HONOR AMONG THIEVES SO CALLED
I have often wondered whence and wherefore that queer--what shall I call
it, satisfaction, pride?--which I think a good many of us feel at being
on nodding or talking terms with notorious characters. Please remember
that I am now speaking as Josiah Flynt, the respectable citizen, and not
as Josiah Flynt, the man of the Under World.
My capacity "for to see and to admire," as Mr. Kipling says, was fairly
active in the most depressing days of my speckled past. The "seeing and
admiring" is the privilege of the spectator who, because he is such, may
be near the crowd and not of it. So, in a sense, I stood aloof, my
insatiable curiosity often prompting me simply to observe where
otherwise I might have freely partaken. This curiosity was one of my few
saving graces, although it is only recently that I have become aware of
its being so.
But this--may I call it philosophic?--habit of observation, and the
making of many incidental and disreputable friendships, is or was, a
totally distinct thing from the prideful zest with which John Brown,
father, taxpayer, and pew-renter turns to James Jones, ditto, ditto,
and ditto, and says:
"Notice that chap who nodded to me? That's 'Corky Bunch,' who fought and
nearly killed Jimmy Upcut out in Colorado last year. He rents his flat
from us."
Or it may be that James Jones will say something like this:
"That's 'Billy the Biff' who just said 'morning' to me. You know--leader
of the Redfire gang. Said to have killed nine men. But they can't send
him to the chair because he does all the thug work round election time
for Barney O'Brill, the 'teenth ward boss. Ain't such a bad looker, is
he? Swell dresser, too. Buys his shirts at our store." And Jones, who is
as law-abiding a citizen as ever lived, turns to his friend a face which
is pink with satisfaction.
Again--not long after my last return to New York, I made the
acquaintance of a nice old gentleman who is the senior partner of a
wholesale stationery concern, father of a fine family, deacon of a
Harlem church, member of a citizens' committee, and much more of that
sort of thing. Likewise, and for certain reasons which are not important
enough to explain, I was introduced to him under another name than my
own. He had been to New York's Chinatown once or twice in tow of a
professional guide, who, knowing what was expected of him, had filled
his patron with amazing stories of the quarter and its residents. The
guide had, furthermore, introduced his charge to the fake opium joints,
the fan-tan games and alleged highbinder clubs which are in turn
arranged for the reception and the mulcting of visitors. Therefore the
old fellow felt fully capable of playing leader himself the next time a
collection of country cousins visited town, and I was invited to join
the party.
"You needn't hesitate to come along," gurgled the ancient, cheerfully.
"When you are with any one that knows Chinatown as well as I do, there
isn't a bit of danger, believe me. It's only strangers to the place that
are likely to get into trouble."
And this to me!
However, I went, and the large glee with which he pointed out, as
hatchet-men and gamblers and lottery keepers and opium-joint proprietors
and members of various tongs and of this society and that guild,
inoffensive Chinese, who were in reality shopkeepers or laundry-men who
had come down to Pell or Mott streets in order to have a night off, was
a sight to see. It vouched for the industrious imagination of the
professional guide, and when it was all over, and we were on our way
uptown again, he beamingly remarked that unless people mixed with all
sorts and conditions of folk they--the people--were likely to get very
narrow. In other words, you could only round out your life by rubbing
shoulders with disreputables.
I have already offered, or rather suggested, one explanation of this
social phenomenon, and now another occurs to me. Haven't you, when a
youngster, thrust your toes out under the blankets on a winter's
morning for the express purpose of accentuating the comfort of the bed
when you drew them back again? I guess you have. And so, I think,
respectable people like to emphasize their respectability by bringing it
into close, if temporary, contact with its antithesis. A shudderful joy
results, no small part of which arises from the conviction that we are
not like unto the other men.
Something like that which I have just set down came to me on the second
day of my return to New York, while riding downtown on a Sixth Avenue
car. It was Monday morning, and three-fourths of the passengers were
bargain-hunting women, judging by their conversation. On the rear
platform were two "moll-buzzers," or pickpockets, who make a specialty
of robbing the fair sex, and sitting near the front door was a stylish,
"well-groomed," reserved woman, whom I at once recognized as "Angeles
Sal," or Sarah Danby, one of the cleverest women who ever stole a purse.
There came to me a thrill of the feeling of which I have been speaking.
I felt a pleasant glow of superiority in that I, alone, of all the
people in the car, was so well versed in the affairs of the Under World
that I knew that some of the dwellers therein were on board. I awaited
the things which I felt sure were soon to happen.
They came somewhat more quickly than I had imagined.
At Herald Square the car stopped to let a half dozen of the women
alight. Besides the "moll-buzzers," there were two or three other men on
the rear platform, which was, in consequence, somewhat crowded. This was
precisely as the pickpockets desired. Scarcely had the last woman
gotten into the street when there came a loud shriek from one of them.
She turned, grabbed the hand-rail of the car that by this time had begun
to move, and yelling, "I've been robbed!" ran along with it without
loosening her grip. Naturally, every remaining passenger jumped to his
feet, and I saw "Angeles Sal" press into a group that were clustered at
the windows.
Events followed with surprising celerity. The car halted with a jerk,
one of the "moll-buzzers"--the "stall," by the way--opened the near
platform gate, jumped into the roadway, and disappeared as completely as
if the earth had swallowed him. The other seemed to vanish into thin air
and simultaneously a police officer appeared at both front and rear
doors.
Instinctively my eyes sought Sal. She was in the act of getting out from
among the others, and by a single swift movement stood in front of me.
Then she made a scarcely audible sound with her lips--something like the
ghost of a kiss--and as her right hand passed to the left, apparently
for the purpose of opening a hand-bag which was hanging from her left
wrist, I felt something drop into the folds of a newspaper which I was
carrying in an upright fashion between my hands, its lower edges resting
on my knee. The woman had recognized me as of the Under World, had given
me the thief's call for help and caution, and had planted her "swag" on
me without further parley. Indeed, there wasn't time for talk, only time
for action. The next instant, the excited little woman who had been
"touched," burst into the car, accompanied by a third policeman.
"Now, madam," said the detective, brusquely, "is there anybody here whom
you think lifted your purse? If so, pick the person out and we will go
to the station house." The woman hesitated, glancing from face to face.
"This is infamous," said Sal, in a tone of well-bred anger to a lady who
was standing by her side. "We are all of us, so it seems, practically
accused of theft." And she moved toward the front door.
"You will excuse me, lady," said the officer on guard, "but you will
please stop in the car until this party has said her say out."
Sal flushed indignantly, and drew herself up with magnificent
haughtiness. Then she pulled out her cardcase.
