shoes. The traveling man, if he succeeds, soon becomes a member of the
Great Fraternity--the Brotherhood of Man. The ensign of this order is
the Helping Hand.

I once overheard one of the boys tell how he had helped an old
Frenchman.

"I was down in Southern Idaho last trip," said he. "While waiting at
the station for a train to go up to Hailey, an old man came to the
ticket window and asked how much the fare was to Butte. The agent told
him the amount--considerably more than ten dollars.

"'_Mon Dieu!_ Is it so far as that?' said the old man. '_Eh bien!_
(very well) I must find some work.'

"But he was a chipper old fellow. I had noticed him that morning
offering to run a foot race with the boys. He wasn't worried a bit
when the agent told him how much the fare to Butte was. He was really
comical, merely shrugging his shoulders and smiling when he said:
'Very well, I must find some work.' Cares lighten care.

"The old man, leaving the ticket window, sat down on a bench, made the
sign of a cross and took out a prayer book. When he had finished
reading I went over and sat beside him. I talked with him. He was one
of Nature's noblemen without a title. He was a French Canadian. He
came to Montana early in the sixties and worked in the mines. Wages
were high, but he married and his wife became an invalid; doctors and
medicines took nearly all of his money. He struggled on for over
thirty years, taking money out of the ground and putting it into pill
boxes. Finally he was advised to take his wife to a lower altitude. He