"No! he was murdered there. Look here. Can you read? Yes, yes, I know ye can. So can I. Do you see that account of prisoners dying by suffocation—poisoned by carbonic acid gas—there, read it,"—and she thrust a crumpled paper before us—"read how ye reform drunkards—shut them up in prison cells, and in spite of their prayers, and groans, and dying cries for air, ye let them die. Are ye not murderers? Do you see that name? That is—that was my husband. Ha, ha, ha! Now, what is he, where is he? Don't answer—I know your answer; but if he is in hell, who sent him there? Who, who, who?"
And she sank down upon one of the pallets which were spread over the floor, in a paroxysm of wild, delirious grief and rage, speechless as her dying boy, lying unheeded and unheeding, by her side. What could we do? Nothing here; much elsewhere; and we looked up and registered a vow, that much as she hated us for what we had not done, yet had permitted our fellows to do without crying out against them, that she should be avenged. If we could do nothing here—if we could not pull down the sturdy oak by taking hold of its topmost branches, yet, although its mighty strength defies our weak efforts thus applied, we can and will dig around its roots—we will take away the life-sustaining earth—and that strong tree shall be made to feel our power—it shall wither, dry up, and die, and time shall rot down its strong trunk, and the place that once knew it, shall know it no more.
This then is our pledge, made over that dying boy, and, worse than by murder, widowed mother, and here now we redeem it. Here we expose the hydra-headed monster—the orphan and widow-maker—the property, health, and virtue-destroyer. Sad, harrowing as these scenes of wretchedness and misery are, they must be laid open to the gaze of the world. "Wounds must be seen to be healed." Weak nerves tremble at the idea that physicians cut and carve the dead, talking, aye laughing, as freely over the quiet heart and still nerves in the dissecting-room, as the butcher over his beef upon the market house block; yet without the dissecting of one and butchering of the other, how should the maimed be healed, or meat-eating multitude be fed? So let us on with our panorama of scenes from life in New York.
OLD PLATO COOKING HOT CORN.
Let us open this door. Ah! we have been here before.
The room is seven by twelve feet, under the roof, which comes down at one end within a foot of the floor. There is a broken, dirty, window in the roof, at the right hand of the door as we enter on the side. No fire-place or stove, no table, only two broken chairs—a very old bureau—a dilapidated trunk—a band-box—a few articles of female apparel—some poor dishes and a few cooking utensils—used upon a little portable furnace standing in the room—a poor old bedstead and straw bed in one corner—a child's cot and a doll; and yet the only occupant of the room is an old negro man, who sits of nights upon cold stones, crying Hot Corn. We look about wonderingly, peering in here and there, but except the old man we see no one.
"She gone, massa, clean gone—cry old eyes out when I come home next day arter dat one, you know massa, which one dis child mean—sad day—don't like to mention him, massa—give me chaw terbacca, massa—come home and find her and little sis—nice child dat—"
"You found her."
"No sir, found her gone—done gone entirely—key in old place where I knew where to find him—everything all here—no word for old Plato—what I give to see her once more—to see little Sissee—Oh that I knew where she was. Oh, oh, oh."