Kit no sooner comes in than the strange gentleman drinks his health, and tells him he shall never want a friend as long as he lives, and so does Mr. Garland, and so does Mrs. Garland, and so does Mr. Abel.  But even this honour and distinction is not all, for the strange gentleman forthwith pulls out of his pocket a massive silver watch—­and upon the back of this watch is engraved Kit’s name with flourishes all over—­and in short it is Kit’s watch, bought expressly for him.  Mr. and Mrs. Garland can’t help hinting about their present, in store, and Mr. Abel tells outright that he has his; and Kit is the happiest of the happy.

There is one friend that Kit has not seen yet, and he takes the first opportunity of slipping away and hurrying to the stable, and when Kit goes up to caress and pat him, the pony rubs his nose against his coat and fondles him more lovingly than ever pony fondled man.  It is the crowning circumstance of his earnest, heartfelt reception; and Kit fairly puts his arm round Whisker’s neck and hugs him.

Happy Christopher!—­the darkest days of his life are past—­the brightest are yet to be.  Let us wish him all joy and prosperity and leave him on the threshold of manhood!

JO, THE CROSSING SWEEPER

[Illustration:  JO, THE CROSSING SWEEPER.]

Jo lives in a ruinous place, known to the likes of him by the name of Tom-all-Alone’s.  It is a black dilapidated street, avoided by all decent people; where the crazy houses were seized upon when their decay was far advanced, by some bold vagrants, who, after establishing their possession, took to letting them out in lodgings.

Jo sweeps his crossing all day long, and if he is asked a question he replies that he “don’t know nothink.”  He knows that it’s hard to keep the mud off the crossing in dirty weather, and harder still to live by doing it.  Nobody taught him that much—­he found it out.

Indeed, everything poor Jo knows he has had to find out for himself, for no one has even taken the trouble to tell him his real name.

It must be a strange state to be like Jo, not to know the feeling of a whole suit of clothes—­to wear even in summer the same queer remnant of a fur cap; to be always dirty and ragged; to shuffle through the streets, unfamiliar with the shapes, and in utter darkness as to the meaning, of those mysterious symbols so abundant over the doors and at corners of the streets, and on the doors and in the windows.  To see people read, and to see people write, and to see the postman deliver letters, and not to have the least idea of all that language,—­to be to all of it stone blind and dumb.

It must be very puzzling to be hustled and jostled, and moved on, and to really feel that I have no business here or there or anywhere; and yet to be perplexed by the consideration that I am here somehow, too, and everybody overlooked me until I became the creature that I am.