"Dear Mr. Editor: I have been reading much lately in your paper, and also in the daily papers about the 'Little Mother's' work in providing a home for the fellow just out of prison. I am very glad indeed that such a work is being carried forward, for if ever there existed a class of men who need looking after it is the ex-prisoner. I recently attended one of Mrs. Booth's meetings and was deeply impressed as she made plain to her audience the great need of 'her boys.' It is very probable that I was all the more interested in view of the fact that I, many years ago, was sentenced to a term of eighteen months in the ---- Penitentiary and to-day, after the lapse of years, I very vividly recall the utter friendlessness that was my lot at that time. "The prison was one in which the prisoners were compelled to observe the rule of silence; and my sentence carried with it also the requirements of hard labor. No person can realize fully the meaning of such a sentence except he pass through it. To sit at a work bench day after day touching elbows with your fellows, not daring to say a word becomes exquisite torture as the months pass slowly by. "I understand that the Little Mother not only looks after the 'boys' when they come out of prison, but takes to them a gospel of love and light and peace. I do not want to disparage the work done by other Christian workers. God bless them; they mean well, but some of them fail to grasp the fact that what we wanted to hear were words of love and sympathy. "But what I want to bring out in this is the decided contrast between coming out of prison years ago and coming out now. "The majority of the men confined in that prison had no hope of being met at the prison door by a friend or a relative when the day of their discharge arrived, and I was one of that number. When my sentence had expired, I was given a suit of clothes and a small sum of money, and was told I was free. So I reentered the world. Free; but where could I go? My first thought was to find employment. Need I tell you of that weary search? I could furnish no recommendations. The prison pallor showed all too plainly on my face. The shuffle of the lock-step still clinging to me, with the instinctive folding of my arms when spoken to, told plainer than words where I had last been employed. "After many days I secured work only to be dismissed when my employer was warned by a detective that he was employing an ex-convict. "Then, at last discouraged, I joined that great army of men, known as tramps, and for a time I wandered over the country, living an aimless, hopeless life. That I am not now a tramp is due to my having been saved by the precious blood of Jesus Christ.