from the cradle to the
+grave,' we too often require the valuable services of the accoucheur,
+doctor, surgeon, or physician, in consequence of departing from Nature's
+laws, increased state of civilization, and overtaxed condition of the
+mental and bodily systems, necessitating from time to time the knowledge
+and attendance of the medical man. Under these circumstances it behooves
+each individual to be placed on his guard, so as to be made cognizant of
+the means to detect the nefarious, unqualified, and dishonest
+charlatans, in order to save the one in search of health from falling in
+their meshes, and thus jeopardize the welfare of his nearest and dearest
+objects. The laws of the country, public opinion, and private
+information, have and are doing much to save the reputations of those
+who have made choice of the medical profession, thereby exposing
+themselves to be placed on a level with some with whose names we will
+not soil our pages, _nor indirectly offer the advantages of publicity_,
+for it has well been remarked that to be mentioned with disparagement is
+to these preferable to not being mentioned at all, and thus it very
+often happens that the veil to hide a motive is so flimsy that even the
+uninitiated are unable to catch a glimpse at the mystery within."
+
+
+Here are the strains of another disinterested Mentor in the same field,
+who once had an office on West Twenty-second street in New York City:
+
+
+"Country patients are informed that they can have the necessary remedies
+sent to any address, or directed to be left at an Express Office _till
+called for_, in a portable compass. The medicines are carefully packed,
+_and free from observation_; and may be taken without confinement or any
+restraint. Patients should be as _minute_ as possible in the details of
+their symptoms, age, general habits of living and occupation in life.
+_The Communication must be accompanied by the usual_ CONSULTATION
+FEE OF FIVE DOLLARS, which may be sent in bank note, or by
+Post-office order, without which no notice can be taken of the application.
+In all cases _secrecy is to be considered as inviolable_, all
+letters being, if requested, either returned to the writers, or destroyed.
+
+"Dr.---- begs to impress upon patients the importance of ONE personal
+interview, even when resident at a distance. The advantages are
+manifold, when compared with mere correspondence. A single visit will,
+in most cases, enable Dr.---- to form an instantaneous and accurate
+judgment, _and thus expedite the patient's recovery_. In the first
+place, many important questions affecting the patient are likely to be
+suggested by a personal interview, which might be lost sight of in
+correspondence. Secondly, more correct diagnosis of the disorder and a
+better appreciation of the patient's constitution can be arrived at,
+_whilst a microscopic examination of the urine, where necessary, will
+render any mistake impossible_, especially in cases of Spermatorrhoea.
+And thirdly, where the patient is laboring under urethral discharges,
+which may or may not be produced by impure connection, one personal
+visit with a view to a urinary examination is eminently advantageous. In
+a word, the correspondent will be more than repaid for the trouble and
+expense of his journey by the increased rapidity of the cure.
+* * * * * * * *
+
+"Such patients, although they may be reaping the rewards of their own
+folly, are, nevertheless, the very ones who have special need of correct
+counsel, and are, for the most part, in just the frame of mind to
+appreciate advice fitly rendered by a judicious medical man. In my
+experience, it has always appeared strange to me why the treatment of
+this affection should remain abandoned by respectable members of the
+profession to the benefit of quacks and those vile harpies who play on
+this class of victims.
+
+"Medical men are too apt treat the complaints of such patients lightly,
+making no effort to allay their anxiety--a course which often leads them
+to apply for aid in illegitimate quarters, and to become the victims of
+unprincipled men."
+
+
+In some instances it is a clergyman who is the reputed advertiser, who,
+as in the following unabridged "Ad," widely circulated in the country
+papers, wishes to communicate to suffering humanity "the recipe that
+will cure you free of charge":
+
+
+*A Card.*
+To all who an suffering from the errors and indiscretions of youth,
+nervous weakness, early decay, loss of manhood, etc., I will lend a
+recipe that will cure you, FREE OF CHARGE. This great remedy was
+discovered by a missionary in South America. Send a self-addressed
+envelope to the Rev. * * * * Station D, New York City.
+
+
+Then there are the "Retired Philanthropic Physicians," and the "Patients
+Who have been Cured," _et hoc genus omne_, who, with such rare
+disinterestedness, incur large weekly expenses in advertising their
+willingness to forward to sufferers the means of self-cure "on receipt
+of two postage stamps." In a word, one and all of these pirates have
+only one common aim and aspiration--to fleece the fools who are
+credulous enough to seek their aid.
+
+The main point to attain in this business is to decoy the victim to the
+advertiser's den or office. Once there, he is impressed with the
+multifarious engagements of the human decoy-spider who is probably
+appraising his prey through a peep-hole. By and by, the patient's
+anxiety is dissipated by the appearance of the pretended Medicus, and he
+proceeds to give all the painful details of his case, while the
+listener, by looks and words, does everything to increase his alarm. The
+history finished, questions will be asked him as to his avocations,
+position and income, all apparently with the view of elucidating the
+points of his case, but in fact for the purpose of estimating the "size
+of his pile," with the object of ascertaining to what extent he can be
+"bled." This essential information obtained, the quack at once sets his
+moral rack to work. Everything will be said not only to confirm the
+patient's fears, but to increase them. A pretended examination of urine
+will be made, and he will be gravely told that the quack's worst fears
+are confirmed, ocular demonstration being offered the dupe. The effect
+of this ordeal may be imagined. The unfortunate victim believes that he
+has received "confirmation, strong as proof of holy writ," of his
+dangerous condition. Glibly the quack discourses on the consequences of
+neglecting the terrible symptoms, and the great difficulty of combating
+them. He is told that he will be liable to spinal disease, softening of
+the brain, or insanity. Sometimes a collection of plates, containing
+hideous representations of dreadful eruption, and sores covering all
+parts of the body, are submitted to the patient's horrified inspection.
+Frightened by the hideous pictures before him, and at the same time
+soothed and charmed by the high-flown encomiums which the quack
+pronounces on his particular "non-mercurial mode of treatment," the
+patient becomes anxious to submit himself to the process. The quack is
+equally ready to take the case in hand, and the only stumbling-block
+likely to be in the way, may be the patients' inability to pay the large
+fee demanded. When the victim, however, is manifestly pecunious, the
+remedy employed in the treatment is correspondingly expensive. In some
+cases "a preparation of gold" has been used, and the patient has been
+instructed that it would be absolutely necessary for him to remain in
+bed for the six weeks during which he would have to take the remedies,
+and that he must have a nurse to sit up with him at night, in order to
+wake him and give him the medicines regularly!
+
+We presume no intelligent person need be told that the pretensions as to
+the "golden" and other "secret and valuable medicines" which these
+quacks boast themselves to possess, are absolutely without foundation.
+They no more possess such remedies than they possess any legitimate
+right to the names and medical titles which they too frequently assume.
+
+In cases of indiscretion, the quack treatment is always with
+mercury--notwithstanding denials. Sometimes serious mercurial poisoning
+results, and not unfrequently, through the charlatan's ignorance of
+proper treatment in complicated diseases, irreparable injury ensues.
+
+The quack advertisements and pamphlets are the source of incalculable
+evils to youths between the ages of seventeen and thirty. They are
+impelled by fear to visit the quack's den, where they are "played" as
+long as practicable. Sometimes exciting drugs, like cantharides, are
+given in the medicine, and thus intensify the evil. The quack, of
+course, ascribes the result to the patient's alarming condition, who is
+growing worse, in spite of his medicines, and who can only be cured by
+more powerful and costly drugs. Sometimes a seemingly candid but equally
+misleading offer of "no cure no pay" is offered. In this case the
+patient is usually required to sign a statement of his condition, in
+which his symptoms and his previous bad habits are fully set forth. It
+is stipulated that the "doctor" is to be paid a certain round sum when a
+cure is effected, and while the case is under treatment the patient pays
+for the medicines. If no pay is asked for the "stuff," the quack is
+seldom or ever a loser. Such a document few persons, with characters to
+lose, would care to run the risk of publishing, and hence they generally
+acknowledge themselves cured, or pay the doctor handsomely to redeem the
+document.
+
+While wading through this dark morass of deception and fraud, the
+"anatomical museums" must not be overlooked. These Priapean
+establishments, in which is an exhibition of wax models of different
+organs and parts of the human body, are too vile for description.
+"Lectures" are delivered with the design of furnishing patients to the
+quack practitioners in whose interest the place is run. Thousands--we
+might have said millions--of copies of disgusting little books on
+"Marriage," or the "Philosophy of Marriage," or some cognate obscenity
+are distributed gratis, and it is no unusual sight to see a score of
+nervous, hollow-eyed patients waiting for treatment.
+
+We have endeavored to speak plainly and to the point in dealing with
+quacks and quackery, because it is a topic of sovereign importance and
+urgency. Hundreds upon hundreds of our population are plundered and
+poisoned by these medical pests of society, and if we have not made it
+plain that it is dangerous to have anything to do with the advertising
+doctors of New York or any other place, we have failed in our purpose.
+Their advertisements, their pamphlets, and their rascally little books,
+penetrate the remotest corners of the land. Curiosity leads the farmer's
+son or the apprentice to send for some advertised book to satisfy a
+craving for information, or to pander to an already diseased
+imagination, and the bad seed is sown. He is surprised, startled, and
+finally alarmed; and he writes. He is told in the reply that "I seek my
+remedies in far-off climes; some in the distant prairie, some in the
+ever-blooming balsam; in the southern climes, where eternal summer
+reigns, and on the top of the snow-clad Himalayas." Accompanying the
+reply is a recipe calling for articles having no existence, or for
+decoctions from plants unknown to botanists. But in whatever form the
+response comes, the result is uniform. Plunder, always plunder, in the
+first place; sometimes this is supplemented by murder; whole families
+are destroyed, insanity is engendered, and the victims of these vile
+knaves are driven headlong to destruction and an early grave.
+
+It has always been the dearest wish of a quack doctor to possess a
+diploma of some sort, no matter where or how dishonestly procured.
+Sometimes it was forged; sometimes second-hand; but however or wherever
+procured it was framed and conspicuously displayed in the "consulting"
+room. By the recent and entirely wholesome amendment of the law,
+however, those beguiling documents are no longer available. It is now
+imperative that the certificate of every physician must be filed with
+the County Clerk. Until this provision is observed, no doctor--no matter
+how eminent or well-qualified--can practice in New York. Many a quack,
+flourishing like a green bay-tree, was summarily brought to the "end of
+his tether," by this most wise legislative enactment.
+
+We would be derelict to the duty we owe to the public did we not here,
+and in this connection, state our emphatic opinion that the editors and
+proprietors of newspapers, as a rule, have hitherto looked too leniently
+on this subject of quackery and its baleful announcements. Happily some
+of our journals will not publish such advertisements, and no editor can
+excuse himself by saying that he is ignorant of the character of such
+announcements. It must be known to every man of experience that such
+advertisements are unfit for the perusal of young men or women, and it
+is surprising that the heads of families should permit newspapers
+containing those advertisements to enter their houses. As a well-known
+English author some-time since wrote:
+
+
+"It is pregnant with matter for grave reflection, and this not only in
+reference to patients themselves, but also in regard to the
+reprehensible conduct of parents who so recklessly admit into their
+family circle newspapers which insert the obscene advertisements of the
+quacks. As I have said before, these advertisements are traps for their
+sons and an offense to the modesty of their daughters. Well assured am I
+that many cases of unaccountable suicide in youths and young men, which
+cause so much surprise and misery in families, are due to these
+unfortunates having become the dupes of quacks."
+
+
+This is a very terrible picture of the evil wrought through the abuse of
+the advertising columns of the press, but experience has shown us that
+it is not by any means overdrawn. The responsibility of the health and
+comfort--even of the lives--of many of the rising generation thus rests
+with the newspapers. How careful, then, ought publishers to be that the
+columns of their journals should in nowise assist in disseminating that
+which pollutes the minds of the young, renders them unfit to fulfill the
+duties of society, or to enjoy its pleasures, and, in short, makes their
+whole life a burden and a misery.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+ABORTION AND THE ABORTIONISTS.
+
+ _The Career of Madame Restell--Rosensweig's Good Luck_.
+
+"Such is the fate of artless maid.
+Sweet flow'ret of the rural shade!
+By love's simplicity betrayed,
+        And guileless trust.
+
+Till she, like thee, all soiled, is laid
+        Low in the dust."
+        --Burns, "To a Mountain Daisy."
+
+Love's young dream--the dream of the ages--has sometimes a fearful
+awakening. In her "guileless trust" and unsuspecting ignorance, a young
+woman weaves a light web of folly and vain hopes, which one day closes
+around her like a poisoned garment, instantly changing all her
+fluttering raptures into a wail of the deepest human anguish. All at
+once the whole force of her nature is concentrated in the effort of
+concealment, and she shrinks with irresistible dread from every course
+that would tend to unveil her miserable secret. Overshadowed by a
+misfortune that is worse than death, in her half-benumbed mental
+condition, she hears of the professional abortionist, and braces herself
+for one of those convulsive actions by which a betrayed woman will
+sometimes leap from a temporary sorrow into the arms of Death.
+
+The dark crime of abortion abounds in New York, as it does in all great
+cities. Yet this crime is conducted with so much care that rarely a case
+comes to light. Even when one of these ghouls is arrested and put on
+trial it is but seldom that conviction follows, because it is an offense
+extremely difficult to bring home to the perpetrator. Many indictments,
+for inexplicable causes, from time to time have been pigeon-holed; but
+as the transaction is committed in private, the victim is the only
+witness, and she is naturally averse to exposure.
+
+It is only when the remains of some beautiful victim are found packed in
+a box, or jammed into a barrel, that the imagination realizes the
+imminent peril dishonored women incur by trusting themselves to the
+mercy of those sordid butchers. The author of her wrong usually makes
+the arrangement, under cover. The wily practitioner talks blandly and
+soothingly. If the operation succeeds, all is well; if not, the poor
+victim's body is secretly disposed of. She is chronicled among the
+mysterious disappearances, because every precaution had been taken that
+her friends should know nothing whatever of her condition, or of her
+whereabouts.
+
+Naturally, the practice of child-murder hardens the hearts and petrifies
+the feelings of those systematically engaged in it. The tortures
+inflicted on the patient are, no doubt, in many cases unavoidable if the
+end is to be achieved; but many of these operators are cruelly ignorant
+and unscrupulous, and barbarously brutal and reckless. The mind shrinks
+from contemplating the thrilling honors of some of the scenes enacted
+within those deadened walls. Despite the tears and protestations of the
+suffering woman, the operation will sometimes be repeated two or even
+three times. But helpless and unprotected as she is, she is compelled to
+submit, because she is terrorized by her inquisitor's threats to send
+her to some hospital at once, to expose her condition to the world and
+to die.
+
+When death appears only too probable, the abortionist generally has the
+victim either sent to a hospital or to some regular physician's
+premises, and leaving her before her condition or their connection with
+the case has been discovered. If the death occurs on their own premises,
+a certificate from some doctor called in at the fast moment, and
+deceived as to the cause of death, may enable a quiet little funeral to
+take place. And again, the fact cannot be denied that from time to time
+regular, diplomated physicians have been found who would not hesitate,
+for a consideration, to give "crooked" certificates. Should it be found
+impracticable to dispose of the body in such a convenient and regular
+way, in some cases it is shipped by rail to a distant and fictitious
+address, without any clue by which it can be traced back to the
+"shipper."
+
+The pitiable case of Miss Alice Augusta Bowlsby will occur to many
+readers just here. The facts in her case were simply these: One Saturday
+night towards the end of August, 1871, a trunk containing the remains of
+a young and beautiful female was found at the depot of the Hudson River
+Railroad, checked for Chicago. The remains were subsequently recognized
+as those of Miss Bowlsby of Paterson, New Jersey, and the trunk was
+traced, by means of the truckman employed to carry it, back to the
+residence of Dr. Jacob Rosenzweig. It was soon discovered that the death
+of the unhappy girl was caused by an operation tending to produce
+abortion. Rosenzweig was a burly fellow, with a forbidding aspect, and a
+bold, confident look. His large, bullet eyes looked defiantly from
+behind the deep-intrenched line of wrinkles that care or conscience had
+gradually drawn around them. He had, in fact, a forbidding aspect, and
+when he was placed on trial before Recorder Hackett, according to a
+newspaper reporter present,
+
+
+"one eye was devoted to watching the Grecian bend of his vulture-hooked
+nose, while the other was on duty over a precocious lock of his curling
+red hair, which clung to the verandah of his left ear like a Virginia
+creeper."
+
+
+Rosenzweig was convicted of manslaughter while treating a woman for
+abortion, and was sentenced to state prison for seven years--a sentence
+so obviously out of proportion to the enormity of the crime that a howl
+of public indignation went up to the skies. However, Recorder Hackett
+had awarded the utmost penalty of the then existing law, and Rosenzweig
+was sent to Sing Sing. Soon after, a law was enacted by the state
+legislature, making the penalty of crimes like Rosenzweig's twenty years
+in the state prison, with hard labor. After this law was passed, and
+when the abortionist had served about a year of his sentence, another
+charge of abortion was found against him, and he was brought down the
+river, again put on trial and sentenced. Mr. Howe, for his defense, in
+appeal, raised the natural objection that it was unfair and improper to
+try Rosenzweig in two cases at once. Consequently, he got a new trial,
+in which he was acquitted, because the old law under which he had been
+previously convicted had been repealed. Here was a manifest miscarriage
+of justice effected by a wise change in the laws. This prisoner escaped,
+but such a result could hardly, within the range of possibility, occur
+under the same law again.
+
+In the majority of cases, the victims of abortion are gotten rid of by
+the practitioner before they die. The operation once over, they are
+hurried from the premises with all possible dispatch, even though the
+fatigue and exposure may imperil their lives. Many die a few days after
+reaching home, in which case the name of the abortionist is never known,
+and many more linger for a few months or years, mere physical wrecks of
+their former selves, till merciful Death folds them in his leaden arms.
+
+Before the recent laws were passed, making it a punishable offense to
+offer to produce abortions, either by medicine or instruments, there
+were many nostrums, in the form of pills and powders, covertly
+advertised for the alleged purpose of producing miscarriages. When a
+person called on one of those quacks and explained the purpose for which
+the medicine was needed, he was told that it was very dear--from five,
+ten, to fifteen dollars a box. At the same time he would be assured that
+his lady friend was merely suffering from "an obstruction arising from
+cold." If he insisted on explaining, the hard face of the quack would
+grow darker and harder, and a mysterious gleam of intelligence would
+shoot from the speculative eye as he was told:
+
+
+"I will not sell medicine for anything else but a cold; nor will I treat
+any lady for anything else. Your young friend has only taken cold, and
+if she is not relieved by these pills she had better come and see me
+herself."
+
+
+No doubt most of those medicines were deceptive, fraudulent and futile.
+But they had the intended effect of advertising the person who sold
+them, whose "professional" services were generally brought into request
+when the pills proved inoperative. This was the secret of Madame
+Restell's reputation and immense accumulated fortune. Her occupation was
+that of a midwife, and in that assumed capacity she advertised her
+"Female Pills." As all the world knows now, her real vocation was the
+ante-natal destruction of unwelcome babies. To her gorgeous palace at
+the corner of Fifth avenue and Fifty-second street went for years some
+of the most wealthy and fashionable women of this metropolis. It is a
+dreadful admission, and a sad commentary on our boasted civilization,
+but the truth must be told. Some of her patrons were married ladies who,
+finding themselves likely to become mothers, and being too heartless and
+frivolous to desire the pains and cares of maternity, sought this
+woman's aid and, in some instances, paid her fabulous sums to have their
+innocent offspring destroyed before they saw the light. Others who
+sought her services were unmarried girls, who, having sacrificed their
+honor were prepared to pay any price to conceal their shame, by the
+destruction of the little life which would blazon it to the world.
