rwarding the newly-arrived immigrants, so that they may
escape the dangers and temptations of the city, has been much improved.
Very few, comparatively, now remain in our sea-ports to swell the
current of poverty and crime. The majority find their way at once to the
country districts. The quality, too, of the immigration has improved.
More well-to-do farmers and peasantry, with small savings, arrive than
formerly, and the preponderance, as to nationality, is inclining to the
Germans. It comparatively seldom happens now that paupers or persons
absolutely without means, land in New York.

As one of the great causes of crime, Emigration will undoubtedly have a
much feebler influence in the future in New York than it has had in the
past.

WANT OF A TRADE.

It is remarkable how often, in questioning the youthful convicts in our
prisons as to the causes of their downfall, they will reply that "if
they had had a trade, they would not have been there." They disliked
drudgery, they found places in offices and shops crowded; they would
have enjoyed the companionship and the inventiveness of a trade, but
they could not obtain one, and therefore they were led into stealing or
gambling, as a quick mode of earning a living.

There is no doubt that a lad with a trade feels a peculiar independence
of the world, and is much less likely to take up dishonest means of
living than one depending on manual labor, or chance means of living.

There is nearly always a demand for his work; the lad feels himself a
member of a craft and supported by the consciousness of this membership;
the means of the "Unions" often sustain him when out of employment; his
associates are more honest and respectable than those of boys depending
on chance-labor, and so he is preserved from falling into crime.

Of course, if such a lad would walk forth to the nearest country
village, he would find plenty of healthy and remunerative employment in
the ground, as gardener or farmer. And to a country-lad, the farm offers
a better chance than a trade. But many city boys and young men will not
consent to leave the excitements of the city, so that the want of a
mechanical occupation does expose them to many temptations.

The persons most responsible for this state of things are the members of
such "Unions" as refuse to employ boys, or to encourage the training of
apprentices. It is well-known that in many trades of New York, hardly
any youn