Chapter XVI: Part 16

Then came an hour of darkness and when the full moon rose it lighted a fairyland. Every twig, weed, and exposed blade of grass was frosted to three times its usual thickness with feathery hoarfrost of dazzling whiteness. Only the trunks and larger limbs of the trees remained black. As the stars were blotted out by the light, all except the larger ones and a planet that hung in the west like a drop of liquid silver, the snow began to light up with infinite constellations. There was moonlight and snow "Fur's you cud look or listen." Not a breath of air disturbed the tense stillness. Presently, an owl--who, no doubt, "for all his feathers, was a-cold"--hooted in the ghostly woods and the sound boomed and echoed weirdly.

"Whoo-hoo-hoo-whoo-oo!"

It seemed the only sound that would be appropriate in that frozen stillness. As the moon rose higher a perfect storm circle that almost broke into rainbow colours formed around it. All night the spectacle lasted, but the wind that came with the dawn scattered the light frost flakes and mingled them with the drifting snow, but all who loved beauty had a chance to see the matchless artistry of

"The goblins of the Northland
That teach the gulls to scream,
That dance the autumn into dust,
The ages into dream."

It is worth while to take a trip along the side roads where they still have rail fences to see the snowdrifts. The briars and withered golden-rod stalks form shelters where the drifts can form and be carved into wonderful shapes by the driving wind. Along the main roads where wire fences are in use the drifts do not have a chance, but on the side-lines they can gather and lie undisturbed, save for the tracking of the wild creatures that now more than at any other season "do seek their meat from God." Sprawling rabbit-tracks abound everywhere, and here and there the loosely-woven lacework of quail-tracks may be seen. Where the briars and weeds are thick they bend down under the weight of the drifts, but hold them up sufficiently to provide hiding-places for the rabbits and quail, and shelter them from the cold. Occasionally one sees the jumping track of a weasel or mink that finds in the drifts an ideal hunting-ground. Everywhere flocks of snowbirds swoop down among the weeds to feed, and add their tiny tracks to the strangely-written history of the winter struggle for existence.

A few mornings ago the predatory members of the family, who, if there be truth in Spencer's lucid observation that the ontogenesis may be traced in the philogenesis, must now be in the stone age, came in with the news that there were rabbit-tracks in the garden. Of course, that meant a rabbit hunt to be organised at once. With outward signs of reluctance, but secret joy, I took a squirrel rifle and joined in the chase. While we were trying to unravel the tangle of tracks and find the freshest, a neighbour told us where a rabbit had been seen not five minutes ago. Following the direction we found the tracks, and started wolfishly on the trail, giving the best imitation we could of

"The long, hard gallop which can tire
The hound's deep hate, the hunter's fire."

We had not travelled far before it was apparent from the tracks that the rabbit was frightened about something. His easy lope had changed to frenzied jumps. In some places he had cleared fully fifteen feet at a spring. We increased our pace, climbed fences impetuously, floundered through snow-filled ditches, and tried to get through a thorn hedge, but after due consideration, induced by some ugly scratches, decided to walk around the end of it. Finally we came to the tracks of three people, and found that the rabbit had started along this broken path. Just then we realised that the tracks were our own, and that the rabbit had led us around a circle. Although we had not seen him, he had seen us, and it was at our pursuit he had been frightened. Feeling sure that he could not be far ahead of us we kept on, and finally he left the circle and loped off through the woods. But the pack was on his trail and would not be shaken. By actual count we climbed eleven wire fences, floundered through a government drain twice, crossed three farms, and then found that the rabbit was leading us around a larger circle. Once more we followed our own tracks to where he branched off again. This time he ran into brush heaps and then doubled back on his own trail to throw us off. At last he struck off across a field, and, observing the curve of his path, I made a hasty calculation and decided that he was going to circumnavigate the earth on his next circle. So I pantingly called a halt, and led my protesting young barbarians straight home. We had not seen hide or hair of the rabbit during the chase, though he had certainly seen us. It was disappointing, of course, but the disappointment was forgotten in the ravenous appetites we had developed. In a Toronto restaurant we would have been bankrupted before being satisfied, but in the country they like to see one eat heartily. It is proof that the food offered is being appreciated. Having no ill-will against the rabbit, we hoped that he found a good supper and enjoyed it as much as we did ours.

