A KNOCK ON THE DOOR 111 



when he was docked a bushel and a half to a load of 

 fifty bushels on top of it all he had been aroused to 

 protest. 



A protest from young Oerar was no mild and bashful 

 affair, either. It was big-fisted with vigor. But when, 

 with characteristic spirit, he had pointed out the 

 injustice of the price offered and the dockage taken 

 the elevator man, quite calmly, had told him to go to 

 the devil ! 



" There's no use going to the other elevators, for 

 you're all alike," said young Crerar hotly. 



" Then take your damned grain home again !" 

 grinned the elevator operator insolently. 



So the young farmer was compelled to sell his first 

 wheat for what he could get. He was prepared to pay 

 three cents per bushel on the spread, that being a 

 reasonable charge; but although plenty of cars were 

 available at the time, the spread cost him ten cents, a 

 direct loss of seven cents per bushel. Besides this he 

 was forced to see between twenty-five and thirty 

 bushels out of every thousand appropriated for dock- 

 age, no matter how clean the wheat might be. That 

 was in 1902. 



It was hard to forget that kind of treatment. And 

 when, later on, young Crerar accepted an offer of $75 

 per month to manage a Farmers' Elevator at Russell 

 he bore his own experience in mind and extended every 

 possible consideration to the farmers who came to him. 

 The elevator company, as a company, did not buy 

 grain; but as representative of Graves & Reilly, a Win- 

 nipeg firm, he bought odd lots and for this service 

 received an extra fifty dollars per month. 



Financially, it was better than teaching school. He 

 had made ten dollars the first summer he taught school 



