probation officers. As far as we have observed, there is not a doubtful note in any of them, although everybody intimately acquainted with social work knows that its discouragements are many and often distressing, and that only those with stout hearts, fired by an ideal, together with strong minds, determined by conviction can stay long in the field. The enthusiasm, too, is of the intelligent sort that rests upon knowledge of the elements of life and their right and wrong interaction, upon the wonderful opportunities afforded by a position of authority to virtually create environment and lead humanity on to goals of decency and goodness. The old way offered no such openings for great work. The branding act was the only act thought to be in place when the child who had done wrong, however slight, as long as it violated a law, was before the bar of justice. That it was thought, was the cure. Thankful we should be that this blighting method has been relegated to the realm of antiquities. Several important conclusions one may get from the facts and figures given in the reports. The number of children of foreign parentage that have been before the Juvenile Courts is notable. What an indictment of our lack of social facilities for preventing the early downfall of the young foreign guests whom America invites to its shores. Then the age of so many offenders indicates that there is an especially perilous time in youthful life when energy and excitement need direction into proper channels. Adult delinquency as a too frequent cause of the evil in the children and the need for legal means to deal with it are mentioned. Other data pointed out for the successful prosecution of the work are: a sufficiently lengthy term of probation, so that the officers may have enough time in which to effect some real improvements either in home conditions or in personal habits; and co-operation between the charities and the probation officers to prevent clashing of methods with consequent loss of results. A VISIT TO THE ST. CHARLES BOYS' HOME BY CHARLES RICHMOND HENDERSON. Of the University of Chicago. A swift journey on the North-Western Road, a drive of a few miles across the country in keen winter air, brings us into the group of buildings called the St. Charles Home. From the elevation on which the substantial brick cottages are erected one looks across the fertile valley with towns on the horizon. The temptation to "flip" a ride on the railroad is reduced to a minimum, while a spur track brings freight cars with supplies of food and fuel straight into the grounds. The 1,000 acres of selected land were bought at a reasonable price and when the State has no more delinquent boys this property will still be a valuable asset. It will not run away. The cottages, hall and farm buildings are examined in de tail, and the school rooms inspected with the eye of a teacher. The houses are new and barely ready for occupancy. The red tile roofs will seldom need repairs, for they have no valleys to hold snow and produce floods. The pressed brick wall will not demand expensive periodical painting. The floors are of hard wood and clean as a Holland housewife would ask. The stairs are of iron and forbid flames to creep from story to story. The construction is slow burning, practically fireproof, since heat comes by steam pipes from a central plant. All is simple, economical, solid, worthy of a Commonwealth which has begun seriously to act the part of a parent toward its wayward young citizens. And these lads are hopeful subjects. They respond to their drill master, move in ranks, heads erect, lungs expanded, their very pose promising a resolute and honest manhood. Health is the basis of mortality, and these mischievous lads soon PROF. CHARLES R. HENDERSON, LL.D. grow fat, without becoming saucy; and with physical exercise directed to useful ends they lay on muscle and build up brains. Experience in similar institutions awakens the reasonable hope that 90 per cent of them will form habits of industry and be come wealth producers for the State which invests in their manhood. The St. Charles Home is a farm, and a farm is really a universal school. Far from the madding crowd of cities with their unclean air and foul dens, these youngsters are busy all day and interested in their many-sided existence. One slipcame to the school brim full of ignorance and a purpose to make trouble. He could not read and made a row to keep awake. He was permitted to care for a calf, and the helpless creature won his heart, awakened his intellect, gave him a motive, and within a few weeks he was in the second reader, and on his way to the university. Think what Spring will be in this charming glorious rural retreat! It makes one feel like doing something to induce the jolly Judge of the Juvenile Court to sentence him to Paradise. The little forest will be "in verdure clad." Wild flowers will deck every nook with rare loveliness of color. Chickens bursting their shells will awaken the knightly sense of responsibility and the merchant's sense of ownership in boys whose poverty never suggested such hopes. A hundred different trades are necessary on a big farm and there will be men to teach them. Inventive genius will be discovered and directed. The law governing the school is flexible and liberal, but it rightly makes it mandatory with the Board to place boys in suitable homes as soon as they are fit for them and can find them with help. It is to be no costly snug harbor for life pensioners, but only a training school for family life and useful industry. Equipped with skill and habits of work the graduates will be able to earn their own living. The school is a prophecy of a noble policy of the State. Hitherto the law has waited in cruel neglect during the years when children have been spoiled, and then when the fictitious day of maturity has come that law has stretched forth its powerful hand to arrest and punish