_Dec. 28._--"Eben," said Mrs. Summersox in the tone of settled resignation which she adopted on the day they had moved into the country. "The cook has gone away to visit her mother, and you will have to look after the fires."

"Yes, my dear," said Mr. Summersox brightly, without moving his paper.

"The kitchen fire went out while you were at the post office, and I don't understand the draughts on the heater, and----"

"You don't tell me," said Mr. Summersox, putting down his paper, and taking up his rôle of spontaneous joy-maker. In order to square himself with his wife, the world, and his own conscience, he had to see the rosy side of everything.

"The fire is out, you say. Well, well. Now you mustn't think, my dear, I induced you to come out here to live without foreseeing just such little troubles as this. Nothing will please me better than to look after the fires. Fires are one of the few things I know all about. I have lit all kinds of them, from a clay pipe to a political bonfire. Lighting the fires will take me back to my happy youth when I used to light the wood fires every morning. Gee, it fairly makes me shiver to think of some of the mornings I used to get up in, and I didn't wear pyjamas then either. I remember lots of times when I left the kettle boiling on the stove when I went to bed, and got up to find it full of ice. Those were the happy days when I laid the foundations of my constitution. And the stove I used to light was no halter-broke coal stove, with all the modern improvements, but a rip-snorting, bucking high-oven stove, with a back draught that would blow out the kindling, and I never used coal oil to light it, either. Now you just watch me renew my youth with that fire."

"You had better light it now so that it will be ready to turn off when we go to bed."

"Nonsense. I'll lay the fire to-night, and to-morrow morning I'll pop out of bed, touch a match to it, and then rush back between the blankets as I used to when a boy."

"Very well," said Mrs. Summersox with a little sigh.

Taking up a lamp Mr. Summersox went down cellar and broke up a packing box for kindling. Then he returned to the kitchen, and while he slithered off slivers with the carving knife he sang "Old Dan Tucker," for his mind was in the past. Then followed much banging of the stove-lids and rattling of coal, while he laid the fire. When the task was done to his satisfaction he returned to the sitting-room, and took up the tale.

"I tell you this life just makes a new man of me. There is nothing like having to do things for oneself once in a while. It was the self-reliance that I cultivated when a boy in the country that made me get along so well in the city that we are now in a position to retire modestly. You just mark my words, Verbena, when you have been here a year you can't be hired to go back to the city to live."

Mrs. Summersox smothered a sigh, and her husband resumed his paper.

Next morning when the alarm clock went off at six o'clock the thermometer had lost its grip on the higher register. But Mr. Summersox was not to be daunted. Flinging back the blankets with an energy that uncovered his patient wife, he bounded out on the floor as well as the chalky deposits in his joints would allow.

"You'd better put on some clothes or you'll catch your death of cold," said Mrs. Summersox in a tone as crisp as the atmosphere.

"Tut, tut," said Mr. Summersox as he groped his way towards the kitchen. Mrs. Summersox tucked the blankets into the small of her back, and awaited developments. Presently Mr. Summersox called in a restrained voice:

"Where in--in this igloo do you keep the matches?"

"Under the pantry shelf."

"Under which shelf, Bezonian?"

Mr. Summersox rarely paraphrased Shakespeare except under the stress of deep emotion.

"Under the bottom shelf."

There was some stumbling, a gratified grunt as the matches were found, and after a pause a sharp exclamation of pain. Mrs. Summersox didn't need to be told what had happened. In spite of all her protests he would insist on lighting matches on his trousers, and now he had forgotten that all he had on was a thin pair of pyjamas. She stuffed a corner of the blanket in her mouth and began to take an interest in life.

"Did you light this fire last night?" came from the icy kitchen.

"Indeed, I did not," was the reply from the cosy depths of the blankets. The cheerfulness of her tone was not lost on Mr. Summersox.

"Well, it is burned out," he bawled.

"Hadn't you better come back and put on your clothes?" she asked in a choking voice. "Probably there was a live coal in the ashes and it started the fire after we went to bed. Do be sensible and come and put on your clothes."

If the world was one vast storehouse of fur-lined overcoats Mr. Summersox wouldn't have put on another stitch after realising that she was laughing at him. No, by thunder. He would show her. Disdaining to make any reply to her chirpy explanation of the calamity, he went down cellar for more kindling. For a couple of minutes he made a noise like a railroad wreck, and as he returned to the kitchen he was whimpering to himself:

"You needn't tell me! I don't believe C-Cook or P-Peary ever went to the P-Pole. B-r-r-r!"

In the darkness of the parlour bedroom Mrs. Summersox laughed a noiseless laugh. She hadn't had so good a time since she had left the city. She could already see visions of a detached house in Rosedale, with a subdued husband, who was thoroughly cured of his foolish hankering for the country. Meanwhile, the lids banged, paper rustled, and coal rattled. Despite the condition of the temperature Mr. Summersox was evidently working with feverish haste. After a pause, during which he watched the lighted paper flare up and die out, he suddenly yelled in desperation:

"Where do you keep the coal oil?"

"In a wicker-covered carboy in the cellar entrance."

Once more the lids banged and Mr. Summersox splashed the contents of the carboy lavishly over the paper, kindling wood, and coal. Then he struck a match and applied it to the soaked paper. It spluttered once and went out. He lit another match. Same fate. As the last vestiges of his self-control were slipping away he lit a third match. He waited until it was burning brightly and then plunged it into the midst of the paper and kindling. It went out quicker than the others. Then Mr. Summersox lifted up his voice and tore a passion into tatters.

"Confound the greedy, griping, soulless Standard Oil Company anyway. If I didn't want it to light that confounded oil would explode at the sight of the cook's red hair, and here I can't light it with a forced draught. The whole cursed corporation ought to be rooted out and drowned in its own incombustible product. What is the flash point of this condemned coal oil anyway?" Not being a swearing man, Mr. Summersox was greatly handicapped in dealing with so universal a sinner as the Standard Oil. Just as he was going to start on a second outburst his wife called softly:

"Eben, dear. Are you sure you didn't take the carboy of vinegar? It stands beside the coal oil."

"Vinegar, woman? Did you say vinegar?" He sniffed at the fluid, and then his whiskers began to bristle with rage.

"What in blazes do you think I am trying to do? To make a salad? If I didn't have more sense than to put the vinegar beside the coal oil I'd go and run a junk shop, instead of pretending to be a housekeeper."

Mrs. Summersox was altogether too happy to resent the attack. The cosy bed shook with her silent laughter. Meanwhile her husband put fresh paper under the kindling and poured on so much oil to neutralise the vinegar that when he touched a match to it it started with a blaze that singed off his eyebrows. Banging the door shut he started for the parlour bedroom with chattering teeth, and feet so numb with cold that he hobbled rather than ran.

"Turn on the draughts on the heater," shouted his wife.

"It's out!" he snarled as he still approached rapidly like a runaway iceberg on the high seas. Mrs. Summersox was filled with sudden alarm.

"Eben Summersox! Don't you dare to come bouncing into this bed and giving me my death of cold. If you touch me with your cold hands or feet I'll----" But she never told what she would do. With a wild, despairing scramble her husband clawed at the clothes with numb fingers, and then plunged between the blankets like a hunted thing.

