xcited crowd following with shouts and
merry huzzas.

Mr. Dinneford was standing in a maze, shocked and distressed by this
little episode, when a man at his side said in a grave, quiet voice,

"I doubt if you could see a sight just like that anywhere else in all
Christendom." Then added, as he extended his hand,

"I am glad to see you here, Mr. Dinneford."

"Oh, Mr. Paulding!" and Mr. Dinneford put out his hand and grasped that
of the missionary with a nervous grip. "This is awful! I am sixty years
old, but anything so shocking my eyes have not before looked upon."

"We see things worse than this every day," said the missionary. "It is
only one of the angry boils on the surface, and tells of the corrupt
and vicious blood within. But I am right glad to find you here, Mr.
Dinneford. Unless you see these things with your own eyes, it is
impossible for you to comprehend the condition of affairs in this by-way
to hell."

"Hell, itself, better say," returned Mr. Dinneford. "It is hell pushing
itself into visible manifestation--hell establishing itself on the
earth, and organizing its forces for the destruction of human souls,
while the churches are too busy enlarging their phylacteries and making
broader and more attractive the hems of their garments to take note of
this fatal vantage-ground acquired by the enemy."

Mr. Dinneford stood and looked around him in a dazed sort of way.

"Is Grubb's court near this?" he asked, recollecting the errand upon
which he had come.

"Yes."

"A young lady called to see you yesterday afternoon to ask about a child
in that court?"

"Oh yes! You know the lady?"

"She is my daughter. One of the poor children in her sewing-class
told her of a neglected baby in Grubb's court, and so drew upon her
sympathies that she started to go there, but was warned by the child
that it would be dangerous for a young lady like her to be seen in that
den of thieves and harlots, and so she came to you. And now I am here in
her stead to get your report about the baby. I would not consent to her
visiting this place again."

Mr. Paulding took his visitor into the mission-house, near which they
were standing. After they were seated, he said,

"I have seen the baby about which your daughter wished me to make
inquiry. The woman who has the care of it is a vile creature, well known
in this region--drunken and vicious. She said at first that it was her
own baby, but afterward admitted that she didn't kn