- [←529]
A correspondent writing for an eastern paper from Salt Lake City, a few years since, said: “Of all the ill-conditioned, God-forsaken, hopeless looking people I ever saw, the women here beat them all. Yesterday was supply day for the Mormons living outside the city. They bring their wives into town in dead-axle wagons, and fill the vacant room with children who look fully as bad as their mothers, if not worse. Many of them are lean and hump-backed and all look sickly and ill-clad. Two out of three women on the streets yesterday, had nursing infants in their arms. One of the saints had thirteen wives and ninety-four children; another had nine wives and five nursling babies, which he exhibited with all the pride I should take in a lot of fine horses. 1 never realized the infernal nature of the institution nor its effect upon society as I do now.”