A Lodge in the Wilderness

CHAPTER VIII.-3

“I was afraid I should shock you,” said Lady Warcliff sweetly. “And yet— will you show me any other remedy? There are classes of the poor in every town who in all seriousness are beyond hope. It may be physical, or moral, or mental, but the weakness is there and cannot be overcome. We shut up criminals and lunatics, and yet we allow these people, who are as certainly a leprous spot in our society, to go on marrying and perpetuating their worthless stock and hampering the activity of the State. Sharp surgery is the only cure. I want to see these hordes of thriftless, degenerate, scrofulous pariahs treated as what they are, irredeemable outcasts from society, and compelled by the State to keep their noxious influence away from the saner parts. This, however, is beside the question. It is the