The Rag Pickers and Other Stories

DADDY, isn't it almost time to go home? called out little six-year-old Dilly Hogan. "Daddy, I'm tired, I am; I want to go home and see mammy." Her father, or Bill Hogan as he was called by his companions, was a man, with a hard, stern face. He heard his little girl, no doubt, for she was on the ground, close to his feet; but he made no answer. I suppose you will want to know what poor Dilly had been doing to tire her so. Had she been throwing ball, or rolling hoop, or jumping rope? No. Had she been playing with her dollies, putting on and taking off their best dresses, until she was tired with play? Oh, no! Dilly knew nothing of these amusements, except as she sometimes saw children playing in the streets, or a little miss carrying a large dolly almost as smartly dressed as herself. What was Dilly doing then? Why, she was a rag and coal picker. As soon as she was out of bed in the morning, she had some Indian porridge or a piece of dry bread, or sometimes a potato, and then she started off with her father, mother, and brothers, to pick rags, old paper, or coal. Perhaps you have never heard of a coal field, and so I will tell you about it. Near almost all large cities some place is set apart where the rubbish gathered from the streets is carried. Persons who live in nice houses do not like to have old coal, broken crockery, or rags lying around their small yards, and so they gather all these things into barrels or boxes, and men go round with carts and take them away. These they carry and empty all over the great field kept for the purpose; and here men, women, and children go and gather up what they please. This is a hard way to get a living, but the poor people who worked at it were glad to do anything to keep them from starving. The first man or woman who went into the field had the right to make choice of the place where he would work; so he walked quickly over the ground to see if one place looked better than another; and then he set himself to work, knowing that whatever he found would be his own. Here old cinders, broken crockery, decayed potatoes or pumpkins, were thrown into the same heap with dirty house-cloths, old paper, or any kind of rubbish. Some of the men who worked hero lived a few miles out of town, and were able to make a better living by keeping a horse and cart, and carrying away for sale so much of the coal as their neighbors wished to sell. Here it was that poor Dilly had worked for ten long hours. Do you wonder she was tired? Oh, how she longed to jump up and run about, for her limbs ached from being bent under her. When she stopped just for a moment to look about, her father said, "Mind your work, Dilly!" or "Child, let other folks alone, and mind your own business!"

Dettagli