double the value of the carcass. There is a splendid opportunity 
for a farmer who rill raise nothing but high-class stuff am see 
to the packing etc. himself, and gibe his customers the same guaranty 
as the big Department stores, "Satisfaction or your money back" 
It has always been our hope that the boys would wish to live on 
the piece, and continue the work we have begun. And so it seems 
likely to turn out. Their work at school is planned to this end, 
and by them, and they are specializing in their own lines, one in 
poultry and the other in dairy cattle. And now that they have a 
direct interest in the lace, and can put their own plans into op¬ 
eration and have some authority, their interest is increased by 
so much more, and I do not think two boys ever took a greater int¬ 
erest in their work than they do. Some day when I have good photo¬ 
graphs of them I will send them to you and let you see •■ T hat kind 
of boys we raise in the loghouses of the frontier. I suppose it 
must seem strange to you, living in the midst of the oldest civil¬ 
ization of the States to receive these letters from one lifting in 
almost the same conditions as the Pilgrims. Almost my nearest neigh¬ 
bors are the Indians, olid right good people they are. 
Some time I want to take a trip up the mountain and find 
you some of those little ferns which I sent you seme years ago, 
and which you never got, and aloft, I want to locate some calypsos 
which I can get for you in the ripe stage. Do you suppose if I 
sent you the plants with plenty of soil, that they would ripen 
for you at home? 
We have been very busy this spring blowing stumps. I have 
a field of some 20 or 25 acres which has been cleared since'98, 
it was covered with heavy timber, alder and maple, some of them as 
large as 3 ft, in diameter, and the plow and mower have dodged 
round the stumps all these yeafts, and this spring I decided to take 
them out. It has taken about a quarter ton of dynamite, and a 
