The Clockmaker

T >> Thomas Chandler Haliburton >> The Clockmaker

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"'Well,' says the Bluenose, 'perhaps they bean't great men, exactly
in that sense, but they are great men compared to us poor folks;
and they eat up all the revenue; there's nothin' left for roads and
bridges; they want to ruin the country, that's a fact.' 'Want to ruin
your granny,' says I (for it raised my dander to hear the critter
talk such nonsense); I did hear of one chap,' says I, 'that sot fire
to his own house once, up to Squantum, but the cunnin' rascal insured
it first; now how can your great folks ruin the country without
ruinin' themselves, unless they have insured the Province? Our folks
will insure all creation for half nothin', but I never heerd tell of
a country being insured agin rich men. Now if you ever go to Wall
Street to get such a policy, leave the door open behind you, that's
all; or they'll grab right hold of you, shave your head and blister
it, clap a straight jacket on you, and whip you right into a mad
house, afore you can say Jack Robinson. No, your great men are
nothin' but rich men, and I can tell you for your comfort, there's
nothin' to hinder you from bein' rich too, if you will take the same
means as they did. They were once all as poor folks as you be, or
their fathers afore them; for I know their whole breed, seed and
generation, and they wouldn't thank you to tell them that you knew
their fathers and grandfathers, I tell you. If ever you want the loan
of a hundred pounds from any of them, keep dark about that; see as
far ahead as you please, but it ain't always pleasant to have folks
see too far back. Perhaps they be a little proud or so, but that's
nateral; all folks that grow up right off, like a mushroom in one
night, are apt to think no small beer of themselves. A cabbage has
plaguy large leaves to the bottom, and spreads them out as wide as
an old woman's petticoats, to hide the ground it sprung from, and
conceal its extraction, but what's that to you? If they get too large
salaries, dock 'em down at once, but don't keep talkin' about it for
everlastinly. If you have too many sarvents, pay some on 'em off, or
when they quit your sarvice don't hire others in their room, that's
all; but you miss your mark when you keep firin' away at bankers,
lawyers, and public officers, the whole blessed time that way.

"'I went out a-gunnin' once when I was a boy, and father went along
with me to teach me. Well, the first flock of plover I seed I let
slip at 'em, and missed 'em. Says father, says he, "What a blockhead
you be, Sam, that's your own fault, they were too far off; you hadn't
ought to have fired so soon. At Bunker's hill we let the British come
right on till we seed the whites of their eyes, and then we let 'em
have it slap bang." Well, I felt kinder grigged at missin' my shot,
and I didn't over half like to be scolded too; so, says I, "Yes,
father; but recollect you had a mud bank to hide behind, where you
were proper safe, and you had a rest for your guns too; but as soon
as you seed a little more than the whites of their eyes, you run for
dear life, full split; and so I don't see much to brag on in that
arter all, so come now." "I'll teach you to talk that way, you puppy
you," said he, "of that glorious day;" and he fetched me a wipe that
I do believe if I hadn't a dodged, would have spoiled my gunnin' for
that hitch; so I gave him a wide birth arter that all day. Well, the
next time I missed, says I, "She hung fire so everlastinly, it's no
wonder;" and the next miss, says I, "The powder is no good, I vow."
Well, I missed every shot, and I had an excuse for every one on
'em--the flint was bad, or she flashed in the pan, or the shot
scaled, or something or another; and when all wouldn't do, I swore
the gun was no good at all. "Now," says father (and he edged up all
the time, to pay me off for that hit at his Bunker hill story, which
was the only shot I didn't miss), you hain't got the right reason
arter all. It was your own fault, Sam."

