In the meantime the girl is being schooled in vice and crime. She learns that it is more expeditious sometimes to take a man's money out of his pockets than to wait for him to spend it twenty-five cents at a time, buying drinks. No matter whether the house profits by these thefts or not, they form another bond to tie the girl to a life of shame; for some one must always know of them, and if the girl is untractable she is threatened with criminal prosecution. If she commits no crime, she can still be charged with vagrancy, and it too often happens that police officers, knowingly or unknowingly, are made the instruments of persecution and the means for whipping these unfortunate women into submission to any wrong.
Dancing all night every night, drinking after every dance, living in the fumes of liquor and tobacco, and in constant jangle of profanity and obscenity, how long is required to snuff out every spark of womanliness that a girl may bring with her to such a haunt?
DOG-LIKE DEVOTION TO MALE ASSOCIATES.
And yet there is one trait of her sex that is not snuffed out. It is the distinguishing trait of womankind and one of the finest traits that the human race can boast of—the trait of constancy and devotion.
The lower the fallen woman sinks, the more wrongs and iniquities that are placed upon her, the stronger it sometimes seems this devotion and constancy becomes. Nine-tenths of all the women of the tenderloin, it is stated, have some man, or some animal called a man, about whom this affection, this dog-like devotion centers. No matter how much he may abuse her, no matter if he takes every cent of the earnings of her misery and shame, no matter if he beats and kicks her because she can not give him more, the girl in nearly every case, is faithful to "the kid" and the worst fate than can befall her is that "the kid" should "throw her down." [In other words, forsake her.]
And "the kid" always throws her down some time; for "the kid" is not encumbered with any such inconvenient traits as constancy and devotion.
Then there is carbolic acid, or a long debauch, and a sinking down of the system, and the horrible disease against which even the county hospitals, which are open to the criminals and outcasts of society, who never did a stroke of useful work in all their lives, close their doors. And then there is the dishonored grave, over which the friends and the relatives, maybe, are ashamed to weep.
DANCE-HALLS TABOOED.
In the enlightened communities, where there is a healthy public sentiment, dance-halls are no longer tolerated. Their day is over in California, and in only a few places are they permitted to exist. In the places where they do exist the communities are still hanging on the ragged edge of frontier life, where there is little regard for the common decencies of life. Sacramento recently made a clean-up of its dives, and disreputable dance-halls were closed up.
It is recognized by those who are observant, that dance-halls are more degrading than any other form of dissipation. They are public institutions with their doors open to all who enter, and those with money to spend are made welcome. When the money is gone, their welcome is worn out, and if the person is saturated with liquor, he is kicked out ignominiously, only to return when he has more money to spend.