OUR LOGGING-BEE
There was a man in our town,
In our town, in our town--
There was a man in our town,
He made a logging-bee;
And he bought lots of whiskey,
To make the loggers frisky--
To make the loggers frisky
At his logging-bee.
The Devil sat on a log heap,
A log heap, a log heap--
A red hot burning log heap--
A-grinning at the bee;
And there was lots of swearing,
Of boasting and of daring,
Of fighting and of tearing,
At that logging bee.
J.W.D.M.
A logging-bee followed the burning of the fallow, as a matter of
course. In the bush, where hands are few, and labour commands
an enormous rate of wages, these gatherings are considered
indispensable, and much has been written in their praise; but to
me, they present the most disgusting picture of a bush life. They
are noisy, riotous, drunken meetings, often terminating in violent
quarrels, sometimes even in bloodshed. Accidents of the most
serious nature often occur, and very little work is done when we
consider the number of hands employed, and the great consumption
of food and liquor.
I am certain, in our case, had we hired with the money expended in
providing for the bee, two or three industrious, hard-working men,
we should have got through twice as much work, and have had it done
well, and have been the gainers in the end.
People in the woods have a craze for giving and going to bees,
and run to them with as much eagerness as a peasant runs to a
race-course or a fair; plenty of strong drink and excitement
making the chief attraction of a bee.
In raising a house or barn, a bee may be looked upon as a necessary
evil, but these gatherings are generally conducted in a more orderly
manner than those for logging. Fewer hands are required; and they
are generally under the control of the carpenter who puts up the
frame, and if they get drunk during the raising they are liable to
meet with very serious accidents.
Thirty-two men, gentle and simple, were invited to our bee, and the
maid and I were engaged for two days preceding the important one,
in baking and cooking for the entertainment of our guests. When I
looked at the quantity of food we had prepared, I thought it could
never be all eaten, even by thirty-two men. It was a burning hot day
towards the end of July, when our loggers began to come in, and the
“gee!” and “ha!” to encourage the oxen resounded on every side.
There was my brother S----, with his frank English face, a host in
himself; Lieutenant ---- in his blouse, wide white trousers, and red
sash, his broad straw hat shading a dark manly face that would have
been a splendid property for a bandit chief; the four gay, reckless,
idle sons of ----, famous at any spree, but incapable of the least
mental or physical exertion, who considered hunting and fishing as
the sole aim and object of life. These young men rendered very
little assistance themselves, and their example deterred others
who were inclined to work.
There were the two R----s, who came to work and to make others work;
my good brother-in-law, who had volunteered to be the Grog Boss,
and a host of other settlers, among whom I recognised Moodie's old
acquaintance, Dan Simpson, with his lank red hair and freckled face;
the Youngs, the hunters, with their round, black, curly heads and
rich Irish brogue; poor C---- with his long, spare, consumptive
figure, and thin sickly face. Poor fellow, he has long since been
gathered to his rest!
There was the ruffian squatter P----, from Clear Lake,--the dread
of all honest men; the brutal M----, who treated oxen as if they
had been logs, by beating them with handspikes; and there was Old
Wittals, with his low forehead and long nose, a living witness of
the truth of phrenology, if his large organ of acquisitiveness and
his want of consciousness could be taken in evidence. Yet in spite
of his derelictions from honesty, he was a hard-working,
good-natured man, who, if he cheated you in a bargain, or took away
some useful article in mistake from your homestead, never wronged
his employer in his day's work.
He was a curious sample of cunning and simplicity--quite a character
in his way--and the largest eater I ever chanced to know. From this
ravenous propensity, for he eat his food like a famished wolf, he
had obtained his singular name of “Wittals.”
During the first year of his settlement in the bush, with a very
large family to provide for, he had been often in want of food.
One day he came to my brother, with a very long face.
“Mr. S---- I'm no beggar, but I'd be obliged to you for a loaf of
bread. I declare to you on my honour that I have not had a bit of
wittals to dewour for two whole days.”
He came to the right person with his petition. Mr. S---- with a
liberal hand relieved his wants, but he entailed upon him the name
of “Old Wittals,” as part payment.
His daughter, who was a very pretty girl, had stolen a march upon
him into the wood, with a lad whom he by no means regarded with a
favourable eye. When she returned, the old man confronted her and
her lover with this threat, which I suppose he considered “the most
awful” punishment that he could devise.
“March into the house, Madam 'Ria (Maria); and if ever I catch you
with that scamp again, I'll tie you up to a stump all day, and give
you no wittals.”
I was greatly amused by overhearing a dialogue between Old Wittals
and one of his youngest sons, a sharp, Yankeefied-looking boy, who
had lost one of his eyes, but the remaining orb looked as if it
could see all ways at once.
“I say, Sol, how came you to tell that tarnation tearing lie to Mr.
S---- yesterday? Didn't you expect that you'd catch a good wallopping
for the like of that? Lying may be excusable in a man, but 'tis a
terrible bad habit for a boy.”
“Lor', father, that worn't a lie. I told Mr. S---- our cow worn't in
his peas. Nor more she wor; she was in his wheat.”
“But she was in the peas all night, boy.”
“That wor nothing to me; she worn't in just then. Sure I won't get a
licking for that?”
“No, no, you are a good boy; but mind what I tell you, and don't
bring me into a scrape with any of your real lies.”
Prevarication, the worst of falsehoods, was a virtue in his eyes.
So much for the old man's morality.
Monaghan was in his glory, prepared to work or fight, whichever
should come uppermost; and there was old Thomas and his sons, the
contractors for the clearing, to expedite whose movements the bee
was called. Old Thomas was a very ambitious man in his way. Though
he did not know A from B, he took into his head that he had received
a call from Heaven to convert the heathen in the wilderness; and
every Sunday he held a meeting in our loggers' shanty, for the
purpose of awakening sinners, and bringing over “Injun pagans” to
the true faith. His method of accomplishing this object was very
ingenious. He got his wife, Peggy--or “my Paggy,” as he called
her--to read aloud to him a text from the Bible, until he knew it
by heart; and he had, as he said truly, “a good remembrancer,” and
never heard a striking sermon but he retained the most important
passages, and retailed them secondhand to his bush audience.
I must say that I was not a little surprised at the old man's
eloquence when I went one Sunday over to the shanty to hear him
preach. Several wild young fellows had come on purpose to make fun
of him; but his discourse, which was upon the text “We shall all
meet before the judgment-seat of Christ,” was rather too serious a
subject to turn into a jest, with even old Thomas for the preacher.
All went on very well until the old man gave out a hymn, and led
off in such a loud, discordant voice, that my little Katie, who was
standing between her father's knees, looked suddenly up, and said,
“Mamma, what a noise old Thomas makes.” This remark led to a much
greater noise, and the young men, unable to restrain their
long-suppressed laughter, ran tumultuously from the shanty.
I could have whipped the little elf; but small blame could be
attached to a child of two years old, who had never heard a
preacher, especially such a preacher as the old backwoodsman, in
her life. Poor man! He was perfectly unconscious of the cause of
the disturbance, and remarked to us, after the service was over,
“Well, ma'am, did we not get on famously? Now, worn't that a
_bootiful_ discourse?”
“It was, indeed; much better than I expected.”
“Yes, yes; I knew it would please you. It had quite an effect on
those wild fellows. A few more such sermons will teach them good
behaviour. Ah, the bush is a bad place for young men. The farther in
the bush, say I, the farther from God, and the nearer to hell. I
told that wicked Captain L---- of Dummer so the other Sunday; 'an','
says he, 'if you don't hold your confounded jaw, you old fool, I'll
kick you there.' Now ma'am--now, sir, was not that bad manners in a
gentleman, to use such appropriate epitaphs to a humble servant of
God, like I?”
And thus the old man ran on for an hour, dilating upon his own
merits and the sins of his neighbors.
There was John R----, from Smith-town, the most notorious swearer in
the district; a man who esteemed himself clever, nor did he want
for natural talent, but he had converted his mouth into such a sink
of iniquity that it corrupted the whole man, and all the weak and
thoughtless of his own sex who admitted him into their company. I
had tried to convince John R---- (for he often frequented the house
under the pretence of borrowing books) of the great crime that he
was constantly committing, and of the injurious effect it must
produce upon his own family, but the mental disease had taken too
deep a root to be so easily cured. Like a person labouring under
some foul disease, he contaminated all he touched. Such men seem to
make an ambitious display of their bad habits in such scenes, and if
they afford a little help, they are sure to get intoxicated and make
a row. There was my friend, old Ned Dunn, who had been so anxious to
get us out of the burning fallow. There was a whole group of Dummer
Pines: Levi, the little wiry, witty poacher; Cornish Bill, the
honest-hearted old peasant, with his stalwart figure and uncouth
dialect; and David, and Nedall good men and true; and Malachi
Chroak, a queer, withered-up, monkey-man, that seemed like some
mischievous elf, flitting from heap to heap to make work and fun
for the rest; and many others were at that bee who have since found
a rest in the wilderness: Adam T----, H----, J. M----, H. N----.