"If you don't know me, my good man," she remarked, quietly, "I suppose
you have heard of my husband?" And she passed him a pasteboard.
The detective simply wilted as he glanced at the card.
"I beg your pardon, madam," he said. "No offense meant; line of duty,
you know, madam." And, mumbling more apologies, he helped her off the
car and made way for her through the crowd that had gathered.
Later I learned that Sal had "sized up" the detective as unknown to her.
She had the audacity to make it appear--on her cards--that she was the
wife of a certain member of the judiciary who was the owner of an
international reputation.
It should be added that the cards stood her in good stead on several
occasions. But when the shining light of the bench began to get polite
notes from department stores in which he was requested to be good enough
to ask his wife to be somewhat more discreet in her methods of
"obtaining expensive goods, inasmuch as some of our assistants to whom
Mrs. ---- is not known, may cause her inconvenience," he began to
investigate. These communications meant that she had been caught
shoplifting and had only squeezed out of the scrapes by her _grande
dame_ manner and her visiting cards.
In the meantime I had been sitting with Sal's swag "fiddled," or
concealed, in my newspaper and expecting a squeal from the "touched" one
every instant.
The squeal didn't come off, however. Neither did the excited little
woman identify her despoiler. So the police departed and the car went
on. I took an early opportunity of disembarking, and in a convenient
place examined that which the newspaper contained--I don't mean the
news.
Sal's graft proved to be a small gold or gilt purse, which contained a
few bills and a couple of valuable rings, which were evidently on their
way to a jeweler's for repairs. One was a cluster ring of diamonds and
rubies that had had its hoop broken. The other had two big, white
stones, set gypsy fashion--it was a man's ring, or rather the stones
were so set. But one of the diamonds having loosened had been removed
and sewed up in a bit of muslin which, in turn, was secured to the ring
itself. The purse evidently belonged to a woman.
Now, you would have thought that the moment that the cry of "thief" was
raised, the owner of the rings would have assured herself that the
valuables were all right, and would remain so. That thought by the same
token would mark you as a denizen of the Over instead of the Under
World.
Angeles Sal was not only an expert with her hands, but also a student of
human nature. For that matter most "guns" are those whose graft is
somewhat out of the ordinary. So, when the "squeal" was put up, she kept
a keen eye on the women passengers and saw most of them slap their hands
on that part of their persons where their valuables were hidden. The
action was involuntary, as it always is in such cases. It told Sal all
she wanted to know.
She selected to "touch" a woman who was carrying a suede hand-bag, the
fastenings of which were of the dumb-bell order. This woman had, when
the outcry was raised, spasmodically touched the lower part of the bag,
felt it a moment, and, satisfied, turned her attention to the crowd
outside. This was Sal's cue, and it was an easy matter for her to
"teaze" the bag open, extract the purse, and re-shut the former. Her
knowledge of everyday people's nature had taught her that if the idea of
the rings being safe was once fixed in their owner's mind the latter
would, in consequence, be safer to "touch" than she would be under
ordinary circumstances.
This reminds me that a good many of the successful "get-aways" of the
Powers that Prey are due to an insight into the workings of the human
mentality rather than to agile fingers or elaborate kits of tools. If
you know what the other man is going to do next, he is yours, or rather
his belongings are. This is an aphorism that is always in order in the
Under World. So it is that "guns" are always studying the art of
forecasting. So well are most "plants" arranged, in consequence, that,
for the most part, when they fail it is on account of the interposition
of the unexpected rather than from any defects in the plan of campaign.
If the foregoing story interests you at all it will probably be on the
score of its being an illustration of the so-called "honor among
thieves." In other words, you will have come to the conclusion that Sal,
thinking that she recognized in me a member of the Under World, threw
herself and her "swag" on my presumed "honor," trusting to luck for us
to meet again and "divvy" on the usual terms that exist between pal and
pal; for, in all cases of a "touch," the parties to it share alike. Now,
as a matter of fact, Sal's motive was of an entirely different kind. She
knew that she was in a tight place, saw one chance of saving her booty,
and took it. That was all that it amounted to, and, from her point of
view, she did perfectly right. Newspapers and cheap novels are
responsible for a whole lot of romantic humbug in regard to pickpockets
and their doings, from the time of Robin Hood down, including the
"thieves' honor" proposition.
It is proper for me to add that I advertised the purse and the rings as
being "found," and they were, in due time, restored to their owner.
I have often been asked as to whether "honor among thieves" is fact or
fiction. The question is not easy to answer. In the first place, honor
is a relative term, its interpretation, so it seems to me, depending on
place, person and circumstance. Those casuists of the cynical sort who
affirm that all human motive is based on selfishness, will hardly except
the attribute in question from their generalization.
However open to criticism this same generalization is, so far as it
applies to the average citizen, I am certainly inclined to accept it
when the crook is concerned. The business of attaching to yourself
things that don't belong to you is plainly of a very selfish nature. It
has its inception as well as its execution in a desire to get as much
possible pleasure with as little possible trouble as may be, and that,
too, while ignoring the incidental rights of anybody and everybody.
This statement, as I take it, is a pretty fair definition of selfishness
of any and every description. As most motives take color from the acts
from which they spring or to which they relate, it follows that the
"honor" which we are pleased to think of as existing between rogues, is
in reality a something which is prompted by a due regard for the persons
or the purses of the self-same individuals. This distinguishes the honor
that obtains in the Under World from that which is mostly in evidence in
the Over World. In the latter instance the factor of one's good name or
character is involved; it is absent in the former. From this
characterization you will infer, as I intend you shall, that the "honor"
of the Powers that Prey is but a poor sort of a thing after all, and
is, as I have intimated, but personal interest more or less thinly
disguised.
Still, sometimes the disguise is so clever that it looks like the real
thing--to the outsider; but "wise" people rarely fail in tracing the
reasons which prompt a rogue to refuse to give away a pal. Even when his
doing so means a long term in prison as against immunity if he would
only use his tongue to "peach" on his associate and therefore cause that
person's conviction.
In such cases the newspapers, so I've noticed, are apt to give the mum
one a species of glorification _which is never deserved_. I want the
words set up in italics; they deserve that distinction. Let me repeat,
the crook who cannot be got to "flash" on his gang, either by the third
degree at the "Front Office"--the often brutal inquisition at police
headquarters--the prison chaplain, or the district attorney's staff, is
never dumb because his "honor" prompts him to remain so. It is his
self-interest that bids him keep his mouth shut.
