that there is no punishment, only “help for a
feller if he needs it,” and among the most inter-
esting experiences that the Judge has to tell, are
the discussions he has with boys as to whether
they “need to go to Golden.”
There’s a little, old, young, big man, called “ Major,” whom I saw in command of the battalion at Golden. He is somewhere between twelve and sixteen, but with an old, old face; very tiny of stature, but very tall in dignity. He never smiles, so sober and sensible is he. But he had what the kids and their Judge know as the “movin’-about fever.” The Major had come honestly by it. He had no home, and he wanted none, for he could range all over the West, from Chicago up into Idaho and down into New Mexico, and always, everywhere, he was known, for his pom- pous dignity, to hoboes, cow-boys, miners — to all men as “the Major.” The Judge gave him trial after trial, and it was no use; the time always came when the Major had to “move on.” If they must move, the Judge lets boys go, but he expects them to call on him to say good-bye and be pledged to write to him regularly and not to steal. Well, once when the fever was coming upon the Major, he called on the Judge. The Judge urged the Major to down the temptation. The Major tried, but he couldn’t; he confessed that
