_Saskatoon--Acquiring Transport_
In the evening of April 17, 1903, at precisely twenty minutes before
seven o'clock, the third of the C.P.R. special passenger trains
carrying Barr Colonists steamed gingerly across the old wooden bridge
spanning the South Saskatchewan River and clattered into Saskatoon.
The weather was gorgeous. The middle of April had only just slid by,
yet the sun shone dazzlingly out of an azure sky. Far-distant
objects etched themselves in the magic air with marvellous
visibility. Not one single thing in Nature marred the colonists'
arrival.
From a tumbled heap of unguarded bell tents, each of which was
tucked, pegs and all, into a bag, the settlers helped themselves
freely. Long before several hundred of these conical canvas shelters
were coaxed--with many imprecations, and much laughter--to stand
erect, the sun had disappeared below the edge of the world, leaving
behind it a glorious topaz-flaked sky, which slowly turned to purple
before melting into mysterious night.
That morning, the hamlet had jumped out of bed with a population of a
trifle over a hundred to its credit--or, allowing for a few of the
more important citizens being counted twice, say a level one hundred.
At night, it retired to rest boasting two thousand. Saskatoon's
eclipse was over.
The camp sprang into vivid life early the next morning. There was
much to be done. The faces of the natives whom the colonists came in
contact with were all burned a deep nut brown, the result of the
reflection of the sun's heat off late winter snows. "Everybody's
been to the seaside," Bert decided to himself. This tanned
appearance, coupled with the narrowing of their eyes, which was
caused by squinting through the glare, imparted a by no means
unsightly aboriginal aspect to the natives.
The "Barr-lambs" were soon approached by those of the shrewd-looking
traders who had horses, or oxen, or something or other to sell.
Everything in the district--even portions of the "town" itself--was
for sale. No one seemed to mix sentiment with ownership. A
practical sort of philosophy, that!--especially when one remembers
that one is on earth for only sixty or seventy years.
Most of the males of the Barr party plunged into orgies of buying.
It is quite safe to state that never in the history of colonization
in Western Canada has such a multitude of wealthy and free-handed
spenders been gathered in one place.
It was Saskatoon's day out. Even Fate itself took sides, neglecting
its duties of determining the "Heads or tails?" of existence
elsewhere on earth, in order to patronize the little hamlet.
Prodigious efforts were made to satisfy the many needs of the
colonists. From a baker's shop but slightly larger than a fair-sized
room, a man worked day and night in an endeavour to keep the camp
supplied with bread. It was an impossible task. So flapjacks,
pancakes and bannock bread were concocted.
Weird experiences of the widest variety crowded thick and fast about
the ingenuous Englishmen. One young fellow, a pale, thin-cheeked
grocer's assistant from somewhere in Sussex, bought a stallion, three
sections of drag harrows, and a pair of spurs within twenty-four
hours of reaching Saskatoon. The vendor of the horse was an Ontario
man. He said the animal's official name was "Napoleon Bonyparte,"
and that it possessed (which is more than the Emperor himself did) a
pedigree longer than from Guelph to Owen Sound.
After about a week, the grocer's assistant rechristened his stallion
"Beelzebub," and then traded it off to a man at the livery stable for
a second-hand stock-saddle. So what with the harrows, and the cowboy
saddle, and the spurs, not mentioning the experience he was buying,
he was doing pretty well, particularly as his mind, in its more
rational moments, leaned strongly to mixed farming. It was severe
pressure from his neighbours in camp, really, which induced him to
sever his connection with "Beelzebub." Being springtime, the animal
used to plunge about and squeal a lot, keeping tired people awake at
night.
Teams of vicious-looking mustangs, hitched to brand-new wagons,
careered up and down the main street of the tiny hamlet like runaway
fire engines. The more speedy of them, not recognizing the uses of
reverse, wheeled in great circles about the adjacent prairie.
Others, not so numerous, but sufficiently so to prevent monotony,
probably sensing a two-hundred-mile journey into the vast unknown,
gave full bent to their natural proclivities for doing their heaviest
pulling in reverse. These were called baulkers, which, translated
into English stable talk, means jibbers. A few teams were determined
neither to back up nor advance, but simply stood stock-still, at the
same time wearing a stupid but comic air of the most abject self-pity.
