their energies; they are absolutely throwing away both time and money, which might be much better employed. In putrid fevers, there is a tendency to mortification, which, generally, first attacks the extremities, sometimes the fingers, but more frequently the toes. In these cases, when a medical practitioner is called in, he begins by getting quit of the mortified parts; if the subject will bear it, he cuts them off, and then applies strong internal remedies to save the vital parts from corruption. What would be thought of a medical man, who, instead of following this practice, wasted his time and his talents in making local applications to the mortified toes, to endeavour to restore them to their former sound state, while he completely neglected the vital parts, which might otherwise have been saved?

I hope and trust, that I am neither hard-hearted nor narrowminded; but I cannot help declaring, that I look upon those objects of the Society's labours, as mortified members of the body-moral of this country, which ought to be cut off, in order to preserve the yet sound parts from corruption; and the more that I am convinced of this, the greater is my wish, my anxiety, my eagerness, to accomplish that object. If such be the effects of seduction and prostitution,-if every female, who falls a victim to these, bę irretrievably lost to society, then is every inhabitant of the country without discrimination, whether he be a Christian philanthropist, or an infidel misanthrope, imperiously called upon to do his utmost to stem the destructive torrent, by preventing its being augmented by fresh victims, not by unavailing and fruitless efforts to drag those out of it, who have been completely overwhelmed in its deleterious

stream.

If the Society, therefore, wish to do their country a real service, if they have any desire to immortalize their names, to raise their fame even above that of the successful advocates for the abolition of the slave-trade, let them probe to the bottom this dreadful distemper, let them find out the real cause, and let them exert themselves to have a remedy, or remedies, applied to it. Then, instead of merely receiving into their asylums a few hundred of worn-out victims, they may be the means of saving thousands of their fair country-women from a state of slavery and misery,worse, much worse, than that of the African in the West Indies.

To facilitate their researches is the intention of my addressing you. For this purpose, I shall state what appears to me to be the great cause of this evil, and what the only effectual remedies that can be applied to it.

The great cause of this dreadful evil may be given in a very few words. It is the perfect impunity with which Seduction is allowed to be practised in this country.

It is certainly very surprising-nay, it is almost incredible, that, in Great Britain, a country which is not only held up as a pattern for the excellence and perfection of its laws, but extolled for its religious and moral character, there should be no punishment attached to the crime of Seduction. The penal statutes now fill a great many volumes, and in every session of Parliament additions are made to them, so that there is scarce a crime that can be thought of, for which a punishment is not provided; and yet, astonishing to relate, there exists no statute against, or punishment for Seduction.

Only two excuses suggest themselves for this neglect, either that the crime is unknown in this country; or that it is but a venial one, from which no very bad consequences can possibly ensue. Neither of these are, however, available. So far from its being unknown in this country, I do not hesitate to aver, that seduction of unmarried females is more practised, and openly practised, in Great Britain, than in any other civilized state in the world; and it is not confined to the wealthy, the great, and the fashionable;-to those who can afford to squander large sums in such pursuits, and to pay procuresses extravagantly; it has spread through every rank of society, and, more especially among the lower orders in London, the progress it has made, is dreadful beyond conception. Fashionable Beaux used to boast of their knowledge of intrigue, and of their success; but many a journeyman and apprentice could now be produced who excel them far in both. The early age at which those practices are commenced is shocking and disgusting;-a great deal was said in the papers lately, about a boy of eighteen having carried off a girl of fifteen, and having been traced to a house where they had been living together for some days; I have reason to believe, that such things happen much more frequently than the public, or at least the members of your Society, seem to be at all aware.

It is this licentiousness among the lower orders which principally contributes to fill the streets with nightly wanderers, and which has so very much destroyed the class of servant girls in

London.

But seduction is not confined to the higher and lower classes of the community; it is unhappily making rapid progress in the middling class, in that class, for which Britain has been so long celebrated, that class which can only be found in a free country,

that class which has so long successfully opposed corruption in politics and corruption in morals, and which, alas, is now fast falling a sacrifice to both. As a proof of what I am asserting, I beg leave to recal to your recollection an incident, which will serve to shew how far seduction is now carried, and in what light

it is viewed. It was a case recorded in the papers of August 1815, of a young man, who attempted to carry off the daughter of a respectable merchant in the city; and, when opposed by her two sisters, persisted in his design; and at last drew a cane-tuck upon the crowd collected round. When he was carried before a magistrate, so far from being ashamed, he boldly avowed his intention, and apparently gloried in it. After lying a night in the Poultry Compter, he told the magistrate, with a sneer, that he was the son of a friend of his, and was much obliged to him for the lodgings he had provided for him. Had he met his deserts, he should have had those lodgings for life; and yet, for this outrage upon all decency and morality, he was not, by the laws of this land, liable to any punishment.

It is this prevalence of seduction that is the real cause of respectable females being now so little employed in shops or warehouses in London, and not the reason reported to have been quoted by a reverend gentleman, at the meeting, a reason which reflected no credit on the person from whom he had it, nor on him for repeating it. Had he made the inquiry of proper persons, he would have been told that no prudent or respectable parents, if they can possibly help it, will ever put their child to a public business in London; because, in such situations, it is now scarcely possible for her to escape pollution. A milliner's, dress-maker's, or habetdasher's apprentice is reckoned fair game by every high or low, young or old puppy in London, and she is beset and attacked on all hands. I rather wonder that some of the tales, that were told in the report, did not open the reverend gentleman's eyes on this head; they certainly do corroborate, véry strongly, what I am now asserting. Many respectable tradesmen decline taking female apprentices on this very account; and if legal protection is not speedily extended to them, there will very soon be no respectable female found in such situations. It must be evident, therefore, that the seduction of unmarried females is too well known, and too much practised in this country.

