Days of Toil and Tears

by Sarah Ellis

  June 24

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  I am at home even though it is the middle of the day. I had an accident at the mill. I had crawled under the machine to twist a broken thread when a mouse ran over my bare foot. (I take my shoes off to save them.) It startled me so much that I sat up sharply and hit my head hard on the machine. Next thing I knew was Auntie Janet’s face close to mine and blood on my pinafore. I knocked myself out under there and the only way they could get me out was to drag me by my feet. My head was bleeding where I cut it and my face was scraped from the floor. The doctor came and bandaged me up. Then Auntie Janet walked me home. I wasn’t very steady at walking and I vomited twice in the gutter on the way.

  I feel terrible to be such a bother. I know it is not sensible to be scared by a mouse. Mr. Haskin was mean about letting Auntie Janet off to bring me home, even though Agnes said she would mind Auntie Janet’s machine.

  My head hurts in two different ways. The pain all over comes in waves and on my face it burns all the time. But mostly I am so sleepy.

  June 25

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  I wanted to go to work today, but when I got up the world was still tipping back and forth. So Auntie made me stay home. Mungo was happy about that.

  I have a big lump on my head. Uncle calls it a goose egg. Auntie told me that on the way home yesterday I just kept asking, over and over, “Have I spoiled my pinafore?” I don’t remember that at all. The not remembering is frightening. This morning Uncle James collected my pay, which was not very much because of missing two days. Auntie Janet lost two hours for taking care of me yesterday. That made Uncle angry, but she said, “They’re not likely to be paying me if I’m not working, James.” Auntie and Uncle can disagree about something without getting one bit angry. I wonder if that is another family thing.

  Sleepy again.

  June 26

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  My head feels better, but I was still glad to stay in bed this morning. We missed church. Auntie got all the blood stains out of my pinafore.

  It is very hot. The outside is as steamy as the inside of the mill.

  Auntie and I went for a short walk this afternoon and we saw a poster about a Temperance lecture. It is on Thursday evening. The lecturer is to be Miss Beulah Young. I asked what a lecture is and Auntie says it is like a sermon, but women can do it. I do not think I want to listen to more than one sermon a week, but Auntie seemed excited about going and she would like me to go with her. Uncle James does not want to go.

  June 27

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Back to work today. There are sweet peas in bloom in a garden on Edward Street, spilling out over the fence. Uncle James picked me a stem and I put it in my buttonhole. The smell made me think of pegging out washing with Alice. Cook planted sweet peas by the back door at the Home. Alice and I often had the job of pegging out the laundry and that sweet pea smell made me remember the weight of wet sheets and the sounds of birds and laughing with Alice.

  As soon as Auntie Janet and I got up to the spinning room the noise made my head start to pound again. The sweet peas drooped in the hot, damp air and lost their smell. The first time I had to twist a broken thread, I didn’t want to go under the machine. It seemed alive. I didn’t want to be a piecer or a doffer girl. I wanted to run down the stairs and out the front door, over the bridge, up Mill Street, along the railway tracks and over the fence into the Edward Street garden where I could hide under a bush and make believe all day.

  But I am a mill girl, so I made myself go under the machine. The second time was not so hard.

  June 28

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Today’s bit from the newspaper is the story of how two train car loads of silk came through Almonte last Saturday in the middle of the night. The silk came from Japan and was going to New York City on the C.P.R. That much silk was worth $360,000. Oh how I wish I could have seen it. I had a silk hankie once, as a present at the Home. I asked Uncle James if spinning silk was like spinning wool and he said that silk is spun by worms! I thought he was having a joke, but it turns out to be true. Then we all thought of all the spinners at the mill being giant worms. Especially Mr. Haskin. A skinny worm. I will never forget when he was going to drown Smokey.

  The kittens are growing like billy-oh. They try to walk, but they keep falling over their own paws. Mrs. Campbell, who knows all about kittens, says that in three weeks they can leave their mother. I can’t wait to move Mungo from the shed to my snug.

  Oh. I just thought of something. What will Mr. Haskin do when Smokey appears back at the mill?

  The cut on my head has turned into a scab and it is very itchy.

  June 29

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  It is too hot to sleep. We sit out on the front steps in the dark and so does everybody else, up and down the road.

  June 30

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Tonight was the Temperance lecture. The town hall was very full. I saw several people from church there, and from the mill — more women than men. First of all a young man came on the stage and sang a very rousing song that went, “Speed thee on, the cause of Temperance, Raise the Temperance banner high.”

  Then Miss Beulah Young came on the stage. She is beautiful. She had on a lovely suit and she was very neat, but the best thing was her voice. She had a way of speaking that is like the Bible. She did not seem to be speaking loudly, but her voice filled the whole hall.

  The title of the lecture was “Will Your Anchor Hold?” It was all about the wickedness of drinking, how alcohol makes people poor and sick and how it makes families unhappy. Miss Beulah Young is a member of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and they think that alcohol should not be allowed at all.

  Another thing that is not like a sermon is that Miss Young told us all about herself. She told us about her childhood, how her mother died when she was very young and how she cared for her sick father and how she had a message from God that she had a mission, not in foreign lands, but right here, in taverns and saloons. She told us many sad stories about men who drank and ruined themselves and their wives and children. She asked if we would stand by and watch while a man was given poison — and yet that is just what we do when we stand by and watch as millionaires make money selling alcohol.

  She said we must band together. She said that a human being is like a ship, on a long voyage from childhood. There will be calm seas and storms, arctic winds and warm tropical breezes. If we set our sails wisely no storm can drive us off our track. The winds of change will bring us even faster toward our goal. And as we pass other ships we can hoist signals of goodwill and helpfulness. But if we set our sails foolishly, by drinking, the winds of trial and change will drive us to the rocks of despair.

  Everything she said was like that. You could see a picture of it in your mind. (Especially the picture of arctic winds. The town hall full of people was hotter than hot and we would have welcomed a bit of arctic wind.)

  Then she handed out little slips of paper. Printed on the slips was a promise never to drink alcohol. You can sign the slip and put it in the collection plate. “Promise by promise,” she said, “we can change the world.” I was happy to sign my slip and so was Auntie Janet. I never thought before that I could be part of changing the world.

  (Now that I am home I have remembered that I never wanted to drink alcohol anyway. I’ve never tasted it, but when you walk by the tavern and breathe in, it smells disgusting. So signing the promise was not really noble of me, although when I did it I felt rather noble, just for a moment.)

  The lecture ended with a song, rather like a hymn. Auntie Janet and I could not get it out of our heads and we sang it softly on the way home.

  Drops in an ocean of infinite might;

  We all belong, we all belong;

  Rays in a prism of white radiant light;

  We all belong, we all belong.

  Strands in a cord reaching down from God’s thro
ne,

  Links in a chain which now circles each zone,

  Notes in the deepest of harmonies known;

  We all belong, we all belong.

  I remembered how I felt on Jubilee day, like something bigger than myself.

  When we passed by the tavern I imagined myself going in and telling all the men about setting their sails wisely and getting them to sign the pledge. I wish I could speak like Miss Beulah Young.

  July 1887

  July 1

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Happy Dominion Day to Canada, which is twenty years old, the same age as Agnes. Something is up with Agnes. Fred, from wet finishing, seems to be finding lots of reasons to visit the spinning room. He comes up and asks if anything wants doing, but really I think he is courting Agnes. He often joins us for the dinner break. Agnes does not appear to favour him. When the other women tease her she flips her hair and says, “I’m certainly setting my sights higher than Fred Armstrong, if I’m setting my sights at all, which I am not.” Today he brought her a stick of apple blossom in a jam jar. I am sorry for Kathleen.

  July 4

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Last night just after supper we had a grand storm. When we got off work this evening the outside was so steamy and hot that it felt as though you could wring the air like laundry. Then later a huge black cloud appeared and there was thunder and lightning and the rain fell in buckets as though someone was throwing it against the windows. The house rattled with the wind. Uncle James started saying verses from the Psalms. “The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven, the lightnings lightened the world; the earth trembled and shook.” Auntie Janet said he should become a preacher. He said he would rather go on the stage.

  In the gap between the thunder and the lightning I heard your voice, Papa, counting off the seconds. Laird howling and you counting and holding me tight. That gap is magic. I always think that I might see a fairy. But I never have.

  July 5

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Somebody in the weaving room heard that an entire barn out toward Carp was blown over in the storm. The animals were rescued in time.

  The storm left everything hotter and wetter than ever, especially inside the mill. Walking home today I felt like a piece of cabbage that had been boiled for hours. We passed by two of those skipping girls, sitting on a porch, chatting and sipping and waving paper fans. They did not look like cabbage. Now that school is over I wonder how they spend their days. Every day must be like Sunday to them. I know — Commandment number ten: Thou shalt not covet any thing that is thy neighbour’s.

  July 6

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  We found out today that the commissioners will come next month. I had stored this worry away, but now it is back. At dinnertime everyone was talking about it, but nobody talked about the age question, thank goodness. I still do not know what to do.

  July 8

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Tonight in the newspaper there was something about a strike in the cotton mill at Cornwall. The mill owner lowered the workers’ wages. Uncle James explained about strikes. It is when the workers won’t work any more until the owners give them what they want. Auntie Janet said that strikes are wicked and Uncle James said that they are the only thing to do when wealthy employers treat the workers as if they were slaves. And then Auntie Janet said that Mr. Flanagan does not treat us like slaves. She said that Uncle James should remember how we had a holiday for the Jubilee and that the Almonte mill pays more than the other mills and we have a garden and everything.

  Who is right? I hate it when I don’t know what is the right thing to think. I went out to the shed to tell my worries to Mungo. He now has teeth and Smokey is getting a bit grumpy about feeding him and the other kittens. Mrs. Campbell says we must start to bring scraps for them.

  The story by Mr. Wilkie Collins is getting more and more mysterious. Why is the Countess Narona visiting the frank and simple Miss Lockwood? She is up to no good.

