Resources.Numbers.
Dependent solely upon prostitution 1698
Have other means of support 302
Total 2000

No surprise will be excited by the fact indicated above, that seventeen of every twenty women examined in New York reply to this question in the affirmative, for it is almost impossible to conceive that any honest occupation can be associated with vice of such character. The small minority who have other means consists principally of women who work at their trades or occupations at intervals, or who receive some slight payment for assisting in the ordinary work, or for sewing, in the houses of ill fame where they reside. It is difficult to believe women working as domestics in brothels are virtuous themselves; on the contrary, it is a well-known fact that they are, in every sense of the word, prostitutes; the only difference being that they work a portion of the time, while the “boarders” do not work at all.

Those who follow an employment at intervals are mostly women whose trades are uncertain, and who are liable at certain seasons of the year to be without employment. Then real necessity forces them on the town until a return of business provides them with work. They are more to be pitied than blamed.

There is another class not entirely dependent on prostitution. It consists mostly of German girls, who receive from five to six dollars per month as dancers in the public ball-rooms. In the first ward of New York there are several of these establishments, and the Captain of Police in that district has attached some interesting memoranda to his returns, from which is gleaned the following information respecting these places and their inhabitants. It is submitted to the reader, in order that he may draw his own conclusions as to the virtue of the dancers.

“These dance-houses are generally kept by Germans, who consider dancing a proper and legitimate business. They are in general very quiet. The girls employed to dance do not consider themselves prostitutes, because the proprietors will not allow them to be known as such. Each girl receives monthly from five to six dollars and her board, and almost every one of them hires a room in the neighborhood for the purpose of prostitution. I have classed them all as prostitutes, because, in addition to the previous fact, I know that the majority of them have lived as such. Very few of these girls are excessive drinkers. Although the regulations of the ball-room require them to drink after each dance with their partners, yet the proprietor has always a bottle of water slightly colored with port wine, from which they drink, and he charges the partner the same price as for liquor.”

Alluding to the keeper of one of these places, the same officer says:

“The proprietress of this house is a German woman over seventy years of age. She established the house over eighteen years since, to my certain knowledge. Her husband had just then arrived from Germany with their four children. They were not worth one hundred dollars at that time. The man died three years ago, and by his will directed forty thousand dollars to be divided among his children. The widow is possessed of an equal amount in her own name.”

Question. What trade or calling did you follow before you became a prostitute?

Occupations.Numbers.
Artist 1
Nurse in Bellevue Hospital, N. Y. 1
School-teachers 3
Fruit-hawkers 4
Paper-box-makers 5
Tobacco-packers 7
Attended stores or bars 8
Attended school 8
Embroiderers 8
Fur-sewers 8
Hat-trimmers 8
Umbrella-makers 8
Flower-makers 9
Shoe-binders 16
Vest-makers 21
Cap-makers 24
Book-folders 27
Factory girls 37
Housekeepers 39
Milliners 41
Seamstresses 59
Tailoresses 105
Dress-makers 121
Servants 933
Lived with parents or friends 499
Total 2000

Wherever the social condition of woman has been considered, one fact has always been painfully apparent, namely, the difficulties which surround her in any attempt to procure employment beyond the beaten track of needlework or domestic service. Numerous light or sedentary employments now pursued by men might with much greater propriety be confided to women, but custom seems to have fixed an arbitrary law which can not be altered. If a lady enters a dry goods store, she is waited upon by some stalwart young man, whose energy and muscle would be far more useful in tilling the ground, or in some other out-door employment. If she wishes to make a purchase of jewelry, she is served by the same class of attendants. Why should not females have this branch of employment at their command? It would in a majority of cases be more consonant with the feelings of the purchasers, and consequently more to the interest of store-keepers. It would open an honorable field of exertion to the women, and improve the condition of the men who now monopolize such employments, by forcing them to obtain work suitable to their sex and strength, and driving from the crowded cities into the open country some whose effeminacy is fast bringing them to positive idleness and ruin.