"Yet plenty of others do."
"They do; but what else have they done?"
"Only tell me—then—tell me what to do. Am I to read?"
"No; you have read enough for the present. Rest your eyes from books; open them to the world; see things as they are. Look out of this window. What do you see?"
"Nothing; a row of houses; a street; a road."
"I see, besides, that the houses are mean, dirty, and void of beauty: but I see more. I see an organ player; on the curbstone the little girls are dancing; in the road the ragged boys are playing. Look at the freedom of the girls' limbs; look at the careless grace of the children. Do you know how clever they are? Some of them, who sleep where they can and live as they can, can pick pockets at three, go shop-lifting at four, plot and make conspiracies at five; see how they run and jump and climb."
"I see them. They are everywhere. How can we help that?"
"You would leave these poor children to the Government and the police. Yet I think a better way to redeem these little ones is for the working-men to resolve together that they shall be taken care of, taught, and apprenticed. Spelling, which your cousin says constitutes most of the School Board education, does not so much matter. Take them off the streets and train them to a trade. Do you ever walk about the streets at night? Be your own police and make your streets clean. Do you ever go into the courts and places where the dock laborers sleep? Have a committee for every one such street or court, and make them decent. When a gang of roughs make the pavement intolerable, you decent men step off and leave them to the policeman, if he dares interfere. Put down the roughs yourselves with a strong hand. Clear out the thieves' dens, and the drinking shops; make roughs and vagabonds go elsewhere. I am always about among the people; they are full of sufferings which need not be; there are a great many workers—ladies, priests, clergymen—among them trying to remove some of the suffering. But why do you not do this for yourselves? Be your own almoners. I find everywhere, too, courage and honesty, and a desire for better things. Show them how their lot may be alleviated."
"But I don't know how," he replied, humbly.
"You must find out, if you would be their leader. And you must have sympathy. Never was there yet a leader of the people who did not feel with them as they feel."