The messenger boys and the American District Telegraph boys are frequently found in the worst resorts of the “red-light” districts of our cities. In New York there are hundreds of such boys, ranging in age from twelve to fifteen, who know many of the prostitutes of the Tenderloin by name. Sad to relate, boys like to be employed in the “red-light” districts. They like it, not because they are bad or depraved, but for the very natural reason that they make more money there, receiving larger and more numerous tips. They are called upon for many services by the habitués of these haunts of the vicious and the profligate. They are sent out to place bets; to take notes to and from houses of ill-fame; or to buy liquor, cigarettes, candy, and even gloves, shoes, corsets, and other articles of wearing apparel for the “ladies.” Not only are tips abundant, but there are many opportunities for graft of which the boys avail themselves. A lad is sent, for instance, for a bottle of whiskey. He is told to get a certain brand at a neighboring hotel, but he knows where he can get the same brand for 50 per cent of the hotel price, and, naturally, he goes there for it and pockets the difference in price. That is one form of messengers’ graft. Another is overcharging for his services and pocketing the surplus, or keeping the change from a “ten-spot” or a “fiver,” when, as often happens, the “sports” are either too reckless to bother about such trifles or too drunk to remember. From sources such as these the messenger boy in a district like the Tenderloin will often make several dollars a day.[136] A whole series of temptations confronts the messenger boy. He smokes, drinks, gambles, and, very often, patronizes the lowest class of cheap brothels. In answering calls from houses of ill-repute messengers cannot avoid being witnesses of scenes of licentiousness more or less frequently. By presents of money, fruit, candy, cigarettes, and even liquor, the women make friends of the boys, who quickly learn all the foul slang of the brothels.[137] The conversation of a group of messengers in such a district will often reveal the most astounding intimacy with the grossest things of the underworld. That in their adolescence, the transition from boyhood to manhood, fraught as it is with its own inherent perils, they should be thrown into such an environment and exposed to such temptations is an evil which cannot possibly be overemphasized. The penal code of New York declares the sending of minors to carry messages to or from a house of ill-fame to be a misdemeanor, but the law is a dead letter. It cannot possibly be enforced, and its repeal would probably be a good thing. While it may be urged that the mere existence of such a law has a certain moral value as a condemnation of such a dangerous employment for boys, it is exceedingly doubtful if that good is sufficient to counterbalance the harm which comes from the non-enforcement of the law.