Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations

ions, Foibles

ty's contemporaneous history. They have figured in connection with many of its social romances and domestic infelicities, as well as with its scandals and its crimes-secret and revealed. In Go

in ready-made fabrics-understand so well! Who has not noticed how the tall, slender-framed girls, with their graceful movements and flexible spines, their long, smooth throats and curved waists, are drafted off to stand as veritable decoy-ducks? Who has not observed the grace and ease with which they wear risky patterns and unusual fa?ons, and so delude the arrogant but ungraceful custome

riant hair, made amenable to the discipline of the prevailing fashion; the gown stylish and perfect, and frequently not at all reticent in its revelations of form; the countenance calm, watchful and intelligent-frequently mischievou

d their generally poor salaries: their natural levity, and the example of their companions; their love of dress and display, coupled with a natural desire for masculine attentions; lon

y dress in an attractive manner, with the hope of beguiling the ideal hero they have constructed from the pages of the trashy story paper. It is a sort of voluntary species of sacrifice on their part-a kind of suicidal decking with flowers, and making preparation for immolation. Full of pernicious sentimentality, they are open to the first promising flirtation. They see elegantly-dressed and diamonded ladies, and their imagination is fed from the fountains of vulgar literature until they dream that th

n air of easy assurance, and she readily finds employment as a saleslady. Her influence afterwards, among girls comparatively innocent and without her experience, cannot

ce of his jewelry, and she thinks her mission in life is to walk beside the splendid swell, amid rose gardens, theatres and supper rooms, for the remainder of her life. Finally she yields to his soft solicitations, and her prospects are forever blighted. She becomes an incorrigible flirt, meets her "fellows" on the corner of the street ne

ied with exceptional hardships. The young lady is beautiful as well as good perhaps, and the pride of her idolizing parents, who have taught her that she is fit to be the wife of a duke. She attracts the eye of a man about town, and the process of courting and flattery-of sapping and mining-begins, with the result that he has had in view since the inception of the acquaintance. He is not a bad fellow as t

wn beauty gave

ant the wound th

d handsome as Adonis, with whom she is to fall in love. He is generally described with considerable minuteness, and the time and place of meeting foretold. This may be fictitious, and it is fortunate for her if it is so. Rut the seeress too frequently needs no powers of clairvoyance or ratiocination to make these disclosures, for some roue; who has exhausted the ordinary rounds of dissipation, or some fast young fellow seeking a change, has made a bargain with the prophetess for a new and innocent victim-the amount of the fee to depend on the means and liberality of the libertine and the attractiveness of the victim. The vain, silly girl is dazzled with the wily woman's story, and readily promises to

nster of so f

ted, needs b

oft, familiar

e, then pity,

th a "Matrimonial" or a "Personal," is an object of commiseration. From dallying and reading and wondering, the step is easy to answer such notices. She believes that she has a chance of getting a rich and handsome husband, who will take her to Europe, and, in other respects, make her life a sort of earthly paradise. The men who write such advertisements know this besetting female weakness and bait their trap accordingly. And so a young girl, too frequently, walks alone and unadvised into the meshes of an acquaintanceship which leads to her ruin. It

thers whose character needs stronger colors for proper delineation than have hitherto been employed. There are those among pretty shop girls who simply give up their leisure time to surreptitious appointments. This is the worst and most dangerous form in which this prevalent vice stalks abroad, and it more clearly stamps the character of a community than does its more open and brazen manifestations. Many causes may lead to a woman's becoming a professional harlot, but

like good eating and drinking. I have the most expensive suppers sometimes. I am engaged to be married to a young fellow who works on a daily newspaper and who is busy at night. We shall be married some day, I suppose. He does, not suspect me to be 'fast,' and you don't suppose I am going to take the trouble to undeceive him. This is not a frequent practice of mine; I only come out when I want money, and I always have an appointment before I come out. I always dress well of course, and can pick up a gentleman anywhere when I like. Yes, I know I have good feet, and I know how to use them. I have hooked many a fifty dol