 CHAPTER 1 OF PLOUD STORIES LONG AGO BEFORE PEOPLE HAD LEARNED TO WRITE AND TO FIGURE AS WE CAN, THOUSANDS OF YEARS BEFORE AMERICA WAS DISCOVERED, THERE WERE, IN THE ORIENT, THE BEGINNINGS OF MANY THINGS And beginnings are very interesting. If it were not for beginnings, you know, fine and finished inventions could never be. It is a great and wonderful thing to have a new and useful idea. Each of us begins life as a tiny baby with no real ideas at all, and little by little each baby begins to have ideas or thoughts. Other babies have had the same ideas before he was born, but to him they are quite new and interesting discoveries. When he is older and has learned to talk, he and other children begin to compare ideas and learn from each other. There is always this wonderful thing about a fine idea. You can give it away and yet keep it. You cannot do that with money or food or any other kind of things. The great countries of the world, with their different languages, were like babies who could not talk to each other at first, but they had ideas which made them do things. The first idea, in every country, was always the same. Food. In only very few countries can people keep well and strong without sewing and harvesting grain. Up in the frozen north they can, but elsewhere they must have grain, wheat, corn, rice and other grains of which we hear less. At first every man was a farmer planting and harvesting what he needed for his own family. Later on people began to divide the work and some men raised grain to exchange or sell. Grain has to be sown on soil that has been broken up and stirred and then it must be covered with earth so that it may have the darkness, moisture and warmth that it needs for growing. Besides having the right food ready within reach of its tiny rootlets as soon as those begin to appear. We do not know certainly in which country they first learned to plow the ground because there are no records to tell us that, but we do know that in several old eastern countries people had learned to plow thousands of years ago. It may have been in Egypt or it may have been in Assyria or Babylonia or it may possibly have been in some other Oriental country. What we do know is that men were making rude plows in all of these lands before they began cutting pictures on stone in Egypt or engraving them on clay to be baked into brick in Assyria and Babylonia. Pictures of stone and brick pictures have been found in these lands and many of them have been brought to museums of western countries for people to see. We know what the very early plows were like. We know that after nations were older and knew each other better they exchanged ideas and all were wiser and wealthier for doing so. When this happened men began to improve their plows but it took thousands and thousands of years and the thought and labor of many wise people to develop such ones as are used in this country. Now we have different kinds of plows for different kinds of soil as well as for different kinds of crops. Every man who discovered even the slightest improvement to a plow has helped thousands of people whom he never knew. And the Bible speaks of the blessed times of peace it says. And they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nations shall not lift up sword against nation neither shall they learn war anymore. When in 1872 people were sick and weary after our civil war men of different countries met in the city hall of Geneva Switzerland to make peace plans. The room in which they met was then named the Alabama Room and in it there were afterward placed a plow made from swords which had been used in war and a pruning hook also made from old weapons. There have been terrible wars since then and there may be more yet but the wisest men and women know that metal made into weapons bring sorrow and death and that metal made into farm tools brings health and happiness. Learn all you can about plows even if you live in a great city. City people would soon starve if there were no plows and plowmen at work to raise food for them. Not even the strongest locomotives or the most wonderful printing presses are so necessary to us as plows. Learn all you can about them. Chapter 2 Ever since the boy could remember his father and mother had lived near the banks of the Great River he and his brothers and sisters had to work almost all the time after they were old enough to do anything but they did not mind this very much because all children had to work every day except when there was some great festival when work stopped. They did not go to school because there were no schools for them. They did not rest on Sunday because there was no Sunday then. This was thousands of years ago even before Moses had received the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai and learned about the day of rest. The boy had never heard that women and girls had souls. He thought that it was pleasant to have them around his home because they ground the grain in handmills and made it into cakes to cook over their little fires. Then the men and the boys ate of these cakes and of the meat which the women and girls boiled or roasted for them. Afterward the women and girls were allowed to eat what was left and there was almost always some left. The boys' sisters helped their mother find fuel for the fire. Sometimes they gathered bundles of wood from the forests and sometimes they brought in straw and other fuel, bits of which they found here and there along the roads, where the oxen and camels and the donkeys passed with their burdens. They never had a fire to warm themselves by, for they did not need one. Their home was in Egypt so warm a country that fires were needed only for cooking. Sometimes the boy had to gather fuel too, but that was only when there were not enough girls to do it. Most of the time he helped his father in the fields, for his father is one of the Felaheen, or farmers, and farmers could work almost the whole year in Egypt where they could raise as many as three crops on their land if they could have water enough. Heavy rains fell in the fall and early winter when the land was carefully howed and the seeds sown. The only snow that the boy had ever seen was that which whitened the tops of the mountains. He had neither touched it nor had a chance to look at its beautiful six-sided crystals. In the summer there came a time when no rain fell and when it was too hot to work all day in the fields. Then people stayed in the shade and did more quiet tasks. Now the boy was called upon to help his father get the hose ready for putting in their grain crop. These hose were called sarkles and were made of two pieces of wood, one of which was straight and used as a handle and the other was curved and sharp. The two were tied together at their upper tips, with thongs, strips of leather, and there was also a second thong connecting them partway down, so that when the sharp end of the sarkles struck the ground the two pieces of wood would be less likely to be wrenched apart by the blow. Sarkles did not wear very long, because there was no metal on them, so the fellaheen got several ready before the time came to use them. The man, the boy's father, had a pile of heavy sticks both straight and curved, stacked beside him under a tree, and was cutting thongs of ox-hide. Come to me, boy, he cried, and I will show you how to make sarkles. You are my eldest son and old enough to use one. Now you must learn to make one. So the boy seated himself on the ground, near the man, and picked two sticks from the pile, one straight and one curved. Who taught you to make a sarkle, my father, said he? Who should teach me but my father, answered the man? That is the way in which all knowledge is spread. Fathers teach their sons, and when their sons are old they teach their sons the same thing. And do they never forget, asked the boy. Why should they forget, said the man? There are not many things to think about. Why should people forget any of them? One must know how to build a mud-house, how to keep water, how to make sarkles, and how to harvest his crops. Also one must know when to go to the temple, but the priests tell one that, surely one can remember those things. The boy was silent for a while, watching his father sharpen a crooked stick with a rude knife, which he had made from a stone. The last he spoke again. Do women teach their daughters in the same way, he asked? The man grunted crossly. Why talk about women? he said. They know less than cattle. They know little, but how to grind the grain and make the cakes and cook the meat. We have them around to make life easy and pleasant for us, but they know very little. The woman, who was making flour for the family's side when she heard her husband say this. Of course, she thought, the priests and the men must be right. Still there are days when I'm not too tired and when the weather is not too hot and the people are not too cross. When it really seems to me that I know a good deal. Then she went on with her grinding, for she had to grind many hours each day in order to make flour enough for that day's meals. Her daughters were not yet old enough to turn the heavy upper stone, although they could gather fuel and tend the sheep. Also they could gather the wild fruits which grew on the plains and the hillsides around about. Hundreds of years before, when their great, great, great, great grandparents lived in Asia, the women and girls did all the work in the fields as well as in the home. That was because the men had to spend all their time in hunting and fighting. Again the boy asked a question. Tell me, O my father, he said. Is there ever anything new for a man to teach to his sons? Never, answered the man. How could there be? Do we not already understand how to build houses, store water, make circles and harvest crops? To be sure, there are a few other things like caring for the animals that bear our burdens on their backs, but all these necessary things we know. What else is there to learn? The boy was silent again, for he could not answer that question, not knowing what there was that he did not know. Still he felt that there might be something more, after all, and he found his mother looking at him quite as though she thought so too. He decided then that he would talk it over with her. At some time when the man was not around. Now the man passed the knife to him and showed him how to cut thongs for his own circle. It was a heavy knife, and looked as though it would last a long time, perhaps even longer than the man would live. It cost a great deal of work to make a knife in those days, and people who had knives never left them lying around, either out of doors or in. Still mourning the boy wrought beside the man, and again all afternoon, and when the sun was sinking low in the west and they ate their meat and dough cakes with fruit from the mountainside, which the women had dried in the hot summer sun, they had a pile of neatly made circles ready for use. Then the