THE BUILDING OF THE SHANTY.
Frank looked about him with quick curiosity, expecting to see some of the
men in whose society he was to spend the jointer. But there were only the
farm-hands lounging listlessly about, their days work being over, and
they had nothing to do except to smoke their pipes and wait for
nightfall, when they would lounge off to bed.
The shantymen had not yet arrived, Mr. Stewart always making a point of
being at the depot some days in advance of them, in order to have plenty
of time to prepare his plans for the winter campaign. Noting Frank's
inquiring look, he laughed, and said,--
"Oh, there are none of them here yet--we're the first on the field-but by
the end of the week there'll be more than a hundred men here."
A day or two later the first batch made their appearance, coming up by
the heavy teams that they would take with them into the woods; and each
day brought a fresh contingent, until by the time Mr. Stewart had
mentioned the farm fairly swarmed with them, and it became necessary for
this human hive to imitate the bees and send off its superfluous
inhabitants without delay.
They were a rough, noisy, strange-looking lot of men, and Frank, whose
acquaintance with the shantymen had been limited to seeing them in small
groups as they passed through Calumet in the autumn and spring, on their
way to and from the camps, meeting them now for the first time in such
large numbers, could not help some inward shrinking of soul as he noted
their uncouth ways and listened to their oath-besprinkled talk. They
were "all sorts and conditions of men"--habitants who could not speak a
word of English, and Irishmen who could not speak a word of French;
shrewd Scotchmen, chary of tongue and reserved of manner, and loquacious
half-breeds, ready for song, or story, or fight, according to the humour
of the moment. Here and there were dusky skins and prominent features
that betrayed a close connection with the aboriginal owners of this
continent. Almost all bad come from the big saw-mills away down the
river, or from some other equally arduous employment, and were glad of
the chance of a few days' respite from work while Mr. Stewart was
dividing them up and making the necessary arrangements for the winter's
work.
Frank mingled freely with them, scraping acquaintance with those who
seemed disposed to be friendly, and whenever he came across one with an
honest, pleasant, prepossessing face, hoping very much that he would be a
member of his gang. He was much impressed by the fact that he was
evidently the youngest member of the gathering, and did not fail to
notice the sometimes curious, sometimes contemptuous, looks with which he
was regarded by the fresh arrivals.
In the course of a few days matters were pretty well straightened out at
the depot, and the gangs of men began to leave for the different camps.
Mr. Stewart had promised Frank that he would take care to put him under a
foreman who would treat him well; and when one evening he was called into
the office and introduced to a tall, powerful, grave-looking man, with
heavy brown beard and deep voice, Mr. Stewart said,--
"Here is Frank Kingston, Dan; Jack's only son, you know. He's set his
heart on lumbering, and I'm going to let him try it for a winter."
Frank scrutinized the man called Dan very closely as. Mr. Stewart
continued,--
"I'm going to send him up to the Kippewa camp with you, Dan. There's
nobody'll look after him better than you will, for I know you thought a
big sight of his father, and for his sake as well as mine you'll see that
nothing happens to the lad."
Dan Johnston's face relaxed into a smile that showed there were rich
depths of good nature beneath his rather stern exterior, for he was
pleased at the compliment implied in the superintendent's words, and
stretching out a mighty hand to Frank, he laid it on his shoulder in a
kindly way, saying,--
"He seems a likely lad, Mr. Stewart, and a chip of the old block, if I'm
not mistaken. I'll be right glad to have him with me. But what kind of
work is he to go at? He seems rather light for chopping, doesn't he?"
Mr. Stewart gave a quizzical sort of glance at Frank as he replied,--
"Well, you see, Dan, I think myself he is too light for chopping, so I
told him he'd have to be chore-boy for this winter, anyway."
A look of surprise came over Johnston's face, and, more to himself than
the others, he muttered in a low tone,--
"Chore-boy, eh? Jack Kingston's son a chore-boy!" Then turning to Frank,
he said aloud, "All right, my boy. There's nothing like beginning at
the bottom if you want to learn the whole business. You must make up your
mind to put in a pretty hard time, but I'll see you have fair play,
anyway."
As Frank looked at the rugged, honest, determined face, and the stalwart
frame, he felt thoroughly satisfied that in Dan Johnston he had a friend
in whom he could place perfect confidence, and that Mr. Stewart's promise
had been fully kept. The foreman then became quite sociable, and asked
him many questions about his mother, and his life in Calumet, and his
plans for the future, so that before they parted for the night Frank felt
as if they were quite old friends instead of recent acquaintances.
