large towns are just as bad, as far
as sexual morality goes, as the cities of the old world. The higher
economic position of women does not seem to touch the evil either in
the Antipodes or beyond the Atlantic. It exists among communities
where destitution is an almost unmeaning word; it exists in lands
where no woman need be idle, and where she is highly paid for her
services. In the face of such facts it is impossible to believe that
destitution is the only motive which impels a certain class of women
to wander the streets.

What is true with respect to destitution is that it compels women to
remain in the deplorable life they have adopted, but it seldom or
never drives them to take to it. Almost all the best authorities are
agreed upon this point. No one has examined this social sin in all its
bearings with such patience and exhaustiveness as Parent Duchatelet,
and his deliberate opinion, after years of investigation, is that its
origin lies in the character of the individual, in vanity, in
slothfulness, in sex. It does not, however, follow that a person
possessing these characteristics in an abnormal degree is bound to
fall. If such a person is protected by parental care, no evil results
need necessarily ensue. It is when low instincts are combined with a
bad home that the worst is to be feared. This fact was clearly and
emphatically brought to light by the parliamentary inquiry which took
place in France a few years ago. M. Th. Roussel, one of the highest
authorities on the committee, the man, in fact, from whom the inquiry
derived its name, thus sums up some of its results: "However large a
part in the production of prostitution must be allowed to the love of
pleasure and of finery, to a dislike of work and to debased instincts,
the cause which, according to the facts cited, appears everywhere as
the most powerful and the most general, is the want of a home, the
want of maternal care." Here are some of the facts on which M. Roussel
bases his general statement. "At Bordeaux, out of 600 'filles
inscrites' 98 were minors. Of the latter, 44 appear to have fallen
through their own fault alone. The remaining 54 grew up under
abnormal, domestic conditions; 14 were orphans, without father or
mother, 7 had only one parent, 32 had been abandoned or perverted by
their parents."

In England it would be impossible to conduct a parliamentary inquiry
on the lines of the "Enquete Roussel," but it is very probable if such
an in