The man who earns by the sweat of his brow or the cunning of his mind a comfortable living for those dependent upon him should not complain but consider the mean lot of others, less fortunate, and rejoice at his good fate. There is not a day of my life that I do not see some wretch faring worse than I; some poor person struggling desperately to keep body and soul together.

Let us thank God for a sound mind and a sound body: that we do not think side-whiskers are pretty and that we have not hair-lips.

One day not long ago, while hurrying from my work, I passed a Greek peanut roaster, and wondered about his lot. Day after day I had seen him with his little push-cart, but rarely had I observed any customers.

“How fares it to-day?” said I, as I hurried by.

“Fine, thank you: little mon, good book, good health, and heap of joy!”

“There is a philosopher,” thought I to myself. “He is a happy man. His life seems to be sweet, although he has but little of the goods of this world.”

That very day John, that son of Athens, had sold less than fifty cents worth of truck, yet he was rejoicing as he sat on the curbing, reading the life of Thomas Jefferson in Greek.

On a fine afternoon, in the spring of 1898, I walked from the Hotel LaFayette, at Fayetteville, to the Cape Fear river. I had a purpose in making the trip; I had been threatened with a fit of melancholia and was trying to stave it off. I strolled down to the water’s edge, where fishermen were wont to tie their boats at night, and stood there looking, looking, studying the topography of the country and the people in their labor for bread and meat.

I tarried on a pretty little hill, just above the river, where I had a good view of the water and surrounding fields. The territory for a hundred yards square in my immediate vicinity was bald and smooth from the constant tread of fishermen’s feet. Back of that, early vegetables and succulent grasses were springing up. Along the shore a dozen or more batteaus, or small fishing boats, were chained to stakes, or anchored to each other.

Far up and down the river I could see men in boats, gliding noiselessly along the banks, setting hooks for the evening bite. It was past the middle of the afternoon and the big fish, cats, carp and red horse, were beginning to run. This the fishermen knew and were hurrying to place their hooks, baited with mussels. At nine o’clock at night and early the next morning the hooks were looked.

While standing there, gazing here and there, I saw a party of small negro boys, wading to their waists in the water, graveling in the sand, for mussels to sell to the fishermen. Silently and doggedly, the little fellows hunted the slimy, shell-covered creatures, gathering them by the hundred.

The longer I remained there on that knoll, in the midst of that peculiarly fascinating life, the more interested I became. Every man, every woman and every boy or girl appealed to me. Between five-thirty and six o’clock the men who baited and placed the hooks came ashore, fastened their boats, and went to their respective homes for supper and a moment with their wives and children before starting out for the night fish. I saw them go and come with their nets. From dark until about ten o’clock they fished for shad, the most valuable fish in the Cape Fear at that season of the year.

It is intensely fascinating to watch the movements and study the habits and manners of the people who get their living from the water. They belong to a certain class and are of a certain type, differing from their brothers and sisters who till the soil. Loving the water and having become so used to it, they would not quit it for the land.

As a rule, river people are strong and ruddy. Their faces are hard and sunburned and their muscles well-knit and tough.

It is a wholesome life.

These be the sort of men I saw that afternoon. On the ground they were awkward, ill at ease, and grouchy, but in their boats graceful, sturdy and merry.

Soon after I went down to the river and settled myself, to look on and learn what I could of the ways of the living things about me, I heard a shuffling noise behind me, and when I turned to ascertain the cause, my eyes fell upon the most pitiful creature it had ever been my fortune to see. A woman, yes, a woman, one of God’s noblest creatures, stood and gazed in wonderment at me. She had approached within a few feet of me before she realized that I was a living being; I was hid from the view of the path that leads from the town to the river by a thicket of weeds and grass.

Once I began to look at the woman I could not keep from staring at her. She was ragged, wrinkled and unwashed. The clothes that covered her back, all bent and misshapen, were tattered and torn. Her leathery face was deeply seamed and drawn. The queer sound that attracted my attention as she came up, was made by her shoes, which were large, not mates, and without strings. They slipped up and down upon her naked heels and made the “slick-slack,” “slick-slack” noise, so familiar to the country boy who has plowed in his father’s cast-off brogans, several numbers too large for his feet.

The woman was pathetic-looking, her crestfallen face was partially hid from me by an antiquated, dilapidated, weather-beaten split bonnet. Every garment she wore was a misfit and threadbare.

I felt myself drawn to this poverty-stricken creature. In order that I might find out something about her, I engaged her in conversation before she could wheel and escape.

“Are you going fishing?” I asked.

“No,” she answered pleasantly; “I came down to see if I could see my old man. He is fishing.”

“Do you live here?”

“Yes. We have lived in this town thirty-odd years; me and my old man.”

“What does he do for a living?”