Some seven years ago, a bank in a little New Jersey town, about fifty
miles due west of New York, was one night "done up" in good shape. The
"peter-men," of whom there were four, secured something like eighteen
thousand dollars in greenbacks, to say nothing of a bunch of negotiable
papers and a couple of small jewel safes, weighing about a hundred
pounds each. The rich residents of the locality used to store their
sunbursts, tiaras and rings in these safes, which, by the way, were kept
in the main safe of the bank. This was known to the gang who turned the
trick, and the big safe proving easy, the little ones "fell" in
consequence.
The "guns" who were on the job hailed from the West, and had been
working together for some years. They were all "good people," as the
detective phrase is for clever crooks. There was "Bandy" Schwarz, an
old-timer, who had seen the inside of every "stir and jug" west of the
Missouri; "Ike" Mindin, otherwise "Beak," an expert with the drills and
levers; "Sandy" Hope, a notorious cracksman of Chicago birth and
criminal reputation, who, at the time of the New Jersey "plant," was
wanted in Kansas City in connection with the shooting of a watchman of a
dry goods store; and another man who shall be nameless, so far as I am
concerned. I may add, however, that at this writing he is living in New
York, and has a fairly prosperous undertaking business (of all things!),
having "squared it" for a half dozen or more years. If he should happen
to read this, he will know that the small, weazen-faced chap who used to
be about a good deal with Pete Dolby's gang in the old days in Chicago,
isn't ungrateful. Following the breaking up of Dolby's crowd, through
the stool-pigeon, "Dutch Joe," I would many a time have had to "carry
the banner," or walk the streets all night if it hadn't been for this
man, who was always ready to give up a bed or a cup of coffee.
As I've said before, the "get-away"--that is, the method of escaping
with the "swag"--is always carefully worked out by the framers of a
"plant," or proposed robbery. In this case it was of a rather elaborate
sort. The safe was to be drilled and jimmied instead of being blown,
because of the proximity of houses to the bank. Then the plunder was to
be loaded into a buggy, the wheels of which were rubber-tired, while the
horses' hoofs were wrapped in cloth to deaden their sound. The buggy was
then to be driven to an appointed spot near South Amboy, where a
cat-boat in charge of Sandy would be in waiting, to which the articles
were to be transferred. Then the craft was to be rowed off to a
fishing-ground, where the day was to be spent, and as night fell, was to
head for Gravesend Bay, where it was believed that the valuables could
be gotten on shore without suspicion, either as fish or as the outfit of
a fishing party.
But the unexpected happened. The "get-away" was begun all right, but a
couple of miles from the bank the buggy broke down under the weight of
the two safes. This was about four-thirty and in June. Now, it so
happened that the cashier of the bank was to take his vacation during
the following week, and in consequence he was getting to his work ahead
of time, and on this particular morning reached the bank at five-thirty
o'clock. Fifteen minutes later, the local police and population were
scouring the surrounding country, the "Front Offices" of New York,
Philadelphia and other big cities were being notified, and a net, so to
speak, was drawn tightly around the scene of the "touch" from which
there was no escape. It all ended by Bandy and Mindin being caught while
trying to "cache" the safes in a wood near to the scene of the
breakdown. The third man had disappeared with the currency. Mindin
tried to scare the pursuing Jerseymen by shooting, but got filled with
buckshot in consequence.
Bandy absolutely refused to "peach" on his pals. He was bullied, coaxed,
threatened, prayed over, offered immunity and in other ways tempted to
tell. It turned out afterwards that the cause of all this effort on the
part of the police was that somehow or other they had got a hint that
Sandy Hope was mixed up with the job, and they wanted him the worst way
on account of the Kansas City affair. In other words, they were willing
to let a "peter-man" go for the sake of getting a man-killer. Bandy
stood it out, though, and was finally sentenced to seven years in
prison.
Not long before I last left for Europe, I happened into a prosperous,
hybrid sort of store in a pretty town about an hour's ride from New
York. It was one of those shops where you can buy nearly everything,
from stationery to Japanese ware, with tobacco, candy and dress goods in
between. Behind the counter, with a blue apron covering his comfortable
paunch and the capital O legs, from which he got his "monacher," was
Bandy himself.
Now, the etiquette of the Under World doesn't permit of one pal even
recognizing another in the everyday world unless the "office" is given
and such a recognition is desired--and safe. Hence, while I knew that
Bandy knew me and he knew that I knew it, I gave no sign of that fact.
Yet as he passed me the pack of cigarettes for which I had asked, my
forefinger tapped the back of his hand twice, which, in the sign
language of the Under World, is equivalent to "I want to chin with you."
Bandy coughed a slight, guttural cough and gave a hardly noticeable jerk
of his head toward the rear of the store. He had replied that he was
willing to "chin" and that the room at the back was all right for that
purpose. Whither we went when the other customer in the place had been
served and had departed.
I needn't tell about the reminiscences we exchanged. I will come direct
to that part of our conversation which had to do with his exhibition of
crook "honor" on the lines related.
"You certainly wouldn't 'beef,'" I said tentatively. "Many a man fixed
like you were would have let his clapper loose all right. And the
newspapers did you proud. 'Twas a fine front you put up, and the gang
ought to be proud of you."
"Proud nothing!" said the reformed crook, impatiently. "And seems to me,
Cig., that you've caught the patter of those nutty newspaper guys who is
always stinging the dear public about guys who never go back on pals,
because they're built that way and all the rest of such guff."
He stopped disgustedly.
"Here's the straight of it. Up to the time that we frisked a joint in
Chi that happened to be owned by the brother of a cop, we--the four of
us--was doing well and had a lot of fall money [large reserve sum for
use in case of emergencies]. Well, the gang agreed that if one of us was
copped out, the others would look out for his piece of fall money, and,
what was more, while he was put away, he should get a share of
one-eighth of all touches, which same could be sent to his wife or kids,
as the case might be. That was good enough, wasn't it?"
I nodded and Bandy went on.
"That was the reason why I didn't turn mouthpiece. Another was," he
smiled grimly, "that it was quite clearly understood that any one of us
who opened his mouth to the police _once_, wouldn't do so _twice_. Sandy
Hope, I mind me, was fond of announcing this fact in a kind of casual
way. Not that we mistrusted each other, but it was well for everybody to
know that the man who tried any stalling off would have his light put
out just as soon as it could be arranged."
"But," I said, "supposing that the crowd didn't keep its word--got away
with the fall-money and the percentage on the touches while you were in
jail?"
"In that case," answered Bandy, without a moment's hesitation, "all bets
would be off. The gentleman in custody would make a cry that would be
heard in every detective bureau in America. There would be an immediate
decrease in the population of crooks. Why, I know enough about Sandy to
get his neck----" he stopped suddenly.
"And was this, too, understood by the gang?"
Bandy shifted uneasily on his seat.
