Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1892-01-23

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nr1Nr NJ, baldi, you's the biggest
M1 .~ circus I ever seen,"
n gibed her companion
,N/N1 0m Then, in an ecstacy of
~ ~ WI brutal amusement. she
shouted to q group Of
slatternly girls who were
looking in the windows of the Newsboys' Home
like so many Lazaruses, waiting for crumbs
from the rich mans table. "Here be's this kid
a-kicking now cause she amt boy"
Most Of them-God pity them-were sat
! urated with misery themselves, but with that
terrible tendency Of the human kind to perse-
cute that which it cannot understand they
| turned with one accord on the forlorn bit Of
humanity who had protested SO passionateiy
against fate
Crazy Mary Garibaldi. "t'whats eaten your
"Come off your perch" "Does it want to be
boy?" were some of the cries with which they
tainted her.
In the excitement of tormenting her, they
forgot the aching longing which filled their
own hearts for the warmth and light visible
within.
As soon as the child realized that the atten-
ton OF the whole crowd had been drawn to her
she tried to slip through it and escape.
She had almost succeeded when q girl larger
than any of the rest pounced upon her and
thrust her up against the railing separating
the parking from the street. The little girl. a
tiny. stunted thing, looked at them with the
terror Of q wild hunted thing brought to bav
As they leased her, however, a vivid color
sprang to her sallow cheek, an angry, stoiid.
suiien look came into her eyes, and she kept
her mouth shut resolutely.
This logged silence incensed the Others and
tINa 0t~1 xr1.~ l.
just about to strike the child, when lady. an
unnoticed spectator of the scene, interferred,
saying: For shame! it is wrong to fight, and
SO many against one, too"
For moment they stood hushed and
abashed, Then the ringleader with the ready
volubility of hardened street child. began:
Please, miss it's all her fault; she won't talk,
and little while ago she was maxim q row
cause she wasn't boy
"Oh !! said the young woman. fumbling near
ter look at this epitome of discomfort, "nice
little girls are glad they are girls aud wouldn't
be boys if they could"
Now, Miss Brown she said this BETRAYED
plainly that she disapproved utterly Of any
such desire. Poor Msry's stolidness was not
proof against the wish to have champion and
she broke out with-her childish treble CULVER
ing with excitement and growing shriller and
shriller as she protosted-'.Its lie /! It's lie
don't want to be boy, but l wants to do
wH0s sASy 40. WaHtS 10 sell papers, balloons,
flowers or bananas, or run errants, stidder lug
GIN the baby, cookin', washin' and gettin'
licked. Boys sees the purity stores and they
alters cribs enough to git sumthin' to
eat; they, gifts alleys, too, some
alters dom sumthin' for EN-; they gin EN- this
nice house; the boys has grand times here. See
In there? Them fellers is playin' what they
calls checkers; there's a sure enough black
board and they're maxim pictures on ii. They's
cot nj CHI &1,4.1
Why don't no one never give girls things like
thatF No one never does. They just has to
work and git licked"
Worn out by her eloquence, she paused for
breath. The strength born Of her eagerness to
be heard dying away she leaned against the
iron fence, exhausted and iistiess Dead 81
lence fell upon the group. Miss Brown was
nonplussed at this vehement protest against
injustice coming from such a child, and the
others were awe struck at the audacity of Crazy
Mary" talking in this way to one of the earth's
favored ones
Giving them quarter and saying, sect some
candy and divide it among you, Miss Brown
hastily assembled the stairs to attend n meeting
called to arrange an entertainment for tine
newsboys' Xmas.
In giving them the money she had followed
an impulse to set herself free from the imputa-
ton that she, too, did everything for BOYS and
nothing for girls. She felt vaguely conscious
that the chllds complaint had been Just one
uho tuue buc udu DetteT leave the meeting to
the tender mercies of the other ladies and look
after this storm beaten atom. But it is somuch
easier to walk in a beaten track; such tempta-
ton to follow fad, even in religious matters
that she went along in her little rut, saving
her conscience with the resolution that she
would look after the child as soon as she had a
minutes time.
Meanwhile. with the fckeness belonging to
all nobs popular favor suddenly veered round
to Mary, as she had really been the means Of
getting this windfall, and the children urged
her to come with them to a candy shop.
But she, with peryersity which almost had
the effect Of angering them again. fatty re-
fused and walked off alone, pathetic, solitary
little figure. The tears, proudly kept back
till she was alone, trckled down her grimv
face and never having had such a luxury as a
handkerchief she SMILED forornly, finally
using the sleeve Of her old coat in lieu OF that
necessary article.
Decidedly she was not an attractive object.
She had inherited her Irish mothers pale blue
eyes, protruding teeth and a nose tersely de-
scribed by the hoodlums of her neighborhood,
as "a sky gaZer" From her father an Italian. she
had gotten her swarthy skin, bushy brows and
coaree. matted black hair. 1t is doubtful
whether a search warrant could have un-
earthed q single curve in her angular little an
atomy.
Yet this repulsive waif had a warm child's
heart as hungry for love as that of the most
tenderly reared. Besides this she had the
keenest sense Of justice, which, with her pas
sionate, rebellious nature, promised to develop
the unfortunate creature into ranting. bomb
throwing socialist. Indeed the surprising
thing would be that she should grow up
the patient, accomplishing beast of burden the
average poor woman is. For added to the bit
ter contrast between the lives Of the rich and
the poor. the differen. treatment she received
as girl from that given to the most objection
able boy, forced her otherwise torpid soul into
q rapid but most unhealthy growth.
Glad under any pretext to escape the drudgery
of the household work and incessant attend
| ance upon that, in the Garibaldi family, per-
petual institution-the baby, she was eager to
60 to school.
Her mother did all she could to discourage
Summing in the alley assuring her that she
| should send her daughter to school as a re-
ligious duty, she retorted that the .Howly
Virgin" was 'too sins IDLE intirely" to expect a
woman with "furrin" husband. who would
not cultivate o taste for such Christian food as
| ''prates" cabbage and bacon, but who insisted
| on having his native delicacies of polenta,
| maccaroni, &C., and mine masterful '.men