and, as I discovered by some inquiries of my own in the principal cities of Europe, it is not of very valid effect over there. But the Director adopted most of the familiar requirements of the Parisian reglement, except the examinations, and the registration of those not en maison; he required the proprietresses to report at police headquarters the presence of new inmates; he forbade them to have minors or male parasites in the houses, and as far as possible he separated the business from the saloon business. Any house which ignored his orders found a policeman posted before it; then it came to time. The result was, as Mr. Mooney could report in the course of a year, that the number of brothels had been reduced from over two hundred to thirty and the number of prostitutes of whom the police had any knowledge, in an equal proportion. He was very proud when General Bingham complimented his policemen and their policing, as he was at similar compliments from the government's white slave agents.
Superficially this was a very gratifying report, but only superficially. Five-sixths of the brothels had been closed, but their inmates had to go somewhere, just as Jones said, and the police found that clandestine prostitution had proportionately increased; the women had gone into flats, or hotels, or residences which on occasion could be made to serve as assignation houses. It may perhaps have improved the life of the prostitute, made it freer and more human, or perhaps it indicated that prostitution in America is showing a decadent tendency
