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Show " EAR LADIES, I thank you for I the Thanksgiving basket. It I I was a surprise to me. The CCjJjRigk kids wuz crazy. Kj Yours thankful, LENA HALL." That was the letter she dictated to me, the woman from 'way over there where rents are relatively cheap, where coal is bought by the single basket bas-ket and where a can of tinned milk can be made to last a family of four a whole week. I put the words down just as she said them, for I thought the "ladies" would find it heart-warming to learn that their gift had such an effect on the dull gray household that "the kids wuz crazy." She told me it was a $5 basket. There was a chicken, vegetables enough for a week, even potatoes the first in their house this winter fruit, everything to make a real feast. Who sent it? Well, she didn't know their names, but she knew it was through the Bureau of Charities her family had got all that. So she had called up the bureau and thanked them and they said a club of ladies were the ones that sent the things. The club had telephoned In and asked for the address of some family that would not be likely to have a big dinner, and then they had filled the basket and sent It to the address given. Now she would like to thank the club. She could read English but she couldn't spell the words. Would I write the letter let-ter for her? And that was the way the ladles found out that the "kids wuz crazy." I went over to Mrs. Hall's home, and the setting and situation seemed to my Inexperience exaggerated beyond actuality. The place looked like a stage representation of poverty. The husband had deserted ; there were three children, a toddler, a sickly girl of nine, a sickly boy of ten ; and the mother had "pains In the chest," could work only intermittently. There was plenty of work to be had this year, she said, but first one child fell sick, then another, and she herself, after being so hot In the steamy basements where she did washings and then going go-ing out into the cold, would got those pains in the chest and would have to give up for awhile. At present about all she was doing was working at home, putting strings on express tags. Going home in the street car I fell Into such an abstraction I went nearly to the limits before I woke up enmr-'h to consider the matter of alighting. I got to thinking of contrasts of a world of folk fussing about the ovtf amount of protein they had in their systems, and that other world with Ihe family milk ration one tin a week ; of people suffering from superheated apartments, and of those that watched anxiously the dwindling nuggets in the basket; of people blinking under the glare of too-many-and-too-high-powor bulbs, of the Hall family that went to bed right after supper to save light ; of dancing-dresses trimmed with fur, of the thin cottony coat Jlmmie Hall was wearing; of limousine with orchids orch-ids showing at the glass and foot- warmers for footrests, then of Mrs. Hall walking miles to her work to save five cents. Attending a Kinsolving concert a recent re-cent morning in the crystal ballroom of the Blackstone hotel, after the concert con-cert loitering awhile in the lobby, later sauntering along Michigan avenue ave-nue and stopping to look at this window win-dow of exotic blooms, at that one where platinum, diamonds and pearls showed up with full effect against their, velvet backgrounds, the while seeing the stream of luxurious vehicles flowing flow-ing on in such volume, the companion that was with me had said, "Well, undoubtedly un-doubtedly America is prosperous this year; I have never been so impressed with our luxury, with the general well-being." well-being." Coming from the Halls that later day I thought of this remark, of the whole pleasurable scene calling it forth ; and I wondered at the why and the wherefores of the inequalities. Why the too-much on the one table the bare subsistence on the other? The slothful warmth, and the dreary cold? The over-brilliant rooms, and the long darkness? Of chiffon bordered bor-dered with fur, and of shivering Jim-mie? Jim-mie? Of "the colonel's lady, and of Julia O'Grady"? Who are going to solve it, when is it going to be solved? Nobody, it seems. Never, it seems. But at least once in awhile, at this special season and that, a momentary lifting of the cloud may occur at least for the children. chil-dren. Say at Thanksgiving and Christmas, Christ-mas, if each able one would look after The Place Looked Like a Stage Representation Rep-resentation of Poverty. one unable family, what a lot of "kids could be made crazy !" Come on, pile up the basket ! Telephone Tele-phone to the center that knows the needs, or take a case whose needs you yourself know, and do your best to spoil one group of small ones for one day. Put in the chicken ! Put in vegetables vege-tables enough for a week. Pon't forget for-get the potatoes. Remember the fruit. Add candy. Get some Jimniie a woolen coat, and long thick stockings, and exchange ex-change his misshapen, run-down-at-the-hecls shoes for brand-new ones, thick-soled and equal to keeping out the cold. Give the sure-to-be-thr re baby a warm outfit, second-hand or first-hand, matters not. Cover that little lit-tle girl's thin red fingers with thick red mittens. Be sure to give plenty of candy it won't hurt 'em. And tie nil the stuff up fancy like and foolish like. Tour friends are bored to extinction, ex-tinction, of course, by the repeated Complexities of today's Christinas packing; but folk like the Halls won't be. They'll like it; luxuries will help toward that wildness of joy you are working for. Come on. ye unhappy overfed, ye over-warmed, ye blinded by too much light and color, ye of the frivolous fur trimming, and ye lady of the limousine; come all and have a hand in this riot, this midwinter madness, mad-ness, this effort to make a certain class of kids "crazy." (Copyright. 1S17. Weetern Newspaper Union.) |