Horatio Alger 
Julius, The Street Boy [EPUB ebook] 

“Where are you goin’, Julius? Where’s yer blackin’ box?” asked Patrick Riley.
“I’ve retired from business, ” said Julius.
“Did yer rich uncle die, and leave yer a fortune?”
“No, but he’s goin’ up the river to Sing Sing, for the benefit of his constitushun, and I’m goin’ West fer my health.”
“Goin’ West? You’re gassin’.”
“No, I ain’t, I’m goin’ in a few days, along of Mr. O’Connor, and a lot of other chaps.”
“Is it far out there?” asked Pat.
“More’n a hundred miles, ” said Julius, whose ideas of geography and distances were rather vague.
“Yer don’t mean ter live out there?”
“Yes, I do, I’m goin’ on to a farm, or into a store, and grow up respectable.”
“Won’t yer miss the city, Julius?”
“Likely I will.”
“I don’t think I’d like the country, ” said Pat, reflectively. “New York’s a bully place. There’s always something goin’ on. I say, did you hear of that murder in Center Street last night?”
“No; what was it?”
“A feller stabbed a cop that was trottin’ him round to the station house for bein’ tight. There’s always something to make it lively here. In the country there ain’t no murders, nor burglaries, nor nothin’, ” concluded Pat, rather contemptuously.