Part 29

Driving to school with the children these mornings is a task full of interest. The white page of the snow is scribbled over with all sorts of stories. I never knew rabbits and quail to be so plentiful as they are this year. Their tracks are everywhere, though where they hide themselves is a mystery. I have seen only one rabbit this year. That one was poked out of a culvert, and I saw it only for the three or four seconds it took to get under a stack, yet the whole neighbourhood is tracked by them as if mobs of them played about at night. There are three flocks of quail on the farm and yet I have never seen them except when I set out to search for them diligently. I hear them whistling in different directions almost every morning and evening, but they manage to keep themselves out of sight. This makes me wonder a little about the sharp-sighted heroes of modern nature stories who can't walk through a page of printed text without seeing game and making observations that would take me hours of hunting and watching. If it were not for the snow, which reveals every movement of the little creatures, we should hardly know that there is life of any kind in the fields. To the children these tracks are a never-ending source of wonder and delight. They are sure that the rabbits or quail are under every bush to which the tracks lead, if I would only stop the buggy long enough to let them go and see. But I looked too often years ago when trudging through the fields and woods with a gun to feel much enthusiasm. These winter tracks seem to lead everywhere and nowhere. One almost imagines that they are purposely confused so as to conceal the hiding-places.

_Nov. 9._--The turkeys in Appin district are not wild, but their owners are. This is the season of the annual round-up, and if it were not that Canadians are a peaceable and law-abiding people the results might be disastrous. The confusion is equal to that of a round-up of wild cattle in Texas in the old evil days. Flocks are inextricably mixed. It is true that some of the tough stringy old gobblers and hens are marked with bits of gaudy rags tied on their wings, but the young, plump, edible birds are unbranded. Hence the confusion and heart-burnings.

Turkeys are native here, and they do not seem to understand that the world has become civilised since the time when their ancestors roamed through the woods in mighty flocks. They are the only important survivors of the wild life of other days, and they still retain many of their wild instincts. Although they are hatched out in the barns or poultry houses, they take to the woods as soon as they have the use of their legs, and live the wild life until full grown.

The great trouble is that, like the Indians, they are unable to understand property rights in land. Line fences mean nothing to them, and they will range wherever food is plentiful. Flocks sometimes wander miles from home in quest of grasshoppers in the summer time, and of beechnuts in the fall. While the weather is mild the flocks keep apart, but when a cold snap comes on they rush together, and then the trouble begins.

"My turkeys were hatched early in June," says one farmer's wife.

Sixty gobblers gobble together as at a signal, while an equal number of hens stretch their necks and look worried.

"Mine were July birds, but they are of a big breed, and fast growers." The gobblers comment on this statement with a clamorous, simultaneous gobble.

"Mine were July birds, too, but I fed them on oatmeal for a couple of weeks, and that gave them a good start."

Once more the gobblers in convention assembled gobble furiously.

Here you have all the elements of a neighbourhood row. Each woman is convinced in her own soul that all the really big turkeys belong to her by rights, and that the runts that have pulled through an attack of roup or blackhead belong to some one else.

"When my hens were setting I noticed that all their eggs were sharp-pointed, and I've heard it said that gobblers always hatch out of that kind."

After this remark the gobblers gobble their worst. They seem to have a mania for gobbling after every remark made by people who are viewing them. At the same time the other two women sniffed, for they knew just what the remark about sharp-pointed eggs and gobblers means. It means that the speaker thinks she should come out of the round-up with a flock wholly composed of gobblers. They would like to do the same, but it is manifestly impossible. There are fully fifty hens, and they must belong to somebody.

At last, in desperation, it is suggested that each owner drive out her own marked old hens and turkeys and see if the young ones will follow their parents. Only people who have tried to drive turkeys know what this means. Make a pass at a gobbler with a switch and he sidesteps out of range. Then he stands to await further developments. As no two turkeys by any possibility sidestep in the same direction the progress that can be made in driving them is evident. It is asserted on good authority that the more people know about turkeys the better they like geese.

In order to facilitate the division of the flocks the owners make wild rushes at them, each trying to cut out towards her own nucleus the finest-looking birds. Full of a sense of the wrongs they are enduring, they keep at it until each has the number of birds in her original flock. Then each makes her way home to tell her husband how she was imposed upon and cheated, and each vows she will never speak to either of her greedy and over-reaching neighbours as long as she lives--no, never.

The turkeys are then fed on grain for a few days and rushed to the Christmas market. The only good turkey is a dead one, but it is so very good that much may be forgiven.