The following morning Johnston was bestirring himself bright and early
getting his men and stores together, and before noon a start was made for
the Kippewa River, on whose southern bank a site had already been
selected for the lumber camp which would be the centre of his operations
for the winter. Johnston's gang numbered fifty men all told, himself
included, and they were in high spirits as they set out for their
destination. The stores and tools were, of course, transported by waggon;
but the men had to go on foot, and with fifteen miles of a rough forest
road to cover before sundown, they struck a brisk pace as, in twos and
threes and quartettes, they marched noisily along the dusty road.
"You stay by me, Frank," said the foreman, "and if your young legs happen
to go back on you, you can have a lift on one of the teams until you're
rested."
Frank felt in such fine trim that although he fully appreciated his big
friend's thoughtfulness, he was rash enough to think he would not require
to avail himself of it; but the next five miles showed him his mistake,
and at the end of them he was very glad to jump upon one of the teams
that happened to be passing, and in this way hastened over a good part of
the remainder of the tramp.
As the odd-looking gang pushed forward steadily, if not in exactly
martial order, Frank had a good opportunity of inspecting its members,
and making in his own mind an estimate of their probable good of bad
qualities as companions. In this he was much assisted by the foreman,
who, in reply to his questions, gave him helpful bits of information
about the different ones that attracted his attention. Fully one-half
of the gang were French Canadians, dark-complexioned, black-haired,
bright-eyed men, full of life and talk, their tongues going unceasingly
as they plodded along in sociable groups. Of the remainder, some were
Scotch, others Irish, the rest English. Upon the whole, they were quite a
promising-looking lot of men; indeed, Johnston took very good care to
have as little "poor stuff" as possible in his gang; for he had long held
the reputation of turning out more logs at his camp than were cut at any
other on the same "limits;" and this well-deserved fame he cherished very
dearly.
Darkness was coming on apace, when at last a glad shout from the foremost
group announced that the end of the journey was near; and in a few
minutes more the whole band of tired men were resting their wearied limbs
on the bank of the river near which the shanty was to be erected at once.
The teams had arrived some time before them, and two large tents had been
put up as temporary-shelter; while brightly-burning fires and the
appetizing fizzle of frying bacon joined with the wholesome aroma of hot
tea to make glad the hearts of the dusty, hungry pedestrians.
Frank enjoyed his open-air tea immensely. It was his first taste of real
lumberman's life, and was undoubtedly a pleasant introduction to it; for
the hard work would not begin until the morrow, and in the meantime
everybody was still a-holidaying. So refreshing was the evening meal
that, tired as all no doubt felt from their long tramp, they soon forgot
it sufficiently to spend an hour or more in song and chorus that made the
vast forest aisles re-echo with rough melody before they sank into the
silence of slumber for the night.
At daybreak next morning Dan Johnston's stentorian voice aroused the
sleepers, and Frank could hardly believe that he had taken more than
twice forty winks at the most before the stirring shout of "Turn out!
turn out! The work's waiting!" broke into his dreams and recalled him to
life's realities. The morning was gray and chilly, the men looked
sleepy and out of humour, and Johnston himself had it a stern distant
manner, or seemed to have, as after a wash at the river bank Frank
approached him and reported himself for duty.
"Will you please to tell me what is to be my work, Mr. Johnston?" said
he, in quite a timid tone; for somehow or other there seemed to be a
change in the atmosphere.
The foreman's face relaxed a little as he turned to answer him.
"You want to be set to work, eh? Well, that won't take long." And looking
around among the moving men until he found the one he wanted, he raised
his voice and called,--
"Hi, there, Baptiste! Come here a moment."
In response to the summons a short, stout, smooth-faced, and decidedly
good-natured looking Frenchman, who had been busy at one of the fires,
came over to the foreman.
"See here, Baptiste; this lad's to be your chore-boy this winter, and I
don't want you to be too hard on him--_savez?_ Let him have plenty of
work, but not more than his share."
Baptiste examined Frank's sturdy figure with much the same smile of
approval that he might bestow upon a fine capon that he was preparing for
the pot, and murmured out something like,--
"_Bien, m'sieur_. I sall be easy wid him if ee's a good boy."
