Threshing 



" Let's go and try," said Tom ; so, thanking 

 our host and hostess, we hitched up and struck 

 the trail once more. 



Following the trail pointed out to us, we arrived 

 just as the sun was setting at a homestead near 

 a little slough, where we found Jerry and a neigh- 

 bour busy at work getting a small separator and 

 engine ready for a start on the morrow. They 

 were assisted by a young Englishman who had 

 undertaken to drive the engine. 



After looking on for a few minutes and identi- 

 fying Jerry, I asked if another team and two 

 more hands were wanted. At this Jerry, dusty 

 and with oil-blackened hands, looked up from 

 his work of tightening up the nuts of a bearing, 

 and after eyeing us and our team, asked if e 

 had any crop of our own to thresh. 



On receiving a reply in the negative, as it was 

 our first season, he said : " We could do with your 

 help, and if you had a crop to thresh, might have 

 put that against the hire." After some further 

 conversation, he agreed to put us on at five dollars 

 per day for ourselves and team, and two each if 

 he needed us for stack-threshing without the 

 team, but remarked : "I tell you straight, you 

 will have to wait for your money till I get some." 



The arrangement was, of course, not a very 

 satisfactory one from our point of view; but, as 



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