Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1909-01-26
CHAPTER IT.

BEFORE setting IOrIn on TINS mem0ra-
BILE pilgrimage to nowhere, | promised
certain friend of mine, in literary Bohe-
mia. to keep notes of my adventures, with
a view of future publication, illustrated
by my own brilliant sketches. | fear. the
promise was a rash one--firstly because
am constitutionally lazy and adverse to
literary exertion, and, secondly, because
| have, as yet, met with no adventures
worth writing about. Not that | have al
together lost my first enthusiasm for the
idea. There would be novelty in the
title, at any rate, Cruises in a Caravan,
by Charles Brinkley. with illustrations by
the author; Photographic frontispiece, the
Caravan, with Tim as large as life, smirk-
ing self-eonsciously in delight at having
his pictur' taken. A friend has promised
to find me publisher, if will only per-
severe. Well, we shall see. If the book
does not progress. il will be entirely my
own fault for have any amount OK line
on my hands. Paint as hard as | may
all day. / have always the long evenings.
when | must either write, read or do
nothing.
so | am beginning this evening, exact
ly a fortnight after my first start from
Chester. | purchased the Caravan there
from a morose individual. with one eye,
who had it built with view to the ex-
hibition of Wild Man of Patagonia but
said Wild Man having taken it into his
head &c return to County Cork where he
was born. and the morose individual hav-
ing no definite idea of a novelty TO take
his place. the Caravan came into the mar
ket. Having secured this travelling palace.
duly furnished with window blinds, a
piece of carpet, chair-bedstead, table,
stove, cooking utensils. not to speak of
my own artistic paraphernalia, | sent
over TO Mulrany. County Mayo, for my
old servant. Tim-na-Chalnig. or Tim o
the Ferry-otherwise Tim Linney; and
with his assistance, when he arrived,
purchased a strong mare at Chester Fair.
All these preliminaries being settled. we
started one fine morning soon after day
break. duly bound for explorations along
macadamized highways and byways-
Il am pleased to say that Tim, after
he had recovered the first shock of seeing
a peripatetic dwelling house. took TO the
idea wonderfully. Sure it's just ike
the old cabin at home he averred, bar
rim the wheels, and the windies, and the
chimley. and the haste to pull ii along :
and l think rhe resemblance would have
been complete in his eyes, if there had
only been two or three pigs to trot mer-
| rilysb behind t.s back door. As for myself,
| took to the nomad life as naturally as
| If had never in my life been in a civil
| ixed hahitation. To be able to so where
| ore pIeases, 10 dawdle as one pleases. 70
stop and sleep where one pleases. was GER
| tainly new sensation. My friends, OBJ
| serving my sluggish ways, had often com
pared me to that interesting creature, tbs
snail: now the resemblance was complete,
for was snail, indeed, with my house
| comfortably fixed upon my shoulders
crawling TRANQUILITY along.
| LOT course. the Caravan has its incon-
yeniences Inside. to quote the elegant
smile Of our progeniTors, there is scarcely
room enough TO swing cat in. and wher
my bed is made. and Tins hammock j
swung lust inside the door, the placs
forms the tiniest of sleeping chambers
Than cur ccsSing arrangements are prin