Dr. Hiltz kindly showed interest in our caravan project, and said that if it proved possible of accomplishment he would like a report of the work at the end of the season. He remarked that there was great need for work of the kind.
CHAPTER IV
LIFE IN A LITTLE PRAIRIE TOWN
We had arranged to work at Regina until the season was sufficiently advanced for us to take the road, but before leaving Toronto I heard that my caravan was not yet begun. This was exceedingly worrying, as it was now the middle of March, and I wished to start on the prairie by May 1, when the trails should be open. I had only six months' leave from my diocese, and was anxious to make the most of it, and now it seemed as if the whole plan would be spoilt by this delay over the caravan. I determined to stop at Winnipeg on my way to Regina in order to see about the matter, and to bring what influence I could to bear upon the coach-building firm. As a member of the Victoria League,[1] I had an introduction to a Daughter of the Empire at Winnipeg, and I wrote and asked her to use her influence in getting my order for the caravan put through without further delay. Then, arming myself with a letter from an official of the Royal Bank of Canada, stating that I was to be relied upon to carry out my business transactions, I had a "stop-over" for Winnipeg put on our tickets, and on arrival in that town went straight to the coach-builder's office. The Daughter of the Empire had telephoned to the firm, and this, with the official's letter, had the desired effect. The manager was most civil and obliging, and promised to do everything in his power to carry out the contract. To my surprise I found that the order for the caravan had never been received, the firm through which it had been given never having transmitted it. When I pressed for a promise that the van should be finished by May 1, adding that otherwise I should not pay for it, the manager, knowing that I came from the land of labour troubles, said, with a twinkle in his eye: "Yes, if there isn't a strike."
I spent some hours in attending to the details of the van, and then we went on to Regina by the night train, arriving there next morning. The clergy of the Railway Mission gave us hospitality at first, then Winifred Ticehurst went to work in St. Peter's parish, and lived at the vicarage, and I went to St. Mary's parish, and lived in lodgings.
Soon after I arrived in Regina Aylmer Bosanquet asked me to go out to her at Kenaston for a week-end. I was thankful that I was going to make my cross-country journeys by caravan when I found that it was no unusual thing for the trains in Western Canada to be three hours late in starting. This was so much a matter of course that a fellow-traveller—one of the Railway Mission clergy, who was going up to Kenaston to take service on the Sunday—telephoned to the station from the Mission-house before attempting to catch the train. These automatic telephones were a feature of every house in Regina, and were also installed in all parish halls and public buildings. The person using them could switch on to the desired number without calling up through the Exchange.
It was a five hours' journey to Kenaston, which is a typical prairie town—just a wide earth road, with wooden side-walks, and bordered on either side by wooden shacks. Even in Regina all but the main streets are of this unpaved earth, and when the snow is melting or after heavy rain this earth turns into thick and sticky mud (called "gumbo"), which cakes on your boots in lumps of incredible hardness, so that you often find yourself walking with one foot higher than the other. It is so hard that it can only be scraped off with a knife. Of course one has to clean one's own boots, unless one is near a "Shoe-shine Parlour" in some large town.
Kenaston is surrounded by illimitable prairie, across which one can see for twenty or thirty miles. When I first saw it the prairie was covered with snow, stained crimson in the West by the red glow of the setting sun. An unforgettable sight.
The town has a lumber-yard and several elevators, both of which are found in every town situated close to the "track"—i.e., the railway. The lumber (trees sawn into boards) is sent down from British Columbia and other parts for building shacks, etc., there being no timber trees on the prairie. The elevator is a high granary for storing the wheat till it is sent away by train.
Small as the place is there are three churches—Anglican, Roman Catholic, and Evangelical Lutheran. In many places there is a "Union" Church and Sunday school. This is a sort of co-operative Nonconformity, the ministers of the different denominations officiating alternately. Presbyterians have united in this matter with the other non-episcopal sects. The plan has been adopted to economise in men and money; but its weak point seems to be that, as the ministers have to please all denominations, the teaching is apt to become wishy-washy. A possible alternative occurred to me—namely, that all the religious bodies of a given area should combine to build a church, which could then be used for their own special services at different hours. But, of course, this plan would not economise in men.