Chapter III: Reconciled (4)

"Saved! I sprang to my feet, sobbing like a child. As I turned to go back to the station, a startling apparition met my eyes; standing ten paces from me and waving a red lamp was Julia. Her white clothing and the fitful glare of the red light made her look like something supernatural. The fierce wind tossed the hair in sweet disorder about her refined delicate face, while the cold rain made the clothing cling to her slender figure like a shroud. 'Julia!' I exclaimed aghast, advancing toward her with faltering steps. Then the lantern fell, and I caught her as she was about to fall. I carried her back to the station, with the strength born in me by the continued angry whistling of the engine, and by the final cessation of its violent breathing. As I laid her on one of the benches in the waiting-room, I heard the driver whistle 'brakes off.' I knew the train would now soon be back to the station again with its precious load!

"Hardly had Julia recovered before the light on the rear car of the express backed past the station. Standing on the platform of the car was old Rawlings. With an imprecation he ran into the station and laid his hand heavily on my shoulder. 'What does all this mean? why did you throw up the semaphore and wave the red light for us to return?' he demanded, his face all aglow with passion. 'Don't talk like that,' I replied; 'thank God for the red lamp and the semaphore! You likely now would have been a corpse were it not for them. There is a crossing order to hold you here. Herbert got it and forgot to enter it in the book and turn the lamp. He will soon be back and tell you whether the crossing is with a freight or passenger special.'

"'Bless me, what an escape!' burst out Rawlings. 'There will be a mighty big row about this. Where is that ass of a fellow?' The question was soon answered. Slowly walking backward, with bent shoulders and arms wrapped around some dark object, entered the driver of the express, while following him and bent in a like manner came the fireman. With a dull foreboding of evil I took a step forward. They were carrying Herbert, all torn and mangled! 'We must have backed over him,' said the driver, quietly as he laid the poor battered burden down. 'There is just a spark of life left in him, nothing more.' I saw the pallid lips move, and kneeling, bent my ear to them. The last words they ever formed came very slow and faint, yet faint as they were I heard them: 'The express must--cross--the--passenger--special. I--loved--her--so.' Then the weary lips were at peace--lasting peace. As I rose, my eyes fell on Julia; she was crouching at the feet of the poor fellow whom, but a few moments ago she had refused to marry. As the driver threw a sheet over the remains he said, 'Poor fellow, his mistake cost him dear.' Then turning to me: 'What a blessing it was that you kept your head and signalled us with the red light; for I had just passed under the semaphore when the arm rose. Consequently I thought nothing of the matter; but the fireman at that moment ran up the back of the tender to throw down some coal near the fire-box, and while doing so he noticed the light. He at once called to me to look behind. The signal, coupled with the arm being thrown up before the whole train had passed under it, made me think something was wrong, so I reversed the engine and came back.'

"It was Julia, then, and not I, who had saved the express!

"On reaching the operating room I found the conductor of the passenger special waiting. He had heard of the forgotten order, and said, 'That is the closest call I have had for years. We should have met about the trestle bridge over the ravine. It would have been a terrible pitch-in, as I have eight cars of excursionists.'

"A few moments later both trains had departed, and the only sounds to be heard were the ticking of the busy instrument and the monotonous hum of the wires. I looked at the clock. It was 9.09--just nine minutes since the regular express had steamed into the station. It seemed impossible to me that so much could have happened in so short a time. Had each minute been a week it could not have seemed longer."

George paused as though his story was done. "And Julia?" I asked, laying my hand lightly on his knee. Without replying, he drew out of his pocket an old frayed pocket-book, took out of it a slip of faded newspaper, and silently handed it to me. The words printed on it were very few; simply these: "Died March 8th, 1874, of rapid consumption, Julia Waine, aged twenty years and five months."

As I raised my head and looked at him, he said as he looked out of the low window, "The cold she took that fearful night killed her."

* * * * *

A Memorable Dinner.

As I often have wondered whether a Christmas dinner ever was so fearfully and wonderfully constructed, and under such novel circumstances, as the one to which I sat down on Christmas Day, 1879, I have decided to relate--in the truthful, unvarnished style that one always looks for in the old railway man--the incidents in which I was fortunate enough to participate on that occasion.