_Nov. 11._--During the past couple of days I have had a chance to give some close study to the hen. It was decided to shift one of the flocks to another house. This was done at night--the time when so many hens are shifted. They were picked from their roosts, stuffed into canvas bags, and carried squawking to their new home. Chicken-thieves must have a knack that I cannot discover, or they would be caught every time they make a raid. It doesn't matter whether I catch a hen by the legs or by the neck, or by both at once, she is sure to squawk, and after she is put in a bag she keeps right on "searching her soul for sounds to tell how scared she is." Merely as a matter of scientific interest, I should like to know how the chicken-thieves manage their work so quietly. If there happen to be any among the readers of this page, I wish they would write me a line privately, telling how the trick is done. Communications will be treated as strictly confidential, and I promise not to make bad use of the information given. I really want to know, for it is an irritating mystery how a creature so full of assorted noises can be taken away in silence. Those who know will please write, instead of coming and giving a practical demonstration. They need not disclose name and address as a guarantee of good faith. Write soon.

The only thing in the first night of the moving that seems worth recording was the conduct of the sporty Leghorn rooster. He had been plunged head-first into a bag, squawking like the most chicken-hearted pullet, but when he had been dumped on the floor of his new home he began to strut around and talk hen talk just as if everything had turned out as he had expected. He crooned and clucked to his flock, and acted for all the world like the leader of an Opposition that had suffered a humiliating defeat. He seemed to be telling his followers not to be discouraged, for when the right time came he would rip things wide open and crow over the wreck of the Government. On the day after the moving the old chicken-house was taken away, or every hen would have been back in it next night. As the phrenologists used to say, "The hen has a wonderfully developed bump of locality." When she gets settled in one place she becomes very much attached to it. Unless carried beyond her bearings, she will come back as inevitably as a cat. Knowing this, we were not surprised, on going out with the lantern on the second night, to find a lot of the hens huddled where the chicken-house had stood. The snow was pelting down on them, but they seemed to prefer the tender associations of the old place to the warmth and shelter of the new. There was nothing to be done but to grab them by the legs and carry them to their new home again. Wishing to get through with the job as quickly as possible, I put one under each arm, took two in each hand, and carried the lantern with my teeth. I was just about as fully occupied as a man could well be, but it is always at such times that things begin to happen. I hadn't walked two rods before my nose got itchy. Wow! It wasn't a gentle little tickling, but a wild, exasperating, fiery agony that made me wrinkle up my face till my eyes were shut. I couldn't raise my hands without dropping chickens, and I couldn't get comfort from the wire fence because the lantern was in the way. For the next few seconds I was as busy as Rex Beach's "one-armed paper-hanger with the hives." But it was no use. Luckily the hen-house was not far away, and I rushed towards it. As soon as I reached the door I scattered chickens all over the place and clutched my nose. It is all right for you to laugh, but if you were the right kind of person you would rub your nose in sympathy as you read this. I wonder how many of you did.

Among the chickens that had to be carried were four pure-bred Brahma cockerels and a pullet. They interested me, and from now on I am going to cultivate their acquaintance. All fall they have been ranging over the whole farm, and even trespassing on neighbouring farms in search of sunflower seeds and other delicacies. This had caused me some surprise, for my early recollections of Brahmas were that they were exceedingly sedentary fowls, slow movers, and without ambition, save the overmastering ambition of the hens to set. As I remember them they were setting all the time and all over the place. If they were thrown off the nests they would cuddle down contentedly on a door-knob or piece of broken crockery, apparently with the idea of hatching out some egg-cups. When approached they would ruffle up their feathers and snarl, but they wouldn't move unless lifted. It was useless to hold them under the spout and pump on them, for that only seemed to make them mad--which justifies the proverb, "Mad as a wet hen." It was practically impossible to break them of setting. But I am assured that these up-to-date Brahmas are non-setters. They can't be induced to set. I can't help wondering how the strain was developed. As these are July chickens and there is only one pullet, I haven't had a chance to see if the marvellous change has been really accomplished. But I do know that they range around as no old-time Brahma ever did. When they hear a beechnut fall in the woods they stretch out their long necks, unlimber their long legs, and almost seem to shake the earth as they bounce across the fields to get it. As yet they are all feathers and skeleton. They look as big as turkeys, but they have no meat on them, though each one has enough neck and feet to make a boarding-house chicken fricassee. They seem to be like Sir John Macdonald's Holstein cattle: "The more you feed them the more bone they grow." I am assured that it takes them about a year to get their growth and fill out, and I am curious to see what they will be like when ready for the table. They didn't look very dignified the other night when I found them standing where their old home used to be, trying to protect themselves from the snowstorm by sticking their heads under one another while the wind seemed to be whistling through their ribs. But I am going to make a sympathetic study of them if they will only stay at home long enough to let me.

