The San Francisco call., 1910-01-08

were school children. Here, said,
after carefully blotting it, is your copy.
You make those with pen or pencil,
plenty of them, on any kind of paper
wrapping paper, newspaper, any kind.
1t was not many days after before
the shipping clerk, taking a Shine"
to the bright, cheerful little olive COM
plexioned shaver, had him between
shines running messages for him, tip
ping him so that he did as well as a
messenger, pecuniarily, as shoe
sinner.
He was always around at closing
time and invariably came into the Of
fee and handed me a packet of ovals,
done on backs of torn bills of lading,
shipping receipts, brown paper, and
what not. Dirty, very dirty at first
and ink smeared, but always an i'm
provement, marked as the days went
on
In time the ovals were not only very
creditable and all done in ink, no
more lead pencil, but the blots had dis
appeared and his work was done on
clean white paper, letter heads fur
nished him by the shipping clerk
And then T stepped into a Stationery
store and bought Spencerian copy
book. N.Y. the recollections brought
up by that book! The Fairgrounds
and study halls, the class rooms and
call bell that sent lis TO sleep, to work,
to dinner and to play-I can hear its
old familiar ding dong, ding dong now
echoing in my ears-and the faces OF
the boys of my childhood days, van
ished now like a pleasant dream, with
all their disintereSted and friendly as
sociations! How familiar those ups
and downs and those y's and W's and
the old (but how dsreg arded in these
days of high finance) adage of Hon
esty is the best policy and, all Wall
street to the contrary, it is the policy
that wins out in the finals of the great
game of life.
SO when the little fellow now neater
in his dress and cleaner as to his hands
and nails Che had the run of the ship
ping clerks wash basin) than of yore.
stopped in to leave his daily stint of
ovals, nothing but ovals G wonder
whether he ever dreamed of ovals at
night), I showed him the Spenceran
copy book Now said, you have
made ovals enough. Here is a copy
book, pens and pen holder, all new,
fresh and clean. Here, too" taking a
fresh clean dollar bill from my pocket,
silk threaded, geometrically engraved,
vignetted and signed, lis fresh, clean
dollar bill. l am going to put it in
this envelope and save it for you. 1t
is your dollar bill, when. without
blot or a smutch of any kind, you re-
turn this copy book filed from cover to
cover. / want no more oyals'
And the first thing that Juno eyed
boy did was to find clean piece OF
wrapping paper and wrap the book up.
If elasticity Of step indicated anything,
as the boy shouldered his backing box
and went hurryng toward his Baxter
street home, he certainly was walking
on air, for / had also given him a shiny,
ticking Ingersoll watch.
1t is many years ago and hard to re-
member just how quickly that book
IL i 49,
yes, as 'spotless town." No blot,
scratch or blemish marred the surface
of the pages. The ups and downs were
a little shaky but good, and the VS.
and the WIS We're open to criticism,
and his learn to do good. X. Y. G..
Wix." might have been bettered but
the effort and purpose of the boy
showed in every line. The last pages
of the book were simply excellent and
beyond criticism, all the circumstances
considered. certainly was proud OF
my pupil and the boy was not far off,
as to his showing. So l watched his
face wreath itself in smiles, his lips
twtch and extend, the fresh young
blood in the cheeks coursing under the
thin, olive hued epidermis, his great
blue eyes all but suffused in tears of
JOY, as We're Junos (suffusis oculis)
when / reached into my drawer, opened
the envelope and handed him the much
dreampt of and coveted dollar promise
of Uncle Sam. And he wanted the
envelope to protect it as he tucked IL
away in his pocket, There was great
rejoicings, l know, In that little back
room tenement up three or four flights
of stairs in some double decker" in
Baxter street that night
Changes came. l was away months.
years. from New York. l returned and
ran across the old shipping clerk. "And
whatever became of little Angelino?"
shipping clerk with big plate glass
house. married and living comfortably
Writes with copper plate, and always
asks after you and says you got him
the job all right"