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