Volume 2 - ElectricCanadian.com

THE ROMANCE OF BANKING 271At Langham the staff lived in a shack, forOffice accommodation under these conditions was necessarilyprimitive.when the safe was installed in the temporary office, ten bytwelve feet in area, there was little room for anybody. Thewalls were only of wood, an inch thick, and the office was heatedby a second-hand cook-stove. The resourceful pioneers keptthe ink in the oven, but even there it sometimes froze at nightwhen the fire burned low.Among the early customers of the bank in this partof theWest were Doukhobors; but the officers of the bank soon foundout that though primitive in some things these Russian Quakershad the instinct of business fully developed. The first advancemade at the Langham branch was one to the head-men ofthirteen Doukhobor villages. After sun-down, the eveningbefore the note was due, they came to pay it off, and didnot fail to ask for a rebate of interest because of paymentahead of time.The opening of the branch at Innisfail (Alberta) wasan instance of forestalling a rival. The officer of The CanadianBank of Commerce detailed for the purpose got into conversationwith another traveller on the train, and learnedthat the latter's mission was that of opening at Innisfail abranch for another bank. The Commerce officer preservedsilence as to his own mission, taking comfort from the factthat arrangements had previously been made to occupy theoffice of an Innisfail solicitor. To tell the rest of the storyin his own words: "Although there was a blizzard ragingat the time, I was able to have a sign erected across the building,but found that the solicitor had made no effort whatever tomove out of the premises, although he had received amplenotice. He was in the country at the time and the owners ofthe building did not know when he would return. With theofficer who accompanied me, I decided we would clean up thebuilding ourselves, although it was in a rather disorderlycondition. As the lawyer's papers were scattered all over thefloor, we naturally concluded they were not of much value.