Beautiful Joe (14 page)

From my
station under Miss Laura’s chair, I could see that all the time Mr. Harry was
speaking, Mr. Maxwell, although he spoke rather as if he was laughing at him,
was yet glancing at him admiringly.

When Mr.
Harry was silent, he exclaimed, “You are right, you are right, Gray. With your
smooth highways, and plenty of schools, and churches, and libraries, and
meetings for young people, you would make country life a paradise, and I tell
you what you would do, too; you would empty the slums of the cities. It is the
slowness and dullness of country life, and not their poverty alone, that keep
the poor in dirty lanes and tenement houses. They want stir and amusement, too,
poor souls, when their day’s work is over. I believe they would come to the
country if it were made more pleasant for them.”

“That is
another question,” said Mr. Harry, “a burning question in my mind the labor and
capital one. When I was in New York, Maxwell, I was in a hospital, and saw a
number of men who had been day laborers. Some of them were old and feeble, and
others were young men, broken down in the prime of life. Their limbs were
shrunken and drawn. They had been digging in the earth, and working on high
buildings, and confined in dingy basements, and had done all kinds of hard
labor for other men. They had given their lives and strength for others, and
this was the end of it to die poor and forsaken.
“I looked at them, and they reminded me of the martyrs of old. Ground down,
living from hand to mouth, separated from their families in many cases they had
had a bitter lot. They had never had a chance to get away from their fate, and
had to work till they dropped. I tell you there is something wrong. We don’t do
enough for the people that slave and toil for us. We should take better care of
them, we should not herd them together like cattle, and when we get rich, we
should carry them along with us, and give them a part of our gains, for without
them we would be as poor as they are.”

“Good,
Harry—I’m with you there,” said voice behind him, and looking around, we saw
Mr. Wood standing in the doorway, gazing down proudly at his stepson.

Mr. Harry
smiled, and getting up, said, “Won’t you have my chair, sir?”

“No, thank
you; your mother wishes us to come to tea. There are muffins, and you know they
won’t improve with keeping.”

They all
went to the dining room, and I followed them. On the way, Mr. Wood said, “Right
on top of that talk of yours, Harry, I’ve got to tell you of another person who
is going to Boston to live.”

“Who is
it?” said Mr. Harry.

“Lazy Dan
Wilson. I’ve been to see him this afternoon. You know his wife is sick, and they’re
half starved. He says he is going to the city, for he hates to chop wood and
work, and he thinks maybe he’ll get some light job there.”

Mr. Harry
looked grave, and Mr. Maxwell said, “He will starve, that’s what he will do.”

“Precisely,”
said Mr. Wood, spreading out his hard, brown hands, as he sat down at the
table. “I don’t know why it is, but the present generation has a marvelous way
of skimming around any kind of work with their hands. They’ll work their brains
till they haven’t got any more backbone than a caterpillar, but as for manual
labor, it’s old-timey and out of fashion. I wonder how these farms would ever
have been carved out of the backwoods, if the old Puritans had sat down on the
rocks with their noses in a lot of books, and tried to figure out just how
little work they could do, and yet exist.”

“Now,
father,” said Mrs. Wood, “you are trying to insinuate that the present
generation is lazy, and I’m sure it isn’t. Look at Harry. He works as hard as
you do.”

“Isn’t
that like a woman?” said Mr. Wood, with a good-natured laugh. “The present
generation consists of her son, and the past of her husband. I don’t think all
our young people are lazy, Hattie; but how in creation, unless the Lord rains
down a few farmers, are we going to support all our young lawyers and doctors?
They say the world is getting healthier and better, but we’ve got to fight a
little more, and raise some more criminals, and we’ve got to take to eating
pies and doughnuts for breakfast again, or some of our young sprouts from the
colleges will go a-begging.”

“You don’t
mean to undervalue the advantages of a good education, do you, Mr. Wood?” said
Mr. Maxwell.

“No, no;
look at Harry there. Isn’t he pegging away at his studies with my hearty
approval? and he’s going to be nothing but a plain, common farmer. But he’ll be
a better one than I’ve been though, because he’s got a trained mind. I found
that out when he was a lad going to the village school. He’d lay out his little
garden by geometry, and dig his ditches by algebra. Education’s a help to any
man. What I am trying to get at is this, that in some way or other we’re
running more to brains and less to hard work than our forefathers did.”

