children who were lost in New Jersey.]

Their money is unfortunately apt to slip away, especially for gambling
and petty lotteries, called "policy-tickets." A tradition in the remote
past of some boy who drew a hundred dollars in these lotteries still
pervades the whole body, and they annually sink a considerable portion
of their hard-earned pennies in "policy-tickets."

The choice of these lads of a night's resting-place is sometimes almost
as remarkable as was Gavroche's in "Les Miserables." Two little newsboys
slept one winter in the iron tube of the bridge at Harlem; two others
made their bed in a burned-out safe in Wall Street. Sometimes they
ensconced themselves in the cabin of a ferry-boat, and thus spent the
night. Old boilers, barges, steps, and, above all, steam-gratings, were
their favorite beds.

In those days the writer would frequently see ten or a dozen of them,
piled together to keep one another warm, under the stairs of the
printing-offices.

In planning the alleviation of these evils, it was necessary to keep in
view one object, not to weaken the best quality of this class--their
sturdy independence--and, at the same time, their prejudices and habits
were not too suddenly to be assailed. They had a peculiar dread of
Sunday Schools and religious exhortations--I think partly because of the
general creed of their older associates, but more for fear that these
exercises were a "pious dodge" for trapping them into the House of
Refuge or some place of detention.

The first thing to be aimed at in the plan was, to treat the lads as
independent little dealers, and give them nothing without payment, but
at the same time to offer them much more for their money than they could
get anywhere else. Moral, educational, and religious influences were to
come in afterward. Securing them through their interests, we had a
permanent hold of them.

Efforts were made by the writer among our influential citizens and in
various churches, public meetings were held, articles written, the press
interested, and at length sufficient money was pledged to make the
experiment. The board of the new Society gave its approval, and a loft
was secured in the old "Sun Buildings," and fitted up as a lodging-room,
and in March, 1854, the first Lodging-house for street-boys or newsboys
in this country was opened.

An excellent superintendent was found in the person of a carpenter, Mr.
C. C. Tracy, who showed remarkable ingenuity and t