78 Details and Dollars 



intervals for rest and recreation. And then it 

 often occurred that work which had to be done 

 took me out of bed long before daylight. Four 

 years of this sort of drudgery with very small 

 prospects of release in the future or of reward 

 which would have made such toil bearable, 

 often caused me to turn over in my mind 

 whether there was not some avenue of escape. 

 As country pursuits had always had a fascina- 

 tion for me from childhood, I had heard more 

 or less of the famous Ten Acres Enough, One 

 night as I was leaving my office a friend pre- 

 sented me with an old copy of the book, which 

 he said would interest me as I was fond of 

 preaching upon the superiority of country life 

 to city life. On the way home I opened it 

 with but small expectations that anything in 

 it could apply to my own case. With all my 

 love for the country and for country pursuits 

 I had never thought of myself as a practical 

 farmer or of the possibility of making any kind 

 of a living out of the soil. It had been pointed 

 out to me too often that while potatoes and 

 cabbages are raised all about New York by men 

 who make a poor living at it, any German or 



