340 WHEAT AND WOMAN 



only was horribly worried about affairs, but tortured 

 with the sight of my poor sick horse, who, in spite 

 of Dr. Creamer's strongest tonic, and boiled oats, 

 and perfect rest, and the sweet air of the prairie, 

 looked every day more like " a shadow in the grass." 

 Altogether it is quite certain that I was difficult just 

 then, and I think the English are always exacting 

 and inclined to be fussy and hysterical over trifles 

 when they first come out ; and the end of it was I 

 nearly lost my excellent caretakers, and they nearly 

 lost comfortable winter quarters, and quite a useful 

 sum of money. 



A " little rift " crept in over the subject of the 

 children's noise, but the bottom fell out of the lute 

 over the matter of the winter fuel. 



Within my limited experience my countrymen 

 are not clever woodsmen. Even Mr. Wilton's 

 brother had gone to seek poplar poles with the box 

 on the wagon, and had then brought home the 

 tops instead of the poles of the poplars, in all the 

 green glory of trimmings. Then again they are 

 as a rule over-anxious about fuel, and never by any 

 chance can find it ; nor are they quick to discrimi- 

 nate between the heat-producing property of poles 

 in different stages of qualification for fuel according 

 to the evaporation of sap. They set a huge kettle 

 of water on a stove packed with green poplar, and 

 go away to wash their hands whilst they leave the 

 frying-pan set in an open stove lit with the lightest of 

 fuel burned match- dry through the passing of a 

 prairie fire. 



One dazzling November morning Mr. Wilton 

 was shovelling the wheat into the wagon from the 

 granary, and I was shovelling back to the far corners ; 