"Well, I hope you are satisfied," said Mrs. Summersox tartly. "If this is the way the joys of your youth are going to turn out I should think this would cure you."

"W-what are y-you talking about? The whole trouble is that we tried to bring city conveniences with us to the cu-country. A man needs a course in a technical college before trying to run one of those coal stoves. I am going down town to-day to get a couple of wood stoves, and I'll throw those confounded coal stoves on the scrap heap. The country is all right, but if you are going to live in it and enjoy it you must live as country people do. I am going to root out of this house everything that has to do with city life, and then I can live as a man should."

At this point Mrs. Summersox resumed her air of resignation and sighed deeply. There was silence for a while, and then a knock sounded from the kitchen door. Mr. Summersox blazed with wrath.

"What miserable idiot is knocking at this hour of the morning? He can just knock till he is tired, and then come back at a reasonable hour." The knock sounded again, louder than before. Mr. Summersox sulked. His wife sighed once more and stirred as if about to get up, but was careful not to uncover herself.

"Oh, well, I suppose I must get up and see who it is."

Mr. Summersox threw back the clothes and went to the door intending to work off his wrath on the intruder. When he came back he was almost cheerful.

"It's the cook," he volunteered.

"Well, I am glad she had the kitchen fire lit when she came in out of the cold."

"She hadn't. It went out," snapped Mr. Summersox.

Then silence reigned in the parlour bedroom until the warmth from the newly-lighted heater began to take the chill off the air.

_Dec. 31._--I want to fulfil a promise I made some time ago that I would sum up the results of my experiment at farming before the end of the year and tell frankly what it means to get back to the land. I cannot do that in facts and figures because I have not received the returns for my shipment of apples, and yet I feel that I got enough from it to justify me in saying something. But what I got is not the sort of thing that a man can store in his granary or deposit in a bank. It can be set down only in terms of personal satisfaction with the world we live in. What I am treasuring is chiefly the memory of spacious days, serene hours, and emotions that were not even productive of thought. That seems rather hazy, does it not? And yet it seems everlastingly worth while. After having felt the grip and grind of the world it is something to feel peaceful and secure for a few hours.

And now let us get back to the real advantages of farming and country life. The prevailing idea with many people is that it is monotonous and lonely. It has never struck me in that way, and I take much satisfaction in quoting what Thoreau replied when questioned about the loneliness of his life.

"What sort of space is that which separates a man from his fellows and makes him solitary? I have found that no exertion of the legs can bring two minds much nearer to one another. What do we want most to dwell near to? Not to many men, surely--but to the perennial source of our life, whence in all our experience we have found it to issue, as the willow stands near the water and sends out its roots in that direction. This will vary with different natures, but this is the place where a wise man will dig his cellar."

There are joys surpassing the joys of any success, of good harvests, of fat steers, or anything that most farmers desire and take account of, but these joys cannot be set down in words. I can only ask the poets to suggest them for you. Whitman says in one of those seemingly egotistical passages where he is really voicing the soul of things:

"I will never translate myself at all only to him or her who privately stays with me in the open air."

In the supreme hours of the open life of the country those who are able to feel and see and enjoy reap a harvest that is beyond all sordid dreams. At such times they care little for your trusts and mergers, or for what the future may have in store. And though these days cannot last those who have once enjoyed them feel that they counterbalance all the failures and worries and bitterness of life.

A FARMER'S DEFENCE

The world is full of deeds of praise,
But what is that to me?
I work my fields and do my chores,
Nor care what deeds they be.
Year in, year out, with glare and gold,
The wonder world goes by,
And all my fellows of the fields
As little care as I.

But oh, it seems another world,
Out there where things are done,
Where glories worth a king's desire
We see so bravely won.
But something clutches at my heart
When I would rise and go--
Who wins the most shall lose the most!
The world is ordered so.

The children crowd about my knee
And question till I tell
About the golden wonder world
Where all their heroes dwell.
Their eager voices thrill my heart,
I see their eyes ashine,
And would not change for wonder worlds
This little world of mine.

