Read Ebook: My Life by Flynt Josiah Symons Arthur Author Of Introduction Etc

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roper, after so unceremoniously leaving brush factory and schoolroom, took place, one night, at some coke ovens near the State line toward which I was traveling. My boots had been exchanged for shoes, the old cap had given way to a better one, and the ragged coat had been patched. In this fashion I climbed to the top of the ovens and said "Hello!" to some men who were cooking their coffee in a tomato-can over one of the oven openings. I do not recall now whether they were Gay-Cats or hoboes, but they were at any rate very hospitable, which must be said of both classes of men when separated. Thrown together they are likely to be on their dignity--particularly the hoboes.

Coffee was given me, also bread and meat, and I was shown how to fix some planks across the edge of the oven for sleeping purposes. My inexperience became only too apparent when I told the men that I had "just beat the Ref." The look they gave one another after this confession was a revelation to me at the time, and remains in my memory still as one of the earliest typical hobo traits I remarked. What it meant to me at the moment is not clear any longer; I probably simply made a note of it, and resolved to know more about it later on. Thinking it over, it seems to me that it epitomized in a glance all the secret clannishness and "ear-wigging" tendencies which the travelers of the Road possess in such large and abundant measure. The "ear-wigging"--listening--was plain to see when the men stopped talking themselves, and gave heed to me, practically a kid; the secrecy, when one of them kindly advised me not to spread the news of my escape too promiscuously; and the clannishness in giving a fellow roadster such practical counsel.

That night on the coke ovens was uneventful, except that all of us had to be careful not to roll off our perches into the hot fires beneath us, which fact calls to mind an experience I had later on in a railway sand-house in Ohio. The sand was just comfortably hot when I lay down to sleep, but I forgot that the fire might brighten up during the night, and I lay close to the stove. What was my dismay in the morning, on brushing off the sand, to find that the seat of my best trousers had been burned through over night. Fortunately I had two pair on, otherwise my predicament would have been no laughing matter.

In West Virginia I heard of a country district between the State line and Wheeling where it was easy to "feed," where, in fact, travelers on the highway, when meal-time came, were beckoned into the cabins by the mountaineers to have a bite. Such localities are called by tramps "fattenin'-up places." What with the nervousness, incident to the escape, and the following severe travels, I had become pretty thin and worn-out, and the country district in the hills took hold of my fancy. There is nothing of particular interest about the locality or my stay there to call for especial comment here, except that the mountaineers were so friendly and hospitable that I was able to build up my strength very considerably for the struggle of existence in inhospitable places further on. It was also a capital hiding-place until the excitement over my departure from the school, if there had been any, should subside.

In my other writings I have told pretty minutely what I learned about tramp life during the eight months' trip as well as on later excursions. There is consequently not much left to tell on these lines except of a pretty personal nature and as it affects the general progress of this autobiography. I shall therefore have to skip hurriedly from district to district relating such incidents as illustrate my position and experience in Hoboland, and estimating what this strange country accomplished for me and with me.

During the first month of my wanderings I was bedless, and frequently roofless. Indeed, when I finally did rest or try to, in a bed, the experience was so strange that I slept very little. A box-car, a hay-stack, a railway tie drawn close to a fire--these were my principal lodging places during the entire eight months. It may have been a hard outing, but it toughened and inured me to unpleasantness which would certainly seem very undesirable now. In a way, they were undesirable then. I always laugh when a tramp tells me that he is happier in a box-car than in a bed. He merely fancies that he is, and I certainly should not like to risk offering him my bed in exchange for his box-car. Yet at the time in question I was able to sleep uncommonly well in box-car or hay-stack, and except when traveling at night, eight hours' good rest constituted my regular portion. In general, I kept track of the names of the different States and large cities I visited, but, when asked to-day whether I have been in a certain town, I am often at a loss for an answer; I simply do not know whether I have been there or not. On the other hand, certain "stops" at comparatively insignificant places have clung in my memory when much larger places that I must have seen are dim and hazy. All told, I traveled in the great majority of the full-fledged States of that period, and visited many of the large cities.

At one of these minor "stops" in Michigan, I probably had a chance to experiment with that tantalizing dream of earlier years--the notion that to amount to anything I must go secretly to some place, work my way into a profession, and then on up the ladder until I should be able to return to my people, and say: "Well, with all my cussedness, I managed to get on."

"You're a nice fellow!" I said to him in no uncertain tones of disgust. "Couldn't even look back to see where I'd fallen, huh?"

