_Feb. 2._--Since moving to the country I have been greatly impressed by
the spread of education. Those who are set in authority over us seem to
think that education is a remedy for everything. If the farmers are not
prospering the cry goes forth, "Educate them." When the high cost of
living begins to pinch in the cities they trace the whole trouble to the
farmer, and then some one yells, "Educate him!" If the farmer complains
about the exactions of the middlemen, the answer invariably is "Educate
him." No matter what goes wrong, the only solution that occurs to any
one is to "educate the farmer."
Once in a while a reporter representing the press, our modern palladium
of freedom, calls on a canning magnate and tells him in a deferential
tone that the farmers are complaining because he is not paying enough
for tomatoes on the hoof and is charging altogether too much for catsup.
The great man looks at the paragraphical serf with a baleful eye,
scatters some benzoate of soda on a pile of bills, puts them into his
vault and snarls: "The farmer is grumbling, is he? Then ejjercate him."
Another trembling representative of the above-mentioned palladium calls
on a high financier and tells him that the farmers are complaining
because the last issue of watered stock he unloaded on them had typhoid
germs in it.
"Oh, they are, are they?" sneers the plutocrat as he packs a tainted
million in a deposit vault and wipes his hands on his overalls. "Then
why don't you educate them?"
Up to a certain point this attitude is a good thing for the farmer. In
the past he has been woefully lacking in education. But now he is being
educated so thoroughly that almost any farmer I meet is ready to sit
down and have a breezy chat about the way the soil particles are held
together by the water menisci or to discuss intelligently the value of
(PbHAsO_{4}) in destroying codling moths. The farmer is getting his
education all right, and it is a good thing, even though it might be
better adapted to his needs than it is. Moreover, if you would only
increase his opportunities a little he would clamour for more education.
But that is not what is bothering me.
While I sat on a corner of the voluminous report of the Department of
Education meditating on these deep matters in a playful spirit I began
to wonder what would happen if the farmers got to thinking, like every
one else, that education is a national cure-all. If they once get this
into their heads they will want to educate a few other people who are
standing in the way of progress. They will want to start night schools
in Toronto and Montreal to educate a few plutocrats into right ways of
thinking. Does not your imagination kindle at the prospect? The
class-room would be the smoking-room of the Millionaires' Club, and the
little scholars would be sitting around in large, kind-looking
arm-chairs, smoking expensive cigars, toying with slim-necked glasses,
and letting their second chins rest comfortably on the bosoms of their
dress shirts. Unobtrusive imported waiters would be flitting about
noiselessly, taking orders and promoting good cheer. Enter Bill Simmons,
instructor in true economic doctrines. Bill's necktie is climbing over
his collar, but no one dares to smile, for he is carrying a well-oiled
harness tug in his brawny right hand. Hanging the tug suggestively over
the corner of the mahogany desk, he takes his place on the costly
Ispahan rug, thrusts out his chin truculently, and opens the proceedings
with a few well-chosen words. Thus Simmons:
"The House Committee informs me that after last night's session some of
the hollow-stemmed glasses were full of cigarette ashes, and that there
were cigar stubs in the silver-plated champagne-coolers. Now, I want it
distinctly understood that if I catch any dollar-besotted financial
degenerate up to tricks like that I shall dust his swallow-tails so that
he will eat his meals off the onyx mantelpiece for the next week and
then I shall kick him several parasangs down the street. Do you get me?"
(Oh, yes, he would talk like that. You have been educating him, you
know.) "The class in elementary economics will now step forward."
Prompt at the word Sir Philabeg McSporran, Senator Redneck, Mr. Gosh
Whatawad, and a few others step to the edge of the rug, where they stand
with thumbs at the seams of their trousers legs, heels together, and
their toes well apart.
"Now, my pretty ones," says Bill, "if a railroad is built under a
government charter, with the assistance of the public treasury, and is
then presented to the company that built it, to whom should that
railroad finally belong?"
"To me," pipes Sir Philabeg, who is a High Financier and understands how
to manipulate the market.
"Wrong," says our bold bucko from lot 17, seventh concession of Alfalfa
township. "It will belong to the peepul--at least sufficiently so to
justify them in regulating its operations so that it will serve the best
interests of the community. You may go to your seat, Sir Philabeg, and
figure it out, and I will come around with the tug in a few minutes and
see that you have it right."
