When Life Was Young: At the Old Farm in Maine

by C. A. Stephens

Gram usually sent in one or more firkins of butter, several cheeses and even loaves of bread and cake. The Old Squire exhibited several head of cattle and sometimes his entire herd; also sheep, hogs and poultry. Then there was always an extensive exhibit of apples, pears and grapes, arranged on plates, as also seed-corn, wheat, barley, buckwheat, oats and garden vegetables. We were occupied for fully a fortnight, that season, gathering and preparing our various exhibits.

In addition, Halstead and Addison expected to do a flourishing business selling apples, pears and grapes; they also talked of opening an eating booth on the Fair Grounds, with baked beans, cakes, pies and hot coffee; and they had agreed with Theodora and Ellen to prepare the food beforehand, and take a share in the profits. The previous fall they had sold cider (moderately sweet) and done very well; but Addison had become so rigid a temperance reformer, during the year, that he would not now deal in cider.

This being my first season at the farm, I was not included as a partner in these lucrative privileges, but expected to be admitted to them all the following year. Meantime I intended to learn about it, and expected to derive a great deal of pleasure from attending the coming exhibition. There were to be numerous "attractions," besides the slow race, and the scrub race, which was for any kind of animal that had legs and could run except horses. I had finally raised two dollars to invest with Tom in the old horse, named "Ponkus," previously alluded to, and by a hard strain on my resources also became interested to the extent of another dollar with him in "Tige," the cart dog, for the scrub race.

The Fair Grounds were located near the neighboring village, about seven miles distant from the Old Squire's, and consisted of a large wooden building and a high fence, enclosing about thirty acres of land. The admission fee was fifteen cents. The Fair continued three days: Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, of the last week of September.

We set off at four o'clock of the opening day, Addison, Halse, Thomas and I driving three ox-carts, loaded with farm products. We had also to lead "Ponkus" and a two-year-old Hereford bull behind the carts, and manage a yoke of Durham steers for the "town team;" our progress was therefore slow and it was nine o'clock in the forenoon before we arrived at the Grounds and had made a disposition of our various charges.

A great crowd of people was pouring through the gate of the enclosure. Fully four thousand people were already on the grounds; and a gaudy array of "side shows" at once attracted our attention. There were counters and carts for cider, gingerbread and confectionery. Loud-voiced auctioneers were selling "patent medicines" and knickknacks of all sorts.

Close at hand, a snare drum and fife, inside a tent, drew attention to "a rare and wonderful show of wild animals," which the fakir at the door declared to consist of "a pair of bald eagles, two panther cubs, a prairie wolf and Hindoo seal," and sometimes he said "prairie wolf and Bengal tiger."

Then there were rather disreputable fellows with "whirl-boards" at "ten cents a whirl;" with "ring-boards" at "five cents a pitch," and ten cents made when you lodged the rings on the points. There was also a blind-fold professor of phrenology, who examined heads at fifteen cents per cranium.

In the crowd, too, were even less reputable fellows, who sought to entrap rural youths into "betting on cards," and making "rare bargains" in delusive watches. Altogether it was an animated scene, for young eyes. Addison, Halse and Theodora were occupied with their "booth." Ellen and Wealthy were with Gram in the Fair building, where the fruit and dairy products had to be watched and presided over. The Old Squire was a member of numerous committees on stock and other farm exhibits. We hardly caught sight of him during the day. For my own part I kept with Thomas and "Tige," whose little wagon for racing we had brought down in one of the ox-carts. We avoided the sharpers, for the good reason that we had very little money in our pockets. We were cheated but once, by a youthful Philistine who had "tumblers to break," suspended in a row by a string.

We paid him ten cents, and standing off at a distance of forty feet, threw a nicely-whittled club at the row of suspended glasses. If we broke one, we were to receive twenty-five cents. The safety of the tumblers lay in the extreme lightness of the clubs, which were of dry pine wood, much lighter than their size indicated. Tom and I each threw the clubs twice. Not a tumbler was injured. The proprietor called it a "game of skill;" but it was nearer a game of swindling.