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The great size of the timber here impressed me. The officer in charge turned out to be an old friend from Toronto, Major A. M. Jarvis. I also met John Schott, the gigantic half-breed, who went to the Barren Grounds with Caspar Whitney in 1895. He seemed to have great respect for Whitney as a tramper, and talked much of the trip, evidently having forgotten his own shortcomings of the time.
"Supposin' I was to thump 'ee on the nose?" he inquired. "What for?" "For makin' so free wi' my hay." "Why then," said I, "I should earnestly endeavor to thump you on yours." The farmer looked me slowly over from head to foot, with a dawning surprise. "Thought you was a common tramper, I did," said he. "Why, so I am," I answered, brushing the clinging hay from me.
'Such a one as he money! said the old dame, 'the tramper! Why, if he had clothes to his back, it was as much as he had. Then the robbers began to talk among themselves what they should do with him; if they should kill him outright, or what else they should do.
"Stop a moment," interposed the postillion, "I have one more word to say: and when you are surrounded by your comforts, keeping your nice little barouche and pair, your coachman and livery servant, and visited by all the carriage people in the neighbourhood to say nothing of the time when you come to the family estates on the death of the old people I shouldn't wonder if now and then you look back with longing and regret to the days when you lived in the damp, dripping dingle, had no better equipage than a pony or donkey cart, and saw no better company than a tramper or Gypsy, except once, when a poor postillion was glad to seat himself at your charcoal fire."
"It be enough," said he, "to raise the 'Old Adam' inside o' me to 'ave a tramper o' the roads a-snoring in my hay, but I ain't a-going to be called names, into the bargain. 'Rusty' I may be, but I reckon I'm good enough for the likes o' you, so come on down!" and the Waggoner shook his fists again.
I heard, occasionally, the bark of dogs; but the sound appeared to come from an immense distance. The rain still fell, and the ground beneath my feet was wet and miry; in short, it was a night in which even a tramper by profession would feel more comfortable in being housed than abroad.
'Goodness! If ever I did see such a pig! said Ellen King, as she mounted the stairs. 'I wouldn't touch him with a pair of tongs! 'Who? said a voice from the bedroom. 'Why, that tramper who has just been in to buy a loaf! He is a perfect pig, I declare! I only wonder you did not find of him up here! The police ought to hinder such folk from coming into decent people's shops!
But I tell you that you shall quit this house in half an hour that you shall never enter it again but at your peril; and if you do within ten minutes from that time you shall be in the town gaol. It is no longer a contest between you and your defenceless daughter; it is a contest between " "A tramper in fustian, and a gemman as drives a coach," interrupted Darvil, laughing bitterly, yet heartily.
The tramper, tired as he could be, at length approached, but the crowd had increased so enormously that the road was completely blocked. Tradesmen with their portable workshops, pedlars with their cumbersome gear and pack-horses could not pass, but had to wait for their turn; there were not even any tortuous by-streets in this place whereby they might reach their destination.
Oliver, alarmed and indignant, supposing this intrusive spectator of his privacy to be some bold and lawless tramper, stepped out of the room, opened the front door, and bade the stranger go about his business; while the terrier still more inhospitably yelped and snapped at the stranger's heels. Then a hoarse voice said, "Don't you know me, Oliver? I am your brother Randal!
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