the offender who was permitted to grow up in vicious habits without care. Happily a wiser theory has been accepted, and the paternal hand now guides the ignorant and wayward child into right conduct and honorable paths. A visit to St. Charles Home is an inspiration and a hope. New problems will arise. Only a beginning has been made. There will be room for friendly criticism and suggestion, but a brave start is made and good men are at the helm. DEPENDENT CHILDREN. The society during the past six months, ending March 1st, 1905, filed in the Juvenile Court 80 per cent. of all the dependent petitions. The importance of this work will be at once appreciated when it is stated that there are 30 different societies and institutions represented in the Juvenile Court. In addition to the foregoing the society is recognized by the Juvenile Court and Child saving Societies of this city as one of the most influential and powerful societies connected with the work. JUVENILE COURT STATISTICS. No. of dependent petitions filed in Juvenile Court, Chicago, Per cent. filed by V. and A. officers. No. of societies represented in Juvenile Court. LABOR BUREAU. 820 650 170 80 30 The Labor Bureau of the Parochial Schools located in the State Factory Inspector's office was continued under the direct supervision of the Society and has accomplished valuable work during the past six months; an average of 250 Child Labor Certificates were issued monthly; many complicated questions arise daily which are referred to the President of the Society for adjustment. The School Principals and other parties interested commend the Bureau for its efficient work. PROBATION OFFICERS. The probation officers in the Juvenile Court heretofore maintained by the Society were continued; valuable services are rendered by these officers. Daily reports are made to the office of the Society. COOK COUNTY POOR HOUSE. The above institution was visited Tuesday, Friday and Sunday of each week by the Chaplain and members of the Society. As a result of the strict adherence to the plan of visitation which has been enforced by the Society for years, each inmate of the institution is visited weekly, letters are written for persons desiring the same and communication is maintained with relatives and friends of the inmates, a circulating library is maintained in the institution for their pleasure. Religious services are held on the days of visitation. An average of 1,400 persons were in the institution during the winter. SAMPLE CASES. Dfamily father, mother and three children, home a room in a shed 10 x 12 in which the family lived, two pigs, twenty chickens, two cats and a dog; furniture consists of a stove, one chair, a bed made of rags and straw in one corner. Petitions were filed by one of the officers of the Society; the Court paroled the children with instruction to secure a better living place. Sfamily father, mother and two pair of twins, the youngest pair age two weeks died as a result of the father subjecting the mother to frequent shower baths under the cold water faucet, an officer of our Society had the man arrested for extreme cruelty and heavily fined, the mother had to go to the hospital where she died as a result of his brutal treatment, dependent petitions were filed for the two remaining children, they were committed to St. Vincent's Infant Asylum. C- -family consists of three boys, one little girl, mother and father, the father practiced inhuman acts upon his three sons and ruined his little daughter, then abandoned the family marrying a young girl. Officers of the Visitation and Aid Society had this man arrested, indicted and he is now awaiting his trial in the County Jail. N- -father dead, mother a habitual drunkard, her home the resort of several young men, ages, 16, 17 and 18 years of age, it was proven she was immoral; petitions were filed in Court and the two little girls were taken from her care and given to the Illinois Children's Home and Aid Society for adoption. -father dead, mother in the House of Correction on a $40.00 fine, petitions filed by officer of the Visitation and Aid Society, two children placed in institutions. H JOHN CUDAHY, MICHAEL CUDAHY, VISITATION AND AID SOCIETY. THE BOYS IN COOK COUNTY JAIL The work of the Juvenile Court shows in the reduced number of boys in the jail. For three years before the Juvenile Court was established the average number of boys was 568; the average since is 373 for the five years that have elasped. Total number of boys in the jail for 3 years before Law, 1725 Total number of boys in the jail for 5 years since Law, 1866 Boys in jail Had been in Boys under 16. 16 to 19 yrs. Juv. Court. Mr. Whitman says: "Believing as I do that the work of the Juvenile Court has achieved such splendid results, I would like to see the age limit raised to take in boys of 18 years, in the discretion of the Court. I see many coming here who would be susceptible to the treatment accorded boys in that Court. A large per cent would yield to those methods while they would only be hardened by those of the Criminal Court. The old ways proved so disastrous to best interests of the young that I wish to see the better method now employed used as widely and including as great a number as possible of those who have made themselves amenable to the law. MILWAUKEE JUVENILE COURT Amendments to the Juvenile court law providing for an adult delinquency clause and for the systematizing of the proba、 tion work of the court by the appointment of a head probation officer who shall be salaried have been forwarded to Madison by the Children's Betterment league and the probation officers of the Juvenile court in the hope that the legislature will pass these amendments and put the Juvenile Court law on the same working basis as the law in Colorado. Mrs. Howard F. Van Wyck and other members of the committee having the work in charge will visit Madison personally in the interests of the desired legislation. The effort to secure the adult delinquency act is the direct result of the recent visit to Milwaukee of Judge Ben B. Lindsey of the Denver Juvenile court, and of a growing sentiment among the probation officers and the superintendents of institutions to which dependent and delinquent children are committed that the real purpose of the law for the protection of children will be defeated until there is some way of reaching the parents or guardians who are responsible for the neglect of the children. PARENTS COMPLAIN OF OWN CHILDREN. The records of the past year show several instances where parents have made the complaints against their own children and where they have shown an evident desire to be relieved of the care of the children by having them placed in some institution. The proposed amendment is practically the Colorado law, which provides that in any case of a dependent or neglected child the parent or parents or other persons responsible for or by any act causing, encouraging, or contributing to such dependency or neglect shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and, upon trial and conviction thereof, shall be fined in a sum not to exceed $1,000 or imprisonment in the county jail for a period not to exceed one year, or by both such fine and imprisonment, and further gives the juvenile courts jurisdiction of all cases coming within the provisions of the act. The law further provides that the court may suspend this sentence if, in case a child is committed to some institution, the parent furnishes a bond to pay VISITING CHILDREN for its support or if the parent retains custody of the child on condition of the removal of the cause of delinquency or neglect. In effect the parent or guaridan is placed on probation, rather than the child, and the sentence may be executed at any violation of the conditions imposed. POWER TO SUSPEND IS EFFECTIVE. This power to suspend sentence is said to be most effective. In some instances the parents are made to serve three or four days before the suspension on the condition of good behavior is granted, and Judge Lindsey testifies that where this method of procedure is followed only in two cases out of 100 has complaint been made the second time. While many cases have come into the Milwaukee Juvenile court in which both Judge Neelen and probation officers have been satisfied that the parents and not the children were to blame, the present law does not allow the imposing of any fine in the Juvenile court and the threat to take away the children has been the only way of reaching the parents. It has not always proved effective. Supt. A. C. Kringel of the Home for Dependent Children, to which a large number of the Juvenile court cases are com mitted, is one of those who have been most active in urging the necessity for dealing with the parents and making them responsible for the care and good behavior of their children. He declares that as a result of his experience with the children he has found that the majority of them respond quickly to kind treatment and wise direction. and that some of those who have been sent to him as incorrigible have proved to be as good children as any one could desire after a few weeks of training. PROBATION OFFICER IS IMPORTANT. The appointment of a salaried probation officer, who shall devote all his or her time to the work and have charge of the volunteers, is believed to be important, and it is urged that such systematizing of the probation officers will result in reaching cases before they are brought into court and is a more intelligent treatment of individual cases. It is also believed important that the law should provide for the keeping of the records of the court.-Sentinel. worker who has much of hardship and By Mrs. Eva L. Evans, Dist. Supt. of the Illinois Children's Home and Aid Society We who see both sides of the picture-the then and the now-often see a sharp contrast. Go with me into this home. Hear the soft tones of the foster-mother as she calls the daughter and introduces the superintendent as "the dear lady who made mamma so happy by bringing you to me!" Sixteen and a half years ago that happy event occurred. For fourteen years other superintendents had visited in that home and this was the first glimpse the dear young girl had remembered of the woman who had held the year old babe in tender remembrance during all the years that had intervened. "She has never given me an hour of anxiety" was the foster-mother's testimony. "The sweetest, brighest girl in the community" the almost universal expression of the neighbors. Well could the "dear lady" believe both mother and friends. The reader can only faintly imagine the satisfaction that such results bring to the Calling in another home where a sev- you may have done some good work; was placed with a family bereaved by the death of their only son. This baby was taken with the hope that he might help the mother not to forget, but to bear her loss with greater fortitude. Today the boy is "older brother" to two boys of twelve and fifteen, and a sister of ten years and the foster-parents say that they love him as they love their own. He has been a noble son, and we do not wonder that he commands their affection. "Well, in spite of the fact that Edith has been such a troublesome comfort we have never for one moment regretintendent replied: "You are mistaken! ted taking her." Quickly the Super know it." E- had been a frail, delicate child, and for years a great care You do not mean that she has been a troublesome comfort but a comfortsome trouble do you not?" LaughingI another instance the foster-par-Yes, that is what I meant only I didn't ly the foster-mother assented, saying, ents were found in a disturbed state in regard to the health of the daughter who had been with them nearly eighteen years. All that love and money could do had been expended on the education of the daughter, and