The Portland daily press., 1893-03-25
ONE KIND OF A BEAT.
He Hsunts Hotels and Coolly Takes
Many Privileges.

Many Privileges.
How He Develops From a Telephone User
to a Full Pledged Guest Through Inter
esting stages-A Type of Beggar That Is
Hard to Put Down.
"Among the peculiar animals that in
fest large cities said the clerk at one of
the big hotels this morning, sis the hotel
beat. He is product Of large towns
and grows and fattens with the liberali-
ty of the landlords. He enjoys all the
privileges of guests except that of sleep
ing in one of the beds and getting regu-
lar meals, yet he never pays cent for
the accommodations, and although he
invariably gets ousted he is cheerful
and transfers his patronage to some 9TH
er hotel.
ssNo, don't refer to the man who
beats his board bill. The man | speak
of never registers. He is type. In his
milder form he is a neighboring business
man OF attorney who finds it inconven-
lent to have telephone put up in his
Office, and so uses ours regularly. That
is a little thing, and we don't mind it
much, but the idea grows on some men.
"From using our telephone, most of
them drift up against the water cooler,
especially in hot weather. That is all
right, too, but from the water cooler the
way is short to the toilet rooms. The
novice will be modest in his use Of the
toilet rooms and deal slightly with the
towels, wiping on those that hang up.
But as the days progress, and the novelty
of the thing wears away, most of them
get holder and help themselves to the
clean towels on the shelves. Some ho-
tells have porters in the toilet rooms who
advance and give every man who enters
q whisking.
"This is supposed to make the beats
feel ashamed and extract tip at least.
Butsdoes it? Bless you, no. The beat is
one of the most graceful posers for the
broom man, and it is so commonplace to
thank the porter he does not doit Pay
for getting his boots BACKED? Well.
that shows that you don't know the beat.
He blacks his own, with the porter's APP
paratus of course, but he stoops to the
manual labor, as he knows that even the
guests pay for having their boots shined.
The GOODNESS with which he borrows the
brushes is worth the price of shine.
At first he takes only the brush, but he
swiftly reaches the point of taking all
the backing he can use.
'sBless you, no, he does not stop at
backing his shoes! If that were all. we
could forgive him. Having put his
person into good trim he feels like writ
ing letter. Do you know that there
are fellows living at cheap boarding
houses who write all their letters at first
class hotels, and thus give their friends
at distance the idea that they live
there? Yes it is even so, and some Of
them go SO far as to have their mail ad-
dressed here. At first these fellows
slide quietly into the writing room and
use what chance supply of paper and
envelopes they find there, but as the
the novelty wears off they do not hest
tate to come to the desk and ask for
paper. Yes, and occasionally beat
will object to the quality of the paper
ooh, yes, when he gets to that point he
is almost graduated from that particular
hotel, but he takes few more degrees.
Often he has made the clerk feel ashamed
for giving out such poor stationery. He
takes loaf into the parlor, where after
awhile he will occasionally have his
friends from the country call and wait
for him.
s'No, that is not the last course. His
last dealings with the hotel are through
the dining room. Few ever get to this
stage, however, but that makes it all the
better for the few who are blessed with
such superabundance of impudence.
They have but little competition.
Having become thoroughly accus-
toned to the usages Of the hotel, the
beat rides up the elevator to a room he
knows to be empty. The elevator boy
of course does not watch him as he
walks briskly through the hall several
times and then summons the cab and
descends to the dining room floor. See
ing him come down stairs from the ele-
vator the doerkeeper returns the gra-
cious smile with which he pays for his
meal and lets him pass unhlndered.
Once in, he goes through the bill of fare
in the most approved style.
'sHe seldom tries to get more than
meal at long intervals, for he invariably
gets caught after he has eaten five or six
meals. Then, knowing his character and
how useless it,would be to sue him for
the price Of the meals, we simply con-
duct him to the entrance and have
stout porter kick him from the thresh-
old. Then we rest contented till some
other sharper makes sucker of u.s.
'tNo, you can't rank the beat with the
hotel swindler. This latter man gets &C
commodations under false pretenses and
runs the risk of going to Jail. There is
something manly about that, but the
beat runs no risk of Jail. He simply does
whatever we will let him do, and if he
beats us we alone are to blame and must