Quotation from: The Strength of the Strong

Written by: Jack London


When he had been living in the Bartell home a little more than a
year, he broke his leg. He sustained the injury through playing on
the forbidden roof--as all boys have done and will continue to do
to the end of time. The leg was broken in two places between the
knee and thigh. Emil, helped by his frightened playmates, managed
to drag himself to the front sidewalk, where he fainted. The
children of the neighbourhood were afraid of the hard-featured
shrew who presided over the Bartell house; but, summoning their
resolution, they rang the bell and told Ann Bartell of the
accident. She did not even look at the little lad who lay stricken
on the sidewalk, but slammed the door and went back to her wash-
tub. The time passed. A drizzle came on, and Emil Gluck, out of
his faint, lay sobbing in the rain. The leg should have been set
immediately. As it was, the inflammation rose rapidly and made a
nasty case of it. At the end of two hours, the indignant women of
the neighbourhood protested to Ann Bartell. This time she came out
and looked at the lad. Also she kicked him in the side as he lay
helpless at her feet, and she hysterically disowned him. He was
not her child, she said, and recommended that the ambulance be
called to take him to the city receiving hospital. Then she went
back into the house.

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Old Dominion University CS Dept
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Part of a series of experiments in web preservation under the direction of Michael L. Nelson, Ph.D.