Then the grim instructor goes on:
"What is a Big Interest?"
"A corporation that contributes liberally to our campaign fund," says
Senator Redneck, with a knowing smile.
"Wrong!" booms Simmons. "The Biggest Interest in this country is farming
and after that comes labour--both engaged in producing the real wealth
of the country. If any one is to get special privileges the farmers are
the ones that should get them. You may go to your seat and figure that
out, and I will see you when I get through with Sir Philabeg."
Again Simmons:
"If a farmer builds a new bank barn and silo, how much should he be
fined in the shape of taxes for showing so much enterprise?"
And so it would go through the whole educative evening.
Of course it is not likely that we shall ever have any educational
developments along the lines suggested, but why not? If education will
cure all the troubles of the farmers, why shouldn't it be tried on a few
other problems? When the promoters of mergers and combines begin to do
things that are against the best interests of the country, why shouldn't
the farmers all yell: "Educate them!" When politicians become
subservient to the powers that prey on the resources of the country, why
shouldn't we all start to "educate them"? It wouldn't be so very hard. A
few well-placed votes at the right time would do wonders in the way of
giving light and leading to those who are making trouble for us. Let the
work of educating the farmers go right on, but I hope the farmers will
soon feel that they have enough and to spare, and that they can devote a
few hours to educating their leaders. "Educate him" is a beautiful cry
for a campaign of education of the right kind, and as there are a lot of
people besides the farmers who need education, I hope that it will soon
swell to a fine chorus. Don't get mad at the people who are bamboozling
you. Just give them a good dose of the medicine they are so fond of
giving you. "Educate them."
_Feb. 4._--Have you ever noticed how the sounds carry on some winter
mornings? One day last week we had a few hours when I felt as if I were
eavesdropping on the whole countryside. The air was very still and
judging from the way the smoke fell to the ground it was very light.
When I went out to do the chores I was struck at once by the clearness
with which I could hear things going on. I could hear the neighbours
talking to their cattle and somewhere about a mile away an angry man was
reasoning with an impenitent pig. I could hear what he said to the pig
and what the pig said to him, and judging by what the pig said I think
the man must have kicked him while pouring swill into the trough. Every
sound started an echo that went bounding over the fields. I could hear a
train moving on the Michigan Central Railroad twelve miles away and
almost imagined I could hear the people in the town three miles off
frying their breakfast bacon and grumbling about the high cost of
living. I understand that the carrying quality of the air is due to its
being thin or rarefied. According to the papers some inventor has
increased the power of the telephone by having the air in the receiver
warmed by some new device. The principle on which he works is probably
the same as prevailed on this particular morning. The ease with which
sounds carried was due to the condition of the atmosphere and that
reminds me that at other times the air must be very heavy and dead.
Anyway, I know that there are days when I cannot make a boy in the next
room hear that the wood-box is empty even when I yell at the top of my
voice. Now that must be due to the condition of the atmosphere, and I
have noticed that the best way to overcome the difficulty is to warm
things up.
_Feb. 7._--There seems to be something wrong about Mr. Glendinning's
criticism of telephone and rural free delivery at the recent meeting of
the Grange. It seems like flying in the face of progress at a time when
every one is insisting that we might as well be dead as unprogressive. I
have avoided the telephone myself, chiefly because I got tired of it in
the city and did not want any one to call me up to talk things over
unless I wanted to talk. I have always sympathised with the British in
their attitude to the telephone. The best families may have one in the
kitchen for ordering supplies, but they refuse to be disturbed by it
themselves. When a Britisher goes to his home he wants it distinctly
understood that his home is his castle, and when he takes up the
drawbridge and lets down the portcullis no one can intrude on him
without his permission. I have a very distinct recollection of having an
interview with an English business man, and while we were talking the
telephone bell on his desk began ringing. Instead of stopping to hear
what was wanted he reached out and took the receiver from the hook and
placed it on his desk so as to stop the ringing. He would not allow any
one to reach him by the telephone any more than he would by letting them
enter through the door of his office while he was keeping an engagement.
As a contrast to this I remember an advertising man in New York telling
me with much glee of being refused admission to a business man and
instead of being discouraged he went to the nearest telephone booth,
called the man up, submitted his proposition, and got his order. We
people of the new world lack the necessary poise to use the telephone
properly. When the bell rings we are consumed with curiosity until we
know who is speaking and what is wanted. If we could learn the British
method of using the telephone only when we need it, instead of using it
for gossiping and all kinds of nonsense, and instead of being slaves to
its constant ringing, there would be no good ground for objecting to it.