That year, I was Assistant-Superintendent of the St. ---- R.R., and was returning on Christmas eve from the annual inspection of the line, in company with the General Manager of the road, in the private car "St. Paul," when one of the worst blizzards I ever experienced, even in that prairie country, burst upon us, and in less than an hour, had buried the track so deeply that further progress was impossible.

It was about midnight when the engine, fully five miles distant from a human habitation, and two hundred miles from our home, sulkily admitted the superior power of nature's forces and hove to.

Fortunately, for humanity's sake, there were on our special--which consisted of the engine, the baggage car, and our private car--only five souls: Charles Fielding, the manager; myself, William Thurlow; Fred Swan, the conductor; Joe Robbins, the driver; and the hero of this history, Ovide Tetreault, the French-Canadian fireman.

It was about two o'clock in the morning when we finally gave up all hope of getting along any farther, at least for some hours, and Fielding and I lay down in our berths with the hope that the storm would abate before daybreak, so that a snow-plough might reach us and clear the line, in time to enable us to reach our homes for the Christmas dinner.

But as I lay awake and listened to the shrieks of the storm, the presentiment grew upon me that the chances of our spending the best part of Christmas Day in our contracted abode were depressingly promising. These thoughts, coupled with the knowledge that our car was but poorly provisioned, and that we were without a cook--having let that functionary stop off for Christmas Day at the station beyond which we were stranded--were in nowise conducive to my falling asleep more readily than was my wont.

I awoke a little after eight o'clock, and was just about to hurry into my clothes to see what the weather was like, when I suddenly decided there was no need of any undue haste--the roar of that festive wind could have been heard a mile away.

When I did reach the body of the car and looked out of the window, a sight met my gaze that might have made a less sinful man, than one who had spent the best part of his life on railways, give vent to comments that I am persuaded would not appear quite seemly in print. Our car was wedged well-nigh up to the windows in a huge drift, while the wind, which had whipped the harassed snow into fragments as fine as dust, caught up great clouds of the dismembered flakes, and with triumphant shrieks drove them against the panes of glass. As I stood glaring at this inspiring picture, Fielding joined me and said, as he, too, feasted his eyes on the scene: "A villainous day! we shall be lucky if we get home by midnight. A lovely way to spend Christmas shut in like rats in a trap! If we only had our cook to do up the little food we have, it would not be so hard on us."

This last reflection was uttered in such a doleful key that I had considerable difficulty in not laughing outright, for my superior officer was a man of imposing breadth, and I knew his one weakness was the love of a good meal. The contemplation of the loss of his Christmas dinner had made him forget his usual blunt, hopeful tone of speech, and adopt this dismal strain.

During the long pause which followed, I knew that he was casting anxious glances at me. Finally he said, insinuatingly: "Er--er--William, during all the years that I have known you, it never occurred to me to ask you if you knew anything about cooking. But, of course, it is a foolish question to put to the assistant-superintendent of a railroad," he added deprecatingly.

I was sorry to have to admit that my education in the culinary art had been sorely neglected.

It must have been about two hours after partaking of our Christmas breakfast, which consisted of bread and butter, cheese and tea, that we had managed somehow to scrape together, that Fielding said to me: "Why, William, there is the conductor, and the driver, and the fireman--perhaps one of them knows enough to roast that beef in the larder. Suppose you go and interview them. There is enough meat there to make a dinner for the lot of us."

The suggestion struck me as being a good one, and I wondered that I had not thought of questioning them about the matter earlier in the morning. I soon had the trio marching behind me into our car, to be examined as to what they knew of the now much-to-be-desired art of cooking.

With divers sincere regrets, the conductor protested that he had not the slightest knowledge of this housewifely accomplishment. But old Joe Robbins, the driver, a sterling, dogged Yorkshire man, and one of our oldest employés to whose speech still clung a goodly smattering of the Yorkshire dialect, raised Fielding's sinking hopes by saying that although he did not know how to roast, he was pretty well posted in the art of frying. He further explained, and this time to the gratification of us all, that he had in a box, on the tender of the engine, a ten-pound turkey that he had bought up the line to take home for Christmas, and which we were quite welcome to. The only drawback to the bird was that it was frozen as hard as a rock, and would probably take a lot of thawing out. If we wished, however, he would do his best to thaw it and give us fried turkey for dinner.

