It08 
July  22,  1910. 
E'Ao  RURAL  NEW-YORKER 
a 
'Mvi 
a: 
■  ■  .s 
.'  ~-4p:  r  -  -  ,  '••>.• 
The  Pastoral  Parson  on  the  Lonely  Road 
Some  Out-Door  Help  Experience 
By  Rev.  Geo.  B.  Gilbert 
Wno’s  Green? — We  used  to  hear  a 
good  deal  about  the  green  country  bump¬ 
kins  and  the  funny  tilings  they  do  when 
they  come  to  town  ;  but  how  about  these 
city  folks?  “Henry,”  said  the  Pastoral 
Parson,  “you  may  drive  this  horse  and 
wagon  in  town  to  a  certain  house  and 
wait  outside  the  curb  till  I  come  in  the 
car.  when  we  will  load  in  a  stove  from 
the  man's  garage  that  is  going  down 
country.”  “All  right,”  said  the  large  14- 
year-old  lad  in  long  pants,  and  drove 
off.  The  large  stove  was  given  to  the 
church,  and  T  was  especially  anxious  to 
get  it  out,  without  disturbing  anything 
or  anybody.  But  as  for  Henry  !  Being 
a  city  boy  be  could  not  do  as  he  was 
told — must  show  his  city-bred  wisdom ! 
Ho  must  needs  display  bis  horseman¬ 
ship.  He  drove  right  in  the  backyard 
and  before  I  Could  get  there  he  had  the 
horse  all  over  a  lily  of  the  valley  bed, 
had  torn  great  holes  in  the  lawn,  had 
run  over  and  nearly  ruined  a  beautiful 
shrub  just  in  full  bloom,  had  backed  into 
the  garage  door  and  nearly  ripped  it  off 
the  binges,  and  on  being  ordered  from 
the  place  by  the  owner,  had  knocked  a 
piece  off  the  corner  of  the  house  as  a 
final  remembrance ! 
A  I1ai,k  Day’s  Help. — I  once  had  a 
man-grown  boy — I  believe  he  was  in  the 
high  school — come  out  to  help  me  while 
I  was  running  a  camp.  After  dinner  I 
told  him  he  could  go  out  in  the  boat,  and 
take  up  a  set  line  of  300  feet  I  had  in 
the  water.  It  rested  on  bobs,  with  a 
drop  line  and  hook  every  10  feet.  “Be 
sure  to  take  off  the  hooks  first)”  said  I. 
But  of  course  he  knew  more  about  it 
than  I  did.  Was  he  not  studying  alge¬ 
bra  and  geometry?  lie  would  take  it  up 
hooks  and  all,  and  straighten  it  out  after 
supper!  Can  you  imagine  that  tangle! 
Toward  evening  I  told  him  he  could  go 
up  to  a  nvun’s  house  and  get  a  bushel 
of  early  Seckel  pears  in  a  bag  that  I 
had  bought.  The  pears  were  dead  ripe, 
just  ready  to  eat.  The  trolley  track  ran 
from  us  to  the  house.  At  dusk  I  heard 
a  bumping  noise  and  looked  up.  He  was 
dragging  those  pears  on  the  ties,  and  had 
bumped  them  that  way  the  whole  dis¬ 
tance.  “You  may  light  the  lantern,  and 
we  will  see  if  there  is  a  good  pear  left.” 
said  the  Pastoral  Parson.  After  waiting 
and  waiting  I  went  to  see  wily  he  did 
not  bring  the  lantern.  lie  said  it  did 
not  seem  to  have  any  wick.  He  had 
turned  it  backward  to  turn  it  up,  and  the 
wick  was  down  in  the  bottom.  (Did  you 
ever  try  to  get  one  out?)  1  honestly  be¬ 
lieve  it  was  tbe  next  morning  I  sent  him 
with  a  team  to  town  to  get.  a  new  oil 
stove  to  heat  the  baby’s  milk  on.  Of 
course  he  had  to  take  in  two  or  three 
“fellers”  to  ride  and  then  show  them 
what  a  driver  he  was,  by  yanking  and 
jerking  and  clicking  the  horse,  every  min¬ 
ute,  till  it  ended  in  bobbing  the  round 
drum  part  of  the  stove  out  of  the  wagon 
and  the  hind  wheel  running  right  over 
it!  It’s  great  to  have  these  city  folk 
come  out  and  “help"  us  poor  farmers! 