_Nov. 14._--We have now reached that part of the harvest which I most thoroughly understand and enjoy. Earlier in the season we changed work with the horses, so as to provide the food needed for them and the cattle during the winter, and the surplus was sold for "rascal counters," with which we can get the things not grown on the farm that we need for ourselves. Now, however, we are putting away that part of the produce which we shall need for home consumption. Apples are being stored, potatoes pitted, celery and cabbage trenched, and other vegetables protected for the winter. I say that I understand this part of the harvest better than the other and I'll tell you why. We are all the time being told to go to the ant for an example of wisdom. Well--one time I went, and I am afraid that the lesson I learned was one that my teachers did not intend. Instead of having money invested in bonds or a good bank account, the ant simply had a plentiful store of provisions. As I put away these vegetables I have a comfortable feeling that I have learned the lesson of the ant as it was intended to be taught. Food is the most important form of wealth and to have a plentiful supply stored away is the highest form of wisdom. In more primitive times the wealth of kings consisted of full granaries and countless herds, and they were considered rich because they had ample food for themselves and all who were dependent on them. I suppose if I sold the celery, which is a somewhat costly luxury in the cities, I could put money in the bank, but I am fond of celery, and the wisdom of the ant is good enough for me. There is no knowing what may happen to the banks when the Bank Act comes up for revision, but I feel moderately secure regarding the vegetables.

Speaking of celery, there is one thing I should like to know, and perhaps some gardener who reads _The Farmer's Advocate_ can tell me. I have no doubt that the trouble is due to some mistake I have made, but I wish to be set right, so that I can do better next year. When trenching the celery I found that part of it had grown very rank, and was so pithy that it is practically useless. The celery was grown in an old barn yard, where the ground was just about as rich as it could possibly be, having been used as a barn yard since the land was first cleared. I am inclined to think that this is about the first crop ever raised on this bit of soil, and that the original fertility is still there, as well as what has been accumulating during the past seventy years. Most of the celery is just about as fine as it could possibly be, large stalks, crisp and tender and as sweet as a nut. Besides, the stalks are about the largest I have ever seen, but some of the very largest are almost useless. What is the trouble? Has the growth been too rank or have I neglected something that should be done? Most of the trouble is with the Giant Golden Heart variety. The White Plume is all firm and sound, and both kinds were cultivated in the same way. Should I have treated the two kinds differently?

Two correspondents have asked me to give in _The Farmer's Advocate_ the receipts for Force Meat and Dried Beef, which I described in an article elsewhere about a year ago. We prepared the dried beef, which proved to be excellent, according to the following receipt:

"Take the best of beef, or that part which will be the most lean and tender. The tender part of the round is a very good piece. For every twenty pounds of beef use one pint of salt, one teaspoonful of saltpetre, and a quarter of a pound of brown sugar. Mix them well together and rub the beef well with one-third of the mixture for three successive days. Let it lie in the liquor it makes for six days, then hang up to dry. A large crock or jar is a good vessel to prepare the meat in before drying it."

This dried beef is good either when cut in thin slices and fried or made up in the various ways in which "chipped beef" is used.

The force meat I had reference to is an old-fashioned country dish, and not the kind that usually goes under that name in the cook books. It strikes me as being more like pemmican than anything else. Take any convenient quantity of lean beef. The better the cut, the better the result will be, but any part may be used from porter-house steak to the neck. Chop this beef as finely as possible with a chopping-knife, but do not put it through a meat-chopper. Take about one-third the amount of suet and chop it in the same way, then mix the two and add salt and pepper to taste. When the beef and suet have been thoroughly mixed and flavoured, press it into small cakes by hand and put it away in a crock. It is ready to use at once, and is fried like steak. If there is any better eating for cold weather I have yet to find it. This is a truly pioneer dish and one of the best. Some day I may gather and put in shape the pioneer receipts that I have come across while gathering information about the first settlers. Quite a number of the dishes they used are no longer in vogue, but most of them that I have sampled have been good, though rather strong food for palates that are trained to sweets and delicacies.

_Nov. 17._--This morning I did something so foolish that I hate to tell about it, but duty must be done. How are the young and the city people who are moving back to the land to be properly warned of dangers unless some one tells of things that happen on a farm with shameless truthfulness? It would not be so bad if I didn't know better, but I did, and now most emphatically do.

