488 
7*e RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
April 1 , 1922 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
Up from the sea the wild north wind is 
blowing 
Under the sky’s gray arch; 
Smiling. 1 watch the shaken elm houghs, 
knowing 
It is the wind of March. 
Between the passing and the coming sea¬ 
son, 
This stormy interlude 
Gives to our Winter-wearied hearts a 
reason 
For trustful gratitude. 
—JOHN G. WHITTLES. 
My sister sent me that verse the other 
day. She has passed through a long and 
rather tiresome Winter in New England. 
Many of us carry within us "Winter- 
wearied hearts.” iu spite of all the "phil¬ 
osophy" we can muster. 1 have letters 
from people in the Central West who ex¬ 
press astonishment at what we write 
about the hard Winter. With them it 
has been a mild season, with little snow 
and ice. and with the wheat green nearly 
all through. There has been little of that 
here. Now that the snow has disappeared, 
cold winds are blowing down from the 
north, and frost is still in the ground in 
sheltered places. March came in like a 
lion and is staying with ns like a tiger. 
I was thinking of this poem of Whittier's 
the other day as 1 stood in one of our 
back bill orchards and looked off over the 
valley. Far across to the Hudson the 
west side of the Palisades rose bright and 
cold. Here and there little brown patches 
showed where farm fields had been out 
out. White spots with here and there 
a bright glitter like a star showed where 
the sun had illumined the windows of 
some church or schoolhou.se. In between 
lay the wide rolling country, dotted with 
little towns or dark patches of wood. It 
is a strange thing, but this old, long- 
settled country has more timber than 
many a farming section not half so long 
from the wilderness. 
* * * * 
While I stood there looking off east to 
those sun-gilded hills, a sudden dark 
flurry of suow crept up behind us. The 
darkening squall blew over us, shutting 
out the sun and spitting out great flakes 
of snow as it hurried on. In 10 minutes 
it was over, and the sun shone once more; 
but I watched that cloud pass along to 
the Hudson, casting its shadow and spit¬ 
ting its white, impotent venom until it 
disappeared over the bluff. And after it 
passed the sun was still shining, and the 
clear March wind was drying up the 
damp and sloppy dimples on the face of 
Nature What a glorious tiling it would 
he if we poor humans could regard the 
storms of life as peacefully and confidently 
as the good old earth regards these flurries 
of wind and water which sweep over her. 
They pass, and the sun always follows* 
them, and the grass comes iu to heal the 
sears. All our orchards are named. 
We like to identify them, and have them 
recall old friends or places. The orchard 
where we were working on that blustering 
March day is called Stringfellow, named 
after the man who, -0 years ago. advo¬ 
cated the theory of root-priming-—that is, 
cutting the roots of nursery trees back 
to mere stubs and- planting them in small 
holes. It was in this orchard that our 
folks tried out the largest experiment in 
such planting ever attempted at the North. 
We planted 1,000 small peach tides, cut¬ 
ting the roots to mere stubs, and putting 
them into holes made by driving a crow¬ 
bar into the ground. These trees have 
lone since been pulled out. but we learned 
great things from the experiment, and the 
orchard stands today as "Slringfcllow.” 
***** 
It is now planted in young apple trees, 
about four years old. These were closely 
root-pruned, and most of them have made 
rood growth, but they have not been prop¬ 
erly headed, and many of them have grown 
into fantastic shapes. Left to itself, a 
tree or a child will go back to Nature 
and develop the powers of character best 
fitted to enable it to fight for its life 
against wild enemies. The self-headed 
!roo s and the self-raised man will show 
many strong and enduring qualities, hut 
a careful shaping or direction in youth 
will make a man or tree far more efficient. 
And so here we were on this blustering 
March day trying to trim these young 
apple-producers so they would develop 
into more useful citizens. And I tbiok 
these old hills were never before peopled 
hv inst suoli an assembly, i figure that 
this farm of ours has been under cultiva¬ 
tion for about 250 years—since the origi¬ 
nal Hollander Imnght a great tract from 
the Indians Here on the sunny slopes 
of “Stringfellow” the red men grew grapes 
and built their rude huts. During the 
Revolution sharp-eyed men Ia ; v on this 
hill and watched scouting parties of red- 
coated Hessians march up the valley road. 
A stout boy hoeing corn among the rooks 
threw down his hoe. crept through the 
woods to Paterson, and enlisted to fight 
in the Civil War. A girl weary of pick¬ 
ing strawberries and going through the 
small penurious life of these rocky hills 
felt the call of the West, and out on the 
prairies became a great teacher and 
trainer of men. Yes, indeed. "Ktringfel- 
low” has played its humble part in Ameri¬ 
can history, but never before had it been 
peopled by such a company as stood in 
the March wind and started those young 
1 rees on the road to good apple citizen¬ 
ship. 
There was a woman with a hrilliant 
red hat, with folded arms and head on 
one side, studying the head of a Baldwin. 
