INCLUDING
THE STORY OF LITTLE KATY,
MADALINA, THE RAG-PICKER'S DAUGHTER,
WILD MAGGIE, &c.
WITH ORIGINAL DESIGNS, ENGRAVED BY N. ORR.
BY SOLON ROBINSON.
NEW YORK:
DE WITT AND DAVENPORT, PUBLISHERS,
160 & 162 NASSAU STREET.
1854.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, by
DE WITT & DAVENPORT,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of New-York
W. H. TINSON, Stereotyper, &c.,
22 Spruce Street, New York.
R. CRAIGHEAD, PRINTER,
53 Vesey St, N. Y.
TO
HORACE GREELEY,
AND HIS CO-LABORERS,
EDITORS OF THE NEW YORK TRIBUNE;
The Friends of the Working Man; The Advocates of
Lifting up poor trodden-down Humanity; The Ardent Supporters of, and Earnest
Advocates for the Maine Law;
The Wishers for Better Rewards for Woman's Labor,
And All Honest Industry,
This Volume is
RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED,
BY YOUR FRIEND AND FELLOW WORKER,
THE AUTHOR.
The growing taste for works of this kind—works intended to promote temperance and virtue, to lift up the lowly, to expose to open day the hidden effects produced by Rum, to give narratives of misery suffered by the poor in this city—has induced the Publishers to offer liberal inducements to the author to use his powerful pen, and words of fire, to depict his "Life Scenes," and embody them in a volume, which, we are satisfied, will prove one of the most acceptable to the moral portion of the community, ever published. It is a work of high tone, that must do good. The peculiar style of the author is as original as the tales of truth which he narrates. It is unlike that of any other author, and every page is full of fresh interest and thrilling narrative.
As a temperance tale, it has no equal. As such, we hope it may prove but the commencement of a series. As an exposé of life among the poor in this city, it will be read with deep and abiding interest, in all parts of this country. It is a work for the fireside of every family; a book that commends itself to the heart.
No one who has read the "Hot Corn Stories," as they appeared in the Tribune, but will rejoice to have the opportunity to possess them, and many more like them, all complete and connected, in one handsome volume, such as we now offer.
To a moral and religious public; to all who would promote temperance; to all who would rather see virtue than vice abound; to all who have a heart to feel for other's woes; to all who would have their hearts touched with sympathy for the afflictions of their fellow creatures, "Life Scenes," as depicted in this volume, are respectfully commended, by
"Oh, pshaw," says pretty Miss Impulsive, "I hate prefaces." So do I. Nobody reads them; that is, nobody but a few old fellows with spectacles. I would not write one, only that some folks think a book looks not well without. Well, then, I have written a great deal in my life—travels, tales, songs, temperance stories, some politics, a good deal upon agriculture, much truth, and some fiction, always in the newspapers, never before in a book. I know that many, very many, have read what I have written with pleasure, or else "this world is awfully given to lying," for they have said so. Will they read my book? That we shall see. If they do, they must not criticise too closely. Remember that some of the most thrilling sketches were written amid the daily scenes and avocations of a city editor's office, for the paper in which they first appeared, without any thought or design on the part of the author of making a book;—that was the thought of the publishers. They read the first sketches, and judged, we hope rightly, if enlarged and embodied in a neat volume, it would be appreciated as one of the best efforts, in this book-making age, to do good.
If they have judged rightly,—if it does have that effect,—if the public do appreciate the volume as they often have my fugitive effusions,—then shall I be rewarded, and they may rest assured, whenever they buy a volume, that a portion of the purchase money will go to ameliorate the condition of the poor, such as you will become acquainted with, if you follow me in my walks through the city, as depicted in this volume, which I offer most hopingly to all who do not know, and most trustingly to all who do know him, who has so often signed himself
Your old friend,
Solon Robinson.
