Page:The cry for justice - an anthology of the literature of social protest. - (IA cryforjusticea00sinc).pdf/681

 Poor little mites that breathe foul air, Where garbage chokes the sink and drain— Now when the hawthorn smells so sweet, Wet with the summer rain.

But few of ye will live for long; Ye are but small new islands seen, To disappear before your lives Can grow and be made green.

No. 5 John Street

(See page 137)

Some are locked in all day, "to keep 'em quiet," while their owners go forth to work or to booze. The infant faces, lined with their own dirt, and distorted by the smeared impurities of the window-panes, seem like the faces of actors made up for effects of old age. The poor little hands finger the panes without ceasing, as they might finger prison bars. The captives crawl over one another like caged insects, and all their gestures show the irritation of contact. But the clearest transmission through that foul medium is to the ear rather than to the eye, in the querulous whimper, at times rising to a wail, which betokens the agitation of their shattered nerves. The children playing below look up at them, and beckon them into the yard, or make faces at them, with the charitable intent of provoking them to a smile.