The writer now owns a farm in Maine, or at least holds a deed of it, given him, for a consideration, by another man who in turn had bought it of a previous incumbent who had seized it from the Indians, wood-chucks, hares, foxes and other original proprietors, without, as I hear, making them any return whatever; who, in fact, ejected them without ceremony.
For some years whenever the wood-chucks ate anything that grew on the land, particularly if it were anything which I had sown or planted, I attacked them with guns, traps and dogs and killed them when I could.
But one day it occurred to me that perhaps my deed did not fairly authorize me to behave in just that way towards them, and that I was playing the role of a small, but very cruel, self-conceited tyrant over a conquered species whose blood cried out against me from the ground. I ceased my persecutions and massacres. Twenty or thirty wood-chucks now live on the premises with me, unmolested, for the most part. They take about what they want and dig a hole whenever they want a new one. They are really very peaceable neighbors, and it is rarely that we have a difference of opinion in the matter of garden truck,--for I still draw the line at early pease and beans in the garden.
It is, indeed, quite surprising how little they take, or destroy. I do not believe that in all that time they have done me damages which any two fair-minded referees would allow me five dollars for. I am sure I spent more than that for ammunition, to say nothing of time, traps, dog-food, etc., during the year or two that I was playing the despot and trying to exterminate them. Now that I have rid my mind of the barbarous propensity to kill them, I really enjoy seeing them sitting up by their holes, or peeping at me over the heads of clover.
But a boy naturally likes to use his trap and his gun, especially on any animal, or bird, which his seniors represent to him as an outlaw. When the Old Squire set a bounty of five cents upon wood-chuck scalps, the desire to go on the war-path against the proscribed rodents at once took possession of us. A number of rusty fox-traps and mink-traps were brought forth from the wagon-house chamber, to be set at the entrances of the wood-chucks' holes. We covered the trenchers of the traps carefully over with loose dirt and attached the chain to stakes, driven into the ground a little to one side of the hole. In this way five chucks were trapped in the south field during the week.
Halstead and I were in partnership trapping them, but Addison preferred to rely on the gun. It is next to impossible to kill a wood-chuck with shot so quickly that he will not, after being hit, succeed in running into his hole, and thus defeat the evidence that he is a dead wood-chuck. Addison, however, hit upon a stratagem for shooting them at short range. He could imitate their peculiar "whistle" quite cleverly, and having observed that when one wood-chuck whistles, all the others within hearing are apt to exhibit some little curiosity as to what is going on, he turned the circumstance to account. Going cautiously to a burrow, he would crouch down, and placing the muzzle of the gun so as to shoot into the hole, "whistle," as if some neighboring chuck had come along to prospect the premises. In almost every instance, when there was a chuck in the hole, it would immediately come up in sight, probably to greet, or repel its visitor. The instant it appeared, Addison would fire and nearly always kill the animal; for although often he could not secure it, he would carefully close up the hole with stones and earth, and if, after three days, the chuck did not dig out past the obstruction, he laid claim to the bounty. A roster, which he kept in notches on the garden gate, showed that he had shot fourteen wood-chucks.
I remember that Theodora had something to say several times about our cruelty to the poor creatures; but we justified it on account of the damage which the wood-chucks were alleged to do to the grain, grass and beans.
"Oh, Doad would let the wood-chucks eat up everything we plant!" Halse would say, sarcastically. "'Let them have it,' she would say. 'Don't hurt the poor little things!' That's just like girls. They don't have to plant and hoe, so they are very merciful and tender-hearted. But if they had to plough and work and plant and sow and hoe in the hot sun all day, to raise a crop, they'd sing a different tune when the plaguey wood-chucks came around and ate it up!"
We thought Addison's stratagem a very bright one. That he could "whistle" the chuck out of his hole, and fetch him up to the very muzzle of the gun, was considered remarkably clever. But an incident which occurred a few days later rendered it forever unpopular.
Catherine Edwards had come over to go raspberrying, and Theodora, Ellen and Wealthy set off with her after school for the south field. They had to go around the clover piece, and as they passed it, Kate espied a wood-chuck, which, when it heard them, instead of disappearing in its burrow hard by, ran around in so peculiar a manner that they all stopped to watch it.
"It's crazy," cried Catherine; and at first they were afraid the animal would attack them; it ran to and fro in what seemed an aimless sort of manner. At length, they concluded that it had lost its hole and was trying to find it. They saw that its head was bare of hair in front, and presently decided that the poor creature was blind, for its eyes appeared to be gone, or covered over with an incrustation.
The explanation of its singular appearance and behavior then suddenly occurred to Ellen. "I know!" she cried. "It's one of those wood-chucks that Ad has shot in the face and eyes, as they peep out of their holes when he 'whistles' to them!"
"Oh, the poor, abused thing!" exclaimed Catherine. "I never heard of anything so hatefully cruel!"
The wood-chuck, although so dreadfully wounded and with its eyes destroyed by the powder, had yet, after several days, mustered sufficient strength to come out and feed. But it was totally blind, and once having lost its course, could not find the way back to its burrow, but dashed about in terror amidst the clover. Finally it took refuge beneath some of the lodged grass beside a stone; and meantime those sympathetic girls held an indignation meeting. Their pity for the poor creature knew no bounds, and Ellen was despatched to call us boys to the spot, that the full enormity of our act might be exhibited before our eyes.
We were just finishing hoeing the corn, the second time, that afternoon, and had only a few rows more. With an air of one who has a mission and a duty to perform, Ellen approached where we were at work and said, "We want you to come down to the south field this minute!"
