12 , AGEICULTURE AND EURAL-LIFE DAY. 



In the fourteenth century a baker was required to go through a 

 four years' apprenticeship, after which he was licensed to pursue his 

 occupation. Bread was suj^posed to contain properties according to 

 its mixture and preparation. Hence the baker's art was important. 

 Different kinds of bread were prepared for different people. The 

 slave had a special kind that would keep him humble and sub- 

 missive; the athlete another kind that would make him strong and 

 supple; princes and senators another kind, and fashionable ladies 

 still another kind. Each kind was expected to give to the individual 

 eating it a character appropriate to his station in life. 



—Selected from Brooks' " Story of Corn." 



THE PLOWMAN. 



Clear the brown path, to meet his coulter's gleam ! 

 Lo ! on he comes, behind his smokinj; team, 

 With toil's bright dewdrops on his sunburnt brow, 

 The lord of earth, the hero of the plow ! 



First in the field before the reddening sun, 

 Last in the shadows when the day is done. 

 Line after line, along the bursting sod, 

 Marks the broad acres where his feet have trod; 



Still, where he treads, the stubborn clods divide. 

 The smooth, fresh furrow opens deep and wide ; 

 Matted and dense the tangled turf upheaves. 

 Mellow and dark the ridgy cornfleld cleaves; 



Up the steep hillside, where the laboring train 

 Slants the long track that scores the level plain; 

 Through the moist valley, clogged with oozing clay, 

 The patient convoy breaks its destined way ; 



At every turn the loosening chains resound, 

 The swinging plowshare circles glistening round. 

 Till the wide field one billowy waste appears. 

 And wearied hands unbind the panting steers. 



These are the hands whose sturdy labor brings 

 The peasant's food, the golden pomp of kings; 

 This is the page whose letters shall be seen 

 Changed by the sun to words of living green ; 



This is the scholar whose immortal pen 

 Spells the first lesson hunger taught to men; 

 These are the lines which heaven-commanded Toil 

 Shows on his deed — the charter of the soil ! 



— Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



