The book takes the reader through the Children's Lodging House, the Bowery Theatre, and the Fulton ferry, besides giving one a description of the life of bootblacks, match boys, apple girls, Bowery B'hoys and other assorted street creatures living in New York.
Horatio Alger Jr. ; January 13, 1832 – July 18, 1899) was a prolific 19th-century American writer, best known for his many young adult novels about impoverished boys and their rise from humble backgrounds to lives of middle-class security and comfort through hard work, determination, courage, and honesty. (Excerpt from Wikipedia)