Part 4

"I don't want you to think that I'm a gump[4] because of these ideas, but to me they've been a good deal of comfort and whenever I get to doubting at all about things over there I just recall it's a home and I settle back content."

[2] Gone to a lumber camp.

[3] A loon.

[4] A very foolish person.

VIII

CHRISTMAS WITH JIM'S FRIENDS

There was the calendar right before me on the wall, with figures big enough to mentally hit me and hit hard, and I should have remembered that the road of the year had turned toward Christmas. But before me was an unfinished news article that even a hungry and insistent stomach did not seem able to push to a conclusion. Beyond my desk out of the window I looked now and then down upon the hurrying throng who were making their way across City Hall Park to Brooklyn Bridge. It was the hour when you do not know whether to call it day or night. It was indescribable in another way,--it was either misting or raining. I suppose a Scotchman would have called it mist and an Irishman rain. I think that any one looking out that night would have found it hard to see in the gray view anything suggestive of Christmas. I turned from the wet view to my unfinished work only to be again interrupted.

A Western Union boy burst into my office with a telegram. It was from St. John's and I wondered as I tore it open if anything had happened to Harbor Jim. It was short and for once the operators had apparently followed the author's spelling.

come fur chrismus cant take no fur an answer no how biggest an best you or yourn hev ever seed come jim

A few days afterward a long letter came enforcing and elaborating the invitation. Jim wrote that he was already at work upon a Christmas that would eclipse anything New York had ever had. He had taken the idea out of a city paper that I had sent him a year before and had developed it and he wouldn't care to go forward with it, unless I could be there.

That is how it happened that a few days before Christmas, on the last steamer that would get me there in time, I was steaming into St. John's Harbor. Our boat was sheathed with ice and as in the morning we came thru the Narrows there were knobs of ice floating around us. The hills were white and the brown stone now and then stuck thru where the snow had lost its footing.

Landing I found the people in furs and the sleighs making merry music with their bells. A fellow agreed to drive me out to Jim's for two dollars and a half and I went in his sleigh, he called it, but in New England it would have more properly have been called a pung.

Jim almost literally wrapped me in his arms and outdid himself in the cordiality of his welcome.

"How's fishing, Jim?" I asked when the first greetings were over and I had my feet up in front of the stove.

"Fishin', why land o' Goshen, this ain't no time for fishin'. There ain't but one thing on my mind an' that is Christmas. Don't you see what we are a' doin'?"

A kettle of oil was on the stove and the dipping of half grown candles had been recently finished. On the floor were half a hundred full grown candles.

Jim could talk only of Christmas. "I've been thinkin'," he said, "that if there should ever be a second coming of the Lord or He should send another Son to His people He couldn't pick out a better place than this. Suppose it was to be another birth. I callate this land has just as good a chance as Palestine and hereabouts is as fittin' a place as Bethlehem. Look out there at the snow! Makes you think o' a baby's blankets, it's so white and clean and pretty. Our nights man't have stars as brilliant as that one greater star of the first Christmas mornin', but I don't believe they have flyin' lights[5] like 'ourn. I hev noticed that the Lord tries to be as impartial as He can and since He sent His Son to the East last time, if ever He should send again why I think He'd be likely to send Him somewhere hereabouts. You remember the Son liked fishin' an' He'd be delighted with Newfoundland."

The door opened and Bob McCartney walked in.

"What's the matter, Bob; what you got your good behavior[6] on fur?" asked Jim as his friend entered.

"Ain't the occasion worth it? You sed yourself that it was to be the biggest Christmas the Landers ever hed; and I'd like to know if we aren't in a way celebratin' now while we're gettin' ready."

"Who's coming to this Christmas, Jim?" I asked, taking my turn at a question.

"Well, everybody in this town, quite a mess o' folk from St. John's and Quidi Vidi. Some from Brigus, Kelligrews and Heart's Ease. Aunt Saray Bailey is a' comin' from Nancy Jobble.[7] It's such a general invitation that they ain't no definite countin' no how, but their comin'. Everybody that meets anybody hereabouts and nowadays jes' says are you a' comin' to Jim's fur Christmas."