man and the boy, and the boy's younger brothers, sat on the ground and ate and were happy, for the man was a hard worker and the woman was a good and busy one. And none of the fellow heen had a better hut, nor more food for his children, the fine-looking boys who had minds and souls and the equally fine-looking girls who were said to have neither. Early the next morning the man and the boy began to work with the newly made circles, the soil was rich with the richness which their great river, the Nile, had been bringing to the land from the middle of Africa for hundreds of years. Whenever the Nile became swollen with rains it overflowed its banks and spread this richness over the level plains on either side. When the water went down, this richness, or alluvium, as we call such water-born richness, remained on the plains and that is why all Egypt was sometimes called the gift of the Nile. Such which soil did not need to be deeply stirred and turned over before the seed was sown, indeed neither the man nor his friends nor his father nor his father's friends had ever heard of stirring the soil before planting their grain. Sometimes they even sowed their seed before all the water had sunk into the ground. Sometimes they spoke of doing this as casting their bread upon the waters. They knew that it was not wasting their bread grain, for it would come back to them after many days, in the shape of much more grain than they had sown. The man had not sown his grain early this year, for there were more fowls of the air around than usual ready to devour it. First of all he and the boy scattered the grain over as much land as they expected to work that day. They carried the grain in vessels made of clay and flung it broadcast with swinging motion of the right hand, and one handful at a time. When they had done this they went back and forth across the field with circles hoeing the soil. This stirred the soil in such a way that part of the grain was covered and the rest of it fell into little crevices, where the moist earth surrounded it, and the rootlets would find strength giving food ready for them on all sides when they appeared. It was hard work this bending almost double all day and raising and lowering the clumsy wooden circles. They had to grasp them well out of the handles with their left hands and hold them far enough away from their bodies to make sure that the sharpened points did not strike their bare feet on the downward stroke. When night came they were glad to rest under the trees after eating the good meal which the women had ready for them. Then the work of the day being done the children played around. Some of them took up the earth-stained circles and pretended that they were feline. The girl and her sister next younger both wanted to use the boy's circle, and at last they fell to quarrelling about it. The younger sister had it and the girl tried to get it away seizing the end of the handle and dragging it towards her. The younger sister hung on to the part where the ends of the two sticks were lashed together, but the girl was the stronger of the two and dragged both the circle and her little sister towards her. The circle point catching in the soft soil as she did so. The woman looked up when she heard the noise and came towards them to stop the quarrel, as mothers have done since the world began. She saw the circle point catching in the soil and loosening it, and instead of slapping her children, as she had meant to do, she laughed and said, That is a new way to use a circle. You stir the ground by dragging it instead of by chopping with it, but it would cover the seed exactly as well, and you do not have to keep lifting it. Each of the children cried, Make her, let go! The woman shook her head, No. This is a good new way to use a circle, she said. Why not play this way? I have always thought that it would be fun to do something really new. Her children looked at her in surprise. They had never heard their mothers speak in this way. It sounded as though she actually cared to do something besides the same old tasks day after day, which shows that they also had a new idea. The woman spoke again. Let me take the circle, she said. I will give it back to you. She turned it about in her strong, work-hardened hands, setting it up with its point in the soil, tilting it this way and tilting it that. And then she said, Bring me two sticks from the fuel pile, and I will make you a play-circle. That will be lighter and better for you than this. Then with which two can play at once. Now the girl and her sister did not want the real circle back. They wanted the one which their mother was to make for them, and they fetched it gladly when she called for a straight stick, which should be longer than the one that they had first brought. The woman put the sticks together, first this way, then that, and when she had them as she wanted them, she tied them together. She did not fasten them by two tips as circles were usually fastened. Instead she tied the end of a long straight stick to the middle of the curved one. Now she said, when she had it quite secure, the girl shall drag this with her hands behind her back, and her little sister shall hold the upper end of the curved stick and guide it. This pleased her children, and they began to play happily again. The woman stood watching them, how strong the girl is, she said to herself, she is like a young ox. The man heard her, and suddenly sat straight looking intently at the new tool. He said nothing, but he looked and looked and looked until it grew dark, and they all lay down to sleep. In the morning the man arose, while as yet it was hardly light, and he took a pole which he had already shaped for something else, and hooked it to two circles, thrusting the end of it between them at a point which was half way from their sharp to their blunt ends, and made it quite secure. By the time he had done this the woman was up in preparing breakfast, but when she had it ready he was busy with his oxen. These steady patient beasts had bore great burdens on their backs and were used at harvest time to tread out the grain from the sheaves which lay on the ground, but they had never drawn anything after them. Now the man felt of their horns and said these are good pegs to tie to. When he had eaten the man again busied himself with his oxen, he cut notches in the free end of his long straight pole, and he lashed a cross piece to it. Then he lashed the cross piece to the horns of the oxen, and then the woman and the boy and the girl and the younger children watched him as he worked, but the woman was grinding at the stone mill which was on the ground by the door of the hut while she watched. She knew that it took many times as long to grind the grain as it did to eat it, and that she had no time to spare. When he had finished tying the wooden cross piece to the horns of the oxen the man called the boy and the girl to him. Walk on either side of the oxen, he said, while I try and make them drag these circles through the ground. Carry whips or gourds in your hands to prevent their turning when I do not wish them to, and I will carry one to make them go ahead. I am tired of lifting and lowering a circle all day during the seeding time. I will try this way. Thus far no oxen had ever dragged a weight behind them. For it was before the days of carts, even before the days when men put rollers under blocks of stone and forced beasts to drag them. Of course the oxen did not understand what was expected of them, but they could not go sideways and they could not go backwards, and they had no wings for flying, so when they found that they were beaten for standing still they decided that they must walk ahead and they did so. The boy liked this better than swinging his circle, and the girl enjoyed it more than carrying firewood, and the man was very proud of the success of his plan. In spite of the bewilderment of the oxen, all were quite contented and pleased. The other children followed along to watch them, and the woman, well, the woman kept on grinding at the mill. Soon other fellow heen saw that something unusual was happening. They dropped their circles in the fields and they came over to where the man was forcing his oxen to stir the soil for him. It is true that the circles which they dragged made long furrows, instead of simply chopping the soil into loose little lumps, but the green, which had been sown, dropped into the furrows and the little crevices quite as it should, so that it was all right. It would lie there and sprout quite as well as if the ground had been chopped apart, to make places for it and to cover it. The fellow heen began to talk loudly and excitedly, and as they talked they gestured with their hands. Look at those oxen, cried one, who would ever have thought that they could be taught to drag things? See how the man has fastened that pole to their horns, cried another, who would have ever thought of doing that? I thought of it, said the man, and he stood very tall and swelled out his chest as he spoke. Why should one not use their horns, since they have them? See how long a straight pole he used, in place of the shorter circle handle, cried another, how did he ever come to think of doing that? It had to be long, of course, said the man, in order to reach their horns. Why couldn't he tie the circles to their tails? asked another. Then he would not have to use so long a pole. Yeah! exclaimed another fellow, or farmer. If you tied their tails in that way, how could they switch away flies? Poo! exclaimed another. If you tied it to their tails, they might turn their heads into quite different directions, and then where would your circles go? The man was more and more pleased with himself as he heard the loud remarks of his neighbors, but he made his oxen and his children keep at work. To think of using two circles at once, exclaimed another fellow, I wonder how he came to do that. Don't you see that it gave him a better fastening for his pole, said another? And he spoke quite scornfully, for he found it very easy to see the sense of a thing which had already been done, even though he could never have thought of doing it. Then two or three fellow heen spoke together. The great thing, they said, is the idea of turning the circles around so that they point forward instead of backward. How did he ever think of that? The man stopped his oxen beside the fellow heen who had just spoken. It was all very simple, he said, speaking quite as though the invention of the new implement were in everyday affair for him. For some time I have been thinking that there should be an easier way of stirring the soil and seed time. Besides, it is silly that fellow heen should work all the time while their oxen stand idle so much. Since a man can think, why should he not? The man spoke to his oxen and was starting on, but he stopped them again and spoke to his neighbours once more. His manner was very haughty now. When you speak of my new tool, he