Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1914-12-14

have your soft beds and warm blan-
kets-come and take a walk with US
down this street where poverty turks
at every door. and we will make sew
eral visits as we go. The visit we know
is not alluring. Those one and two room
novels. banked high with ashes and
earth to keep out Jack Frost's icy
fingers. do not contain much that will
give you pleasure. you may even feel
faint by the time we reach Wonder
corner. but the experience will do you
good. the scales will fall from your
eyes and your heart will be warm with
the desire 20 do.
Sad Scenes.
At this first home the windows with
here and there a missing light are
coated thick with frost In response
to our knock a mother careworn and
dishevelled opens the door a crack and
from il peers five little faces. We tell
our mission and the door is flung wide.
The magic words Santa Claus bring
brightness to six pairs of eyes, but the
open door discloses a sorry sight The
room contains a bed. a table. a chair
and stove, nothing more but some
rags and a few dishes. The baby of
less than year has as its covering a
little shirt-nothing more. You can't
believe your eyes, but il is so. The
others have little more than ragged
shoes, stockings full of holes and thin
calico dresses or shirts. The baby has
been sick-and small the wonder-the
next oldest, a child of two years. has
cd frG ha oh
Of age. and the two between are suf-
fering with colds.
But we will go on. after assuring
those babies that Santa Claus will
surely come, ald stop at the next
house. A child answers the knock and
We are admitted TO a house of two
rooms. On the bed lies the mother Ill
with pneumonia, livid with fever and
racked with a cough. In the arms of
the oldest child a little girl of nine
years. is a baby but a few weeks old,
and grouped about the room are four
tots poorly clad and with pinched
faces In the room where the mother
lies i'll. the family lives. sleeps and
eats. The father is out of work. The
visiting nurse has been ministering 20
the mother but she cannot drive away
poverty. The mother may never see |
the dawn of the glad Christmas day.
but there are six babies that will. Here |
gain Santa has promised to take dol /
lies and a train and numerous other /
things to please and make comfort |
able.
But we must hurry on 10 the next 4
place. a bright, active woman opens !
he door and asks us to hurry IN and \
lose the door TO avoid draft. The 4
baby Of less than year has been Ill I
With lung fever. but IL getting well.
The old grandmother of 76 years is
luddled in a chair. sick and feeble.
There are other children, but the
yrave little woman tells us that her
husband has gone to work-that she
.annot give her children much Christ
mas. but that she knows there are so
many who will have none at all that
he would rather see them made happy /
md she will do the best she can with
What she has. That was a bright spot.
in the block, and we
20 on our way. l.
Let us stop here. this looks like an
.partment house-yes. il is-two rooms
n a cellar and two upstairs. An old
and grandmother occupy
he lower apartment and provide for
heir granddaughter. a child of Il. We
yill stop only long enough to find that
he needs shoes and stockings, and she I
will get them
Punched Faces of Children.
At the next house our knock Drinks
o the window a pinched little face
hat calls through the broken pane to a.,
20 around TO the back door. We go
nd are admitted 10 the kitchen by the
OF Mamma has gone TO work and
he does not know where papa is-he ,
asn't been home for a long time ,
ably sister and the little mother Of
our years are keeping house-and by ,
he way. baby sister has an enormous ,
utcher knife with which she is playing. ;
ut OF which she is soon disarmed. OF ,
curse Santa will fad these dear ,
a bies.
At the next house we climb several
tops and find housed in a single room
mother and her small baby. The
hid has been sick with disease that
as caused a terrible running sore on
ne eye that has spread TO the little
mes neck. II is receiving the care