describe what he had himself seen, while visiting 14 of those houses in company with a Sergeant of Police.

"In every instance I marked the presence of abandoned women. In one of the rooms there were 150 persons-a third boys. In another of higher character 400 persons, a fourth of whom consisted of youths of both sexes. The best conducted of the rooms I fear the most. In some the songs and singers are too disgusting to be dangerous: but in the better conducted a thin gauze of propriety is thrown over all the scenes. A few are open on a Sunday evening. lately looked in at one. The audience was smallmost intoxicated. I heard the Old Hundred Psalm sung, the Hallelujah Chorus, Bishop Ken's Evening Hymn, and the Jubilate Deo. The organ was a large one. It was a melancholy thing to see and hear this group (of singers) singing in such a place and such a company, 'We are his People and the Sheep of His Pasture.' The people who frequent Casinos would shrink from going to Beerhouses first; it is not till the depraving influence has done its work that they take to the beerhouses."*

It is no better elsewhere: God's music enlisted in the Devil's cause! A Report of a Committee in Birmingham, appointed to enquire into the alleged Educational and Elevating tendencies of the Traffic now lies before us. The following are extracts-six Saloons and Concert Halls were visited, and 20 gin palaces.

"SALOONS.-The charge for admission to most of these saloons is fixed at fourpence or sixpence, in return for which two cheques are given, each of which purchases refreshments for half the amount. These refreshments generally consist of spirits or other intoxicating beverages; such drinks as ginger-beer and lemonade being, in some of the saloons, unattainable, while in others they were served with so much reluctance as to show plainly that such orders were not in accordance with the spirit of the management. To persons unused to the atmosphere of these places the effluvia which greets them upon entering is almost intolerable: the fumes of ignited tobacco mingling with the humid vapour which rises from the hundreds of steaming glasses around, and these, in audiences of densely-packed human beings, create a stench at once offensive and injurious.

.

"One of the reports given in to your Committee, says: At some of the 'places I have visited, the proprietor is not over particular either as to the dress or appearance of his visitors; at all of them a number of prostitutes are to be found, but by far the greater number of the female portion are young girls working in our manufactories and warehouses, who here mingle with men and boys, spending their cheques in intoxicating liquors. Another-In one case not less than a thousand persons of both sexes were present, many of whom were young. There were some few who, according to appearances, were parents of children, or heads of families.'

"The character of the entertainments provided are various: comic, negro, and sentimental songs, tumbling and gymnastics, ballet-dancing, music, and acting. Light as these are, even when introduced into select circles, and sanctioned by the presence of the sedate and sober, how much more injurious must they become, when frivolity is supplanted by obscenity, and mirth and gaiety become the vehicles for conveying to the heated imagination, thoughts the most debasing and desires the most unchaste. "Another report says: "The performances consist of vocal and instrumental music, farce, pantomime, and low comedy. Great difference is observable in different houses with regard to the merit of the perform

Report on Public Houses. 1853. pp. 228-31.

+ Printed by White and Pike, Bull-street, Birmingham, 1854.

⚫ances, and some small difference in respect to their morality. The same ་ piece, by being produced in a different dress, is rendered more or less objectionable, according to the supposed tastes of the company. At many of the places I have visited I have found that both in the pieces enacted, as well as in the songs, there has been no attempt to conceal immorality, beyond the occasional introduction of sentences which may be made to convey a 'double meaning; and that the majority of those in attendance see through ⚫ the flimsy veil, and construe the sentences to their worst meaning, is only 'too apparent from the applauding manner in which such parts are greeted even by the youngest persons present.' In another place, visited on a Monday evening, the report says: The songs were highly spiced with licentious hints, which were applauded by a mixed audience of both sexes.' A third report states, Drinking and smoking were the order, and of the 'character of the performances we have nothing favorable to report; some ' of them were of that simple, silly kind, which would tend rather to disgust than gratify an intelligent being seeking for rational enjoyment, while in other instances the gestures of the performers, as well as the sentiments ⚫uttered, appeared to us calculated to arouse feelings of the worst character. It was painful to us to witness that the nearer the approach to licen'tiousness, the heartier and louder grew the applause. The places seemed 'to us to be the very hot-beds of excitement; drinking and smoking, stamping and clapping, being predominant features. All those wise and 'sober rules that check and regulate other assemblies are here thrown 'aside, and we doubt not but many a thoughtless female has had her face 'first crimsoned, and the first fires of unhallowed passion kindled, amid the 'unnatural excitement of such scenes as these.' Another report says:-'I 'feel it my duty to state that having visited two concert-halls, I cannot say anything more favorable of the one than the other. Their tendency is to corrupt the morals; to vitiate the tastes of the young, degrade their cha 'racter, and make them low and groveling in their pursuits.' Speaking of another saloon, the report records :-The attendance here was very meagre, dotted here and there with females of very questionable character.' "GIN PALACES.-They have divided the houses visited into three classes. 1st, The Bad; 2nd, The Worse; 3rd, The Worst. The first are simply classified as better than the others, because void of some of those attractions with which the latter are furnished for beguiling chance customers. Their chief visitors are the wretched and impoverished, residing in their immediate neighborhoods. These assemble here to drink, blaspheme, and wrangle, until their scanty means are exhausted. The scenes are at times truly appalling,-parents and children, young and old, all commingling in various stages of intoxication, listening to and uttering the most abominable and filthy language.

