aternal allowances. Any one of the crowd
would think the world was coming to pieces if he woke up in the morning
to wonder where he could get his breakfast on credit, and wonder where
he could earn enough money to buy his dinner. Yet these innocent
youngsters continue to pervade "The Quarter," as they call it; and as
time goes on, by much drinking of ponies of brandy and smoking of
cigarettes, they get to fancy that they themselves are Bohemians. And
when they get tired of it all and want something good to eat, they go up
to Delmonico's and get it.

And their Bohemian predecessors, who sought the French fifty-cent
restaurants as _their_ highest attainable luxury--what has become of
them? They have fled before that incursion as a flock of birds before a
whirlwind. They leave behind them, perhaps, a few of the more
mean-spirited among them, who are willing to degenerate into fawners on
the rich, and habitual borrowers of trifling sums. But the true
Bohemians, the men who have the real blood in their veins, they must
seek some other meeting-place where they can pitch their never-abiding
tents, and sit at their humble feasts to recount to each other, amid
appreciative laughter, the tricks and devices and pitiful petty schemes
for the gaining of daily bread that make up for them the game and comedy
of life. Tell me not that Ishmael does not enjoy the wilderness. The
Lord made him for it, and he would not be happy anywhere else.

There was one such child of fortune once, who brought his blue eyes
over from Ireland. His harmless and gentle life closed after too many
years in direst misfortune. But as long as he wandered in the depths of
poverty there was one strange and mysterious thing about him. His
clothes, always well brushed and well carried on a gallant form, often
showed cruel signs of wear, especially when he went for a winter without
an overcoat. But shabby as his garments might grow, empty as his pockets
might be, his linen was always spotless, stiff, and fresh. Now everybody
who has ever had occasion to consider the matter knows that by the aid
of a pair of scissors the life of a collar or of a pair of cuffs can be
prolonged almost indefinitely--apparent miracles had been performed in
this way. But no pair of scissors will pay a laundry bill; and finally a
committee of the curious waited upon this student of economics and asked
him to say how he did it. He was proud and delighted to tell them.

"I-I-I'll tell ye,