The Two Farms: A moving family saga set in a Victorian farming community

by Mary E. Pearce

  ‘You can’t refuse,’ Kirren said, ‘to take the credit for saving the farm, because that would be too absurd.’

  ‘There was a time when you seemed to think I was taking too much credit for it.’

  ‘Did I say that?’

  ‘Well, not in so many words, perhaps. But you had a few sharp things to say about my motives for doing it.’

  ‘Your motives are neither here nor there. They’ve faded away into the past. It’s what you’ve done that matters to us.’

  ‘Yes, it’s what matters to me as well.’

  The new year came in cold and wet and although there was nothing surprising in this it was, as it turned out, setting the pattern for the rest of the year. Some ploughing was done in the upper fields, where the land was light and well-drained, but by the beginning of February the heavy unrelenting rain had turned the whole farm to mire. Down in the valley the Timmy Brook flooded the meadows for weeks on end. The little bridges were all submerged and when Kirren drove to town, she had to go round by Marychurch and cross the river at Lyall Bridge.

  Even in the wet weather, there was always plenty of work to be done, for the dark winter days were all too short. Horses were taken to be reshod by the blacksmith at Angle Green; plough-coulters went for sharpening; traces went to be repaired; and while the horses were out of the way the stables were given an extra good clean and then whitewashed. Every bit of harness was oiled; all tackle checked and repaired. Waggons were varnished; axles greased; every tool and implement cleaned and sharpened, as need be, or given a smart new coat of paint.

  Still the rain came teeming down, keeping the men off the land, and still Jim found things for them to do. He set them to whitewash the inside of every outbuilding on the farm; all the sheds, both new and old; the pig-sties, the hen-coops, the privvies, the barns; and ‘even the damned cart-shed!’ Nahum Smith said in disgust.

  ‘What are you complaining about?’ Willie Townsend said to him. ‘Would you sooner the master laid us off?’

  The bad weather saw them into the spring. Even March brought little relief. There were a few dry days towards the middle of the month but then, just as the first batch of lambs were due, the rain descended yet again, cold and heavy, out of the north.

  The lambing went badly from the start and although Jim took extra care, providing all the shelter he could and spreading the lambing-pens with straw, conditions were so wet and cold that many ewes, in giving birth, were too enfeebled to play their part.

  ‘That’s the trouble with sheep,’ Riddler said. ‘They give in too easy. They’ve got no spunk.’

  He and Jim and Billy Smith were out at all hours, attending the ewes in their labour, rubbing life into weak, sickly lambs, and doing their best to get them to suck. But in spite of their vigilance and care, a great many lambs were lost to them, and, in time, a number of ewes.

  ‘Ah, what’s the use!’ Riddler said, as he added yet another corpse to the heap already awaiting disposal. ‘That’s how it’s always been on this farm ‒ just when you think things are picking up, whoosh, and you get slammed down again!’

  Kirren, bringing hot food and drink to the men at work in the lambing-field, saw the heap of small dead bodies lying sodden and limp in the rain and turned away, sick at heart.

  ‘How many have you lost?’ she asked, as Jim came to take the food-basket from her.

  ‘So far, more than half,’ he said.

  His expression was bleak, reflecting her own, and he looked at her with tired eyes. But it was not the work that had tired him; it was because so much of the work had been in vain; and Kirren, who knew what his flock meant to him, was stricken anew.

  ‘So many?’

  ‘Yes, it’s bad.’

  She looked past him, up the field. A number of ewes, who had yet to lamb, were grazing in a desultory way, each with its rump to the rain and the wind. A few others, with their lambs, lay in the shelter of the hurdle pens.

  ‘What about the live lambs? Will they pull through all right?’ she asked.

  ‘I hope so, but it’s hard to tell. A lot depends on the weather. If it goes on like this ‒’ he gave a shrug ‘‒ we are bound to lose a few more, I’m afraid.’

  Riddler came stamping down the field, impatient for his dinner. He had heard Jim’s last words and was cocking an eyebrow at the sky.

  ‘It’s no good looking for a change,’ he said. ‘This rain will be with us till Kingdom Come. I can feel it in my chines.’

  It was the cold and the wet together that did so much damage in the flock. A ewe could easily stand the cold if only she had a dry resting-place and a lamb, too, could withstand the cold so long as its birth-coat had a chance to dry out. But the rain that spring showed no mercy and ewes that would not lie down on wet ground remained on their feet until exhausted. Thus, many lambs were stillborn, and others, already weak at birth, died within a matter of hours.

  Still, miraculously, there were survivors, most of them lambs from older ewes. Some of these, both the lambs and the ewes, needed special care and attention, and every available shelter had been brought into use as a nursery. There were also a few orphan lambs, kept in a separate pen in the barn, and it was Kirren who looked after these, warming cow’s milk for them, carefully diluted with water, and giving it to them from a bottle. She also tended two ewes suffering from garget, washing their inflamed udders, rubbing them gently, morning and evening, with the elder ointment Jim gave her, and, when their condition improved, persuading them to accept their lambs.

  Kirren was good with animals. Nothing was too much trouble for her. And Jim, noting her gentleness whenever she handled a sickly lamb or patiently coaxed an awkward ewe, was not only grateful for her help but deeply moved by her concern for the dumb creatures in her care. The animals themselves sensed her concern. They responded to her and trusted her.

  And with all this, Kirren still managed her other duties. The dairywork was done just the same; the chickens were fed and the eggs collected; the housework, the washing, the weekly baking, were all accomplished as usual. If the men were out at night with the flock, she would come to them with hot food and drink, and every morning, by five o’clock, she was sure to be in the kitchen, with a good fire burning on the hearth, the kettle steaming over it, and breakfast already on the go.

  ‘When do you sleep?’ Jim asked her once.

  ‘When do you?’ Kirren retorted.

  One cold dark morning when she was giving her father his breakfast Jim came into the kitchen and, partially opening the front of his jacket, showed her a new-born lamb which he was carrying inside; a lamb so incredibly small that Kirren had to peer close before she could believe it was there and make out its shape in the jacket’s folds.

  ‘Oh, how tiny!’ she exclaimed, and put out a hand gingerly, to touch its coat of tight, close curls. ‘I’ve never seen such a tiny lamb. It’s scarcely so big as my two hands.’

  ‘He’s one of twins,’ Jim said. ‘The ewe has turned her back on him ‒ she hasn’t enough milk for both ‒ and he’s only just barely alive. Can you look after him indoors? Keep him warm here by the fire?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Kirren said.

  ‘Have you got something to put him in? A basket or a box of some kind?’

  ‘Yes, I’ll find something suitable. Just leave it to me.’

  All her attention was on the lamb; she wanted to take possession of it; and Jim, opening his jacket further, eased it carefully into her hands. It was the merest morsel of life, all head and ears, its frail body nothing at all, its long legs limp and knobbly, like the legs of a rag doll. Kirren folded it into her arms and it nestled against her, wearily, its head lying against her bosom, moving against her, seeking her warmth, until, with a little sudden thrust, it buried its nose under her armpit and rested there, with a little sigh.

  ‘It must be the smallest lamb ever born,’ she said. ‘I’ve never seen such a scrap of a thing.’

  ‘He’s spoiling your pinafore,’ Jim said. ‘I haven’
t properly cleaned him up.’

  ‘Never mind. I’ll see to that. The most important thing right now is to get some warm milk into him.’

  ‘I’ll leave it to you, then.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  Riddler, at the table, now put in a word.

  ‘It’s nothing but a waste of time raising lambs by hand. A waste of time and energy.’

  ‘He always says that,’ Kirren said. ‘He said it last year, just the same.’

  ‘He’s probably right about this one,’ Jim said. ‘I doubt very much if it will survive.’

  ‘Then why have you brought him in to me?’

  ‘I wanted him to have his chance.’

  ‘Exactly,’ she said. ‘And so he shall. His little heart seems strong enough. I can feel it thumping against my hand.’

  ‘Well, we shall see,’ Jim said, and touched the lamb’s head where it lay on her breast, still with its muzzle tucked under her arm. ‘If you can manage to pull him through the first two or three days or so …’

  ‘I can but try.’

  ‘Yes, that’s right.’

  Jim turned towards the door. Kirren, frowning, called to him:

  ‘Aren’t you staying to have your breakfast?’

  ‘No, I’ve got to get back to the pens. I’ll be in again in about half an hour.’

  Riddler, sitting longer than usual over his own breakfast, watched with a mixture of interest and scorn as Kirren dealt with the new-born lamb, bedding it down in a shallow box lined with hay, and placing it to one side of the hearth, where it received the warmth of the fire but not its full heat. She then took some diluted warm milk, stirred a little sugar into it, and added two or three drops of brandy. She put the milk into a drinking-bottle and, crouching down beside the lamb, tried to insert the washleather teat between its tightly clamped little jaws.

  This proving difficult, she smeared a few drops of the milk on his lips, gently persevering with him until at last he opened his mouth and licked the milk with his small pink tongue. When she had done this a number of times she was able to persuade the lamb to receive the teat into his mouth. There was a faint snuffling noise as he blew through nostrils not quite clean; a gulping sound as his small throat worked; and, in a moment, quietness, meaning that he had learnt to suck. And at the end of the small wrinkled body lying curled in the box, a wispy tail waggled and twitched.

  Riddler had finished his breakfast now. He rose from the table and pushed in his chair.

  ‘It’s high time you had a lamb of your own,’ he said in a deep-throated growl, and pushed past her to get at his coat which was hanging up by the fire-place.

  Kirren was silent, feeding the lamb, and he stood looking down at her broodingly.

  ‘Did you hear what I said?’

  ‘Yes, I heard.’

  ‘Then why in God’s name don’t you answer me?’

  ‘Because I don’t know what answer to make.’

  ‘I just don’t understand you at all. You’re a woman, aren’t you? You’re not made of stone? And you’ve been married a good eighteen months ‒’

  ‘Married at your instigation, remember, as a business arrangement, nothing more. That’s what you said to us at the time, and that’s what we agreed, Jim and me.’

  ‘But damn it, girl, you must have known that I had something more in mind?’

  He humped himself into his coat and fastened the buttons up to the neck. The lamb had had enough for its first drink and Kirren now rose to her feet, the half-empty bottle in her hands.

  ‘Yes, I knew what was in your mind, but it wasn’t in my mind, nor in Jim’s.’

  ‘More fool you, then!’ Riddler said. ‘And more fool him too!’

  ‘More fool all three of us, it would seem.’

  ‘I thought I’d done pretty well by you, finding you a husband like Jim, a well-set-up chap, healthy and strong, with something more about him than most.’

  Kirren became silent again, turning away from him to the hearth, where she placed the lamb’s bottle on a ledge to keep warm. Then she removed her soiled pinafore, laid it over the back of a chair, and went to take a clean one from the drawer of the dresser. She put the loop over her neck and tied the strings behind her back. She smoothed the pinafore down in front.

  ‘Hell and damnation!’ Riddler exclaimed. ‘Jim is a handsome enough chap, I’d have thought! Not that looks account for much, but you women set some store by them, especially when it’s a case of a chap with clean blue eyes and light fairish hair. Of course, he’s got his faults, I allow. He’s a pig-headed devil for a start ‒’

  ‘Hark who’s talking!’ Kirren said.

  ‘‒ and inclined to think he’s always right.’

  ‘So he is, more often than not.’

  ‘Seems you think pretty well of him, then?’

  ‘I have good reason to think well of him and so have you. Without him we should have lost the farm.’

  ‘I’m not talking about the farm.’

  ‘I know quite well what you’re talking about.’

  ‘He thinks well of you, anyway. That much is obvious, I should have thought. You can tell by the way he talks to you, the way he treats you so civilly, the way he helps you at every turn.’

  ‘Jim treats me the way he does because he happens to be that kind of man.’

  ‘A gentleman?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose.’

  ‘I reckon there’s more to it than that.’

  ‘Do you indeed?’

