BOY'S PRAYER IS ANSWERED.
Supplication to St. Anthony Brings
Food to Hungry Child.
After being apparently abandoned in the Union depot for a day and a half and waiting thirty-four hours without a bite of food for a friend who had promised him that he would come, in the hour of his distress Sylvester Stark, 11 years old, had recourse in prayer. He breathed a supplication to St. Anthony, his patron saint since his confirmation, and his prayer was answered. A red capped depot usher came and took him to Mrs. Olive Everingham, the depot matron. To her he told his story and Mrs. Everingham, turning to some men nearby, said:
"Who'll pitch in to buy this boy a meal?"
"Come with me, sonny," said one of the bystanders and led Sylvester to a restaurant across the street.
Ham and eggs and side dishes were ordered. Sylvester consumed them all and then, contented as a hibernating bear, was bundled into a car and taken to the central police station where he was turned over to the matron and put to bed.
Sylvester lives at 2108 Market street, St. Louis. He is the only son of a widowed mother. In the winter he attends school and last summer he worked. This year a friend of his mother, Charles Ayers, who lives at Whitewater, Kas., invited the boy to pay him a visit. A week ago he sent the ticket and Sylvester came. There on his friend's stock farm he enjoyed himself, but his mother wrote that she was getting lonesome and he must go home. Mr. Ayres bought the boy a ticket to Kansas City and put him on the train, saying he would follow on a stock train and meet him yesterday morning in the women's waiting room at the Union depot.
"I got here at 9:45 o'clock Wednesday night," said the boy last night. "When night came I crawled beneath a bench and slept. When I woke up I was awfully hungry, but I was afraid to go out of the station because while I was gone Mr. Ayres might come and not find me. Then after a while I didn't feel hungry any more. I got a headache and I began to pray and then the man with the red hat came and got me. I think Mr. Ayres must have passed through the station and failed to find me. I'm sure he didn't forget about me."
Word was telegraphed to Ayres last night that the boy was safe.