"You make me weary--honest you do, Cig. What's the matter with you? You
know just as well as I do that every gang of crooks knows just what I've
been telling you. If it weren't true, _what's to keep them from
squealing every time they get arrested_?"
In this last sentence Bandy summed up the whole question of honor among
thieves, and for this reason I have told the foregoing at some length.
The repentance of a thief rarely, if ever, includes restitution. This
statement anyhow applies to the veterans. With the younger men it is
somewhat otherwise, and then usually through the administrations of the
prison chaplain. But after having served a prison term for the first
time the young crook adopts the sophistry and cynicism of his elders in
crime. The only time that a thief feels regret for his misdeeds is when
the latter has been fruitless, or when the proceeds have been lost to
him.
What I have said about crooks not peaching on each other does not apply
to the professional stool-pigeon, or "mouthpiece," who, by the way, is
part and parcel of every police force in every city and town in this
country and abroad. But these fellows can hardly be classed as genuine
crooks, at least in the great majority of instances. They are rather the
Pariahs of the Under World--hated, despised and tolerated for precisely
the same reason that curs are allowed to roam through the streets.
It goes without saying that as long as the "mouthpiece" forms an
integral part of the police system of civilization, so long will there
be a real, although not admitted, alliance between the Powers that Prey
and the Powers that Rule, with an incidental weakening and
demoralization of the latter.
Finally, there are times and seasons in which the Under World of its
own volition gives up an offender. But these occasions are rare, and
only when it is felt that the individual must be sacrificed for the good
of the community. Usually there is a political pact in these rare
happenings.
JOSIAH FLYNT--AN APPRECIATION
BY ALFRED HODDER
What first struck me was his prodigality in talk. He scattered treasures
of anecdote and observation as Aladdin of the wonderful lamp orders his
slave to scatter gold pieces. The trait is not common amongst men of
letters; they are the worst company in the world; they are taking, not
giving; if they have not a notebook and a pencil brutally before you in
their hands, they have a notebook and pencil agilely at work in their
heads; your pleasure is their business; the word that comes from their
lips is but a provocative to gain one more word from you; the smile that
answers your smile is but a grimace; and their good stories, until they
have been published, are locked behind their lips like books in a
safe-deposit box. Flynt had no safe-deposit box for his good stories,
and no gift for silence; the anecdotes in his books are amazing; the
details of just how he got them are still more amazing; he never learned
to use up his material, to economize, and he was more amazing than his
material.
He invited me the night I met him to go with him on one of his
wanderings. A Haroun-al-Rashed adventure it seemed to me. I closed with
the offer at once and asked how I should dress. I had an idea that I
must wear a false beard and at least provide myself with a stiletto and
a revolver, and be ready to use them. "Why, you will do just as you
are," he said. "I shall go just as I am." He did not know it, but he did
not tell the truth. He did not change his clothes, but at the first turn
into side streets he changed his bearing, the music of his voice, his
vocabulary. I could scarce understand one word in five. He was a
finished actor; Sir Richard Burton, of course, was his ideal; always in
the Under World he passed unsuspected; always from the start of our
tramping together he had to explain me. I could never pick up the
manner, and indeed was too amused to try; his habit was to explain me in
whispers as a dupe, and I had once to rescue him from a fight brought on
because he would not consent to sharing with his interlocutor the
picking of my pockets. I had more than once to rescue him; he had the
height and body of a slim boy of fourteen, but just to see what the
beast would do he would have teased my lord the elephant, and he took a
drubbing as naturally as any other hardship.
A finished actor, I have written; and an actor knowing to his fingertips
many parts. One instance must suffice. I figured usually--I have said
it--as a dupe. I was on this night cast for the part of an accomplice,
and he for the part of a bold, bad breaker of safes and doors and
windows. The character was conceived in an instant. An instant before we
were two very tired, very quiet men, strolling home through the Bowery
in a bitter, drizzling rain at three o'clock in the morning.
"Say, mate, what's the chanst for a cup o' coffee?"
The speaker was a fully togged out A. B. for the service of the U. S.,
and on his cap were the letters _Oregon_. To me the disguise was
perfect. He did a bit of the sailor's hornpipe on that slippery,
glistening pavement where the rain fell and froze under electric lights.
"The chances are good," said Flynt; and he led the way into a house near
by.
The front of the house was as unlighted as respectability demands a
house should be at three o'clock in the morning; but there was a dim
light at a side door. We went in under the dim light and found music and
dancing, and little tables at which we could be served with almost
anything except coffee. The "Oregon" took "Whisky straight--Hunter's if
you've got it."
"Out at the Philippines?" asked Flynt.
"Sure thing."
"Came round the Cape?"
"Did I? Say, I'll tell you about that."
"Battle of Santiago?"
The sailor was in the midst of the battle of Santiago when Flynt smiled
and said quietly:
"Have you seen the Lake Shore push yet?"
To me, at that time, the words were pure enigma, but the color faded out
of the sailorman's cheeks, and he dropped back in his chair and said:
"Hell, partner, who are you?"
The rest of the dialogue was swift; I could not follow it; I could only
memorize.
"Where did you get those duds?"
"Bought 'em for nine dollars at No. -- Bowery."
"What is the lay work?"
"About four per. But the war's played out here; I'm going to shift up
State. Where did you get your duds?"
"Just got out."
"Thought your hands looked white. Where did you do your time?"
"Joliet."
"Joliet!--why, I did five years there myself."
And they fell to discussing wardens. Flynt knew the names of the
wardens.
"Say, have you got anything on?"
"A little job to-night uptown."
"Can't you put me next?"
"It's my friend's."
This with a nod toward me. The little job uptown was mine. Never having
heard before of the little job uptown I declined to put any one next;
and we gave the sailorman coin to do a hornpipe for the sitters, and
left, presumably, to do the little job. We left in an odor of sanctity,
almost of reverence; we were supposed to be accomplished cracksmen, and
in high fortune; princes and millionaires of the Under World.
A finished actor--I come back to that--and the streets were his stage,
and the first chance word his cue. In a house he was not at home; when
he put on the uniform he must wear at dinner, he put off his memory,
his experience, his wit. His anecdotes, his good stories, lived in his
"business suit," and refused to wear a Prince Albert or a Tuxedo even,
and waved him farewell at the mere sight of a crush-hat. Make no
mistake; the anecdotes were as clean as what he has published; but he
was to the end a boy; he was shy; and except on his own stage he was shy
to the point of silence or of stammering. He knew books; the books
dealing with the Under World he knew rather well; but I fancy he never
read them except when he was ill. His book was the men in the street;
any man, in any street; policemen, cabby, convict, or men of gentle
breeding; him he would read from dawn to dawn very shrewdly and gaily,
so long as the tobacco was good; and if the tobacco was not good he
would still read. I have given one instance of his getting under a man's
guard, of his turning him inside out and inspecting him, not unkindly.