Gradually by prying questions I found out what Jim was planning to do. He had been extremely interested in the account I had sent him of the illuminated tree in Madison Square, and had resolved to have the trees on a neighboring hill-top all illuminated where they stood. In place of electric lights he was engaged in making tallow candles by hand.

The day before Christmas, Mrs. Jim was up very early and when I came down to breakfast she greeted me with this:

"Got to make a biler full o' tea this morning fur the Decoratin' Committee will be here shortly."

"Yes," added Jim, "they'll be here shortly and then we'll be a carryin' out Christmas. Up your way they fetch it _in_, but we're a goin' to carry it out, good and proper, this year."

The first arrival was Bob, who had caught the full contagion of Jim's spirit, and the second was Parson Curtis.

"Hello, Pa'son Curtis," said Jim as he ushered in his guest. "Did you come to look on or to work?"

"Put me in among the workers, Jim," replied the parson.

"That's right, Pa'son," Jim spoke with heartiness. "I like a pa'son that ain't a mite afraid o' work. I callate that our Lord was one o' the greatest workers this world ever seed, and it's a good thing fur those who are a takin' His place to be up in the front row o' workers. Here's a bag o' candles and here's a coil o' wire. You can take 'em up the hill and begin hitchin' 'em to the tallest tree. You can begin on the low branches an' when the younger fellows get here we'll let 'em shinney up to the taller branches."

By eight o'clock, fifty men and boys were at work, many of them bringing their own donation of candles, and each time that Jim saw more candles coming he beamed, for it meant more trees could be included in the scheme.

With banter, jest and story the work of attaching the candles went on thru the morning and at noon we went back to Jim's for dinner. We all knew what to expect and we were not disappointed, when with keen appetites, we crowded the little house and waited our turn for a hot plate of brewse. It's Newfoundland's distinctive dish and salt fish and pork never tasted better than that noon after our climbing up in the trees.

Walking back to finish our work in the afternoon I said to Jim:

"It strikes me it is a little unfortunate that the hill we are decorating has no tall spruce on top. The trees are well arranged on the slopes but the top of the hill itself hasn't a tree on it!"

"That's what pleases me about it. That's why I selected it, because it leaves room for the Candles of the Lord," answered Jim. "There on the top is where the Light o' the World will shine out tonight. When we get the rest of the work done we'll place it."

An hour later Jim came dragging a sled with a huge candle, four feet high, at least, and it was carefully erected in the centre of the open place on the hill. At three o'clock the work was finished and Jim addressed the workers:

"Thank you all. We'll knock off for a spell. Those that lives near can go home. Those that lives too far will find plenty at my house. Be back every one of you an hour before sunset. The sun won't wait for any o' ye and if you don't get here the lightin' will go on jes' the same, but I wants you all to be here, sure."

They began to arrive before the appointed time, but I waited within until it began to grow dark, then I stepped to the door and watched the multitude coming up from the valley. I remember once I went out with the crowds and climbed Mt. Rubidoux in California on an Easter morning. A little in advance of the larger contingent I stood and watched them coming up out of the darkness of the roads below into the growing light of the mountain top and the new day. I thought of that experience again as I watched them coming along the road to climb the hill and keep Christmas Eve with Jim. Only in this instance the picture was reversed and I saw them coming out of the light into the gathering darkness of the night.

There were many from St. John's who had come out for the lark of it. Men that worked along Water St. and Dock St. Girls from the stores came in little groups full of tickles and nudging one another as things happened to meet their fancy. Women in black were in the crowd who had been before along a sorrowful way and turned to make this journey that they might find light. Some of them plainly showed by their demeanor that they were conscious of the fact that Christ was the best part of Christmas.

