The Sedalia weekly bazoo. [volume] (Sedalia, Mo.) 187?-1904, 1881-08-09
RELIGIOUS TRAMPS.
A Fraternity That Does Really
Exist
A Sketch of Their Modes of Oper-
alton and How they Deceive
the People.

no---They Spot them at Once
Reformation Evidently
Needed.
New York sun.
That man is a religious tramp" said
Manager Bunting, of the Christian
Home for Incorporate Men. The
man had apparently just passed mid
die life. ale can sing finely, pray
earnestly and exhort eloquently. /
wish l could talk a. we'll as he can.
"Why do you call him a religious
tramp"
Il will explain There are relig-
ious tramps just the same as there are
tramps who pray upon the general
public, and who are honest enough to
make no pretence of religion. These
religious tramps are known to every
evangelist, clergyman and philan-
thropist. They hunt gospel temper
once meetings, make religious profess
sions in the meetings Of the Womens
Christion unions, are present at the
mission rooms, and when one city fails
to afford them further pecuniarv re-
lief they start out in the track Of Il
temperance orator, or follow some re
vival movem mt, visiting all parts Of
the country. God is not deceived.
We are not deceived. Many such
men, however, have been saved. and
have led useful lives"
You do not mean to saw that these
religious tramps are ever sincerely
converted ,
1T is fact Because it is 50 these
men are asked to come under chris
tian influence. To be sure many Of
them will not reform. They love
their miserable drunken life. have
taken men into this home, cast their
ragged clothes into the ash box, given
them baths, a new suit of clothes and
sobered them up. Often they have
secured good situations. but before
giving two days application to their
duties they have deliberately gone
back to Chatham and Baxter street
dens and imbibed poison to that ex-
tent that my next knowledge OF them
is that they are Oh BIackwell's island
shoveling ashes. Men have been
through all this and then reformed.
1t is rare exception, however.
"What is the bright side Of this re-
ligions tramp picture ~
These men have one common place
Of meeting. 1t is generally in the
back room of groggery OF the low
est description. recall one particu-
lar place in Chatham street where
hundreds Of them congregate. because
/ have had occasion to snatch men
from its influence. In this place can
be found men who were born .tramps.
The surroundings of their lives have
been such that they could not help
following vicious course, almost from
the cradle to the present. Associated
with them, linked together by the
common tie of misery, are Young
men whose parents are honorable. re-
spectacle and wealthy citizens. Drink
has led them into errors, into the COM
initial of crime. They have gone
down step by step in the social scale,
until to-day they subsist almost ell
tirely on liquid poiscns, mere sembIan-
ces of humanity. Some of them have
been east off from parental recogni-
tion: in some instances they draw a
specified amount of money from home
at regular intervals. l have put Just
such men on their feet again, and for
years past | have been best in know
ing that they are ENJOYING the conf
dence of their families, filling good
situations and leading christian lives"
One of those men, who has been
for some time leading an honest life,
has a good situation in a business
house. and looks on his past career as
a terrible nightmare, was asked:
What led you to put yourself
under christian influence :"
Religion was far from my thoughts
when took the first step to sober up.
My sole object was to secure a new
suit Of clothes in place of the hand
me-downs' was then wearing"
What do you mean by hand-me-
dOwns?"
''Hand-me-downs are obtained in
this way: A man in a temporary in
terval Of sOberness secures a new suit
Of clothes, say worth about $50. As
he has no money to purchase more
whisky, he enters a Baxter street
second hand clothing shop. Possibly
he is in drugged condition. lie re-
ceives an old worn suit in place of his
new one, and not more than dollar or