“It’s railroad money,” he replied. “That may be all the same thing. But there’s no difficulty, really. It’s quite all right for anyone to do this. What’s wanted is the truth. Put in your own opinions of Wall Street if you like. Indeed, do that. Wall Street people are not as you think they are. Valentine is a particularly good sort and honest in his point of view. I vouch for the whole thing.” So I took it; and thereafter posted to John J. Valentine, 130 Broadway, room 607, _personal_, a daily confidential report on the march of the Commonwealers. I would not say that the fact of having a retainer in railroad money changed my point of view. It did somewhat affect my sense of values and my curiosity was extended. For the purpose of the Valentine reports I made an intensive personal study of the Commonwealers. I asked them why they were doing it. Some took it as a sporting adventure, with no thought of the consequences, and enjoyed the mob spirit. Some were tramps who for the first time in their lives found begging respectable. But a great majority of them were earnest, wistful men, fairly aching with convictions, without being able to say what it was they had a conviction of, or what was wrong with the world. Their notions were incoherent. Nobody seemed very sanguine about the Coxey plan; nobody understood it, in fact; yet something would have to be done; people couldn’t live without work. Unemployment was the basic grievance. I took a group of twenty, all skilled workmen, sixteen of them married, and found that for each of them the average number of wage earning days in a year had been twelve. They blamed the money power in Wall Street. When they were asked how the money power could profit by their unemployment, what motive it could have in creating hard times, they took refuge in meaningless phrases. Most of them believed in peaceable measures. Only three or four harbored destructive thoughts. The manner of the Army’s reception by farmers, villagers and townspeople was variable and hard at first to understand. Generally there was plenty of plain food. Sometimes it was provided in a generous, sympathetic spirit; then again it would be forthcoming as a bid for immunity, the givers at heart being fearful and hostile. The Army was much maligned by rumor as a body of tramps obtaining sustenance by blackmail. It wasn’t true. There was no theft, very little disorder, no taking without leave, even when the stomach gnawed. One learned to anticipate the character of reception by the look of the place. In poor, dilapidated communities there was always a hearty welcome with what food the people could spare, cheerfully bestowed; the better and more prosperous the community the worse for the Commonwealers. I spoke of this to some of the more thoughtful men. They had noted the fact and made nothing of it. Then I spoke of it to one of the tramps, who knew the technique of begging; he said: