Gleaner Tales by Robert Sellar - HTML preview

THE SUMMER OF SORROW.

LOOKING FOR THE BOOK.

You want to see the little buk I have? An who tould you about it? You’ll do it no harm. Maybe you won’t get the chance. It’s not the likes of you that should have it. You’ve driven from Huntingdon on purpose and sure I won’t disappoint you. I didn’t ax you to come, did I? You’ll print it. Yis, what suits you: laving out all that tells how we poor Catholics were used in Ireland. Honor bright, you’ll print every word of the little buk. Maybe you would and maybe you wouldn’t, but it is not to everybody I would give a reading of my poor nevy’s book, and, if you plaze, we’ll say no more about that same. Well, then, I might tell you what I saw myself at the favor sheds. Did you ever know anybody who seen a ghost like to talk about it? I tries to forgit what I saw and heard, an thank nobody that brings me in mind o’t. Come now, I’ll tell you a bettor shtory than about poor women and childer a dyin by the score of favor an strong men alayin aside them too wake to git thim a cup o’ wather. An its a thrue story, which is more than can be said about some you’ve prented. Whin I wint to William Bowron to buy my lot, I paid my money down for’t in goold. He wrote my ticket for the lot an’ whin he hands it to me, says he, Now you’ve got a farrum, my man, you’ll want a cow. Thrue for you, says I, I had always a cow in Ireland an my father afore me. Confound it all, says he, then you must have one in Canada; I have a heifer that’ll suit you. Gittin aff his chair, he placed his stick across his back and hooked his elbows over it, an tuk me into his yard, where he pointed to a beauty av a crathur. How much? says I. Three pounds, says he, Done, says I, an’ puttin my hand in my pocket I pays him the money in his fisht. Sure the baste wud have cost tin poun in Ireland. Confound it all, says he, ye’re a dacint fellow; come in an have a bite to ate. An afther I had my dinner I started for my farm, adrivin my springer afore me through the woods, feelin proud as Punch over my bargain. It was not until I stood afore the bit shanty I had got raised, that the thought came on me all at once, that I had nothing to feed the baste. Och, it takes an Irishman to jump before seeing where his feet will fall. Well, I held my whisht, and my woman and her good mother comes out and falls admirin the baste. There was only another cow in the settlement; wan ould Armstrong had. Sure, I cries, won’t the nabors be invying us! Thim here long afore us an widout a four-footed baste, barrin pigs an dogs an cats, an here, the firsht month we come, we have an illigant heifer, new come in. “She’s a beauty, sure,” says my wife’s mother, “an as like the wan I sould when I left the Ould Counthry (bad luck to the day I left it) as a red wan can be like a black; lave her to me, I’ll look afther her.” Indeed an I will, says I, for if you don’t she’ll die, for sorra a bite hev I got for her. An so it was, the ould woman took charge and tended her as if she had been her child, herdin her in the woods an atakin her to the creeks where she could get a bellyful, a drivin her home against nightfall. It divarted the ould woman, who had all the time been lamenting laving Ireland, and sarved us, for me wife an mysilf were workin hard in makin a clearance to get in a few praties. It was on in August that wan night the ould woman an the cow did not come home. She’ll hev lost her way, says my wife to me. Not at all, I tells her, she knows the woods as well by this time as ever she did the bog of Dorroghmore. Thin, why’s she not here? asks she. Och, she’ll have shtrayed furder than ordinar an daylight has failed her. Niver throuble yer mind; she’ll be here with the sun tomorrow. I was more consarned than I let on, but what could I do? It was dark an there was no use going looking for her in the woods wid a candle, seein’ we hadn’t wan. My wife couldn’t get a wink o’ sleep, an sot at the door, shouting whiniver she thought she heard a rustlin in the bush. The day broke an the sun climbed up until he was high enough to look over the tree tops at us an say Good mornin, an nivir a sign o’ the ould woman or the cow. We waited an waited, expectin ivery minute to see her, until I got afeard, an wint an tould the nearest nabors. They were consarned at the news an agreed if she did come back afore, they would warn the settlement an ivery man jack o’ thim would turn out next mornin to luk. An they did; och but there was a crowd ov them, some wid guns an some wid horns an some wid pitchforks. There was grain awaitin to be shore, but not a sowl of mankind stayed away. What’s that you say? They’d be Arangemen? What ilse was there in the sittlemint then? We didn’t talk in thim days about what makes strife, but lived as frindly as nabors could, helpin wan another, an niver askin what you were. Well, it was a fine day, tho hot, an aff we started, watchin for foot tracks an shoutin an blowin horns an firing shots, expectin the ould woman would hastin to us on hearin where we were. It was niver a bit o’ use. Hours wint by an we thravelled miles on miles an niver a sign. Whin we found a track we soon lost it, for the woods were cut up by slues. It was agrowin late whin a few o’ us met to talk it over. “We’ve gone north an east an wist,” says Sam Foster, the ouldest settler ov us all an a knowledgable man, “an havn’t found her or the cow. That shows me she has crossed the swamp to the south an gone towards the lines.” We agreed to this rasonin an shtarted aff for the swamp, which was as dirthy a puddle o’ black wather an green skum as there was in Ameriky. Sam was our guide, or we might av been thryin to crass it to this day. He knew where it was narrowest an by creeping along fallen trees we reached the ridge beyant, an hadn’t gone half a mile afore we struck the footprints of an ould woman an a cow. How did I know it was the footprints ov an ould woman? Hould yer whisht or I won’t be atellin you any more. It was a blessin we did, for it wad soon hev been too dark to have followed them up. I tell ye, we forgot our tiredness an hunger, an hurried on in great spirits, an in half an hour Sam shouts, “There she is,” apointin through the trees. I shouts Whuroo an dashes ahead o’ them all an in a minit I had the ould woman in my arms an the cow a lookin on as innocint as if it had niver played thricks whin a calf. The saints be praised ye are not kilt and ded, I cries, as I hugged her, for sure, though she was ould an wrinkled an bint, she was the mother o’ my darlin wife. Ded I wad hev been, says she, cryin wid joy, but for the crathur, an niver ben waked or buried. By this time the rist o’ the min kem up an awl sat down to hear the ould woman’s shtory. She tould us how, from the drouth, the cow found little to pick and kept amovin on and on until she was floundering in the swamp, an whin they got on solid land sorra the wan of thim knew where they were. “How did ye keep alive?” asks a man, “for ye are spry and hearty.” “I wunna tell ye,” says she. “Two days and two nights in the bush,” says another, “an you not hungry: it’s a mysthery.” “Hould yer whisht,” says another, “it’s a miracle: there be good people in thim woods as well as on the hills ov Ould Oireland.” It was growin late an there was no time for more talk an we shtarted for home, an, bedad, the ould woman bate us all wid the nimbleness she tripped through the bush an over the logs. Whin we got home, an glad my wife was when she hugged her ould mother, an the nabors left, I axed again how she had kept body an sowl so well together in the bush. “I wunna tell ye,” says she again, an aff she wint to bed. I tould all to my wife an axed her to find out, and by-and-bye she got it as a great saycret—the ould woman sucked the cow for food an purticted hersilf from the cowld ov the night by sleeping aside her.

