the weekly dimes in industrial insurance. Or cleaning the streets.

The Old Gentleman moved, straight and stately, toward the
Institution that he was rearing. Truly, the annual feeding of Stuffy
Pete was nothing national in its character, such as the Magna Charta
or jam for breakfast was in England. But it was a step. It was
almost feudal. It showed, at least, that a Custom was not impossible
to New Y--ahem!--America.

The Old Gentleman was thin and tall and sixty. He was dressed all in
black, and wore the old-fashioned kind of glasses that won't stay
on your nose. His hair was whiter and thinner than it had been last
year, and he seemed to make more use of his big, knobby cane with
the crooked handle.

As his established benefactor came up Stuffy wheezed and shuddered
like some woman's over-fat pug when a street dog bristles up at him.
He would have flown, but all the skill of Santos-Dumont could not
have separated him from his bench. Well had the myrmidons of the two
old ladies done their work.

"Good morning," said the Old Gentleman. "I am glad to perceive that
the vicissitudes of another year have spared you to move in health
about the beautiful world. For that blessing alone this day of
thanksgiving is well proclaimed to each of us. If you will come with
me, my man, I will provide you with a dinner that should make your
physical being accord with the mental."

That is what the old Gentleman said every time. Every Thanksgiving
Day for nine years. The words themselves almost formed an