standpoint, indeed, the change is a disadvantage, for it shelters the prostitute from observation, and involves an entirely new readjustment to new conditions.
It cannot be said that either the State of New York or the city of Chicago has been in any degree more fortunate in its attempts at moral legislation against prostitution than against drinking. As we should expect, the laws of New York regard prostitution and the prostitute with an eye of extreme severity. Every prostitute in New York, by virtue of the mere fact that she is a prostitute, is technically termed a "vagrant." As such she is liable to be committed to the workhouse for a term not exceeding six months; the owner of houses where she lives may be heavily fined, as she herself may be for living in them, and the keeper of a disorderly house may be imprisoned and the disorderly house suppressed. It is not clear that the large number of prostitutes in New York have been diminished by so much as a single unit, but from time to time attempts are made in some district or another by an unusually energetic official to put the laws into execution, and it is then possible to study the results. When disorderly houses are suppressed on a large scale, there are naturally a great number of prostitutes who have to find homes elsewhere in order to carry on their business. On one occasion, under the auspices of District-Attorney Jerome, it is stated by the Committee of Fourteen that eight hundred women were reported to be turned out into the street in a single night. For many there are the Raines Law hotels. A great many others take refuge in tenement houses. Such houses in congested districts are crowded with families, and with these the prostitute is necessarily brought into close contact. Consequently the seeds of physical and mental disorder which she may bear about her are disseminated in a much more fruitful soil than they were before. Moreover, she is compelled by the laws to exert very great energy in the pursuit of her profession. As it is an offence to harbour her she has to pay twice as high a rent as other people would have to pay for the same rooms. She may have