"'Now that's jist the case with you; you may blame Banks and Council,
and House of Assembly, and "the great men," till you are tired, but
it's all your own fault--YOU'VE NO SPIRIT AND NO ENTERPRISE, YOU WANT
INDUSTRY AND ECONOMY; USE THEM, AND YOU'LL SOON BE AS RICH AS THE
PEOPLE AT HALIFAX YOU CALL GREAT FOLKS. They didn't grow rich by
talkin', but by workin'; instead of lookin' after other folks'
business, they looked about the keenest arter their own. You are like
the machinery of one of our boats--good enough, and strong enough,
but of no airthly use till you get the steam up; you want to be set
in motion, and then you'll go ahead like anything, you may depend.
Give up politics. It's a barren field, and well watched too; when one
critter jumps a fence into a good field and gets fat, more nor twenty
are chased round and round, by a whole pack of yelpin' curs, till
they are fairly beat out, and eend by bein' half-starved, and are
at the liftin' at last. Look to your farms, your water powers, your
fisheries, and factories. In short,' says I, puttin' on my hat and
startin', 'look to yourselves, and don't look to others.'"

No. XXII

A Cure for Conceit.

"It's a most curious, unaccountable thing, but it's a fact," said
the Clockmaker, "the Bluenoses are so conceited, they think they
know everything; and yet there ain't a livin' soul in Nova Scotia
knows his own business real complete, farmer or fisherman, lawyer
or doctor, or any other folk. A farmer said to me one day, up to
Pugnose's inn at River Philip, 'Mr. Slick,' says he, 'I allot this
ain't "A BREAD COUNTRY;" I intend to sell off the house I improve,
and go to the States.' 'If it ain't a bread country,' said I, 'I
never seed one that was. There is more bread used here, made of best
superfine flour, and No. 1 Genesssee, than in any other place of the
same population in the univarse. You might as well say it ain't a
clock country, when, to my sartin knowledge, there are more clocks
than bibles in it. I guess you expect to raise your bread ready made,
don't you? Well there's only one class of our free and enlightened
citizens that can do that, and that's them that are born with silver
spoons in their mouths. It's a pity you wasn't availed of this truth,
afore you up killoch and off; take my advice and bide where you be.'

"Well, the fishermen are jist as bad. The next time you go into
the fish market at Halifax, stump some of the old hands; says you
'how many fins has a cod, at a word?' and I'll liquidate the bet
if you lose it. When I've been along-shore afore now, a-vendin'
of my clocks, and they began to raise my dander, by belittleing
the Yankees, I always brought them up by a round turn by that
requirement, 'How many fins has a cod, at a word.' Well, they never
could answer it; and then, says I, 'When you larn your own business,
I guess it will be time enough to teach other folks their'n.'

"How different it is with our men folk, if they can't get through a
question, how beautifully they can go round it, can't they? Nothin'
never stops them. I had two brothers, Josiah and Eldad, one was a
lawyer, and the other a doctor. They were a-talkin' about their
examinations one night, at a huskin' frolic, up to Governor Ball's
big stone barn at Slickville. Says Josy, 'When I was examined, the
judge axed me all about real estate; and, says he, "Josiah," says he,
"what's a fee?" "Why," says I, "Judge, it depends on the natur' of
the case. In a common one," says I, "I call six dollars a pretty
fair one; but lawyer Webster has got afore now, I've heerd tell,
one thousand dollars, and that I DO CALL a fee." Well, the judge he
larfed ready to split his sides (thinks I, old chap, you'll bust
like a steam b'iler, if you hain't got a safety valve somewhere or
another), and says he, "I vow that's superfine; I'll indorse your
certificate for you, young man; there's no fear of you, you'll pass
the inspection brand anyhow."

"'Well,' says Eldad, 'I hope I may be skinned if the same thing
didn't e'enamost happen to me at my examination. They axed me a
'nation sight of questions, some on 'em I could answer, and some on
'em no soul could, right off the reel at a word, without a little
cipherin'; at last they axed me, "How would you calculate to put a
patient into a sweat, when common modes wouldn't work no how?" "Why,"
says I, "I'd do as Dr. Comfort Payne sarved father." "And how was
that?" said they. "Why," says I, "he put him into such a sweat as I
never seed him in afore, in all my born days, since I was raised, by
sending him in his bill, and if that didn't sweat him it's a pity; it
was an ACTIVE dose you may depend." "I guess that 'ere chap has cut
his eye-teeth," said the President; "let him pass as approbated."'

