The Waif du lieu suivant : Topeka, Kansas • 1

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Devoted to the Interest of Unfortunate Boys in Prison and Wayward and Neglected Boys on the Outside. No. 8. pi Si i Vol. II.

TOPEKA, KANSAS, AUGUST, 1892. thing was to find my own way out of danger in the darkness and in the other direction. To be continued. Written for the Waif. WHISPERS OF A PINE TREE.

BY MARIE RAYNE. year old boy was brought to us and we arranged for a temparary place for him until we can send him to a permanent home in one of the several places now open in the western part of the State. We have, during the month, received several applications for boys, in response to a notice of the Home and its work published in a recent number of the Kansas Farmer, indicating the value of that paper as a medium of intercourse with the public. In fact the work of the society has been largely promoted by the hearty support accorded it by the press of the city. The hard work of the society will not begin until cold weather sets in, and the homeless boys find goods boxes and hajr lofts insufficient quarters.

HD- DONT WORRY. There are times and seasons in every life Not excepting a favored few, When not to worry over the strife Is the hardest thing to do. When all things seem so dark and drear We fear that they may darker be, Forgetting to trust and not to fear, Though we cannot the future see. Each life has its good to be thankful for, We must trust we may always find Some happiness surely, less or more, Some peace for troubled mind. Let us try the good in our minds to fit, Passing over the ills in a hurry, For when we really think of it, What good ever comes of worry? We must bear our trials cheerfully, Not burden our world with sorrow Because we are anxious, and fearfully Are looking for trouble to borrow.

Look into the future with hopeful heart, Keep a watch for the silver lining, And the cloud of trouble will surely part, If we trust instead of repining. Good Housekeeping. Continued from last issue. KANSAS CONVICT MINES. THE through the woods and laid the old plantation off into town lots.

I was left standing in the midst of the bustling, active little city. Finally an old gentleman bought the lot in which I have dwelt for nearly two hundred years and erected on the site of the old mansion a handsome dwelling. Fountains play once more in the sunlight as in the days of old. The owner of the stately home had one daughter, a tall, beautiful woman, with a sad face and wonderful golden hair. Her favorite spot was a rustic seat at my roots' and she would sit there for hours in the still summer evenings.

One night she seemed unusually sad, and her face bore traces of recent tears. She walked down the smooth white path that skirted the high hedge screening the yard from the street. The soft, mellow moonlight fel over her white dress and shining hair as she threw herself down on the ground burying her face in the pine needles, and sobbingly whispered: "Oh! Lenox, my darling husband; twelve years ago you went away, never to come back to me. The river has hidden your dear face for twelve long years. Why did nt you take me with you Come back to me, Lenox, my darling! As she sat up and raised her arms to the sky her loose sleeve slipped back disclosing a slender golden serpent with blue eyes glittering coldly in the moonlight, the counterpart of the one that for twelve years had been lying where her window now fronts, and where she nightly prays for strength to bear her burden.

has made his first false step. This practice is reversed under the present administration of the Kansas penitentiary. When a prisoner has served one term under the influences and schooling of the institution, goes out and commits a graver offense than the original one and is sent back to the prison the officers meet him in a very friendly and hale-fellow-well-met spirit. A third or fourth termer, as a rule, is received with a proportionately increased degree of cordiality, and an examination of the facts will show that a large proportion of thif class of prisoners enjoy a greater degree of favor and more desirable jobs during their incarceration than does the average sixteen or eighteen year old boy paying the penalty of his first offense. This is recognized and commented upon by the inmates generally, and the more ignorant among the class of men referred to, especially among the negroes, feel that they are being honored for evil As a matter of fact a considerable spirit of emulation is observable among them and manifested by their manner and conversation.

These conditions are the natural result of placing. such an institution under the control of ignorant and incompetent men on the presumable theory that like cures like. Take this boy and show him how to mine, said the officer in charge of the division to the writer, as we reached the mouth of the low entry leading to our room an hundred feet further in. This room entry, or tunnel, was cut just high enough so that a man could enter it by assuming a stooping position with his head on a level with the waistband of his pants and walk thus the entire length of the entry. As the surface or roof of this low passage was jagged with innumerable sharp edges and points of rocks, and was constantly settling unevenly so that there were many places where one needed to stoop even lower than already described, the result was that in passing in and out, in the great haste necessary, the nobs were soon scraped off ones back bone its entire length.

