Incredible as it must sound to modern ears, they were so far
successful that for a whole week I was in ignorance of his
whereabouts, while detectives were hunting for him up and down
England. The abduction was carried out by young Lidderdale, with
the assistance of a youth called Hacking, so coolly and skilfully
as to indicate that the abettors behind the scenes are USED TO SUCH
ABDUCTIONS. This, my lord, points to a very grave state of affairs
in our midst. If the son of a Protestant clergyman like myself can
be spirited away from a populous but nevertheless comparatively
small town like Slowbridge, what must be going on in great cities
like London? Moreover, everything is done to make it attractive for
the unhappy youth who is thus lured away from his father's hearth.
My own son is even now still impenitent, and I have the greatest
fears for his moral and religious future, so rapid has been the
corruption set up by evil companionship.
These, my lord, are the facts set out as shortly as possible and
written on the eve of my departure in circumstances that militate
against elegance of expression. I am, to tell the truth, still
staggered by this affair, and if I make public my sorrow and my
shame I do so in the hope that the Society of which your lordship
is President, may see its way to take some kind of action that will
make a repetition of such an outrage upon family life for ever
impossible.
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