1516 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
"Santa Claus, Jr.” 
Part T 
I have born muling ouo of the most 
remarkable books I have ever found. It 
is “The Xew Air World," by Willis 
Luther Moore. It might not. seem so 
remarkable to you. but to me this study 
of the world which lies in the film of 
atmosphere enveloping the earth certainly 
leads to solemn reflection. Prof. Moore 
suggests some wonderful possibilities. The 
air cools a* we ascend, and Moore says 
it is not impossible tliar in the future we 
may build great scaffolds 1.000 or more 
feet high where we may go in Summer to 
“cool off.” Or we may even pass a va¬ 
cation of days or even weeks far up in the 
air in a region of perpetual cold. There 
may even be aerial sanitariums estab¬ 
lished far above the earth for the treat¬ 
ment of patients who are now sent to the 
Far North. And Moore also sees possi¬ 
bilities for health and comfort down below 
flic surface of the earth, lie says that only 
three feet below the earth's surface the 
ground is as coo] at midday as at mid¬ 
night. There is no annual variation of 
temperature below a depth of 110 to -10 
Let. The temperature in the Mammoth 
Cave is H4 degrees, with no change from 
dn.\ to day. Moore suggests that we take 
advantage of all this by building or dig¬ 
ging sleeping rooms underground. It 
would he merely a matter of ventilation. 
They could be dug into a hillside with 
air tubes reaching above and boxes for 
air drainage below, thus supplying pure 
air and u temperature such as wo have in 
November, and where one could sleep in 
comfort or where cool storage for fruits 
or vegetables could be provided. 
thanking n.y stars that fate had located 
me beside the big air-tight stove instead 
of shelling corn in the cold barn when I 
saw Cap'll lloxie stumbling through the 
snow to our house- Cap’n Hoxie had 
once commanded a fishing schooner sail¬ 
ing out of Gloucester. The schooner 
final 1\ broke her back in a storm off the 
Grand Hanks. Perhaps you will find all 
that is left of her somewhere on the coast 
of Nova Scotia today. The captain him¬ 
self went down with rheumatism, and 
here he was a hack to-the-lamler—cast 
up by the sea on a rocky little farm with 
his wife and three old maid daughters. 
Well, as I recall it these unmarried 
women of New England represented 
either the pride or the petulance of the 
neighborhood, depending oil tin- way they 
viewed life. The captain came in through 
tin- woodshed and stamped the snow off 
bis feet He had on a fur cap. pulled 
down Until it seemed to meet bis gray 
beard. There was a big woolen com¬ 
forter around his neck, and lie bad tied 
grain hags around his feet—a very sen¬ 
sible practice in such a storm. M\ aunt 
was frying doughnuts on lop of t lie air¬ 
tight stove. I'll • captain stood with his 
back to the lire, lie was a tall, lean man. 
His neck and shoulders were straight, 
but there was a bend or crook in bis back 
.inst above the hips. ,vid as lie stood there 
be reminded me somehow of nnr old 
Christmas without tobackcr. So I'll borry 
him to walk down to the center and do 
a little tradin'. Play Santa Claus. Eh. 
boy? If lie goes right and don't lose 
nothin’ I’ll give him the next cent 1 find 
rollin’ up hill.” 
The old folks were ipiite relieved to 
think that Cap’ll lloxie was not after 
something valuable. “The boy" was not 
what you might call an expensive product. 
"Well, you can borry him; but lie ain’t 
very faithfu 1 , and he's sorter careless.” 
It seemed to me then, so dose to Christ¬ 
mas time, that if I had a hoy I'd brag 
him up a little, just as they did the calf 
or the cat. 1 certainly would not dis¬ 
parage him. and no one knows how close 
I came to loving old Cap'll lloxie when 
lie answered : 
"Well. now. I ain’t so sure of that, 
lie looks to me like a good hoy and a 
good worker. I wished 1 had a couple 
jest like him. I’ll bet he'll do the job 
right—jest like T say." 
