1378 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
November 20, 1915. 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
Part I. 
Other Days.—A strange thing has 
happened—one of the things we read 
about and sometimes experience. It is 
the Sunday before Thanksgiving. I 
walked over the hills in the late after¬ 
noon, as I like to do when one of these 
old-time festivals draws near. The day 
has been cold and dismal, and Nature 
had put on her mournful colors of brown 
and gray—as I looked off over the wind¬ 
swept country. I came back through the 
chilling twilight very thoughtful, as peo¬ 
ple of middle years who know that they 
are sliding a little from the ridge of life 
may well be. I am sure that I heaped 
up the open fire until it blazed high, and 
sat down in my big chair before it. I 
knew it because I have the photograph 
clearly on my brain. The roaring fire, 
the big fireplace of stone, the flash of the 
firelight over my books, a glimpse of the 
stars outside, and a couple of the children 
sitting close by in the shadow. I saw 
them finally get up and go to the other 
room where the rest of the children are 
reading, and I knew I was left alone be¬ 
fore my fire—with a feeling growing 
stronger that in spite of years and wor¬ 
ries and many unfortunate things we had 
a houseful of things to be thankful for. 
Or,D Scenes.. —I know this is all so and 
yet, in some wonderful way, a miracle 
happened. Old Time came with his 
scythe and cut nearly half a century of 
years out of me with one swing, and 
Nature and Youth picked up what was 
left of me and threw it several hundred 
miles to the northeast. It landed on that 
little rocky, sterile farm in Bristol Coun¬ 
ty—down near Cape Cod. The old gilt- 
edged mirror hung beside the clock, and 
in it I saw myself—a fat, chunky little 
hoy sitting on a stool close beside the old 
air-tight stove. “Malty,” the gray 
cat, was rubbing her head against my 
arm. Strange how even old thoughts 
came back. My -father had been killed in 
the Civil War, and old Uncle Daniel and 
Aunt Mary Ann, on their lonely, rocky 
little farm, were “bringing me up.” I do 
not know that it is a good thing for a 
child to feel the injustice of life, but sit¬ 
ting on that little stool the lonely little 
hoy was trying to ask in his childish way, 
why it was necessary that the old home 
should be broken and the family scat¬ 
tered in order that people should say as 
they did —“Thank God we've got a coun¬ 
try!” Of course, that boy wanted people 
to have a country, but did it not cost too 
much when, on Thanksgiving Day, there 
must be miles between mother and sister 
and brother? I had not realized in years 
that these little people may see so clearly 
the injustice of life without realizing the 
compensation. 
Dull Day. —Outside the weather was 
about as bad as a New England Novem¬ 
ber can make. That is the limit of mean 
days, for there can be no greater contrast 
than between a June day on a New Eng¬ 
land hillside and a dull, gray day in a 
valley. There would be some life in a 
snowstorm, and a rain might give the re¬ 
lief which comes with tears, but the dull 
terror of the lifeless “gray” day chills you 
to the heart. There was a little crust o? 
frost on the earth, and a skim of ice on 
the pond. The trees had dropped their 
leaves. A flock of hungry crows flew 
over the swamp. Uncle Daniel had al¬ 
ready banked up around the house for 
Winter. The red cow stood by the barn 
with her back humped up like one who 
shrugs up his shoulders with cold. The 
big Brahma rooster stood with ruffled 
feathers and drooping head beside a shock 
of corn, while a couple of his wives looked 
out of the barn cellar as if they were 
telling him to come home before he caught 
his death of cold. 
Farm Supplies. —But while New Eng¬ 
land can, on occasion, put up a desper¬ 
ately poor day outside, it does not follow 
that the inside of the house is so gloomy. 
The two old people and the lonely little 
boy had their troubles, but from ’way 
back to Plymouth Rock it had been bred 
into them that come what might Thanks¬ 
giving was the day for putting the best 
foot forward, and without any kicking 
either. Why not? Sitting on my little 
stool I ran over our material blessings. 
The big wood pile would keep us in fuel. 
It was true that my stent was to cut the 
wood, but there was some little feeling of 
mastery about it after all. Down cellar 
there were at least five barrels of apples, 
three of potatoes, and a pile of turnips. 
