THE DEVIL'S SIAMESE TWINS
Tough saloon and dive combined. Into this place Mona M. was sold

I know that ignorance of law is no excuse for its violation, but I was certainly ignorant that I was breaking any law. I never dreamed of it until, just before my arrest, the proprietress of one of the houses from which a girl whom I had brought to the city had run away, told me of my danger. I asked her why she was not also in danger, and she replied that it was because she carefully followed the instructions of the police and maintained an ignorance concerning the sources from which the girls were brought who came to her house.

I may or may not be believed, but I state the truth when I say that I never brought to this slavery a girl whom I believed to be an innocent girl. I brought only girls whom I found in bad surroundings, usually in disorderly saloons, and girls who claimed to be and appeared to be beyond the protection of that extremely virtuous law, which our wise lawmakers have given us, known as the "age of consent" law. How any sane person must hate such cursed nonsense as such a law!

Now, let me ask why—why, when I was sent as a mere agent of others, when I brought girls from well-known dens where they had been ruined, brought them into a recognized slave market, delivered them to well-known slave owners, where they were used to enrich their owners and the police—why, while the slave market goes on and while the slave owners drive their new gangs, and while the police keep up their system of protection and graft—WHY AM I LOCKED UP HERE ALONE?

Now, let me make it perfectly clear on just what ground I have been sentenced to prison. I was convicted under what is known as the "pandering act," which makes it an offense to secure an inmate for a disorderly resort in the state of Illinois.

I was guilty and the protest I make is the protest of a convict, but I cry out to the good people to know why, if I must be behind prison walls for procuring an inmate for such a place, they walk free and grow rich and hold offices who allow such places to be.

IF IT BE A CRIME WORTHY OF THE PRISON TO PROCURE AN INMATE FOR A VICE RESORT, IS IT A SURE PROOF OF PUBLIC AND PRIVATE VIRTUE THAT VICE RESORTS COVER SQUARE MILES OF THIS CITY AND THE CITY GOVERNMENT "REGULATES" THEM?

Ten long months hence, when, broken, disgraced, without a cent, without a friend, they turn me out into Chicago's cold November storms, will justice have been vindicated, will some great and good ends have been attained by the punishment of me—a tool, a cat's-paw—while seven thousand saloons and square miles of houses of prostitution have gone on in their bloody, damning work under sanction of the government run by you pious men?

E. A. B.