And so it was all arranged, without 
consulting me, that 1 was to fare out 
into the storm and “play Santa Claus.” 
Cap'll lloxie had a basket and a list of 
things I was to buy. There were four 
plugs of tobnopo. 1(1 cents worth of candy, 
two spools of thread, a pound of butter, 
a small bag of salt, five ounces of tea 
and various other necessities. 
"Tell .Tim Lincoln to give yon the small 
These things may or may not he prac¬ 
tical; at any rate, they interest me, for 
I ba\e seen many strange things come 
and go. The thing that most interests 
me in Moore’s book is the clear descrip¬ 
tions of the causes and progress of storms. 
Here is this blanket of air and moisture 
and dust pressing upon the earth. It 
may seem to us quiet and inert, whou 
suddenly it rouses like a liori ami goes 
roaring past us. spitting out rain or snow, 
tearing tilings apart and laying iev hands 
ujion the earth. This book tells why 
such changes occur. Sometimes a vol¬ 
ume of icy air drops from the Upper re¬ 
gions down upon ns or some great whirl 
of air. starting thousands of miles away, 
comes rushing across the country, stirring 
up tbr sleeping air as one would prod a 
wild animal with a pitchfork. As I write 
this 1 can look out upon a wild storm. A 
blast of icy air is tearing down our val¬ 
ley. driving a swarm of great snowflakes, 
which strike like bullets against the win 
flows. There must he some sleet mixed 
with them. Out on the lawn they whirl 
and blow the snow into drifts. The road 
is idling bigb. ami as you try to make 
your way through the storm you feel 
sharp, stinging hands of ice at your face 
and lingers. It seems that this storm 
started in the great plains near the Rocky 
Mountains a few days ago. Now it is 
passing across New Jersey, giving ns an 
extra kick as it swings off over the ocean. 
1 might use Moore’s book to slnflv out 
the cause of ibis storm, and wh«1 lashed 
the lazy atmosphere into this savage and 
snarling thing; but as I look out through 
my window. I forget all about the scien¬ 
tific side of tins “hoary meteor.” There 
rushes inro mind the memory of another 
storm just like this one. and 1 go search¬ 
ing through the past to try to locate it. 
Tf you are as old as 1 am, you know what 
it means to go fishing in the lake of mem¬ 
ory. trying to catch some runaway re¬ 
membrance which had hidden beneath the 
muck of years. When you finally hook 
if and bring it uj, well, there is great 
satisfaction in the catch. And so after 
some mental angling, with my back to 
my pleasant fire, and looking out Upon the 
roaring snow dance. I remember There 
was just such a Storm as this the day 
I played Santa Claus for the first time. 
That was 50 years—yes. more than 5'' 
years ago—but half a century is about 
all that most of us are read” to admit. 
1 imagine I was about the youngest Santa 
Claus tliar ever took the road. 
Just such a sti rm as this—only worse 
- the day before Christmas. These West¬ 
ern folks never did think much of Cape 
'"od. T judge from Moore’s book that 
the storm I remember so well started in 
the Rocky Mountains. It ought to have 
gone roaring down (he St. Lawrence Val¬ 
ley. lnit it switched to the south and 
headed for nnr country, ft saw the 
ocean beyond the cape and tried to avoid 
a watery grave by digging in on our town¬ 
ship. At least, that is the way It seems 
to me. and the struggle to get a grip on 
the hard land did turn tilings around. 
It seemed to me like some terrible giant 
of the air fighting to keep from slipping 
into the Atlantic and sweating great lev 
flakes of snow and pellets of sleet in his 
agony. I did my chores and then came 
into the house, where I was to sew carpet 
rags for my aunt’s new carpet. I was 
No, this is not a picture of the Hope Farm man and his wife. Our fireplace is built 
of stone; this one is of brick. This shows two old friends of The R. N.-Y. who live 
iu Ontario Co., N. Y., and tills is what they say about it: 
"The only natural picture of dad would be "Reading The Rural.” 
We imagine that right at this time hundreds of our folks are sitting by the lire, “read¬ 
ing The Kt'HAi.,” Our hope is that they may absorb all the good things we feel 
for them through its pages. 
