548 
THE RURAL WEW-YORKER. 
AUS © 
given to drink, and have not hitherto done 
much in farming, but have been tr-e peddlers, 
machine agents and ‘‘jacks-of-all-trades.’ 
They, no doubt,formed resolutions when they 
came here, but a visit or two to town softens 
their resolves, and they again fall into their 
old ways. Sometimes days will Is* spent in 
drinking and gambling till their money is all 
gone, and their borrowing powers exhausted. 
Glib of tongue and with a pleasant, manner, 
they worm themselves into your confi¬ 
dence in such an easy way you cannot resist 
the request for a small loan, which unfortun¬ 
ately is never repaid. To the neighboring 
farmers they are a perfect peat, as they never 
cease borrowing this, that, or the other thing; 
and if there is anything we Dakotians bate it 
is to disoblige a neighbor. We are exceed¬ 
ingly large hearted, and if our neighbor asks 
our coat, we let hirn have our hat also. Such 
a disposition is exceedingly favorable to the 
shiftless, and is not without its humorous side 
as well. The discontented, however, are the 
larger class here; once the}' get your ear they 
are never tired of telling you their troubles 
when they were back East, till you might sup¬ 
pose they were very' badly used. But their 
bad luck, as they call it, follows them here; 
pretty soon they change their tune and wish 
they were East again—how much better they 
could then do! Complaints about the East 
are forgotten, and now Dakota eotnes in for 
them. All its drawbacks are magnified; the 
want of this thing, or too much of the other 
dissatisfies them, and ere long they get into 
such a chronic state of grumbling you begin 
to wonder where on earth would they be sat¬ 
isfied. 
It is pleasant to turn from these grum¬ 
blers and drunkards to a class who have 
been overtaken by some calamity and come 
out here to retrieve their fortune—steady- 
going. plucky fellows who make the most of 
everything, and are determined to succeed. 
Their mode of living is exceedingly frugal, 
and in that they are largely indebted to their 
wives. They tax thoir ingenuity to accom¬ 
plish much with few tools, and in every way 
possible get along with as little expense as 
possible. A neighbor of mine went to town 
last Winter with his good lady inside a large 
packing case set on two ruuners made of 
scantling. Hud their friends back in Mich¬ 
igan seen them in such a rig, they would, 
no doubt, have been horrified; but they did 
their journeys quite comfortably and saved 
the expense of a sled. Then that, class ap¬ 
pear t,o have faith, aquulitv very much want¬ 
ed now a-days; faith that their Creator will 
not, fail them in the hour of trial. Their 
tools, what, they have, are well cared for, and 
their stock is well housed, especially in Win¬ 
ter. Things prosper with them so well that 
the irnprovideutclass wonder how they get 
along so well. They ascribe their success to 
good luck, but 1, for one. firmly protest in 
season and sometimes out of it, that there 
is no such thing as good or laid luck. If 
stock or crops do well, it is the direct re¬ 
sult of care and attention: if they don’t, it 
is the result of carelessness. That is a belief 
which nothing can shake, and it would be 
well if it were more generally acted on. 
Only this last Winter, I have seen some 
striking examples of its truth. But to re¬ 
turn to the class of which I have been speak¬ 
ing:—These men are the salt, of Dakota, 
and 1 look for great results from their pains¬ 
taking and systematic labors. 
Nature is exceedingly lavish with her re¬ 
sources here, and poor fanning lives ou her 
bounties; but the time will come when these 
poor farmers will have to mend their ways, 
or, like the Indian, move further west. Every 
month sees some shiftless fellow sell out, and 
in most, cases a better man takes his place, so 
that before long we shall have a good farming 
community. Most people are going into stock 
as fast as thoir means will allow, aud the fact 
that heifer calves cannot be bought, shows 
how things are tending. Then there is the 
young man who “ buehes it.” He has either 
been jilted by his girl back East, and has come 
out. to make his fortune and go baok and have 
his revenge in marrying some one of her 
friends, or his girl is true to him, and he has 
come out to make a home for her. Living 
half Indian, half civilized, he leads a strange 
life. His shanty is very primitive, and his 
mode of living very simple: but he has a 
stout heart and great expectations. He sees 
everything through a rose colored medium, 
and has no doubt of the future. Dyspepsia 
and disbelief are unknown to him; he is poss¬ 
essed of a sound body, and ir he has no great 
soul he is at least generous-hearted He is the 
favorite at the store, as he is a large consumer 
of tobacco aud other things on which there is 
a piofit, aud he never tries to beat down. My 
sketches of character would be incomplete 
without the “ school-marm.” Here she is a 
veritable queen, ami rules her admirers with 
a despot s sway. She has no end of lovers, 
and has escort*, buggy ruins, flirtatious and 
'un ad libitum, but I may ask to what profit? 
