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diff --git a/old/62454-0.txt b/old/62454-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 2f2054f..0000000 --- a/old/62454-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,4045 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Trotwood's Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, October -1905, by Various - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Trotwood's Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, October 1905 - -Author: Various - -Release Date: June 23, 2020 [EBook #62454] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TROTWOOD'S MONTHLY, OCTOBER 1905 *** - - - - -Produced by hekula03, Craig Kirkwood, and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This -book was produced from images made available by the -HathiTrust Digital Library.) - - - - - - -Transcriber’s Notes: - -Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_), and text -enclosed by equal signs is in bold (=bold=). - -Additional Transcriber’s Notes are at the end. - - * * * * * - -[Illustration: WALTER DIRECT, 2:05-3/4.] - - * * * * * - - - - -TROTWOOD’S MONTHLY - - - VOL. 1. NASHVILLE, TENN., OCTOBER, 1905. NO. 1 - -Luther Burbank - - _He touched the spiculed desert--cacti-cursed-- - And turned its thorns to figs, its thistles, fruit; - He nodded to the daisy, half immersed - In dwarfing dust, and lo! a lily mute - Rose from the weeds--a perfume with a flute._ - - _And flowers ran to meet him--trailing vine-- - And wild hedge-roses--they whose souls had died - Beneath the feet of cattle and of kine-- - Sought him--those pallid Magdalenes--and cried - To touch his hem, and so stood glorified._ - - _Trees dwarfed and soulless--fruits with hearts of stone, - Wedded at his word; and in the sacred tryst - Of loves united, that had yearned alone, - Gave to the world the nectar of their bliss - In pitless peaches, crimsoned with a kiss._ - - _Who plants his poems in a berry’s bed, - Or writes, with wild roses, sonnets to the sun, - Hangs pictures on orchard boughs in gold and red, - Makes epics of fruitland where before were none, - Is Poet, Painter, Preacher--Master--all in one!_ - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - - - -Benefits of Forestry to Farmers - - -BY PERCY BROWN, OF EWELL FARM. - -Note.--Mr. Brown is a practical forester, having been chief forester -for the Houston Oil Co. and a graduate of Biltmore Forest School.--Ed. - - The preservation of our forests is an imperative business necessity. - We have come to see that whatever destroys the forest, except to make - way for agriculture, threatens our well being.--President Roosevelt. - -With abundant supplies of timber for farm consumption, farmers of the -South have been inclined to regard the question of forest preservation -merely as a matter of sentiment, and have come to look upon the -forester as an impracticable sort of sentimentalist, whose main object -in life is to keep some lumberman from cutting his timber. - -This indifference has resulted in the loss of the support of the -farming element to the cause of forestry, whereas the lumberman -who at one time considered the forester his natural enemy and the -forestry cause a clog in the wheels of progress, immediately began to -investigate the question with a view of combatting forest legislation -and the creation of a forestry sentiment throughout the country. - -The result was that a thorough understanding of the objects of -forestry and the aims of the forester has caused the lumbermen and -lumber associations to give their unqualified support to all practical -forestry legislation. And in the Southern States we find that the only -journal of any importance that is persistently advocating forestry as a -business is one of the foremost lumber journals south of the Ohio River. - -The silence that the farm journals of the country have maintained on -the question can be explained only by their ignorance of the question -and its important bearing on the agricultural interests of the entire -country. And as it is the purpose of this magazine to discuss all -questions of vital importance as well as those that will be of passing -interest to the farmers of the whole country it is well to begin with -an understanding of what forestry is, and to advance a few reasons why -the farmer should be the most ardent advocate of forestry. - -Dr. W. H. Schlich, the noted English forester, says the task with which -“forestry has to deal is to ascertain the principles according to which -forests shall be managed and to apply these principles to the treatment -of the forests.” - -Dr. B. E. Fernow, formerly chief of the Division of Forestry, defines -it as “The rational treatment of forests for forest purposes.” - -Dr. C. A. Schenck, of the Biltmore Forest School, gives the following -very broad and terse definition: “Forestry is the proper handling of -forest investments.” - -We see from these definitions that the forestry is purely a matter of -business differing only from other investments in the time element. A -forestry venture cannot be undertaken with a view of getting immediate -returns, but contemplates the continuity of the investment which makes -it the first duty of the forester to determine what is the best use the -forest can be put to in order to obtain the greatest annual return upon -the investment without drawing upon his capital invested. This does -not necessarily mean that his forest must be devoted entirely to the -production of timber, it may be maintained as a game preserve, or as a -watershed, in which case the returns to be obtained from the sale of -timber will be a secondary consideration. - -Consequently we see that the forester is not merely a botanist or a -tree planter, but in the fullest sense of the term is a technically -educated man, with the knowledge of the forest trees and their history -and of all that pertains to their production, combines further -knowledge which enables him to manage forest property so as to produce -certain conditions resulting in the highest attainable revenue from the -soil by wood-crops. - -The effect of forest cover and water-flow has been so persistently and -constantly proclaimed as the one great need for forest preservation -that the more important one of supply has been neglected. - -In a series of articles by Dr. Fernow, on “The Outlook of the Timber -Supply in the United States” (Quarterly, 1903), after carefully -considering the data compiled by the Chief Geographer, together with -his personal investigations, he summarizes the situation, which -justifies the urgent need of the forester’s art in the United States, -from the point of view of supplies, as follows: - -1. The consumption of forest supplies, larger than in any other country -in the world, promises not only to increase with the natural increase -of the population, but in excess of this increase per capita, similar -to that of other civilized, industrial nations, annually by a rate of -not less than three to five per cent. - -2. The most sanguine estimate of timber standing predicates an -exhaustion of supplies in less than thirty years if this rate of -consumption continues, and of the most important timber supplies in a -much shorter time. - -3. The conditions for continued imports from our neighbor, Canada, -practically the only country having accessible supplies such as we -need, are not reassuring and may not be expected to lengthen natural -supplies appreciably. - -4. The reproduction of new supplies on the existing forest area could, -under proper management, be made to supply the legitimate requirements -for a long time; but fires destroy the young growth over large areas, -and where production is allowed to develop in the mixed forest, at -least, owing to the culling processes, which remove the valuable kinds -and leave the weeds, these latter reproduce in preference. - -5. The attempts at systematic silviculture, that is, the growing of new -crops, are, so far, infinitesimal compared with the needs. - -That this is a question of serious importance to the South, as well as -to the whole country, is shown by the great increase in the South’s -production of lumber, which, owing to the depletion in other sections -of the country, has risen from eleven and nine-tenths per cent in -1880 to twenty-five and two-tenths per cent of the total output of the -United States in 1900, and it is not hard to predict an even greater -production for 1910, when one concern alone has increased the number -of its mills in the long leaf pine belt from seven to fifteen, and its -daily output from 500,000 to 1,000,000 feet during the period from 1900 -to 1904. - -Basing their estimates upon the present standards of grading, the -hardwood lumber journals are predicting the total exhaustion of the -available supplies of this timber in fifteen years, and the hardwood -lumbermen are already looking to forestry as a means of relief. - -In an address delivered before the third annual meeting of the Hardwood -Manufacturers’ Association of the United States, as an introduction to -the subject of “The Hardwood Producing Centers of the United States,” -Mr. John W. Love, of Nashville, said: - - “I hope to be able to briefly call the attention of this body of - practical manufacturers to a few pertinent facts that may, in a - measure, at least, open our eyes to a painful truth, viz., the - rapidly decreasing area of hardwood timber in the United States, - and when we consider how very little is being done to conserve our - forest growth--how the forests are being cleaned from hoop-poles to - giant oaks, and that to supply the one item of cross ties that are - used in this country alone, about 4,000,000,000 feet of timber is - required (clearing about 200,000 acres of wood lot annually), and - a large proportion of these ties are cut from thrifty young trees, - we must conclude that a matter so weighty as to give us pause. The - one hopeful sign of the future is the hope that practical forestry - methods may be enforced by the Government.” - -This in an address from a lumberman to an association of lumber -manufacturers is indeed an encouraging sign of the times, but I fear -he has waked up “to the realization that our efforts to secure a more -rational treatment of our forest resources and apply forestry in their -management are not too early, but rather too late: that they are by no -means sufficient; that serious trouble and inconvenience are in store -for us in the not too distant future; that the blind indifference and -the dallying or amateurish playing with the problem of legislatures and -officials is fatal.” - -The railroads and the farmers of the Western plains were among the -first to appreciate the importance of making provision for a future -supply of construction timber and material for use on the farms. - -With the far-sighted policy of manipulators of great corporations, the -officials of the Santa Fe Railroad were among the pioneers in forest -planting in America on railroads, as about twenty years ago they -planted 1,280 acres in hardy catalpa at a total expense of $128,000, -and they estimated that at the end of twenty-five years from date of -planting this tract will have produced $2,500,000 of poles, ties and -posts. - -A few years ago the Illinois Central made a plantation of catalpa and -black locust in Illinois and during the current year the Louisville & -Nashville Railroad have arranged for a similar plantation in Alabama. - -It has not been necessary for the farmers of the South to resort to -plantations for their supplies of posts and fuel, and if we are not -improvident of our supplies it will hardly become necessary, as we have -left on nearly every farm enough timber of suitable varieties from -which we can procure our future supplies by self-sown seed, provided -the sections to be reserved for timber growth are protected from stock -and fires. In some instances, however, it may prove cheaper and more -expedient to plant as was the case with the now famous yaggy catalpa -plantation near Hutchinson, Kan., in which a ten-year-old block showed -a net value of $197, or a yearly net income of $19.75 per acre. - -And a twenty-five-year-old plantation of red juniper, belonging to F. -C. F. Schutz, Menlo, Iowa, showed a net value of $200.54 per acre, or a -yearly net income of about $8--not a bad showing for forestry, when we -bear in mind that the net income from other farm crops seldom exceeds -that amount, but from the farm crops the returns are secured annually, -while in the case of a forestry investment there is quite a period -preceding the first harvest, during which we have to figure in an -accumulative value. - -All wood-lot planting should be governed by the local demand, for -that reason it would be hard to suggest either methods or species for -the South as a whole, but generally speaking, black locust (robinia -pseudoacacia), hardy catalpa, mulberry and chestnut would be the most -desirable, as the first three would be quickly available for fence -posts, and the chestnut would always be in demand for telephone and -telegraph poles as well as furnishing construction timber. - -Wood-lot forestry has the advantage over similar work conducted on -a large scale, as the farmer is at no expense for protection or -supervision, the location of forest on the farm assures its safety from -fire or trespass, and he gives it his personal attention. - -However, to secure the most desirable management his supervision should -be carried on under the direction of trained foresters. - -To secure this without appreciable additional cost it is to his -interest to ally himself with those who are striving for a State -forestry system, under which a forester would be employed whose duty -would be to look after the State reserves and give advice to farmers -and timber land owners on the management of all forest tracts set aside -for permanent forest investments. - -The indirect utility of the forests is well known and appreciated