The Secrets of the Great City: A Work Descriptive of the Virtues and the Vices, the Mysteries, Miseries and Crimes of New York CityMcCabe, James Dabney
History
The Secrets of the Great City: A Work Descriptive of the Virtues and the Vices, the Mysteries, Miseries and Crimes of New York City
McCabe, James Dabney
New York (N.Y.) -- Description and travel; New York (N.Y.) -- History
The facts, negatively stated, are briefly and plainly these: There is
not a religious revival in progress among the wretched dwellers in
Water street dance-halls, and sailors' boarding-houses, nor has there
been of late, as represented to the public. Neither Allen, Tommy
Hadden, Slocum, nor 'Kit' Burns are 'converted' or reformed men, all
accounts to the contrary notwithstanding. The whole movement originated
several months ago, in the efforts of the colporteurs of a certain
mission, to ameliorate the condition of sailors and fallen women of the
Fourth Ward. House-to-house visits were made by the missionaries for a
considerable length of time, but without accomplishing all that was
desired. At length it was decided that an unusual and sensational
method should be taken to arouse Water street, and Water street was
accordingly aroused. Allen was selected as the victim against whom the
shafts of religion should be specially levelled, and they were,
therefore, directed toward him. Two articles appeared in a certain
magazine, calling attention to Allen as the 'wickedest man in New York'
and in a short time he was the most notorious character in the country.
The aim of the article in question was evidently to shame John Allen
into a change of life, and thus to obtain a foothold among his vile
neighbors and companions in sin. The stroke was a bold one, but it
utterly failed in its purpose to soften John's heart. The result,
however, was that thousands of religious persons--clergymen and
others--thronged his house daily, either from a motive of curiosity, or
of inducing John to abandon his wicked life and become a religious man.
This he sternly refused to do, threatening to throw any preaching or
praying people, who might come there, out of doors. The rush of
visitors of the better classes to his house entirely destroyed his
business, and for weeks he did not make a dollar of profit in his usual
way. Finding that Allen could not be coerced into a reformation, and
fearing that the game would be lost, his religious shepherds made a
proposition to him to hire his house for one month, to October 1, for
daily prayer meetings, and such arrangement was, after some discussion,
perfected. For the use of the rooms it is known that a check for three
hundred and fifty dollars was passed to Allen, last week, by a party
controlling the movement, and the house is now in legal possession of
the drawer of the check. Allen's prayers, songs, and exhortations, with
which he interested the praying dupes who gathered to his house, were
assuredly bogus, and, after being continued for two or three days, they
were abandoned, and thereafter, in drunken obliviousness or cunning
reticence, the 'wickedest man' passed his time, avoiding visitors, and
talking only when compelled to do so. What he purposes to do hereafter
will be learned in the course of this article. So much for Alien's
falsely reputed conversion!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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