There are three types of the genus vagrant: the hobo, the tramp, and the bum. The hobo works and wanders, the tramp dreams and wanders and the bum drinks and wanders.
In Hoboes: Bindlestiffs, Fruit Tramps, and the Harvesting of the West by Mark Wyman.
We tossed the cakes to them and I fed them like chickens with small pieces of cake and like chickens they ate it. Mr. Stevens kept guard with a whip with which he pretended to whip a small boy. We made them open their mouths and tossed cake into it. For a ‘Coup de Grace’ we threw a lot of them in a place and a writhing heap of human beings. We drove on very soon in the moonlight, It was beautiful.…We made the crowds that we gave cake to give three cheers for the U.S.A. before we gave them cake….
Theodore Roosevelt, Diaries of Boyhood and Youth
The “fun” occurred during a trip to Italy in December of 1869.
Even the entertainment could be traumatic in No Man’s Land. People would gather at makeshift rodeo stands near Boise City, OK on Saturday afternoons to watch the cow dip. Cattle were herded into a chute and down into a vat of water. Once they hit the water, they were drowned by two cowboys, on either side of the vat, who held their heads down while the beeves bucked. Some of the children didn’t like it–an amusement ride with a sudden death at the end.
Timothy Egan, The Worst Hard Time
The other cow dip, meant to ward off ticks carrying Texas Fever, weren’t much better given the fact that vats of pesticide cocktails invariably killed the cows swimming through.