Sunday being wash day for the jerries, it was quiet that morning around the train. Nearly all the men were scattered along the river, washing out their extra shirts and overalls, modestly screened from the eyes of Mrs. Charles and her daughters by the willows, only their voices discovering their presence as they carried on jests and conversations in loud voice from point to point.
The regulation shirt for the jerry of those days was heavy wool cloth, generally navy-blue, a double-breasted garment with two rows of shell buttons, which a modern wringer would have made woeful damage among. There was an arrangement for throwing back the bosom flap to admit the breeze to a jerry's throat and chest. It was a very happy arrangement, a most satisfactory garment.
Two shirts of that sort would wear a jerry half a year, the only drawback about them being the length of time required to dry them, spread out on a bush or hooked along the wire of the railroad fence. This made winter washing entirely out of the question, a hardship that bore lightly on most of the jerries, indeed.
Many of these garments were variously and gayly patched as they blew in the sun that Sunday morning, for each jerry was his own tailor. He cut up old overalls and the arms of old shirts to repair the damage of time and mischance. There were always two parts of