These, at different times, lost their lives in those bright waters
in which, on such occasions as these, they used to sport and frolic
to refresh themselves during the noonday heat. Alas! how many, who
were then young and in their prime, that river and its lakes have
swept away!
Our men worked well until dinner-time, when, after washing in the
lake, they all sat down to the rude board which I had prepared for
them, loaded with the best fare that could be procured in the bush.
Pea-soup, legs of pork, venison, eel, and raspberry pies, garnished
with plenty of potatoes, and whiskey to wash them down, besides a
large iron kettle of tea. To pour out the latter, and dispense it
round, devolved upon me. My brother and his friends, who were all
temperance men, and consequently the best workers in the field, kept
me and the maid actively employed in replenishing their cups.
The dinner passed off tolerably well; some of the lower order of the
Irish settlers were pretty far gone, but they committed no outrage
upon our feelings by either swearing or bad language, a few harmless
jokes alone circulating among them.
Some one was funning Old Wittalls for having eaten seven large
cabbages at Mr. T----'s bee, a few days previous. His son, Sol,
thought himself, as in duty bound, to take up the cudgel for his
father.
“Now, I guess that's a lie, anyhow. Fayther was sick that day,
and I tell you he only ate five.”
This announcement was followed by such an explosion of mirth that
the boy looked fiercely round him, as if he could scarcely believe
the fact that the whole party were laughing at him.
Malachi Chroak, who was good-naturedly drunk, had discovered an old
pair of cracked bellows in a corner, which he placed under his arm,
and applying his mouth to the pipe, and working his elbows to and
fro, pretended that he was playing upon the bagpipes, every now and
then letting the wind escape in a shrill squeak from this novel
instrument.
“Arrah, ladies and jintlemen, do jist turn your swate little eyes
upon me whilst I play for your iddifications the last illigant tune
which my owld grandmother taught me. Och hone! 'tis a thousand
pities that such musical owld crathers should be suffered to die, at
all at all, to be poked away into a dirthy, dark hole, when their
canthles shud be burnin' a-top of a bushel, givin' light to the
house. An' then it is she that was the illigant dancer, stepping out
so lively and frisky, just so.”
And here he minced to and fro, affecting the airs of a fine lady.
The suppositious bagpipe gave an uncertain, ominous howl, and he
flung it down, and started back with a ludicrous expression of
alarm.
“Alive, is it ye are? Ye croaking owld divil, is that the tune you
taught your son?
“Och! my old granny taught me, but now she is dead,
That a dhrop of nate whiskey is good for the head;
It would make a man spake when jist ready to dhie,
If you doubt it--my boys!--I'd advise you to thry.
“Och! my owld granny sleeps with her head on a stone,--
'Now, Malach, don't throuble the galls when I'm gone!'
I thried to obey her; but, och, I am shure,
There's no sorrow on earth that the angels can't cure.
“Och! I took her advice--I'm a bachelor still;
And I dance, and I play, with such excellent skill,
(Taking up the bellows, and beginning to dance.)
That the dear little crathurs are striving in vain
Which furst shall my hand or my fortin' obtain.”
“Malach!” shouted a laughing group. “How was it that the old lady
taught you to go a-courting?”
“Arrah, that's a sacret! I don't let out owld granny's sacrets,”
said Malachi, gracefully waving his head to and fro to the squeaking
of the bellows; then, suddenly tossing back the long, dangling black
elf-locks that curled down the sides of his lank, yellow cheeks, and
winking knowingly with his comical little deep-seated black eyes, he
burst out again--
“Wid the blarney I'd win the most dainty proud dame,
No gall can resist the soft sound of that same;
Wid the blarney, my boys--if you doubt it, go thry--
But hand here the bottle, my whistle is dhry.”
The men went back to the field, leaving Malachi to amuse those who
remained in the house; and we certainly did laugh our fill at his
odd capers and conceits.
