eat literally upon the farthest shores. The
story of little Mary Ellen moved New York eighteen years ago as it had
scarce ever been stirred by news of disaster or distress before. In the
simple but eloquent language of the public record it is thus told: "In the
summer of 1874 a poor woman lay dying in the last stages of consumption in
a miserable little room on the top floor of a big tenement in this city. A
Methodist missionary, visiting among the poor, found her there and asked
what she could do to soothe her sufferings. 'My time is short,' said the
sick woman, 'but I cannot die in peace while the miserable little girl
whom they call Mary Ellen is being beaten day and night by her step-mother
next door to my room.' She told how the screams of the child were heard at
all hours. She was locked in the room, she understood. It had been so for
months, while she had been lying ill there. Prompted by the natural
instinct of humanity, the missionary sought the aid of the police, but she
was told that it was necessary to furnish evidence before an arrest could
be made. 'Unless you can prove that an offence has been committed we
cannot interfere, and all you know is hearsay.' She next went to several
benevolent societies in the city whose object it was to care for children,
and asked their interference in behalf of the child. The reply was: 'If
the child is legally brought to us, and is a proper subject, we will take
it; otherwise we cannot act in the matter.' In turn then she consulted
several excellent charitable citizens as to what she should do. They
replied: 'It is a dangerous thing to interfere between parent and child,
and you might get yourself into trouble if you did so, as parents are
proverbially the best guardians of their own children.' Finally, in
despair, with the piteous appeals of the dying woman ringing in her ears,
she said: 'I will make one more effort to save this child. There is one
man in this city who has never turned a deaf ear to the cry of the
helpless, and who has spent his life in just this work for the benefit of
unoffending animals. I will go to Henry Bergh.'

"She went, and the great friend of the dumb brute found a way. 'The child
is an animal,' he said, 'if there is no justice for it as a human being,
it shall at least have the rights of the stray cur in the street. It shall
not be abused.' And thus was written the first bill of rights for the
friendless waif the world over. The appearance of the