Mr. Wood
was beating on the table with his forefinger while he talked, and everyone was
laughing at him. “When you’ve quite finished speechifying, John,” said Mrs.
Wood, “perhaps you’ll serve the berries and pass the cream and sugar Do you get
yellow cream like this in the village, Mr. Maxwell?”

“No, Mrs.
Wood,” he said; “ours is a much paler yellow,” and then there was a great
tinkling of china, and passing of dishes, and talking and laughing, and no one
noticed that I was not in my usual place in the hall. I could not get over my
dread of the green creature, and I had crept under the table, so that if it
came out and frightened Miss Laura, I could jump up and catch it.

When tea
was half over, she gave a little cry. I sprang up on her lap, and there,
gliding over the table toward her, was the wicked-looking green thing. I stepped
on the table, and had it by the middle before it could get to her. My hind legs
were in a dish of jelly, and my front ones were in a plate of cake, and I was
very uncomfortable. The tail of the green thing hung in a milk pitcher, and its
tongue was still going at me, but I held it firmly and stood quite still.

“Drop it,
drop it!” cried Miss Laura, in tones of distress, and Mr. Maxwell struck me on
the back, so I let the thing go, and stood sheepishly looking about me. Mr.
Wood was leaning back in his chair, laughing with all his might, and Mrs. Wood
was staring at her untidy table with rather a long face. Miss Laura told me to
jump on the floor, and then she helped her aunt to take the spoiled things off
the table.

I felt
that I had done wrong, so I slunk out into the hall. Mr. Maxwell was sitting on
the lounge, tearing his handkerchief in strips and tying them around the
creature where my teeth had stuck in. I had been careful not to hurt it much,
for I knew it was a pet of his; but he did not know that, and scowled at me,
saying: “You rascal; you’ve hurt my poor snake terribly.”

I felt so
badly to hear this that I went and stood with my head in a corner. I had almost
rather be whipped than scolded. After a while, Mr. Maxwell went back into the
room, and they all went on with their tea. I could hear Mr. Wood’s loud, cheery
voice, “The dog did quite right. A snake is mostly a poisonous creature, and
his instinct told him to protect his mistress. Where is he? Joe, Joe!”

I would
not move till Miss Laura came and spoke to me. “Dear old dog,” she whispered, “you
knew the snake was there all the time, didn’t you?” Her words made me feel
better, and I followed her to the dining room, where Mr. Wood made me sit
beside him and eat scraps from his hand all through the meal.

Mr.
Maxwell had got over his ill humor, and was chatting in a lively way. “Good
Joe,” he said, “I was cross to you, and I beg your pardon It always riles me to
have any of my pets injured. You didn’t know my poor snake was only after
something to eat. Mrs. Wood has pinned him in my pocket so he won’t come out
again. Do you know where I got that snake, Mrs. Wood?”

“No,” she
said; “you never told me.”

“It was
across the river by Blue Ridge,” he said. “One day last summer I was out
rowing, and, getting very hot, tied my boat in the shade of a big tree. Some
village boys were in the woods, and, hearing a great noise, I went to see what
it was all about. They were Band of Mercy boys, and finding a country boy
beating a snake to death, they were remonstrating with him for his cruelty,
telling him that some kinds of snakes were a help to the farmer, and destroyed
large numbers of field mice and other vermin. The boy was obstinate. He had
found the snake, and he insisted upon his right to kill it, and they were
having rather a lively time when I appeared. I persuaded them to make the snake
over to me. Apparently it was already dead. Thinking it might revive, I put it on
some grass in the bow of the boat. It lay there motionless for a long time, and
I picked up my oars and started for home. I had got half way across the river,
when I turned around and saw that the snake was gone. It had just dropped into
the water, and was swimming toward the bank we had left. I turned and followed
it.

“It swam
slowly and with evident pain, lifting its head every few seconds high above the
water, to see which way it was going. On reaching the bank it coiled itself up,
throwing up blood and water. I took it up carefully, carried it home, and
nursed it. It soon got better, and has been a pet of mine ever since.”

After tea
was over, and Mrs. Wood and Miss Laura had helped Adèle finish the work, they
all gathered in the parlour. The day had been quite warm, but now a cool wind
had sprung up, and Mr. Wood said that it was blowing up rain.

Mrs. Wood
said that she thought a fire would be pleasant; so they lighted the sticks of
wood in the open grate, and all sat round the blazing fire.