The foreman then said to Frank,--
"There, Frank, go with Baptiste, and he'll give you work enough."
So Frank went dutifully off with the Frenchman.
He soon found out what his work was to be. Baptiste was cook, and he was
his assistant, not so much in the actual cooking, for Baptiste looked
after that himself, but in the scouring of the pots and pans, the keeping
up of the fires, the setting out of the food, and such other
supplementary duties. Not very dignified or inspiring employment,
certainly, especially for a boy "with a turn for books and figures." But
Frank had come to the camp prepared to undertake, without a murmur, any
work within his powers that might be given him, and he now went quietly
and steadily at what was required of him.
As soon as breakfast was despatched, Johnston called the men together to
give them directions about the building of the shanty, which was the
first thing of all to be done; and having divided them up into parties,
to each of which a different task was assigned, he set them at work
without delay.
Frank was very glad that attention to his duties would not prevent his
watching the others at theirs; for what could be more interesting than to
study every stage of the erection of the building that was to be their
shelter and home during the long winter months now rapidly approaching?
It was a first experience for him, and nothing escaped his vigilant eye.
This is the way he described the building of the shanty to his mother on
his return to Calumet:--
"You see, mother, everybody except Baptiste and myself took a hand, and
just worked like beavers. I wish you could have seen the men. And Mr.
Johnston--why, he was in two places at once most of the time, or at least
seemed to be! It was grand fun watching them. The first thing they did
was to cut down a lot of trees--splendid big fellows, that would make the
trees round here look pretty small, I can tell you. Then they chopped off
all the branches and cut up the trunks into the lengths that suited, and
laid them one on the top of the other until they made a wall about as
high as Mr. Johnston, or perhaps higher, in the shape of one big room
forty feet long by thirty feet wide, Mr. Johnston said. It looked very
funny then--just like a huge pig-pen, with no windows and only one
door--on the side that faced the river. Next day they laid long timbers
across the top of the wall, resting them in the middle on four great
posts they called 'scoop-bearers.' Funny name, isn't it? But they called
them that because they bear the 'scoops' that make the roof; and a grand
roof it is, I tell you. The scoops are small logs hollowed out on one
side and flat on the other; and they lay them on the cross timbers in
such a way that the edges of one fit into the hollows of two others, so
that the rain hasn't a chance to get in, no matter how bard it tries.
Next thing they made the floor; and that wasn't a hard job, for they just
made logs flat on two sides and laid them on the ground, so that it was a
pretty rough sort of a floor. All the cracks were stuffed tight with moss
and mud, and a big bank of earth thrown up around the bottom of the wall
to keep the draught out.
"But you should have seen the beds, or 'bunks,' as they called them, for
the men. I don't believe you could ever sleep on them. They were nothing
but board platforms all around three sides of the room, built on a slant
so that your head was higher than your feet; so you see I'd have had
nothing better than the soft side of a plank for a mattress if you hadn't
fitted me out with one. And when the other fellows saw how snug I was,
they vowed they'd have a soft bed too; so what do you think they did?
They gathered an immense quantity of hemlock branches--little soft ones,
you know--and spread them thick over the boards, and then they laid
blankets over that and made a really fine mattress for all. So that, you
see, I quite set the fashion. The last thing to be made was the
fireplace, which has the very queer name of 'caboose,' and is queerer
than its name. It is right in the middle of the room, not at one end, and
is as big as a small room by itself. First of all, a great bank of stones
and sand is laid on the floor, kept together by boards at the edges; then
a large square hole is cut in the roof above, and a wooden chimney built
on the top of it; and then at two of the corners cranes to hold the pots
are fixed, and the caboose is complete. And oh, mother, such roaring big
fires as were always going in it after the cold came--all night long, you
know; and sometimes I had to stay awake to keep the fire from going out,
which wasn't much fun, but, of course, I had to take my turn. So now,
mother, you ought to have a pretty good idea of what our shanty was like;
for, besides a table and our chests, there was nothing much else in it to
describe."
Such were Frank Kingston's surroundings as he entered upon the humble
and laborious duties of chore-boy in Camp Kippewa, not attempting to
conceal from himself that he would much rather be a chopper or teamster
or road-maker, but with his mind fully fixed upon doing his work, however
uncongenial it might be, cheerfully and faithfully for one winter at
least, feeling confident that if he did he would not be chore-boy for
long, but would in due time be promoted to some more dignified and
attractive position.