[Illustration: FISHING ON THE SWIMMING ROCK (page 169)]
Being a Boy
by
Charles Dudley
Warner
[Illustration]
_With Illustrations
from Photographs
by Clifton Johnson_
Boston and New York
Houghton, Mifflin and Company
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
Mdcccxcvii
COPYRIGHT, 1877, BY JAMES R. OSGOOD AND CO.
1897, BY HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND CO.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE TO THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION vii
I. BEING A BOY 1
II. THE BOY AS A FARMER 8
III. THE DELIGHTS OF FARMING 15
IV. NO FARMING WITHOUT A BOY 22
V. THE BOY'S SUNDAY 30
VI. THE GRINDSTONE OF LIFE 38
VII. FICTION AND SENTIMENT 47
VIII. THE COMING OF THANKSGIVING 56
IX. THE SEASON OF PUMPKIN-PIE 65
X. FIRST EXPERIENCE OF THE WORLD 73
XI. HOME INVENTIONS 82
XII. THE LONELY FARM-HOUSE 92
XIII. JOHN'S FIRST PARTY 101
XIV. THE SUGAR CAMP 113
XV. THE HEART OF NEW ENGLAND 123
XVI. JOHN'S REVIVAL 134
XVII. WAR 150
XVIII. COUNTRY SCENES 164
XIX. A CONTRAST TO THE NEW ENGLAND BOY 179
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
FISHING ON THE SWIMMING ROCK (see page 169)
_Frontispiece._
BEING A BOY 2
THE FARM OXEN 4
AT THE PASTURE BARS 8
IN THE CATTLE PASTURE 10
AFTER A CROW'S NEST 16
A STRING OF SPECKLED TROUT 20
WATCHING FOR SUNSET 28
RIDING BAREBACK 32
TURNING THE GRINDSTONE 36
SNARING SUCKERS 45
PICKING UP POTATOES 48
LEAP-FROG AT RECESS 50
POUNDING OFF SHUCKS 58
RUNNING ON THE STONE WALL 75
COASTING 83
IN SCHOOL 89
A REMOTE FARM-HOUSE 93
GOING HOME WITH CYNTHIA 111
A YOUNG SUGAR MAKER 119
WATCHING THE KETTLES 121
THE VILLAGE FROM THE HILL 127
TREEING A WOODCHUCK 131
LOOKING FOR FROGS 136
TROUT FISHING 140
FORCED TO GO TO BED 148
SLIPPERY WORK 165
RIGGING UP THE FISHING-TACKLE 169
WATCHING THE FISHES 170
ENTERING THE OLD BRIDGE 178
THE OLD WATERING TROUGH 180
THE NEW ENGLAND BOY 184
PREFACE TO THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION
This volume was first published over twenty years ago. If any of the
boys described in it were real, they have long since grown up, got
married, gone West, become selectmen or sheriffs, gone to Congress,
invented an electric churn, become editors or preachers or commercial
travelers, written a book, served a term as consul to a country the
language of which they did not know, or plodded along on a farm,
cultivating rheumatism and acquiring invaluable knowledge of the most
fickle weather known in a region which has all the fascination and all
the power of being disagreeable belonging to the most accomplished
coquette in the world.
The rural life described is that of New England between 1830 and 1850,
in a period of darkness, before the use of lucifer matches; but when,
although religion had a touch of gloom and all pleasure was heightened
by a timorous apprehension that it was sin, the sun shone, the woods
were full of pungent scents, nature was strong in its invitations to
cheerfulness, and girls were as sweet and winsome as they are in the
old ballads.
The object of the papers composing the volume—hough "object" is a
strong word to use about their waywardness—twas to recall scenes in
the boy-life of New England, or the impressions that a boy had of that
life. There was no attempt at the biography of any particular boy; the
experiences given were common to the boyhood of the time and place.
While the book, therefore, was not consciously biographical, it was of
necessity written out of a personal knowledge. And I may be permitted
to say that, as soon as I became conscious that I was dealing with a
young life of the past, I tried to be faithful to it, strictly so, and
to import into it nothing of later experience, either in feeling or
performance. I invented nothing,—not an adventure, not a scene, not
an emotion. I know from observation how difficult it is for an adult
to write about childhood. Invention is apt to supply details that
memory does not carry. The knowledge of the man insensibly inflates the
boyhood limitations. The temptation is to make a psychological analysis
of the boy's life and aspirations, and to interpret them according to
the man's view of life. It seems comparatively easy to write stories
about boys, and even biographies; but it is not easy to resist the
temptation of inventing scenes to make them interesting, indulging in
exaggerations both of adventure and of feeling which are not true to
experience, inventing details impossible to be recalled by the best
memory, and states of mind which are psychologically untrue to the
boy's consciousness.
How far I succeeded in keeping the man out of the boy's life, my
readers can judge better than the writer. The volume originally made
no sensation—how could it, pitched in such a key?—but it has gone
on peacefully, and, I am glad to acknowledge, has made many valuable
friends. It started a brook, and a brook it has continued. In sending
out this new edition with Mr. Clifton Johnson's pictures, lovingly
taken from the real life and heart of New England, I may express the
hope that the boy of the remote generation will lose no friends.
C. D. W.
HARTFORD, May 8, 1897.
