24 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 
as enthusiastic as the older brother over the beauty 
and promise of the little alfalfa field. He took off 
his coat and helped with the farm work and enjoyed 
it hugely till September came, when he went away to 
school again. It happened that he never finished 
his education in school; the confinement of the 
schoolroom was too much for his health, so fortu- 
nately for the farm he came back a few years later 
to be a partner, and later to have almost entire man- 
agement of the farm. Willis dreams dreams of his 
own and makes them come true, and he loyally car- 
ries out the plans of the writer. Woodland Farm 
owes its final development very largely to the en- 
ergy and executive ability of this younger brother 
Willis. And there was another brother yet, a sturdy 
lad, Charles, growing up at home; he grew to be 
the largest and strongest of them all and mightily 
he bent his muscle to help with the work. Later he 
too spent years in the West, ranching with sheep 
and cattle, and harvesting alfalfa hay there. Then 
he also came home and found on Woodland Farm 
ample scope for all his energies. It is true, is it not, 
that any work is as big as the man who undertakes 
that work? 
That first summer was uneventful save in the fact 
that the alfalfa grew so well on the trial patch. It 
was a year of drouth and the corn crop was nearly 
ruined, only about 500 bushels in all being harvested. 
The chief events were the long and delighttul drives 
that the boy took with his sweetheart and the fre- 
quent walks he took to watch his alfalfa. When 
