834 
Tht RURAL NEW-YORKER 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
A few weeks ago I spoke of those wild 
strawberry plants which we collected last, 
year and 'brought back to civilization. I 
wish now I had said nothing about them. 
I must have been overcome for the 
moment by the great “domination of 
youth” which is flooding through the 
country and sweeping some of our ideas 
of experience out of life. I dug those 
plants from patches here and there about 
the farm on the theory that some of them 
might come up like the Baldwin apple or 
the Bartlett pear and prove superior. I 
i hould have remembered that the Baldwin 
did not need the care and petting of civil¬ 
ization to bring out its excellence. It was 
supreme even in the wilderness. When 
first found as a seedling in the woods the 
ground beneath it was well covered with 
superior apples. In fact, it was first 
called the “Woodpecker,” because the 
birds were specially fond of it. It has 
been the same with all these wild seed¬ 
lings which have added so much to our 
fruit culture. They proved superior as 
wild plants—otherwise they never would 
have been noticed. Evidently my plan of 
selecting wild plants at random, with no 
knowledge of their natural ability, is 
merely a poor gamble, with the chances 
about 1,000 to 1 against any hope of 
producing anything superior. It seems to 
be a rule of life—plant, brute or human, 
all three—that unless there be some 
superior power in the individual you can¬ 
not feed or pet it into extra quality. You 
can evidently improve the body by good 
feeding and care, but the spirit or quality 
or brain or character must be inherent. 
I dug these plants and put them in good 
soil alongside a patch of Marshalls. They 
had every care of culture, feeding and 
pruning that I knew how to give—and 
they certainly responded. This Spring 
they came on with a rush. Both leaf and 
bloom compared well with the Marshall, 
and were much larger than the plants in 
those wild patches where we dug them. 
Several plants in particular shot up above 
the Marshalls and were loaded with 
bloom. There was where I began to 
dream of a new seedling that would carry 
the name of “Hope Farm” as far along 
in history as the old Wilson strawberry 
had done. Of course, I should have 
known better. Have we not all seen 
smart boys graduating “with honors’’ at 
high schools or colleges as “valedictorian” 
or some other great office? They gave 
great promise 'for a time, but we have 
seen them end as quite ordinary clerks or 
“office men.” while the plodders and dig¬ 
gers who were quite overlooked in school 
came to the front with quality and suc¬ 
cess. Once in Florida our folks went out 
in the swamp and ran down a little 
razorback pig. They caught him, put 
him in a pen and fed him on the best of 
food. Did he wax fat and make a barrel 
of pork? He did not. He was born to 
the habit of fighting for his food—not to 
have it served up to him on a plate. 
Right in the same pen another pig with 
a razorback mother and a purebred 
father made such use of the food that he 
soon doubled the razorback in weight. 
And I have seen people select children 
for “bringing up.” Some of them want 
“beautiful children.” with sweet charac¬ 
terless faces and fine “ringlets.” They 
dress these poor kids like dolls—in fact, 
their idea of child life seems to be a sort 
of doll-dressing contest—and the children 
show it all through life. Others, more 
sensible, cut those ringlets off that they 
may see the shape of the head. You may 
put it down as a sure thing that the baby 
who wins a gold medal at one year will 
most likely be decorated with a leather 
medal at 50 years. 
Of course, I knew all this, and should 
have waited for the fruiting before talk¬ 
ing. but he who can refrain from a little 
bragging about his own children is some¬ 
thing more than a Spartan father ! Those 
plants were surely wonders to look at. 
The Marshalls alongside proceeded to do 
just what we may expect from that 
variety under good cultivation. The big 
flowers slowly but surely developed into 
berries—great red fellows—some of them 
nearly as large as a tennis ball. And into 
the firm flesh of these berries the plants 
packed away what I consider to be the 
most exquisite flavor ever put into any 
fruit. It was an inspiration to see them 
develop. We knew what they would do, 
for we did our part. But those wild 
plants? Right beside the Marshalls, on 
the same soil and with the same condi¬ 
tions. they have made the most miserable 
failure. Those great flowers wasted away 
into little soft fruits practically no larger 
than the wild fruit on the hill, and abso¬ 
lutely lacking in the flavor which makes 
the wild berry superior. 1 would just 
about as soon eat a piece of beeswax as 
to put one of those poor, overfed berries 
in my mouth. It was a great failure, and 
those plants will be spaded under ground 
at once. All they are fit for is to fer¬ 
tilize a row <>f Marshalls. They had no 
character to start with, 
lions of wild plants on 
no doubt there are half 
superior quality. If I 
Among the mil- 
m.v hills I have 
a dozen showing 
could find them 
and give them the care these worthless 
plants have had I have no doubt we could 
develop a great variety. But how are we 
1o find them? 1 have no doubt there are 
in the State of New Jersey half a dozen 
hoys with the brain and natural character 
which would fit them to become great 
leaders of men if they could be trained 
and developed in the right way. But how 
are we to find them with our present 
standards of education and our tests for 
human capacity? Well, at any rate, I 
have had my experience with wild seed¬ 
lings. They represent scrubs; Marshall 
represent pedigree or fixed character. 