There are still a few things that we can learn from the people in the
Old Country.
_Feb. 9._--What are signs of spring, anyway? when I was out doing the
chores this morning the thermometer stood at ten below zero and yet
there was a feeling of Spring in the air. The sky and the sunshine had a
look of spring and the sparrows were all chirping as if they were
talking of the good times coming. There was a hen cackling over a
new-laid egg that would be worth its weight in silver on the table of a
Toronto millionaire, and about a dozen Leghorns had found their voices
again and were making a feeble attempt to scratch in a forkful of straw
that lay in the sunshine. And yet, as I have just said, it was ten below
zero. When I got up to shake down the coal-stove about seven o'clock it
was eighteen below. A little while later when the sun was peeping over
the horizon I looked again, and after scratching away the hoarfrost that
was settling on everything I found the mercury standing at twenty below.
But, of course, the air was so dry I didn't mind it. Still, I didn't
stand before the thermometer to think things over. I preferred standing
as close to the stove as I could get. It did not seem much like spring
just then. Come to think of it, I guess the signs of spring vary
considerably. I remember years ago that a man who had moved to Dakota
wrote home saying that it was beginning to look like spring out there.
He said that the snow was already down to the tops of the windows.
_Feb. 11._--I have fully made up my mind that another winter will not
catch me so unprepared as this one did. Early in the fall I shall get
all my agricultural reports and farm bulletins warmly pitted, so that
when I want a basketful of them to help spend the long winter evenings I
shall know where to get them. Now when I go to look one up it usually
cannot be found, or if it is to be found it is badly frostbitten and
weather-beaten. Besides, when they are lying about loose they are in
danger of being used for all sorts of things. The other day I wanted to
read up on the question of early potatoes, but the pages of the
Vegetable-growers' Report were missing. When I finally tracked them down
I found that I would have to stand on my head to read them where they
had been pasted upside down over a knothole in a shed. The bulletin on
Alfalfa is missing too. I remember sitting on the fence reading it one
day last fall, and in all probability I left it there while I went to do
something else. Of course I intended to pick it up on my way back to the
house. We all intend to do things like that, but somehow we seldom do.
When I find it next spring it will probably be after a cow has stepped
on it. It is a shame to do things in this way, for those bulletins are
really valuable. I would feel worse about it, only I know that a lot of
good farmers are just as careless about such things as I am.
_Feb. 14._--When I read the articles in the papers telling about the
high cost of living I am moved to ask why thrifty housekeepers do not
buy their supplies in the old-fashioned way and get along without paying
the charges and profits of the packers and retailers. Last fall I bought
a dressed hog, hunted up a good recipe for curing bacon, ham, and salt
pork, and proceeded to prepare the winter supply. I also got a chart
showing just how a pig should be cut up for curing, and followed all the
directions carefully. By devoting a few hours to the job the winter pork
was laid in at a cost of nine cents a pound. The only objection to this
method was that the meat was so much better than the kind we had been
buying at the stores for from twenty-three to twenty-seven cents a pound
that we ate more of it. Encouraged by this experiment, I bought half of
a fat heifer--like the man in the old joke we "killed half a cow"--and
proceeded to cure the meat according to good recipes. As in the case of
the pork, I got plans and specifications for cutting the beef, and
followed the blue-print carefully. The beef is turning out as
successfully as the pork, and the cost was nine cents a pound for the
forequarter and ten cents a pound for the hindquarter. In this weather
the roasts and steaks keep without curing of any kind, and besides a
supply of corned beef and soup joints there was plenty of material for
mincemeat and the old-fashioned "forcemeat" that could be found in any
farmhouse in the days when people cured their own meat. This is a luxury
I have looked for in vain in even the best restaurants. It is made by
chopping together fresh beef and suet, moulding it in little cakes, and
putting it away to set. This sounds as if it were a kind of Hamburg
steak, but it is not. It has a flavour entirely its own. I imagine it is
more like pemmican than anything else. And I mustn't forget the piece
that is being spiced and dried. It seems to be coming on fine, and I
have no doubt it will be just as good as the kind they charge thirty
cents a pound for in the stores. I know all this sounds very
carnivorous, but I don't care. I am not a believer in vegetarianism. I
cannot forget that Cain was the first vegetarian on record, and we all
know how bloodthirsty he got from living on fruits and salads. And the
moral of it all is that the cost of living would not be so high if
people did not turn over to the butchers and bakers and canners the work
of curing and preparing their foodstuffs.
