Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 850

This pulp serial, "Caleb Cinders, the New York Castaway" by Jo Pierce, follows a fifteen-year-old orphaned boy living in Manhattan. Caleb, cast out by his family at age twelve, works as a groundskeeper's assistant for the wealthy Irving Proctorham. When Caleb discovers a small boy, Allan Garland, mysteriously locked in the stable loft—kidnapped and abandoned by unknown men—he attempts to help the child. However, Proctorham witnesses their departure together and, disbelieving Caleb's explanation, accuses him of lying and breaking-and-entering. Proctorham promptly fires Caleb and threatens to have both boys arrested by police. The narrative employs colloquial working-class dialogue and focuses on themes of poverty, mistreatment of servants, and urban street life in 1880s New York.