The Madison daily leader. [volume] (Madison, S.D.) 1890-current, 1894-11-07
MR.. WILSON.

down to q recumbent position on tnS
hot, tarry boards.
"A chilly town. That's what Even
in the summer time, said II. Pember-
ton Wilson Us he threw a stray nail
into the muddy slip and lazily watched
the rings enlarge and lose themselves
in faintest ripples. You take any train,
and it lands You here, and the oliy
comfort Of being here is that there's so
many trains out. Is'pose my stomach
thinks I'm tryin to 60 without any
thing for a week just ON a bet. The
country lanes must be sighin for me.
I wonder If turnips are getting large
enough?"
To designate Fl. Pemberton Wilson
as a hobo would simply cO~rroborate his
opinion of himself.
He has carved Hobo Wilson" on
many a section shanty and milepost
between Scranton, Pa, and Council
Bluffs, Ia, and there were friends who
knew him as Rooster.
On one Indiana trip he had earned
the title of Come Again Wilson because
he had a persistent way of getting on a
IIAI1 AlttI OilCt DCllS P0b OAs
Like many another of his class, he
was not devoid of sentiment or philoso-
phv. He carried in his breast pocket q
speckled volume of Burns poems. He
had forgotten to return it to a public
library in southern Illinois. The book
opened of itself at the lines, "A mans
a man for a that" Hobo Wilson read
the poem as he lay with his back against
the warm boards of warehouse F, and
then he put the book back into the pock-
ct of his coat, which he had thrown
down beside him.
At the bend in the river a coal vessel
was being unloaded. The click of the
machinery and the noisy dumping Of
the big buckets at the regular intervals
became rather soothing when the rhythm
was understood. Hobo Wilson tapped
with his thumb, keeping time, and lock-
ed through the rigging of a lumber
schooner in the second slip beyond at
the coughing smokestack which reached
up from o small planning mill. The mill
was buzzing in changeable tones, like a
nest of discordant bumblebees.
The smoke rolling from the stack
drifted through the rigging, where the
yards and Melted lines seemed to cut
into irregular shapes. Hobo Wilson
watched drowsily until to his blurred
vision there were many fantastic forms
floating in the foggy maze. And he was
not greatly surprised when n of these
forms took on the outline of a dwarfish
human being and fioated slowly toward
him. 1t poised for a moment above a
hawser timber and shook itself, q shower
of SCOT falling from it. Then it settled
into a comfortable sitting attitude and
looked at him.
"WelI, Rooster, how's everything?''
The voice was rather small and shrill.
Hobo Wilson could not answer at once.
He was marveling at the appearance OF
his strange visitor. The little man was
hardly three feet high. Under the
SLOUGH hat was a good natured and
wrinkled face, decorated ON the chin
with q tuft of beard, which might have
been gray at one time. but which was
now blackened and dusty, the same as
his face and clothes. The latter were OF
rough quality hickory shirt, a shod'
dy pair of trousers fringed at the bot
toms and held up by one s~uspender, and
q pair of worn shoes much too large and
laced with hemp twine.. $685.
"Are you down on your luck, Roost.
er?'' asked the little man.
I'm Twin ON the air." said Hobo,
"but where did you come from?'
81 just dropped in with the smoke
Don't know me, eh?'
That's what; / don't"
Listen, Hobo Wilson. Do you re
member last Saturday morning whel
you were at Hammond and divided
your handout with a brother who alight
ed from a box car a day ont from Louis
vile and very hungry"
II do "A mans a man for a that:
True enough, Rooster. That was 1
good deed. More than once I've seel
you give a comrade a good place ON TIN
truck"
Where was you?
II dare say you didn't look up int,
the rolling cloud of smoke to see til
good fairy of the hoboes."
Fairy"
''Cert. You didn't expect the guard
ian fairy of the hoboes to tear aroun,
the country in all kinds of weather wit
a little white robe and some ostricl
feather wings?"
II s'pose not"
Hobo Wilson, I've watched you.
never saw you do a pard any dirt. TIL
good things of this world must not al
be given to brakemen and farmers an
people who work. Are you hungry"
"Surei"
''Then feel in the pockets Of that COZ
beside You and believe me when / te
you that every man must live before b
dies"
"Sufferin brake beamsp' gaspe
Rooster as he drew from one peck
after another crumpled rolls of bar
bills. He heaped them up on the fade
check cloth, and his tears fell ON ther
mo more drillin in the snow; /,
souphouses; again in o buckle
Pard, you've done
But when he looked up again the o
Oallusad fairy had disapneared and q