HAPPY HOLLOW FARM 149 



her that would have value some time. It has 

 been a continual surprise to us to find what 

 good stuff is smothered away in those thickets. 

 When the farm came to us it had been all but 

 denuded of mature and serviceable timber. 

 The sawmill men had taken their pick of it in 

 the earlier days, and the tenants had butchered 

 the rest ruthlessly; about all we had left was 

 fit only for firewood, beside the young growths 

 struggling in the ruins for life. So that we 

 need not blunder, we had studied with care 

 some good bulletins and handbooks on farm 

 forestry and the management of woodlots. 

 Save on that first clearing our foresting hasn't 

 gone far beyond the cleaning up stage, but it 

 will be made one of the permanent features of 

 our work. 



Out of that first thicket we saved scores of 

 thrifty young post-oak trees the straightest 

 and best, for after-use in fencing. We kept 

 also all the black locust we found, and all the 

 cherry and black walnut, with here and there 

 a shapely plume-topped elm. Where it did 

 not crowd, we left the best of the young hick- 

 ory, too, and the persimmon that was old 

 enough to fruit. It will be years before that 

 timber has commercial value ; but it will all be 



