XXII
THE FAIR
The State Fair, an event that had long been anticipated at Brookside Farm, was scheduled to be held on September tenth that year. The summer was not more than half over before Joe Williams decided that he had, if any thing, a little better crops and stock than any other man in the county; in fact, he was beginning to "feel his oats," as the saying went, and wanted to show his neighbors just how good a farmer he really was, so he took a great deal of pride in getting his products ready to exhibit.
First he decided to enter his team of Belgian mares and their two handsome young colts; then his majesty, King Pontiac, the head of the Holstein herd, and four of his best Holstein cows; then he selected two handsome Holstein bulls and two heifer calves; two Berkshire sows, one with a litter of ten fine pigs, together with two young Berkshire shoats; then Jerry, the Southdown ram, and the best two Southdown ewes and two good lambs; two breeding pens of white Leghorns and two of white Plymouth rocks were then selected; also the best cock and hen and the best cockerel and pullet, together with a dozen eggs laid by each breed. Then he picked out two bushels of the finest corn that had been raised in the bottom land and two bushels of oats and a dozen each of the three varieties of apples, and two bushels of potatoes. Then Bob selected two pounds of his best comb honey and Aunt Bettie and the girls picked out five dozen of their choice jellies and jams, and on the opening day of the fair this exhibition was taken to the fair grounds.
All work on the buildings was stopped and a number of neighbor boys were engaged to help to take the exhibit to town.
All the cattle had been carefully groomed for several weeks in advance and were in fine shape for exhibition purposes, and attracted a great deal of attention.
When the awards had been made, Joe Williams found he had won first prize in every class he had exhibited and in a number he had also carried off second prizes and sweepstakes, while Bob won first prize with his honey and Aunt Bettie five first prizes and four second prizes on her jellies and jams.
As soon as the exhibits were in place, Joe Williams went from one exhibit to another and fastened white cards printed in dark blue letters, containing the following words: "Grown on Brookside Farm, Joseph Williams, Proprietor."
"Say, Bob," said Alex Wallace, "if your Uncle Joe had won a few prizes more there would not have been any left for the rest of us."
"Oh, I don't know," said Bob, "there were lots of other prizes awarded besides those Uncle Joe got. How many did you win?"
"We got first and second on our Jersey cattle and first on our Clydesdale mare and colt, but your Uncle Joe cleaned up all the prizes on the grain."
"Well, next year perhaps you can win them."
"We're going to try for them all right. Father says Joe Williams needn't think he can come back here from the West and annex the State Fair. If he wins next year, he'll have to go some. We bought a tractor to-day, Bob."
"That's fine, Alex. When are you going to start your silo?"
"Oh, pretty soon," he replied as he left Bob.
Thursday was the big day of the Fair, and Bob, as a special reward for his services, was permitted to go to the Fair each day; in fact, much of the care of the stock depended on him, although he was unable to stay in town overnight as he would have liked on account of taking care of the milking.
Whom should he meet early Thursday morning, as he was coming from milking his cows that were on exhibition, but his father.
"Why, hello, Bob. I was just looking for you. My, how you have grown.
I'd scarcely have known you."
"How-do-you-do, dad; how'd you like to have a drink of good fresh milk? 'Grown on Brookside Farm, Joseph Williams, Proprietor,'" he laughed.
"Fine," said his father, whereupon Bob handed him a glass of rich milk.
"Not as good as Gurney's, but pretty good at that," remarked his father. "I've heard about the prizes you and your Uncle Joe have won and couldn't help but come in and look you over, even, though I'm very busy and it was hard to get away."
"How did you leave mother and the rest of the family?" was Bob's next inquiry.
"Oh, they're all well, Bob. Your mother was sorry she couldn't come with me, but it was hard for her to get away. How do you like farming?"
"Oh, I like farming very much and I want to be a farmer. You know, there are lots of interesting things to do on a farm, dad."
"By the way, I met a friend of yours, Bob—John White, of the First National Bank. He was telling me all about the things you've been doing on the old place. He says you even have a name for it."
"Why, yes; didn't you see it on the exhibits? We're going to sell everything under a trade name, just like thread and other things that have names."
"How much do you weigh now, Bob?"
"I weight 137 pounds; that is 27 pounds more than when I went to the farm, and I'm two inches taller."
"I should say you have been growing, Bob. Has your Uncle Joe paid you yet for your year's work?
"No, he hasn't; but he will when he gets 'round to it. You see, he hasn't sold his crops yet."
"How much do you think he will give you, Bob?"