Boys were in the throng, many of them swaggering along with sticks, copying the manner of English soldiers who feel their importance when on furlough. Little girls tripped along, some of them singing a little Christmas song that begins

"I saw three ships come sailing in, On Christmas Day, on Christmas Day."

The chatter of the many voices did not altogether drown their childish voices and they rose like bird notes above the rushing winds of a forest.

It was slippery walking and now and then some one would fall, but a hand would be reached out to them and they would again go on with a laugh. Everywhere was the glitter. That is what the Newfoundlanders call the spectacle of a snow and icegirt earth. During the day many of our hands had been nearly frozen because of the ice on the trees and they were festooned and sheathed with ice where their branches were a little out of the wind and it had not stripped them of snow during the recent storm. It was a white, shining world, softened by a waning light.

Now the fellows who had been appointed had been at work some time with torches and as we looked up tree after tree put on a garland of jewels and stood forth resplendent for the feast. Parson Curtis had lit the first torch from the Candle of the Lord, as Jim called the big candle on the hill-top, and each torch had been lit from his.

Murmurs ran thru the crowd as the scene grew more beautiful with the lighting of more trees and the deepening of the night shadows. It was now quite dusky, but the snow kept the light so that we could see the workers finishing the lighting.

When all was ready, standing beside the Candle of the Lord, Jim spoke:

"Brothers in Christ, we all are that tonight. I am glad you have come to celebrate the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. Pa'son Curtis will lead us in prayer."

Jim knelt in the snow and the great company followed his example. The prayer was short and Jim was ready to announce the singing of the first of the Christmas hymns, when some one I didn't know made his way thru the crowd, and waiving all formalities, touched Jim on the arm and spoke hurriedly:

"Rascal Moore's took sick. He's got a ketch in his glutch[8] and the Missus wants you to come over right now to sit up with him. She can't manage him no how and she's sent for you."

I was standing beside Jim, watching now his face and now the lights. I looked squarely at him now and thought of the weeks of preparation that he had gone thru and how like some rare flower that blossoms only in the night it had unfolded petal by petal before his delighted eyes. I thought, too, of Rascal Moore, who had so long been living up to his name. It seemed unfair indeed to ask him to go now on this Christmas Eve that he had planned for and was making so successful. Let any one else go if they would, but surely not Jim.

"Tell 'em I'm on my way," was all he said to the messenger, and he moved along as he spoke.

Turning to me he said, what made me feel that he was still human, and without these words I think I must have doubted it. "It would have been a little easier if it had a' been Bob instead of Rascal."

The program began, though Jim was leaving and had turned his back on it all. Will Cunningham, whose tenor voice often led in the little church, started the Christmas hymn "Holy Night, Peaceful Night," and the crowd sang. The female voices seemed in preponderance and I fancied the men all thru the crowd were doing what the few around me were doing, heaping choice epithets upon Rascal Moore.

Jim was yet to see more of his Christmas trees. He may have forgotten it, but his friends remembered that Rascal Moore's place was just about at the foot of the hill and some one started taking off the candles from the trees that were a little beyond and decorating those that were in the direct line toward the Moore house. There were so many hundreds the work was speedily performed. The candles were re-lit and by seven o'clock there was a row of lighted trees extending straight down the hill to the Moore house and at the top of the hill the big candle could now be distinctly seen against the black back-ground of the night.

It may be the angels are a little nearer on Christmas Eve and they decided to add to the wonderful beauty of that night for which Jim had worked and prayed. For now the northern lights came, adding great plumes of light, flashing across the sky in a glory burst of light.

"It's the dead men playing. Come to earth, they have, for Christmas Eve," explained Bob.

When all was ready some one knocked at the Moore door and brought Jim to the porch and he stood bare-headed looking up the wonderful avenue of light to the top of the hill. Then he lifted his eyes from the earth lights and the black crowd to the sky.

"The heavens declare the glory of God," Jim spoke quietly, but many could hear his words. "Mebbe little Peter is here tonight playing in the heavens and joinin' us in our songs. The Lord of Joy has come again!"