_Feb. 16._--I see that there is much being written about the
advisability of giving "demonstrations" of proper beef-raising in
various parts of the country so that the farmers may be induced to raise
better stock. If the men who have this in mind will also arrange to give
"demonstrations" of how to sell the finished product at a reasonable
profit they may be able to accomplish something worth while.
_Feb. 17._--Now is the time to think about reforestation. If you are
thinking of planting in the woodlot now is the time to apply to the
Department of Forestry for trees. I understand it is a case of first
come first served, and you cannot get your order in too early. Of the
thousand and eighty trees I planted last spring about eight hundred
survived the heat and drouth of last summer. That is sufficiently
encouraging to make me apply for twice the number of trees this spring,
so as to finish the job of reforestation that I set out to do. The
conditions last summer were greatly against the little trees, and yet
the result was satisfactory. Above all things, I wish to impress on
those who undertake work of this kind the necessity of following to the
letter the instructions given by the department. They seem to be about
perfect. The way in which the sod is turned up and left beside the tree
not only keeps down the weeds and grass, but I noticed in the fall that
the hole made by lifting the sod filled in with leaves, and in that way
gave the trees a perfect mulching for the winter. I expect to find them
all looking fine and hearty when the snow melts in the spring.
_Feb. 18._--Well, the farming operations for this year have commenced in
earnest. With the Ontario Government acting as my hired man, I propose
to do a few things this summer--and to tell all about them. If we
succeed we will try to be modest and if we fail we will be frank. What
says the poet?
"'Tis not in mortals to command success;
But we'll do more, Sir James: we'll deserve it."
This is how it happened: When I undertook to handle a farm by myself I
was immediately confronted by the problem of labour. How was I to get a
good, capable hired man to help me with my work? Not being able to
solve the problem to my own satisfaction, I wrote to Mr. C. C. James,
Commissioner of Agriculture, and put the matter up to him somewhat as
follows:--
"From what I have been reading in your bulletins and reports I see
no excuse for the man who has a good farm and some capital if he
keeps on working in an unprofitable way. That is all very well as
far as it goes, but there are thousands of people like myself whom
it does not touch. Now, I want to know just what you can do for a
man who is trying to farm without capital and with a lame horse
that is blind in one eye."
This led to some correspondence, and I told him about the orchard on the
place. There are over fifty mature trees of standard varieties that have
been yielding occasional crops of fairly good but very wormy apples. Mr.
James promptly rose to the occasion and agreed to send an expert to show
me how to handle that orchard. This morning Mr. F. M. Clement, B.S.A.,
representative of the Ontario Department of Agriculture in Elgin county,
came and pruned a tree for me and told just what he will do to get
results from that orchard. He outlined his part of the work and my part,
and we are going ahead. Just watch us.
Before telling of the interesting day I had with Mr. Clement I want to
give some idea of the trouble many good people thought I was making for
myself.
"You'll just find that you will have to work in that orchard all summer
if you try to handle it according to the instructions of the Department
of Agriculture. They'll make you scrape the trees and whitewash them and
prune them and spray them three or four times and fertilise the land and
work it every day. There will be no end to the fussing you will have to
do."
That was the way they talked, but I just laid back my ears and looked
stubborn. I made up my mind I would carry out all instructions, even if
I had to work every day and then sit up every night with those trees.
They told me that the scraping alone would take me at least three weeks
of steady work on trees like those. I would find that those Spies and
Baldwins were
"Wild and woolly and full of fleas;
And had never been curried below the knees."
Nevertheless I was willing to curry them carefully, and even to go over
them with a manicure set if that were necessary. And now my courage has
been rewarded. Mr. Clement showed me how to curry an untamed tree, and
estimated that I should be able to go over the whole orchard in two days
at the outside. The pruning will take about a week. Then I shall have to
devote about a day a week to the orchard for a couple of months. Mr.