by -those who have given the matter any thought, but the average American -farmer has little use for a thing which does not appeal to him in -dollars and cents, however, the Bureau of Forestry realizing the great -importance of this matter to the agricultural interests, sent Mr. J. -W. Twomey to the San Bernardino Mountains of California to conduct -investigations of the “Relation of Forests to Stream Flow,” and in the -“Year-Book” of the Department of Agriculture for 1904 he reports these -conclusions: - -“In humid regions, where the precipitation is fairly evenly distributed -over the year, and where the catchment area is sufficiently large to -permit the greater part of the seepage to enter the stream above the -point where it is gauged, the evidence accumulated to date indicates -that stream flow is materially increased by the presence of forests. - -“In regions characterized by the short wet season and a long dry one, -as in Southern California and many other portions of the West, present -evidence indicates, at least on small mountainous catchment areas, that -the forest very materially decreases the total amount of run-off. - -“Although the forest may have, on the whole, but little appreciable -effect in increasing the rainfall and the annual run-off, its economic -importance in regulating streams is beyond computation. The great -indirect value of the forest is the effect which it has in preventing -wind and water erosion, thus allowing the soil on hills and mountains -to remain where it is formed, and in other ways providing an adequate -absorbing medium at the sources of the water courses of the country. -It is the amount of water that passes into the soil, not the amount of -rainfall, that makes a garden or a desert.” - -With such evidence as this before them, what farmer in the South will -dare question the importance of forestry to the agricultural interests -of every section of the South, and especially those sections lying -adjacent to streams having their sources in the territory of the -proposed Appalachian Forest Reserve? - -By protecting the forest growth on the watersheds of these streams the -flow of the water is rendered more continuous, and the dangers from -violent floods, which destroy fences and carry away the most fertile -soil, are lessened. - -The South to-day is pre-eminent in agriculture and timber production, -but the wasteful destruction of our forest resources bids fair to -transfer the laurels to the great undeveloped West, where we find -over 60,000,000 acres of forest reserves, which will for all time to -come offer a continuous supply of lumber for the manufacturer and -an abundance of water for the farmers who have made a garden of the -deserts. - -It is the duty of the Southern farmer to join with the hardwood -lumberman in his efforts to introduce forestry in the South, and by so -doing give to succeeding generations the heritage that except for the -destructive forces of man would have come to them in nature’s great -scheme of things. - - * * * * * - -TO THE CAHABA RIVER - - Ay, laugh along, thou cypress-crown’d stream, - Thou echo of the cloud’s kiss on the hills, - A Southern maid with eyes of deep-pool gleam - And cheeks of dimpled whorls and smiles of rills. - - Dance, sweet, on sward of violet-crested green, - Marked with the silvery pathway of thy track-- - With blue embossing ridge of hills between - And hair mist in the soft wind floating back. - - And sweet with soul of aromatic leaves, - Steeped in thy crucible of sun-warmed pool, - And with the warm breath of the bay, that grieves - His love-sigh out amid thy shadows cool. - - Dance, sweet, adown thy pathway’s wooded hush, - Laughing to ’scape the red arms of the hills, - Yet bringing on thy cheek the telltale blush, - For chattering tongues of all the old dame mills. - - The live-oak bends to kiss thee, and his sigh - Is mingled with the passing of thy charms; - The willows start from hidden coverts by - To clasp thee in their looping, lover arms. - - Is that deep shadow dark’ning now thine eye - Repentant sorrow for the willow’s plight, - As though the stern gloom of the cypress nigh - Thou speedest like a Naiad of the night? - - O life--life--life--and hast thou found it so, - A journey now in sunlight, now in shade-- - A laughter from the willows bending low - A gloom-sob which the cypresses have made? - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - - - -Little Sister - - -Little Sister was Col. Rutherford’s only grandchild. She was also -Capt. John Rutherford’s only niece. I mention the last-named gentleman -because he had a great deal to do with the making of this story. He was -quite original himself, and a braver, bigger-hearted friend no man ever -had. - -The Rutherford home was in the Middle Basin of Tennessee. The house -was built in 1812 by John Rutherford the first, who had eaten, slept, -fought, and finally died, with his old friend, Andrew Jackson. No -truer, better, braver people than the Rutherfords lived. No black sheep -ever came out of the flock. I have always maintained that a family’s -ability to refrain from throwing scrubs is the truest test of its -purity. The prepotency that produced dead-game, honest and true men and -women every time, is a long way ahead of “Norman blood.” “That’s the -genuine stuff,” as little three-year-old Sister once naively remarked -after looking over Uncle John’s pacing filly. However, that’s a story I -will tell later. - -When I first knew Little Sister she was only two years old, for just -two years before a terrible gloom had settled over the Rutherford home -when Little Sister’s mother, the Colonel’s daughter, had died. Death -is a terrible, bitter, hollow mockery to those who live. Some day, in -another world, we shall see things differently. In this, “cabined, -cribbed, confined” in our puny environments, we see only “through a -glass darkly,” and so God help us. - -As I said, she was the old Colonel’s only daughter--the fairest, -frailest, most lovely and most intellectual--a bride one year, and we -buried her the next. That’s all, except Little Sister, a fair, frail, -hot-tempered, sensitive--all brain and nerve--little tot who came to -take her mother’s place. Her bright blue eyes, pale-pink face and -red-flaxen hair kept one thinking of perpetual sunsets and twilights. -She was a _fac simile_ of her mother--intellect, impulsiveness, -loveliness, all except one thing--temper. She was fire and powder -there. A flash, an explosion--then she was sobbing for forgiveness in -your arms. That was Little Sister. - -“I can’t see where in the world she gets her temper from,” Grandmother -Rutherford said when two-year-old Little Sister slapped her squarely in -the face one day and then hung sobbing around the old lady’s neck as if -the blow had broken her own heart. - -“Col. Rutherford,” she would add impressively, “this child ought to be -spanked till she is conquered.” - -“Don’t do it, mother,” said Uncle John, while Little Sister gave him -a grateful look through her tears; “don’t do it; that is not the way -to train race colts. A conquering, your way, would spoil her. She will -need all of that temper, if it is brought under control, to get through -life with, and land anywhere near the wire first. Besides, with her -sensitiveness, don’t you see she is suffering now more than if we had -punished her? If she were a plug, now, she would slap you and never -be sorry till you made her sorry with a switch. But conscience beats -hickory, and gentleness is away ahead of blows.” - -And Uncle John would catch the two-year-old up and take her out to -see the colts. At sight of these she would forget all other trouble. -Her love for horses was as deep in her as the Rutherford blood. When -she saw the colts it was comical to see the great burst of sunshiny -laughter that spread all over her conscience-stricken face, while two -big tears--such big ones as only little heart-broken two-year-olds can -originate--were rolling slowly down her nose. - -“Oh, Uncle John,” she would say gleefully, “now, ain’t they just too -sweet for anything? Do let me get down and hug them, every one.” And -Uncle John would let her if he had to catch every one himself. - -The clear-cut way she talked English reminds me that there were two -things about Little Sister that always astonished me--her intellect and -her great sense of motherhood. I could readily see how she inherited -the first, but could never understand how so tiny a thing had such a -great big mother-heart. She loved everything little--everything born on -the farm. The fact that anything in hair, hide or feathers had arrived -was an occasion of jollification to her. - -“Oh, do let me see the dear little thing,” would be the first thing -from Little Sister that greeted the announcement. And she generally -saw it; at least, if Uncle John was around. It is scarcely necessary -to add that during the spring of the year, on a farm as large as -the Rutherford place, she was kept in one continual state of happy -excitement. - -One day they missed her from the house, and Uncle John quickly -“tracked” her to the cow barn, for it occurred to him he had only -the day before shown her the Short-horn’s latest edition--a big, -double-jointed, ugly, hungry male calf, who slept all day in the bedded -stall like a young Hercules, and only waked up long enough to wrinkle -his huge nose around and mentally make the remark the Governor of -North Carolina is said to have made to the Governor of South Carolina. -But Little Sister had declared he was “perfectly lovely.” That is -where Uncle John found her. She had climbed over the high stall gate, -unaided, and, after becoming acquainted, she had given young Hercules, -as a propitiary offering, her own beautiful string of beads and placed -them around his tawny neck. - -“Come out of there, you little rascal,” laughed Uncle John. “What do -you see pretty about that big, ugly calf?” - -“Oh, Uncle John,” sighed Little Sister, “I’m so sorry for him--he isn’t -pretty, to be sure--and so I have given him my beads. But he has a -lovely curly head,” she added encouragingly, “and he seems to be such a -healthy child.” - -On another occasion they missed Little Sister about night. Everybody -started out in alarm. Grandma found her first, coming from the -brood-sow’s lot. - -“Where in the world have you been, darling?” asked Grandma, as she -picked her up. - -“Playing with the little yesterday pigs,” she said. “And, Grandma, I -ought to have come home sooner, but I kissed one of the cunningest of -the little pigs good-night, and all the others looked so hurt, and -squealed so because I didn’t kiss them, too, I just had to catch every -one of them and kiss them before they would go to sleep. Indeed, I did.” - -Inheritance had played a Hamlet’s part in Little Sister’s make-up. -Most children crow, and babble, and lisp, and talk in divers and -different languages before they learn to talk English, while some never -learn at all. But not so with Little Sister. The first word she ever -attempted was perfectly pronounced. The first sentence she put together -was grammatically correct. The correctness of her language, for one -so small, made it sound so quaint that I often had to laugh at its -quaintness, while her deep earnestness and intensity but added to its -originality. - -And she picked up so many things from Uncle John. Else where did she -get this: Pete was a little darkey on the farm whose chief business -was to entertain Little Sister when everything else failed. Pete’s -repertoire consisted of all the funny things a monkey ever did, but his -two star performances were “racking” like Deacon Jones’ old claybank -pacer, and “playin’ possum.” Little Sister never tired of having -Pete do these two. And it was comical. Everybody knew Deacon Jones, -with his angular, sedate, solemn way of riding, and the unearthly, -double-shuffling, twisting, cork-screw gait of his old pacer. The -ludicrous gait of the old pacer struck Pete early in life, and he soon -learned to get down on his all-fours and make Deacon Jones’ old horse -ashamed of himself any day. The imitation was so perfect that Uncle -John used to call in his friends to see the show, which consisted of -Pete doing the racking act, while Little Sister, astraddle of his back, -with one hand in his shirt collar and the other wielding a hickory -switch, played the Deacon. One evening, as the company was taking -in the performance, and Pete, now thoroughly leg-weary, had paced -around for the twentieth time, Little Sister was seen to whack him in -the flanks very vigorously and exclaim: “Come, pace along there, you -son-of-a-gun, or I’ll put a head on you!” - -Uncle John nearly fell out of his chair. Only a week before he had made -that same remark to Pete for being a little slow about bringing in his -shaving water. But he didn’t know that Little Sister had heard him. - -The spring Little Sister was three years old the Colonel came in -to breakfast one morning with a cloud on his brow. It was a great -disappointment to him--old Betty, his saddle mare, the mare he had -ridden for fifteen years, “the best bred mare in Tennessee,” had -brought into the world a most unpromising offspring. “It is weak, puny -and no ’count, John,” he said to his son; “deformed, or something, in -its front legs, knuckles over and can’t stand up, the most infernally -curby-legged thing I ever saw.” - -“That’s too bad,” remarked Uncle John, as he helped himself to another -battercake. “I’ll go out after breakfast and look at the poor little -thing.” - -“No use,” remarked the Colonel gravely, “it’s deformed--can’t stand up; -and out of compassion for it I’ve ordered Jim to knock it in the head. -It’ll be better dead than alive.” - -Little Sister, with her big, inquisitive eyes, had been taking it all -in, as she gravely ate her oatmeal and cream. But the last remark of -Grandpa stopped the spoon half way to her mouth. The next instant, -unobserved, she had slipped out of her high-chair and flown to