The Caledonian-record. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1920-current, 1922-12-11
W. W. Husband Reporter
On CaledOnian
Continued from Page One

Continued from Page One
if so, why. He has sojouIned
among the natives of Trancau-
casia, and he doesn't need to theo-
rize about them. He knows. He
knows exactly what they would do
if they had two hundred dollars
apiece. He knows because they
have told him, and also because he
has watched them do it. He has
never waded through ninety-eight
pounds of assorted books to find
out the conditions among the
White Russians which relate to
emigration, and then evolved
large number of plausible theories
dealing with the why's and the
wherefores of their whichness:
but he has waded through a good
deal of White Russian mud and
slept on top of a great many
White Russian stoves and scratch
ed himself amiably in the pres
ence of large numbers of more or
less White Russian peasants. He
has picked up their ideas as we'll
as their fieaS, and has no need of
theories where they are concerned.
Similarly, it would be fruitless for
theoist to come TO him with any
groundless or half-baked theories
concerning the Poles, the Let's,
the Germans, the Vlachs, the
Czechs, the Croats, the Slovaks,
the Magyars, the Syrians, the As
syrians, the Greeks, the Arme-
mains, the Turks OF any of the
other involved and battling peo-
pies of Europe He knows about
these people from experience, He
has seen them, and he comes from
East Highgate, Vermont; and
theorist must be able to function
with the maximum of speed and
the minimum of friction in order
to make any appreciate dent on
person who, in addition to hay
ing been reared among the rock
ribbed hills of New England, has
had experience in the matter on
which the theoriSt lis theorizing.
The Commissioner General of
immigration makes, as the saving
goes, particularly poor picking for
theorists because he has one of
those New England upbringings
that seem to coat the possessor
with a sort of adamantine varnish
that offers no point of entry or exit
for free verse, garIulousness, I'M
wise money spending, loose think
ing or kindred barbed rritants.
He was born out among the Yer
mont hills in a section where the
hills are so plentiful that each
house has a hill of its own behind
which to hide. When he was -
years old his mother died, and he
migrated to the flourishing metro
polls of Sheldon, Vermont, where
there were all of seventy-hve hous-
es and three churches. There were
also two glittering emporiums or
general stores which struck the
fifteen-year-old William Walter
Husband as being the last cry in
metropolitan magnifeence. Each
day he fingered in the neighbor-
hood of these marts, feasting his
eyes upon their opulence, and long
ing for an excuse to remain per-
manently among their splendors.
He was diiiident youth, however,
reluctant to ask boldly for a Job
in either store lest he should seem
to presumptuous. But one after
noon, as he tarried before the fas-
cinations of Durkee's General store
he was observed by the Jove of
this Olympus in the person of Dur
kee himself
Unbending, as Joves have been
known to do, Durkee looked nj him
meditativcly and inquired, How'd
you Ike to work in here, SOM"
He was too overcome with Joy
to speak, but he was able to indi-
cate his willingness in the custo-
mary conservative Vermont man
ner, which consists of nodding the
head once The generally accepted
cmolument for labors such as he
performed, which consisted of lis-
ing at five in the morning and
busying himself with the manifold
duties of the store until the last
villager had reluctantly torn him
self from the cracker barrel at nine
o'clock at night, was fifty dollars \
year. The day book of Durkee's
General Store for 1883 shows chat
at the end Of his first year he was
rewarded with scventy-fve dollars
instead of with the agreed fifty
dollars.
After two years Of labor he de-
cidcd that hi, education bad been
neglected, so he went e to- St
Johnsbury Vermont, "a entered
St. Johnsbury Academy. He
worked nights and morning in the
academy boarding house, getting
up at five o'clock to build the fires;
and he also worked all day Satur-
day. This gave him his lodgings,
but he had to pay two dollars a
week for his board, which was
something of an imposition He put
up with it in silence, just as he
puts up today with bad features
o. the immigration law; bat he
knows what he wants and he's 4
good md a patient waiter.
A St. jobs Jury shoe store