"OLD LAME SAM,"
AND HIS MYSTERIOUS CANE
SAMUEL BROWN.
The residents and passers-by in the Bowery, on Hestor Street, and along the byways adjacent thereto, will not have forgotten a limping, oldish man, who perambulated that vicinity regularly for a long period, until within a year or two—slightly palsied, but decently attired, like a farmer or up-countryman—leaning upon his stout cane, which he invariably carried with him, as a support for his at times nervous and tremulous limbs, and who was familiarly known as "Old Sam," of—nobody knew where, precisely; though it was asserted by those who knew him best that he had a domicile somewhere in New Jersey. This eccentric individual is the subject of our present chapter, and his history will be found an entertaining one.
He was generally known by the sobriquet of "Lame Sam," and his every-day innocent manner of speech, and the pleasant smile that almost constantly pervaded the benignant expression of his features, notwithstanding his halting and apparently irksome style of locomotion, could not but