BEING A BOY
I
BEING A BOY
One of the best things in the world to be is a boy; it requires no
experience, though it needs some practice to be a good one. The
disadvantage of the position is that it does not last long enough;
it is soon over; just as you get used to being a boy, you have to be
something else, with a good deal more work to do and not half so much
fun. And yet every boy is anxious to be a man, and is very uneasy with
the restrictions that are put upon him as a boy. Good fun as it is to
yoke up the calves and play work, there is not a boy on a farm but
would rather drive a yoke of oxen at real work. What a glorious feeling
it is, indeed, when a boy is for the first time given the long whip and
permitted to drive the oxen, walking by their side, swinging the long
lash, and shouting "Gee, Buck!" "Haw, Golden!" "Whoa, Bright!" and all
the rest of that remarkable language, until he is red in the face, and
all the neighbors for half a mile are aware that something unusual is
going on. If I were a boy, I am not sure but I would rather drive the
oxen than have a birthday.
[Illustration: BEING A BOY]
The proudest day of my life was one day when I rode on the neap of
the cart, and drove the oxen, all alone, with a load of apples to the
cider-mill. I was so little, that it was a wonder that I didn't fall
off, and get under the broad wheels. Nothing could make a boy, who
cared anything for his appearance, feel flatter than to be run over
by the broad tire of a cart-wheel. But I never heard of one who was,
and I don't believe one ever will be. As I said, it was a great day
for me, but I don't remember that the oxen cared much about it. They
sagged along in their great clumsy way, switching their tails in my
face occasionally, and now and then giving a lurch to this or that
side of the road, attracted by a choice tuft of grass. And then I
"came the Julius Cæsar" over them, if you will allow me to use such a
slang expression, a liberty I never should permit you. I don't know
that Julius Cæsar ever drove cattle, though he must often have seen the
peasants from the Campagna "haw" and "gee" them round the Forum (of
course in Latin, a language that those cattle understood as well as
ours do English); but what I mean is, that I stood up and "hollered"
with all my might, as everybody does with oxen, as if they were born
deaf, and whacked them with the long lash over the head, just as the
big folks did when they drove. I think now that it was a cowardly thing
to crack the patient old fellows over the face and eyes, and make them
wink in their meek manner. If I am ever a boy again on a farm, I shall
speak gently to the oxen, and not go screaming round the farm like a
crazy man; and I shall not hit them a cruel cut with the lash every few
minutes, because it looks big to do so and I cannot think of anything
else to do. I never liked lickings myself, and I don't know why an
ox should like them, especially as he cannot reason about the moral
improvement he is to get out of them.
[Illustration: THE FARM OXEN]
Speaking of Latin reminds me that I once taught my cows Latin. I don't
mean that I taught them to read it, for it is very difficult to teach a
cow to read Latin or any of the dead languages,—a cow cares more for
her cud than she does for all the classics put together. But if you
begin early you can teach a cow, or a calf (if you can teach a calf
anything, which I doubt), Latin as well as English. There were ten
cows, which I had to escort to and from pasture night and morning. To
these cows I gave the names of the Roman numerals, beginning with Unus
and Duo, and going up to Decem. Decem was of course the biggest cow of
the party, or at least she was the ruler of the others, and had the
place of honor in the stable and everywhere else. I admire cows, and
especially the exactness with which they define their social position.
In this case, Decem could "lick" Novem, and Novem could "lick" Octo,
and so on down to Unus, who couldn't lick anybody, except her own
calf. I suppose I ought to have called the weakest cow Una instead of
Unus, considering her sex; but I didn't care much to teach the cows
the declensions of adjectives, in which I was not very well up myself;
and besides it would be of little use to a cow. People who devote
themselves too severely to study of the classics are apt to become
dried up; and you should never do anything to dry up a cow. Well, these
ten cows knew their names after a while, at least they appeared to, and
would take their places as I called them. At least, if Octo attempted
to get before Novem in going through the bars (I have heard people
speak of a "pair of bars" when there were six or eight of them), or
into the stable, the matter of precedence was settled then and there,
and once settled there was no dispute about it afterwards. Novem either
put her horns into Octo's ribs, and Octo shambled to one side, or else
the two locked horns and tried the game of push and gore until one
gave up. Nothing is stricter than the etiquette of a party of cows.
There is nothing in royal courts equal to it; rank is exactly settled,
and the same individuals always have the precedence. You know that at
Windsor Castle, if the Royal Three-Ply Silver Stick should happen to
get in front of the Most Royal Double-and-Twisted Golden Rod, when the
court is going in to dinner, something so dreadful would happen that we
don't dare to think of it. It is certain that the soup would get cold
while the Golden Rod was pitching the Silver Stick out of the castle
window into the moat, and perhaps the island of Great Britain itself
would split in two. But the people are very careful that it never
shall happen, so we shall probably never know what the effect would
be. Among cows, as I say, the question is settled in short order, and
in a different manner from what it sometimes is in other society. It
is said that in other society there is sometimes a great scramble for
the first place, for the leadership as it is called, and that women,
and men too, fight for what is called position; and in order to be
first they will injure their neighbors by telling stories about them
and by backbiting, which is the meanest kind of biting there is, not
excepting the bite of fleas. But in cow society there is nothing of
this detraction in order to get the first place at the crib, or the
farther stall in the stable. If the question arises, the cows turn in,
horns and all, and settle it with one square fight, and that ends it. I
have often admired this trait in cows.
