It was in Reno, Nevada, in the summer of 1892. Also, it was fair-time, and the town was filled with petty crooks and tin-horns, to say nothing of a vast and hungry horde of hoboes. It was the hungry hoboes that made the town a 'hungry' town. They 'battered' the back doors of the homes of the citizens until the back doors became unresponsive.
A hard town for 'scoffings,' was what the hoboes called it at that time. I know that I missed many a meal, in spite of the fact that I could 'throw my feet' with the next one when it came to 'slamming a gate for a 'poke-out' or a 'set-down,' 'or hitting for a light piece' on the street. Why, I was so hard put in that town, one day, that I gave the porter the slip and invaded the private car of some itinerant millionnaire.
The train started as I made the platform, and I headed for the aforesaid millionnaire with the porter one jump behind and reaching for me. It was a dead heat, for I reached the millionnaire at the same instant that the porter reached me. I had no time for formalities. 'Gimme a quarter to eat on,' I blurted out. And as I live, that millionnaire dipped into his pocket and gave me ... just ... precisely ... a quarter.