"What did you leave us for, Jim?" some one in the crowd shouted.

The hundreds stood waiting for Jim's answer. It was a hush of expectancy, such as fitted that holy night.

Jim answered slowly, measuring his words:

"I heard my Father calling and I went to answer Him!"

[5] Northern Lights.

[6] A silk hat.

[7] Lance du Diable.

[8] A sore throat.

IX

HONEY-MOONING ON THE FLAKES

Jim lapsed into silence and his wife, laying down her mending, poked the fire and soon had tea brewing. The Landers are tea drinkers like the English.

"It's a beautiful story, sir, and we often live it over again," Mrs. Jim said as she poured the tea. I noted the flow-blue china and, answering my query, she said:

"It was my grandfather's. He brought it from England sixty years ago. Of course we're awful careful of it, but we use it, for Jim says the only way to have plenty is to use what you have. We always keep a pot handy and there's always a ready chair, for many a time a neighbor drops in and we wouldn't want to let them go on without a cup o' tea,--a cup o' kindness, Jim calls it."

"Now, I've read books," continued Jim, "and they always end just where they really should begin. When in the book story they decide to get married, then they stop short. If I should ever write a story, which I ain't likely to do, with my little learnin', I'd not stop there, but I'd let that end only the first chapter and I'd let the story go on with its joy and sorrow and its hope and its fear and the problems big and little; the blessings so rare that follow along even as they do in real life.

"If I'm not tiring you, I'd be glad to give you another half chapter afore we all quit and turn in for the night."

Jim put down his empty tea cup with a smack of appreciation at his wife's proper brewing and deliberately cut off a fresh slice of tobacco and crushed it into the bowl of his pipe, and I knew that for at least a half hour, the story would go on, the story that was so real to him and now so fascinating to me.

"Bein' both of us very sure, and the Lord havin' given the sign o' His good pleasure, there beyond Brigus, we didn't wait long afore we were hitched up.

"We begun right here in this house and we started right in here the first night and we went to work on the flakes the next morning. We didn't go off no where's for a honey-mooning.

"I reckon there's no place a real woman would rather go at that time than to the new home where her life is agoin' to be lived, and that vacationing then ain't best for either. In any case we never thought a travelling, for you see the cod was running well and 'twas the height of the season and we had to fill the flakes, while we could.

"A man and a woman who gets married has to get acquainted and adjusted one to the other and there's no better place for learnin' to conform than right where they are agoin' to live and raise their children.

"Course a couple can just pretend for a spell there ain't any work to be done, but there is, and I reckon the sooner they face it, the better for all concerned. If you're agoin' to cut bait, there's no use standin' round dreadin' it.

"When I was a boy we used to have in our house a religious book with pictures of saints in it and every blessed one on' 'em had a ring around their head, halos, I think they call 'em; now I callate that a home ought to have some kind of a halo over it and it's easier to get it fastened on just right when your startin' married life and if you don't get it on then, like's not you'll never have a real home but just a house for feeding and sleeping.

"We got the halo fixed on, eh, Effie," and the fisherman's eyes confirmed his words.

"So, next morning we put on our fishin' clothes and went out on the flakes. We'd clean fish for a spell and then we'd split and spread for a spell. Now I know from the standin' point o' city folks fishin' clothes ain't very scrumptious to look at and they are kinder soused with smell, but our clothes didn't interfere none with our honeymoon.

"Her dress was kinder faded blue, but I always liked blue. It's heaven's color and often the sea borrows it, and that morning it made her cheeks more wonderful pink than I'd seen 'em before.

"There was a kind of down-right, deep-seated satisfaction to both of us in feeling we was at work; both of us a doin' what needed to be done and a sharin' of the burdens or the joys which ever you wants to call 'em. For I have found that some folks get their joys and burdens mixed up and don't seem to know one from 'tother till it's too late and they wake up with a start when they can't change 'em.

