neck of woods just beyond town, and there was
the push, a score of husky hobos, charmingly located on the bank of a
little purling stream.

"'Come on, you mugs!' Slim addressed them. 'Throw yer feet! Here's
Cinders, an' we must do 'em proud.'

"All of which signifies that the hobos had better strike out and do some
lively begging in order to get the wherewithal to celebrate my return to
the fold after a year's separation. But I flashed my dough and Slim sent
several of the younger men off to buy the booze. Take my word for it,
Anak, it was a blow-out memorable in Trampdom to this day. It's amazing
the quantity of booze thirty plunks will buy, and it is equally amazing
the quantity of booze outside of which twenty stiffs will get. Beer
and cheap wine made up the card, with alcohol thrown in for the
blowd-in-the-glass stiffs. It was great--an orgy under the sky, a
contest of beaker-men, a study in primitive beastliness. To me there is
something fascinating in a drunken man, and were I a college president
I should institute P.G. psychology courses in practical drunkenness. It
would beat the books and compete with the laboratory.

"All of which is neither here nor there, for after sixteen hours of it,
early next morning, the whole push was copped by an overwhelming
array of constables and carted off to jail. After breakfast, about ten
o'clock, we were lined upstairs into court, limp and spiritless, the
twenty of us. And there, under his purple panoply, nose crooked like a
Napoleonic eagle and eyes glittering and beady, sat Sol Glenhart.

"'John Ambrose!' the clerk called out, and Chi Slim, with the ease of
long practice, stood up.

"'Vagrant, your Honor,' the bailiff volunteered, and his Honor, not
deigning to look at the prisoner, snapped, 'Ten days,' and Chi Slim sat
down.

"And so it went, with the monotony of clockwork, fifteen seconds to the
man, four men to the minute, the mugs bobbing up and down in turn like
marionettes. The clerk called the name, the bailiff the offence, the
judge the sentence, and the man sat down. That was all. Simple, eh?
Superb!

"Chi Slim nudged me. 'Give'm a spiel, Cinders. You kin do it.'

"I shook my head.

"'G'wan,' he urged. 'Give 'm a ghost story The mugs'll take it all
right. And you kin throw yer feet fer tobacco for us till we get out.'

"'L. C. Randolph!' the clerk called.

"I stood up, but a hitch came in the proceedings. The clerk whispered to
the judge, and the bail