The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1888-03-01
FAKIRs ON TIE eoWERY.
The Many Ways Whereby They Trick
the Credulous Multitude.

The Many Ways Whereby They Trick
the Creiulous Multitude.
The Bowery on the open street is the
natural home of the fakir, and the holi.
day season is his harvest time, People
go there to be deceived and they come
away satisfied with the deception. The
knowing ones among the frequenters of
the street laugh at the greeny whose
dimes and dollars they have gathered in,
and in an hour or two afterward skin
faro, policy or neighboring bucket shop
has cleaned these very knowing ones out
of their last cent.
The bittsr cold wind of night sent its
sharp gusts sweeping up along the street,
and it was not a pleasant night on which
to lounge along from Chatham square to
Cooper institute But the boys and girls
were OUT iii force and the east side had
on part of its holiday clothes. On nearly
every corner was the irrepresslbic ts,aa!ssir,
and in front of him the always seen open
mouthed crowd of gadding women and
wonder chained men. How the glib
told stories rolled out from the quick
lips of the sharp eyed operator, as he
rung in here and there the well timed
praises of the articles they were to be
gulled into buying.
AT the intersection of Canal street and
the Bowery, few yards from Pythagoras
hall, a big frowsy, red eyed fellow, with
afat1 Ike &shaxhs Sxas8 the attraction.
Stuffing his capacious mouth fnll OF cots
ton he chewed it with a gusto that
seemed to bespeak long fasting. and
touching light to it breathed out flames
until his head seemed like a veritable
Vesuvius in eruption. And then he sold
a tooth paste that he solemnly assured
the crowd would make the blackest teeth
pearly white. He pulled up an open
mouthed street arab with teeth upon
which the grass could grow, and in the
light of an old torch wiped them into
whiteness that shone through the night.
How could the crowd know that the
enamel on those teeth had been destroyed
and most of them would hardly have
cared, for they poured their stock of dimes
into the dirty hand that was stretched
out for them and grabbed for the acid
powder that was to destroy their molars.
Across the street from him was the
blacking fakir, and his forte lay in his
lightning winged tongue and his political
speeches to the men who crowded about
him. The headquarters of the knights
of Labor in Pythagoras hall were not
fifty feet away from him, and the fakir
gathered in the horny handed toilors and
their money. He declaimed against the
tyranny of capital, and, holding an old
shoe in his hand, showed how his black
ing could make it shine. He spoke If
the oppressed workingman, and rung
in the declaration that the laborer who
went with unshining shoes when union
made backing was being peddled on a
freezing night at five cents box was an
enemy to his kind
Did he sell many boxes? Well, rather
And what difference did it make to the
honest toiler who wanted to help the
poor fellow, to find that the bottom of
the big looking box was hollow and the
alleged backing only SCOT and water?
Just off the corner of Broome and
Bowely, near enough to catch the crowd
Of thrifty housewives with their loaded
baskets, the fruit fakirs had their stands.
Loud mouthed, hoarse throated, dirty
faced and reckless, they are the most law
less of the peddier gang on the Bowery.
'Rosy apples-yer you are, ten cents
a pail-only few more left-talze 'em
right along" and the cheapness tempts
the economical matron, though every
woman on the east side will tell you that
a peddler is thief. She approaches
with the air of woman who knows she
is dealing with dangerous character.
| She handles the apples, the top ones in
| the pail look nice enough and she con-
| cludes to purchase. Then comes in the
nice work of the adept fruit fallir. lie
seizes the pail and into the open basket
of the watching woman he pours the
apples. and with sudden twist of his
hand throws the pail into the farthosi
! part of the wagon. She has seen nc
| taking and yet she is hardly half satisfied
that she has not been cheated. But she
knows it when she gets home and counts
her apples.
Was the pail full? Certainly, but the
two last layers of apples in the bottom Of
the pail had been pressed in so tightly
that they would not drop out, and all she
received for her ten cents was the loost
fruit above these two layers.
Along above Spring street, in front oi
| big dime museum, with flaming pict
ures that caught the gaping strollers, @
| flinty eyed fellow, with q scraggy beard
stood out in the mud and told stories that
made even some of the Bowery rounders
raise their eyes. But the boys liked then
and the wide eyed girls, with cropped
hair and short skirts, laughed as loud as
the fellows, and the fun was fast and fu.
| rious.
OF course he had something to ring ir
upon them. and they all knew it; Sc
when he pulled out his patent wash that
would turn brass into color SO colder
that an expert could not detect the diff
ference, he made some sales, though the
purchasers laughed half sheepishly AZ
they turned over their dimes. But whel
he took the brass watch of fellow will
checker board pants and, rubbing thu
wash over it, held it up to view glisten
ing like gold in the glare Of the electri,
light. his sales increased, and the girl
were the biggest purchasers. They didn'
know, and they would hardly have caret
if they did, that the bottle the faki
handed them was not at all like the opel
one he held in his hand, and that even i
| IL NcTc tue llilSci COlOT NOulu laue ava,
in fifteen minutes.
So the money went all along the Bow
cry. To the fakir on the street corner
to the blind beggar on the other, VIII,
kept one eye on his tin cup lest the thiev
ing gamins OF the gucer would steal tn
charitable pennies that were droppc'
into it: to the grimy old woman mendi
cant, who told the fable of her starvin,
family and spent her gatherings at ever,
alternate saloon; TO the dime museums
with their horrible pictures and thei
puffy faced outside man extolling tn
beauties of the ten cent show inside-t,
everything that the boys and the girls
the men and the women, the rounder
and the newcomers knew TO be fakes.
But there is fun occasionally in bein,
deceived, and on the Bowery it only cost
ten cents TO feel that some man is wors
than cneself-for what can be less hon
est than Bowery fakirl--New Yorl
Graphic.