Jacob Riis

“ The third time he all but passed it, and took a mighty grip on the affrighted woman, shouting into her ear to loose her own hold at the same time. As they passed the window on the fourth trip, he thrust her through sash and all with a supreme effort, and himself (p. 260) followed on the next rebound, while the street, that was black with a surging multitude, rang with a mighty cheer. Old Washington Ryer, on his ladder, threw his cap in the air, and cheered louder than all the rest. But the parrot was dead—frightened to death, very likely, or smothered. ”

“ As if in a dream they saw him issue forth with the coveted prize.
"There, kid!" he said, holding out the two fattest and whitest cakes to Santa Claus's champion; "there's yer Christmas. Run along, now, to yer barracks; and you, Jim, here's one for you, though yer don't desarve it. Mind ye let the kid alone."
"This one'll have to do for me grub, I guess. I ain't sold me 'Newses,' and the ole man'll kick if I bring 'em home."
Before the shuffling feet of the ragamuffins hurrying homeward had turned the corner, the last mouthful of the newsboy's supper was smothered in a yell of "Extree!" ”

“ A writer for a newspaper by vocation, Jacob Riis found in his pen a strong power in his battles for reform. Throughout the latter years of his life he contributed frequent articles to magazines, and in 1890 published a book which alone will long make men remember the vital purpose of his life. How the Other Half Lives tells by its title its message to the world; it is the Golden Rule reduced to modern terms. ”

“ Jim has one friend that hasn't gone back on him. I've come to keep Christmas with you, 'Liza! Had your supper, eh? You're in luck. I haven't; I wasn't bid, 'Liza; but never mind. You shall feed for both of us. Here goes!" He dug into the oats-bin with the measure, and poured it full into 'Liza's crib.
"Fill up, old girl! and good night to you." With a departing pat he crept up the ladder to the (p. 243) loft above, and, scooping out a berth in the loose hay, snuggled down in it to sleep. Soon his regular breathing up there kept step with the steady munching of the horse in her stall. ”

“ So, in all matters pertaining to their religious life that tinges all their customs, they stand these East Side Jews, where the new day that dawned on Calvary left them standing, stubbornly refusing to see the light. A visit to a Jewish house of mourning is like bridging the gap of two thousand years. The inexpressibly sad and sorrowful wail for the dead, as it swells and rises in the hush of all sounds of life, comes back from the ages like a mournful echo of the voice of Rachel "weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are not." ”

“ Even base-ball had lost its savor. The Ivy nine had disbanded at the first drum-beat, and had taken the fever in a body. Jim, being fourteen, and growing "muscle" with daily pride, "had it bad." Naturally Jocko, being Jim's constant companion, developed the symptoms too, and, to external appearances, thirsted for gore as eagerly as a naturally peace-loving, long-tailed monkey could.
Jocko had belonged to an Italian organ-grinder in the days of "the persecution," when the aldermen issued an edict, against monkeys. Now he was "hung up" for rent, unpaid. ”

“ Joe took a step toward his son and held out his hand to him.
“Jim,” he said, “you’re a better man nor yer father. From now on, you’n I run the truck on shares. But mind this, Jim: never leave mother no more.”
And in the clasp of the two hands all the past was forgotten and forgiven. Father and son had found each other again.
“’Liza,” said the truckman, with sudden vehemence, turning to the old mare and putting his arm around her neck, “’Liza! It was your doin’s. I knew it was luck when I found them things. Merry Christmas!” And he kissed her smack on her hairy mouth, one, two, three times. ”

“ He saw that the city spoils much good human material.
“We talk a great deal about city toughs,” he says in his autobiography. “In nine cases out of ten they are lads of normal impulses whose possibilities have all been smothered by the slum. With better opportunities they might have been heroes.”
Many honors came to Jacob Riis. He was known as a “boss reporter”; his books gave him a nation-wide fame; the King of Denmark sent him the Crusaders’ Cross, the greatest honor his native land could bestow; President Roosevelt called him the “most useful American” of his day. ”