+
+Madame Restell's clients were all, or nearly all women of the higher
+orders of society, and of liberal means. Of this disgraceful fact there
+can be no manner of doubt. Her scale of charges was so extravagant as to
+positively prohibit her employment by any one unable to pay a handsome
+fee for the gratification of their murderous project. Sometimes a poor
+girl, ruined by some wealthy libertine, would be supplied by him with
+funds to pay for the terrible operation which would conceal her folly;
+but in the great majority of cases they were ladies of wealth and social
+standing who went dressed in elegant apparel, loaded with jewelry, and
+double veiled, to her palatial mansion to obtain her aid.
+
+Madame Restell, whose name was a scandal and her Fifth-avenue house an
+outrage upon New York for years, was a native of Painswick,
+Gloucestershire. She was the daughter of a humble laborer named Trow,
+and first saw the light in 1813. Her educational facilities--as indeed
+were all those similarly or even better circumstanced in England seventy
+years ago--were of the humblest kind. But she was made to work, taught
+to use her needle, and "sent out to service" in her early teens. And so
+it came to pass that, at the age of sixteeen, she was "maid of all work"
+for a butcher in her native town. She was quite good-looking, with
+piercing black eyes and thick, luxuriant black hair, and shapely form.
+She had many candidates for her young affections among the young weavers
+of the place, but a journeyman tailor named Henry Somers was the
+successful wooer. A year or two after the wedding, Mr. and Mrs. Somers
+emigrated and came to the city of New York, settling over on the east
+side, about Oliver street. Somers was lazy, improvident and a tippler,
+and after a short sojourn in America Mrs. Somers found herself a young
+and blooming widow, with one child, a girl, to provide for. She had all
+along industriously supplemented her husband's earnings by her needle.
+She was now wholly dependent upon it for the subsistence of herself and
+child.
+
+It was while in these pinched circumstances that she made the
+acquaintance of Charles R. Lohman, a printer poor as herself, and became
+his wife. There was no immediate improvement in their condition. Both
+were impatient of the pinchings of poverty. Neither was constitutionally
+disposed to work hard and patiently for an honest competence. The
+celebrated "Female Pills" formed the philosopher's stone which released
+them from this condition of chafing discontent and brooding unrest. From
+what source a knowledge of the ingredients requisite for the composition
+of a pill for such a diabolical purpose was derived, or whether, indeed,
+the pill was effective or diabolical at all, remains a mystery, inasmuch
+as none of her medicine seems to have been subjected to chemical
+analysis. Suffice to say that the couple rented a small room, and the
+first advertisement of the female physician was printed in the old
+_Sun_, and paid for with borrowed money.
+
+Under such auspices the abortion business dawned upon this city, and in
+more than one of the daily newspapers, between the years 1836 and 1840,
+appeared glowing puffs of "the beautiful young female physician," as she
+was termed, accompanied by elaborate advertisements setting forth her
+specialty. No wonder this Upas tree flourished by the river of crime on
+whose banks it was fed. No wonder that her brother Joseph, who had been
+imported from madame's native English town, was kept busy in putting up
+medicines and compounds for the ladies of New York. No wonder that the
+Lohmans, _alias_ the Restells, waxed fat and insolent, or that, with
+only thirty years actual existence, madame informed the public that she
+had been for "thirty years physician in European hospitals"!
+
+By and by her boldness attracted the attention of the Albany Solons, and
+in 1846 a law was enacted which was intended to prevent the dark crime
+which Madame Restell had helped to make so fashionable. In September,
+1847, a minion of justice invaded her Gehenna, then at No. 146 Greenwich
+street, and, upon an affidavit, she was arrested and put in prison. On
+the tenth of that month she was arraigned and, pleading "Not guilty,"
+was sent back to jail to await her trial. At this preliminary proceeding
+it appeared that Dr. Samuel C. Smith had been called upon to attend
+professionally a young woman of Orange County, by the name of Mary
+Bodine, and, upon discovering evidences of foul play, communicated with
+the Mayor of New York, and Madame Restell's arrest followed. Public
+excitement rose to an intense pitch. A spasm of morality shook the city
+to its foundations. Nothing was talked of but the hideous crimes of the
+woman abortionist. People lost sight of the war, then raging in Mexico,
+while listening to the stories of imaginative people about heaps of
+babies' skulls supposed to be mouldering beneath the floors of the
+Greenwich-street Golgotha. There were threats of mob violence, and of
+incendiary proceedings. It was necessary to guard the premises, and
+Lohman kept himself religiously secluded from public observation.
+
+On the twentieth of October, 1847, the abortionist was placed in the
+dock of the Court of General Sessions, before Recorder Scott and two
+aldermen. For the prosecution there appeared Ogden Hoffman, John McKeon
+and Jonas B. Phillips; for the defense, James T. Brady and David Graham,
+Jr. The prisoner was charged in the indictment with manslaughter in the
+second degree. Considerable difficulty was experienced in obtaining a
+jury. Mary Bodine, herself, was the first witness. She described her
+engagement as a servant with a person of the name of Cook; her seduction
+three days after entering upon her duties, and the consequences that
+followed her visit to Madame Restell's establishment; the conversation
+that took place; her sojourn in an apartment of the dreadful den; her
+diet and treatment, and all the revolting details were given with a
+pre-Raphaelite sharpness of outline that carried the conviction of
+truth. It was a long trial, and not before November 12th did the
+Recorder sum up, when the jury, after a brief retirement, found the
+prisoner "Guilty."
+
+She was sent to the penitentiary on Blackwell's Island, and popular
+excitement was allayed, while the spasm of public morality, with a soft
+sigh, fell asleep. When Madame Restell's term of imprisonment expired
+she came back to the city and, purchasing a new property on Chambers
+street, hung out her "Midwife" shingle, and carried on her business with
+nearly as much effrontery, and with quite as much success, as before her
+prosecution and sentence.
+
+A craving for pomp and ostentation was one of the peculiar phases of
+Madame Restell's character. To gratify this kind of ambition, she
+purchased, through a real estate agent, ten lots on Fifth avenue,
+between Fifty-second and Fifty-third streets. They cost at that time
+$1,000 each--$10,000 for the ten. When it became known that this woman
+was the purchaser of the ten lots, a movement was at once made by
+reputable citizens interested in the respectability of New York's
+leading avenue to repurchase the property. Five thousand dollars were
+offered for her bargain without avail. When, many years later, the
+horrified residents of the fashionable thoroughfare beheld ground broken
+and the abortionist's mansion gradually raising its brazen front, their
+indignation knew no bounds. Large sums of money were offered the woman
+to forego her intention, but she haughtily answered that "there was not
+money enough in New York" to prevent her. No expense was spared, either
+in the construction or decoration of this palace of infamy. The frescoed
+ceilings were works of art. Two Italians worked at them for a
+twelve-month, at an expense of twenty thousand dollars. The carpets and
+upholstery, ordered through the house of A. T. Stewart & Co., were
+manufactured specially in Paris. The paintings were selected from the
+productions of the greatest artists of the period. Her stable was
+erected at a cost of twenty-eight thousand dollars. The Osborne House,
+another of her investments, erected on the ground adjoining her own
+residence, cost about two hundred thousand dollars.
+
+In February, 1878, evil days again fell upon Madame Restell. On the
+eleventh of that month she was arrested by Anthony Comstock, of the
+Society for the Prevention of Crime, and taken to Jefferson Market
+Police Court, before Justice Kilbretli. She desired her release upon
+bail, pending examination. The bail was fixed at $10,000, and although
+she offered to deposit with the court that amount in government bonds,
+Judge Kilbreth refused. Satisfactory bail not being forthcoming, she was
+committed to the Tombs, and assigned to a cell on the second tier of the
+women's prison. By and by, she was released on bail and, pending her
+trial, some time early on the morning of April 1, 1878, she committed
+suicide, by cutting her throat from ear to ear, in her bath-tub. The
+scene was described in that morning's _Herald_, as follows:
+
+
+"Mme. Restell's chambermaid, Maggie McGraw, went to her mistress' room
+at about eight o'clock this morning, but not finding her there she went
+to the bathroom, which is on the second floor. There, hanging on the
+door, she saw her mistress' clothes. Thinking that she was taking a bath
+the girl went down-stairs, but soon returned and, seeing the clothes
+still there, she looked in. Not seeing the madame, she became alarmed. A
+peculiar smell then attracted her attention and, looking in, she saw
+that the bath-tub was filled with bloody water, and at the bottom of the
+tub lay the body of her mistress, with her throat cut from ear to ear.
+The instrument of death, a large carving-knife, was lying at her side.
+The bath-room is fitted up with Oriental splendor, being frescoed and
+decorated handsomely."
+
+
+The suicide was buried next day, being conveyed from the Fifth-avenue
+mansion to the Grand Central Depot, and thence to Tarrytown, the place
+of interment. The funeral procession consisted merely of the hearse
+carrying the body and one carriage. It is a strange, revolting story,
+carrying its own warning and moral, besides furnishing an admirable
+instance of the unexpected forms in which the great Nemesis manifests
+herself.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+DIVORCE.
+
+_The Chicanery of Divorce Specialists--How Divorce Laws Vary in Certain
+States--Sweeping Amendments Necessary--Illustrative Cases_.
+
+A large proportion of the marital infelicity now so alarmingly prevalent
+in this country is no doubt caused by the mal-administration of our
+divorce laws, and by the demoralizing discord between the legislative
+statutes of the various States on the subject of divorce. While in the
+middle and a portion of the Eastern and Southern States, the conditions
+legally imposed, before a dissolution of marriage can be judicially
+obtained, are wholesomely exacting and in accord with the strict
+Scriptural standard, in certain of the Eastern, Southern and Western
+States the most trifling alleged causes of disagreement or
+"incompatibility" are sufficient to secure the law's disseverance of the
+marriage tie. The divorce business of certain courts in Illinois, Iowa,
+Utah, and some of the territories, enjoy an infamous notoriety all over
+the world; while even staid old Connecticut offers a positive reward to
+connubial infidelity by at once granting a full or absolute divorce upon
+comparatively slight pretexts, leaving both parties legally free to
+marry again as their altered fancies may elect.
+
+He who, in New York,
+
+
+        "Reads the in image act with pride
+        And fancies that the law is on his side,"
+
+
+may soon be taught, to his dismay, that some backwood's court in the
+West has privately given his artful better-half a divorce, and
+authorized her to wed at her earlier pleasure with the Lothario whom
+he--the cast-off husband--had not even begun to suspect of treachery.
+Or, again the lord and master whose preference has wandered from his
+lawful wife to some designing female poacher on her rightful domain, may
+openly give that wife the fullest justification in law for a New York
+divorce, and, after the petition has been granted, go with his paramour
+to any State outside the jurisdiction of the State of New York, and
+there be legally joined to her for whom he has forsworn himself. One
+might infer from these dangerous and disgraceful possibilities that but
+few of the married ones who, from whatever cause, were discontented with
+their domestic relations, would be long restrained by any other than the
+highest exceptional moral considerations from availing themselves of the
+relief so variously attainable. It must be borne in mind, however, that
+an honorable action for divorce, openly and honestly undertaken in any
+State, involves more or less public exposure with considerable pecuniary
+outlay. These two considerations, in the present lax tendencies of our
+divorce laws, constitute the chief bar against a wholesome "popular"
+adoption of the legal remedy for domestic troubles; while their potency
+has invoked a class of fraudulent practitioners whose insidious business
+it is to procure dissolution of marriage for any or no cause, "without
+publicity," and at a cost suited to the most limited means. In other
+words, New York has been, and still is, the headquarters of a villainous
+divorce ring, by the audaciously fraudulent practices of which the
+solemn marital covenant is made a despised and brittle toy of the
+law--to be broken and discarded at the will of the vicious and
+depraved.
+
+Lord Howell, for fifty years a judge of Doctor's Commons, pointedly said:
+"A knowledge that persons uniting in marriage must continue husbands
+and wives, often makes them good husbands and wives; for necessity is a
+powerful master to teach the duties it imposes."
+
+These sinister traders in domestic infamy, secret libel, and suborned
+perjury announce their business and addresses in advertisements in which
+"success is guaranteed," "no fee required till divorce is granted," "no
+publicity," etc., while the decree is warranted to be "good in every
+State,"--in confirmation of which last assertion the divorce
+specialist's private circular frequently contains the following extract
+from Article IV, Section I, of the Constitution of the United States:
+"Full faith and credit shall be given in each State to the public acts,
+records and judicial proceedings of every other State."
+
+The question may arise, and it is pertinent, who employ these divorce
+specialists? We answer: All sorts of people. They may be dissolute
+actresses, seeking a spurious appearance of law to end an old alliance,
+and to prepare for a new one. They may be frivolous, extravagant,
+reckless, misguided wives of poor clerks or hard-working mechanics,
+infatuatedly following out the first consequences of a matinee at the
+theatre, and a "personal" in the daily newspaper. They may be the
+worthless husbands of unsuspecting faithful wives, who, by sickness, or
+some other unwitting provocation, have turned the unstable husband's
+mind to dreams of new connubial pastures and the advertising divorcist.
+They may be the "lovers" of married women, who come to engage fabricated
+testimony and surreptitious unmarriage for the frail creatures whose
+virtue is still too cowardly to dare the more honest sin. They are _not_
+the wronged partners of marriage, who, by the mysterious chastising
+providence of outraged hearts and homes are compelled, in bitterest
+agony of soul to invoke justice of the law for the honor based upon
+right and religion. The manufacture of a case of the contrabandists of
+divorce is often such a marvel of unscrupulous audacity, that its very
+lawlessness constitutes in itself a kind of legal security.
+
+Another question naturally arises: What are such divorces worth? We
+reply that the whole business is unblushing fraud upon the dupes who are
+entrapped into patronizing the business. Not one of those divorces has
+ever yet held good when ultimately contested in open court, by the
+parties against whom they have been secretly obtained. Many of them,
+however--perhaps thousands!--have served the whole purpose of those
+purchasing them, because the husbands or wives so cruelly wronged have
+either lacked the means, or the heart to take public legal measures for
+exposing the fraud, and setting the divorce aside. How is the poor
+clerk, or mechanic, the invalid or unfriended wife, to raise hundreds,
+perhaps thousands, of dollars necessary for such a purpose?
+
+It seldom happens that the so-called divorce specialist applies to any
+of the courts in the States of New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania,
+Maryland or South Carolina, because in those States the testimony given
+in divorce proceedings becomes part and parcel of the written court
+record. The names, residences, and occupations of the witnesses, and all
+the testimony they offer, is carefully taken down by the referee, and
+reported upon by him to the court. The judge takes all the papers, and
+grants the decree or refuses it, upon the report and the testimony, and
+the record is perpetually on file, and accessible. Consequently when a
+husband or wife unexpectedly finds that their hymeneal bonds are
+severed, they have the right and privilege of inspecting the record of
+the case, in the court archives, and of examining the evidence upon
+which the decree adverse to them was granted. These are what is termed
+"dangerous States," in the parlance of the specialists; for there is
+always a chance of the disbanded mate feeling aggrieved and pugnacious,
+and of the cat coming with portly stare from the bag with a lively
+prospect of the perjured witnesses and the specialist having to "scoot"
+for parts unknown, or run the risk of dignifying the inside of the State
+prison. Many readers of this page will no doubt remember with what
+precipitation the notorious Monro Adams made himself "scarce" in
+January, 1882, upon the discovery of the irregular Chase divorce, and
+others of the same kind fraudulently procured in Brooklyn.
+
+In the Western and Southwestern States, on the other hand, where the
+population is sparser, and where no such press of business is before the
+courts, divorce proceedings are mostly under the immediate control of
+the court itself. The presiding judge hears the testimony as it is
+presented, and decides the case on its merits, there and then. There is
+no necessity for employing a referee, and there are no written records
+of the case. The decision, the date, and the abstract records appear on
+the court books, and that is all. And yet, by the section of the
+Constitution, already quoted, this decree is regarded,--by the court
+that grants it, at least,--as perfectly legal and operative all over the
+Union. Although this is not the case, there are almost insuperable
+obstacles to such a divorce being set aside. For there are no names of
+witnesses and no records. There is the name of the lawyer; but if a
+"muss is raised." he is either _non est inventus_, or his memory is
+paralyzed. He has no recollection of the names of the witnesses, of the
+date of the hearing, or indeed of the case. No matter what evidence the
+injured party might be able to produce, he cannot get an iota of
+satisfaction nor make the least progress until he knows what evidence
+was presented against him when the decree was granted. Daniel McFarland
+found this in Indiana, and so have scores of others. These Western and
+Southwestern States are therefore not unadvisedly deemed "safe," and
+hence they are very largely patronized.
+
+In Iowa, Indiana, and Rhode Island, again, the court possesses what is
+termed "discretionary power" in divorce cases. The State Constitution,
+after specifying the usual prime ground--adultery--goes on to specify:
+"And for any other cause for which the court shall deem it proper that a
+divorce should be granted," or "when it shall appear to the satisfaction
+of the court that the parties can no longer live harmoniously together."
+It requires no elaborate reasoning to perceive that a decree granted
+under such conditions remains tolerably secure. For the testimony has
+been taken _vive voce_, and the decree pronounced in open court, after
+the judge has been "satisfied" that the complainant "can no longer live
+harmoniously" with her Johnny or his Jenny.
+
+A case illustrating this point came under our notice some years ago. A
+wealthy young Frenchman eloped from Bordeaux with the girl-wife of a
+middle-aged wine exporter. The runaways came to New York, and in a short
+time, through a specialist, the lady obtained, in an Iowa court, a
+divorce from her deserted husband. The deferred rite of matrimony was
+then solemnized between the pair.
+
+About twelve months afterward, business called the happy husband back to
+France. It was not deemed advisable for his charming wife to accompany
+him. Neither, as a matter of fact, did she wish to undertake the voyage.
+But she accompanied him on board the steamer and bade him a touching,
+emotional and affectionate adieu. Mark what followed! Hardly had he got
+twenty-four hours beyond Sandy Hook than she proceeded to the same
+specialist, who had severed her former bonds, and employed him to
+procure her another divorce. It was applied for, and duly granted by the
+presiding judge of the Fourth District Court of Iowa. When this decree
+came to hand, with its flash heading and big red seal, the lady was
+married to a handsome young dry-goods man.
+
+Meantime the absent husband in Paris kept up a fervent correspondence
+with his wife, anathematizing his ill-luck in being so long kept from
+her side. She replied regularly and kindly to these letters until her
+wedding with the young dry-goods Adonis was consummated, when she
+abruptly ceased to write. The Frenchman remonstrated, adjured, cursed
+and cabled, but receiving no response finally hurried across the ocean
+to find that he was a divorced man, and to be reminded, in the choice
+phraseology of his supplanter, that "what was sauce for the goose, was
+sauce for the gander."
+
+With true Gallic impetuosity he sought for VENGEANCE! He employed
+lawyers and spent considerable money in the expectation not only of
+setting the divorce aside, but in bringing the lady and her paramour to
+condign punishment. His efforts, however, proved perfectly impotent. The
+lawyer, resident at the court, remembered nothing of the evidence, and
+the court remembered the case only so far as that it was perfectly
+regular and satisfactory.
