\ 
A 
A TRAMP’S STORY. 
“Where now ?” I asked as I saw my old 
chum, Tom Shelby, com mg up, leading a 
large, brindle dog, and carrying a double- 
barrel shot-gun on his shoulder. 
“Oh, I'm off for a coon hunt,” he 
answered, “and I’ve come to get you to go 
along. I’ll want somebody to carry the 
game, you know.” 
“Yes,” I replied, sarcastically, “I shall 
he delighted to act in that capacity; but 
which way ate you going, Tom r” 
“I think,” he said, “we will go north 
until we get to the railroad; we will then 
follow up the track a few miles and return 
by a different route. There are heavy woods 
on both sides of the railroad, you know, 
and tire coons hold high carnival there 
every night. I have seen their tracks in 
the soft mud as thick as sheep tracks.” I 
approved of t^pe.plan and at dusk we set 
out. 
It was a dark, foggy night in March, 
“just the night for coons,” Toni remarked, 
as we set out, but it did not prove to be 
just right, for we reached the railroad 
without “striking a track.” If the rac¬ 
coons were holding “high carnival” there 
that night our dog did not disturb them. 
He followed close at our heels and was 
scarcely out of sight once during the even¬ 
ing. I have heard old hunters say that a 
dog can tell a good night for raccoons and 
I am inclined to think there is some truth 
in it. 
“Somebody else out hunting,” Tom ob- 
served, pointing to a light about a quarter 
of a mile to our left. 
“No;” I answered, “it cannot be any one 
out hunting, for I have been watching tha^ 
light for some time and it is not moving.” 
“Perhaps there is a sugar camp over 
there and somebody is sugaring off,” Tom 
suggested. “Suppose we go over and help 
them; I, for one, am a famous hand at 
sugaring oft.” 
I assented and we set out, On nearing 
the light we saw it was not in a sugar 
camp, as we had at first supposed, but in 
an old deadening. A log-heap had been 
set on fire and the flan ere no.w roaring 
and crackling in a lively manner. 
“A tramp,” whispered Tom, pointing to> 
a huge log, back a short distance from the 
fire. 
Looking in the direction indicated, I 
beheld one of the oddest specimens of 
humanity I ev< j r saw. Hi.- hair was as white 
as the driven snow and hung- in tangled locks 
about his head. A Ion . c •; be? rd nearly 
concealed the lower par. oi Ins lace and a 
huge hat, made of corn husks, shaded his 
massive forehead. His clothe.-, were made 
of old rags wound around about him like 
bandages. His shoes were made in the 
same manner—they resembled huge balls- 
of carpet rags more than shoes. Several 
immense packs lay on the i< ; beside him. 
As we came lip he drew from his pocket a 
large knife and brandished it threateningly. 
We assured him of our peaceable intentions, 
however, and he closed the knife and seat¬ 
ed himself on a log beside the fire. 
“You see,” he said, apologetically, “The 
railroad hands make occasional raids on 
my cairip andTthought they were coming 
to visit me to-night; hence, my war-like 
demonstrations.” 
“You seemto have a pretty comfortable 
fire,” Tom remarked, seating himself on a 
log beside the tramp. 
“Yes,” he said, “but I had a hard time 
making it.” 
“There is no excellence without great 
labor,” I said. 
“That’s true,” he said, but there is some¬ 
times great labor without any excellence. 
At least I have found it so. This is a hard, 
hard world,” h% added bitterly. 
“How came you to adopt this mode of 
life?” 1 om asked after some further con¬ 
versation. 
* 
“Ah!” he said, “you want to know what 
brought me to my present condition. I will 
tell you. It was liquor that did it. From 
my earliest recollections I have had an ap¬ 
petite for strong drink. I came honestly 
by it. My grandfather was killed in a 
drunken fight, my uncle (father’s only 
brother) spent the last years of his life in a 
lunatic asylum, and my father died with 
delerium tremens. Well do I remember 
that dreary, December day when father 
died! How vividly that death scene rises. 