Fielding, after declaring that he would not forget to give the man who acted as cook that day a souvenir when he got back to town, was just about to accept the kind offer, when Ovide Tetreault, the French-Canadian fireman, a dark-skinned, comical-looking little fellow, pushed past Robbins, and said eagerly to Fielding and myself, in amusing broken English: "Messieurs, I'm know how for mak de rost turkey, and rost turkey she's goodder dan de fry turkey. And I'm know, too, how for mak--how for mak--" He rubbed his pointed little chin vigorously to jog his laggard memory, and then continued, triumphantly: "_Ah, oui! ah, oui!_ how for mak what de Anglish call de Creesmis plum-puddin', and if you lak I will do de cookin' for you."

Turning to me, Fielding said in a low voice: "Do you really think that queer-looking specimen knows more about cooking than old Robbins? Would it be safe to let him try and roast the turkey? It would never do to have it spoiled, you know."

Now, from the eager manner in which the little chap had spoken, he impressed me, in spite of his insignificant appearance, with being less commonplace than he looked, and believing that our dinner, under his generalship, would be a much better one than old Robbins would be likely to provide, I strongly urged Fielding to bestow the commission of cook upon my favorite. "What possible reason can he have for saying he can roast turkeys and boil plum-puddings if he cannot?" I urged as a clincher. Of course he had no good argument to meet such a question, and so, turning to Ovide, he said: "All right, my good fellow, go ahead, and give us roast turkey and plum-pudding. I am glad that after all we shall not be without a Christmas dinner."

During this conference Robbins had been eyeing his fireman with growing disfavor, and as Fielding ceased, he strode suddenly up to Ovide and said to him with ill-suppressed wrath: "Before thou begins thy duties as cook, it is only right that thou shouldst say how thou larned to cook, and just how much thou knows about it. For my part, I believe thou knows nought about it; I know thee and thy foolish way of thinking that thou canst do anything thou hast seen anyone else do."

Now, as I knew the old driver heartily disliked his little fireman--whom he always dubbed an intruding foreigner--and had more than once reported him to me on the ground of incompetency, I concluded his remarks were not wholly disinterested, and was about to reprove him, when Ovide, with much heartiness, replied: "Dat's not your bizness to ax me question lak dat; I'm not on de engine now." He then raised his shoulders commiseratingly and continued: "You not be 'fraid, Monsieur Robbin; for when I rost dat turkey and boil dat puddin' you will find her so good dat you will eat more dan de odders."

The dogged old driver was now too angry to be influenced by our amused smiles, and turning contemptuously away from Ovide, he looked to us to press his demand for our cook's credentials.

"Oh, I am sure, Robbins, he will cook the dinner all right. And then you know," I added reprovingly, "this is Christmas Day, and there should be no hard feeling among us."

My reply only the more incensed our doughty old engineer. He pointed prophetically at the now thoroughly defiant Ovide, and said, "I suppose I'm interfering; but, mark my words, that foreigner there'll make you before the day's out forget all about that motto of peace and good-will." His prophetic arm fell to his side, and he seated himself in a position from which he could command a good view of the little kitchen at the end of the passage, where his watchful eyes never failed to fasten on Ovide as he swaggered about, arrayed in our regular cook's long, white apron.

For the next two hours I thought very little of Ovide, my attention being occupied by a game in which Fielding, the conductor and I were engaged.

Suddenly Fielding exclaimed, "Gracious, William, but this car is hot!" I myself had been uncomfortably warm for some time, and had been dimly conscious, too, of the conductor frequently wiping his face, and casting anxious glances in the direction of the kitchen, whence came blasts of hot air heavily laden with the appetizing odor of roast turkey.

Involuntarily I glanced over at Robbins, who was still on guard, although pretending to read a newspaper, and as I caught the grim look of satisfaction on his profile, doubts as to the ability of our new cook for the first time stole over me, and I made my way out to the kitchen.