said, do not call it a circle or a pair of circles. I have made a new name for it. It is a plow. I shall now go on with my plowing. The fellow heen all murmured admiringly and turned away to take up their circles in their own fields. The girl looked at the woman, and the boy looked at the girl. But the woman, who had heard all that was said, kept on grinding at the mill. Now she was thinking I know that I have a mind. Chapter 2 A tall slender woman in a brown dress bent over a bed in the corner of a large single room-log cabin where three boys lay sound asleep. Joseph, she said, Jonathan, William, the sun's almost up, and it is time for thee to be stir thyself. Hast thou forgotten that today they are to begin the plowing of the common? There will be a chance for steady and mannerly boys to ride on the plows which their fathers are guiding. Three sturdy lads sprang from their bed, as though they had been pushed out by the one great spring, and the six feet came down upon the punchin' floor at almost the same instant. This was the day for which they had been waiting, and when they ran to the open door to look at the sky there is not even one small cloud to be seen. That was good, and it was good to be able to play a bit as they dressed. It was Monday morning, and most the day before had been spent in church. Their tops and balls were put away, and the doll belonging to their little sisters laid carefully in the cupboard. They scrambled about to dress quickly, and Joseph, in trying to fasten his rough shirt, pulled off a button which flew across the floor and disappeared. It was not the top button, and he did not stop to find it. His mother was bending over the open fireplace, stirring porridge in a black iron kettle which hung there from the iron crane. Behind the curtain in another corner the boys could hear their sisters, Betsy and patience, talking as they dressed. The porridge is ready, their mother said, dipping out large portions into the oranges which sat on the table nearby. There will be a taste of sugar on it for those who are ready betimes. The children rushed out of the door to the spring where they washed their hands and faces in Jonathan's slyly sprinkled William as he shook the water from his hands. There was a rough towel hanging outside the cabin door, but there was only one and the children shook off all the water they could before using it. It would be damp enough at best before the last one got to it. They were hardly seated at the table, the smaller ones standing to eat, as was the custom in those days, when their father a tall and strong-looking man bowed his head and asked a blessing on the food. A spoonful of maple sugar was then given to each child, and it was a great treat. Truly they thought this is a wonderful day. Joseph had not tasted his porridge when his mother spoke sternly. Joseph, she said, passed thou lost a button from thy shirt. It came off when I was dressing, he replied, me thinks it is on the floor. And thou didst not pick it up, his father said, put down thy spoon and hunt for it at once. Thou knowest that no buttons are made in this new land, and that for every one which is lost another must be brought over from England in a sailing vessel to replace it. Thou shalt eat no breakfast until thou hast found the missing button, and thou shalt not go to the plowing until it is replaced. Very soberly Joseph arose from his stool beside the table, and began his search between the punches or rough slabs which covered the floor of beaten earth. Jonathan, looking round, thought he saw the edge of the button, but he kept still and let Joseph search. Miss Freeman, the mother of the family, spoke to them all. Thou knowest, she said, that it is good of father to buy the buttons when so many children have but tapes to fasten their clothes together. We have but little money for such binaries, so thou must be careful. Our food and our firewood and our yarn and cloth come from our land but our tea, our coffee, our spices, our buttons, and a few other things must be bought with what we can raise to sell or what we can earn by working for others. She bent over to help the little patience manage her spoon, and then arose to lift the baby from his rough wooden cradle with its wooden hood. And Jonathan caught Joseph's eye, and motioned to him where to look. Jonathan were not allowed to speak at mealtime, you know, unless to answer questions, so he had to tell him by emotion of the hand. Joseph was quick to understand, and was soon back to his cooling porridge on which the sugar was slowly melting. The meal was soon finished, the father took down the huge Bible from its shelf, and all listened to his reading and knelt with him in prayer. Then they scattered to do the morning tasks. The boys, hurrying to finish theirs before their father, should be ready to start with his oxen to the common for the plowing. In those days, you know, the farmers all lived in the villages, with only as much land about each house as we have in one or two squares in town. Each man's lot was long and narrow, so that the houses, which were built on the front ends of the lots, were quite close together. This was done in order that they might protect each other from war-like Indians and from wild beasts. Every farmer had his bit of pasture land, and his bit of meadowland, somewhere near. And there was a large stretch of good plow land called the common, where each man had a portion on which to raise his crops. This was fenced in, and all the men helped build and repair the fence in order that the cattle might be kept out. The sheep which grew the wool for their clothing were kept on an island where the wolves could not reach them. Now the committee had decided what should be planted on the common, and when the plowing should begin. Each man had to plow his own part of it, and plant his own crops, so there would be working there at one time all the men of the village, except the few who had to guard the cattle or attend to other public duties. At noon the women were to spread a dinner table near the common in order that the men could be well fed without returning to their homes. The little girls were to care for the babies and help their mothers, and all the boys who weighed enough were to take their turns at riding the plows. Boys and girls worked hard in those days, and were not allowed to go much into gatherings where they could talk or listen to the talk of others. So this was a great day for them. They wore their working clothes, of course. But for them it was a day somewhat like Thanksgiving or Christmas. Boys, called Master Freeman, yes, father, replied Joseph, Jonathan, and William, help me load the plow upon the wagon. All took hold with a will. Twelve-year-old Joseph, ten-year-old Jonathan, and eight-year-old William, and the clumsy plow was soon lying on the old wooden wagon. When it was loaded, Master Freeman stood back and looked at it with a strange expression. My sons, he said, that is like a bit of old England to me. There the farmers are using plows like that, but on fields that are much different. If it were not sinful to make an idol of wood or stone, I could almost make an idol of that. He was a wonderful man who first made a plow. Plows make it possible for us to live in this new land and to grow the grains which English born people need. But for plows we could not live here, for we do not know how to live upon wild fruits and grains and game only as the Indians do. The boys could not remember England, but they could think what it would mean to have no store of grain and roots to put away for winter, so they stood quite silent and respectful while their father spoke. When thou art older, he said, the elder shall tell thee how the Flemish and the Dutch made good plows when many other peoples were still using crooked sticks to stir the soil. Then the English copied their plows. If I mistake not, some Englishmen will yet improve the Dutch plow, for Englishmen are thinkers too. The father removed his hat and looked up to the sky. God gave us the soil, he said, and it is he who sends its sunshine and shower to bless the crops which we plant. We must thank him for them, and we must also thank him that he hath put it into the mind of man to fashion plows, with which to prepare the soil. A plow brings new soil to the surface. It uproots the old growths and turns them under to rot and to enrich the ground, and it gives the air a chance to sweeten and strengthen the soil. Much is needed to bring to our storehouses the grain, from which thy mother makes her fine brown loaves to steam in the kettle in the fireplace and dry off on the hearth afterward. We must go to our work, he added. It is not fitting that we should tarry here while our neighbours prepare to toil, but I would have thee use thy minds as well as thy hands. Who knows, but one of thee, my sons, may yet make a finer plow than this? Lay thy hands upon the mouldboard of this plow, which our village carpenter hath made. Lay them where the blacksmith hath fastened on strips of iron to strengthen and protect it. Then lay them on the iron chair and colter, and as thou layest them there, be thankful, and resolve ever to respect and care for thy tools and implements. Joseph and Jonathan laid their brown hands on opposite sides of the mouldboard. There and colter, and William laid his smaller ones beside Jonathan's. Come now, said their father, bring out the oxen, and we will go to the common. Once there they found other men and boys preparing to turn their furrows, each man making sure where his portion of land lay and pulling his plow to the starting place. The boys, besides riding the plows, to hold them down while their fathers guided them, were often called on to help in little ways, to fetch jugs of cold water from the nearest spring, or to follow behind their fathers and kick apart the largest of the upturned clods with the toes of their stout homemade boots. Come, Joseph, said Master Freeman, you are my eldest son, you shall ride first. Joseph stepped forward to take his seat, but drew back. He had caught sight of Jonathan's face, and he remembered Jonathan's help in his hunt for the button. I will take my turn last, sir, he said. I owe Jonathan a kindness, and this is William's first deer at plowing. I will wait, Master Freeman was surprised. For Joseph was not always so thoughtful, but he answered only, so be it then, and called Jonathan to weigh the plow, while William sat by to be at hand when called, and Joseph followed to break the largest clods. The plow was not a smooth-running one, and Jonathan's seat was not easy, but for a boy of the colonies it was great fun. It was the only chance to ride, which he ever had in his simple and busy life. It was fun to watch the steaming sides and flanks of the oxen ahead of him, to look off at the forest from which the settlers got their firewood, to listen to the wild birds, and at every second turn to catch a glimpse of the Atlantic Ocean sparkling in