"The second are those which, while uniting no mean proportion of the features of the former class, exceed them by far in the pernicious influences they exert over a class of people not yet sunk so far. The greater number of these dens are in the busiest and most frequented thoroughfares of the town, and nearly all have some attraction calculated to arrest the attention of the passer by. Females with faces blackened to imitate negresses, and men in imitation of negroes; at one a fat man, at another a tall woman; a third displays a Caffre chief; here a silvered globe, and there a Georgian slave. Musicians were in request at all, and at most of them there was singing in addition. At many of them there was a raised platform, so as to give the singers prominence. Lads of fifteen or sixteen were not unfrequently met with, drinking spirits and water, even as late as twelve or one o'clock. But the predominating features of these places are the low prostitutes and their 'fancy men.' These congregate round the bar fire, while the women parade the streets in pursuit of their wretched calling. Should one of these succeed in enticing some half-unwilling man or lad to their pur

pose, he is taken to the gin-palace (where her protector is to be found), and here he is generally prevailed upon to stand treat; and yet these persons, in consideration of the custom they bring (and of course their avocations being well known to the landlord), are allowed to harbour here night after night, whether they call for drink or not.

"In treating of the third class, your Committee beg to instance a house situated in one of the most respectable thoroughfares in the town. At three of the visits, prostitutes were found dancing with apparently the vilest of characters, more or less intoxicated, while the most filthy and disgusting epithets were continually passing between them, mingled with obscene jests. This place is evidently a rendezvous after the majority of its compeers are closed; and although the bar in which these orgies take place is the least in size of any visited, yet it is sufficiently capacious to contain the concentrated vice of all in its most objectionable form. There is, your Committee believe, an hotel in connexion with this bar; if so, the fact renders it more objectionable, as this infamous trading in iniquity is hidden by a mask of respectability. There are two others which can scarcely be said to come under the denomination of gin-palaces, as they aim at enlisting under the banners of profligacy those who would (while sober) deem it beneath them to lounge at the public bar of a spirit shop. Your Committee heard of regulations with regard to these places, formed expressly for the purpose of preventing intrusion on the part of the uninitiated. The visitors, however, by patient watching, saw sufficient of the parties who visited these WINE ROOMS, to convince them of the nature of the transactions prevalent within. Music has been heard till between one and two o'clock in the morning; abandoned women are also readily admitted at ihat hour, dressed in the most extravagant and fascinating style, evidently for no transient visit; and one of the visitors, while conversing with a dissenting minister of the town, had this voluntary statement:- A person, who would gladly substantiate the truth, had told him that dancing was carried on at these rooms, not unfrequently both sexes being wholly or partially in a 'state of nudity.' It appeared to your visitors, that little is done in these rooms before the closing of the Theatre, when the influx of visitors (some very young) and prostitutes was perfectly astounding. The rooms stand back from the houses themselves, so that in the day-time nothing extraor dinary presents itself to the view, and room is left at night for any person to regale himself alone, if he should be unfortunate enough to be pronounced not all right. At each of these places is held a table-d'hote, at which many clerks, etc., are to be found, who doubtless are, if up to the mark,' regaled with the intelligence during the day of the kind of amusement to be met with there.-To return to the gin-palaces, at one of them they found all that has been said of the wine-rooms holds good (with the exception of the back premises), while as regards its feature as a ginpalace, it is perhaps even somewhat more objectionable than any yet described. Its proximity to the Theatre, and its situation among a complete hot-bed of brothels, will sufficiently explain this: besides the unfortunate females who abound in our streets, and who are continually trying to flee from self, and to drown the thoughts of their lamentable condition in gin, there are here several of the procuresses of the neighborhood. At one of the houses visited, they obtained undoubted evidence that prostitutes attend there regularly every night, with the tacit consent of the proprietor, and here they remain, if not engaged,' until two or three o'clock in the morning, when the house is closed. At this house, the company began to assemble at about half-past twelve o'clock, and at half-past one, the place was crowded; men and women in every stage of intoxication, shut out elsewhere, found a refuge here. The scene must be imagined, it cannot be described. The language was truly horrible, and as a specimen of the brutalized and degraded tastes here exhibited, your visitors may state that

they received information of treatment of the most disgusting character to which a poor woman was subjected, who had been made intoxicated for the purpose, the details of which could scarcely be believed, even if reported,"