Brahma rooster preparing for his rival, 
the "Domlmcker” on the next farm. 
Fnknown to the old folks, I had read 
Hawthorne's story of “The Snow 
Maiden." who melted when they brought 
her in near the fire I remember that, as 
I sal sewing my rags, I wondered if 
Cap'll lloxie would melt as the snow 
maiden did. But the captain was made 
of sterner stuff—he had been toughened 
by mn v a Labrador storm. 
"Thank ye, /Mis’ Read.” he said; “1 
don't care if I do eat a couple of them 
doughnuts. They smell as if they’d eat 
pretty good.” 
No one bail invited him to eat dough¬ 
nuts. They represented our one Christ¬ 
mas extravagance; but ministers, sea cap¬ 
tains. doctors and editors were ever al¬ 
lowed special privileges, and the Cap’n 
helm >1 himself. 
Now the captain and his family were 
great borrowers. They were the cham¬ 
pions of a neighborhood tilled with ex¬ 
perts. and we all knew what was routing. 
There was nothing t<> do but try to he 
resigned and hope the captain had no 
very important thing in mind. It soon 
came. 
"Mis’ Reed. T guess I’ll have to borry 
your —” 
Here a piece of doughnut went down 
the wrong way. and the captain stopped 
to cough, while my unde and aunt stood 
in deep suspense, fearing that the silver 
spoons or even money was desired. 
The captain toughed himself free of 
the hot doughnut and finished. 
"I guess I'll have to liorr.v your boy. 
I'm all out of tobaoker. and the women 
want every little thing. Can’t spend 
est pieces ot camly lie’s got -it’ll go fur¬ 
ther if they suck one small piece at a 
time. And here's the money tied up in 
this piece of paper. Don't open it till 
ye get to Jim Lincoln's store." 
I must give my aunt credit for financial 
shrewdness. She got out her red sealing 
wax and carefully sealed the ends of this 
I taper. If such a thing were done to me 
now. I should regard it as something of 
an insinuation, but it was really more 
than that. Our folks knew Cap’ll lloxie 
v ry well. He bad a way of sending less 
money than was needed. Then it might 
be claimed that the boy had lost part of 
it and his "guardians” might lie held re¬ 
sponsible. The sealing wax would lie good 
evidence in any sm li case. 
And so this young Santa Clans walked 
out into the storm and it certainly was 
a whirlwind of white bullets. I ’ipt on 
my leather hoots and my uncle let me 
wear his "creepers.” with the stern ad¬ 
monition that 1 Humid be whipped if 1 
lost them. \Ve never hear "creepers" in 
these days. They were little pieces of 
sharp steel strapped to tin* bottom of 
your boots to bold you up when crossing 
ice. Moore in bis book says ihat the 
action of skates on the ice is to melt a 
little of tile ice surface so that tile skate 
may hold ill the depression thus made. 
He also says that at times the cold is so 
intense that skates will not melt the ice. 
but simply slip over it. The ‘'creepers” 
did r.ot s»eni to bold tluit dav. I had on 
a thick jacket, a woolen comforter around 
my neck, yarn mittens and a cloth cap 
pulled flown over my face. I must have 
been a rather forlorn, chunky, little tig- 
Dccember 30, 1022 
tiro a.s I pushed off through the snow. 
Looking back today across the long years 
I can see how different it would have 
been if some one could have pulled on my 
yarn mittens, tightened the comforter and 
sent me away with a kiss and a little lmg. 
As it was. 1 dressed myself and my aunt 
started me away with : 
“Now don't you tarry and play by the 
wayside. Hurry, so you can finish*your 
chores. If you get your feet wet you’ll 
have to go right to bed." 