  July 9

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  More worries. There was more in the newspaper about the strike in Cornwall. I did not read it aloud to Auntie and Uncle. A minister who was supporting the strikers said that they should report how many underage children were working at the mill because the Ontario Factories Act says that they must not, and those children are taking the place of other people who would have to be paid more money. I don’t understand this. A grown woman could not do my job because she would be too big to crawl under to mend the broken threads. And of course children do not earn what adults earn. They are smaller and weaker. That is like saying that women should earn the same as men. But if a minister thinks this is right and ministers are clever and good, how can I disagree? None of these thoughts makes it any easier to decide if I should tell the truth when the commissioners come. And now I feel that I’m keeping a secret from Auntie and Uncle. I don’t think they know about the Ontario Factories Act. What would you do, Mama and Papa?

  July 11

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Agnes, who always seems to know things, says that the commissioners are coming the week of August 8. This is too many weeks to worry what I will do. Maybe they will not really come. Maybe the rules will change by then. Maybe I will have a revelation and a sign, like people in the Bible.

  July 13

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  A mystery. What does Uncle James want with a ball of yellow wool? Auntie Janet won’t give it to him until he tells her what it is for, but he won’t. It is a standoff. Do you think he is taking up knitting? I have given up on my socks for now. Nobody sensible wants to knit in this hot weather.

  July 16

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Payday. We bought ice cream as a treat.

  July 17

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  The lesson at church today was about the children of Israel living for forty years in the wilderness with just manna to eat. If I had to eat just one thing for forty years I would choose ice cream.

  This afternoon I went down to the river with Murdo and Kathleen. We paddled and made stick-and-leaf boats and raced them. I wish I didn’t have to go to work tomorrow. There. I have said it. I would never tell Auntie and Uncle, but Sundays are so pleasant. Time on Sundays flies like a fairy. Time at the mill creeps.

  July 19

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  I saw a poster today on the side of the bank building for a circus that is coming to Almonte. It had a picture of a beautiful lady flying through the air. It is called the Frank Robbins Circus and it says it is the “largest, grandest, and best amusement institution in all the world.” Admission is ten cents. I have that much money saved up, but how can we go when we are at work every day except Sunday and they won’t have a circus on a Sunday? The skipping girls will be free to go any time, as they have every day of the summer to call their own.

  July 21

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Today I got to visit the dye shed. Murdo took me round at dinner. To get there we had to go through the wool sorting room. Mr. Houghton is the chief wool sorter. He is an important man, but kindly. He took a fleece and showed me which parts were good for what kind of yarn. “It’s a matter of staple and fibre and feel,” he said. “See this? Feel it. Shoulder, now that will make a lovely worsted yarn. Some banker will be wearing that some day. Sides and back, likely good for woollens. Flanks, good for blankets.” Murdo says that that is the only part of mill work that can never be done by machine, because the wool sorters have to look at every fleece and decide which parts go where. “Aye,” said Mr. Houghton, “until machines can think or we all dress in furs there will always be wool sorters.”

  When we left, Murdo told me that Mr. Houghton usually says, “Until machines can think or we all go naked,” but he was being more proper with me.

  The next room was mysterious. All the walls were painted black. Murdo says this is because if the walls were any colour at all, even white, it would reflect
the light and the true colour of the cloth could not be judged.

  Then we came to the room with the huge vats of dye. They are like a witch’s cauldron for giant witches. Across the top are walkways and I imagined somebody falling in. I scared myself imagining it. Once you’ve had this kind of thought it is hard to unthink it. I told Murdo, but he just asked me if I would like to be indigo blue or cochineal red. Then he showed me the dyes, which have lovely names. Madder, cochineal, indigo, gambier, sumac, nutgall. He told me you can make dye from any part of a plant — berries, flowers and leaves — and also from insects, which is what cochineal is. I asked if madder was red and he said it was! Indigo and Gambier would make splendid names for fairies.

  July 22

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  Why are mosquitoes so fond of me? I have twenty-six bites. I might have more because I think some of the new bites are on top of the old bites. I try not to scratch. Maybe mosquitoes are bad fairies in disguise.

  Lord Montbarry, husband of the Countess Narona, has died in Venice. Turns out that Miss Lockwood was engaged to Lord Montbarry before he married the Countess. “Ah-ha,” says Uncle, “it is all coming clear.” Not to me.

  July 23

  Dear Papa and Mama,

  You will be surprised to know that today your daughter became a minister. Perhaps you did not know that girls could be ministers, but that is because you have never been to the Almonte Woollen Mill No. 1. When we all arrived this morning there was a lot of laughing and carrying on among the men, especially the men from the dye room. We didn’t know what it was about until the dinner hour. Fred Armstrong came up and said we should come down to the garden, as we were needed. He had a great grin on his face. First thing I saw when I got there was Murdo’s father in a dress! He had a veil over his head and there were flowers tucked into it. It looked so comical, his great red beard sticking out from under the veil. Then I saw Uncle James wearing a yellow wool wig! (Mystery solved!) It turns out that Mr. Stafford, the overseer of the fulling room, is going to be married, so all the hands in the mill decided to have a mock wedding.