Then he would insist upon marrying our maid. There could be no
refusal--have her he would. The girl, to keep him quiet, laughingly
promised that she would take him for her husband. This did not
satisfy him. She must take her oath upon the Bible to that effect.
Mary pretended that there was no bible in the house, but he found an
old spelling-book upon a shelf in the kitchen, and upon it he made
her swear, and called upon me to bear witness to her oath, and that
she was now his betrothed, and he would go next day with her to the
“praist.” Poor Mary had reason to repent her frolic, for he stuck
close to her the whole evening, tormenting her to fulfill her
contract.
After the sun went down, the logging-band came in to supper, which
was all ready for them. Those who remained sober ate the meal in
peace, and quietly returned to their own homes; while the vicious
and the drunken stayed to brawl and fight.
After having placed the supper on the table, I was so tired with the
noise, and heat, and fatigue of the day, that I went to bed, leaving
to Mary and my husband the care of the guests.
The little bed-chamber was only separated from the kitchen by a few
thin boards; and unfortunately for me and the girl, who was soon
forced to retreat thither, we could hear all the wickedness and
profanity going on in the next room. My husband, disgusted with the
scene, soon left it, and retired into the parlour, with the few of
the loggers who at that hour remained sober. The house rang with the
sound of unhallowed revelry, profane songs and blasphemous swearing.
It would have been no hard task to have imagined these miserable,
degraded beings fiends instead of men. How glad I was when they at
last broke up; and we were once more left in peace to collect the
broken glasses and cups, and the scattered fragments of that hateful
feast.
We were obliged to endure a second and a third repetition of this
odious scene, before sixteen acres of land were rendered fit for
the reception of our fall crop of wheat.
My hatred to these tumultuous, disorderly meetings was not in the
least decreased by my husband being twice seriously hurt while
attending them. After the second injury he received, he seldom went
to them himself, but sent his oxen and servant in his place. In these
odious gatherings, the sober, moral, and industrious man is more
likely to suffer than the drunken and profane, as during the delirium
of drink these men expose others to danger as well as themselves.
The conduct of many of the settlers, who considered themselves
gentlemen, and would have been very much affronted to have been
called otherwise, was often more reprehensible than that of the poor
Irish emigrants, to whom they should have set an example of order and
sobriety. The behaviour of these young men drew upon them the severe
but just censures of the poorer class, whom they regarded in every
way as their inferiors.
“That blackguard calls himself a gentleman. In what respect is he
better than us?” was an observation too frequently made use of at
these gatherings. To see a bad man in the very worst point of view,
follow him to a bee: be he profane, licentious, quarrelsome, or a
rogue, all his native wickedness will be fully developed there.
Just after the last of these logging-bees, we had to part with our
good servant Mary, and just at a time when it was the heaviest loss
to me. Her father, who had been a dairyman in the north of Ireland,
an honest, industrious man, had brought out upwards of one hundred
pounds to this country. With more wisdom than is generally exercised
by Irish emigrants, instead of sinking all his means in buying a
bush farm, he hired a very good farm in Cavan, with cattle, and
returned to his old avocation. The services of his daughter, who was
an excellent dairymaid, were required to take the management of the
cows; and her brother brought a wagon and horses all the way from
the front to take her home.
This event was perfectly unexpected, and left me without a moment's
notice to provide myself with another servant, at a time when
servants were not to be had, and I was perfectly unable to do the
least thing. My little Addie was sick almost to death with the
summer complaint, and the eldest still too young to take care of
herself.
This was but the beginning of trouble.
Ague and lake fever had attacked our new settlement. The men in the
shanty were all down with it; and my husband was confined to his bed
on each alternate day, unable to raise hand or foot, and raving in
the delirium of the fever.
In my sister and brother's families, scarcely a healthy person
remained to attend upon the sick; and at Herriot's Falls, nine
persons were stretched upon the floor of one log cabin, unable to
help themselves or one another. After much difficulty, and only by
offering enormous wages, I succeeded in procuring a nurse to attend
upon me during my confinement. The woman had not been a day in the
house before she was attacked by the same fever. In the midst of
this confusion, and with my precious little Addie lying insensible
on a pillow at the foot of my bed--expected at every moment to
breathe her last--on the night of the 26th of August the boy I had
so ardently coveted was born. The next day, old Pine carried his
wife (my nurse) away upon his back, and I was left to struggle
through, in the best manner I could, with a sick husband, a sick
child, and a newborn babe.
