THE 'CORNER.'
Several days were employed in plastering all the crevices of the shanty
with clay, cutting out a doorway and a single window in the front wall,
and building a hearth and chimney. But when completed, and the goods and
chattels moved in, quite a proud sense of proprietorship stole into the
owner's heart.
As yet, this arduous bush-life had not ceased to be as it were a play:
Sam Holt's cheery companionship took the edge off every hardship; and
their youthful health and strength nourished under toil.
'Now, considering we are to be dependent on ourselves for furniture, the
best thing I can fashion in the first instance will be a work bench,'
said Arthur, whose turn for carpentering was decided. 'Little I ever
thought that my childish tool-box was educating me for this.'
'I think a door ought to be your first performance,' suggested Robert.
'Our mansion would be snugger with a door than a screen of hemlock
brush.'
'But I must go to the "Corner" for boards, and that will take an entire
day, the road is so vile. I can't see why I couldn't hew boards out of
a pine myself; eh, Holt?'
'You want to try your hand at "slabbing," do you? I warn you that the
labour is no joke, and the planks never look so neat as those from the
sawmill.'
'We have flung "looks" overboard long ago,' replied Arthur. 'Come, teach
me, like a good fellow.'
'Choose your tree as clean and straight in the grain as possible.'
'And how am I to tell how its grain runs?' asked the pupil.
'Experiment is the only certainty; but if the tree be perfectly clear of
knots for thirty or forty feet, and its larger limbs drooping downwards,
so as to shelter the trunk in a measure from the influence of the sun,
these are presumptions in favour of the grain running straight.'
'What has the sun to do with it?'
'The grain of most trees naturally inclines to follow the annual course
of the sun. Hence its windings, in great measure. Having selected and
felled your pine, cut it across into logs of the length of plank you
want.'
'But you said something of experiment in deciding about the grain of the
wood.'
'Oh, by cutting out a piece, and testing it with the axe, to see whether
it splits fair. When you have the logs chopped, mark the ends with a bit
of charcoal into the width of your planks: then slab them asunder with
wedges.'
'Holt, where did you pick up such a variety of knowledge as you have?'
'I picked up this item among the lumber-men. You must know I spent more
than one long vacation in exploring the most-out-of-the-way locations I
could find. But I'd advise you to go to the sawmill for your planks,
though I do understand the theory of slabbing.'
After due consideration--and as glass for the window was a want for
which the forest could supply no substitute--it was agreed that all
should take a half-holiday next day, and go down to the 'Corner' to
Uncle Zack's store.
'Now that is settled,' said Robert, with a little difficulty, 'I wanted
to say--that is, I've been thinking--that we are here in the wilderness,
far away from all churches and good things of that kind, and we ought to
have prayers of our own every evening, as my mother has at home.'
'Certainly,' said both Arthur and Sam Holt.
'I have never so felt the presence of God,' added Robert solemnly,
'as since I've been in these forest solitudes; never so felt my utter
dependence upon Him for everything.'
'No,' rejoined Sam. 'He seems to draw very near to the soul in the midst
of these His grand works. The very stillness exalts one's heart towards
Him.'
And so that good habit of family worship was commenced, inaugurating the
shanty that very night. Andy Callaghan sat by and listened.
'Throth, but they're fine words,' said he. 'I wouldn't believe any one
now, that that book is bad to listen to.'
'And at home you'd run away from the sight of it. How's that, Andy?'
asked Mr. Wynn.
'It's aisy explained, sir,' replied the servant, looking droll. 'Don't
you see, I haven't his riverence at me elbow here, to turn me into a
goat if I did anything contrary, or to toss me into purgatory the minit
the breath is out of my poor body.'
Thousands of Andy's countrymen find the same relief to their consciences
as soon as they tread the free soil of Canada West.
Truly a primitive settlement was the 'Corner.' The dusk forest closed
about its half dozen huts threateningly, as an army round a handful of
invincibles. Stumps were everywhere that trees were not; one log-cabin
was erected upon four, as it had been, legs ready to walk away with the
edifice. 'Uncle Zack's' little store was the most important building in
the place, next to the sawmill on the stream.
'The situation must be unhealthy,' said Robert; 'here's marsh under my
very feet. Why, there's a far better site for a town plot on my land,
Holt.'
'Ay, and a better water privilege too. Let me see what your energy does
towards developing its resources, Robert.'
They discovered one source of the storekeeper's prosperity in the
enormous price he exacted for the commonest articles. Necessity alone
could have driven Arthur to pay what he did for the wretched little
window of four panes to light the shanty. And Uncle Zack had as much to
say about the expense and difficulty of getting goods to a locality so
remote, and as much sympathizing with his purchaser because of the
exorbitant cost, as if he were a philanthropist, seeking solely the
convenience of his neighbours by his sales.
'That fellow's a master of soft sawder when he chooses: but did you see
how he clutched the hard cash after all? My opinion is, he don't often
get paid in the circulating medium,' said Arthur.
'Of that you may be sure,' rejoined Sam Holt; 'currency here lies more
in potash or flour, just as they have salt in Abyssinia. Society seems
to be rather mixed at the "Corner." Yonder's a French Canadian, and
here's an Indian.'
No glorious red man, attired in savage finery of paint and feathers;
no sculptor's ideal form, or novelist's heroic countenance; but a
mild-looking person, in an old shooting jacket and red flannel shirt,
with a straw hat shading his pale coppery complexion. He wield a
tomahawk or march on a war trail! Never. And where was the grim
taciturnity of his forefathers? He answered when spoken to, not in
Mohawk, or Cherokee, or Delaware, but in nasal Yankeefied English; nay,
he seemed weakly garrulous.
'There's another preconceived idea knocked on the head,' said Arthur.
'My glorious ideal Indian! you are fallen, never to rise.'