in an impersonal, composite sort of
way, which none the less blinded no one to the faithfulness of the local
color.

"Naturally, myself a tramp, the tenor of the article was a protest
against the maltreatment of the tramp. Cutting the taxpayers to the pits
of their purses threw them open to sentiment, and then in I tossed the
sentiment, lumps and chunks of it. Trust me, it was excellently done,
and the rhetoric--say! Just listen to the tail of my peroration:

"'So, as we go mooching along the drag, with a sharp lamp out for John
Law, we cannot help remembering that we are beyond the pale; that our
ways are not their ways; and that the ways of John Law with us are
different from his ways with other men. Poor lost souls, wailing for a
crust in the dark, we know full well our helplessness and ignominy. And
well may we repeat after a stricken brother over-seas: "Our pride it is
to know no spur of pride." Man has forgotten us; God has forgotten us;
only are we remembered by the harpies of justice, who prey upon our
distress and coin our sighs and tears into bright shining dollars.'

"Incidentally, my picture of Sol Glenhart, the police judge, was good.
A striking likeness, and unmistakable, with phrases tripping along like
this: 'This crook-nosed, gross-bodied harpy'; 'this civic sinner, this
judicial highwayman'; 'possessing the morals of the Tenderloin and an
honor which thieves' honor puts to shame'; 'who compounds criminality
with shyster-sharks, and in atonement railroads the unfortunate and
impecunious to rotting cells,'--and so forth and so forth, style
sophomoric and devoid of the dignity and tone one would employ in a
dissertation on 'Surplus Value,' or 'The Fallacies of Marxism,' but just
the stuff the dear public likes.

"'Humph!' grunted Spargo when I put the copy in his fist. 'Swift gait
you strike, my man.'

"I fixed a hypnotic eye on his vest pocket, and he passed out one of his
superior cigars, which I burned while he ran through the stuff. Twice or
thrice he looked over the top of the paper at me, searchingly, but said
nothing till he had finished.

"'Where'd you work, you pencil-pusher?' he asked.

"'My maiden effort,' I simpered modestly, scraping one foot and faintly
simulating embarrassment.

"'Maiden hell! What salary do you want?'

"'Nay, nay,' I answered. 'No salary in mine, thank you most to death. I
am a free down-trodden American citizen, and no man shall say my time is
his.'

"'Save