Tramping
With Tramps
Tramping
With Tramps
STUDIES AND SKETCHES
OF VAGABOND LIFE
By
Josiah Flynt
With Prefatory Note by
Hon. Andrew D. White
New York
The Century Co.
1907
Copyright, 1893, 1894, 1895, 1899,
by The Century Co.
Copyright, 1894, 1895, by Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
Copyright, 1897, by the Forum Publishing Co.
Copyright, 1895, 1896, 1897, by Harper & Brothers.
TO
MY MOTHER
Embassy of the United States of America,
Berlin, April 19, 1899.
Dear Mr. Flynt:
Your letter of March 27 and accompanying articles have greatlyinterested me.
As you know, I consider the problems furnished by crime in theUnited States as of the most pressing importance. We are allowinga great and powerful criminal class to be developed, and whilecrime is held carefully in check in most European countries, andin them is steadily decreasing, with us it is more and moreflourishing, increases from year to year, and in various waysasserts its power in society.
So well is this coming to be known by the criminal classes ofEurope that it is perfectly well understood here that they lookupon the United States as a "happy hunting-ground," and more andmore seek it, to the detriment of our country and of all that wehold most dear in it.
It seems to me that the publication of these articles in book formwill be of great value, as well as of fascinating interest to verymany people.
Yours faithfully,
Andrew D. White.
Mr. Josiah Flynt.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
During my university studies in Berlin I saw my fellow-students workingin scientific laboratories to discover the minutest parasitic forms oflife, and later publishing their discoveries in book form as valuablecontributions to knowledge. In writing on what I have learned concerninghuman parasites by an experience that may be called scientific in so faras it deals with the subject on its own ground and in its peculiarconditions and environment, I seem to myself to be doing similar workwith a like purpose. This is my apology, if apology be necessary, for abook which attempts to give a picture of the tramp world, withincidental reference to causes and occasional suggestion of remedies.
A majority of the papers in this volume have appeared in the "CenturyMagazine." Thanks are due to Houghton, Mifflin & Co. for permission toreprint "The Children of the Road" and "Old Boston Mary," published inthe "Atlantic Monthly"; to Harper & Brothers f