Besides Latin, I used to try to teach the cows a little poetry, and
it is a very good plan. It does not benefit the cows much, but it is
excellent exercise for a boy farmer. I used to commit to memory as many
short poems as I could find (the cows liked to listen to Thanatopsis
about as well as anything), and repeat them when I went to the pasture,
and as I drove the cows home through the sweet ferns and down the rocky
slopes. It improves a boy's elocution a great deal more than driving
oxen.
It is a fact, also, that if a boy repeats Thanatopsis while he is
milking, that operation acquires a certain dignity.
II
THE BOY AS A FARMER
[Illustration: AT THE PASTURE BARS]
Boys in general would be very good farmers if the current notions
about farming were not so very different from those they entertain.
What passes for laziness is very often an unwillingness to farm in a
particular way. For instance, some morning in early summer John is told
to catch the sorrel mare, harness her into the spring wagon, and put
in the buffalo and the best whip, for father is obliged to drive over
to the "Corners, to see a man" about some cattle, or talk with the
road commissioner, or go to the store for the "women folks," and to
attend to other important business; and very likely he will not be back
till sundown. It must be very pressing business, for the old gentleman
drives off in this way somewhere almost every pleasant day, and appears
to have a great deal on his mind.
Meantime, he tells John that he can play ball after he has done up the
chores. As if the chores could ever be "done up" on a farm. He is first
to clean out the horse-stable; then to take a bill-hook and cut down
the thistles and weeds from the fence-corners in the home mowing-lot
and along the road towards the village; to dig up the docks round the
garden patch; to weed out the beet-bed; to hoe the early potatoes; to
rake the sticks and leaves out of the front yard; in short, there is
work enough laid out for John to keep him busy, it seems to him, till
he comes of age; and at half an hour to sundown he is to go for the
cows, and, mind he don't run 'em!
"Yes, sir," says John, "is that all?"
"Well, if you get through in good season, you might pick over those
potatoes in the cellar: they are sprouting; they ain't fit to eat."
John is obliged to his father, for if there is any sort of chore more
cheerful to a boy than another, on a pleasant day, it is rubbing the
sprouts off potatoes in a dark cellar. And the old gentleman mounts
his wagon and drives away down the enticing road, with the dog
bounding along beside the wagon, and refusing to come back at John's
call. John half wishes he were the dog. The dog knows the part of
farming that suits him. He likes to run along the road and see all
the dogs and other people, and he likes best of all to lie on the
store steps at the Corners—while his master's horse is dozing at
the post and his master is talking politics in the store—with the
other dogs of his acquaintance, snapping at mutually annoying flies
and indulging in that delightful dog gossip which is expressed by a
wag of the tail and a sniff of the nose. Nobody knows how many dogs'
characters are destroyed in this gossip; or how a dog may be able to
insinuate suspicion by a wag of the tail as a man can by a shrug of the
shoulders, or sniff a slander as a man can suggest one by raising his
eyebrows.
[Illustration: IN THE CATTLE PASTURE]
John looks after the old gentleman driving off in state, with the
odorous buffalo-robe and the new whip, and he thinks that is the sort
of farming he would like to do. And he cries after his departing
parent,—
"Say, father, can't I go over to the farther pasture and salt the
cattle?" John knows that he could spend half a day very pleasantly in
going over to that pasture, looking for bird's-nests and shying at red
squirrels on the way, and who knows but he might "see" a sucker in the
meadow brook, and perhaps get a "jab" at him with a sharp stick. He
knows a hole where there is a whopper; and one of his plans in life
is to go some day and snare him, and bring him home in triumph. It
therefore is strongly impressed upon his mind that the cattle want
salting. But his father, without turning his head, replies,—
"No, they don't need salting any more'n you do!" And the old equipage
goes rattling down the road, and John whistles his disappointment. When
I was a boy on a farm, and I suppose it is so now, cattle were never
salted half enough.
John goes to his chores, and gets through the stable as soon as he can,
for that must be done; but when it comes to the outdoor work, that
rather drags. There are so many things to distract the attention,—a
chipmunk in the fence, a bird on a near tree, and a hen-hawk circling
high in the air over the barn-yard. John loses a little time in stoning
the chipmunk, which rather likes the sport, and in watching the bird
to find where its nest is; and he convinces himself that he ought to
watch the hawk, lest it pounce upon the chickens, and, therefore,
with an easy conscience, he spends fifteen minutes in hallooing to
that distant bird, and follows it away out of sight over the woods,
and then wishes it would come back again. And then a carriage with
two horses, and a trunk on behind, goes along the road; and there is
a girl in the carriage who looks out at John, who is suddenly aware
that his trousers are patched on each knee and in two places behind;
and he wonders if she is rich, and whose name is on the trunk, and how
much the horses cost, and whether that nice-looking man is the girl's
father, and if that boy on the seat with the driver is her brother, and
if he has to do chores; and as the gay sight disappears John falls to
thinking about the great world beyond the farm, of cities, and people
who are always dressed up, and a great many other things of which he
has a very dim notion. And then a boy, whom John knows, rides by in
a wagon with his father, and the boy makes a face at John, and John
returns the greeting with a twist of his own visage and some symbolic
gestures. All these things take time. The work of cutting down the
big weeds gets on slowly, although it is not very disagreeable, or
would not be if it were play. John imagines that yonder big thistle is
some whiskered villain, of whom he has read in a fairy book, and he
advances on him with "Die, ruffian!" and slashes off his head with the
bill-hook; or he charges upon the rows of mullein-stalks as if they
were rebels in regimental ranks, and hews them down without mercy.
