Fayetteville observer. [volume] (Fayetteville, Tenn.) 1850-1966, 1871-08-03
Little Ben, the NeWsboy.
From the Cincinnati commercisl. :

just how long, for L don remem-
Der times and seasons very we'll
two people were walking down the
street oneday. A big, burly news
boy, very rough looking, very
dirty and uncombed he was, walk
ed slowly along, just before the
two people, crying in a hoarse,
brazen voice: shasa g ea.. i s.
"Yer's yer evening pippers, 5
O'Clock e-dish-ing!"
Just as hundreds OF rough look.
ing, uncombed newsboys do every
day. But a few feet behind the
big boy, another boy, little one,
was walking timidly, He was
the merest mite Of a little boy,
not more than seven years Old. I
think, aud small for his age, too.
He was fragile looking little fel-
low, with a pale face and slender
little hands. His hair was combed
and curled carefully, in long yell
low curls, almost like a girls
None but a mothers hand can
comb and curl q boys hair
just like that, / have noticed.
The small boy had a few pa
pers under his arm, trying to hold
them as the big boy held his
And when the big boy sung out
his cry, Evening papers-5o'clock
e-dish-ing!" in his loud, rough
voice, he would turn Immediately
around to the little one, and nod
encouragingly, and tell him:
"Now you say it, Baby"
Then the pale fellow, with the
long yellow curls, would take up
his cry, family and feebly, and
try to say it in his weak, childish
quaver. S mellow it made one
feel queer about the throat to hear
that poor little voice.
The large boy was teaching the
small one how to be a newsboy.
Next afternoon the two boys had
another rehearsal, and the next,
and that time the little boy ven.
tured to cross the street, and go
down the other side, family and
timidly echoing the cry of his
rough friend opposite. Hundreds
of people must have noticed the
two, | am sure.
The small boy was Little Ben.
Ben was the smallest newsboy
you ever saw. Such q little, lit
tie mite OF a fellow be was, that
you wonder how be could cell pa,
pers at all, and how any mother
could trust him out of her sight.
Fine ladies said sometimes that it
was a pity such q pretty child
should be a newsboy, and that his
mother surely did not care much
for him, letting him run about the
streets SO, in constant danger of be-
ing knocked down and killed
If he were their boy, he shouldn't
do it for anything. For Little
Ben was very pretty child, with
his slender hands and long golden
curls.
How was it? Did not his
mother care for her child? Aye,
she did, tor he was the only COM
fort she had in the world-her
only comfort and her only child.
Little Ben had a father, but he
might better have had no father.
This father was a poor, pitiful
wreck of humanity, fallen SO low
that [ think scarcely the angels
of heaven could have reached him
in the depth of degradation to
which he had sunk! :.
Time had been when his gen.
tie mother, with her slender hands
and yellow curling hair, SO like
little Ben's own, lived in a large
house, and had a carriage to ride
in. Time had been when she had
such happy home that she had
nothing lett on earth to wish for.
But that time was so long gone
by now that Ben's mother, in her
great tlouble and despair, looked
forward to no happiness and no
beautiful home till she should pass
over the river, and enter the gate
of the celestial city. Indeed, so
heavy was her trouble that she
sometime lost sight of even that
one last hope.
The days of plenty and happi-
ness were SO long gone by for lit
tie Ben and his mother, that one
might they had no supper. And
the next day it was just the same,
and the neXt--and after that lit
tie Ben often went hungry to bed.
One day, watching his mother with
his large wistful blue eyes, he saw
that her work had fallen from her
hands, and that she was crying.
At first Ben cried too, because he
ibid not know what else to do;