The sergeant promised this should be done, and rejoiced that he had found some means of serving his friend. Gray covered ten acres with the manure brought from the barracks; and the next year these acres were in excellent heart. This was sufficient for the grazing of ten cows: he had three, and he bought seven more; and with what remained of his hundred pounds, after paying for the cows, he built a shed and a cow-house. His wife, and daughter Rose, who was now about fourteen, were excellent managers of the dairy. They made, by butter and butter-milk, about four pounds each cow within the year. The butter they salted and took to market, at the neighbouring town; the butter-milk they sold to the country people, who, according to the custom of the neighbourhood, came to the house for it. Besides this, they reared five calves, which, at a year old, they sold for fifteen guineas and a half. The dairy did not, however, employ all the time of this industrious mother and daughter; they had time for spinning, and by this cleared six guineas. They also made some little matter by poultry; but that was only during the first year: afterwards Mr. Hopkins sent notice that they must pay all the duty-fowl, and duty-geese, and turkeys, {Footnote: See a very curious anecdote in the Statistical Survey of the Queen’s County.} charged in the lease, or compound with him by paying two guineas a year. This gentleman had many methods of squeezing money out of poor tenants; and he was not inclined to spare the Grays, whose farm he now more than ever wished to possess, because its value had been considerably increased, by the judicious industry of the farmer and his sons.
Young as they were, both farmer Gray’s sons had a share in these improvements. The eldest had drained a small field, which used to be called the rushy field, from its having been quite covered with rushes. Now there was not a rush to be found upon it, and his father gave him the profits of the field, and said that it should be called by his name. Robin, the youngest son, had, by his father’s advice, tried a little experiment, which many of his neighbours ridiculed at first, and admired at last. The spring, which used to supply the duck-pond, that often flooded the house, was at the head of a meadow, that sloped with a fall sufficient to let the water run off. Robin flooded the meadow at the proper season of the year, and it produced afterwards a crop such as never had been seen there before. His father called this meadow Robin’s meadow, and gave him the value of the hay that was made upon it.
“Now, my dear boys,” said this good father, “you have made a few guineas for yourselves; and here are a few more for you, all that I can spare: let us see what you can do with this money. I shall take a pride in seeing you get forward by your own industry and cleverness; I don’t want you to slave for me all your best days; but shall always be ready, as a father should be, to give you a helping hand.”
The sons had scarcely a word in answer to this, for their hearts were full; but that night, when they were by themselves, one said to the other, “Brother, did you see Jack Reel’s letter to his father? They say he has sent home ten guineas to him. Is there any truth in it, think you?”
“Yes; I saw the letter, and a kinder never was written from son to father. {Footnote: This is fact.} The ten guineas I saw paid into the old man’s hand; and, at that same minute, I wished it was I that was doing the same by my own father.”
“That was just what I was thinking of, when I asked you if you saw the letter. Why, Jack Reel had nothing, when he went abroad with the army to Egypt, last year. Well, I never had a liking myself to follow the drum: but it’s almost enough to tempt one to it. If I thought I could send home ten guineas to my father, I would ‘list to-morrow.”
“That would not be well done of you, Robin,” said John; “for my father would rather have you, a great deal, than the ten guineas, I am sure: to say nothing of my poor mother, and Rose, and myself, who would be sorry enough to hear of your being knocked on the head, as is the fate, sooner or later, of them that follow the army. I would rather be any of the trades that hurt nobody, and do good to a many along with myself, as father said t’other day. Then, what a man makes so, he makes with a safe conscience, and he can enjoy it.”
“You are right, John, and I was wrong to talk of ‘listing,” said Robin; “but it was only Jack Reel’s letter, and the ten guineas sent to his father, that put it into my head. I may make as much for my father by staying at home, and minding my business. So now, good night to you; I’ll go to sleep, and we can talk more about it all to-morrow.”
The next morning, as these two youths were setting potatoes for the family, and considering to what they should turn their hands when the potatoes were all set, they were interrupted by a little gossoon, who came running up as hard as he could, crying, “Murder! murder! Simon O’Dougherty wants you. For the love of God, cross the bog in all haste, to help pull out his horse, that has tumbled into the old tan-pit, there beyond, in the night!”
The two brothers immediately followed the boy, carrying with them a rope and a halter, as they guessed that soft Simon would not have either. They found him wringing his hands beside the tan-pit, in which his horse lay smothering. A little ragged boy was tugging at the horse’s head, with a short bit of hay-rope. “Oh, murder! murder! What will I do for a halter? Sure the horse will be lost, for want of a halter; and where in the wide world will I look for one?” cried Simon, without stirring one inch from the spot. “Oh, the blessing of Heaven be with you, lads,” continued he, turning at the sight of the Grays; “you’ve brought us a halter. But see! it’s just over with the poor beast. All the world put together will not get him alive out of that. I must put up with the loss, and be content. He cost me fifteen good guineas, and he could leap better than any horse in the county. Oh, what a pity on him! what a pity! But, take it easy; that’s all we have for it! Poor cratur! Poor cratur!”