"I don't know, but I think he'll be fair. Aunt Bettie will see to that, if he should forget it himself. If you come along with me, I'll show you how many prize winners we have," and he proudly took his father from one exhibit to another, all the time telling him of the permanent improvements they were making on the farm.
"You must come out to the farm to-night and see the place. You have no idea what it looks like with the old barn gone and nearly all the concrete buildings up. You can see the big silo ever so far away. Of course, the biggest change is the taking away of the pond. Just look at that corn standing there—that's what we got out of the old pond where you taught me to swim. We got over 10 tons per acre of ensilage, after leaving several hundred bushels from the field from which to select our seed. You can see for yourself what fine-looking corn it is. Just look at those big ears there, and all that fifteen acres raised before was muskrats and turtles."
"You're right, Bob, it was a 'Hidden Treasure'."
After the speed trials were over Bob milked his cows again, and with his father drove out to Brookside Farm.
"My, it certainly doesn't look like the old place, Bob," his father remarked, when they came in sight of the farm. "What a fine fence; are those stone posts, Bob?"
"No, dad, they're concrete, but will last just as long as stone."
Bob now stopped the car to give his father time to see all the changes.
"Why, the sawmill's gone too, Bob."
"Yes," he replied, "we'll drive down that way and go in at the lower gate."
It was hard for Bob's father to understand the reason for all the buildings and what conditions had made them different sizes and shapes.
He did not know until Bob explained to him that each building required special designing to suit certain conditions.
That night they sang the "Happy Farmer" song for him, and his father sat up long after the others had retired, talking to his brother Joe.
On the way home from the Fair on Friday afternoon, the animals from Brookside Farm fell in behind those of the Wallace Farm. Alex Wallace was looking after their flock of Merino sheep, in which there was an old buck, and had with him their Scotch collie dog "Don." Bob was looking after his flock of Southdown sheep, which he had driven close behind Alex, so the boys could talk to each other back and forth as they went along.
After a while Alex got tired turning his head around to hear what Bob had to say, for the noise of the clattering feet of the sheep on the concrete road made it difficult for him to hear, so he left his dog "Don" between the two flocks and came back and joined Bob.
They proceeded thus for about a quarter of a mile when suddenly Jerry, the Southdown buck of Bob's flock, started forward and all the others followed, so that the two flocks became merged into one. As Bob rushed forward to separate them, the two bucks stepped up to each other and placed their heads together, when Alex, seeing Bob trying to separate them, shouted:
"That's right, Bob, take your big fellow away or mine will kill him."
The remark angered Bob, whereupon he ceased his efforts and said:
"Well, if you think that little runt of yours can kill ours, I guess we had better let them fight it out." "All right," said Alex; "I'm satisfied."
So the two boys stood still while the two bucks placed their heads together, then stepped slowly backwards until they were on opposite sides of the road, where they stood looking at each other. The ewes crowded back and left an open space between them and stood as intently interested as the boys, waiting the coming battle.
After the bucks had paused for a moment, they lowered their heads and rushed at each other. Now, it must be remembered that a Southdown buck stands very much higher than one of the Merino breed, which is rather short in the legs and set close to the ground. Also that the Southdown had been used to associating with sheep of his own size; consequently when he lowered his head to strike, he did not take into account that the Merino was so much lower than himself. This gave the Merino the advantage, and, instead of the Merino striking his adversary on the hard skull as the latter expected he would do, he struck him on the point of the nose, breaking Jerry's neck.
Both boys were horrified to see Bob's prize-winning buck lying dead in the road, and while they looked at him speechless, Tony, who was coming along behind with some of the cattle, rushed forward and quickly turned him into mutton, while Bob with a heavy heart went on to the farm with the others.
It was not necessary for Bob to explain the fight to his uncle, who came along the road shortly behind him and to whom Tony explained the accident.
"It's all right, Bob," said his uncle, as he drove up into the barnyard. "I know just how you felt when Alex Wallace challenged you to let them fight, and while I'm sorry Jerry is dead, still I think if I had been there myself, I would have taken up his dare, just as you did. You know Brookside Farm has a reputation to maintain, and, while I don't believe in quarreling, still this was a case where I think you were justified in letting them scrap it out. At any rate, we've had such a profitable year at Brookside, I guess we can afford to charge Jerry to the profit and loss account. He has not been exactly a gross loss. Tony has turned him into mutton, and, as soon as I get the cattle stowed away, I'm going back for him."
As soon as the Fair was over and all returned to the farm, they started in to dig their potatoes. Joe Williams expected a good yield from the field, but he was surprised when he found that from the seven acres he obtained 1400 bushels, which was considerably more than he thought was possible. To lessen the work, a potato plow was used to dig them, and they were graded by machinery in the field.
