1900 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER; 
647 
The Man Alone. 
The train was stopping longer than 
usual at the water tank, and the Man 
Alone stood in the door of his house on 
wheels, enjoying the treat. The long, 
dust-covered cars usually paused only a 
few moments, and were then whirled on 
by the thirst-assuaged monster at their 
head, in the never-ending race across 
the continent. But to-day the dripping 
tube had clanked back against the iron 
hoops of the tank, and still the engine 
bell did not ring, and the blue-coated 
conductor was looking anxiously from 
his watch to the engineer and fireman, 
who had crawled under the wheels and 
were alternately hammering and swear¬ 
ing. A few passengers, clad in melan¬ 
choly-looking linen dusters, and with 
soiled handkerchiefs about their necks, 
jumped from the platforms of the sleep¬ 
ers and made a little group about the 
engine, but most of the sweltering, al¬ 
kali-choked mortals in the porterless 
and comfortless day coaches were too 
languid to more than thrust their heads 
into the palpitating waves of heat that 
arose from the roadbed and to return 
cheerless reports of apparent disaster. 
It did not occur to the Man Alone that 
he might join the little group and ac¬ 
tually exchange a few words with hu¬ 
man beings. He merely gazed, and 
caught himself counting the people and 
the windows in the cars, just as he had 
wearily tried and tried again the task 
of enumerating the shifting backs of the 
hundreds of sheep under his care. He 
remarked to himself that this was prob¬ 
ably his last sight of the daily train for 
many months, as he had exhausted the 
feeding ground, and would have to move 
away to a location where the buffalo 
grass was more plentiful. Consequently 
he lingered so long and so intently in 
his farewell look that he did not notice 
a slender young woman who had leaped 
lightly from one of the rear coaches and 
was approaching with a baby on one 
arm and a small tin pail in her disen¬ 
gaged hand. When the Man Alone did 
spy her, she was so near that she fright¬ 
ened him, and he could not muster 
strength to move from the door sill, 
against which he was leaning. The 
young woman came quite boldly to the 
edge of the steps that led from the door 
of the wagon to the ground, and the 
Man’s knees nearly went from under 
him as two very brown and very deter¬ 
mined eyes fastened their gaze upon 
him, augmented by a battery of infantile 
ones. 
“Pardon me, but John Henry is very 
thirsty, and I wish to buy some milk for 
him,” said the owner of the brown eyes. 
The Man Alone was too near insensi¬ 
bility to more than gasp. The only wo¬ 
man he had seen in a whole year was 
the proprietor of the “hash counter” at 
Vermilian Creek, 12 miles down the 
track, and this vision in a neat gray 
traveling dress dazzled him. 
“John Henry hasn’t had anything to 
eat since he dropped his bottle and broke 
it, over a hundred miles from here,” 
pleaded the owner of the brown eyes. 
“I ain’t got a thing but airtights—er, 
that is, canned milk, ma’am,” said the 
Man Alone finally, drawing a deep 
breath after nearly every word. “Ef 
that’ll do any good-” 
Here his face took a sudden expression 
of horror and his long arm swept to a 
horizontal. 
“Yer train’s goin’, ma’am!” he ex¬ 
claimed, and the owner of the brown 
eyes turned, with a gasp of dismay, and 
saw the conductor swing himself on the 
last platform and enter the car door, 
while the engine puffed its way into the 
grim vista of sagebrush beyond the 
water tank. 
“Gimme yer baby, ma’am,” said the 
Man Alone, leaping to the ground, 
grasping the child from her arms, and 
starting after the disappearing cars. 
But the young woman stopped him. 
“Don’t waste the effort,” she said. 
“The train is an hour behind time now. 
and wouldn’t return for the president of 
the road. Some one in the car told me 
that we would be delayed here at least 
10 minutes more, and I was willing to 
risk being left behind if I could get 
something for the poor baby. It’s a 
crime for mothers to travel alone with 
when I came here, or I’d been gone long 
ago. I ain’t able to think back very far. 