"I did look back," he returned in an aggrieved manner. "I saw the whole business. What was the use o' gettin' off when I saw 't you was all to the good? Besides, I want to make Erie for breakfast."

Such are the "blowed-in-the-glass-stiffs." When in a hurry and a meal is in sight, even nations can clash and fall without influencing a hobo's itinerary one iota. Even had my hand been crushed under the wheels, it is doubtful whether "Slim" would have gotten off the train. Erie once reached, and a good breakfast added to his assets, he would doubtless have bestirred himself in my behalf. One learns not to complain in Hoboland about such trifles. I have also been guilty of seeing companions in danger, with a calm eye and a steady lip.

My first "baptism of fire," when the "Song of The Bullet" was heard in all its completeness, took place in Iowa, or western Illinois, I forget which, this forgetfulness being another testimony to the cold-blooded indifference of the Road and its travelers as to time, place and weather. Five of us were very anxious to "make" Chicago by early morning of the next day. Ordinarily, we had plenty of time, but we failed to consider the railroad we were on--the C. B. and Q., or the "Q," as it is more familiarly known. Some years previous the great "Q" strike had taken place, affording so-called "scabs" from the East, who were very liberally introduced into the "Q's" territory, an opportunity to manage things for a time. Their lot was not an easy one, and to be called "scabs" incensed them not a little.

We determined to ride on an afternoon "freight" at least far enough to land somewhere nicely about time for supper. I certainly remember catching the train in Iowa, but whether the "Song of the Bullet" was sung there or on the Illinois side of the Mississippi, I am at a loss to say. On one side or the other the crew discovered us, and insisted on our "hitting the gravel," getting off the train. We demurred.

"Get off, you dirty tramps," the conductor ordered.

We were not particularly dirty, and although we might be called tramps and live up to the "calling," we believed that even as such, we were higher in the social scale than were "scabs." The crew numbered four. As I have said, we were five strong. Finally, losing our tempers and judgment, we told the conductor that we would not only ride in his train, but his caboose as well, and we scrambled for places on the platform. He tried to kick at us first, but fright at our numbers soon overcame him, and, with an oath, he ran into the caboose, shouting back, "I'll soon see who is running this train." We knew only too well what his actions meant, and dropped off. In a minute he appeared on the back platform with a revolver and opened up on us. Fortunately, his train was moving ahead at a fair pace and he was a poor shot. As I recall the incident none of us was particularly frightened, and there was no such "Pingh-h" in the "Song of the Bullet" as I have so often heard described. The "Pingh-h" indeed I have never heard anywhere. The bullets that the conductor sent our way went over our heads and around us, with a whizzing whine. As Bret Harte suggests in his bullet verses, it was as if the disappointment at not reaching us was overwhelmingly acute. Since that experience other bullets have whizzed and whined about me--not many, thanks!--and it seemed to me sometimes that they went purring on their flight, and then again whining. Perhaps the purring bullets found soft lodgment after passing me, but I hope not if the mark was a human being.

"You got yer nerve on," said one of the burly brutes to "Scotchy," tickling him none too gently in the ribs with his toe-tip. "Get out o' there, an' give yer betters their rights." The rasping voice and the striking of matches wakened me also. Somehow, it may have been tramp instinct, for certainly the Road develops such things, I felt impelled on the instant to grab and capture the poker, and "Scotchy" secured the sand-bucket.

"Me betters, huh?" cried "Scotchy," ominously swinging his bucket. "This for you," and he brought the bucket perilously near one of the Kickers' heads. Matches were being struck on all sides, and it was not difficult to see. The Kickers framed closely together for their attack. They forgot, or did not know, about my poker. Pretty soon another match was struck. The Kickers had coupling pins, and looked formidable. I was in a shadow. They consolidated their forces against "Scotchy." His bucket, however, stretched one Kicker flat before he had time to defend himself. Total darkness and silence followed. Then a Kicker ventured another match. This was my chance. The long poker shot out, and the point must have hit hard in the temple; at any rate, the wounded Kicker sat down. The remaining Kicker risked still one more light, but on seeing his disabled pals, he made for the door. Too late! Other hoboes, not Kickers, had arrived, "dope" lights were secured, and the story was told. The poor Kickers were "kicked" out of that sand-house as never before or since, I am sure.