"They both knowed well enough; they only made as if they didn't, to
poke a little fun at them, for the Slick family were counted in a
general way to be pretty considerable cute.

"They reckon themselves here a chalk above us Yankees, but I guess
they have a wrinkle or two to grow afore they progress ahead on us
yet. If they hain't got a full cargo of conceit here, then I never
seed a load, that's all. They have the hold chock full, deck piled up
to the pump handles, and scuppers under water. They larnt that of the
British, who are actilly so full of it, they remind me of Commodore
Trip. When he was about half-shaved he thought everybody drunk but
himself. I never liked the last war, I thought it unnateral, and
that we hadn't ought to have taken hold of it at all, and so most of
our New England folks thought; and I wasn't sorry to hear Gineral
Dearborne was beat, seein' we had no call to go into Canada. But when
the Guerriere was captivated by our old Ironsides, the Constitution,
I did feel lifted up amost as high as a stalk of Varginny corn among
Connecticut middlins; I grew two inches taller I vow, the night I
heerd that news. Brag, says I, is a good dog, but Holdfast is better.
The British navals had been a-braggin' and a-hectorin' so long, that
when they landed in our cities, they swaggered e'enamost as much as
Uncle Peleg (big Peleg as he was called), and when he walked up the
centre of one of our narrow Boston streets, he used to swing his arms
on each side of him, so that folks had to clear out of both foot
paths; he's cut, afore now, the fingers of both hands agin the shop
windows on each side of the street. Many the poor feller's crupper
bone he's smashed, with his great thick boots, a-throwin' out his
feet afore him e'enamost out of sight, when he was in full rig
a-swigglin' away at the top of his gait. Well, they cut as many
shines as Uncle Peleg. One frigate they guessed would captivate,
sink, or burn our whole navy. Says a naval one day, to the skipper of
a fishing boat that he took, says he, 'Is it true Commodore Decatur's
sword is made of an old iron hoop?' 'Well,' says the skipper, 'I'm
not quite certified as to that, seein' as I never sot eyes on it; but
I guess if he gets a chance he'll show you the temper of it some of
these days, anyhow.'

"I mind once a British man-o'-war took one of our Boston vessels, and
ordered all hands on board, and sent a party to skuttle her; well,
they skuttled the fowls and the old particular genuine rum, but they
obliviated their arrand and left her. Well, next day another frigate
(for they were as thick as toads arter a rain) comes near her, and
fires a shot for her to bring to. No answer was made, there bein' no
livin' soul on board, and another shot fired, still no answer. 'Why
what on airth is the meanin' of this,' said the Captain; 'why don't
they haul down that damn goose and gridiron?' (That's what he called
our eagle and stars on the flag.) 'Why,' says the first leftenant,
'I guess they are all dead men, that shot frightened them to death.'
'They are afeared to show their noses,' says another, 'lest they
should be shaved off by our shots.' 'They are all down below
"A-CALCULATIN'" their loss I guess,' says a third. 'I'll take my
davy,' says the Captain, 'it's some Yankee trick--a torpedo in her
bottom or some such trap; we'll let her be;' and sure enough, next
day, back she came to shore of herself. 'I'll give you a quarter of
an hour,' says the Captain of the Guerriere to his men, 'to take that
'ere Yankee frigate, the Constitution.' I guess he found his mistake
where he didn't expect it, without any great sarch for it either.
Yes (to eventuate my story), it did me good; I felt dreadful nice,
I promise you. It was as lovely as bitters of a cold mornin'. Our
folks beat 'em arter that so often, they got a little grain too much
conceit also. They got their heels too high for their boots, and
began to walk like uncle Peleg too, so that when the Chesapeake got
whipped I warn't sorry. We could spare that one, and it made our
navals look round, like a feller who gets a hoist, to see who's
a-larfin' at him. It made 'em brush the dust off, and walk on rather
sheepish. It cut their combs that's a fact. The war did us a plaguy
sight of good in more ways than one, and it did the British some good
too. It taught 'em not to carry their chins too high, for fear they
shouldn't see the gutters--a mistake that's spoiled many a bran' new
coat and trousers afore now.