As I proceeded down this low passage as rapidly as possible that not a moment of time should be lost toward the accomplishment of the regular task of the day, frequent loud thumps could be heard as the boy's head came in contact with a projecting rock or a sharp exclamation of pain as a greater or less portion of skin was gouged off his back until we finally reached the still lower opening into the room or space along the thin seam of coal where all of our work must be done. Here the poor boy sat down to rub his giddy head and smarting back, while contemplating the greater terrors before him. The room, at the door of which we found ourselves, the rear wall of which was the natural vein of coal against which our efforts were to be directed, was not a particularly lofty or spacious affair, being from four to six feet wide, about twenty-six inches high, and fifty feet long. Bidding the boy to follow I crawled under the face among the slender wooden props, each about the size and length of stick of ordinary stove wood, which were set about four feet apart and were the only support for.Jthe thousands of tons of rock over this space in which we now lay, from which the coal had been taken the day before. Every few moments one of these props or the seam of coal would snap and crack from the great weight resting upon them and my young companion would utter exclamations of fright at the situation.

The first thing necessary for us to do that morning was to mine out under the coal to a depth of two feet the entire length of our room," or fifty feet. In doing this work the miner lays his shovel on the ground bottom side up and lies facing the coal with his shoulder resting on the slanting shovel blade, which acts as a fulcrum, raising his shoulder enough to enable him to swing his mining pick while thus lying down. Having allowed my young friend to watch the mode of proceedure for a quarter of an hour I crawled about fifteen feet further into the room and began in a new place allowing him to follow up the work I had just begun. We had been working thus about an hour when without warning there was a crash behind me, a gust of air that extinguished my light, and looking toward the point where the boy had been working I could see only a glimmer, showing that retreat was cut off in that direction by a cave in. I could, however, hear a terrible scrambling beyond the wreck, indicating that the boy had not been killed, or so badly hurt as to prevent him from making good time in getting to the entry.

The next in a conspiracy against the peace and discipline of the prison. The policy of the present deputy warden in whose hands is vested the discipline of the prison, recognizes but one method in the treatment of prisoners; and that is physical force. It is a recognized fact that the lenses of a man's mental and moral vision are formed from a crystalization of his own mental and moral propensities; hence the axiom that a man looks at the world through his own spectacles, and every other individual seefns to be a somewhat inferior reflex of himself. And thus it is that the person who has held the position of deputy warden of the Kansas penitentiary since the 12th day of May, 1885, is unable to conceive that other men may possess attributes superior to those of the lowest brute, or that they can be kept under restraint or become amendable to other influences than those of brute force. In a word, he assumes that every man is a species of ravening wolf for whom a steel cage is the only safe place; but if, from the exegencies of the case, or for the purposes of toil, the fruits of which are devoured by the other ravening wolves in sheeps clothing who have been placed over him, he be let out of his cage for a few hours each day, he should be overawed and kept in subjection by an array of more vicious brutes than himself who by constant snarling and biting shall keep him so harrassed and trodden under foot that he shall have no opportunity to indulge like propensities of his own.

This is the policy by which the Kansas penitentiary is now controlled and under which its inmates are being prepared for the exercise of the rights, privileges and opportunities of citizenship; and the official referred to has gathered around him so far as possible, a gang of creatures in accord with such ideas, five I believe, being his Wn brothers-in-law, who are thus living from the state treasury while brutalizing and degrading hundreds who are to eventually become citizens of the state. In the mine particularly, the deputy wardens thugs hold high carnival. Visitors from the outside world seldom have the courage to descend to these regions of hades; and when they do they can see or know but little of the abuses, as all of the conditions are so abnormal and unusual, consequently these underground bosses can carry things with as high a hand as their disposition may prompt, and no one to molest or make them afraid. The officer at the foot of the shaft having relieved himself of accumulated bile, and the boy having been assigned to the division in which the writer worked, the eighteen men comprising that division were ordered to fall in," there was a commotion of twinkling lights as the bent forms started down the entry to begin another day of toil, danger and unsatisfied hunger. When we had arrived at the section of the mine occupied by our division the lad was directed to go to work in the room" with the writer, which made three of us that were to work together; green dutchman, the lad, and myself The boy had worked in a grocery store, except when at school and had therefore never performed heavy toil.

