Can we not find some means to secure to infants a mother’s care and love for at least the first year of their lives, by furnishing these mothers with some honest means of support, and thus saving both mothers and children? I leave this important question for you to consider, for even if it is not strictly part of our work, it is a sequel to one department of our Hospital. A young woman, who in her childhood lost her mother and whose stepmother not only kept a house of ill-fame but sent this daughter to another, has now a beautiful baby to which she is so strongly attached that, in spite of the evil influences of all her past life, she is willing to do even the hardest work for the sake of keeping her baby with her. Yet, only a few evenings ago she came, with her blue-eyed baby sweetly smiling in the soft wrappings provided by its fond mother, and said that she must give it up. “Nobody,” she said, “would take _her_ with her baby,” and I saw the hard look in her eyes and the bitter smile that made me tremble for her future, though I am confident that she had the will and the strength to earn her living honestly. Last winter we were called to attend a woman in a difficult and complicated labor. She lived in a dark basement with floor wet and broken, the scanty bedcovering eked out by her husband’s old coat (which he himself needed) and the small pile of coal on the floor being the only comforts visible except the stove. Cold, faint and hungry, this woman had suffered for hours. When she was safely delivered, public charity could not make her comfortable--it was private benevolence that gave her blankets, sheets, clothing and care. Another case of recent occurrence shows how insufficient is the law to take care of the sick. A woman in one of the worst localities in the city who was beaten by her drunken husband and turned out of doors, was seized with premature labor in the streets and found her way into the house of a neighbor. This neighbor, Mrs. M., who was nearly blind, supported by her daily earnings herself and an interesting little boy whom she had taken from the city crier’s to nurse and whom she had kept with her rather than send him to Tewksbury. Mrs. M. allowed the woman to stay, and on the third day I was sent for and found her in an almost dying condition. It was late Saturday evening, and there was neither food nor fuel in the house. The woman was too ill to be removed, no aid could be obtained from the city before Monday, and then the legal allowance would be only two dollars in groceries and one dollar in money. Clothing, a bed and a nurse were absolutely needed. These were provided by private charity and the woman recovered, though it was said that three different physicians who were called in by the neighbors had declined to attend her as they considered it useless under such adverse circumstances to attempt to save her.