Mr.
Maxwell tried to get me to make friends with the little snake that he held in
his hands toward the blaze, and now that I knew that it was harmless I was not
afraid of it; but it did not like me, and put out its funny little tongue
whenever I looked at it.

By-and-by
the rain began to strike against the windows, and Mr. Maxwell said, “This is
just the night for a story. Tell us something out of your experience, won’t
you, Mr. Wood?”

“What
shall I tell you?” he said, good-humoredly. He was sitting between his wife and
Mr. Harry, and had his hand on Mr. Harry’s knee.

“Something
about animals,” said Mr. Maxwell. “We seem to be on that subject today.”

“Well,”
said Mr. Wood, “I’ll talk about something that has been running in my head for
many a day. There is a good deal of talk nowadays about kindness to domestic
animals; but I do not hear much about kindness to wild ones. The same Creator
formed them both. I do not see why you should not protect one as well as the
other. I have no more right to torture a bear than a cow. Our wild animals
around here are getting pretty well killed off, but there are lots in other
places. I used to be fond of hunting when I was a boy; but I have got rather
disgusted with killing these late years, and unless the wild creatures ran in
our streets, I would lift no hand to them. Shall I tell you some of the sport
we had when I was youngster?”

“Yes, yes!”
they all exclaimed.

“Well,”
Mr. Wood began: “I was brought up, as you all know, in the eastern part of
Maine, and we often used to go over into New Brunswick for our sport. Moose
were our best game. Did you ever see one, Laura?”

“No,
uncle,” she said.

“Well,
when I was a boy there was no more beautiful sight to me in the world than a
moose with his dusky hide, and long legs, and branching antlers, and shoulders standing
higher than a horse’s. Their legs are so long that they can’t eat close to the
ground. They browse on the tops of plants, and the tender shoots and leaves of
trees. They walk among the thick underbrush, carrying their horns adroitly to
prevent their catching in the branches, and they step so well, and aim so true,
that you’ll scarcely hear a twig fall as they go.

“They’re a
timid creature except at times. Then they’ll attack with hoofs and antlers
whatever comes in their way. They hate mosquitoes, and when they’re tormented
by them it’s just as well to be careful about approaching them. Like all other
creatures, the Lord has put into them a wonderful amount of sense, and when a
female moose has her one or two fawns she goes into the deepest part of the
forest, or swims to islands in large lakes, till they are able to look out for
themselves.

“Well, we
used to like to catch a moose, and we had different ways of doing it. One way
was to snare them. We’d make a loop in a rope and hide it on the ground under
the dead leaves in one of their paths. This was connected with a young sapling
whose top was bent down. When the moose stepped on the loop it would release
the sapling, and up it would bound, catching him by the leg. These snares were
always set deep in the woods, and we couldn’t visit them very often. Sometimes
the moose would be there for days, raging and tearing around, and scratching
the skin off his legs. That was cruel. I wouldn’t catch a moose in that way now
for a hundred dollars.

“Another way
was to hunt them on snow shoes with dogs. In February and March the snow was
deep, and would carry men and dogs. Moose don’t go together in herds. In the
summer they wander about over the forest, and in the autumn they come together
in small groups, and select a hundred or two of acres where there is plenty of
heavy undergrowth, and to which they usually confine themselves. They do this
so that their tracks won’t tell their enemies where they are.

“Any of
these places where there were several moose we called a moose yard. We went
through the woods till we got on to the tracks of some of the animals belonging
to it, then the dogs smelled them and went ahead to start them. If I shut my
eyes now I can see one of our moose hunts. The moose running and plunging
through the snow crust, and occasionally rising up and striking at the dogs
that hang on to his bleeding flanks and legs. The hunters’ rifles going crack,
crack, crack, sometimes killing or wounding dogs as well as moose. That, too,
was cruel.

“Two other
ways we had of hunting moose: Calling and stalking. The calling was done in
this way: We took a bit of birch bark and rolled it up in the shape of a horn.
We took this horn and started out, either on a bright moonlight night, or just
at evening, or early in the morning. The man who carried the horn hid himself,
and then began to make a lowing sound like a female moose. He had to do it
pretty well to deceive them. Away in the distance some moose would hear it, and
with answering grunts would start off to come to it. If a young male moose was
coming, he’d mind his steps, I can assure you, on account of fear of the old ones;
but if it was an old fellow, you’d hear him stepping out bravely and rapping
his horns against the trees, and plunging into any water that came in his way.
When he got pretty near, he’d stop to listen, and then the caller had to be
very careful and put his trumpet down close to the ground, so as to make a
lower sound. If the moose felt doubtful he’d turn; if not, he’d come on, and
unlucky for him if he did, for he got a warm reception, either from the rifles
in our hands as we lay hid near the caller, or from some of the party stationed
at a distance.

