222 An American Fruit-Farm 



"struck, " nor all the parents ceased to provide for 

 their children. At least children under fifteen still 

 stick to the old folks, but the youth of eighteen 

 or twenty, working on the fruit-farm for "the old 

 folks," is a rare bird in the landscape. Whether 

 there be one or several boys, the fruit-grower 

 usually runs his plantation by hired help. Not 

 one of the boys is at home. The bank, the post- 

 office, the grocery, the factory, the railroad, the 

 office, not the fruit-farm, holds them. But the 

 old folks still live on "the place," and the boys 

 occasionally come home and look upon the farm 

 as a distant asset. His business bringing him 

 through the ancestral Valley, the boy "stops off" 

 "over a train " and is a guest at the old home. He 

 is treated as a visitor and discovers what a quiet, 

 comfortable, pretty spot is the old farm. He sees 

 it at a different angle from that when he picked 

 apples from tossing boughs. He was not so well 

 treated when he was a boy on the farm. Perhaps, 

 had he been treated as well as the passing guest, 

 he would not have left the farm. He did not know 

 it was so comfortable. Bank, office, factory, seems 

 for the moment a prison-house, especially if this 

 visit be in summer. And he turns from the old 

 home back to his prison-house with a sigh. If they 

 had treated him as well twenty years ago, would he 

 have left the fruit-farm in disgust? The glamor 

 of office-life, clerical work, railroading, practicing 

 medicine, — ^whatever his vocation, — has faded. 

 Work is work whatever its name and wherever 



