384 WHEAT AND WOMAN 



the fact that we looked in vain for our usual thunder- 

 showers, and rain was badly needed. I missed the 

 croak and criticism of my neighbour that year, and 

 I missed his kindness too. His people arrived from 

 England ; there were tents and disorder around the 

 peaceful shack, and presently a kind of miniature 

 elevator towered on its other side ; and when the 

 disorder of the process of new buildings had cleared 

 off, where peace had reigned order ruled. Not that 

 the shack had ever been set in anything but the pink 

 of neatness, and the fields of my neighbour's 

 homestead were deep ploughed and clean, but 

 capital and labour can accomplish so much more 

 in a short time than just the land and the man — 

 and very soon the little shack was the picturesque 

 old friend rather than the centre of a model farm 

 on which everything was just as my neighbour and 

 critic and friend had always grumbled that it ought 

 to be, and he was farming miles away on the far 

 side of the valley. 



It had been a glorious summer with the only 

 drawback of a lack of July showers. On August 12 

 we awoke to a steady downpour of rain which 

 ceased at midday, when the swollen clouds made 

 way for the August sun. But at eventime the 

 clouds had floated all too far away, and the sun went 

 down in royal scarlet. In Canada we make everyday 

 use of our senses — the sun is my clock, my body a 

 faithful thermometer. Before dawn it had regis- 

 tered freezing-point ; at sunrise I saw Jack Frost had 

 called and left his mark. However, my poppies 

 and sweet peas reassured me ; they seemed even 

 fresher and more lovely than before, but a line of 

 potatoes on the south of the garden and on a line 



riL. 



