I have come to that portion of my journeying and of my story where all day, every evening, and all night long I was conscious of the odour of mown clover, of fields of ambrosia.
I was tramping along the border of Northern Ohio and Southern Michigan, from Toledo to Angola, Indiana. I was entering the rich West. The fields were vast and square, the road was long and flat, and straight and quiet, the June haze hung over luxuriant meadows, and there was a wonderful silence and ripening peace over the country.
One evening, as the red sun sank into night-darkened mist, I talked with an old farmer, who was smoking his pipe at his gate.
"I came along this same road like you, with a bundle on my back, forty years ago," said he, "and I took work on a farm; then I rented a farm. Many's the lad I've seen go past of an evening. And one or two have stopped here and worked some days, for the matter of that."
THE SOWER
THE SOWER.
The farmer had left England when he was a [Pg 253]stripling, and I tried to talk to him of the old country, but he was not really interested. He did not want to go back.
That is the Colonial feeling.
Strange to plough all day, or sow or reap, and in the evening to return to the quiet, solitary house of wood beside the great red-painted barn and not want England or Europe, not be interested in it, not want anything more than you've got; to have the sun go down red and whisper nought, and the stars come up and the moon, and yet not yearn; to work, to eat, to market; to have children growing about you ripening in so many years, and corn springing up in the fields ripening in so many weeks; births, marriages, deaths, sowings, harvests....
There is all the pathos of man's life in it.
I slept that night in the dry wayside hay, under the broad sky and the misty golden moon. It was a quiet night, warm and gentle. Earth held the wanderer in her cradle and rocked him to sleep.
They are kind people about here. Next morning as I sat by my fire a woman sent her son out to me with a quart of milk and a bag of cookies. And milk is a much commercialised business on this western road,—the electric freight train carries nearly all the milk away in churns to Toledo. It was a very welcome talkative boy who brought out the milk. His father rented one-third of a section (213 acres),[Pg 254] but was now laid up with pneumonia. As a consequence of the father's illness the young children had to work very hard in the fields. And there was a sick cow on the farm—sick through eating rank clover. And the boy himself had had scarlet fever in the spring. The serving-girl had had to go away "to have her little baby," and the one that came in her place brought the fever.
"What's your name?" said I.
"Charles."
Cheerful little Charles. He had much responsibility on his shoulders.
There were some big farms along the road, and near Metamora I had the privilege of seeing a dozen cows milked simultaneously by a petrol engine, rubber tubes being fixed to their teats and the milk pumped out. It was astonishing, the matter-of-fact way in which the latest invention was applied to farm life.
"It's rather ugly," said I.
"Well, what are you to do when labour is so scarce?" was the reply.
Land is rich here, but labour is scarce. I fell in with a garrulous farmer who told me that land now sold at 150 dollars (￡30) the acre, and that in a few years it would rise to 250 dollars. The days of large farmers were over. All the big ranches were being sold up, and the farmers were taking holdings that they could farm themselves without help. Labour[Pg 255] was expensive, owing to the high wages paid in the towns for industrial work; even at two and a half dollars (ten shillings) a day it was difficult to get a decent gang to do the work in the harvest season. You could do better with a small piece of land. Fields here were forty and fifty acres, and the steam plough was not used. In the old days land was dirt cheap, and you could buy vast tracts of it; there were no taxes, no extra expenses, and you just went in to raise tremendous crops and make a big scoop. To-day things were different. To work on a large scale a horde of labourers was necessary. But now the Socialists were stopping the flow of immigrants into the country. Socialists said that it was too difficult to organise newcomers. The newcomers behaved like blacklegs, strike-breakers, all the first year of their stay in America. They didn't know the language, were very poor, suspected their brother workmen of jealousy, and just took any wage offered them. The Socialists wanted to keep the price of labour up, and my farmer friend bore them a grudge because it was difficult to develop the land unless the price was reduced.
A little later, outside Fred M'Gurer's farm, the jovial farmer himself came and squatted beside the fire and chatted of affairs. He had insured his house for 1000 dollars, but it would take 1800 dollars to rebuild it. "I think it's only fair to take some of the[Pg 256] risk myself," said he; "and if the place burns down the company will know I didn't set it alight o' purpose."
