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“Well, they had a ravishing display, so Alma, the cook, and William, the man, assured me–per Derry. All the sadder its fate; for alas! a gang of rowdy boys fell upon Harry, and while he was busy fighting half of them–he is as plucky as his uncle, the general–the other half looted the beautiful stock in trade! They would have despoiled our poor little merchant entirely but for the opportune arrival of a schoolmate who is mightily respected by the rowdies. He knocked one of them down and shouted after the others that he would give every one of them a good thrashing if they did not bring the plunder back; and as he is known to be a lad of his word for good or evil, actually the scamps did return most of the booty, which the two boys brushed off and sold, as far as it went (!) The consequence of the fray has been that Harry is unboundedly grateful to this Tommy Fitzmaurice, and is at present coaching him on his graduating oration. Fitzmaurice has studied hard and won honors, and wants to make a show with his oration, to please his father. ‘You see,’ says Harry, ‘Tommy’s father has saved money and is spending it all on Tommy, so’s he can be educated. He needs Tommy in the business real bad, but he won’t let him come in; he keeps him at school, and he thinks everything of his getting the valedictory, and Tommy, he worked nights studying to get it.’ When I asked what was the father’s business, Harry grew a bit confused. ‘Well, he kept a saloon; but’–Harry hastened to explain–‘it was a very nice saloon, never any trouble with the police there; why, Tommy knew every man on the force. And they keep good liquors, too,’ said Harry, earnestly; ‘throw away all the beer left in the glasses.’ ‘What else would they do with it?’ asked innocent I. ‘Why, keep it in a bucket,’ said Harry, solemnly, ‘and then slip the glass under the counter and half fill out of the bucket, then hold it under the keg LOW, so’s the foam will come; that’s a trick of the trade, you know. Tommy says his father would SCORN that!’ There is a vista opened, isn’t there? I was rather shocked at such associates for Harry, and told his mother. Did she think it a good idea to have such a boy coming to the house? a saloon-keeper’s son? She did not laugh, as I half expected, but answered quite seriously that she had been looking up Tommy, that he was very much attached to Harry, and that she did not think he would teach him anything bad. He has, I find myself, notions of honor, though they are rather the code of the street. And he picks up things quickly. Once he came to tea. It was amusing to see how he glued his eyes on Harry and kept time with his motions. He used his fork quite properly, only as Harry is a left-handed little fellow, the right-handed Thomas had the more difficulty.

“He is taking such vast pains with his ‘oration’ that I felt moved to help him. The subject is ‘The Triumph of Democracy,’ and Tommy civilly explained that ‘democracy’ did not mean the Democratic party, but ‘just only a government where all the poor folks can get their rights and can vote.’

“The oration was the kind of spread-eagle thing you might expect; I can see that Tommy has formed himself on the orators of his father’s respectable saloon. What he said in comment interested me more. ‘Sure, I guess it is the best government, ma’am, though, of course, I got to make it out that way, anyhow. But we come from Ireland, and there they got the other kind, and me granny, she starved in the famine time, she did that–with the fever. Me father walked twenty mile to the Sackville’s place, where they gave him some meal, though he wasn’t one of their tenants; yes, and the lady told him how he would be cooking it. I never will forget that lady!’