At one of my mass meetings of working women in the North I was told at
its close that a woman wished to speak with me in private. As soon as I
could disengage myself from the crowd of mothers who were always eager
to shake hands with me, and to bless me with tears in their eyes for
taking up their cause, I went down the room, and there, in a
dimly-lighted corner of the great hall, I found a respectable-looking
woman waiting for me. I sat down by her side, and she poured out the
pent-up sorrow of her heart before telling me the one great favor she
craved at my hands. She had an only daughter, who at the age of sixteen
she had placed out in service, at a carefully-chosen situation. We all
know what a difficult age in a girl's life is sixteen; but our girls we
can keep under our own watchful care, and their little wilfulnesses and
naughtinesses are got over within the four walls of a loving home, and
are only the thorns that precede the perfect rose of womanhood. But the
poor have to send their girls out into the great wicked world at this
age to be bread-winners, often far away from a mother's protecting care.
The girl, however, in this case was a good, steady girl, and for a time
did well. Then something unsettled her, and she left her first place,
and got another situation. For a time it seemed all right, when suddenly
her letters ceased. The mother wrote again and again, but got no answer.
She wrote to her former place; they knew nothing of her. At last she
saved up a little money and went to the town where she believed her girl
to be. She sought out and found her last address. The family had gone
away, and left no address. She made inquiries of the neighbors, of the
police. Yes, they remembered the girl--a nice-looking girl with a bright
color; but no one had seen her lately. It was as if a trap-door had
opened and let her through. She had simply disappeared. In all that
crowded city her mother could find no trace of her. "It is now thirteen
years, ma'am, since I lost her."