Should she cut out that inside limb or 
let it go? Here was another in rich furs 
trying to cut off a good-sized sucker with 
a penknife. See that man of evident sub¬ 
stance. saw in hand, trying to decide what 
to do with that ‘‘double-header"? There 
were about 25 of them, men and women, 
representing the class ill horticulture at 
Columbia University. Some of them have 
farms of their own ; others dream of a 
piece of land where in the future they 
may plant an orchard. Last Summer 
Professor Findlay came out with some of 
his students, and I showed them this 
“Stringfellow" orchard. The trees had 
made a good growth, hut they had never 
been headed properly. Professor Findlay 
viewed them with joy. I presume Gen¬ 
eral Pershing would feel much the same 
way if he were to see a great crowd of 
husky, uncouth fellows, big and strong, 
but with no idea of discipline or training. 
The soldier would see the possibilities* of 
such great awkward fellows if they could 
be trained properly, or some skilled and 
experienced teacher would feel much the 
same way iu viewing a group of little 
ones, badly managed and badly advised. 
How she would enjoy training and prun¬ 
ing them for good citizenship! In much 
the same way Prof. Findlay saw in 
these vigorous, but misshapen, trees the 
vision of a great orchard—if they could 
only he headed out and shaped for busi¬ 
ness. tfo I told him to bring out his peo¬ 
ple aud go as far as he liked. I would 
stand at one side and let them do their 
worst—or their best. And so here they 
were—with saw and clippers and knife, 
heading off these trees in their rush back 
to Nature and shaping them for civilized 
work. 
***** 
I wish you could have been there to 
see it. You would then understand how 
impossible it is to tell one how to prune 
or train a tree on paper. In order to 
understand it one must be right beside 
the tree and get the real spirit of it. I 
though Prof. Findlay’s method of teach¬ 
ing admirable. First, he explained the 
use of the tools, how to use the saw, 
shears and knife without bruising the 
tree, and how to cut close, so as not to 
leave a stub. Then he inserted several 
bridge-grafts and grafted a small tree, 
showing how to out scions and how to 
fit them. It: was made clear that in 
pruning trees the variety and its habit 
of growth must he considered. Mc- 
Iutosh. Wealthy, Baldwin and Sutton, 
each has a particular habit, of growth, one 
being upright like a pear, another slender 
and ’another thick and bushy. Thus in 
shaping i young tree we must have in 
mind an ideal of what it should be at full 
growth. Wo did not prune heavily. The 
useless or inside branches were cut out, 
but often where two were growing close 
together we left them both. Another 
year's growth will decide which is the 
stronger. Many of these young trees had 
started two stems at the ground, or 
formed a very low crotch. In most cases 
these were cut back to a single trunk. 
In one of the older orchards I have many 
trees badly headed in this way. The 
crotches are loo near the ground, and 
with a heavy load of fruit there will be 
a smash, unless the limbs are well 
propped. Tt was interesting to see how 
these men and women went at the job. 
They worked in pairs—two to each tree, 
and' there was much discussion. They 
would first stand back and study the tree, 
then cut off the suckers, decide where the 
head should start, and then go at it. I 
cannot think of any finer way of teaching 
horticulture. They made notes of the 
trees they operated on, and they will be 
out again to see how they grow One 
man said I ought to present my bill for 
damage done to the trees; but. I consid¬ 
ered it a good and helpful job. 
***** 
It was the first time a crowd of stu¬ 
dents had cvpi* held forth on my sunny 
hills, but in one very human respect they 
were like all the generations that have 
gone before. Humanity may differ in 
brain or mind or color or general charac¬ 
ter. but we are alike in one thing—we all 
get hungry. Mother was a very pretty 
girl in her youth. She will deny any pre¬ 
tensions to beauty of form now, yet she 
seemed like a very handsome woman as 
she came driving Brownie through the 
woods about one o’clock. Little Rose sat 
on (lie seat beside her. and behind were 
several large packages—-dinner. My 
daughter appeared across the hill, carry¬ 
ing two tin buckets. Thomas had built a 
roaring fire in a sheltered corner, where a 
scrcpu of white birch formed n wind¬ 
break. I brought piles of brush and put 
them around the fire. These, with blan¬ 
kets laid oxer them, made ns fine a seat 
as any of the couches upon which the old 
Romans reclined at their feasts. We had 
three kinds of sandwiches, frankfurters, 
fried bacon, hiseliits. coffee, and little 
cakes. The frankfurters and bacon were 
roasted over the fire, You took a long 
stick, likp an apple sucker, ran the end of 
it through the sausage, aud then stood off 
and held it over the hot fire until it was 
browned or burned. Then you put it 
inside a roll or biscuit, shut your eyes, 
and had several moments of pure enjoy¬ 
ment. It gives one rather Strangs 
thoughts to see some dainty creature, 
who looks as if she lived on angel cake, 
pull a browned sausage out of the ashes 
and cat it with her eyes rolled up in 
cestaey. I attributed it to the March 
wind. The bacon was crisped in the same 
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