You have all heard of the foolish man who got a fall by sawing off the limb he was sitting on. The story was one of the favourites of my youth, and I have seen it used scores of times in political cartoons. It illustrates human foolishness better than any joke I know of, and yet I did exactly the same thing as the man in the story. I cut off the limb I was standing on. Looking at it thoughtfully, I have a humble feeling that there is no form of foolishness of which I am not capable. Of course, there were extenuating circumstances. There always are. A man does such a thing as that only when he is feeling that he is wiser and smarter than other men, and I thought I was altogether too skilful and cautious to let that limb get out from under me. I would cut to the right point and then stop. That's what they all say, but, as usual, the scheme didn't work out right.

This is how it happened. I went to the woodlot to forage for stove-wood, and noticing that the heavy sleet last February had broken down a number of big branches, I decided to use them. They were resting on the ground, but still connected with the trees by a few splinters. I had to climb to cut the splinters and bring the branches down. All went well until I came to a big beech, from which a branch about a foot in diameter was hanging by a stout slab. The break was about fifteen feet from the ground, and there were no other branches at that point. When I had climbed the tree, I found that the split-end of the branch made a good platform to stand on, and, after figuring out the situation, I decided that the easiest way to do the trick would be to chop nearly through the connecting slab while standing where I was, and then get close to the trunk and finish the job by swinging the axe with one hand and clinging to the trunk with one arm. But I had forgotten that the sapwood of the beech gets brittle when it has been drying for a year, and I had not given more than half a dozen strokes before there was a sudden snap, and the excitement began. I hadn't time to think, so must have acted on instinct, or from reflex action. I grabbed at the trunk of the tree with both arms and both legs. I just splashed myself against it, while the axe went flying. But before I could get my brakes adjusted, I had slipped about six feet down, and the legs of my trousers and sweater had slipped about two feet up. And the bark of that old beech was rough--very rough. After coming to a stop, I surveyed the scene, and felt thankful that I was not mixed up with the axe and the big limb on the ground. Then I shinned down the rest of the distance with a chastened spirit and a sprained thumb.

While chopping the branch into stove-lengths I meditated much on the foolishness of what I had done, and felt properly ashamed of myself. If one of the boys had done such a thing, I would never have stopped laughing at him. And now I had done it myself. Oh, well, I have a suspicion that most men do things that are just as foolish, when no one is looking, and have the reputation of being wise and careful just because they escape and keep quiet about it. Sometimes I think that there is something in us that makes us try to do things that we know are foolish. It helps to keep us humble, if we are wise enough to learn the lesson. To-night I am feeling very humble. I don't think I should laugh, even if the baby took a spoonful of salt in mistake for granulated sugar. It is a mistake that might be made by any of us.

Whoever worked out the plan of planting young trees that is given by the Department of Forestry certainly knew what he was about. I doubt if it could be improved upon. Lifting a sod and turning it back kills all the grass and weeds around the seedling, and gives it a chance to get a good start. To-day I looked over the trees I planted in the spring, and found that they are all beautifully mulched. The little hollow from which the sod was taken, and in which the tree was planted served as a trap for the drifting leaves. Around each tree there is a mulch of packed leaves three or four inches deep, and the work could not have been done better by hand. I don't think they mentioned that result in the bulletin on Reforestation, so it came to me as a surprise which aroused my admiration. The trees should come through the winter safely with such protection, and the rotting leaves should furnish them with the food they need next spring. Of the thousand and eighty trees I planted, at least eight hundred came through the scorching summer safely, and I expect that they will make quite a showing next year. The pine suffered the most. Though I have always understood that walnuts are very delicate, I find that almost all of mine lived. I was also pleased to find that thousands of young maples got a good start this year because the cattle had been kept out of the woods. Little as they are, these seedlings help to keep the leaves from drifting, and it looks as if the sod that had made such headway before replanting was attempted will soon disappear. Next spring, if the Forestry Department is kind, and I am feeling equal to the task, I shall plant out a couple of thousand more young trees, and try to get at least five acres back to natural woods. Of course, I know there are plenty of wise people who will say that I am foolish to be planting out trees in the garden land of Ontario, instead of clearing away those that remain; but, as I told you in the first paragraph, I am now convinced that I am capable of any kind of foolishness. Still, there is a saving remnant of the people who believe that reforestation is a wise thing. I do not think I am making a mistake in casting in my lot with them.

First let me tell you how the whole thing started (For I have seldom troubled you with rhyme), I woke this morning feeling happy-hearted, Lulled by the dreams of a supernal clime, And ere the drowsy glamour had departed I heard soft music, like an elfin chime; It seemed as if the old house had begun Like Memnon's statue to salute the sun.

An Indian Summer dawn of amber haze Along the east was glowing luminous, Ushering one of those Canadian days Of rare perfection, warm and languorous, That well deserve such mystic strains of praise As still were rising faint, mysterious-- Although their source I sought in vain, until I chanced to look upon the window-sill,