IV
TREE-NOT-SHAKEN-BY-THE-WIND
Ten-year-old Fred Hope looked up at the men who looked down at him. He was very happy because he had just taken the pencil and paper which one of the men handed him, and written
Fred Hope$1.00
He lived on a farm near Flat Rock, Illinois, and many times he had seen his father sign his name to a subscription paper when the deacons had been collecting money for the church and had made up his mind that some day he would sign his own name. At last he had done so, and his eyes were shining.
"Now," said he, "I've got to find a way to make that dollar."
He took a hoe and some beans and went into the garden to begin to earn his dollar. He planted the beans and watched eagerly to see them grow. It was a bad year for beans in Illinois and there was no crop. But he did not give up. From beans he turned to rats. The rats had been eating his father's grain and Fred made a contract to rid the place of rats at five cents apiece. It happened there were more rats than beans in Flat Rock that year and no Indian chief ever counted with more pride his scalps of white men than Fred the notches which numbered the rats he had slain. Soon the dollar was paid, and his father's grain was safe.
The next money Fred made was to pay his way to college. When he had almost enough saved, his mother said:
"Father does not see how he can get along without you on the farm. He has had a great deal of trouble and lost a lot of money."