“Are you done, grandpa?”

I turned, a girl stood behind us, having come unnoticed.

“Yis, yis; what is it?”

“Supper is ready, and I’ve been waiting ever so long to tell you.”

“Come,” said the old man to me as he rose, “an have a bite.”

I followed and when after tea I rose to take my horse for my homeward journey, my eyes must have expressed what courtesy kept my tongue from again asking. “Och, the little buk, is it. Well, I’ll trust ye wid it.” Leaving the room he returned with what looked like a greasy and much handled pass-book. “Take care of it,” he exclaimed with emotion, “an don’t keep it long.” Placing it in my pocket we parted.

HOW THE BOOK WAS GOT.

On retiring to my room that night, I examined the book given me with such reluctance and read every word of it before going to bed. I found it to be the diary of an Irishman who had left his country during the famine. In the ship on which he embarked for Canada typhus fever broke out and the incidents of the horrors of the voyage and of the equal horrors of the quarantine sheds on being landed at Grosse isle were described with a simplicity and directness that alternately moved me to tears and filled my bosom with indignation. Next day I set to work to copy the diary. On considering the matter I saw it would be necessary to learn somewhat of the writer, who he was, whether he survived the plague, and if he did, where he was now. The first day I could get away from duty found me on the road to interview the old man a second time. On restoring to him the book I expressed freely my indignation at the conduct of the landlords, of the ship-agents, and of the quarantine officers, and my pity for those whom they oppressed. My words seemed to be unlooked for.

“Begorra,” said the old man, “I didn’t expict this aff ye. I tuk ye for wan that thought anything good enough for the likes of us.”

