130 Old Bays on the Farm 



LEABNING TO FLAIL 



Peas were harvested in those days with scythes 

 and were usually cut a little on the green side 

 of maturity and the straw made excellent fodder. 

 Consequently, most farmers flailed out the pea 

 crop and winter was the season for such work. 

 The operation would be conducted on the barn- 

 floor and it was quite a sight to watch two or three 

 sturdy men start in on a bed of peas and with 

 rhythmic motion of their bodies and with beat as 

 steady and regular as army drummers, pound and 

 pound away till the peas would all be loosened 

 from the pods and on the floor below the straw. 



I do not recall that the flailers had songs or 

 chanteys for such occasion, as sailors have, while 

 reeling at the capstan of a ship, but such they 

 might well have had. It would have made the 

 toil easier and assisted the toilers in keeping time. 



**P0VEKTY stick" DESCRIBED 



As a boy I considered myself quite an artist 

 with the "poverty stick,'* and I remember that I 

 attained efficiency only after I had dented my 

 head in various places. It may be explained that 

 the flail was formed of two pieces of wood — 

 hickory wood was the most favoured — the handle 

 would be, perhaps, two feet longer than the wooden 

 lash which was joined to it with a swivel, this lat- 

 ter cunningly made by hand. Unless one exer- 



