PHASES OF FARM LIFE. 267 



farm in the section of the State of which I write is 

 fence-building. But it is not unproductive labor, as 

 in the South or West, for the fence is of stone, and 

 the capacity of the soil for grass or grain is, of course, 

 increased by its construction. It is killing two birds 

 with one stone : a fence is had, the best in the world, 

 while the available area of the field is enlarged. In 

 fact, if there are ever sermons in stones, it is when 

 they are built into a stone-wall, turning your hin- 

 drances into helps, shielding your crops behind the 

 obstacles to your husbandry, making the enemies of 

 the plough stand guard over its products. This is the 

 kind of farming worth imitating. A stone-wall with 

 a good rock bottom will stand as long as a man lasts. 

 Its only enemy is the frost, and it works so gently 

 that it is not till after many years that its effect is 

 perceptible. An old farmer will walk with you 

 through his fields and say, " This wall I built at such 

 and such a time, or the first year I came on the farm, 

 or when I owned such and such a span of horses," 

 indicating a period thirty, forty, or fifty years back. 

 " This other, we built the summer so and so worked 

 for me," and he relates some incident, or mishap, or 

 comical adventures that the memory calls up. Every 

 line of fence has a history ; the mark of his plough or 

 his crow-bar is upon the stones ; the sweat of his early 

 manhood put them in place ; in fact, the long black 

 line covered with lichens and in places tottering to 

 the fall revives long-gone scenes and events in the 

 life of the farm. 



