Beneficial Effects on the Women Themselves.

We have now had sufficient experience of the Act to test the effect the Contagious Diseases Act has had on the women themselves, and I see around me gentlemen^* this evening who will, I am sure, corroborate the following statement:—

The women are at least taught to respect themselves, and they are already less dirty and less disreputable. If care be taken in the selection of the health inspectors, every prostitute who comes within the scope of the Act, will every week find herself brought face to face with a man who disapproves and stands aloof from her life of sin, she will have the necessity of cleanliness impressed upon her, she will have the filthiness of her life imperceptibly brought to her notice. I have suggested that page 18 at the inspector's office papers should be kept, to be had on application, showing how those who desire to turn from a life of prostitution can have the means placed before them of doing so, and a notice should be fixed up in the office that such papers are there, and may be had on application. This would at least prevent the women who came for inspection, from supposing that their calling was either allowed, or tolerated, or considered necessary. But the weekly inspections will lead to something more, they will lead to the detention of numbers of these women; the life in the hospital will give to all the very opportunities that now penitentiaries give to some, and give them in a far more judicious and salutary manner. It may be that many weeks of inspection will be undergone, and more than one visit made to the hospital, before the desired change is produced. But I have said that the method that I propose is gradual, and that the change to be real must be gradual.