Return of the Boys--Their Adventures--Harvesting--Partridges
and Quails
Toward evening we began to grow anxious about the return of the
boys, when suddenly Jack appeared in the distance. He arrived at
full gallop on his ostrich, having left his brothers far behind.
He brought nothing with him, pretending that his courser would
receive no other burden than himself. Fritz and Francis coming up,
we discovered that each of them carried before him a sack full of
game, the products of the chase, in which they had been extremely
fortunate; and they had brought back with them four of those beasts
whom we had christened “beasts with a bill,” twenty ondatras, one
monkey, a kangaroo, and two varieties of the musk-rat, which they had
found in the swamp.
During supper, each one recounted his adventures, Fritz describing
their passage through the valley, the attack of the ondatras and the
beavers. “We also,” said he, “then saw those ‘beasts with a bill’
coming out of the swamp to partake of a repast not intended for them.
We then caught a fish or two in the lake; and relieving our dinner
with a plate of ginseng cooked in the ashes, sat down to our humble
meal.”
“Pooh, pooh!” cried Jack the boaster; “who cares for rats and
fishes? It is to my courser and me that you owe this royal prize,
this noble kangaroo.”
“Oh, yes,” added Francis, “a prize very easy to take, as it remained
quiet until you came up and shot it.”
“For my part,” continued Fritz, “I have brought home nothing but
a plant: but it is of more value than the kangaroo. Examine these
thistles, I beg of you; see their hard, sharp points. Will they not
be excellent to card the hair in manufacturing our hats?”
Each one of our young adventurers had a thousand different stories to
relate, each one vaunting his own prowess and extolling his share in
the events of the day. I had no time to listen to their boastings,
and I turned to examine the products of the expedition and determine
their use. The thistles of Fritz, which I recognized as being the
“carding-thistle,” were received by me as a precious discovery--one
more instrument added to our resources. My sons had also brought
home some cuttings of sweet potatoes and cinnamon: their good mother
received them with joy; and the next morning they were carefully
planted in the kitchen garden.
The grain that we had sown before the rainy season, I perceived,
had now come to maturity, although it was not more than five months
since we had confided it to the earth. We now had our hands full of
business. The herrings would soon arrive, then the sea-dogs would
come; and my dear Elizabeth lamented piteously while she enumerated
all the labour we yet had to perform. There was the manioc to dig up,
the potatoes to gather and sow--in short, a thousand cares to attend
to, a thousand labours to undertake, that would occupy more time than
the year has days.
I tranquillized my good companion as well as I was able, assuring her
that the manioc would not be injured by remaining in the ground; and
as to the potatoes, I informed her that she had nothing to fear for
this precious fruit, as our soil was warm and sandy, and they would
keep a great while in the earth.
I decided that our labours should commence with the grain, the chief
and best of our resources; but wishing to effect the harvest in
the shortest possible time, and with the smallest expenditure of
strength, I resolved to adopt the Italian method rather than the
Swiss.
I commenced by levelling a large space before the grotto, to serve
as a threshing-floor. We then, after having well watered it, beat
the earth for a long time with clubs. When the sun had dried it
up, the operation was repeated, and we continued it until we
obtained a solid, flat surface, without a crack in it, and almost as
impenetrable to water as to the sun’s rays.
On arriving at the field we were about to reap, my wife asked me
where I would find anything with which to tie up the blades into
sheaves.
“We will need nothing of the sort,” said I; “everything is to be done
according to the Italian method. Those people, naturally averse to
labour, never use sheaves, as being too heavy to carry.”
“How, then,” asked Fritz, “do they manage to carry their harvest
home?”
“You will soon see,” said I.
At the same time I gathered up in my left hand all the stalks it
could contain, and taking a long knife in my right hand, I cut off
the stalks about six inches below the head. I then threw the handful
into a basket. “There,” said I, laughing, to Fritz, “there is the
first act of an Italian harvest.”
My children thought it was an admirable plan; and in a short time the
plain presented but an unequal surface, bristling with decapitated
stalks, here and there dotted with a forgotten blade.
We now hastened to the grotto, taking with us the grain we had cut.
When we arrived there, Ernest and his mother received orders to
sprinkle the blades over the threshing-floor I had prepared, while my
three cavaliers stood by their coursers’ sides, laughing at our new
invention for threshing grain.
When everything was prepared, “To the saddle!” cried I, “to the
saddle!” and I told them they had nothing to do but display their
horsemanship among the grain. I leave the screams, the shouts of
laughter to the imagination of readers; the bull, the onagra, and the
ostrich rivalled each other in swiftness; my wife, Ernest, and I,
each one armed with a pitchfork, followed after them, throwing the
grain under the feet of the animals.
When the grain was all threshed, we set to work to clear it of the
straws and dirt that had become mixed with it. This was the most
difficult and the most painful part of all the labour. We laid the
grain on close hurdles, and with wooden flails we endeavoured to
disengage the dirt; but this was not to be effected, except at the
expense of our eyes, mouth, or nose. The poor little workmen coughed
terribly, and we were obliged to desist every few moments to clear
our throats.
We were several days engaged in these works, and we wished to see
exactly how much we possessed. We found ourselves rich enough to
defy all attacks of famine; we had sixty bushels of barley, eighty
of wheat, and more than a hundred of maize, from which I concluded
that the soil was more favourable to this last than to the barley
and the other European grains we had sown at the same time. We had
not prepared the maize as we had the other grains; but after having
dried the stalks, we detached the grains by beating them with long,
flexible whips; we took this care because we wanted its soft and
elastic leaves to stuff our mattresses.
I had not lost sight of my intention of obtaining a second harvest
before the end of the season, and we now set to work to clear our
fields of the straw; but we had scarcely commenced when we beheld an
innumerable swarm of quails and partridges start up from the dried
stalks, where they had been enticed by the few blades of grain we had
left behind. As we were unprepared for them, they all escaped, save
one quail, which Fritz brought down with a stone; but the presence of
these birds after the harvest was a precious discovery for following
years, and we anticipated with pleasure the superb chase of quails
and partridges we should have after our harvests.
When the land was all cleared I sowed it anew; but remembering what I
had learned in Europe, not to exhaust the soil, I varied my original
mode of operation, and contented myself by sowing, for the second
crop, wheat and oats.
Our agricultural labours were scarcely finished, when the bank of
herrings appeared off Safety Bay. Our winter provisions being so
abundant, we did not take as many as customary of these; and we
contented ourselves with preparing two barrels, one of salted and one
of smoked herrings; we also preserved some of the fish alive, which
we put in the Jackal’s River, so that at any time we could obtain
them.