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“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 moved to the coast and settled in the Willamette Valley, in Oregon. His wife became better at first; then she grew sick again. More medicine!

“Well, sir, do you know that old man–over seventy years of age–was working his way back to Butte to hunt work in the mines again. I spoke French to him and asked him how much money he had. ‘Not much,’ said he–and he took out his purse. How much do you suppose the old man had in it? Just thirty-five cents! I had just spent half a dollar for cigars and tossed them around. To see that old man, separated from his wife, having to hunt for work to get money so he could go where he could hunt more work that he might only buy medicine for a sick old woman and with just three dimes and a nickel in his purse–was too much for me! I said to myself: ‘I’ll cut out smoking for two days and give what I would spend to the old man.’

“I put a pair of silver dollars into the old man’s purse to keep company with his three dimes and one nickel. It made them look like orphans that had found a home. ‘ Mon Dieu! Monsieur, vous etes un ange du ciel. Merci. Merci.‘ (My God, sir, you are an angel from Heaven. Thank you. Thank you.) said the old man. ‘But you must give me your address and let me send back the money!’

“I asked my old friend to give me his name and told him that I would send him my address to Butte so he would be sure to get it; that he might lose it if he put it in his pocket.

“He told me his name. I gave him a note to the superintendent at Pocatello, asking him to pass the old Frenchman to Butte. We talked until my train started. Every few sentences, the old man would say: ‘ Que Dieu vous benisse, mon enfant!‘ (May God bless you, my boy!)

“As I stood on the back end of my train, pulling away from the station, the old man looked at me saying:

“‘Adieu! Adieu!’ Then, looking up into the sky, he made a sign of the cross and said: ‘ Que Dieu vous protege, mon enfant!‘ (May God protect you, my boy!)

“That blessing was worth a copper mine.”