New York, November, 1853.
| CHAPTER I. |
|
| Page | |
| Scenes in Broadway | 15 |
| First Appearance of Hot Corn | 18 |
| Sally Eaton—Julia Antrim | 19 |
| Drunken Man Killed by an Omnibus | 20 |
| Bill Eaton sent to the Hospital | 28 |
| The Fire—Mrs. Eaton's House Burned | 30 |
| Three Golden Words | 41 |
CHAPTER II. |
|
| Hot Corn—First Interview with Little Katy | 44 |
| A Shilling's Worth of Happiness | 46 |
| A Watch-word | 49 |
CHAPTER III. |
|
| Wild Maggie | 50 |
| The Five Points—Dens where Human Beings Live | 53 |
| Wild Maggie's Home | 55 |
| The House of Industry—Commencement of the Ragged School | 60 |
| The Rat-hole—The Temperance Meeting—The Pledge—'Tis Done | 63 |
| Jim Reagan—Tom Nolan—His Temperance Address | 69 |
| Ring-nosed Bill—Snaky Jo | 71 |
| The Pledge and a Kiss | 73 |
CHAPTER IV. |
|
| The Temptation—The Fall—James Reagan after the Pledge | 75 |
| The Conspiracy at Cale Jones's Grocery | 76 |
| Tom Top—Snaky Jo—Ring-nosed Bill—Old Angeline | 78 |
| Reagan Rescued by Maggie | 84 |
| His Second Fall | 85 |
| Tom Finds and Feeds Him | 87 |
| His Second Visit to the Temperance Meeting | 89 |
CHAPTER V. |
|
| The Two-Penny Marriage—Thomas Elting | 95 |
CHAPTER VI. |
|
| The Home of Little Katy | 104 |
| A Sad Tale and its Termination—"Will he come?" | 112 |
CHAPTER VII. |
|
| Wild Maggie's Mother | 115 |
| Wild Maggie's Father | 118 |
| Wild Maggie's Letter | 120 |
| Death and his Victim | 129 |
| Greenwood, and the Rose planted by a new-made Grave | 132 |
CHAPTER VIII. |
|
| Athalia, the Sewing Girl | 135 |
| The Morgans | 137 |
| Athalia's Song | 141 |
| Her Home—Jeannette | 143 |
| The Blow and its Results | 148 |
| Charley Vail and Walter Morgan | 149 |
CHAPTER IX. |
|
| The Trip to Lake George—Preparation—A New Bonnet | 160 |
| One Bottle too many, and the Catastrophe | 163 |
| Marriage and Death | 165 |
| Where Shall the Dead find Rest? | 170 |
| Going "To Get a Drink" | 171 |
CHAPTER X. |
|
| Walter Morgan and Wife—Charley Vail and Wife | 175 |
| Going to Savannah | 179 |
| The Ten Dollar Bill | 186 |
| Seeing is Believing | 187 |
| Athalia Homeless and Friendless | 189 |
CHAPTER XI. |
|
| Life at the Five Points—Madalina, the Rag-Picker's Daughter | 190 |
| Cow Bay and its Inhabitants | 204 |
| Tom and the Glass of Cold Water | 217 |
| "I never Kiss any but those I Love" | 219 |
| "Our Trade," said the Fiend | 221 |
| Pocket-picking | 222 |
| The Poor-House Hearse | 224 |
CHAPTER XII. |
|
| Athalia, and the Home she found | 225 |
| Mrs. Laylor—Nannette | 228 |
| The Arts of Deception | 230 |
| Frank Barkley | 246 |
CHAPTER XIII. |
|
| The Little Peddler | 249 |
| The Exchange—Money for Rum, Health for Misery | 250 |
| Mr. Lovetree | 258 |
| Stella May | 261 |
| Savage, Civilized, and Christian Nature | 266 |
| A Walk up Broadway | 267 |
| Mysterious Disappearance | 268 |
| The Legless Flower-seller | 271 |
| Visit to a Suspicious House | 274 |
| Agnes Brentnall and the Negro Wood-sawyer | 283 |
| Phebe and her Bible | 287 |
| A Girl Lost | 289 |
| Stella May and her Mother | 294 |
| The Will | 297 |
CHAPTER XIV. |
|
| New Scenes and New Characters | 306 |
| Mrs. McTravers | 307 |
| Visit to the Five Points | 310 |
| The Home of Little Katy deserted | 321 |
| Mrs. De Vrai—Who is she? | 324 |