the barn. - -“I tell you, John,” remarked the old Colonel, “I sometimes think this -breeding horses is pure lottery. To think of old Betty, the gamest, -speediest mare I ever rode, having such a colt as that; and by Brown -Hal, too--the best young pacing horse I ever saw. It makes me feel bad -to think of it. Now, take old Betty’s pedigree----” - -But the old Colonel never got any further, for piercing screams from -Little Sister came from the barn. Uncle John glanced at her empty -chair, turned pale with fright, kicked over the two chairs which stood -in his way, then his favorite setter dog that blockaded the door, -and rushed hatless to the barn. There a pathetic sight met his eyes. -A negro stood in old Betty’s stall door with an axe in his hand. In -a far corner, on some straw, lay a sorry-looking, helpless colt. But -it was not alone, for a three-year-old tot knelt beside it, and held -the colt’s head in her lap while she shook her tiny fist at the black -executioner, and screamed with grief and anger: - -“You shan’t kill this baby colt--you shan’t--you shan’t! Don’t you come -in here--don’t you come! How dare you?” And, child though she was, the -flash of her keen, blue Rutherford eyes, like the bright sights of the -muzzle of two derringers, had awed the negro in the doorway and stopped -him in hesitancy and confusion. - -“Go away, Jim,” said Uncle John, as he took in the situation. “Come, -Little Sister,” he said, “let’s go back to Grandma.” - -But for once in her life Uncle John had no influence over the little -girl. She was indignant, shocked, grieved. She fairly blazed through -her tears and sobs. She would never speak to Grandpa again as long as -she lived. She intended her very self to kill Jim just as soon as she -“got big enough,” and as for Uncle John, she would never even love him -again if he did not promise her the baby colt should not be killed. - -“Poor little thing,” she said, as she put her arm around its neck and -her tears fell over its big, soft eyes; “God just sent you last night, -and they want to kill you to-day.” - -Uncle John brushed a tear away himself, and stooped over and -critically examined the little filly--for such it was. Little Sister -watched him intently for, in her opinion Uncle John knew everything and -could do anything. The tears were still rolling down her cheeks, as -Uncle John looked up quickly and said in his boyish, jolly way: “Hello, -Little Sister, this little filly is all right! Deformed be hanged! -She’s as sound as a hound’s tooth--just weak in her front tendons. I’ll -soon fix that. No sir, they don’t kill her, Mousey”--Uncle John called -her Mousey when he wanted her to laugh. - -The tears gave way to a crackling little laugh. “Well, ain’t that just -too sweet for anything; and Oh, Uncle John, ain’t she just sweet enough -to eat?” And Little Sister danced about, the happiest child in the -world. - -And what fun it was to help Uncle John “fix her up,” as he called it. -She brought him the cotton-batting herself and watched him gravely as -he made stays for the weak forelegs, and straightened out the crooked -little ankles. Finally, when he called Jim, and made him take the -little filly up in his arms and carry her into another stall where old -Betty stood and held her up to get her first breakfast, the little -girl could hardly contain herself. In a burst of generosity she begged -Jim’s pardon, and told her Uncle John confidentially that she didn’t -intend to kill Jim at all, now; but was going to give him a pair of her -Grandpa’s old boots instead. - -In return for this, Jim promptly named the filly “Little Sister,” a -compliment which tickled the original Little Sister very much. - -But having said the little filly was no-’count, the old Colonel stuck -to it--refused to notice it or take any stock in it. - -“Po’ little thing,” he would say a month after it was able to pace -around without help from its stays--“po’ little thing; what a pity they -didn’t kill it!” - -But Uncle John and Little Sister nursed it, petted it, and helped old -Betty raise it; and the next spring they were rewarded by seeing it -develop into a delicate-looking, but exceedingly blood-like, nervous, -highstrung little miss. Grandpa would surely relent now, but not so. -Prejudice, next to ignorance, is our greatest enemy, and the old -Colonel looked at the yearling and remarked: - -“Po’ little thing--that old Betty should have played off on me like -that!” And he turned indifferently on his heel and walked away, -whereupon both the filly and the little girl turned up their noses -behind the old man’s back. - -In the fall that the little filly was three years old the county pacing -stakes came off. A thousand dollars were hung up at the end of that -race, but greater still, the county’s reputation was at the feet of the -conqueror. The old Colonel had entered a big pacing fellow in the race, -named Princewood, and it looked like nothing could beat him. The big -fellow had been carefully trained for two seasons by a local driver, -and had already cost his owner more than he was worth. “But it’s the -reputation I am after, sir,” the Colonel would say to the driver--“the -honor of the thing. My farm has already taken it twice; I want to take -it again.” - -Now, Uncle John was quite a whip himself, and the old Colonel had -failed to notice how all the fall he had been giving Betty’s filly -extra attention, with a hot brush on the road now and then. The old -man, wrapped up as he was in Princewood’s wonderful speed, had even -failed to notice that Uncle John had frequently called for his light -road wagon, and he and Little Sister, now six years old, had taken -delightful spins down the shady places in the by-ways, where nobody -could see them, behind the high-strung little filly, and that often, at -supper, when Grandpa would begin to brag about Princewood’s wonderful -speed, Uncle John would wink at Little Sister, and that little miss -would have to cram her mouth full of peach preserves to keep from -laughing out at the table and being sent supperless to bed. - -There was a big crowd on the day of the race--it looked like all the -county was there. The field was a large one, for the purse was rich -and the honor richer--“and Princewood is a prime favorite,” chuckled -the old Colonel, as he stood holding a little girl’s hand near the -grandstand. - -But the little girl was very quiet. For once in her life “the cat had -her tongue.” Now, anybody half educated in child ways would have seen -this tot clearly expected something to happen. If the old Colonel -hadn’t been so busy talking about Princewood he might have seen it, too. - -The bell had already rung twice, and all the drivers and horses were -thought to be in, and were preparing to score down, when a newcomer -arrived, who attracted a good deal of attention. Instead of a sulky, he -sat in a spider-framed, four-wheeled gentleman’s road cart, at least -four seconds slow for a race like that. Instead of a cap he wore a soft -felt hat, and in lieu of a jacket, a cutaway business suit. He nodded -familiarly to the starting judge and paced his nervous-looking little -filly up the stretch. - -“Who is that coming into this race in that kind of a thing?” asked the -old Colonel of a farmer near by--for the old man’s eyesight was failing -him. - -“Why, Colonel, don’t you know your own son? That’s Cap’n John -Rutherford,” said the farmer. - -“The devil you say!” shouted the excitable old gentleman. “Why, damn -it, has John gone crazy?” and he jumped over a bench and rushed -excitedly up the stretch to head off the driver of the little filly. - -“In the name of heaven, John,” he shouted, “are you really going to -drive in this race?” - -Captain John nodded and smiled. - -“And what’s that po’ little thing you’ve got there?” - -“It’s Little Sister, father,” said Captain John good naturedly. “I’m -just driving her to please the little girl. I want to see how she’ll -act in company, anyway.” - -The old Colonel was thunderstruck. “Why, you’re a fool,” he blurted -out. “They’ll lose you both in this race. For heaven’s sake, John, get -off the track and don’t disgrace old Betty and the farm this way. Po’ -little no-’count thing,” he added, sympathetically, “it’ll kill ’er to -go round there once!” - -The Captain laughed. “It’s just for a little fun, father--all to please -the baby. It’s her pet, you know. I’ll just trail them the first heat, -and if she’s too soft I’ll pull out. But she’s better than you think,” -he added indifferently. “I’ve been driving her a good bit of late.” - -The old Colonel expostulated--he even threatened--but Captain John -only laughed and drove off. Then the old Colonel repented, and it was -comically pathetic to hear him call out in his earnest way: “John! Oh, -John! Don’t tell anybody it’s old Betty’s colt, will you?” - -Captain John laughed. “I’ll bet ten to one,” he chuckled to himself, -“he’ll be telling it before I do.” - -And the little filly--when she got into company she seemed to be -positively gay. She forgot all about herself, threw off all her nervous -ways, and went away with a rush that almost took Captain John’s breath. -He pulled her quickly back. “Ho, ho! little miss,” he said, “if you -do that again you’ll give us dead away,” and he looked slyly around -to see if anybody had seen it. But they were all too busy chasing -Princewood. That horse clearly had the speed of the crowd. And so Uncle -John trailed behind, the very last of the long procession, with the -little filly fighting for her head all the way. Nobody seemed to notice -them at all--nobody but a little girl, who clung to her grandpa’s -middle finger and wondered, in her childish faith, if the mighty Uncle -John--the Uncle John who knew everything and could do everything, and -who never missed his mark in all his life, was going, really going, to -tumble now from his lofty throne in her childish mind? And with him -Little Sister, too. - -She got behind Grandpa. Princewood paced in way ahead. She stuck her -fingers in her ears so she couldn’t hear the shouts, but took them out -in time to hear Grandpa say, “Well, I thought John had more sense,” as -that gentleman, after satisfying himself that he was not distanced, -paced slowly in. - -This made Little Sister think it was all up with Uncle John. She went -after a glass of lemonade, but really to cry in the dark hall behind -the grandstand and wipe her eyes on the frills of the pretty little -petticoat Grandma had made her just to wear to the fair. It was too bad. - -When she got back Grandpa was gone. He was over in the cooling stable, -talking to Uncle John. - -“John,” he said solemnly, “don’t disgrace old Betty any more. I’m -downright sorry for the po’ little thing. I’m afraid she’ll fall dead -in her tracks,” he added. - -Captain John flushed, “Well, let her drop,” he said, “but if I’m not -mistaken you’ll hear something drop yourself.” - -The old Colonel turned on his heels in disgust. - -But Uncle John meant business this time. He changed his cart for a -sulky, and again they got the word. Gradually, carefully, he gave the -little filly her head. Steadily, gracefully, she went by them one by -one, until at the half she was just behind Princewood, who seemed to -be claiming all the grandstand’s attention. The field left behind! If -Princewood wins this heat the race is over! - -“Princewood’s got ’em, Colonel!” exclaimed a countryman to the old man. -“They’s nothin’ that kin head ’im!” and “Princewood wins! Princewood -wins!” as they headed into the stretch. - -And then something dropped. Little Sister felt the reins relax, and a -kindly chirrup came from Uncle John. In a twinkling she was up with the -big fellow, half frightened at her own speed, half doubting, like a -prima donna when her sweet voice first fills a great hall, that it was -really she who had done it. - -“Princewood! Princewood!” shouted the crowd around their idol, the -Colonel. “Princewood will break the record!” from partisans who knew -more about plow horses than race horses. - -The old Colonel arose in happy anticipation--and then, as his trained -eye really took in the situation, his jaw dropped. What was that little -bay streak that had collared so gamely his big horse? Who was the -quiet-looking gentleman in the soft felt hat, handling the reins like a -veteran driver? His son John was in a cart--this driver was in a sulky. -“Who the devil--” he started to say, when somebody clinging to his -finger cried out: “Look! Look! Grandpa! It’s Little Sister. Ain’t she -just too sweet for anything?” - -And the next instant the little filly laughed in the big pacer’s face, -as much as to say, “You big duffer, have you quit already?” And then, -like a homing pigeon loosed for the first time, she sailed away from -the field. - -“Princewood! Princewood will break the record!” shouted a man who -hadn’t caught on and was yelling for Princewood while looking at the -champion pumpkin in the window of the agricultural hall. - -And then the old Colonel lost his head and, I am sorry to say, the most -of his religion, for he jumped up on a bench and shouted so loud the -town crier heard him in the court-house window, a mile away: “_Damn -Princewood! Damn the record! It’s Little Sister! Little Sister! Old -Betty’s filly--my old mare’s colt!