the sunshine. He thought his father's plow the very best on the common, and indeed it was. No two were exactly alike. The moldboards were usually made from a section of the tree trunk that had a winding grain shaped by the owner or the village carpenter, and protected with whatever iron they had to use. Even old horseshoes had been used in this way. The land sides were also wooden, and shod with iron. The shares were of iron, and sometimes had hardened steel points. The cooters, those cutters, which were attached to the plow beams, to cut the turf, were also of iron edged with steel. The wooden beams were usually straight, and the handles which arose from them were usually made from the crooked roots of the white ash. Some of the farmers used one-handed plows, carrying sticks in their free hands, with which they constantly scraped the dirt from their moldboards. These one-handed implements turned an even shallower furrow than the two-handed ones, and none plowed deeply. But the land was new and rich, and it would yield well for years, even with shallow plowing. When William was called to take his turn, Jonathan took Joseph's place and followed his father down the furrow. Master Freeman looked kindly at Joseph, and told him to do whatever he chose for a time that he was not needed just then, and Joseph asked if he might run to the forest and back. Master Freeman consented and Joseph was off, first removing his heavy shoes and stockings. He had set a baited hook in the forest, hoping to catch a wolf, which had been seen prowling about recently. It was a stout iron wolf hook, and it was well covered by a piece of fat pork, quite enough to tempt any beast of prey. Over the fields he ran, enjoying it as only boys could, who were given so little chance to play in rom. Indeed he was going so fast, as he neared the forest, that he almost crashed into the laurel bushes where his trap was set. There was a wolf lying dead, with the hook in his mouth, a fine, large, young wolf. He was, with an unspoiled skin which would be good for many things. Joseph went up to him very carefully, thinking that he might be only pretending to be dead, but when he had made sure of it he loosened the chain of the hook from the sapling to which it had been fastened, and started back with the wolf on his shoulders. Such a proud boy as he was, it was his first wolf, although he had caught many smaller animals in his homemade traps, and had even sold a few beaver skins the last winter to be shipped to England. He was a warm boy when he got back with his burden, for he had gone as fast as he could, but he was proud, proud, proud, as he drew near the field one man after another caught sight of him and paused, on the near side of the common to await his coming. Mr. Hopkins was the first to greet him, a kindly old man, who preached long sermons, but loved all the boys of the town. Joseph, thou hast done well for the settlement with thy hook, he said. Of late this wolf hath lived too well on suckling pigs and young hens. He must be the same for which our men hunted last week. Men came other men to look at it and speak a kindly word, and last of all came his father, who had chanced to be at the far side of the common, and had waited to plow his way back. May I carry the wolf on my lap when I ride the plow, asked Joseph? Nay, nay, answered Master Freeman, thou knowest better, if thou wilt but think, for the smell of the beast would frighten the oxen. Bring it up on this side of the common, where the wind will carry the smell away from them. Then thou canst see it whenever thou art coming this way. Later I will help thee skin it, and tan the pelt, it shall be thine own to sell or to use. So Joseph took his seat on the plow, feeling very happy and proud. It was a fine day, his father and even the elder had praised him. His wolf hung from a tree nearby. He had been kind to his younger brothers, and the women of the settlement would soon spread forth a wondrous dinner in the grove beyond. What more, he thought, could a boy of the colonies want. End of Chapter 3 Chapter 4 of Plow Stories by Clara D. Pearson A few years before the American War of the Revolution, a French man, named Alphonse Ribor, was drowned in the Mississippi River by the upsetting of the old E-Rogue, a canoe made from a hollowed out log, in which he was carrying some casks to the settlement below. Alphonse Ribor was a strong man and a good one. He worked hard and he was one of the best farmers in what was then called Upper Louisiana, and many of the kindly French settlers who lived near him felt that they had lost one of their best friends. The widow Ribor and her two children, Renee and Marie, talked long with the village priest, Father Bonneen, as to their future. I do not wish to leave my so pleasant home by the river, said widow Ribor. Alphonse built it with his own hands, and there I lived from the time I was a bride. You do not think that I should sell it, no? No, my daughter answered the priest gravely. At first it will be hard for you to manage your farm, but Renee here is large for his sixteen years and he is a good boy. He will be a fine farmer like his father before long, meanwhile, before he is strong enough for the plowing and the other heavy work, wrench your farmland to some neighbor and let Renee keep himself busy with other tasks. I think that I am strong enough to do it all now, Father, said Renee, squaring his shoulders and standing as tall and straight as he could. Not so, not so, said the kindly priest. These shoulders will have enough burdens to bear soon, and there is no returning to childhood after one is grown. Wait a bit, my son, and busy yourself with other things. There is no lack of work in a new country like this for youths like you, and you can fill your good father's place in many ways already. He is a good boy, said the widower bore. I lean upon him now. Never a cross or disrespectful word does he give me, and Marie here is fast learning all the arts of the household. May the good God bless you all, said Father Bonif, raising his right hand in the gesture which the French Catholics loved, and help you to honour the name of Alphonse Reboire. So they went back to the strong long house, which had stood for seventeen years on the village lot of the Reboire family. It was not built as the English colonists built theirs, for the French way was first to dig trenches where the walls were to stand, and then to set logs upright in the trenches, packing the soil firmly around them, and grading the height of those on the ends to support the slanting thatched roof. Every house had its front and its back porch, or gallery as the French settlers called it, made by the roof extending beyond the walls, and on these galleries much of the work of the household was done in the warm weather. Under the gallery roofs the walls of each house were neatly plastered over, with a mixture of mud and lime. In front of each house was a space enclosed by a picket fence, and behind each was another picket enclosure containing a thrifty garden. Elsewhere were the tilled fields, and the vineyards, and elsewhere also the common pasture, where grazed the goats and the small black cattle of the villagers. Here, as in the English colonies of the East, the settlers dwelled close together for company and for protection from their enemies, going to and from their fields. Rene was soreful. He did not wish to be treated as a child. He was already as tall as his father had been, and he looked forward to the time when Widow Reborn should permit him to have his father's gun, powder horn, and bullet pouch, and hunt as he had done. The widow Reborn saw this, and put her work-hardened hand upon his shoulder. See, Rene, she said. The weight poles, which hold the thatch in place, are slipping. No wonder that our last heavy rain came through. You are the man of the house now. Even though I shall rent my grain-land to my neighbour, Dino, why not make it neat again, to-morrow? And when the new straw is ready, you shall try your hand at making us a new roof. Your father said that you were very handy when helping him thatch the stable last year. And I will cook you a great dish of meat with onions when you finish, cried Marie. And I will make you meal-cakes to eat with maple syrup, quite as our mother did, for our father and you last year, such a feast as it was. Then Rene felt more cheerful. He was to be the man of the house after all, and he reached down to pet the shaggy dog that arose to greet them. Then he looked up at the roof which he was to repair. It was spring, and here and there tiny green shoots were appearing in the straw of the old thatch, where seeds that had lean under the winter snows were beginning to sprout. They were starting earlier than those in the forest, for they were warmed by both the sunshine and the heat from the big stick and clay chimney at one end of the house. It was only at the chimney end of the thatch that green appeared, and the seeds that sprouted were those of the earliest wild flowers. See my children cried the brave widower bore, every little seed is doing the very best it can, even though it cannot live, as it would choose to, on the rich black soil of the prairie. We must be as courageous as the plants in the thatch, and do the very best that we can, even though our hearts are sad. It was not long before they had eaten their supper of meal-cakes and dried buffalo meat, with also a bit of goat's milk cheese, which the widower bore had made, quite as her grandmother had been used to making it in France. Then after their black cows and Nanette their favourite goat had been fed and milked, the little family of three laid down on their piles of skins, which served as beds, and slept soundly until daylight. It is true that an open lamp, with its rag-wick floated in oil, hung from the centre of the rough ceiling, but it was seldom lighted, except in mid-winter, when the nights were so long that even the most tired could not sleep from sunset to sunrise. Then it was the custom of the family to sit close together between the flashing flames of the fireplace, and the sputtering, winking yellow flame of the lamp, and attend to their various bits of handiwork. There could be no reading aloud, for very few of the settlers owned even a single book. But the widower bore, and in his day her husband, the good Alphonse, had told the children wonderful tales of that beautiful France from which their forefathers had come. Even the children, sitting wide-eyed on their rude stools, or close together on the roughly made bench, would ask many questions. Tell us how they built their log-houses in France, Renee once said. Do all the men in the settlement help as they do here? And do the women make a feast for them afterward? But no Alphonse rebore replied, there the houses are built of stone, which can be handled by one or two men only. They have less trees, and more stone than we who dwell in Upper Louisiana. How strange, exclaimed Renee, one