The Catholic bulletin., 1916-01-22
A MOTHER OLD AND GRAY

Two young men and pretty girl,
home for the Christmas holidays, were
singing college songs. And because the
d-December weather was warm the
window near the piano was open,
and the sound of the music and the
gay young voices foated out to the
street beyond.
A little newsboy, his evening news
papers nearly all sold, pressed close
to the low iron railing that enclosed
the small grass plot in front of the
house, and two men who were passing
also paused and listened.
I've mother old and gray sang
one of the boys, "a mother old and
gray, who needs me now"
His clear young tenor rose higher
and higher as he proceeded with the
song and in the refrain he was joined
by his brother and the girl, so that
every word reached the listeners with
out. Then the song ceased for the
nonce, as the boys began turning over
pile of music, and the girl, her
fingers still pressing lightly on the
keys, began to talk for want OF some
thing better to do.
The elder of the two men outside
the window gave a short cynical
laugh.
Very pretty" he said, "and they
sang it well, but where are mothers
old and gray? Some of them nova
days dye their hair, and most of them
wear hobble skirts, lacey waists, high
heels and have their hair done up as
if they were 20 They patronize the
masseuse to try-to ward Off wrinkles,
and the majority would be affronted
| if you called them old"
His companion, young man, with
a pleasanter face, smiled, but still a
little cynically.
1T is true," he said. "The old-fash-
ioned mother is almost thing Of the
past. You look in vain for one who
bears any resemblance to Whistler's
portrait of his mother, which saw
in the Luxemburg last summer"
"Ah!" said the elder man, Il have
it'll / know why Mona Lisa had that
peculiar enigmatical smile! She saw,
way down the ages, the modern old
lady coming, and when she finally ap,
| peared on the scene, and became an
established fact, Mona Lisa disap-
peared from the Louvre for very
shame of her sex.
"Quite an idea, Arthur, why moi
make a novel out of it?"
"A novel about the modern. old
lady? Pouf! But about the mother
old and gray-well! perhaps.
The two men passed on down the
street, and the little newsboy was left
alone. Wide eyed and wondering he
had listened to the conversation, and
understood not a word; but the song
All, that was different! 1t was beau.
tiful. He must hurry and sell his pa
pers SO he could the sooner go home
and tell his young mother about it.
Half an hour later he was scamper.
ing down Halsted Street, his papers
sold and the money iingling in his
Epocket. 1t had been a good day, as
the evening edition of the papers had
some absorbing news, SO he had more
money than usual to take home.
| Presently he had reached the cor
ner Of his street and, turning west,
the tired but patient little boy hur-
ried on several blocks further until
he reached tall tenement near the
railroad tracks. Here in the midst
of dust and cinders, with tall build
ings keeping out the light, and the
smoke from the cfiimneys of nearby
factories adding their quota to the
gloom that obscured the sun, was the
place that the boy called home. Two
small rooms on the fourth floor in
the midst of dirt and squalor, but
within was love and cleanliness, and
mother!
The child opened the door and en-
tered with rush, and the thin worn
face of the young mother, so unut-
terably sad in repose, became radiant
as she saw the boy.
You are early, Christopher, and
your papers are sold? That is good;
now We will have supper
Il a - 4
"Oh, mother, mother, something SO
funny happened! / heard such q love-
" song, I never heard a piano before,
and never knew any one could sing
as these people did"
And then, rapidly and eagerly, the
child told his mother of his expert
ence, and because he had sweet
voice, not entirely ruined by shouting
his papers through the streets. he es-
sayed to sing the opening bars Of the
song SO as to make it all more real
in the recital.
So engrossed was he with his sub
ject that at first he did not see that
his mothers eyes filled with tears.
"A mother old and gray she re-
peated after him, "a mother who
needs me now!,' she lifted her hand
to her head, brown still because she
was only %, and through the van
ished years she felt again the gentle
touch Of a tender mothers hand, and
saw through the mist Of her own.
tears. sweet face crowned with gray,
hair. q dress Of soft black with .