134 HAPPY HOLLOW FARM 



peas as a main crop, seeding as early in the 

 spring as the ground is thoroughly warmed up. 

 Always we follow small grain with peas, no 

 matter if the grain harvest is late ; for, what- 

 ever happens, we'll have a rich green crop to 

 turn under. Always we drill peas between the 

 corn-rows at the last cultivation, cutting and 

 feeding the vines with the fodder after har- 

 vest, or occasionally "topping" the corn-stalks 

 for a fodder crop and pasturing young cattle 

 on the stubble and pea-vines. The long and 

 short of it is that we plant cowpeas wherever 

 and whenever we have a vacant space on the 

 land. I'm persuaded that, barring only the 

 deep breaking and thorough cultivation, noth- 

 ing else has served so well to build up our soil 

 and our crop yields. 



In that second year our corn, too, showed 

 the effect of the previous year's pea-planting. 

 That corn was good to look upon on our one 

 big field. We had bought good seed of a well- 

 bred white dent type, planning to have this 

 thoroughly acclimated to our conditions and to 

 build it up from year to year by careful selec- 

 tion. Its spring growth promised fulfillment 

 of the seventy-five-bushel forecast given us at 

 the experiment station. Not a hill was miss- 