It was his habit to get under the guard of everyone he met, to turn them
inside out, and inspect them, not unkindly. He talked to any one, every
one, who gave him an opening; but the man who got the first hearing was
the vagabond. In our strollings we never passed one without a halt, and
an interview, and copy. "They are all friends, humbugs," he said
philosophically; "I have been one of them myself." But he always gave
generously for his means, and though he had begun by censuring me for
giving, for giving in ignorance, he expected me always also to give.
Again, one anecdote must serve for many. The scene was Fifth Avenue,
two blocks north of Washington Square. The petitioner was a well-set-up,
firm-built Englishman, clean-shaven, aged twenty-five, who said to me:
"I beg your pardon?"
"Yes?" I said and halted.
"It's rather beastly, but I need a drink and I haven't a penny--not a
sou."
I said "Diable," and put my hand into my pocket. The man's clothes,
accent and bearing presumed so much that if he needed a drink he needed
food. At once Flynt intervened. What was said I do not know; the two
stepped aside; but presently there was laughter from both Flynt and my
beggar; and we three sat at table later, and told tales, and flushed one
another's secrets. My beggar was a gentleman ranker out on a spree (it
is Kipling of course), damned to all eternity, but his guard once broken
he was amusing, and Flynt knew the trick to break his guard.
"Why, after I was dropped from the service, and it came to selling my
wife's jewels, I had rather beg than that, and I cannot get work," he
said simply. "They say my clothes are too good. What the deuce is the
matter with my clothes? But begging is not so bad; I make a good thing
of it."
At the moment the point I wish to make is that Flynt knew his vagrant in
the open. He had a profound contempt for the books written by
frock-coated gentlemen who have academic positions, and say "sociology,"
and measure the skulls and take the confessions of the vagrant in
captivity. Skull for skull he believed there was small difference
between that of the first scamp and the first minister of the Gospel. I
set that down for what it is worth as his opinion. The confessions of a
vagrant in captivity are always, he said, false. This I fancy is almost
true.
I had chose a passably dreary seminary course in Harvard in which all
the literature of criminology had been got up and reported. I myself had
looked into some of the books--too many--some is too many. Five minutes
of Flynt's talk turned my books into a heap of rubbish. Five hours'
stroll with him made me forget that the rubbish heap existed. At his
best, and it was at his best that I knew him, he was what he wished to
be--the foremost authority among those who knew him in the side streets.
He had paid for his knowledge--paid with his person. "Old Boston Mary" I
believe to be in part fiction; I could never surprise the little man
into a confession; but he has lain on the trucks of a Pullman and in the
blinding cinders and dust seen his companion lose grip from sheer
weariness, and go--to meet Boston Mary. He had tightened his own grip,
and been sorry. He could do no more.
JOSIAH FLYNT--AN IMPRESSION
BY EMILY M. BURBANK
In "My Life," Josiah Flynt says, "I have spoken of Arthur Symons'
interest in my first efforts to describe tramp life. I think it was he
and the magazine editors who abetted me in my scribblings, rather than
the university and its doctrines of 'original research.'... His
(Symons') books and personal friendship, are both valuable to me, but
for very different reasons. I seldom think of Symons the man, when I
read his essays and verses, and I only infrequently think of his books,
or of him as a literary man at all, when we are together."
Josiah Flynt not only greatly admired Arthur Symons, the distinguished
Englishman, as poet, master of prose, and critic, but had an
affectionate regard for him, one expression of which was his use of the
nickname, "Symonsky." While Flynt's guest in Berlin, Symons had some
difficulty in persuading a letter-carrier that a communication from
London was for Arthur _Symons, Esq._, and not for some _Herr Symonsky_!
The Slavic twist to the name amused Flynt, who seized upon it. His shy,
affectionate nature found an outlet in renaming close friends.
After one of his visits to London, I asked Flynt if he had seen much of
Symons.
"Symonsky put me up, you know," he replied; then with a quick, side
glance and a smile, as he lighted a cigarette, "but, to be perfectly
frank, when _I_ went to bed, _he_ was getting up!"
Here we have defined in a sentence the difference between the two men.
Their natures, like their lives, were never parallel; they only just
touched one another's imaginations in passing!
Flynt was then studying London's _Under World_--the great city's
blackest corners and darkest ways; while Symons, as it chanced, was
seldom out of the lime-light circle of London concert halls, preparatory
to writing his "London Nights."
Both men were the sons of clergymen, and launched in life's calmest,
safest waters, at about the same time, though on opposite sides of the
Atlantic. It was their own volition which led them to take to life's
high seas. Symons went from his small town to London, which, in spite of
continental sojourns, has remained his permanent mooring. Flynt took to
the "open" at an early age, and tied up in whatever harbor the storm
drove him. American by blood and birth, he felt at home in Russia,
Germany, France, or the British Isles, if given the _Mask of No
Identity_.
One of the swiftest currents of London life flows down the Strand.
There, Josiah Flynt, in what disguise he chose, could do his "work,"
and, when he would, step over the sill of the old Temple and find a
welcome from his friend, who had chambers in Fountain Court, that
silent square of green, which slopes to the Thames, and is kept fresh
and cool by its jets of water and great shade trees. Symons lived in the
building to the right, after entering the Court, and up a winding flight
of old stone steps.
It was in these bachelor quarters of his (he has since married and moved
away) that I first saw Symons, the year after Flynt's "Tramping with
Tramps" had appeared in the _Century Magazine_. I had been invited,
through a mutual friend, for tea, one cool afternoon in June, and we sat
on an immense tufted sofa, before the grate, while our host stood, back
to the fire, and talked of other people's work.
I can see him now, big, blond and very English, his hands deep in the
pockets of his gray tweeds; an old, brown velveteen jacket, faded blue
socks and soft tan slippers, harmonizing with his "stage-setting"--well
mellowed by time. Books lined the walls, and a spinnet, on which Symons
played, when alone, stood in one corner. He had prepared tea and
elaborate sweets for us, and then forgot to offer them, so busy was he,
talking of his friend, Christina Rossetti, whose poems he had just
edited! When he spoke of Olive Schreiner, some one asked him if she was
interesting, and I remember quite well Symons' reply: "I stood all one
night listening to her talk!"
Even at nineteen, in his "Introduction to the Study of Browning,"
commended by Robert Browning himself, Symons had proved himself to be an
artist, and he is always lyric. Flynt was never an artist in the same
sense, in his literary work--and epic to the end! He knew and understood
the ways of men, and had the gift of words; but when he wrote for
publication, his imagination seemed chained to earth. It may be that he
was too much "on the inside" to get his subject in perspective. Then,
too, it must be remembered that Flynt was the tramp writing, not the
literary man tramping.