The new concrete root cellar had been completed just a few days before and the potatoes were taken there and put into bins.
"Do you know what I think, Uncle Joe?" said Bob one evening at supper, after the potatoes had all been gathered.
"What have you thought of now?" asked his uncle laughing, for since his crop had turned out so well and he had won so many prizes at the Fair, Joe Williams was very happy.
"I think if we would take our seven-acre potato field and put in an overhead sprinkler system, and put plenty of manure on it next year, we could increase the yield from 1400 bushels to 4200 bushels."
"How could it be possible to get that many potatoes out of seven acres of ground, Bob?" asked his uncle incredulously.
"Well, I've been reading of a farm in New Jersey where they do that, and they got $960 per acre for the potatoes, which were only one of three crops raised on the ground the same year."
"If that's so, Bob, why wouldn't it pay to plant the whole farm in potatoes?"
"Well, maybe it would, Uncle Joe, at least several of the fields. The story of the farm I was reading about said they put on one hundred tons of manure, worth $2.50 per ton, on each acre of ground."
"What!" said his uncle; "$250 worth of manure on each acre. That wouldn't be possible."
"Well, that's what the paper said—plenty of water and plenty of manure, and the crops take care of themselves."
"That's right, Joe," said his wife. "Bob showed me the same article. The farm averaged over $2000 per acre and I think it would be a good idea to buy the outfit next year, Joe. The same as our growing of vegetables under glass. I'm very much interested in growing vegetables out of season—there isn't much work to do in winter and we can easily take care of them, and in that way we may find we could make more money on less ground than by doing general farming."
"Well, it's worth looking into," said her husband. "All of our things so far have panned out pretty good and I'm not willing to pass up anything now without giving it a thorough investigation. By the way, Bettie, don't you think we ought to put an orchard on 'Old Round Top?' That's one field we can't very well plow."
"What had you thought of planting, Joe?"
"I thought peaches would be a good crop there—peaches ought to do well on the south slope."
"Well, you know a peach orchard doesn't live very long and it's rather a fickle crop," she replied.
"I tell you what I was thinking of, Uncle Joe," said Bob.
"What's that?" asked his uncle.
"Planting it with peaches with black walnut trees in between."
"What do you want with black walnuts?" asked Bob's uncle.
"Well, when the trees are grown, you have the walnuts, and when the trees get older black walnut timber, which is very valuable. A hill such as Round Top that isn't much good for anything else, would raise good black walnut timber. Of course, you'd have to dynamite the holes good and deep where you put the trees, so they'd have no trouble getting good roots. Once they were well started, I don't think there'd be any trouble with them."
"I hadn't thought of that, Bob," said his uncle, "but I guess we had better look into it. By the time the peach trees were dead, the walnut trees would have a good start. How many trees will it take to plant it?"
"I figure if we took the whole twelve acres, it would require twelve hundred peach trees," said Bob.
"But that would be a good many peach trees to take care of, Uncle
Joe."
"Yes, but we won't be building any concrete buildings by the time they begin bearing, so why not plant it all in peach trees with the black walnuts in between, as you say?"
"I'll have Edith write to a grower to-night, if you wish, Joe, and find what the peaches will cost," said his wife.
"How about the black walnuts?" asked Bob. "Shall we plant the trees or nuts?"
"I think we had better plant nuts and let them grow themselves. We can stick a lot of them between the peach trees and, of course, the peach trees will be dead long before the walnuts get to be any size."
Much to the regret of every one, two days later Ruth and Edith said good-by to Brookside Farm and went back to their New England homes. They had intended to stay a few weeks longer, but a telegram from Edith's father saying her mother had been taken suddenly ill and needed her, caused them to decide that they should return at once. When Bob came back from an inspection trip with John White and the County Commissioners over the new concrete road, they had packed their trunks and were ready to leave for the afternoon train. He drove the girls and their Aunt Bettie to town in the car and was particularly depressed when he said good-by at the station—somehow or other they had become part of the life at Brookside Farm, and now that they were going he began to realize how much he would miss them. Even the good- natured Ruth, in her impetuous way and ability to get into trouble, had added much to the life on the farm. Edith was very quiet all the way to the station, and Bob could not tell whether it was worrying over the possible illness of her mother or her disappointment in having to return so soon, or maybe, as he hoped, it was for another reason she was silent—at any rate, she had little to say to him as he bid her good-by, but just before she ascended the steps of the train, when, for a second, they looked full into each others' eyes, he seemed to feel that perhaps he was right in attributing it to that reason.
So the girls went on their way and Bob went back to work.