Don't let the 'crusader' persuade you that everybody is asleep
and that nothing is being done; the government is doing a good deal,
although the country as a whole is unaware of it."

"Yet it is increasing?"

"In spite of all that is done to prevent it, it is increasing," the
other said quietly, "that is the sad part. If it could be thought of as
a passing thing, it would be bad enough, but to know that every month
hundreds of children die from enforced labor and that greater numbers
fill their places, is a sad reflection on the industrial life of
to-day."

"Well, as the South progresses, that will probably take care of itself,
won't it?" queried the boy.

The superintendent looked at him curiously.

"I think you told me last evening that you were a New York boy," he
said.

"Yes, Mr. Wharton," answered Hamilton.

"I suppose you consider New York a fairly progressive city?"

"Greatest on earth!" affirmed the boy in true Gotham style.

"Yet that same progressive city," the older man declared, "is the
headquarters of several forms of industry in which large percentages of
the workers are children under fourteen years of age."

"What kinds of business can those be?" asked Hamilton in surprise.

"Making ostrich plumes and artificial flowers. It's not factory labor,
of course, but that doesn't alter the point that at least half the
output of artificial flowers is made by the cramped fingers of children,
generally after school and far into the night. They are not officially
reported, of course, but less than twenty per cent is done by men. The
disgraceful fact that the New York schools are so crowded that many of
them can only give 'half-time' to the children and consequently teach
them in two sections is a great help to the sweat-shop managers. But
every city has its own share of this child labor in the homes, although
in some of the smaller places, civic associations and municipalities
have taken the matter in hand with considerable success. Even that is
but a drop in the ocean."

"Your 'crusader' will have to lead his crusade then, it seems," the boy
suggested.

"Poor lad!" sighed the superintendent.

"Why?" asked Hamilton.

"He will never lead that crusade," the older man replied pensively.

"Why not?"

The man tapped his chest significantly.

"He is incurably ill," he said, "partly glass-blowers' disease from
breathing the particles of glass dust. Men don't mind it so much, but it
is fatal to chil