What fun it might be if there were only another boy there to help. But
even war, single-handed, gets to be tiresome. It is dinner-time before
John finishes the weeds, and it is cow-time before John has made much
impression on the garden.
This garden John has no fondness for. He would rather hoe corn all day
than work in it. Father seems to think that it is easy work that John
can do, because it is near the house! John's continual plan in this
life is to go fishing. When there comes a rainy day, he attempts to
carry it out. But ten chances to one his father has different views.
As it rains so that work cannot be done outdoors, it is a good time to
work in the garden. He can run into the house during the heavy showers.
John accordingly detests the garden; and the only time he works briskly
in it is when he has a stent set, to do so much weeding before the
Fourth of July. If he is spry he can make an extra holiday the Fourth
and the day after. Two days of gunpowder and ballplaying! When I was
a boy, I supposed there was some connection between such and such an
amount of work done on the farm and our national freedom. I doubted
if there could be any Fourth of July if my stent was not done. I, at
least, worked for my Independence.
III
THE DELIGHTS OF FARMING
There are so many bright spots in the life of a farm-boy, that I
sometimes think I should like to live the life over again; I should
almost be willing to be a girl if it were not for the chores. There
is a great comfort to a boy in the amount of work he can get rid of
doing. It is sometimes astonishing how slow he can go on an errand, he
who leads the school in a race. The world is new and interesting to
him, and there is so much to take his attention off, when he is sent
to do anything. Perhaps he couldn't explain, himself, why, when he is
sent to the neighbor's after yeast, he stops to stone the frogs; he
is not exactly cruel, but he wants to see if he can hit 'em. No other
living thing can go so slow as a boy sent on an errand. His legs seem
to be lead, unless he happens to espy a woodchuck in an adjoining
lot, when he gives chase to it like a deer; and it is a curious fact
about boys, that two will be a great deal slower in doing anything than
one, and that the more you have to help on a piece of work the less
is accomplished. Boys have a great power of helping each other to do
nothing; and they are so innocent about it, and unconscious. "I went as
quick as ever I could," says the boy: his father asks him why he didn't
stay all night, when he has been absent three hours on a ten-minute
errand. The sarcasm has no effect on the boy.
[Illustration: AFTER A CROW'S NEST]
Going after the cows was a serious thing in my day. I had to climb a
hill, which was covered with wild strawberries in the season. Could any
boy pass by those ripe berries? And then in the fragrant hill pasture
there were beds of wintergreen with red berries, tufts of columbine,
roots of sassafras to be dug, and dozens of things good to eat or to
smell, that I could not resist. It sometimes even lay in my way to
climb a tree to look for a crow's nest, or to swing in the top, and
to try if I could see the steeple of the village church. It became
very important sometimes for me to see that steeple; and in the midst
of my investigations the tin horn would blow a great blast from the
farm-house, which would send a cold chill down my back in the hottest
days. I knew what it meant. It had a frightfully impatient quaver in
it, not at all like the sweet note that called us to dinner from the
hayfield. It said, "Why on earth doesn't that boy come home? It is
almost dark, and the cows ain't milked!" And that was the time the cows
had to start into a brisk pace and make up for lost time. I wonder if
any boy ever drove the cows home late, who did not say that the cows
were at the very farther end of the pasture, and that "Old Brindle" was
hidden in the woods, and he couldn't find her for ever so long! The
brindle cow is the boy's scapegoat, many a time.
No other boy knows how to appreciate a holiday as the farm-boy does;
and his best ones are of a peculiar kind. Going fishing is of course
one sort. The excitement of rigging up the tackle, digging the bait,
and the anticipation of great luck,—these are pure pleasures, enjoyed
because they are rare. Boys who can go a-fishing any time care but
little for it. Tramping all day through bush and brier, fighting flies
and mosquitoes, and branches that tangle the line, and snags that break
the hook, and returning home late and hungry, with wet feet and a
string of speckled trout on a willow twig, and having the family crowd
out at the kitchen door to look at 'em, and say, "Pretty well done for
you, bub; did you catch that big one yourself?"—this is also pure
happiness, the like of which the boy will never have again, not if he
comes to be selectman and deacon and to "keep store."
But the holidays I recall with delight were the two days in spring and
fall, when we went to the distant pasture-land, in a neighboring town,
may be, to drive thither the young cattle and colts, and to bring them
back again. It was a wild and rocky upland where our great pasture
was, many miles from home, the road to it running by a brawling river,
and up a dashing brookside among great hills. What a day's adventure
it was! It was like a journey to Europe. The night before, I could
scarcely sleep for thinking of it, and there was no trouble about
getting me up at sunrise that morning. The breakfast was eaten, the
luncheon was packed in a large basket, with bottles of root beer and
a jug of switchel, which packing I superintended with the greatest
interest; and then the cattle were to be collected for the march,
and the horses hitched up. Did I shirk any duty? Was I slow? I think
not. I was willing to run my legs off after the frisky steers, who
seemed to have an idea they were going on a lark, and frolicked about,
dashing into all gates, and through all bars except the right ones;
and how cheerfully I did yell at them; it was a glorious chance to
"holler," and I have never since heard any public speaker on the stump
or at camp-meeting who could make more noise. I have often thought
it fortunate that the amount of noise in a boy does not increase in
proportion to his size; if it did the world could not contain it.