| A Woman Drunk in the Street | 328 |
CHAPTER XV. |
|
| Little Katy's Mother. | 334 |
| De Vrai, and a Night Scene | 340 |
CHAPTER XVI. |
|
| Agnes Brentnall | 343 |
| Spirit Mediums | 351 |
| How Agnes was Deceived | 353 |
CHAPTER XVII. |
|
| The Intelligence Office | 361 |
| Agnes' Story | 364 |
| Mr. Lovetree's Story | 370 |
| Agnes finds her Mother | 372 |
| Mrs. De Vrai's Story | 373 |
| Song—Will he Come? | 383 |
| A Death-bed Appeal | 385 |
CHAPTER XVIII. |
|
| Julia Antrim and other Old Acquaintances | 386 |
| The Penitentiary—the Visit to Mrs. May | 387 |
| Stella May in her New Home | 388 |
| Julia Antrim's Story | 390 |
| Names and Characters for Life Scenes | 391 |
| Invitation to a Party | 392 |
| Going to be Married | 393 |
| Visit to Mrs. De Vrai—Mrs. Meltrand—Agnes and Adaleta | 394 |
CHAPTER THE LAST. |
|
| "She is Gone, Sir!" | 396 |
| The Death-bed—Little Sissee | 397 |
| The Wedding Party at Mrs. Morgan's | 398 |
| Who is the Bride?—The Double Marriage | 399 |
| Greenwood Cemetery—the Grave | 400 |
| "'Tis the Last of Earth" | 401 |
| "Will he Come?" | 401 |
| In the Dark Grave Sleeping—a Poem | 402 |
| A Voice from the Grave—a Poem | 403 |
| The Last Word | 408 |
LIFE SCENES IN NEW YORK ILLUSTRATED.
OUR TITLE.—THE STORY.
"How hard it is to hide the sparks of nature."
"It is a queer title for a book; what can it mean?" is the exclamation of those who open it for the first time.
Visit this city—walk with me from nine o'clock till midnight, through the streets of New York, in the month of August, then read the first interview of the author with little Katy, the Hot Corn girl, and the story of her life, and you will not ask, "What does it mean?" But you may ask, what does it mean that I see so many squalid-looking women, so many tender children, so many boys, who with well directed labor might work their way to fortune; or crippled men, sitting upon the stone steps along the street crying, "Hot corn! here's your nice hot corn—smoking hot, smoking hot, just from the pot!" Your heart, if it has not grown callous, will be pained as mine has been at the sights of misery you will meet with, and you will then exclaim, "What does it mean that I see these things in the very heart of this great commercial city, where wealth, luxury, extravagance, all abound in such profusion? Surely the condition of the people, the ways and wants of the poor, cannot be known, or they would be improved. Why does not somebody write a book illustrating these 'Life Scenes in New York,' whose every page shall be a cry, startling as this of 'Hot corn, hot corn!' now pealing in the midnight air?"
So thought I; and so straightway set about the work, with ample material at hand, and more accumulating at every step. In writing a book, the first thought of the author is, what shall be my title? What better could I have than HOT CORN, since that was the inciting cry that waked my pen to action, to paint these life scenes in vivid pictures, for the world to look at and improve?
If, in my daily walks and midnight rambles, I have seen revolting sights, the details of which are harrowing to your soul as you read, so much the more need that they be opened to your view. Wounds must be seen to be healed. Old sores are often pronounced incurable, simply because they are old.