Armed with ancestors of distinction, birth, training, education and the
influence of cultured parents, he abhorred all social anchors and
obligations. I remember his once saying to me, "My mother has sent me my
books from Berlin. Her idea is to anchor me, I think, but I'll leave
them boxed for a while, for I'm uncertain about my plans." He was
"always a-movin' on!"
Flynt was not a great reader, yet he had a wide knowledge of
books--gleaned one scarcely knew when. The child of book-loving parents,
he started out in life with a valuable equipment--an innate respect for
books and their authors. In every case, however, I think that his chief
interest lay in the man, not his literary output. In spite of the sordid
realism of his writings, the manner of his last years, and the regretted
circumstances of his death, there was a poetic vein, which, like a
single, golden thread, ran in and out, the warp and woof of his mind.
This betrayed itself in conversations with intimates, and when
discussing books of travel or their authors. Especially did Sir Richard
Burton and George Borrow fire his imagination. "Lavengro" and its
author were discussed during one of our last conversations.
The "white road" and the sea may have meant something to him as such,
but to me he never spoke of either, except as highways; hence I conclude
that as such only did they make their appeal to him. Man, not nature,
attracted him, and it was always man in the meshes of civilization.
He was a victim to morbid self-consciousness, and this was one reason
for his avoiding people of the class in which he was born. Give him a
part in a play--he was gifted as an actor--the disguise of a vagabond,
or whisky with which to fortify himself, and the man's spirit sprang out
of its prison of flesh, like an uncaged bird.
This effect which whisky had upon him, led Flynt to give it as a reason
for the "perpetual thirst" of some. He used to say, "Whisky makes it
possible for me to approach men with a manner which ignores all class
barriers. Pass the whisky and it's man to man--hobo, hod-carrier or
king!"
Flynt was a slave to tobacco, which he preferred in the form of
cigarettes. One never thinks of him without one, so no wonder he was
called "Cigarette" in Trampdom!
His family thought that the too early use of tobacco stunted his growth,
for, when seated, the upper part of his body, being broad and strong,
suggested a larger man than he proved to be when on his feet. He stood
not more than five feet three inches. He was naturally thin and
nervous, with quick movements of the body, and an ever-changing
expression of face--a face clean-shaven and rather boyish. None of his
photographs give any idea as to his appearance, because the abiding
impression received from him was produced by his magnetic personality
and individual mannerisms, one of which was a way of dropping his head
forward and looking up through frowning eyebrows. He decorated his
speech with Russian, French or German words, thrown into a sentence
haphazard, and spoke in a voice pitched low and used rhythmically. He
had an impressionable, volatile nature, and seemed really to become one
of the race which at the moment filled his mental vision.
Flynt's ethical code was that of the Under World, and, in some respects,
superior to the one in use on the Surface of Life.
A prominent sociologist said recently, "Flynt had the field to himself;
there is no one to take his place at present. Few men who live and know
the life of the Under World, as he did, have his mental equipment. Many
can retain the facts, but are unable to handle them as satisfactorily;
then, too, to be friend and companion of tramps and criminals, and of
men like Tolstoy and Ibsen, is to possess a wide range of octaves in
human experience and mental grasp!"
Flynt's talent for languages enabled him to pick up the vernacular, even
of underground Russia, in an incredibly short time.
As he says himself, _Wanderlust_, not the scientist's curiosity to
verify theories, led him on to his well-merited distinction as
criminologist, and down to his ultimate undoing, at the early age of
thirty-eight.
"Beyond the East the sunrise,
Beyond the West the sea,
And the East and West the _Wanderlust_
That will not let me be."
While Flynt had most of the appetites, good and bad, possible to man, he
was not a weak man, but a physically selfish one, strong in his
determination to "enjoy." Condemned to an early death by the excessive
use of stimulants, he agreed to write his "Life," did so, and then shut
himself in his room in Chicago, to pass out--unafraid, unaccompanied,
uncontrolled--a characteristic ending!
That Josiah Flynt has started on his long journey, that this world will
see him no more, is impossible for his near friends to realize, so
accustomed are they to his periodical disappearances and his unfailing
return to their midst.
He who preferred the byways, the crooked winding paths, has at last
struck the broad, straight road where there is no turning back. It is he
who must wait for us now, as we push on, with his cheerful "Good luck!
Be good! Don't forget me!" ringing in our ears, and in our hearts
Stevenson's words:
"He is not dead, this friend, not dead,
But in the path we mortals tread,
Got some few trifling steps ahead,
And nearer to the end,
So that you, too, once past the bend,
Shall meet again, as, face to face, this friend
You fancy dead....
"Push gaily on, strong heart! The while
You travel forward, mile by mile,
Till you can overtake,
He strains his eyes to search his wake,
Or, whistling as he sees you through the break,
Waits on the stile."
(R. L. S.)
Flynt often talked of his death after disease fastened upon him, but
always with an inconsequence as to what lay beyond the grave--not
bravado, but the philosopher's acquiescence to the inevitable, whatever
it be. He had great faith in the loyalty of friends who might survive
him. "So-and-so will speak a good word for me, I know!" he would say.
Separation, by geographical distances, never bothered him, yet he wrote
but few letters. He seemed to get satisfaction out of his belief that he
and his nearest friends communicated by thought transference: "The wires
are always up!" Doubtless he passed out with the conviction that this
would continue.
The man's spirit remained childlike in its tender, confiding quality,
and pure, in spite of the fact that he dragged his poor body through the
mire of life.
His generous nature and faithful friendship have set in motion currents
which are eternal.
A FINAL WORD[2]
BY BANNISTER MERWIN
To complete the story of Josiah Flynt's life is not an easy task. His
later years were lived in the open, it is true, and the details of his
movements were, in every case, known to at least one of his friends; but
his own love of mystery and the delight that he found in mystifying
others led him to conceal from one friend what he freely told to the
next.
If all his friends could come together and compare notes, the result
might be a consecutive account of what he did during those years. But
alas! some of them are dead. Alfred Hodder, who knew more than most of
us, died only a few weeks after Josiah.
"My Life," however, makes little pretense of being a complete biography
in the accepted sense. Rather it is the disjointed record of those
incidents which in their combined impression brought him most nearly to
the understanding of himself. The mere facts of life did not seem very
important to him; feeling was everything. And few men who have set out
to write their own stories have been able to show themselves as truly as
he has shown himself. That is because he was essentially a man of
feeling--sensitive, proud, filled with sentiment--though only his close
friends may have known this of him.
