rsistence of youth be in you and the
belief that a jest becomes better with repetition--like beans nine days
cold within the pot--you will shout your question until he turns the
corner and his answer is lost in the noises of the street. "Adieu! Adieu!
thy plaintive anthem fades--"

To this day I think of a rag-picker's wife as dining sparingly out of a
bag--not with her head inside like a horse, but thrusting her scrawny arm
elbow deep to stir the pottage, and sprinkling salt and pepper on for
nicer flavor. Following such preparation she will fork it out like
macaroni, with her head thrown back to present the wider orifice. If her
husband's route lies along the richer streets she will have by way of
tidbit for dessert a piece of chewy velvet, sugared and buttered to a
tenderness.

But what is this jingling racket that comes upon the street? Bless us,
it's a hurdy-gurdy. The hurdy-gurdy, I need hardly tell you, belongs to
the organ family. This family is one of the very oldest and claims
descent, I believe, from the god Pan. However, it accepted Christianity
early and has sent many a son within the church to pipe divinity. But the
hurdy-gurdy--a younger son, wild, and a bit of a pagan like its
progenitor--took to the streets. In its life there it has acquired, among
much rascality, certain charming vices that are beyond the capacity of its
brother in the loft, however much we may admire the deep rumble of his
Sabbath utterance.

The world has denied that chanticleer proclaims the day. But as far as I
know no one has had the insolence to deny the street-organ as the proper
herald of the spring. Without it the seasons would halt. Though science
lay me by the heels, I'll assert that the crocus, which is a pioneer on
the windy borderland of March, would not show its head except on the
sounding of the hurdy-gurdy. I'll not deny that flowers pop up their heads
afield without such call, that the jack-in-the-pulpit speaks its maiden
sermon on some other beckoning of nature. But in the city it is the
hurdy-gurdy that gives notice of the turning of the seasons. On its sudden
blare I've seen the green stalk of the daffodil jiggle. If the tune be of
sufficient rattle and prolonged to the giving of the third nickel, before
the end is reached there will be seen a touch of yellow.

Whether this follows from the same cause as attracts the children to
flatten their noses on the windows and calls them to the curb that they
put their e