First, strip off their dirty covering, then probe and wash, and then apply the healing balsam. If not already gangrened from long neglect, you may save the patient's life, and at all events, ease his suffering, and smooth his road to the grave.
Be mine the task to strip and expose, and yours to wash and heal.
Of just such life scenes as I depict, there are enough transpiring every night to fill a volume.
Come, walk with me, of an August evening, from the Battery to Union Square, and you shall see all the characters of a romance.
'Tis concert night at Castle Garden. Stand here a short half hour, and look at the gay and smiling throng. There is material for many a tale.
Three thousand robes of fine cloth, silks, gauze, and lace, pass the Battery gates in one night, fluttering to the open sea breeze, without one thought from those who wear them for the poor little girl that sits shivering by the path, crying hot corn, or vainly striving to beg one penny from the overflowing purses that freely give dollars for amusement, and less than nothing to misery, or for its annihilation. Little do they think that this child has a mother at home, who once counted one in just such a thoughtless throng.
Here might a chapter be written, but let us on; we shall find plenty of subjects. If we stop to write the history of that little girl and her mother, we shall fill our book before we start.
The Philadelphia boat has just landed her passengers at Pier No. 1., North River, and the crowd are coming up Battery Place. Here is a picture of American character. Every one is pushing forward as though there was but one bed left in the city, and to obtain that he intended to outstride and overreach all his fellow travellers. Take care, little hot corn girl, or you will be run over, and your store trampled under-foot. Bitter tears for your loss will run down your hollow cheeks, but they will gain you no sympathy. The only answer that you will get, will be, "Why didn't you get out of the way, you little dirty brat—good enough for you." Yes, good enough for you, that you have lost your entire stock of merchandize; what business had you in the way of commerce, or path of pleasure?
"But, sir," says benevolence in a drab bonnet, "you have hurt the child."
"What if I have? She has no business in the way. She is nothing but a hot corn girl; they are no better than beggars and often are little thieves. Why don't she stay at home?" Sure enough. Simply because necessity or cruelty drives her into the street. Now your cruelty will drive her home to be beaten by a drunken father, for your act of wanton carelessness.
Stand aside, my little sufferer, or you will be run over again. Here comes a little dark skinned, black-eyed, black-haired man, with life and death in his very step.
What magic power impels him forward. He is a Jew—a dealer in second-hand clothes. Surely his business cannot be so important that he need to upset little children, or step on the gouty toes of slow-going old gentlemen, in his hurry to get forward.
It is Friday night, his Sabbath has already commenced, he can do no business—make no monish—to-night. He is not in a hurry to reach the synagogue, that is closed, what then? He has a Christian partner, and he wants to arrange a little speculation for to-morrow. He has just received information of a shipment of yellow fever patients' clothing, which will arrive to-morrow or Sunday, and he wants his Christian partner to look out on Saturday; on Sunday, the Jew will watch the chance to buy the infected rags, which both will sell on Monday at a hundred per cent profit.
"What, at the risk of human life? Oh, I can believe that of a Jew, but certainly no Christian would do it."
There spoke the Christian reader. The Jew will say the same, only reversing the character. No good Christian or Jew either will do it; yet it will be done, and little beggar girls will be run over in the hot haste to meet the coming ship.
Walk on. The side-walks are crowded, and the street between the curb-stones full of great lumbering omnibuses and carriages, that go up and down all night for hire; but there is a melancholy stillness in all the houses where wealth and fashion, in our young days, lived in lamp-lighted parlors, and diamonds flashed down upon the listener to music which had its home in these gay dwellings, where happy looking faces were seen through open windows. Iron shutters close them now, and commerce wears a dark frown by gas light.
