boys stood in line, waiting their turn upon the bridge ladder and the
travelling rings, that hung full of struggling and squirming humanity,
groping madly for the next grip. No failure, no rebuff, discouraged
them. Seven boys and girls rode with looks of deep concern--it is their
way--upon each end of the seesaw, and two squeezed into each of the
forty swings that had room for one, while a hundred counted time and saw
that none had too much. It is an article of faith with these children
that nothing that is "going" for their benefit is to be missed.
Sometimes the result provokes a smile, as when a band of young Jews,
starting up a club, called themselves the Christian Heroes. It was meant
partly as a compliment, I suppose, to the ladies that gave them club
room; but at the same time, if there was anything in a name, they were
bound to have it. It is rather to cry over than to laugh at, if one but
understands it. The sight of these little ones swarming over a sand heap
until scarcely an inch of it was in sight, and gazing in rapt admiration
at the poor show of a dozen geraniums and English ivy plants on the
window-sill of the overseer's cottage, was pathetic in the extreme. They
stood for ten minutes at a time, resting their eyes upon them. In the
crowd were aged women and bearded men with the inevitable Sabbath silk
hat, who it seemed could never get enough of it. They moved slowly, when
crowded out, looking back many times at the enchanted spot, as long as
it was in sight.

Perhaps there was in it, on the part of the children at least, just a
little bit of the comforting sense of proprietorship. They had
contributed of their scant pennies more than a hundred dollars toward
the opening of the playground, and they felt that it was their very own.
All the better. Two policemen watched the passing show, grinning; their
clubs hung idly from their belts. The words of a little woman whom I met
once in Chicago kept echoing in my ear. She was the "happiest woman
alive," for she had striven long for a playground for her poor children,
and had got it.

"The police like it," she said, "They say that it will do more good
than all the Sunday-schools in Chicago. The mothers say, 'This is good
business.' The carpenters that put up the swings and things worked with
a will; everybody was glad. The police lieutenant has had a tree called
after him. The boys that did that used to be terrors. Now they take care
of the trees. They plead