The Secrets of the Great City Part 23

"Such are the effects of vice, and a life of infamy, upon the n.o.ble feelings and natural impulses of the female heart. With an exclamation of, 'Oh, there's my man!' our attendant suddenly left us, and joined an individual who had just entered the apartment, and we did not see her again.

"At a table nearly opposite to our own, are seated a couple, one, at least, of whom, to even a casual observer, is a stranger to the place and its surroundings; there is no doubt of it. Wholly enwrapped in the beauty and grace of his female companion, he is totally oblivious to all pa.s.sing around. She is exerting all her arts to entice 'greeny'

into her net, and before long will be counting the amount of his cash-- while he, her dupe, will be, too late, reflecting upon the depravity of pretty waiter girls. By this time the saloon is crowded with men and women, of all degrees of social standing. Here is the man about-town, the hanger-round of the hotels, in clothes of unexceptionable cut and make, talking earnestly with a female, whose drawn veil conceals her face--perhaps some unfortunate victim of his l.u.s.t, or probably his mistress, come to plead for justice, or for her week's allowance of money. Yonder is a youth, of, as Sylva.n.u.s Cobb, Jr., would say, 'some eighteen summers,' young in years, but old in sin, who supports on his knee a _nymph du pave_, with whom he has entered from the street, and upon whom he is spending his last quarter's salary, or the proceeds of an investigation into the till of his employer. In that corner, is the returned soldier, who has just been paid off, and who is now expending the hard-earned pittance of the government upon some bepainted and bedizened courtesan, while perhaps his wife and family are suffering for want of the common necessaries of life. A cry of pain, followed by a burst of brutal laughter, causes us to turn our eyes to the corner, just in time to witness a woman fall to the ground, felled by a blow from the clenched fist of the brute with whom she has been quarrelling.

A moment, there is silence in the hall; but only for a moment. The girl is picked up by one of her companions--a few rough jokes at her expense--and all goes on as before. Such scenes are of too frequent occurrence to provoke comment. Observe that couple descending the steps; a handsome, almost n.o.ble-looking man, but upon whose countenance is stamped the mark of a dissolute life--upon his arm, a female, her face hidden from view by a dark veil. They advance to the bar. The gentleman whispers a word in the ear of one of the girls, a meaning smile flickers over her face as she hands him a key, with which he opens a door in the end of the room, and disappears with the female.

Reader, you have seen half a dozen similar couples arrive and vanish through the same door. Do you know the why and wherefore of this proceeding? This saloon is one of the most _notorious a.s.signation houses_ in New York. We might go on and notice more fully the various personages and scenes, constantly varying, in this house; but we have neither s.p.a.ce or time at present--besides, the task is not an agreeable one. So, let us leave the murky atmosphere of the 'crib,' and once more breathe the pure air of heaven."

Bad as they are, the concert saloons of Broadway are the best in the city. Those of the Bowery, and Chatham street, are mere brothels, in which no man's life is safe.

Persons entering these places run a fearful risk. They voluntarily place themselves in the midst of a number of abandoned wretches, who are ready for any deed of violence or crime. They care for nothing but money, and will rob or kill for it. Respectable people have no business in such places. They are sure to have their pockets picked, and are in danger of violence. Many men, who leave their happy homes in the morning, visit these places, for amus.e.m.e.nt or through curiosity, at night. They are drugged, robbed, murdered, and then the harbor police may find their lifeless forms floating in the river at daybreak.

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

DANCE-HOUSES.

THESE houses differ from the saloons in two things--they are lower and viler, and their guests a.s.semble for the purpose of dancing as well as drinking. They are owned chiefly by men, though there are some which are the property of and are managed by women. They are located in the worst quarters of the city, generally in the streets near the East and North Rivers, in order to be easy of access to the sailors.

The buildings are greatly out of repair, and have a rickety, dirty appearance. The main entrance leads to a long, narrow hall, the floor of which is well sanded. The walls ornamented with flashy prints, and the ceiling with colored tissue paper cut in various fantastic shapes.

There is a bar at the farther end of the room, which is well stocked with the meanest liquors, and chairs and benches are scattered about.

From five to a dozen women, so bloated and horrible to look upon, that a decent man shudders with disgust as he beholds them, are lounging about the room. They have reached the last step in the downward career of fallen women, and will never leave this place until they are carried from it to their graves, which are not far distant. They are miserably clad, and are nearly always half crazy with liquor. They are cursed and kicked about by the brutal owner of the place, and suffer still greater violence, at times, in the drunken brawls for which these houses are famous. Their sleeping rooms are above. They are sought by sailors and by the lowest and most degraded of the city population. They are the slaves of their masters. They have no money of their own. He claims a part of their infamous earnings, and demands the rest for board and clothes. Few have the courage to fly from these h.e.l.ls, and if they make the attempt, they are forced back by the proprietor, who is frequently aided in this unholy act by the law of the land. They can not go into the streets naked, and he claims the clothes on their backs as his property. If they leave the premises with these clothes on, he charges them with theft.

HOW THE LAW AIDS VICE.

In _Packard's Monthly,_ for September, 1868, the reader will find a deeply interesting article on this subject, by Mr. Oliver Dyer, from which we take the following ill.u.s.tration of our remarks.