the ambitious student had worked beyond her strength. It is to be hoped that a year's rest will effect a cure, and that this promising young life may be spared. Eighteen years ago a little boy babe and anxiety. She is now eighteen, and has acquired robust health besides an education. Her proficiency in music. is quite unusual, and every advantage for the cultivation of her talent will be afforded this dear girl whom everybody loves. Jessie, now nearly twenty-five, is mistress of a home of her own only a few miles away from the home of her foster-parents who go frequently to see the daughter who for years was the object of their care and affection. No one would imagine to hear them talk of her that she was not truly their own child. In one instance we found a boy who had been wronged by the family with which he had been placed. As long as they lived on the farm and had work for the boy to do they treated him well, but when they built a beautiful house in town and took possession of it the boy was not considered a needed piece of furniture in this new home, and was turned out to shift for himself. The society stood ready to care for him, but he was of sturdy frame of mind and without complaining went to "rustling" for himself. Today word came that he had received an appointment as telegraph operator and station agent at more than the average salary paid to a nineteen year old boy. Attention to business, good habits, steadfastness of purpose have gained him many friends who rejoice in his promotion. Visiting a little four-year-old girl who had been in the home nearly two years the child who is possessed of a very sweet and sunny disposition was described by an aunt as being "as sweet as Heaven." At first the description seemed out of place, but upon learning of the lovely traits and affectionate ways of the child and watching her flit through the rooms like a beam of sunshine, a veritable little bundle of happiness and good-will toward others we remembered "of such is the Kingdom of Heaven" was spoken of the children PLACED IN A HOME. by Him who loved to take them in His arms and bless them. In the light of past experience we have no hesitancy in recommending others to try the experiment of taking It is in one of these homeless ones. not a matter of sentiment but of fact that a home is not complete without the child therein as the center of thought. Too many homes lack this chief attraction, and to such we would call attention to the ninety or more children we have for placement. We have many vigorous, active, wide-awake boys between the ages of six and twelve years LOVED BY ALL. who must some of these days help direct the affairs we are now looking after with such interest. What better task could be found than to train some homeless boy into good citizenship by actual daily example and contact? No puerile undertaking to be sure, but one worthy of the best mettle of Christian manhood and womanhood; one which faithfully undertaken and carried out will bring at the close of the day when the sheaves are gathered in the "Well done" of the Master. If you hear His call will you not take one of these the "least" of His to train for Him? They need you, and you in no less measure need them in your homes to bring out the latent affection of your natures. "Whosoever receiveth one of these little ones in My name receiveth Me." A professor at Bonn university, Germany, in tracing the posterity of habitual drunkards has found 834 descendants from a woman who for forty years was "a thief, a drunkard and a tramp" and whose miserable life came to an end in the last year of the eighteenth century. The professor has traced the lives of 709 of this woman's descendants from youth to old age and of these 142 were beggars and sixty-four more lived on charity. Among the women 181 lived disreputable lives and there were in the family seventy-six convicts, including seven murderers. The professor estimated that in seventy-five years this family has cost the German authorities in almhouses, law courts, prisons and other institutions about $1,250,000. The Governor's Wife "Two men in Buffalo," says ex-LieutenantGovernor Woodruff, "recently had a heated argument over the question whether the wife of a Governor of a State had an official title. One man contended that she should be addressed as 'Mrs. Governor So-and-So.' while the other man stoutly insisted that she was simply 'Mrs. Blank, wife of Governor Blank.' Finally they agreed to submit the question to the first man they should meet. He proved to be an Irishman. The case was put before him, and he was asked for a decision. ""Nayther of yez is right,' said the Irishman, after a moment's reflection. The wife of a governor is a governess.'"-Collier's Magazine. Australia is a continent without an orphanage. Each waif is taken to a receiving house, where it is cared for till a country home is found. The local volunteer societies canvass their neighborhoods and send to the children's committee the names of any families they have found where children may be placed. The children's committee selects the home which it judges is best adapted to the development of the child in question. No child is placed in a family so poor that the child might suffer. The foster parent receives a sum averaging $1.25 per week for the care of the child and for proper clothing. When of school age the child must be sent to school. The local volunteer committee looks after its care and culture, and zealous neighbors often assist in watching the growth and education of these happy children. When the child is 14 years old he begins to work. His earnings are placed in the postal savings bank and at the age of 17 or 18 he goes out into the world independent. Thus the state at an expense of about $60 a year has raised a man or woman to contribute to its wealth and prevented the manufacture of a criminal and the expense of courts, prisons and reformatories. |