Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1882-09-15
Tramps and Their Houses.

All regular tramp. .houses-there are
irregular ones, with peculiar and note
worthy features-are licensed taverns,
spirit-houses, or, as the phrase goes on
the road, "bingo kens" (from 1t. 6ianco,
white, the color of gin). Most of these
licenses are very old indeed, and some
are the oldest in the kingdom. Every
one of these houses is known far and
wide. No tramp, let him come from
where he may, ever enters a town with
out very definite ideas as to the house
where he is to put up. He has learned
all about it-aye, hundred miles off !;
and he goes to 1t As readily, and, when
inside, conforms as smoothly to all its
ways, as though he had been born with
in its precincts. The custom of such q
house is constant. The tramp stream
thither is perennial, and maintains about
the same level season after season and
year after year. This kind of people,
indeed, will halt here, and nowhere else,
so long as the house continues to main
tain its reputalit among them, and
they are much more profitable company
than most people would imagine. In q
great many instances the tramp house is
managed by tha same family for age
after age. There is one-the Goat, or,
as the genuine tramp prefers to term it,
the Welsh Buffalo-at W, which
has been held by the same people since
the days of the Long Parliament, as
records in the possession of the landlord
show. They are just the sort to conduct
such house successfully. In stature
the family has always been gigantic; q
little too stolid and surly, perhaps, but
in temper and tastes tramp all over.
For one thing, nobody ever heard of q
regular marriage taking place among
them. The eldest son takes over the
house during the "old mans" life. The
younger sons, as rule, join the police
in their native town or elsewhere, but by
preference in London. Wherever they
settle, however-and the fact is worthy
of notice-they remain to the last in the
full confidence Of the fraternity among
which they have been brought up.
1t is the landlords of these tramp
houses who keep up the vagabond
organization, and who renew and
circulate its signs and passwords from
time to time. The vagabonds them
selves could not do il, land never think Of
doing it. 1t is difficult to give an idea
OF the beggar passwords and sign sys-
tom; but we will do the best we can.
1t has no common center, and no uni
formity. There may be, and probably
there are, fifty different sets of them in
use in England. Each has its own do
main, and these domains intersect one
another in curious fashion. These
landlords form small circles among
themselves according to contiguity; and
a dozen to twenty Of these small circles
will form one great one. A great circle
of tramp landlords-perhaps it were
better to call it Oval-may spread fifty
miles along one of the great highways
and ten to fifteen miles on each side Of
it. And so far the set of signs and pass
words in use therein is good for three
months, when they are regularly
changed. A free tramp pays three
pence for the sign and password every
time they are renewed. All he has to
do on these occasions is to 90 to any
landlord of the right sort, give in the
old sign and password in due form, and
pay his pence. And he has to pay again
every time he enters new circle. Ex-
perience teaches him very well the pre-
else bonds of each. However, when he
manifests ignorance on this point he is
very soon set right by the landlord, and
must purchase the freedom of the new
circle in the usual way. He meets with
little difficulty here, provided the pence
are forthcoming. For the tramp land
lord can tell in an instant, by the word
and sign given by the tramp, whether
the latter Is one of the right sort or not.
Password and sign, indeed, serve,
among other things, as a means where
by tramp landlords levy q tax upon
vagabonds all over the country.
The usss Of this vsgaboAd frsema-
sonry are manifold. kte-ehes the vag