land furnish a large proportion of this class. The hotels in this
city are closely watched by the agents of these infamous establishments,
especially hotels of the plainer and less expensive kind. These harpies
watch their chance, and when they lay siege to a blooming young girl,
surround her with every species of enticement. She is taken to church,
to places of amusement, or to the park, and, in returning, a visit is
paid to the house of a friend of the harpy. Refreshments are offered,
and a glass of drugged wine plunges the victim into a stupor, from which
she awakes a ruined woman.

A large number of the fallen women of this city are from New England.
The excess of the female population in that overcrowded section of the
country makes it impossible for all to find husbands, and throws many
upon their own resources for their support. There is not room for all at
home, and hundreds come every year to this city. They are ignorant of
the difficulty of finding employment here, but soon learn it by
experience. The runners of the houses of ill-fame are always on the
watch for them, and from various causes many of these girls fall victims
to them and join the lost sisterhood. They are generally the daughters
of farmers, or working men, and when they come are fresh in constitution
and blooming in their young beauty. God pity them! These blessings soon
vanish. They dare not escape from their slavery, for they have no means
of earning a living in the great city, and they know they would not be
received at home, were their story known. Their very mothers would turn
from them with loathing. Without hope, they cling to their shame, and
sink lower and lower, until death mercifully ends their human sufferings.
As long as they are prosperous, they represent in their letters home that
they are engaged in a steady, honest business, and the parents' fears are
lulled. After awhile these letters are rarer. Finally they cease
altogether. Would a father find his child after this, he must seek her
in the foulest hells of the city.

When other arts fail, the wretches who lie in wait for women here seek to
ruin them by foul means. They are drugged, or are forced into ruin. A
woman in New York cannot be too careful. There are many scoundrels in
the city who make it their business to annoy and insult respectable
ladies in the hope of luring them to lives of shame. Young girls have
been frequently enticed into low class broth