Whenever I think of them I think of the spectacle that genius of the burlesque world of my day, Nat Wills, used to present when, in fluttering rags and tatters, his vestless shirt open at the breast, revealing no underwear, his shoes three times too big, and torn and cracked, a small battered straw hat, from a hole in which his hair protruded, his trousers upheld by a string, and that indefinable smirk of satisfaction of which he was capable flickering over his dirty and unshaven face he was wont to strike an attitude worthy of a flight of oratory, and exclaim: “Fifteen years ago to-day I was a poor, dispirited, broken-down tramp sitting on a bench in a park, not a shirt to my back. Not a decent pair of shoes on my feet. A hat with a hole in it. No money to get a shave or a bath or a place to sleep. No place to eat. Not a friend in the world to turn to. My torn and frayed trousers held up by a string. Yet” (striking his chest dramatically) “look at me now!” And then he would lift one hand dramatically, as much as to say, “Could any change be greater?” The humor was not only in the contrast which his words implied and his appearance belied, but in a certain definite and not unkindly characterization of the bum as such, that smug and even defiant disregard of the conventions and amenities which characterizes so many of them and sets them apart as a species quite distinct from the body social--for that they truly are. And for that very reason they have always had a peculiar interest for me, even a kind of fascination, such as an arrestingly different animal might have for others. And here in the great city, from time to time I have encountered so many of them, suggesting not poverty or want but a kind of devil-may-care indifference and even contempt for all that society as we know it prizes so highly--order, cleanliness, a job, a good suit of clothes, marriage, children, respected membership in various orders, religion, politics--anything and everything that you will. And yet, by reason of their antithesis and seeming antipathy to all this, interesting.