Explaining my wish to publish the diary I asked him to tell me what he knew about its writer.

“Sure he was my nevy, an I will tell ye awl about him.”

Though it was mid-October the day was warm and the sun unpleasantly hot, and the old man suggested we should go to the orchard, where he could tell me what he knew without interruption. It proved a long interview for I had many questions to ask and the substance of his statement, though not in his words, I will now give as an introduction to the diary.

It was in the year 1847 myself and wife were behind the house cutting hay. There was no mowing-machine those days; no, not even a scythe could be used because of the stumps, and we were picking the locks of hay out atween the stones and stumps with our hooks. It was a hot day and we had been at work since sunrise, so our backs were tired enough, but we could not rest, for there was much to do and we had no help beside ourselves. We were working hard and fast, when a voice came ahint us that made us start.

“Uncle, wanna you look roun at me?”

There stood a girl, with a bundle in her right hand. By her figure you might say she was 17 or thereabout; by her face she was an old woman, for the bones were sticking out of the tight drawn skin and her skin was a deadly grey, with black streaks above and below the eyes. My first thought was the colleen was demented.

“God save you kindly,” says I, “but why do you name me uncle?”

“I am your brother’s child.”

You might have knocked me down with a feather, I was so astonished.

“What! me brother Jerry?”

“That same,” answers she in a wake voice.

“Where is he?” shouts I, throwing down my hook. “Lade me to him. Niver a line did he send to tell us he was laving Ireland, but welkim he and his as the flowers in May to the best I have.”

The girl didn’t stir; she seemed numbed and dead like and answered in her hollow voice, “He’s dead thim three weeks.”

“God save us all,” I shouted, “you are mad my colleen, and ye’re mind’s awandering. My brother Jerry is in Ireland with his wife and the childer, and ye’re mistaen when you call me uncle.”

“No, no,” she says to me, “ye’re my own uncle for I axed at the house next to you. My mother, my father, my brothers and sisters are wid the saints in glory,” and wid that she lifted her eyes and crosses herself.

“When and where?” I shouted in desperation.

“They died ov the ship favor, part are buried in the say and part at the favor sheds.”

With those words the truth of all she said burst on me and I staggered, for my head swam, and I had to throw myself down on the meadow, but my wife rushed past and clasped the poor child in her arms, “I’ll be mother to you, and, God help us, it won’t be on our account if the tear o’ sorrow come again to your eye.”

The poor thing didn’t respond as you might expect, but sank on my wife’s bosom and looked about with that stony stare of hers. My wife’s hot tears were raining on her face, when she whispered, “Wad ye give me a bite to eat?”

Then we saw it all. The girl was starving. I caught her up in my arms—she was no heavier than many a baby—a bag of bones—and I ran with her to the house, crying to my wife to hurry and get something ready. Had ye seen her look at the food as my wife brought it out of the cellar, with the eye of a wild beast, you would have shivered. “Draw in,” says I, “it’s coorse, but it is the best we have, an there’s plenty av it.”

“Is the mate for me?” she asks doubtful like.

“Surely,” says I.

“I havn’t put a tooth mark on mate for three years,” says she simple like.