There is, probably, not a police reporter in the city, of much experience, who has not seen one of these girls arraigned at the Tombs, or at some other police court, on a charge of theft; because in fleeing from the intolerable servitude of some den of vice, she had had to wear clothes belonging to the keeper--not having any of her own wherewith to hide her nakedness.

"We will give a scene of this kind. Place, the Tombs, time, six o'clock in the morning; present, police justice, officers of court, about thirty prisoners, policemen attending as witnesses, and parties preferring charges against prisoners. The name of the girl against whom complaint has been made having been called, the following examination took place:

"_Justice_.--'What is the charge against this girl?'

"_Policeman_.--'Felony-stealing wearing apparel.'

"_Justice_.--'Who is the complainant?'

"_Policeman_.--'This woman here,' pointing out the keeper of the den from which the girl had fled--a most villainous old hag.

"_Justice_ (to the keeper).--'What did the girl steal?'

"_Keeper._--'Every rag she's got on; bad luck to her.'

"_Justice_ (to the girl).--'Mary, who owns that shawl you have on?'

"_Mary._--'_She_ does, sir;' pointing to the woman.

"_Justice._--'Who owns that hat and dress you have on?'

"_Mary._--'_She_ does.'

"_Justice._--'Havn't, you any thing of your own to wear?'

"_Mary._--'Nothing, sir.'

"_Justice._--'This woman owns them all--all the clothes you have on, does she?'

"_Mary._--'Yes, sir.'

"_Justice._--'If they are hers you should not have taken them.'

"_Mary._--'Please, sir, I couldn't stay in her house any longer, and I couldn't go naked into the street.'

"_Justice._--'It is a hard case, Mary, but stealing is stealing, and I shall have to send you up for twenty days.'

"And so Mary is sent to the Penitentiary on Blackwell's Island for twenty days (and sometimes for a longer period), wearing the 'stolen'

clothes; and the hag of a keeper goes back to her den and tells the other girls of Mary's fate, satisfied to give the shabby garment, in which the victim was attired, in exchange for the 'moral effect' of the girl's conviction and imprisonment on those who are still in her clutches.

"Justice Dowling, we believe, never convicts a girl of theft under such circ.u.mstances, but gives her accuser such a scoring down in open court as sends her back to her den in rage and shame."

WHERE THE WOMEN COME FROM.

Let no one suppose that these women entered upon such wretched lives voluntarily. Many were drugged and forced into them, but the majority are lost women who have come regularly down the ladder to this depth.

You can find in these h.e.l.ls women who, but a few years ago, were ornaments of society. No woman who enters upon a life of shame can hope to avoid coming to these places in the end. As sure as she takes the first step in sin, she will take this last one also, struggle against it as she may. This is the last depth. It has but one bright ray in all its darkness--it does not last over a few months, for death soon ends it. But, oh! the horrors of such a death. No human being who has not looked on such a death-bed can imagine the horrible form in which the Great Destroyer comes. There is no hope. The poor wretch pa.s.ses from untold misery in this life to the doom which awaits those who die in their sins.

O, parents, look well to your children. Guard them as you have never guarded them before. Make home happy and bright to them. Encircle them with love and tenderness. Weigh well your every act and word, for you may learn some day, when it is too late, that your criminal carelessness has been the cause of your child entering the path which leads inevitably down to h.e.l.l.

The keepers of these dens use every means to decoy emigrant girls into their dens. As we have shown in another chapter, they frequently succeed. Mr. Oliver Dyer, in the article from which we have just quoted, relates the following, which will show how this is done. We merely remark that this is perhaps the only case in which the helpless victim has been rescued:

"In the month of February, 1852, Isaac W. England, Esq., formerly the city editor of the _New York Tribune_, subsequently the managing editor of the _Chicago Republican_, afterwards editor-in-chief of the _Jersey City Times_, and now the managing editor of the _New York Sun_, was returning to this city from Liverpool in the emigrant packet s.h.i.+p _New York_, in which he had taken a second cabin pa.s.sage, for the purpose of learning practically how emigrants fared in such vessels.

"Mr. England did this with a view to exposing the atrocities then practiced upon emigrants, and which he afterwards did expose, in the columns of the _Tribune_, with such effect as to be largely instrumental in the fundamental regeneration of the whole emigrant business, and the creation of the Castle Garden Commission.

"Among the pa.s.sengers in the second cabin of the packet s.h.i.+p was a handsome English girl, some nineteen years of age, from near Mr.

England's native town. The fact that the girl came from near his native town led Mr. England to feel an interest in her, and he learned that she was coming to America to join her brother, then living near Pottsville, in Pennsylvania.

"On landing in New York, the girl went to a boarding-house in Greenwich street, there to await her brother's arrival--it having been arranged that he should come to New York for her.

"Mary (for that was her name) had not been at the boarding-house many days when a German woman called there in search of a bar-maid, and seeing Mary, she at once sought to induce her to accept the situation.

It is not uncommon for English girls, of the cla.s.s to which Mary belonged, to act as bar-maids in England, that being there a respectable employment.

"Deceived by the complaisant manners, and lured by the liberal promises of the German woman, the unsuspecting English girl accepted her offer and went with her to her saloon--bas.e.m.e.nt in William street, near Pearl.

"After one day's service as bar-maid, Mary was bluntly informed by her employer that she had been brought thither to serve in a capacity which we will, not name, and was ordered to make ready for at once entering upon a life of shame.