"Sharin', I said, and that's a word we set out to understand when we commenced an' with us it's always been a big word ever since.

"After breakfast that first morning we went to the flakes, I took out my wallet and said to her: 'There's no sense of my carryin' this round when you are more likely to need it than I. I'll leave it here behind the clock and when you need money, it's yours and bein' yours you don't have to give any account of it 'cept to your own conscience. More properly speakin' it's 'ourn, for now we're married there ain't no longer yourn or mine, but 'ourn.'

"I callate that if a man can trust a woman to bring up his children, trust her with his house and his reputation and his disposition, he ain't no cause to fear to trust her with his wallet.

"Bob McCartney always says a woman ought to have an allowance, but I tell him too much book-keeping is bad for a married couple and then how's a man able to judge the amount of an allowance anyhow. I guess most women earn more'n an allowance, and a sharin' always seems bigger than an allowance.

"I've heared folks liked honey-moons 'cause they got away from pryin' eyes, but I want you to know that our honeymoon want never once interrupted. The neighbors see we had work to do and they had theirs and we both of us did it. The children of the neighbors was often round with us then, but they made us think of 'ourn that was to come, in the favor of the Lord. And if when I helped her along from plank to plank, I held her hand a little longer than absolutely necessary, who was to care.

"There's been no decided change in the years; we've been honey-mooning along just about the same. Course with the children she had more to do in doors, but she's always managed, if there was an extra run o' fish to come to the flakes and help me over the rush; and if one o' the kids was sick or anything extra come, why I've always toted the load for her."

During the last few sentences Jim was watching the clock intently and as he spoke the last sentence, he crossed the little room and began winding the clock. I looked up and there, sticking out from behind the clock, was a worn, brown wallet. Evidently he was still living up to his habit of sharing.

"It's time all decent folks was in bed," he said. "We done want to ape the city folks."

So bidding them good night I went out into the night. The rain had ceased and there were fast hurrying clouds breaking up and I could see the moon high over the spruces. I felt my way along the road back to St. John's.

X

JIM AND HIS BOOK

"They that seek the Lord understand _all_ things." Jim spoke with his usual deliberation. Again, I had found my way to the little house, where now I felt welcome. It was "lightin' an' readin'" time as Jim called it.

"They that seek the Lord, understand _all_ things," repeated Jim. I'm finding it true more and more. It is true that the Lord giveth to a man what is good in His sight, wisdom and knowledge and joy.

"We began sharin' the book, just as we began sharin' the wallet. I callated that since the Lord by wisdom founded the earth we'd have to found our earth home the same way.

"I'm not educated with figgering knowledge. I never got much school wisdom, for I never went much, and what I did get was mostly from the fellow that set on the bench with me instead of from the teacher. The teacher was so busy with fifty odd pupils, varying from four to twenty years in age, that he didn't have much time for any one. He had to skip from the multiplication table to algebra and often he skipped some of the pupils, and I was apt to be the one he overlooked.

"I know my limitations. A city chap told me about them once and I thanked him." Jim chuckled at the remembrance.

"'Look ahere,' the city chap said to me, 'do you know you've lost all the G's out of your vocabulary. Your words don't look nor sound natural. You better start in putting them on. And there is no such word as ain't. Remember that or you can't talk in polite society.'

"I presume he knew, for he talked as though he was on good terms with a dictionary; and when he went fishing and caught the hook in his hand he said words that weren't in the dictionary, and that came near breaking the first commandment. I've got some of those G's put back on, but not all. Two things is helping me on the job, the reading of the Good Book and the children.

"Book learnin's a fine thing. I'm stumblin' along thru a book or two myself, but I callate the prophets didn't refer to book knowledge when they wrote of wisdom, but rather heart and soul wisdom. The promise I recollect was this: 'For wisdom shall enter into thine _heart_ and knowledge shall be pleasant unto thy _soul_.'

Then he reached for his Bible, but before he opened it he said: