The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1876-09-21

as his rags and his filth were. He got
rid of neither because he objected TO
neither.
understanding him better, but still
not understanding him thoroughly, we
wondered and speculated concerning
him How was it, we asked, that he
made his appearances so suddenly and so
opportunelyP Why were there so many
of him? Whence came he, and why?
One magaZine-writer studied him as the
entomologist studies new species of
insect, and pronounced aim an import
alton, against which our tariff laws had
failed to protect us, devised, as they
are, for the purpose of keeping out only
prosperity and thrift The tramp, par
taking in no degree of either prosperity
or thrift, had free entrance, and, ac-
cording to the writer, referred to, he is
simply the English sturdy beggar,
transplanted from the lanes and hedges
of Britain to the wider field of opera
tons which our country affords We
doubt this, however, if for nOother rea-
son.. because the tramp comprehends
no mode of travel and respects none ex-
CtDI ludG lIOlu w ulCn IC JtihCS Ills
and he can not have crossed the Allan
tic Ocean on foot The theory that ne
saved up money enough to pay even
Storage passage across is too wildly
absurd to be entertained for a moment,
and there is every reason to believe that
he is a native growth, closely resem-
bling the English beggar, but springing
! from different source, precisely as our
house-fly, which naturalists say is a dis
tinct species, closely resembles the Eu-
ropean insect of the same name. u
There was this much of truth, how
ever, in the magazinist's theory, that
like the English beggar our tramp has
gone permanently into business. He
is not, as we supposed when he first
appeared, temporary outgrowth-a
fungus, as it were-of the panic and of
the hard times heis Z" development"
in the Darwinian sense; and while the
panic may have helped, as an environ
ment,to hasten his growth, he is never
theless q natural product of advancing
civilization. We had him not until recent
.ly, because we were yet too young as a
nation to have produced him by. the
processes OF evolution, but he has come
into being now precisely as his fellow,
the sturdy begger, came into being in
the mother country-aS the result OF
certain conditions, operating through q
long series of years. -.-.- 49,
= 1t is y great gain that we know and
recognize these facts now. Having the
tramp, and understanding that he is
permanent possession, and not n mere
accident of the time, we shall the better
determine what to do with him. He
has been annoying, disgusting and mis-
chievous, hitherto, chiefly because our
social and political system was organ
ized without reference to him. In cOHn-
try districts especially, in which hospi-
tality to wayfarers has always been
deemed a Christian and social duty
which must never be neglected, neither
law nor custom was fitted to the new
condition of things; but now that
we know the tramp as sep
arate species, not in any way
to be confounded with the needy
wayfarer, we shall provide for him by
local legislation, as has been done al
ready in some instances, or otherwise,
and if we can not eXterminate him we
may at least abate him as nuisance.
He will tramp still, and beg and pilfer,
but he will do these things less inso-
lently than now and less annoyingly.
In a word, we have no place for him in
our social system, but we shall make
one, and then his presence viii be less
irritating than it has been hitherto. We
shall asSimilate him, as the doctors say,
and he will no longer be, as he is now,
a foreign substance in the body polite
and social.-Neo0 YORK. Bvening Post