business men
met in the office of Killaen Van Ransellaer, 56 Wall Street. In
discussing the plan of a municipal lodging house, the "Wayfarers
Lodge" in Boston, an institution of the character under discussion,
was pointed out as a model, and it was decided to send a
representative to Boston to investigate and make a report on it.

I was suspicious of the printed report of the Boston place. It spoke
of the men getting clean bedding, clean sheets and good meals; and
experience was teaching me that that kind of catering for the tramp
would swamp any institution. Then, I knew something about the padding
of charitable reports. I did not care to offer any objection to the
sending of a representative, but I determined to go myself; so,
dressed in an old cotton shirt with collar attached, a ragged coat, a
battered hat and with exactly the railroad fare in my pocket, I went
to Boston. I stopped a policeman on the street, told him I was
homeless and hungry. "Go to the Police Station," he said, and knowing
that at each Police Station tickets of admission were served, I
presented myself to the Sergeant at the desk.

Furnished with a ticket, I went to No. 30 Hawkins Street, and there
fell in line with a crowd of the same kind of people I was working
with and for on the Bowery. We had about an hour to wait. When it came
my turn for examination, I was rather disturbed to find the
representative of the committee sitting beside the superintendent,
investigating the tramps as they passed. I knew he could not recognize
me by my clothes, but I was not so certain about my voice, so I spoke
in a low tone.

"Open your mouth," the superintendent said. "Where are you from?"

I kept my eyes on the ground and answered a little louder, "Ireland."

"You are lying," the superintendent said. "Where are you from?"

"Ireland," I answered again in the same tone.

Two kinds of checks lay on the table in front of him--one pile green,
the other red. After answering the rest of the questions, I was given
a red check and taken to a cell where a black man stripped me to the
skin.

"Why did I get a red card while most of the others got a green card?"
I asked.

"You're lousy, boss, dat's why."

"Well, what are you going to do about it?"

"Steam 'em." So he tied my clothes in a bundle and put them under a
pressure of two hundred and fifty pounds of steam, the coloured man
remarking as he stowed them away: "What's left of 'em when they come
out, b