Part 11

And it seems to be a day for big ideas. While gathering sap, I sampled some of the buckets and noticed that some trees give much sweeter sap than others. Now, why shouldn't the Department of Forestry look into the matter of maple sugar production in a scientific way? The trees that give the sweetest sap must be of a better strain than the others, and by adopting selective methods, why should it not be possible to develop sugar maples just as they are developing new brands of wheat? By taking seeds from the best trees and planting them, in about sixty years we should have another generation of trees ready to tap. We could then discover, or rather our descendants could, which of these inherited the strongest sugar-producing qualities, and seeds could be gathered from them for a new planting. By keeping up the work for a thousand years or so trees might be developed that would produce "real, old-fashioned" maple syrup direct from the spile without all this troublesome work of "boiling-in." Somehow on a day like this such an idea does not seem half so absurd as it will probably look in type. Canada is a young nation, with all the future before it. We are now laying the foundations of all the great things that are to be, so why should not something be done to develop the maple sugar industry? I wish I had thought of this sooner, so that I might have suggested it to the sugar-maker of the Donlands with a view to having the matter properly considered by Parliament. But the idea will keep. In an experiment that is to extend over a thousand years or so a year or two at the beginning will not matter much.

Does not the college song say, "The best of friends must part, must part?" After I had been chumming with my neighbour, the sun, for a few glorious hours its work carried it elsewhere and it moved westward, "trailing clouds of glory" as it moved. My helpers had long since gone to hunt for sandwiches--and had failed to return. Even the little boy whose part in sugar-making was purely decorative, making mudpies with snow frosting, had lost interest in his work and had gone home. I was left alone with the kettle and the ravenous fire under it--and with a spring appetite. About the time when the sun was touching the horizon and the frost was coming back to undo its work in puny spitefulness I went home to supper, leaving a good fire blazing and the kettle boiling. After that came a session under the stars and the full moon, and then another trip across the fields, carrying a twelve-quart pail of syrup. Tired? Well, yes, but I had an outing in that wonderful sunshine. Besides, I have a pailful of the sunshine to use with future pancakes. Sugar-making has compensations.

April 5.--Have you ever watched a small boy trying to make a broad jump? He will go back and back, so as to get a good start, and when at last he tries he has to run so far before he reaches the mark that he is out of breath and can't jump. Well, that is exactly the fix I am in this morning. There is something I want to talk about, and I want to do it without appearing to be teaching a lesson or drawing a moral or preaching a lay sermon. I have gone so far back in my attempt to get a good start that for the past half hour I have been grumbling against Shakespeare for having made the Duke say that he could find

"Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, Sermons in stones and good in everything."

If I thought there was any truth in those lines I would lock myself in the house and pull down the blinds, so that I could not see the face of nature. I can enjoy nature only when I feel that nature is enjoying herself. Of course the explanation of Shakespeare's little sermon lies in the fact that the Duke was speaking in character, and he was a stodgy, inefficient person of the kind that are all the time going around spoiling the good things of life by drawing morals from them. That same Shakespeare had a little practice that casts a great light on the workings of his mind. He usually put his wisest philosophy into the mouths of his fools and his noblest sentiments into the mouths of his worst villains. It was the murderous king in Hamlet who mouthed about the divinity that hedges the person of a King, and it was Iago who moralised about the stealing of one's purse being the stealing of trash. Because of this I don't believe that Shakespeare ever meant that "sermons-in-stones" stuff to cast a gloom over my open-air life in this glorious spring weather. It is my private opinion that he accepted life as he found it with more irresponsible joyousness than any other man that ever walked the earth, and if he let some of his characters drool improving sentiments it was because he found people doing such things, and found, moreover, that it was the people whose actions conformed to them the least whose sentiments were the most elevating.