Clement and his assistant will do the spraying themselves to make sure
that it is done right. That doesn't look as if I would not have any time
left for anything else. Of course there is no knowing whether the work
will pay or not. Unless there are plenty of fruit buds that have not
been killed by the severe frosts there will be no crop. We shall have to
wait until blossoming time to see what the prospects really are. In the
meantime we shall do the necessary work of pruning, scraping, and the
first spraying.
During the day Mr. Clement rid me of a few popular delusions. Ever since
I can remember I have heard that an orchard will bear only every other
year. It seems that this is true only of neglected orchards. Apple trees
can be made by proper treatment to yield a decent crop every year. And
yet I am not sure that I am rid of this bugbear of orcharding. This
orchard has been neglected and it is just possible that this will be the
off year. If the fruit buds are not on the trees all the expert work in
the world will not make them bear apples. We made a hasty examination of
a couple of trees and found some fruit buds, but not enough to make me
see rosy visions of big profits. When I go at the pruning I shall
examine more carefully, but in any case the treatment that will be given
to the trees should insure a good crop next year. That seems to be the
way with a whole lot of things on a farm. In order to get results you
should have started working last year. I always seem to get started a
year too late, but now that I have the Ontario Government shedding
wisdom upon me I hope to do better. By the way, there was one thing that
I forgot to ask Mr. Clement. I had been warned not to prune the trees
during the full of the moon because at that time the bark is loose and
the trees would be injured. But as Mr. Clement came on the second day of
the new moon I presume he had this in mind. A man who has studied the
question of orcharding as thoroughly as he has and has won so high a
reputation for good work would never overlook so important a point.
From the above paragraphs you may get an impression that we are having
spring weather out in the country. Well, it has been pretty decent for a
few days, but at the time of writing the blizzard of the season is
raging. Although it was quite mild on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, and
this morning was still temperate enough for us to prune trees, we are
having a snowstorm-driven gale from the north-east that is piling such
drifts as we have not seen for many a day.
_Feb. 19._--I have to thank F. M. Clement, B.S.A., for a kindness he had
no thought of doing me. By a chance question he recast all my ideas of
farm work. He flung two words at me over his shoulder, and instantly my
ideas shifted, like the bits of coloured glass in a kaleidoscope when
you shake the tube. He came over from Dutton yesterday to show me how to
handle that orchard I have been talking about, and, to begin with, he
pruned a tree. While at work, he explained just why he removed one
branch and spared another, and told me just what I should have in mind
when pruning a tree. Of this part of my experience I shall have nothing
to say, for you can get such instructions as he gave in the bulletins or
in _The Farmer's Advocate_. From time to time I asked questions, and
tried to figure out just how much hard work I would have to do to get
results. I was also figuring how much of the work I could get out of
doing without being caught. But he finally completed his task, so that
every branch was swinging free and open to the sunlight. Then he climbed
down and looked at his work. I was standing behind him. Suddenly he
asked, with a backward turn of his head:
"How's that?"
There you have the question that startled me. Simple enough, isn't it?
There doesn't seem to be much to it, but wait.
It has been my privilege to stand beside a great artist while he drew
aside the curtain from his picture, and then to have him fling the same
question at me:
"How's that?"
It has also been my privilege to have poets whom the world acclaims as
great, recite their poems to me, and then ask:
"How's that?"
To have the same question flung at me in the orchard was something of a
shock. The manner and the tone were the same. I realised that once more
I had been asked to pass on something in which a man had expressed
himself. The chance question suddenly elevated work to a form of
self-expression worthy to rank with the great arts. Ever since I have
been able to see possibilities in work--mere work. It is something that
a man can engage in as a man, and not simply as a drudge.
"How's that?"
Now the cat is out of the bag. I have let you see that I do not like
physical work, and never have. But I am neither humiliated nor ashamed.
Why should I like work? I have seen it in almost all its forms, and have
practised it in a few. Almost everywhere it is slavish and sordid. I
have seen it in the sweat-shops of the big cities, in the factories of
the New England States, the mills of the south, and of England, and on
the Canadian farms. Always it was wearing, soul-stifling, degrading.
Men, women, and children--little children--were being ground to
extinction by work. They became old before their time, broken-spirited,
deformed. Work is a hideous monster, demanding all we can give of youth
and strength and vitality, and giving in return only a starved and
meagre living. Seeing work in this way, I learned to hate it. It has
"the primal, eldest curse on it." It is slavery of the cruellest kind,
and makes slaves of men even where they are their own masters. Do you
wonder that I turned to the arts? The arts are joyous, exultant. They
enable a man to express himself, and we all hunger for self-expression.
The greatest tragedy in the world is to be misunderstood, and we are all
misunderstood. The artist makes himself understood--at least, to a
select few--but the worker usually dies
"With all his sweetness in him."
But here was a worker who expressed himself by an ordinary piece of farm
work. He had laid creative hands on a tree, and it would take form as a
picture might under the brush of an artist, or a song on the lips of a
poet. He had put into it his conception of what it should be. In that
way he gave expression to his own soul, and was willing that the world
should look and see. He had enjoyed the task because he had a definite
purpose and knew just what he was doing. He got the effect he was after,
just as an artist might when working under the stimulus of an urgent
inspiration. I looked with new-found admiration, and now the tree has a
new meaning to me. I feel that he has revealed to me something of
himself, just as did the artists and the poets.
How's that?
Since getting this little flash of light, farm work has looked very
good. Farming is a great art, and the artist works with life, rather
than with pigments or words. He gets his effects by working in accord
with Nature. Surely that is greater than merely imitating Nature, or
describing it. And, though I look at farming in this way, I do not
regard it any the less as a science or as a money-making proposition. In
fact, it should be all the more scientific and profitable by making it
artistic. The art puts the joy into it and elevates it above mere
drudgery. Mark Twain said that "Play is work that a man enjoys," and I
see no reason why many kinds of farm work should not have the charm of
play. If we could only go at it in that way, we would accomplish more,
and life would be more worth living.
Of course, I quite realise that I am only a beginner at real farming,
and that I should remember the text: "Let not him that girdeth on his
harness boast himself as he that putteth it off." There is a job of
ditching to do that it will be hard to make joyous, but never mind. I
have at least seen that farm work can be made fine and ennobling,
instead of being a sordid drudgery, and that is worth while, even though
I may have to write a poem to express what I mean, instead of
cultivating a field so that it will tell what I want to say as clearly
as would the verses. I know that a true farmer who was master of the
possibilities of the art he practises could do it, and for that reason I
shall have a higher respect for farming. I may not be able to do it
myself, but my failure will not prove that I am wrong. It will only
prove that I cannot do the work as it should be done. Perhaps I have
been hating work too long to take it in the right spirit, even after I
have discovered its possibilities. But knowing what I do, I shall in
future have nothing but pity for the man who can make of farm work
nothing better than a dreary round of grinding work, and I am afraid I
shall have little respect for the young man who starts at the present
time if he develops into a slave. He has a chance that his father never
had to make his life worth while. In the meantime, I am going at farm
work with the feeling that it is a great art, in which a man can find
enjoyment and self-expression, and if I find that I am wrong, I shall
not be afraid to tell you so and to shoulder the blame. But if I find
that there is both joy and profit in it, I shall certainly have my
proper laugh at you who think that my fancies are absurd. I have much to
get even for, and I shall not fail to rub it in if I get a chance.
_Feb. 21._--George Grossmith has a story that never fails to delight his
audiences--in England. He tells, with affected sympathy, of a
conversation he once had with an American lady who had seen better days.
"We had everything the heart could wish for," she told him, "until my
husband was caught in the panic of '93. His business went to smash in a
day. It took every cent we had to satisfy the creditors; but what hurt
me the most was that we had to give up the old family mansion." Here she
heaved a desolating sigh. "Yes, we had to give up the family mansion. It
had been in the family for twelve years."
If you once heard an old British audience laugh at that you would never
again doubt that the good people at the seat of empire have a sense of
humour. To the solid citizen who can trace back the ownership of his
home to some follower of William the Conqueror, who slew the original
Saxon owner on the threshold so as to clear the title, all new world
pretensions to pride of ancestry and estate are wildly funny. Yet a word
may be said in all seriousness in defence of landed pride here in
Canada.
No one who has made a study of the pioneers of Ontario can doubt for a
moment the inspiration of their toil. They wanted homes. They knew, as
generations before them knew, what it meant to be tenants--subject to
the whims and oppressions of landlords or their agents. They wanted
homes that would be their own, and that would be inherited by their
descendants. Their first aim was to secure shelter, food, and clothing
for their families. Money-making was not only a secondary matter, but,
in most cases, was out of the question. Until the railroads came there
were no means of transportation and no markets. What the new clearings
produced beyond the needs of the settlers was used to barter for
necessities, or was given in payment for labour that cleared more land.
