"wrong throats"--"I do assure _you_, that it would 'ave
done yer 'art good to 'ave seed 'm, as I did the day I went there, so
clean and comf'r'able and 'appy--no mistake about that. Their 'appiness
was genoo_ine_. Wot made it come 'ome to me was, that I seed there a
little boy as I 'appened to know was one o' the dirtiest, wickedest,
sharpest little willains in London--a mere spider to look at, but with
mischief enough to fill a six-fut man to bu'stin'--an' there 'ee was,
clean an' jolly, larnin' his lessons like a good un--an' no sham
neither, cos 'e'd got a good spice o' the mischief left, as was pretty
clear from the way 'ee gave a sly pinch or pull o' the hair now an'
again to the boys next him, an' drawed monkey-faces on his slate. But
that spider, I wos told, could do figurin' like one o'clock, an' could
spell like Johnson's Dictionairy.

"Well," continued Dick, after a few moments' devotion to a bowl of
coffee, "I 'anded Billy Towler over to the superintendent, tellin' 'im
'ee wos a 'omeless boy as 'adn't got no parients nor relations, an wos
werry much in need o' bein' looked arter. So 'ee took 'im in, an' I
bade him good-bye."

Dick Moy then went on to tell how that the superintendent of the Grotto
showed him all over the place, and told him numerous anecdotes regarding
the boys who had been trained there; that one had gone into the army and
become a sergeant, and had written many long interesting letters to the
institution, which he still loved as being his early and only "home;"
that another had become an artilleryman; another a man-of-war's man; and
another a city missionary, who commended the blessed gospel of Jesus
Christ to those very outcasts from among whom he had himself been
plucked. The superintendent also explained to his rugged but much
interested and intelligent visitor that they had a flourishing Ragged
School in connection with the institution; also a Sunday-school and a
"Band of Hope"--which latter had been thought particularly necessary,
because they found that many of the neglected young creatures that came
to them had already been tempted and taught by their parents and by
publicans to drink, so that the foundation of that dreadful craving
disease had been laid, and those desires had begun to grow which, if not
checked, would certainly end in swift and awful destruction. One
blessed result of this was that the children had not only themselves
joined, but had in some instances induced