The cricket match could not take place till after school, then the children arrived in cars and buggies, and we had a splendid game. We played till it was too dark to see, and then had the Bible picture talk by the light of the moon and the headlights of the cars. The day-school master and the parents standing behind the children seemed just as interested as the latter were.
CHAPTER XVI
AMONG THE PRAIRIE FARMS
Our host and hostess were charming, cultured people. He and his brothers, 'Varsity men, were farming in a little colony of their own. He was a member of the Provincial Parliament, or Senate. Our hostess was a trained nurse from St. Bartholomew's. She had been matron at a hospital in Rosetown, and she still helped in cases of illness whenever she had time. She told us how badly nurses were needed on the prairie. She was also President of the local Grain Growers' Association, which is similar to the Home-Makers' Club and the Women's Institutes—we got the latter idea from Canada. The chief aim of these associations is the selling of farm produce and the general betterment of home and rural life. Our hostess was one of those who saw the need for a higher moral standard in the country, and her Association had appealed to the Senate to that effect.
They were most kind and hospitable, and insisted on our having meals with them. The farm hands sat at the same table—in this democratic country no longer below the salt. On several evenings I went with our host and his children to play cricket at other farms, and I noticed that the farm-hands and everyone else joined in the game.
It was very interesting to go round the farm and see all the wonderful labour-saving devices. They had cut the hay and were getting it in. The term "wild and woolly West" is said to have originated from the "prairie wool," or natural hay, which is specially luxuriant on dried-up sloughs. It is a grass with a fluffy, golden-brown plume. But this natural hay can only be cut every other year, hence many farmers are sowing hay seeds as well. The wagon which they use for carting hay and wheat has enormously high rack-like sides. On this farm, when carting hay, an immense canvas sheet with rings at the corners is put in the wagon and the hay piled up on it. When a wagon-load reaches the barn, a rope attached to a pulley in the barn roof is put through the four rings of the sheet, the horses are taken out of the shafts and harnessed to the pulley-rope, and the whole load is swung up into the barn, along a rod, and on to the rick. The whole operation only takes three minutes. There was a blacksmith's shop on this farm, and as some of the metal on my shock-absorber had broken, our host cut me a piece of metal, and I mended it with his assistance—a job which entailed lying under the car for an hour with earth falling into one's eyes. The vicar was famous as a "fixer" of broken-down Fords, and one day he came to the farm with his children to gather Saskatoon berries.[7] Whilst he was waiting for the party to start, he and our host took out my steering-rod and straightened it at the forge. As he put it back he eyed me solemnly and remarked: "I suppose you know that your two lives depend on this rod."
One very hot night we were sleeping in the van with all the doors wide open for the sake of coolness. I woke up suddenly to a tremendous clap of thunder with terrific forked lightning and a hurricane of wind, and hailstones the size of a hen's egg. I sprang up and pulled the wind-screen to and shut the side doors, and then woke up Winifred and told her that we must hold on to the back doors for dear life. If once the wind got in it would certainly overturn the van. How we got through the next half-hour I cannot tell. There was no catch inside the back doors, as we always bolted them from the outside, but so sudden and terrific was the storm that there was no time to run round and bolt them. The wind would have swept you off your feet, and you might have been struck by the lightning. For the same reasons it was impossible to make a dash for the farmhouse, and even if we had got there safely by any chance, the caravan would have been smashed to atoms as soon as an open door gave entrance to the wind. The only thing to do was to hold the back doors with our fingers in the chinks, though how we managed it I do not know. The alternative was to abandon the caravan and lie flat on the ground, as one was advised to do in cyclones, but in this case we might have been killed by lightning. All through that half-hour the van quivered like a live thing, and we expected every minute that it would be blown away or broken in. I have never felt so near death. The storm lessened after a time, and then I bolted the back doors. In the morning we found that the farmhouse had been nearly flooded by the torrential rain, a stream of water having poured through the house. They had looked out at us anxiously from time to time, but could no more reach us than we could get to them when the storm was at its worst. Two great hay-wagons had been blown several yards into a fence, and we heard that a shack eight miles off had been blown over, and the settler had had all his limbs broken. We had often heard of these storms before. On one occasion such a storm burst upon a prairie school, smashing in the windows. The young teacher gathered the children into the porch, where they escaped injury. But when they returned to their homes most of them found the shacks blown over and their parents killed. A neighbouring school was entirely wrecked and the teacher and children killed.
On the Saturday, when the trails had dried up, we started for Birdview. We were now entering the dried-out area again, but the sand-drifts had sunk a good deal and become more compact, so we managed to get the caravan through, though she skidded a bit. We camped by the little prairie church, built miles away from any farm so that it might be in the most central spot for each. Beside it stood the vicarage, a one-roomed shack with a cellar beneath. There was also a good-sized parish hall and a stable for the parishioners' horses. This complete isolation has its perils. During the influenza epidemic in 1918 one of the clergy lay here helpless for three days before anyone knew that he was ill.
We stayed here for a week, having the place all to ourselves. We cleaned out the shack and had our meals in it, sleeping in the van. It was intensely hot, and we found the cellar a great boon for our butter, etc. These cellars are a necessity on the prairie, keeping your food cool in summer and your house warm in winter. Mrs. M., the farmer's wife who had arranged for our visit here, used to bring us water and milk and eggs from her farm two miles away. The well at the shack was now very low. She also drove us to visit a day-school teacher who had promised to carry on the Sunday School if we started it. We held the school on Sunday, and two prospective teachers listened. After school there was a most excellent tea in the parish hall, provided by the parents who had brought the children. Delightful al fresco meals are a feature of prairie life. After tea we held a service in the church. We had made it as beautiful as possible, with golden rod in the altar vases. Members of the Women's Auxiliary had cleaned it thoroughly for us. This service will always remain in my memory. There were people of all ages present, and a large number of men, both middle-aged and young. Winifred played, and I read the service and gave the address. We had a shortened form of evensong. For the lessons I selected passages from the Gospels about our Lord and the children. I also used some of the beautiful prayers written for the Forward Movement—in particular, the one for a parish left without a clergyman. We chose well-loved hymns, such as "Rock of Ages," from the Canadian hymn-book, which is beautifully called "The Book of Common Praise." It is the best collection of hymns which I have ever seen, including suitable ones for both children and adults. There is also a Canadian prayer-book, some of the prayers being for the special needs of the country, such as the prayer in time of drought. We used this one at the service on behalf of this dried-out area.
I spoke on the importance of religious education, building up my theme from the Gospel readings of the lessons. I tried to show how juvenile crime had increased in countries which neglected the spiritual welfare of the children. I ended by reminding them that, just as they had chosen a font for their War Memorial, so the children, properly trained, would be a living memorial of those who had laid down their lives for Christian ideals. It was very easy to draw analogies between the spiritual life of the child and the growth of the wheat, which is so easily prevented by storms and drought from coming to its full perfection.