The Florida agriculturist. [volume] (DeLand, Fla.) 1878-1911, 1907-09-11

let go or ms tllted DOWl, watching
it sway drunkenly, and settle into
equilibrium again without enthusiasm.
All around there was the scraping
of spoons or iron-stone china, the
scratch Of small shoes on the rungs
of chairs, and the subdued hum Of
little voices. The windows were wide
open, and from beyond the dusty
screen came the clatter of passing
wagons and the cool splash Of water
from the asylum horse as John wash
ed down the brick-paved courtyard.
James William leaned back and
drew long breath; then, with superb
Indifference to his red-and- white-bar-
red bib, he wiped his mouth with the
back of his hand Next to him,
Selling an opportune moment when
his neighbours eyes were fixed on the
window, a red-haired boy seized the
bowl with its soggy remnants of
bread and milk, and greedily devoured
them It was an indication of the
depth of James Williams gloom, that
when he noticed the theft he failed to
resent it.
Outside a push cart drew up be-
yond the iron fence-a push cart
containing a dingy tin can, whose
lid was fitted down over a sheet of
brown paper "1ce cream!' called
the vendor shrilly. "Ice crea-amW
James William sighed-not that he
cared about the ice cream, but that,
being sad anyhow, it brought back to
him the memory of his mother, of the
sizzling days on Wylie street when
-
and the paint rose in blisters on the
wooden shutters; when the advent of
the ice-cream man, with his penny
spoonful of sticky deliciousness on a
bit of brown paper, was the only
cool moment Of the day. Family,
perhaps, he regretted his mother;
there were visiting days when other
mothers came with offerings of new
1y-mended stockings and surrepti-
tious gift of candy James William
sometimes had a heartache at those
times a queer little pain that he hid
under a cloak of contempt, with a
lump in his throat, that boy like, he
combated with a gibe.
"Hel1o, mothers baby" he would
say huskily, when some mother hav-
ing taken a red-eyed farewell, a little
mattress would be left bullying at the
side with a bag of n1olasses taffy I'M
der it, taffy that in the heat had melt
ed into a knobbyc lump and whose
flavor was so strongly tainted with
portions of the adhering paper bag
But it was of none of these things
that James William thought as he
gazed broodingly through the screen;
it was not homesickness that made
his mouth twitch and his eyes blink
furious1y at the upper windows of
the house across the street, blazing
scarlet in the setting sun. Instead,
there was passing through his mind
chaotic succession of passion,
anger, resentment, humiliation.
James William had been taken off
the fire corps!
What did it matter that the next
week the "Fresh Air" outings began?
What sa1ve was it to his injury to
have Miss Adams say she knew it
was an accident, but that there were
no accidents in fire corps, and that
boy who would fall headlong down
the stairs from the dormitory would
be apt to fall with a baby in his
arms, with goodness knows what ter
rible results!
And his father was a fireman too!
That was what hurt. The father
who had broken up the home after
the mothers death, and sent his boy
to the asylum because he couldn't
h