Accordingly when the regular time arrived to visit the Web-Foot again, after seeking Divine guidance the ladies, fifteen in number, once more presented themselves; and after the usual means had been adopted by Mr. Moffett to attract a crowd, the police were again called upon, and ordered to arrest the ladies for praying and singing.
The officer who had them in charge, not liking his duty very well endeavored to persuade them to go quietly home; but as they declined to promise compliance, he signified to them his intention of taking them to jail, and started them in the direction of the Police Court. After walking a couple of blocks in the direction indicated, some one discovered that no officer was in attendance; and as the ladies then were not so familiar with Police Courts and prisons as they have since become, they stopped and considered whether it was customary for arrested persons to find their own way to jail. Concluding that it was not, and believing themselves deserted by the guardians of the law, they turned back to resume their interrupted duty.
But now the officer, seeing that they were not frightened into going home as he had suggested, really did appear and escort them to the city jail, where they spent a couple of hours in prayer and song, to their own refreshment and the delight of the other prisoners. Counsel were not lacking who volunteered to defend them. A special session of the Court being called, Messrs. C. W. Parrish and H. Y. Thompson appeared on the side of the accused. After a hearing of the complaint, Judge Denny decided that there was no ordinance under which they could be held; saying, in substance, that had there been such an ordinance it would have been illegal, as the Constitution of the State of Oregon, and of the United States, permitted every person to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience.
The arrest of the ladies created, of course, a strong feeling of indignation in the community among their friends, and rejoicing among their enemies. It also increased the number of those who thought the ladies had not chosen the right way of making temperance converts; the idea of policemen and prisons being too terrible to contemplate.
But these ladies contended that they were glad they had made the acquaintance of both. They were glad to know in what spirit the officers had performed their duty, and whether they were trustworthy, conscientious men: and they were glad to know what a prison was like, what sort of persons were to be found there, and how it felt to be there! Their first visit to the jail had made them anxious to return to it that they might carry the truth and mercy and promises of God to its inmates. The feeling of duty towards those "in prison" impressed them very strongly, and remains with them to-day, a; it will always remain with them, and become a legacy to their daughters. Up to the time of this arrest of the Crusaders, only one woman in Portland of Christian character and feeling, had ever visited those in prison to converse with them and try to point them to ways of holy living. This one woman has been an invalid for months, unable to go her weekly rounds among the poor and despised of the earth. But her mantle, God be thanked! has fallen upon other shoulders; and