Them sheep won’t let me. When I git 
back’s far’s a year ago I kind o’ switch 
off an’ can’t see anything but th’ backs 
o’ thousands o’ sheep. Fust thing I 
know, I’m tryin’ to count ’em. I count 
an’ drive—drive quick or them sheep’ll 
be coming back into my head before I 
see my—my wife. Larrup that horse 
good! I want to git to the station 
wuss’n you do.”—Arthur Chapman, in 
Portland Oregonian. 
children, isn’t it?” 
“Sure!” said the Man Alone, heartily, 
and then he endeavored to make amends. 
“Perhaps yer husband couldn’t-” 
The owner of the brown eyes laughed 
merrily. 
“Oh, John Henry isn’t my baby,” said 
she. “His mother is a little slip of a 
woman who looked so forlorn that I 
have been sitting with her ever since we 
left Portland. My father is in the 
smoker, my traveling bag is in the 
sleeper, and here I am in the desert 
with a strange baby on my hands. Oh! 
this is a trifle more unconventional than 
usual, even for a Chicago girl.” 
“But Miss—Miss-” 
“Miss Meredith. Father has been at¬ 
tending a Masonic convention at Seattle, 
and took me with him. He will doubt¬ 
less get off at the next stopping place 
when he misses me, and so will John 
Henry’s mother, if she can be kept from 
jumping from the moving train. How 
far is it to the next station?” 
“Twelve mile,” said the Man Alone, 
laconically. He could not remember 
many things as pleasant as that voice, 
and he dimly wished that it could keep 
right on going forever. 
“Well, I want you to take me there,” 
said the girl, consulting a pretty watch. 
“It’s 12 now, and we ought to make it 
before dark.” 
The Man Alone took off his broad, 
leather-banded hat, and slowly scratch¬ 
ed his head. He was not bad looking, in 
spite of a great scar which lost itself in 
his iron gray hair. Then he took a hal¬ 
ter from the side wall of the wagon and 
scooped a hatful of oats from a box un- 
so many, an’ then they all shuffle up an’ 
begin all over. Then I feel like I got to 
take that gun an’ go out an’ shoot sheep 
right ’n left. I seen th’ cowboys do that 
when my pardner drove a flock over the 
dead line on to cattle land. It’d been 
better if they’d shot him, too, for he 
got sheep backs in his head, an’ went 
locoed. He killed his dogs an’ all th’ 
sheep he had cartridges fer,. an’ then he 
went up in th’ hills an’ froze.” 
“But don’t you have any amusement?” 
“Yes—I been seein’ th’ trains every 
day fer a month, but now I got t’ move 
on th’ range. I don’t care much, for 
there ain’t no real fun since they plug¬ 
ged up that water tank. I uster amuse 
myself by shooting holes through that. 
First I couldn’t hit it every time, but 
purty soon I got it down, and could put 
a hole in it every lick. One day I 
pumped a hull chamber o’ cartridges in¬ 
to it, an’ there wasn’t water enough 
left in it fer th’ overland. I guess I had 
all th’ big bugs o’ th’ road tellin me 
what’d be done t’ me if I didn’t git a 
new target. These railroads don’t keer 
anything fer a sheep man’s fun.” 
As he spoke he was deftly harnessing 
the horse, and then he lighted a red lan¬ 
tern and set it on the ground near the 
wagon, after which he called an intelli¬ 
gent-looking shepherd dog and spoke a 
few kindly words of caution. 
“The lantern an’ th’ dog’ll hold ’em 
all right,” he said, as he assisted Miss 
Meredith to the wide seat under the 
overhanging top of the wagon and tossed 
John Henry into her lap. 
When the wagon began to dip and 
plunge and curtsy over the rough trail, 
How does one acquire patience, seren¬ 
ity, generosity, save through their ex¬ 
ercise in meeting trials and sorrow? 
