and the Hicks family gushed at
me--ever so many children of all ages and an immense mother in an
under-waist and petticoat. The interior was neat; the wooden floors were
scrubbed spotless. I congratulated myself. Mrs. Hicks clucked to the
family group, smiled at me, and said:

"I never took a boarder in my life. I ain't got room enough for my own
young ones, let alone strangers."

[Illustration: "THE BREATH OF THE BLACK, SWEET NIGHT REACHED THEM,
FETID, HEAVY WITH THE ODOUR OF DEATH AS IT BLEW ACROSS THE STOCKYARDS"]

There were two more names on my list. I proceded to the nearest and
found an Irish lady living in basement rooms ornamented with green
crochet work, crayon portraits, red plaid table-cloths and chromo
picture cards.

She had rheumatism in her "limbs" and moved with difficulty. She was
glad to talk the matter over, though she had from the first no intention
of taking me. From my then point of view nothing seemed so desirable as
a cot in Mrs. Flannagan's front parlour. I even offered in my eagerness
to sleep on the horsehair sofa. Womanlike, she gave twenty little
reasons for not taking me before she gave the one big reason, which was
this:

"Well, to tell you the truth, I wouldn't mind having you myself, but
I've got three sons, and you know _boys is queer_."

It was late, the sun had set and only the twilight remained for my
search before night would be upon me and I would be driven to some
charity refuge.

I had one more name, and climbed to find its owner in a tenement flat.
She was a German woman with a clubfoot. Two half-naked children
incrusted with dirt were playing on the floor. They waddled toward me as
I asked what my chances were for finding a room and board. The mother
struck first one, then the other, of her offspring, and they fell into
two little heaps, both wailing. From a hole back of the kitchen came the
sympathetic response of a half-starved shaggy dog. He howled and the
babes wailed while we visited the dusky apartment. There was one room
rented to a day lodger who worked nights, and one room without a window
where the German family slept. She proposed that I share the bed with
her that night until she could get an extra cot. Her husband and the
children could sleep on the parlour lounge. She was hideous and dirty.
Her loose lips and half-toothless mouth were the slipshod note of an
entire existence. There was a very dressy bonnet with feathers hanging
on a peg in the bedroom, a