Winter Festivities 



visit to an elderly couple who were returning 

 to the Old Country after a stay with their sons. 

 The good lady was quite a blessing to the boys 

 while with them ; she cooked, washed, baked, 

 and made butter, and the old man used to do 

 some little chores around, such as riding or driving 

 for the mail, helping with the hay, bucking a 

 bit of wood, and so on, and, what he detested, 

 as most people do, carrying water in buckets. 



Few dwellers on the prairie love chores, and 

 they are apt to fall to the lot of the young or the 

 old, to those who are ambitious to be doing more, 

 as ploughing or driving a binder all day, or to 

 the older, who are apt to look back with regret 

 for the things they have done in the world. 



I think this particular couple had come out 

 to visit their people with some idea of renewing 

 their youth on the land, as they had both been 

 accustomed to farming and a country life in the 

 Old Country in their younger days, like so many 

 who during the Victorian times drifted into the 

 cities. 



A good many middle-aged or elderly folk have, 

 in fact, followed some of the younger genera- 

 tion to the West with similar ideas, and many 

 will doubtless lay their bones there; but it must 

 be recognized that this great new land is a young 

 people's country. 



193 N 



