“Vail, if I aifer!” And so forth, till the poor fellow was blushing to the roots of his hair, and would have liked to bite his tongue out. Mr. Koch took up the cudgels in his behalf. “Oh, come,” he shouted, “don't make Mr. Bacharach feel as though he'd brought the Tower of Babel crashing around his ears. He's got a right to his opinion, hasn't he? I understand the way he feels. In fact, I feel about the same way, myself. I _go_ to the theater a good deal, I don't deny; but that's because there's nothing else to do. When I get home at night I'm fagged out, and I want a little amusement, and I take my wife and go to the theater. But all the same, I'm free to say that the theaters here in this town are about as poor as they can make them, and no mistake. Melodrama and burlesque--that's what they give you. Good, honest pictures of life--where'll you find them, I'd like to know? Now and then you get a big star--Salvini or Booth; now and then you get an old English comedy; but it's the average that I'm talking about, and I defy any man to say any thing in defense of that. You folks, you go to the theater, the same as I do, because you haven't got any thing else to do. But an intellectual young fellow like Mr. Bacharach, he don't need any outside amusements of that sort. He'd rather stay home, and think; wouldn't you, Mr. Bacharach?” “Washington,” said Mr. Blum, “you're talking about American theayters. But what you got against the Chairman theayter--the Thalia--hey?” “Oh, you go 'way. You want to get back to our old quarrel,” Mr. Koch retorted. “No, thanks.” “Sarah,” said her father, abruptly, “there's one of your adopted children--my grainchild, consequently,” he added, winking humorously at Elias. He pointed toward the open window, at which appeared the red and weather-beaten visage of an elderly tramp. The tramp was peering in through the iron bars, and muttering an inarticulate, plaintive prayer--presumably for “cold victuals.” Mrs. Koch glanced over her shoulders at him, and then, addressing a hasty “Excuse me,” to the company, got up and left the room. “She's got about twenty of them fellers,” Mr. Blum informed Elias, “who she tries to be a mudder for. She feeds them, and clothes them, and gives them free lectures. They're coming all the time. We don't never sit down to a meal, but one of them sticks his head in the winder. Now, you just listen.” Out in the area, Mrs. Koch's high-pitched voice could be heard earnestly speaking as follows: “Oh, you baid man! You told me you wouldn't touch another drop of liquor this week! And now I see you been indoxicated! You smell perfectly outracheous; and dot loafly coat I give you, all spoiled! I got a great mind to send you away, and naifer do nothing for you any more.”