For my part, I never spent five cents on drink until I had made the grub stake which would carry me out of the country.
But a cowboy who has been out on the prairie, seen no one, spoken to no one for weeks on end, must do all the crazy things that come into his mind when he gets into civilisation. He is like a big boy let loose.
The night I was considering all these things by the fire, there came into my mind a promise I had made before I left England, that if things went against me I would come back. There was no question about my being up against it, and a promise is a promise. Furthermore, I could gather together more money, on my own job at sea, than I ever should cow punching, so, just as quickly as I made up my mind to get out, I decided to go back.
It was with a horrible sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that I sold, and said god-bye to my old pal Rufus. It hurt like hell, and does even yet. Still, it had to be done, so I got it over as quickly as possible and started off back to England in dead earnest.
I had become a hobo.
The term applies to anyone who is trying to beat the country. He is not a tramp, as is generally known at home. He is best described as “a traveller without means of paying his way,” an accepted fact in the country, and it is a war of wits between the hobos and the various means of transport, which in those days were mainly in the hands of the C.P.R. Jumping trains, riding the blind baggage, or making out on the rods were three of the recognized methods, and the brakies, your natural enemies; who would think nothing of swinging a five pound lynch pin on the end of a line, if they thought somebody was “riding the rods.” If you were and unluckily got a crack on the head, you simply fell off, and the train passed on. If you were lucky and could get into a van you traveled in luxury. Another good plan was to ride the blind baggage, the platform at the back of the last car, but from which you are more easily expelled. The third and last method is riding on the rods (suspension rods) under the car. That is where I usually parked, for although the least comfortable, I always found it the safest, and the place where one was sure to make the longest journey undiscovered.
I still had with me my inseparable companion the banjo, also a small sack in which I kept bacon and bread, my blankets, and another companion, a piece of cheese. I asked, when I bought this cheese, for the strongest the chap could find. It certainly was powerful. Perhaps that was why I was so successful in making such long stretches without being thrown off!
Anyway, I noticed that everyone gave it an astonishingly wide berth. However, I eventually parted company with both my cheese, and my blankets, my bread, and my bacon, through a mistaken sense of hospitality on the part of a man in charge of one of the water tanks.
These tanks are situated just so far apart, where the engine may draw up in the otherwise uninhabited country and get water. I had dropped off the fill my billy can, and the tanker, when he saw me arrive, gave the usual salutation, “Hullo, Bo. Where are you going?” My invariable reply was, “Liverpool.”
As a rule a hobo is making his way from one town to another, and the vision of a man heading for Liverpool, England, seemed to strike everyone as particularly humorous. It tickled this chap to the extent that he would have me take, as he expressed it, “a drop of something with a kick.” He was a decent fellow and meant well, but whilst we were busy with our salutations the train sloped off with my worldly possessions, and I was left the proud possessor of a banjo. He was so sorry that I believe he would have stopped the train at the next tank and had it held — had I urged him — until I had time to catch it up. In any case he made an excuse to flag the next train along, and whilst he was telling a little story to the brakie, I made myself as comfortable as I could on the blind baggage, which landed me as close to Winnipeg as I wanted to go.
I spent three weeks in that Prairie City; an exhibition was on at the time, which for me proved fruitful, and enabled me to collect sufficient currency to make the long to Montreal. I had not been many hours in Winnpeg when I heard of a man who had built a house and was trying to get it finished, by way of painting and so forth; but he was a notoriously bad payer and the men that were working for him had quit, as they could not get their money.
His name was Chamberlain, so I made my way over to where he lived and dug him out.
“Did he want a painter?”
“Yes, he wanted a painter. Was I a painter?”
“Yes, I was.”
“Well,” said he, “go right ahead and get it finished.”
I did, though it was a pretty tall order. I found some paint brushes and so forth and sailed in. We neither of us discussed wages. As a matter of fact a painter’s pay was three dollars a day, with which I credited myself.
After my experiences with jamb piles and muskegs, work with a paint brush, either in one hand or the other, was child’s play, and, in any case, I had served in the hardest school in which one can learn painting, and that is a British sailing ship.
Chamberlain seemed tickled to death with the hours I worked and the ginger I put into the job; in fact we became great friends, and he cordially invited me to work any number of hours I cared. I took him at his word. In the evening, I usually walked into the town and bought myself provisions to cook overnight, which served me for the next day. Good solid food, but no luxuries. One day old Chamberlain asked me where I lived. I told him “on the prairie.”
“Hell, you don’t mean to tell me you sleep out there every night, no wonder you get up early in the morning.”
I told him that I had been sleeping out there for very nearly twelve months. However he eventually made me take a room in the house. I did for one night, and felt very nearly suffocated, and I gave up again in favour of the open air.
The time finally came when the job was finished, and up till then no mention of pay had passed between us; although some of the former hands, in the goodness of their hearts, had walked all the way out to where this house was situated on the prairie, to tender the information that I should certainly never get any money. Well, I might, or again I might not, but my impression was that I should get what I worked for. We left it at that. Later on, Chamberlain informed me he was getting a mortgage through on the house, and until that was through he could not pay me.
He happened to tell me that his solicitors were Andrews and Pitblado, and it also just happened that while working on the exhibition grounds, I had made contact with Andrews, who was, at that time, Mayor of Winnipeg. It came about that he met me on the grounds where I was working and sent me over to bring a huge wooden form. The band of the Black Watch were playing out there at the time, and one can get an idea of the size of the form, when four forms accommodated the whole band. They were made of just rough hewn timber. I thought it a tall order, but as I was in the very pink of condition I actually managed to hoist it on my shoulder and proudly marched off with it across the grounds. By luck, I met Andrews, who asked me a bit fluently, what I thought I was doing. I told him I was carrying a form, and that, furthermore he had sent me for it.
“Put the damn thing down. Do you think I sent you alone. Where’s the other man?”
Well, I had not seen him, but nothing would suit Andrews but to leave the form there for the others to collect whilst he took me away and put me on another job, which was all to do with ropes and tackles, and right into my hand. I may say that I had casually told him when walking across the grounds, in reply to his enquiry, that I was a sailor, had been out on the gold rush, and was then a hobo, bound back to Liverpool to pick up my job again, and we became quite good friends.