To the Editor of the "Normm-Casa Dany News."
Sir,—I am sure that you will allow me a little space in your valuable paper to give vent to some pent-up feelings.
Doubtless you have bad your attention called many times to the ubiquitousness, in Shanghai, of the so-called " pheasants," or, in plainer language, Chinese women of ill-fame. Never was a work more needed than the Rescue Home, which some of the good women in Shanghai are about to commence, and surely there is no work that so deserves the help and sympathy of all respectable people of Shanghai. Not only on account of the help that ought to be given the poor fallen ones, but also for our own protection, for unless something is done, we will be run out of the place by them. Certainly they are greatly on the increase. I remember when I came to Shanghai over twelve years ago, there were a few streets which respectable people knew. to avoid, after dark, to save themselves embarrassment; but now I can venture to say that there are not many streets, between the Defence Creek and the Bund, where one can walk after nine o'clock at night without seeing some of this class hawking themselves to passers-by.
In former days, here in the neighbourhood of the Yunnan Road Methodist Church, there was as good a class of Chinese as one would desire for neighbours, but now, how different. With the ence] tion of a few respectable families, the houses are mostly occupied by these " phear sants," and unless something is done they will run all the good people away.
In every civilised country that Ihave heard of, this class have a certain portion of the city given up to them, and people who wish to avoid them know which streets to.shun; but not so in Shanghai. When one walks out after dark, in the British Settlement, unless he be going down the Nanking Road, he had best keep his eyes looking straight ahead, otherwise he is most sure to meet the gaze of some of these poor painted creatures.
The foreigner often has his sense of decency shocked, but the Chinese fare worse. Last Friday night as one of my members was returning home from a se! vice, he was caught hold of by one of these women and drawn towards her house. He resisted and a rowdy, who was evidently in league with the w@nan, came to her assistance and gave my man a bloody eye. The man is a quiet and amiable fellow, about fifty years old. He is a man of family and has always borne a good reputation. In fact this is not the only case of the kind that has come to my ears. Tt seems to me that a civilised community such as this ought to be able to give the Chinaman as good or better protection than he gets in the interior. In many respects he has better protection, but not so in this regard. In the interior such attacks as these are never heard of.
It is hard, too, to blame these poor girls, for Ihave heard that they are beaten most unmercifully, unless they can bring in one guest every night, and are not treated decently unless they can get several. I am sure that it is not the wish of our Municipality that human beings should suffer such hardships as these women are made to suffer, and I am sure that when the ladies get the Rescue Work well established that the authorities will ce-operate with them 85 effectively in ameliorating the condition of the human animals, as they have with the Society for the protection of Dumb Animals, C. Gajctte.
The motion that this is a necessary evil is too deeply rooted in society for me to have any hopes of getting rid'of it entirely during my life time; but could not something be done to put our " Model Settlement" on an equal footing with other civilised places? I am sure that no city in England or America would put up with such a condition of things as we have here. We have a model settlement in many respects. See with what promptness the authorities put down lotteries. Why can they not regulate in some way this growing evil? Could they not confine this kind of traffic to a certain quarter? Then decent people would know how to steer clear of it.
No one who has not tried it knows the trials of living in the midst of them, to have their poor painted faces flaunted before the eyes of your wife and innocent children, to be ogled at from just across the street as you walk the verandah with a friend, to hear their snickerings from the opposite house as you sit on your lawn, in the cool of the evening, with your family. Then the nights are made hideous by the curing and fighting that take their rise in these houses. It is no uncommon thing for us to be awakened anywhere from twelve to three o'clock by noises that can only be described by the term hellish. We have expected to hear on the next morning that some awful murder had been com: mitted. Why cannot the police put stop to these pandemoniums? We have not a bad police service and they are very cfiective along some lines. Could they not see that peace was preserved at night? Still I realise that they have a P- hard job before them, ith these houses scattered about everywhere. If they were in some certain quarter, it could be managed better. Thanking you for your valuable space, Tam, ete., W. B. Bunxe,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.