CHAPTER XXI.

JUVENILE DELINQUENTS AND BENEVOLENT SOCIETIES.

IT has been well inquired whether it be cheaper to allow youths to become criminals, and then support them at public charge, or to control the early causes of criminality, and thereby rear up honest and useful members of society. During the formation of the character, the law-court is an idle lookeron, it is not till that formed character exhibits itself in trespass and disturbance that law can restrain it. "Follow the embryo convict a few years, during childhood and youth. Behold the circumstances that made him what he is-circumstances (in one sense) beyond his control-circumstances which the community might and ought to have controlled. There are hundreds of children growing up in our state, in conditions, and surrounded by circumstances, that render it morally certain they will become candidates for the prison or the gallows. It is in our power to change these circumstances. Shall we do it? Yes; it is in our power to change those circumstances by placing such children in a House of

Refuge; and every generous heart and reflecting mind will say we should do it."

Such are the sentiments expressed by the founders of the first Pennsylvania House of Refuge.

There are several such houses now connected with different states, partly sustained by the state, and partly by private contribution. New York has two, one in the city and one at Rochester. Massachu

setts has two. Ohio has one. New Orleans had one, authorised by the State of Louisiana, which has been destroyed by fire. It was a wooden structure, and is expected to be replaced by more appropriate buildings.

We had the pleasure of accompanying the Ladies' Committee of the House of Refuge at Philadelphia, on one of their monthly visits, and thus saw a little of the internal working of the institution. The outset was striking to one who has plodded many a day in the mud, endeavouring to lend a little help where a great deal is needed. The carriage of the House came round and gathered up the committee, and repeated journeys were required before all were collected. The absence of tax on carriage, coachman, and horses, allows many to drive in the United States, whose equals in station and fortune here never attain such a relief.

Another difference, of far more weight than this to the cause of Christian charity, may be mentioned. With us, benevolent females, whose influence is calculated to be useful to their own sex, obtain admis

sion, as it were, by stealth, or, at any rate, by great favour, to prisons, bridewells, infirmaries, &c. Nay, it is a mortifying fact, that some who desired in Christian love to enter, have been turned back from their gates, not being able to obtain orders from the proper authorities. In America, the states invite the co-operation of women in such offices as become their sex, and look for their reports as guides in their management, or in making changes in the institutions; and nobly do their women meet the wishes of the rulers, and fulfil the expectation of their country. Calm, practical, and business-like, they are able to say what they wish, exhibiting neither bashfulness nor boldness, having lost self in the interests of the institution. I have heard a discussion where there was much to be weighed, and a considerable difference of opinion. like firm politeness. "ayes had it," the "

It was conducted with ladyWhen put to the vote, and the noes," without any appearance

of temper, set to work on the side of the "ayes," and went on with the business. In England, I have seen Quaker ladies act with equal simple decision. Perhaps their liberty arises from early training, or partly from their emancipation from some of our aristocratic trammels. But how often have I seen matters which ought to have been taken up, allowed to pass with us, merely because no one had courage to speak out, or because Mrs or Miss So-and-so thought it was not her place to make the first move, when the Hon. Mrs or Lady So-and-so was present-thus

yielding the real interests of the institution to a matter of etiquette. One has sometimes left such a committee with pain, from the consciousness of having flinched from duty on some such petty ground, when I am pretty sure my American sisters would have had too much of the independent courage arising out of the love of the useful, to have left their scene of labour with any such sentiments.

It was not my lot to fall in with any discussion of this kind in the Refuge at Philadelphia. There is much to be admired in its well-aired, orderly, and beautifully clean apartments. Its bathing and eating and sleeping places, specially the latter, are admirably managed. The long galleries which form the dormitories are partitioned with brick, each bedroom having its own door and lock, and little window of glass. The girls acquire habits of neatness by the encouragement given them to decorate these little chambers. Daily, after making the bed, they arrange whatever they have of pictures, pretty bags, china figures, peacocks' feathers-in short, they are not particular-anything that gives the air of pains, design, and good order, is set forth, or hung up. Happy is the girl whose lady teacher, as a mark of approbation, gives her a gay print, or a bit of bright carpet. One would think, after examining fifty such little dormitories, that no child is born in the country without a taste for the beautiful, and that no one is so desolate as not to take pleasure in indulging it.

R

In some of these institutions, one of the employments, which is in itself as dull as picking wool or teazing oakum, has arisen out of American ingenuity and thrift, and was quite new to me. It is the making of rag carpets. They cut cloths of all textures and colours into long strips, tack them together so that they will follow the shuttle, and wind them into large balls. In this stage they are sent to the weaver, who uses them as the woof which crosses a wide warp of hempen cords, and he sends home gay, comfortable, rough-looking "rag carpets," with which the rooms and the staircases of some institutions are covered. Such thrifty and long-lasting carpets are found in the houses of tradespeople, of all complexions, in town and country. They are also used often in the basement or kitchens of the opulent.

In the Refuge, we had the pleasure of seeing the young people promoted to higher classes according to their attainments, and after examination of the reports of the matron and teachers as to their obedience, industry, and orderliness. They were neatly dressed, but not in uniform, the school aprons alone being all alike. When we learned that many had been plucked from dens of dirt and wretchedness, and that some had been placed there by parents who could not manage them, it was very pleasant to consider the better path which the Christian discipline of this house opens for them. We heard them sing several hymns in a modest,