The whole day was full of excitement and of freedom. We were away from
the farm, which to a boy is one of the best parts of farming; we saw
other farms and other people at work; I had the pleasure of marching
along, and swinging my whip, past boys whom I knew, who were picking
up stones. Every turn of the road, every bend and rapid of the river,
the great boulders by the wayside, the watering-troughs, the giant pine
that had been struck by lightning, the mysterious covered bridge over
the river where it was most swift and rocky and foamy, the chance eagle
in the blue sky, the sense of going somewhere,—why, as I recall all
these things I feel that even the Prince Imperial, as he used to dash
on horseback through the Bois de Boulogne, with fifty mounted hussars
clattering at his heels, and crowds of people cheering, could not have
been as happy as was I, a boy in short jacket and shorter pantaloons,
trudging in the dust that day behind the steers and colts, cracking my
black-stock whip.
[Illustration: A STRING OF SPECKLED TROUT]
I wish the journey would never end; but at last, by noon, we reach
the pastures and turn in the herd; and, after making the tour of
the lots to make sure there are no breaks in the fences, we take our
luncheon from the wagon and eat it under the trees by the spring.
This is the supreme moment of the day. This is the way to live; this
is like the Swiss Family Robinson, and all the rest of my delightful
acquaintances in romance. Baked beans, rye-and-indian bread (moist,
remember), doughnuts and cheese, pie, and root beer. What richness!
You may live to dine at Delmonico's, or, if those Frenchmen do not eat
each other up, at Philippe's, in the Rue Montorgueil in Paris, where
the dear old Thackeray used to eat as good a dinner as anybody; but you
will get there neither doughnuts, nor pie, nor root beer, nor anything
so good as that luncheon at noon in the old pasture, high among the
Massachusetts hills! Nor will you ever, if you live to be the oldest
boy in the world, have any holiday equal to the one I have described.
But I always regretted that I did not take along a fish-line, just to
"throw in" the brook we passed. I know there were trout there.
IV
NO FARMING WITHOUT A BOY
Say what you will about the general usefulness of boys, it is my
impression that a farm without a boy would very soon come to grief.
What the boy does is the life of the farm. He is the factotum, always
in demand, always expected to do the thousand indispensable things that
nobody else will do. Upon him fall all the odds and ends, the most
difficult things. After everybody else is through, he has to finish up.
His work is like a woman's,—perpetual waiting on others. Everybody
knows how much easier it is to eat a good dinner than it is to wash the
dishes afterwards. Consider what a boy on a farm is required to do;
things that must be done, or life would actually stop.
It is understood, in the first place, that he is to do all the errands,
to go to the store, to the post-office, and to carry all sorts of
messages. If he had as many legs as a centipede, they would tire before
night. His two short limbs seem to him entirely inadequate to the task.
He would like to have as many legs as a wheel has spokes, and rotate
about in the same way. This he sometimes tries to do; and people who
have seen him "turning cart-wheels" along the side of the road have
supposed that he was amusing himself, and idling his time; he was only
trying to invent a new mode of locomotion, so that he could economize
his legs and do his errands with greater dispatch. He practices
standing on his head, in order to accustom himself to any position.
Leap-frog is one of his methods of getting over the ground quickly. He
would willingly go an errand any distance if he could leap-frog it with
a few other boys. He has a natural genius for combining pleasure with
business. This is the reason why, when he is sent to the spring for a
pitcher of water, and the family are waiting at the dinner-table, he is
absent so long; for he stops to poke the frog that sits on the stone,
or, if there is a penstock, to put his hand over the spout and squirt
the water a little while. He is the one who spreads the grass when the
men have cut it; he mows it away in the barn; he rides the horse to
cultivate the corn, up and down the hot, weary rows; he picks up the
potatoes when they are dug; he drives the cows night and morning; he
brings wood and water and splits kindling; he gets up the horse and
puts out the horse; whether he is in the house or out of it, there is
always something for him to do. Just before school in winter he shovels
paths; in summer he turns the grindstone. He knows where there are lots
of wintergreen and sweet flag root, but instead of going for them he is
to stay indoors and pare apples and stone raisins and pound something
in a mortar. And yet, with his mind full of schemes of what he would
like to do, and his hands full of occupations, he is an idle boy who
has nothing to busy himself with but school and chores! He would gladly
do all the work if somebody else would do the chores, he thinks, and
yet I doubt if any boy ever amounted to anything in the world, or was
of much use as a man, who did not enjoy the advantages of a liberal
education in the way of chores.
