stumps and Snake-fences 111 



cereal glades until the long day's task is done and 

 that ten acres of wheat is laid low. 



The binding and shocking is a task for the 

 morrow. 



Warm work, that cradle swinging — ^well, I guess 

 yes. Many visits were made that day to the cool 

 grey jug in the hollow stump. A man didn't 

 have to go **east of Suez," as Kipling says, to 

 raise a thirst in cradling days. Let him swing a 

 big, heavy cradle all day long, over uneven 

 ground, and with snags, and snakes, and stones, 

 and stumps, hidden in the grain and he'd have a 

 thirst that would need a whole lot of liquid to 

 quench. In shilling-a-gallon whiskey days they 

 say it was not considered improper for cradlers 

 to take a stone jug to the field, which jug did not 

 contain water. And I've heard stories that cra- 

 dlers had to be steadied by a man holding them 

 from behind until they'd get the proper swing on. 

 When they'd get rightly under way they could 

 maintain a balance and win through with their 

 swaths. 



THE REAPEES OF THE PIONEERS 



I well remember our first machine reaper — a 

 big clumsy contraption with a reel to throw the 

 grain onto a platform. It took two men and a 

 team to work it. One man drove and another 

 swept the grain off the shelf or platform when 

 enough had accumulated to make a sheaf. I recall 



