Out of Mulberry Street: Stories of Tenement Life in New York City |
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ain't alley arms baby block Bowery breath brought burning Carmen Chief child Chinese dragon Christmas tree corner crowd dark dead Denny doll door eyes face father fell fight fire firemen floor gave George Finnegan goat gone hand head heard Hell's Kitchen holiday horse island Jake John Binns JOHN GAVIN jumped Kate knew ladder laughed Leho little dollar lives Liza look luck Maggie ment Mike morning mother Mulberry street never newsboy Nigger Martha night North Brother Island once Paolo passed Pell street police policeman Potter's Field reached rest roof Santa Claus says scart sergeant Sheeny Rose shout shrieks sleep slept slum smile smoke spoke stairs step stood story strange tenement thing thought told took turned Valley Stream wall watch whole wife window woman young
Popular passages
Page 198 - Oh promise me, that you will take my hand, The most unworthy in this lonely land, And let me sit beside you, in your eyes Seeing the vision of our paradise, Hearing God's message while the organ rolls Its mighty music to our very souls; No love less perfect than a life with thee; Oh promise me! Oh promise me!
Page 260 - ... and wider, farther and farther, until now, with a mighty effort, it swung within their reach. They caught the skirt of the coat, held on, pulled in, and in a moment lifted him over the edge. They lay upon the roof all six, breathless, sightless, their faces turned to the winter sky. The tumult of the street came up as a faint echo, the spray of a score of engines pumping below fell upon them, froze, and covered them with ice. The very roar of the fire seemed far off. The sergeant was the first...
Page 258 - I could n't let him," he said to me, months after, when he had come out of the hospital a whole man again, and was back at work, — "I just couldn't, standing there so quiet and brave." To the man he said sharply: "I want you to do exactly as I tell you, now. Don't grab me, but let me get the first grab.
Page 259 - You cannot save me. I will stay here till it gets too hot, then I will jump." " No, you won't;" from the sergeant, as he lay at full length on the roof looking over. "It is a pretty hard yard down there. I will get you, or go dead myself." The four sat on the sergeant's legs as he swung free down to the waist: so he was almost able to reach the man on the window with out-stretched hands. "Now jump— -quick!" he commanded: and the man Jumped. He caught him by both wrists as directed, and the sergeant...
Page 259 - he commanded ; and the man jumped. He caught him by both wrists as directed, and the sergeant got a grip on the collar of his coat. " Hoist ! " he shouted to the four on the roof ; and they tugged with their might. The sergeant's body did not move. Bending over till the back creaked, it hung over the edge, a weight of two hundred and three pounds suspended from and holding it down.
Page 258 - The smoke was so dense there that he could see little, but through it he heard a cry for help, and made out the shape of a man standing upon a window-sill in the fifth story, overlooking the courtyard of the hotel. The yard was between them. Bidding his men follow — they were five, all told — he ran down and around in the next street to the roof of the house that formed an angle with the hotel wing. There stood the man below him, only a jump away, but a jump which no mortal might take and live....
Page 235 - ... roaring overhead, is generally sufficient to convince the timid that the service is not for him. No cowards are dismissed from the department, for the reason that none get into it. Every fireman nowadays must pass muster at lifesaving drill, must climb to the top of any building on his scaling ladder, slide down with a rescued comrade, or jump without hesitation from the third story into the life-net spread below. By such training the men are fitted for their work, and the occasion comes soon...
Page 241 - Presently the crowd sees rubber-coated, helmeted men with pipe and hose go through a window from which such dense smoke pours forth that it seems incredible that a human being could breathe it for a second and live. The hose is dragged squirming over the sill, where shortly a red-eyed face with disheveled hair appears to shout something hoarsely to those below, which they understand. Then, unless some emergency arise, the spectacular part is over. Could the citizen whose heart beat as he watched...
Page 223 - ... the hoarse shouts of the firemen, the wild rush and terror of the streets ; then the great hush that fell upon the crowd ; the sea of upturned faces with the fire glow upon it ; and up there, against the background of black smoke that poured from roof and attic, the boy clinging to the narrow ledge, so far up that it seemed humanly impossible that help could ever come. But even then it was coming. Up from the street, while the crew of the truck company...
Page 257 - Howe's in the splendid rescue at the Geneva Club, — he took a half-hitch with the other in some electric-light wires that ran up the wall, trusting to his rubber boots to protect him from the current, and made of his body a living bridge for the safe passage from the last window of the burning hotel of three men and a woman whom death stared in the face, steadying them as they went with his free hand. As the last passed over, ladders were being thrown up against the wall, and what could be done...