A boy on a farm is nothing without his pets; at least a dog, and
probably rabbits, chickens, ducks, and guinea hens. A guinea hen
suits a boy. It is entirely useless, and makes a more disagreeable
noise than a Chinese gong. I once domesticated a young fox which a
neighbor had caught. It is a mistake to suppose the fox cannot be
tamed. Jacko was a very clever little animal, and behaved, in all
respects, with propriety. He kept Sunday as well as any day, and all
the ten commandments that he could understand. He was a very graceful
playfellow, and seemed to have an affection for me. He lived in a
woodpile, in the dooryard, and when I lay down at the entrance to his
house and called him, he would come out and sit on his tail and lick
my face just like a grown person. I taught him a great many tricks and
all the virtues. That year I had a large number of hens, and Jacko went
about among them with the most perfect indifference, never looking on
them to lust after them, as I could see, and never touching an egg or
a feather. So excellent was his reputation that I would have trusted
him in the hen-roost in the dark without counting the hens. In short,
he was domesticated, and I was fond of him and very proud of him,
exhibiting him to all our visitors as an example of what affectionate
treatment would do in subduing the brute instincts. I preferred him
to my dog, whom I had, with much patience, taught to go up a long
hill alone and surround the cows, and drive them home from the remote
pasture. He liked the fun of it at first, but by and by he seemed to
get the notion that it was a "chore," and when I whistled for him to
go for the cows, he would turn tail and run the other way, and the
more I whistled and threw stones at him the faster he would run. His
name was Turk, and I should have sold him if he had not been the kind
of dog that nobody will buy. I suppose he was not a cow-dog, but what
they call a sheep-dog. At least, when he got big enough, he used to
get into the pasture and chase the sheep to death. That was the way
he got into trouble, and lost his valuable life. A dog is of great use
on a farm, and that is the reason a boy likes him. He is good to bite
peddlers and small children, and run out and yelp at wagons that pass
by, and to howl all night when the moon shines. And yet, if I were a
boy again, the first thing I would have should be a dog; for dogs are
great companions, and as active and spry as a boy at doing nothing.
They are also good to bark at woodchuck holes.
A good dog will bark at a woodchuck hole long after the animal has
retired to a remote part of his residence, and escaped by another hole.
This deceives the woodchuck. Some of the most delightful hours of my
life have been spent in hiding and watching the hole where the dog
was not. What an exquisite thrill ran through my frame when the timid
nose appeared, was withdrawn, poked out again, and finally followed
by the entire animal, who looked cautiously about, and then hopped
away to feed on the clover. At that moment I rushed in, occupied
the "home base," yelled to Turk and then danced with delight at the
combat between the spunky woodchuck and the dog. They were about the
same size, but science and civilization won the day. I did not reflect
then that it would have been more in the interest of civilization if
the woodchuck had killed the dog. I do not know why it is that boys
so like to hunt and kill animals; but the excuse that I gave in this
case for the murder was, that the woodchuck ate the clover and trod it
down; and, in fact, was a woodchuck. It was not till long after that
I learned with surprise that he is a rodent mammal, of the species
_Arctomys monax_, is called at the West a ground-hog, and is eaten by
people of color with great relish.
[Illustration: WATCHING FOR SUNSET]
But I have forgotten my beautiful fox. Jacko continued to deport
himself well until the young chickens came; he was actually cured of
the fox vice of chicken-stealing. He used to go with me about the
coops, pricking up his ears in an intelligent manner, and with a
demure eye and the most virtuous droop of the tail. Charming fox!
If he had held out a little while longer, I should have put him into
a Sunday-school book. But I began to miss chickens. They disappeared
mysteriously in the night. I would not suspect Jacko at first, for he
looked so honest, and in the daytime he seemed to be as much interested
in the chickens as I was. But one morning, when I went to call him,
I found feathers at the entrance of his hole,—chicken feathers. He
couldn't deny it. He was a thief. His fox nature had come out under
severe temptation. And he died an unnatural death. He had a thousand
virtues and one crime. But that crime struck at the foundation of
society. He deceived and stole; he was a liar and a thief, and no
pretty ways could hide the fact. His intelligent, bright face couldn't
save him. If he had been honest, he might have grown up to be a large,
ornamental fox.
V
THE BOY'S SUNDAY
Sunday in the New England hill towns used to begin Saturday night
at sundown; and the sun is lost to sight behind the hills there
before it has set by the almanac. I remember that we used to go by
the almanac Saturday night and by the visible disappearance Sunday
night. On Saturday night we very slowly yielded to the influences of
the holy time, which were settling down upon us, and submitted to
the ablutions which were as inevitable as Sunday; but when the sun
(and it never moved so slow) slid behind the hills Sunday night, the
effect upon the watching boy was like a shock from a galvanic battery;
something flashed through all his limbs and set them in motion, and
no "play" ever seemed so sweet to him as that between sundown and
dark Sunday night. This, however, was on the supposition that he
had conscientiously kept Sunday, and had not gone in swimming and
got drowned. This keeping of Saturday night instead of Sunday night
we did not very well understand; but it seemed, on the whole, a good
thing that we should rest Saturday night when we were tired, and play
Sunday night when we were rested. I supposed, however, that it was
an arrangement made to suit the big boys who wanted to go "courting"
Sunday night. Certainly they were not to be blamed, for Sunday was the
day when pretty girls were most fascinating, and I have never since
seen any so lovely as those who used to sit in the gallery and in the
singers' seats in the bare old meeting-houses.
Sunday to the country farmer-boy was hardly the relief that it was to
the other members of the family; for the same chores must be done that
day as on others, and he could not divert his mind with whistling,
hand-springs, or sending the dog into the river after sticks. He had to
submit, in the first place, to the restraint of shoes and stockings.