“ Riley was a capable meat-cutter earning good wages, who wouldn’t have done a neighbor out of a cent that was his due, a robust citizen with more than his share of good looks, a devoted husband and a doting father, inseparable when at home from little Mike, whose baby trick of squaring off and offering to “bust his father’s face” was the pride of the block. ”

“ The water would not be back to lift them off for six hours and more. They indulged in no lamentations, but sturdily produced the schnapps and sandwiches without which no Dane is easily to be tempted out of sight of his home: the rector evolved a pack of cards from the depths of his coat pocket, and upon the sandbank the party camped, playing a cheerful game of whist until the tide came back and bore them home.
The night comes on. The people are returning from their evening constitutional, walking in the middle of the street and taking off their hats to their neighbors as they pass. ”

“ The charity managers in London said it, when we looked through their slums some years ago, "The Jews have renovated Whitechapel." I, for one, am a firm believer in this Jew, and in his boy. Ignorant they are, but with a thirst for knowledge that surmounts any barrier. The boy takes all the prizes in the school. His comrades sneer that he will not fight. Neither will he when there is nothing to be gained by it. Yet, in defence of his rights, there is in all the world no such fighter as he. Literally, he will die fighting, by inches, too, from starvation. ”

“ So strong and so handy on the wagon. Old 'Liza loved him like a brother and minded him even better than she did himself. If he only had him now, they could face the winter and the bad times, and pull through. But things never had gone right since he left. He didn't know, Joe thought humbly as he jogged along over the rough road, but he had been a little hard on the lad. Boys wanted a chance once in a while. All work and no play was not for them. Likely he had forgotten he was a boy once himself. But Jim was such a big lad, 'most like a man. ”

“ They crowded out, glasses in hand, to see what it was.
"Only a dead tramp," said some one, and the crowd went back to the warm saloon, where the barrels lay in rows on the racks. The clink of glasses and shouts of laughter came through the peep-hole in the door into the dark hallway as Policeman Schultz bent over the stiff, cold shape. Some one had called him.
"Denny," he said, tugging at his sleeve.
"Denny, come. Your time is up. I am here." Denny never stirred. The policeman looked up, white in the face. ”

“ The man of industry and wealth tried to buy it many a time and oft, but Knud would not sell; not he, for in an unguarded moment the other had disputed his right to keep it there at all, and he was merely standing upon his undoubted rights. Had not his father kept it there before him? So it was a drawn battle, and the subject of many heart-burnings, until the Palm Sunday when the manufacturer’s daughter went to confirmation. Knud loved [Pg 46] the ground she trod on, as did every one else in the Old Town, and sought a way of showing his good-will. ”

“ He had expressed a wish to my wife to read our story, and I sent to London for a copy of “The Making of an American,” which he fell to reading at once, according to his habit. They say in Denmark that he reads everything and never forgets anything, and has it all at his fingers’ end always. I had proof of that when we next met. It was in the Old Town at the reopening of the Domkirke. I was coming out of our hotel at seven in the morning, and in the Square ran plumb into a gentleman in a military cloak, who had a young man for company and a girl of fifteen or sixteen. ”

“ Mr. Riley rampant was a very different person. His arrival was invariably heralded by the smashing of the top of the kitchen stove, followed by the summary ejection of the once beloved family, helter-skelter, from the tenement. Three times the Bureau had been at the expense of having the stove top mended to keep the little Rileys from starving and [Pg 19] freezing at once, and it was looking forward with concern to the meat-cutter’s next encounter with his grievance. For there was a psychological reason for the manner of his outbreaks. The Rileys had once had a boarder, when Kate was a baby. ”