There are of course, some features of the work not so heavy or dangerous as working under the face," where such a boy might have been employed and the most crush' ing toil left for the able-bodied men and the more vicious criminals. A natural sense of justice would dictate such course, but this inexperienced young lad who had in a moment of weakness been led to commit an act which barely brought him under the operations of an undiscriminating statute, was given pick and shovel and compelled to crawl through the narrow opening into this dark region of danger and death dealing hardships, while from fifty to an hundred able bodied negroes and white convicts of the most vicious disposition and crimi nal lives were occupying easy positions about the prison, as boot-lickers and suckers for the officials. In fact this feature was so general and conspicious as to be recognized by all of the prisoners, and it was a matter of com mon remark among the more intelligent and self-respecting that most of the offi cers found their level and natural fellow' ship among the most degraded men and grave offenders in the This strong characteristic manifested itself in another direction also, which was productive of much evil. It is a recog nized principal among all penologists that second offenders should receive less consideration and leniency under a puni tive system than is accorded to one who I stand on a corner lot in a busy Southern city. I began my existence in this spot two hundred years ago, and to-day I stand towering far above all about me, the last of my race left standing in a radius of many miles.

The birds have built their nests in my branches, and the savage wolf has slept at my feet The Indian has erected his wigwam beneath tny boughs, and treaties have been ratified in my shade between dusky tribes. I have stood proudly through the wintry storms of two hundred years, and withstood the fiery heat of as many summers. Then came civilization, and I saw the rise and glory of the Old South. A spacious Southern mansion stood near me overlooking broad fields of cotton and corn. Often when those wide halls were the scene of gaity young lovers came out and rested at my feet in the light of the golden Southern moon.

I have heard their hopes, fears, joy, and dispair; and I held out my arms above them whispering blessings upon their young lives. To them, it was only as the moonlight, the breeze, the flowers and the night song of the mocking bird, a part of their own joy and happiness. One night a couple came out from the music and dance and I listened to the old story I had heard so often. She would not bid him hope; she had been trifling with him, and thought, she said, that he meant no more, and with a sweet smile upon her beautiful face she left him and went within, leaving him alone. He sat with his head bowed for some time, and then raising his hand saw something glitter in the moonlight, then a sharp report and his lifes blood ebbed out into the pitying earth, and I wept over him, covering his white face with my tears.

In the long years that followed the maiden would come, and burying her face in the glistening pine needles grieve bitterly for the life she had broken. When the storm of war swept over the land I witnessed the passing of many brave men who never returned to their peaceful homes. The happy home over which I had watched and whispered blessings for many years gave up its two proud sons. One of them fell on a bloody battlefield; the other came back sick and wounded. He had gone away with a grieving heart, and life drags wearily to such as he.

He would lie in a hammock in the yard, looking off into the fathomless blue above, or far beyond the cloud portals of the west, into a world that is seen only by those who have gained the threshold and can move the veil aside; there he lay patiently waiting the summons from the Master, and when it came he smilingly yielded to the call surrounded by hosts of weaping friends, and was laid at rest beneath my roots. Then the raiders burned that proud home, but for thirty years I have sung a requiem over the young hero who went forth with a crushed heart to his duty. The wide acres in which I stood were deserted and were soon covered with a rank growth of bushes and weeds. One day there was a stir among the undergrowth, and a horseman rode slowly into tne bare space where had stood U.e mansion. He seemed to be waiting for some one, his face was stern and sad He took from his pocket a picture, upon which he gazed long and tenderly; a womans face smiled back at him, and covering his eyes with his hand he mur mured a prayer.

He raised his sleeve and upon his arm gleamed a slender coiled serpent with glittering sapphire eyes. Hearing a rustle in the bushes he hastily drew down his sleeve and resumed his calm, cold demeanor. Another horse man came from the opposite direction, He was of hard and selfish aspect, with less of noble dignity than his companion. After a few low spoken words they stepped a few paces apart, fired, and the younger and better man fell dead. The other made for him a grave, and after placing the sod above him so skillfully that its removal could scarcely be detected the slayer stood looking down at the new made grave of his fallen enemy, and said: All obstacles are removed from the path of my ambition.