Such aggregations of tramps are met with throughout Hoboland, and there are constant clashes between them and itinerant roadsters traversing the gangs' districts. The only thing to do is to fight shy of them when alone, and if in force, to fight them; otherwise they become so arrogant and despotic that no one, not even the mere short distance trespasser, is left unmolested.

In spite of all the chances to get hurt, in feelings as well as physically, that Hoboland offers to all comers, I must repeat that I was able to explore its highways and byways with very few scratches to my credit or discredit. A small scar or two and some tattoo figures constitute all the bodily marks of the experience that I carry to-day. There were opportunities without number for fisticuffs, but, as I have declared, I had long since joined the peace movement, and regularly fought shy of them.

The sentencing over, we prisoners were taken to our different destinations, mine being the jail at Rome, the Utica prison being crowded. There is little to add here to what I have long since told in print about my stay there; but perhaps I have never emphasized sufficiently the tramp's disgust at having "to do time" in June. From May till November is his natural roving time, his box-car vacation; in winter, jail, even the workhouse is often more of a boon than otherwise. The Rome jail consequently harbored very unwilling guests in the persons of the few tramps lodged there. However, even thirty summer days, precious as they are on the "outside," pass away sooner than one at first expects them to, and then comes that glorious moment--thunder, lightning, not even a pouring rain can mar it--when the freed one is his own master again. There may be other experiences in life more ecstatic than this one, but I would willingly trade them all temporarily for that first gasp in the open air, and that unfettered tread on the ground, which the discharged prisoner enjoys.

Of my status as a tramp in the general social fabric in Hoboland, perhaps enough is said when I report that before quitting the Road, I could have at any time claimed and secured the respect due to the "blowed-in-the-glass" wanderer. Yet I could make myself quite as much at home at a "hang-out" of the Gay-Cats as among the hoboes. Begging for money was something that I indulged in as little as possible; at the start, it was impossible for me to ask for "coin." My meals, however, lodging and clothes were found by me in the same abundance as the old-timer's. I had to have such things, and as asking for them was the conventional way of getting them, I asked persistently, regularly and fairly successfully.

There is nothing to be said in defense of this practice. It is just as much a "graft" as stealing is; indeed, stealing is looked upon in the Under World as by all odds the more aristocratic undertaking. But stealing in Hoboland is not a favorite business or pastime. Hoboland is the home of the discouraged criminal who has no other refuge. His criminal wit, if he had any, has not panned out well, and he resorts to beggary and clandestine railroading as the next best time-killer. Punishment has tired him out, frightened him, and the Road looms up before him spacious and friendly.

I have often been asked seriously, whether the Road can be looked upon as a necessary school of discipline for certain natures; whether, for instance, as an anxious mother of a wayward boy, once put the query to me, "is there enough that is worth while in it, if looked for, to overbalance that which is not worth while?" It depends both on the boy and the treatment he gives to and gets from his pals. In general, the Road is not to be recommended--not for morals, comfort, cleanliness, or "respectability." It is a backwater section of our civilization; it is full of malaria and other swampy things. Yet, with all its miasma, this backwater district has sent many a good man back to the main Road, which we all try to travel. In my own case, I can certainly say that many desirable truths were revealed to me while in Hoboland which it seemed impossible for me to grasp until having had the Hoboland experience.

MY VOYAGE TO EUROPE

Twenty years ago, and probably at an earlier date still, the traveler bound for Europe on any of the ships, sailing from Hoboken, might have seen, had he been curious enough to look about him, a strange collection of men of all ages, sizes and make-ups, huddled together nights in a musty cellar only a few steps from the North German Lloyd's docks. And, had he talked with this uncouth company, he would have learned much about the ways and means necessary to make big ships go and come on their ocean voyages.

Somewhat less than twenty years ago, say eighteen, a greasy paper sign was tacked to the door of the cellar for the benefit of those who might be looking for the dingy hole. It read: "Internashnul Bankrupp Klubb--Wellcome!" The words and lettering were the work of an Italian lad, who had a faculty for seeing the humor in things which made others cry and sigh. In years that have passed the sign has been blown away, and a barber to-day holds forth where the "Bankrupps" formerly lodged. The store above, a general furnishing establishment for emigrants and immigrants, has also given way to a saloon, I think, and the outfitting business of former days has developed, in the hands of the old proprietor's sons, into a general banking and exchange affair near-by around the corner. The old proprietor has long since been gathered unto his fathers, I have been told; but the boys possess much of his business acumen and money-getting propensities and are doing well, preferring, however, to handle the currencies of the various nations to selling tin pots, pans, mattresses and shoddy clothing, as did the old man.

