“Who made the grass?”
“Chief Police.”
“No, no—not the Chief of Police. God made the grass. Say it, now.”
“God made the grass.”
“That is right. Who takes care of the beautiful grass and makes it grow?”
“Chief Police.”
“Oh, no, no, no—not the Chief of Police. The good God takes care of the grass and makes it grow. Say it, my boy— that’s a good fellow.”
“The good God takes care of the grass and makes it grow.”
“How does grass grow?”
“With an iron railing around it.”
“No, I do not mean that. I mean, what does it come from? It comes from little tiny seeds. The good Heavenly Father makes the grass to grow from little seeds. You won’t forget that now, will you?”
“Bet your bottom dollar!”
“Ah, naughty, naughty boy. You must not use slang. Where do little boys go who use slang?”
“Dono. I goes to the Bowery when shining’s good and I’ve got the lush.”
“Tut, tut, tut! Don’t talk so. You make me nervous. Little boys who talk that way go to the——bad place!”
“No—but do they? Where is it?”
“It is where there is fire and brimstone always and forever.”
“Suits Crooks! I never ben warm enough yet, ony summer time. Wisht I’d a ben there in the winter when I hadn’t any bed kiver but a shutter. That Higgins boy he busted two of the slats out, and then I couldn’t keep the cold out no way. It had a beautiful brass knob on it, Cap., but brass knobs ain’t no good, ony for style, you know. I’d like to ben in that bad place them times, by hokey!”
“Don’t swear, James. It is wicked.”
“What’s wicked?”
“Why, to be wicked is to do what one ought not to do—to violate the moral ordinances provided for the regulation of our conduct in this vale of sorrows, and for the elevation and refinement of our social and intellectual natures.”
“Gee—whillikins!”
“Don’t use such words, my son—pray don’t.”
“Well, then I won’t—but I didn’t mean no harm—wish I may die if I did. But you made a ‘spare,’ that time, didn’t you?”
“A ‘spare?’ What is a spare, my child?”
“You don’t know what a ‘spare’ is? Oh, no, gov’ner, that cat won’t fight, you know. Fool who, with your nigger babies whitewashed with brickdust!”
“Well, I believe it is nearly useless to try to break you of using slang, my poor, neglected boy. But truly, I do not know what a ‘spare’ is. What is a ‘spare?’ ”
“Well, if you ain’t ignorant, I’m blowed! Why a spare is where you fetch all the pins with two balls—and when you make a ten-strike, you’ve got two spares, you know. Well, when you got off all of them jaw-breakers, I judged the pins was all down on your alley, anyway.”
“I stand rebuked, James. Egotism will betray the best of us to humiliation.”
“Spare! I tell you them winders of yours snakes the head pin every time, gov’ner.”
“Conquered again!—Well, James, we will go back to the old lesson. I am out of my element in this. James, what is grass for?”
“To make parks out of,—like the City Hall.”
“Is that all? Isn’t it to make the pretty fields, and lawns, and meadows?”
“Don’t know nothing about them things—never seen ’em.”
“Ah, pity. What does our Heavenly Father do with the grass when He makes it?”
“Puts it in the Hall park and puts up a sign, ‘Keep off’n the grass—dogs ain’t allowed.’ ”
“Poor boy! And what does He put it there for?”
“To look at, through the railings.”
“Well, it really does seem so. What would you do with the beautiful grass that God has made, if you had it?”
“Roll in it! Oh, gay!”
“Well, I wish in my heart the City Fathers would let you—so that you might have one pleasure that God intended for all childhood, even the children of poverty!—yea, that He intended even for vagrant dogs, that shun the tax and gain precarious livelihoods by devious ways and questionable practices.”
“Set ’em up again, gov’ner!”
“I was partly talking to myself, James—that is why I used the long words. James, who made you?”
“Chief Police, I guess.”
“Mercy! I wish I could get that all-powerful potentate out of your head. No, James, God made you.”
“Did he, though?”
“Yes—God made you, as well as the grass.”
“Honest injun? That’s bully. But I wish he’d fence me in and take care of me, same as he does the grass.”
“He does take care of you James. You ought to be very thankful to Him. He gives you the clothes you wear—”
“Gov’ner, I got them pants from Mike the ragman, myself.”
“But they came from above, James—they came from your Heavenly Father. He gave them to you.”
“I pass. But I reckon I had to pay for ’em, though. Mike never told me. He never said nothing about parties giving ’em to me.”
“Why, James! But then you do not know any better. And He gives you your food—”
“ ’Spensary soup! I wisht I had a cag of it!”
“And the bed that you sleep in—”
“Cellar door and a shutter with a brass knob on it. Now look-a-here gov’ner, you’re a guying me. You never tried a shutter. I ain’t thankful for no such a bed as that.”
“But you ought to be, James, you ought to be. Think how many boys are worse off than you are.”
“I give in, I do. There’s that-there Peanut Jim—his parents is awful poor. He ain’t got no shutter. I was always sorry for that poor cuss.”*
c. May 1868