_” - -And then Uncle John laughed till he nearly fell out of the sulky. “I -said he’d be telling all about her first,” he said, while a little -innocent-looking tot plucked the old man by the coat-tail long enough -to get him to stop telling the crowd all about the marvelous breeding -of the wonderful filly, as she naively remarked: “And the little thing -did play off on you sure enough, didn’t she, Grandpa?” - -The crowd laughed, and Grandma picked her up, kissed her, and shouted: -“And here’s the girl that saved her, gentlemen--the smartest girl in -Tennessee--and she’s got more horse sense than her old granddaddy!” - -There was one more heat, of course; but it was only a procession, and -those behind cannot swear to this day which way Little Sister went. - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - - - -A History of the Hals - - -By JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - -[Illustration: CAPT. THOMAS GIBSON. Owner of Gibson’s Tom Hal and John -Dilliard.] - - -CHAPTER I. THE PACING RACE HORSE. - - Full-muscled, clean, clear-cut, without a flaw, - Deep-chested--shallow where the quick flanks draw-- - Round-footed, flat and flinty in the bone, - Eyes full and flashing, as the opal stone, - Neck like the deep-grooved classic column’s ply-- - Massive at base, tap’ring towards the sky, - Ears thin and slender, velvet-pointed, fine - As the unbursted leaflets of the columbine. - Shoulders well back, slanting, thin and strong, - Ribbed close as steel, where girders run along; - Quarters long and massive, rubber-hard and round, - Quick in the stride, but quicker in rebound-- - Back like the beam that held Pantheon’s dome-- - Gods, give the word, and see this horse come home! - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - -The race horse has come, by common consent to represent all that is -graceful and grand in the animal kingdom. The culmination of perfected -strength and speed, courage and intelligence, he stands, nevertheless, -the model of patience, gentleness and forbearance. How wonderful it -seems that in this dumb creature, whose mental gifts, compared to -man’s, are as a clay bed to a bank of violets, yet has he reached, -through the misty channels of mere instinct, a physical perfection and -often a moral excellence which his maker and molder may never attain! -He is amiable in spite of force and desperate races, and often blows -and cruelty; he is gentle, notwithstanding a training tending to make -him a whirlwind of wrath and a tornado of tempests; he is honest in -spite of the dishonesty of those around him and docile and contented -despite the fact that there slumbers within him like sleeping bolts in -a flying cloud the spirit of madness gathered from the nerve granaries -of a long line of unnumbered ancestors. - -A regiment with his courage would ride over the guns of a Balaklava; -a state with his honesty would need no criminal laws; give scholars -his patience, and the stars would be their playthings; imbued with -his power of endurance, the weakest nation would tunnel mountains as -a child a sand hill, build cities as a dreamer builds castles, and -shoulder the world with a laugh. To one who sees him as he is, and -loves him for his intrinsic greatness, he is all this and more. Man’s -honest servant, dumb exemplar, truest helper, best friend. - -In his master’s hour of recreation, he is the joyful spirit that whirls -him, at the swish of a whip, along the dizzy course where the whistling -winds sing their warning. In his hours of stern reality, when fortunes -hang on his hoof beats and fame stands balanced on the wire that ends -the home-stretch, he is the embodiment of power and dignity, the -champion of might and the god of victory. And finally, in his gentler -moods, he is the faithful servant of the stubble and the plow, the -gentle guardian of the family turn-out, who hauls the laughing children -along the by-ways amid the sweet grasses, where the sunshine and the -zephyrs play. Out from the past, the dim, bloody, shifting past, came -this noble animal, the horse, side by side with man, fighting with -him the battles of progress, bearing with him the burdens of the -centuries. Down the long, hard road, through flint or mire, through -swamp or sand, wherever there has been a footprint, there also will be -seen a hoof-print. They have been one and inseparable, the aim and the -object, the means and the end. And if the time shall ever come, as some -boastingly declare, when the one shall breed away from the other, the -puny relic of a once perfect manhood will not live long enough to trace -the record of it on the tablet of time. - -The greatest distinct family of horses that has ever lived is the -Hal family of pacers, a distinctively Tennessee product, originating -in that peculiar geological formation known as the Middle Basin--the -bluegrass region of Tennessee. To understand the greatness of this -family of horses--now known throughout the world, wherever speed and -endurance has a name--it is only necessary to publish the following -table of world-records held by them. These records have all been won -in the last quarter of a century, the remarkable fact being that -before that time these horses lived only for the plow, the saddle -or the wheel, and that nearly all of them are sons and daughters or -descendants of one horse--a roan, known locally as Gibson’s Tom Hal, -from the fact that Capt. Thomas Gibson, a gentleman of the old school, -then living on his estate in Maury County, Tenn., and now the efficient -secretary of the Nashville, Chattanooga & St. Louis Railway Library, -first reclaimed him from obscurity and brought him to the county where -his greatness was recognized. - -These world records, the choicest in the harness world, are held -to-day, August, 1905, by the descendants of the old roan pacer: - - 1. First horse to go a mile in harness in 2 minutes, Star Pointer, - 1:59-1/4. - - 2. Fastest 4-year-old mare, The Maid, 2:05-1/4. - - 3. Fastest green performer (1905), Walter Direct, 2:05-3/4. - - 4. Fastest heat in a race, stallion, Star Pointer, 2:00-1/2. - - 5. Fastest heat in a race, mare, Fanny Dillard, 2:03-3/4. - - 6. Fastest first heat in a race, Star Pointer, 2:02. - - 7. Fastest third heat in a race, Star Pointer, 2:00-1/2. - - 8. Fastest fifth heat in a race, The Maid, 2:05-3/4. - - 9. Fastest two heats in race (Dariel and) Fanny Dillard, 2:03-3/4, - 2:05. - - 10. Fastest three consecutive heats in a race, Star Pointer, - 2:02-1/2, 2:03-1/2, 2:03-3/4. - - 11. Fastest three heats in a race, Star Pointer, 2:02-1/2, 2:03-1/2, - 2:03-3/4. - - 12. Fastest seven-heat race, The Maid, 2:07-1/4, 2:07-1/4, 2:05-1/4, - 2:09, 2:05-3/4, 2:07, 2:08-3/4. - - 13. Fastest mile in a race to wagon, Angus Pointer, 2:04-1/2. - - 14. Fastest team, Direct Hal and Prince Direct, 2:05-1/2. - - 15. Fastest three-heat in race to wagon, Angus Pointer, 2:06-1/4, - 2:04-1/2, 2:06-1/4. - - 16. Fastest green performer, stallion, Direct Hal, 2:04-1/2. - - 17. Fastest team in a race, Charley B and Bobby Hal, 2:13. - - 18. Fastest pacing team, amateur trials, Prince Direct and Morning - Star, 2:06. - -It will be observed that all of these records except a few were made in -races and not against time. - -Whence came this wonderful family of horses? What is this pacing gait? -What mingling of blood lines have brought these horses of the plow, the -saddle and the wheel to the grandstand and the pinacle of fame? - -This is the story I shall tell as a serial during the first twelve -issues of Trotwood’s Monthly. - -The light-harness horse has come to be a type of its own. It is -distinctly an American type, as distinguished from the English running, -or thoroughbred horse, the German and French coach, the Russian Orloff -and horses of other nationalities. There is a wide gap, however, -between a race horse, whether runner or harness horse, and other -breeds, however pure, their blood lines. It is the difference of -intelligence, speed, endurance, of lung development, of steel bone. It -is the difference between genius and mediocracy--for speed is to the -horse what genius is to man. - -Whence began this speed--in the English runner, in the American trotter -and pacer? Traced back, the sheiks of the desert might tell; they who -worshipped the midnight stars, or chased on steeds of fire the wild -antelope of the plains, before Abraham came from “Ur of the Chaldees.” -Knowing the past now from the present, seeing it so clearly through -the glasses of twentieth century science, knowing the laws of the -“survival of the fittest,” that land and air and sand and sun make both -the physical man as well as the physical horse, we can easily guess -what centuries of wild gallops across the desert will do for the horse, -supplemented by that natural love of him in his master--that love which -brings care and kindness and the exercise of common sense in mating and -maternity. - -As to the American horse, there are two distinct classes, based on -their respective gaits--the trotter and the pacer. In another chapter -these respective gaits are fully discussed, their difference shown, -their origin and the speed attained by each. This brief history will -deal only with the pacing gait, but so closely are these two great -gaits related, and so often do the blood lines of trotter and pacer -run in parallel columns that it is necessary for a clear explanation -of the subject to say a foreword about the trotter, that grand type of -beauty, speed and utility, so purely American and so superbly great -that the very mention of his name should excite a patriotic glow in the -bosom of every American who loves his country and her just fame. - -The history of the trotting horse began with Messenger, a gray -thoroughbred foaled in 1780, and imported from England to America in -May, 1788. He was royally bred for his time, being by Mambrino, son -of Engineer, and through both sire and dam he traced to the famous -Godolphin Arabian. An old description of him says he was 15-3/4 -hands high, with “a large, long head, rather short, straight neck, -with wind-pipe and nostrils nearly twice as large as ordinary; low -withers, shoulders somewhat upright, but deep and strong; powerful -loins and quarters; hocks and knees unusually large, and below them -limbs of medium size, but flat and clean and, whether at rest or in -motion, always in perfect position.” With this beginning, in 1822, a -Norfolk trotter called Bellfounder, who had trotted two miles in six -minutes, and had challenged all England to a trot, was imported. It -was his daughter in which the strains of Messenger met that produced -Hambletonian 10, the head of the trotting type in America, the first -great trotting sire of the world, and through him perpetuated by his -great sons, such as Geo. Wilkes, Electioneer, Dictator, and their -descendants. Through all these years the trotting record has gradually -been reduced, first by one great trotter and then another, beginning -with the first queen of the trotting turf, Lady Suffolk, and ending -with that superb little thing of fire and speed and sweetness, Lou -Dillon. Literally, in that century of progress millions of dollars -have been spent, not only by thousands of small breeders, but by such -financial magnates and great breeders as Vanderbilt, Sanford, Bonner, -Backman, Alexander, Forbes, Lawson and others, chiefly in New York, New -England, Kentucky and California. - -The effect of all this was to create that splendid race of trotters now -known all over the world, and to produce a horse capable of trotting a -mile in two minutes or better. - -But even before the advent of Messenger there had developed in the -eastern coast of the Colonies, chiefly in Delaware and Rhode Island, a -family of extremely fast pacers known as the Narragansetts, an account -of which will be seen a few chapters further on. These horses were -small, but game, docile, excellent under the saddle, and used almost -exclusively for travel in those early days of pioneer roads. Their -speed was marvelous, if the testimony of Rev. Dr. McSparrow, 1721, an -English minister who was stationed in the Colonies, may be accepted as -proof. This reverend gentleman, writing to a friend in England says -that he has seen them pace in races under saddle, going a mile in “a -little less than two and a good deal better than three minutes.” - -However, for nearly two centuries the pacer never was thought of as -a factor in horse development, especially as a race horse until the -advent of the Hal family of Tennessee, in the early 70’s, with Little -Brown Jug and Mattie Hunter, although the great bloodlines and speed -of Pocahontas, James K. Polk and other noted pacers in the early ’40’s -ought to have foretold what great possibilities lay in the despised -pacing gait. As usual, the rejected stone found itself in the key of -the arch, and out of Tennessee, by what some might term chance, but in -fact the legitimate product of scientific breeding, of soil, of climate -and grass, out of an obscure family of saddle horses, bred with no idea -of racing and with never a thought of fame, but taken, like Coriolanus, -literally from the plow, this horse is found--the first to go a mile -in two minutes or better, and to do almost without price and without -effort what the millionaires of horsedom had spent fortunes to do in -vain. - -This was first accomplished by Star Pointer, at Readville, Mass., -September 2, 1897. - -Such a family deserves to be perpetuated in history, however brief it -may be and unpretentiously written. And I beg the future as well as the -present historian not to criticise too closely its style, for in it, -as I go along, a hundred fancies will twine themselves with my facts. -There is so much about man and horse that is akin. There is so much of -human nature in both--there is such a chance for moralizing on their -life, their death, their fame, their fortune, their brief days’ strut -on the stage of time, their passing out--“and the rest is silence.” -And, speaking of fame in both man and horse, is it not all a lottery? - -With men she is a sly and uncertain goddess, coming seldom to those who -court her, and often to others who care nothing for her, so, in the -rearing of race-horses the same uncertainty exists, and matron after -matron bred in purple lines may go on throwing quitters and lunkheads -year after year, while some obscure dam, whose breeding is barely -tolerable, but stamped by nature with a spirit of fire and a soul of -steel, sends out from some hithertofore obscure breeders’ farm a race -horse that sets a new mark for speed and a new fashion for blood lines. - -In a decision, Judge Gaynor, of the Supreme Court of King’s County, -New York, in