of humanity.

As he looked at the boy he wondered how many thousands there were like
him within rifle-shot from where he sat, and he thought each of them
would thank whatever gods they knew for such a neglected meal. The
words from the scare-column of the paper he held smote his sight:

"War Inevitable--Transvaal Bristling with Guns and Loaded to the Nozzle
with War Stores--Milner and Kruger No Nearer a Settlement--Sullen and
Contemptuous Treatment of British Outlander." ... And so on.

And if war came, if England must do this ugly thing, fulfil her bitter
and terrible task, then what about such as this young outlander here,
this outcast from home and goodly toil and civilized conditions, this
sickly froth of the muddy and dolorous stream of lower England? So much
withdrawn from the sources of the possible relief, so much less with
which to deal with their miseries--perhaps hundreds of millions, mopped
up by the parched and unproductive soil of battle and disease and loss.

He glanced at the paper again. "Britons Hold Your Own," was the heading
of the chief article. "Yes, we must hold our own," he said, aloud, with
a sigh. "If it comes, we must see it through; but the breakfasts will
be fewer. It works down one way or another--it all works down to this
poor little devil and his kind."

"Now, what's your name?" he asked.

"Jigger," was the reply.

"What else?"

"Nothin', y'r gryce."

"Jigger--what?"

"It's the only nyme I got," was the reply.

"What's your father's or your mother's name?"

"I ain't got none. I only got a sister."

"What's her name?"

"Lou," he answered. "That's her real name. But she got a fancy name
yistiddy. She was took on at the opera yistiddy, to sing with a hunderd
uvver girls on the styge. She's Lulu Luckingham now."

"Oh--Luckingham!" said Stafford, with a smile, for this was a name of
his own family, and of much account in circles he frequented. "And who
gave her that name? Who were her godfathers and godmothers?"

"I dunno, y'r gryce. There wasn't no religion in it. They said she'd
have to be called somefink, and so they called her that. Lou was always
plenty for 'er till she went there yistiddy."

"What did she do before yesterday?"

"Sold flowers w'en she could get 'em to sell. 'Twas when she couldn't
sell her flowers that she piped up sort of dead wild--for she 'adn't
'ad nothin' to eat, an' she was fair crusty. It was then a gentleman,
'e 'eard 'er singin' hot, an'