Beautiful Joe by Marshall Saunders (most important books of all time txt) 📕

Miss Laura.

 

"Yes, my child. The older I grow, the more I find out, and the better

care I take of my stock. My grandfather would open his eyes in

amazement; and ask me if I was an old women petting her cats, if he were

alive, and could know the care I give my sheep. He used to let his flock

run till the fields were covered with snow, and bite as close as they

liked, till there wasn't a scrap of feed left. Then he would give them

an open shed to run under, and throw down their hay outside. Grain they

scarcely knew the taste of. That they would fall off in flesh, and half

of them lose their lambs in the spring, was an expected thing. He would

say I had them kennelled, if he could see my big, closed sheds, with the

sunny windows that my flock spend the winter in. I even house them

during the bad fall storms. They can run out again. Indeed, I like to

get them in, and have a snack of dry food, to break them in to it. They

are in and out of those sheds all winter. You must go in, Laura, and see

the self-feeding racks. On bright, winter days they get a run in the

cornfields. Cold doesn't hurt sheep. It's the heavy rain that soaks

their fleeces.

 

"With my way I seldom lose a sheep, and they're the most profitable

stock I have. If I could not keep them, I think I'd give up farming.

Last year my lambs netted me eight dollars each. The fleeces of the ewes

average eight pounds, and sell for two dollars each. That's something to

brag of in these days, when so many are giving up the sheep industry."

 

"How many sheep have you, uncle?" asked Miss Laura.

 

"Only fifty, now. Twenty-five here and twenty-five down below in the

orchard. I've been selling a good many this spring."

 

"These sheep are larger than those in the orchard, aren't they?" said

Miss Laura.

 

"Yes; I keep those few Southdowns for their fine quality. I don't make

as much on them as I do on these Shropshires. For an all-around sheep I

like the Shropshire. It's good for mutton, for wool, and for rearing

lambs. There's a great demand for mutton nowadays, all through our

eastern cities. People want more and more of it. And it has to be

tender, and juicy, and finely flavored, so a person has to be particular

about the feed the sheep get."

 

"Don't you hate to have these creatures killed, that you have raised and

tended so carefully?" said Miss Laura with a little shudder.

 

"I do," said her uncle; "but never an animal goes off my place that I

don't know just how it's going to be put to death. None of your sending

sheep to market with their legs tied together, and jammed in a cart, and

sweating and suffering for me. They've got to go standing comfortably on

their legs, or go not at all. And I'm going to know the butcher that

kills my animals, that have been petted like children. I said to

Davidson, over there in Hoytville, 'If I thought you would herd my sheep

and lambs and calves together, and take them one by one in sight of the

rest, and stick your knife into them, or stun them, and have the others

lowing, and bleating, and crying in their misery, this is the last

consignment you would ever get from me.'

 

"He said, 'Wood, I don't like my business, but on the word of an honest

man, my butchering is done as well as it can be. Come and see for

yourself.'

 

"He took me to his slaughter-house, and though I didn't stay long, I saw

enough to convince me that he spoke the truth. He has different pens and

sheds, and the killing is done as quietly as possible; the animals are

taken in one by one, and though the others suspect what is going on,

they can't see it."

 

"These sheep are a long way from the house," said Miss Laura; "don't the

dogs that you were telling me about attack them?"

 

"No; for since I had that brush with Windham's dog, I've trained them to

go and come with the cows. It's a queer thing, but cows that will run

from a dog when they are alone will fight him if he meddles with their

calves or the sheep. There's not a dog around that would dare to come

into this pasture, for he knows the cows would be after him with lowered

horns, and a business look in their eyes. The sheep in the orchard are

safe enough, for they're near the house, and if a strange dog came

around, Joe would settle him, wouldn't you, Joe?" and Mr. Wood looked

behind the log at me.

 

I got up and put my head on his arm, and he went on: "By and by, the

Southdowns will be changed up here, and the Shropshires will go down to

the orchard. I like to keep one flock under my fruit trees. You know

there is an old proverb, 'The sheep has a golden hoof.' They save me the

trouble of ploughing. I haven't ploughed my orchard for ten years, and

don't expect to plough it for ten years more. Then your Aunt Hattie's

hens are so obliging that they keep me from the worry of finding ticks

at shearing time. All the year round, I let them run among the sheep,

and they nab every tick they see."

 

"How closely sheep bite," exclaimed Miss Laura, pointing to one that was

nibbling almost at his master's feet.

 

"Very close, and they eat a good many things that cows don't

relish--bitter weeds, and briars, and shrubs, and the young ferns that

come up in the spring."

 

"I wish I could get hold of one of those dear little lambs," said Miss

Laura. "See that sweet little blackie back in the alders. Could you not

coax him up?"

 

"He wouldn't come here," said her uncle, kindly; "but I'll try and get

him for you."