+
+Thus it will be seen that
+
+
+        "Domestic happiness,
+ That only bliss of Paradise which has survived the fall,"
+
+
+when once perverted by cunning treachery like this, leaves the betrayed
+with little chance to cover its poor grave with the ostentatious
+monument of legal justice.
+
+There are some aspects of this divorce specialist business which would
+be amusing did they not furnish such a cloak and encouragement to
+depravity and licentiousness. The following narrative of actual facts
+illustrates a phase of the kept-mistress ethics, and shows how the
+Western bogus divorce operates in lowering the tone of society and in
+sapping the foundations of morality:
+
+A few years since a young stock broker of this city, spent his summer
+vacation in the sylvan glades of the country surrounding Lake Champlain.
+He possessed an appreciative eye for feminine beauty, and a soul burning
+for adventure. Like most men of this type, he was not apt to be
+disturbed by qualms of conscience where the gratification of his
+passions was concerned. In an evil hour, he made the acquaintance of a
+handsome Vermont girl, just merging upon the full meridian of
+exceptionally voluptuous charms. Without any special claim to mental
+endowments, Sadie F----- was a superb animal. Her, our frisky broker
+saw, and wooed. The girl fell madly in love with him, and, before long,
+ceased to be a virgin of the vale. Lothario was much attached to her,
+and by his persuasions and ornate representations of city life, backed
+by aureate promises, she was induced to fly from her once happy rural
+home and to live with her seducer in this city. He began by treating her
+well, placing her in handsome apartments in a boarding house on the west
+side, and for nearly a year the ardor of his attachment knew no
+abatement. Gradually, however, the affection on his side began to wane.
+She awoke from her delusive dream to the consciousness that she was
+alone in a great city without friends, money, or virtue. Whither could
+she flee? She could not return to her country home to look into the
+sorrowful depths of her mother's tender eye, or face the stings and
+sneers of the people of her native village. "A life of pleasure"--as it
+is sarcastically termed--seemed her only resource. In her terrible
+extremity, she made a last appeal to her deceiver, and succeeded in
+touching a tender spot in his heart. Perplexed as to what disposition he
+could possibly make of the girl who had loved him "not wisely but too
+well," he consulted an acquaintance notorious for the number and variety
+of his amours. "Oh, my dear boy, that's easily settled,"' said the
+friend, "get a Western divorce through one of those advertising
+fellows." The broker didn't "catch on"--he couldn't see why he should
+obtain a divorce, and said as much. "But she wants the divorce!" replied
+the adviser. "Let her be divorced from Frederick Brown, or Augustus
+Smith, or Maximilian Johnson, and then, you see, her character will be
+restored, her virtue whitewashed, and she will be corroborated and
+sustained as a respectable member of society; an object of envy and
+emulation on the part of her sex, and of interest, admiration and honest
+courtship by ours." So a decree was duly applied for through one of
+those "divorce lawyers" wherein the petitioner, Mrs. Sadie Johnson,
+sought to be severed from the hated yoke of her husband, George
+Frederick Johnson, who, as the petition set forth, not only treated her
+with habitual brutality but continually violated the purity of the
+hymeneal couch, to wit, etc., etc. The papers were duly served upon the
+defendant, who assumed the name of George Frederick Johnson for the
+purpose of the suit. At the expiration of the time allowed in such cases
+for an answer to the petition, no defense had been set up. The lady's
+lawyer thereupon moved for the appointment of a referee, as well as for
+counsel fee and alimony. All went smoothly, of course, for the
+petitioner, and in due course the decree of absolute divorce was granted
+to this unmarried lady, with permission for her to marry again, while
+the disreputable George Frederick Johnson was absolutely debarred from
+any such privilege.
+
+When the decree was recorded, Sadie returned to her family by the
+peaceful waters of the lake, and was received with open arms. She was an
+object of envy to the unsophisticated young ladies of the neighborhood,
+and of open and unbounded admiration to the young men. She had learned
+to dress and to put on flash airs, and her experience in vice, gilded
+over by this divorce sham, rendered her much more attractive metal to
+matrimonially-disposed Strephons than any quiet, retiring Daphne of the
+rural district. She soon became the wife of a well-to-do country
+store-keeper, and made his home a pandemonium, which ended by him
+employing a regular lawyer to procure a divorce, when the foregoing
+facts were elicited.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+BLACK-MAIL.
+
+_Who Practice it, How it is Perpetrated, and upon Whom--The Birds who
+are Caught and the Fowlers who Ensnare them--With other Interesting
+Matters on the same Subject_.
+
+There is a class of crimes prevalent in the metropolis, which, from its
+secret character and the apparent respectability of those engaged in it,
+rarely ever sees the light of exposure. Some of these offenses are
+hushed through the influence or prominence of the operators. In others
+the facts are never divulged, because the victims prefer to suffer loss
+rather than have their names dragged into a publicity which, to say the
+least, would reflect on them discreditably. For these, and other obvious
+reasons, many kinds of secret crimes flourish and abound in the esoteric
+life of great cities. In New York, where money is often rapidly
+acquired, and where little curiosity is manifested as to the mode of its
+acquisition, there are naturally many facilities for putting
+black-mailing schemes into successful operation. Scores of persons,
+apparently respectable, are constantly on the alert to discover
+compromising facts in connection with persons of wealth. Words dropped
+from ordinary conversations, hints and allusions overheard, form a clue,
+which, followed up and reported in a broadly compromising form to the
+pecunious person concerned, will, in the majority of instances, induce
+him to imitate the _role_ of the coon that preferred to "come down"
+rather than be shot at.
+
+Experienced New Yorkers need not be told that there has existed among us
+for years a class of individuals whose only source of revenue is
+black-mail. Ever on the _qui vive_ for real scandal or its counterfeit
+presentment, these cormorants levy tribute upon both sexes. The high and
+haughty dame, with a too appreciative and wandering eye; the wealthy
+banker, with a proclivity for "little French milliners;" the Christian
+husband, with a feminine peccadillo; the pew-owner at church, with a
+disposition to apply St. Paul's "holy kiss" a little too literally; and
+the saintly pastor with a skeleton in his closet, are all alike fish in
+the tribute net of this insatiable toiler of the turbid sea of scandal.
+
+No uninitiated person can form an idea of the large number of such cases
+that are yearly silenced by the payment of hush-money in this city.
+Sometimes the victim and the victimizer meet, the money demanded is paid
+over, and there the matter ends. More frequently the negotiation is
+conducted by means of a "go between" with the same pecuniary result. In
+some cases, again, the trouble receives settlement in the office of a
+lawyer, when a receipt and full release of past and future claims is
+taken by the legal gentleman, who thus secures his client immunity from
+further demands. It is a well-accepted axiom that under like
+circumstances the same cause produces the same effect. And so the causes
+which lead to black-mailing in this city are precisely similar to the
+influences operating in Paris or London to produce the same ignoble
+crime. A married lady may become too familiar with some gentleman who
+has not the pleasure of being known to her husband; she may have been
+tenderly sentimental and gushingly confidential with him, and may even
+have confided her arduous imaginings to paper, when a rupture
+occurs--and be sure that a rupture always does occur in such cases--the
+cavalier may not only threaten to talk and "tell," but refuse to return
+the amatory correspondence, unless under substantial pecuniary
+inducements. This is the return she gets for what may be termed her
+privateering experiences, and there are numbers of creatures, whom it
+were sacrilege to call men, who make a regular business of becoming
+acquainted with married women for this special purpose. Instances are on
+record where a certain stipulated sum of money has been paid for years
+to a professional black-mailer, who held letters written to him by a
+lady whose acquaintance was made at a matinee. We were cognizant of a
+case in which the bird of prey, not content with his own extortions,
+handed over the lady's letters, on his death-bed, to a confederate, who
+continued successfully to maintain the payment of hush-money until death
+removed the weak and persecuted victim.
+
+Ladies have no idea what risks they run when making chance
+acquaintances, nor how such intimacy may end. They may be successfully
+fortified against all the arts and blandishments brought to attack their
+honor, and yet be seriously compromised. The handsome and fashionably
+dressed street-lounger is very frequently a resourceful rascal. He may
+invite the lady to take a carriage-ride, and, as has sometimes happened,
+an accomplice acts in the capacity of hackman. The drive selected is
+through the principal streets. Some hotel or fashionable restaurant is
+visited, and if she still successfully resists wine and wiles, it is
+more than likely that she will be visited the following day by a
+"detective" who will calmly inform her that he "shadowed" her yesterday.
+Of course he is after money, and she pays his demand rather than permit
+him to carry into execution his threat of telling her husband.
+
+Young girls, too, are frequently compromised by the professional
+"masher." This vile species of the _genus homo_ affects the fashionable
+streets where he saunters in solitary splendor, waiting for an
+opportunity to make the acquaintance of some young girl on her way to or
+from school. If her parents happen to be wealthy, the extraction of a
+neat sum follows this undesirable association; far an exposure in which
+her name would in any way be associated with the adventurer's, would
+forever stigmatize her in society. In some instances the immature
+acquaintance has developed into an elopement, and when parental
+interference followed, it was discovered that the scalawag husband was
+not only ready but willing to relinquish his bride when the money
+agreement was made sufficiently potent. Sometimes, again, a man is
+sufficiently infatuated to marry a lady with a soiled or shady
+reputation, and if that circumstance becomes known to the Knight of
+Black-mail, it is morally certain that potential hush-money will be
+extorted. In point of fact every kind of "skeleton," social or criminal,
+if once its whereabouts be discovered and its individuality established,
+becomes a source of revenue to those unscrupulous pirates of society.
+
+It occasionally happens that black-mailers will systematically weave a
+web whereby they may entangle a wealthy person. The possession of wealth
+confers no exemption from the weaknesses and frailties of human nature,
+and in many instances indeed the unwise use of money only brings the
+obliquities of its possessor into greater prominence. It is not long
+since an affluent and well-known elderly merchant of this city, walking
+in the neighborhood of the Fifth Avenue Hotel, had his attention
+attracted by a beautiful woman of graceful carriage and voluptuous
+symmetry of form, who seemed to keep just abreast of him on the inner
+sidewalk, and maintained this relative position block after block. He
+was not insensible to the charm of the situation, and, before he exactly
+knew how, was engaged in conversation with the fair unknown. She was an
+admirable conversationalist and spoke with that expressive pantomime
+which gives probability to the blackest lies. Thus conversing, he
+accompanied her to the residence she had been describing. The
+"residence" proved to be an assignation house. He entered, unconscious
+of the character of the house, and, as he had been on his way home,
+remained within only a few brief moments. Bidding the lady politely
+"good-day," he took his leave. As he walked rather briskly up the street
+he was accosted by a gentleman, who brusquely said:
+
+
+"So, sir! I have got you at last. I have had my suspicions excited for
+some time past concerning the probity of my wife, but until to-day have
+failed in discovering proofs of her infidelity. Now, however, I have
+them! You have just left the house. I saw you and her meet on the street
+and I followed you."
+
+
+The respectable elderly gentleman protested with all the indignation of
+maligned innocence, and was fluent and resourceful in explanation. He
+had, he said, simply been doing an act of politeness that any gentleman
+deserving the name would have as readily discharged, and so forth. His
+interlocutor didn't see it in that light, and told him so. The following
+day he was waited upon by the much-injured husband, who informed him
+that he was about to institute divorce proceedings against his wife. To
+demonstrate that he was dead in earnest he produced a formally drawn
+complaint in which the wildly astonished and indignant merchant figured
+as co-respondent. The result of this cunning maneuver may be foreseen.
+The old gentleman paid a large sum of money to the "injured" husband on
+the condition that he would withdraw the legal proceedings against his
+wife. When the money had been spent, the leech again renewed his
+black-mailing effort, and with success, although the respectable
+gentleman had been guilty of no further crime than the indiscretion of
+accepting the woman's invitation to step inside for a minute or two.
+With the second payment, however, he obtained a promise from the
+"husband" that on the receipt of the money he would start for California
+and importune him no more. It is perhaps needless to state that the
+scoundrel never left, but soon after made further demands, always
+holding over the victim threats of exposure in divorce proceedings. This
+system of extortion continued until as much as eight or nine thousand
+dollars had been paid. He was then impelled, in sheer self-defense, to
+consult a lawyer, when further extortion at once ceased and determined.
+It subsequently transpired that the "lady" and her "husband" were two of
+the most notorious panel thieves in the city.
+
+The "anonymous letter" dodge is also sometimes successfully operated in
+levying black-mail. The conspirator becomes acquainted with real or
+alleged facts, and dispatches an artfully-worded communication for the
+purpose of frightening the intended quarry. Very frequently silence is
+obtained by the payment of a lump sum of money, especially where the
+victim lacks backbone and decision of character.
+
+Another form of black-mail is practiced by women who run fashionable
+assignation houses and bagnios in this city. Gentlemen well known in
+public life, fathers of families, and even clergymen, are occasionally
+found in these gilded palaces of sin. It is a simple matter for the
+madame of the house to inform "her friend" that Mr. This, or the
+Reverend Mr. That, has been numbered among her recent visitors. The
+usual machinery is set in motion forthwith--threats of exposure and
+importunate demands for money. When the intended victim refuses to be
+black-mailed, his family--his daughter, perchance--is notified of her
+father's transgression and informed that the affair will be made public.
+Under such circumstances she is very likely indeed to pay hush-money
+rather than have her family's honored name dragged through the dirt of
+public scandal.
+
+It is not so long ago that a regular business of blackmail was conducted
+in connection with the leading assignation houses. Ladies, as well as
+gentlemen, who visited them by appointment were "shadowed" and
+"spotted"; sometimes followed home and their standing and character in
+the community carefully determined, preparatory to the application of
+the financial thumbscrews.
+
+A noted black-mailer of this city at one time maintained his wife in a
+private house, conveniently within call of a woman who kept a house of
+ill-fame. The wife promptly responded to any summons from the madame,
+and when she subsequently made the acquaintance of some wealthy visitor
+she would inform her husband of the gentleman's name and position. If,
+as probable, he was a person of ostensible respectability and advanced
+in years, with everything to lose by exposure, he "came down" promptly
+and liberally. On other occasions this high-toned husband would procure,
+through the offices of a mutual friend, an introduction for his wife to
+some prominent member of the Stock Exchange. The lady, who was a
+remarkably handsome, fascinating and wily woman, usually entangled the
+intended victim in the snare. Then the Husband appeared on the scene,
+boiling with indignation and "breathing threatenings and slaughter"
+until money was paid. The gentleman so entrapped might afterwards
+complain to his friend who introduced him to the siren, but he would
+never dream of associating him in the "crooked" transaction.
+
+We are not alarmists by any means, but simply relate facts as they have
+come within our personal knowledge. The weakness of human nature,
+combined with the play of the passions, especially the passion of love,
+renders the existence of the black-mailer possible and often profitable.
+In a city like ours, where such freedom is accorded to young wives and
+demoiselles, it is not surprising that machinations against their virtue
+and their honor are planned and executed.
+
+The picture has still another side. What does the reader think, for
+example, of a mother who has three daughters,--bright, beautiful little
+girls, with long braided hair hanging down their shapely backs, large,
+lustrous, melting eyes; childish, innocent-looking lambs, aged
+respectively thirteen, fifteen and seventeen,--and sends them on the
+street in the afternoons, exquisitely and temptingly dressed, in order
+to capture susceptible elderly gentlemen? Yet these bewitching little
+girls have been often seen in the neighborhood of Madison Square, on
+Broadway, Fifth Avenue, and even down on Wall street. Their mother would
+follow them at a distance, keeping them in view all the time. When
+accosted by a gentleman, which happened every day, their mother would
+follow them, watch the man when he came out of the house or hotel with
+one of her daughters, and the next day visit him, saying he had
+destroyed her young and beautiful daughter, and so on, and that she was
+going to have him arrested. This species of black-mail is not so
+uncommon as it would seem, even the fathers of young and prepossessing
+girls are partners in these affairs.
+
+As a fact there is nothing that devilish ingenuity can devise to entice
+men and women into committing every kind of crime that is not practiced
+by the blackmailers of this city, and many are the fish that are landed
+and great the booty that is secured.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+ABOUT DETECTIVES.
+
+_The "Javerts," "Old Sleuths" and "Buckets" of Fiction as Contrasted
+with the Genuine Article--Popular Notions of Detective Work Altogether
+Erroneous--An Ex-Detective's Views--The Divorce Detective_.
+
+We are told that "all the world loves a lover," and it is, perhaps,
+equally true that most people like to read the details of clever
+detective exploits. The deeds of criminals naturally awaken the emotions
+of horror, fear, curiosity and awe in proportion to their heinousness
+and the mystery by which they are enveloped. Consequently the detective
+officer who pierces the mystery--unravels it thread by thread, and by
+unerring sagacity penetrates its innermost depths and lays his hand on
+the criminal--is at once invested, in the popular mind, with qualities
+approaching the preternatural. The vivid and fertile imagination of the
+literary romancist magnifies the illusion. The detective of the
+successful novel resembles the Deity in his attributes of ubiquity and
+omniscience. In whatever city his functions are exercised we may be sure
+that he knows every man-Jack of the criminal classes, their past and
+present history, their occupation and their residence. He knows all
+their names, their aliases and their soubriquets, just as Julius Caesar,
+as tradition tells, knew all the soldiers of his army. Moreover, they
+are invariably individuals of remarkable personality. While endowed with
+a strong spice of the world, the flesh and the devil, they are at the
+same time clothed in a sort of white robe of social immaculacy. They are
+half lamb and half wolf, if such a paradoxical being were possible.
+
+Take, for instance, the Inspector Javert of Victor Hugo: A tall man,
+dressed in an iron-grey great coat, armed with a thick cane, and wearing
+a hat with a turndown brim; grave with an almost menacing gravity, with
+a trick of folding his arms, shaking his head and raising his upper lip
+with the lower as high as his nose, in a sort of significant grimace. He
+had a stub nose with two enormous nostrils, toward which enormous
+whiskers mounted on his cheeks. His forehead could not be seen, for it
+was hidden by his hat; his eyes could not be seen because they were lost
+under his eyebrows; his chin was plunged into his cravat; his hands were
+covered by his cuffs, and his cane was carried under his coat. But when
+the opportunity arrived there could be seen suddenly emerging from all
+this shadow, as from an ambush, an angular, narrow forehead, a fatal
+glance, a menacing chin, an enormous hand, and a monstrous rattan. When
+he laughed, which was rare and terrible, his thin lips parted and
+displayed not only his teeth but his gums, and a savage, flat curl
+formed round his nose. When serious he was a bulldog, when he laughed he
+was a tiger. His guiding principles--or perhaps instincts is the more
+appropriate word--were respect for authority and hatred of rebellion. In
+his eyes all crimes were only forms of rebellion. Give a human face,
+writes Hugo, to the dog-son of a she-wolf and we shall have Javert. No
+wonder that his glance was a gimlet, or that his whole life was divided
+between watching and overlooking. And, as if all this analytic
+rodomontade was not enough, we are told in characteristic rhetorical
+vagueness that he was a pitiless watchman, a marble-hearted spy, a
+Brutus contained in a Vidocq.
