CLEANLINESS
"Among the tenements that lay within my jurisdiction when I first took
up mission work on the East Side." says a New York young woman, "was one
to clean out which would have called for the best efforts of the
renovator of the Augean stables. And the families in this tenement were
almost as hopeless as the tenement itself.
"On one occasion I felt distinctly encouraged, however, since I observed
that the fa
e of one youngster was actually clean.
"'William,' said I, 'your face is fairly clean, but how did you get such
dirty hands?"
"'Washin' me face,' said William."
A woman in one of the factory towns of Massachusetts recently agreed to
take charge of a little girl while her mother, a seamstress, went to
another town for a day's work.
The woman with whom the child had been left endeavored to keep her
contented, and among other things gave her a candy dog, with which she
played happily all day.
At night the dog had disappeared, and the woman inquired whether it had
been lost.
"No, it ain't lost," answered the little girl. "I kept it 'most all day,
but it got so dirty that I was ashamed to look at it; so I et
it."--_Fenimore Martin_.
"How old are you?" once asked Whistler of a London newsboy. "Seven," was
the reply. Whistler insisted that he must be older than that, and
turning to his friend he remarked: "I don't think he could get as dirty
as that in seven years, do you?"
If dirt was trumps, what hands you would hold!--_Charles Lamb_.