In fact, some of the pioneers were as land-hungry as the farmer
described by Henry Ward Beecher. His sole purpose in life was to "raise
more hogs, to make more money, to buy more land, to raise more hogs, to
make more money, to buy more land, to raise more hogs," etc.
An evidence of the home-making purpose of all this toil is the nature of
the wills made by the pioneers. In almost every case they left to their
descendants tracts of land, rather than money, even though, in many
instances, their farms had to be divided into small sections to attain
their end. One of the earliest recollections of the writer is hearing
some of the old pioneers regretting that it was no longer possible to
entail their land so that it would always remain in the family.
How the work of the pioneers went astray is shown by an examination of
the present ownership of the land. An inquiry into the history of fifty
farms in one district brought out the fact that only eight are owned by
descendants of the original settlers. The children raised on these farms
have scattered to every part of the earth and their heritage has passed
into the hands of strangers. If an old-home-week could bring back all
who are living, there would be a notable gathering of lawyers, doctors,
merchants, business men, and at least two multi-millionaires; but if the
sturdy old home-makers could rise from the graveyard where they lie with
their feet to the east, it is doubtful if they would be as cordial to
those who sold their birthright, even to advantage, as they would be to
those who clung to the land and cherished the name and memory of their
forefathers. It is among the latter that one finds the pride of home
that makes patriots. Their land means more to them than a source of
profit. They know the history of every field, the kind of timber that
was on it, and the toil with which it was cleared. They know where the
deer runs were, and the beaver dams, and the knolls where the Indians
used to camp. There is not an acre but has its little tradition, and
they are bound to it all by the sentiments that unite to make a national
sentiment. They are not able to trace back their titles to a Domesday
Book. But what of it? Their homes have been in their families since they
were homes, and perhaps ten generations hence that will be as much a
source of pride as if they had been the spoils of warlike conquest.
_Feb. 22._--After spending a couple of hours reading bulletins of the
Department of Agriculture I felt the need of some light reading, and
picked up Mr. Frank Yeigh's little encyclopædia of _Five Thousand Facts
About Canada_. This is a book that deserves the comment that a
Scotchman made on the dictionary: "It has bonny tales, but they're unco
short." Here is one of the little tales that fairly staggered me:
"Ontario ranks higher than any other province in field crops, being
nearly forty per cent. of the whole, fairly double that of the next
important, and greater than the three grain-growing provinces of the
North-west combined."
Now, what do you think of that? I thought that, when compared with the
clamorous west, we were raising only chicken-feed, and hardly enough of
that. Here are a few more little tales that should be framed in every
house in Ontario, and that all the school children should be forced to
commit to memory:
"The value of agricultural produce has increased 60 per cent. during
fifteen years.
"Three-quarters of the dairy produce of Canada comes from Ontario.
"The province produces 75 per cent. of all fruits grown in Canada, 60
per cent. of the plums, 70 per cent. of the apples, 80 per cent. of the
small fruits and pears, and 99 per cent. of the peaches and grapes."
We should find out where that other peach tree and grape vine are and
buy them up so that we could claim the whole 100 per cent. On top of all
this we get these two amazing statements:
"There are about twenty million acres of good arable land left for
settlement south of the 50th parallel of latitude.
"Ontario received in 1909-10, 46 out of every 129 of the total
immigration into Canada."
As the total immigration for 1910 was 325,000, one cannot be blamed for
asking why Ontario did not get more settlers. This province seems to be
badly in need of a press agent. And why, in the name of all that is
sensible, should any one want to leave Ontario when it offers such
opportunities? If they must wander, why not wander about in Ontario? Let
the people who are now having their sale bills printed and putting
"owner removing to the west" at the bottom give some thought to these
facts before it is too late.