But this is not what I intended talking about at all. However, I warned you in the opening sentences that I might not be able to make my jump after all. To do or say anything definite requires concentration, and how can a man concentrate his mind when the sun is shining and the south wind blowing and the birds singing and the children asking when we are to go fishing? Then there is the garden to be attended to and so many other things to be done that one doesn't know where to start. And all the while, as some poet has sung:

"Nature's calling from the trout-brook, Calling: 'Whish! Son, you poor, tired, lazy feller, Come and fish!'"

But I mustn't go fishing. That would be flying right in the face of public opinion. Everybody is working as everybody should be. Instead of saying, with Hamlet, "I must be idle," I must say with the prosaic people who make up this workaday world, "Get busy! Get busy!"

April 7.--The other day when we were sawing the big maple a little thing happened that put me in a hopeful frame of mind. It was found that the saw did not have enough "set," and that if the work was to be completed with reasonable ease it must be fixed. My recollections of setting saws went back about twenty-five years, when the instrument used was a huge contraption made up of screws, gauges, pincers, and such things that needed the management of an expert. It usually took a couple of hours to set the saw, and unless the thing was skilfully done it did more harm than good. But the situation had to be faced, and I went and got the most up-to-date setting tool. To my surprise it was a little punch that a man might carry in his vest pocket. I was instructed to put it on the end of a tooth and give it a smart tap with a hammer. If I did that to every tooth the saw would be set perfectly. Full of incredulity I undertook the task, and in less than five minutes had the saw in perfect trim. Every tooth had the same amount of set, and the cut we made was as smooth as if it had been planed. Evidently the perfect tool for setting a saw has been developed, and nothing could be simpler. That started me to thinking about all the implements that are in use on the farm, and how simple they are when compared with the first inventions. The first mowers were so big and complex and heavy that they foundered scores of horses every spring. A team could hardly pull them across the field, and they made a noise like a boiler factory. The modern mower is so light and simple that one horse can pull it, and it doesn't make any more noise than a sewing machine. Apparently man makes all his first inventions in the most complex way possible, and it takes him years before he can hit on the simple and obvious way of doing things. A disreputable philosopher once said, "Nothing is so hard to see as the obvious," and I guess he was right. The touch of hope, I found, lay in the fact that whatever a man sets his mind to he will finally simplify, though he may begin with a bewildering tangle. Now, about the only thing that is getting more complex every day is the art of living. When we try to improve it we add something--put in a telephone or something of the kind--and keep on adding until we make life a burden. Perhaps that is because we have not yet given life sufficient thought. When conditions become intolerable perhaps we will begin to give them thought and be able in time to simplify them as we are simplifying everything else. Perfected living may yet be found to be as far from the complex life of the present as the old cumbersome saw-setting tool was from the little punch that I used the other day. It is a cheering thought. Simplicity makes our work easier, and it may yet make our living more enjoyable. That is worth thinking about.

The number of green fields there are, as compared with those that are ruled off with brown furrows, brings up once more the question of the constant migration from the farms of Ontario. But I am coming to the conclusion that we are going about the problem of keeping the boy on the farm in the wrong way. Instead of trying to point out the advantages of farm life, we should devote some of our energy to showing the disadvantages of city life. The cities remind me of sticky fly-paper. They look so inviting from a distance, and when once you get your feet into them it is almost impossible to get out. And those who are already caught make such a great buzzing that every one within hearing thinks that the honey must be plentiful and fine. The buzzing is evidence of excitement, and the young people living the monotonous life of the country are just dying for excitement. Besides, the cities have an unfair advantage. They publish all the important newspapers, and of course a newspaper that does not constantly point with pride to the glories of its home would be lacking in public spirit. They paint everything in attractive colours, and the flies keep on flocking to the centre of attraction. I hope that some day we shall have a paper that will be edited and printed somewhere in the fields, and that will stand up for them as the city papers stand up for the streets.