+
+Readers of Dickens will remember that Mr. Bucket appears on the scene in
+Bleak House in a weird and mysterious way, which suggests that Inspector
+Byrne, of New York, had been a student of lawyer Tulkinghorn's methods
+when he undertook to pump Alderman Jaehne. The sly lawyer is plying
+Snagsby with rare old port in the dim twilight and evolving his story,
+when suddenly the victim becomes conscious of the presence of "a person
+with a hat and stick in his hand, who was not there when he himself came
+in, and has not since entered by either of the windows." This composed
+and quiet listener is "a stoutly built, steady-looking, sharp-eyed man
+in black, of about middle age," and he looks at Snagsby "as if he was
+going to take his portrait." When the poor, hen-pecked wretch, who has
+thus been drawn into the legal confessional, learns that Mr. Bucket is a
+detective officer, "there is a strong tendency in the clump of Snagsby's
+hair to stand on end."
+
+The method of Bucket consists partly of gross flattery and of being "all
+things to all men," as Saint Paul somewhere advises. "You're a man of
+the world," he says to Snagsby; "a man of business and a man of sense.
+That's what you are, and therefore it is unnecessary to tell you to keep
+QUIET." He flatters the gorgeous flunkey at Chesney Wold by adroitly
+commending his statuesque proportions, and hinting that he has a
+friend--a Royal Academy sculptor--who may one of those days make a
+drawing of his proportions. Further, to elicit the confidence of the
+vain and empty-headed Jeames, Bucket declares that his own father was
+successively a page, a footman, a butler, a steward, and an innkeeper.
+As Bucket moves along London streets, young men, with shining hats and
+sleek hair, evaporate at the monitory touch of his cane. When there is a
+big job on the tapis "Bucket and his fat forefinger are much in
+consultation together. When Mr. Bucket has a matter of this pressing
+interest under consideration the fat forefinger seems to rise to the
+dignity of a familiar demon. He puts it to his ears and it whispers
+information; he puts it to his lips and it enjoins him to secrecy; he
+rubs it over his nose and it sharpens his scent; he shakes it before a
+guilty man and it charms him to his destruction. The Augurs of the
+Detective Temple invariably predict that when Mr. Bucket and that finger
+are much in conference a terrible avenger will be heard of before long."
+Furthermore we are told that "Mr. Bucket pervades a vast number of
+houses and strolls about an infinity of streets, to outward appearance
+rather languishing for want of an object. He is in the friendliest
+condition toward his species, and will drink with most of them. He is
+free with his money, affable in his manners, innocent in his
+conversation--but through the placid stream of his life there glides an
+undercurrent of forefinger."
+
+Sergeant Cuff, of The Moonstone of Wilkie Collins, is "a grizzled,
+elderly man, so miserably lean that he looked as if he had not got an
+ounce of flesh on his bones. He was dressed in a decent black with a
+white cravat. His face was sharp as a hatchet, and the skin of it yellow
+and dry like a withered autumn leaf. His eyes, of a steely, light gray,
+had a very disconcerting trick, when they encountered your eyes, of
+looking as if they expected something more from you than you were aware
+of yourself. His walk was soft, his voice was melancholy, his long,
+lanky fingers were hooked like claws. He might have been a parson, or an
+undertaker, or anything else you like, except what he really was." Then
+as to Cuff's methods: He is introduced to the reader with the usual air
+of mystery. He makes no allusion whatever to the business he had been
+hurriedly summoned to investigate, but "he admired the grounds, and
+remarked that he felt the sea air very brisk and refreshing." To the
+gardener's astonishment Cuff proved to be quite a mine of learning on
+the trumpery subject of rose gardens. As in the case of Bucket, the
+effective armor of Cuff is flattery. "You have got a head on your
+shoulders and you understand what I mean," is his typical style of
+address.
+
+It is unnecessary to remind the reader that the detective of the
+novelist cannot be foiled or turned aside by false scents from the
+unerring pursuit of his lawful prey. If by _malice prepense_ Javert or
+Cuff is temporarily beguiled, it is simply for the purpose of showing
+that the writer himself is in reality a very much more ingenious person
+than even the subtle detective he depicts for the delectation of his
+readers. These tricks resemble those feints of failure common to
+professional gymnasts and trapezists, purposely perpetrated with the
+object of magnifying in the mind of the excited spectator the difficulty
+or danger of the performance.
+
+In our American literature the most popular detective stories are not
+composed of the imaginary performances of fictitious characters. We have
+made a great advance on that unsatisfactory and _effete_ style. To
+satisfy the exacting palate of our reading people, we require a real
+flesh-and-blood detective, with a popular name and reputation, to pose
+as the figurehead, while an ingenious scribbler does the romancing.
+There is something thrilling and realistic in this method, and it
+carries an air of veracity which is irresistibly attractive and
+convincing. The French people did something of the same kind for Vidocq
+and Lecocq; but, as in most everything else, there is a pervading
+breeziness and expansiveness of horizon about the American product that
+is totally lacking in the _blaze_, frouzy, over-geometrical, Gallic
+detective romance.
+
+No doubt the popular conception of the detective has been derived from
+the flash literature in which the "Old Sleuths" have formed the
+pervading figure. Concerning them, a clever ex-member of that particular
+branch of the force recently said:
+
+
+"Now that I'm out of the business I don't mind telling you what you
+perhaps already know--that the usual stories of detective work are the
+veriest bosh. There is not one officer in ten thousand, for instance,
+who ever disguises himself for any work he may be bent upon. The
+successful detective is the man who has the largest and most accurate
+knowledge of a particular class of criminals. For instance, in a
+counterfeiting case there are one or two United States officers who will
+look at a bill, and after a scrutiny will say, 'Now, let's see; there
+are three men in the country who are capable of such work as this. Bad
+Jack is doing a ten-year stretch in Sing Sing, Clever Charley is in hock
+at Joliet, and Sweet William is the only one who is at large--it must be
+William.' So he proceeds to locate William, and when they get him they
+have the man who did the work."
+
+
+As to those very interesting newspaper reports about how Detective
+So-and-So, while strolling down Broadway, saw a suspicious-looking
+individual whom he "piped" to the east side of the city, and eventually
+arrested in possession of property supposed to have been the plunder
+from a certain burglary, they are equally misleading. As the ex-officer,
+quoted above, said:
+
+"Ninety-nine out of a hundred cases are worked through the squeal of
+some thief, or ex-thief, who keeps posted on the doings of others of his
+class in the city. He knows some officer intimately; goes to him and
+tells him that the night before One-Thumbed Charley turned a trick on
+Church street, and the stuff is 'planted' at such and such a place.
+Acting on this information, the officers visit the place indicated, and
+just sit around and wait till their man shows up. Lots of ability about
+that, isn't there? Some people have an idea, you know, that after a
+burglary the detectives visit the house where it occurred, and, after
+examining certain marks on the window where the man got in, immediately
+say: 'This is the work of Slippery Sam; he is the only fellow who does
+this sort of work in this particular style.' Nothing of the kind. It's
+just as I've told you in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred. In the
+other cases, some citizen gives the officers information that leads to
+the capture of the man."
+
+
+If the foregoing illustrations serve no other purpose, they at least
+emphasize the point which might have been made at the outset of this
+chapter, that detectives are a recognized necessity of our civilization.
+Crime and vice permeate every rank and every profession, and just as
+surely as crime and vice will always exist, so will detectives be
+employed to discover wrong-doers and hand them over to justice. Crime
+and vice are two terms used for the infraction of different kinds of
+laws--social and moral--and detectives may be conveniently classed in
+the same way. The detectives who deal with the transgression of social
+laws, including such crimes as counterfeiting coin and notes, railroad
+bonds, scrip, etc., forgers, embezzlers, swindlers, and the wide class
+of criminals generally, are exceedingly useful members of the community
+when they are inspired by a high sense of duty, and guided by principles
+of truth and integrity. The other class of detectives who enact the role
+of Paul Pry on breaches of the moral law, as, for example, the working
+up of testimony in divorce cases, is mostly a despicable, unreliable,
+corrupt being, whose methods are villainous, and whose existence is a
+misfortune.
+
+Concerning our New York detectives, a writer of some note said, as
+recently as 1879:
+
+
+"It is claimed that in about eight years the district attorney's office
+in New York has not known of one conviction of a criminal through the
+instrumentality of their detective police. And in those years the city
+has been overwhelmed and startled over and over again by depredations of
+almost fabulous magnitude. Still, although the scoundrels are known, and
+their haunts familiar to what are called 'the detectives,' they are
+never brought to justice unless they stagger up against the
+representatives of some of the many detective organizations in New York.
+Instead of surrounding the thieves with a net-work of evidence to
+convict them, the New York headquarters' detectives furnish them with
+all the facilities for escape known to modern criminal practice."
+
+
+No doubt this deplorable condition of affairs was very largely due to
+the prevailing practice of the victims of robberies compromising with
+the felons. In this way detectives eagerly seize the opportunity of
+acting as go-betweens, and hence their relations with the criminal
+classes are established and maintained. They are thus largely
+interested, not in the prevention and discovery of crime, but in its
+perpetration and concealment. By this method they thrive, and their
+large incomes and accumulated property are no doubt largely attributable
+to the success of these delicate negotiations.
+
+We are glad to bear testimony to the fact, however, that there is a
+great improvement in the detective force of this city, noticeable during
+its present administration. The men now engaged on the local detective
+force are as a class, those who have kept their eyes open, and have
+formed a wide acquaintance among criminals in the district, and are
+therefore able to obtain information from these crooks about the
+movements of those suspected of having been mixed up in certain criminal
+work. For when the reader reflects how easily criminals keep out of the
+reach of the police in St. Petersburg, Paris and Vienna, where every
+concierge, every porter, every storekeeper, every housekeeper, is
+required to report to the police at least once a week all the details of
+strangers with whom they may have come in contact, it should be no
+wonder that criminals can elude the police in New York and other
+American cities.
+
+Concerning the private detective agencies, it has been said by one of
+their number:
+
+
+"They are no better than the regular officers so far as skill is
+concerned. The only real difference is that there is a superior
+intelligence in the make-up--their disguise--of the agency people. They
+are first-rate at shadowing a man, but any man with ordinary good sense,
+who knows how to keep his mouth shut, will make a good shadow. If you
+will watch the private agency men carefully you will find that they
+associate largely with the high-toned criminal class. They are solid
+with one or two leaders and all the gamblers. All thieves of any
+prominence are gamblers, and as soon as they turn a big trick, they are
+sure to turn up here or in some other city and 'play the bank' a little.
+The agency men who are associating with the gamblers hear of this as
+soon as the crook strikes town, and a little inquiry set on foot will
+show where the crook came from. If, then, in the course of a few days, a
+complaint is lodged with the agency people from the town where the
+suspected party has been that a big confidence game has been played, or
+that a forged or raised check has been worked on some bank or other
+institution, it is not very hard to imagine that the thief who was
+recently so flush is the one who turned the trick."
+
+
+There are a great many private detective organizations in New York City,
+some of which are located in elegant and commodious quarters, with a
+net-work of agencies covering the whole country and extending even to
+Europe. Between these reliable firms and the guttersnipe operator there
+are among detectives, as among other professions, every grade of
+reliability and respectability, some making a handsome living and some
+earning a bare existence. There are some thousands of them, and they all
+occasionally find something to do which pays. It may be watching some
+money-broker's exchange down-town, for the dishonest boy of some
+establishment clandestinely selling the postage stamps of his firm. It
+may be shadowing a confidential clerk, whose blood-shot eyes and
+generally "used-up" air have attracted the notice of his employers, who
+thereupon desire to learn where and how his evenings are spent. It may
+be some bank clerk, hitherto enjoying the confidence of the directors,
+but who now, in consequence of certain rumors, desire to have him
+watched. Or it may be any of a thousand instances in which an employee
+ceases to retain the full confidence of his employer, and the convenient
+private detective's services are at once put in requisition. Undoubtedly
+it would greatly surprise the army of clerks, cashiers and assistants of
+this and every great city to learn how many of them are thus under
+detective espionage. The young fellow may have fallen into the web of
+the siren. He may be down at Coney Island or at the races enjoying
+himself; utterly unconscious that a pair of watchful eyes is observing
+every motion and chronicling every act. Some fatal morning the reckoning
+comes. He may be a bank teller, and he is requested by the board of
+directors to show his books and give an account of the situation and
+prospects of the bank. Despite his proficiency in bookkeeping, he will
+be unable to figure up and cover the money he has squandered in gambling
+houses, on the street, or at the race-course. _"Crimine ab uno disce
+omnes,"_ says Virgil. From a single offense you may gather the nature of
+the whole.
+
+The detective who accepts employment for the purpose of procuring
+testimony in divorce cases is undoubtedly at the nadir of his
+profession. No self-respecting member of the private detective
+organizations will undertake the service even when the pecuniary
+inducement, as is frequently the case, is large and tempting. For
+testimony so procured is regarded by the courts with suspicion. The
+veracity of a person who would crawl into a house, peer through a
+key-hole or crane his head through a transom window for the purpose of
+witnessing an act of immorality, can hardly be considered higher than
+his sense of honor, decency and self-respect. When he stoops to this
+kind of business he will hardly manifest any remarkable zeal for
+truth-telling, and he will be quite likely to offer to sell his evidence
+to the other side--a course which invariably transpires when the other
+side is willing to pay for the information.
+
+Violations of conjugal faith are, unfortunately, not unknown, but in the
+majority of cases the intrigue progresses in secure secrecy until some
+wholly unforeseen accident brings it to sudden and relentless publicity.
+The recent case of a Brooklyn lady, who was carried into the
+city-hospital of that city about the beginning of last June, with both
+legs broken, illustrates this position with singular force and aptness.
+To quote from the article of the New York _Sun_ of June 7, 1886:
+
+
+"Mrs. Williams is young and pretty. 'She is not bad,' her melancholy
+husband said of her yesterday, 'only gay like.' She has been married
+about ten years, and two little children--a boy and a girl--are now
+longing for a mother's care and tenderness, which she cannot give them
+perhaps ever again. The faithful husband of the unfortunate woman is a
+hard-working man, honest if not dashing, devoted to his home, fond of
+his wife and proud of his children. 'I have been way down,' he says,
+'but I am getting good wages now and getting on top again. But Lizzie
+wasn't content with these things. She was full of life, and I ought to
+have watched her long ago. Then this wouldn't have happened.'
+
+"What has happened is this: When Lizzie went down on Fulton street on
+Saturday a week ago, ostensibly to make some purchases, she didn't
+return that night. Her husband's anxiety was increased when on Sunday he
+had no tidings of her. Day after day passed without word, and he sent
+for a young woman friend of Mrs. Williams to come in and look after the
+children and the household.
+
+"On Thursday a young man from East New York, a friend of Mrs. Williams
+and a relative of a certain young lady friend of hers, stuck his head in
+the basement window of Fainter Williams' house and said:
+
+"'Lizzy is in the City Hospital. She was hurt by a runaway, and both her
+legs are broken.'
+
+"Mrs. Williams had first sent word to her East New York friend, who had
+thus taken the first tidings of his wayward wife to her anxious
+husband. Williams went at once to the hospital and found his Lizzie. She
+told him she had been driving with a friend in Fulton avenue and had
+been hurt.
+
+"'Who was he?' Williams asked eagerly, the suspicions which he had been
+putting away from him for a long time suddenly becoming convictions.
+
+"'None of your business,' said pretty Lizzie, defiantly. This reply was
+calculated to satisfy her husband that all was not right. In fact, it
+convinced him that everything was wrong, and in his excitement and pain
+he upbraided his wife with such vehemence that she called upon the
+hospital attendants to put him out of the ward unless he quieted down.
+
+"Superintendent of Police Campbell heard of the alleged runaway in
+Fulton street, and he wanted to know why it had never been reported to
+him officially. He began an investigation and learned that the mishap
+had occurred out on the Coney Island boulevard. Mrs. Williams was
+confronted with this report. She denied its truth vehemently and
+protested 'before Almighty God' and in the presence of nurses and
+patients that she was run over and hurt in Fulton street. Nothing could
+move her from this statement, and when fifty witnesses to her accident
+sent word to the Police Superintendent of what they had seen, she was
+not discomfited, but repeated her false statements with determination.
+
+"Mr. Williams says that his wife has for a long time nodded to
+sportive-looking men as they have passed his Bergen street house, and
+her absences from home have been irregular and sometimes prolonged
+indiscreetly into the evening. He has felt that her love of attention
+and social excitement was leading her beyond the bounds of propriety,
+but he had no doubt until now of her faithfulness to him and her
+children.
+
+"Who took Mrs. Williams to drive on this eventful Saturday afternoon a
+week ago is her secret, shared only by her escort. Where they met is not
+known by anyone, but they started about four o'clock and drove through
+Prospect Park to the Coney Island boulevard. The day was fine and many
+fashionable turnouts and flashy rigs were on the road. Mrs. Williams, in
+her close-fitting and becoming dark habit, sat beside a young man not
+over twenty-five years old, in a road wagon of approved style, and
+behind a well-kept and fleet-footed horse. It was unmistakably a private
+rig. Her escort was of light hair and complexion, fashionably dressed,
+and of a style that is called 'giddy.'
+
+"Down the level road they drove at a good pace toward the King's
+Highway, which crosses the boulevard about two and a half miles from the
+Park, and just north of John Kelly's hospitable road house. A short
+distance before this point was reached ex-Alderman Ruggles of Brooklyn
+came bowling along at a 2.40 gait, and he gave the young man who was
+driving Mrs. Williams a brush along an open stretch of road. As they
+were speeding on toward Coney Island a dog-cart suddenly loomed up,
+coming from the opposite direction, and bore down upon the racers.
+
+"Mrs. Williams and her friend were on the right side of the road and
+Alderman Ruggles was in the middle. The dog-cart undertook to pass
+between them, and in doing so struck the wheel of the light road wagon,
+throwing Mrs. Williams' companion out. He was not hurt, and he held on
+to the reins just long enough to check his horse's speed and change his
+course. The spirited animal turned short across the road right in front
+of Kelly's and the wagon was upset, throwing Mrs. Williams out. She fell
+under the wagon and her left ankle and right thigh were fractured. A
+great many people saw the upset and ran to the injured woman's
+assistance. . . . . .
+
+"When Mr. Williams was told about the accident he said, 'If that's so, I
+give her up. If she has done that I am through with her. She cannot come
+back to me. As long as she lies to me, to shield this other fellow, she
+may go to him. She can't come to me.'"
+
+
+This giddy Brooklyn woman reckoned too much on her influence over her
+husband, when she expected to soothe his resentment by holding her
+tongue. Those women who deceive good, indulgent husbands, frequently
+discover, to their sorrow, that the most unmerciful and inexorable of
+men are those who have been deceived by their idolized partners. Yet men
+of this kind would be far more likely to thrash a private detective, who
+had possessed himself of the particulars of the amour in a sneaking way,
+than to recompense him, and properly, while the courts would absolutely
+refuse to receive such testimony unless abundantly corroborated. For
+those and other considerations, which will readily occur to the
+thoughtful reader, the detective who engages to get up testimony in
+cases of marital unfaithfulness is regarded as quite ghoulish by his
+fellow-detectives, and looked upon as being entirely unworthy of
+credence by lawyers and courts.
+
+After all that has been said the press is, on the whole, the best
+detective--the most reliable and efficient agent against evil-doers.
+When a crime is committed the daily newspaper, with its Argus eyes,
+gives such minute and circumstantial details, together with such
+exhaustive particulars concerning its environment, and the details of
+its perpetration and supposed authors, that the public at large, so
+instructed and informed, become detectives. Hence "crooked" and wicked
+people are really more afraid of the thunderbolt exposure of the
+newspapers than of the slower and more uncertain action of the law.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+GAMBLING AND GAMBLERS.
