“Bats.”
Act IV. Judication
Condemnation
Long Vacation
“Rats.”
Antiquated Methods at Fall River.—The citizens of Fall River, Mass., have recently been aroused by a revelation of conditions prevailing in the central station house of that city. Because of the lack of modern detention quarters, children, women and men of all degrees of vice are crowded together in a common compartment. A clergyman, who investigated the place, says:
“I found two children there, a boy and a girl, about twelve years of age. At night the station filled up with its inevitable horde of drunkards and offending women, whose language, if not immediate presence, was forced upon these children. I called upon the boy on Sunday and found him the companion of the loose women whose cases were to be heard in court Monday morning. I have nothing to say in regard to the accommodation of the men and women who must needs be shut up. But I think the treatment accorded to these children was outrageous.
“Why were they there? For the inexcusable, the damnable reason, that there was nothing else to be done with them. I am not criticising the officers of the central station. They are extremely kind to these children. It is the city of Fall River that is responsible. The community is committing an offence against children. If the city, as by all means it should, will take in hand either to punish or reform little children, it ought to make provision to properly accommodate such.”