Canada West Part 15

Railroads carry him to a short distance of his new home, the country roads are good, and there is settlement in all parts, so that shelter is easily reached. Temporary provision is required for the family's arrival, when better may be made. If going in the winter months, it is well to have a pair of good strong sleds. As teams cost $5 a day take along your horses and do your own hauling. As they require care, write ahead to some livery barn for room. In s.h.i.+pping your horses have them loaded by the best s.h.i.+pper in your home town. For feeding on the way, put in two-by-four cleats breast high on the horses, and fix to fit the end of a stout trough which is dropped in, afterwards nailing on a top cleat. If they have been used to corn take along twenty bushels for each horse, if possible, not to feed alone along the way, but to use while breaking them in to an oat diet. You need both hay and oat straw on the cars. The new arrival may have to pay $7 a ton for hay and 40 cents per bushel for oats. Railroad construction consumes lots of both, and not half the farmers take time in the fall to put up plenty of hay. Bring all the horses you can. Five big horses can pull a twelve-inch gang through the sod, but six can do it easier, and you can use five on the harrow. You can hitch a team to a goat or scrubber, as they call them here, and lead them behind the drill, making your ground smooth and packing it lightly, as you put in the seed. If you have been intending to bring eight horses, bring twelve; if you were going to bring twelve, bring sixteen. The first two years on the new land is hard on horses, and you will need plenty. If you have any spare time or can get help, they bring in money. I know two men who cleared over $600 apiece doing outside work this last summer. They worked on the roads, in harvest and thres.h.i.+ng, and received $5 per day for man and team. One can get all the outside breaking one's team can do at $4 per acre, so horse power is the main thing.

Take a supply of meat along, also lard, canned goods, and other things for your cellar. One settler took a sugar barrel packed with canned fruit, and had not a single can broken or frozen, wrapping each in a whole newspaper and then packing in between with old rags, worn out underwear, old vests, and such goods as might otherwise be thrown away.

Remember there is no old attic or store-room to go to on the new farm.

The same settler says: "Cooked goods are also good. In the cold weather we kept and used beef that had been roasted two weeks before, and a bushel of cookies lasted well into the summer, keeping fresh in a tin box. Bring your cows and also your separator. The latter will not sell for much at the sale and is useful here, as you have no place to store quant.i.ties of milk. Bring at least your two best cows with you on the journey. We had milk all along the road and furnished the dining car cooks (we had a diner on our freight train) for favors they extended.

Then when we landed we found that milk and cream were scarce, and b.u.t.ter of the farm variety out of range.

"We packed two one-gallon jars before we moved and also some to use on the way. This lasted fresh and sweet until it was all used and saved us the trouble of churning or saving cream, hence we lived high on cream for the first few weeks. It came in handy making corn starch, as well as on our fruit and in a dozen other ways. We also had a nice big box of groceries handy and all selected for emergency. Corn starch, tapioca and similar packages are easy to handle while moving, and a big box of such things made cooking easy for the first few weeks.

"Do not sell anything that can be used in your new farming. Old belts, singletrees, doubletrees, and such goods are worth far more away out on the prairies than on the old improved farm, and they will cost more here. We even brought our best big rugs and every carpet, even having more carpets than we had rooms. Your new home may not be as warm as the old one. We laid down a carpet and put a big rug right on top of that on the floor, and then we were comfortable in our rough house. Bring all sorts of tools and wagon gears with you; you will save money by doing so, anvil, drills, old bolts, and screws, etc., come in handy. We brought pieces of hardwood for doubletrees and unexpected uses.

"Bring your stock remedies. You will be far from a veterinarian. Boracic acid comes in handy, so does a medicine cabinet for the household, with carbolic salve, liniments, etc.

"One of the first things you will need is a hayrack, and you will not have time to build one before it is needed, so take the old one or build a new one and take it with you. It can be used for crating and for part.i.tions and other purposes in loading the car. Make the sides of the rack quite close and have a solid bottom.

"Bring along your base-burner. I am writing by a hard coal fire in a round oak stove, and it makes a splendid heat. Better soft coal than you ever burned can be had at $9.50 per ton, and hard coal is $13. Wood is plentiful in the parks, chiefly dry poplar and a species of willow.

"So far from town one needs big supplies of kerosene, so bring a steel barrel that will not become leaky. You can buy oil cheaper by the barrel and it saves trouble. Also bring a good oil stove. It will do the baking and save hauling fuel in the long working season.

"One thing we highly appreciated was a small tank we had made to carry water in the cars for the horses. It was made to hold two barrels, was about three feet in diameter and four high, and had the top soldered on, with a lid just large enough to get in a pail. This was the best arrangement on the train for hauling water. After we landed we had to haul water for our house use and the tank was very useful to draw up a couple of barrels and have a big supply on hand and no slopping when hauling."

[Ill.u.s.tration: DOMINION OF CANADA AND NEWFOUNDLAND 1914]