Who  was  it  that  said  :  “Beats  the  deuce, 
don’t  cher  know,  what  fools  those  farm¬ 
ers  be!  They  go  each  year  and  plant 
whole  corn  and  then  lug  it  off  to  have  it 
cracked  when  they  might  plant  cracked 
corn  and  save  all  that  bother !” 
Hand  Mowing. — The  town  people 
glide  by  in  their  autos  and  see  us  mowing 
out  the  side  of  the  road.  Ilow  easy  it  is 
to  mow  by  hand !  I  remember  when  a 
town  man  came  out  to  work  for  father  in 
baying.  “Can  you  mow?”  shouted  fath¬ 
er.  Oh  yes,  lie  could  rnow.  Had  he  not 
often  seen  it  done!  “Whet  your  scythe 
first.”  ordered  father.  Did  you  ever  see 
a  city  chap  whet  a  scythe?  Then  he 
started  iu.  “You’re  a  little  high.”  said 
father.  But  he  was  low  enough  the  uext 
time.  .  The  scythe  pierced  the  earth 
about  a  foot  and  then  buckled  right  in 
the  middle. 
Examples  of  Ignorance. — A  New 
York  City  teacher  had  finished  telling  the 
story  of  Billy  Beg  and  his  bull.  “By 
the  way,”  said  she,  “can  anyone  tell  me 
wbat  a  bull  is?”  A  bright  East-sider 
raised  his  hand.  “What  is  it,  David?” 
said  she.  “Please  ma'am  a  bull  is  a  big 
thing  with  four  legs  and  bicycle  handles 
sticking  out  of  its  head.” 
“Queer  you  plant  this  shriveled 
corn,”  said  a  man  to  me  this  Spring.  “I 
shouldn’t  think  it  would  grow.”  The 
corn  referred  to  was  some  very  fine  dent 
corn  of  the  Beaming  variety. 
A  grown-up  city  girl  once  came  to  visit 
at  the  old  farm.  We  boys  took  her  over 
to  see  the  neighbors'  sheep  in  their  sheep 
baru.  “Ob,  let  me  out,  let  me  out,”  she 
cried,  as  a  sheep  approached.  ”It  will 
bite  me.” 
Real  Help. — “Papa,  papa,”  said  tbe 
oldest  boy  one  morniug,  just  as  the  Pas¬ 
toral  Parson  had  finished  breakfast, 
“There’s  a  man  olit  in  the  barn,  and  he 
says  he  knows  the  name  of  our  horse.” 
When  the  Parson  went  out  lie  was  up 
iu  the  lot  talking  with  a  man  who  was 
plowing.  Eater  the  man  came  down  t<> 
the  house.  “Moms,”  said  I,  “has  that 
man  ’phoned  again  for  a  hired  man.” 
“There,”  said  the  stranger,  “stop  right 
there.  Now  I  will  tell  you  what  I  have 
come  here  for,  clear  from  up  in  York 
State.  I  want  to  see  for  myself  if  these 
things  you  write  about,  iu  The  Rural 
New-Yorker  are  really  so.”  Then  he 
went  on  to  tell  how  so  many  wrote  fine- 
sounding  stuff,  but  when  you  really  saw 
them  and  their  farms  it  was  quite  a  dif¬ 
ferent  story.  It  is  certainly  easier  to 
tell  other  folks  how  to  do  things  than  to 
do  them  ourselves.  This  man  had  tra¬ 
veled  the  country  over  and  had  worked 
four  years  for  the  California  State  Col¬ 
lege.  He  had  made  a  great  study  of 
farming  conditions.  The  Pastoral  Par¬ 
son  learned  a  great  deal  from  him. 
Tite  Rural  New-Yorker. — He  said 
The  R.  N.-Y.  was  the  one  great  paper, 
farm  paper,  that  did  not  work  for  the 
money,  but  whose  chief  aim  seems  to  be 
to  help  the  people  regardless  of  what 
conies.  “You  do  not  realize  bow  many 
read  your  articles,”  he  kept  saying. 
“You  have  too  much  to  do  and  are  work¬ 
ing  too  hard  and  I  fear  will  give  up  this 
writing.  I  want  to  help  you.  You  must 
keep  them  up.”  Then  what  do  you  sup¬ 
pose  this  man  did — ail  utter  stranger? 
