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WILLIAM AND ROBERT WEST At public functions, such as parades, carnivals, and Saturday-night skating, he entertained free of charge. Attired in weird costumes and usually carrying a parasol, he accompanied the band (of which he was a non-playing member) and performed whimsical capers to waltzes and marches. In 1904, Fireman Bert Hatch was killed while helping to fight a blaze at the Alabastine Mill. A tall chimney toppled over and crushed him. He was given a public funeral. As the cortege pro- ceeded along Grand River Street, the solemn stillness broken only by the beat of iron-shod hoofs and the rattle of steel tires, a piebald figure in carnival clothes skipped out before the black hearse and plumed horses and began a strangely rhythmic dance. It was Bobby, expressing his sorrow. The mourners saw nothing unseemly in his conduct; they knew what lay in his heart. One of Bobby's last public appearances was in 1932, when the Earl of Bessborough officially visited our town. As the car bear- ing the vice-regal couple turned from Grand River Street onto William Street and headed for the bridge, again a strange figure suddenly broke from the crowd and skipped and pranced in front of the procession. It was Bobby, wearing black rubber-rimmed goggles and a Chinese costume, and jigging a Japanese parasol over his shabby bowler-hat. He was hurriedly removed, while my lord and lady stared. These public appearances endeared Bobby to the people of Paris. To the children he was a quaint and colorful figure from the world of fairy-tales. To the adults, a strange gnome that made them pon- der the signifigance of their lives. Marcus Adeney, who as a boy knew Bobby well, writes: As I remember the Paris of my childhood and adolescence "Bobby" West was always there, in the background of our lives and our town - an incorrigible, often embarrassing child that never grew up, an elfin creature who was smarter than he pretended to be, a kind of mirror with the power of uncanny distortion wherein we could discover our own foibles. Yes, that was the unkempt genius of the man: he went about his own amazing business, always in motion, always conversational, always on the verge of achieving great things, without disturbing the pattern of our lives. You might have called him a damn nuisance with his Ancient, Mariner tactics, but when he was gone you didn't laugh; for, like the famous Wedding Guest, whoever he addressed was forced after- wards to reflect, if not to become "a sadder and a wiser man." Wherein lay the strength, the unassailable dignity with which this eccentric unemployable confronted poverty and loneliness? I think it was a passionate loyalty to the memory of his mother l and the true hermit's unconquerable spirit of independence. He was at once self contained and completely social; so that his words conformed to the huckster's life most of us are compelled to lead, while his person remained a part of nature, withdrawn. If he spoke with exaggerated politeness (we boys were always addressed as Master this or that), or if he told of the great party of Ladies and Gentlemen who had toured the Nith river on his bicycle boat last Saturday, he was only showing respect for our way of life. 251i