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Those in charge of military lodgings furnished by the inhabitants also made large profits. At Dresden could be seen Parisian tailors and bootmakers, teaching the natives to work in the French style. Even bootblacks were found on the bridges over the Elbe, crying, as they had cried on the bridges of the Seine, "Shine your boots!"
Newsboys and bootblacks were the only beings who escaped the formality; tips to waiters, porters, cabbies, etc., were recorded and afterward put into a class by themselves. Receipts for the few dollars remaining in his possession were to be turned over on the morning of the 23d and the general report was not to be completed until 9 o'clock on that day.
Wonderful! how the lad had changed! like a phantom, the thoughtless prattler was gone in a moment, and in his place stood the seer-boy of the picture, the profound foreboding eyes fixed anxiously, earnestly, on the singular man who at that moment entered: a singularly small man, cheaply but tidily attired in black; even his shoes polished, a rare and dandyish indulgence in San Francisco, before the French bootblacks inaugurated the sumptuary vanity of Day and Martin's lustre on the stoop of the California Exchange, and made it a necessity no less than diurnal ablutions; a well-preserved English hat on his head, which, when he with a somewhat formal air removed it, discovered thin black locks, beginning to part company with the crown of his head.
It was decided that the finding should be advertised; but as the owner was not forthcoming, the boy placed his savings in a bank; and has added considerably to the original amount. The bootblacks form a peculiar feature of New York life. They are boys from ten to sixteen years of age. A few are older, and there are some men following this avocation on the street.
Few if any guests at hotels enjoyed so much honor from porters, bell-boys, waiters, chambermaids and bootblacks as the Landers, for they gave richly in fees for every conceivable service which could be rendered them; they went out of their way to invent debts of gratitude to menials who had done nothing for them.
"If there were any bootblacks in Centreville I suppose you'd be proposing them?" said Fletcher with a sneer. "I might, if they were as smart as my friend Walton." "You are not very particular about your friends," said Fletcher in the same tone. "I don't ask them to open their pocket-books, and show me how much money they have." "I prefer to associate with gentlemen." "So do I."
You wouldn't believe how sulky and stupid she gets at times. Ah, Barbara," as her sister bustled into the room, and dropped into a chair at the table, "how are the bootblacks?" "Oh, they're lovely," said Barbara, "they ate all the dinner, and then stole the forks. I rescued some of them, though Elizabeth, can't you go to see the Common Council this afternoon about that Statue Fund?
Godfrey could do nothing for him immediately, but only hold out his promise of future assistance, how was he to live in the meantime? After all, he might have to realize his thought of the morning, and join the ranks of the bootblacks. That was not a pleasant thought to a boy of his education. All labor is honorable, to be sure, but, then, some occupations are more congenial than others.
He even made inquiries of a master-plumber, of a Fourth Avenue vender of antiques, of a hairy woman with one eye who ran a news-stand, of a bar-tender, of saloon-keepers and bootblacks. He drifted through a department store, and whispered to a pretty girl who sold "art pictures." She shook her head.
Few if any guests at hotels enjoyed so much honor from porters, bell-boys, waiters, chambermaids and bootblacks as the Landers, for they gave richly in fees for every conceivable service which could be rendered them; they went out of their way to invent debts of gratitude to menials who had done nothing for them.
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