Part 22

Now comes the task of rounding up the sheep, loading them on a waggon, and taking them to a railway station. If the man who first compared voters to a flock of sheep didn't know any more about politics than he did about sheep he should have been waited on by a delegation of farmers and told a few things. Of all the stubborn, contrary, ornery critters to drive, coax, or lead, sheep certainly deserve the mahogany sideboard, or trip to Europe, or whatever it is they offer in popular prize competitions. They follow their leaders, of course, but any fool that starts running in any direction is instantly followed as a leader. And the leaders never seem to have a clear idea of where they want to go. Their one idea seems to be to bolt the convention, and that is a characteristic of reformers rather than of ordinary voters. If the people were at all like sheep the politicians could do nothing with them. The simile is no good. And will some psychologist kindly explain why a man's memory will turn sarcastic on him--when he has almost run his legs off and can feel his lungs red all the way down--and throw up a quotation like this:

"Falstaff: He fled from me like quicksilver. Doll: Ay, and thou followest him like a church;"

or words to that effect. If my motions resembled those of a church, the church must have been hit by a cyclone when its actions were observed. However, the task was finally accomplished and the sheep joined the fat steers, hogs, calves, and lambs in their progress towards the kitchen.

Some farmers in this district have threshed their wheat without putting it in barns or stacks--carrying it from the shocks to the threshing-machines. The grain was then rushed to market, so that advantage might be taken of the high prices. The highest yield reported was of thirty-one bushels to the acre--a return that is highly satisfactory at present prices. All spring crops will be light on account of the late sowing and the continued dry weather. One field of oats was seen that has already turned yellow, as if ripening, without having headed out. But so many things are making for prosperity on the farms this year that few people have any real cause to grumble.

July 29.--The country has been described from a car window, an automobile, a buggy, a bicycle, and even afoot, so why not from a hammock? It is favourably located with a view of the best the country has to offer. One end is suspended from a little oak that has grown within the memory of man from an acorn dropped by a red squirrel or a predatory small boy. The other end is attached to a crab-apple tree that "casts a generous shade." A gentle breeze is whispering in a near-by clump of oaks and elms--an untouched bit of the original forest. The bees are humming like a city, and the hens are cackling over recent contributions to the world's food supply. A reaper is clacking faintly in the distance, and somehow the hour of ease seems sweeter because of the knowledge that some one is working. A panorama of green corn, oat, and barley fields, brown hay stubble, and yellow wheat in the shock can be seen by merely turning one's head. And around all is a wall of woods still as fresh as in the spring. What more could be asked by any one enamoured of the simple life?

The haying came and went this year as quickly as the express train that needed two men to see it--one to say, "Here she comes," and another to say, "There she goes." One morning the mower started, in the afternoon the rake was busy, and by the end of the next day the hay was all in the mows and lofts. As it was all cut, raked, loaded, and unloaded by machinery, the old back-breaking work of pitching was not in evidence. Still, the work was hard enough, and those who kept at it from early morning till late at night were thankful to have some one else volunteer to do the chores. The haying weather was ideal, plenty of sunshine and a good breeze to cure the hay; but for the first time on record the haymakers were wishing for rain. This section is suffering from a peculiar dry spell that is damaging the spring crops. For some weeks past there have been almost daily indications of rain, but none has come. Storms gather in the west almost daily and then drift away to the south or north. The papers bring reports of heavy rains at every point of the compass, but a strip about thirty miles wide through this part of the province has not been blessed with a decent sprinkle. In some places the corn is wilting through lack of moisture, and all spring crops will be light unless there is a heavy downpour within the next few days. It looks like rain to-day, but the performance of previous days will probably be repeated. Will the weather man kindly explain why other sections are favoured while this one is left desolate? Can it be possible that there is a Jonah living in this neighbourhood? But perhaps it will be as well not to investigate that point.

The wheat harvest is now on and progressing at the same rate as did the haying. The self-binders are doing the heavy work, but there is no machine for loading or unloading the sheaves. They must be handled with a fork and to put in a full day at that is to know what hard work means. The sheaves are of uniform size, however, and that is an advantage. In the days of the self-rake machines that did not measure the sheaves automatically, but had to be "tripped" by the driver, they varied from a few wisps to huge bundles that would break the fork handles. This inequality made pitching a worse job than it is to-day. By doing the binding, the modern reaper has relieved harvesting of its heaviest work. It used to take four men to keep up with an old self-rake machine and many a good man was "bushed"--that is, driven to the bush to cool off and rest--by the killing pace. Before the day of the self-rake machine the grain was harvested with the cradle, and cradling was work for a giant. A farmer whose memory goes back to the days of cradling tells a story on himself that is worth repeating because of the light it casts on the women who helped to build up Canada. In his day he was a master with the old turkey-wing cradle, and it was his boast that few binders could keep up with him when he went swinging down a field. When his own wheat was harvested it was his custom to "hire out" to do cradling for the neighbours. On one occasion he hired out with a farmer whose daughters,

"Huge women, stronger than men, Blowzed with wind and rain and labour,"

used to help with the harvest. When he went to the field in the morning he was accompanied by one of these Amazons, who proposed to bind after him. He started down the field at an easy swing and when he reached the end of the swath and prepared to whet the scythe of his cradle he glanced around to see how his partner was progressing. To his surprise he found that she had just tossed aside the last sheaf. With the handle of the rake resting on her shoulder, she was mopping her face with a corner of her apron. As she caught his eye she remarked cordially:

"It's a het day, Mr. Jamieson."

On the next round he bent to his work with all his energy, but when he reached the end of the swath and glanced around his triumphant partner remarked:

"It's a het day, Mr. Jamieson."

All day long he plunged ahead, but she kept at his heels, and when the last swath was cut and the last sheaf bound she threw the rake over her shoulder and remarked:

"It has been a het day, Mr Jamieson."

It is generally believed that later on he proposed to the Amazon and that the answer she gave made it "a cauld day" for Mr. Jamieson.

With the spirit of harvest home in the air it is a source of real joy to one who reclines in a hammock and meditates on what other people do that the last word on these happy festivals has been written by a Canadian. All the poets have had a try at it and some of them did fairly well, but it remained for McIntyre of Ingersoll, The Cheese Poet, to reach the fundamental truth. With the plain practical common sense for which he was noted, he penetrated through all the shams and make-believes that always surround periods of thanksgiving and let the truth gush forth in limpid verse. His poem on "Big Crops" closes with a couplet that should be better known, for it is undoubtedly destined to immortality. Hearken to McIntyre:

"Forty bushels to the acre Makes us grateful to our Maker."

There you have it. Can you add anything or take anything away! To approve its truth you have but to notice the thin, sour smile of the man whose crops yielded but ten bushels to the acre when he takes up the Thanksgiving hymn. Then behold the irradiating happiness of him whose bins are bursting with a forty-bushel crop. Note how he bellows forth the strains and makes a joyful noise. Unquestionably the laurels belong to McIntyre. He has summed up the harvest-home spirit once for all.

To the hammock comes the odour of raspberry jam in the making. Owing to the dry weather the raspberries were not plentiful this year, but they are well-flavoured. The same report applies to currants, gooseberries, and all other small fruits. The prospect for apples is excellent. The trees are heavily loaded, and where they have been properly sprayed there will be a good yield. It seems incredible, and yet it is true, that in different parts of Ontario thousands of bushels of the best apples are allowed to rot every year because the farmers cannot get enough to pay for the labour of picking and marketing the fruit. Yet good apples are dear in the cities. Just where the trouble lies is not quite clear.

Of all the delights enjoyed by the occupant of the hammock, watching the sunsets is chief. This summer they have been unusually fine, owing to the storms that threatened and turned aside. Each evening has given a picture of marvellous splendour, ranging from light streaks of silvery cloud over blue skies of illimitable depth to masses of rose and gold. Sometimes the colours are confined to one glowing spot. At others they spread over the whole sky, varying in their shadings at each shifting of the clouds. To this splendour of the skies must be added the silvery grey of the oat and barley fields, and the cool green of the woods, shot with streaks of golden sunlight. Mountainous countries may show more stupendous effects, but the sunsets of the level reaches of central Ontario have a beauty that it would be hard to rival. And after the sunset the stars come out, and hours of waking dreams precede the hours of dreamless sleep that only the quiet country can give. It is all very good.

July 30.--There are no doubt many hot jobs on the farms during the summer months, but up to the present writing I have struck nothing hotter than cultivating corn in the still, humid hours of the early afternoon when a thunderstorm is gathering. As the green-headed flies are always at their worst just before a storm, they get the horse frantic, and her attempts to dislodge her tormentors with her hind feet are so disastrous to the growing hills of corn that a man's temperature goes up steadily until he makes a sweating, panting, howling exhibition of himself. These flies are said to be especially bad this summer, and one "grave and reverent seignior" told me that the ones that attacked his horses not only bit them, but took out chunks of flesh and flew away to the woods with them, where they could eat them at their leisure. But I have my doubts of that. I am beginning to suspect that real farmers take a delight in telling me whoppers, and otherwise imposing on my credulity. For instance, a man was telling me what a hearty feeder one of his horses is.

"Why," he said, "when she is pasturing, and makes up her mind that she wants to have a roll, she never stops eating. She lies down, still eating away, and rolls over and over, without ever missing a bite." Now, I leave it to the editor if that man wasn't stretching it a little bit. But to get back to hot jobs. I thought that my job of cultivating in the blazing sun was hot enough for any one, but I am told that a man who has never mowed away hay under a steel roof has no idea of what heat is. According to the accounts I have heard, it must be a trifle worse than mining borax in Death Valley, and that is said to be the hottest job that any human being ever undertook. But the corn job is hot enough for me.

Yesterday afternoon I was nearer to being "bushed" than I have been since undertaking to work a farm. I was pitching hay in the field--I am told it was native blue grass, and unusually heavy--and the coils were compact, and looked to have only about one forkful in each one. We were working at the gait of men who want to get a stack finished before a shower, and I thought I was good for anything that came along. But before evening I hadn't a word to say to any one. They could "josh" me all they wanted to, but I hadn't the energy to answer back. Every coil was bigger and heavier than the last, and the day kept getting hotter and the wind died down, and the weather got more threatening, until it seemed as if human nature couldn't stand more, but the rest of the gang didn't find out how tuckered I was. I managed to stick it out, but I am not anxious to repeat the experience. If a large plantigrade man had come along hunting for work while the trouble was in progress, he could have had any price he asked, but hired men are too scarce to be foot-loose at this time of the year. Oh, yes, I know I should be up-to-date and have a hay loader and hay fork, but any implement agent who reads this will be wasting his time if he comes and tries to sell them to me. I have noticed that a lot of farmers who are farming on about the same scale as I am keep themselves poor buying the latest improvements, and I am not ambitious to join their melancholy ranks. Improved implements are an excellent thing to have if one has enough work for them to do, but there are cases where the sensible thing is to be old-fashioned. Muscle is still cheaper than machinery for small jobs.

This experience started me meditating on hired men I have known. Where now can we find the equals of those wonderful workers who were known in "the short and simple annals of the poor" as "Bill the Cow" and "Three-fingered Jack, the Human Hayfork"? Bill used to laugh aloud at ordinary haycocks. What he wanted was young stacks, and he would heave them up whole, and was insulted if offered anything smaller than a barley fork to work with. And when hay forks were first introduced, did not Three-fingered Jack get all lit up at the fall fair and start on a rampage to find the agent who had sold the toys. He reeled up and down the one street of the village and "bellered like all Bashan," and breathed slaughter, and would not be comforted when he could not find the man who was spoiling the good old pastime of haymaking by introducing horse forks. Those men used to work from dawn until after dark on the longest days, and they hated a mid-day shower as badly as the men who hired them. But where are they now? For answer, let us cull a fitting threnody from Homer, mighty singer of heroes:

"They long since in earth's soft arms are reposing, Afar from their own dear land, their native land--Lacedemon."

Instead of Lacedemon, read Scotland, or England, or Ireland. They died, and their methods of working died with them. If they could only come back, we would organise excursions and charge an admission fee to those who wished to see them at work. But we are living in another and no doubt a better age. Men do not work as they did, and could not if they wanted to. Compared with them, we are a degenerate race, even though we wear finely-laundered linen when we go to town, instead of donning paper collars and putting butter on our hair.

Of course, time is very valuable, and we are assured by all kinds of wise people that "Time is Money." Even The Farmer's Advocate has published articles telling what to do on rainy afternoons, so that no time may be lost. All this is no doubt very excellent, and far be it from me to say anything that might justify lazy people in wasting time, but I am still of the opinion that no man should work during the first few minutes after a summer shower. When everything in nature has been refreshed, he should try to breathe in a little of the refreshment himself. The air is so pure, and everything in the fields and woods so beautiful that it is positively invigorating to share in the joy by which we are surrounded at such times. Even the birds, though their broods may be hungry, stop for a chorus of song among the dripping leaves. Before the storm comes up all nature is parched and wilting, but after it has passed everything is throbbing with life. The corn and oats are a fresher green, and sparkle with countless jewels. It is at such times that life in the country is at its best, if we will only forget our cares and worries to enjoy it, even though only for a minute. The beauty of the world needs to be harvested and stored away in the memory just as carefully as the crops that are now causing us so much concern. The memory of what is beautiful should be as precious to us as full granaries.

AUGUST