GREENLAND.
The population of Greenland is partly composed of European colonists and partly of Esquimaux. They are a vain and indolent people, whose virtues consist in the negation of active vice. Their women occupy an inferior position. Marriage is essentially a contract for mutual convenience, dissolved when it ceases to be agreeable. It is considered etiquette for a girl, when any man demands her in marriage, to fly to the hills and hide herself, in order to be dragged home with a great show of violence by her suitor. If courted by a man she dislikes, she cuts off her hair, which is a sign of great horror, and usually rids her of her lover.
The Greenlanders consider themselves the only civilized people in the world, and consequently pride themselves on decorum. They do not allow marriages within three degrees of affinity, and consider it disreputable for persons who have been educated in the same house to marry, even if no relationship exists between them. Prostitution prevails to a considerable extent, widows and divorced women almost invariably adopting it as a means of living. There are numerous habitations in the large communities which can only be considered as brothels, but the life of an abandoned woman is generally reprobated, and those following it incur the most undisguised odium of the people at large.
CHAPTER XXXII.
NEW YORK.—STATISTICS.
Schedule of Questions.—Age.—Juvenile Depravity.—Premature Old Age.—Gradual Descent.—Average Duration of a Prostitute’s Life.—Nativity.—Proportion of Prostitutes from various States.—New York.—Effects of Immigration.—Foreigners.—Proportion to Population.—Proportion to Emigration.—Dangers of Ports of Departure, Emigrant Ships, and Boarding-houses.—Length of Residence in the United States.—Prostitution a Burden to Tax-payers.—Length of Residence in New York State.—Length of Residence in New York City.—Inducements to emigrate.—Labor and Remuneration in Europe.—Assistance to emigrate; its Amount, and from whom.—Education.—Neglect of Facilities in New York.—Social Condition.—Single Women.—Widows.—Early and Injudicious Marriages.—Husbands.—Children.—Illegitimate Children.—Mortality of Children.—Infanticide.—Influences to which Children are exposed.
It is to be hoped the reader has already perused the introduction to this volume, containing a description of the modus operandi adopted to obtain the necessary information from the prostitutes of New York City. The following schedule of questions was prepared for this purpose, and the ensuing pages present in tabular form the answers received thereto.
“How old will you be next birth-day?
“Were you born in America? and, if so, in what state?