Charlie Bell, The Waif of Elm Island

  CHAPTER V.

  CHARLES RETURNS JOHN’S VISIT.

  The orphan boy, whom his mother in her dying moments committed in faithto God, had fallen into good hands. He, who through storm and tempestdirects the sea-bird to her nest amid the breakers, and hears her youngones when they cry in their lonely nest on the ocean rock, had numberedhis steps. Ben knew how to treat a boy, because he liked them, andunderstood their feelings.

  The reason John was so much attached to his brother Ben, who was somuch older, arose, not merely from his being his brother, but becauseBen not only loved him, but always made due allowance for a boy’snature and feelings. The amusements and employments of men, and boysalso, in those old times, were not so far apart as they are now; theycould fish and hunt in company, and the boy could be very useful to theman, and this brought them together, and kept their mutual sympathiesalive and fresh. He did not, therefore, because Charles had caughtthree hundred weight of fish, tell him he must be up by daylight thenext morning and catch four hundred; he knew boys better than that;knew that while Charles needed no other stimulus than his own noble,grateful heart to urge him on to exertions, yet he was aching to letJohn know what he had done. He said to him, “Well, Charles, we’llhave a chowder out of the heads of some of these biggest cod (there’snothing equal to a cod’s head for a chowder), and save a couple to fry,and take the rest over to the main land in the morning; you can go tothe house and get John to go to the store with you, and sell them, andget half money and the rest in groceries. You can stay all night withJohn, and come off the next morning.”

  Charles’s eyes flashed with delight at this, and he could hardlycontain himself till Ben was out of sight; and then he got behind abush and jumped right up and down with delight. He lost no time ingoing to tell the good news to Sally, between whom and himself therewere no secrets, but the most perfect sympathy.

  “O, mother!” he cried, “don’t you think father’s going to let me takethe fish to the store, and stay all night! _only think!_ stay allnight with John, mother!”

  Sally added (if possible) to his happiness by saying, “I’m glad of it,Charlie, for I want some errands done; and I want you to take over someeggs and butter, and get some coffee, sugar, and flax, and carry someyarn to Hannah Murch, for her to weave for me. Now you see how muchhelp you can be.”

  “Yes, mother; and what a good thing it is to have my canoe to go in,and catch fish to sell, and get things; it pays--don’t it?”

  “I guess it does pay; for, if you didn’t go, Ben would have to leavehis work and go.”

  “And I shall see Mr. Murch?”

  “Yes; John will go over there with you; and I’ll get breakfast bydaylight, so that you can make a long day of it.”

  “Mother, I like Mr. Murch; he’s such a pleasant way, and he says suchcute things, somehow you can’t help liking him; when I hear him, itseems just as if something was drawing me right to him. Don’t you likehim, mother?”

  “Like him! I love him, Charlie! After my father died, I don’t know whatmy mother would have done, if it had not been for Uncle Isaac. He usedto come over and tell her to trust in God, and encourage her; tell Samwhat to do, and plough for us, sow our grain, shear the sheep, and helpus every way.”

  “Perhaps he’ll like me, and let me call him Uncle Isaac, same as Johndoes, when he’s acquainted with me.”

  “I dare say he will.”

  “Mother, does John ever come over here alone?”

  “He never has; his folks don’t like to have him.”

  “Then I shall do to-morrow more than he’s ever done; leastways, I’lltry.”

  “I don’t know as it is hardly the thing for you to go; ’tis a goodways.”

  “It is not much farther than I go a fishing. I wish you could see howI can make my canoe _hum_, if I have a mind to; come down to the shorejust a minute, and see how quick I can pull over to the White Bull andback.”

  Sally went down. Charlie got into the canoe, took his oars, spit onhis hands, and stretched himself for a mighty effort. The canoe wentthrough the water in fine style; but, when about half way to the Bull,one of the thole-pins broke short off, Charlie went over backwards intothe bottom of the canoe, and had to paddle back with one oar.

  “Never mind, Charlie,” said she; “I can see that you make her go likeanything.”

  “I’m glad it broke now, and not when I was off in the bay,” said he, tohide his mortification, and resolved next time he undertook to show offto look well to his thole-pins. He didn’t sleep much that night. I’lllet John know, thought he, as he lay in bed anticipating the morrow,that I can do something besides make baskets; he didn’t seem to thinkmuch of that. He thought I had a great deal to learn, but I’ll let himknow I’ve learned something already. The next morning was fair, and hewas off by sunrise. When he came to the other side, John received himwith great pleasure; and as they were just at breakfast, Captain Rhinesinsisted on having Charlie sit up with them, saying that a boy who wasgrowing could eat any time, especially when he had pulled six miles.

  “Did you come in Ben’s big canoe?”

  “No, sir; the oars are so large I can hardly lift them.”

  “So I thought; but what did you come in?”

  “My own canoe, sir.”

  “Has Ben made you a canoe so quick?”

  “No, sir; I made it myself; but he showed me.”

  “Whew! Who cut the tree down?”

  “I did, sir.”

  “What do you think of that, John?”

  John and Charles went to the store, and sold the fish and other things;then John showed Charles his gun, and yoke of steers he was raising;then they yoked them up, and put them on to a light sled, that theycould haul on the bare ground, and gave Charles a ride. He also showedhim his powder-horn, and all his playthings, and a tame gray squirrel,and hens. Then they went to the shore and saw John’s gunning float; andJohn made Charles lie down in the bottom of her, and showed him howto scull. Putting the sail up, they sailed round the bay; and goinground a little point, they saw some birds; they then lay down in thefloat, and John sculled up to them, and shot two. This excited Charlievery much. As he took the dead birds in his fingers, the passion forshooting, for which he had never felt the least inclination, seemed tobe inspired by the very contact.