--

Yet this town it was that STINTON and his compeers, in the Parliamentary Committee, endeavored to blanche from intemperance and stain as connected with the Traffic! Mr CLAY stated (p. 632) of PRESTON, speaking of the Alehouses" Of 84 statements made by Prisoners, 41 testify to harboring of Prostitutes, 10 to the keeping of dancing-rooms, 56 to gaming," etc. So it seems, that while we put down Gaming and Brothels under one name, we are actually multiplying and licensing them under another! Mr JAMES MATHER, Spirit Merchant, SOUTH SHIELDS, before the same Committee (p. 556), says of the ' tied' Publicans "They admit all descriptions of characters into their houses, which are a PERPETUAL SOURCE of nightly disorder. Loose women and the young of both sexes are admitted; and that kind of house becomes, in fact, a source of very great evil to the community." In SUNDERLAND, 60 public-houses were visited by deputations, in nine of which 450 persons were found, chiefly young persons of both sexes, exhibiting the most repulsive immorality and debauchery. An affecting account is furnished, on the authority of Captain SHEPPARD, of the state of things in BLACKBURN. At the early part of 1853, there were 34 publichouses and beershops which "harbored prostitutes, or maintained auxiliary-brothels." There is given the history of a girl who had lived in Manchester with six factory girls, two of whom persuaded her to come to Blackburn with them. She was invited to the Printers' Arms, but being unwilling to fall into the profligate system of the place, the landlady sent her to the Black Boy, kept by her (the landlady's) brother. She was made drunk, and induced to sleep with a gentleman. "They maintain auxiliary brothels adjoining their houses, as a means for increasing the sale of their liquor." In his 24th Report of the House of Correction at PRESTON, Mr CLAY reveals the following startling facts :

"My last years's intercourse with the subjects of my ministry, has made me acquainted with practices resorted to in certain beerhouses, which must be mentioned in order to show what demoralizing agencies are added to those already existing in them, viz: the keeping of prostitutes. From three entirely independent sources, and at different times, I received statements fully confirming each other, which leave no doubt of the extent to which this profligate system is carried on. Sixteen houses in one town, harboring, or rather maintaining, about fifty-four prostitutes, have been named to me. But this is not the full amount of the evil. The neighborhood of those houses is corrupted. Women-married women, occupied to all appearance with their own proper avocations at home, HOLD THEMSELVES AT THE CALL OF THE BEERHOUSE FOR THE IMMOBAL PURPOSES TO WHICH I HAVE REFERRED."

* Vide 1st Report on Public-houses, pp. 355-6.

The same horrid fact is true of several Public-houses at SHIELDS; the contagion spreads through the neighborhood, and passes, with its taint and sorrow, into the far future. So much for the direct connexion of this sin with the Traffic. It is of no

avail to say, that we must not condemn the bad for the good; for the question is one, not of men, but of a system. This vice belongs to the system, is inseparable from it; and, after all, it is the respectable part-' the body'-that bears the excrescences and to extirpate them, we must destroy it.

Mr R. HAMMOND, Jun., J.P., states before the recent Parlia mentary Committee, as follows:-"There are 182 public-houses in Yarmouth; of these 128 are Brewers' Houses, 41 of them being the property of Sir C. E. LACON and Co., and 47 of them the property of STEWART and Co., Norwich. A great many of them are of the lowest and worst description, fiddling, and dancing, and whoring all night long; but, from the interest the parties have on the bench, little or nothing is said on the licensing day."

So, in like manner, the unlicensed Traffic must be regarded as part of the system which affords facilities for evasion, and for the purchase of the liquor sold in the 'Hush-shops.' Mr OSBORNE, in his Beershop Evil, says :-"Within a short distance "of the spot where these pages are written, there is a village "notorious for its immorality, and a very hot-bed of crime, in 66 which, though there is every evidence of the amount of beer "consumed at the several beershops, there is no one such shop "licensed to sell beer on the premises; there is no public-house in "the place." (p. 30.)* In OLDHAM and elsewhere, hundreds of these shops exist. They must be regarded as parts of a system, for which entire prohibition of the Traffic is the only efficient remedy.

in

§ 107. The Report of the Committee on Drunkenness, 1834, shows how Intemperance directly leads to Prostitution, as it is undoubtedly at the bottom of much of the Illegitimacy of the country. Mr G. WILSON, overseer of St Margaret's, Westminster, said "When unfortunate females have applied for parochial assistance, or, being pregnant, for admission into the workhouse, I have invariably, in the presence of the matron, enquired into the causes which led to their wretchedness. Almost, if not always, they have attributed it to the excitement of liquor; being taken out by their companions in hours devoted to relaxation, or their attending a place of worship, and being taken to a Public-house, and there the company, or the excitement of spirits, have thrown them off their guard; and they have dated their first ruin to that, I think, almost invariably,' 278.) The Rev. DAVID RUELL, Chaplain to the Clerkenwell Prison, said Drunkenness is the very element on which

* Will the Publicans argue that Law and Police could not mend this?