“In
stalking, we crept on them the way a cat creeps on a mouse. In the daytime a
moose is usually lying down. We’d find their tracks and places where they’d
been nipping off the ends of branches and twigs, and follow them up. They
easily take the scent of men, and we’d have to keep well to the leeward.
Sometimes we’d come upon them lying down, but, if in walking along, we’d broken
a twig, or made the slightest noise, they’d think it was one of their mortal
enemies—a bear creeping on them, and they’d be up and away. Their sense of
hearing is very keen, but they’re not so quick to see. A fox is like that, too.
His eyes aren’t equal to his nose.

“Stalking
is the most merciful way to kill moose. Then they haven’t the fright and
suffering of the chase.”

“I don’t
see why they need to be killed at all,” said Mrs. Wood. “If I knew that forest
back of the mountains was full of wild creatures, I think I’d be glad of it,
and not want to hunt them, that is, if they were harmless and beautiful
creatures like the deer.”

“You’re a
woman,” said Mr. Wood, “and women are more merciful than men. Men want to kill
and slay. They’re like the Englishman, who said ‘What a fine day it is; let’s
go out and kill something.’”

“Please
tell us some more about the dogs that helped you catch the moose, uncle,” said
Miss Laura. I was sitting up very straight beside her listening to every word
Mr. Wood said, and she was fondling my head.

“Well,
Laura, when we camped out on the snow and slept on spruce boughs while we were
after the moose, the dogs used to be a great comfort to us. They slept at our
feet and kept us warm. Poor brutes, they mostly had a rough time of it. They
enjoyed the running and chasing as much as we did, but when it came to broken
ribs and sore heads, it was another matter. Then the porcupines bothered them.
Our dogs would never learn to let them alone. If they were going through the
woods where there were no signs of moose and found a porcupine, they’d kill it.
The quills would get in their mouths and necks and chests, and we’d have to gag
them and take bullet molds or nippers, or whatever we had, sometimes our jack-knives,
and pull out the nasty things. If we got hold of the dogs at once, we could
pull out the quills with our fingers. Sometimes the quills worked in, and the
dogs would go home and lie by the fire with running sores till they worked out.
I’ve seen quills work right through dogs. Go in on one side and come out on the
other.”

“Poor
brutes,” said Mrs. Wood. “I wonder you took them.”

“We once
lost a valuable hound while moose hunting,” said Mr. Wood. “The moose struck
him with his hoof and the dog was terribly injured. He lay in the woods for
days, till a neighbor of ours, who was looking for timber, found him and
brought him home on his shoulders. Wasn’t there rejoicing among us boys to see
old Lion coming back. We took care of him and he got well again.

“It was
good sport to see the dogs when we were hunting a bear with them. Bears are
good runners, and when dogs get after them, there is great skirmishing. They
nip the bear behind, and when they turn, the dogs run like mad, for a hug from a
bear means sure death to a dog. If they got a slap from his paws, over they’d
go. Dogs new to the business were often killed by the bears.”

“Were
there many bears near your home, Mr. Wood?” asked Mr. Maxwell

“Lots of
them. More than we wanted. They used to bother us fearfully about our sheep and
cattle. I’ve often had to get up in the night, and run out to the cattle. The
bears would come out of the woods, and jump on to the young heifers and cows,
and strike them and beat them down, and the cattle would roar as if the evil
one had them. If the cattle were too far away from the house for us to hear
them, the bears would worry them till they were dead.

“As for
the sheep, they never made any resistance. They’d meekly run in a corner when
they saw a bear coming, and huddle together, and he’d strike at them, and
scratch them with his claws, and perhaps wound a dozen before he got one
firmly. Then he’d seize it in his paws, and walk off on his hind legs over
fences and anything else that came in his way, till he came to a nice, retired
spot, and there he’d sit down and skin that sheep just like a butcher. He’d
gorge himself with the meat, and in the morning we’d find the other sheep that
he’d torn, and we’d vow vengeance against that bear. He’d be almost sure to
come back for more, so for a while after that we always put the sheep in the
barn at nights and set a trap by the remains of the one he had eaten.

