Two hours had elapsed since Filippo, or Phil, as I shall call him, for the benefit of my readers unfamiliar with Italian names, had left the miserable home in Crosby Street, where he and forty other boys lived in charge of a middle-aged Italian, known as the padrone.

Of this person, and the relations between him and the boys, I shall hereafter speak.

At present I propose to accompany Phil.
Though he had wandered about, singing and playing, for two hours, Phil had not yet received a penny.

This made him somewhat uneasy, for he knew that at night he must carry home a satisfactory sum to the padrone, or he would be brutally beaten; and poor Phil knew from sad experience that this hard taskmaster had no mercy in such cases.
The block in which he stood was adjacent to Fifth Avenue, and was lined on either side with brown-stone houses.

It was quiet, and but few passed through it during the busy hours of the day.