It was a melancholy season, one of severe mental and bodily
suffering. Those who have drawn such agreeable pictures of a
residence in the backwoods never dwell upon the periods of sickness,
when, far from medical advice, and often, as in my case, deprived of
the assistance of friends by adverse circumstances, you are left to
languish, unattended, upon the couch of pain.
The day that my husband was free of the fit, he did what he could
for me and his poor sick babes, but, ill as he was, he was obliged
to sow the wheat to enable the man to proceed with the drag, and
was therefore necessarily absent in the field the greater part of
the day.
I was very ill, yet for hours at a time I had no friendly voice to
cheer me, to proffer me a drink of cold water, or to attend to the
poor babe; and worse, still worse, there was no one to help that
pale, marble child, who lay so cold and still, with “half-closed
violet eyes,” as if death had already chilled her young heart in
his iron grasp.
There was not a breath of air in our close, burning bed-closet; and
the weather was sultry beyond all that I have since experienced.
How I wished that I could be transported to a hospital at home,
to enjoy the common care that in such places is bestowed upon the
sick. Bitter tears flowed continually from my eyes over those young
children. I had asked of Heaven a son, and there he lay helpless by
the side of his almost equally helpless mother, who could not lift
him up in her arms, or still his cries; while the pale, fair angel,
with her golden curls, who had lately been the admiration of all
who saw her, no longer recognized my voice, or was conscious of my
presence. I felt that I could almost resign the long and eagerly
hoped-for son, to win one more smile from that sweet suffering
creature. Often did I weep myself to sleep, and wake to weep again
with renewed anguish.
And my poor little Katie, herself under three years of age, how
patiently she bore the loss of my care, and every comfort. How
earnestly the dear thing strove to help me. She would sit on my
sick-bed, and hold my hand, and ask me to look at her and speak to
her; would inquire why Addie slept so long, and when she would awake
again. Those innocent questions went like arrows to my heart.
Lieutenant ----, the husband of my dear Emilia, at length heard of
my situation. His inestimable wife was from home, nursing her sick
mother; but he sent his maid-servant up every day for a couple of
hours, and the kind girl despatched a messenger nine miles through
the woods to Dummer, to fetch her younger sister, a child of twelve
years old.
Oh, how grateful I felt for these signal mercies; for my situation
for nearly a week was one of the most pitiable that could be
imagined. The sickness was so prevalent that help was not to be
obtained for money; and without the assistance of that little girl,
young as she was, it is more than probable that neither myself nor
my children would ever have risen from that bed of sickness.
The conduct of our man Jacob, during this trying period, was marked
with the greatest kindness and consideration. On the days that his
master was confined to his bed with the fever, he used to place a
vessel of cold water and a cup by his bedside, and put his honest
English face in at my door to know if he could make a cup of tea, or
toast a bit of bread for the mistress, before he went into the field.
Katie was indebted to him for all meals. He baked, and cooked, and
churned, milked the cows, and made up the butter, as well and as
carefully as the best female servant could have done. As to poor
John Monanghan, he was down with fever in the shanty, where four
other men were all ill with the same terrible complaint.
I was obliged to leave my bed and endeavour to attend to the wants
of my young family long before I was really able. When I made my
first attempt to reach the parlour I was so weak, that, at every
step, I felt as if I should pitch forward to the ground, which
seemed to undulate beneath my feet like the floor of a cabin in a
storm at sea. My husband continued to suffer for many weeks with the
ague; and when he was convalescent, all the children, even the poor
babe, were seized with it, nor did it leave us until late in the
spring of 1835.
THE EMIGRANT'S FAREWELL
Rise, Mary! meet me on the shore,
And tell our tale of sorrow o'er;
There must we meet to part no more--
Rise, Mary, rise!
Come, dearest, come! tho' all in vain;
Once more beside yon summer main
We'll plight our hopeless vows again--
Unclose thine eyes.
My bark amidst the surge is toss'd,
I go, by evil fortunes cross'd,
My earthly hopes for ever lost--
Love's dearest prize.
But when thy hand is clasp'd in mine,
I'll laugh at fortune, nor repine;
In life, in death, for ever thine--
Then check these sighs.
They move a bosom steel'd to bear
Its own unwonted load of care,
That will not bend beneath despair--
Rise, dearest, rise.
Life's but a troubled dream at best;
There comes a time when grief shall rest,
Kind, faithful hearts shall yet be bless'd
'Neath brighter skies!