would think that everyone must live in a log-house. And there are no Indians there, whatever, asked the small Marie, not even one in all that beloved land, answered her father. But you must not fear the Indians, my daughter. They are kind to the friendly French settlers. We buy pelts of them, and we treat them fairly. The white people from other lands have often been cruel to them, and it is they who need to fear Indians, not we. Often too the children would ask, why did our forefathers leave France if they loved it so? The reply of Alphonse rebore was always the same. And if, as sometimes happened, he had on a cap at the time, he always removed it before answering. He did this quite as he removed it before entering the little log church where on Sunday's father Benin preached to the people of the settlement. They came, he said, because America is the land of opportunity for all those who are willing to work hard and live plainly, and do that which they know to be right. When your grandparents left France, only those who were born wealthy and noble families could find opportunities there, chances to learn and to live comfortably. Then Renée and Marie always looked about their snug log cabin home, with the inside of its walls so neatly dobbed with clay, and its floor of punchins which their father had split from forest trees, and which often rocked slightly when troddened upon. They could remember very well the time when their floor was only mud, pounded level, and dried, so they thought that they understood what it meant to live in a land of opportunity. Living floors were so much warmer in winter than those of mud only. Also, it was possible to hide things under them. The morning after their visit to Father Benin, the widow rebore and her children awakened early. It was a busy morning in the settlement, for all the men were farmers, and this was the first day suitable for the spring plowing. Nearly every rough little log barn oxen were being led forth and yoked in pairs. The yolks were of wood, quite straight, and tied to the animal's horns, with strips of untanned leather. A few farmers had horses, but only a few. These wore harnesses of braided rawhide. Plows were also brought forth from the out-of-the-way corners, where they had been stored away from rain and snow. They were just such plows as had been used by the settlers' forefathers in France. They were of roughly hewn wood, with only one piece of iron in each. That piece was a small plow share fastened to the wood in such a way as to cleave the earth. It had a hole in the forepart of the share, in which the front end of the wood was placed. And the two were then firmly bound together with rawhide. The handles were so short and crooked that the plowman walked almost on his plow. The beam of the plow was straight, and was laid on the axle of a low-wield carriage. There were holes on the plow beam, so arranged that it could be raised or lowered on the axle to make the furrows shallower or deeper, as the farmer might wish. Rene had to drag forth the rebourg plow and yoke the rebourg oxen to it. For farmer Deneau had so much land of his own, that he and his oxen would be kept busy there. And his eldest son, Gaston, was to plow the rented land with the rebourg plow and oxen. It was hard for Rene, when he had to hand Gaston the ox gourd and see him drive away the faithful animals, which had always hitherto been driven by his father, and which he so longed to drive. Tears stood in his eyes as he watched 18-year-old Gaston Deneau guiding the creaking plow down the street of the settlement toward the rebourg fields. Clearly enough the settlers seldom greased the wooden wheels of their carts and their plows, and since these were but rough affairs, the wheels being sometimes mere cross-sections of logs, the little processions starting off that morning was a noisy one. When it was gone Rene found himself the oldest youth remaining. During the settlement saved Joseph Cortale, and Joseph was there only because he had a broken leg. The men remaining were those too old and feeble to work in the fields. It was not strange that Rene's eyes filled with tears, and his heart with bitter longing. Still, he had the sense to do the work which had been given him to do, and to do it as well as he could, and that always comforts one. He brought the homemade ladder from the barn and leaned it against the end of the house. Then he went off in search of rawhide thongs, with which to tie the weight-poles in place. He found a few long ones, and he crowded part of them into the pockets of his short buckskin trousers, and the rest into the breast of his buckskin jacket. After he had done this he climbed to the roof and busied himself with a thatch, filling in the places where it was too thin, with what he took from those places where the sliding weight-poles had piled it too thickly. Rene was on the highest part of the roof when a faint cry made him pause in his work and look off in the direction of the river. The heavy wind of the week before had blown down one of the trees along the shore, and it lay with its upper branches almost touching the farther side. General Eugenie Cortade had walked out as far as she could on the fallen trunk and lost her footing in trying to turn around for the return trip. It was her scream which Rene had heard, and now she was struggling in the water, held by the branches of the tree from being swept downstream, but too young and too badly frightened to grasp and hold them. They leaped to the ground, not waiting to use the ladder, and ran to the shore and the fallen tree, taking off his buckskin jacket as he went. He saw no other person outside the houses which he passed, and he had neither time nor breath for calling his neighbors out and explaining. He simply ran, with all the ease and speed which resulted from his many races with French and Indian lads. Just on the fallen tree he sped until near enough to plunge into the icy water and seize the small Eugenie, who was half crazed by fright. She threw her arms about his neck, and would have dragged him down with her, save that he was able to hang to the branch with one hand. "'Let go, Eugenie,' he said. "'Let go of my neck. Rene will not let you drown if you do that. If you hold Rene so tightly, he can never get you out of the water, and carry you home never, never.' Still Eugenie kept her small arms about his neck, and Rene began to think that both would drown before help came. It was then that he set his quick French mind to work and remembered the thongs in his pocket. He wound his legs around one of the branches under the water, and then he let go of the one which he had been grasping with his right hand. When that was done he fished a stout thong from his pocket, and, working slowly and patiently with a struggling child, tied it about her below the arms, fastened the ends of it securely together, and then passed the loop thus made over a stout stub above his head. This he felt sure would hold her head above the water while he climbed onto the tree trunk. Next he gently but firmly unwound her clinging arms and drew away so that she could not reach him. The rest was not dangerous, but it was far from being easy. Rene shivering and half-frozen, and much hampered by his wet garments and heavy moccasins, swam to a branch suitable for climbing, gained a footing on the tree trunk, crept to a point above the child, lifted her up by the loop of rawhide until he could clasp her in his arms, and then made his way slowly back to the home shore, holding her with her face and head down, in order that any water which she had breathed in might more easily drain away. Madame Cortade had just stepped out on her front gallery as Rene returned with her only daughter, her beloved six-year-old, dripping and only half-conscious in his arms. She screamed and filled the air with her exclamations of horror and of gratitude, but she kept her wits about her and swung the house door open on its leather hinges. Rene bore the child inside and lay her in front of the great fireplace, where the bake kettle and the soup kettle stood in their banks of coals and hot ashes. Where was she? asked Madame Cortade. I had just missed her and gone to look. She is so big now that she lifts the peg latch of the gate, and she is one little squirrel for quickness. For climbing also is she one little squirrel, said Rene. She went out on the tree which lies in the river, went out until she fell, then alas she was not one little beaver for swimming. My poor little one, exclaimed Madame Cortade, and you were by the river and saw her? No, but I was on our roof, mending the fat, she answered. I was high up, so that I saw and quiet so that I heard. She arouses herself now, Madame, so pardon me, I go to recover my coat and dry myself. That night when all the farmers were back from their fields, the cows and goats milked and all the stock warmly stabled, the sturdy French settlers took their lanterns in their hands and made their way to the home of Madame Reboire. Perhaps she knew that they were coming. At all events the single lamp was burning and there were fresh homemade candles in her two candlesticks, ready to be lighted with a splinter from the fireplace. Also a bright fire blazed upon the hearth. Suddenly the visitors swung the gate open on its clumsy hinges of wives, and quietly they lifted the latch string of the heavy house door. Quietly then they flocked in to where René clad in his dry buckskins was whittling out a squirrel trap, then Father Benin stepped forward and laid a hand on the lad's shoulder. René he said, your friends have come to thank you for what you did today. It is not alone that you saved the small Eugenie, although that is much, but you showed us all that you are a worthy son of our beloved Alphonse. With his goodness, his quick wit, and his so great courage we all thank you, and I bestow on you my blessing. Others came crowding forward as the old priest finished. They seized his hands and they kissed him on both cheeks in true French fashion, while they spoke their thanks. Then they bestowed some little gift upon him. One woman laid a dish on the table beside him, a pâté, she said. I made it for my best dried cherries. Farmer Corte gave him a fine new coonskin cap, with the tail hanging down on the back. It was made for our Joseph, he said, but Joseph wishes you to have it. And so it went, with simple homemade gifts piling up on the rough table, sometimes a present like a cap for René alone, sometimes a bag of hickory nuts or walnuts, which he could share later with his mother and his sister, but whatever it was always given with a kindly word, which meant even more to the happy boy than the gift itself, than the visitors left, for the hour was late for people who must arise with the sun. As the door closed behind, the last one Marie threw her arms around her brother's neck and cried, I am so proud of you, my brother. Widowrebor did not speak, but she took from its peg