CHAPTER XXXVI.

In a dark, narrow street, in one of those heterogeneous boarding-houses abounding in the city, where clerks, market-boys, apprentices, and sewing-girls, bolt their meals with railroad velocity; where the maid-of-all-work, with red arms, frowzy head, and leathern lungs, screams in the entry for any boarder who happens to be inquired for at the door; where one plate suffices for fish, flesh, fowl, and dessert; where soiled table-cloths, sticky crockery, oily cookery, and bad grammar, predominate; where greasy cards are shuffled, and bad cigars smoked of an evening, you might have found Ruth and her children.

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"Jim, what do you think of her?" said a low-browed, pig-faced, thick-lipped fellow, with a flashy neck-tie and vest, over which several yards of gilt watch-chain were festooned ostentatiously; "prettyish, isn't she?"

"Deuced nice form," said Jim, lighting a cheap cigar, and hitching his heels to the mantel, as he took the first whiff; "I shouldn't mind kissing her."

"_You?_" said Sam, glancing in an opposite mirror; "I flatter myself you would stand a poor chance when your humble servant was round. If I had not made myself scarce, out of friendship, you would not have made such headway with black-eyed Sue, the little milliner."

"Pooh," said Jim, "Susan Gill was delf, this little widow is porcelain; I say it is a deuced pity she should stay up stairs, crying her eyes out, the way she does."

"Want to marry her, hey?" said Sam, with a sneer.

"Not I; none of your ready-made families for me; pretty foot, hasn't she? I always put on my coat in the front entry, about the time she goes up stairs, to get a peep at it. It is a confounded pretty foot, Sam, bless me if it isn't; I should like to drive the owner of it out to the race-course, some pleasant afternoon. I must say, Sam, I like widows. I don't know any occupation more interesting than helping to dry up their tears; and then the little dears are so grateful for any little attention. Wonder if my swallow-tailed coat won't be done to-day? that rascally tailor ought to be snipped with his own shears."

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"Well, now, I wonder when you gentlemen intend taking yourselves off, and quitting the drawing-room," said the loud-voiced landlady, perching a cap over her disheveled tresses; "this parlor is the only place I have to dress in; can't you do your talking and smoking in your own rooms? Come now--here's a lot of newspapers, just take them and be off, and give a woman a chance to make herself beautiful."

"Beautiful!" exclaimed Sam, "the old dragon! she would make a good scarecrow for a corn-field, or a figure-head for a piratical cruiser; beautiful!" and the speaker smoothed a wrinkle out of his flashy yellow vest; "it is my opinion that the uglier a woman is, the more beautiful she thinks herself; also, that any of the sex may be bought with a yard of ribbon, or a breastpin."

"Certainly," said Jim, "you needn't have lived to this time of life to have made that discovery; and speaking of that, reminds me that the little widow is as poor as Job's turkey. My washerwoman, confound her for ironing off my shirt-buttons, says that she wears her clothes rough-dry, because she can't afford to pay for both washing and ironing."

"She does?" replied Sam; "she'll get tired of that after awhile. I shall request 'the dragon,' to-morrow, to let me sit next her at the table. I'll begin by helping the children, offering to cut up their victuals, and all that sort of thing--that will please the mother, you know; hey? But, by Jove! it's three o'clock, and I engaged to drive a gen'lemen down to the steamboat landing; now some other hackney coach will get the job. Confound it!"