74 HOW TO MAKE A COUNTRY PLACE 



This was one of the many experiments of the amateur which 

 made the men of the soil at times give even a city greenhorn his due. 



In these winter evening meetings, a simple discussion often 

 developed into a battle royal over the method of running a silo; to 

 weight or not to weight, whether it was wise to feed horses on 

 ensilage or injurious to man to feed pigs on brewery grains, what 

 were the best paying crops, also irrigation and crop succession, what 

 kind of green soiling was the best and the correct proportions of 

 lime, muck, and nitrates to make a sand dune rival in fertility the 

 drained river bottom lands. 



To enter the realm of insect fighting, including the elm beetle 

 and gypsy moth, as well as diseases that are killing the apple, peach, 

 pear, chestnut and walnut trees, the proper scraping and tarring of 

 trees, etc., was to run the risk of prolonging the discussion until 

 morning milking time.* 



The County Fair. 



The County Fair was the climax of enjoyment, prepared for 

 and looked forward to for months. The farmer's calendar 

 in many, to him, important matters dates either forward or backward 

 from the County Fair. In it the farmer's family also have some slight 

 recreation, the wives and daughters, who feel the heavy burden of 

 house chores and farm housekeeping, the monotonous grinding routine 

 of which brings many to the verge of insanity indeed, statistics are 

 said to prove that the inmates of insane asylums include a large 

 percentage from the farm. A brain saver and a brain builder is the 

 change of thought and ambition to excel that come so largely through 

 the County Fair. All hail to it and its prizes, rewards of merit and 

 honorable mention, desperately fought for and on rare occasions won. 



Serious Symptoms of Building Mania. 



Thus in my musings, I trace the beginnings of Hillcrest Manor 

 when it comprised but potato and hay fields and wild pasture land, 

 with a single homestead crowning the hill. The building mania even 

 then throbbed in our veins and tugged at purse strings. 



The Last Stand Against the Insect World. 



The yellows began to claim their prey in the peach orchard, 

 and apple blight, assisted by the predatory coddling moth, scarred 

 fruit and limb and sapped the heart's life from many a noble tree. 

 The black knot seemed to grow again in a single night on plum 

 and quince, and our hay crop was being steadily throttled by 

 Canada thistle, white daisy and wild carrot. But emancipation was 

 dawning in the rapid growth of shrubbery, trees and vines on all 

 building sites as well as in the arboretum. That two-mile floral 



*Tanglefoot as a barrier was voted a better insect discourager than bod lime which 

 sometimes blights the tree. 