“Well, he fishes now. He is getting so old and feeble that he cannot do anything else. When young and strong, he worked on a freight boat on the river, but his health failed about ten years ago, and we have had a mighty hard time since. I have actually seed the time that we did not have enough to eat. He is proud, and would not beg. He fishes, while I tries to make a little money washing and sewing, but he will not let me work much.”

“Have you any children?”

“No, sir, Mister; God never gave us any, and I expect it is best. We are so poor they might have a hard time. Me and him are all of the two families left. He is the only person that I have to look to and he is good to me. He does his best, and God will not forget him for it.”

“Do you own a home?”

“No, sir. We have nothing but a little bit of furniture. We live in a rented house and the man who owns it could put us out to-night, but he is a Christian and would not do it. We have paid no rent in six years. We just can’t; that’s the reason. But it won’t be long now, for my old man is getting weak—weaker day by day. He can’t live much longer, and when he goes I hope that I may go too. We have been together forty-odd years, and in death I pray that God will not part us.

“The Lord has been good to us. We get comfort from the Bible.

“We don’t see anybody nowadays; we go nowhere, and nobody comes to see us. The friends we had in more prosperous days have deserted us; there is nothing about us to attract people. Some seem to shun us through fear that we may beg, but never, never; we would starve first. My old man is too proud to beg. I live in fear that he may get so feeble that he cannot go and that we will have nothing. He often says that he hopes he will die some night after fishing all day. If he does, I want to go too.”

“Do you ever go to church?”

“No, Mister; we haven’t been in goin’ on ten years. We have no fit clothes. The churches look too fine inside for our old rags, but we read our old Bible every Sunday. We can’t read much now; our eyes are bad; but we get much comfort out of the Good Book.

“The Church folks don’t ever come to see us. They don’t need us, as we ain’t got no money to give. I guess when we die some good preacher will say a word over our graves; I don’t know.”

This said, the old woman moved on toward the river, craning her neck as she went, so that she could see to the right of a clump of trees that stood near the water, looking for her husband, but she must not have seen him, for she soon passed back on her way home.

Becoming interested in what she said, I made up my mind to remain there till the old gentleman arrived and look him over. I had a long wait, for it was almost dark when his little boat hove in sight. His wife had been back and looked up the river several times. She seemed lonely, restless and uneasy.

I felt sorry for the old woman, but was afraid to say so. It was, as she said, a bitter fight for existence. The aged pair had no associates, and actually suffered from poverty.

The last time she came to the landing she carried in her arms a tiny, toothless, starved dog.

“Is that your pet?” said I, anxious to reopen the conversation.

“Yes, he’s nearly twenty-two years old, and has been ours since a pup.”

“He is very old,” I declared, for the want of something better.

“Yes; and blind, and toothless.”

“Why do you keep him?”

“For what he has been. It would be cruel to kill him or desert him now, when he cannot take care of himself. I shall keep him until he dies, unless I go first. When he was younger he kept me company, and guarded our little home, when my old man was down the river for days and nights at a time, and now, if God spares me, I will see him through. I have to make a sort of soup for him to eat, and guide his footsteps. I do not think he is here for much longer; he is getting very thin and frail.”

She let him down on the ground by her side, and said: “Fido, do you love your mistress?” and the grateful little brute shook his tail.

The wife was not there when the husband came; though I had never seen him before I knew him when he landed. His face was haggard and worn, and his body emaciated. Some disease preyed at his vitals. His constitution was gone, but the blazing fire of pride still burned in his gray eyes. The will and the spirit were there. He had a fair string of fish, and after eating the smaller ones would have enough left to bring twenty-five cents.

Having tied his boat, he shouldered his tackle, took up his fish, and climbed the hill past me. I did not see his eyes searching for the faithful wife who had four times come to greet him; this lack of care I did not like. He seemed too indifferent. Possibly he was disappointed when his old companion was not there to meet him, not knowing that she had come and gone time after time. He dragged his weary limbs over the brow of the hill, and toward the city. As he went by, I had a good opportunity to observe his clothes. He was not the one-gallus fellow that the politicians so often refer to, but the no-gallus one. His trousers were held up by sharp hip-bones and his shirt was decorated with vari-colored patches.

I followed the old man, until he met his wife, who was coming in a half-trot from their little cabin. The meeting was full of meaning. No word was uttered; no time lost. He looked solemn, the least bit angry, and she smiled, a bitter sad smile, and turned and followed him. Her eyes were on the fish, giving them a cash valuation.

All of this passed without a sound from either.

That night, after I had enjoyed a good meal, to gratify my curiosity I walked by the home of the lonely couple, and found them enjoying a pipe of tobacco each. The little dog was there, on the top step between them, and they were apparently happy.

As I moved on, I said to myself: “I wonder how it would feel to be penniless, friendless, decrepit and old, but too proud to beg?”

May fortune smile on the old fisherman, his loyal helpmeet and their little dog!