"Well, these Bluenoses have caught this disease, as folks do the
Scotch fiddle, by shakin' hands along with the British. Conceit has
become here, as Doctor Rush says (you have heerd tell of him? he's
the first man of the age, and it's generally allowed our doctors take
the shine off of all the world), acclimated; it is citizenized among
'em; and the only cure is a real good quiltin'. I met a first chop
Colchester gag this summer a-goin' to the races to Halifax, and he
knowed as much about racin', I do suppose, as a Choctaw Ingian does
of a railroad. Well, he was a-praisin' of his horse, and runnin'
on like statiee. He was begot, he said, by Roncesvalles, which was
better than any horse that ever was seen, because he was once in
a duke's stable in England. It was only a man that had blood like
a lord, said he, that knew what blood in a horse was. Captain
Currycomb, an officer at Halifax, had seen his horse and praised him;
and that was enough--that stamped him--that fixed his value. It was
like the President's name to a bank note, it makes it pass current.
'Well,' says I, 'I hain't got a drop of blood in me, nothin' stronger
than molasses and water, I vow, but I guess I know a horse when I see
him for all that, and I don't think any great shakes of your beast,
anyhow. What start will you give me,' says I, 'and I will run Old
Clay agin you, for a mile lick right an eend.' 'Ten rods,' said he,
'for twenty dollars.' Well, we run, and I made Old Clay bite in his
breath and only beat him by half a neck. 'A tight scratch,' says I,
'that, and it would have sarved me right if I had been beat. I had
no business to run an old roadster so everlastin' fast, it ain't fair
on him, is it?' Says he, 'I will double the bet and start even, and
run you agin if you dare.' 'Well,' says I, 'since I won the last it
wouldn't be pretty not to give you a chance; I do suppose I oughtn't
to refuse, but I don't love to abuse my beast by knockin' him about
this way.'

"As soon as the money was staked, I said, 'Hadn't we better,' says
I, 'draw stakes? That 'ere blood horse of your'n has such uncommon
particular bottom, he'll perhaps leave me clean out of sight.' 'No
fear of that,' said he, larfin', 'but he'll beat you easy, anyhow. No
flinchin',' says he, 'I'll not let you go back of the bargain. It's
run or forfeit.' 'Well,' says I, 'friend, there is fear of it; your
horse will leave me out of sight, to a sartainty, that's a fact,
for he CAN'T KEEP UP TO ME NO TIME. I'll drop him, hull down, in tu
tu's.' If Old Clay didn't make a fool of him, it's a pity. Didn't
he gallop pretty, that's all? He walked away from him, jist as the
Chancellor Livingston steamboat passes a sloop at anchor in the north
river. Says I, 'I told you your horse would beat me clean out of
sight, but you wouldn't believe me; now,' says I, 'I will tell you
something else. That 'ere horse will help, you to lose more money to
Halifax than you are a-thinkin' on; for there ain't a beast gone down
there that won't beat him. He can't run a bit, and you may tell the
British Captain I say so. Take him home and sell him, buy a good yoke
of oxen; they are fast enough for a farmer, and give up blood horses
to them that can afford to keep stable helps to tend 'em, and leave
bettin' alone to them, as has more money nor wit, and can afford to
lose their cash, without thinkin' agin of their loss.' 'When I want
your advice,' said he, 'I will ask it,' most peskily sulky. 'You
might have got it before you axed for it,' said I, 'but not afore you
wanted it, you may depend on it. But stop,' said I, 'let's see that
all's right afore we part;' so I counts over the fifteen pounds I
won of him, note by note, as slow as anything, on purpose to rile
him; then I mounts Old Clay agin, and says I, 'Friend, you have
considerably the advantage of me this hitch, anyhow.' 'Possible!'
says he, 'how's that?' 'Why,' says I, 'I guess you'll return rather
lighter than you came, and that's more nor I can say, anyhow;' and
then I gave him a wink and a jupe of the head, as much as to say, 'do
you take?' and rode on and left him starin' and scratchin' his head
like a feller who's lost his road. If that citizen ain't a born fool,
or too far gone in the disease, depend on't, he found 'A CURE FOR
CONCEIT.'"

No. XXIII

The Blowin' Time.

The long, rambling dissertation on conceit to which I had just
listened, from the Clockmaker, forcibly reminded me of the celebrated
aphorism "gnothi seauton," know thyself, which, both from its great
antiquity and wisdom, has been by many attributed to an oracle.

With all his shrewdness to discover, and his humour to ridicule the
foibles of others, Mr. Slick was kind to the many defects of his own
character; and while prescribing "a cure for conceit," exhibited in
all he said, and all he did, the most overweening conceit himself.
He never spoke of his own countrymen, without calling them "the
most free and enlightened citizens on the face of the airth," or as
"takin' the shine off of all creation." His country he boasted to
be the "best atween the poles," "the greatest glory under heaven."
The Yankees he considered (to use his expression) as "actilly the
class-leaders in knowledge among all the Americans," and boasted that
they have not only "gone ahead of all others," but had lately arrived
at that most enviable NE PLUS ULTRA point, "goin' ahead of
themselves." In short, he entertained no doubt that Slickville was
the finest place in the greatest nation in the world, and the Slick
family the wisest family in it.

I was about calling his attention to this national trait, when I saw
him draw his reins under his foot (a mode of driving peculiar to
himself, when he wished to economize the time that would otherwise be
lost by an unnecessary delay), and taking off his hat (which, like a
peddler's pack, contained a general assortment), select from a number
of loose cigars one that appeared likely "to go," as he called it.
Having lighted it by a lucifer, and ascertained that it was "true in
draft," he resumed his reins and remarked--

"This must be an everlastin' fine country beyond all doubt, for the
folks have nothin' to do but to ride about and talk politics. In
winter, when the ground is covered with snow, what grand times they
have a-sleighin' over these here marshes with the gals, or playin'
ball on the ice, or goin' to quiltin' frolics of nice long winter
evenings, and then a-drivin' home like mad, by moonlight. Natur'
meant that season on purpose for courtin'. A little tidy scrumptious
lookin' sleigh, a real clipper of a horse, a string of bells as long
as a string of inions round his neck, and a sprig on his back,
lookin' for all the world like a bunch of apples broke off at
gatherin' time, and a sweetheart alongside, all muffled up but
her eyes and lips--the one lookin' right into you, and the other
talkin' right at you--is e'enamost enough to drive one ravin' tarin'
distracted mad with pleasure, ain't it? And then the dear critters
say the bells make such a din there's no hearin' one's self speak; so
they put their pretty little mugs close up to your face, and talk,
talk, talk, till one can't help lookin' right at them instead of
the horse, and then whap you both go capsized into a snowdrift
together, skins, cushions and all. And then to see the little
critter shake herself when she gets up, like a duck landin' from a
pond, a-chatterin' away all the time like a canary bird, and you a
haw-hawin' with pleasure, is fun alive, you may depend. In this way
Bluenose gets led on to offer himself as a lovier, afore he knows
where he bees.

"But when he gets married, he recovers his eyesight in little less
than half no time. He soon finds he's treed; his flint is fixed then,
you may depend. She larns him how vinegar is made: 'Put plenty of
sugar into the water aforehand, my dear,' says she, 'if you want to
make it real sharp.' The larf is on the other side of his mouth then.
If his sleigh gets upsot, it's no longer a funny matter, I tell you;
he catches it right and left. Her eyes don't look right up to his'n
any more, nor her little tongue ring, ring, ring, like a bell any
longer, but a great big hood covers her head, and a whappin' great
muff covers her face, and she looks like a bag of soiled clothes
a-goin' to the brook to be washed. When they get out, she don't wait
any more for him to walk lock and lock with her, but they march like
a horse and a cow to water, one in each gutter. If there ain't a
transmogrification it's a pity. The difference atween a wife and a
sweetheart is near about as great as there is between new and hard
cider: a man never tires of puttin' one to his lips, but makes plaguy
wry faces at t'other. It makes me so kinder wamblecropt when I think
on it, that I'm afeared to venture on matrimony at all. I have seen
some Bluenoses most properly bit, you may depend. You've seen a boy
a-slidin' on a most beautiful smooth bit of ice, hain't you, larfin',
and hoopin', and hallooin' like one possessed, when presently sowse
he goes in over head and ears? How he outs, fins, and flops about,
and blows like a porpoise properly frightened, don't he? and when he
gets out there he stands; all shiverin' and shakin', and the water
a squish-squashin' in his shoes, and his trousers all stickin'
slimsey-like to his legs. Well, he sneaks off home, lookin' like a
fool, and thinkin' everybody he meets is a-larfin' at him--many folks
here are like that 'ere boy, afore they have been six months married.
They'd be proper glad to get out of the scrape too, and sneak off if
they could, that's a fact. The marriage yoke is plaguy apt to gall
the neck, as the ash bow does the ox in rainy weather, unless it be
most particularly well fitted. You've seen a yoke of cattle that
warn't properly mated, they spend more strength in pullin' agin each
other, than in pullin' the load. Well that's apt to be the case with
them as choose their wives in sleighin' parties, quiltin' frolics,
and so on; instead of the dairies, looms, and cheese-houses.

"Now the Bluenoses are all a-stirrin' in winter. The young folks
drive out the gals, and talk love and all sorts of things as sweet
as doughnuts. The old folks find it near about as well to leave the
old women to home, for fear they shouldn't keep tune together; so
they drive out alone to chat about House of Assembly with their
neighbours, while the boys and hired helps do the chores. When the
Spring comes, and the fields are dry enough to be sowed, they all
have to be ploughed, 'CAUSE FALL RAINS WASH THE LANDS TOO MUCH FOR
FALL PLOUGHIN'. Well, the ploughs have to be mended and sharpened,
'CAUSE WHAT'S THE USE OF DOIN' THAT AFORE IT'S WANTED? Well, the
wheat gets in too late, and then comes rust; but whose fault is that?
WHY, THE CLIMATE TO BE SURE, FOR NOVA SCOTIA AIN'T A BREAD COUNTRY.

"When a man has to run ever so far as fast as he can clip, he has
to stop and take breath; you must do that or choke. So it is with a
horse; run him a mile, and his flanks will heave like a Blacksmith's
bellows; you must slack up the rein and give him a little wind, or
he'll fall right down with you. It stands to reason, don't it? Atwixt
spring and fall work is 'BLOWIN' TIME.' Then Courts come on, and
Grand Jury business, and Militia trainin', and Race trainin', and
what not; and a fine spell of ridin' about and doin' nothin', a real
'BLOWIN TIME.' Then comes harvest, and that is proper hard work:
mowin' and pitchin' hay, and reapin' and bindin' grain, and potato
diggin'. That's as hard as sole leather, afore it's hammered on the
lap stone; it's a'most next to anything. It takes a feller as tough
as Old Hickory (General Jackson) to stand that.

"Ohio is 'most the only country I knew of where folks are saved that
trouble; and there the freshets come jist in the nick of time for
'em, and sweep all the crops right up in a heap for 'em, and they
have nothin' to do but take it home and house it, and sometimes a man
gets more than his own crop, and finds a proper swad of it all ready
piled up, only a little wet or so; but all countries ain't like Ohio.
Well, arter harvest comes fall, and then there's a grand 'blowin'
time' till spring. Now, how the Lord the Bluenoses can complain of
their country, when it's only one third work and two-thirds 'blowin'
time,' no soul can tell.

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