obviating the
assistance of eight hundred and sixteen waiters, who would have had to
walk an aggregate of six hundred and seventy-seven miles from tables to
kitchen."

The solid food was brought to the scores of small serving-tables by
means of overhead conveyors and traveling-cranes, a sort of gigantic
cash-carrier system operated by electricity. The food came in individual
covered dishes, also of water-proofed paper. Everything was automatic.
The S. A. S. A. system prevented spilling, waste, delay, inefficient
waiters, and the dissatisfaction of the guests.

"You will observe," went on the official statement, "that for the first
time in history the beneficiaries of the bounty of their fellow-men are
treated as honored cash guests and not compelled to wait. The bread of
charity is hard, but not when served by the S. A. S. A."

Leaflets containing much the same information had been placed in each of
the thousands of seats in the Garden in lieu of programs. As each man
entered he saw the pipes and the traveling-cranes and the mechanical
waiters, and read the placard on the stage.

"Ain't it great?" inquired every charitable ticket-buyer. "_In six and
three-quarter minutes!_ No regiments of waiters. Everything automatic.
Say, that H. R. is a wonder!"

It naturally took some time before they remembered to look at the
starving people who were sitting at the long tables waiting to be fed.

They saw haggard faces, sunken-eyed, pale-lipped men and women and
children. They saw trembling hands that fidgeted with knives and forks
that were obviously unnecessary. They saw women at the tables trying to
still whining children. They saw gray-haired heads fallen on soup-plates
utterly exhausted from inanition.

They saw starving and penniless human beings by the thousand.

And the spectators, hosts of these guests, ran over the faces and the
forms of the men and women and children--all alike in that all were
hungry and all were penniless. And the same thought struck them all, and
they expressed it audibly, with gusto, as though they were original
thinkers, with the modesty of professional epigrammatists. All the
spectators said:

"Say, it will be great to see them eat!"

New York's great big heart had spoken in no uncertain accents!

"And the greatest of these is charity."

XXIV

Just after the applause that greeted Grace Goodchild's arrival had begun
to subside, and the public was about to demand that the fea