NEIGHBORHOOD NUISANCE 217 



During the second winter he could not annoy 

 me as much, but every mean insinuation that 

 malice could invent or distort, he made. It was 

 in April of the second year that I got him hard 

 and fast, and by the merest chance. 



I had in the previous September bought my 

 Jersey cow. I was very particular about her ap- 

 pearance, curried her every day, bedded and 

 blanketed her, and indeed cared for her as well 

 and painstakingly as I did for Polly. The custom 

 of the local farmers was to allow filth to accumu- 

 late on their cows' flanks and legs, until it hung 

 from them in crusty scales, to peel off in the 

 spring with the shedding of the old coat. The 

 care I gave my cow made her coat shine like satin, 

 and certainly lent a relish to her milk. In April 

 her old coat became dull and dead, and she 

 began to rub it off her head and neck in patches, 

 disclosing a close new coat of cream-color where 

 the winter coat had been a light chestnut. 



One morning, in rubbing her down, I found 

 that with my fingers I could pull the old coat off 

 in tufts, and that she apparently enjoyed having 

 it pulled. Without really thinking of what I was 

 doing, I wrote my initials, H. A. S., on her back 

 by pulling out the dead hair. Seeing how easily I 

 could do this, I drew, or rather pulled, on her 

 side near the curve of the belly, a grotesque figure 

 of a small boy, then a circular brand on her 



