Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 8, 2025
The black miners at Virden could tell us something about the pursuit of wealth; and the Jews about its social and political value after it has been acquired. But the worst result to-day of this kind of advice is that it is so quickly taken up by rash and evil-minded men, who shout it from the platform in its coarsest and most misleading form.
About August I of this same year, 1895, there were sharp conflicts between the white and the black miners at Birmingham, a number being killed on both sides before military authority could intervene. Three years later, moreover, the invasion of the North by Negro labor had begun, and about November 17, 1898, there was serious trouble in the mines at Pana and Virden, Illinois.
Sahwah and Agony and Hinpoha heard themselves called to go to Gitchee-Gummee; Gladys and Migwan were put with Bengal Virden, the Elephant's Child from India, into a tent called Ponemah; while Katherine and Oh-Pshaw were assigned, without any tentmate, to "Bedlam."
Down the hillside other forms were stealing; Migwan, and Gladys, and Bengal Virden, followed by Tiny Armstrong, until practically all the inhabitants of the Alley were gathered upon the dock. Miss Judy was leaning over the edge of the pier untying the launch.
Bengal Virden had sobbed, trickling tearfully back to Ponemah with a long tress of black hair clutched tightly in her hand a souvenir which she had begged from Mary at the moment of parting. Next to Pom-pom, Mary Sylvester was Bengal's greatest crush. "I'm going to put it under my pillow and sleep on it every night," Bengal had sniffed tearfully, displaying the tress to her tentmates.
From Avernus to Gitchee-Gummee the Alley rang with praises of Katharine's cleverness. "What's the excitement?" asked Agony wonderingly as she returned to the bungalow in time for supper after resting quietly by herself all day. "The best thing the Alley ever did!" replied Bengal Virden enthusiastically, and recounted the details for Agony's benefit.
"What is her name?" asked Hinpoha, feeling immensely drawn to the girl, not because she came from India, but because she was even stouter than herself. "Her name is Bengal Virden," replied Miss Judith. "Bengal?" repeated Sahwah. "What an odd name. I suppose she was born in Bengal?" "Yes, she was born there," replied Miss Judith.
The other girl laughed, showing a row of very white, even teeth. "Did you see that girl who came running into the dining-room this morning with her middy halfway over her head?" Sahwah laughed, too, at the recollection. "That was Bengal Virden, the one they call the Elephant's Child," she replied. "She lives in Ponemah, with some friends of mine.
"Give me your paddle," she said quickly to Bengal Virden, who sat in front of her, and took it out of her hand without ceremony. The Dolphin righted herself without any further trouble and came out into the straight upstream course only a little behind the Turtle. Then the real race began.
"Bengal Virden!" screamed Miss Peckham, in such a tone of terror that Bengal involuntarily stood still in her tracks, dropping the stick she was in the act of picking up. "It's a deadly poisonous snake," gasped Miss Peckham, beginning to get breathless from fright, "a monstrous black one with red rings on it. I saw it crawling among the leaves. It reared up and menaced me with its wicked head.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking