Trail-Tales of Western Canada

by F. A. Robinson

He remembered how his widowed mother had toiled and struggled to bring up her six boys aright and give them the best equipment possible for the battle of life. He recalled his own setting out from home—from the home to which he had never returned, and to which he had rarely written. The "Western fever" had gripped him in his early twenties, and nothing could induce him to stay on the Homestead. And so ere long the property had to pass into other hands, because there were no boys left to work the place. The mother's sorrow over the parting with her "Willie" had rested very lightly on him the morning he started Westward. Yet to-day he viewed it in a different light, and he lived the parting over again with very different feelings. The last breakfast had been prepared in silence by the one who had never ceased to love him. More than once she had tried to speak, but the lump in the throat prevented. At last they stood in the hall, and her words were uttered with sobs as she clung to her "baby boy." "Good-bye, my Willie, and remember, that as long as your mother has breath she will pray every day for her boy, and ask God to take care of him." He had assured her he could take care of himself. He remembered the last flutter of the handkerchief as she stood on the milk-stand watching the buggy disappear from the sideroad on to the "gravel." He had "taken care of himself," and a mighty poor job he had made of it, and there seemed little chance of any improvement.

While he was in the midst of such thoughts, George Clarke entered. Bill was still holding the photograph. With moistened eyes he looked into the face of his hospitable friend. "George Clarke," he commenced, "it takes a man a long time to own up that he has made a botch of things; it's too late now to make a fresh start, but I've been looking at this picture, and God knows I'd like to have as good a character as I had when that was taken. That woman is as good a mother as any boys ever had, and I haven't shown her the gratitude of a dog."

To this day, George Clarke feels that he never made a poorer attempt at trying to speak a helpful word to a discouraged man than on the morning when Bill Bird stood in his little parlour on the old ranch. One result of the conversation, however, was the decision on Bill's part to accept the invitation to remain at the Clarke ranch for at least a few weeks, and during those weeks he saw demonstrated the best type of Christian living with which he had ever come in contact. On several occasions he accompanied George to the hall in which the special services were being held. Rather to the surprise of the Clarkes, he made no response to the appeals from the missioner, which seemed to them so powerful. One Sabbath evening, however, as they sat around the stove, Bill expressed himself in such a way as to bring a thrill of joy to the hearts of those who were greatly concerned in seeing him make the "Choice of the Highest."

"George Clarke," said Bill, "I haven't taken much stock in religion, but if there's a kind that makes a man do what you and your missus did for me when I wasn't fit company for a pig, I guess I ought to go in for it." Then in a lower and subdued tone he added, "For anybody to take an interest in me is a stunner, the dirty tough that I was."

It was Bill's own opinion that for him life in the bush was no longer safe, and so, until his future was fully decided, he agreed to assist the Clarkes with the work on the ranch. When a few months later, through the death of a brother in the East, George Clarke decided to make his home in Nova Scotia, Bill Bird said in effect, "Where thou goest, I will go."

And it so happens that to-day, down by the Eastern sea, the former lumberjack is building a home, a business and a character. He has not again returned West, but he has often told intimate friends that there is a rancher's small home in the distant province which he never forgets; and he thanks God for those who valued a dirty, wrecked, but God-loved man more than furniture and carpets, and whose hospitality and service awakened desires that have transformed a life.

But it was not to Bill Bird alone that an uplift came. Let George Clarke speak for himself. His words were spoken as he renewed his acquaintance with the missioner two years later. The audience had dispersed, and George and the speaker walked down the street of the little fishing village. Bill Bird was the main subject of their conversation. For a long time they stood in the darkness as George narrated all that had transpired after the missioner's departure from the Western town. When his story was ended, the missioner clasped his hand and said, "God bless you, Clarke, for what you did in Bill's behalf. If only we could multiply that kind of effort we could redeem this dominion."

George clung to the extended hand as he said, "You are very good, sir, to say that to me, but I tell you honestly, when I tried to do that little bit for Bill Bird, I did a deal more for George Clarke. I have had my ups and downs as you know. Since I've been in the East I've done pretty well on the whole, but honestly, sir, the palmiest days I've ever had, and the best returns my bank-book ever showed, are as nothing in value compared to the satisfaction that came to me and my wife when we saw Bill Bird solidly on his feet as a Christian man. If you're going back by the Intercolonial, try to stop over at C——. Bill would be mighty glad to see you, and you'll see what the Lord can do with a man who has gone even as far as the "snake-room."