+
+_The Delusins that Control the Devotees of Policy--What the Mathematical
+Chances are Against the Players--Tricks in French Pools--"Bucking the
+Tiger"--"Ropers-in"--How Strangers are Victimized_.
+
+"And there were several offered any bet,
+        Or that he would, or that he would not come;
+For most men (till by losing rendered sager),
+Will back their own opinions with a wager."
+                                    --_Byron's "Beppo."_
+
+Some people are born gamblers, and resemble Jim Smiley, of Mark Twain's
+"Jumping Frog." Jim was "always betting on anything that turned up, if
+he could get anybody to bet on the other side; and if he couldn't he'd
+change sides. Any way that suited the other man would suit _him_--any
+way just so's he got a bet, _he_ was satisfied." If there was a
+horse-race, we are told, "you'd find him flush or you'd find him busted
+at the end of it; if there was a dog-fight, he'd bet on it; if there was
+a cat-fight, he'd bet on it; why, if there was two birds setting on a
+fence, he would bet you which one would fly first."
+
+Despite all efforts of repressive legislation, games of chance are in
+vogue all over the country. Gambling is practiced everywhere. Tourists
+to and from Europe engage in draw-poker and other games of chance, while
+they make pools and lay wagers on the distance sailed per day, or the
+length of the voyage, and on the number of the pilot-boat that will
+first be hailed. Gambling prevails on board those splendid steamers that
+ply up and down the great rivers of the country, and more than one
+passenger, driven to distraction by his losses at the gaming-table, has
+thrown himself overboard. Our legislators occasionally while away the
+time in traveling between Albany and New York in a poker-game, and they
+frequently meet each other at their lodgings around the capitol for the
+same purpose. At picnics in summer, when Nature wears her most enticing
+garmenture, groups of young men may be discovered separated from the
+merry-making multitude, jammed into some nook with a pack of cards,
+cutting, dealing, playing, revoking, scoring and snarling, wholly
+engrossed in the game.
+
+No game of chance is more extensively played in New York City than
+policy. Many people are disposed to regard policy as the negro's game
+exclusively, but this is a great mistake. Policy embraces all classes in
+its ranks, and the white devotees of the game outnumber the colored five
+to one. Among the patrons of the policy-shops which, despite police
+raids and surveillance, still flourish in the district, of which the
+Post Office may be considered the focus, may be seen lawyers,
+journalists, advertising agents, book-keepers, mechanics,
+liquor-dealers, bar-tenders, peddlers, insurance agents, etc. Gamblers,
+as a class, are very superstitious, and the white policy-player is
+hardly less so than his colored brother. The latter dreams a good deal,
+while the former divides his time between trying to guess the lucky
+numbers and avoiding evil omens. Bad luck walks arm in arm with him
+beneath every ladder, and below every safe that is being hoisted to a
+top-floor room. If he forgets anything when he is leaving home in the
+morning, and has to turn back, he is ruined for the day. If he washes
+with a piece of hard untractable soap, and it darts from his hand and
+scoots along the floor, his "luck has dropped" and "slidden" likewise.
+If he, by some malign fate, meets a cross-eyed person, especially the
+first thing on Monday morning, he is plunged into despair.
+
+It is estimated by an old policy-player that every dollar a man gets out
+of the game costs him at least five. To show how slim is the chance of
+winning, it is only necessary to explain that many men play the numbers
+4, 11, 44 every day regularly, and this well-known "gig" only comes out
+about once a year, or say once in every 600 drawings. This is especially
+the negro's "gig." He watches for its coming day after day with fond
+anticipation. He would rather "ketch dat 'ar gig" for five dollars than
+receive a present of ten.
+
+The lotteries now sold surreptitiously in New York are supposed to be
+drawn in Kentucky; but years ago numbers were drawn from a wheel on the
+steps at the old City Hall in the park. When the State Legislature
+annulled the charter of the lottery company and declared the game
+illegal, it moved over to New Jersey, where it was drawn as late as
+1850.
+
+
+"It was a standard joke in the old time," said an experienced operator
+recently, "to find out what numbers a man had played, and then to
+volunteer to stop at the City Hall and take a copy of the numbers drawn.
+A false slip was invariably brought back, and when the player examined
+it, seeing all the numbers he had bought, he generally dropped his work
+and went to collect the winning. When the lottery was driven from New
+York, interested persons used to cross over to New Jersey to witness the
+drawing, and the numbers were taken from the wheel amid the greatest
+noise and excitement. Some numbers were received with derisive hoots and
+howls, and others applauded; and all through the drawing certain
+favorites would be loudly and continually called for, and if they failed
+to appear curses filled the air. After being driven out of New Jersey,
+the lottery men found refuge in several other places, notably Delaware,
+Maryland, and other Southern States. The principal drawings now take
+place at Covington, Ky., opposite Cincinnati. The numbers from 1 to 78
+inclusive are put into glass globes and placed in a wheel. This wheel is
+turned until the numbers are well mixed, when a trap in the wheel is
+opened and a boy, with his eyes tightly bandaged and arm bare, draws
+forth one of the globes, which is unscrewed and the number in it called.
+From ten to fourteen numbers are thus drawn, according to the size of
+the lottery. The drawing is immediately telegraphed on to New York in
+cipher, certain words standing for certain numbers. After the drawing is
+translated the runners are furnished with a list of the numbers on a
+'running slip,' as it is called, which they immediately take to the
+various policy shops. No 'hits' are paid on the running slips, as some
+of the numbers are invariably wrong. About an hour or so after the
+drawings are received in New York, a printed slip is sent to every
+office, and then all claims are promptly settled. The managers, being in
+an unlawful business in this State, have the opportunity to swindle as
+they please. The players have no redress. Ten thousand dollar 'hits'
+have been made, according to tradition, and 'hits' of from $500 to
+$1,500 are known of sometimes. Three-number lottery tickets are sold on
+every drawing, and constitute a very lucrative branch of the business.
+Prizes are supposed to range from $30,000 down, and any ticket with one
+draw-number on it entitles the holder to the price originally paid for
+it. The first three drawn numbers constitute the first prize, and that
+ticket nobody ever gets."
+
+
+The most of the money spent in policy is on "gigs" and "combinations." A
+"gig" is composed of three numbers, and they must all come out of the
+same lottery to entitle the player to win. Besides "gigs," there are
+"saddles," "capitals," "horses," "cross-plays," and "station numbers."
+In fact there are almost as many ways of playing policy as there are
+numbers in the wheel. As an old gambler explained it:
+
+
+"You see there are placed in the wheel 78 numbers, from which are drawn
+12, 13, 14, or 15, as the case may be. The latter number will not be
+drawn but once a week. Suppose 13 to be drawn. The rates--that is, the
+sum the player will receive if he wins--are as follows: For day numbers,
+5 for 1; for station or first numbers, 60 for l; for saddles, 32 for 1;
+for gigs, 200 for 1; for capital saddles, 500 for 1; for horses, 680 for
+1; and for station saddles 800 for 1. Cross plays--the numbers to come
+in either lottery--may be made at the same rate, subject to a deduction
+of 20 per cent. You see that some of these offer a remarkable margin for
+profit. The station saddle, with its 800 for 1, seems to offer unequaled
+facilities for making a fortune. But since the game was started, no one
+has ever been known to hit one. To get a station saddle you must not
+only guess two of the thirteen numbers drawn, but you must also guess
+the position they will occupy in the slip. The chances of this is so
+very remote that the policy-player, sanguine as he generally is, very
+seldom attempts it. The next in order is the capital saddle, with its
+500 for 1. A capital is two of the first three numbers drawn. Of course
+there must be a first, second, and third number, and either two of these
+three constitute a capital saddle."
+
+
+The chances of playing a "capital saddle," "gig" or "horse" in policy
+are easily determined by the following formulae, well known to all
+students of the advanced branches of Algebra:
+
+The number of combinations that can be formed of _n_ things, taken two
+and two together, is
+
+
+_n_ * [(_n_ - 1)/2]
+
+For _n_ things, taken three and three together, the number is
+
+_n_ * [(_n_ - 1)/2] * [(_n_ - 2)/3]
+
+For _n_ things, taken four and four together, the number is
+
+_n_ * [(_n_ - 1)/2] * [(_n_ - 2)/3] * [(_n_ - 3)/4]
+
+
+Applying these formulae to policy, it will be seen that to ascertain the
+number of "saddles" in any combination you multiply by the next number
+under and divide by 2; for "gigs," multiply by the next two numbers
+under and divide by 6; while for "horses" you multiply the next three
+numbers under and divide by 24. Thus,
+
+
+78 X [(78 - 1)/2] = 3,003 "saddles."
+
+78 X [(78 - 1)/2] X [(78 - 2)/3] = 76,076 "gigs."
+
+78 X [(78 - 1)/2] X [(78 - 2)/3] X [(78 - 3)/4] = 1,426,425 "horses."
+
+
+In other words, there are 3,003 "saddles" in 78 numbers, and it follows
+that any person playing a capital has two chances in his favor and 3,001
+against him.
+
+There is a joke among policy-players that the game is the best in the
+world, because so many can play it at once. Different players have
+various ways of picking out the numbers they think will come out. Some
+go by dreams exclusively, some play chance numbers they run across in
+the streets, or signs or express wagons, while others make a study of
+the game and play by fixed rules.
+
+As we have already hinted, the business of policy-playing is
+insignificant in comparison to what it used to be. Still we are assured
+that New York City is still spending a good many thousand dollars a day
+in "policy," two-thirds of which professedly, and really more, goes to
+the managers and agents. If policy-players would stop awhile and think
+seriously of their ways, they would cease playing; or if they would keep
+an account of all the money spent on the game for a month or two, they
+would discover that they had chosen a wrong road to fortune.
+
+Pool gambling at the various race-courses in the suburbs of New York is
+now under stern interdict of the law. This feature is greatly deplored
+by those who are in the habit of patronizing this exciting pastime. Of
+course the business is carried on _sub rasa_ in the city, in a sort of
+sporadic form. No doubt, if we are to reason from analogy, the
+pool-fever, emboldened by being "winked at" and tolerated, will, by and
+by, assume its noisy, epidemic manifestations.
+
+It is hardly necessary to dwell on the familiar auction pool, with its
+close, stifling, dingy room; its crowd of solemn, stupid, wide-awake
+gentlemen seated in chairs before a platform, backed with a blackboard,
+on which are inscribed the names of the horses expected to start; and
+its alert, chattering auctioneer, gay as a sparrow, and equally active,
+fishing for bids, with strident voice and reassuring manner. A few
+words, however, may be spared to touch lightly on what is designated the
+"Mutuel" system, which was invented by M. Joseph Oller, an ingenious
+Frenchman, about 1866. Those who had the good fortune to attend Paris in
+1867 may remember that M. Oller's indicators were prominent race-course
+features during the Great Exposition. They are now familiar to all
+frequenters of our American race-courses, and their mode of operation
+needs no explanation. The pool-seller's profit is safe as in all big
+gambling schemes. He subtracts a commission of five per cent., and thus
+makes a handsome profit when business is at all brisk.
+
+The "Paris Mutuel" would appear to be a pretty square arrangement, but,
+according to those acquainted with its true inwardness, it has been
+"easily manipulated by those in control." There are two ways of
+cheating, according to one authority, and "both are practicable during
+the last moments of the race, when the horses are coming up the
+home-stretch. At this time everybody is anxiously intent upon the
+contest and nothing else, so that it is an easy matter for the operator
+to see what horse is ahead, and then quietly add five or ten tickets to
+his record on the indicator; or, on the other hand, if the horse favored
+by the 'ring' is away behind, he can quietly take off some of his
+tickets and so save $50 or $100 out of the five. The former, however, is
+the easier method and can be with difficulty detected, for very few
+people keep transcripts of the French pools, more particularly that
+before they are closed everybody is off trying to secure a good place to
+see the race."
+
+The prohibition placed upon pool selling naturally renders the
+book-maker's occupation to be at a premium. Book-making is reckoned a
+"science," and is based upon the principle of the operator betting up to
+a certain limit, "play or pay," against every horse entered.
+Despite all statements, official or otherwise, to the contrary, there
+are a large number of "hells" or gambling houses in New York city, in
+which millions of dollars are lost every year by unwary persons. The New
+York _Herald_ of June 14, 1886, contains a synopsis of the experiences
+of an educated and high-toned young man belonging to a good family, who
+had descended from gambling to the practices of a sneak thief. According
+to the story he told Inspector Byrnes, he was in love and at the same
+time
+
+
+"became infatuated with the gambling craze. I wanted to make my sweetheart
+some presents, and hoped to make enough at the gaming table to purchase
+what I wanted. My game was _rouge el noir_--"red and black"--and the
+establishments that I visited were on Sixth avenue, between Twenty-eighth
+and Twenty-ninth streets, and in Thirty-second street, near Jerry McAuley's
+Mission House. Instead of winning I lost. I bucked the game and it
+'bucked' me. Then I was penniless and became desperate. By honest
+ways I knew it would take a long time to pay my debts, and as I was in
+desperate straits I determined to steal. As I did not associate with
+professional thieves I had no reason to fear betrayal, so I became a
+rogue again."
+
+
+There is this insuperable difficulty with the born gambler that he is
+unteachable. The fool who ruins himself at Homburg or Monte Carlo
+belongs to the same type as the young man above, whose identity was
+betrayed by a love-letter. Gamblers are always discovering some
+infallible system of beating the bank. The first word in La Bruyere's
+famous work--"_Tout est dit_" "Everything has been said,"--is true of
+gambling against the bank's system, which is to take a positive
+advantage which must win in the long run. Not only has everything been
+said, but everything has been done to beat the bank. Every move has been
+tried, and the result is evident to all but those who are given over to
+"a reprobate mind" and will not be convinced. "To gamble against the
+bank," said an eminent authority, "whether recklessly or systematically,
+is to gamble against a rock."
+
+If the odds are so much against the insane gambler who, secure in an
+infallible system, hastens to place his foot on the neck of chance in
+what is called a "square" game, how must he inevitably fare in a "skin"
+operation. And the stranger who comes within our gates, bent on backing
+his methods by a wager, is almost sure to be beguiled into the "skin"
+game; for he is likely to meet, lounging around his hotel, some
+fashionably dressed young man who spends money freely, and who, by and
+by, kindly offers to show him around. He has run across a "roper-in," as
+he is well named, whose business it is to track the footsteps of
+travelers visiting the metropolis for business or pleasure. It is the
+engaging mission of those suave and persuasive gentlemen to worm
+themselves into the confidence of strangers, with or without an
+infallible system of beating the game, and introduce them to their
+employers, the gambling-hell proprietors. And when the poor, misguided
+pigeon is plucked, the adroit "roper-in" receives his commission on the
+profits realized. This hunting after pecunious strangers is so
+systematically carried on that it might be dignified by the name of a
+science. Keepers of gambling-houses are necessarily particularly
+wide-awake. They take care to be regularly informed of everything
+transpiring in the city that may be of interest to their business, and
+their agents and emissaries leave nothing to chance. They are not
+impetuous. They never hurry up the conclusion of the transaction. When
+the unwary stranger is in a fit condition for the sacrifice he is led to
+the gaming-table with as much indifference and _sang froid_ as butchers
+drive sheep to the shambles.
+
+The reader, among other of Gotham's gambling devices, may have heard of
+what is aptly designated "Skin Faro," but it is altogether unlikely that
+he may be acquainted with the _modus operandi_ of the game. Skin faro is
+not played at a regular establishment in which the player against the
+bank is fleeced. The game is liable to drift against the stranger in his
+journey to New York, or indeed on any railroad or steamboat, and the
+"point" is to get the unsophisticated countryman to be banker. In this
+"racket" it is the banker who is to be skinned. According to a recent
+authority the ordinary process is something like this:
+
+
+"After the topic has been adroitly introduced and the party worked up to
+the desire to play, it is proposed that the man with the most money
+shall act as banker. Now, in an ordinary square game, few would be
+unwilling to stand in this position, for though the risk is
+considerable, the profit is generally slow but certain. At this point
+the question rises as to who has a pack of cards. The question is soon
+answered; there always is a pack handy, and the swindlers have it; and
+this pack, if examined, will be found to contain a neat round pin-hole
+through the center of the pack. The object of this pin-hole is as
+follows: the player against the bank makes his boldest play on the turn,
+that is, at the end of the game, when there are only three cards out,
+tarry; five, nine and all the aces, except spades, can be _guessed_ with
+almost uniform certainty by any one looking on the dealer's hand just
+before he is about to turn the last two cards (excluding the one left in
+_hoc_). As the bank pays four for one 'on the turn,' it is a very good
+thing for the player, and the faro banker, for the nonce the would-be
+sport, soon finds himself cleaned out."
+
+
+The people who frequent gambling-houses may be divided into two classes:
+occasional gamblers and professional gamblers. Among the first may be
+placed those attracted by curiosity, and those strangers already
+referred to who are roped in by salaried intermediaries. The second is
+composed of men who gamble to retrieve their losses, or those who try to
+deceive and lull their grief through the exciting diversions that
+pervade these seductive "hells."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+GAMBLING MADE EASY.
+
+_The Last Ingenious Scheme to Fool the Police--Flat-Houses Turned into
+Gambling  Houses--"Stud-Horse Poker," and "Hide the Heart."_
+
+The following timely article on the newest racket in gambling in the
+City of New York is from the _Sunday Mercury_ of June 20, 1886:
+
+
+"Since the gambling houses in the upper part of the city, where night
+games flourished, have been closed and their business almost entirely
+suspended, a new method of operations has been introduced. A _Mercury_
+reporter a few days ago was hurrying down Broadway, near Wall street,
+when he was tapped on the shoulder by a young man not yet of age, whom
+he recognized as a clerk in a prominent banking house, and whose father
+is also well known in financial circles. After interchanging the usual
+courtesies the young clerk pulled a card-case from his pocket, and,
+asking if the _Mercury_ man liked to play poker, presented a neat little
+piece of white Bristol board which read:
+
+
+        HARRY R . . . . N,
+      _First Flat, No. -- Sixth Avenue._
+
+"'If you want to play a nice quiet game,' remarked the promising clerk,
+'you can take that card and go up there any evening, or come with me
+to-night and see how the whole thing is done, but whatever you do don't
+lose that card, for you can't get in without it.'
+
+"Suspecting the nature of this 'quiet little game,' the reporter agreed
+to meet the banking clerk that evening.
+
+"'You will find a very nice set of fellows in this party,' remarked the
+clerk. 'There's none of those toughs or men you see in regular gambling
+houses there, but young men like myself and some of the best business
+men in this town. Why, I have seen young fellows there whose fathers
+have got loads of rocks. They lose a good pile once in a while, but
+don't mind that, because a fellow's no blood who cries just because he
+drops from ten to fifty dollars of a night.'
+
+"The house was one of a row of French flat buildings, the ground floor
+of which is occupied by stores. The clerk, on entering the vestibule,
+gave an electric button a familiar push with the index finger and almost
+immediately the hall door swung itself open. As soon as the head of the
+first flight of stairs was reached, a colored man, wearing a white tie,
+was met standing near a door. To him the clerk gave a card, and the
+reporter following the example, both were ushered into what happened to
+be a reception-room. Two heavy and rich Turkish curtains at one end of
+this room were quickly pushed aside and the front or card parlor was
+then entered. There were five round and oblong baize-covered tables in
+different parts of the elegantly furnished apartment. A number of costly
+oil paintings hung on the frescoed walls and a well-stocked buffet at
+one side completed the furniture. The adjoining rooms consisted of two
+sleeping apartments and a rear connecting kitchen, in which a colored
+cook seemed quite busy.
