The vice-president, a smart young man with the courage of a lion, went to the boys’ home to make an investigation of how they lived, and why they were so bad when on the streets. Here is what he discovered: They lived in a small cottage and with a man and woman who were not their parents. Their own father had died leaving several valuable pieces of property to his wife, who was again married within a year, and to a man who soon lost all the property, having spent the money for liquor. The mother died, and her husband again married in less than a month, and to a woman who drank as much as he did. This was the home of the two newsboys. “They both went to bed, nearly every night, with their clothes on,” said the officer, “and what the boys had to eat wasn’t fit for a dog.” The case was left entirely in the hands of the young officers with instructions to report within a month. In less than the appointed time a report was made. The two newsboys were brought into the president’s office, each having on a nice suit of clothes, their faces and hands clean, and their general appearance and deportment remarkably improved. “What did you do?” was asked the officer. “We went to the house and demanded that the boys receive care and attention for what they were doing—they were bringing into the house from fifty to sixty cents a day earned by selling papers. And instead of the drunken man and woman spending this for whiskey, we made them buy good things to eat. A retail clothier gave us the suits of clothes, and the boys are simply good, and are working their way on the streets.” While the boys were working on this case the president reported to the humane officer the condition of things at this home, and in a very short time the family was quite respectable and the boys attending school. To the president, remarkable as seemed the turning of two bad boys into good, honest little sellers, the work of the two officers of the association with the parents was even more so. Self-governing boys. Boys whom we think can do nothing, and seldom trust, for fear of failing, and yet they brought in line two of the worst cases Boyville had experienced. As the weeks passed the two boys became favorites among their little friends. One afternoon about six or eight months after the two boys became members, one of them, the younger, came running into the president’s office, holding a roll of bills in his hand. Everybody had to get out of the way. He was followed by the “gang,” some twenty boys, all looking at the little fellow with wonderment. [Illustration: ROLL OF HONOR. SOME OF THE BOYS WHO TURNED IN VALUABLE ARTICLES FOUND ON THE STREET.] [Illustration: THE BOYVILLE CADETS—WHEN FIRST ORGANIZED. _See Page 48_ ] “See, here, pres., what I found,” he said, laying fifteen dollars on the desk. “I found this at the post-office.” “And what do you want me to do with this?” asked the president. “I wants you to find the owner. That’s what.”