Would you call that typical of New
York?"
"Of course not," said Rivington, with a sigh of relief. "I'm glad you
see the difference. But if you want to hear the real old tough Bowery
slang I'll take you down where you'll get your fill of it."
"I would like it," I said; "that is, if it's the real thing. I've
often read it in books, but I never heard it. Do you think it will be
dangerous to go unprotected among those characters?"
"Oh, no," said Rivington; "not at this time of night. To tell the
truth, I haven't been along the Bowery in a long time, but I know it
as well as I do Broadway. We'll look up some of the typical Bowery
boys and get them to talk. It'll be worth your while. They talk a
peculiar dialect that you won't hear anywhere else on earth."
Rivington and I went east in a Forty-second street car and then south
on the Third avenue line.
At Houston street we got off and walked.
"We are now on the famous Bowery," said Rivington; "the Bowery
celebrated in song and story."
We passed block after block of "gents'" furnishing stores--the
windows full of shirts with prices attached and cuffs inside. In
other windows were neckties and no shirts. People walked up and down
the sidewalks.
"In some ways," said I, "this reminds me of Kokomono, Ind.
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