HARVEST. 



281 



old-time "husking bee" the ears were all torn off from 

 the stalks, and were heaped in great piles either on the 

 barn floor or on a clean plat of grass in the yard. The 

 neighbors invited would gather in, divide into parties 

 (as at a spelling match), and see which side could get 

 the most ears in the husking, the reward for the victors 

 being the first swig at the jug. In some localities It 

 was the customary understanding that whenever a girl 

 happened on a red ear in the husking it was the privi- 

 lege of all boys present to kiss her; and the correspond- 

 ing prerogative of whatever boy shucked such an ear 

 to invade the fair ones, and forthwith to kiss unchal- 

 lenged the girl he liked the best. Thus the girls had 

 the best of it in either case ; and many a love story has 

 started from the husking party. Rarer even than red 

 ears, though, were those having an uneven number of 

 rows of kernels, which generally are arranged evenly 

 on the cob in rows of two and two. It was quite an 

 achievement to have the luck to find such an ear. If 

 there was a fiddler in the neighborhood (as there was 

 apt to be), he would always surely be invited; and, 

 while the girls were in the house, getting the doughnuts 

 and cake and cider, the men cleared off the barn floor 

 ready for the dance. 



The harvest-home festivals of our generation, when 

 the choicest fruits, and samples of grain, and stock are 

 submitted in good-humored competition for premiums, 

 are but a survival of the old English custom of cele- 

 brating the homing, or final garnering, of the harvest 

 with merrymaking and feasting. We in our day, too, 

 are always glad when the crops have been gathered, 

 so much so that the countryman does not shrink from 



