The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1898-10-18
WHALEN'S LUCK.

w HALEN > 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 a mortgaged right of way
through the sagebrush and several COM
pleted but detached sections of a big
ditch.
Mr.. Brick Whalen, the contractor on
section 8, had finished the heavy work
there and was preparing to move camp to
section 6 when the company went
broke. 1t was, in fact, upon the very
day the suspension was posted that
Whalen, having had his contract work
inspected, took the engineers certificate
up to headquarters to get his check. He
received instead a statement that the
company was in temporary difficulties
and an assurance that it would soon re-
sumo
Whalen had before this worked for
shaky corporations. He knew better and
lost no time in acting on his knowledge.
mo good howlin over broken pipe
Or tryin to save the pieces" he told
himself. To his gang of 90 men he
said: "B'ys, the company's broke and
SO am /. 1 can't pay ye and Ican't feed
We. You got to rustic. 3"
whats the matter with us taking
the mules?'' said one.
'Them mules and sorapers don't be-
long to me, as I've often told ye,' said
| Whalen, whose custom it was to refer
to legendary hacker "This ditching
outfit is the property of Martin of San
Francisco, and any man that NEEDLES
with it will get the sheriff after him. J"
"I'll take 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
duced 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
mules. "Forty one head. That was a
pretty close call, +" said he.
1t was late in the season to find an
| n+har 5nh ~ hv7% %bo 90
could not live ON sagebrush and were
at once started for the railroad On a
small stream where camp was made
one night band of trail sheep was
also camped. Whalen eyed them dis
painfully.
81 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 81 never was so near a
sheep in my life, - he continued. "The
smell of EN- mile away is enough for
me- Funny little fellows, and they look
some like mules with ears and tails cut
off. What do you do with them?"
Double our money ON them every 10
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 ia
miliar phrase for describing any hope
| full venture, and on that evening he
smoked many pipes of black plug over
| -,
diet and double your money every year
is an interesting creature
At day break Whalen was in the sheep
camp negotiating a trade of sheep for
mules on basis of 90 to / 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 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, land I'll bet I'm the only
Irishman in America ever owned a
herd of sheep"
Winter came and passed, and the only
Irishman prospered. By roofing in cut
with brush he had commodious sheds,
and cross sections of poles divided the
broad ditch into as many corrals as
chose. The sheep were fat and carrie
heavy f1eeces.
Whalen had for help two boys who
Aad 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
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
occasional trips to the railroad anG
once to San Francisco.
''I'm going to see my friend Mar
tin" he told the boys. Now, tend tt
business and don t let any get away. ,
And the boys gave their word that no
one should escape.
During Whalen's absence in the city
he went out of the sheep business ever
more abruptly than he went into it thu
previous autumn The instruction to thu
boys was fulfilled to the letter. Not an,
got away.
1t happened on hot day in Jun'
when, contrary to the usual custom, thu
boys brought the flock to camp and thu
shade of sheds at noontime. 1t neve
rains in that arid region, but sometime
pours. This was one of those times
Charged with ice and water, grea
black cloud came drifting down TIN
wind and emptied out its load upon tn
camp and the hillside above it. Tn
canal, curving around its base, formed
an cave trough for the whole mountain
and poured several thousand inches o
water into Whalen's improvised sheel
sheds. The flood very soon subsidized
but when the cloud had passed and tn
sun again shone forth there were NJ
living sheep. Not many minutes ar