There was a barrel of cider working 
away. I think that was temperance 
cider, for it worked hard to get inro 
vinegar before folks could drink it up. 
Uncle Daniel helped it along on sunny 
days by running it through shavings 
from one barrel to another. Then there 
was a bushel of carrots for “coffee,” a 
bushel of beans, a dozen big codfish, and 
the pig was safely resting in the pork 
barrel. The bees had not been as busy 
as they might, yet there was some honey. 
In the barn there were at least two tons 
of hay and some cornstalks for old Hero 
and the cow. The 20 Brahma hens would 
not lay an egg before March, but what 
society they were ! Business looked pros¬ 
perous, too. On the barn was a big sign 
“Coffin Warehouse,” for Uncle Daniel 
eked out his farming by selling coffins 
and making the boxes. Then in the lit¬ 
tle shop in the corner of the barn Uncle 
Daniel had his lathe. We worked it by 
foot power and did all the neighborhood 
turning, from a baseball bat to a stair 
post. Then, too, there was work at peg¬ 
ging shoes and braiding straw. Surely 
on that dark Thanksgiving Day we had 
been well remembered with blessings, and 
both the old people looked rather wist¬ 
fully up the road now and then as if they 
would like to have some one to share their 
bounty. 
Dinner. —One of the best things about 
this miracle was the real, true, smell of 
that dinner. I am inclined to think that 
with voting age the man loses the true 
joy of eating. Sitting on that little stool 
by the airtight stove I enjoyed what is 
denied forever to the millionaire. There 
was no turkey, but Aunt Mary Ann 
opened the oven door and exposed a fat 
Brahma hen. This foolish creature had 
demanded the right to brood at Thanks¬ 
giving. Here she was laying on fat for 
sitting when she should have been work¬ 
ing it off in thanks and eggs. Thanks¬ 
giving is no time for brooding, so she 
went into the oven and played turkey. 
Stuffed with the choicest dressing and 
swimming in rich gravy that Brahma hen 
looked so good that Uncle Daniel nearly 
frightened me out of a season’s growth by 
saying it was a shame ever to cut such a 
bird. Knowing something of the under¬ 
taking business I was afraid he would 
embalm it! Then there were potatoes so 
“mealy” and dry that they needed cases 
to hold them together. It was the old red 
Davis Seedling which I had planted and 
lioed. Mashed turnip and boiled onions! 
Then the squash! yellow and rich and 
fine. Tacked away in it was a lesson of 
life for me. It had been a dry Summer 
and part of my job had been watering the 
squash vines to carry them through. I 
had toiled out with a bucket of water 
and poured the drink out on the vines 
where the squash had formed. Uncle 
Daniel had shown me how the water was 
largely wasted in this way. It ought to 
go in at the hill and be pumped out 
through the long vines. Then, browning 
above the Brahma, was a thick mince pie 
with Greening apple and meat and rais¬ 
ins and a pinch of real spice. There is no 
wonder that Uncle Daniel went out and 
stood by the stove while I sat on the wood 
box and “Malty” licked her chops at a re¬ 
spectful distance. n. W. c. 
(To be continued.) 
Treatment ot Peach Orchard. 
I have a peach orchard of 50 trees set 
in Spring of 1014; have kept it well 
worked. Last Winter I put about eight 
quarts of clear hen'manure around each 
tree, and about the same amount of wood 
ashes. Trees have made a remarkable 
growth this year; have the ground well 
covered now with rye, rape and turnips, 
Is it best now to put on more manure, or 
would I better let them stand just as 
they are? d. s. 
Warren, Conn. 
Of course what is “a remarkable 
growth” to one man might be quite or¬ 
dinary to another, but we should think 
that these trees had made all the growth 
they ought to this year. We should let 
them alone and let the cover crop grow 
on so that the trees may finish their 
growth and harden up their wood for 
Winter. From this description we doubt 
if any more nitrogen is needed for these 
trees. Next Spring the cover crop may 
be plowed under, or cut and piled around 
those trees. It might pay to use more of 
the wood ashes next Spring, but we 
should no use more of the manure. 
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