April 9.--Unless something is done to relieve the scarcity of hired men we may hear of the revival of the press gang, and then the country will be no place for a man whose most strenuous work is done on a typewriter. Farmers are getting positively ravenous for help. And that reminds me that I haven't seen a tramp in two years. They used to be so plentiful along the lines of the railroads that they were a tax on charitably-disposed people, but now I doubt if a tramp could travel a mile in any direction through the country without being gobbled up. He would find every avenue barred with work, and eager employers waylaying him at every corner. A man cannot be idle in the country now unless he has a farm of his own on which to loaf, and even then he must put up "No Trespass" signs. Perhaps that accounts for the migration of the poets to the cities. It would hardly be safe for them to be going around picking flowers, listening to the birds, and rolling up their eyes when the country is full of farm work that is crying to be attended to. And that reminds me that one of them, whose name I shall not betray, has these poignant lines in one of his poems:

"I fear that work before me lies-- Indeed, I see no option, Unless perhaps I advertise: 'An orphan for adoption.'"

April 12.--It seems that the apple trees get "that tired feeling" in the spring, just like the rest of us, and need a good tonic to put them in shape. As nearly as I could learn from Mr. Clement and Mr. Buchanan, that first application of lime-sulphur wash means much the same to the trees as a dosing of sulphur and molasses does to the boys, and I can tell you right here that it is a whole lot easier to administer. The trees can't squirm and howl and wriggle out of it. They just stand and take their medicine. The lime-sulphur kills the oyster-shell scale, insect eggs, fungi, microbes, etc., and acts as a general constitutional. And it is no particular trick to apply it. As a matter of fact, it looks to me to be about the easiest spring job on the farm. I say "looks," because all I did was to smoke my pipe and look on. Perhaps the other spring jobs seemed harder because I had to put on my overalls and pitch into them myself. But to a man sitting on the fence and smoking while the work is being done spraying doesn't seem a bit hard, even though it may be scientific. And even the science of it is not so very profound. They demonstrated the whole process to me, from carrying the water in buckets to the boiler to spilling what was left over from the barrel when they were done. It was a complete and satisfying exhibition.

To begin with, they unloaded their boiler and explained how to make it and what it cost. It is made from pine boards and a sheet of zinc--the boards for the sides and ends and the zinc for the bottom. Whether it costs $2.50 or $2.80 I cannot remember, and I have lost the envelope on the back of which I made my notes. Anyway, it doesn't matter, for any one who is interested in the work can get the bulletins on "Lime-sulphur Wash" and "Apple Orcharding" from the Department of Agriculture by sending a postal card asking for them. These bulletins contain full and exact explanations of everything that an orchardist needs to know, from preparing the ground for the planting of trees to the packing and marketing of apples. If you have only one tree in the back yard it will pay to get these booklets and they will tell you much more than I intend to take the trouble to tell. But let us get back to our work. After they had set up the boiler they put in it forty gallons of water, which they heated almost to the boiling point. Then they mixed a hundred pounds of sulphur with water till it made a smooth paste and added it to the water in the boiler. After it was thoroughly mixed they began to drop in stone lime until fifty pounds had been added, and the mixture became as much a witch's broth as the one described in Macbeth. I found myself unconsciously repeating:

"Double, double toil and trouble, Boil, cauldron, boil and bubble."

It boiled and bubbled all right, but the toil and trouble were not particularly evident. All that was necessary was to keep the mess stirred up with a hoe and to keep it boiling for an hour. Even though making lime-sulphur wash comes under the head of science, I would rather undertake to cook a barrel of it than to make a pot of oatmeal porridge without getting it scorched. No one need be afraid of that part of the work.

When finished, the barrel of mixture, according to the most careful ciphering, cost just $2.80. That included charges for both labour and wood--two things no farmer would think of mentioning. As for the labour, every farmer has a lot of it in his system that is bound to go to waste unless he employs it on some job like this, and he would never think of taking it into account. It is the same with the wood. Why put in a charge for wood when all you need is the tail-board of the gravel box or an armful of bed slats or anything else that is not being used at the time? Still, they insisted on counting in the wood, though they refused to add two cents for the extra tobacco I smoked while watching them and sniffing the brew. The barrel of mixture was strong enough to make eight barrels when diluted to the strength required for the trees. This makes the cost of each barrel of home-cooked wash thirty-five cents. This is an important item, as the commercial wash comes to eighty cents a barrel. It certainly pays the man who has a large orchard to prepare his own materials.

But it was when they began to apply the wash to the trees that I really got into touch with my scientists. After they had explained to me the workings of their spraying outfit, which had cost $27.50, they filled the barrel to which the spraying pump was attached and got busy; and right there they revealed the fact that scientists are just as human as the rest of us. The spraying outfit is fitted with two lines of hose, so that two men can administer the spray at the same time, but they were able to use only one line, as they had lost one of the nozzles. My heart opened to them at once. That was just the way things would be likely to happen if I had tried to do the work myself. And I had a decided advantage of them. If I had lost a nozzle I could blame it on the boys, but all they could do was to admit that they had lost it themselves. After this incident I was no longer abashed by the fact that the work being done was of the kind that is called scientific. The bane of my existence is perfect people who never make mistakes and who always do everything right. When I found that these scientists were human like myself I filled my pipe again and began to take an interest in life. The one hose that was in working order ended in a bamboo pole with a tube inside it. This made it possible for the man doing the spraying to reach the top branches of the trees. Here again the work did not seem hard nor of a kind to need special training. Any one should be able to do it. The nozzle was spouting out a cloud of spray and all that was necessary was to direct it so that the cloud would touch every twig and branch of the tree. Of course, a man had to manage it so that he didn't get sprayed too much himself, for that lime-sulphur certainly had some "zip" to it. I got a couple of whiffs of it, and it is my private opinion that any microbe that could stand up against it without sneezing would be able to "stand unabashed amid the war of elements, the wreck of matter, and the crash of worlds."

After all, it was not the work of spraying that impressed me most about the visit of Mr. Clement, Mr. Buchanan, and Mr. Palmer. They did their work well, and no sensible man can doubt that such work is necessary and profitable. But what is coming over the world when three well-educated, cultured, ambitious young men are doing such work at all? They are of the type of clean-cut, intelligent young fellows that you would have found a few years ago preparing themselves for law or medicine or for a career in the world of business. But here they are teaching farming, talking farming, and looking forward to farming as their life-work. Ever since Cadmus invented the alphabet education has been looked upon as a door of escape from the drudgery of farm work. When I went to school no lesson impressed me more than the one about John Adams and his Latin grammar. When the boy found the grammar too hard his father gave him a job of ditching and he quickly went back to his studies and became President. Moral: Get an education and get out of doing farm work. But here are these young men with their good educations coming back to work the land. Are the farmers of the future to be men of this type? I can hardly believe it, and yet it should be true. Farming is one of the finest occupations in the world if taken in moderation. But it will take more than science and profits to keep young men of this type on the land. They will need a very fine quality of philosophy to enable them to see the true value of things. They will have to learn how to realise the possibilities of their own souls while doing the humble daily tasks. I do not know whether they have a chair of philosophy in Guelph or not, but if they have it should be occupied by some one

"High-rife with old Philosophy And mad with glimpses of futurity."

His course of lectures should be the most important in the college. His work would be to prepare us for a future in which the heavy burdens of the world will be borne by educated men who will understand their rights as well as their work. With such men behind the ploughs, the day of predatory big business will soon come to an end. The men who feed the world will no longer be the slaves of the cunning. But it is still so much easier to make a living by cleverness and cunning that it is hard to believe that the hard work of farming is to be taken over by men of education who will know their own worth and the worth of their work. It is a glorious dream, but the world will have to make more progress in philosophy than it has in science before it comes true. When my scientific friends finally completed their work and left me I felt lonesome and homesick for the outer world for the first time since coming back to the land. In spite of their enthusiasm about farming and farm work, I felt that they belonged to that world rather than to the world in which I am sojourning.

