EDITOR CaEr :
It was pleasant reading on Wednesday
morning when we took up the papers and
read the entertainment furnished by the
Patchen Avenue gang. When Bill Porter
got out of State's prison a few months ago,
I gave a short sketch of his career. I told
you that, notwithstanding his promises, the
chances of reform were slim. He is a nat
ural born thief. He could not be honest if
he tried. He has been a thief and the com
panion of thieves since his boyhood. The
same can be said of Jack Irving, Shang
Draper and Jack Walsh. The only thing to
be regretted is that Shang Draper and Bill
Porter did not do for each other what Jack
Irving did for Walsh and Walsh did for Ir
ving. It is rather pleasant for our country
friends to know that when they come to
town and wander up Sixth Avenue to see
the sights they might innocently have
dropped into Shang Draper's saloon, and if
they did, at any hour of the day or night,
they would have fallen into the company of
as desperate a band of villains as could
have been found outside of State's prison
in any portion of the Union. Just think of
it: on one of the most public thoroughfares
in the city of New York, where any unsus
pecting person might be trapped, is a den
of unhung villains, well known to the po
lice; every man of them a known thief and
a suspected mumderer, and yet there is no
sign of warning to the unwary or the stran
ger.