The moment I opened the door, and stepped into Ovide's new sanctum, I thought the last great day of conflagration had surely come, and that the elements were melting with fervent heat. Never before had I experienced such withering heat and choking smoke as proceeded from that little range, nor such dense vapor as came from the mouth of the boisterous kettle upon it--many a locomotive would have been proud to spout forth such a body of steam!

Finally my half-blinded eyes found out Ovide, who looked truly like an emissary of the evil one among it all, as he stood with his wet scarlet face, his feet buried in turkey feathers, and his arms up to the elbows in a bowl of flour.

"Ovide!" I called, faintly.

When he saw me, a pleased, triumphant look lit up his face.

"Do you want to burn down the car?" I asked, shortly, when I got him into the passage.

"Oh, no fear for dat," he answered in a somewhat patronizing tone. "You know," he went on, good-naturedly, "big turkey can't be cook if not have pretty good fire. But I'll open de window and den de fire she'll all go out. For me, you know I'm not mind de heat, for I'm used to dat when I fire de engine."

"But surely, Ovide, you will burn the turkey all up," I insisted, in a milder tone--for, as I have already stated, I was in no wise an authority on cooking, and from the patronizing way in which he spoke, I began to feel that I had been interfering unnecessarily.

"Well," he replied ponderingly, "p'rhaps she do a little too quick, and I'll tak her out; aldo she's only be in a few minute."

As I glanced at his flour-bedecked arms, he said, "Oh, yes, I'm find de raisin, and de curran, and de peel, and lots powder, dat makes de flour come big, and I'm mix dem all together when you come in, and we going to have fine Creesmis puddin' sure. It's too bad, do, dat I find a hole she's born in de bottom of de sospan, so dat I must put de puddin' in de kettle, which has not got big mouth; but she's pretty big around de middle, so I suppose de puddin' she's cook just as well dare."

I was too bewildered by all this detail to pay much attention to what he was saying about the smallness of the kettle's mouth; but I remembered it vividly afterwards.

Nodding gaily to me, he hurried back to the oven, from which the blue odorous smoke was still pouring. I lingered long enough to see him take the turkey out of it, stand it on the shelf in the corner, and then open the window.

As I passed Robbins, he let his paper flutter to his knee, and said, meaningly: "I hope yon chap, sir, don't think he's still firing on the engine."

As I smilingly shook my head and passed on, a presentiment of approaching disaster took possession of me--so that the recollection of the speaker's prophecies of evil regarding our cook did not come back with that keen sense of humor one would have expected.

When I reached Fielding's side, he said anxiously, "I hope he is getting along all right, William." As I noted his anxiety, and the hungry expression of his face, I answered with a glibness which I was far from feeling, that things were getting along swimmingly. I was now beginning to feel such a weight of responsibility in the success of the dinner that I sincerely wished I had not taken such an active interest in the appointment of the cook.

About an hour later, when we ceased our game, I noticed the odor of roast turkey was no longer prevalent; so with apprehensive heart, though nonchalant air, I made my way over to the kitchen again, and was just in time to see Ovide snatch the turkey--which now looked cold and forlorn enough--from the shelf and shove it into the still fervent oven, and to hear him mutter, "Dat's too bad I'm forgot to put you back for so long."

He did not see me until he had closed the oven door, and then he said, joyously, pointing to the kettle: "De puddin' she's in dare, and she's nearly all done now, and in fifteen or twenty minute more de dinner she's all be ready."

I suppose if I had not seen the bird's entrance into the oven for the second time, the announcement of the early approach of the festivities would have allayed some of my apprehensions, and perhaps have afforded me a little of the satisfaction Fielding and the conductor experienced when they heard the news. The effect of the tidings upon old Robbins, however, was tantalizing in the extreme. He threw his paper to one side, rested his elbows on his knees, and holding up his grizzly chin with his hands, began softly to whistle a monotonous, soul-disturbing air.

Ovide was true to his word, for scarcely had the twenty minutes elapsed, when in he bustled, pulled the table into the centre of the car, set it fairly well, after a number of amusing blunders, and then drawing up the chairs, said, with great gusto: "Now, Messieurs, I'm go and get de dinner."

