As with all other "business men," there is keen rivalry and competition among newsboys. The only difference is that, among the boys, the most primitive and direct way is the most frequent one employed to settle disputes. Some men, after great sorrows or disappointments, seek forgetfulness in battle, being entirely indifferent to their ultimate fate, and they always make good fighters. My position was not altogether dissimilar from theirs. What little I had known of comfort and affection was behind me; my mode of life at that time had no particular attraction for me, and my only ambition was to conquer by fight, and, therefore, I made a good fighter.
In all those long years I cannot recall more than one incident which stirred the softer emotions of my heart.
A newcomer, a blue-eyed, light-haired little fellow, had come among us, and was immediately chosen by me as my favorite victim. Certain traces of refinement were discernible in him and this gave me many opportunities to hold him up to the ridicule of our choice gang of young ruffians. I hated him without knowing why.
One day I saw him standing at the corner of "the Row," offering his wares with the unprofessional cry: "Please, won't you buy a paper?"
It was a glorious chance to "plant" a kick on one of his shins, and thereby to relieve myself of some of my hatred. Stealthily I crept up behind him, and was on the point of sending my foot on its mission, when two motherly-looking women stopped to buy a paper from "the cherub." Wits are quickly sharpened in a life on the streets, and I realized at once that my intended assault, if witnessed by the two ladies, would evoke a storm of indignation.
I immediately changed front, and endeavored to create the impression that my hasty approach had been occasioned by my desire to sell a paper.
"Poipers, ladies, poipers," I cried, but was barely noticed.
The "cherub" claimed all their attention.
"What a pretty boy!" exclaimed one. "Have you no home, no parents? Too bad, too bad!"
All this was noted and registered by me for a future reckoning with the recipient of so much kindness.