One night at a late meeting in the Florence Crittenton mission in New York a drunken Scotch girl ran to the front screaming, “Pray for me! Pray for me!” After the meeting was over, the workers gathered around her. She told how she had wandered from home. How her mother lived in New York City, a poor but honest woman. They tried to get the girl to go to her home but she said no, her mother would not welcome her. They tried to get her to stay with them, but she would not, but promised that if they would see her mother the next day that she would come around the next night, and if her mother would receive her, she would go to her home.
One of the workers went the next day to the address given and found the mother. She said to her, “We have found your daughter.” The mother replied, “I have no daughter.” But when they explained to her about the night before, she said, “I had a daughter once but she left me years ago. I thought she was dead. I will take her back, but do not disappoint me now that you have raised my hopes again. Be sure and bring her.” They appointed an hour in which they would bring her that night. But the night came and the girl did not come. Hour after hour the meeting went on but the girl did not come. About midnight the meeting closed but the girl had not appeared. They held a consultation as to what they should do and some of them decided to make a visit to the low dens of iniquity in the neighborhood. At last in a sub-cellar in a little narrow room, blue with smoke, they found a crowd of men and women and the Scotch girl in the midst, wild with drink. Her good resolutions had fled and she refused to go to her mother. A policeman heard the noise and came down to see what it was and said to the girl, “Now you have a chance to lead a better life, you accept it. If you don’t, if I ever find you on my beat again, I will club you.” The girl was getting somewhat sobered but still protested that she could not go to her home because she had no shoes fit to wear. A warm-hearted Irishman in the crowd agreed to find her a pair of shoes. Where he found them at that hour of the night, I do not know, but he soon found her a good, strong pair of shoes and they started for the mother’s rooms. When they reached the rooms, they found the door locked. The mother had given up in despair and had gone to bed, but in answer to repeated rappings she came to the door. She said she would unlock the door and they could pass into the other room and as soon as she could dress she would come in. As they sat in the room waiting for the mother to come in, the daughter looked around the room, and as the old familiar objects met her eyes, her heart began to melt. The mother soon came into the room carrying a candle. As she looked at the girl seated on the sofa, she started back almost dropping the candle and exclaimed, “That is not my daughter.” “Mother,” said the girl, “do you not know me?” In a moment the mother recognized the voice and rushed to her child’s side and they were locked in one another’s arms. The visitors felt that the scene was too sacred to gaze upon and turned away. Both mother and girl were later shown the way of life, and turned their faces heavenward.