As we seated ourselves, Fielding said, with a satisfaction that comes back to me vividly as I pen these words: "Well, William, I am glad it is ready; I never remember being so hungry." The kindly look which he bestowed on Ovide as he came in with the smoking turkey will also never be difficult to conjure up. But the moment my eyes fell upon that unfortunate bird, my heart began to beat with renewed apprehensions. Never before had I seen such an ill-favored, uninviting-looking fowl placed upon a table; its naturally white, smooth skin was now as seamy, black and arid-looking as the mouth of an ancient crater.

Covertly I glanced at Fielding to see what effect this steaming, yet mummified-looking object had upon him. My worst fears were verified: the complacent expression had fled, and was succeeded by a look in which consternation, anger and amazement were all blended.

The short, trying silence was broken by a rasping cough from Robbins, and then Fielding said, in a constrained tone, as he whetted his knife: "Well, this animal looks as though it had been through the fiery furnace created by Nebuchadnezzar for the undoing of the three Israelites."

Ovide, who was standing complacently behind Fielding's chair, not understanding the allusion, and thinking that he was called upon to say something, said brightly, "Oh, yes, sir, dat turkey is de finest turkey I never see."

Now, I had known Fielding, on numerous occasions, to laugh heartily at a much less amusing blunder, but on this occasion I sought his usually expressive face in vain for even the ghost of a smile. To add to my annoyance and the constraint of the situation, old Robbins found it necessary to again loudly clear his troublesome throat.

To save himself from making an angry reply, Fielding somewhat viciously commenced operations on the turkey, and attempted to carve off a leg; but in some unaccountable manner the knife came to a sudden halt as soon as it had pierced the dark skin. This unlooked-for interruption brought a puzzled look into Fielding's face; but he was a man not easily daunted by anything, and thinking that he had somehow come across a bone hitherto unknown to him in a turkey's anatomy, he twisted the bird round and confidently began the dissection of the other leg. The result was equally disheartening; the blade went a little below the skin, and then refused to budge.

Poor Fielding! His patience was by this time pretty well exhausted, and turning to the now anything but jubilant Ovide, said grimly: "In the name of all that is good, man, what is the matter with this turkey?"

He had gone however, to the wrong fount, for information this time, as Ovide wonderingly shook his head, and said, "Dat is de queerest ting I'm never see, sir."

The angry words on Fielding's lips were prevented by a low comprehensive laugh from old Robbins, who said, as he pointed satirically at his fireman, "Oh, aye; oh, aye; thou knows how to cook; thou does, of course thou does." Then turning to Fielding he said, with a side glance at me: "That bird, sir, has nobbut had its hide cooked, and all beneath it is frozen."

Even before Fielding, to verify this startling statement, had seized the knife, and, laying open the skin, exposed to view the partly frozen flesh, the whole miserable catastrophe was clear to my mind. I recalled how I had borne down on Ovide soon after he had put the bird for the first time into the blazing oven; how, in deference to my fears, he had taken it out and stood it on the shelf--when its skin, of course, could only have been scorched--where it had remained over an hour while he was superintending the construction and cooking of the pudding; and, finally, how the prevaricating fellow--whom I knew understood little more about cooking than I did--must have concluded, from the cinder-like appearance of the skin when he took it out of the oven the second time, after another twenty minutes' scorching, that it was cooked to the very marrow.

"Well!" ejaculated Fielding, letting his knife and fork fall noisily on the table, and turning to our guilty-looking cook, "of all the pure--"

But I am sure, the reader will agree with me that under such trying circumstances, my friend should not now have recorded against him, in cold print, every word he uttered on that occasion.

When Fielding had somewhat relieved his feelings and sat down again, Ovide, in his ludicrous English, tried to throw the blame for what had happened upon the stove, which, he explained, burned much more zealously than he wanted it to; but his lame excuses were cut short by Fielding telling him to take the thing away.

Ovide, however, was a difficult subject to silence, and said apologetically, as he took up the platter: "It's vary much too bad, sir, dat I'm forgot to mak her freeze out before I'm put her in de oven. But de puddin', sir,"--with a sudden revival of his old self-confidence--"no danger of de same trouble with her; I'm sure she's cook vary well all de way over."