+
+"At the center table, where a game of draw poker was in full blast, was
+noticed two celebrated professionals, a couple of race-horse owners
+and two clerks in a public department office down-town. At a side table
+were the sons of a prominent Hebrew merchant and property owner, two
+college students and several young men whose appearance would indicate
+they were employed in mercantile houses. Another side table was
+surrounded by a gathering of Broadway statues and gambling house
+hangers-on, who were engaged in a game called 'hide the heart,' and the
+last table had a circle of big, heavy-bodied and solid-looking men about
+it who were putting up on a game known as 'stud-horse poker.' The
+reporter and the clerk were quickly accommodated with seats at the
+center table, where 'draw poker' was in operation. The colored attendant
+with the white tie was at hand, and pulling out a ten-dollar bill the
+clerk gave it to the negro with the request to get him that amount of
+chips in return. The reporter followed suit with a crisp five-dollar
+bill. The colored man went away with the money to the further end of the
+room, where he passed it over to a clean-shaven and well-dressed young
+man with a big diamond in his shirt front. This, the clerk informed him,
+was the proprietor of the place, who sat at a separate table, and, after
+receiving the cash, handed out to the waiter several stacks of white and
+red ivory chips, which were then brought back for the money. The play or
+'ante' to the game was fifty cents, with no limit. The white chips
+represented half a dollar each and the red ones just double that sum. In
+the first two hands of cards the clerk lost his ten dollars, while the
+reporter made a profit. A short time convinced the reporter the two
+professionals were hard to beat.
+
+"While an extremely close game was carried on, the house was certainly
+sure never to lose, as it put up no money and as 'banker' reaped a
+steady percentage deducted from the chips of all winners who cashed in.
+
+"The clerk was broke in two hours' sitting and confessed he had lost
+sixty dollars, more than three weeks' salary, and while he wore a gold
+chain over his vest, he had left his watch in pledge with the game-owner
+for twenty dollars' worth of chips besides. As the reporter and his
+guide reached the sidewalk, one of the young men who had been in the
+place was asked what he thought of the place. Not suspecting the
+reporter's motive, the player answered glibly: 'Oh, that racket in
+French flats is getting to be all the go now, and I tell you it's
+immense. The police can't get on to it, and now as all the faro games
+are closed or not making expenses, and afraid to open, it is doing well.
+Then there is such a better class of people that go to these places,
+people who would not care to be seen or caught in a regular concern. Now
+up in Harry's you see how nice it is. There's your parlor to play in.
+Then if it's an all-night play you can sleep in turns or lay off during
+the day, and get anything you want to eat right there. 'Get pulled?'
+Why, there ain't the ghost of a show for that in those flats. In the
+first place, no one is let in without he is known or has a card; then a
+'copper' can 't go in without forcing an entrance or a warrant, and if
+he does, what evidence can be produced to show the place is a gambling
+house? Why, gambling in the Fifth Avenue clubs is no better protected.
+No one in the house up-stairs suspects what's going on. The halls are
+all carpeted and so are the stairs, and you never can hear any one pass
+up and down. Then if any raid is made, can't a man swear he was only
+having a game of cards in his own house with a party of friends?' In
+society, next to progressive euchre, poker comes the highest.
+
+"'Are there many of these private flat games?' asked the reporter. 'Oh,
+yes; there's at least half a dozen I know of. There's one on Fifty-ninth
+street, one on Forty-fifth street, and several more on Sixth Avenue and
+Broadway, and any quantity now in other private houses run as social
+club rooms. You see, no games but poker--draw, stud-horse and straight,
+and hide the heart--are allowed to be run. Now if you never was in
+Harry's before, and you were seen to be all right, you would be given
+some cards to pass around to your friends confidentially, which would
+tell them where to go for play and would get them in without bother."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+SLUMMING.
+
+_Depravity of Life in Billy McGlory's--A Three Hours' Visit to the
+Place--Degraded Men and Lost Women Who are Nightly in This Criminal
+Whirlpool._
+
+The following from the Cincinnati _Enquirer_ tells its own story:
+
+"Slumming in New York always begins with a trip to Billy McGlory's. It
+is a Hester street dive. What The. Allen was thought to be in the days
+when he was paraded as 'the wickedest man in New York,' and what Harry
+Hill was thought to be in the days when the good old deacons from the
+West used to frequent his dance hall, Billy McGlory is in New York
+to-day. The. Allen and Harry Hill are both alive, but Billy McGlory
+bears off the palm of wickedness amid the wickedest of Gotham. If you
+want to see his place, two things are necessary, a prize-fighter for a
+protector and a late start. I had both when I went there the other
+night. My companions were half a dozen Western men, stopping at an
+up-town hotel, and our guide was a little 'tough' who has fought half a
+dozen prize fights and would fight at the drop of the hat. We had pooled
+issues and one man had all the money in the party. Our wallets and
+watches and jewelry were left behind. It was nearly midnight when we
+started, and half an hour later when the carriage drove us up in front
+of a dingy-looking double doorway, from which the light was streaming.
+The walls around were black; no light anywhere except that which came
+out of the open door. The entrance was a long hall, with nothing visible
+at the further end from the outside. It might have served for a picture
+of Milton's description of the 'Cavernous Entrance to Hell.'
+
+"There was a policeman outside, and down the street a score of shadowy
+forms flitted in and out of the shadows--prostitutes lying in wait for
+victims, our guide told us. McGlory's place is a huge dance hall, which
+is approached by devious ways through a bar-room. There is a balcony
+fitted up with tables and seats. There are tables and seats under the
+balcony. There are little boxes partitioned off in the balcony for the
+best customers--that is the sight-seers--and we got one of them. A piano
+is being vigorously thumped by a black-haired genius, who is accompanied
+by a violinist and a cornet player. 'Don't shoot the pianist; he is
+doing his best,' the motto a Western theater man hung up in his place,
+would be a good thing here. Yet the pianist of one of these dance halls
+is by no means to be despised. It was from a position like this that
+Counselor Disbecker rose within a few years to a legal standing that
+enabled him to get $70,000 out of Jake Sharpe for lawyer's fees.
+Transpositions are rapid in New York, and Billy McGlory, who was on the
+Island a few months ago for selling liquor without license, may be an
+excise commissioner himself before he dies.
+
+"These side thoughts have crowded in while we are looking around. There
+are five hundred men in the immense hall. There are a hundred
+females--it would be mockery to call them women. The first we hear from
+them is when half a dozen invade our box, plump themselves in our laps,
+and begin to beg that we put quarters in their stockings for luck. There
+are some shapely limbs generously and immodestly shown in connection
+with this invitation. One young woman startles the crowd by announcing
+that she will dance the cancan for half a dollar. The music starts up
+just then, and she determines to do the cancan and risk the collection
+afterward. She seizes her skirts between her limbs with one hand, kicks
+away a chair or two, and is soon throwing her feet in the air in a way
+that endangers every hat in the box. The men about the hall are all
+craning their necks to get a sight of what is going on in the box, as
+they hear the cries of 'Hoop-la' from the girls there. There is a waltz
+going on down on the floor. I look over the female faces. There is one
+little girl, who looks as innocent as a babe. She has a pretty face, and
+I remark to a companion that she seems out of place among the other poor
+wretches--for there is not an honest woman in the hall. Before we leave
+the place it has been demonstrated that the little girl with the
+innocent face is one of the most depraved of all the habitues of the
+place.
+
+"The dance is over, and a song is being sung by a man on crutches with
+only one leg. 'He is an honest fellow, is the Major,' says one of the
+girls. 'Poor fellow, he has a wife and six children. He sticks to them
+like a good fellow and works hard to get a living. He sells pencils in
+the day-time and works here at night.' A generous shower of coin goes on
+to the floor when the Major finishes. I begin to notice the atmosphere
+of tobacco smoke. It is frightfully oppressive. The 'champagne' that it
+has been necessary to order so as to retain the box has not been drank
+very freely. The girls have been welcome to it the visitors having
+discovered that it is bottled cider, with a treatment of whisky to give
+it a biting tang and taste. It costs three dollars a bottle. It would
+cost a man more to drink it. There was a young business man of
+Cincinnati here three or four weeks ago who filled himself up on it at a
+cost of $300. He had been foolish enough to go to McGlory's alone. He
+was found on the Bowery at five o'clock the next morning without any hat
+or overcoat. His pocket-book, watch and jewelry were gone. His only
+recollection was that he had taken three or four drinks of McGlory's
+'champagne.' He went to the hotel where he was a guest and was wise
+enough to take the advice of the clerk. By paying $100 and no questions
+asked he got back his watch and jewelry. He also got his pocket-book and
+papers, but not the $200 that was in the book when he started out on his
+spree. In the intervals of the dance his story has been told me as a
+sample of the nightly occurrence.
+
+"What is this that has come out for a song? It has the form of a young
+man, but the simpering silliness of a school girl. Half idiot, it
+jabbers out a lot of words that can not be understood, but which are
+wildly applauded by the crowd on the floor, who 'pat juba' while the
+creature dances. The girl who has been hanging around me to get a
+quarter, whispers something like 'Oh, the beast!' in my ear. I hear the
+other girls uttering similar remarks and epithets. So I look closer at
+the young man on the floor--for young man it is. He has a long head and
+smooth face, with a deathly white pallor over it, big mouth and lips as
+thick as a negro, a conical shaped forehead, and eyes that glitter with
+excitement like a courtesan's, but from which at times all signs of
+intelligence have apparently fled. He has a companion whose general
+appearance is like his own, but whose head is large and round, with a
+high forehead and full moon face. Who are they? Well, they are part of
+Billy McGlory's outfit, and that is all I can say about them. There are
+four more of them in female dress, who have been serving drinks to the
+customers at the tables, all the while leering at the men and practicing
+the arts of the basest of women.
+
+"Some of my companions have been drawn into one of the little boxes
+adjoining ours. They come back now to tell of what depravity was
+exhibited to them for a fee. 'Great heavens!' exclaims one of them. 'I
+feel sick. Get me out of this if you can. It is damnable.' No wonder
+they are sick. The sights they have seen would sicken all humanity.
+Editor Stead, of London, could find a bonanza every night for a week
+right here in New-York City at Billy McGlory's Assembly Hall. 'Hist!'
+says our guide. We look up and find three or four toughs around. They do
+not allow any adverse criticisms to be passed aloud at Billy's. If you
+begin to talk aloud what you think, out you go. There have been more
+round dances. There has been more indifferent singing and some clog
+dancing. It is getting late. The fumes of tobacco and of stale beer are
+stifling. Four-fifths of the men have not moved from the tables since we
+came in. Here and there one is lopped over asleep. But the waiter in
+female clothing comes along to wake him up and induce him to order more
+beer. Your glass must always be before you if you want to stay at
+McGlory's.
+
+"'What are they all waiting for?' I ask. But no one will tell me. Across
+the balcony a girl is hugging her fellow in a maudlin and hysterical
+manner. Another girl is hanging with her arms around the neck of one of
+the creatures I described some time ago. She is pressing her lips to his
+as if in ecstasy. He takes it all as a matter of course, like an
+indifferent young husband after the honeymoon is over. His companion
+joins him--the moon-faced fellow--and they come around to our box and
+ogle us. They talk in simpering, dudish tones, and bestow the most
+lackadaisical glances on different members of our party. The girls
+shrink back as if contamination itself had come among them. 'We are
+pretty hard,' says one of them, 'but not so hard as they.'
+
+"The piano gives a bang and a crash. The gray light is beginning to
+stream through the windows. There is a hurrying and a scurrying among
+the females, and there are a precious lot of young fellows, with low
+brows and plug-ugly looks gathering on the floor. There are twenty odd
+women with them, mostly young, none good-looking, all bearing marks of a
+life that kill. The band strikes up a fantastic air. The whole place is
+attention at once. The sleepy beer-bummers rouse up. The persons on the
+balcony hang over the railings. The figures on the floor go reeling off
+in a mixture of dancing and by-play as fantastic as the music. The
+pianist seems to get excited and to want to prove himself a Hans von
+Bulow of rapid execution. The fiddler weaves excitedly over his fiddle.
+The cornetist toots in a screech like a car-engine whistle. The
+movements of the dancers grow licentious and more and more rapid. They
+have begun the Cancan. Feet go up. Legs are exhibited in wild abandon.
+Hats fly off. There are occasional exhibitions of nature that would put
+Adam and Eve to shame. The draperies of modern costumes for a time
+covers the wanton forms, but as the performers grow heated wraps are
+thrown off. The music assumes a hideous wildness. The hangers-on about
+the place pat their hands and stamp and shout. The females on the floor
+are excited to the wildest movements. They no longer make any attempt to
+conceal their persons. Their action is shameful beyond relation. It is
+climaxed by the sudden movement of eight or ten of them. As if by
+concerted arrangement they denude their lower limbs and raising their
+skirts in their hands above their waists go whirling round and round in
+a lascivious mixture of bullet and cancan. It is all done in an instant,
+and with a bang the music stops. Several of the girls have already
+fallen exhausted on the floor. The lights go out in a twinkling. In the
+smoky cloud we have just enough daylight to grope our way out. The big
+policeman stands in the doorway. Billy McGlory himself is at the bar, to
+the left of the entrance, and we go and take a look at the man. He is a
+typical New York saloon-keeper--nothing more, and nothing less. A
+medium-sized man, neither fleshy nor spare; he has black hair and
+mustache, and a piercing black eye. He shakes hands around as if we were
+obedient subjects come to pay homage to a king. He evidently enjoys his
+notoriety.
+
+"I had a chat with an old detective, who says to me about McGlory: 'He
+is a Fourth-warder by birth. He has a big pull in politics, but takes no
+direct part himself. He pays his way with the police, and that ends it.
+I have known him for years, and 'tough' as he is, I would take his word
+as quick as I would take the note of half the bank presidents of New
+York. His place is in the heart of a tenement region, where there are a
+great many unmarried men. Grouped around him are the rooms and haunts of
+hundreds of prostitutes, with their pimps, thieves and pick-pockets who
+thrive in such atmosphere. His place is head-quarters for them. These
+can not be suppressed, and it is part of the police policy to leave a
+few places like McGlory's where you can lay your hands on a man at any
+time, rather than scatter them indiscriminately over the city.'
+
+"We go out on Hester street. It is a narrow, dirty, filthy street. It is
+the early morning--five o'clock. We had spent nearly five hours in the
+den. The air was reeking with the filthy odors of the night, but it was
+refreshing compared with the atmosphere we had left.
+
+"We get in our carriage to go home.
+
+"Three or four blocks up-town we pass Cooper Institute and the old
+Mercantile Library. A stone's throw from McGlory's are the great
+thoroughfares of the Bowery and Broadway. You could stand on his
+house-top and shoot a bullet into the City of Churches. I have not told
+the half, no, nor the tenth, of what we saw at his place. It can not be
+told. There is no newspaper would dare print it. There is no writer who
+could present it in shape for publication. It can only be hinted at.
+There is beastliness and depravity under his roof compared with which no
+chapter in the world's history is equal.
+
+"Involuntarily, when I reached my apartment, I turned into the bath-room
+and bathed my face and hands. It was like getting a breath of heaven
+after experiencing a foretaste of sheol."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+OUR WASTE BASKET.
+
+_Contemporaneous Records and Memoranda of Interesting Cases._
+
+
+*Miss Ruff's Tribulations.*
+
+Miss Louise Ruff was a tall, fair-complexioned young lady of twenty-two,
+with a handsome form, lovely shoulders, handsome arms and bewitching
+address. Her family was well known on the east side of the town, and she
+had received a fairly liberal education. Miss Ruff, two or three years
+previous to the legal proceedings here chronicled, had the good or bad
+fortune to form the acquaintance of Mr. Julius Westfall, the well-to do
+proprietor of a couple of restaurants. Mr. Westfall was a Teutonic
+"masher" with which any Venus would have been justified in falling in
+love. He was a brunette with hyacinthine locks and lustrous black eyes,
+and with hands and feet too pretty, almost, for use. Mr. Julius Westfall
+fell violently in love with Louise. She had dropped in with a lady
+friend to drink a cup of coffee. From behind the receipt of custom he
+took an observation, and then he began to prance round, as one who had
+suddenly been attacked by a combination of the fire of St. Anthony and
+the dance of St. Vitus. He skipped around the saloon like a grasshopper
+on a gravel lot, and smiled, and smiled, and smiled--looking his
+Fourth-of-July prettiest. Of course Miss Ruff nudged her companion above
+the fifth rib, and whispered something complimentary to the beaming
+proprietor; and when the ladies left, he bowed them out with all the
+grace of a Belgravia footman.
+
+Mr. Westfall began to watch for Louise and to trot after her like a
+doppelganger. He kept a tub of ice-water in a closet, in which he
+occasionally bathed his throbbing temples. He was devoured by a
+consuming passion. When he beheld her at a distance, he smacked his lips
+like a beautiful leopard. The heart of Miss Ruff was not of adamant. It
+was not a trap-rock paving stone. She could not resist the young man's
+loveliness and his innumerable fascinations. They began to walk out
+together in the evening when the dandelions were being kissed by the
+setting sun. They strolled into the beer gardens and listened to music's
+power, while moistening their clay. The Bowery Garden, between Canal and
+Hester streets, was a favorite resort. So was the Atlantic Garden and
+the Viennese lady musicians. Thus, for one long twelve-month they
+loved--after nature's fashion, nor thought of the crime.
+
+Sometime in the latter part of last year--it may have been in October,
+or November, or December--Mr. Julius Westfall was summoned to the German
+fatherland. It became necessary to dispose of his business and to bid
+adieu to Louise. Why he did not marry the young lady doth not appear. He
+seems to have left suddenly, and probably the idea of matrimony did not
+occur to him. Mr. Ludwig Nisson became Mr. Westfall's successor in the
+restaurant business. More than that, he also became the successor of Mr.
+Westfall in the affections of Miss Ruff. Now, Mr. Ludwig Nisson is a
+handsome young blonde, with lovely flaxen side-whiskers and a rose-pink
+complexion. Mr. Nisson's chin and upper lip are shaven clean every
+morning. He wears the latest Fifth-avenue style of store clothes. An
+ornamental garden of jewelry adorns his vest. His studs are diamonds;
+his hay-colored hair exhibits the perfection of the barber's skill. Mr.
+Nisson's lips are red and pouting. He may be seven or eight and twenty.
+He is very good-looking, and he knows it. As in the case of Mr.
+Westfall, Ludwig made superhuman efforts to please Miss Ruff when she
+entered his saloon, in which are seats always "reserved for ladies." In
+the art of soul-floralization, Ludwig was his predecessor's equal. What
+could Louise do but listen to his blandishments? And when a young lady
+listens once, the poet tells us, she "will listen twice." Thus it came
+to pass that before Julius Westfall had been long gone--perhaps before
+he was even half seas over--Mr. Nisson began to meander around with Miss
+Ruff, to quaff the foaming lager, and to be on hand in the Bowery Garden
+when the band began to play.