a case against the president of the Gravesend track, -where runners are raced, held that horse racing was not a lottery. -This may be true within the technical meaning of the term, lottery, -but if the honorable court had held that breeding race horses was not -a lottery, we have our doubt whether the decision would have met with -the unanimous consent of the breeders themselves. And, as we remarked -above, fame itself is not more uncertain. - -There is so much similarity between man and horse that a student of -either will constantly find himself comparing the two. Almost every -quality possessed by man has its counterpart, though often in a less -degree, in man’s favorite animal, while now and then the master fails -to come up to the many excellencies of his beast. A good judge of -human nature is invariably a good judge of horses and horse nature. In -fact, so well understood is this rule that “horse sense” in man has -come to have a definite meaning of its own, and classes the human thus -favored with a common sense stronger than usual. - -It is almost certain failure for erring man to struggle only to be -famous. She never yet came in all her splendor to the impetuous wooer. -Like Cleopatra, who secretly tired of the infatuated Anthony, who could -not fight at Actium for thoughts of her, and secretly died for love of -the young Caesar who heartily despised the character of the ancient -Langtry, so also with fame. “God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb,” -and perhaps knows if he allowed the fools who burn up their lives and -their midnight oil seeking to become famous, to become so, their heads -would burst with conceit or their own vanity would wreck them. But -on the other hand, He often showers on those who honestly fight for -right, regardless of consequences, who care more for principle than -for worldly honor, and more for truth than for glory, and who do their -whole duty regardless of consequences, the greatest fame and honor. -The strutting peacock has all he can carry in his gaudy plumage and -resplendent feathers. It would have been as much a sacrilege to have -added these decorations to either Ulysses S. Grant or Robert E. Lee, as -it would have been cruel to deprive John Pope and Robert Tombs of them. -And the gap between the pairs is the true distance between fame and -feathers. - -The wild, reckless and dissipated young rake, who left Rome more to -be rid of his creditors than to fight the Gauls, never dreamed of the -glory in store for him as he threw the fire of his soul in his work and -blazed his way to fame both with a pen and sword--each so resplendently -bright that the student of to-day is lost in wonder and admiration -as he endeavors to decide on which Caesar’s greatest claim to renown -rests. “Here lies one whose name is written on water,” is the epitaph -which the poor, gentle, timid Keats begged to have carved on his tomb, -begged it as he lay dying from shafts of cruelty and malice. And yet, -his fame is as enduring as his art, and that is “a thing of beauty” and -“a joy forever.” “What have I done to be worthy of this great honor?” -asked Washington, when he heard he was elected the first president of -the Republic. Shakespeare was silent, morose, dissatisfied, as all true -artists are, with his own work, and judging from the epitaph, which it -is said he himself wrote, it appears he was fearful he might not have -even a place to rest his bones. And so, the world over. Simplicity is -greatness. Truth is fame. Honesty is glory. If you doubt it compare -Agricola and Cataline; Washington and Arnold; Paul and Iscariot; -Shakespeare and Sheridan. - -In the same line of reasoning it is an hundred to one when a breeder, -pinning everything on a pedigree, an individuality, or some supposed -excellency, ever hits the mark. It is said that the same man once -owned Kittrell’s Tom Hal and Copperbottom. The latter he thought was -the better horse; the former was ignored. Time has shown, perhaps to -his loss, the owner’s error. An exchange recently published a story of -how a prospective buyer went to purchase one or two colts. The first -was Hambletonian 10, then, I think, a yearling; the second was a horse -called Abdallah. He regarded Abdallah the handsomest, the speediest, -the best. He spent a good deal of time in his examination, and as they -were priced the same, showing that even the owners had not discovered -any difference, he finally purchased the Abdallah colt, and, the writer -adds, “The first went to fame, the second to a double-tree.” - -But some people think horse-breeding is not a lottery. Why, even -man-breeding is. - -And so the Hal family, thinking not of fame, find it thrust upon them. - -(To be Continued.) - - * * * * * - -THE LAST HYMN OF THE BILOXI - -(The Biloxi, a noble tribe of Indians who lived on the Gulf Coast many -centuries ago, were defeated in battle and besieged in their last -remaining fortress by an unrelenting enemy. Choosing rather to die in -the sea than to be captured and enslaved, they marched out of their -gate on a moonlit night, singing a death chant, a stately procession -of men, women and children, and continued seaward until the waves -swallowed them up. Their enemies stood on the shore and watched them, -struck with surprise and admiration. The remains of their last fortress -is said to be still standing at Biloxi, Miss., and to this day there is -heard a weird music which comes in from the Gulf, oftenest on still, -moonlit nights, which the natives call “The Last Hymn of the Biloxi.”) - - Over the sea, the silent sea, - Faint is the music that comes to me. - Pitifully pealing. - Silently stealing. - Kissing the waves so tenderly. - - Starlight above--June--chirrup of crickets-- - Fireflies and phantoms of stars in the glow. - Corn in the tassel--faint odor of pollen-- - Blow! ye soft night winds, our requiem, blow-- - Dear land that has known us, no more will ye know. - - Over the sea, the moonlit sea, - Sad is the music that comes to me. - Echoing--dying-- - Sobbing--sighing-- - Song of a race that would ever be free. - - Death in the land--grim death in the battle-- - Death--and worse death--for mother and maid. - Bravely we fought, but Fate did not favor-- - Sons of Biloxi, ye were never afraid-- - In caverns of corals our bones shall be laid. - - Over the sea, the crooning sea - (Weird as the wail of a wraith, to me). - Soft as the light dew - Falling the night through. - Faint as a sea-shell’s lullaby. - - Moonlight around--mist, mist on the water-- - Mist--’tis the drapery of Death on the deep. - White-robed we come--babe, mother and maiden-- - Priest--warrior--pity us, sweet sea, and keep-- - Dear Sea that has nursed us, in thee let us sleep. - - Into the sea, the soothing sea. - Singing, they entered, and died to be free. - Now, when the echoing wave - Sobs o’er their coral grave. - It sings the last hymn of the brave Biloxi. - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - - - -Testing and Redeeming Soils - - -BY H. ALISON WEBSTER. - -With the population of the world ever increasing, and the acreage of -fertile lands ever decreasing, with the consequent increasing demand -for, and decreasing supply of all products of the soil, is not the -duty of redeeming worn-out lands, enriching naturally poor lands and -preserving the fertility of fertile lands a duty that every land owner -owes to posterity? If the results of robbing the soil of its plant -foods has already been felt by the farmer, and if such a practice -be continued, what will be the condition of the same soil by the -time it descends to his great-grandchildren? If the vast majority of -the inhabitants of the globe are poor, and scarcely able to provide -food and raiment at the present prices, what will be the fate of -such a people when prices rise higher and higher, as will be the -inevitable result of an inadequate supply? Is confidence the cause -of such shameful neglect, or does the farmer lack confidence in the -practicability of the results of scientific research? It is true that -the great variety of objects in nature are extremely bewildering, and -if every farmer were forced to comprehend God’s creations in order -to equip himself to cultivate his land intelligently, the soil would -continue to get poorer and poorer, as the useful years of a long life -would pass in study; but men of science, in the past and present -generations, by faithful and noble work, have reduced all to simple -facts to be made practicable by the farmer, and there is no longer any -excuse for ignorance and neglect. Study the results of the work of -these men of science. Put them into practice. Experiment and work with -the soil. Study it and find out what it needs, and having found out, -supply the right thing in the right way at the right time. It is work, -hard work; but the reward is generous. In the words of Mr. Charles -Barnard, “Try things and learn, and having learned, do what is right by -your soil, and it will return all your labor in full measure, running -over, and your children will inherit the land as a well-kept trust and -blessing.” - -As stated, things have been greatly simplified. Chemists, by thousands -of experiments, have found in all sixty-five single separate things -they call elements. Seventeen of these elements are in the soil. Out -of these seventeen the farmer is obliged to provide only four, as -the remaining thirteen, with favorable weather and proper tillage of -the soil, will take care of themselves. The four to be provided are -nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus and calcium. The first three elements -are the most important, as they are plant foods or fertilizers. The -last, calcium, or lime, is a stimulant, and serves in the capacity of -neutralizing the acids of the soil. Lime is abundant in many soils and -in such soils is not needed; but where it is needed it is needed badly -and should be supplied. Nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus are the -plant foods that are yearly consumed in various quantities by various -crops, which are taken away and sold or otherwise disposed of. They -are foods absolutely necessary to plant life, and if taken away and -never returned, the soil is as certain to become poor and exhausted -as the sun is to set in the west. This is the sum and substance of -the whole matter. What you take from the soil, you have to replace or -suffer loss. Your soil may need one, two, three or all four of the -elements. What it requires can be found out by experiment, as will -be shown further on. These elements as everyone must know, can be -easily obtained at costs varying with, and depending upon, the form -in which they are bought, or methods by which they are secured. The -all-important thing is to study the soil and prepare it to accept -and properly appropriate whatever foods are applied. No fertilizer -is insurance against laziness and ignorance. It takes work and -intelligence to accomplish any task. Study your soil, and you will -appreciate the fact that it has a constitution like yourself, and -will get worn out, and sick, and need physic just as you do. After -knowing its constitution, you can prescribe and administer the physic -it requires. No doctor can prescribe medicine intelligently without -knowing the constitution of his patient. - -Naturally, though unfortunately, men of science, so far as the farmer -is concerned, are quite as intricate in their explanations of the -objects of nature, as are the objects themselves. Mr. Charles Bernard -in his “Talks About Soils,” published by Funk & Wagnalls, New York, is -the first to reduce matters to a practical plane. His explanations and -experiments I therefore adopt to simplify and make clear many things -which are of unquestionable importance. - -The soil having been formed, in the main, by the weathering away of -the rocks, its foundation is either sand or clay or both combined. -On account of different quantities of sand and clay being found in -different soils, and to distinguish one from another, soils have been -divided into six classes. These are as follows: - -A Light Sand.--This is a soil containing ninety per cent of sand. If it -had more sand and less of clay and other matter it would hardly produce -any useful plants, and could not fairly be called a soil. - -2. A Pure Clay.--This would be a soil in which no sand could be found. -A pure clay soil would be wet and cold, and would not be good for our -common plants. Such soils are rare: and what is commonly called a pure -clay soil is one containing a great excess of clay, and only a little -sand or other matter. - -3. A Loam.--This is one of the best of all soils. Such a soil contains -both sand and clay as well as other matter. - -4. A Sandy Loam.--This is a mixture of sand and clay, with more sand -than clay. - -5. A Clay Loam.--This is a mixture in which there is more clay than -sand. - -6. A Strong Clay.--This is a clay containing from five to twenty per -cent of sand and other matter. - -Experiments with Sand and Clay.