The Abominations of Modern Society. T. De Witt Talmage
be administered, and the fever guarded, and the restless tossing of the coverlet resisted, and the ice kept upon the temples, and the perpetual prayer offered by hearts soon to be broken. The street-lamps, standing in long line, reveal the silence and the slumber of the town.
Stupendous thought: a great city asleep! Weary arm gathering strength for to-morrow's toil. Hot brain getting cooled off. Rigid muscles relaxing. Excited nerves being soothed. White locks of the octogenarian in thin drifts across the white pillow—fresh fall of flakes on snow already fallen. Children with dimpled hands thrown put over the pillow, with every breath inhaling a new store of fun and frolic.
Let the great hosts sleep! A slumberless Eye will watch them. Silent be the alarm-bells and merciful the elements! Let one great wave of refreshing slumber roll across the heart of the great town, submerging trouble and weariness and pain. It is the third watch of the night, and time for the city to sleep.
But be not deceived. There are thousands of people in the great town who will not sleep a moment to-night. Go up that dark court. Be careful, or you will fall over the prostrate form of a drunkard lying on his own worn step. Look about you, or you will feel the garroter's hug. Try to look in through that broken pane! What do you see? Nothing. But listen. What is it? "God help us!" No footlights, but tragedy—mightier, ghastlier than Ristori or Edwin Booth ever acted. No bread. No light. No fire. No cover. They lie strewn upon the floor—two whole families in one room. They shiver in the darkness. They have had no food to-day. You say: "Why don't they beg?" They did beg, but got nothing. You say: "Hand them over to the almshouse."
Ah! they had rather die than go to the almshouse. Have you never heard the bitter cry of the man or of the child when told that he must go to the almshouse?
You say that these are vicious poor, and have brought their own misfortune on themselves.
So much the more to be pitied. The Christian poor—God helps them! Through their night there twinkles the round, merry star of hope, and through the cracked window-pane of their hovel they see the crystals of heaven. But the vicious are the more to be pitied. They have no hope. They are in hell now. They have put out their last light. People excuse themselves from charity by saying they do not deserve to be helped. If I have ten prayers for the innocent, I shall have twenty for the guilty. If a ship be dashed upon the rocks, the fisherman, in his hut on the beach, will wrap the warmest flannels around those who are the most chilled and battered. The vicious poor have suffered two awful wrecks, the wreck of the body, and the wreck of the soul; a wreck for time and a wreck for eternity.
Go up that alley! Open the door. It is not locked. They have nothing to lose. No burglar would want anything that is there. There is only a broken chair set against the door. Strike a match and look around you. Beastliness and rags! A shock of hair hanging over the scarred visage. Eyes glaring upon you. Offer no insult. Be careful what you say. Your life is not worth much in such a place. See that red mark on the wall. That is the mark of a murderer's hand. From the corner a wild face starts out of the straw and moves toward you, just as your light goes out.
Strike another match. Here is a little babe. It does not laugh. It never will laugh. A sea-flower flung on an awfully barren beach: O that the Shepherd would fold that lamb! Wrap your shawl about you, for the January wind sweeps in. Strike another match. The face of that young woman is bruised and gashed now, but a mother once gazed upon it in ecstasy of fondness. Awful stare of two eyes that seem looking up from the bottom of woe. Stand back. No hope has dawned on that soul for years. Hope never will dawn upon it. Utter no scorn. The match has gone out. Light it not again, for it would seem to be a mockery.
Pass out! Pass on! Know that there are thousands of such abodes in our cities. An awful, gloomy, and overwhelming picture is the city in the third watch.
After midnight the crime of the city does its chief work. At eight and a half o'clock in the evening the criminals of the city are at leisure. They are mostly in the drinking saloons. It needs courage to do what they propose to do. Rum makes men reckless. They are getting their brain and hand just right. Toward midnight they go to their garrets. They gather their tools. Soon after the third watch they stalk forth, silently, looking out for the police, through the alleys to their appointed work. This is a burglar; and the door-lock will fly open at the touch of the false keys. That is an incendiary; and before morning there will be a light on the sky, and a cry of "Fire! Fire!" That is an assassin; and a lifeless body will be found to-morrow in some of the vacant lots.
During all the day there are hundreds of villains to be found lounging about, a part of the time asleep, apart of the time awake; but at twelve to-night they will rouse up, and their eyes will be keen, and their minds acute, and their arms strong, and their foot fleet to fly or pursue. Many of them have been brought up to the work. They were born in a thief's garret. Their childish plaything was a burglar's dark lantern. As long ago as they can remember, they saw, toward morning, the mother binding up the father's head, wounded by a watchman's billet. They began by picking boys' pockets, and now they can dig an underground passage to the cellar of the bank, or will blast open the door of the gold vault. So long as the children of the street are neglected there will be no lack of desperadoes.
In the third watch of the night the gambling-houses are in full blast. What though the hours of the night are slipping away, and the wife sits waiting in the cheerless home! Stir up the fires! Bring on the drinks! Put up the stakes! A whole fortune may be made before morning! Some of the firms that two years ago first put out their sign of copartnership have already foundered on the gambler's table. The money-drawer in many a mercantile house will this year mysteriously spring a leak. Gaming is a portentous vice, and is making great efforts to become respectable. Recently a member of Congress played with a member elect, carrying off a trophy of one hundred and twenty thousand dollars. The old-fashioned way of getting a fortune is too slow! Let us toss up and see who shall have it!
And so it goes, from the wheezing wretches who pitch pennies in a rum grocery, to the millionnaire gamblers in the gold-market.
After midnight the eye of God will look down and see uncounted gambling-saloons plying their destruction. Passing down the street to-night, you may hear the wrangling of the gamblers mingling with the rattle of the dice, and the clear, sharp crack of the balls on the billiard-table.
The finest rooms in the city are gambling dens. In gilded parlor, amid costly tapestry, you may behold these dens of death. These houses have walls attractive with elaborate fresco and gems of painting—no sham artist's daub, but a masterpiece. Mantel and table glitter with vases and statuettes. Divans and lounges with deep cushions, the perfection of upholstery, invite to rest and repose. Aquaria alive with fins and strewn with tinged shells and zoophytes. Tufts of geranium, from bead baskets, suspended mid-room, drop their witching perfume. Fountains gushing up, sprinkling the air with sparkles, or gushing through the mouth of the marble lion. Long mirrors, mounted with scrolls and wings and exquisite carvings, catching and reflecting back the magnificence. At their doors merchant-princes dismount from their carriages; official dignitaries enter; legislators, tired of making laws, here take a respite in breaking them.
From all classes this crime is gathering its victims: the importer of foreign silks, and the Chatham street dealer in pocket-handkerchiefs; clerks taking a game in the store after the shutters are put up; and officers of the court whiling away the time while the jury are out. In the woods around Baden Baden, in the morning, it is no rare thing to find the suspended bodies of suicides. No splendor of surroundings can hide the dreadful nature of this sin. In the third watch of this very night, the tears of thousands of orphans and widows will dash up in those fountains. The thunders of eternal destruction roll in the deep rumble of that ten-pin alley. And as from respectable circles young men and old are falling in line of procession, all the drums of woe begin to beat the dead march of ten thousand souls.
Seven millions of dollars are annually lost in New York city at the gaming-table. Some of your own friends may be at it. The agents of these gaming-houses around our hotels are well dressed. They meet a stranger in the city; they ask him if he would like to see the city; he says, "Yes;" they ask him if he has seen that splendid building up town, and he says "No." "Then," says the villain to the greenhorn, "I will show you the lions and the elephants." After seeing the lions and the elephants, I would