BEAUTIFUL BUT POOR

Fancy a dingy old brick house on B—— street, New York city—dusty outside and moldy in all its ragged, papered walls inside—a dreary house with small, poorly ventilated rooms—these rooms wretchedly furnished, and I have made you at home in “Miss Scrimp’s Boarding-House for ladies only—no gentlemen boarded, lodged, or admitted.” For this was the inscription on a faded tin sign nailed over the front door.