+
+Some of these affectionate and confidential manifestations did not
+eventuate amid the glare and blare of the beer garden's, but away up in
+a sanctum over a drug store and in other "sweet, retired solitudes,"
+where they could listen to the sweet music of their own speech. Early in
+January of the present year, Louise possessed a secret which she felt
+she could confide to no ear but Ludwig Nisson's. With reddening cheeks
+she softly made her confession. The easiest and most economical course
+under the lamentable circumstances was to offer her some advice. That is
+just what Ludwig did offer--subsequently, however, backing it with a
+modest fiduciary bonus. After this Mr. Ludwig Nisson sought no more to
+commune with Miss Ruff. The poor, indiscreet girl was in a pitiable
+dilemma. She had no mother in whose heart of hearts she could seek
+forgiveness and shelter. If her family were made aware of the event
+impending, she knew the explosion of indignation would be terrific. So
+she professed to be tired of staying at home, and entered her name in a
+registry office for servants. Fitfully occupying two or three positions,
+a victim of anxiety and unrest, she finally consulted an old friend of
+her family--Mr. Peter Cook, the lawyer, who wrote a letter to Mr. Nisson
+for his client. In a few days a lawyer called on Mr. Cook on behalf of
+the restaurateur, and stated that the case would be allowed to go for
+trial, in which case, Mr. Nisson would defend it. Shortly afterward, or
+to be more specific, in May last, Mr. Henry E. Von Voss, collector for a
+down-town business house, called upon Miss Ruff and had a conversation
+with her in regard to a possible arrangement. Mr. Von Voss was anxious
+that the conversation should be private, but the lady with whom Louise
+was residing counseled her to secure the presence of a witness. He
+advised her to settle the matter amicably, on a pecuniary basis, and
+thus avoid the scandal of publicity. This counsel was favorably
+entertained, and in a few days, on the receipt of a small sum of money,
+she signed what in law is known as "a general release," drawn up by a
+Second Avenue lawyer, in which she exempted Mr. Nisson from all further
+claims of any kind whatsoever.
+
+Time passed on, and the money was spent. The tale of the months that
+would make her a mother were being surely fulfilled. As yet her family
+knew nothing of her condition. With Disgrace, his gaunt twin brother,
+Starvation, threatening to assail her, what should she do? Happy
+thought! There were the Commissioners of Charities and Corrections.
+There was an asylum for unfortunate girls in her condition. Here would
+she apply and conceal her trouble.
+
+Before an applicant can be admitted to this humane institution certain
+preliminary information must be given. Louise refused to reveal Ludwig's
+name or to make a complaint against him. Thereupon she was taken before
+his Honor Justice Otterbourg at Essex Market and ordered to reveal the
+name of her lover, and to make complaint against him. "It is the first
+case in my practice," said Mr. Cook, "where the girl was compelled to
+make the complaint." Thereupon the usual order of arrest was issued, and
+Ludwig was sacrilegiously thumbed by a coarse-handed sheriff. Of course
+the necessary bail was immediately found, and then he was at liberty to
+walk down to 89 Centre street and seek legal succor from Messrs. Howe &
+Hummel.
+
+The hearing came up in the private examination room of Judge Otterbourg
+on Friday last. Judge, and clerks, and lawyers, and principals, and
+witnesses were promptly on hand. The Judge smoked a cigar, and his
+smooth white forehead, beneath his Hyperion curls, looked the picture of
+judicial impartiality. Lawyer Cook looked like Charles the Wrestler,
+waiting for a burly and muscular antagonist. Lawyer Hummel was all
+brains and diamonds; and when the Judge wanted a light, Mr. Hummel
+handed him a match-box of solid virgin gold dug from a California mine
+by Tony Pastor. The fair plaintiff was nervous. Mr. Ludwig Nisson was
+very handsome but very pale. His counsel fought for him as earnestly as
+if his client had been arraigned for murder; and when opportunity
+offered he whispered in his client's ear and bade him keep up his heart.
+The seven witnesses for the defense sat in the rear. Four of them were
+former friends of Louise. Miss Ruff took the stand and in reply to Mr.
+Cook briefly told her experiences. Then Mr. Hummel took her in hand. She
+answered modestly and straightforwardly, not denying the nature of her
+intimacy with Mr. Julius Westfall, but stated her inability to remember
+when that gentleman went to Europe.
+
+Mr. Richard Kloeppel then perched himself gracefully on the witness
+chair and smiled benignly upon the court and counsel. Mr. Kloeppel is
+the bartender in the Gilbert House, and in answer to Mr. Hummel declared
+that he was acquainted with Miss Ruff. He had walked in that portion of
+Second Avenue known as Love Lane in the company of Miss Ruff, and he had
+also sweethearted and otherwise mashed other young ladies. Nobody in
+court--with the possible exceptions of Louise and her lawyer--were
+surprised when Richard went into particulars about his intimacy with
+Miss Ruff.
+
+Mr. Rudolph Fuchs was the next occupant of the witness chair; a
+bewilderingly pretty brunette with coal-black eyes and perfect teeth.
+During the height of the season Mr. Rudolph Fuchs had been the cynosure
+of all eyes at Brighton Beach, where, for a pecuniary consideration, he
+condescended to fill the role of waiter. Last year he was similarly
+engaged at Cable's. Next year, he will probably be the subject of fierce
+rivalry among Coney Island caterers. Mr. Fuchs gave his testimony with
+inimitable grace. Mr. Fuchs had also enjoyed the acquaintance and
+association of Miss Ruff. He had danced with her; he had listened to the
+band in her charming society; he had escorted her along the street, and
+he had accompanied her to an establishment that shall be nameless here.
+
+Then Lawyer Hummel called Joseph Neuthen. He was another exasperatingly
+pretty young man, with pearl complexion and hazel eyes. He was the
+fourth of the phenomenally pretty young men who had loved Miss Ruff. Mr.
+Neuthen rehearsed a soft and scandalous tale. He learned to look upon
+Louise with love two years since this summer. One evening he had been in
+a private apartment in West Third street with Miss Ruff.
+
+After this charming witness retired, lawyer Cook lashed himself into a
+rage. Miss Ruff once more graced the witness stand. She told the
+incidents connected with Mr. Neuthen's acquaintance in a different, but
+in an equally interesting way. At the same time she emphatically denied
+the soft impeachments of Richard Kloeppel and Rudolph Fuchs. She had
+known them, she swore, as casual acquaintances; but closer relations she
+positively denied. As to "Joseph," Miss Ruff remembered a certain
+evening, over two years since, when he brought her tidings that Mr.
+Westfall wanted to see her. She was gratified by the intelligence, and
+readily adopted Joseph's suggestion, more especially as Mr. Westfall had
+charged his messenger with it--to drink a glass of beer, till the
+restaurateur arrived. Joseph and Louise waited and waited, but Julius
+failed to appear. Then Joseph said: "Perhaps he has gone home; perchance
+he slumbereth; let us go after him." They went to Third street, where
+Julius was accustomed to woo Morpheus. Joseph and Louise entered a room.
+Soon after he became demonstrative in his attentions. But being
+comparatively a giantess, she kicked him away, and after he had gone to
+sleep she put off her outer raiment and went to sleep also.
+
+Mr. Theodore Utz, of Stapleton, L. I., an upholsterer by trade, was the
+next witness. He had received letters from Miss Ruff, and was familiar
+with her handwriting. He had seen a letter addressed by her to Mr.
+Westfall since he left for Europe. The letter was addressed to Mr.
+Westfall in Hamburg, and he was familiar with its contents.
+
+Counsellor Hummel: "Now state the contents of that letter as near as you
+can recollect."
+
+Counsellor Cook: "I object."
+
+Judge Otterbourg ruled out the testimony.
+
+"Put this down on the record," said Mr. Hummel. "Counsel for defendant
+excepts and insists that the question is admissible on the ground that
+the complainant having sworn that she did not write a letter to Mr.
+Westfall, charging him with the paternity of the child likely to be
+born, the defense desires to prove by this witness, who has sworn that
+he knows the handwriting of, and who has received letters from, the
+complainant, that the complainant did write a letter to said Westfall
+charging him with the paternity of said to-be-born child; that it is an
+impossibility to secure said original letter, or said Julius Westfall,
+it having been proven in evidence that due effort was made to secure the
+original letter and Westfall, but Westfall is in Europe and not in the
+jurisdiction of this court."
+
+Mr. Francis L. Specht, a butcher on the east side, who supplied the
+restaurants of Mr. Nisson, gave some testimony tending to prove that
+Miss Ruff sometimes kept late hours. When asked by Mr. Hummel, "Do you
+known her general character for virtue?" plaintiff's counsel objected,
+and the objection was sustained. The result of the case, however, was
+that the proceedings were eventually dismissed, the evidence
+conclusively establishing the fact that Miss Ruff "loved not wisely but
+too much."
+
+
+*Astounding Degradation.*
+
+A WIFE FLIES FROM HER HUSBAND'S HOME--REVOLTING HEARTLESSNESS OF A
+FATHER--AN ABHORRENT TRUTH STRANGER THAN THE MOST IMAGINATIVE FICTION.
+
+Supreme Court.--John Edward Ditmas against Olivia A. Ditmas. Such is the
+title of an action for divorce instituted by Howe & Hummel, on behalf of
+an injured husband, against a youthful, educated, accomplished and
+fascinating wife, who had fallen from woman's high estate, violated her
+marriage vows, and by her own libidinous conduct and lustful debauchery
+become one of the many fallen ones of this great metropolis.
+
+Some years previous to the action, at Perinton in this State, John E.
+Ditmas, a well-to-do young farmer of Gravesend, L. I., was united in the
+bonds of holy matrimony by the Rev. J. Butler, to the youthful,
+beauteous defendant, whose maiden name was Olivia A. Mead. And for some
+time they lived most happily together, but her father, thinking that she
+was then too young--she being only sixteen years of age--to enter into
+the marriage state, induced her to leave the husband and temporarily
+board with him at the corner of Main and Clinton streets, in the city of
+Rochester, in this State, Her father subsequently succeeded in inducing
+her to enter a ladies' boarding school at Rochester, but her conduct
+there in flirting with young gentlemen was so openly improper that the
+proprietress was compelled to expel her from the establishment.
+
+To the utter astonishment of every one and disclosing an unparalleled
+revolting case of parental heartlessness, William B. Mead, the father of
+Olivia, induced his daughter to quit the path of virtue, and to enter a
+fashionable house of prostitution in Rochester, then kept by Madame
+Annie Eagan; and, as the beautiful but frail defendant states, the
+paternal originator of her being told her that as she was inclined to be
+"gay" she might as well live in a "gay" house as not; and he took her
+there, making arrangements with the proprietress for her stay, and she
+became one of the inmates, conforming to the requirements and
+regulations of the situation.
+
+The plaintiff, hearing this heart-breaking intelligence, made every
+effort to induce the defendant to leave her life of debauchery, and
+portrayed the misery, disease, and prospects of early death consequent
+upon such a life; but it appeared to be time wasted to talk to her, as
+she was evidently too far gone to become awakened to any desire for
+reformation.
+
+Subsequently, learning that her devoted and much injured husband had
+determined to avail himself of the law to get free from the legal
+obligation which bound him to one lost past redemption, the defendant
+addressed to the plaintiff two letters, of which the following are
+copies, and which but too plainly admit the extent of the degradation
+and crime into which the unhappy, and lost, abandoned wife had plunged
+herself:
+
+
+"ROCHESTER, . . . . .
+
+
+"My dear husband,--With a sad and breaking heart I sit down to
+communicate my thoughts and feelings to you; but oh, if I could tell you
+how I feel I should be happy, but words can never express or tongue
+tell. I believe that I am at present one of the most unhappy, as well as
+unfortunate and miserable beings, that ever existed, but I can only feel
+to say that it was God's curse upon me, and that I know that I am
+deserving all, so I do not murmur. But, oh! the tears I have shed for my
+past follies would make an ocean; and to-night, if I was only laid in
+my grave, is my wish. John, what shall I say? In the first place, can
+you ever forgive me? for God alone knows that I am penitent if there
+ever was one in the world. I can hardly hope to be forgiven, for my sins
+are almost beyond redemption, but God will forgive at the eleventh hour,
+and I want to be forgiven and reform. I will reform. I have seen enough,
+and now I want to settle down and live a virtuous and respectable life
+the rest of my days and die a happy death, for I have spent many an hour
+of late in deep thought, and it is not an impulse of the moment, but I
+have spent hours and days and months, and conclude that this is no life
+for me to lead. I am cured of my follies and I want to reform. Now,
+John, I have used you like a dog. I can say nothing for myself only that
+I am sorry, and have suffered enough, and have had my just dues. But,
+oh, John, forgive me! I could never do enough for you, and though I
+should live for years I could never wash out the stain which I have
+brought upon your name, but I am willing to end my days in your service.
+I am willing to do anything for you, if you are only willing to forgive
+me and live with me again, for I am your wife the same as ever, although
+I never filled that position or deserved the name. I am now willing to
+steady down and be a wife to you the remainder of my days. I think it
+was God's will that things should have been as they have; for my part, I
+know that it has been the making of me. I do not think that I could ever
+have settled down, and have been a woman and true wife, if I had not
+passed through what I have, for now I have seen not only the ways of the
+world, but the follies of my ways, and am cured, and now I am willing to
+go anywhere, and live with my husband, and be to him a true wife the
+rest of my days. That I am penitent and want to be forgiven by you and
+all of the rest, 'though I can never expect that,' and that the words
+come right from my heart, God alone knows. John, I would have written to
+you long before, but my pride forbade it, for I thought I would wait and
+see if you loved or cared anything for me, for I thought if you did that
+you would write or send for me, but when I saw that you did not, it
+worried me, too, but still I felt that I would not humble myself enough
+to write. I thought if you did not care anything for me I would not let
+you know I cared enough for you to write; but it was pride and pride
+alone; but it had a fall, and I felt as if I had passed through a fiery
+furnace and came out cleansed, for I feel like a different person.
+Everybody says it has been the making of me to pass through what I have.
+Many and many a time have I repented of the step I took in the month of
+August, when I left the city of Brooklyn. Many a time I have prayed that
+I might once again be placed back to that time. Oh! how differently
+would I act. Now I can see that I was wholly to blame--alas! when too
+late, I am afraid. John, you know all, you know everything that has
+transpired from the time I left you up to the present time, therefore it
+would be useless to say anything concerning my life for the past six
+months, only that I am not past reformation, but have steadied down and
+want to live a virtuous life the rest of my days, and the only one I
+want to spend them with is my husband, for we are the same to each other
+as on that October morning when we were pronounced man and wife. Then
+let us forgive as we hope to be forgiven by that Higher One. Now, John,
+I know that your mother or any of your family would never speak to me or
+forgive me, but if my future life will ever be the means of restoring
+the peace again that once existed between your folks and me, I am
+willing to do anything, sacrifice everything to live so that they will
+once more recognize me and term me their daughter and sister. I love
+them all; but, oh! what hellish spirit ever took possession of me I know
+not; but, oh! John, forgive me, take me back, and though they discard
+me, remember I am your wife.
+
+"Now, John, write to me, for God's sake; write for the love you once
+bore me; write, let me know if you are done with me forever or not, for
+suspense is killing; but, oh, if you ever hope to be forgiven by God,
+forgive your wife, and let us once more live together and dwell in
+harmony and peace.
+
+"Now, John, I send my love to you, and 'Oh, forgive me!' is my prayer.
+
+"John, forgive! But you will have to follow the directions, as no one
+knows me by any other name. Nevertheless I am your wife. Good-by!
+
+                "From your wife,
+                "OLIVIA.
+
+"Direct: Maud Coles, No. 13 Division street, Rochester."
+
+
+                "ROCHESTER, . . . . .
+
+
+"My dear husband,--I call you so because I have the right to, but, oh,
+how I have abused that right that I am not worthy of, John. As I sit
+writing to-day my heart is near breaking and my eyes are filled with
+tears; and though I have written to you once and heard nothing from you,
+still I cannot, will not, give you up. Oh, John, I am one of the most
+miserable and unhappy beings that ever lived. I wish I were dead, and I
+wish I had died before I ever used you as I did. I do from the bottom of
+my heart. I shall write just I feel, and as I have felt since I left the
+path of virtue and abused the only protector and friend,' for you were
+mine for life.' I don't think any one, after doing as I have done, ever
+has peace of mind. I am sure I do not. I dream of you most every night,
+and the other night I had a fearful dream, and I will tell you some
+other time what it was. John, I was talking about you to-day, and I was
+saying if you would only take me back and live with me, that I would do
+anything for you. I would beg on my hands and knees. I would do anything
+to come back and live with you. I would be through life what you would
+wish me to be. It lays in your power to determine my future end. If you
+will forgive me and take me back, I will always do right, and you will
+never have cause to repent it. You say to yourself that I promised once
+before. This is only the second offense, and if we do not forgive each
+other on earth for such trivial offense, 'as we may say,' when compared
+with our wickedness in the eyes of God, how can we ever expect to be
+forgiven for the manifold sins we commit daily? and, John, I am truly
+repentant, and what I say is not an impulse of the moment, but I have
+long thought it over, and God, who alone knows the heart, knows that I
+want to be forgiven, and that I love you and want to live with you
+again; and He knows that mine has been a sad and bitter experience, and
+I am steadied down and profited by it. When I am in trouble and feel
+unhappy, then it is that I think of you, and all that keeps me up is the
+cheering thought that at some day you will forgive me and live with me
+again; but if you should write that I need have no such thought, that
+you were done with me forever, it would kill me; for, as I have said
+before, all I care to live for is you, and I do not want to live if you
+do not forgive me; but, John, you shall never be aught else to me than
+my husband, and I hope in time to soften your heart towards me, for I
+want to come back and live with you. I want you to forgive me, for I
+love you, John, I do; and write to me and say-that I am forgiven. Write,
+if it is only to say that you are done with me forever, for suspense is
+killing. I am going to write to Maria and aunt Em to-day, to see how far
+their influence will go. Oh, John, forgive me! I am your lawful wife,
+and do not be influenced by any one, for, John, think what I was when
+you married me--pure and virtuous. I will always be good, and be for the
+rest of my life a fond and affectionate wife. John, I've got no friends,
+nobody to love or care for me, but I have got a husband, and it grieves
+me when I read over my old letters which you wrote to me before we were
+married, 'as I was to-day,' to think of the words of love and promises,
+and enjoyment we were to take; but, alas! the devil had possession of
+me. But now I will throw all things aside but the love and interest of
+my husband. Oh, John, for my sake, forgive me! for God's sake, forgive
+me, and I will always be a Christian: if not I will end my days in
+misery! John, write to me; do write immediately and forgive your erring
+wife,
+
+        "OLIVIA.
+
+"Direct: Olivia, 13 Division street, Rochester. N. Y."
+
+
+To the request contained in the above letters the husband felt he could
+not comply, as he learned that she was really attached to the immoral
+life which she was leading; and he was also deeply overcome at finding
+that her own father, instead of devoting his life to his daughter's
+redemption, should have actually perpetrated the horrible crime of
+consigning his own child to a fashionable den of infamy. Detective
+Rogers, of Rochester, by the directions of Commissioner Hebbard,
+arrested the defendant in Madame Eagan's house, as being the inmate of a
+house of prostitution; but she was suffered to escape on her paying a
+fine of twenty-five dollars, and return to her evil associations.
+
+The plaintiff, coming to the conclusion that his wife was irreclaimable,
+through Howe & Hummel, sent on process to the sheriff of Monroe County,
+who served the same on the defendant, whilst she was actually in Madame
+Eagan's fashionable "Maison de joie," and lost no time ridding himself
+of the unwholesome partner of his joys. Was ever stranger history of
+man, wife and father recited?
