starved, half-naked,
and bruised child when it was brought into court wrapped in a
horse-blanket caused a sensation that stirred the public conscience to its
very depths. Complaints poured in upon Mr. Bergh; so many cases of
child-beating and fiendish cruelty came to light in a little while, so
many little savages were hauled forth from their dens of misery, that the
community stood aghast. A meeting of citizens was called and an
association for the defence of outraged childhood was formed, out of
which grew the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children that was
formally incorporated in the following year. By that time Mary Ellen was
safe in a good home. She never saw her tormentor again. The woman, whose
name was Connolly, was not her mother. She steadily refused to tell where
she got the child, and the mystery of its descent was never solved. The
wretched woman was sent to the Island and forgotten.

John D. Wright, a venerable Quaker merchant, was chosen the first
President of the Society. Upon the original call for the first meeting,
preserved in the archives of the Society, may still be read a foot-note in
his handwriting, quaintly amending the date to read, Quaker fashion, "12th
mo. 15th 1874." A year later, in his first review of the work that was
before the young society, he wrote, "Ample laws have been passed by the
Legislature of this State for the protection of and prevention of cruelty
to little children. The trouble seems to be that it is nobody's business
to enforce them. Existing societies have as much, nay more to do than they
can attend to in providing for those entrusted to their care. The Society
for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children proposes to enforce by lawful
means and with energy those laws, not vindictively, not to gain public
applause, but to convince those who cruelly ill-treat and shamefully
neglect little children that the time has passed when this can be done, in
this State at least, with impunity."

The promise has been faithfully kept. The old Quaker is dead, but his work
goes on. The good that he did lives after him, and will live forever. The
applause of the crowd his Society has not always won; but it has merited
the confidence and approval of all right-thinking and right-feeling men.
Its aggressive advocacy of defenceless childhood, always and everywhere,
is to-day reflected from the statute-books of every State in the American
Union, and well-nigh every civilized governme