I reached her a rib of cold boiled pork and she smiled for the first time, and sucked it as a child does the orange it wants to have the taste of as long as possible. When she had eaten as much as my wife thought safe, she took and laid her on our own bed, and willing she was, for she was clean beat out, and went to sleep when her head touched the pillow. Then we had a talk. She had come from the fever sheds and might give the disease to the children, who had gone berrying, so I goes, as agreed on, and meets them, tells them of their new cousin from Ireland, who had come to us sick, and takes them to stay with a neighbor for the night. Next morning I off to the hay before sunrise and worked excited like till the sun got high and overpowering, when I says to myself, “I’ll take a rest and go and see my brother’s child.” She was sitting at the door, where the hops clustered round her, and looked another crathur. The fearsome glare of hunger in the eye was gone and there was a glint of color in the cheek as she rose to welcome me. “You don’t think me mad today, uncle?” she asks me. “God forgive me,” says I, “for the word—.” With that she puts her hand over my mouth. Oh she was the kindly crathur, and now that she was clean and fresh dressed I could see would be a handsome lass when there was more mate on her bones. My wife had been looking for my coming and had the table spread, and after we had eaten we sat again in the shade at the door and as I smoked my pipe Ellen told her story. It was, more the pity, a common enough one in those days. The failure of the potatoes had left my brother unable to get enough for his family to eat let alone pay the rent. On the back of the hunger came sickness and when things had got to be as bad as they could, the agent comes round and tells him if he would give up his houlding and go to Canada the landlord would forgive him the rent, pay the passage-money and a pound ahead on landing at Quebec. He took the offer as his neighbors did and went to Dublin, where they found a ship waiting for them. They were not out of sight of land when the fever broke out and the children, one after another, took it, and three died at sea. When quarantine was reached they were all sent ashore, and there the rest of the children, saving Ellen, died, with the father and mother. When the fever left her she was put on board a steamer for Montreal, and got sorra a bite from the hour she left until she landed, though it took the boat 36 hours. Faint and sick she was hurried ashore and when she made for the city a policeman turned her back and she sat down on the wharf, wishing to die. By and by a man comes along and by his dress she knew he was a minister, though not of our sort. He spoke to her and she told him she wanted to get to me, and showed my address on a bit of paper she carried in her bosom. He read it and saying to follow him, led to a steamer lying in the canal. He sought out the captain and told him to take the girl and land her at Beauharnois, and the captain promised he would to oblige the minister and refused the dollar he offered. The stranger handed it to her with the words, “I must leave you, for others are perishing,” and slipped away before she could thank him. That evening she was landed at Beauharnois and when the steamer left the wharf for the Cascades she felt more lost than ever, for she heard nothing but French, and not a word she understood. She spied a man putting bags of flour in a cart with a face that she thought was that of an Old Countryman. She went up to him and he answered her in English, or rather Scotch, for I know him well; he lives near the Meadows. She told where she wanted to go. “You’ll be ane o’ thae emigrants,” says he, “an may hae the fever.” “I’ve had it,” says Ellen, “an am well again.” “Aye, but ye may give it to ither folk.” At this a Frenchman came up to speak to the man and on seeing Ellen put his hand to his mouth and drew back. “Louis,” says the Scotchman, “tak this lassie hame wi you and give her a nicht’s lodgin.” Louis shook his head. “I’ll pay you, man,” shouted the Scotchman. “No, no,” said Louis, making a sign of horror, “me not let her in my house.” “You are a’ o’ ae kirk and suld be kind to ane anither.” Without replying, Louis left. “Weel, lassie, gin they’ll no gie you cover in this town, ye maun gae wi me,” and with that he went into the tavern at the head of the wharf and came back with some bread in his hand for her. He spread his horse blanket on the bags for her to sit on and off they started. It was a long drive in the dark, for the horse walked every step of the way, and Ellen fell asleep. On waking at the rumbling of the cart ceasing, she found they were standing in a farm-yard. The night was clear but cold, but she had not felt it, for the Scotchman had tucked his big coat around her. He told her he dare not take her to the house for fear of infecting the children. Lighting a lantern he showed her to a corner of the barn, where she lay down to sleep, while he went to unyoke his horse. On waking in the morning she stepped into the yard, where she found the Scotchman unloading his cart. “I’ve been waitin for you,” says he, “an dinna tak it unkind if I say you maun go at ance on yer way. Were my naebors to hear o’ ane wha has been sick o’ the fever bein here, my place wad be shunned.” Putting something to eat in her hand he bade her follow him, and pointed out the road she was to take for her uncle’s place, and by observing his directions had succeeded.

“An so there’s only yirsilf left?” asks my wife.

“Av our family,” says she, “but unless he’s dead since I left, there’s my cousin Gerald in the fever sheds at quarantine.”

Gerald was my sister’s only child and I had heard after her death he had gone to Maynooth to be a priest.

“Do you tell me my nephew, that rode on my knee the day I left Ireland, is in Canada? Why did he not come wid you?”

