“Certainly. Why, of course.” This with an upward lift of the voice. “Come right in.” And although flustered and red because of what to her seems an embarrassing situation, she introduces me to her black-haired, heavy-faced husband, who is sitting at the center table with a zither before him. “Papa, here is a gentleman who wants to hear the music.” I smile, and the old German arises, smiles and extends me a welcoming hand. He is sitting in the center of this combination sitting-room, parlor, kitchen and dining-room, his zither, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, on the table before him. “I don’t know your name,” I say. “Schmick,” he replies. I apologize for intruding but they both seem rather pleased. Also the little daughter, who is sitting in one corner. “Were you singing?” I ask her. “No. Mamma,” she replies. I look at the gray-haired little mother and she shows me even, white teeth in smiling at my astonishment. “I sing but very little,” she insists, blushing red. “My woice is not so strong any more.” “Won’t you sing what you were singing just before I came in?” I ask. Without any of that diffidence which characterizes so many of all classes she rises and putting one hand on the shoulder of her heavy, solemn-looking husband, asks him to strike the appropriate chord, and then breaks forth into one of those plaintive folksongs of the Tyrol which describes the longing of the singer for his native land. “I have such a poor woice now,” she insists when she concludes. “When I was younger it was different.” “Poor!” I exclaim. “It’s very clear and beautiful. How old are you?” “I will be fifty next August,” she answers. This woman is possessed of a sympathetic and altogether lovely disposition. How can she exist in Hell’s Kitchen, amid grime and apparent hardness, and remain so sweet and sympathetic? In my youth and ignorance I wonder. * * * * * I am returning one day from a serious inspection of the small stores and shops of the neighborhood. As I near my door I am preceded up the street by three grimy coal-heavers, evidently returning from work in an immense coalyard in Eleventh Avenue. “Come on in and have a pint,” invites one great hulking fellow, with hands like small coal-shovels. He was, as it chanced, directly in front of my doorway. One of his two companions needs no second invitation, but the other, a small, feeble-witted-looking individual, seems uncertain as to whether to go on or stay. “Come on! Come on back and have a pint!” shouts the first coal-heaver. “What the hell--ain’t you no good at all? Come on!” “Sure I am,” returns the other diffidently. “But I ought to be home by half-past.” “Aw, home be damned! It won’t take long to drink a pint. Come on.” “All right,” returns the other, grinning sheepishly. They go over the way to a saloon, and I pause in my own door. Presently a little girl comes down, carrying a tin pail. “Whose little girl are you?” I inquire, not recognizing her.