I noticed another man and his old woman join the line, both of them past
fifty. The woman, because she was a woman, was admitted into the spike;
but he was too late, and, separated from his mate, was turned away to
tramp the streets all night.
The street on which we stood, from wall to wall, was barely twenty feet
wide. The sidewalks were three feet wide. It was a residence street. At
least workmen and their families existed in some sort of fashion in the
houses across from us. And each day and every day, from one in the
afternoon till six, our ragged spike line is the principal feature of the
view commanded by their front doors and windows. One workman sat in his
door directly opposite us, taking his rest and a breath of air after the
toil of the day. His wife came to chat with him. The doorway was too
small for two, so she stood up. Their babes sprawled before them. And
here was the spike line, less than a score of feet away--neither privacy
for the workman, nor privacy for the pauper. About our feet played the
children of the neighbourhood. To them our presence was nothing unusual.
We were not an intrusion. We were as natural and ordinary as the brick
walls and stone curbs of their environment. They had been born to the
sight of the spike line, and all their brief days they had seen it.
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