Then she explained; told us of what he had been to the sick and dying and how the day before she left he had been stricken himself. She wanted to stay with him, but he told her to hasten to her uncle and if he had a mind he might come and help him; she could do no good to stay. I jumps up. “I’ll go,” I cries, “and will bring him back wid me here safe and sound.” As I said that I caught my wife’s eye so pleading like, not to go. But I did. I got my neighbors to look after my hay and off I started next morning, bright and early, to catch the stage at the Potash. When old Mr Oliver heard my errand, he told me to go back to my family, but my mind was made up. When my own brother was adying I was in comfort. I was determined my nephew would not suffer like him and me so near. When the stage came along I jumped into a seat and before darkening I was in the city. All the talk there was about the fever, and how the poor creatures were dying by the hundred in the sheds at Point St Charles. Everybody was in mortal dread of infection and the police had orders to watch that none of the emigrants got past the wharves or out of the sheds, but some did, and they were hunted down and taken back. I kept my whisht as to my errand and listened in the bar-room of the tavern to one story after another, that made the blood run cold to my heart. After an early breakfast next day I left the tavern and walked down to where the steamer sailed for Quebec. It was a beautiful morning and I thought it the prettiest sight I had seen for a long time, the blue river sparkling in the sun and the islands and the other shore looking so fresh and green, with the blue mountains beyant. It was going to be a while before the steamer was ready, for there was a pile of freight to put on board, and I walked up a bit to look round me. In turning the corner of a shed I sees lying on the ground a young lad with a girl leaning over him. I went up to them. “What’s come over you, my boy, that you be lyin on the ground?” asks I. Never a word from either. I went close up and I sees his eyes closed and his face white as death, with his head resting on the girl’s lap. “God save us, what’s wrong?” Never a word. “Can I do anything for you?” I says, placing my hand on her shoulder. She lifted up her head that was bowed down on the young man’s, oh so slowly, and looked at me, her face white and sunk like. “No,” she whispered, “he’s adyin.” “Dyin like this in a Christian land,” says I, “I will get help.” I ran back to where the crowd was and tould a policeman. “They’ll be escaped imigrants,” says he, “and must be sent back, the villins,” and off he comes with me. I led him to the place and he flourished his big stick, shouting, “What div ye mean, coming among Christian people agin orders?” I caught his arm. “Don’t touch them; he’s dyin,” for I heard the rattle in his throat. We stood aside for a minute or so, there was a gurgle and a drawin up of the legs, and all was over. “Oh, my brother, my brother, hev you died afore me,” moaned the poor girl as she tighter clutched his body. “Come wid me,” I said, stooping over and trying to lift her, “I am Irish like yersilf, and will spind my last dollar if need be to bury your brother. Lave him, and I will take you where you will find friends.” I could not loosen her hould on the body. The policeman said he would go for the ambulance and left me. I stroked her hair, I talked to her as if she had been my own daughter; I tried to comfort her. Never a sign or a word. There was a sound of wheels and I looked and saw the ambulance. The men came and I grasped the girl to lift her off the corpse. I caught a look at her face—she was dead too. The ambulance men said that was nothing, that fever patients dropped dead every day without a sign. I looked at the poor colleen as I helped to lift her into the ambulance beside her brother’s corpse, and I knew it was not of the fever alone she had died, but of a broken heart. Och, och, to come to Ameriky to die on the quay. “Drive to the cimitry,” says I, “and I will pay all expinses,” trying to get up beside the driver. “Have you lost your sinses,” says he, “they wad not bury them in the cimitry; they go to Point St Charles, and if yer wise ye’ll tell nobody you handled faver patients and go about your business.” Wid that he cracks his whip, and rattles aff at a great rate. “Well, well,” I said to myself, “at ony rate they will be united in burial as they were in life and death,” and they rest in the field where a big stone tells more than 3000 were buried. I turned with a heavy heart to the steamer, which was ringing a warning bell to get on board and lying down on a pile of bags fell asleep. It was afternoon when I awoke and soon after we were at Three Rivers, where I went ashore and got something to eat. When we had left it a while a steamer hove in sight, coming up the river. We crowded to see her in passing. It was a sight that sunk like a stone on my heart. Her lower deck was chuck full of women and childer and men, all in rags, and with faces as sharp as hatchets from starvation, and most all of them white or yellow from the fever. She passed between us and the wind and the smell was awful. A sailor told me steamboats passed every day like her on their way from quarantine, and never a one reached Montreal without a row of corpses on her upper deck for burial and a lot of sick to be carried to Point St Charles.

It was late in the night when we tied up at Quebec and I took the first lodging-house I found. When I paid the landlord next morning, I asked him how I would get to Grosse Isle. “Ye’re jokin you are,” says he, “people lave it, they don’t go to it.” I tould him my errand. Says he, “Go home, it’s no use; your nevy is dead by this time, an if he isn’t he’ll be dead ony way. It’ll be the death of yoursel to go.” No, says I, I have come awl the way from Huntingdon to save the boy and I wunna go back widout him. Whin he see I was detarmined he told me how hard it was to get to the island; that the city people were afraid of the infection and watched everybody going and would let none come from there. He pointed to the landing-stage where the quarantine steamboat lay and I went to it. There was a sentry at the end and when I made to pass him he ordered me back. “I’m going to quarantine,” says I. “The divil ye be; shtand back; ye can’t pass widout an order.” I was pleadin wid him to let me by whin a voice behind says, “What is all this loud talk about?” I turns and sees a tall man in black, straight as a hickory. “Yer rivrince, this man wants to go to quarantine and has no permit.” “My good man,” says he to me, “you are seeking to rush into danger if not certain death. The sentry does a kindness in turning you.”