Philosophical oxen of biblical aspect, contrasting vividly with their
vendors' appearance, waddled along in yokes, or in meagre harness, or
lay down in various attitudes of peaceful somnolence, apparently
dreaming of a bovine heaven carpeted with luscious green grass.
A whole trainload of machinery was being unloaded. The colonists
queued up, and in some instances actually fought, for the wagons,
which were in huge demand. Spot cash was paid for everything--a
proceeding which almost paralyzed the natives at first, but, true to
their characteristic adaptability, they quickly grew accustomed to
the miracle.
"Wot are we goin' to get to our land wiv?" queried Sam, the third or
fourth evening after they reached Saskatoon--"hoxen or 'orses?"
They were talking things over in Bert's bell tent, which was one of
the hundreds flecking the yellow prairie west of the then Canadian
Pacific Railway line--the Regina-Prince Albert branch.
Bert adopted an air of supreme wisdom, ridiculously unnatural in one
so young and green.
"I rather fancy horses, myself," he replied; "although they do say
those bally bullocks can get along without anything to eat."
Sam sniffed. "I'm fer the gee-gees. Know a bit abaht 'em an' all.
My ole man used ter drive a blinkin' cab. 'E once drove the Juke
of----"
"Damn the Duke! What's that to do with it? The question is--can you
hold your end up when it comes down to business relations with these
horse dealer chaps?"
"'Old my end up in an 'orse deal! Wot d'yer tyke me for--a ruddy
vetingary surgeon?"
"Perhaps we'd better commission one of the government men," observed
Bert. "I hear they are familiar with horse-flesh, and, being in the
colonial civil service, they are sure to be as straight as a
gun-barrel."
The discussion was shelved for the time being, but the next day they
took pot-luck at a team. Saskatoon was well awake by the time they
plunged head-first into the turbulent sea of horse-trading.
"Ow old is them 'orses?" says Sam to a tall, dark man, eyeing a grey
and a buckskin with wise unwisdom. The team was tied to the side of
a second-hand wagon, and was dressed in a rather ornate set of
harness plentifully bespattered with unpolished brass knobs and
things.
The vendor wore a tranquil appearance almost approaching benevolence,
as though he might have a New Testament tucked away in his pocket
somewhere. Not being particularly good at arithmetic, Sam's question
had completely stumped him. However, he spat slowly a couple of
times, to give himself a chance to reckon up, and then said:
"Eight and nine."
Only a confirmed cynic would have doubted him, he was so obviously
sincere.
Presently Bert says: "How much?"
The tall, dark man's face was like a mask, but an acute observer
might have noticed that his conscience wiggled a bit at Bert's abrupt
question. He soon put that in its place, however.
"Five hundred for the outfit," he said, as coolly as though it were
the middle of winter. Then Sam and Bert, looking frightfully
sagacious, sidled away for a private consultation.
"Wot abaht it?" whispered Sam. "Ain't that grey 'orse got a wickid
eye? The yeller 'un looks a faithful sort of animal, though."
Right in the middle of some profound thinking by Bert, whose father's
hard-earned money was soon to be involved, a short, thick-set man,
dressed in a pair of faded blue overalls and a week's growth of
reddish whiskers, slouched up and spoke to them.
"You boys wantin' a team?"
"We are, my son," returned democratic Sam, cheerily. Bert, not
having been introduced, was naturally annoyed at the rude intrusion.
With true "Arbuthnot" training, he drew back a little, and kept
silent. But his English aloofness rolled off the fellow's gall as
easily as mercury off a sheet of glass.
"That pair there," said the thick-set man, pointing at the grey and
buckskin, "is the best team in North America. I drove 'em all day
yesterday, so I ought a know. Draw! Say, boys, you just oughta see
that there grey get down and heave."
Sam hid his suspicion behind a vacuous grin, his big, rather ugly,
mouth opening like a cheap purse.
"Wot are you gettin' aht of this?" he asked.
