The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-03-17
LONDON AND PARIS BEGGARS
Professional Mendicants Have for GencE
lions Made q Good Living.

Professional Mendicants Have for Genera
rions Made a Good Living.
The professional beggar is not a mod
ern innovation, by any means. says the
North American Review. A specimen
case was 'Scarecrow, the famous
London beggar, who, having disabled
himself in his right leg, asked alms all
day in order to get a warm supper at
night. According to John Timb BIS, the
Buffers" whom we often find men
toned in the literature of the seven
teenth century, were troops OF idle
Migrants who infested Lincoln's Inn
Fields, London. They assumed the
character of manned soldiers who had
suffered in the great rebellion and
found ready prey in the people OF
fashion and quality who drove by. In
deed, it is made clear by contemporary
allusion in comedies that this square
was the regular haunt of bogus Grip
plies who lived by Inerdicancy, which
they carried on in the most barefaced
and even intimidating manner. 1t is
related that George w.. when prince
of Wales, once attended a beggars'
carnival in London, incognito. He
had not been there very long when the
chairman, addressing the company and
pointing to the prince, said: 81 call
upon that ERE gemman with shirt
for song" The prince, as well as he
could, got excused upon friend who
accompanied him promising to sing in
stead, which the latter did amid great
applause. The health of the price
and his friend having been drunk and
duly responded to, they departed in
order to afford the company an oppor-
tunity to fix their different routes for
the ensuing days business, for at that
time the professional beggars of Lon
don used to have a general meeting
several times during the year at which
they were divided into companies, each
company having its particular walk.
In those days their earnings varied
much, some getting as high as five shil-
lings day. Most of the professional
beggars in London to-day-and their
name is legion-emanate from two or
three common lodging-houses. The
most populous of these, which is known
as THE Dispensary," supports an in
dividual known as a SERVER" who
earns a living by manufactu turing the
pathetic signboards which the sham
cripples and the bogus blind men carry
round their necks. In Paris, as is well
known, the professional beggars hold
regular weekly meetings at which the
routes to be followed by the members
of the guild are mapped ont by
standing committee. They have an
organ of their own called the Journal
des Mendicants, which appears twice
week. From a recent issue the follow
ing curious advertisement is taken:
''Wanted-To engage cripple for
seaside resort. Good references and
small deposit required" This queer an
nouncement is explained by the fact
that the proprietors of hotels and
boarding-houses at fashionable French
watering places assume that visitors
would be disposed to give ulms if an
opportunity were afforded them, and,
as they cannot very well do the beg
ging themselves, they engage profess
sional beggars, to whom they grant
permission to solicit aims on their
premises, and the beggars in return
pay them one-half of their daily re-
cciptS