Over rocks and grass the army charged towards bliss unutterable, strewing their path with overturned and howling babies of prosperity who, clumsy from many nurses and much pampering, failed to make way. Past all barriers, accidental or official, they pressed, nor halted to draw rein or breath until they were established, beatified, upon the waiting swan-boat.
Three minutes later they were standing outside the railings of the landing and regarding, through welling tears, the placid lake, the sunny slopes of grass and tree, the brilliant sky and the gleaming rubber-neck-boat-bird which, as Ikey described, "made go its legs," but only, as he had omitted to mention, for money. So there they stood, seven sorrowful little figures engulfed in the rayless despair of childhood and the bitterness of poverty. For these were the children of the poor, and full well they knew that money was not to be diverted from its mission: that car-fare could not be squandered on bliss.
Becky's woe was so strong and loud that the bitter wailings of the others served merely as its background. But Patrick cared not at all for the general despair. His remorseful eyes never strayed from the bowed figure of Eva Gonorowsky, for whose pleasure and honor he had striven so long and vainly. Slowly she conquered her sobs, slowly she raised her daisy-decked head, deliberately she blew her small pink nose, softly she approached her conquered knight, gently and all untruthfully she faltered, with yearning eyes on the majestic swans:
"Don't you have no sad feelings, Patrick. I ain't got none. Ain't I told you from long, how I don't need no rubber-neck-boat-bird rides? I don't need 'em! I don't need 'em! I"—with a sob of passionate longing—"I'm got all times a awful scare over 'em. Let's go home, Patrick. Becky needs she should see her mamma, und I guess I needs my mamma too."
MYRA KELLY
Is it necessary to say that she was Irish? The humor, the sympathy, the quick understanding, the tenderness, that play through all her stories are the birthright of the children of Erin. Myra Kelly was born in Dublin, Ireland. Her father was Dr. John E. Kelly, a well-known surgeon. When Myra was little more than a baby, the family came to New York City. Here she was educated at the Horace Mann High School, and afterwards at Teachers College, a department of Columbia University, New York. She graduated from Teachers College in 1899. Her first school was in the primary department of Public School 147, on East Broadway, New York, where she taught from 1899 to 1901. Here she met all the "little aliens," the Morris and Isidore, Yetta and Eva of her stories, and won her way into their hearts. To her friends she would sometimes tell of these children, with their odd ideas of life and their dialect. "Why don't you write these stories down?" they asked her, and at last she sat down and wrote her first story, "A Christmas Present for a Lady." She had no knowledge of editorial methods, so she made four copies of the story and sent them to four different magazines. Two of them returned the story, and two of them accepted it, much to her embarrassment. The two acceptances came from McClure's Magazine and The Century. As McClure's replied first she gave the story to them, and most of her other stories were first published in that magazine.
When they appeared in book form, they were welcomed by readers all over the country. Even the President of the United States wrote to express his thanks to her, in the following letter:
Oyster Bay, N. Y.
July, 26, 1905.My dear Miss Kelly:—
Mrs. Roosevelt and I and most of the children know your very amusing and very pathetic accounts of East Side school children almost by heart, and I really think you must let me write and thank you for them. When I was Police Commissioner I quite often went to the Houston Street public school, and was immensely impressed by what I saw there. I thought there were a good many Miss Baileys there, and the work they were doing among their scholars (who were largely of Russian-Jewish parentage like the children you write of) was very much like what your Miss Bailey has done.
Very sincerely yours,
Theodore Roosevelt.