Their father was a Hebrew, who may or may not have had a very interesting history before I met him, but at the time of our acquaintance he looked so fat and comfortable and money was so plainly his friend and benefactor that he was a pretty prosaic representative of his race. I had heard about him in New York, after making unsuccessful attempts there and in Brooklyn to secure a berth as caretaker on a Europe-bound cattle-ship.

I finally heard of the corpulent Hebrew and the "Bankrupps" Club in Hoboken. A German sailor told me about the place, describing the cellar as a refuge for "gebusted" Europeans, who were prepared to work their way back to their old country homes as coal-passers. The sailor said that any one, European or not, was welcome at the club, provided he looked able to stand the trip. The Hebrew received two dollars from the steamship companies for every man he succeeded in shipping.

My first interview with this man, how he lorded it over me and how I answered him back--these things are as vivid to me to-day as they were years ago. "Du bist zu schwach" , he told me on hearing of my desire for a coal trimmer's berth. "Pig mens are necessary for dat vork," and his large Oriental eyes ran disdainfully over my shabby appearance.

The week spent "downstairs" is perhaps as memorable a week as any in my existence. Day after day went by, "Pig mens" by the dozen left the cellar to take their positions, great ships whistled and drew out into the mighty stream outward bound, my little store of dimes and nickels grew smaller and smaller--and I was still "downstairs," awaiting my chance with the other incapables that the ships' doctors had refused to pass. The Italian lad, with his sweet tenor voice and sunny temperament, helped to brighten the life in the daytime and early evening, but the dark hours of the night, full of the groans and sighs of the old men, trying for berths, were dismal enough. Nearly every nationality was represented in the cellar during the week I spent there, but Germans predominated. What tales of woe and distress these men had to tell! They were all "gebusted," every one of them. A pawnbroker would probably not have given five dollars for the possessions of the entire crew.

But those poor old men from Norway! Theirs was the saddest plight. "The boogs" , one said to me, an ancient creature with sunken eyes and temples, "they eat down all my farm--all. They come in a day. My mortgage money due. They take my crops--all I had. No! America no good for me. I go back see my daughter. Norway better." I wonder where the poor old soul is, if he be still on earth. Ship after ship went out, but there was no berth for his withered up body, and after each defeat, he fell back, sighing, in his corner of the cellar, a picture of disappointment and chagrin such as I never have seen elsewhere, nor care to gaze upon again.

Our beds were nothing but newspapers, some yellow, some half so, and others sedate enough, I make no doubt. We slept, however, quite oblivious of newspaper policies and editorials. Looking for our meals and wondering when our berths on the steamers would be ready constituted our day's work, and left us at night, too tired out to know or care much whether we were lying on feathers or iron. I have since had many a restful night in Hoboken, and to induce sleep, even with mosquitoes as bed-fellows, nothing more has been necessary than to recall those newspaper nights in the Hebrew's underground refuge. I trust that he is resting well somewhere.

"Where's your good news?" I yawned, and pulled on my jacket.

I was the first to tell the Hebrew of what had happened over night, emphasizing the necessity of finding coal-passers immediately and the fact that we were the handiest materials. What a change came over the man's face! Sleepy wrinkles, indolent eyes, jeweled hands, projecting paunch were started into wondrous animation.

"You sure?" he asked eagerly.

"Absolutely. The men are all arrested."

"You goin' as a passer?" he exclaimed. "Why, boy, they'll bury you at sea, sure. You can't stand the work. Just wait and see," he warned, as if waiting, seeing and sea-burial were necessary to substantiate his words.

"Stay here with me," he went on, "and I'll give you a job."

"Doing what?"

"Oh, cleaning up and learning the business."

I thanked him for his kindness, but insisted that I was going to ship.

As in earlier days, when attending college and living in the lawyer's home, a lawyer's career had been ruthlessly thrown aside, I was now perhaps throwing away a wonderful chance to become a saloonkeeper--a great fat brewer, even, who could tell? Thus it is that opportunities come and go. I might now be living in ease and luxury in a mosquitoless palace on the Hoboken Heights. As it is, I am a poor struggler still--but for the time being unmolested by mosquitoes, thank heaven. Many and many times after our good ship had put to sea, and we had all been initiated in our work, I remembered my friend, the saloonkeeper, and temporarily regretted that I had not thrown my lot with his concern. Now, I know that it was all for the best that the coal-passer's job was preferred. Only the other day I learned with regret that the saloonkeeper became insane not so very long after I had known him, his monomania being sidewalks. They say he got so bad that he thought the ceiling of his saloon was a sidewalk, and it was when he tried to use the ceiling as a sidewalk for his empty beer kegs that he was pronounced incurably out of order.