On the right is Wall street, where fortunes are made and lost as by the turn of a card, or rattle of a dice box. It is very thronged at noon day. It is very dull now. A few watchmen tread slowly around the great banking houses, working for a dollar a night to eke out a poorly paid day, by guarding treasures that the owners would not watch all the live long night for all the watchman is worth. But he must watch and work; he has a sick wife at home, and four little girls are growing up to womanhood and city life. God knows for what!
A few express wagons, and more of these ever-going ever-coming omnibuses, are coming out of Wall street to join the great Broadway throng. And a pale-faced little girl sits upon the steps of the Bank of the Republic, adding to that constant cry, "Hot corn! Hot corn!" Now here comes the Cerberus of this money palace. What possible harm to his treasures, can this little poverty-clad girl and her sickly looking little beggar boy brother do, sitting here upon the cold grey, stone steps, with an appealing look to every passer-by to give a penny or buy an ear of corn. Does he think they are merely using their trade to plot mischief and schemes to rob his vaults of their stores of gold? One would judge so by the way he growls at them.
"Clear out, you dirty brats—away with you, lousy beggars—home to your kennel, young thieves. Don't come on these steps again, or I will throw your corn in the gutter."
Are these the words to work reform? They are such as fall every day and night upon the ear of just such specimens of the young sprouts of humanity, that vegetate and grow a brief summer in the city, dying in some of the chill winters of neglect, that come over their tender years, blighting, freezing, killing. How little of the gold, Cerberus guards, would serve to warm these two young children into useful life. How little those who guard or use it, care for those they drive unfeelingly away from their door steps—for what? They have made it a place of convenience for their nightly trade. Tired of walking, carrying a heavy pail between them—heavy to them—it would be light, and were it all gold, compared with that within—they have sat themselves down, and just uttered one brief cry of "Hot corn, here's your nice hot corn!" when they are roughly ordered to "clear out, you dirty brats." Yes, they are dirty, poor, and miserable, children of a drunken father—who made them so? No matter. They are so, and little has that gold done to make them otherwise.
"Clear out—get off these steps, or I will kick you off."
They did so, and went over to the other side of Broadway, and clung to that strong iron fence, and looked up three hundred feet along that spire which points to heaven from Trinity church. Did they think of the half million of dollars there piled up, to tell the world of the wealth of New York city? No, they thought of the poor, wretched room, to them their only home, a little way down Rector street, scarcely a stone's throw from this great pile, in a house, owned and rented to its poor occupants by that great land monopoly, the Rectory of this great church.
"Bill," says the girl, "do you see that gal? how fine she is tittivated up. Don't she look like a lady? I know who she is, Bill. Do you think when I gets a little bigger, the old woman is going to keep me in the street all day and half the night, peddling peanuts and selling hot corn? No, sir-ee. I will dress as fine as she does, and go to balls and theatres, and have good suppers and wine, at Taylor's, and lay a-bed next day just as long as I please. Why not? I am as good-looking, if I was dressed up, as she is."
"Why, Sal, how will you do that? You ha'n't got no good clothes, and mother ha'n't got none, and if she had, she wouldn't give 'em to ye."
"I don't care, I know how to get them. I know the woman that owns every rag that street gal has got on her back."
"Them ain't rags, them's silk, and just as good dress as them opera gals had on, that went stringing along down Broadway a while ago. I don't see how you can get sich, 'less you prig 'em. I'd do that if I had a chance, blessed quick. How'd she get 'em, Sal?"
"I knows, and that's 'nuff."
Why should she not know? She had been to school long enough to learn, and would be a very inapt scholar if she had not learned some of the ways of the street, in thirteen years. In thirteen years more she will be a fit subject to excite the care of the Moral Reform Society, or become the inmate of a Mary Magdalene asylum; perchance, of Randall's Island.
There is a history about these two children and their parents, which you may read by and by. We cannot stop, now. Let us walk on. Iron shutters—bolted, barred, and strong locked doors, what piles of treasure lie just within.
At Maiden lane on the right, and Courtlandt street on the left, more omnibuses come up, crowding their way into an already overfull "Broadway."
