The two walked to the edge of the pavement, and talked together some little time. I did not overhear the conversation, but learned afterwards that the Judge told Mr. Grady that he had no provisions at home, and no money to buy them with, and asked for a small loan.
“I’ll do better than that,” said Mr. Grady. “I’ll go with you and buy them myself. Come with us,” he remarked to me with a quizzical smile. “The Judge here has found a family in distress, and we are going to send them something substantial for Christmas.”
We went to a grocery store near at hand, and I saw, as we entered, that the Judge had not only recovered his native dignity, but had added a little to suit the occasion. I observed that his bearing was even haughty. Mr. Grady had observed it, too, and the humor of the situation so delighted him that he could hardly control the laughter in his voice.
“Now, Judge,” said Mr. Grady, as we approached the counter, “we must be discreet as well as liberal. We must get what you think this suffering family most needs. You call off the articles, the clerk here will check them off, and I will have them sent to the house.”
The Judge leaned against the counter with a careless dignity quite inimitable, and glanced at the well-filled shelves.
“Well,” said he, thrumming on a paper-box, and smacking his lips thoughtfully, “we will put down first a bottle of chow-chow pickles.”
“Why, of course,” exclaimed Mr. Grady, his face radiant with mirth; “it is the very thing. What next?”
“Let me see,” said the Judge, closing his eyes reflectively—“two tumblers of strawberry jelly, three pounds of mince-meat, and two pounds of dates, if you have real good ones, and—yes—two cans of deviled ham.”
Every article the Judge ordered was something he had been used to in his happier days. The whole episode was like a scene from one of Dickens’s novels, and I have never seen Mr. Grady more delighted. He was delighted with the humor of it, and appreciated in his own quaint and charming way and to the fullest extent the pathos of it. He dwelt on it then and afterwards, and often said that he envied the broken-down old man the enjoyment of the luxuries of which he had so long been deprived.
On a memorable Christmas day not many years after, Mr. Grady stirred Atlanta to its very depths by his eloquent pen, and brought the whole community to the heights of charity and unselfishness on which he always stood. He wrought the most unique manifestation of prompt and thoughtful benevolence that is to be found recorded in modern times. The day before Christmas was bitter cold, and the night fell still colder, giving promise of the coldest weather that had been felt in Georgia for many years. The thermometer fell to zero, and it was difficult for comfortably clad people to keep warm even by the fires that plenty had provided, and it was certain that there would be terrible suffering among the poor of the city. The situation was one that appealed in the strongest manner to Mr. Grady’s sympathies. It appealed, no doubt, to the sympathies of all charitably-disposed people; but the shame of modern charity is its lack of activity. People are horrified when starving people are found near their doors, when a poor woman wanders about the streets until death comes to her relief; they seem to forget that it is the duty of charity to act as well as to give. Mr. Grady was a man of action. He did not wait for the organization of a relief committee, and the meeting of prominent citizens to devise ways and means for dispensing alms. He was his own committee. His plans were instantly formed and promptly carried out. The organization was complete the moment he determined that the poor of Atlanta should not suffer for lack of food, clothing, or fuel. He sent his reporters out into the highways and byways, and into every nook and corner of the city. He took one assignment for himself, and went about through the cold from house to house. He had a consultation with the Mayor at midnight, and cases of actual suffering were relieved then and there. The next morning, which was Sunday, the columns of the Constitution teemed with the results of the investigation which Mr. Grady and his reporters had made. A stirring appeal was made in the editorial columns for aid for the poor—such an appeal as only Mr. Grady could make. The plan of relief was carefully made out. The Constitution was prepared to take charge of whatever the charitably disposed might feel inclined to send to its office—and whatever was sent should be sent early.