  ‘Yes, I do. He feels something for you, Kirrie, I’m sure. Why, the way he looks at you sometimes ‒’

  ‘And what way is that?’ Kirren asked, in a tone crisp-edged with disbelief.

  ‘It’s the way any man will look at a girl, so long as she’s comely enough and young, with a face and figure worth looking at. And with Jim being the man he is ‒’

  ‘You are making all this up. I have never seen Jim looking at me in the way you are talking about.’

  ‘You wouldn’t, would you?’ Riddler said. ‘He would take good care of that, just in case of offending you and making you think he’d gone back on his word. He knows your views on marriage and men. You made all that pretty clear from the start. And a young man of Jim’s sort needs some sign from a girl, first, before he’ll come out in the open with her. Remember, he’s been hurt once before and he wouldn’t want to risk that again, so it’s up to you to encourage him and let him know you’ve changed your mind.’

  ‘I didn’t say I’d changed my mind.’

  ‘Then what the hell did you say?’ Riddler exclaimed, his patience giving way to wrath.

  ‘Nothing that’s worth saying again.’

  ‘I wish I could get you to talk sense sometimes.’

  ‘And I wish you would leave me alone!’

  Abruptly Kirren moved to the table and began clearing the used breakfast things. Riddler, swearing under his breath, took his hat from the fire-place and jammed it down hard on his head.

  ‘Stupid cat of a girl!’ he muttered, and went out, slamming the door.

  Within a few hours of being brought indoors the lamb, thoroughly warmed through, had left his bed beside the fire and was exploring the kitchen, tottering over the flagged floor on legs that were apt to crumple beneath him. In a matter of three or four days, although his legs might still let him down, he was able to right himself without help, and would follow Kirren constantly while she went about her chores. Fed every three hours or so, both night and day, he was slowly picking up strength, beginning to take a lively interest in everything that happened around him.

  ‘He’s doing nicely,’ Jim said. ‘You’ve pulled him through the most difficult time. He’s got it in him to thrive from now on.’

  ‘Do you think he will?’

  ‘I’m sure of it.’

  The early lambing came to an end, having lasted fifteen days. Of the seventy-six lambs born, only forty-two had survived, and, with the weather still bad, a few more of these might still be lost. Of the sixty ewe
s that had lambed, five had died, and another eight or nine would be useless for future breeding.

  Anyway, it was over now, until the second lambing began. Life for Jim would be less of a strain during the next three or four weeks and he would be able to sleep in his bed instead of snatching an hour at a time in a chair by the kitchen fire.

  On the morning that the last two ewes had lambed he came into the kitchen at ten o’clock when Riddler had just ridden off to town and Kirren was about to begin her baking. As she moved between cupboard and table, setting out the things she would need, the hand-reared lamb, now eight days old, followed her faithfully to and fro, still uncertain on his legs but showing a bright, adventurous spirit.

  When Jim entered the room the lamb scampered towards him, put up his chin to be fondled and scratched, and then, with a little flouncing movement, went lolloping over to his bed. It was occupied by a tortoiseshell cat expecting kittens who had that morning chosen it as a suitable place for her lying-in. As the playful lamb nuzzled her body she put out a slow, lazy paw, pushing against his woolly face with just a slight suggestion of claws, sharp enough to make him draw back. He veered away from her to the hearth and peered into a shallow basket wherein crouched a bedraggled hen, surrounded by a number of chicks, all of which Kirren had rescued from a flooded ditch in the home pasture.

  ‘It seems there’s almost as much livestock indoors as there is out,’ Jim remarked. He stood looking down at the lamb. ‘I’ve come to take this chap off your hands. I think I’ve got a mother for him. It’s the ewe I’ve just left ‒ her lamb was stillborn.’

  ‘Can I come and watch?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  They went together through the rain, across the yard to the open barn, Kirren with a shawl over her head, the lamb tucked under her arm. Inside the barn, as they crossed the threshold, there was a gentle surge of warmth; a warmth that was all the more grateful because of the greyness of the day and the steadily falling rain outside. The warm barn smelt of the penned sheep and lambs; of the straw trampled under their feet; of the sweet dry hay in the hay-bags that Jim had tied all along the pens.