Oh! what a scream. It is a woman's scream. A cry of anguish—of horror, that chills the blood. It comes from the apple woman at the corner, and yet she is not hurt. No one is near her, the crowd is rushing to the centre of the street. What for? An omnibus has run over a drunken man. This is always enough to excite the sympathy of woman, and make her cry out as with pain. It is pain, the worst of pain; it comes from a blow upon the heart; worse than that, in this case, for the man is her husband. He has just left her, where he has been tormenting her for an hour, begging, coaxing, pleading, promising, that if she would give him one shilling, he would go directly home and go to bed, as soon as he got something to eat. "Something to drink." No. Upon his word, he would not touch another drop the blessed night. She well knew the value of such promises. She well knew that the corner grocery, where he would stop to buy the loaf of bread, which he promised to share with the two children, kept a row of glistening glasses and decanters upon the same shelf with the loaves. "The staff of life," and life's destroyer, side by side. She knew his appetite—she knew the temptation to which he would be subjected, she knew he could not resist, she knew the vampire who dealt in life and death, would suck up that shilling, if with it came the heart's blood of him, her, and their two children. She knew her husband, he could not resist the temptation. Once sober and he could keep so, if the means of intoxication were kept out of his sight. Once drunk and he would keep so, as long as he could obtain a shilling to pay for the poison. His last resource was to beg from his wife's scanty profits, by which she mainly supported the family, who often went supperless to bed, for the rent must be paid. Landlords are inexorable. Hers was worth so many millions that the income was a source of great care, how it should be disposed of. Her rent was coming due, and every shilling looked to her of tenfold value to-night. Her children are in the street, filling the night air with an appealing cry, "Hot corn, hot corn, who'll buy my nice hot corn?" Her husband was begging for one more shilling to waste—worse than waste—to close an ill-spent day. Oh, what a contrast between this and their wedding day!
She resisted his importunity until he found 'twas no avail, and then he swore he would upset her little store in the gutter, if she did not give him the money. What could she do? She would not call an officer to take him away. No, she could not do that, he was her husband. She could not resist him, could not have an altercation in the street, that would draw an idle crowd around her, spoil her trade, and worse than that, let the world know that this bloated, ill-looking, miserable remnant of a man, was her husband. Shame did what persuasion or fear could not: she gave him the shilling, and he started to cross the crowded street. He heeded little of danger—he had often crossed when more drunk than now—he heeded not the tripartite crush of carriages coming up and going down these streets, all meeting in a sort of vortex at that point. He heard, or heeded not, the drivers, "hi, hi, hi, get out of the way, you drunken son of a——," and down he went among the horses' clattering feet, upon the slippery stones, and the wheels passed over him, crushing bones—human bones, and mangling flesh, and mixing human blood with street dirt.
The omnibuses turned aside, the passengers shuddered as the poor wretch was lifted up, covered with blood and dirt, and inquired, "Is he dead?" The drivers looked down coolly from their high seats, with a consoling remark, that, "it's nothing but a drunken man," yet, that drunken man was that woman's husband; him who, fourteen years ago, walked the streets as well dressed, as proud, as sober as any in the crowd who now gaze carelessly upon his bruised form, and hear the remark, that he, "is nothing but a drunken man."
Fourteen years ago—yes, this very night—that woman walked this very street, arm in arm, with that man, and heard him, for the first time, call her wife. It was a happy time then, and "all was merry as the marriage bell." Little thought they then—less thought they a year afterwards, while rocking the cradle in their own happy home, that the time would come when he would raise his hand in anger to strike that loving wife, or that child would be driven, with kicks and curses, into the streets, or that he would lie bleeding upon the pavement he had so often and so proudly trod before, a poor mangled drunkard.
Oh how those words—joyous words—first rung in that happy mother's ears, when the proud father said:—
"Have you got a baby?"