1I<*  got  a  room  nearby  and  came  and 
helped  tbe  Pastoral  Parson  for  about  10 
days — early  and  late.  Such  help  as  be 
was — slightly  different  from  those  I  just 
wrote  of.  He  knew  how  to  do  everything 
and  do  it  right — such  a  relief  to  have 
such  help  around.  Not  a  cent  would  he 
take,  and  somewhere  lie  will  read  this 
article  and  know  I  appreciated  it.  It 
put  my  work  ahead  for  the  whole  Sum¬ 
mer.  lie  put  in  the  oats  and  fixed  the 
pasture  fences  and  when  lie  could  do 
little  more  he  went  as  quickly  as  he  came. 
I  want  to  tell  him  that  the  oats  are 
looking  fine  and  there  is  a  great  catch  of 
clover.  This  cold  rainy  Spring  has  been 
just  right  for  them,  lie  said  as  he  left 
he  expected  to  make  a  visit  to  the  Hope 
Farm  sometime  before  long. 
The  Parson’s  Help  On  The  Farm. 
— Since  writing  about  “Tbe  Hired  Girl 
on  tbe  Farm.”  some  have  asked  what 
help  the  parson  himself  lias  on  the  land. 
Yes,  he  has  help.  As  a  young  man  he 
was  John,  just  as  promising  as  your  boy 
or  mine,  but  while  in  college  liis  mind 
gave  way  and  he  became  "Johnnie.”  And 
as  his  good  mother  used  to  say,  "He  will 
always  be  ‘Johnnie’.”  His  father  went 
years  ago,  and  before  bis  mother  left  him 
I  promised  him  I  would  always  do  what 
I  could  for  him.  So  he  lives  with  us. 
lie  does  well  and  thoroughly  the  things 
lie  can  do — things  that  require  no  judg¬ 
ment.  “You  fed  Doll  that  hay  you  got 
down?”  I  asked.  “Well,  no,  I  didn’t.  I 
fed  her  yesterday !”  Yet  with  many  a 
hard  job  and  heavy  lift  has  he  helped 
me.  yucli  people  are  sometimes  gifted 
with  no  mean  wit.  There  had  been  ice 
cream  standing  in  the  barn  all  day  from 
a  party  the  night  before.  We  had  none 
for  dinner.  I  was  saving  it  for  supper. 
Johnnie  dearly  loves  it  and  knew  all  day 
it  was  there  some  time  before.  One 
night,  when  overtired,  it  had  made  him 
sick.  So  about  five  o’clock,  half  teasing- 
ly,  I  said,  “I  fear  you’ll  be  too  tired  to 
eat  ice  cream  tonight.”  “Tired,”  lie  an¬ 
swered,  quick  as  a  flash,  “tired  waiting 
for  it.”  Often  when  things  have  been 
very  trying  have  Moms  and  the  Pas¬ 
toral  Parson  talked  the  matter  over  once 
again  and  always  before  we  get  through, 
have  we  remembered  how  that  we  have 
three  boys  and  no  one  knows  what  may 
happen  to  any  of  them  when  we  are 
gone,  and  so  “Johnnie”  stays  on  with  us. 
How  much  comes  back  to  us  through  our 
children  and  our  children’s  children  of 
that  which  we  may  lmvo  given  iu  our 
own  day  and  time! 
Old  Home  Day. — Such  a  good  time  as 
we  shall  halve  down  at  the  little  country 
church  next  Sunday!  It  is  to  be  our  first 
Old  Home  Day.  Like  company  in  the 
house,  it  puts  you  to  fixing  up  and  clean¬ 
ing  up.  We  have  been  painting  on  the 
church,  and  really  did  more  painting 
than  we  planned.  The  Pastoral  Parson's 
faithful  old  auto  was  resting  quietly  be¬ 
side  tbe  church  wheu  one  of  tbe  paint¬ 
ers  on  the  belfry  let  drop  accidentally  a 
pot  of  white  paint!  It  rolled  down  that 
roof  and  struck  plumb  on  the  top  of  the 
auto.  Perhaps  that,  ear  wasn’t  some 
sight!  A  leopard  would  have  been  mor¬ 
tified  to  have  met  that  car  in  the  woods. 
It  took  a  deal  of  black  paint  and  a  deal 
more  of  patience  to  put  that  car  in  shape 
again.  But  as  for  that  Old  Home  Day! 
We  are  going  to  have  morning  service 
and  then  dinner  for  all  with  a  five-gal¬ 
lon  freezer  of  ice  cream,  and  then  at  the 
afternoon  service  we  expect  a  whole  vest¬ 
ed  choir  down  from  the  town  with  a  spe¬ 
cial  musical  service.  This  will  be  a  great 
treat  for  those  country  people.  And  a. 
great  education  for  those  town  people. 