“I have a good raison for wanting to go.”

“It would need to be in risking your life and endangering the safety of the community by bringing back infection. What may be your reason?”

I saw he was a gentleman and his kind voice won me. I told him all.

“What is your nephew’s name?”

“Gerald O’Connor.”

“Has he been stricken! They did not tell me when I was last there. He has been one of our best helpers. His only hope lies in instant removal on convalescence and since you have come for that purpose, I shall see you have opportunity.”

With that he says to the sentry, “This man is my assistant today,” and putting his arm in mine he walks me on to the boat, where even the deck hands saluted him. When he walked away with the captain, I axed who he was. “Dat am Bishop Mountain,” says a Frenchman. “Bedad,” says I, “they shpoiled a fine cavalryman when they made a preacher ov him.”

The order was given to cast off and on we went, the river smooth as a millpond. When a long way off we could see rows of white tents and long wooden sheds where the sick lay on Grosse isle, and off the landing we found anchored 17 ships that had come from Ireland or Liverpool and had fever aboard. The wharf was a poor one and we had trouble getting ashore, for the steps were rotten and broken. The gentleman they called the bishop beckoned me to follow him as he walked on, speaking with the friends who came to meet him. When in front of the first shed, before going in at the door, he says to me, “Dr Russell will take you to your nephew,” and with a bow he passed into the shed. I followed the doctor to another shed and, heavens! when we went in the smell nigh knocked me down. The doctor must have seen something in my face, for he says, “Never mind, my man, you’ll soon get used to it.” We passed along between two rows of berths, everyone filled, and an odd man, here and there, trying to attend to their wants. The doctor stopped before a berth where lay a young man, with thick black hair. Seizing his arm he felt his pulse. “This is your man,” says he. I looks at the worn face and with a trimble in my voice I could not keep back, I asks, “Is he able to go away wid me?”

“He’ll go to his grave in a few hours,” says he.

“Doctor, dear, don’t say that; you can save him. I’ll pay you well, if I have to mortgage my farm to get the money.”

“There is no saving of him, poor fellow; he’s going as many like him are going,” and with that the doctor moved away.

I knelt beside my nephew and put my hand on his forehead. It was burning hot. His lips were going and he was muttering something, what I could not make out. “Gerald, won’t you spake; I’m your uncle come to take you home wid me.” Never a word. I went over to one of the men in charge and he pointed where the water was. I filled a noggin and pressed it to my nephew’s lips and wet his face. I watched by him for what seemed a long while and saw others die and heard the groans of those in pain and the screams of those that were raving, and the beseechings for water to drink. I attended to those near by as well as I could, and it was when I was coming back with a pail of water I noticed the flush had left my nephew’s face. I was bathing his forehead when he opened his eyes and stared at me. “I’m your uncle, me poor boy; you feel better?”

“May God bless you,” says he, “but what made you come to this fearful place?”

“Sure its nothing; its little to do for my own sister’s child.”

He squazed my hand and closed his eyes and I knew he was praying for me.

“Bring me a priest.”

A man that was passing told me I’d find one in the next shed. It was worse than the one I left, for it had one row over the other of berths. At the far end I saw a priest, and found he was giving the last rites to an ould man, whose white hair was matted with dirt. I waited till he was done and asked the father to come with me. I left Gerald and him alone, and the priest had no sooner said the last prayer than there was a message for him to go to another poor soul for whom there was no hope. When Gerald saw me, he said, despairin’ like, “Take me out o’ here; ye can carry me. I want to die in God’s free air.” These were his very words.

“That I will,” says I, “and you’ll be home wid me in Huntingdon afore three days.” He smiled a sorrowful smile, and said nothing. I lifted him in my arms and carried him out of the shed. I was powerful strong when I was young, and tho’ he was tall and broad-shouthered he was wasted to skin and bone. I laid him down in the shade of a tree, for the sun was hot. He didn’t look at the river or the hills beyant, but fixed his eyes on a spot that I took to be a