elf stopped up into a
jug next! Why, you remind me of an uproarious old fellow poor Granny
used to talk about, that they called Old Hurricane, because he was so
stormy!" whispered Capitola, turning toward him.

"Humph! she's heard of me, then!" muttered the old gentleman to himself.

"Well, sir--I mean, miss--go on!" said the clerk, addressing Capitola.

"Yes, sir. Well, your honor, at the end of five days, being a certain
Thursday morning, when I couldn't get a job of work for love nor money,
when my last penny was spent for my last roll, and my last roll was
eaten up, and I was dreading the gnawing hunger by day and the horrid
perils of the night, I thought to myself if I were only a boy I might
carry packages and shovel in coal, and do lots of jobs by day, and sleep
without terror by night. And then I felt bitter against Fate for not
making me a boy. And so, thinking and thinking and thinking I wandered
on until I found myself in Rag Alley, where I used to live, standing
right between the pile of broken bricks, plaster and lumber that used to
be my home, and the old Jew's shop where I sold my clothes for meal. And
then all of a sudden a bright thought struck me? and I made up my mind
to be a boy!"

"Made up your mind to be a boy?"

"Yes, sir, for it was so easy! I wondered how I came to be so stupid as
not to have thought of it before. I just ran across to the old Jew's
shop and offered to swap my suit of girl's clothes, that was good,
though dirty, for any, even the raggedest suit of boy's clothes he had,
whether they'd fit me or not, so they would only stay on me. The old
fellow put his finger to his nose as if he thought I'd been stealing and
wanted to dodge the police. So he took down an old, not very ragged,
suit that he said would fit me, and opened a door and told me to go in
his daughter's room and put 'em on.

"Well, not to tire your honors, I went into that little back parlor a
girl and I came out a boy, with a suit of pants and jacket, with my hair
cut short and a cap on my head! The Jew gave me a penny roll and a
sixpence for my black ringlets."

"All seemed grist that came to his mill!" said Old Hurricane.

"Yes, Governor, he was a dealer in general. Well, the first thing I did
was to hire myself to the Jew, at a sixpence a day and find myself, to
shovel in his coal. That didn't take me but a day. So at night the Jew
paid me, and I slept in peace behind a stack of boxes. Next morning I
was up be