In August the wheat fields were ready for the reapers. This was the great crop of the year. Other grain was grown, such as rye, oats, peas, barley and corn, but principally for feeding. Wheat was the farmer's main dependence, his staff of life and his current coin. A good cradler would cut about five acres a day, and an expert with a rake would follow and bind up what he cut. There were men who would literally walk through the grain with a cradle, and then two men were required to follow. My father had no superior in swinging the cradle, and when the golden grain stood thick and straight, he gave two smart men all they could do to take up what he cut down. Again the younger fry came in for their share of the work, which was to gather the sheaves and put them in shocks. These, after standing a sufficient time, were brought into the barn and mowed away, and again the girls often gave a helping hand both in the field and the barn. In all these tasks good work was expected. My father was, as I have said before, a pushing man, and "thorough" in all he undertook. His mottoes with his men were, "Follow me," and "Anything that is worth doing, is worth doing well;" and this latter rule was always enforced. The ploughers had to throw their furrows neat and straight. When I got to be a strong lad, I could strike a furrow with the old team across a field as straight as an arrow, and I took pride in throwing my furrows in uniform precision. The mowers had to shear the land close and smooth. The rakers threw their winrows straight, and the men made their hay-cocks of a uniform size, and placed them at equal distances apart. So in the grain field, the stubble had to be cut clean and even, the sheaves well bound and shocked in straight rows, with ten sheaves to the shock. It was really a pleasure to inspect the fields when the work was done. Skill was required to load well, and also to mow away, the object being to get the greatest number of sheaves in the smallest space. About the first of September the crops were in and the barns were filled and surrounded with stacks of hay and grain.
My father was admitted to be the best farmer in the district. His farm was a model of good order and neatness. He was one of the first to devote attention to the improvement of his stock, and was always on the look-out for improved implements or new ideas, which, if worthy of attention, he was the first to utilize.
There is always something for a pushing farmer to do, and there are always rainy days through the season, when out-door work comes to a stand. At such times my father was almost always found in his workshop, making pails or tubs for the house, or repairing his tools or making new ones. At other times he would turn his attention to dressing the flax he had stowed away, and getting it ready for spinning. The linen for bags, as well as for the house, was then all home-made. It could hardly be expected that with such facilities at hand my ingenuity would not develop. One day I observed a pot of red paint on the workbench, and it struck me that the tools would look much better if I gave them a coat of paint. The thought was hardly conceived before it was put into execution, and in a short time planes, saws, augers, &c., were carefully coated over and set aside to dry. Father did not see the thing in the same light as I did. He was very much displeased, and I was punished. After this I turned my attention to water-wheels, waggons, boats, boxes, &c., and in time got to be quite an expert with tools, and could make almost anything out of wood. We children, although we had to drive cows, feed the calves, bring in wood, and all that, had our amusements, simple and rustic enough it is true; but we enjoyed them, and all the more because our parents very often entered into our play.
Sunday was a day of enjoyment as well as rest. There were but few places of public worship, and those were generally far apart. In most places the schoolhouse or barn served the purpose. There were two meeting- houses—this was the term always used then for places of worship—a few miles from our place on Hay bay. The Methodist meeting-house was the first place built for public worship in Upper Canada, and was used for that purpose until a few years ago. It now belongs to Mr. Platt, and is used as a storehouse. The other, a Quaker meeting-house, built some years later, is still standing. It was used as a barrack by the Glengarry regiment in 1812, a part of which regiment was quartered in the neighbourhood during that year. The men left their bayonet-marks in the old posts.
[Illustration: QUAKER MEETING HOUSE.]
On Sunday morning the horses were brought up and put to the lumber waggon, the only carriage known then. The family, all arrayed in their Sunday clothes, arranged themselves in the spacious vehicle, and drove away. At that time, and for a good many years after, whether in the school-house or meeting-house, the men sat on one side and the women on the other, in all places of worship. The sacred bond which had been instituted by the Creator Himself in the Garden of Eden, "Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; and they shall be one flesh," did not seem to harmonize with that custom, for when they went up to His house they separated at the door. It would have been thought a very improper thing, even for a married couple, to take a seat side by side. Indeed I am inclined to think that the good brothers and sisters would have put them out of doors. So deeply rooted are the prejudices in matters of religious belief. That they are the most difficult to remove, the history of the past confirms through all ages. This custom prevailed for many years after. When meeting was over it was customary to go to some friend's to dinner, and make, as used to be said, a visit, or, what was equally as pleasant, father or mother would ask some old acquaintances to come home with us. Sunday in all seasons, and more particularly in the summer, was the grand visiting day with old and young. I do not state this out of any disrespect for the Sabbath. I think I venerate it as much as anyone, but I am simply recording facts as they then existed. The people at that time, as a rule, were not religious, but they were moral, and anxious for greater religious advantages. There were not many preachers, and these had such extended fields of labour that their appointments were irregular, and often, like angels' visits, few and far between. They could not ignore their social instincts altogether, and this was the only day when the toil and moil of work was put aside. They first went to meeting, when there was any, and devoted the rest of the day to friendly intercourse and enjoyment. People used to come to Methodist meeting for miles, and particularly on quarterly meeting day. On one of these occasions, fourteen young people who were crossing the bay in a skiff, on their way to the meeting, were upset near the shore and drowned. Some years later the missionary meeting possessed great attraction, when a deputation composed of Egerton Ryerson and Peter Jones, the latter with his Indian curiosities, drew the people in such numbers that half of them could not get into the house.
There were a good many Quakers, and as my father's people belonged to that body we frequently went to their meeting. The broad brims on one side, with the scoop bonnets on the other, used to excite my curiosity, but I did not like to sit still so long. Sometimes not a word would be said, and after an hour of profound silence, two of the old men on one of the upper seats would shake hands. Then a general shaking of hands ensued on both sides of the house, and meeting was out.
Many readers will recall gentle Charles Lamb's thoughtful paper on "A Quakers' Meeting." [Footnote: See Essays of Elia.] Several of his reflections rise up so vividly before me as I write these lines that I cannot forbear quoting them. "What," he asks, "is the stillness of the desert, compared with this place? what the uncommunicating muteness of fishes?—here the goddess reigns and revels.—'Boreas, and Cesias, and Argestes loud,' do not with their interconfounding uproars more augment the brawl—nor the waves of the blown Baltic with their clubbed sounds —than their opposite (Silence her sacred self) is multiplied and rendered more intense by numbers, and by sympathy. She too hath her deeps, that call unto deeps. Negation itself hath a positive more and less; and closed eyes would seem to obscure the great obscurity of midnight.
"There are wounds which an imperfect solitude cannot heal. By imperfect I mean that which a man enjoyeth by himself. The perfect is that which he can sometimes attain in crowds, but nowhere so absolutely as in a Quakers' Meeting.—Those first hermits did certainly understand this principle, when they retired into Egyptian solitudes, not singly, but in shoals, to enjoy one another's want of conversation. The Carthusian is bound to his brethren by this agreeing spirit of incommunicativeness. In secular occasions, what so pleasant as to be reading a book through a long winter evening, with a friend sitting by—say a wife—he, or she, too (if that be probable), reading another, without interruption, or oral communication?—can there be no sympathy without the gabble of words?—away with this inhuman, shy, single, shade-and-cavern-haunting solitariness. Give me, Master Zimmerman, a sympathetic solitude.
"To pace alone in the cloisters, or side aisles of some cathedral, time- stricken;