ve the power to lift men up to office, and
to cast them down, against a hundred thousand slaughter-houses in
our American cities. In the name of our happy homes, of our refined
circles, of our schools, of our churches,--in the name of all that is
dear and beautiful and valuable and holy,--I enter the complaint. If
you now sit unconcerned, and leave to professed philanthropists
the work, and care not who are in authority or what laws remain
unexecuted, you may live to see the time when you will curse the day
in which your children were born.

My belief is that such an exposition of public immoralities will
do good, by exciting pity for the victims and wholesale indignation
against the abettors and perpetrators.

Who is that man fallen against the curbstone, covered with bruises and
beastliness? He was as bright-faced a lad as ever looked up from your
nursery. His mother rocked him, prayed for him, fondled him, would
not let the night air touch his cheek, and held him up and looked down
into his loving eyes, and wondered for what high position he was being
fitted. He entered life with bright hopes. The world beckoned him,
friends cheered him, but the archers shot at him; vile men set traps
for him, bad habits hooked fast to him with their iron grapples; his
feet slipped on the way; and there he lies. Who would think that that
uncombed hair was once toyed with by a father's fingers? Who would
think that those bloated cheeks were ever kissed by a mother's lips?
Would you guess that that thick tongue once made a household glad with
its innocent prattle? Utter no harsh words in his ear. Help him up.
Put the hat over that once manly brow. Brush the dust from that coat
that once covered a generous heart. Show him the way to the home that
once rejoiced at the sound of his footstep, and with gentle words tell
his children to stand back as you help him through the hall.

That was a kind husband once and an indulgent father. He will kneel
with them no more as once he did at family prayers--the little ones
with clasped hands looking up into the heavens with thanksgiving for
their happy home. But now at midnight he will drive them from their
pillows and curse them down the steps, and howl after them as, unclad,
they fly down the street, in night-garments, under the calm starlight.

Who slew that man? Who blasted that home? Who plunged those children
into worse than orphanage--until the hands are blue with cold, and the
cheeks are