The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-10-28
BEGGAR MAKES FORTUNE.
Once Year He Discards DISCUSSES
and Visits His Estate.

New York. Oct 2S.-Motto Modric, of
whose triumphal progress toward Amer
lea Vienna cable has warned New
Workers, is one of those who might well
be said to be coming in velvet gown.
In half the great cities of the east
Modrlc is known as the king of Beg
CARS" In and around New York he is
called The Beggar King of HObOken.'
In IL years he has not earned an honest
dollar, yet he is rich. He has found
it more profitable in America to beg
than to loot. and he boasts of his dis
coVery. In New York Boston Pitts
burg and Chicago Modric's slight form.
his stoop shoulders and bent back, his
crippled hand, self mutilated. and his
arm, scared with acids and colored with
iodoform are familiar as characteristics
of this seemingly most miserable of
mendicants.
But periodically the King of the Beg
gars" discards his DISCUSSES and lays
aside his scepter. Then. clad like gen
tleman. spending money freely, he goes
abroad to visit his estate and family in
the village of Polaricani Croatia. The
simple minded Croatian peasants of his
native town revere him as a wonderous
evidence of American progressiveness.
Among them he poses as rich specula-
tor and contractor and what not, who
has thriven upon his many great enter
prises in the land of the free.
After a season of such diversion al his
old home Modric returns to the soualor
"a Ills I1OOOhtu tenSHleuls I0SuIu6S his
ragged masquerade, takes charge of his
band of IS or 20 panhandlers, and again
adds rapidly to his hoard. For more
than a decade this has been his dual
| life The Ellis island Authorities have de-
tanned him repeatedly, but he is willy.
and they have never held him long.
According to the Vienna cable dis
patch, the Austrian police have learned
that the shrewd Croatian, after another
! Of his periodic visits home, has Just
sailsd on a fast steamer for the United
States, accompanied by young wo-
MAJ"
They have also learned that he is the
owner of valuable real estate in Agram.
Neither statement will surprise persons
| familiar with Modric's picturesque ca
reer. When not posing in his character
of a crippled mendicant he is addicted
to travelling first class and by fast
steamships. He is uncommonly fond,
also, of woman's society. and is quite
a gallant in his way.
John j. Fallon. a Hobol1en lawyer
whose professional business has given
him insight into Eodric's dual life. is
authority for the statement that from
begging alone this marvellous mendi-
cant has enjoyed for years an average
| income of not less than $40 a day. Only
last summer. Mr.. Fallon says, Modrte
sent $1,000 to Austria in one consign-
rrert.
At the same time he was involved in lit
! igation with Lucia MiskutOn who is rec
ognized by the police the Queen OF
Panhandlers,' over $780, which she said he
had given her. and one of the witnesses
then summoned before Recorder Stanton
of HObOken. asserted that MOdric haC
boosted to him of having once begged ar
aggregate of $500 within three months
Under pressure at the time of his last
arrest Modic submitted to a careful ex-
animation of the supposedly damaged a-Ir
which for years has supplemented his ma
tive wit and his histrionic powers as hi:
chief stock in trade. 1t was found thai
the arm was habitually treated with acit
and then rubbed with iodoform and ban
daged- The effect of this treatment to
gether with a severed finger. cut off him
self with a cleaver to evade military duty
was sufficiently grewsome to appeal t.
guliible philanthropists at street corners
Detectives have discovered that Modri
has a substantial account in a Greenwich
street banking establishment in this city