 

He rose, and after several efforts succeeded in capturing the

black-faced creature, and bringing him up to the log. He was very shy of

Miss Laura, but Mr. Wood held him firmly, and let her stroke his head as

much as she liked. "You call him little," said Mr. Wood; "if you put

your arm around him, you'll find he's a pretty substantial lamb. He was

born in March. This is the last of July; he'll be shorn the middle of

next month, and think he's quite grown up. Poor little animal! he had

quite a struggle for life. The sheep were turned out to pasture in

April. They can't bear confinement as well as the cows, and as they bite

closer they can be turned out earlier, and get on well by having good

rations of corn in addition to the grass, which is thin and poor so

early in the spring. This young creature was running by his mother's

side, rather a weak-legged, poor specimen of a lamb. Every night the

flock was put under shelter, for the ground was cold, and though the

sheep might not suffer from lying out-doors, the lambs would get

chilled. One night this fellow's mother got astray, and as Ben neglected

to make the count, she wasn't missed. I'm always anxious about my lambs

in the spring, and often get up in the night to look after them. That

night I went out about two o'clock. I took it into my head, for some

reason or other, to count them. I found a sheep and lamb missing, took

my lantern and Bruno, who was some good at tracking sheep, and started

out. Bruno barked and I called, and the foolish creature came to me, the

little lamb staggering after her. I wrapped the lamb in my coat, took it

to the house, made a fire, and heated some milk. Your Aunt Hattie heard

me and got up. She won't let me give brandy even to a dumb beast, so I

put some ground ginger, which is just as good, in the milk, and forced

it down the lamb's throat. Then we wrapped an old blanket round him, and

put him near the stove, and the next evening he was ready to go back to

his mother. I petted him all through April, and gave him

extras--different kinds of meal, till I found what suited him best; now

he does me credit."

 

"Dear little lamb," said Miss Laura, patting him. "How can you tell him

from the others, uncle?"

 

"I know all their faces, Laura. A flock of sheep is just like a crowd of

people. They all have different expressions, and have different

dispositions."

 

"They all look alike to me," said Miss Laura.

 

"I dare say. You are not accustomed to them. Do you know how to tell a

sheep's age?"

 

"No, uncle."

 

"Here, open your mouth, Cosset," he said to the lamb that he still held.

"At one year they have two teeth in the centre of the jaw. They get two

teeth more every year up to five years. Then we say they have 'a full

mouth.' After that you can't tell their age exactly by the teeth. Now,

run back to your mother," and he let the lamb go.

 

"Do they always know their own mothers?" asked Miss Laura.

 

"Usually. Sometimes a ewe will not own her lamb. In that case we tie

them up in a separate stall till she recognizes it. Do you see that

sheep over there by the blueberry bushes--the one with the very pointed

ears?"

 

"Yes, uncle," said Miss Laura.

 

"That lamb by her side is not her own. Hers died and we took its fleece

and wrapped it around a twin lamb that we took from another ewe, and

gave to her. She soon adopted it. Now, come this way, and I'll show you

our movable feeding troughs."

 

He got up from the log, and Miss Laura followed him to the fence. "These

big troughs are for the sheep," sad Mr. Wood; "and those shallow ones in

the enclosure are for the lambs. See, there is just room enough for them

to get under the fence. You should see the small creatures rush to them

whenever we appear with their oats, and wheat, or bran, or whatever we

are going to give them. If they are going to the butcher, they get corn

meal and oil meal. Whatever it is, they eat it up clean. I don't believe

in cramming animals. I feed them as much as is good for them, and not

any more. Now, you go sit down over there behind those bushes with Joe,

and I'll attend to business."

 

Miss Laura found a shady place, and I curled myself up beside her. We

sat there a long time, but we did not get tired, for it was amusing to

watch the sheep and lambs. After a while, Mr. Wood came and sat down

beside us. He talked some more about sheep-raising; then he said,

 

"You may stay here longer if you like, but I must get down to the house.

The work must be done, if the weather is hot."

 

"What are you going to do now?" asked Miss Laura, jumping up.

 

"Oh! more sheep business. I've set out some young trees in the orchard,

and unless I get chicken wire around them, my sheep will be barking them

for me."

 

"I've seen them," said Miss Laura, "standing up on their hind legs and

nibbling at the trees, taking off every shoot they can reach."

 

"They don't hurt the old trees," said Mr. Wood; "but the young ones have

to be protected. It pays me to take care of my fruit trees, for I get a

splendid crop from them, thanks to the sheep."

 

"Good-bye, little lambs and dear old sheep," said Miss Laura, as her

uncle opened the gate for her to leave the pasture. "I'll come and see

you again some time. Now, you had better go down to the brook in the

dingle and have a drink. You look hot in your warm coats."

 

"You've mastered one detail of sheep-keeping," said Mr. Wood, as he

slowly walked along beside his niece. "To raise healthy sheep one must

have pure water where they can get to it whenever they like. Give them

good water, good food, and a variety of it, good quarters--cool in

summer, comfortable in winter, and keep them quiet, and you'll make them

happy and make money on them."

 

"I think I'd like sheep-raising," said Miss Laura; "won't you have me

for your flock mistress, uncle?"

 

He laughed, and said he thought not, for she would cry every time any of

her charge were sent to the butcher.

 

After this Miss Laura and I often went up to