Neither is it a venial crime; on the contrary, it is next to murder of the greatest turpitude, and of the most disastrous consequences to society. Nay, it is frequently a prelude to murder, and to murder of the deepest dye. How many instances have, of late, occurred of men murdering the victims of their seduction, and how many, indeed more frequent instances occur of these victims becoming self-murderers! Even when such, dreadful effects do not immediately take place, what are the invariable consequences attending this crime? The unhappy victims of lawless passion are precipitated from a state of respectability, comfort, and happiness, at once, into the lowest pit of human misery. To

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day sees a young female starting up into womanhood, amiable, gentle, and affectionate, listening to, and obeying her mother's advice and her father's precepts, the pride of the one and the delight of the other. The breath of pollution infects her, and to-morrow sees her driven from her paternal mansion to wander -the streets, without a habitation or a name, and to associate with wretches already sunk in the lowest depravity. Forced by hunger and nakedness to follow their practices, if madness do not instigate to immediate suicide, shame and disgrace prey upon her mind, and, aided by the effect of cold, drunkenness, and disease, soon put an “ end to her miseries, and she sinks unknown and neglected into a 'premature grave. Well may unhappy woman exclaim :—

Who steals my purse, steals trash;

'Tis something, nothing;

'Twas mine, 'tis his, and may be slave to thousands:
But he that robs me of my virtue,

Takes that which not enriches him,

And makes me poor indeed.

And this is the crime,-I beg pardon, sin, I should say,—which is not to be found in the list of crimes in the boasted penal statutes of this most religious and most moral country. Blush, oh, ye legislators, and hide your heads, oh, ye statesmen! You have been called a nation of shopkeepers; and sorry, indeed, am I to have to say, that your penal statutes corroborate this assertion in the strongest manner. The preservation of property is by them so completely fenced, that it is almost impossible to devise a mode of robbing, stealing, plundering, cheating, swindling, breaking or betraying trust, or wrong appropriating another's property in any manner or way, for the remedy of which a statute is not provided, with an adequate punishment. And yet woman, weak woman, is left to be robbed of the most precious jewel she possesses, without any restraint or possibility of redress whatever. If a man obtain money from me, under false pretences, he is liable to punishment; but he may with the most perfect impunity employ the most false and deceitful pretences to rob fond, believing, unsuspecting, confiding woman of her virtue.

Nay, such few statutes as glance at this subject, smell strongly of the "love of lucre," and are actually an insult to the sex. A woman who is entitled to property, either immediately or at her parents' death, is deemed by the law of this land not to be capable of taking proper care of it, until she is twenty-one years of age, but of her virtue she is left completely mistress after twelve; a man, therefore, is prevented getting possession, in a lawful way, of her and her property until she is twenty-one, but of the other

he may rob her whenever he can, perfectly unchecked. If a father seeks redress, by these boasted laws, for being robbed of his daughter, he must do it under the low and disgusting plea of being deprived of her services; he must prove that, in return for the expense he had been at in her education and maintenance, she had served him in the capacity of a cook, a chamber or a nursery maid,-degrading idea! for being robbed of an amiable and accomplished being, just starting into an agreeable and entertaining companion in health, a tender and affectionate nurse in sickness, or to be the future mother of children, among whom he might have looked forward to spend his latter days in domestic comfort and happiness, he can receive no redress; but must sit down quietly to mourn over his loss, aggravated by the hopes of the future being blasted 'for ever.'

Oh, my gentle, but ill-fated young country-women, my heart bleeds, and tears obliterate my words, when I reflect upon your lot; when I think how much you have been neglected, and how hardly many of you are treated in this highly-favoured land. While man, selfish man, has fenced round his pelf, his dirty pelf, with triple guards, your fair, but fragile forms have been left defenceless to the pelting of the pitiless storm, to be scorched and withered by the sirocco of seduction, and swept away in the whirlwind of pollution.

It may be inquired, what remedy does the society of this country provide for this dreadful omission in the penal statutes. It will naturally be conceived that its doors will be kept shut against the perpetrator of such an outrage, and that the unfortunate victim will experience all commiseration and every possible alleviation of her hard fate. Here, again, nothing but disappointment meets us. By the conformation of society in this most moral country, while the seducer is received, without scruple, into every company, the unhappy victim is driven, with unrelenting severity, entirely out of the pale; she is hunted like a wild beast until she is completely inclosed in the toils of misery, wretchedness, and death. On this head, what are called the laws of society are so severe, that, out of respect to them, many a deeply-wounded, but tenderhearted parent, is forced to shut the door against a repentant child, who would otherwise have been received into their bosom.

I cannot help here expressing, not merely my surprise, but my utter astonishment, at the manner in which this subject has been

Another instance of this pelfish disposition of the laws may be here mentioned. If a parent met with that heart-rending calamity, the having a child stolen, and discovered the depredator, until very lately the party was not punishable for that crime, but had to be tried for stealing the clothes that were on the child, which might not be worth five shillings.