on the wall her husband's long flintlock American rifle, his otterskin bullet pouch, with its clear powder horn and white bone charger, and held them out to René. Take them, my son, she then said. They belonged to a good man, and I give them to another who is a good man, even though he is not yet permitted to do all of a man's heavy work. Once more René's eyes filled with tears, but this time they were not tears of longing. I thank you, my mother, he said simply. I will care for them well as my father's son should do, and I will wait patiently for their time when I am permitted to till our fields. I have already thanked the good God that I was not granted my wish this morning, that instead of guiding the plow I was mending, Arthach. The Quaker Boy and the Pewter Cup Jethro, called a woman's voice, pleasant but very, very firm, Jethro, thou art needed at the churn. The Quakeress wore a grey stuffed gown, and had a thin gauze cap on top of her head. She stood still and listened for a reply, but none came. She called again more loudly, Jethro, Jethro, thou art needed at the churn. This time there was a soft reply, Jethro, Jethro. And a few seconds later, churn, churn, it was only an echo sent back from the nearby hillside of the Massachusetts farm, so the Quaker mother turned back to her kitchen and, seizing the dasher of her old-fashioned churn, brought the butter herself when she had wished to be cooking by the fireplace at one end of her kitchen. Even while under some wild bushes behind the old barn a boy was sitting, as still as a statue, with his clumsy knife on his knee holding the mouth of his dog too tightly to permit even the slightest sound to escape. Not only that, but his other hand was on the dog's flank, pressing him so close to the ground that no motion was possible, which might cause a swaying of the bushes or a tell-tale rustle. When the boy heard the closing of the kitchen door he released the dog and patted him tenderly. I did not wish to hurt thee spot, he said, but I did not feel called to go just then, and thou art too apt to speak when others are spoken to. With this explanation made he took up a large potato from the ground beside him, a potato in which a few cuts had already been made, and bent busily over it, adding one cut here and another there, pausing often to turn it over and over in his hand, and to compare it with a clearly cut potato on the ground before him. At last he spoke again to the dog, that was then lying near his nose between his paws, and his eyes rolling this way and that as he followed every motion of his young master. Spot, he said, thou shouldst be a good judge of plows by this time. Tell me, dost thou not think this mould-board far better than the last one? Spot pleased at being noticed waged his tail until it thumped on the ground. Good! cried his master young Jethro Wood. I see that thou dost think even as I do, moreover thou showest great good judgment when thou speakest with thy tail rather than with thy mouth. It tells quite as much to those who are near and nothing to those at a distance. Thou art a wise dog, Spot, a very wise dog, and that is why I trust thee with my secrets. Spot, catching approval in Jethro's voice, waged harder still, and then arose slowly, catching himself, first forward and then back, as is the custom of dogs, and then gently nosing at the carved potatoes. Hold still, Spot, cried Jethro, hold still, I would use thee as a drying-cloth for my new plow, the dog obeyed, and Jethro used his shaggy coat on which to dry his latest carving. Now we will try it in the earth, as we did the other, he said, drawing the tiny plow many times through a pile of fine earth nearby. It doth not scour, he said, as he saw a bit of earth clinging to the damp little model. It doth not scour, but that is because my impatient spirit made me try it ere it dried. It doth not scour, but me things it turneth the soil over far better than the last. I would think it could be dried without warping and losing its fine shape, but since that cannot be and potatoes would feign be potatoes even when I would have them plows, there remaining not for me but to try my knife on wood. That reminded him of something and, leaving his tiny model protected by stones, he went to the woodpile behind the house, where he was soon swinging the axe, with a skill that proved him used to doing it. Mistress Wood, her churning now quite done, stepped to the door to reprove him, for not being ready to churn, but when she saw the swift, sure strokes of the shining axe, and noted the neat pile built up after the chopping of the day before, she paused, smiled, and at last returned to her work without speaking. Jethro, who had heard the door open and close again, smiled also. After a while spot, he said, I will carry in a great armful of the best wood ends. By that device we shall be quite safe, you and I, all of which shows that even quiet Quaker lads of the 18th century were somewhat like other lads of the 20th century. The next morning, friend Wood, Jethro's Quaker father, finished his early breakfast and led the morning worship, with which the household began each day, sometimes with Bible reading and spoken prayer, but more often in perfect silence. That done he said, Jethro, I would have the prepared potatoes this day for my planting. Thou knowest how it should be done, and I would have the waste no time, since the ground is right for planting, and it should be finished forthwith. Jethro, added Mistress Wood, as the door closed behind his father, I would warn thee to cut no plows from the potatoes to be planted, else thou art like to feel thy father's cane across thy shoulders, which showed that even quiet Quaker mothers of the 18th century were somewhat like other mothers of the 20th century. Night after night, young Jethro whittled on his mottles by the open fire in the living room, gathering up his shavings from time to time to cast them on the blaze, and always sweeping the hearth clean, at last with the stout birch broom which stood in the chimney corner. The other children begged him to play cat's cradle or jack stones with them, but his mottles meant more to him. By day he was usually dutiful and helpful, yet many an odd minute he snatched to look over and feel of the big wooden plow, which he was not strong enough to guide. It was not greatly different from those used in Holland and England, or from those which the pilgrims had wrought for themselves in the early days of the colonies. It was all of wood, save as a small iron share, was fastened to the moldboard, a small iron caulter to the wooden beam, and scraps of old iron nailed to the moldboard, to lessen the wearing action of the soil. Jethro's father was well to do, else he might not have had so good an implement. Many farmers still used only stout branches with prongs. One day, when friend Wood was plowing new ground, which was full of stones, his wooden moldboard broke, and the other parts were more or less wrenched apart and splintered, so that it took him a long time to repair it. That day a great new idea came to Jethro, and he thought of it so hard and so long that he made strange mistakes in his work and was strongly reproved by his parents. After supper he was sent to his bedroom to bring down a garment, which he had asked Mistress Wood to mend, and as he climbed the steep stairs, this great new idea came back to him. It was the thing about which he was really thinking, but as the light of his candle fell on the old four-posted bed, with its feather-ticks piled high on its lacing of bed-cord, it seemed to suggest a familiar action to him. So he removed his clothes and went to bed, snuffing out his candle and staring into the darkness, dreaming about his great new idea. Jethro called his mother from below the stairs, What art thou doing that thou dost not return? Then Jethro aroused with a start and began to dress himself in haste. This was not easy, of course, because he had blown out his candle, and the only way in which fresh fires or candles could be lighted was by the use of flint and steel which he did not have. He scrambled around in the darkness and managed to dress himself in his plain-worn garments. Then he had to find the breeches, which he always wore to the Quaker meeting on first day, and carry them below. Jethro said his father, Thou art slower than molasses in January, Thou art a very snail for slowness. Does thou not see that his candle is out? asked Mistress Wood. And thou, I think, wouldest be slow if thou haddest to fumble and grope thy way about? Give me thy better breeches, she said to Jethro, and I will mend them ere the fire be covered for the night. Swiftly her needle flew to and fro as she sewed up the long rip in the stout gray breeches, and then she called Jethro to her and handed them to him. Jethro, she said very softly, thy mother heard thy bed creak when thou wasst above stairs. Didest thou grow absent-minded again and retire for the night? Jethro hung his head shame-facedly, but he answered truthfully, I did, he said. My candle was out because I had snuffed it out. I have a wonderful new idea about plows. It grips me day and night. Nevertheless said Mistress Wood, thou must learn to rule thy thoughts and not to become careless in the everyday business of life. If thou choosest to use thy playtime on thy plow-models, it is well, and thou mayest be blessed by them in the end. Thy working hours belong to thy people, who clothe and feed and shelter thee, and during those hours thou shouldest sternly banish from thy mind thoughts of anything safe present duty. Remember this, my son. Now put away thy whittling and light thy candle once more. This time thou shalt stay in bed until morning. About a week later when Mistress Wood had left her house to set a broody hen, Jethro slipped in through the door on the farther side and, climbing on the settle, reached down a big pewter cup from its place, with other seldom used dishes on the upper shelf. His wonderful new idea was gripping him so hard that he had resolved to sacrifice the old cup, which had been his grandfather's gift to him, to an experiment. He knew that his parents would not approve of it, so he took the cup when they were absent, but he took only what was his own. When the hen was properly set and the fresh-laid eggs were gathered in, Mistress Wood returned to her house and missed nothing. She did not dream that her son was speeding away to their sugar-bush, his gift cup hidden under his jacket and some coals from the kitchen hearth in an old bucket quite covered with ashes. Jethro had been given a half day for play, since the work in the fields was not crowding, and she thought him at a neighbor's home. Out in the sugar-bush, where every spring the fine old maples were tapped for sap, and the great iron cauldron steamed day and night during the sugaring off, Jethro laid down his plunder. Next he heat up some of the dry wood, which had been left over from the last sap-boiling, started