She was not cruel or unkind. She 
simply did not know how a hoy feels 
about such things. The spirit of Christ¬ 
mas could not quite enter her heart. 1 
plowed away down the road until I came 
to (lie Orthodox church. Our f< Ik-, were 
I nitarians. and 1 bad been brought up 
to regard the Orthodox people as a cruel 
and hard-headed crowd. Wo wm- not 
supposed to enter the church but as I 
passed it there came a hurst of music, 
such as I had never heard before. So 1 
stopped and led on by the music. entered 
the forbidden place. Old Sam Brewster, 
the sexton, was sweeping and dusting, 
lie was very deaf, and never heard the 
organ, even when the full power was on. 
At the end of the church, seated at the 
organ, was ’Squire Clapp’s hired man. 
He was an Englishman—a silent man. 
who. as I now realize, must have had 
wlini wo call a "past.” We children were 
taught to fear him because fie smoked, 
read “atheist” hooks, ami. as Deacon 
Smith said, was one of. "them awful 
Episcolopeans.” Yet here he was in the 
Orthodox church, of all places, playing 
the organ and singing while Sam Brew¬ 
ster placidly used his broom, all uncon¬ 
scious of the music which was rioting 
in the iTitirch. I stood listening, and 
without knowing why, I pulled off my 
cap. Somehow I felt inclined to get 
right down on my knees, as we did when 
the minister came to hear family wor¬ 
ship. 
"1 i> ;l thought T'd let him play," said 
Bam Brewster. "I see he had the hymn 
hook open. Most likely he's playing 
‘Hark from the Tombs a Doleful Sound,’ 
so there ain't no harm in it.” And he 
went on sweeping. 
But there was no doleful sound about 
wliar the Englishman was singing. I 
shall stop right here and look it tip in 
Lohgfellow: 
“1 heard the bolls on Christmas day 
Their old familiar carols play. 
And wild and sweet 
The words repeat 
Of peace on earth, good will to men! 
* * * * * 
“And in despair I bowed my head; 
‘There is no pence on earth.' I said. 
‘For hate is strong. And mocks the song 
Of peace on earth, good will to men 1” 
"Then pealed the hells more loud and 
deep • 
“Gofl is not dead, nor doth lie sleep! 
The wrong shall fail. 
The right prevail. 
TV ith peace on earth, good will to men.” 
There iu the cold, dim church sat the 
hired man in overalls and rough clothing, 
unshaven, and not very clean, his rough 
bands tombing the organ keys and his 
face raised into the gentle light which 
came in through the only sraiuefl glass 
window of the church. 1 shall never for¬ 
get it. The thought of it — the "lory of 
it will go with me all through life, just 
as it. did along the cold and stormy road 
to Jim Lincoln’s store. And to this day 
I can smile at Sam Brewster, the deaf 
sexton, who, could he have heard that 
tnusio, would p'. nimbly have driven 
Clapp’s hired man from the church. 
h. w r . c. 
(To Be Continued) 
A Contest in Pie-making 
Here \vc come again with a new pre¬ 
sentment of an old proposition. In years 
past we have made many suggestions. 
Many of them have been worked out prac¬ 
tically, but this one somehow hangs fire. 
Ti is a great novelty for some fruit show. 
We suggest offering prises of $30. more 
or less, for the best apple pie made in 
plain, open view of the audience. It is 
all well enough to exhibit cold pies, made 
at home < no one knows how), but the 
point is to have them >na<i< in public. 
We would open the contest to young 
women, say those under ‘>0 years. Have 
one or more gas ranges set up right in 
the exhibition hall. Provide an abun¬ 
dance of flour, lnitter. sugar, spice, lard, 
baking powder and the choiee of half a 
dozen varieties of apples. Enclose the 
contestants and the judges inside a fence. 
Keep the public outside and let the young 
women proceed to manufacture pies in 
their own way. In our opinion this 
would prove an attractive novelty. It 
would call out a crowd aud help to popu¬ 
larize apple pies—a most desirable thing 
for all. It might not be quite so exciting 
as a horse race, but it would draw a 
crowd. We think there would be quite a 
little competition for a position mi the 
hoard of judges for such a contest, partic¬ 
ularly if the judges are expected to eat a 
piece of each pie— as wc think should be 
done. 
