"There is a lost sheep returned to the fold."
If those who would reform the vicious, knew the power of love and kind words towards the poor fallen creatures who abound in our city, and how much stronger they are than prison bars, how much more powerful than handcuffs, fetters and whip lashes, we should soon see the spirit of reformation hovering over us like the guardian angel sent to save a city that should be found to contain only five righteous persons.
My readers may remember the slight glimpse they had of the face of Julia Antrim, on two occasions—once as a street walker, only thirteen years old, dressed in borrowed clothes, or rather in garments furnished by one of the beldams who keep the keys of our numerous city pandemoniums, where innocence is entrapped, and virtue sold at a discount; and again a year or two later, when the fiend who said "our trade," laughed to see her dragged out of one of the underground dens where demons dwell, where rum is sold and souls destroyed, on her way to prison, and the termination of a career, to which one half, at least, arrive at, who take the first step—false step—in the same road.
In the morning she was "sent up:" a short phrase which means imprisonment for six months in the city penitentiary. Penitentiary!! What is a penitentiary? A place of repentance and reformation.
Ours is a place to harden young offenders, or rum-made criminals—to make them worse rather than better. It made Julia Antrim worse. It was the work of the missionary, and the benevolent heart of Mr. Lovetree, and the kind words of Mrs. May and Stella, that effected what dungeons, fetters whips, and harsh language could not.
"Oh!" said Mrs. Morgan to me one evening, "such a story as my uncle has been telling me; do tell him, uncle, about one of those 'Five Point girls,' rescued from one of those miserable dens."
"You remember the girl," said he, "that you saw dragged out of the cellar for picking her paramour's pocket? Come with me and you shall see her and hear her own story. Athalia, come put on your hat and go with us. You know how glad Mrs. May and Stella always are to see you."
They were so this evening. Stella was in the front shop busy with her pins and needles, threads and tapes, and all the numerous little articles of necessity which go to make up an assortment, for which she had a demand that not only kept her busy, but also a fine bright active little boy. He is on the road to wealth and manhood now. He was on the road to ruin once. He was the son of a drunken father, who taught him to "prig" and sell the stolen articles for rum. The reader has seen him before. Would you like to know where? Turn back to page [30]—look at that picture of the fireman rescuing two children from the flames. This bright boy is the child of drunken Bill Eaton. How Stella's eyes did sparkle as she saw us enter; far more than they would to see her best customer, for now she saw her best friend, her kind patron, who gave her the means to gain good customers.
"Oh, mother, mother, here is Mr. Lovetree and Mrs. Morgan, and that other gentleman!"
Then Mrs. May's eyes sparkled, for "she was so glad to see us"—she was always glad to see us. She was very busy in the little back shop, working away, and she had two very neat-looking industrious girls at work with her. We have seen both of them before. One of them for the first time on the steps of the Bank of the Republic, clothed in a poor dirty ragged dress, with that same little boy, sickly and pale, leaning upon his sister for support, and keeping her company as the two wandered through the streets, making midnight melodious with that ever pealing summer cry, of, "Hot corn, hot corn, here's your nice hot corn, smoking hot, smoking hot, just from the pot, all hot, hot, hot!"