"There being no lights except along the automo- bile drives, us 179 tenants of the Beersheba Flats prepared to spend the night as best we could in the raging forest. Them that brought blankets and kin- dling wood was best off. They got fires started and wrapped the blankets round their heads and laid down, cursing, in the grass. There was nothing to see, nothing to drink, nothing to do. In the dark we had no way of telling friend or foe except by feeling the noses of 'em. I brought along me last winter overcoat, me toothbrush, some quinine pills and the red quilt off the bed in me flat. Three times during the night somebody rolled on me quilt and stuck his knees against the Adam's apple of me. And three times I judged his character by running me hand over his face, and three times I rose up and kicked the in- truder down the hill to the gravelly walk below. And then some one with a flavor of Kelly's whiskey snug- gled up to me, and I found his nose turned up the right way, and I says: ' Is that you, then, Patsey? and he says, 'It is, Carney. How long do you think it'll last?'
"' I'm no weather-prophet,' says I, 'but if they bring out a strong anti-Tammany ticket next fall it ought to get us home in time to sleep on a bed once or twice before they line us up at the polls.'
"A-playing of my flute into the airshaft, I says Patsey Rourke, 'and a-perspiring in me own windy to the joyful noise of the passing trains and the smell of liver and onions and a-reading of the latest mur- der in the smoke of the cooking is well enough for me,' says he. 'What is this herding us in grass for, not to mention the crawling things with legs that walk up the trousers of us, and the Jersey snipes that peck at us, masquerading under the name and denom- ination of mosquitoes. What is it all for Carney, and the rint going on just the same over at the flats?'
"Tis the great annual Municipal Free Night Outing Lawn Party,' says I, 'given by the polis, Hetty Green and the Drug Trust. During the heated season they hold a week of it in the principal parks.
'Tis a scheme to reach that portion of the people that's not worth taking up to North Beach for a fish fry.'
"' I can't sleep on the ground,' says Patsey, 'wid any benefit. I have the hay fever and the rheuma- tism, and me car is full of ants.'
"Well, the night goes on, and the ex-tenants of the Flats groans and stumbles around in the dark, trying to find rest and recreation in the forest. The children is screaming with the coldness, and the jan- itor makes hot tea for 'em and keeps the fires going with the signboards that point to the Tavern and the Casino. The tenants try to lay down on the grass by families in the dark, but you're lucky if you can sleep next to a man from the same floor or believing in the same religion. Now and then a Murpby, acci- dental, rolls over on the grass of a Rosenstein, or a Cohen tries to crawl under the O'Grady bush, and then there's a feeling of noses and somebody is rolled down the hill to the driveway and stays there. There is some hair-pulling among the women folks, and everybody spanks the nearest howling kid to him by the sense of feeling only, regardless of its parentage and ownership. 'Tis hard to keep up the social dis- tinctions in the dark that flourish by daylight in the Beersheba Flats. Mrs. Rafferty, that despises the asphalt that a Dago treads on, wakes up in the morn- ing with her feet in the bosom of Antonio Spizzinelli.
And Mike O'Dowd, that always threw peddlers down- stairs as fast as he came upon 'em, has to unwind old Isaacstein's whiskers from around his neck, and wake up the whole gang at daylight. But here and there some few got acquainted and overlooked the discom- forts of the elements. There was five engagements to be married announced at the flats the next morning.
About midnight I gets up and wrings the dew out of my hair, and goes to the side of the driveway and sits down. At one side of the park I could see the lights in the streets and houses; and I was thinking how happy them folks was who could chase the duck and smoke their pipes at their windows, and keep cool and pleasant like nature intended for 'em to.
Just then an automobile stops by me, and a fine- looking, well-dressed man steps out.
'Me man,' says he, 'can you tell me why all these people are lying around on the grass in the park?
I thought it was against the rules.'
"''Twas an ordinance,' says I, 'just passed by the Polis Department and ratified by the Turf Cut- ters' Association, providing that all persons not car- rying a license number on their rear axles shall keep in the public parks until further notice. Fortu- nately, the orders comes this year during a spell of fine weather, and the mortality, except on the borders of the lake and along the automobile drives, will not be any greater than usual.'
"'Who are these people on the side of the bill?' asks the man.
"'Sure,' says I, 'none others than the tenants of the Beersheba Flats -- a fine home for any man, especially on hot nights. May daylight come soon!'
"'They come here be night,' says be, 'and breathe in the pure air and the fragrance of the flowers and trees. They do that,' says be, 'coming every night from the burning beat of dwellings of brick and stone.'
"'And wood,' says I. 'And marble and plaster and iron.'
"'The matter will be attended to at once,' says the man, putting up his book.
"'Are ye the Park Commissioner?' I asks.
"'I own the Beersheba Flats,' says he. 'God bless the grass and the trees that give extra benefits to a man's tenants. The rents shall be raised fifteen per cent. to-morrow. Good-night,' says he."
