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Rosanna Vorpiano! Isn't that a musical name? And doesn't the child look as if she had just stepped out of a "genre" picture? Her old checked gingham dress is partly covered by a little apron, tied behind with an old shoe-string; and the buttons on her dress, as diverse in color and shape as "Joseph's coat," give a very funny effect as she turns suddenly round into the broad light. It is a warm day, but she has thrown over her tight jet braids an old knitted hood -- black and purple, -- and the frizzy curls that blow about her forehead look like so many imps that have come out to frolic with her roguish black eyes.

As she stands there, leaning against the steps with that old basket on her arm, half-filled with bright red apples, I long to put her upon canvas.

She has made fifty cents to-day, -- can't you hear the dimes jingling in her pocket, -- and to-morrow she means to start very, very early to market.

Up and down Tremont and Washington Streets, through Temple Place, Winter, Bromfield Street, -- up long flights of stairs into offices and "composing rooms," and into scores of close rooms that swarm with heated and thirsty toilers, -- wherever she can find a customer little Rosanna goes, up and down, up and down, all day long. She doesn't aspire to a "stand" yet; thinks she would like to go to school; but I'm much afraid this roving sort of street-life will bring out all the "gypsey" in our little Italian girl and utterly unfit her for any kind of study.

Oh! there is so much want and suffering all about us! Do my "WIDE AWAKE" readers realize, I wonder, how many of their brothers and sisters are toiling, all day long, just for a place to lay their head and a bit of bread to eat! Amelia and Rosanna are not imaginary characters,- what I have told you about them is true all through! -- and then there are so many others like them! Alike, and yet different, too; for each of the three hundred fruit stands, scattered about our Boston streets, and every little basket peddler, have a story "all their own."

And did you ever notice what a variety there is in the stands themselves? Sometimes you will find them nicely painted, -- green seems to be the favorite color -- and, very often, the tray is placed on wheels so that it can be easily carried about. Then there is the big broad basket with its flat cover that serves for a table, while the under part is used as a sort of refrigerator. This is certainly more picturesque than the wooden tray, but I don't believe it is half as convenient.

One day I watched with a deal of interest the "setting up of a stand" on the Common. It was a very modest affair -- two little saw-horses, and just a rough board thrown across, -- but everything was arranged in "apple pie" order. There was a nice white cloth to cover the uneven planks, and then, one after another, the little hand baskets were emptied of their contents. Of course, every apple and pear was duly polished with a bit of rag before it was laid on the cloth; and, somehow, the biggest and fairest always found their way to the top.

At the main entrance to the Common, on Charles Street, is an old woman whose weather-beaten face shows a long apprenticeship in that trade. On cold days she protects herself from the bleak east winds by a wide long strip of black enamel cloth, which she fastens to the high fence just behind her; and a very nice background it makes for her odd little stand and her picturesque self. As the weather changes from biting cold to scorching heat, old umbrellas are substituted; but, no matter what the season may be, our fruit venders will always be found at their posts.

To the passers-by, it may seem an idle, romantic sort of life; but they know nothing of the hard labor done at home, night and morning, to give this leisure through the day. In little baskets and crates and carts and wheelbarrows, all the unsold fruit is carried home every night; and every morning it must be carried to the "stand," and polished and re-arranged. And many are the stockings and mittens that have been knit by these indefatigable little women, while waiting for customers.

The constant exposure to all sorts of weather renders the fruit-vender's life anything but a desirable one; still, to a large class of deserving poor, it offers one means of earning an honest livelihood. And, while these modest little stands do not interfere with public travel, it does seem as if our good city ought both to protect and to patronize them.

THE BOOTBLACKS.

"Have a 'shine,' mister? Only five cents!"

It is a very small voice from a very small boy, and there, is such a crowd hurrying to and fro that little Fred can hardly make himself heard.

But he has his regular customers who know just where to find him and who pay him twenty-five cents a week. And then that particular corner of his, down on Hanover and Blackstone Streets, is such a good stand that the little fellow seldom fails to earn forty or fifty cents each day. Sometimes, on Sundays, he can make from a dollar to a dollar and a half; but then these are always considered "red letter days" for the whole bootblack brigade.