discover its lurking-place and relieve him of the burden of
responsibility. This was the only skeleton which lurked in the man's
closet. It was the only cloud in his sky; the rest of the zenith was
sunshine and gladness. To the neighbors and itineraries he had been
preaching hard times for twenty years, although the whole earth
suspected the contrary. He became known throughout the width and breadth
of Yale, Lillooet and Cariboo as "Hard Times Hance." Although
diplomatically reserved and unsociable, he was more popular and famed
than he suspected. Peculiarity is a valuable advertisement.

His outward appearance and mode of life certainly justified the above
appendix to his personality, and it was so blazoned that it could be
seen and heard all over British Columbia. He had but one competitor, and
that was "Dirty Harry," who at one time frequented the streets of
Ashcroft. No other name could have distinguished him so completely from
the other members of the human family.

His overalls, which were once blue, had become pale with age, and had
adopted a dishrag-white color; and one of the original legs had been
patched out of existence. His Stetson hat, which had left the factory a
deep brown, now approached the color of his terrestrial real estate. His
"jumper" had lost its blue and white "jail bird" stripe effect, and was
now a cross between a faded Brussels carpet and a grain sack. To save
buying boots he wore his last winter's overshoes away into the summer,
while his feet would blister in discomfort. Braces were a luxury which
he could not endure, so he supported his superfluously laundried
overalls with a strand of baling-rope which had already served its time
as a halter guy. His feet had never known the luxury of a factory or
home-knitted stocking since he had graduated from the home crib, but
were put off with gunny sacking which had already seen active service as