HARVEST. 269 



for it, and gets even in the plowing season. Some- 

 times hay-making becomes a great frolic, and the chil- 

 dren climb on the loads, and happy are the long rides 

 from the field while they nestle among the fragrant 

 grasses. I have even seen a fiddle go to the field with 

 the jug, when the meadows were far distant from the 

 farmhouse; and the laborers would then stay out for 

 some days, until all was cut and stacked. 



Whitman has left a realistic picture of the return 

 of the load to the barn : 



"The big doors of the country barn stand open and ready, 

 The dried grass of the harvest-time loads the slow-drawn wagon, 

 The clear light plays on the brown gray and green intertinged, 

 The armfuls are packed to the sagging mow. 



"I am there, I help, I came stretch'd atop of the load, 

 I felt its soft jolts, one leg reclined on the other, 

 I jump from the cross-beams and seize the clover and timothy. 

 And roll head over heels and tangle my hair full of wisps." 



You must be careful not to get mixed up in a 

 bumble-bees' nest in the field. They are very irascible 

 customers. And yet I knew of no better fun as a boy 

 than to stir up a nest, and, armed with leafy branches 

 or a bunch of weeds, to fight my way right among them, 

 and finally, after the massacre, secure the little egg- 

 shaped globules, of cocoon-like covering, that contained 

 the honey. Bumble-bee honey is stronger than the 

 honey-bee's, but it has a sort of wild taste, and serves 

 very well to vary the monotony in the haying season. 

 The big yellow-banded fellows — regular ogres, so cross 

 are they — seem to choose a clover field above all others 

 for their domicile. If they sting the horses, you will 

 have a time of it, and may get the harness all broken 



