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TOMMY BROWN

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International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Apr 22, 1889

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 16.

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TOMMY BROWN.

"What is your name?" asked the teacher. "Tommy Brown, ma'am," answered the boy.
He was a pathetic little figure, with a thin face, large, hollow eyes, and pale cheeks, that plainly told of insufficient food. He wore a suit of clothes evidently made for someone else. They were patched in places with cloth of different colors. His shoes were old, his hair cut square in the neck in the unpracticed manner that women sometimes cut boy's hair. It was a bitter day, yet he wore no overcoat, and his bare hands were red with the cold.
"How old are you, Tommy?"
"Nine year old come next April. I've learnt to read at home, and I can cipher a little."
"Well, it is time for you to begin school. Why have you never come before?"
The boy fumbled with a cap in his hands, and did not reply at once. It was a ragged cap, with frayed edges, and the original color of the fabric no man could tell.
Presently he said: "I never went to school 'cause—'cause—well, mother takes in washin' an' she couldn't spare me. But Sissy is big enough now to help, an' she minds the baby besides."
It was not quite time for school to begin. All around the teacher and the new scholar stood the boys that belonged in the room. While he was making his confused explanation some of the boys laughed, and one of them called out, "Say, Tommy, where are your cuffs and collar?" And another said,
"You must sleep in the ragbag at night, by the looks of your clothes!" Before the teacher could quiet them, another boy had volunteered the information that the father of the new boy was "old Si Brown, who is always as drunk as a fiddler."
The poor child looked around at his tormentors like a hunted thing. Then, before the teacher could detain him, with a suppressed cry of misery, he ran out of the room, out of the building, down the street, and was seen no more.
The teacher went to her duties with a troubled heart. All day long the child's pitiful face haunted her. At night it came to her dreams. She could not rid herself of the memory of it. After a little trouble, she found the place where he lived, and with two friends went to visit him.
It was a dilapidated house, in a street near the river. The family lived in the back part of the house, in a frame addition. The ladies climbed the outside stairs that led to the room occupied by the Brown family. When they first entered, they could scarcely discern objects, the room was so filled with the steam of the soap-suds. There were two windows, but a tall brick building adjacent shut out the light. It was a gloomy day too, with gray, lowering clouds that forbade even the memory of sunshine.
A woman stood before a washtub. When they entered, she wiped her hands on her apron and came forward to meet them.
Once she had been pretty. But the color and light had all gone out of her face, leaving only sharpened outlines and haggardness of expression.
She asked them to sit down, in a listless, uninterested manner; then, taking a chair herself, she said:—
"Sissy, give me the baby."
A little girl came forward from a dark corner of the room, carrying a baby, that she laid in its mother's lap—a lean and sickly-looking baby, with the same hollow eyes that little Tommy had.
"Your baby doesn't look strong," said one of the ladies.
"No, ma'am, she ain't very well. I have to work hard, and I expect it affects her;" and the woman coughed, as she held the child to her breast.
This room was the place where the family ate, slept, and lived. There was no carpet on the floor, an old table, three or four chairs, a broken stove, a bed in one corner, in the opposite corner a trundle-bed—that was all.
"Where is your little boy, Tommy?" asked one of the visitors.
"He is there in the trundle-bed," replied the mother.
"Is he sick?"
"Yes'm, and the doctor thinks he ain't going to get well." At this the mother laid her head on the baby's face, while the tears ran down her thin and faded cheeks.
"What is the matter with him?"
"He was never very strong, and he's had to work too hard, carrying water and helping me lift the washtubs, and things like that."
"Is his father dead?"
"No, he ain't dead. He used to be a good workman, and we had a comfortable home. But all he earns now—and that ain't much—goes for drink. If he'd only let me have what little I make over the washtub. But half the time he takes that away from me, and then the children go hungry."
She took the child off her shoulder. It was asleep now, and she laid it across her lap.
"Tommy has been crazy to go to school. I never could spare him till this winter. He thought if he could get a little education he'd be able to help take care of Sissy and baby and me. He knew he'd never be able to work hard. So I fixed up his clothes as well as I could, and last week he started. I was afraid the boys would laugh at him, but he thought he could stand it if they did. I stood in the door and watched him going. I can't ever forget how the little fellow looked," she continued, the tears streaming down her face. "His patched-up clothes, his old shoes, his ragged cap, his poor little anxious look. He turned round to me as he left the yard, and said, 'Don't worry, mother; I ain't going to mind what the boys say.' But he did mind; it wasn't an hour till he was back again. I believe the child's heart was just broke. I thought mine was broke years ago. If it was, it was broke over again that day. I can stand most anything myself, but, oh, I can't bear to see my children suffer!" Here she broke down in a fit of convulsive weeping. The little girl came up to her quietly, and stole a thin little arm around her mother's neck. "Don't cry, mother," she whispered, "don't cry."
The woman made an effort to check her tears, and wiped her eyes. As soon as she could speak with any degree of calmness, she continued:—
"Poor little Tommy cried all day; I couldn't comfort him. He said it wasn't any use trying to do anything. Folks would only laugh at him for being a drunkard's little boy. I tried to comfort him before my husband came home. I told him his father would be mad if he saw him crying. But it wasn't any use. It seemed like he couldn't stop. His father came and saw him. He wouldn't have done it if he hadn't been drinking. He ain't a bad man when he is sober. I hate to tell it, but he whipped Tommy. And the child fell and struck his head. I suppose he'd a' been sick, anyway. But, oh, my poor little boy! my sick, suffering child!" she cried. "How can they let men sell a thing that makes the innocent suffer so?"
A little voice spoke from the bed. One of the ladies went to him. There he lay, poor little defenseless victim. He lived in a Christian land, in a country that takes great care to protect sheep, and diligently legislates over its game! Would that the children were as precious as brutes and birds!
His face was flushed, and the hollowed eyes were bright. There was a long purple mark on his temple. He put up one little wasted hand to cover it, while he said:—
"Father wouldn't have done it if he hadn't been drinking." Then, in his queer, piping voice, weak with sickness, he half whispered: "I'm glad I'm going to die. I'm too weak ever to help mother, anyhow." He turned his head feebly on his pillow, and said, in a low tone: "Some day—they ain't going—to let the saloons—keep open. But I'm afraid—poor father—will be dead—before then." Then he shut his eyes from weariness.The next morning the sun shone in on the dead face of little Tommy.
He is only one of many. There are hundreds like him in tenement houses, slums and alleys in town, in country. Poor little martyrs, whose tears fall almost unheeded; who are cold and hungry in this Christian land; whose hearts and bodies are bruised with unkindness. And yet "the liquor traffic is a legitimate business, and must not be interfered with," so it is said.
Over eighteen hundred years ago it was also said:—
"Whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in Me, it were better for him that a mill-stone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea."—Common School Education.