--Procure a quart of pure sand and -spread it out in the sun to dry, and when dry place a small quantity -on a spoon, and hold over a hot fire. The heat has no effect upon it. -Remove the spoonful of sand from the fire, and it will be found that -the sand keeps its heat for a long time. Place a small quantity of sand -in a small sieve and pour water over it. The water at first flows away -more or less discolored, and presently runs quickly through the sand -pure and clean. While wet the sand sticks together slightly. Place it -in the air, and it soon dries, and the grains are as loose as before. -Place a little of the washed sand in a bottle filled with water. Cork -the bottle and shake it up. The sand will move about as long as the -water is in motion, but the instant the bottle is at rest, it falls -to the bottom, and forms a layer under the clear water. Place some -of the sand in an oven or in the sun till perfectly dry. Place three -tablespoonfuls of water in a saucer, and then pour carefully into the -saucer a cupful of dry sand. It becomes wet around the little heap -while still dry at the top; soon the water will begin to creep up the -sand and in a short time it is all wet, and remains wet as long as -there is water in the saucer. - -These experiments show us that sand is not affected by heat, and that -it keeps its heat for some time; that water passes through it readily -and, if clean, the water passes through pure and clean. When wet it is -very slightly sticky, when dry this stickiness disappears completely. -In water it sinks the moment the water is at rest. Water rises through -it easily by capillary attraction. - -Another experiment, taking more time, is to place some clean sand in a -flower pot, wet it, and sprinkle fine grass-seeds over it. Place in a -warm room and the seeds will soon sprout and send small roots down into -the sand. - -These experiments show some of the characteristics of all soils -composed largely of sand. We observed that sand when heated retains its -heat for some time. Any soil having a large proportion of sand, when -warmed by the sun will keep the heat after the sun has set or is hid by -the clouds. We proved that water would flow quickly through it. A sandy -soil is therefore a dry soil, and for this reason favorable to nearly -all our useful plants. We saw that water would rise through sand by -capillary attraction, which makes sand useful in soil in dry weather to -bring water up from a damp subsoil to feed the roots of plants growing -in the soil. - -However, there are objections to sand. As we saw, it is loose and -easily moved about by water. A sandy soil is therefore easily washed -away by rains, and, if too sandy, may suffer great injury by washing in -heavy storms. Water flows through sand quickly, and if there is no damp -subsoil immediately beneath, the soil may get so dry that plants will -burn up. The water may also wash down all the light organic matter out -of reach of the plants. - -We observed that sand is easily moved about. This is important in that -all soils where plants are growing must be frequently stirred, to let -air come into the soil, and to kill the weeds. A sandy soil is easy to -hoe or plow, because the sand is loose. This saves time and money, or -work in caring for plants, and is a business advantage. - -If you carry out the experiment with seeds planted on sand you will -observe that the roots of the young plants easily find their way -through the sand in search of food and water. This shows that a soil -containing sand is favorable to the growth of plants, because in it -their roots spread in every direction. - -Procure a small quantity of clay from some clay bank. Place in a -warm place to dry, and in a day or two you can crush it into a soft, -impalpable powder. Pinch a little between the fingers and it appears -to stick together slightly. Place some in a bottle of water, cork it -tight and shake the bottle. The powder floats in the water in clouds, -till the water appears completely filled with it. Let the bottle stand -and it will be many hours before the clay settles and the water becomes -clear. Wet some of the dry clay, and it forms a sticky, pasty mass, -that has a soft, greasy feeling between the fingers. Spread some of the -soft, pasty mass over a sieve, and pour water on it and the water will -hardly pass through the sieve at all. Spread some wet clay over a rough -board, and pour water over it, and the clay will cling to the board a -long time before it is swept away. Place a lump of wet clay in the sun -and it will be many hours before it is entirely dry. Spread some of the -wet clay over a dish and place it in the sun, and when it slowly dries -it will be found full of cracks. Place a lump of wet clay in an oven -and it will dry hard like stone. - -Place some of the wet clay in a pot and scatter fine seeds over it. -The seeds may sprout and try to grow, but they will probably perish as -tender roots are unable to push their way through the sticky clay. - -After all these experiments have been performed with the clay and sand, -another experiment can be made by drying both the clay and sand and -then mixing them together in equal parts. When well mixed place in a -pot and scatter fine seeds upon the mixture. Water well, and place in -a sunny window; and the plants will sprout and grow longer and better -than in either the pure sand or pure clay. - -These experiments with the lump of clay show that if soil consists -wholly of clay, it must be a poor place for plants. In every hard rain -the water, instead of sinking into the soil to supply the plants, would -run away over the surface and be wasted. After slow soaking rains the -soil would remain wet and cold for a long time. When the sun dries the -soil it splits and cracks and tears the roots of plants growing in it. -This sticky, pasty soil sticks to spade and plows and we find it hard, -slow work to cultivate it. A pure clay from these would appear to be -a poor soil for plants. We must not, however, be led astray by our -experiments, as it is not easy to find a soil composed wholly of clay. -It is usually mixed with other things and then forms a valuable part of -the best soils. Sand alone would be a poor soil. Clay alone would be a -poorer soil. Mixed together and mixed with other things, they make a -part of all good soils. - -Organic and Inorganic Matter.--Organic matter is something that has -life, or has had life at some time. The organic matter in the soil has -been supplied by animals and plants, in one way or another. All else -is inorganic. Both organic and inorganic matters are necessary to the -existence of plants. Peaty soils wholly organic will not grow plants, -neither will sandy soils wholly sand. Inorganic matter forms the -foundation of soils and generally forms from eighty to ninety per cent -of the whole soil. - -Testing Soils for Clay, Sand and Organic Matter.--Take from the ground -you wish to test, a peck of soil and place on a board in a round heap, -and with a trowel stir it until completely mixed. Then pile into a -heap and divide into four equal parts. Next weigh out eight ounces, -and spread it out to dry. When dry weigh it and note the loss by -air-drying. Next put the soil in a pan and place it in an oven for -three hours. Then take the soil out of the pan and weigh it, noting the -loss by fire-drying. It is now dry soil and to estimate the organic -and inorganic matter, place an iron shovel over the fire, and when -red hot put the dry soil on it, let it burn, stirring it occasionally -as it burns. It will smoke and smoulder away to ashes and dust. When -it ceases to smoke, carefully weigh the ashes. This ash represents -the inorganic sand and clay parts of the soil. All the organic matter -disappeared in the smoke. - -Now take this ash and pour it in a bottle of water. Shake the bottle -well and then set on a table, and just so soon as the water becomes -still the sand will immediately settle at the bottom, while the clay -will remain for some time making the water muddy. As soon as the sand -has settled, pour the muddy or clay water off, being careful not to -pour any of the sand with it. Then pour some clear water in the bottle -on the sand, shake it and pour sand water and all on a cloth fine -enough to catch the sand. Dry the sand and weigh it. If it weighs two -ounces, then out of the four ounces of dry soil you have tested you -have two ounces of sand, one ounce of clay and one ounce of organic -matter. Or your soil is twenty-five per cent organic matter and -twenty-five per cent clay, and fifty per cent sand. You have a loam -soil. - -Testing Soils with Plant Foods and Lime.--In the field to be tested, -select as level a place as possible and mark out ten squares, each -measuring one rod on each side. Place these in two rows leaving spaces -three feet wide between the squares. These empty spaces are to be kept -clear of weeds and used as walks. Each square should be marked by -stakes at the corners, and properly numbered as in the accompanying -diagram. - -The squares are to be planted with the same crop and well cultivated -through the season. Two of these squares, Nos. 2 and 9, are to have no -fertilizers, that they may serve as a check or guide in testing the -other squares. Square No. 1 is to have a fertilizer containing nitrogen -only. No. 4 potassium and phosphorous combined; No. 5 potassium alone; -No. 6 nitrogen and phosphorus; No. 7 phosphorus alone; No. 8 all three -plant foods combined, and No. 10 is to have calcium only. - - No. 1. Potassium and Nitrogen No. 2. No Fertilizer - - No. 3. Nitrogen No. 4. Potassium and Phosphorus - - No. 5. Potassium No. 6. Nitrogen and Phosphorus - - No. 7. Phosphorus No. 8. Nitrogen Phosphorus Potassium - - No. 9. No Fertilizer No. 10. Calcium - -Apply the fertilizers and work them in the soil about four inches deep -before the crop is planted. Plant the same variety of seed on all the -squares at the same time, and carefully cultivate through the entire -season, treating all exactly alike. Suppose that potatoes have been -used. During the growing season, carefully watch the different plats -and notice if any one or more seems more or less thrifty than others. -Notice which plat appears to mature first, which blooms first and keep -a record of all observations. At the end of the season, carefully dig -the crop on each square, gathering all the tubers large and small, -and weigh each lot. First weigh the crops on squares 2 and 9. This -will serve as a standard of comparison, as it will show the natural -condition of the soil. Record the weights in each lot and just for -illustration we may say that they run something like this: Average of -2 and 9, 80 pounds; No. 1, 380 pounds; No. 3, 250 pounds; No. 4, 360 -pounds; No. 5, 350 pounds; No. 6, 300 pounds; No. 7, 220 pounds; No. 8, -400 pounds; No. 10, 120 pounds. - -On the particular soil we are supposed to be testing, we can clearly -see that the land is benefited in some degree by every element used. -Calcium helps, and that means that it should be used on that soil -in addition to all of the others. This land plainly needs all four -elements and needs potassium especially. - -What to Do.--After having gone through with Mr. Barnard’s experiments, -you will have a practical idea of what your soil is, and what it needs. -The only remaining questions then are those of preparing the soil, and -obtaining and applying the plant foods and the lime. - -A cold, wet, clay soil needs to be made warmer and lighter, and a -light, sandy soil, being too dry, needs some moisture-retaining -substance. If conditions are favorable, it would be well at odd time -to put sand on the clay soil and clay on the sandy soil; but in most -cases this is too expensive, and therefore not practical. To redeem -poor lands then, you will have to depend almost entirely upon green -manure and lime. Barnyard manures are, of course, at all times, with -all soils, the best of all fertilizers, as they return to the soil by -the laws of nature, what has been taken from them, or what it should -have. Besides the plant foods, it furnishes additional organic matter -or humus, which makes the soil lighter and facilitates plant growth by -furnishing food to bacteria essential to plant life. The trouble about -barn-yard manure is its scarcity. Every farm needs more plant food and -humus than can be supplied with common manure. - -In the fall, apply 500 pounds of lime per acre to the poor land to be -redeemed, break it and prepare it thoroughly, and seed it to rye. In -the spring when the rye heads out, turn it under and sow cow peas. When -the peas mature, scatter lime, 500 pounds to the acre, over them and -turn them under. The lime will prevent the green stuff from souring the -soil, will decompose it and fit it for plant food, and will prepare the -soil to accept any other foods that may be applied. Follow the peas -with wheat, or wheat and clover. - -The land once redeemed, do not wear it out again, but preserve its -fertility by the use of high-grade commercial fertilizers and barn-yard -manure, always rotating the crops so as to get back to some leguminous -crop and lime at least once every four years. - -Do not retard agricultural education by making warfare on commercial -fertilizers, for they are indispensable to every farmer in preserving -the fertility of the soil. The world employs the use of just about -one-tenth of the artificial fertilizers it should use, and about -one-half of what is used is used intelligently. Make war on low -grade fertilizers that have the attractive but deceiving feature of -cheapness, and buy grade fertilizers by the unit under the guidance of -the requirements of your soil. - - -Phosphatic Limestone. - -The use of lime has been and is being sadly neglected, especially in -the Southern States and, when it is absolutely necessary to all soils -in which it does not exist or exists only in small or insufficient -quantities, it does look like the move to provide it is one of -imperative moment. Look at the Bluegrass Region of Tennessee and -Kentucky, the fairest and most fertile of God’s country. What made -it? The dissolution and weathering away of the original phosphatic -limestone rock. It is strictly a limestone country and teaches one of -nature’s great lessons that the agricultural world should accept and be -profited thereby. - -All the limestone of this region contains more or less bone phosphate -of lime, and in this fact lies the whole secret. In the past ages the -foliage from the thick mass of trees and other vegetable growth fell -to the ground, soured, and formed an acid which immediately attacked -the bone phosphate of lime and converted it into phosphoric acid, while -the calcium carbonate or lime decomposed all vegetable matter and -conditioned it for plant food, neutralizing all acids and stood ready -itself to enter into all future and standing vegetable growth. Now the -forests have given place to the