These obstacles are as essential to spir¬ 
itual development as the practice of the 
scales to the development of the skill of 
the artist. There are three mental states 
that can overcome ill fortune: these are 
concentration, meditation and equanim¬ 
ity. If trials come, lift up the heart to 
God and pray to learn the lesson that 
He sends it to teach.—Lilian Whiting. 
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Lithographed Carpet, Rug and 
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derneatb. 
“The ol’ farm way’s better’en ropin’,” 
he explained. “Th’ grass ain’t up to 
standard this year, an’ the smell o’ oats 
’ll almost bring th’ wild horses down f’m 
John Henry was delighted. His infant 
dreams had never pictured such splen¬ 
did jolting, and the whimper which had 
begun to materialize, owing to the long- 
delayed dinner, now changed to the 
B. & B. 
new broadcloths 
the hills.” 
When he had gone Miss Meredith set 
John Henry in the shade of the wagon 
and then peeped in at the open door. 
“I’ve always been dying to find out how 
these western shepherds live,” she said. 
“I wonder if he has a crook and an 
crow of gladness. 
“Mighty good little chap, ain’t he?” 
ventured the Man Alone, between clouds 
of alkali dust. 
“He hasn’t cried once during all that 
terrible railroad trip. Poor little father¬ 
less fellow! His mother isn’t as old as 
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Alpine horn!” 
She ran lightly up the steps and 
looked about the dark interior. A bunk, 
swung from the side wall by iron braces, 
evidently served the double purpose of 
bed and table, as blankets were heaped 
at one end and several dishes were care¬ 
fully piled at the other. Miss Meredith 
shuddered at the sight of a repeating 
rifle, leaning in one corner, and then a 
slight noise at the door made her turn. 
The Man Alone was at the foot of the 
steps, with a raw-boned horse rubbing 
its nose lovingly against its shoulder. 
“The nag was nearer’n I thought,” he 
said, with a mere trace of irritation in 
his voice. 
“I beg your pardon for being so curi¬ 
ous,” said Miss Meredith, as she de¬ 
scended and caught up John Henry, “but 
I’ve always wanted to know how you 
sheepherders stand the hot Summers and 
the cold Winters. Isn’t your life lone¬ 
ly?” 
“Lonely!” exclaimed the Man as he 
backed the horse into the wagon shaft. 
“Why, yours is the first voice I’ve heard 
since—since—oh! I can’t remember very 
far back.” 
“But you have dogs, and then the 
sheep are such dear things. They must 
be company.” 
“The dogs are all right, but they can’t 
talk, an’ th’ sheep—why, lady, them 
sheep ’ll drive a well man crazy in a 
year. I wasn’t quite right in my head 
MOTHERS.—Be sure to use“Mrs.Wins- 
low’s Soothing Syrup” for your children 
while Teething. It is the Best— Adv. 
I am, but she has a gray streak in her 
hair. Her husband was a railroad man, 
and he disappeared just after John Hen¬ 
ry was born. She’s going to her folks in 
Trinidad, but it will break her heart to 
live there, as they believe her husband 
ran away, and she doesn’t. Her name is 
Clark, and-” 
Here Miss Meredith clutched the seat 
in terror, as the Man Alone had dropped 
the reins and sent his hat sailing into 
the sagebrush and cactus, while the 
horse threatened to ditch the wagon at 
the trail side. 
“Clark! Clark!” exclaimed the Man 
Alone, in a thick voice. “That’s the 
name, by Glory! I kin think back now 
without them sheep interferin'. He was 
a railroad man, and he run out o’ Salt 
Lake west. It’s all plain to me now, an’ 
I kin remember failin’ off them cars an’ 
gittin’ an awful crack on the head. 
Here, don’t you hold that baby any 
more. He’s mine. You give him to me 
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BOGGS & BUHL, 
Department C, 
ALLEGHENY, PA. 
Dietz “BUZZARD” LANTERN Gold Blast 
T HIS LANTERN is the culmination of a vast deal of experiment, 
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