I stood in the strawberry field thinking 
about this as the sun disappeared over 
our western hill. It had been a busy day 
and the evening brought coolness and rest. 
Mother sat out on the porch reading. A 
group of the children were playing cro¬ 
quet on the lawn. Cherry-top and the 
Japanese boy were practicing a few 
curves for the baseball game to be played 
on Saturday. Philip sat on the rock in 
the barnyard smoking his pipe and think¬ 
ing of his old home in Norway. As I 
stood there considering those wild and 
worthless plants I became aware that one 
of the wisest members of the family was 
beside me. For old Bruce, the big Aire¬ 
dale dog. had left his place on the lawn 
and had walked into the strawberry 
patch. There he stood with that wise old 
head at one side, contemplating me as I 
struck at one of those worthless plants 
with my hoe. Old Bruce can do every¬ 
thing but talk, and it seems to me at 
times that I can understand just what he 
is trying to say. A human being, with 
the dog’s thought in mind, would have 
said: 
“I am glad you have your lesson at 
last. I knew how it would come out. 
You cannot cut around any of Nature’s 
corners or hurry her along. How long 
has it taken me to develop from the wolf? 
Ages ago your ancestors and mine would 
have fought each other for the bone I 
have just hidden in the ground. You 
humans learned to use fire, which we 
never did. So now you boil the bones, 
scrape off the meat and throw what you 
cannot gnaw to me. Off in the center of 
Africa, or even in South America, there 
are so-called humans—your brothers, you 
might say—who still obtain fire by rub¬ 
bing two sticks together. Why do you 
not go and get a dozen of them, feed and 
house them well, and expect them to make 
superior hired men? That was about 
what they attempted under slavery, and 
the result was that the master became 
part slave. Abandon this field and let 
your Marshalls go back into the tangle of 
grass and weeds, and what would they 
come to? Little hard fruit, not much 
larger than these wild berries. The vines 
would exhaust themselves in the struggle 
for existence, so that there would be 
little vitality left for fruit production. 
Yet bring these plants or their children 
back into civilization and they would 
come back, for you cannot easily destroy 
the power of quality. These wild plants 
have lost their power, if they ever had 
any. You ought to know that you cannot 
bring it back simply by feeding them. 
Why don’t you try to breed their good 
qualities into the Marshall—or let them 
alone to their job of fighting for a use¬ 
less place?” 
***** 
The old dog glanced at the children on 
the lawn. There happened to be members 
of seven families grouped there. I could 
not make out whether he felt the same 
about children that he does about wild 
plants. Then he looked at me again, and 
I think I got his new thought. 
“You have done one good thing, though, 
and that is joining that co-operative socie¬ 
ty. For generations back my folks have 
lived on farms and served farmers. Most 
of these farmers have thought they could 
live by themselves, as individuals, with no 
man to boss them or tell them what to do. 
Juno 28, 2921 
I might have told them what would hap¬ 
pen. for one of the things which has been 
handed down to me for ages from my old 
ancestors is ‘The Law of the Jungle.’ One 
of your poets, Kipling, wrote a piece 
about it some years ago. That man un¬ 
derstood the wolf language, and he had it 
right. He said that the wolf made the 
pack strong, while the pack gave strength 
to the wolf. It is just the same with you 
humans—only more so. Why don’t you 
go in the house and read that poem? It 
applies to farmers even more than to 
wolves.” 
But Philip started to drive the geese 
into their pen, and Bruce walked solemn¬ 
ly down the lane to help him, like one who 
knew he has given wise advice which is 
likely to be wasted ! And little Rose came 
running to say good-night, for under day¬ 
light saving little folks must go to bed 
early. And so, as it grew dark, I went 
inside, borrowed my daughter’s volume of 
Kipling and read “The Law of the Jun¬ 
gle.” Here are a few lines from it. It 
seems to me that Bruce had it about 
right. 
“Now this is the law of the Jungle —as 
old and as true as the sky, 
And the wolf that shall keep it may pros¬ 
per, but the wolf that shall break 
it must die. 
“As the creeper that girdles the tree 
trunk, the law runneth forward 
and back. 
For the strength of the pack is the wolf, 
and the strength of the wolf is the 
pack. 
“Now these are the laws of the Jungle, 
and many and mighty are they, 
But the head and the hoof of the law. and 
the haunch and the hump is — 
obey !” 
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