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NORTH BEACH
IF any artist of pen or brush is eager to
find character studies of more than
ordinary interest and at the expense
of only a short stroll from the busi-
ness portion of the City, he should
direct his steps to that portion of the
beach about the foot of Sansome street,
keep his eyes wide open and watch the
procession go by.
Everybody down that way'knows old
Bob Spear. Any gamin can tell you where
he lives. "Old Bob" Las the name of
being "well off," bnt you would never
suspect it were you to see his poorly attired
form on the street, and you wouldn't be
lieve it were you to get a glimpse of the
insid9 of his dwelling-place. Nevertheless
when you get close enough to peer over
his back fence and note the fact that he has
hens in great number and a half dozen
pigs; nnd when you gaze up at the most
attractive feature in all the premises— his
dovecotes, with their cooing white-winged
multitude of residents — you begin to think
that Bob can't be so very bad off after all.
Bob was a boatman long ago, but the tus
sle with winds and waves was too much of
a drain on his visor of life and he settled
down as an economical landsman. No
body ever sees him spending any more
than the few pennies that keep his kitchen
supplied with the bare necessaries which
preserve the spirit safely in the clay. He
feeds his hogs and his hens on the de
cayed cabbages and other truck that are
thrown out daily by the vegetable mar
kets, and this makes the daily banquet of
his oirds and beasts. The people around
the base of Telegraph Hill are certain that
"Old Bob" is the possessor of a razor, for
the hair-crop on his face is regularly
mowed down; and they are sure that the
aged Spear would never patronize a bar
ber even at a nickel a chance. Hence they
are free to guess that the razor is an heir
loom in Bob's family.
Street arabs, «o they say, have seen old
Bob digging now and then in lonely spots,o ts,
and so the story has passed around tnat
Spear has treasure buried somewhere or
other, and in many a water-front breast is
inspired the hope that some day, while
pamins are digging for baitworni, they
may turn up one of old Bob's hidden pots
of gold.
The ancient fellow has an ancient male
companion, who holds the fort whenever
Bob is away. They have no visitors, and
never respond to knocks on the front door.
People in the vicinity are used to these
ways and never disturb the gray brethren.
Beach urchins have framed many mystery
tales about these old men. They are both
silent and grave. This silence and gravity
is puzzling. Now if old Bob, for instance,
would get wild once in a while and open
up with a volley of oaths, the boys would
take a supreme delight in keeping him
worried; but old Bob simply says nothing,
though his eyes have a look in them tnat
SHE LIKES TO EAT BONLS.
A Chicago Woman Who Loves to Have
a Dish ot lioni'H for a Meal.
Mrs. Matilda Childs of 2625 Dearborn
street is the possessor of one of the most
remarkable appetites known to the human
family. She crunches bone*, fresh or old,
witn a vigor that would put to shame the
most active stone-crutner in Chicago. Bhe
X, is very modest and retiring, and to see her
partake of her osseous diet is a favor
granted to few.
Mrs. Childs is 30 years of age, a decided
beauty, and her mother was as goud a
Kentucky cook as ever served a #ot of
'•purk and beans," while M rs. Childa her
self is a cook of no mean ability, although
she at present boasts of a hired g:rl who
performs that onerous duty for her.
Early in life Mrs. Child's parents moved
troni the dismal Rwamns of Kentucky to
the more congenial prairies of lowa, where
tney found a good school as well a3 a suit
able climate. The young girl attended
a seminary lor young ladies, from
which she graduated with high
honors, being valedictorian of her
class. Mra. Childs came to Chicago about
eight years ago to visit friends who were
living on Butt(»r(ield street, and while
stopping there she was at 3 o'clock one
THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, MAY 10, 1596.
carries a sort of warning along with it.
The mystery is like a wall of protection.
The boys perpetrate many pieces of devil
ment on the beach; they steal chickens
sometimes and torture stray animals, but
Bob's pigs are never assaulted, his hens
are never molested, and the missile of the
slungsbot is never hurled at the congrega
tions of his dovecotes. Old Bob is held in
veneration. His silence and his piercing
eye are the most effective police force on
the water front.
"Horseshoe Kate" is famous in the dis
trict toward the foot of Sansome street.
It is a very common declaration that
woman is physically too weak to compete
with her brother, man, in tne heavier em
ployments. This claim is refuted by the
instance of "Horseshoe Kate." She may
be called an exception by some; but what
has been done can be done. Women have
ousted their male brethren from many of
the lighter walks of life. Who shall say
bat that, in a generation to come, the
e-oti^t, man, will be met by femaie comp
; day introduced to Charles A. Cnilds a
railroad porter, and at 5 o'clock she be
came his smiling bride; thus in three
i short hours she was met, wooed and won
! and is to-day, she says, "the same sweet'
smiling bride of eight years ago."
"My husband and I were always lovers,"
ehe declared, "and I think in" that way
we solve the problem, 'Is marriage a
failure?' "
The "bone-eater," as she is now called
by the few who are fa in i in r with her
: queer taste, has' from childhood evinced a
< decided preference for that part of the
! food generally thrown away. Her dog —
' for ahe has oue — certainly has the
etitors all along the line— even down to
the street-swiping contract-. Wasn't it
the Rev. Anna Shaw who a short while
ago told of her ambition to be a police
man? It is just possible that in the ap
proaching century the disorderly man wiil
be made to toe the line of the ordinance
by the star-adorned woman as solidly built
as "Horseshoe Kate."
Women may run the meat snd fish mar
kets, and drive the plow, instead of merely
monopolizing the telephone business, tho
typewriters, millinery, clerkship and fruit
canning. Wnat a powerful woman is
"Horseshoe Kate!" The average man is
not so stout as she. The greater part of
her time is spent out in the open air, and
she is the very picture of sturdy health.