_Feb. 24._--I have received so many inquiries about the education of
Sheppy the collie that it seems time to report progress, although there
has been very little. Sheppy is willing to go to the barnyard without
being dragged by a rope. He has even gone so far as to drive one cow
across the yard, but it's seldom long before he remembers something and
bolts back to the house. I am beginning to wonder if this is not a case
where corporal punishment would be justified. Moral suasion seems to
have no effect. And every day he is developing so much steam that he is
in danger of getting into trouble unless he finds some useful outlet for
his energies. Every day he has an outburst that would raise the
countryside if these were the dog-days. He will start running wildly
around the house, barking, with his head down, snapping at posts and
trees, and he will keep up the performance for several minutes. Then he
will stop as suddenly as he started and come up to any one who has been
watching, evidently wanting to be petted and praised for his
performance. Some people might think he was going mad, but I am
convinced that his case should be diagnosed as Mr. Bumble diagnosed that
of Oliver Twist. "It's meat." He is living too high and is in need of
work. He is becoming quite expert at catching mice in the fields, but
that is hardly the proper occupation for a dog with a pedigree. I know
he should be trained to look after the children like those dogs we
sometimes read about, but he gets altogether too much fun out of pulling
off their caps and mits and running away with them to be allowed any
position of responsibility. Oh, well, he'll grow old and be a serious
dog quite soon enough. I guess I'll let him enjoy himself while he can.
It is really worth while having one bit of irresponsible joyousness
frolicking about the place. No one can look at Sheppy without accepting
his invitations to have a play with him, and that of itself justifies
his existence.
_Feb. 25._--The quail seem to be wintering in good shape.
Yesterday a flock of over a dozen was seen, and when we were tapping a
few trees in the sugar bush I saw tracks in the mud where it had been
thawed by the heat of the sun. Although the quail here did not come up
for their feed regularly, they always came after storms, and they had
good old-fashioned shelter in the shape of brush heaps. I know where
there are two more flocks in the neighbourhood that have been getting
their feed regularly every day for months. The prospects are that we
shall have plenty of quail this year. I am afraid the doves and
meadow-larks have been killed by the storms. I never see them in the
fields any more, and a short time ago Sheppy was seen playing with a
dead meadow-lark. The crows have been with us most of the winter, though
they kept very quiet. On the fine day when we tapped one was perched in
the topmost branch of a "stag-topped" maple, and his tones were
positively argumentative. I don't know whether he was trying to tell us
that spring is at hand or was trying to tell us that we were rushing the
season. Anyway he seemed very much in earnest. Outside of the crows, a
few blue jays, and the sparrows, the country is wholly without
bird-life. The snowbirds have disappeared, and so have the hawks that
were hovering around most of the winter. I think I saw a grosbeak a few
days ago, but I am not sure. Nevertheless the time has come when every
one should be spouting Roberts' lines:
"Hark, the migrant hosts of June,
Marching nearer, noon by noon!"
The spring and the birds will soon be with us again, and I am glad of
it. I am perfectly willing to confess that I am thoroughly tired of this
long winter.
_Feb. 26._--Land of Good Neighbours! How will that do as a descriptive
title for Canada? We have heard much of the "Land o' Cakes" and
something overmuch of the "Land of the Free and Home of the Brave." Why
should we not have a title of our own that is at once descriptive and
true? Canada is, above everything else, a land of good neighbours. If
the pioneers had not been good neighbours the country would never have
been settled and cleared. The almost superhuman work of clearing away
the forests was not done by individuals, but by neighbourhoods. Every
field was the scene of a logging bee, where good neighbours helped to
roll the logs into heaps for the burning. No man could do such work
unaided, so all worked together. Not only did this accomplish needed
work, but it led to much social intercourse, mutual helpfulness, and
enduring friendships. No one who has burrowed in the history of pioneer
days or listened to the stories of the few and scattered survivors can
help being struck by the neighbourly spirit that evidently existed
everywhere. Was any one sick, the neighbours gathered and put in his
crops for him or reaped it, as the case might be. Was a newcomer in need
of seed grain, a neighbour would lend it and wait till harvest for his
pay. Before the introduction of labour-saving machinery practically all
heavy work was done by bees. They had logging bees, reaping bees,
threshing bees, sewing bees, spinning bees, quilting bees, and bees for
every kind of work. Both the men and the women helped one another in
this way. Circumstances forced the pioneers to be good neighbours, and
the results they achieved showed that they did their duty by one
another.
"What men they were--the pioneers!
So stout of heart--and able!
They bore themselves like men of might
At work--and at the table!
They chopped and burned--and cheered their souls
With many a deep potation!
They bore themselves by day and night
Like builders of a nation.