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The Sport of the Gods by Paul Laurence Dunbar
page 56 of 160 (35%)

It was a relief to the Hamiltons to find Mrs. Jones so gracious and
home-like. So the matter was settled, and they took up their abode with
her and sent for their baggage.

With the first pause in the rush that they had experienced since
starting away from home, Mrs. Hamilton began to have time for
reflection, and their condition seemed to her much better as it was. Of
course, it was hard to be away from home and among strangers, but the
arrangement had this advantage,--that no one knew them or could taunt
them with their past trouble. She was not sure that she was going to
like New York. It had a great name and was really a great place, but the
very bigness of it frightened her and made her feel alone, for she knew
that there could not be so many people together without a deal of
wickedness. She did not argue the complement of this, that the amount of
good would also be increased, but this was because to her evil was the
very present factor in her life.

Joe and Kit were differently affected by what they saw about them. The
boy was wild with enthusiasm and with a desire to be a part of all that
the metropolis meant. In the evening he saw the young fellows passing by
dressed in their spruce clothes, and he wondered with a sort of envy
where they could be going. Back home there had been no place much worth
going to, except church and one or two people's houses. But these young
fellows seemed to show by their manners that they were neither going to
church nor a family visiting. In the moment that he recognised this, a
revelation came to him,--the knowledge that his horizon had been very
narrow, and he felt angry that it was so. Why should those fellows be
different from him? Why should they walk the streets so knowingly, so
independently, when he knew not whither to turn his steps? Well, he was
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