134 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 



of age. I wondered at the time why the owners of 

 the hogs that I purchased, did not feed them to 

 fattening, for even if they had no corn they could 

 make more profit by holding the hogs and buying 

 corn to feed, than by selling them to me. I have 

 since discovered that thoughtless farmers some- 

 times imagine that by selling both the livestock and 

 the feed they make double money. During that 

 winter I also learned, to my loss, that mature fat 

 cattle can be made to gain very little if any on dry 

 feed, in the winter months, however carefully they 

 may be fed. I have set down the above results in 

 fattening animals to show how I received a valu- 

 able part of my education in agriculture. 



About one year after we arrived in Mount 

 Pleasant a mild form of varioloid appeared in the 

 town ; so mild that few precautions were taken to 

 check its spread. At that time physicians differed 

 widely as to the nature of the disease. Mrs. Rob- 

 erts, having been exposed to contagion at a public 

 gathering, had a mild case ; but my little daughter, 

 Mary, had a severe attack of real small-pox. 

 When the family had about recovered I took an 

 orphan boy about fourteen years of age to raise 

 and to school. Although he had been vaccinated 

 before he came to the house, we had but little faith 



