efuge the other night, and he's afraid of 'em. They
don't take any over sixteen, and so I can't go, an' he's afraid somehow
they'll take him in spite of me. I'd be willin' enough, for there's no
more I can do for him, and he's too little for this sort of life; but he
won't go."

The girl's thin clothing was soaked with rain; she shivered as she
spoke, but sat there with the strange patience in look and manner that
marks the better class of English poor. "But is there nobody to give you
a shelter on such a night? You must have somebody. What does it mean?"

"I had a bit of a place till last Wednesday, but the rent was far behind
and they turned me out. I was home then a day or two, but it's worse
there than the streets. There was no work, and father drunk, and beating
mother and all of us, and Billy worst of all; so the streets were
better. I've tried for work, but there's none to be had, and now I'm
waiting. Perhaps I shall die pretty soon, and then they can take Billy
into the Refuge. I'm waiting for that."

"But there must be work for any one as young and strong as you."

The girl shook her head. "I've walked the soles off me shoes to find it.
There's no work in all London. I can go on the streets, but I'd rather
do this. My mother did her best for us all, but she's been knocked round
till she's as near death as we. There's no work for man nor woman in all
London."

The boy had settled down at her feet again, satisfied that no attempt
was to be made to separate them, and fell asleep instantly, one hand
holding her dress. To leave the pair was impossible. Other cases might
be as desperate, but this was nearest; and presently a bargain had been
made with an old woman who sells roasted chestnuts in St. Martin's Lane,
close by, and the two were led away to her shelter in some rookery in
the Seven Dials. A day or two later the full story was told, and has
its place as the first and strongest illustration of the state of things
in this great city of London, where, as the year 1888 opens, official
registers hold the names of over seventeen thousand men who wish to work
at any rate that may be paid, but for whom there is no work, their names
representing a total of over fifty thousand who are slowly starving; and
this mass known to be but a part of that which is still unregistered,
and likely to remain so, unless private enterprise seeks it out in lane
and alley where it hides.

The father was a "coal whipper" on the do