He plays on the tenement staircase—cuffed off the staircase.
He plays ball in the street—cuffed, if caught by the policeman.
He swings on the area railing, trying to exercise his stunted muscles—cuffed again.
In burning July, with shirt and trousers on, he goes swimming in the park fountain—caught and cuffed and handed over to "the society."
A few months in a sort of semi-decent imprisonment, treated in a fashion about equivalent to that endured by the sea turtle turned over on its back in the market.
He escapes to begin the same life once more.
He tries for work.
"What do you know?"
"I don't know anything; nobody ever taught me."
He cannot even endure the discipline of ten hours' daily shovelling—it takes education to instil discipline, if only the education of the early pick and shovel.