Daily intercourse with a couple of hundred little street
Arabs furnished a field for the practice of considerable feminine
virtue, and in reality the woman's kingdom at the top of the broad
wooden steps was a great 'culture engine' of spiritual motherhood.
It certainly was a very merry place, and if its presiding geniuses
were engaged in conscious philanthropy, the blighting hallmark was
conspicuous by its absence. Peals of laughter rang through the
rooms; smiling faces leaned from the upstairs windows, bowing
greeting to the ashman, the scissors-grinder, the Italian and Chinese
vegetable-vendors, the rag-sack-and-bottle man, and the other
familiar figures of the neighbourhood.
It was at the end of a happy, helpful day that Mistress Mary stood in
the front door and looked out over her kingdom.
There was a rosy Swedish girl sitting on the floor of a shop window
opposite and washing the glass. She had moved the fresh vegetables
aside and planted herself in the midst of them. There she sat among
the cabbages and turnips and other sweet things just out of the
earth; piles of delicate green lettuce buds, golden carrots bursting
into feathery tops, ruddy beets, and pink-checked. It was pretty to
see the honest joy of her work and the interest of her parted lips,
when, after polishing the glass, it shone as crystal clear as her own
eyes.
Pages:
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32