Horatio Alger

“ Mark was a gentle, peaceful boy, but such attacks naturally made him indignant.
"I am not an impostor, and I neither lie nor steal," he said, looking alternately from the mother to the son.
"Oh, you're a fine young man, I've no doubt," said Roswell, wiht a sneer. "But we'd better be getting on, mother, unless you mean to stop in Fulton Market all night."
So mother and son passed on, leaving Mark with a sense of mortification and injury. He would have given the ten cents he had, not to have asked charity of this woman who had answered him so unpleasantly. ”

“ Then there are fruit- stalls with tempting heaps of oranges, apples, and in their season the fruits of summer, presided over for the most part by old women, who scan shrewdly the faces of passers-by, and are ready on the smallest provocation to vaunt the merits of their wares. ”

“ But there still remained fifteen cents to obtain, and with- out that he did not feel safe in going back.
So he looked about him for another person to address. This time he thought he would ask a lady. Accordingly he went up to one, who was walking with her son, a boy of sixteen, to judge from appearance, and asked for a few pennies.
"Get out of my way, you little beggar!" she said, in a disagreeable tone. "Ain't you ashamed of yourself, going round begging, instead of earning money like honest people?"
"I've been trying to earn money all day," said Mark, rather indignant at this attack. ”