midnight
Many a sick wife and ailing child did I visit then , pining for the little delicacies their breadwinner could not afford to buy -- all of this at the behest of two bespangled gentlemen , who even then were writing to their distant wives , enclosing substantial checks , and descanting eloquently upon the sumptuous fare at the aforesaid Imperial Hotel . Two sights there are in this panoramic world which greatly madden me , and they are twins . The first is the spectacle of a pot-bellied landlord , his wife and family sated with every luxury , as he smilingly takes across the bar -- have you ever seen a snake swallow its prey , an equally slimy sight ? -- the five-cent piece of some poor fellow whose child hath neither toy nor bread , and whose broken wife , struggling in God 's name to shield her children from indecency and want , will tremblingly explore his pocketbook at midnight , only to find every farthing of his wages gone . For the aforesaid smiling landlord hath poured it into the satin lap of the equally smiling wife at the Travellers ' Rest . And the other sight is the spectacle of a complacent gentleman , organ for the Trades and Labour Union , who alighteth from his Pullman car to ply his incendiary trade , living in the lap of luxury , while weeping wives stroke the famished faces of their hungry bairns and dumbly plead with God that this cruel strike may soon be over . It was at such a time as this that Angus first impressed us with his real power .