They  will  see  where  the  people  live  who 
toil  and  labor  and  dig  to  raise  something 
for  them  to  eat.  “One  thing  I  have 
learned,  that  has  really  paid  for  all  this 
work  and  disappointment,”  said  a  back- 
to-the-cityer  to  me  the  other  day,  “I  shall 
never  again  try  to  beat,  down  a  farmer 
on  the  price  of  his  eggs,  for  I  know  now 
what  they  cost.”  It  is  quite  the  thing.  I 
hear,  for  the  city  churches  to  take  under 
their  wing  some  mission  in  Uganda,  but 
why  not  pay  a  little  attention  and  give 
some  personal  help  to  the  little  country 
church  off  on  tbe  Lonely  Road,  whose 
people  supply  your  breakfast  table? 
Autos  And  Oxen. — One  Lonely  Road 
family — 10  miles  from  anywhere — is  try¬ 
ing  out  a  very  interesting  experiment  this 
year.  It  is  oxen  and  a  light  auto  in¬ 
stead  of  oxen  and  tbe  horse,  Gan  oxen 
do  everything  on  a  farm?  Who  has 
tried  it?  How  about  cultivating  corn 
and  potatoes?  Yet  I  have  heard  of  one 
man  that  cultivates  with  an  ox.  How 
about  raking  hay?  Gan  you  put  a  pole 
on  the  one  horse  rake  and  put  on  the 
cattle?  They  could  pull  it!  Who  has 
tried  it?  The  cattle  will  eat  much  less 
grain  than  the  horse  and  a  poorer  qual¬ 
ity  of  hay  or  corn  fodder.  (  T  hear  it 
called  “stover”  now).  With  the  car  the 
man  goes  to  market  and  gets  back  in 
three  hours,  with  the  horse  it  took  all 
day.  He  attends  tile  widening  circle  of 
gatherings  of  the  border  township  as  ho 
would  those  of  the  next  school  district 
with  the  horse.  But  aside  wholly  from 
the  matter  of  convenience  and  pleasure, 
where  land  is  stony  and  pasturage  plenty 
and  distances  great  and  the  Winters  not 
too  long,  isn’t  it.  an  economic  saving  to 
keep  a  growing  pair  of  steers  and  a  light 
car  rather  than  the  steers  and  a  horse,  or 
just  a  liurse,  hiring  the  plowing  and  mow¬ 
ing  done? 
The  Grots. — The  Pastoral  Parson  has 
begun  haying,  and  such  a  crop  as  it  is! 
He  has  been  mowing  lodged  clover  to¬ 
day.  Such  a  mass  of  stuff  and  so  green. 
It  doesn’t  seem  as  though  it  would  dry 
in  a  month.  If  I  can  once  get  it  cocked 
up,  I  will  leave  it  there  till  it  cures  if 
it  takes  till  Winter.  The  beautiful  piece 
of  Winter  wheat  has  lodged  some,  but 
not  very  badly.  We  hope  to  have  bread 
this  Winter  from  our  own  wheat — the 
first  in  30  years.  Corn  is  small,  rather 
yellow  and  very  backward.  Much  corn 
in  this  section  is  not  planted  yet,  June 
22.  No  one  ever  saw  so  much  rain  as 
we  have  had.  Yet  the  crops  have  stood 
it  well.  The  old  adage  still  rings  true: 
“Much  rain  tends  to  scare  the  farmer  to 
death,  but  too  much  drought  starves  him 
to  death.” 
A  Vacation  At  Home. — This  was 
tried  with  good  results  one  Summer  by 
myself  and  two  daughters,  high  school 
girls.  The  first  day  mother  gets  the 
meals,  baking  bread,  pies,  etc.;  oue  girl 
washes  dishes  and  one  takes  a  day  off 
after  dusting  the  living  room.  She  does 
fancy  work,  fixes  her  room,  makes  visits, 
goes  to  town,  etc.  The  next  day  she  gets 
the  meals  and  makes  cake  and  cookies. 
Mother  washes  dishes  and  the  other  girl 
has  her  day  off,  getting  the  meals  the 
next  day  while  mother  has  a  day  to 
wash,  pick  berries,  or  do  anything  she 
cannot  do  when  there  are  three  meals 
to  get.  The  change  of  work  is  a  rest  for 
mother  and  good  for  the  girls,  while  each 
can  make  plans  for  some  pleasure  one 
day  out  of  three.  K.  M.  M. 