“Everybody
hated bears, and hadn’t much pity for them; still they were only getting their
meat as other wild animals do, and we’d no right to set such cruel traps for
them as the steel ones. They had a clog attached to them, and had long, sharp
teeth. We put them on the ground and strewed leaves over them, and hung up some
of the carcass left by the bear nearby. When he attempted to get this meat, he
would tread on the trap, and the teeth would spring together, and catch him by
the leg. They always fought to get free. I once saw a bear that had been making
a desperate effort to get away. His leg was broken, the skin and flesh were all
torn away, and he was held by the tendons. It was a foreleg that was caught,
and he would put his hind feet against the jaws of the trap, and then draw by
pressing with his feet, till he would stretch those tendons to their utmost
extent.

“I have
known them to work away till they really pulled these tendons out of the foot,
and got off. It was a great event in our neighborhood when a bear was caught.
Whoever caught him blew a horn, and the men and boys came trooping together to see
the sight. I’ve known them to blow that horn on a Sunday morning, and I’ve seen
the men turn their backs on the meeting house to go and see the bear.”

“Was there
no more merciful way of catching them than by this trap?” asked Miss Laura.

“Oh, yes,
by the deadfall—that is by driving heavy sticks into the ground, and making a
boxlike place, open on one side, where two logs were so arranged with other
heavy logs upon them, that when the bear seized the bait, the upper log fell
down and crushed him to death. Another way was to fix a bait in a certain
place, with cords tied to it, which cords were fastened to triggers of guns
placed at a little distance. When the bear took the bait, the guns went off,
and he shot himself.

“Sometimes
it took a good many bullets to kill them. I remember one old fellow that we put
eleven into, before he keeled over. It was one fall, over on Pike’s Hill. The
snow had come earlier than usual, and this old bear hadn’t got into his den for
his winter’s sleep. A lot of us started out after him. The hill was covered
with beech trees, and he’d been living all the fall on the nuts, till he’d got
as fat as butter. We took dogs and worried him, and ran him from one place to
another, and shot at him, till at last he dropped. We took his meat home, and
had his skin tanned for a sleigh robe.

“One day I
was in the woods, and looking through the trees espied a bear. He was standing
up on his hind legs, snuffing in every direction, and just about the time I
espied him, he espied me. I had no dog and no gun, so I thought I had better be
getting home to my dinner. I was a small boy then, and the bear, probably
thinking I’d be a mouthful for him anyway, began to come after me in a
leisurely way. I can see myself now going through those woods—hat gone, jacket
flying, arms out, eyes rolling over my shoulder every little while to see if
the bear was gaining on me. He was a benevolent-looking old fellow, and his
face seemed to say, ‘Don’t hurry, little boy.’ He wasn’t doing his prettiest, and
I soon got away from him, but I made up my mind then, that it was more fun to
be the chaser than the chased.

“Another
time I was out in our cornfield, and hearing a rustling, looked through the
stalks, and saw a brown bear with two cubs. She was slashing down the corn with
her paws to get at the ears. She smelled me, and getting frightened, began to
run. I had a dog with me this time, and shouted and rapped on the fence, and
set him on her. He jumped up and snapped at her flanks, and every few instants
she’d turn and give him a cuff, that would send him yards away. I followed her
up, and just back of the farm she and her cubs took into a tree. I sent my dog
home, and my father and some of the neighbors came. It had gotten dark by this time,
so we built a fire under the tree, and watched all night, and told stories to
keep each other awake. Toward morning we got sleepy, and the fire burnt low,
and didn’t that old bear and one cub drop right down among us and start off to
the woods. That waked us up. We built up the fire and kept watch, so that the
one cub, still in the tree, couldn’t get away. Until daylight the mother bear
hung around, calling to the cub to come down.”

“Did you
let it go, uncle?” asked Miss Laura.

“No, my
dear, we shot it.”

“How
cruel!” cried Mrs. Wood.

“Yes,
weren’t we brutes?” said her husband; “but there was some excuse for us,
Hattie. The bears ruined our farms. This kind of hunting that hunts and kills
for the mere sake of slaughter is very different from that. I’ll tell you what
I’ve no patience with, and that’s with these English folks that dress
themselves up, and take fine horses and packs of dogs, and tear over the
country after one little fox or rabbit. Bah, it’s contemptible. Now if they
were hunting cruel, man-eating tigers or animals that destroy property, it
would be different thing.”