Shenac's Work at Home

by Margaret M. Robertson

Chapter Ten.

Winter set in early that year, but not too early for Shenac and her brothers. The winter preparations had all been made before the delightful stormy morning came, when Hugh and Colin and little Flora chased one another round and round in the door-yard, making many paths in the new-fallen snow. The house had been banked up with earth, and every crack and crevice in the roof and walls closed. The garden had been dug and smoothed as if the seeds were to be sown the next day. The barn and stable were in perfect order. The arrangements for tying up oxen and cows, which are always sure to get out of order in summer, had been made anew, and the farming-tools gathered safely under cover.

These may seem little things; but the comfort of many a household has been interfered with because such little things have been neglected. What may be done at any time is very often left till the right time is past, and disorder and discomfort are sure to follow. I daresay the early snow fell that year on many a plough left in the furrow, and on many a hoe and spade left in garden or yard. But all was as it should be at Mrs Macivor’s.

In summer, when a long day’s work in the field was the order of things, when those who were strong and able were always busy, it seemed to Hamish that he was of little use. This was a mistake of his. He was of great use in many ways, even when he went to the field late and left it early; for though Shenac took the lead in work and planning, she was never sure that her plans were wise, or even practicable, till she had talked them over with Hamish. She would have lost patience with Dan and the rest, and with her mother even, if she had not had Hamish to “empty her heart to.” But even Shenac, though she loved her brother dearly, and valued his counsels and sympathy as something which she could not have lived and laboured without—even she did not realise how much of their comfort depended on the work of his weak hands. It was Hamish who banked the house and made the garden; it was he who drove nails and filled cracks, who gathered up tools and preserved seeds, quietly doing what others did not do and remembering what others forgot. It was Hamish who cared for the creatures about the place; it was he who made and mended and kept in order many things which it would have cost money to get or much inconvenience to go without. So it may be said that it was owing to Hamish that the early snow did not find them unprepared.

A grave matter was under discussion within-doors that morning while little Flora and her brothers were chasing each other through the snow. It was whether Dan was to go to the school that winter. It was seldom that any but young children could go to school in the summer-time, the help of the elder ones being needed in the field as soon as they were old enough to help. But in the winter few young people thought themselves too old to go to school while the teacher could carry them on. Hamish and Shenac had gone up to the time of their father’s death. But as for Dan, he thought himself old enough now to have done with school. He had never been, in country phrase, “a good scholar?”—that is, he had never taken kindly to his books—a circumstance which seemed almost like disgrace in the eyes of Shenac; and she was very desirous that he should get the good of this winter, especially as they were to have a new teacher, whose fame had preceded him. Dan was taking it for granted that he was the mainstay at home, and that for him school was out of the question. But the rest thought differently; and it was decided, much to his discontent, that when the winter’s wood was brought, to school he must go.

Great was his disgust—so great that he began to talk about going to the woods with the lumberers; at which Shenac laughed, but Hamish looked grave, and bade him think twice before he gave his mother so sore a heart as such a word as that would do. Dan did think twice, and said nothing more about the woods. His going to school, however, did not do him much good in the way of learning, but it did in the way of discipline. At any rate, it left him less idle time than he would otherwise have had; and though his boyish mischief vexed Shenac often, things might have been worse with Dan, as Hamish said, and little harm was done.

Winter is a pleasant time in a country farm-house. In our country the summers are so short, and so much work must be crowded into them, that there is little time for any enjoyment, save that of doing well what is to be done, and watching the successful issue. But in winter there is leisure—leisure for enjoyment of various kinds, visiting, sewing, singing; and it is generally made the most of.

As for Shenac, the feeling that all the summer’s work was successfully ended, that the farm-products were safely housed beyond loss, gave her a sense of being at leisure, though her hands were full of work, and would be for a long time yet. The fulled cloth and the flannel came home. The tailor came for a week to make the lads’ clothes, and she helped him with them; and tailor McCallum, though as a general thing rather contemptuous of woman’s help, acknowledged that she helped him to purpose.

A great deal may be learned by one who begins by thinking nothing too difficult to learn; and Shenac’s stitching and button-holes were something to wonder at before the tailor’s visit was over.