THE FIFTH SON
Arthur Wemyss, fifth son of the Reverend Alfred Austin Wemyss, Rector
of St. Agnes, Tilbury Road, County of Kent, England, had but recently
crossed the ocean. He and six hundred other fifth sons of rectors and
earls and dukes had crossed the ocean in the same ship and had been
scattered abroad over Manitoba and the Northwest Territories to be
instructed in agricultural pursuits by the honest granger, and
incidentally to furnish nutriment for the ever-ready mosquito or wasp,
who regarded all Old Country men as their lawful meat.
The honest granger was paid a sum varying between fifty and one hundred
fifty dollars for instructing one of these young fellows in farming for
one year, and although having an Englishman was known to be a pretty
good investment, the farmers usually spoke of them as they would of the
French-weed or the rust in the wheat. Sam Motherwell referred to his
quite often as "that blamed Englishman" and often said, unjustly, that
he was losing money on him every day.
Arthur--the Motherwells could not have told his other name--had learned
something since he came. He could pull pig-weed for the pigs and throw
it into the pen; he had learned to detect French-weed in the grain; he
could milk; he could turn the cream-separator; he could wash dishes and
churn, and he did it all with a willingness, a cheerfulness that would
have appealed favourably to almost any other farmer in the
neighbourhood, but the lines had fallen to Arthur in a stony place, and
his employer did not notice him at all unless to find fault with him.
Yet he bore it all with good humour. He had come to Canada to learn to
farm.
The only real grievance he had was that he could not get his "tub." The
night he arrived, dusty and travel-stained after his long journey, he
had asked for his "tub," but Mr. Motherwell had told him in language he
had never heard before--that there was no tub of his around the
establishment, that he knew of, and that he could go down and have a
dip in the river on Sunday if he wanted to. Then he had conducted him
with the lantern to his bed in the loft of the granary.
A rickety ladder led up to the bed, which was upon a temporary floor
laid about half way across the width of the granary. Bags of musty
smelling wheat stood at one end of this little room. Evidently Mr.
Motherwell wished to discourage sleep-walking in his hired help, for
the floor ended abruptly and a careless somnambulist would be
precipitated on the old fanning mill, harrow teeth and other debris
which littered the floor below.
The young Englishman reeled unsteadily going up the ladder. He could
still feel the chug-chug-chug of the ocean liner's engines and had to
hold tight to the ladder's splintered rungs to preserve his equilibrium.
Mr. Motherwell raised the lantern with sudden interest.
"Say," he said, more cheerfully than he had yet spoken, "you haven't
been drinking, have you?"
"Intoxicants, do you mean?" the Englishman asked, without turning
around. "No, I do not drink."
"You didn't happen to bring anything over with you, did you, for
seasickness on the boat?" Mr. Motherwell queried anxiously, holding the
lantern above his head.
"No, I did not," the young man said laconically.
"Turn out at five to-morrow morning then," his employer snapped in
evident disappointment, and he lowered the lantern so quickly that it
went out.
The young man lay down upon his hard bed. His utter weariness was a
blessing to him that night, for not even the racing mice, the musty
smells or the hardness of his straw bed could keep him from slumber.
In what seemed to him but a few minutes, he was awakened by a loud
knocking on the door below, voices shouted, a dog barked, cow-bells
jangled; he could hear doors banging everywhere, a faint streak of
sunlight lay wan and pale on the mud-plastered walls.
"By Jove!" he said yawning, "I know now what Kipling meant when he said
'the dawn comes up like thunder.'"
A few weeks after Arthur's arrival, Mrs. Motherwell called him from the
barn, where he sat industriously mending bags, to unhitch her horse
from the buggy. She had just driven home from Millford. Nobody had
taken the trouble to show Arthur how it was done.
"Any fool ought to know," Mr. Motherwell said.
Arthur came running from the barn with his hat in his hand. He grasped
the horse firmly by the bridle and led him toward the barn. As they
came near the water trough the horse began to show signs of thirst.
Arthur led him to the trough, but the horse tossed his head and was
unable to get it near the water on account of the check.
Arthur watched him a few moments with gathering perplexity.
"I can't lift this water vessel," he said, looking at the horse
reproachfully. "It's too heavy, don't you know. Hold! I have it," he
cried with exultation beaming in his face; and making a dash for the
horse he unfastened the crupper.
But the exultation soon died from his face, for the horse still tossed
his head in the vain endeavour to reach the water.
"My word!" he said, wrinkling his forehead, "I believe I shall have to
lift the water-vessel yet, though it is hardly fit to lift, it is so
wet and nasty." Arthur spoke with a deliciously soft Kentish accent,
guiltless of r's and with a softening of the h's that was irresistible.
A light broke over his face again. He went behind the buggy and lifted
the hind wheels. While he was holding up the wheels and craning his
neck around the back of the buggy to see if his efforts were
successful, Jim Russell came into the yard, riding his dun-coloured
pony Chiniquy.
He stood still in astonishment. Then the meaning of it came to him and
he rolled off Chiniquy's back, shaking with silent laughter.
"Come, come, Arthur," he said as soon as he could speak. "Stop trying
to see how strong you are. Don't you see the horse wants a drink?"
With a perfectly serious face Jim unfastened the check, whereupon the
horse's head was lowered at once, and he drank in long gulps the water
that had so long mocked him with its nearness.
"Oh, thank you, Mr. Russell," the Englishman cried delightedly. "Thanks
awfully, it is monstrously clever of you to know how to do everything.
I wish I could go and live with you. I believe I could learn to farm if
I were with you."
Jim looked at his eager face so cruelly bitten by mosquitoes.
"I'll tell you, Arthur," he said smiling, "I haven't any need for a man
to work, but I suppose I might hire you to keep the mosquitoes off the
horses. They wouldn't look at Chiniquy, I am sure, if they could get a
nip at you."
The Englishman looked perplexed.
"You are learning as well as any person could learn," Jim said kindly.
"I think you are doing famously. No person is particularly bright at
work entirely new. Don't be a bit discouraged, old man, you'll be a
rich land-owner some day, proprietor of the A. J. Wemyss Stock Farm,
writing letters to the agricultural papers, judge of horses at the
fairs, giving lectures at dairy institutes--oh, I think I see you,
Arthur!"
"You are chaffing me," Arthur said smiling.
"Indeed I am not. I am very much in earnest. I have seen more unlikely
looking young fellows than you do wonderful things in a short time, and
just to help along the good work I am going to show you a few things
about taking off harness that may be useful to you when you are
president of the Agricultural Society of South Cypress, or some other
fortunate municipality."
Arthur's face brightened.
"Oh, thank you, Mr. Russell," he said.
That night Arthur wrote home a letter that would have made an
appropriate circular for the Immigration Department to send to
prospective settlers.