ntiment on
the lowest plane. Pity for old men is an altruistic feeling, and
besides, the workhouse door is the accustomed place for old men. So she
showed no pity for them, only for me, who deserved it least or not at
all. Not in honour do grey hairs go down to the grave in London Town.

On one side the door was a bell handle, on the other side a press button.

"Ring the bell," said the Carter to me.

And just as I ordinarily would at anybody's door, I pulled out the handle
and rang a peal.

"Oh! Oh!" they cried in one terrified voice. "Not so 'ard!"

I let go, and they looked reproachfully at me, as though I had imperilled
their chance for a bed and three parts of skilly. Nobody came. Luckily
it was the wrong bell, and I felt better.

"Press the button," I said to the Carpenter.

"No, no, wait a bit," the Carter hurriedly interposed.

From all of which I drew the conclusion that a poorhouse porter, who
commonly draws a yearly salary of from seven to nine pounds, is a very
finicky and important personage, and cannot be treated too fastidiously
by--paupers.

So we waited, ten times a decent interval, when the Carter stealthily
advanced a timid forefinger to the button, and gave it the faintest,
shortest possible push. I have looked at waiting men where life or death
was in the issue; but anxious suspense showed less plainly on their faces
than it showed on the faces of these two men as they waited on the coming
of the porter.

He came. He barely looked at us. "Full up," he said and shut the door.

"Another night of it," groaned the Carpenter. In the dim light the
Carter looked wan and grey.

Indiscriminate charity is vicious, say the professional philanthropists.
Well, I resolved to be vicious.

"Come on; get your knife out and come here," I said to the Carter,
drawing him into a dark alley.

He glared at me in a frightened manner, and tried to draw back. Possibly
he took me for a latter-day Jack-the-Ripper, with a penchant for elderly
male paupers. Or he may have thought I was inveigling him into the
commission of some desperate crime. Anyway, he was frightened.

It will be remembered, at the outset, that I sewed a pound inside my
stoker's singlet under the armpit. This was my emergency fund, and I was
now called upon to use it for the first time.

Not until I had gone through the acts of a contortionist, and shown the
round coin sewed in, did I succeed in getting the Carter's help. Ev