When he had nearly completed his "confession," as he liked to call it,
he said to me one day: "I have given them my insides." He did indeed
make the strongest kind of an effort to let the world see him as he
honestly saw himself--and I think he saw himself more honestly than most
men do, for he was free from self-exaltation. Always he was humble about
his own limitations.
If anything is to be added to what he has written about himself, it
should comprise those experiences which he would have been most likely
to relate, had he lived to write more. And first, doubtless, he would
have told something of his work in investigating "graft" in several of
our larger cities. As far as I can find, he was responsible for the
introduction of the word "graft" into book English. It was a word of the
Under World, and he lifted it to the upper light. The articles in
_McClure's Magazine_, in which he exposed police corruption, were also,
if I am not mistaken, the first important examples of modern
"muck-raking." They are still obtainable in printed form, and Josiah
probably would have said little about them in his book. But he certainly
would have related with relish the week's wonder of his escape from the
New York police. When the article about "graft" in New York was
published, the "Powers That Be" in the metropolis were loud in their
denunciation of Josiah Flynt. They swore roundly that they would make it
hot for him when they caught him, and the daily press announced that he
was to be arrested and compelled to make good his statements. But Josiah
Flynt had disappeared. The police did not find him, and it was some time
before he came back to his old haunts.
There was reason to think that the police were only "bluffing." There
was also reason to think that Josiah would be able to "make good," if he
were captured and examined by a police tribunal. Nevertheless he hid
himself in obscure lodgings in Hoboken. An escaped criminal would not
cover his tracks more carefully. The truth was that the opportunity for
mystification appealed to him irresistibly. He exaggerated the necessity
for concealment in order that he might enjoy to the full the sensation
of being vainly hunted. For, as I have said, he always loved to make
mystery. I have seen him, during a quite harmless expedition along a New
York street by night, take elaborate precautions to avoid approaching
strangers, on the assumption that they were "hold-up" men. Such
avoidance of hypothetical dangers was to him a most fascinating game--a
game which he was well qualified to play.
He found a melancholy and sentimental pleasure, too, in keeping himself
in the background at times when such inaction was contrary to his
happier desires. I remember that, in 1887, during the time when he was
living in the Under World, after his escape from the reform school and
before his appearance at his mother's home in Berlin, he made one brief
and characteristic emergence which may throw light upon this trait in
him. Josiah was my cousin. At that time the home of my family was in
Detroit, Michigan, and one day Josiah put in an appearance at my
father's office. He was ragged and unkempt, and uncertain in his account
of himself. By his own story he was a detective engaged in an important
case, and he asked for money enough to get him to some near city. My
father tried to persuade him to go home with him to the house. The
little vagabond refused, but he added: "I found out where you lived and
went up and looked at the house, and I stood and watched the boys [my
brother and myself] playing ball in the next lot." He had remained at
the edge of the lot for some time, taking strange and wistful pleasure
in his own forlornness.
Reference has been made by others to the fact that there was one
romantic passion in Josiah's life. For years he worshiped from afar a
girl who possessed grace, intelligence, and beauty, though so far as his
friends know he never offered himself to her. In July, 1894, I was with
him for a few days at his home in Berlin. He told me at that time that
the girl he loved was on the continent, spending the summer at a
mountain resort. He had come to the conclusion, he said, that it was
time for him to go to her and declare himself. Accordingly, he did make
a pilgrimage of many hundred miles to the place where she was staying,
dreaming we may not guess what dreams along the way. It was many months
before I saw him again. When he began to speak of the girl in the same
old terms of distant adoration, I asked him about his journey of the
preceding summer. "Well," he said, "I went there, and I saw her, but I
didn't speak to her." "Did she see you?" I asked. "No," he answered.
Again he had been the watcher by the wayside standing in shy
self-effacement while the girl of his heart passed by.
A few years before his death Josiah, in what was undoubtedly an honest
and serious determination to improve his health and his habits, went to
Woodland Valley, in the Southern Catskills, and there had built for him
a comfortable little "shack," on the grounds of a beautifully situated
summer hotel. Different friends were with him during the time he spent
in the mountains, but every now and again the call of the city became
too strong for him to resist. While he was living at the "shack" he made
a few of the conventional trips to the summits of near-by mountains, but
his interest was usually centered in simply "getting to the top." The
goal once reached he would enjoy for a few moments the pleasant sense of
obstacles overcome, and then, after a casual glance at the "view," he
would say: "Well, now let's go back." His real life at Woodland was his
interest in the natives of the valley. He worked himself into close
acquaintance with them, and sought to understand their point of view.
Even after he had given up his shack, he still held to the valley as his
place of refuge. He bought a little tract of land there and, to the time
of his death, talked of building upon it a snug but permanent home.
Mr. Charles E. Burr, to whom Josiah so often refers in his narrative,
supplies the story of an interesting period. I will quote him. "In the
summer of 1904," he says, "I had some correspondence with Flynt, who was
then in Berlin. The tone of his letters made me think that a few months
in the Indian Territory, where rigid prohibition laws are enforced,
would benefit him. I therefore offered him a position as car-trailer on
the Southwest Division of the Saint Louis and San Francisco Railroad,
with headquarters at Sapulpa, Indian Territory. The offer was accepted,
and Flynt came to Sapulpa about the middle of August, by way of
Galveston, Texas.
"The duties assigned to him kept him on the road much of the time.
Whenever the opportunity came, I saw to it that he made the acquaintance
of interesting characters who lived in the Territory and in Oklahoma.
Among them were several United States deputy marshals who were known as
'killers,' and he afterwards told me that he had got from these men a
fairly complete account of the 'Apache Kid' and his numerous
gun-fights. I once sent Flynt to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, to interview the
famous Apache, Geronimo, but the old chief was in a bad humor and would
not talk.
"During September horses were stolen from a car at Okmulgee, Indian
Territory, and Flynt and two United States marshals went with me in
pursuit of the thieves.
"The trail led us into the heavily timbered Arkansas bottoms, long the
home of the outlaws and 'cattle rustlers' of the Territory. At the end
of a continuous forty-mile ride we found some of the stock, and Flynt,
who was not accustomed to sitting a horse, then declared that he would
rather die on the prairie than ride that broncho any farther. He drove
back to Okmulgee with a rancher whom I employed to take the recovered
horses.
"Later, Flynt became more accustomed to a saddle, and rode to many
points of interest near Sapulpa. He once told me that he had made
several trips to the home of a half-breed negro who lived near a ledge
of rocks called 'Moccasin Tracks,' about five miles from Sapulpa. This
half-breed had a bad record. The United States marshals had him
'marked,' and planned to 'get him' at the first opportunity, but Flynt
said that he was a very interesting man to talk with.