"Yes, Willie, we have got a baby."
How these words have rung like electric sparks through many a happy heart.
"Have you got a baby?" said a little girl to a gentleman riding out of Boston. It was a queer question, arising as it did from a child he overtook on the road. How his city friends would have laughed at him if they had heard the question—"Have you got a baby?" No he had got no baby, yet he was a man full forty years of age, and looked as though he might have been a father, and so thought the little girl. Yet he had no baby. Why? He was a bachelor! So he had to answer, "no, my pretty miss, I have got no baby." "Oh la, haven't you? Well we have. We have got a baby at our house!!"
This was not interesting to a bachelor. How different it would have been if he had married Lucy Smith, whom he intended to a dozen years ago, but he was too busy then—too intent upon making money enough, to support a wife before he got one. Nonsense! How little he knew of the sweet music of the words, "have you got a baby?" How her heart would have leaped up and choked her utterance if she had now been riding by his side as his wife, instead of his "old flame," Lucy Smith! Lucy Smith, still, for she had never heard those words touchingly applied to her, "have you got a baby?" nor had she ever heard a sweet little girl say of her, "we have got a baby at our house!"
How many a mother's heart has leapt for joy, at that question, when she could answer it, "Yes, I have got a baby!" How many a father's heart will be touched with emotion when he reads, "Have you got a baby?" for he will think as I do, of a time when, returning from a long journey, he meets just such a little cherub of a girl at his own gate, who does not stop to ask him how he does, nor climb his knee for the accustomed kiss, so exuberant is her joy—so anxious is she to possess him with the secret that wells up and fills her very existence to overflowing, so that she must speak or burst, and hence she watches for Papa, and runs out to meet him at the gate with such a smile—such a joyous, glorious smile, and cry of "Oh, Papa, we have got a baby!!" How many a mother's heart will swell and throb, and how the warm tears—tears of joy and gladness—will flow as she hears that husband's footstep approach, for she knows he will say, "Have you got a baby?"
But there is no such joy now for that mother's heart. Yet that is the same father—fallen, trampled, dying, and she rushes to the rescue.
Two police officers bear him to the side-walk and lift him, lifeless as he is, upon a hand-cart. How the idle crowd push and jostle each other to get a sight of the wounded man. What for? To administer to his wants; to give, if need be, something to minister to his relief? No. To gratify curiosity—morbid, idle curiosity.
How this woman pushes and struggles to break the circle, crying, "Let me in, let me in; let me see him." How little the crowd heed her. They think it is curiosity, too, nothing but curiosity, that impels her, as it does themselves.
Why don't she say, "It is my husband?" and then they would give her room, or the officers would make them. Why! why don't she say it? She is ashamed to tell unfeeling hearts how low she has been sunk in the world since first she called that man by that name, or heard those heart-touching words when their first child was born.
Husband was a sweet word once; it is a bitter one now; yet it must be spoken, for they are about to bear him away to the hospital. Whether dead or alive she knows not, and she rushes madly forward, seizing the policeman, with a cry of, "No, no; not there, not there; take him home, I will take care of him—nobody can take care of him so well as I can. Oh, let me take him home! Do let me take him home." What could she do with him in her one room, the home of herself and children. She could not stay to nurse him day after day, for then her trade would be lost; somebody else would take her stand; there would be no income, all would be outgo, and all would soon be exhausted; nothing to buy bread, nothing to pay rent, and then out must go the whole, sick or well; they must go in the street if they fail to meet that dreaded periodical—the rent day. There is no help for it. All this is hastily considered, and there is no other way; he must go to the hospital. 'Tis a blessed institution—a noble honor to the city, charitably sustained, to give relief to—who? A thousand just such subjects as this; made drunk, covered with gore, maimed with broken limbs, by a legalized traffic in hell's best aid on earth. A trade that fills jails, thieves-dens, and brothels, and furnishes subjects like this for hospitals.
