Jack

Jack was a swarthy, swaggering son-of-a-gun 
He worked thirty years on the railroad, ten hours a day, and his hands were tougher than sole leather 
He married a tough woman and they had eight children and the woman died and the children grew up and went away and wrote the old man every two years 
He died in the poorhouse sitting on a bench in the sun telling reminiscences to other old men whose women were dead and children scattered 
There was joy on his face when he died as there was joy on his face when he lived — he was a swarthy, swaggering son-of-a-gun