He read in the Old Testament that when Moses came to holy ground he
put off his shoes; but the boy was obliged to put his on, upon the
holy day, not only to go to meeting, but while he sat at home. Only
the emancipated country-boy, who is as agile on his bare feet as a
young kid, and rejoices in the pressure of the warm soft earth, knows
what a hardship it is to tie on stiff shoes. The monks who put peas in
their shoes as a penance do not suffer more than the country-boy in his
penitential Sunday shoes. I recall the celerity with which he used to
kick them off at sundown.
Sunday morning was not an idle one for the farmer-boy. He must rise
tolerably early, for the cows were to be milked and driven to pasture;
family prayers were a little longer than on other days; there were the
Sunday-school verses to be re-learned, for they did not stay in mind
over night; perhaps the wagon was to be greased before the neighbors
began to drive by; and the horse was to be caught out of the pasture,
ridden home bareback, and harnessed.
[Illustration: RIDING BAREBACK]
This catching the horse, perhaps two of them, was very good fun
usually, and would have broken the Sunday if the horse had not been
wanted for taking the family to meeting. It was so peaceful and still
in the pasture on Sunday morning; but the horses were never so playful,
the colts never so frisky. Round and round the lot the boy went,
calling, in an entreating Sunday voice, "Jock, jock, jock, jock," and
shaking his salt-dish, while the horses, with heads erect, and shaking
tails and flashing heels, dashed from corner to corner, and gave the
boy a pretty good race before he could coax the nose of one of them
into his dish. The boy got angry, and came very near saying "dum it,"
but he rather enjoyed the fun, after all.
The boy remembers how his mother's anxiety was divided between the set
of his turn-over collar, the parting of his hair, and his memory of
the Sunday-school verses; and what a wild confusion there was through
the house in getting off for meeting, and how he was kept running
hither and thither, to get the hymn-book, or a palm-leaf fan, or the
best whip, or to pick from the Sunday part of the garden the bunch
of caraway seed. Already the deacon's mare, with a wagon load of the
deacon's folks, had gone shambling past, head and tail drooping, clumsy
hoofs kicking up clouds of dust, while the good deacon sat jerking the
reins in an automatic way, and the "women-folks" patiently saw the dust
settle upon their best summer finery. Wagon after wagon went along
the sandy road, and when our boy's family started, they became part
of a long procession, which sent up a mile of dust and a pungent if
not pious smell of buffalo-robes. There were fiery horses in the train
which had to be held in, for it was neither etiquette nor decent to
pass anybody on Sunday. It was a great delight to the farmer-boy to see
all this procession of horses, and to exchange sly winks with the other
boys, who leaned over the wagon-seats for that purpose. Occasionally
a boy rode behind, with his back to the family, and his pantomime was
always something wonderful to see, and was considered very daring and
wicked.
The meeting-house which our boy remembers was a high, square building,
without a steeple. Within, it had a lofty pulpit, with doors underneath
and closets where sacred things were kept, and where the tithing-men
were supposed to imprison bad boys. The pews were square, with seats
facing each other, those on one side low for the children, and all
with hinges, so that they could be raised when the congregation stood
up for prayers and leaned over the backs of the pews, as horses meet
each other across a pasture fence. After prayers these seats used to
be slammed down with a long-continued clatter, which seemed to the
boys about the best part of the exercises. The galleries were very
high, and the singers' seats, where the pretty girls sat, were the most
conspicuous of all. To sit in the gallery, away from the family, was a
privilege not often granted to the boy. The tithing-man, who carried
a long rod and kept order in the house, and outdoors at noontime, sat
in the gallery, and visited any boy who whispered or found curious
passages in the Bible and showed them to another boy. It was an
awful moment when the bushy-headed tithing-man approached a boy in
sermon-time. The eyes of the whole congregation were on him, and he
could feel the guilt ooze out of his burning face.
At noon was Sunday-school, and after that, before the afternoon
service, in summer, the boys had a little time to eat their luncheon
together at the watering-trough, where some of the elders were likely
to be gathered, talking very solemnly about cattle; or they went over
to a neighboring barn to see the calves; or they slipped off down
the roadside to a place where they could dig sassafras or the root
of the sweet flag,—roots very fragrant in the mind of many a boy
with religious associations to this day. There was often an odor of
sassafras in the afternoon service. It used to stand in my mind as a
substitute for the Old Testament incense of the Jews. Something in the
same way the big bass-viol in the choir took the place of "David's harp
of solemn sound."
[Illustration: TURNING THE GRINDSTONE]
The going home from meeting was more cheerful and lively than the
coming to it. There was all the bustle of getting the horses out of the
sheds and bringing them round to the meeting-house steps. At noon the
boys sometimes sat in the wagons and swung the whips without cracking
them: now it was permitted to give them a little snap in order to bring
the horses up in good style; and the boy was rather proud of the horse
if it pranced a little while the timid "women-folks" were trying to get
in. The boy had an eye for whatever life and stir there was in a New
England Sunday. He liked to drive home fast. The old house and the farm
looked pleasant to him. There was an extra dinner when they reached
home, and a cheerful consciousness of duty performed made it a pleasant
dinner. Long before sundown the Sunday-school book had been read, and
the boy sat waiting in the house with great impatience the signal that
the "day of rest" was over. A boy may not be very wicked, and yet not
see the need of "rest." Neither his idea of rest nor work is that of
older farmers.
VI
THE GRINDSTONE OF LIFE
If there is one thing more than another that hardens the lot of the
farmer-boy it is the grindstone. Turning grindstones to grind scythes
is one of those heroic but unobtrusive occupations for which one gets
no credit. It is a hopeless kind of task, and, however faithfully the
crank is turned, it is one that brings little reputation. There is a
great deal of poetry about haying—I mean for those not engaged in it.
One likes to hear the whetting of the scythes on a fresh morning and
the response of the noisy bobolink, who always sits upon the fence
and superintends the cutting of the dew-laden grass. There is a sort
of music in the "swish" and a rhythm in the swing of the scythes in
concert. The boy has not much time to attend to it, for it is lively
business "spreading" after half a dozen men who have only to walk
along and lay the grass low, while the boy has the whole hayfield on
his hands. He has little time for the poetry of haying, as he struggles
along, filling the air with the wet mass which he shakes over his head,
and picking his way with short legs and bare feet amid the short and
freshly cut stubble.
But if the scythes cut well and swing merrily it is due to the boy
who turned the grindstone. Oh, it was nothing to do, just turn the
grindstone a few minutes for this and that one before breakfast; any
"hired man" was authorized to order the boy to turn the grindstone.
How they did bear on, those great strapping fellows! Turn, turn, turn,
what a weary go it was. For my part, I used to like a grindstone that
"wabbled" a good deal on its axis, for when I turned it fast, it put
the grinder on a lively lookout for cutting his hands, and entirely
satisfied his desire that I should "turn faster." It was some sport to
make the water fly and wet the grinder, suddenly starting up quickly
and surprising him when I was turning very slowly. I used to wish
sometimes that I could turn fast enough to make the stone fly into a
dozen pieces. Steady turning is what the grinders like, and any boy who
turns steadily, so as to give an even motion to the stone, will be much
praised, and will be in demand. I advise any boy who desires to do this
sort of work to turn steadily. If he does it by jerks and in a fitful
manner, the "hired men" will be very apt to dispense with his services
and turn the grindstone for each other.
This is one of the most disagreeable tasks of the boy farmer, and,
hard as it is, I do not know why it is supposed to belong especially
to childhood. But it is, and one of the certain marks that second
childhood has come to a man on a farm is that he is asked to turn
the grindstone as if he were a boy again. When the old man is good
for nothing else, when he can neither mow nor pitch, and scarcely
"rake after," he can turn grindstone, and it is in this way that he
renews his youth. "Ain't you ashamed to have your granther turn the
grindstone?" asks the hired man of the boy. So the boy takes hold and
turns himself, till his little back aches. When he gets older he
wishes he had replied, "Ain't you ashamed to make either an old man or
a little boy do such hard grinding work?"
Doing the regular work of this world is not much, the boy thinks, but
the wearisome part is the waiting on the people who do the work. And
the boy is not far wrong. This is what women and boys have to do on a
farm,—wait upon everybody who "works." The trouble with the boy's life
is that he has no time that he can call his own. He is, like a barrel
of beer, always on draught. The men-folks, having worked in the regular
hours, lie down and rest, stretch themselves idly in the shade at noon,
or lounge about after supper. Then the boy, who has done nothing all
day but turn grindstone, and spread hay, and rake after, and run his
little legs off at everybody's beck and call, is sent on some errand or
some household chore, in order that time shall not hang heavy on his
hands. The boy comes nearer to perpetual motion than anything else in
nature, only it is not altogether a voluntary motion. The time that
the farm-boy gets for his own is usually at the end of a stent. We used
to be given a certain piece of corn to hoe, or a certain quantity of
corn to husk in so many days. If we finished the task before the time
set, we had the remainder to ourselves. In my day it used to take very
sharp work to gain anything, but we were always anxious to take the
chance. I think we enjoyed the holiday in anticipation quite as much
as we did when we had won it. Unless it was training-day, or Fourth
of July, or the circus was coming, it was a little difficult to find
anything big enough to fill our anticipations of the fun we would have
in the day or the two or three days we had earned. We did not want to
waste the time on any common thing. Even going fishing in one of the
wild mountain brooks was hardly up to the mark, for we could sometimes
do that on a rainy day. Going down to the village store was not very
exciting, and was on the whole a waste of our precious time. Unless
we could get out our military company, life was apt to be a little
blank, even on the holidays for which we had worked so hard. If you
went to see another boy, he was probably at work in the hayfield or
the potato-patch, and his father looked at you askance. You sometimes
took hold and helped him, so that he could go and play with you; but
it was usually time to go for the cows before the task was done. There
has been a change, but the amusements of a boy in the country were
few then. Snaring "suckers" out of the deep meadow brook used to be
about as good as any that I had. The North American sucker is not an
engaging animal in all respects; his body is comely enough, but his
mouth is puckered up like that of a purse. The mouth is not formed for
the gentle angle-worm nor the delusive fly of the fishermen. It is
necessary therefore to snare the fish if you want him. In the sunny
days he lies in the deep pools, by some big stone or near the bank,
poising himself quite still, or only stirring his fins a little now
and then, as an elephant moves his ears. He will lie so for hours,—or
rather float,—in perfect idleness and apparent bliss.