I said to the man on my right:
“Did you have any supper to-night?”
“No, I didn’t, and I feel pretty weak and hungry. I spent my last thirty cents this morning for a breakfast, and what do you think I got for it? I got a piece of beefsteak four inches square so tough I could scarcely eat it, and some potatoes fried in rancid lard.”
I made no reply and the exhausted and half-starved man fell asleep.
“I wish I had a couple of drinks of whiskey,” said the man on my left.
“Oh,” I replied, “you don’t want much; one drink would do me.”
“Yes, but I’ve got beyond that,” he said; “it takes a good many drinks to do me, and they can’t come too fast, either.” Then, with a sigh, he added, “My dear old Daddy, God bless him, I have one thing to blame him for. He taught me to drink, and here I am in this charity business—a drunkard.”
And he, too, turned over and fell asleep. But I could not sleep; asthmatics and consumptives were coughing constantly, and the wreckage around me was too much for my sympathies.
The coming of the daylight through the windows was a welcome sight. I got up and went to the drinking place, and asked a burly looking attendant if it was time to get up.
“Naw, taint!” he snapped, with a wicked scowl.