THE FRESH-AIR FUND.
THE FRESH-AIR FUND.
BY W. A. ROGERS.
We have in New York city a number of kind-hearted ladies and gentlemen, who have arranged a plan by which the little girls and boys of our streets are taken in great boat-loads to different parts of the country round about, where they spend a week or two playing in the green fields, eating good food and drinking rich milk, and enjoying themselves to their heart's content, gaining meanwhile a stock of health and strength that lasts them many days after their return to the warm city.
On a hot evening in July one of these excursions left the New York pier, bound for the beautiful country bordering on Lake Champlain. A steamer had been chartered for the trip as far as Troy, and from there a railway train was to take the children to the lake.
From end to end the great boat was filled with wonder-eyed and rather awe-stricken little girls, and somewhat subdued but mischievous-looking boys. All of them were provided with luggage for a two weeks' stay in the country, but there seemed to be a great difference in their ideas of how much to bring. A little paper bag tied with a piece of string, and an empty basket, were all one very serene-looking little fellow had brought. Many of the girls brought their wardrobes packed in their school satchels, and one little lass had under her arm such a box as a gentleman's suit generally comes home in from the tailor's.
In the wistful little faces that peered out over the rail could be read stories too sad to be more than hinted at to our young people. Here were little girls and boys who had never felt the green sod under their feet, nor picked a flower, but who had spent all their lives penned up in great towering houses, their only play-ground the burning roof, a hundred feet above the streets.
It did not take the little passengers long to get used to their surroundings, and long before the darkness came the decks of the good steamer Minnie Cornell were alive with such pranks as only city urchins ever think of. At nine o'clock, mattresses were spread upon the cabin floors, and without any special preparation, except that some of the boys took off their hats and stuffed them into their coat pockets, the children lay down to sleep.
Long before the sun came up next morning the forward deck swarmed with little folks eager to catch the first glimpse of green fields and blue hills. It was here that your artist saw a bright little boy holding a very large satchel, on which was painted in eccentric letters, "Jerry Doyle, Avenue A." Beside him a tiny little fellow sat swinging his feet in a very contented manner.