"He must go to the hospital."
"Then I will follow and nurse him there."
There spoke the wife, as, ever since that holy name was known, the wife has spoken—can speak alone.
How can she go?
Something clings to her dress and pulls her back. She looks around upon a little boy and girl—it is the hot corn girl, just driven from the banking-house steps three squares below.
"Mother, mother, do speak to us; it is Bill and me. Is father dead? What killed him?"
Rum! She did not say so. She only thought. She thought, too, of her helpless children, and what would they do if she went to take care of their father. She did not think of the blows, the kicks, and cuffs, and curses, received from him during long bitter years, for they were given by—not by him—not by her husband—but by the demon in him—the devil engendered by rum. She thought nothing of the cruel neglect and poverty and suffering of herself and children, for that was a sequence of the other. She did think of this night, fourteen years ago. She did think of the night when this girl, now clinging to her dress and convulsively crying, "Mother, is he dead," was born, for then she was a happy wife and mother. Then that father took that child in his arms and kissed and blessed it—then he took her in his arms and kissed and loved her, and called her his dear wife. She did not think of the night when that little slender boy, now ten years old, was born, for then a devil—not a husband—dragged her by the hair, while in labor, from her poor cot, and bid her go out in the pitiless storm to fill his bottle for him. No, she did not remember that; she only remembered that he was her husband; wounded, dying husband, in need of some kind hand to make his bed and smooth his passage to the grave, and she would leave all without a thought to follow him to the hospital. She was his wife. Now there is a struggle between duty and affection—between husband and children. She cannot go with both. One must be neglected; which shall it be? Had the husband been what he was when that girl was born, the heart of many a wife would give the ready answer. She looked upon her and remembered the time when she first heard these words, "Have you got a baby?" She looked upon her, and all intervening time faded from memory, and she thought and felt as she would have felt if he had been struck down that night. She tears herself away from the grasp of the little girl, telling her to pick up the apples and go home, she must go with father.
Another hand clings to her dress, and looks up with such an appealing look and says:—
"Don't go, mother; they will take care of father. Don't leave us."
She looked upon her sickly boy, and thought of the night he was born. Why does she start and turn round? Did some one pull her by the hair? No, it was only fancy. A sort of magnetic influence, linked with thought. That twinge decided her. That twinge decided his fate, and saved her children's lives. She went home with them, and tired nature slept in spite of mental agony. At four o'clock the bells rung for fire; it was long before she could wake sufficiently to count the eight strokes which told it was in her district. Dreamily unconscious of danger, she moves not till she hears a crash and sees a light through the small rear window, when she springs up, opens the door, looks out in the direction of the stairs, and meets a burst of flame and smoke coming up. Back, back to the bed, closing the door—a thin pine door—the only barrier between the fire and her sleeping babes, she drags them out and up to the window. Will she throw them down upon the pavement below, as the only hope of saving their lives, for the fire is fairly up the stairs and rattling at the door behind her? If it enters all is lost. The window is opened, and the little boy first—he is the darling—poised upon the sill, in the bewildered amazement of half-awaking consciousness.
"Oh mother, mother, don't throw me out! I will be a good boy, mother. I never will tear my jacket again. Indeed I could not help it. It was a big boy that pulled me. Oh, mother, mother, don't, pray don't."
He screams with fear, as he hangs convulsively upon his mother's neck, and looks down upon the gathering crowd, crying, "Throw him out, throw him out; we will catch him." And a hundred hands are outstretched, a hundred noble hearts would prostrate themselves upon the pavement to save, to break the fall of a beggar boy whom they would have kicked out of their path the day before. Now a mother appeals to her fellow men to save her child. She had oft appealed before, but then the house was not on fire; the fire was in his father's mouth—and that they heeded not. No bells rung, to call the engines with copious streams of water to put it out—they are ringing now. And now see the outstretched hands, each ready to risk its own life to save that of a child.