The improvement, both in conduct and in morals, of the neglected little waifs whom we had gathered into our asylum, urged us on in our work; for we realized that our experiment was a success. Our friends were thus encouraged to press forward with the petition.
Dr. Mahan and his wife, our president, went before the Legislature with the view of pressing our claims. Members of the Senate and House proposed to grant Dr. Mahan one evening in representing the project, and left it in the hands of the Committee on Petitions. Senator Randall, of Coldwater, put it in the form of a bill that covered the spirit and requests of the petition. Being chairman of the Committee on Bills, he presented it in the Senate. It was passed in that body, to our great joy, and soon after was passed in the House, and received the governor's signature, making it a law.
Though only thirty thousand dollars were appropriated by the Legislature with which to commence operations, yet I knew the State would carry on the work hereafter. The site for the new asylum was to be selected at whatever desirable locality offered the most liberal donations. As Coldwater offered thirty thousand dollars toward the new enterprise, it was located in that city. While the buildings for the State school were being erected, our asylum was moved into the city of Adrian, as at that point it was more convenient for the sisters composing the board of managers to care for it. When the "State Public School" should be opened, all in our asylum not provided with homes were to be transferred to it.
My health improved sufficiently to enable me to make a few appeals to bring up arrears in our work. The matron and myself had received but very little, as all went to the support of the children. I cared but little for myself; but for sister Smith, who had been such a faithful, mother to these poor children, I was more anxious. At length I secured permission of my tender care-takers—my two daughters—to go among my friends in Detroit. To most of them I appealed by letter, and made but one personal call. That was more particularly in the interest of a prisoner for whom I solicited a pardon. This was at length granted. Governor Baldwin had known of my asylum work, and inquired after its interests. He gave me twenty dollars towards it. Mr. Crapo's son gave me twenty-five dollars, and Captain E. B. Ward fifty dollars. Others responded to my letters, and I obtained over two hundred dollars.
The great fires in Chicago and Northern Michigan stopped farther work of this character; but we did what we could toward canceling arrearages, being confident that were it not for the continued and faithful toiling of Jane A. Smith the asylum would have died during my long and serious illness. It must have died, even after its removal to Adrian, had it not been for a faithful few.
A few months after the State Public School was opened at Coldwater, in charge of Professor Truesdell, superintendent, and Miss Emma A. Hall, matron. I went into the school as seamstress and nurse, and remained there nearly two years. Instead of overhauling, cutting, and making over second-hand clothes for the three hundred little homeless waifs we had cared for in our orphans' home, we were now well supplied with bolts of substantial new material, out of which we made comfortable bedding and clothing. Here we had no care about furnishing, and no anxious fear for their support. With pleasure we saw the vast contrast in conveniences and supplies compared with our little rill in which we so long paddled our own canoe, and in which faithful laborers were still at work. It matters not by whom this great work was accomplished; it matters not by what agencies our prayer of more than four years long, previous to the adopting of this work by the State, was answered. Through an overruling power clouds and icebergs vanished, and in lieu thereof the massive brick buildings of the State Public School in Coldwater were raised, instead of the old Raisin Institute, where it drew its first breath.
CHAPTER XVII.
CHRISTIAN LABOR AND RESULTS.
It seemed refreshing to meet with sympathizing friends after toiling for months among false brethren. It was a relief to enjoy a few days of freedom from care. After asking a few friends to sign an article of agreement to pay one dollar a year during five years for the orphan asylum, and mailing a couple of letters to Levi Coffin and Rev. E. M. Cravath, of Cincinnati, I took from the office a drop-letter from Mr. Burton Kent, County Superintendent of the Poor, containing the following notice:
"MRS. LAURA S. HAVILAND,—Many persons transported by you last year have become a county charge, and it has become an intolerable burden to the tax-payers. Any person bringing a child or indigent person into this county without being legally indentured, shall be prosecuted to the full extent of the law."