Clarke Co., Dak. K. macalpine. 
--- 
A GLIMPSE OF FARM LIFE IN THE 
PROVINCE OF QUEBEC. 
BY ANNIE L. JACK. 
“I can always tell without a guide-board, 
when we come to Canada.” This sentence, 
I have heard over and over again from pier- 
sons coming into this province, and have been 
obliged to adroit the humiliating fact; for 
fact it is, that the difference in houses and 
their surroundings, in methods of culture and 
appearance of the people, is so pronounced 
that there is no need of being told “This is 
Canada.” or “This the United States.” It is 
true, that along the borders, influenced by 
their neighbors, there is more of thrift and 
energy, but along the St. Lawrence, and in all 
French Canadian settlements there is a con¬ 
tented apathy so long as “ fetes” abound and 
the church is there, a never-failing recreation; 
so long as there are fish in the rivers, and a 
little corn patch to boo, the happv “Baptiste” 
requires do more. “ I should llketo be a little- 
Canadian girl,” said my young daughter, and 
when asked the reason for this unusual am¬ 
bition, she replied, “ Because they have noth¬ 
ing to do but fish and dance and go to church 
—they huve lots of fun.” The statement was 
Childlike, but covered the whole situation. 
It, is an idle, desultory life, though many earn 
their living by the rod, and it is a common 
thing on the market boats to see the front of 
the deck covered with fish for the city markets 
from the fresh water lakes. The farms of these 
French Canadians were once large home¬ 
steads: but they have been divided and fe- 
dividod, giving each member of each suc¬ 
ceeding family, a lot fronting on their belov¬ 
ed river; the result is a collection of small, 
whitewashed huts, anything but agreeable 
to the eye, except that, they are us clean 
as it is pos&ble for lime and scrubbing to make 
them. The meadow and pasture fields arc 
stony and rough, the gardens and corn plot 
are worked with the “pioche” or hoe, and 
these are the chief agricultural possessions of 
the jieople . Nowhere else is ignorance such 
“ bliss.” But worst of all, this apathetic con¬ 
tentment. prevents any advancement in any 
locality where they are the majority. Al¬ 
ways polite to his neighbors, urbane and ho»- 
pitable to all, there is simply no use talking 
to the French Canadian of improved roads, or 
improved methods of farming, or of assisting 
iu the county shows. The antiquated ideas of 
the people, and their utter ignorance of even 
the elements of education, are an armor 
against which no neighbor Can prevail. Yet 
their lives are pure aud simple; quarrels are 
rare: there is no element of rowdyism in their 
composition, unless when they imbibe too 
much “ lire water," and even then they are 
more orderly than any other drunken men. 
Here and there, among these happy-go- 
lucky people, are the thrifty and hard-work¬ 
ing farmers, who have taken up laud and paid 
for it under the various magMates who owned 
lurge tracts under the old regime. To them 
there is still paid tithes— in some localities 10 
cents on every acre, aud in others, as in our 
own, it is a bushel and a quarter of wheat, 
paid to the seignoress, who is the superior of 
the Gray Nuus. The land was bought ou 
these terms. To me this seems a curious cus¬ 
tom, aud 1 always feel like rebellion when the 
Nuns’man of business presents his lit tle bill, 
for the English speaking people prefer paying 
the fitkv in cash. So particular are they in 
regard to their rights, that a house and lot 
belonging to the seignory has not been sold, 
and is falling into decay liecause the Nuus 
would reserve the right to use the water 
power, and no one would buy the property 
with the ehances of a mill being built, w hether 
it interfered with the purchaser or not. The 
English-speaking farmer is alive to all the 
modern improvements. He plants orchards 
and vineyards; he tills his land with a view 
to the rotation of crops, and prides himself on 
having good horses and good implements. 
Working early and late, during the short sea¬ 
son, he acquires a hurried manlier, in marked 
contrast to the repose of his Freuchneiglihor; 
but he keeps his fences iu repair and his road¬ 
way passable. The bishop makes the round 
of the diocese every three or four years, and 
before his visit every stone is removed, every 
hole In the road is tilled up, and the paths are 
made straight. So when the Frenchmen’s 
roads are particularly bad, we pray for the 
visitation of the bishop. 