Fifty-eight years old is Fred M'Gurer, and his son is now coming to live and work with him altogether, after seven years spent wintering in the city and summering in the country. Irish once, and of an Irish family—but they go to no church. The old man feels that he is a Christian all the same, and will get to heaven at last, because he "deals square with his fellow-men."
Fred and his son work the farm all by themselves, outside labour is so expensive. The beet-fields take all the immigrants. Did I see the red waggons as I came along, full of Flemish and Russians living by beet-picking on the beetroot farms near by?
I saw them.
"America is a high hill for them that don't speak the language," said Fred. But he said that because he likes talking himself, and can't imagine himself in a land where he could not hold converse. The immigrants manage very well without the language, and scale the hill, and rake in the dollars easily. Perhaps they do not glean much of the American ideal, and the hope of the American nation. But I suppose Fred did not mean that.
I had a pleasant talk with a successful German farmer, who took me in a cart from Pioneer to Grizier, through comparatively poor country. He had [Pg 257]possessed a farm of five acres in Germany, but there each acre had been worth between 450 and 500 dollars. When he came to Grizier land was selling at 25 dollars an acre, and he was able to buy fifty acres of it and to bring up his family in health and plenty. His farm was now worth more than 5000 dollars.
I slept on an old waggon in a wheat-field near Grizier; but about midnight it began to rain, and I was obliged to seek shelter in a crazy, doorless, windowless cottage, and there I sat all next day and slept all the next night whilst the elements raged. In the cottage were two chairs, a home-made table, and a broken bedstead. I cooked my meals on the rainy threshold. The refuge was shared by a great big bumble bee, two red-admirals, a brown squirrel, and two robins.
The second morning was Sunday, radiant, fresh, and green. The road was soft but clean, with yielding cakes of mud; the grass was fresh, for every blade had been washed on Saturday; the wild strawberry was a brighter ruby; on spread bushes the wild rose was in bloom; there were sun-browned country girls upon the road, who were shy but might be spoken to; the odour of clover was purer, the hay-fields had round shoulders after the storm, and you'd think cows had been lying down where the wind had laid the tussocks low. The sun shone as if it had forgotten it had shone before, and was doing it for the first time. To-day it became evident that the grain was ripening; the apple[Pg 258] trees in fantastic shapes were knee-deep in yellowing corn. The little oak trees by the side of the road presented foliage, every leaf of which looked as if it had been carefully polished.
In America wild strawberries are three on a stalk, which causes a pleasant profusion....
I got a whole loaf of home-made bread given me at Cooney ..., and a quart of milk at "Fertile Valley Farm." ...
Only at sunset did I strike the main Angola Road, and off that road I made my bed in a wheat-field and fell asleep, watching the bearded ears disproportionately magnified and black in the flame of the crimson sky. Next day, when I awoke, life was just creeping into the blue-green night, a soft radiance as of rose petals was in the East, and a breeze was wandering like a rat among the stalks of the wheat. I fell asleep again, and when I reopened my eyes it was bright morning.
The Sunday gave way to the week-day. There is nothing happening on the roads on the Sunday; the tramp is left with Nature, but directly Monday comes the work and life of the people reveal themselves, and adventures are more frequent.
THE STORE ON WHEELS
THE STORE ON WHEELS.
My first visitor this Monday was a man of business. As I was making my tea he came up towards me driving two lean horses and a great black oblong box on wheels. At the farm where I had drawn water for my kettle he pulled up and dismounted. A girl[Pg 259] who had seen him from a window of the farmhouse came tripping to meet him. He exchanged some words with her, and then from the far side of his hearse-like cart he produced a black chest, out of which he pulled a pair of boots. The young lady then hopped back to the house to try them on. Satisfied as to her purchase she took in addition a pound of tea and a packet of sugar. The cart was a moving store: here were all manner of things for sale. But the storekeeper received no money; all his debts were paid in eggs. One side of the hearse was full of merchandise, the other contained nested boxes and crates for the accommodation of hundreds of dozens of eggs.