Here lies the last. A few more steps and fame is mine. It is too bad that I had to make this opportunity by insulting him, but he was in my way." Nothing disturbed the solitude for years, until a surveying party came The Reformatories. The School Courier, The reformatories of our country do not confine their teachings exclusively to the moral, educational, physical and industrial training of their pupils, but extend their influences in every direction. The teaching of patriotism and of that higher and nobler form of politics which has in view the great good of our nation, or more particularly the teaching of the science of good government, is a phase of the work that is not omitted.

The several institutions of our country aim in every possible way to impress upon the minds of the pupils, by precept and otherwise, the duties which each boy or girl owes to the country in which he or she lives. Hence we find many elaborate programs arranged for such occasions as Washingtons and Lincolns birthdays, Memorial occasions, Independence day and Thanksgiving day. The programs of these occasions indicate the desire of the institutions to firmly impress upon the minds of the pupils the sublime teachings of loyalty to ones country and the highest order of political sentiment. The People Pay us a Visit. Prison Mirror.

By the invitation of the governor and the prison management about one hundred and sixty of the delegates to the Peoples Party convention visited this institution for the purpose of inspecting the States binding twine factory. Free transportation was furnished by the State. The party arrived from St. Paul about 10 A. and under the guidance of Managers Hall, Temple, Norrish and Dunn and Warden Wolfer, they went at once to the twine factory where they viewed the whole process of twine making, from the time the hemp fiber leaves the bales until it is finished twine, tagged, baled and ready tor shipment.

After the inspection of the twine plant the visitors were assembled in front of The Mirror tower where the Warden requested those wishing to return to St. Paul on the noon train to separate themselves from those desiring to remain until 3 p. m. This was done that an early dinner might be served to those intending to go back at noon, and that they might be given a more hurried view of the other parts of the prison. About half of the party stepped to one side and were taken through the prison and then to the dining rooms, where they partook of an excellent dinner.

The other party took their time and visited every nook and corner of the prison. The library, printing office and cellroom were the first places inspected. After wandering through the cellroom for some time, they went to the solitary. When they had seen all within that gruesome place they congregated about the ntrance where the Warden gave them a talk on the Bertillon system of identification. The various instruments were exhibited and their uses explained.

Leaving here they visited the photograph gallery, bath-house, and storeroom. After seeing all the departments, the visitors assembled on the lawn in the shade of the cell-building where they rested, chatted and read The Prison Mirror until about 1 130, when they were invited to the dining-room for dinner. After dinner the visitors passed out of the iron doors, and a number of them met the Managers and the Warden in wardens office, where they talked about twine. The visitors expressed their satisfaction with what they had seen, and tendered a vote of thanks to the management for the courtesies received. Nearly all the visitors carried away witik them sample balls twine.

Nearly all expressed their intention of patronizing the prison twine factory, and some proved their earnestness by leaving oiders for their season's supply. The visit will prove a good thing for the visitors and the States twine industry. Get on to that cage or Ill kick the stuffing out of you, surlily growls John Dodds, the top officer at the prison mine, speaking to a pale, frightened lad of sixteen, who had, the evening before, been compelled to don convict garb and begin a term of three years in the Kansas penitentiary on the charge of larceny. Looking into the lads fair, frank face, with tear dimmed eyes and trembling lips, one is loath to believe it the face of a tMef, or that the heart beating with shame Jc terror under the striped jacket ought covered by such a garb, which will ive its life-long brand of disgracfe upon unfortunate wearer. This idea is sen-Ijly vivified when the eye glances from trembling tear-faced lad to the sneer-'j (countenance of the blue coated offi-Igt just named, and we listen to the untiling gibber, brutal threats of punish-vnt, insulting allusions and sometimes i'ilihs that come from a heart infinitely re vicious than half of these men into ose lives he is allowed dayffiy day to Jject so much of the venom that is being Jjnerated in the space where his soul bight to be, if he possessed one of normal felvelopment.

