As I had no money to throw away, I stayed at a modest hotel in Park Row, where one could live on less than twenty-five dollars a day. I shall never forget a brief acquaintance I made there. The first evening I stayed in New York, I was seated in the hotel trying to make up my mind whether to go to the theater or not, when I observed, sitting near me, a sedate gentleman of prepossessing exterior, fifty or sixty years old, and dressed in plain clothes and a broad-brimmed silk hat, of a grave and dignified appearance. I could not help fancying that he was at least an ex-governor, or something of the sort; and I felt somewhat flattered when he moved his chair closer to mine, with the obvious intention of addressing me. He opened his mouth to speak, and I nerved myself to reply with respectful dignity, when he said, in a low tone: “Would you lend me fifteen cents?” The man was a “dead beat.” I resolved never to place much reliance on appearances again. Having made up my mind to go to the theater and see John E. Owens play “Solon Shingle,” I walked out. At the door I met a solitary boot-black, who greeted me with, “black ’em?” “You may black _it_,” I replied, “for you see I have only one to black.” “All right,” said he; whereupon I seated myself on a low railing that guarded a cellar-way, and placed my foot on his box. He had soon “shined” it sufficiently, but was still brushing away at it, when I said: “There, that will do; what do you charge?” The dirty, ragged little fellow looked thoughtfully and earnestly up into my face, and replied: “O, I won’t charge _you_ any thing; you’re only got _one_.” I compelled him to accept a ten-cent note, of course, assuring him that I had “bushels of ’em;” but the intention was no less kind in him; and such a noble thought, though the poor little heart from which it sprung be clothed in rags and filth, will shine in heaven when the rust has long covered and hidden the millions of gold which men of wealth have contributed to “charitable institutions!”