  “We will have them for dinner,” said John; “let us go home, so thatmother will have time to cook them.”

  This was all new to Charlie, for Ben had been too busy to gun since hecame.

  “Are they good to eat?” asked Charlie.

  “First rate; and you can sell them at the store. The feathers fetch afirst-rate price at the westward, and you can sell them at Witchcassett(Wiscasset) to the English vessels.”

  “I never knew that before. If I could shoot, I might kill some on theisland.”

  “I guess you could; there ain’t such a place for gunning along shore.”

  “I might earn something to help along.”

  “Yes, indeed! Come, let us hurry home; I’ll show you how to load andfire; and there are guns enough on the island; you can practise there;Ben will show you.”

  When they got home, Charlie fired John’s gun five or six times, andlearned to load it. “John,” said his father at the dinner-table, “whereis that little gun of yours?”

  “Up chamber.”

  “Why don’t you give that to Charles?”

  “I will, father.”

  This was a gun that Ben had cut off, in order to make it lighter, andgot Uncle Isaac to make a light stock for it, and given it to John; buthis father having given him a larger and better one since he had becomeaccustomed to gunning, he didn’t use it.

  “I’ll give you a real nice horn, Charles,” said the captain, “and youcan scrape it and put the bottom in yourself.”

  After dinner they set out for Uncle Isaac’s. They both rode on onehorse; John got into the saddle, and Charles sat behind him on thepillion that Mrs. Rhines rode on when she went with her husband; heput his ar
ms round John’s waist just as the women did when they rode.They had fun enough going over, and when they arrived found Uncle Isaacmaking cider.

  “Well, boys,” said he, “you’ve come in the nick of time; I’m just goingto lay up a cheese, and want some help to squat it.”

  “We’ll help you,” said John; “we’re just the boys for that, and we candrink the cider, too.”

  A very few of our readers may know how they made cider in those daysin the new settlements, and a good many may not even know how it ismade now. We will describe his cider mill and press. At the end of hisorchard was a large white oak tree, more than four feet through; underthis he had placed a large trough, dug out of a log; in this he putthe apples. He then took an oak log about six feet in length, and sixinches through, in the middle of which a hole was bored, and a roundstick put through for a handle. A rope was attached to the top end,which reached, and was fastened, to a large branch of the tree. Whenhe took hold of the handle, and struck the pounder down on the applesin the trough, the spring of the limb helped to lift it up, which wasthe hardest part of the work. Uncle Isaac had been pounding apples allthe forenoon, and was now about to press them. Fred Williams now camealong, whom John introduced to Charles as one of his playmates, and areal good boy. Fred blushed at this, for he felt that it had been but avery short time that he had deserved such a character.

  Between the tree and the trough was an elevated platform of plank,jointed together, and watertight; on this was a square frame of boards,about four feet across, and six inches high; he laid some long straw onthe edge of this frame, and then put in the apples; when the frame wasfull he turned the straw over the edge, and tucked it into the mass ofbruised apples; he then lifted the hoop up the width of it, put on morestraw, and piled it up again, till he had a square pile four feet high.The straw was to bind the edge, and keep the pomace from squatting outsidewise when he came to press it. This was called the cheese.

  The boys helped him lift up the hoop, tuck in the straw, and shovelin the apples, with right good will. Planks were now placed upon thecheese, and some short blocks of timber on them, when the cider beganto run from the edges through the straw, and was led by a gutter, whichran round the platform, into a half-hogshead tub.

  Uncle Isaac now sat down to rest, and eat an apple, while the boys,providing themselves with straws, began to suck the cider from thegutter as though their lives depended on their diligence. Every oncein a while you would hear a long-drawn sigh as they stopped to takebreath. As the cheese had now settled together, and become a littlefirm, Uncle Isaac prepared to press it.

  This is done nowadays with a screw, but it was not the fashion then. Hehad a white oak beam forty feet in length and ten inches square; oneend of this enormous stick was placed in a mortise cut in the tree, theother on a horse. The stick extending over the middle of the cheese,a pair of shears and a tackle were placed at the end, and Uncle Isaacand the boys hoisted up the end of the great beam, took the horse away,and let the beam come down on the cheese, not very hard at first, butgradually; this set the cider running at a great rate. As the cheesesettled, he lifted the beam and put under more blocks, and at lengthhe and the boys piled great rocks on the end of the beam, and got onthemselves, till they squat it dry.

  Nothing would do but they must stop to supper; Uncle Isaac would nothear to their going home.

  “Only think,” whispered Fred to John, “if we had succeeded in killingUncle Isaac’s orchard last spring, I shouldn’t have been sucking ciderand eating apples to-day.”

  “I’ve heard mother say,” was the reply, “that a person couldn’t injureanother without injuring himself, and I believe it.”

  John told Uncle Isaac that Charles had cut down one of the biggestpines on the island, and made a float, oars and all, made anaxe-handle, and caught three hundred weight of codfish.

  When they went home, Uncle Isaac told the boys to fill their pocketswith apples, and gave Charles a bag full and a jug of cider to carry tothe island.

  John and Charles slept together, and lay awake and talked half thenight, laying plans for the future.

  “I’ll tell you what you can do, Charles; you can make a paddle, andcut a scull-hole in your canoe, and she’ll make a first-rate gunningfloat.”

  “So she will; I never thought of that.”

  It seemed to the boys the shortest day they had ever spent; itcertainly had been a very happy one. In the morning they separated,John going half way home with Charles in his float.