WThus encouraged the young lad stepped 0 to the cage as it hung suspended by PI wire cable in the mouth of the seven ndred foot perpendicular shaft, and ck his place beside the writer in the jfydst of six others. Each one grasped liron rod in the top of the cage a few (hes above our heads, with one hand, id in the other held the miners lamp aith which each man is provided. These mps are in form and construction like miniature coffee pot, and hold half a gill of oil, the nozzle being filled with candle wicking, and when lighted gives I forth a smoky blaze a little more than equal to a common tallow candle, i The bell rings, the large drum from which the suspending cable unwinds, begins to revolve, and down we go toward the region supposed to be inhabited by an individual whom I used to look upon as being quite a bad mannered kind of a personage, but tor whom I have come to entertain a considerable degree 6f respect since nr acquaintance with some of the so-called human beings who control the Kansas convict mine and penitentiary, and to whom and their practices I shall take pleasure in introducing the readers of this paper as this narrative proceeds. Before the cage had descended an hundred feet all of the lights were extin gUished by the rush of air as we dropped through the darkness at the rate of ten feet per second. poor lad by my side became terror stricken, and releasing his hold on the cage clung to me in such a manner as to almost force me against the cross timbers lining the sides of the shaft, which would have ground me up like nutmeg on grater.

The penalty for one prisoner to speak to another while on the cage, is to be confined in one of the dungeons of the prison for a period of from one to five days, and the shaft has the properties of a speaking tube so that the top" or bottom" officer is almost sure to hear if anything is said. In this case; however, I took the risk of trying to quiet the boys fears, but when we reached the bottom he was too weak to stand alone and I was compelled to assist him off the cage, for which both of us were as severely repri nanded as though we had been engaged r.U Uf.m nit ,1 WAIFS. mr iCiki.J NX I 1 ui w.n j. THE WAIFS HOME. QUINTON HEIGHTS, TOPEKA.

Walter L. Russ, Superiutendent, Mrs. Tillie Nordeen, Matron. Dr. Ida C.

Barnes, Physician. HOUSE COMMITTEE. Mrs. Bowman, Mrs, Thomas Page, Mrs. J.

N. Henry. Mrs. L. H.

Sherwood, THE WAIFS AID SOCIETY OF KANSAS. Rev. Charels Sheldon, President. Rev. Dr.

W. E. Archibald, 1st Vice-Pres, Olive P. Bray, Treasurer. Walter Russ, Secretary.

J. B. Larimer, Legal Advisor. DONATIONS SINCE OUR LAST REPORT, Mrs. J.

N. Henry, set of knives and forks; Mrs. Sickles, 1 pair of sheets, 1 pair of pillow cases; Mrs. A. J.

Brovn, 1 table spread; Mrs. Green, 1 hanging lamp and lot of clothing; Mrs. Tuttle, 2 comforts; Mr. Willis Norton, $50 Garland range, to which the W. A.

L. Thompson Hardware Company added gio worth of fixtures; Mrs. A. J. Arnold, fly screens.

CASH DONATIONS. Presbyterian church, Sterling, Kansas, Presbyterian church, Madison, United Brethren church, Chanute, Presbyterian church, Chanute, $2. NEW MEMBERS. The following ladies and gentlemen have become members of the Waifs Aid Society since last report: I. T.

Parvin, Burrton, Rev. W. S. Garges, W. J.

Carter, W. B. Graham, Mrs. Veda Johnson, Miss Sarah R. Forsythe, of First U.

P. church, Sterling, Kansas; Rev, W. F.Hemmingway and G. L. Bon-tecou, Eureka, Kansas; J.

D. Yockey, Abe Long, S. G. YocKey and S. Beach, Chanute, Kansas; I.

P. Kunkle, Perryville, Kansas. The secretary has, during the month, visited a number of towns "oughout the State in the interest of the Home, and presented its work and that of the society from the pulpits of the Presbyterian churches at Burrton, Sterling, Madison and Chanute. The people manifested considerable interest in the subject and the seed thus sown will bear fruit in due season. Revs.

Hennirigwayand Wright, of the Congregational and Methodist churches at Eureka invited the secretary to visit that city in the near future and talk about the waifs from their pulpits, morning and evening service respectively, Since our last report one boy has been rescued from the influences of a shame less mother who was keeping him in a house of ill-fame, and one inmate of the Waifs Home has been sent to a farm where he is teaming good wages. A little six year old girl has been received tern porarily until circumstances indicate the best course to pursue in the case. She has a mother who tries to make a living by going out to days work, which she cannot do at all without some place to leave her child. While at Chanule a homeless thirteen.