"Not a dam' nickel. I'm only trying to do you boys a good
turn"--then, approaching the team, the stranger exclaimed--"Ho,
there, George!" and he caught hold of the buckskin's tail, twisted it
sharply aside, then in a charmingly familiar manner smacked the
inside of the animal's left thigh several times.
The horse, George, lifted his foot dangerously. A stored-up kick or
two lurked somewhere about; but the supreme self-confidence, and
personal magnetism, of the man in reddish whiskers completely awed
him. Then he put his foot down again as meekly as a half-dead cab
horse might have done.
Sam surveyed the playful stranger's overalls, then his discoloured
sweater, then his whiskery chin.
"So you are one of them there good samaringtons wot goes abaht the
purple world doin' kind hactions, are yer?"
The stranger appeared somewhat surprised at the scepticism so plainly
stamped on Sam's ugly face.
"If you boys don't believe me," he protested, "don't, that's all.
And I ain't no good samarington, either. That's a new one on me.
I'm a liveryman. I work at that barn over there," and he waved his
hand towards a mass of sway-backed, neoteric architecture of noble
dimensions which graced one of Saskatoon's main thoroughfares.
Evidently deeply grieved at being misunderstood, he made himself look
as much as possible like a martyr being condemned to the stake, and
then walked off in the direction of the livery-stable.
"That man's an 'ostler, Bert," remarked Sam, "but 'e's tellin' the
trufe. The silly fool's as innercent as us. Why 'e don't even know
wot a good samarington is!"
"Obnoxious fellow," muttered Bert, "poking his nose into a
gentlemanly transaction, like that."
"Never mind 'im," returned Sam. "Let's buy the 'orses. They seem
'armless. An' just look at the neck of that grey 'un!"
The tall, dark owner of the team was patiently waiting. Not a muscle
of his face moved. Not the slightest hint did he give as to whether
he were a lying horse dealer, or a recently converted cavalryman.
Bert, assuming an air of perspicacity positively weird in its
gravity, went over and felt of the horses' legs--the front ones,
luckily. After conducting a very minute search for blemishes, and,
finding no indications of spavins or poll evil on their kneecaps, he
bought and paid for them.
Coldly the owner accepted the cash, rolled it up and shoved it into
his pocket, spat once with great satisfaction, never said Thank you,
Go to blazes, nor uttered a single one of the many similar
pleasantries which are reputed to smooth the path of trade, and then
calmly sauntered away towards the livery-barn.
The ghost of a smile drifted fleetingly across his inscrutable
features as he peeled a ten-dollar bill from the outside of a thick
roll and handed it to the reddish-whiskered tactician. That model of
truth and virtue was wasting some of his valuable time filling a very
large wheelbarrow with exceedingly small forkfuls of horse dung in
the main gangway of the overcrowded livery-barn.
"That's two hundred and a quarter you cleaned up on that deal--eh?"
he grinned, as he folded the ten-spot about eight times and thrust it
into an empty tobacco sack. "Ha-ha-ha!" he gurgled. "Pretty good!
Pretty good! How would it be if we went along to the Queen's and had
one on the green Englishmen?"
This rather clever suggestion appeared to meet with the tall, dark
stoic's silent but sincere approval, for immediately they both walked
out of the barn as though to carry it into effect.
"What's that silly ass intend to do about his wagon and harness, I
wonder?" demanded Bert of his little partner, a few minutes after the
vendor's departure. "Surely he doesn't expect us to take care of
them for him. Run across and ask him what we're to do with them.
Sam!"
Rightly or wrongly, Sam had all his life been trained to regard the
striving after excessive purism in business as an infallible sign of
approaching idiocy.
"Say nothink wotever abaht 'em. If 'e don't worry arter 'em 'isself,
why should we? Come on, let's slip orf before 'e begins ter think
abaht rememberin' 'e's forgot 'em."
Bert almost blushed at the dishonourable proposal. But he was much
too sensitively constructed to appear ultra-virtuous, so he silently
acquiesced.
With a little instruction, and less assistance, from two or three
interested onlookers, they hitched the horses to the wagon and drove
off to purchase a schooner-top. Something must have propitiated
Fate. The horses went along all right. Though being almost old
enough to vote, they were perfectly honest.