Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1899-05-26
A VAGABOND
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BY Mark Lennox

TIE WAS as fine specimen of tramp
II humanity as ever 1 had come
across, and I almost became reconci1ed
to the storm that had driven me into
the ramshackle wayside inn. He bore
his rags with inimitable grace, and
there was good-temepered, independ-
ent, whimsical something behind his
devil-may-care appearance that was
simply irresistib1e-a strong dash of
poetry and romance, moreover, SO often
found in your lord of the lane and high
way.
His first words disappointed me,
confess, for he spoke with the unmis-
taxable tone and accent of gentleman,
and I was growing trifie tired of peo-
pie who had "come down" in life.
When he had finished the second pot of
ale that he permitted me to pay for 1
limited, somewhat rudely perhaps, that
no doubt he had seen better days.
''Seen better days? 1 should hope L,
have-and worse ones, too; many of
them. Better days? Did you ever
come across a man on his beam ends
that hadn't seen better days? Talking
of lies, it'll have struck you by this
time, no doubt, that man is lying ami
NAL. No? Oh, we'll, that's because
you're thinking of one kind of liars
only. They're not all of one kind, 1
grant you. There's the man who de-
ceives others. He's a meterialist, if
ever there was one. But then there's
the man that deceivcs himself-and
that's your ideaGst. See?"
did see, and-tried to draw him out
further, but he did not really wax elo-
quent until he was deep in his post
prandial glass of toddy and his huge
frame doomed dim from out a smoke
cloud. 1t was then 1 asked my man to
spin me yarn.
He raised himself from his lolling
posture, and, planting both elbows on
the table, looked at me with those half
quizzical, half-pathetic eyes of his.
What queer fish you going,
respectable people are!" he said, at
last. you're keen as ferrets on tales
of wild life-and low life. too, for that
matter. But that's neither here nor
there. Do you believe in regular
tramp and vagabond repenting and
turning round-for good, [ mean?"
Don't your I parried, laughing at
wondering what he was driving at.
Eve got to- he answered, dryly, 'for
I've seen 'em do it-actually seen them
do it, and I could no more keep them
back than baby could have done"
He stopped, and, signing, yelled him
self in melancholy smoke.
"How heart-breaking!" murmured,
sympathetically.
When he emerged again from the
cloud the melancholy had departed.
''Now, did you ever hear of a respec-
table and 1aw-abiding citizen suddenly
taking a headlong plunge into tramp
dom and rowing on in happy lawless-
ness for the rest of his natural life?"
L gravely shook my head.
He pulled away in deep meditative-
ness.
''Why shouldn't that be possible as
well as the otheF?" he said. Il never
did see why it shouldn't. and-Fm a bit
of mental and moral philosopher, you
must know; I never heard of a man
worth the name who didn't pick up
that trick on the tramp-and / thought
I'd try and settle the question by an ex-
pertinent, i'm flesh and blood"
"You actually tried to turn "a
"a decent man into a vagabond. EX-
actly. Hark at the wind screaming up
the hillside. 1t was just such a night
as this when 1 first began But I'll
let you have it in regular order.
after once determined on my ex-
pertinent tried to get hold of decent
subject. I was in London at the time.
trying to get the hang of the place. and
didn't know respectable soul there
except little Tom Allen, poor city
clerk, who lived in the same house as
did. And he was respectable-a nervous,
hly-ivered sort of a fellow. who went
to chapel regularly, and had never
tasted anything stronger than water
in his life. He drudged at his desk all
day, and came home at night to tea and
Pollok's Course of Time or some other
equally entertaining work, and he'd
been living this monotonous little life
of his for close on 25 years when came
across him. And fixed on him at once,
for saw the untamable little teIl-tale
devil in the corner of his meek and quiet
eye, and / knew he'd do. Strange.
though, how a bit of the devil turks in
The mildest of creatures, and a bit OF
the brute, too, for that matter But let
that pass-except that it brings me
back to what ! said just now about you