[Illustration:  ANOTHER SERIOUS CONTRIBUTION TO THE SOCIAL QUESTION]

Tolstoy’s terrible story “Resurrection” has for its central anecdote in the opening chapter a court-room scene in which a judge is called upon to sentence to prison a woman for whose downfall he had, years before, been responsible.  A somewhat similar story in real life, with a happier ending, was told me by the head of a woman’s reformatory.  This official received a visit from a lawyer, who told her with much emotion that he had, several days before, been present when a young girl was sentenced to a term in a reformatory.

“She lived in my home,” said the man.  “I believe that she was a good girl up to that time.  My wife died, my home was given up, and of course I forgot that poor girl.  She never made any claim on me.  When I saw her there in court, among the dregs of humanity, her face showing what her life had become, I wanted to shoot myself.  Now she is here, with a chance to get back her health and a right state of mind.  Will you help me to make amends?”

The head of the reformatory rather doubted the man’s sincerity at first.  She feared that his repentance was superficial.  She refused to allow him to see or to communicate with the girl, but she wrote him regularly of her progress.  Several times in the course of the year the man visited the reformatory, and at the end of that period he was allowed to see the girl.  This institution happens to be one of the few where a rational and a humane system of outdoor work is in vogue.  The girl, who a year back had been almost a physical wreck from drugs and the life of the streets, was again strong, healthy, and sane.  The two forgave each other and were married.

If the position of the domestic, while living in the shelter of a family, is sometimes precarious, her situation, when out of a job, is often actually perilous.

If a girl has a home she goes to that home, and regards her temporary period of unemployment as a pleasant vacation.  But in most cases, in cities, at any rate, few girls have homes of which they can avail themselves.

“In no city,” says Miss Kellor’s report, “are adequate provisions made for such homeless women, and their predicament is peculiarly acute, for their friends are often household workers who cannot extend the hospitality of their rooms.”

I think I hear a chorus of protesting voices:  “We don’t have anything to do with the servant class you are describing.  Our girls are respectable.  They meet their friends at church.  They come to us from reputable employment offices, which would not deal with them if they were not all right.”

Are you sure you know this?  What, after all, do you really know about your servants?  What do you know about the employment office that sent her to you?  What do you know of the world inhabited by servants and the people who deal in servants?  Can you not imagine that it might be different from the one you live in so safely and comfortably?