“Why,” I ask, “what was the matter down there, Nathan?”
“Why, blame my stogys, ef the feller hadn’t gone ’n highsted the clog-stick on the end o’ the chain, ’n shoved it agin the pan, ’n sprung the trap on’t, ’n then stepped up and knabbed the bait. An’ I say thet enny feller what’s got brains enuff fer thet, I swaiou he’d oughter live off’n um; ’n he kin fer all me!”
It was too bad to have fooled old Nathan so; but then, you see, he had a big farm, and was awfully stingy with us boys, and never would let us set a rabbit snare on his place. He said it was “pesky cruel,” and seemed to prefer the more humane way of wounding them with shot, and breaking their necks afterward to end their sufferings. Nathan had kept very quiet about his little game. There really was a very sly fox in the neighborhood; but boys make good foxes too, sometimes.
Nathan’s house was a typical New England home, with slanting roof on one side, and embowered in maples, and it had the most picturesque barn in the neighborhood. Oh you good people far off in the country everywhere, how I envy you these dear old barns! How much you ought to appreciate their homely rustic beauty! But you never will, until, like me, you are forced to live away from them, and to see them only through the golden haze of memory. Then you will learn how great a part they took in influencing your daily life and happiness.
Was ever perfume sweeter than that all-pervading fragrance of the sweet-scented hay? and was ever an interior so truly picturesque, so full of quiet harmony?
The lofty hay-mows piled nearly to the roof, the jagged axe-notched beams overhung with cobwebs flecked with dust of hay-seed, with perhaps a downy feather here and there. The rude, quaint hen boxes, with the lone nest-egg in little nooks and corners. How vividly, how lovingly, I recall each one!
In those snow-bound days, when the white flakes shut in the earth down deep beneath, and the drifts obstructed the highways, and we heard the noisy teamsters, with snap of whip and exciting shouts, urge their straining oxen through the solid barricade; when all the fences and stone walls were almost lost to sight in the universal avalanche; and, best of all, when the little district school-house upon the hill stood in an impassable sea of snow—then we assembled in the old barn to play, sought out every hidden corner in our game of hide-and-seek, or jumped and frolicked in the hay, now stopping quietly to listen to the tiny squeak of some rustling mouse near by, or, it may be, creeping cautiously to the little hole up near the eaves in search of the big-eyed owl we once caught napping there. In a hundred ways we passed the fleeting hours. The general features of New England barns are all alike; and the barn of memory is a garner full of treasure sweet as new-mown hay. You remember the great broad double doors, which made their sweeping circuit in the snow; the ruddy pumpkins, piled up in the corner near the bins, and the wistful whinny of the old farm-horse, as with pricked-up ears and eager pull of chain he urged your prompt attention to your chores; the cows, too, in the manger stalls—how pleasant their low breathing—how sweet their perfumed breath! Outside the corn-crib stands, its golden stores gleaming through the open laths, and the oxen, reaching with lapping upturned tongues, yearn for the tempting feast, “so near and yet so far.” The party-colored hens group themselves in rich contrast against the sunny boards of the weather-beaten shed, and the ducks and geese, with rattling croak and husky hiss, and quick vibrating tails (that strange contagion), waddle across the slushy snow, and sail out upon the barn-yard pond.
Here is the pile of husks from whose bleached and rustling sheaths you picked the little ravellings of brown for your corn-silk cigarettes. Did ever “pure Havana” taste as sweet?