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Newspaper Page Text
. How many of them fall into the hands of the white slavers? I am in clined to think the number less than we hysterically believe when one comes to our notice, and yet even though the "dumber be- small it is frightful to contemplate such a fate for even pne girL With the boy who runs away, though a mother's heart may ache over him, and the lamp may he left lighted in the window, there is always; the assurance that the most horrible thing that may happen to the boy is that he may be hungry or may get into bad company. But, in either, event, life offers him a chance tq get back. To the mother who speculates over the fate of her girl, there is no such assurance. The question: 'Wl1er3 is" she tonight?" brings onlyihc anwjer that she is out on the streets;,enjoy ing for a little while .her sense of freedom, but,paying for it a price that leaves her branded. , There isn't any chance of believing that if she has been taught in..tlic maelstrom of bad company, ishe may simply leave them .when she has learned her lesson .and get back again. Because the-brand cannot be washed away and a girl doesnft out grow it. ' ' ' j I talked to a girl.not so long since who is only 18 and very pretty,' She told me she has -worked In different cities, though her ,hpme isin-Alabama. She came to Chicaga"wih only $4 in her purse and did not think it was an adventurous thing to do when she has no special qualifications, but when I asked her about her people, heclips tightened and she refused to answer. Yet she spoke very lightly of offers she had had to do work that had a taint of dishonesty about it, and I wondered what they would think of her poise, of her self-assurance and of her vanity back in Alabama, and I wished somehow she had stayed there and been the usual sweet, mod- est thing tha,a girl of 18 is instead i of being older and wiser than most women of twice her age. There wasn't any doubt but that she is a good girl, nor that it was the spirit of adventure that has led her into so many different cities, but while the boy may foam and not be hurt hy the knocks of fortune he en Counters, it takes the softness away from a Woman's nature. Almost twice as many boys and girls leave home in the summertime as in the winter. It almost seems as though the warm air, the cloudless sky and the lavishness of all nature during thejvarmest period of the year makes youngsters want to throw off restraint.. The city parks lure them for days and evenings and gradually they lislikeniore the thought of be ing "shut In" for even, a ftsw hours, and. so .theystart out to gain abso lute freedom. . One girl ran" away from home and was juot traced for 3. year. When she was found she, would offer no expla nation, of her motive Jn leaving, nor where s"he had been,- but 'after she had been home but'a sholt time, slje ran" away again and has .now been missing over-two months; What .becomes of the' people who drop out x)f sight like the star that shoots out of the sky and are not heard of again? fi ' o o She -fcfliSatU- gtKw,vHfer "What Is this Item here on the bot tom of this menu- card, waiter?" "Beg pardon, ma'am, that's some -mayonnaise I spilled."