So unashamed I stand with those
Who do no deeds of praise;
We work our fields and do our chores,
Unhonoured all our days.
We may not set the world on fire,
And yet we do our share!
Without our toil your wonder world
Would hungry go and bare.

INDEX

Agricultural bulletins, 34
Apple blossoms, 124
Apples, 1, 246
Art of pruning, the, 39
Automobile ride, an, 165
Automobiles, 193
Autumn day, an, 290
Autumn evening, an, 294

Back to the land, 162
Balancing accounts, 359
Ballade of apples, a, 244
Ballade of nutting, a, 310
Barn-raising, a, 202
Bee-keeping, 170
Bees, 107, 226
Berry-picking, 232
Birds, the, 46, 185
Burden of labour, the, 222

Catching the driver, 256
Celery, 220
Celery and apples, 26
City farming, 222
Coon hunting, 181
Country from a hammock, the, 210
Country life, 145, 314, 353
Country swindles, 22
Cow's digestion, a, 333
Curing meat, 34, 324
Cutting corn, 262
Cutting the maple, 78

Danged farm, the, 93
December day, a, 336
Digging potatoes, 291
Dog story, a, 159
Ducks, the, 299, 340

Educating Sheppy, 46
Educating the farmer, 28
Exercise for hens, 237
Experiment, an, 73

Facts about Ontario, 45
Fallen tree, a, 1
Fall fairs, 302
Fall rain, a, 311
Fall weather, 255
Fall work, 248
Farmer's defence, a, 360
Farm profits, 152
Farm prospects, 136
Farm work, 141, 214
Fences, 110
Fox-hunt, a, 51

Good neighbours, 47
Good roads, 105
Grasshoppers, 196
Great day, a, 77

Hen, the, 97
High cost of living, the, 177
Hired men, 88
Hiving bees, 173
Hoar frost, 350
Horses, 18
Hunters, 24
Husking corn, 272

Indian fair, an, 283
Indian summer day, an, 328

January thaw, the, 16
Job of draining, a, 147

Landed pride, 43
Lime-sulphur wash, 89
Little pigs, 264
Live horse-hairs, 245
Lonesome calf, the, 305

Maple syrup, 69
Moving the hens, 319
Mudturtle, the, 139
My first stack, 198

Nature's poems, 261
New alarm clock, a, 185

October, 279
Old-fashioned winter, 346
Ontario farms, 104
Orchard, the, 37
Out to grass, 130
Overwork, 120

Packing apples, 297
Picking pears, 276
Picnics, 154
Piece of foolishness, a, 325
Pioneer days, 58
Pioneer spring, a, 58
Pitching oat-sheaves, 230
Planting apple trees, 128
Planting trees, 111
Playing checkers, 12
Potato bugs, 192
Pot herbs, 99

Quail, the, 66

Rabbit hunt, a, 352
Reforestation, 36, 111
Retired farmer, the, 100
Roses, 197
Round-headed bolts, 190
Rural telephones, 32

Sawing wood, 7
Selling farm stock, 206
Signs of fall, 242
Signs of spring, 33
Simple inventions, 87
Skating, 349
Skidding logs, 62
Spraying the orchard, 133
Spring, 108
Spring emotions, 85
Spring frost, 117
Spring rush, a, 112
Spring work, 82
Still morning, a, 31
Stone, the, 233
Strawberry season, the, 169
Sulky ride, a, 250
Sun-dogs, 56
Supply and demand, 14

Thinning apples, 218
Thoughts of cows, 4
Thoughts on Diogenes, 156
Ticklish load, a, 268
Turkeys, the, 317

Value of birds, the, 150
Visiting weasel, a, 169

Winter evening, a, 343
Winter food, 322
Wordsworth on the farm, 125

THE TEMPLE PRESS LETCHWORTH ENGLAND