The Letter of the Law

We sat around the supper table and in the big farm Kitchen. Grandfather Braithwaite at the head, Grandmother presiding over the tea at the other, and, stretching between, an army of Braithwaites: -~ Braitwaites by birth, and Braithwaites by marriage. Half an hour earlier the kitchen had been a chapel, but willing hands of Braithwaite sons and grandsons had rushed the forms to the barn, stacked harmonium and reading desk and restored the great table to its rightful position, where at had promptly been spread with an overwhelming array of home~ made ‘bread, cakes, scones ia appletarts, flanked by mountains of butter and cheese. With a mixture of the respect due to the preacher, and the unused tolerance due to a townsman and a “foreigner”, I had been installed in a smaller throne by Grandfather's side.

The talk turned to recent disputes about the observance of Sunday, and I found the comments of this family —— methodists by a long line of descent, pungent and pithy. In the midst of the talk, it dawned on the company that one of the sons was indulging in secret chuckles. 

"Do you remember Father?" he began -(the invariable opening, for these was not much the old man now here in his ninetieth year, had forgotten), “that time when, you led hay on Sunday?”

 “Led hay on - SUNDAY!" the old man replied indignantly, Then suddenly he lapsed into interminable chuckles. At last he was induced to stop and tell the story. “It was in ‘03,” he began, “nay, Tom, ‘o was the year that - - “ here followed a technical discussion which was brought to an end by Tom conceding that it was ‘03. “We had a fair lot of hay that year and planned to load it on a Monday. The weather had been good till then, but on Sunday morning it showed signs of breaking. Tom here, and I went out and looked at it, and Tom says “It’ll rain before Monday.” ‘It will ‘an all’, says I. Then Shaw, who farms alongside me, he comes up and says the same thing. "You'll have to load it today, or you’ll lose it’ says he. ‘Nay’? I says, I’ve never led hay on a Sunday yet, and never will, not if I never load it at  all!”  here he thumped the table and waited for applause, and a murmur of approval went round.

 “We were right about ‘the rain", he went on. "It set in Monday morning and went on for a week. Lose my hay? Nay we didn't lose the hay" . He chuckled again and the rest of the company, seeing my mystification nudged one another and chuckled too, till the old man deigned to explain.

 "We didn't go to bed that Sunday night. We watched the weather and  the rain held off, though it was threatening all the time. As soon as the clock struck midnight, we went out with the wagons. The girls came too and worked alongside the boys, and James brought his wagon over to lend a hand, and we led hay all night by lantern light till morning. Just as the last load had gone. ‘Shaw came by on his way to market. ‘So you led hay on Sunday after all,’ says he.  ‘Nay’ says I.  “But it was standing on Saturday night", says he. “It was that’, says I. Ay, I had him there. Couldn't make it out. But”, and he thumped the table again“ I never -have led hay on a Sunday yet, AND I NEVER WILL!"