folk baked and were
happy, content if now and then the housewife opened the one pane of
glass which hung on a hinge, or the slit in the sash, to let in the cold
air. As a rule, the occasional opening of the outer door to admit some
one sufficed, for out rushed the hot blast, and in came the dry, frosty
air to brace to their tasks the cheerful story-teller and singer.

In summer the little fields were broken with wooden ploughs, followed by
the limb of a tree for harrow, and the sickle, the scythe, and the flail
to do their office in due course; and if the man were well-to-do, he
swung the cradle in his rye and wheat, rejoicing in the sweep of the
knife and the fulness of the swathe. Then, too, there was the driving
of the rivers, when the young men ran the logs from the backwoods to the
great mills near and far: red-shirted, sashed, knee-booted, with rings
in their ears, and wide hats on their heads, and a song in their mouths,
breaking a jamb, or steering a crib, or raft, down the rapids. And the
voyageur also, who brought furs out of the North down the great lakes,
came home again to Pontiac, singing in his patois:

"Nous avons passe le bois,
Nous somm's a la rive!"

Or, as he went forth:

"Le dieu du jour s'avance;
Amis, les vents sont doux;
Berces par l'esperance,
Partons, embarquons-noun.
A-a-a-a-a-a-a-a!"

And, as we know, it was summer when Valmond came to Pontiac. The
river-drivers were just beginning to return, and by and by the flax
swingeing would begin in the little secluded valley by the river; and
one would see, near and far, the bright sickle flashing across the gold
and green area; and all the pleasant furniture of summer set forth in
pride, by the Mother of the House whom we call Nature.

Valmond was alive to it all, almost too alive, for at first the
flamboyancy of his spirit touched him off with melodrama. Yet, on the
whole, he seemed at first more natural than involved or obscure. His
love for children was real, his politeness to women spontaneous. He was
seen to carry the load of old Madame Degardy up the hill, and place it
at her own door. He also had offered her a pinch of snuff, which she
acknowledged by gravely offering a pinch of her own from a dirty twist
of brown paper.

One day he sprang over a fence, took from the hands of coquettish Elise
Malboir an axe, and split the knot which she in vain had tried to break.