Somewhat mollified by the outlook of getting a little of something to eat, Fielding replied somewhat less shortly, "Well, hurry up and bring it along."

As we silently waited for him to return, we heard him noisily lift the kettle containing the now doubly precious pudding off the stove; but scarcely had he done so when he uttered an amazed cry, and a few moments later hurried up to the table again, the big kettle in his hand and his eyes fairly bulging with excitement.

"See! Monsieur," he exclaimed, almost superstitiously, as he halted at my side and pointed to the mouth of the kettle, "see de size dat puddin' she's now! When I'm put her in she's so small dat she's go in easy; but now look! she's swell, and swell, and swell till she's fill all de kettle inside, and now she's tree times too big for de mouth, and she won't come out."

I glanced down, and true enough, the pudding had assumed alarming proportions. Little wonder the problem of getting the thing intact out of the kettle's small mouth had caused him such woful distress.

"Well," I said impatiently, "go pour off the water and take it out in sections; if there is more pudding than you expected, so much the better; there seems little chance of us getting anything else to eat."

As he was scudding away to carry out my instructions, Robbins, whose sharp eyes had seen the freak in the kettle, said to Ovide in an undertone, "Thou hast not forgotten, lad, to take the frost out of that, anyway."

After a very brief absence, Ovide hurried back again, bearing aloft the most marvellous pudding human eyes, I am persuaded, ever rested upon. Apart from the pitiful manner in which it had been rent and torn asunder, its complexion was such as to attract the most lively interest--no chronic sufferer from jaundice ever sported such a gorgeous yellow. The mystery of its unwonted complexion was solved the moment he laid it on the table: the car was permeated with the rank odor of baking powder.

Out of pure curiosity, I put a piece of the pudding into my mouth. It was something awful! A spoonful of pure baking powder could not have tasted much worse. It had been only partially cooked, too.

Fielding gave Ovide one look, and then, too full for speech, he pushed back his chair and strode to the other end of the car.

Slowly I leaned back in my chair and fixed my eyes on the face of the now thoroughly craven-looking Ovide. "What made you tell us you knew how to cook?" I asked, trying hard to speak without anger, but in utter failure. The cravings of the inner man, just then, were strong upon me.

After all the fellow was not without some redeeming trait, for he made a clean breast of it. "It is dis way," he began remorsefully, "when I'm tak de job for cook to-day I'm tink, for sure, I know de way for do it. De reason I get idea like dat, is this way: When I'm be little boy and sit in de kitchen and see my mudder bake de bread, and boil de puddin', and rost de meat, I'm say to myself, many time, 'Ovide, you can do little easy ting like dat, just so well as she can.' I'm ax my mudder, too, many time to let me try and mak de dinner, but she laugh loud and say, 'Ovide, you just lak all de boys and lots of men too, for dey all tink dat it's just so easy for de woman to cook de food as it is for dem to eat it.' And den she laugh some more, and say dat all de men tink dat what de womans do is noting at all."

As he paused, I had no small difficulty in preserving the severity of my countenance, owing to certain recollections of thoughts I had indulged in when a boy--and, I must admit, a pretty big one, too--when I had sat and watched my mother cook. From the way Fielding, at the other end of the car, put his hands into his pockets, I got the impression that conscience was hard at work with him, too.

"Even after I'm be away from home all dese years," continued Ovide, "I'm still have dat feeling dat I can cook just so well as she can; and so when I'm come into de car to-day and hear Mr. Fielding say dat he want cook, and say dat he will give a souvenir, and when I'm see, too, dat engine-driver man Robbin, dare, dat I'm not lak at all, and who I tink not know how for cook and yet going for get de job--I'm just tink dat a good chance she's come for me to please de bosses and make somethin' good for myself, and so I'm come straight out, and say I'm de best man for de job. And dat's all de truth."

He had been slowly edging his way to the passage leading to the door, and as he reached it he continued regretfully, "If I'm only not forget to freeze out dat turkey before I'm put her in de oven, and tink too not to put nearly cupful bakin' powder in de puddin', everyting she's be all right den, sure." As he concluded he turned abruptly down the passage, and fled out of our car into the baggage-car, with Robbins' rasping cough in his ears.