"What for?" asked Addison.
"A good reason," replied Ellen, with an accent of suppressed scorn.
"Kate and Doad sent me."
"What is it?" persisted Addison.
"Some of your fine works," said Ellen. "And you just come straight along and see it."
"We won't go unless you tell," replied Halse.
"Oh, you won't!" exclaimed Ellen severely. "Great wood-chuck hunters you are!" At the word _wood-chuck_ we began to feel interested, and at length so far obeyed Ellen's iterated summons as to follow after her to the south field.
"Well, what's wanted?" demanded Addison, addressing himself to Theodora, as we drew near.
"I want you to see just what a cruel boy you are!" she replied. "There's one of the wood-chucks that you pretend to shoot so cutely. Go look at him, right under the clover there by that stone. Look at his poor little eyes all burned out, you cruel fellow!"
Not a little dumbfounded by this blast of indignation, thus suddenly let loose upon us, we drew near and examined the crouching chuck. It was really a rueful spectacle,--the disabled and trembling creature trying in vain to see where its enemies were gathered about it.
"I didn't think you were such a cruel boy!" exclaimed Catherine, sarcastically. "Alf Batchelder might do such a thing. He is hateful enough always. But I didn't think it of you."
"Well, I shot at him," exclaimed Addison. "I thought I had killed him, you know."
"Oh yes, you did think, did you!" cried Catherine. "How would you like to have some one come along to your door or your chamber window, and speak to you to come out; and then when you stepped to the door to see what was wanted, to have them fire powder in your face and burn your eyes out! How would you like that?"
"I don't think I would like it," replied Addison, laughing.
"Now I wouldn't laugh," said Theodora, whose feelings, indeed, had been wrought upon to the point of tears as she watched the blinded creature.
"You ought not to have such a hard heart. I didn't think you had, once,"
she added reproachfully.
"Oh, he is just like all the rest of the boys," exclaimed Kate. "No, he isn't," said Theodora, wiping her eyes.
"They are all alike," persisted Kate. "Always killing and torturing something."
"And all the girls are little saints," mimicked Halse.
"Oh, I'm not speaking to you!" cried Kate. "You're the Alf Batchelder sort. But I'm ashamed of Addison, to treat any creature in that way!"
In short, those girls read us a dreadful lecture; they berated us hot and heavy. If we attempted to reply and defend ourselves, they only lashed us the harder.
"Well, well," said Addison at length, picking up a club. "I'll put the creature out of its misery, so that at least it will not be caught and worried by dogs."
"You sha'n't! You sha'n't kill the poor thing!" cried Ellen; and then finding that Addison was about to do so, they all turned and ran away, without looking back.
Halstead was inclined to make light of the matter, and ridiculed the girls, but Addison did not say much about it. I think he felt conscience-smitten, and I never knew him to attempt to shoot a wood-chuck in that way afterwards.
CHAPTER XVII
HAYING TIME
It was the custom at the Old Squire's to begin "haying" on Monday after the Fourth of July. What hot and sweaty memories are linked with that word, _haying!_
But haying in and of itself is a clean and pleasant kind of farm work, if only the farmers would not rush it so relentlessly. As soon as haying begins, a demon of haste to finish in a given number of days seems, or once seemed, to take possession of the American farmer. Thunder showers goad him on; the fact that he has to pay two or even three dollars per day for his hired help stimulates him to even greater exertions; and the net result is, that haying time every year is a fiery ordeal from which the husbandman and his boys emerge sunburnt, brown as bacon scraps and lean as the camels of Sahara, often with blood perniciously altered from excessive perspiration and too copious water drinking. An erroneous idea has prevailed that "sweating" is good for a man. Sometimes it is good, in case of colds or fevers. While unduly exerting himself beneath a scorching sun, the farmer would no doubt perish if he did not perspire.
None the less, such copious sudation is an evil that wastefully saps vitality. Few farmers go through twenty haying seasons without practically breaking down.
The hired man, too, has come to know that haying is the hardest work of the year and demands nearly double the wages that he expected to receive for hoeing potatoes--far more disagreeable work--the week before.
As a result of many inquiries, I learn that farmers' boys dread haying most of all farm work, chiefly on account of the long hours, the hurry beneath the fervid July sun, and the heat of the close lofts and mows where they have to stow away the hay. How many a lad, half-suffocated by hay in these same hot mows and lofts, has made the resolve then and there never to be a farmer--and kept it!
Is it not a serious mistake to harvest the hay crop on the hurry-and-rush principle? Why not take a little more time for it? It is better to let a load of hay get wet than drive one's self and one's helpers to the brink of sunstroke. It is better to begin a week earlier than try to do two weeks' work in one. A day's work in haying should and can be so planned as to give two hours' nooning in the hottest part of the day.
Gramp was an old-fashioned farmer, but he had seen the folly of undue haste exemplified too many times not to have changed his earlier methods of work considerably; so much so, that he now enjoyed the reputation of being an "easy man to work for." For several years he had employed the same help.
On this bright Monday morning of July, the hay-fields smiled, luxuriant, blooming with clover, herdsgrass, buttercup, daisy and timothy. There was the house field, the west field, the south field, the middle field and the east field, besides the young orchard, the old orchard, the Aunt Hannah lot and the Aunt Hannah meadow, which was left till the last, sixty-five acres or more, altogether. What an expanse it looked to me!
It was my first experience, but Addison and Halse had forewarned me that we would have it hot in haying. I had already grown a little inured to the sun during June, however; and in point of fact, I never afterwards suffered so much from the sun rays as during those first attempts to hoe corn at the old farm in June.