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At twenty-one.—Be less particular than heretofore, for time begins to wane.

At twenty-two.—Think seriously of paying a visit to some friend at Madras or Calcutta.

At twenty-three.—Marry any body that is not downright intolerable.

At twenty-four.—You cease to be a young lady, and must manage as well as you can.

APPENDIX 7

COLONIAL TIMES

Tuesday 10 March 1840, page 4

Female Factory—The Flash Mob!

On more than one occasion, as our readers may recollect, have we directed the attention of the proper authorities, to the laxity of discipline, which is practised at the Female House of Correction, near this town. Did nothing further result from this heedlessness, than a winking at certain harmless pastimes, indulged in by the inmates, we should not again bring forward the subject, thus prominently; but information has reached us of so flagrant and revolting a character, that we cannot, under any consideration, remain silent.

We have appended to the title of this article, the term “Flash Mob”; that this term is technical, is sufficiently obvious; but few of our readers,—few, indeed, of any who possess the ordinary attributes of human nature, can even conjecture the frightful abominations, which are practised by the women, who compose this mob. Of course, we cannot pollute our columns with the disgusting details, which have been conveyed to us; but we may, with propriety, call the notice of the proper Functionaries to a system of vice, immorality, and iniquity, which has tended, mainly, to render the majority of female assigned servants, the annoying and untractable animals, that they are.

The Flash Mob at the Factory consists, as it would seem, of a certain number of women, who, by a simple process of initiation, are admitted into a series of unhallowed mysteries, similar, in many respects, to those which are described by Goethe, in his unrivalled Drama of Faust, as occurring, on particular occasions, amongst the supposed supernatural inhabitants of the Hartz Mountains. Like those abominable Saturnalia, they are performed in the dark and silent hour of night, but, unlike those, they are performed in solitude and secrecy, amongst only the duly initiated. With the fiendish fondness for sin, every effort, both in the Factory, and out of it, is made by these wretches, to acquire proselytes to their infamous practices; and, it has come to our knowledge, within these few days, that a simple minded girl, who had been in one and the same service, since she left the ship,—a period of nearly six months,—very narrowly escaped seduction (we can use no stronger term) by a well known, and most accomplished member of this unholy sisterhood.

This practice constitutes one of the rules of the “order;” and we need not waste many words to show how perniciously it must act upon the “new hands,” exposed to its influence. Another rule is, that, should any member be assigned, she must return to the Factory, so soon as she has obtained (we need not say by what means) a sufficient sum of money to enable herself and her companion to procure such indulgences, as the Factory can supply,—or, rather, as can be supplied by certain individuals, connected with the Factory. This sufficiently accounts for the contempt, which the majority of female prisoners entertain for the Factory, while it shows, also, why the solitary cell is considered the worst punishment.

Presuming that neither the Superintendent of the Female House of Correction, nor the Matron, can be cognizant of these things, we have thus publicly directed their attention to them; while we cannot but remark, that, their want of knowledge can only originate in direct and palpable negligence. In more than one sense, is this place deserving of the title of the “Valley of the Shadow of Death;” and in reflecting upon, what we can vouch to be true we do not, know, whether horror of indignation prevails most in our mind. Good God! When we consider that these wretches in human form, are scattered through the Colony, and admitted into the houses of respectable