* * * * *

Half an hour later, thanks to old Robbins' skill, we sat down to fried turkey, boiled potatoes, bread and butter, and tea.

The great French-Canadian cook gladly ate his portion of the banquet in the baggage-car, for no amount of persuasion could make him come to the table with us.

Twelve hours later we reached our homes.

On New Year's Day, a bulky blue envelope was handed to Ovide. As it bore the stamp of the General Manager's office, he opened it with fear and trembling, for he was sure that it contained his dismissal. I shall not attempt to describe his gratification when he found it contained a handsome silver watch, on the inside of which was neatly engraved a belligerent-looking turkey. The note from Fielding, accompanying the gift, read as follows: "May the souvenir bring as many pleasant memories to the receiver as the memory of Christmas Day, 1879, is sure to bring the donor."

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A LOVER IN HOMESPUN.

COMMENTS OF THE PRESS.

"These stories are of good merit and comprise some excellent descriptions of forest and clearing, and a clever delineation of the passions which actuate humanity in the rough.... The stories, eleven in all, deal with love and life and religion in many aspects, and as character studies of the simple Canadian peasantry, French and English, can compare favorably with similar selections in which Scotch, Welsh and Irish rural life have been exploited.... Its readability might be further dwelt upon."--_Literary World (London)._

"After a careful perusal of 'A Lover in Homespun,' we are impressed with the fact that the author cannot only 'photograph' pictures but 'paint them'; all the characters live, breathe, act, feel and speak naturally. Mr. Smith gives individuality and charm to the personages of his stories, without involving any sacrifice to truth. One thing characterizes every story in the volume, viz., strong dramatic sentiment and situation, and a decided deftness and a naturalness in dialogue. In order to satisfy himself that this estimate of Mr. Smith's powers and work is not an exaggerated one, let the reader take up the book and peruse it. He will find every story interesting." --_Herald (Montreal)._

"There is not a poor story in this bright entertaining book. Many of the stories touch very high dramatic art--Canada has another writer to be proud of."--_Canadian Home Journal._

"There is undoubted power displayed in the stories in this book. Many of the characters are drawn in a natural and picturesque manner, and we hope that on a future occasion Mr. Smith will use the material, that he evidently has on hand, for a long romance. We believe Mr. Smith's appeal to the literary public will be favorably received."--_Star (Montreal)._

"Mr. Smith's book, 'A Lover in Homespun,' is sure to be found a literary treat by the reading public. His stories have that polished finish which is so difficult to attain, and which makes the short story a work of art."--_Canadian Magazine._

"Mr. Smith is a talented writer; his style is pure and he possesses in a high degree the principal gift of a novelist, imagination. Mr. Smith's new book is made up of a dozen short stories, several of which are French-Canadian. The author shows himself very sympathetic to our race."--_La Presse (Montreal)._

"The contents of this volume give evidence not only of innate capacity for story-telling, but of conscientious elaboration of the various plots. All the stories have their characteristic merits, and they are all Canadian."--_Gazette (Montreal)._

"A book to be looked for and read, and which is sure to go down to the future."--_Our Monthly._

"As a writer of short stories Mr. Smith is truly delightful."--_Massey's Magazine._

"The studies of French-Canadian character in this book are exceedingly clever. The stories are peculiarly charming and the volume should certainly be read by French-Canadians."--_Le Soir._

"This book is well written, and all the stories are very interesting; some are very amusing, some pathetic and some thrilling. The scene of each is in our own country. The book should certainly sell well."--_Christian Guardian._

"Mr. Clifford Smith's book, 'A Lover in Homespun,' gives graphic descriptions of habitant life by one who knows it well, or adventures in the newer Canada of the North-West. The stories have all the same sympathetic quality, the same rapid movement and strong situations, and clever use of French-Canadian dialect which made Mr. Thomson's stories so successful."--_Onward._

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TORONTO: WILLIAM BRIGGS. Montreal: C.W. COATES. Halifax: S.F. HUESTIS.

End of Project Gutenberg's A Lover in Homespun, by F. Clifford Smith