THE LOGGING BEE
Macdonald Bhain's visit to his brother was fruitful in another way.
After taking counsel with Yankee and Kirsty, he resolved that he would speak to his neighbors and make a "bee," to attack the brule.
He knew better than to consult either his brother or his nephew, feeling sure that their Highland pride would forbid accepting any such favor, and all the more because it seemed to be needed. But without their leave the bee was arranged, and in the beginning of the following week the house of Macdonald Dubh was thrown into a state of unparalleled confusion, and Kirsty went about in a state of dishevelment that gave token that the daily struggle with dirt had reached the acute stage. From top to bottom, inside and outside, everything that could be scrubbed was scrubbed, and then she settled about her baking, but with all caution, lest she should excite her brother's or her nephew's suspicion. It was a good thing that little baking was required, for the teams that brought the men with their axes and logging-chains for the day's work at the brule brought also their sisters and mothers with baskets of provisions. A logging bee without the sisters and mothers with their baskets would hardly be an unmixed blessing.
The first man to arrive with his team was Peter McGregor's Angus, and with him came his sister Bella. He was shortly afterward followed by other teams in rapid succession--the Rosses, the McKerachers, the Camerons, both Don and Murdie, the Rory McCuaigs, the McRaes, two or three families of them, the Frasers, and others--till some fifteen teams and forty men, and boys, who thought themselves quite men, lined up in front of the brule.
The bee was a great affair, for Macdonald Bhain was held in high regard by the people; and besides this, the misfortune that had befallen his brother, and the circumstances under which it had overtaken him, had aroused in the community a very deep sympathy for him, and people were glad of the opportunity to manifest this sympathy. And more than all, a logging bee was an event that always promised more or less excitement and social festivity.
Yankee was "boss" for the day. This position would naturally have fallen to Macdonald Bhain, but at his brother's bee, Macdonald Bhain shrank from taking the leading place.
The men with the axes went first, chopping up the half-burned logs into lengths suitable for the burning-piles, clearing away the brushwood, and cutting through the big roots of the fire-eaten stumps so that they might more easily be pulled. Then followed the teams with their logging-chains, hauling the logs to the piles, jerking out and drawing off the stumps whose huge roots stuck up high into the air, and drawing great heaps of brush-wood to aid in reducing the heavy logs to ashes. At each log-pile stood a man with a hand-spike to help the driver to get the log into position, a work requiring strength and skill, and above all, a knowledge of the ways of logs which comes only by experience. It was at this work that Macdonald Bhain shone. With his mighty strength he could hold steady one end of a log until the team could haul the other into its place.
The stump-pulling was always attended with more or less interest and excitement. Stumps, as well as logs, have their ways, and it takes a long experience to understand the ways of stumps.
In stump-hauling, young Aleck McGregor was an expert. He rarely failed to detect the weak side of a stump. He knew his team, and what was of far greater importance, his team knew him. They were partly of French-Canadian stock, not as large as Farquhar McNaughton's big, fat blacks, but "as full of spirit as a bottle of whisky," as Aleck himself would say. Their first tentative pulls at the stump were taken with caution, until their driver and themselves had taken the full measure of the strength of the enemy.
But when once Aleck had made up his mind that victory was possible, and had given them the call for the final effort, then his team put their bodies and souls into the pull, and never drew back till something came. Their driver was accustomed to boast that never yet had they failed to honor his call.
Farquhar's handsome blacks, on the other hand, were never handled after this fashion. They were slow and sure and steady, like their driver. Their great weight gave them a mighty advantage in a pull, but never, in all the solemn course of their existence, had they thrown themselves into any doubtful trial of strength. In a slow, steady haul they were to be relied upon; but they never could be got to jerk, and a jerk is an important feature in stump-hauling tactics. To-day, however, a new experience was awaiting them.
Farquhar was an old man and slow, and Yankee, while he was unwilling to hurry him, was equally unwilling that his team should not do a full day's work. He persuaded Farquhar that his presence was necessary at one of the piles, not with the hand-spike, but simply to superintend the arranging of the mass for burning. "For it ain't every man, Yankee declared, "could build a pile to burn." As for his team, Yankee persuaded the old man that Ranald was unequaled in handling horses; that last winter no driver in the camp was up to him. Reluctantly Farquhar handed his team over to Ranald, and stood for some time watching the result of the new combination.
Ranald was a born horseman. He loved horses and understood them.
Slowly he moved the blacks at their work, knowing that horses are sensitive to a new hand and voice, and that he must adapt himself to their ways, if he would bring them at last to his. Before long Farquhar was contented to go off to his pile, satisfied that his team was in good hands, and not sorry to be relieved of the necessity of hurrying his pace through the long, hot day, as would have been necessary in order to keep up with the other drivers.