“ In the gap the slum grows up. That was one reason why I hailed with a shout the proposition of Mr. Schwab, the steel trust millionnaire, to take a regiment of boys down to Staten Island on an excursion every day in summer. Let me see, I haven't told about that, I think. He had bought a large property down there, all beach and lake and field and woodland, and proposed to build a steamer with room for a thousand or two, and then take them down with a band of music on board, (p. 406) and give them a swim, a romp, and a jolly good time. ”

“ From distant lands and peaceful homes have we come to battle for freedom, truth and thy gospel. Give us victory for thy holy name’s sake, Amen!”
Tilly had expected the King to attack, but the fiery Pappenheim upset his plans. The smoke of the guns drifted in the faces of the Swedes and the King swung his army to the south to get the wind right. In making the turn they had to cross a brook and this moment Pappenheim chose for his charge. Like a thunderbolt his Walloons fell upon them. The Swedish fire mowed them down like ripened grain and checked their impetuous rush. ”

“ Her father and Knud were neighbors and Knud's barn-yard was a sore subject between them, being right under the other's dining-room window. He sometimes protested and oftener offered to buy, but Knud would neither listen nor sell. But he loved the ground his neighbor's pretty daughter walked upon, as did, indeed, every poor man in the town, and on her Sunday he showed it by strewing the offensive pile with fresh cut grass and leaves, and sticking it full of flowers. It was well meant, and it was Danish all over. Stick up for your rights at any cost. ”

“ He sat in the pew beside the deacon through the sermon as decorously as befitted a dog come to years of discretion long since, and wagged his tail in a friendly manner when the minister came down and patted him on the head after the benediction. Outside he met the Sunday-school children on their own ground, and on their own terms. Jack, if he didn't have blood, had (p. 348) sense, which for working purposes is quite as good, if not so common. The girls gave him candy and called him Jack Sprat. ”

“ The good parson was hardly out of sight on his way back when the sheriff’s men came looking for Gustav. It did not occur to them that the yokel who stood warming himself by the stove might be the man they were after. But the gamekeeper’s wife was quick to see his peril. She was baking bread and had just put the loaves into the oven with a long-handled spade. “Here, you lummox!” she cried, and whacked him soundly over the back with it, “what are ye standing there gaping at? Did ye never see folks afore? Get back to your work in the barn.” And Gustav, taking the hint, slunk out of the room. ”

“ But, happily, Jim was little concerned about things to come. He lived in the day that is, fighting his way as he could [Pg 171] with a leg and a half and a nickname,—“Gimpy” they called him for his limp,—and getting out of it what a fellow so handicapped could. After all, there were compensations. When the gang scattered before the cop, it did not occur to him to lay any of the blame to Gimpy, though the little lad with the pinched face and sharp eyes had, in fact, done scouting duty most craftily. ”

“ The Old Town never saw her again.
Happily the ordinary tenor of life there ran on a different plane. Neighborly kindness ruled; on the basis of the square deal, however: to every one his own. Stick up for your rights; these [Pg 44] secure, go any length to oblige a neighbor. It is a characteristic of the Danish people, who are essentially honest, intolerant of pretence, stubbornly democratic, and withal good-natured to a degree. Hence their apparent passion for argument, which is all-pervading, but utterly harmless, excepting as it delays action. Business is held up ”

“ The tenement house children organized street cleaning bands to help along the work, and Colonel Waring enlisted them as regular auxiliaries and made them useful.
They had no better friend. When the unhappy plight of the persecuted push-cart men—all immigrant Jews, who were blackmailed, robbed, and driven from pillar to post as a nuisance after they had bought a license to trade in the street—appealed vainly for a remedy. Colonel Waring found a way out in a great morning market in Hester Street that should be turned over to the children for a playground in the afternoon. ”

“ Riis and his works that he is one man among a thousand. He is unique. He does his work of benevolence and reform under conditions that would harden the hearts of many men and certainly excite disgust; but he comes out of the grime and dust with some cheery note or some heroic incident, some story of self-sacrifice among the poor, or some thought which ennobles the struggle.”—New York Mail. ”