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That is a story worth remembering when you are ashamed of doing something which your parents have asked you to do, perhaps to carry a parcel on the street or to mow the lawn. You will see sometime, I hope, that all honest work, if it is well done, is a thing to be proud of, instead of to be ashamed of. But it may be too late then.
In this barn, as perhaps you have seen in barns at your grandpa's farm in the country, there is a little hole cut in the floor of the loft, or upstairs part, so hay can be pushed down from the mow into the stall of a horse or a pony. There was a little hay covering this hole, so Sue did not see it when she went up to look for her doll. And it was down this hole that Sue had fallen.
There was the horse, hitched to the staple in the corner of the barn, there was the basket of eggs on the ground waiting for its even dozens. "D'you find any?" she called. He did not answer, and she ran out to the barn and called up to the mow: "You there? You find any?" But the barn, in its soft darkness, with a beam of dusty light here and there, knew nothing about him.
Indeed, he had a brain for everything: he could thatch better nor many that arned their bread by it; could make a slide-car, straddle, or any other rough carpenter work, that it would surprise you to think of it; could work a kish or side creel beautifully; mow as much as any two men, and go down a ridge of corn almost as fast as you could walk; was a great hand at ditching, or draining meadows and bogs; but above all things he was famous for building hay-ricks and corn-stacks; and when Squire Farmer used to enter for the prize at the yearly plowing-match, he was sure to borrow the loan of Larry from whatever master he happened to be working with.
There was one mow that was kept pretty well supplied with grass, and there were two or three horse stalls that were in tolerable order, although but rarely used. There were a number of excellent hiding-places about the old rookery.
We can barricade the lower doors, and hurl down the upper and nether millstones on the enemies' heads, set the mill going, and mow them down with the sails, and melt lead ready to pour down in ladlefuls to make them run from the scalding silver soup. A grand tower for practising all those old barbaric delights."
But we never really raised a melon fit for the table until the old Squire and Addison invented the "haymaker." To make hay properly we thought we needed two successive days of sun. When rain falls nearly every day haying comes to a standstill, for if the mown grass is left in the field it blackens and rots; if it is drawn to the barn, it turns musty in the mow.
"But you don't mow how I crave for freedom: it makes me mad to think of it." "Ay, ay; I know," sighed the old fellow. "It used to be so with me once; but now it only comes on me when my term is nearly up. One gets patient as one gets old, you'll find. No; I've no plan just now; though, if I ever have, I promise you you shall be the man to know it.
For, North and South, how many lives as sweet, unmonumented for the most part, commemorated solely in the hearts of mourning mothers, widowed brides, or friends did the inexorable war mow down!
I never saw the thing executed better, even by the leading colleges. Depend on it, my boy, if you and your men do as well as that to-morrow, and there's no treachery shown, you're going to mow Clifford down far worse than she suffered at the hands of Bellport. I congratulate you, every one, for the fine form you show. It does my heart good to see it.
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