She wears an abbreviated frock, a leathern
apron and long boots. Binom»rs would
probably serve her admirably, but bloom
ers are at this per;od tabooed by water
front society, and, therefore, would be in
bad form.
"Horseshoe Kate" makes money. She
buys, cleans and smokes fish, which are
daily offered her by the fishermen who
spend most of their time in luring the
finny inhabitants of the bay to destruc
best of the meui when meat is the
| diet, for Mrs. Childs very dexterously
I slice- the meat from around the bone and
. feeding the meat to the dog retains for
! Herself the bone, which she devours with a
i relish. The bone-eating habit has grown
! as she grew, until now it is the "skeleton
; in the closet," and one of which she is
I very much ashamed, although her meal is
considered incomplete without her favor
ite delicacy.
"My mother often whipped me, but to
no '-ffect," explained she, ''for eating 'old
bones,' as she termed them, for I would
Bteal away and gnaw them in spite of her.
Bones seem to have a savory sweetness
■ lor me which no other food contains and
tion. Kate wields an immense meat-ax
with an ease and grace that would make
Corbett green with envy. Doubtless she
could strike a blow that would fo.l an ox,
or put an ordinary man to sleep in short
order.
Kate cleans horses in a livery stable and
manages unruly steeds by the bits, look
ing upon the animals with a sort of proud
contempt that shows her confidence in her
perfect /uastery.
"Hiirs--shoe Kate" is respected on the
without whicn I think I should literally
Bti\rve.
"These bones," she remarked, as she
drew forth a plate of huge beef bones,
"shall never rise again." And the way
she went at them proved to the reporter's
entire satisfaction that her quotation was
pat.
Mrs. Ctiilds' jaws are firm as iron, and
in them are securely set thirty-two pearly
white teeth, :is sound aft a dollar; though !
very short, they taper off in a wedge-like
manner with razor edges, which cut
through ossified matter as easily as carv
ing-knives can divide the most tender sir
loin. Mrs. Childs is a member of several
secret societies and a treat favorite among
bench. Nobody talks elightingiy to her. |
They know better. She is afraid of noth- i
ing, and night or day she goes about her j
business with a kingly air of indepen- j
dence. It would hardly do to bring a
queen into the comparison.
Kate is 40 years of age. Married?
Never! She can't get a man who would
support her in luxury, and she won't take
a man that she will have to toil to feed.
Kate is one of the "new women," in a few
particulars, anyhow.
the prominent people of her race.—Chicago ;
News. ;
•• ——■»
An Elephant ■ Rescues a Child.
Beasie Rooney, the 10-year-old sister of j
Michael Rooney, the bareback-rider was j
about to be hugged to death by a bear yes- i
terday j morning at Tattersall's, when
Babylon, one of Rinding Brothers- 1 big
elephants, knocked the brute down ana |
saved the child's life.
. The ; bear, known as "Growler," has a
vicious temper. He was chained near the
elephants. The little girl is a friend of
the ■ elephants,; and was romping with
Borne of them when Growler seized her '
That old woman yonder, with a load of
driftwood on her shoulders, is a sorry
sight to see. Wait a while and you may
witness several more like her, all strug
gling under the same kind of a burden.
These women, perhaps, dwell in miserable
hovels, with scarcely enough food to eat,
eking out an existence wherein there can
be little sunshine of soul. "Horseshoe
Kate," it is said, often cheerily lends a
helping hand to these victims of poverty
and misfortune — often drops them a dime
or so. Such wrinkled old faces and bony
old hands as those poor women have!
And if he could read the stories hidden in
those breasts, perhaps the realist mieht
pause to think how little he knows of the
trials of life, which he pretends to portray
as it is. Some of these old women are
truly religious, it is said. It is easy
enough for the rich to be religious; but
where an abiding faith arises from homes
wherein the gaunt wolf of starvation sit*
ever beside the hearthstone, there cer
tainly is virtue, one would think, worthy
of better things than beggars clothing or
crumbs from the tables of the well-fed.
The tou^'h girl will not permit herself
to be missed. There she is! Her dress
is toucrh. Her hat 13 tough. Here face is
tougher still. The dialect she speaks is a
cross between slang and profanity. She
walks with an unwomanly swagger, and
one can hardly regard her as a woman at
all. Her nose* tells a story of dissipation,
and the rest of her face furnishes corrobo
rative evidence. She is devoid of self
respect; aud there is no deep of life so low
that she will not recklessly and shame
lessly descend to it. It is too bad that the
Salvation Army cannot arrest the tough
girl and keep her in a guardhouse on
healthful rations until she undergoes a
chance of spirit.
Those boys running alo^g the streets
withvbarrels on iheir back are a type of the
enterprising street arab. The gates of
that rock-quarry have been left open while
the men have gone to lunch. The boys
have made a raid on the empty cement
barrels inside the gates, ard are now in
full career up Telegraph Hill. The barrels
will be broken up for firewood, and the
youngsters will thus save themselves, for
the time, from the necessity of dragging
up spiles from the beach.
The procession has only just begun to
move; but we shall not dally for other
Bights. The breeze from the bay is chilling
and there are days to come.
and closed his paws around her slender
form.
Babylon, who had been an interested
spectator, brought his trunk down with
crushing force on Growler's head. The
bear was stunned by the blow and released
the child, who had fainted. The elephant
then picked her up and placed her where
the bear could not reach her. Attendants,
wno heard Bessie's screams, ran to her
assistance, but arrived too late to rob
Babylon of the honor of saving a human
life.— Chicago Daily Tribune.
In Gloiicester over 20.000 persons have
been vaccinated or revaccinated during the
present outbreak.
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