Phil, the Fiddler. Alger Horatio Jr.

The apple he might keep for himself, and it would vary agreeably his usual meager fare.

      “The biggest contribution yet,” said Edward.

      “Here, Sprague, you are liberal. What’ll you give?”

      “My note at ninety days.”

      “You might fail before it comes due.”

      “Then take three cents. ‘Tis all I have; ‘I can no more, though poor the offering be.’”

      “Oh, don’t quote Shakespeare.”

      “It isn’t Shakespeare; it’s Milton.”

      “Just as much one as the other.”

      “Here, Johnny,” said Edward, after going the rounds, “hold your hands, and I’ll pour out the money. You can retire from business now on a fortune.”

      Phil was accustomed to be addressed as Johnny, that being the generic name for boy in New York. He deposited the money in his pocket, and, taking his fiddle, played once more in acknowledgment of the donation. The boys now dispersed, leaving Phil to go on his way. He took out the apple with the intention of eating it, when a rude boy snatched it from his hand.

      “Give it back,” said Phil, angrily.

      “Don’t you wish you may get it?” said the other, holding it out of his reach.

      The young musician had little chance of redress, his antagonist was a head taller than himself, and, besides, he would not have dared lay down his fiddle to fight, lest it might be broken.

      “Give it to me,” he said, stamping his foot.

      “I mean to eat it myself,” said the other, coolly. “It’s too good for the likes of you.”

      “You’re a thief.”

      “Don’t you call me names, you little Italian ragamuffin, or I’ll hit you,” said the other, menacingly.

      “It is my apple.”

      “I’m going to eat it.”

      But the speaker was mistaken. As he held the apple above his head, it was suddenly snatched from him. He looked around angrily, and confronted Edward Eustis, who, seeing Phil’s trouble from a little distance, had at once come to his rescue.

      “What did you do that for?” demanded the thief.

      “What did you take the boy’s apple for?”

      “Because I felt like it.”

      “Then I took it from you for the same reason.”

      “Do you want to fight?” blustered the rowdy.

      “Not particularly.”

      “Then hand me back that apple,” returned the other.

      “Thank you; I shall only hand it to the rightful owner—that little Italian boy. Are you not ashamed to rob him?”

      “Do you want to get hit?”

      “I wouldn’t advise you to do it.”

      The rowdy looked at the boy who confronted him. Edward was slightly smaller, but there was a determined look in his eye which the bully, who, like those of his class generally, was a coward at heart, did not like. He mentally decided that it would be safer not to provoke him.

      “Come here, Johnny, and take your apple,” said Edward.

      Phil advanced, and received back his property with satisfaction.

      “You’d better eat it now. I’ll see that he doesn’t disturb you.”

      Phil followed the advice of his new friend promptly. He had eaten nothing since seven o’clock, and then only a piece of dry bread and cheese, and the apple, a rare luxury, he did not fail to relish. His would-be robber scowled at him meanwhile, for he had promised himself the pleasure of dispatching the fruit. Edward stood by till the apple was eaten, and then turned away. The rowdy made a movement as if to follow Phil, but Edward quickly detected him, and came back.

      “Don’t you dare touch him,” he said, significantly, “or you’ll have to settle accounts with me. Do you see that policeman? I am going to ask him to have an eye on you. You’d better look out for yourself.”

      The other turned at the caution, and seeing the approach of one of the Metropolitan police quickly vanished. He had a wholesome fear of these guardians of the public peace, and did not care to court their attention.

      Edward turned away, but in a moment felt a hand tugging at his coat. Looking around, he saw that it was Phil.

      “Grazia, signore,” said Phil, gratefully.

      “I suppose that means ‘Thank you’?”

      Phil nodded.

      “All right, Johnny! I am glad I was by to save you from that bully.”

      CHAPTER III

      GIACOMO

      After eating the apple Phil decided to buy his frugal dinner. He, therefore, went into a baker’s shop, and bought two penny rolls and a piece of cheese. It was not a very luxurious repast, but with the apple it was better than usual. A few steps from the shop door he met another Italian boy, who was bound to the same padrone.

      “How much money have you, Giacomo?” asked Phil, speaking, of course, in his native tongue.

      “Forty cents. How much have you?”

      “A dollar and twenty cents.”

      “You are very lucky, Filippo.”

      “A rich signora gave me fifty cents for playing to her sick boy. Then I sang for some schoolboys, and they gave me some money.”

      “I am afraid the padrone will beat me to-night.”

      “He has not beat me for a week.”

      “Have you had dinner, Filippo?”

      “Yes, I had some bread and cheese, and an apple.”

      “Did you buy the apple?”

      “No; one of the schoolboys gave it to me. It was very good,” said Phil, in a tone of enjoyment. “I had not eaten one for a long time.”

      “Nor I. Do you remember, Filippo, the oranges we had in Italy?”

      “I remember them well.”

      “I was happy then,” said Giacomo, sighing. “There was no padrone to beat me, and I could run about and play. Now I have to sing and play all day. I am so tired sometimes,—so tired, Filippo.”

      “You are not so strong as I, Giacomo,” said Phil, looking with some complacency at his own stout limbs.

      “Don’t you get tired, Filippo?”

      “Yes, often; but I don’t care so much for that. But I don’t like the winter.”

      “I thought I should die with cold sometimes last winter,” said Giacomo, shuddering. “Do you ever expect to go back to Italy, Filippo?”

      “Sometime.”

      “I wish I could go now. I should like to see my dear mother and my sisters.”

      “And your father?”

      “I don’t want to see him,” said Giacomo, bitterly. “He sold me to the padrone. My mother wept bitterly when I went away, but my father only thought of the money.”

      Filippo and Giacomo were from the same town in Calabria. They were the sons of Italian peasants who had been unable to resist the offers of the padrone, and for less than a hundred dollars each had sold his son into the cruelest slavery. The boys were torn from their native hills, from their families, and in a foreign land were doomed to walk the streets from fourteen to sixteen hours in every twenty-four, gathering money from which they received small benefit. Many times, as they trudged through the streets, weary and hungry, sometimes cold, they thought with homesick sadness of the sunny fields in which their earliest years had been passed, but the