A Colony Of Tramps

In a woodland on Darby road, in one of the most picturesqtie seetionf5 of country in the vicinity of PLiladelphia, there is a certain community or settlement of tramps. During the day they lounge around fires of brushwood, made in a little stony hollow, sometimes singing, sometimes cooking, ormending, orwasLing, sometimes drinking. Occasionally some of them, spurred by appetite or tired of idleness, go out in the fields and gather lierbs or flowers and bring them into the city to sell, and with the money received buy whisky, upon which thcy all get drunk and make the woods ring with songs and boisterous laughter, or savage cries. The size of this motley gathering varíes with the time and tbc seasons. It hardly ever numbers less than twenty, and has reaelied to eighty. There are men and woinen, old and young. Nearly nll day long, as I haye said, they linger arotmd the fires in the wood, and when the weather is not nnpleasantly cold they also sleep out undcr the trees, but in the winter, and when storins of great violenoe occur, they takc refuge in bams in the neigLborhood. Upon a beautiful wooded knollthey have set up a little cabin made of logs and the bark of trees. In the stony hollow in the side of a hill, where they pass much of their time, they have kettles and pans and other houschold uttnsils, and a woodeu tripod upon which to hang a kettle over a fire, and strung f rom tree to tree, lines upon whire to hang their clothes to dry. They fare well. They beg f rom the farmers in t?e neighborhood, who dare not refuse them, and fear even to murmur at their demands. Any offense to them might result in the burning of the barn or home of the helpless offender. It is no wonder that a man should live in dread with a gang of lawless vagabonds about Lis door and no protcction near Lim f or himeelf or Lis wife or daugliters. TLis community seems to be governed by a " masier " and "mistress " - the latter an old, white-haired wretcL wLo Las been known in the vicinity fcr years. Tbey receive the allegiance of all the others, and refuse aduiittance into the circle to such applieants as do not, for any reason, please their fancy. Of course, their authorüy is not always submitted to, but, to a great extent, they are the rulers of the colony. The society generally is not inviting, and, individually, it is repulsive. So many low-browed, scowling, savage human beings ene seldom meets with in the same day. If an honestlaborer looks contemptuously at tliem they scowl in return or mutter threateningly; if a curious stranger go too near their "residence " they warn him otï, or if he laughs at their patched garments fliipping in the breeze they curse Lim; if he alludes to them as "bummers" they riae in their majesty and pourforth their indignation. Now, to break up tliis settlenipnk is a question which has agitated the minds of the farmers round I about for a long time. Winter does not destroy it. All last winter the tramps could be tracked by the foot-prints on the from the barn were they slept to the hollow in the woods. where they had gathered together an immense mound of leaves and withered brush. No one is willing to order them off. It is not safe. They have been tolerated until patience Las given way, and Low to get rid of tLein is a problem whicL is yet to be solved.