AT THE FARM PART 2

People in my uncle's district believe that it is unlucky to go farming on Fridays, so on that day we stayed in the village and helped my uncle to mend his farming tools.

On Saturday, however, we were back at work again, and Kwabena and I had cleared such a lot of ground by the time we stopped for our midday rest that my uncle said that he would buy us both new cloths before we went back to school.

It was later in the day, that the accident happened which seemed to show Saturday to be an unluckier day for farming than Friday so far as we were concerned

My girl cousin, Abla, had stayed close beside my aunt all day, giving her all the help she could. As she is only nine years old, she cloud not do the same work as Kwabena and I were doing. When she heard my uncle promising to buy cloths for us boys, she was hurt and angry that he had said nothing about buying anything for her. She therefore watched her opportunity to take a cutlass when no-one else was using it and to set to work on her own account.

The cutlass had been sharpened, and, as she slashed angrily at the weeds, she made rapid progress at first, and began to think that she would impress us all with her efforts. However, the cutlass was too heavy for her small hand, and she was not very skilful in using it. As she made one violent sweep at a stubborn clump of weeds, the blade of her cutlass hit a stone, glanced off it and cut her deeply on the shin.

Hearing her cry of fear and pain, we all rushed to investigate and were alarmed to see her bleeding profusely from the wound on her leg. My aunt, who is a sensible woman, told us all to keep calm, sent Kwabena for water from a steam, and cleaned up the injury as best she could. The cut continued to bleed, and Kwabena and I, who had learned some first aid at school, wanted to apply a tourniquet. My aunt, however said that it was not that kind of bleeding, but she would bind up the leg with a piece of calico torn from Abla's skirt, and we must try to carry her back to the village to get treatment from the dispenser.

Kwabena and I joined our four hands to make a seat for the patient. She put one arm round his neck and one arm round mine, and we carried her along, with occasional halts for rest. She had really been more frightened than hurt, and had stopped crying long before we reached the village. When we took her to the dispenser, he said that the injury was not really serious. He cleaned it with an antiseptic, which made Abla wince a bit, then put on a dressing and said that her leg would be healed in a few days.

That night, after a tearful Abla had told us the whole story, my aunt said that of course my uncle meant to buy her a cloth too, and she went to bed quite happily. As for me, I returned to town next day thinking that I should find it a peaceful change from the eventful life in a village.'