"I left Sapulpa in October, and Flynt accompanied me to Chicago, where
he remained until March. He was very proud of the certificate which was
issued to him when he severed his connection with the Saint Louis and
San Francisco.
"These certificates are commonly called 'Letters of Identification.'
Flynt always referred to his as his 'Denty,' and he took much pleasure
in showing it to his friends. He gave it to me a few days before his
death and asked me to keep it for him."
From this "Denty" we get a rough description of Josiah Flynt as he was
in 1904. "Age, thirty-five years. Weight, one hundred and twenty-five
pounds. Height, five feet five inches. Complexion, light. Hair, light.
Eyes, brown." It also gives as his "Reasons for leaving the service":
"Resigned. Services and conduct entirely satisfactory."
In the autumn of 1905 the insurrectionary outbreaks in Russia were
assuming such proportions that a serious revolutionary war was not
improbable. Josiah secured a commission from a magazine to go to Russia
and investigate the situation. His health was by no means good, and his
temperate life in Oklahoma had had no permanently good effect upon his
habits, but he set forth eagerly to do his work. He gathered much
interesting material, and he wrote the required articles. He became very
ill, however, and for a long time he lay at the point of death in a
German hospital. When he returned to America for the last time, in the
first warm days of 1906, he was broken, changed in his looks, a feeble
shadow of himself. He told me then that, while he was so near death in
Germany, the two thoughts that did more than anything else to get him on
his feet again were his desire to see his mother and his determination
to "make good" with his articles, which were not completed until his
partial convalescence had begun. I had helped to get him that Russian
commission, and it seemed to be ever in his mind that, since I had
"stood for him"--that was the way he put it--he must not fail. From his
bed of pain he dragged himself to "make good." Loyalty such as that was
one of his strongest traits. I remember that once, while he was living
in the Catskills, a distant relative sent a request for some money to
help him out of a difficulty. Josiah came to New York by the first train
he could get, and went to one of the savings banks in which he kept his
funds. The relative received the money he needed. Before returning to
Woodland Josiah told me of the errand which had brought him to New York.
He added: "We must always stand by the family."
It was late in 1906 that Flynt began his last task. He was sent to
Chicago by the _Cosmopolitan Magazine_ to "write up" pool-room gambling.
Unable to give to this work the old energy of investigation, he was
helped to a creditable showing by people who had the information he
desired. He must have known that he was near the end. In every letter
that he wrote to me during those last weeks he referred again and again
to his having seen "mother," or his expectation of spending the next day
with "mother," or of his plan to "make a short trip with mother." All
his love centered more and more closely in her as death approached him,
though, indeed, for years his chief thoughts had been of her. She was
spending those last weeks in a suburb of Chicago, and he especially
welcomed the work that took him to Chicago, because it made it possible
for him to see her often.
But when, about mid-January, 1907, he came down with pneumonia, he would
not let his friends admit her to his room in the Chicago hotel. She was
not to witness his suffering. He died at 7 P.M., on January 20, after
two hours of unconsciousness.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] NOTE BY THE PUBLISHERS.--It was Josiah Flynt's intention to add to
his autobiography some concluding chapters of a philosophic and
sociological nature. Among other subjects, he intended to prove that
there is no such thing as honor among thieves, and to show conclusively
that there is no real happiness in unlawful existence.
The call to the road which goes, but does not return, came to him,
however, in January, 1907, when his life came abruptly to an end.
To Mr. Bannister Merwin, his relative and friend, we are indebted for
the following account of Flynt's movements during the last few years of
his life.
Interesting Fiction
_Bar-20_
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_By GENE STRATTON-PORTER_
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The scene of this charming, idyllic love story is laid in Central
Indiana. It is for the man who loves the earth under his foot, the
splash of the black bass, the scent of the pine wood, and the hum of
earth close to his ear.
_The New York Times says:_ "The novel is imbued throughout with a poet's
love of nature, and its pathos and tender sentiment place it in the
category of heart romances."
_The Way of a Man_
_By EMERSON HOUGH_
_Illustrated, cloth, decorative. Price, $1.50._
A great, strong, masterful romance of American life in the early
sixties. Love, romance and adventure are paramount in this wonderful
story.
_The Chicago Record-Herald says:_ "A story that grips the reader's
attention, whets his appetite, and leaves him ever eager for more."
_The Sportsman's Primer_
_By NORMAN H. CROWELL_
_Illustrated, decorative cover design, boards. Price, $1.25._
For the man who enjoys sport of all kinds--for every person who has even
an "ounce" of humor--this book will prove a gold mine of fun.
_The St. Louis Republic says:_ "Most enjoyable."
_Albany Times-Union says:_ "One of the jolliest of fun making books."
Other Important Outdoor Books
_The Book of Camping and Woodcraft_
_By HORACE KEPHART_
_Illustrated, cloth, decorative. Price, cloth, $1.50 net. Flexible
leather, $2.00 net._
An encyclopedia that fits the pocket.
_The Chicago Evening Post says:_ "THE BOOK OF CAMPING AND WOODCRAFT is
one of the most alluring and easily the most complete manual of camping
now available."
_Camp and Trail_
_By STEWART EDWARD WHITE_
_Illustrated, cloth, decorative. Price, $1.25 net._
A practical experience book telling what is necessary for comfort and
convenience in the camp and on the trail.
_The Albany Evening Journal says:_ "The book will undoubtedly be eagerly
sought by every one of Mr. White's large circle of readers and will
prove a valuable guide and helpmate to those who love outdoor life."
_The Pass_
_By STEWART EDWARD WHITE_
_Illustrated, cloth, decorative. Price, $1.25 net._
Mr. White has done nothing more charming or more instinct with the
subtle spirit of the outdoors.
_The Nation says:_ "As an opened-eyed forest rambler and mountain
climber he (Mr. White) is easily in the first rank of nature writers."
_Fishing and Shooting Sketches_
_By GROVER CLEVELAND_
_Illustrated, cloth, decorative. Price, $1.25 net._
Written in the spirit of an Izaak Walton.
_The San Francisco Bulletin says:_ "It is a classic that for pleasant
philosophy and a sound defence of amiable mendacity stands alone in the
literature of sport."
_Big Game at Sea_
_By CHARLES FREDERICK HOLDER_
_Illustrated, cloth, decorative. Price, $2.00 net._
It is safe to say that this work is the author's most important book--as
well as his most entertaining.
_The Boston Globe says:_ "It is one of the best collections of
descriptions on sea angling ever landed between book covers, and, being
fact instead of fiction, it is doubly interesting."
_THE OUTING PUBLISHING CO._
_35-37 WEST 31ST STREET, NEW YORK_