THE TIM BUXKKK PAPERS. 



small already. Your population will only grow in the 

 cities and villages.&quot; 



&quot; But who is going to have my farm when I m through 

 with it ?&quot; I asked. 



&quot;Well, father, there is Timothy Bunker Slocum, a 

 smart boy in his first pair of boots, and big enough to 

 ride a horse and go to mill already. Sally thinks she s go 

 ing to send him to college and make a minister of him, 

 but unless I m a good deal mistaken the Lord has made a 

 farmer of him from the start, and if Sally undertakes to 

 turn him off that track, she ll find she s having a sharp 

 fight with the Almighty and give it up. These things 

 run in the blood, and the Bunkers have always stuck to 

 the soil, and haven t amounted to much in any other call 

 ing. Little Tim takes to a horse as naturally as a young 

 Arab, and his voice has just the right coop for driving 

 oxen. He is your own flesh and blood, and you ought 

 not to feel very bad if a grandson takes care of the 

 Bunker mansion when you have done with it. 



&quot; As I was saying, you have had your chance to make a 

 home and build up society here. We want to take our 

 chance down South where there is plenty of room. The 

 South wants people, New England people, and brains 

 especially, more than anything else. It is almost a wil 

 derness, with only a few little clearings and scratches up 

 on its surface. Its worn-out and abandoned fields are on 

 ly worn out upon the surface. The riches of the soil are 

 hardly touched yet. The forests are magnificent, and the 

 climate probably quite as healthful as the Valley of the 

 Connecticut, when it was first settled. It seems a pity 

 that it should lie waste any longer. We want to start a 

 new Hookertown down there, and are willing to take our 

 chances of soil and climate. What is the use of conquer 

 ing Canaan unless the people go over Jordan and possess 

 the land ?&quot; 



John said this, and a good deal more in the same vein, 



