Jim and Asa were greatly disappointed. "Let me give 'em jest a few licks," Jim begged, with a longing glance at the whip.
"Not this time," the old Squire replied. "If we catch them at this again, I'll see about it. And, boys," he said to them, as Jim and Asa very reluctantly untied the knots of their bonds, "any time you want a pocketful of pears to eat just come and ask me. But mind, don't you steal another pear or plum in this neighborhood!"
Addison opened the barn doors, and Alfred and Harvey took themselves off without ceremony.
Apparently they kept their promise with us, for we heard of no further losses of fruit in that neighborhood.
CHAPTER XXVIII
HALSTEAD'S GOBBLER
At that time a flock of twenty or thirty turkeys was usually raised at the old farm every fall—fine, great glossy birds. Nearly every farmhouse had its flock; and by October that entire upland county resounded to the plaintive Yeap-yeap, yop-yop-yop! and the noisy Gobble-gobble-gobble! of the stupid yet much-prized "national bird." At present you may drive the whole length of our county and neither hear nor see a turkey.
In their young days the old Squire and Judge Fessenden of Portland, later in life Senator Fessenden, had been warm friends; and after the old Squire chose farming for a vocation and went to live at the family homestead, he was wont to send the judge a fine turkey for Thanksgiving—purely as a token of friendship and remembrance. The judge usually acknowledged the gift by sending in return an interesting book, or other souvenir, sometimes a new five-dollar greenback—when he could not think of an appropriate present.
The old Squire did not like to accept money from an old friend, and after we young people went home to Maine to live he transferred to us the privilege of sending Senator Fessenden a turkey for Thanksgiving, and allowed us to have the return present.