For twenty minutes or more odd waifs and strays of humanity crawled in through the trap-door, obtained their message of good or ill, and departed into the shadows as silently as they had come.

" From these waifs and strays of gossip we return to a subject of deeper interest.

By Louisa M. Alcott Author of "Little Women," etc. Originally published under the title "PROVERB STORIES" 1882 [Illustration: Deeper in the wood sounded the measured ring of axes] PREFACE Being forbidden to write anything at present I have collected various waifs and strays to appease the young people who clamor for more, forgetting that mortal brains need rest.

We were just waifs together.

It is a heart-rending picture, this sensitive child working from dawn till dark for a few pennies, and associating with toughs and waifs in his brief intervals of labor; but we can see in it the sources of that intimate knowledge of the hearts of the poor and outcast which was soon to be reflected in literature and to startle all England by its appeal for sympathy.

David Copperfield, enduring Mr. Murdstone's cruel neglect, Florence Dombey pining for her father's love, the Marchioness starving upon cold potatoes, Tom and Louise Gradgrind, stuffed with facts and allowed no innocent amusement, and the waifs of Tom's-All-Alone dying from abject poverty and disease, are only a few of the sad-eyed children peering from the pages of Dickens and yearning for love and understanding.

His first stories and poems, often written in hot haste, to fill the urgent need of more copy, appeared as waifs and strays in the papers for which he wrote.

On arriving there he joined a mess of waifs and strays like himself, who herded in a small room and clubbed their pice to provide meals.

I ask you on behalf of the twelve hundred children under twelve years of age who are in the poor-houses of Indiana, of the sixteen hundred in the poor-houses of Illinois, and on that average in every State in the Union, that you shall take the word "male" out of the constitutions and allow the women of this country to sit in legislative halls and provide homes for and look after the little waifs of society.

All credit is due Mr. and Mrs. Breen for keeping the nine helpless waifs left with them at Starved Camp alive until food was brought them by members of the Third Relief Party.

It was a time when the divine creatures born of woman seemed mere little waifs astray in a friendless universe, somehow lost on a cruel earth, crying like children in the pitiless night, foredoomed and predestined to broken hearts and death.

A Street Waifs' Benefit for Street Waifs!

A Street Waifs' Benefit for Street Waifs!

Imagine the rapture of wrecks from the gutter and waifs from the slum, When first on their ears falls the jubilant thrill of the sky-soaring lark, or the wild bee's low hum!

"Nobody's Boys," the lost waifs of the city, foredoomed, but for aid, to debasement and crime, Possible gallows-birds,they with wan faces late cleansed from the rookery's hideous grime, Snatched from the gutter whilst boyhood bears hope with it, gathered and tended with vigilant care.

BURNS should have sung of them; trim-skirted Muse, with punctilious tastes, Were not at home with these waifs from the rookery, pastured at large in free Nature's wild wastes, Bounding, and breathing fresh air, romping, wrestling, and disciplined only to cleanness and order.

Mr. J.W.C. FEGAN, of the Boys' Home, Southwark, the writer of the pleasant pamphlet entitled Camping Out, makes appeal towards the expenses of giving "a fortnight's holiday under canvasby the sea, if possible"to the waifs and strays in Mr. FEGAN'S Homes.

The waifs from the slum and the gutter Are off "to the country" in troops, To feed on new eggs and fresh butter, To frolic with balls and with hoops; These three, with their eyes on the poster That hints unattainable joys, Must envy the son of the Coster, The waifs of the Workhouse.

The waifs from the slum and the gutter Are off "to the country" in troops, To feed on new eggs and fresh butter, To frolic with balls and with hoops; These three, with their eyes on the poster That hints unattainable joys, Must envy the son of the Coster, The waifs of the Workhouse.

only too many waifs already in the world to whom such a home, though imperfect, would be a paradise to what it has.

For more than a year I thoroughly enjoyed the work of uplifting those waifs on our sea of life; they responded appreciatively to the influence of kindly words and acts, even as the Aeolian harp yields its sweetest music to the caresses of the airs of heaven.

Three little waifs had found a home.

It is yet in its infancy; but we hope to see, ere many years have passed, in every State of our Union, asylums reared, where these waifs of humanity shall be gathered, and such training given them as may develope in the highest degree possible the hitherto rudimentary faculties of their minds, and render them capable of performing, in some humble measure, their part in the drama of life.

Here and there, slowly revealing themselves through the diminishing darkness, like horrible waifs left uncovered by a falling river, appeared the bodies of four Apaches, naked to the breechcloth and painted black, all quiet except one which twitched convulsively.

He put into my hands old books, unprinted diaries, scraps of paper inscribed by great figures in historic moments, the solid sources, and also the waifs and strays from which proper history must be built up.