April 16.--"I've given up the danged farm," said a callow youth this morning in response to a civil question about the progress being made with the spring work. At present he is putting in his time as the village cut-up, and when it really becomes necessary for him to work he'll get a job as cook on a gravel train or as oiler in a garage. He'll live in a boiled horse boarding-house and fill himself with husks and other deleterious substances. The "danged" farm isn't swift enough for him.

Unfortunately there are many in his class, though they express themselves differently. They are travelling the school and college route to the over-crowded professions or going to the city in search of a nice, clean job. "The danged farm" isn't good enough for them.

At this point the observer usually begins to pound the pulpit, but I am in no mood to usurp the prerogatives of the preacher. If fellows of this sort want to leave the country for the city, let them go. There are altogether too many useless people in the country now. There are men spoiling land who ought to be putting in their time as dock-wallopers or at some city occupation that requires no brains. At the same time, there are a lot of struggling doctors, lawyers, preachers, and business men in the cities who have just the education and brains needed to make the best kind of farmers. Don't make any mistake about it. The farming of the future is going to be the best of the learned professions, and the only one in which a man of brains and character can find scope for his individuality and abilities. Farming is about the only man's job left.

The city has changed as much as the country in the last twenty-five years, and it is no longer the place for a man of wholesome ambition. The change is due to two things--machines and organisation. The machines have made trades a thing of the past, and organisation is doing away with individual enterprise. There are no more trades where skilled artisans work in wood or metal or cloth or leather. There are machines now that do the work, and men and women can get jobs to wait on them. You cannot realise what it means to be the slave of such a machine unless you have been one or have seen such slaves at work. Some years ago I was conducted through one of the largest shoe factories in Lynn, Massachusetts, by its proud proprietor. I could not help noticing the clock-like regularity with which the men and women who were at work performed every motion. In making a shoe there are seventy-two separate operations, and each is made by a different operator with a machine. No one person in all that factory could make an entire shoe. The skill of each individual was confined to one operation, such as sewing in the tongue or pegging on the heel. While we were passing through the factory and the proprietor was explaining to me how things were done, not one of those workers paused or looked up. I commented on their unflagging industry. The proprietor smiled. "I have figured out to a nicety just how many operations can be made in a day by each machine, and have the speed regulated to perform just that number of operations. Of course, the operator can stop the machine if not ready to go on, but he is docked at the end of the day for each operation he misses."

I never was so near being an anarchist in my life as I was while the memory of that incident was fresh in my mind. The workers in that factory were not simply slaves to their employer, but to merciless machines. And that is only a sample of what you can find in any industry that has been perfected along modern lines. In the factories work has none of the charm it had for the old-time artisan who performed every operation himself. It is simply machine-driven drudgery, and the man who thinks that kind of work preferable to work on a farm deserves no better employment.

So much for the physical workers. The case of the mental workers, while apparently better, is really worse, but the subject is a dangerous one to handle. Still enough may be said to suggest some lines of thought. The fact that almost all business enterprises are conducted by organisations or companies has entirely changed the positions of all employees, from office-boy to the president of the company. To parody Tennyson: "The individual withers, and the company is more and more." The shareholders, through their directors, adopt a money-making policy for their company, and that policy must be enforced, no matter how heartless it may be. For instance, I know of a lithographing company which has the excellent rule that it pays for only the work done by its employees. That seems all right, doesn't it? Well, one day I was lunching with the superintendent of manufacture and he was very much depressed. I asked what was troubling him, and he explained:

"One of my best printers has had a hard winter of it on account of sickness in his family. He is an entirely sober, industrious fellow, but I know he has had a hard time to make both ends meet. Well, he had to stay out one day this week to bury his little girl, and when pay-day came he was docked for that day."