a fire by using his precious live coals, and settled down to coaxing the first flames by feeding them strips of birch bark. That bark, as everyone knew in those days, was full of oil, and made fine-fired lighters. When he had a strong blaze, Jethro put his pewter cup in an old dipper which had been used for sap and saw it melt slowly into a thick silvery pool. Nearby was a little hollow in the ground filled with sand which he had fetched from the shores of a pond, and dampened until it would pack well. In this lay the last wooden plow-model which he had whittled. He had packed the sand closely about it with his hands, tamping down with his mother's potato-masher which was shaped much like half of a rolling-pin. It was not for nothing that Jethro had hung about the fondry and asked questions of the workmen when he drove to town with master wood. Spot nosed around the place and tried to crowd in between his master and the work which so interested him. He could not understand why Jethro paid so little attention to him. At last when he almost trod upon the sand-mold, Jethro saw that he must be sent away. He dared not shut him up or tie him lest he howl and draw somebody to the sugar-bush, so catching sight of a rabbit he sent him rushing after that, and then turned again to his work. It took but a minute to lift the tiny wooden model from its sand-bed, and then he bent over to inspect the imprint which it had left. Every line and curve was perfect. Now, Jethro, he murmured to himself, if thou canst but hold thy hand steady and pour no more pewter than will fill thy mold to the edges, thou wilt have thy metal plow at last. The pewter was ready, spot was out of sight, the sugar-bush was perfectly still, and Jethro's great moment had come. He lifted the old dipper and poured from it with steady hands. For a minute he feared that he lacked metal enough to fill the mold, but luckily as it spread out on the moist sand it reached to the very limits set for it. Then was Jethro happy indeed, for his wonderful great idea was working. Before milking time the little pewter plow was cold and hard enough to be lifted from its bed. Then the smoldering fire was carefully put out by dumping the damp sand on it. The old dipper hung in its place, spot recalled from scratching at a chipmunks burrow, and Jethro started back, with his precious plow hidden, where the cup had been. As far as he knew it was the very first cast-metal plow in the world. He dreamed of the time when he should be a man and make iron plows of working size, casting them in a real foundry. For some days he kept his new model a secret, stealing time to fit it with a wooden beam and handles. Then he was so delighted that he could keep the secret no longer. I may as well have the pleasure of showing it, he told spot. In next we have guests to tea. My mother will miss the cup, and I shall have to confess. I wish that thou werest not so big a dog-spot. If thou werest smaller I would hitch thee to my plow and drive thee in our living-room. Thou wouldst look so fine if harnessed to it. A few minutes later another idea came to Jethro. Spot, he said sonly, thou wilt have to see thy hated enemy, our tabby, drawn this same plow, which thou hast helped me devise, and mine spot that thou darest not growl or chase her while she draws it. Thou must remember her sharp claws, and how she punished thee last first day for stealing her food. And again he said spot, thou must not howl when they whip me for melting the cup. The pleasure that I have had means more to me than many whippings, so do not be too sorry for thy master. My father hath told me that the life of an inventor is a hard one, but he considereth only the outward misfortunes, he doth not know the joy which cometh from thinking out a new device. That evening when the family were sitting by the whale-oil lamp in the living-room, and Mistress Wood had its thick lens so fixed as to throw its brightest beams upon her spinning-wheel, she noticed that Jethro coaxed the cat to come to him behind the high-back settle. How fond the lad is of animals, she thought, always spot, and now tabby must share his play. A few minutes later, just as the fire blazed highest on the hearth, out came a bewildered and troubled tabby, draking behind her a tiny metal plow. She was followed by Jethro, flushing and proud. What now, exclaimed his father, is this thy latest invention? Yes, replied Jethro, this is my wonderful new idea. Why should men make their plows with wooden mould-boards to wear and split as they do, instead of casting them of metal? Friend Wood considered long, for Quakers dislike unseemly haste. It may be, he said, that thine idea is good. Indeed, it seemeth so to one who hath had his troubles with implements, and yet it would be a mighty change to make. Farmers are slow to leave off doing as their fathers did before them. New ways are fearsome to them, and Jethro, the way of the inventor, is hard. Jethro's happiness is great, for never had his father shown such faith in his inventions. If a metal plow seemed good to his father, that stern, just man he thought that it must seem good to all the world. But he had not time to make reply, for Tabby, tired of her part, was trying hard to rid herself of harness and plow, and Jethro sprang to rescue it. When he had it free and safe, he found his mother gazing sternly at him. Thou art very clever, she said, but thou canst not make pewter. Where dost thou get the metal for thy casting? I melted down the cup which grandfather gave me, he replied. It was my own, and I melted it. It was thine own to drink from, not to melt, she said, and while thou knowest I would not permit its melting, thou tookest it by steeleth like a thief in the night. Thy plow may be very fine, although we women cannot judge as to that, but thy taking the cup was sinful, and thou shalt be whipped for it. Yes, said Jethro, I knew that I should be whipped, but first let me put my casting on the mantle. I wish thou couldst have seen how beautifully it melted. Women had many whippings in those days, even young men of twenty were often soundly caned for their misdeeds, so to Jethro one more whipping seemed to matter very little. It is true that he pranced and cried as the birch and rod fell on his back and legs, and spot howled until he was turned out of doors, but and this is the queer thing about it. The whipping did not sound like a hard one. When it was ended, and friend Wood released his grasp upon his son, and said, Now, hie thee to thy bed, and take thy pewter plow along with thee, Jethro gave him a look which seemed almost grateful. May I let spot in first, he asked, and when Master Wood gave permission, he lingered in the woodshed to caress the dog. Not, he whispered, thou needest not to whimper, nor yet to lick my hand so sorrowfully. He had to whip me, else the other children might be melting their cups, and we should soon have empty shelves instead of full ones, but spot. There was small pain in such a whipping. For though he raised the rod high and looked full stern, he stayed it somewhat on its downward course. And now, tis over, and on the morrow we will melt that pewter again, for I believe that I can make another plow still better. Spot lay down again by the hearth, sprawling out upon his side. Tabby curled her tail around her tucked in feet and purred sleepily, and upstairs, a very happy boy lay planning how to better his invention. Master Wood was wrong in thinking the inventor's life a sad one. It is true that it is often full of disappointments, but the whippings seem to matter little to those who have the joy of working out their wonderful, great ideas. Chapter 6 of Plow Stories by Clara D. Pearson A pale-faced little girl of ten walked slowly down the village street in Marshfield, Massachusetts, one sunshiney morning in 1837, pausing now and then to look after some passing team or to watch the birds hopping over the ground in search of worms. She had a small basket of eggs in her hand, and whenever she stopped she set this down, on the ground, or on a nearby stone wall. Other children ran and skipped about her, but Ladisha was too weak, too tired to play with them. She was carrying the eggs to her Aunt Betsy, and when she had delivered them she was going back to lie on the couch at home. At least that is what she thought she was going to do, for she did not want to play outside, as the other children did on their holiday. She wanted to lie still indoors, and watch her busy mother do her Saturday baking, and put the small house to rights for Sunday. Aunt Betsy had a kind heart, but a rather sharp tongue, and when she saw her small niece strolling along so lazily she said, "'Sakes alive, child! Why don't you spunk up some? You act more dead than alive. Ain't you feeling any better than you did?' Ladisha shook her head and edged towards the door. She was tired of hearing people talk about her being thin and pale and slow, but her aunt would not let her escape. "'Are you keeping out of doors the way the doctor said you should?' she persisted. "'It ain't every child has the chance you have. Keep out of school and given medicine and extra kinds of vitals the way you are?' Ladisha talked back. "'Yes, she did.' She talked back to her aunt in a manner not often heard in New England. "'I hate the medicine,' she said. "'And I don't like the vitals, and I'm not going to stay out of doors. I'm going home to lie on the couch right now.' "'There, there,' said Aunt Betsy, "'there ain't any need for you to get riled, because a body asks after your health. Is there? There's one kind of vitil that you never refused yet. So you just draw up to the kitchen table and try fresh floating island?' Aunt Betsy was right about that, and Ladisha was soon enjoying her favorite dish, thick yellow custard, with fluffy little islands of beaten white of egg floating on it. And in the centre of each island a delicious scrap of pink crab-apple jelly. Aunt Betsy served it for her in one of her very best china bowls, white with tiny bunches of grapes and leaves on the outside, raised above the rest of the china, and colored a light blue. Also, she took from her cupboard a thin old spoon of solid silver and handed to Ladisha. "'There,' she said, "'I'll let you use one of the spoons that were given to your grandmother at her wedding. The one your father marked with his teeth when he was a little boy and bit too hard. So Ladisha forgot to be crossed, and sat on a rush-seated kitchen chair. The back was painted black with yellow stripes and red flowers on it, and sucked her custard and broke off and ate one bit after another of the white islands, until all that was left in the old bowl was a small yellow pool of custard with three scraps of crab-apple jelly. "'Now,' she said, "'I am going to eat my jelly, so I can't talk any more for a while.'" To get the full good of jelly, you know, you have to let it melt slowly in your mouth and think about it every minute. That was the way