+
+
+*Fall of a Youthful, Beautiful and Accomplished Wife.*
+
+For some time past, Theodore Stuyvesant, one of our most prominent and
+wealthy lawyers, residing at East Seventh street, in this city, and
+having a splendid country seat in Queen's County, had cause to suspect
+the fidelity of his youthful, beautiful and accomplished wife, and,
+unhappily, these suspicions resulted in sad reality.
+
+It appears that for some time past Mr. Stuyvesant and his wife were in
+the habit of giving magnificent entertainments to a numerous circle of
+legal, literary and theatrical acquaintances, at some of which some
+friends of the gentleman observed indications of undue familiarity on
+the part of the lady with a repeated and oft-invited guest.
+
+The warnings were from time to time unheeded and disregarded by the too
+confiding and affectionate husband; but, on the afternoon of Thursday,
+harrowing facts were whispered n his ear, which induced him to resort to
+the stratagem which resulted in the detection of his wife in grossly
+improper conduct.
+
+On the day referred to, Mr. Stuyvesant informed his wife that legal
+business required his absence from the city, and would detain him,
+probably, ten or fifteen days; and she parted with him, bestowing so
+affectionate, and apparently loving farewell, as almost to remove the
+bitter and heart-rending suspicions which were then racking the breast
+of the injured husband. But, resolved on carrying out his intent, he
+simulated departure; but instead of leaving the city he remained at the
+house of a trusty friend, deliberating upon and maturing plans for the
+carrying out of that project, which was fated to reveal to him his
+wife's shame and his own dishonor.
+
+After a lapse of some hours, Mr. Stuyvesant, with two friends, repaired
+to his residence, and having obtained admission through a rear
+sub-entrance, proceeded to his bed-chamber, on entering which, on
+tip-toe, he discovered his guilty wife in the embrace of her betrayer.
+The dishonored husband stood aghast and petrified--the wife endeavored
+to conceal herself--while her paramour was summarily ejected through the
+window by the avenging friends.
+
+The husband, on recovering from the shock which had temporarily
+paralyzed him, left the house in solemn sadness, and absented himself
+from the presence of one who had so cruelly dishonored him, and for whom
+he had always evinced the warmest affection. Fearing lest reason should
+leave its throne, and he commit an act which would usher the soul of one
+he fondly loved un-shriven to her last account with all her
+imperfections on her head, poor Stuyvesant wept and left. His cup of
+bitterness was full. He repaired to the house of his friend where he
+passed the remainder of the night. In the morning, depressed and
+heart-broken, he returned to the home, once so happy and joyous, but now
+bleak and desolate, for the purpose of winding up domestic affairs,
+breaking up the house, dismissing the servants, and parting forever from
+the frail and erring woman, now wife to him but in name.
+
+But the lady, instead of expressing contrition and supplicating for
+pardon for the irreparable wrong she had inflicted, assailed him with a
+torrent of vituperative abuse; and on his aged mother remonstrating with
+the guilty one upon the iniquity of her proceeding, she flew at her with
+the passion of a tigress, and cruelly beat and maltreated the aged lady,
+who is now verging on the grave. The neighbors, hearing the disturbance,
+called in the police, and Mrs. Stuyvesant was arrested and taken before
+Police Justice Mansfield at Essex Market Police Court, by whom she was
+committed to the Tombs for trial, in which prison the guilty lady--the
+lawyer's wife, the leader of fashionable society--was confined, a
+degraded and fallen woman. Proceedings for a divorce were at once
+instituted by Mr. Stuyvesant, and the judicial tribunal freed him from
+his unfortunate alliance. He, however, became heartbroken and shortly
+after died, the disgrace wrecking his home and nearly driving him
+insane.
+
+
+*A French Beauty's Troubles.*
+
+A WALL STREET BROKER SUED FOR BREACH OF PROMISE AND OTHER BAD ACTS--A
+HANDSOME MILLINER LAYS HER DAMAGES AT TWENTY THOUSAND DOLLARS.
+
+Twelve months before the proceedings in court, at the City of New
+Orleans, the presiding goddess of the most fashionable milliner's
+establishment of the place was Mary Blanchette. She was 21 years of age,
+tall, elegantly moulded, and possessed of a maturity of charms which
+made her seem three or four years older than she really was--with rich
+auburn hair, eyes of deep blue, large and rolling, and at times
+expressing an involuntary tenderness, which gave a voluptuous languor to
+her beautiful countenance. Her forehead was high and open; she had teeth
+of pearly whiteness, and possessed all the accomplishments which a
+French lady of _ion_ need desire. It is not surprising, therefore, that
+Miss Blanchette should have captivated many admirers. Among those who
+paid homage at the shrine of beauty was a wealthy New York broker named
+Theodore Raub, who, possessing a handsome person, easy and elegant
+address, a melodious, yet manly voice, and a fascinating style of
+conversation, was received by the fair Marie with considerable favor,
+and he became a daily visitor, and ultimately her acknowledged lover.
+
+Theodore Raub was a thorough man of the world, and deeply versed in all
+the mysteries and intricacies of the human heart: and especially was he
+an able anatomist of the female mind, which he could dissect and
+comprehend in an instant; and on the occasion of one of his visits to
+the beauteous French girl, after promising her marriage, the emotions
+which she experienced were not lost upon him. He perceived and
+deciphered them almost as soon as they had sprung into existence, and he
+saw in a moment that he had conquered. He had taken her hand, which she
+had not withdrawn, and when he pressed his burning kisses on her lips,
+the roseate blushes which suffused her cheeks were indicative of a deep
+and burning joy, and Raub well knew by the melting voluptuousness which
+beamed in her eyes that the hour had come when he could secure his
+victim.
+
+Marie, awakening as it were from a dream, struggled to extricate
+herself, but he murmured impassioned words and vows and protestations in
+her ear, and with kisses he stifled the remonstrances and the
+beseechings which rose to her lips. But suddenly a strong sense of
+danger flashed into the mind of Marie; aye, and therewith a feeling that
+all this was wrong, very wrong; so that the virtuous principle which was
+innate in her woman's nature, asserted its empire that very instant. The
+immediate consequence was that, recovering all her presence of mind and
+casting off in a moment the voluptuous languor that had come over her,
+Marie tore herself from his embrace, exclaiming:
+
+"Oh! Theodore, Theodore, is this your love for me? Would you ruin my
+body and my soul? Have pity on me. Have pity on me."
+
+"Marie," said Theodore, "you love me not; you will drive me mad," he
+exclaimed, and he turned abruptly away, as if about to leave the room.
+
+"He says that I love him not!" cried Marie, wildly, as she sprang to her
+feet, and in another moment she was again clasped in her lover's arms.
+
+Raub was not less expert in soothing the soul of Marie that was now
+stricken with remorse, and in quieting the anguished alarms that
+succeeded the moments of pleasure, and under reiterated promises of
+marriage, poor Marie retained within her own breast the secret of her
+ruin, until nature was about, in its own mysterious way, to proclaim her
+shame itself. As soon as Raub became aware of the fact that Marie was
+about to become a mother, he absconded from New Orleans, and instead of
+carrying out his repeated promises to the injured and ruined fair one,
+he came on to New York, leaving her unconscious and ignorant of his
+whereabout.
+
+Marie, with that pertinacity which belongs peculiarly to a wronged and
+neglected woman, tracked him to this city, and demanded of him here the
+only atonement he could make before man and before God,
+namely--marriage. To all these entreaties Raub turned a deaf and defiant
+ear, and, at the suggestion of the French Consulate in this city, Marie
+retained the services of Howe & Hummel, and proceedings were taken which
+brought the contumacious Theodore to a satisfactory fiscal arrangement
+so far as Miss Blanchette was concerned.
+
+
+*Life on the Boston Boats.*
+
+A FAST WOMAN WRONGFULLY ACCUSED.
+
+Maria Wilson is a beautiful woman, and of that age at which most women
+are admired by men. She is courteous, affable and lady-like in her
+manner. So far as appearances go, she is just such a woman as most men
+would like to have for a wife. But appearances often deceive. Maria has
+fallen from grace, just as mother Eve did before her.
+
+Her beauty has perhaps to her been her greatest misfortune; without it
+she might be virtuous; with it she certainly is not. Like many others of
+her erring sisters, see desires to live like a lady; to dress well; go
+to the opera in season; go to the theater and, indeed, to every other
+place where woman is likely to go.
+
+Unfortunately for Miss Wilson, though born pretty, she was not born
+rich. The good things of this world were not given to her very
+abundantly. Work, she wouldn't. For some reason or other, certainly not
+a valid one, work appears degrading to some people. So it appeared to
+Miss Wilson.
+
+What was she to do then? To steal would be to go to the penitentiary or
+the State prison. She didn't like to live in either, and yet she had
+taken the first erring step to go there. She is, in short, a fast woman,
+yet driven to a gay life in order to eke out a precarious existence, to
+gratify her love of dress. Fearing that she might get into the hands of
+the police if she staid in the city, Maria engages a passage on one of
+the Boston boats every alternate day, for the purpose of affording
+"noctural accommodation" to gentlemen not having their wives along. A
+day or two ago Maria, in company with another "lady" of like loose
+character, went on board one of the boats alluded to, each bent upon
+securing a state-room, if possible, but one at least was doomed to
+disappointment.
+
+Miss Wilson's good looks made her a favorite with the officer of the
+boat, and she succeeded in obtaining a stateroom. Her partner, however,
+did not, and though unfortunate in this respect, she was well off in
+another way. She did succeed in "picking up a man," with whom she seemed
+to become suddenly in love.
+
+After perambulating the boat decks and cabins for some time in
+flirtation and social chat, Maria's friend asked her if she would be
+kind enough to allow her the use of her state-room for a short time.
+Maria being lonely, and not feeling any disposition to retire,
+consented, when her friend and her company retired. They occupied the
+room for the best part of the night, and left Maria to do the best she
+could under the circumstances.
+
+In the morning they left at an early hour, after which Maria feeling
+sleepy retired to take a "nap." She was not long in the room, however,
+when her friend tapped at the door and desired an interview. Though
+fatigued, Maria consented, when she was astonished at being accused of
+theft by one who seemed but a moment before to place the most
+unsolicited confidence in her. However, her friend (whose name we have
+not learned) lost her watch, and said she left it under the pillow, and
+accused Maria of stealing it. This was ingratitude indeed.
+
+Maria, of course, denied any knowledge of the missing jewel, but her
+accuser was positive she left the watch under the pillow, and when the
+boat returned to this city she made the charge of theft against Maria
+before Justice Dowling, at the Tombs. Maria did not let her indignation
+run away with her senses, but shrewdly enough kept quiet and employed
+Counselor Howe to defend her.
+
+When the case came up the attorney explained the whole circumstances to
+his Honor the Judge, and added that the complainant had also accused the
+colored waiter on board the boat of the theft. Of course under such a
+state of things there was but one course left, and Justice Howling, not
+wishing to prosecute an innocent though erring woman, allowed Maria
+Wilson to go her way rejoicing.
+
+She left the court in company with her counsel to return to the abode of
+her sister, where, it is to be hoped, she will abandon her follies, live
+a life of virtue, and be forever a happy woman.
+
+
+*An Eighty-year-old "Fence."*
+
+A METROPOLITAN ECHO OF A BALTIMORE BURGLARY.
+
+Before Justice Wandell, Hirsch Lowenthal of this city, was brought up
+for examination on the charge of being the receiver of $20,000 worth of
+gold watches and jewelry, burglarized in Baltimore. The case has had the
+attention of the court for some days, and the premises, briefly stated,
+are as follows: On the January date the store of Simeon J. Rudberg, of
+Baltimore, was entered by four men who secured the property in question.
+For a long time nothing was heard of the goods, but, eventually, they
+were traced to this city, and, following the same clew, Mr. Rudberg
+proceeded to Buffalo, where he had the pleasure of confronting two of
+the thieves, who were held in that lake city on a charge of
+shop-lifting. He identified them, and saw, moreover, in their company a
+very handsome woman who had been with them in Baltimore. The whereabouts
+of the other two burglars are unknown. So is that of the female. She was
+established, however, as the step-daughter of Hirsch Lowenthal, whose
+alleged conversation last Wednesday in a Division street beer saloon
+about the "loot" led to his arrest.
+
+Happy thought! Division street is the place to speak about the partition
+of spoils.
+
+Bad as it looked for Mr. Lowenthal, who is aged eighty years, he had a
+_petite_ consolation in the fact that he was defended by Mr. Hummel. The
+prisoner came out of the pen in a tottering way and leaned against the
+rail. Hirsch Lowenthal is bowed with eighty years that have dashed over
+him like waves, and he seemed caught in the tangling undertow of death.
+There was no evidence in his appearance of being a "fence." He looked
+rather an aged Hebrew who simply wished to go his way. The white
+semi-circle of whisker under his chin, the trembling hands, the bald
+head, like a globular map with the veins as rivers, all attested extreme
+decrepitude. He was dressed in a light suit of fluttering linen that
+blew about him as if his legs were topmasts and he was a ship running in
+close-reefed on a stormy coast. He has lived in this city for many
+years, and has been twice married. The second wife and he did not get
+along very well, and have abided apart for the last five months.
+Theresa, who is the central figure in this romance, is the daughter of
+the second wife by another husband. She is married to a burglar who
+luxuriates in the euphonious name of "Sheeny Dave." Dave is one of the
+two men identified in Buffalo, and resides now at Auburn at the expense
+of the State. When they saw the Baltimore merchant in Buffalo Dave and
+his companion came sagely to the conclusion that to plead guilty to the
+local charge and avoid extradition for the burglary would be about the
+best thing to do. They reckoned without their host. When the New York
+State term is finished they will be waited upon by Maryland officials.
+It is sometimes embarrassing to be popular and sought after by everyone.
+
+
+Perhaps it would be a safe rule in life to avoid drinking beer if you
+have had anything to do with stolen goods. On last Wednesday evening,
+Mr. Lowenthal visited a Division street saloon in company with a
+villainous looking man who had but lately returned from Sing Sing. They
+ordered the loquacious lager and fell into an easy strain of
+conversation. After touching upon the weather, crops, trade, etc., Mr.
+Lowenthal fell to speaking of some goods in his house, the proceeds of a
+Baltimore burglary in last January. At the next table sat Mr. Rosenberg,
+who listened. It was Mr. Rosenberg who gave this damaging evidence
+before Justice Wandell. He was forced to admit, however, that the aged
+gentleman had not mentioned the name of the Baltimore firm, although he
+had specified the quality of the goods. Mr. Hummel claimed that as the
+commodity spoken of was only material in general and had not been
+identified as Mr. Rudberg's particular property, and that, furthermore,
+as there was no evidence tracing the stuff to the old man, who had
+merely chatted pleasantly about some burglarized property to which he
+had helped himself while occupying a fiduciary position, there was no
+case and asked for the discharge of his client. The prosecution claimed
+that the fact of Theresa being the step-daughter of Mr. Lowenthal, and
+the wife of one of the identified burglars at the same time, taken in
+connection with the conversation in the beer shop, during which direct
+allusion was made to a burglary in Baltimore in January, made a good
+foundation for procedure. Judge Wandell pondered, and then Mr. Hummell
+pushed his side energetically, using tons of cold sarcasm and barrels of
+withering scorn. It was the sapling shielding the blasted oak, one of
+the youngest, and certainly the smallest counselor thundering forth in
+behalf of the oldest prisoner.
+
+"Oh, by all means, put the gentleman from Sing Sing on the stand," he
+said, "but let's have him sworn first. It is precisely what I desire.
+Nothing would charm me half so much."
+
+So they swore the jail-bird, made him confess that he had served his
+term fully, and then told him to step down and out. His evidence was not
+needed. Mr. Rosenberg was raked fore and aft, but he stuck to his story.
+When the diminutive counsellor intimated that he was worse than the
+prisoner, the witness smiled serenely and winked at the magistrate as if
+it was a good joke.
+
+"If he talked that way to me I'd punch his head," said the Baltimore man
+in a whisper.
+
+No one could tell where Theresa was, although weeks had been spent
+searching for her. And yet she is no ordinary woman. Twenty-three years
+of age, elegantly formed, dark, lustrous eyes, satiny coils of black
+hair, olive complexion, seed-pearl teeth, full red lips, small hands and
+feet, and graceful carriage. She wears diamond drops at her ears and
+sparkling rings upon her fingers. Her favorite attire, as if life were a
+perpetual dressing for dinner, is a black-corded silk, fitted close to
+the figure, made high in the neck, with a trembling edge of lace at the
+throat clustering about a diamond catch whose brilliancy it veils. This
+is not a fancy portrait, but word for word from an enthusiastic admirer
+of Lowenthal's step-daughter. But where is she? It is not known. Where
+is the John Sherman letter to Anderson? Where is the Boston Belting
+Company's money? Where is Tom Collins? And where's Emma Collins? An
+impenetrable gloom shrouds them all.
+
+After a rather protracted lunch on his eye-glasses, Judge Wandell, in
+reply to Mr. Hummel's motion, rendered his decision to the effect that
+there was not sufficient evidence to hold aged Mr. Lowenthal. The
+octogenarian heard it with delight, and came as near skipping like a
+lamb from the court-room as is possible for one of his age.
+
+
+*Shoppers' Perils.*
+
+INTERESTING CASE TO TRADESPEOPLE--THE PERILS TO WHICH RESPECTAPLE LADIES
+ARE SUBJECTED TO IN CERTAIN FASHIONABLE STORES.
+
+Much of the time of the Court of Special Sessions was absorbed in the
+trial of a case of some importance to ladies who make purchases. A
+pleasant-faced looking woman, named Ellen Whalen, was arraigned for
+petit larceny in having stolen an accordeon from the store of Ehrich's
+on Eighth Avenue. The main evidence against her was that of Alexander G.
+Sisson, the detective of that establishment, who testified that the
+prisoner took the property from one of the counters while he was looking
+at her, and that he followed her on the street and found it in her
+possession hid under her shawl.
+
+Mr. A. H. Hummel, who appeared as counsel for the accused,
+cross-examined the detective at some length and gleaned that there were
+others in close proximity at the time the property was taken, and among
+them a Miss Maggie McKenna, a saleslady, who was not, however, in court.
+
+
+Mrs. Whalen was next called by Counselor Hummel, and deposed that she
+lived in West Seventeenth street, and went to Ehrich's to purchase the
+accordeon and showed a marked receipt which she claimed was given to her
+with her change. That the detective followed her out of the store,
+treated her roughly on taking her into Custody, and kept her confined
+fifteen minutes in a cellar before he brought a policeman to arrest her.
+Mr. Doyle, her landlord, vouched for her general good character, and Mr.
+Hummel then made a stirring appeal to the court for his client's
+discharge. He characterized the arrest as a gross outrage, for which the
+jury would render instant acquittal, and stigmatized the private
+detective's testimony as unworthy of belief without corroboration,
+saying that the higher courts had so decided in many cases, as it was
+clearly evident the desire of such employees to secure convictions for
+theft in order to retain their place. Mr. Hummel also adverted to the
+negligence of the real complainants not appearing, and the absence of
+the saleslady who should have been sent here by them, so that the court
+might have had a full and ample investigation. With much feeling counsel
+urged a dismissal of the complaint, and an honorable discharge of the
+prisoner.
+
+The court remained in consultation for some time and announced a verdict
+of "not guilty," which was greeted with a round of applause from the
+assembled multitude. Mrs. Whalen thanked the court and fervently pressed
+Mr. Hummel's hand in gratitude and left the courtroom, accompanied by
+her three children and a host of friends.
+
+[EOF]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Danger! A True History of a Great
+City's Wiles and Temptations, by William Howe and Abraham Hummel
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