The thrifty countryman tolerates his thrift¬ 
less, happy neighbor, and blames his supersti¬ 
tion instead of himself for his want of suc¬ 
cess; but it is a drawback to social find agri¬ 
cultural advancement. Like many other 
things, both would be lietter if their charac¬ 
teristics were more evenly divided. If the 
overworked English farmer would take a little 
more ease, aud the lazy, indolent French fish 
eiman had a little more energy, the country 
would be a gainer, and s<> would the people 
• £or Women. 
CONDUCTED BY MIS.' RAY CLARK. 
SKETCHES OF GERMAN LIFE. 
BERTHA A. ZEDI WINKLER. 
CONFIRMATION DAY, 
Palm Sunday! Palmy victory of life's 
first trials—eight toilsome, studious years! 
Shining faces, shining dresses, joyous peals of 
bells! Though leagues of the broad Atlantic 
sweep between, and changes of busy years 
loom before, they are present to the memory 
as a bright yesterday. How, at break of 
dawn, we awoke with the first pleasant sensa¬ 
tion of freedom, donned our gala suite just 
bordering in length and cut on the style of 
young womanhood, and betook ourselves in 
groups to the woods, for the scant blossoms 
and greens which nature kindly yielded in se¬ 
questered nooks. How our songs roused forest 
songsters to a chorus, and cuckoo notes were 
counted for years of destined maidenhood! 
For wdiat could be more dominant in the mind 
of budding womanhood, than the next natu¬ 
ral event—love! How, if the tantalizing bird 
enumerated more years than could be placed 
this side of 35, it was chased into silence and 
hiding by bis irate questioner, who generally 
lost herself in the depth of the forest and was 
roundly laughed at upon her return, especially 
if it happened, us was often the case, that the 
cuckoo notes emanated from the throat of a 
mischievous boy confirmer who, foreseeing 
feminine wrath, has ensconced himself in the 
topmost branch of u tree. 
The echo of the first bell, which rings an 
hour before service and is the general signal 
for preparation, endsuIso this woodland frolic. 
The village is now astir, in anticipation of 
their return. Threshold and windows are full 
of eager, gesticulating figures, as white dress¬ 
es, silver-laced cors-eyes, and eapots come 
shimmering through the green hedge-rows by 
the road. Side by side in sparkling lines, 
loaded with earth’s earliest, blossoms, they 
appear now, the special pride aud darlings of 
so many homes. Hands wave, and ribbons 
flutter from the windows in joyous salutation. 
But no voice breaks the holy music of chim¬ 
ing Sabbath bells and chanted byuins as they 
slowly wend their way to the church. There 
they decorate the chancel and pulpit, present 
to each of the three boy bell-ringers a nose¬ 
gay, and fasten in each pew a sprig of box, in 
token of the constancy they are about to pro¬ 
mise to tiie church before the entire congrega¬ 
tion. Half an hour later a stranger passing 
by, might wonder why the bells chimed so 
wondrounly every few minutes and entering, 
would see the children npun their knees around 
the ultar, aud the church's adoption of each, 
signaled by the pastor's benediction, and the 
joyous event proclaimed immediately to all 
the world by this ringing of bells. Many of 
the confirmers are deeply moved by this im¬ 
pressive ceremony, and there are few who do 
not spend the rest of the day in pensive medi¬ 
tation. 
In the afternoon the resort of all is the mag¬ 
nificent ruin of a feudal castle situated on a 
rocky eminence, from which its tower affoids 
a full view over the road, and, no doubt, facil¬ 
itated many a knightly highway robbery in 
times past. A rock-hewn foot-path leads to 
the summit, and one of the most picturesque 
sights from the road lielow is the winding up 
ot a long string of gaily-dressed individuals, 
who now lost, now appearing from the rocky 
projections, look from that immense hight 
like the legendary dwarfs of the Seven Moun¬ 
tains, or the enchanted children of the Piper 
of Hamelin, especially if the notes of the real 
musician reverberates from the rocks, aud 
fills the air with the weird pathos of voices 
from departed spirits. Truly the ruins and 
traditions of ages fill these regions with a 
dreamy glory iu which one might well think 
one’s self enchanted. 
Here the confirmees fitly congregate to take 
from these rugged bights a new view of their 
future symbolically stretched before them in 
the checkered landscapes. Youths, whose 
ambition is more Quixotic tbau practical, 
scan the distance for oceans, and rivers, and 
cities heedless of the rich fields before them 
that woo their hands of toil with sure pro 
inises of golden harvests. 
