The Lumberjack Sky Pilot

by Thomas D. Whittles

A—— was built for doing things, and looked the part. If you were judging from appearances you would say that he was one of the best, and if you asked for confirmation of your opinion the lumberjack would answer regarding him, "None better in all the north woods,"—a high physical certification.

For some time A—— had been a foreman. His abilities won the admiration of the men and his habits of life made him feared,—it was another case of what whiskey can do with a man.

Once when Mr. Higgins was preaching in A——'s camp, A—— came into the meeting and drunkenly listened to the minister as he pleaded with the men to forsake evil and get right with God. A tense stillness hung over the bunkhouse and all the audience listened in sympathy.

Suddenly another voice broke into the harmony. It was A—— crying in fervid encouragement: "Lace it to them, Higgins, give them hell, old boy, the drunken sons of the nameless need a dose of religion to make them log right."

"Don't notice him, boys," said Mr. Higgins; "that is whiskey that is talking. A—— would be ashamed of that sort of thing if he were sober, but whiskey isn't ashamed of anything."

At the end of Frank Higgins' first year in Bemidji, when the camps were pouring their men into the towns, he happened to visit the little town of Farley, Minnesota. The lumberjacks owned the town. The long drought of winter was turned into a deluge and it was the evident intention of the foresters to consume in a day enough to make up for the enforced abstinence. A stream of coin passed over the bar and a tide of liquor came from the other side.

Near a saloon a laughing crowd watched the antics of a powerful fellow who drunkenly wallowed in the mud. Bewilderingly fluent and ingeniously profane was the man in the gutter, and his drunken comrades raised their laughter of approval at his antics and remarks. Pushing his way through the crowd, Mr. Higgins came upon the object of their mirth—it was A——, the foreman, too drunk to care about or to understand his degradation.

The missionary helped the foolish fellow to his feet and, leaning him against a building for support, scraped the filth from his garments with a shovel.

The father and brother-in-law of A—— were in the village and to them the missionary, took his drunken charge. A—— had been working but a few miles from home but had not visited his people for two years. When the relatives saw their son and brother, at the same time realizing his helplessness in the presence of temptation, they asked the missionary to take him to the Keeley Cure at Minneapolis, two hundred miles away.

Mr. Higgins was not anxious for the task, but he knew that there was a chance for at least a partial reformation, and anything was an improvement on the present way of living. The only way to accomplish the journey with an unwilling patient was to keep the man drunk and get him to the institute while under the influence of his enemy—this was beating the devil with his first lieutenant. So the minister packed his grip with unministerial baggage—whiskey—and patiently waited his train. It took three men to get the logger into the car, and with the beginning of the journey the real troubles of the temperance worker began. On one side was the grip loaded with bottles, on the other a man loaded with whiskey. The only thing that suggested the ministry was the half fare permit, and that was out of sight.