"Ach Gott!" the latter returned jovially. "The heat will sweat 'em into shape. I know the kind."

No doubt he did, but I recall some men, nevertheless, that the heat failed to sweat into shape, or into anything else worth while. They were born laggards and sneaks, throwing all the work they could shirk on others who were honestly trying to do their best. It is trite enough to say that such human beings are found everywhere, but they certainly ought to be barred from the fire-room of an ocean liner.

My "watches," four hours long, began at eight in the morning and at four in the afternoon; the rest of the time was my own, excepting when it was my turn to carry water and help clean up the mess-room.

The ashes out and up, we trimmers were divided into shovelers and carriers. Sometimes I was a carrier and had to haul baskets of coal to the firemen--"trimming" the coal consists, so far as I ever found out, in merely dumping the basketfuls conveniently for the firemen; and sometimes I was a shoveler, my duties then consisting of filling the baskets for the passers. Every bit of it, passing and shoveling, was honest, hard work. Shirking was severely reprimanded, but, as I have said, there were a few who did just as little as they could, although they were far better fitted for the work than I was, for instance. Once our "boss" decided that I was moving too slowly. He found me struggling with a full basket, in the alleyway between the hot boilers. "Further with the coals," he cried; "further!" accompanying the command with what he termed a "swat" on my head with his sweat-rag. I was tired out, mentally and physically, my head was dizzy, and my legs wobbled. For one very short second, after the fireman had hit me, I came very near losing control of myself, and doing something very reckless. That sweat-rag "swat" had aroused whatever was left in me of manhood, honor and pride, and I looked the fireman in the eye with murder in my own. He turned, and I was just about to reach for a large piece of coal and let him have it, when such vestiges of common-sense as were left to me asserted themselves; and I remembered what treatment was accorded mutinous acts on the high seas. Without doubt I should have been put in irons, and further trouble might have awaited me in Germany. I dropped the piece of coal and proceeded on my way, a coward, it seemed, and I felt like one. But it was better for the time being to put up with such feelings, galling though they were, than to be shut up and thrown into irons. I must blame my tramp life, if blame be necessary in the premises, for having often pocketed my pride on more or less similar occasions, when an overwhelming defeat stared me in the face had I taken the offensive.

About the middle of each watch "refreshments" were served in the shape of gin. A huge bottle, sometimes a pail, was passed around, and each man, fireman as well as trimmer, was expected to take his full share. During the short respite there was the faintest possible semblance of joviality among the men. Scrappy conversations were heard, and occasionally a laugh--a hoarse, vulgar, coal-dust laugh might be distinguished from the general noise. Our watch was composed of as rough a set of men as I have ever worked with. Every move they made was accompanied with a curse, and the firemen, stripped to the waist and the perspiration running off them, looked like horrible demons, at times, when they tended their fires. Yet when the "watch" was over with and the men had cleaned up, many of them showed gentler traits of character which redeemed much of their roughness when below.

The call to go up the ladders was the sweetest sound I heard throughout the trip. First, the men to relieve us would come clattering down, and soon after we were free to go back to daylight and fresh air again. There was generally a shout of gladness on such occasions, the firemen being quite as happy as the inexperienced trimmers. My little Italian friend used to sing "Santa Lucia" on nearly every climb bathwards and bunkwards. A wash-down awaited all of us at the top, and soon after a sumptuous meal, in quantity and wholesomeness certainly as good as anything given the saloon passengers. The head fireman insisted on our eating all that we could. He wanted able-bodied, well-nourished trimmers on his staff, and I, at least, often had to eat more than I wanted, or really needed.

One day I decided to try to escape a watch. The night before I had hardly slept at all, my eyes were painfully sore from cinders getting into them, and I was generally pretty well used up. Other men had been relieved of duty at different times, and it seemed to me that my turn was due. I went to the doctor.

"Well?" he said in English. I dwelt mainly on my sore eyes, telling him how the heat inflamed them.

"Let me see them," and he threw back the lids in turn, washing out each eye as if it had been a marble-top table.

"How about them now?" he questioned, after throwing away the blackened cloth. It would have paid to tell him that they were better if only to keep him from going at them again.

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