Connecticut western news., 1897-10-07
WHALEN'S LUCK.

w HALEN 5 LUCk.
 Whalen's luck was copious, and it became proverbial. The facts here re- corded are but specimen pages from the book of his experience.
 When the Consolidated Canal com pany went into insolvency, its assets consisted of mortgaged right of way through the sagebrush and several com pleted but detached sections of big ditch.
 MT Brick Whalen, the contractor on section 3. had finished the heavy work there and was preparing to move camp to section when the company went broke. It was. in fact upon the very day the suspension was posted that Whalen, having had his contract work inspected, took the engineer s certificate up to headquarters to get his check He received instead statement that the company was in temporary difficulties and an assurance that it would soon re- sume.
 Whalen had before this worked for shaky corporations He knew better and lost no time in acting on his knowledge
 No good howlin over broken pipe or tryin to save the pieces,' he told himself. To his gang of 20 men he sad: "B'ys. the company's broke and 80 am l. can't pay ye and Ican't feed ye. You got to rustic. ''
 Whats the matter with us taking the mules?" said one.
 'Them mules and scrapers don't be- long to me, as I've often told ye," said Whalen, whose custom it was to refer to legendary packer. rThis ditching outfit is the property of Martin of San Francisco, and any man that meddles with it will get the sheriff after him.. "
 I'll tako one, just the same" said Shorty. and tell Martin he can have him again when my wages is paid That's about fair. {"
 A few others took the same view of the equities involved and took mules, to which Whalen made only wordy resistance. Most of the men were in- duoed to accept orders on the defunct company for the amount due them, payable with large interest. And if you don't get it very soon the interest will double your money. said Whalen.
 When the last man had gone, Whalen went out to the corral and counted the mulea Forty one head. That was a pretty close call" said he,
 It was late in the season to find an- other job of scraping, but the mules could not live on sagebrush and were at once started for the railroad. On small stream where camp was made one night a band of trail sheep was also camped. Whalen eyed them dis dainfully
 Il see the beggars eat sage. said he.
 Why, certainly" replied the sheep man. That's the finest kind of feed for sheep.
 Il wish work mules would do that, said Brick II never was so near a sheep in my life, he continued. Tho smell of em mile away is enough for me Funny little fellows, and they look some like mules with ears and tails cut of. What do you do with them?'' Double our money on them every 12 months. was the reply
 No extended description of sheep farming would have impressed the fancy of the veteran mule skinner, but
 double your money" was his own fa- miliar phrase for describing any hope ful venture, and on that evening he smoked many pipes of black plug over it. A brute that can thrive on a brush diet and double your money every year | is an interesting creature. At day break Whalen was in the sheep | camp negotiating trade of sheep for | mules on basis of 50 to l and pre- pared to accept much less. Three days later he sat in the door of the shack which had long done duty as mess house on section of the canal, as many an evening before he had sat watching the mules come in from | water Tonight there was never a mule in sight Down the breeze came a | pungent odor and tinkling of little bells. Over the crest of an adjacent hill appeared the flock, browsing on the rank sage.
 'They do look some like mules, he soliloquized, and I'll bet I'm the only lrishman in America ever owned @ herd of sheep"
 | Winter came and passed, and the only Irishman prosperea. By roofing in cut with brush he had commodious sheds, and cross sections of poles divided the broad ditch into as many corrals as he chose. The sheep were fat and carried heavy f1eeces
 Whalen had for help two boys who had wandered there and asked for work He had proposed to hire one of them, but the boys protested that they had never been separated, and that if they 1 got jobs,at different ranches ''the other one wouldn't know where the other one was" contingency which they could not abide. So Whalen offered to take the two at the price of one, and on that basis they shared with him the shack, herded the flock and cooked the grub. They soon knew as much or as little about sheep as Brick himself, and the proprietor found opportunity to break the monotony of camp life by