Autobiographical Passages 49 



themselves up in it for a deliberate drunk. But even this 

 family which was distinguished and prayed for as "the poor" 

 kept up at least a profession of supporting themselves hon- 

 estly. They probably owned the cabin they lived in and a 

 small piece of mountain land about it. If not, I think they 

 were the only family that did not own some land and 

 till it. 



Every one made long days' work; the parson was diligent 

 and traveled far every week on his pastoral duties. He 

 worked with his own hands a Httle farm from which the 

 family living was helped out. He kept a horse and cow. He 

 entertained a good deal of company, — agents of benevolent 

 societies and traveling preachers as well as family friends, 

 parishioners and the families of neighboring ministers; but 

 he had no hired man servant and the only maid was a young 

 girl, probably a relative of his wife's who often sat at the 

 table with us and before I left was married, perhaps to an- 

 other minister. There was another pupil, a big boy who was 

 reading Greek with the parson and who paid for his tutorship 

 by helping in the farm work. On the parson's little farm we 

 had cows and swine and sheep, turkeys, geese, fowls and 

 bees. Besides the commoner farm crops, we raised flax and 

 spun it. We had an orchard and sent apples to a neighboring 

 cider mill. I remember seeing the parson grafting scions into 

 the trees. I remember also the beating a pan when the bees 

 swarmed, helping to pick the geese, helping to wash the sheep, 

 setting up the martin box, going with yarn to the weavers, 

 helping to make soap and to dip candles. 



It seems to me that while I was here, though only six 

 years old, I was under no more constraint than a man ; that 

 I went where I liked, did what I liked and, especially, that I 

 had a hand in everything that was going on in the neighbor- 

 hood. When I saw other boys going barefoot, I threw away 

 my shoes and was no more required to wear them except on 

 Sundays. Every house, every room, every barn and stable, 

 every shop, every road and highway, every field, orchard and 



