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Five miles out we turned left to the main trail, where a single telegraph-wire plays the part of traveller's guide from South Qu'Appelle, a station on the main line of the C.P.R. to Prince Albert, a town in Saskatchewan some miles north. We had passed two farmsteads on our way, and in turning on to the telegraph-trail we noticed a substantial, neatly built farmhouse with good outbuildings, standing among trees and well-fenced land. Two miles further on two tiny shacks stood side by side about a mile to the south-west, and at a further distance of two miles we caught sight of a well-built frame shack of considerable dimensions, with a neat looking stable in the rear.
"That's Larcen's place," my brother informed us. "He makes a mint of money taking in stoppers. Hicks and I have often put up there. Twenty-five cents a meal. Porridge without milk, and he always happens to be out of butter; but it's twenty-five cents, mind you, all the same. And twenty five cents for the priveledge of sleepin' under your own rug on his floor. Oh, Larcen is great! He knows a thing or two. He is a Christian Scientist. Now we shan't see another sign of human habitation for the next eight miles."
"What then"" inquired Hilaria.
"Headlands post office. I'll run across and get the mail. It is only a mile north-east of the trail. Guess I can run across, double back, and meet you at the other end whilst your gees are makin' the trail, if you keep this dangerous pace, Klarnz."
taken from page 102
A Summer on the Canadian Prairie
Chapter: Lipton - The Prairie
The fence, which consisted of two rows of barbed wire slung on poplar poles, ran for a mile; a heap of stones at the corner poles indicated the place of our meeting. From this point of view the foreground wore quite an air of settlement. A long shack, with a solid-looking turf stable and traces of beasts and human habitation, was within a stone's throw. Beyond was a big enclosure of well-fenced land, with a neat frame shack, and a tiny one about a mile farther on. We learned from Klarnz that we were sixteen miles from Lipton, and had a further eight to travel.
taken from page 106
A Summer on the Canadian Prairie
Chapter: Lipton - The Prairie
...we struck off the Touchwood trail, and jolted towards the hut on the eminence.
In dimensions the shack was fourteen by fourteen. It boasted a three by four by five pit in the middle, which did duty for a cellar, and it lacked the worst inconvenience of limited habitudes, it was not low.
Built of poplar poles knocked into the ground on end, and carefully plastered with sand and cement, these settlers shacks' can be wonderfully warm and cosy in winter, and cool in summer; but the poles of my brother's shack were wide-set, and almost the whole of the plaster, which was of mud only, had fallen in. Daylight peered in on us from the north, south and east walls; and at the west end, not only through the gaps and chinks which defied the plaster, but from a ten inch by twelve immovably fixed window.
The roof, which was constructed of recumbent poles placed at the usual angle, and covered with blocks of turf, seemed fairly sound; but the sky gleamed through a circular space to remind us of the stove which had not arrived with us at Lipton. In one corner of the shack two collapsible, canvas-covered stretchers lay side by side; these, with the forlorn-looking hunting sketch by Basil Nightengale, were the full force of the household goods. There was a detached air of welcome about the familiar sketch, but the stretchers seemed only to accentuate the nakedness of the land.
Hilaria threatened to become hysterical, but my brother suddenly announced that he had forgotten lamp-oil and lantern chimneys, which at once inspired her to the sensible solution of a difficult situation.
taken from page 110-111
A Summer on the Canadian Prairie
Chapter: Lipton - The Prairie
On the days when Hilaria and I made acquaintance of the Hungarian woman and her babies, she too was mud-plastering the shack. But what a difference between the effect of her work and that of our own! Her walls might have graced the studio and the paintings of a Melbury Road artist, so perfectly had she achieved her task; and although the floor was guiltless of board, it was beautifully clean, and smooth enough to waltz upon. One noticed at once the tendency of the Hungarian to rely on Nature alone to aid Hungarian exertion of physical power in fixing up a home.
This particular shack was built, as was my brother's of logs and mud; but it was fully twice the size and considerably higher. The poles were very long and gig; instead of being driven into the ground, they were placed horizontally one upon the other; a wedge being sliced from either end cased the poles to fit closely together, which secured the situation, and afforded better groundwork for plastering. A wide porch added to the convenience and the beauty of this simple, neat and comfortable dwelling-house. This porch was also lofty; four maple poles driven into the earth secured the roof. The junior members of the domestic fowls, the baggage, the milk-pails and the cream-can, all found refuge within its hospitable shelter. A fence of poles kept out the cattle and pigs, and a rustic gate contrived to do its duty.
taken from page 125-126
A Summer on the Canadian Prairie
Chapter: Early Days - "The Staff of LIfe" -Hungarian settlers
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Wheat and Woman
Also by Georgina Binnie-Clark
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