HAPPY HOLLOW FARM 307 



The talk turned by and by to another sum- 

 mer night out of doors our first night on the 

 farm, six years ago, when we camped in the 

 thicket down by the big spring, strangers fac- 

 ing a new life with only a vision to guide us. 

 That time seemed very remote now, separated 

 from this day by a world of curious experience 

 no, not curious, but vivid, vital, transform- 

 ing. It needed no deep self-scrutiny to dis- 

 cover that I'd become another man in those six 

 years. The change was more than a change 

 in interests or in manner of living or in out- 

 look ; it was a change that went to the very 

 heart's core. Is it egotism to say that I've be- 

 come a wise man? All right; but don't grudge 

 me that indulgence. Say if you like that there 

 are degrees and degrees of wisdom. What I 

 mean is that upon the whole I'm more wise 

 than foolish. I'm rid now of just about all 

 of the insanities that may fill a man's life with 

 doubts and distresses. 



Farming has made the change ; nothing else. 

 You know how easily a man's thinking may be- 

 come all littered up with the non-essentials if 

 the life about him is tangled and confused. 

 He mistakes the shadows for realities and the 

 realities for shadows till after a while the whole 