Ladisha always did when she ate floating island, and that is the way you will probably do if you ever had the chance to eat any. When it was all gone, Ladisha laid down her spoon with a sigh, her little smooth, thin old spoon with a dense from her father's baby teeth in it, and a rose to go. "'Thank you, Aunt Betsy,' she said. "'It was very good, and I am sorry that I was cross.' Then she picked up her empty basket and walked slowly down the path to the gate in the picket fence, opened and relatched it carefully and returned the same way she had come. Her Aunt Betsy stood, bowl in hand, watching her, until she passed the corner. "'Sakes alive,' she said. "'I do wish Ladisha wasn't so puny. Seems as if she was more peaked than ever this spring, and they can't get her interested in anything,' she sighed again and turned to her work. She had no child of her own, and she was very fond of Ladisha. Meanwhile, the little girl had gone as far as the village blacksmith's shop, when she met a gentleman who was tall and very dignified. He had straight black hair, streaked with white and very large dark eyes. He stood very erect and had a fine deep chest. He looked down kindly at her and said, "'Good morning, little maid, or what are you doing this fine morning?' "'Nothing, sir,' said Ladisha. The dark-eyed gentleman smiled, and his rather stern face became extremely pleasant. "'Is it enjoyable to do nothing?' he asked. "'Is it interesting? Is it as much fun as rolling a hoop? I don't want to run about, sir,' said Ladisha. The gentleman smiled again, but this time there was a queer sort of tenderness in his smile. The gentleman might almost say that there was more tenderness than amusement in it. It was as though he remembered years of weakness and linger before he had built up his own fine strong body, and was sorry for a little girl who was not strong enough to want to play. "'Would your mother mind if you did not hasten home?' he asked. "'No, sir,' replied Ladisha. She likes me to stay out of doors, only I don't always want to. "'Do you suppose,' said the gentleman, that you could sit in my wagon here and watch my horses while I am busy with the blacksmith? I have just tied them, you see, so they cannot run away with you. It is very comfortable up on this long seat in the sunshine, and the folded robe will make you a soft couch, if you wish to lie down. Perhaps if you are here the horses will stand better.' One might have thought that his large, dark eyes twinkled as he spoke, and suddenly Ladisha felt very well acquainted with him. "'I'd love to sit up there,' she said. "'I could pretend that they were my horses, couldn't I? And then I could watch the blacksmith at work, and that would be nicer still.' So the gentleman helped her climb to the high seat, rearranged the old robe on it, to make her more comfortable, and then turned to the blacksmith, who had put aside his hammer and now stood in the doorway. "'I brought the new plow from the wheel-rights,' he said. I stood by while he made the wooden moldboard, and shaped its curves. Now we will cover it with strips of iron, and fasten on the iron chair and the iron colter. "'I have them ready, Mr. Webster,' said the blacksmith. "'It will be but a short task.' "'Mr. Webster!' Now Ladisha knew who the gentleman was, for although she had never seen him until that day, she had often heard her father speak of the great statesman, whose farm lay beyond their own. He was a man whom all this great young nation admired and respected, and yet who never held himself to be too wealthy or too important for the common cares of a farmer or the pleasant friendships of country life. And this great man, so lately returned from Washington, had invited her to sit in his wagon, and she could watch the work done on his plow. Ladisha suddenly found it a very interesting world, and she forgot to feel tired, or too long to lie on her mother's couch. The blacksmith's man was called to help in lifting the great plow frame and the moldboard from the back of the wagon and carrying them into the shop. Then to Ladisha's great surprise she saw Mr. Webster remove his coat and fasten about his waist a leather napkin, like the ones which the other men were wearing. She could not hear what they were saying, there in the dark shop, so much darker than the place where she was sitting, but she watched them as they bent over the moldboard and handled the chair and the colter. The walls blackened with smoke, made a fine background, and it made a wonderful picture, save that the figures moved, and Ladisha had never heard of a moving picture. Then the blacksmith's helper began working the great bellows, and the glowing coals began to send forth flashing flames that roared up the chimney. Then the smith picked up the colter with a pair of tongs and laid it in the fire. Mr. Webster had not been satisfied with its shape, so it had to be altered to please him. After a little the blacksmith drew it from the forge and laid it on the anvil, hammering it into a different shape, as Mr. Webster watched and directed him. It looked as though the blacksmith did not quite understand what was wanted, for soon Ladisha saw Mr. Webster take the smith's place, reheat the colter, and wield the hammer himself until it suited him. After that she saw him work in the same way on the chair, and now she remembered hearing her father tell her mother that Daniel Webster was planning a huge new plow, with which to till a field where the scrub oak had burned off, but the roots remained. She decided to watch very carefully that she might tell her father and mother all about it. Ladisha sat on the high seat all morning, except when she became so interested that she had to stand. She thought that she saw somewhat better when she stood. At last the three men brought the great plow out, with its iron strips, its colter, and its chair all in place, and put it in the wagon to be carried away. When it was loaded the handles stuck out far beyond the end of the wagon box, for the plow was twice as long as the blacksmith was tall, twelve feet long, Ladisha heard her father say afterwards. When this was done, and the blacksmith paid, Mr. Webster washed his grimy hands, took off his leather napron, put on his coat, unhitched his team, and climbed to the seat beside Ladisha. I'll drive you home, he said, for the smith told me that you live on one of the farms that I pass. Oh, what do you think of my plow? It is very big, and looks very strong, replied Ladisha. It needs to be big and strong, said Mr. Webster, looking straight ahead of him. It has a hard job to do. It has to break up and turn under the tough roots of scrub oaks, and it has to cut a furrow twelve inches deep. Your father's plow does not cut over four or five inches deep, I am sure. For none of the plows around here do. Your father must come to watch mine at work. He drove in silence for a while, and then he said, plows and people need to be strong. Plows cannot make themselves strong, but people can. It is a wonderful thing to watch a weak young body grow strong and fine and equal to the work and play of life. Before she knew what she was saying, Ladisha cried out, Oh, Mr. Webster, how do people make themselves strong? Tell me some nice way to do it. Then Mr. Webster turned and smiled down on her. There is no easy way of making either plows or people strong, he said. But I had a weak body when I was a boy, and I was willing to do many difficult and disagreeable things to make it strong. Ladisha thought this over. Did you stay out of doors when you didn't want to? She asked. I did, said Mr. Webster gravely. Did you eat viddles you didn't like? If the doctor said you ought to, asked Ladisha. I did. I said, Mr. Webster, did you take bitter medicine brewed from herbs? Asked Ladisha. I did when my mother wanted me to, said Mr. Webster. Again they rode in silence for a while. Then Ladisha spoke again. I'm not very strong, she remarked. I had the whooping cough and I've been spindling ever since, but it made me mad when people talked about it. Perhaps I'd have been mad if you had talked about it. I wouldn't have thought of talking about it, said Mr. Webster. Then he halted his horses in front of Ladisha's home and handed the egg basket to her after she had climbed down. Tell your parents that Mr. Webster asked you to mind his horses for him, he said, and say that Mr. Webster would like to have your father bring you with him to-morrow to see the new plow tried. The next afternoon Ladisha and her father drove to the Webster farm. He joined the other visiting farmers in watching the plow. While she sat on the seat of her father's wagon and watched also, or else looked off to where the blue waves of the Atlantic Ocean sparkled in the sunlight, four pairs of Daniel Webster's beautifully matched oxen were yoked to the great plow. Mr. Webster himself had hold of the handles, although sometimes six and sometimes eight men had to help in the steering and steadying of the plow. There was a constant cracking and snapping of roots, and they and the small stumps of scrub oak were turned into the furrow and well-covered by the mellow soil, which rolled over them from the iron-covered moldboard. After Ladisha looked, she saw something strong. The tough scrub oak stumps and the roots were strong, but the plow was stronger and was drawn by strong oxen and guided by strong men. Right then Ladisha made up her mind about something that she had thought over the day before, but of course, you do not know what that was. When it was nearly supper time, and the farmers began to come toward the place where they had left their teams, Mr. Webster walked across the field with them, wiping the sweat from his forehead and lifting his hat to let the fresh ocean breeze cool his head. I am more proud of my new plow, he said, than of anything I ever did at Washington. Back of everything else in this country, the very foundation of our success must always be the tilling of our fields. He saw Ladisha and spoke to her, as to an old friend. The other farmers passed on, and when only her father and Mr. Webster remained, Ladisha did a very queer thing. May I whisper to Mr. Webster, she asked her father. He nodded, and she leaned over, until her lips were near the great man's ear. I took my bitter medicine without a fuss, she said, and I ate my plate clean at every meal, as clean as the cats, except I didn't lick it off, and I have decided to be strong. Thank you for telling me, said Mr. Webster. You are a very sensible little girl. Many years afterward, when Ladisha was an old, old lady, although hail and hearty, she used to tell the story to her grandchildren, and she showed them a picture of her childhood friend, the good neighbor, famous statesman, and wise hard-working farmer. Sometimes she even showed them the thin little old spoon bearing the dents of their great-grandfather's baby teeth. I used that, she used to say, the very last time that I had to be coaxed to eat my vitals.