C Ihe Ladies c cu. V'VVAN - History and Classics, Department of

D.rysAshore 31Long after midnight we staggered out into the cool daylight world and back tobed.Unless we arrived in the dining-saloon at 8 we got no breakfast. To gain a fewminutes more in bed I would throw on a hat, coat and skirt, arriving at breakfastunwashed but, apparently, fully dressed. Gwen was indignant at such slovenlyways. "I was not brought up like that," she said. Next morning, however, as wetottered in to breakfast half sleep-bound, we noticed the frogs of the Judge'spyjamas below his half-buttoned coat. Thereafter Gwen also changed her habitsand dressed in two stages, the first for show, the second for cleanliness and security.Fort Fitzgerald was a gloomy place standing on slippery clay. We had to leavethe Athabasca that day and hang about in a warehouse full of freight boxes andbuffalo skins until we got a little roadster car to take us to Fort Smith. Away wewent, bumping over black soil like a ploughed field. Our driver, half-Swedehalf-Eskimo, had driven buffalo teams over this portage as lately as 19II. Inearlier days it took four days to drive the 16 miles through unfeUed saplings. Theroad ended at Fort Smith in pure sand. The SS Distributor was still downriver inher winter quarters so we had supper at the hotel in a somewhat rough assemblyof old-timers.After supper we paid another social call with the judge and Mr Brabant.In conversation the men of the North average one remark to five puffs at theirpipe, expanding every anecdote into a full-length story, but their anecdotes areracy enough to stand the test of this dilution, their talk being rich, concentratedand highly flavoured.The party were soon swapping yarns about mutual friends, the best story beingabout how old Murphy of Fort Simpson missed the priesthood, as related byhimself."We chaps went up to the seminary at Montreal and the priest he looked usover and he sez 'All right you come back on the 23rd,' so I went away and off Igoes on the toot. One day I come to meself and looks about and finds it's the27th. 'All right,' I siz to me self, "tis only four days late,' so I goes up to the seminaryand sits down for a chat with the priest. Presently he sez to me, 'Do you knowwhat day of the month it is Mr Murphy?' 'Why yes,' sez I, "tis the 27th.' 'And doyou know what month it is Mr Murphy,' sez the priest. "Tis the month of June,'sez 1. 'If my eyes serve me right Mr Murphy,' sez he, "tis the month of August on