The storeman gave me a lift and explained to me his business. He possessed a cold-storage establishment in the city; he credited the farm people with sixteen cents (eightpence) for every dozen eggs they gave him, then he stored them in his freezing-house till autumn, when they could be thrown on the market at twenty-five to thirty cents the dozen.
He was a great believer in cold storage. "Meat," said he, "is tenderer when it has been frozen some weeks."
Business in eggs used to be better. Now the State set a limit on the time you could keep them in cold storage. Sometimes he had to sell out at a loss. The hope was to keep all the farm produce till there was a real scarcity and prices went high. Then it would be possible to make a small fortune.
[Pg 260]
"But I'm tired of this business," said the storeman, "I'd like to give it up and buy land."
We lumbered along the road and stopped at each farmhouse. Sometimes we sold articles, but whether we sold anything or not we always took a few dozen eggs; every farmer was in business with my man and used him as a sort of egg-bank. Even if they were not in debt to him they were glad to hand over their eggs and be credited with the corresponding amount of money. We took four or five dozen eggs at least at every farm, and sometimes as many as twenty and thirty dozen. The storeman left behind an empty crate at each farm, so that it might be filled for him next time he came along, and he took aboard the crate already filled. In exchange he sold kerchiefs, boots, corsets, cloth, brooms, brushes, coffee, corn-flake, wire-gauze to keep out mosquitoes, etc. At the end of his round he would have got rid of almost all his merchandise and have filled both sides of the hearse with eggs. He took home upon occasion as many as five hundred dozen eggs!
A cheerful American with a word of news, a titbit of gossip, and the top of the morning for all the country women. He was eagerly awaited, and children at farm-gates descried him a long way off and ran in to tell their mothers. Even the babies were excited at his approach, for they knew he carried a supply of candy. At each farm where there was a baby the[Pg 261] storeman left a little bag of candy. He knew the value of good-will.
"It's a good business," said he; "no expense of keeping a shop, double profit,—profit on the goods and profit on the eggs; it pays all right. But I'm tired of it, and I think I shall give it up and buy land." To several of his customers who asked after his business he replied in the same terms. He was getting tired of it, and was thinking of buying land. When I took a photograph of his cart and himself he said he would be very glad to have a copy, just to remind him of old days—for he was thinking of giving it up, etc.
It is interesting to observe the commercialisation that goes on in the country in America. Not only does the egg-bank and travelling store come round, but the cream-vans come also and buy up all the cream, and the baker comes from the bread factory and dumps, twice or three times a week, huge baskets of damp, tasteless loaves, all wrapped in grease-paper. Not many people bake their own bread—they save time and take this astonishing substitute. Then travellers in coffee have exploited special brands—"Euclid Coffee," "Primus Coffee," "Old Reliable," and the like, done up in pound packets. Rural Americans do not realise that good coffee is coffee and no more.
No one had a quart of milk to spare on the road to[Pg 262] Angola, so I hit on a plan which I recommend to others in like circumstances. I went to a farmhouse and asked for a cupful of milk to have with my coffee; I got it easily and freely. The farmer was rather touched. But as you cannot make decent coffee with one cupful of milk I went to another farm and begged another cupful, and then to another. I was able to make a good pot of coffee, despite the scarcity of milk.
Whilst I was having lunch, I had an interesting talk with an ancient man who was mowing grass at the side of the road.
"You look like Father Time," said I.
"Well, I've mown a good many days," he replied. "I shall soon die now. There's no strength in me; my day is over."
"Have you enjoyed life?" I asked.
"Yes, I have," he replied, his face lighting up.
"Do you work your farm yourself?"
"No! My son works it; he is twenty-two. Yes, I married late. Thirty-two years I wandered as you are doing. I've been in thirty states. I was ten years on the Lakes, a sailor."
"Ever across the Atlantic?"
"Never on the big waters."
"And how do you think America is going on?"
I HAD AN INTERESTING TALK WITH AN ANCIENT MAN BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
"I HAD AN INTERESTING TALK WITH AN ANCIENT MAN BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD."
"I think she is going bad. The new generation is ............