But Other and sweeter scenes are presented 
in the rustic summer-houses that are scattered 
around the old ivy-covered ruins. Here we 
find most of the girls in lover-like tete-a-tete. 
Life is opening to them its mystic glory, and 
school girl friendship is ou the wane; so they 
cement it with renewed vows of constancy in 
vague anticipation ot a [lower that threatens 
with delight. Ab, school-girl friendships, of 
all sentiments the most transient, of all attach¬ 
ments the most beautiful iu its purity of affec¬ 
tion, fain would they keep a ray of its departs 
ing sunshine to light the prosy hours of future 
toil. Heavenly lover* 1 fain would they dream 
on of things unreachable and lock their bosoms 
to every palpitating joy of earthly taint. 
Holy promises are sealed with holy kisses: 
and many shining tears, many resolute lips 
bear witness of their sincerity. But they have 
only one Palm Sunday such as this, when the 
atmosphere of sanetitv, the benediction of the 
Spirit makes renunciation and resolutions a 
joyous necessity for the soul. And not always 
have they these grand fortress bights from 
which to bid defiance to life's unromantic 
assailants. To-morrow they are down in the 
valley, face to face with care, and want, and 
temptation of the most sordid kind. The soul 
soon becomes again narrowed to its earthly 
mould, and happy she who, artcr years, can 
still feel a thrill of reverence for those un¬ 
reached ideals on castle bights. 
Is it not even so with us? Royal habita¬ 
tions do we build for the soul on God’s infinite 
bights. But they remain ever uninhabited 
til) nature’s prison bars crumble away, and 
death brings the spirit's liberty. 
HOME MEMORIES. 
However successful the mother of “Illi¬ 
nois” may have been in bringiug up her Hi 
children to orderly ways, I hope no mother 
will be induced to try her method of punish¬ 
ment for disorder—catching him by the ear, 
leading him to the coat aud hat <5ut of place, 
and thou giving him a blow that “made his 
cheek tingle for 15 minutes.” 
Never, no matter what the provocation, 
strike a child a blow on the head A Deautiful 
girl was brought by her anxious mother to 
consult a distinguished physician with regard 
to her hearing, which was steadily growing 
more impaired. After a most careful exami¬ 
nation, he could give her but little encourage¬ 
ment. She would, no doubt, become hopeless¬ 
ly deaf, iu her fresh young womanhood. 
“Has she not been accustomed to frequent 
blows on the ear iu childhood?” he asked. 
How the mother’s heart smote her as she re¬ 
called the many hasty strikes which her own 
hand had so impatiently given for most trivi¬ 
al causes. And now she had doomed her child 
to carry this heavy burden all through her 
life, shutting her out from so many sources of 
improvement and enjoyment, and darkeniug 
all her life prospects. 
Very often, when the results are not so ap¬ 
parent, great injury is still done by such a 
practice. The delicate structure of the brain 
is jarred, gatherings in the head are not un¬ 
frequent, and loss of memory also is one of the 
legitimate results of this habit. Now and then 
a child may be sturdy enough to stand it, with 
no permanent bad results, but it is not a very 
pleasant memory for most of us to have asso¬ 
ciated with a mother’s bund. 
We need only run back iu our minds to our 
childhood’s days, to recall what scenes are de¬ 
picted most cheeringly and lovingly upon the 
heart, to forecast a little how it will be with 
our children and their remembrance of us. 
“More to be desired tbau gold,” or the shrewd¬ 
ness and hard-working ability that can get 
gold, are early lessons ot love and home cour¬ 
tesy, a spirit to deny one’s self for the good of 
others. “Charity” and all the class she rep¬ 
resents, will do well to make due inquiry here 
with regard to a young man's early training, 
liefore consenting to unite the life destiny with 
him. The boy who was trained in a home 
where sharp words rang from morniDg to 
night, where work always “drove” and where 
making money was the god, is not one to make 
your life happy. True home politeness, found¬ 
ed on love, can make a cabin happier than a 
palace without these precious gifts. 
ROSELLE. 
HOW TO HELP THE NEEDY. 
There is much of well meaning talk and 
many benevolent plaus made to assist the 
poor—to carry the loaf of bread to the needy. 
This is well. It is Christ like, for He cared 
for the bodies as well as the souls of men. But 
let us look for a moment and see what else 
can be done for them. That shed ought 
to be re-shingled, and that fence ueeds repairs, 
aud other odds-aud-ends of out-door work, 
which you think “may last a little longer 
without living fixed.” Why not assist the poor 
by giving them this work to do? Even though 
you may have to show them something about 
