d at the boy, whom he had not previously
noticed, and it was observed that the last shaft had hurt his pride.
The boy returned his wounded look with a straight, undaunted, spirited
glance, out of a child's nature. Mr. Reybold was impressed with
something in the attitude of the two, which made him forget his own
interest in the controversy.

Beau answered with a tone of nearly tender pacification:

"Now, my little man; come, don't be hard on the old veteran! He's down,
old Beau is, sence the time he owned his blooded pacer and dined with
the _Corps Diplomatique_; Beau's down sence then; but don't call the
old feller hard names. We take it back, don't we?--we take _them_ words
back?"

"There's a angel somewhere," said Lowndes Cleburn, "even in a
Washington bummer, which responds to a little chap on crutches with a
clear voice. Whether the angel takes the side of the bummer or the
little chap, is a p'int out of our jurisdiction. Abe, give Beau a
julep. He seems to have been demoralized by little Crutch's last."

"Take them hard words back, Bub," whined the licensed mendicant, with
either real or affected pain; "it's a p'int of honor I'm a-standin' on.
Do, now, little Major!"

"I shan't!" cried the boy. "Go and work like me. You're big, and you
called Mr. Reybold mean. Haven't you got a wife or little girl, or
nobody to work for? You ought to work for yourself, anyhow. Oughtn't
he, gentlemen?"

Reybold, who had slipped around by the little cripple and was holding
him in a caressing way from behind, looked over to Beau and was even
more impressed with that generally undaunted worthy's expression. It
was that of acute and suffering sensibility, perhaps the effervescence
of some little remaining pride, or it might have been a twinge of the
gout. Beau looked at the little boy, suspended there with the weak back
and the narrow chest, and that scintillant, sincere spirit beaming out
with courage born in the stock he belonged to. Admiration,
conciliation, and pain were in the ruined vagrant's eyes. Reybold felt
a sense of pity. He put his hand in his pocket and drew forth a dollar.

"Here, Beau," he said, "I'll make an exception. You seem to have some
feeling. Don't mind the boy!"

In an instant the coin was flying from his hand through the air. The
beggar, with a livid face and clinched cane, confronted the Congressman
like a maniac.

"You bilk!" he cried. "You supper customer! I'll brain you! I had
rather parted with