cleared fields and we no longer have -the dropping from the trees to enrich our soils, neither have we in -our fields in sections devoid of limestone any vegetation with roots -that extend deep enough in the earth to bring up the carbonate of lime -sufficient to support our crops. Therefore the vegetable matter the -cheapest of all manures, we provide by turning under green leguminous -or nitrogen-gathering plants. These plants sour and finally decompose, -but without carbonate of lime to perform its important duties of -creating plant food out of this decayed matter, all the fertilizer you -get from your crop is the nitrogen it has gathered from the air. Then -why not use powdered Tennessee phosphatic-limestone containing enough -calcium carbonate (not quick lime) to furnish desired results and no -more bone phosphate of lime than will be entirely and immediately -converted into plant food. If this phosphatic-limestone product is used -with leguminous crops, potash is the only plant food that you will have -to provide during the two crop seasons following; however, every soil -that has a clay subsoil is a safe bank that will retain all you place -on deposit, and if you have the money to spare, deposit it in the soil -by investing in high-grade fertilizers and draw a high rate of interest -on it instead of letting it stand idle. The calcium in the phosphatic -limestone will absolutely correct all free acids in the commercial -fertilizers, the burning, deleterious effects of which you may have -experienced, and it will rectify the sourness of any and all soils. - -An object lesson in favor of this phosphatic limestone is taught -by riding along any turnpike macadamized with it and observing the -rankness of the crops about fifty yards on either side of the pike, -especially where the fields are worn and poor. This demonstrates that -it is the dust blown from the roads over into the fields that makes -the rank growth alongside the roads. It may be argued that the manure -dropped on the pike produced the results; but if so small an amount -of manure produced such wonderful results when mixed with the dust -from the pike, what would be the result if you would mix all of your -barn-yard manure with the powdered limestone? - -Recently the writer made twelve tests or experiments with litmus paper. -The first ten of these experiments were made with blue litmus paper and -samples drawn from ten different fields, all of which have been under -cultivation for many years and have had liberal yearly applications -of acid fertilizers. The soils so tested are Alabama soils, and are -decidedly acid, as shown by the bits of blue litmus turning red on -coming in contact with them. - -Everyone must know that it takes lime to neutralize the acids of acid -soils; but comparatively few farmers ever take the trouble to find out -whether or not their soils are acid, even after failing to get a catch -of clover three or four years in succession. All clovers positively -refuse to grow in acid soils. Inoculation will not do any good for -bacteria cannot exist and operate in such soils. Sweeten the soil and -nature will in most cases supply the bacteria. - -Carbonate of lime enters into the frame of every plant and a lack of -it will cause soft stems and flabby leaves. It improves the chemical, -mechanical and biological condition of the soil. It flocculates very -light, sandy soils, making them compact and capable of retaining -moisture, while it prevents clayey soils from becoming pasty hard and -full of cracks by causing them to crumble when dry. - -Lime is the great carrier into plants of other elements which go there -to form their organic compounds, during the elaboration of which, -organic acids are created, any and all of which would poison and kill -the plants were it not for the action of lime; so lime, in addition -to its all-importance as a salifiable base, becomes the great carrier -of all foods into plants where it is again of paramount importance as -a fixer of oxalic fermentation, thus having the natural and distinct -power to act where all other elements are useless. - -It will correct sourness in any soil regardless of its origin, it will -neutralize all acids that come into the soil through cultivation, -through commercial fertilizers or green manurial crops. It will -facilitate cultivation and produce a greater porosity and granulation -of all soils and thereby lessen the bad effects of drought by reducing -surface evaporation, will obviate excessive capillary rise of moisture -which elevates the water-soluble foods above the zone of roots, provide -better circulation of air in the soil and will cause rapid percolation -of rain and thus reduce surface washing. It stimulates and increases -nitrification and decomposes vegetable matter, extracting from it -all plant foods and leaving humus to lighten the soil and retain -its moisture. It enters into the composition of all plant life and -therefore into all animal life, giving to animals its carbon combined -with the carbon of the air to furnish them fat, and its lime to furnish -them bone. It is the phosphatic-limestone that has made Tennessee and -Kentucky horses the strength to excel in work and racing, and it is -this same soil constituent that has given to the Jersey cow sufficient -butter fat to lead the world in butter tests. It enables the clovers -and grasses to grow, and without such crops what would the brothers of -the hoe do toward profitable farming and meeting the responsibilities -of life? It perpetuates and permits the use of commercial fertilizers -which are becoming so absolutely essential to husbandry, as it obviates -the evil effects of the acids these products contain, and makes all -plant food available to the plant. Finally, it is a property designed -by the Creator to act for and enter into all vegetable and animal life, -and evil will be the reward to him who rejects it. - - - - -The Watermelon Sermon - - -Watermelon time is in full blast in Tennessee now. Ordinarily, the -whites in the South cease to eat watermelons after the fifteenth of -September, because they know that as soon as the cool nights begin -every melon contains a thousand chills. But not so with the darkey. -A chill rattles as harmlessly off the armour of his constitution as -buckshot from the back of the Olympia. He can absorb miasma like a -sponge, and, like it, grow fat as he absorbs. The negro, then, eats his -melon until the November frosts kill the vines. Even then he carries -the half-ripe melon into his cabin and often, on Christmas morning, an -ice-cold watermelon is his first diet. - -And a great treat it is. Did you never wander over the fields, way -down South, after the cotton was all picked, and the November breezes -came cool and ladened with that delicate, indescribably rare flavor -the frost gives when it first nips the mellow-ripe muscadine? You -have shouldered your gun and gone out after old Mollie Cotton Tail. -It was cool and crisp when you went out, but toward noon it has grown -hot again. Flushed and tired, you stop to rest by the big spring that -flows from under the roots of the big oak near the cotton field. In -the shadow of that oak, half hid in the frost-bitten weeds, you find a -little striped watermelon--a guinea melon, as the darkies call it--a -kind of a volunteer melon that grows in the cotton every year, the -first seeds of which were brought by some Guinea negro, from the coast -of Africa, when he first came over to servitude, with silver rings in -his nose and ears. And though he failed to bring his idols and his -household gods along with him, yet did he not forget the melon of his -naked ancestors. Planting it as he hoed his first crop of cotton for a -new master, it has never deserted him since, and so, year after year, -it comes up amid the cotton, to remind him of the days it grew wild in -a sunnier clime. - -And there you find it this November morning. Boy like, you pounce on -it with a shout and soon it is laid open, as red as your first love’s -lips and as sweet; and so cold it seems to have been raised in the -deep-delved cellars of all the centuries. I am sorry for the boy who -has grown to be a man and never, in a November morning’s hunt after Old -Mollie, had the exquisite sweetness of this satisfying surprise--the -like of which is not equalled by the sweetness of any other surprise on -earth. No--not even should he grow to be a man, and awake some morning -to find himself famous and the father of twins! - -Every darkey of any standing in Tennessee “gives a treat” at least -once in his life. He will stint and economize for months to save money -enough to invest in watermelons and tartaric acid (the acid makes -the lemonade). Then, when the glorious day arrives, Nero, giving free -entertainment to the citizens of Eternal Rome, is not in it with that -darkey. Henceforth he can get anything in that community he wishes, -from constable to presiding elder, while the widows of the church are -his’n by a large majority! - -I had heard that old Wash was going to run again for justice of the -peace and the “deaconship of Zion” over in the coon district of Big -Sandy, and that he was going to give his annual treat. - -These had always passed off beautifully and ended in the unanimous -election of the old man to both offices and anything else he wanted. I -thought it was all over and entirely harmonious until he came in the -other night, looking like Montejo’s flag-ship after Dewey’s ten-inch -shell went through her, “a-rippin’ out her very innards”--as Old Wash -himself described it--“from eend to eend.” - -But when I saw the old man, creeping into my library, I was certain he -was in the last stages of Asiatic cholera, and I rang the telephone -hastily to get my family physician. But he feebly raised his hand, and -beckoned me to desist. - -“No, no, boss; he can’t do me no good--no good,” as he feebly sank into -a chair. Then he whispered: - -“Jes a drap, a leetle drap, on my tongue, boss--jes’ to let the old man -shuffle off dis mortal coil wid a good taste in his mouth. It’s all I -wants.” - -Under the stimulant of that eternal beverage of moonlight and melody, -he revived a little. - -“What’s the matter with you? Anybody been giving you a hoodoo,” I asked. - -“No, no, boss”--feebly--“I--I--I gin a treat at Big Sandy.” - -“Well, you have given many a treat at Big Sandy. Why should this one -make you look like a piney-wood coal-kiln after a cyclone had struck -it?” - -It took another dose from my side-board bottle to put enough life into -the old man to make him take any interest in things. Then he brightened -up and said: - -“Dat’s jes’ hit--a man may go on doin’ de same trick year arter year, -ontwel it looks lak he cud do it wid his eyes shet, an’ den at last, if -he ain’t mighty keerful, hit’ll buck and fling ’im! De hardes’ luck, -I take it, in dis wurl’, am when a man dun shuck de dice ob success -ontwell dey seem to bob up at his word, only to play off on him an’ -bust ’im es his palsied han’ shakes ’em fur de las’ time.” - -His tears were flowing so freely and his remarks seemed so true and -heartfelt, I did not have it in me to fail to brace him up with -another pull from the side-board bottle. Then I saw he was ripe and -reminiscent, and I lit my cigar, struck an easy attitude, and let him -do the rest: - -“On de Sundy befo’ de fust Mundy ob de full moon in September,” he went -on, “cum off de ’lection fur ’ziden elder of Zion, an’ de next day -am de day sot by law fur de ’lection of jestus ob de peace. So las’ -Sat’d’y I gin a treat. I axed ebry nigger in de deestrict dar, an’ all -de members of Zion, an’ Br’er Johnsing wus to preach de watermilion -sermon. - -“Ain’t nurver heurd ob de watermilion sermon? Hit’s de sermon preached -at de feast ob de watermilion jes’ befo’ de new moon in September, -an’ it am one ob de doctrines ob Zion to kinder take de place ob de -feast ob de Passober ’mong de Jews--only in dis case we don’t pass -ober nuffin’, ’specially de watermilions. Now, hit tain’t eb’ry nigger -kin preach de watermilion sermon. Hit takes a mighty juicy nigger to -do hit, yallar with dark stripes, juicy at de core, full of tears an’ -sweet penitence an’ easily laid open by the blade of grace, an’ brudder -Johnsing am de slickest one I eber seed at it. - -“Now, dat wus my time to git in my fine Italyun han’, an’ so I gin -it out that hit wus to be my treat, an’ I axed all de voters ob de -deestrick an’ all de members ob Zion ter be on han’ fur de revival ob -de speerit an’ de refreshment ob de flesh. - -“’Cordin’ to my custom, jes’ befo’ de time fur de sermon I had all -de watermilions laid out on de grass, one hundred ob de bigges’ an’ -fattes’ ones you eber seed. You see, boss, I am constertushunally -upposed to long sermons,” he winked, “an’ I knowed dey wa’n’t a -nigger libin’ c’uld preach ober ten minnits wid all dem watermilions -a-layin’ dar a-winkin’ at ’im an’ waiting to be led, lak’ lambs, to de -sacrifice. Does you see de p’int?” - -I saw it. - -“Wal, suh, you orter jes’ heurd de prayer Br’er Johnsing put up--it -wus short, but mighty sweet. De flavor ob de watermilions seem ter -git into hit, an’ de ’roma ob hits juice b’iled outen his mouth. Boss, -you’ve seed dese kinder preachers dat talks to de good Lord wid all -de easy fermileriaty ob a deestrick skule-teacher axin’ de presedent -ob de skule board fur what he wants, an’ wid all de sassy assurance -ob de silent partner in a lan’-offis bisness, ain’t you? Wal, dat’s -de way Br’er Johnsing prayed, an’ I wus de speshul objec, ob his -conversashun wid de Almighty dat day. He tole ’im whut I’d dun fur -dat community, informed ’im very posertively ob de fac’ dat I wus a -Godly man, refreshed His mem’ry in a gentle way consarnin’ sum’ ob my -long-furgotten deeds ob cheerity, an’ gin Him sum’ good, brotherly -advice on how to git eben wid me, an’ in a measure pay off de debt -of gratitude He owed me by makin’ it His will dat I wus erg’in to -administer de law ob de lan’, both spiritual an’ temper’l, an’ fur -ernudder twelvemonth ter be de venerbul ram ob de flock ob Zion, to -lead His sheep to de fold an’ by de still waters. Wal, suh, when he -finish, mighty nigh eb’ry nigger dar said Amen, an’ den dey lick dey -chops an’ look sorter dreamy lak ober whar de watermilions lay ’n de -col’ spring branch. - -“Dis wus my time to spring de s’prise ob de ebenin’ on ’em, dat I’d -fixed up. An’ so I riz up wid de most sancterfied look on I c’uld git, -one ob dem onworthy, miserbul-sinner sorter looks dat we elders allers -carry aroun’ in our coat pockets along with our bandanna handkerchiefs -fur enny emergency, an’ I sez: ‘Brudders an’ sistrin, befo’ we listen -to de soulful sermon in store fur our spiritual natures, which Br’er -Johnsing gwineter gib us in his ellerquent way, I’ve sprung a letle -s’prise on you, an’ I wants you all to retire wid me an’ refresh de -innard man a leetle. Brudderin’ knowin’ my onworthiness an’ de many -obligashuns I am under to dis enlightened community ob Christian saints -an’ godly men an’ wimmen, I’ve made two bar’ls ob ice-cold lemmernade, -an’ you’ll find ’em asettin’, es a big s’prise,’ sez I, ‘on de houn’s -ob my ox-waggin, in de cool shade by de spring, wid plenty ob tin -dippers fur all. We’ll now adjourn twenty minnits fur refreshments.’ - -“Wal, suh, you sh’uld a heurd de shout. Ef de ’lection bed cum’ off -den, I’d a got eb’ry vote in de deestrick an’ a fair sprinklin’ ob sum’ -in all de yudders. I went wid ’em an’ drunk, too. An’ we all drunk ter -one ernudder’s health. I drunk to Sister Ca’line, an’ Br’er Johnsing he -drunk to Dinah, an’ de leetle niggers drunk, an’ de ole niggers drunk, -de gals an’ de boys. I hilt up my dipper an’ laugh, an’ sed to Br’er -Johnsing, ‘Br’er Johnsing, here’s to you,’ sez I, ‘an’ all dat goes up -must go down.’ An’ wid dat I swallered down. - -“Den Br’er Johnsing--he’s mighty funny--an’ he hilt up his’n and laugh, -an’ say: ‘Br’er Washington, here’s to you,’ sez he, ‘an’ all dat goes -down nurver comes up ergin.’ An’ den we all laugh. - -“But dat wus one time he wus terribly mistaken, es you will see. - -“Wal, suh, when we all hed drunk enough we went back to hear de -watermilion sermon, an’ den eat de fruit ob whut we heurd. ’Tain’t -eb’ry man kin say dat, boss, dat he eats de fruit ob whut he hears; -digests de fustly, an’ de secondly, an’ de thudly, assimmerlates -in de juicy rime ob de tangerbul thing, de logical konclushun ob -de intelectual fac’. An’ darfore I’ve allers sed dat drawin’ yo’ -konclushuns frum de heart ob a watermilion makes de bes’ sermon in de -wurl’. - -“I b’leeve I tole you, boss, dat dat lemmernade wus intended fur a -s’prise fur ’em, didn’t I?” - -“Yes, I believe you mentioned that it was a little surprise of yours in -store for them.” - -The old man groaned. “Boss, fur heaben’s sake, annudder drap outen dat -bottle! I’ll hafter brace up erg’in to tell de sorrowin’ scene dat -follers. Thankee, thankee! I’m better now, an’ maybe I kin finish, fur -dat lemmernade turned out to be de bigges’ an’ sorrerfullest surprise -dat ever come down a pike. - -“Br’er Johnsing tuck fur his tex’ de sermon ob Noah an’ de ark, -an’ whilst Noah wus de man menshuned, hit wus plain dat I was de -applercashun. He went on to show dat I wus a godly man, jes’ lak’ ole -Noah, an’ dat I wus to de community ob Big Sandy whut Noah was to -Jeerruselum. He wus makin’ it short, but a-gwine in two-minnit time, -a-pacin’ lak’ ole Joe Patchen at a matternee fur a silver cup an’ -wreath ob roses, an’ den all at onct he lifted up his voice an’ sed: -‘Yes, brudderin, de waters ob de g-r-e-a-t deep riz up, an’ de bottom -drop outen de clouds; de w-i-n-d-e-r-s ob heaben wus flung open, an’ -de upheaval ob de u-n-e-v-e-r-s-e begun----’ - -“Dat wus es fur es he got, befo’ de word upheaval wus outen his mouth, -sho’ ’nuff, de upheaval did begun. I seed ’im stop so suddenly he -kicked up behind, clap his hands on his stummick an’ try to bolt fur a -locus’ thicket, but he c’uldn’t--he jes’ turned a complete summerset, -athrowin’ up his immortal soul es he turned. Den I heurd a turrible -commoshun in de congregashun, an’ I look erroun’, an’ eb’ry nigger dar -wus in de same fix es Br’er Johnsing. Dey wus whoopin’, an’ barkin’, -and layin’ out in eb’ry kinder way, an’ all on ’em bent on de same -thing. An’ whut dey wus doin’ to dat groun’ wus a-plenty! Dey thought -dey was pizened an’ wus gwineter die, an’ den sech s’archin’ prayers -es went up to de throne ob grace, mixed in wid moans, an’ groans, an’ -ice-cold lemmernade dat seem to think hit wus time ter rise erg’in and -fetch eb’rything else frum de grabe along wid it. By dis time I wus so -’stounded I didn’t kno’ whut ter do. I look erroun’ an’ I seed dat me -an’ ole Aunt Fat Ferreby wus de onlies’ ones dat wa’n’t tryin’ to turn -inside out. She wus lookin’ mighty ashy erroun’ de gills, but she brace -hers’f up an’ started out ter raise dat good ole hymn: - - ‘How firm a foundation’-- - -But she hadn’t more’n got to ‘foundahun’ befo, her foundation was -shaken, I seed her gag an’ double up an’ start in on: - - ‘My risin’ soul leaps up to sing, - A song of praise ter day.’ - -“’Bount dat time I felt a ’tickler kinder mizzry in my own innards, -an’ de nex’ thing I disremember I had Sister Ferreby ’round’ de neck -an’ we wus singin’ dat hymn tergedder. Lor’! hit wus awful. I’ve seed -menny a sight, but I nurver expect erg’in ter see three hundred an’ -sixty-five niggers throwin’ up at de same time. When sum’ on ’em got -dey secon’ wind dey wanted to lynch me, but by de time dey got erroun’ -to me wid a rope dey ’cided I wus too nigh dead to need killin’, and by -dis time dey all had to ’zamperfly de truth ob de biblical sayin’ about -de dog an’ de thing he would go back to. By dis time eb’ry doctor in de -country wus dar, fetchin’ all de querrintine offercers, an’ pest-tents, -an’ disenfec-tents, an’ preparin’ fer c’olera an’ fever. An’ den we -foun’ out what ailed us.” - -“In the name of heaven, what was it?” I asked eagerly. - -The tears rolled down the old man’s cheeks as he feebly begged for -another drop to enable him to finish his tale. Then he said: - -“Ain’t I dun tole you hundreds ob times it am de leetle mistakes we -make in life dat turns de tide? Ain’t I? Wal, dat’s whut ruined me -dat day, an’ terday I am a man widout offis an’ widout honor in my -ole age. Dat mornin’, ’stead ob gwine down to de sto’ myse’f to get -de poun’ ob tartar acid ter make up dat lemmernade wid, I saunt dat -trifflin’ Jim Crow gran’son ob mine, an’ he got de names twisted, an’ -’stead ob fetchin’ me back tartar acid, he fotcht me back a poun’ ob -tartar emetic, an’ I didn’t do a thing but make up dat lemmernade wid -it!” - -“But, surely, they wouldn’t treasure up such a mistake against you, -seeing that you suffered with the rest,” I said. - -“Boss,” said the old man, rising, “how long you gwine ter lib wid -niggers, an’ den hafter be tole ober an’ ober ergin de same thing? In -course, dey didn’t beat me fur offis on ercount ob dat fool mistake, -but jes’ lemme ax you, whar is de nigger libin’ dat gwinter vote fur -enny man dat’d lay out a hundred watermilions in de spring branch, let -’em look at ’em an hour, an’ den turn dat nigger’s stummick into a -green-persimmon fur a week? Whar is he, I ax?” And the old man crept -feebly out to find him a cheap coffin. - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - * * * * * - - _We never give, but giving, get again; - There is no burden that we may not bear; - Our sweetest love is always sweetest pain, - And yet the recompense--the recompense is there._ - - * * * * * - -_The sweet things of life do not lie so much in sight as in the heart -that sees them._ - - - - -Stories of the Soil - - - The Little Things of Life, Happening All Over the World and Caught in - Ink for Trotwood’s Monthly. - - -TIM’S EASTER. - -The first streaks of day were breaking. It looked to the fireman of -496 that the old engine was sticking her nose into the red dawn as -she plowed ahead hauling her fast freight South on schedule time. Tim -Doogan was at the throttle--an old engineer who stood at the head of -the road’s list; for Tim had been in service longer than any of them, -had never failed in his duty and for twenty years had never taken a day -off except one--to bury his wife. - -He had never even asked for a promotion, and when it had been -offered--the highest post of the engineer--Tim shook his head and -declined. - -“I guess I’m used to this old route and I’d feel lost if I didn’t pass -through the Little Town every few days.” - -They were now approaching the Little Town, and Tim had not spoken -since he left the city, a hundred miles back. He was naturally quiet, -but the fireman had never known him to make the run before and not -say something. Something told the fireman that Tim had struck sadness -somewhere, and so at intervals he fired up but said nothing to the big, -begrimed man in overalls and cap who stood silently at his post, with -one hand always on the throttle of his engine. - -“I’m goin’ to stop twenty minutes in the Little Town, Jim,” said Tim -as they began to pull into the station. - -“Any orders?” asked Jim, surprised. - -“No, but it’s my orders--ever’ Easter--been doin’ it for twenty years. -Company don’t like it, kin lump it,” Tim added dry. - -This was Jim’s first year, and he had never heard. - -“No. 3 may be late an’ give me the chance. If she don’t, why, we stops -anyway, Jim.” - -“Why, I’d rather she’d be on time, so we can go on. Don’t you want to -go on?” asked Jim. - -“Not for twenty minutes, ef I can he’p it. Fact is, we’re goin’ to stop -here a little while anyway.” - -The fireman said nothing, and Tim slowed up No. 496 in the yard. Then -he jumped down and went in to report. - -“No. 3 twenty minutes late,” he said, as he came back. “Take keer o’ -things till I git back. I’ll not be gone long.” - -“You ain’t that there thirsty for a drink this mornin’ are you, Tim? -You don’t drink to speak of, and I never knowed you to leave old 496 -befo’.” - -Tim said nothing, but climbed up and opened his big box. The fireman -smelt something sweet, and very tenderly Tim took out a longer -pasteboard box. - -“Flowers,” said the fireman. “Say, Tim, old man,” he laughed, “I’ve -caught on--it’s a gal.” - -“She _was_ a gal,” said Tim, quietly, “and the pretties’ and sweetes’ -one that ever hit the soil o’ this wurl. An’ the little boy wa’nt no -fluke.” He brushed at his eyes as he spoke, and left another grimy -smear there. - -“I’m a-goin’ over to the little cemetery a bit, Jim--yes, you stay with -496. They’re buried over there. We lived--her an’ the little ’un--we -lived here after we was married. She was allers sweet on Easter, and -for flowers and sech, an’ I love to do this for her an’ the boy. Been -doin’ it twenty year’. We don’t know nothin’, an’ maybe it’s all -so--an’ if anybody’ll rise again it’ll be her--with her faith--for I -tell you, Jim it was as a little child. Yes, they was both my children.” - -He was taking the flowers out, lilies and roses and carnations and -cultivated violets, big and blue and beautiful. In his big, grimy, -black hands, and amid the soot and dust of 496 they lay beautified and -glorified, and the sweet odor went through the rough fireman until he -saw pictures of a far-away home. - -Silently Tim trudged across the hill to the little cemetery. The -village was asleep, the unkept streets empty, the cold, gray mist hung -low over everything, and finally Tim disappeared in it. But twenty -minutes later, when the sun had risen and 496 was butting through the -gray, her throttles open, the smoke belching from her stack, Tim stood -at his post, a smile lighting up his grimy face, his eyes fixed on two -graves amid pines, far up on the hill upon which shone lilies and -roses and violets. - -They thundered past, and the old engineer took off his cap and, turning -to the fireman, said, above the roar of wheels and steam: - -“She used to say it this-a-way, Jim--I’ve heard her so often, an’ fer -five years she taught it to the little boy befo’ he left.” He looked -toward the sun rising through the mist, and said slowly: - -“_In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn, toward the first -day of the week came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the -sepulchre._ - -“_And, behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord -descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone from the door -and sat upon it.... And the angel answered and said unto the woman, -Fear not ye: for I know that ye seek Jesus that was crucified. He is -not here for He is risen._” - -He shut off steam as he pitched down a steep grade, and then Jim heard -him say: - -“That’s the way she said it, an’ we don’t know nothin’, Jim, nothin’. -But we do know that stranger things is happenin’ ever’ day than jes’ -the spirit livin’ agin. What’s light? What’s heat? What’s love? What’s -that wireless talkin’ through the air but things to tell us how little -we know, how small our minds is an’ how easy it ’ud be to be true, an’ -we not know how to explain it with our little standards.” - -He threw a kiss at the vanishing hill of pines. “No, I’ll keep on -sayin’ it as she sed it, anyway, true or not: ‘I am the resurrection -an’ the life.’” - - -HO! EVERY ONE THAT THIRSTETH! - -The corn crop up in the Bigbyville neighborhood is clean, the cotton -shows not a spear of grass. The potato field looks as clean and green -as a billiard cushion floor and the darkies are still, still hoeing. -All this was caused by a sermon old Wash preached there on foot-washing -day last month, a literal extract of which I got from the old man -himself: - -“Brudderin’ an’ Sisterin’--You’ll find my text in de six chapter of -Noah’s pistols to de Gentiles. _Ho! every one dat thirsteth! Ho!_ - -“De commandments we get from de Bible am beyond de scrutiny of man, an’ -we natchurly think dat when a man gets hot an’ thirsty de thing fur -him to do is to hunt de spring branch an’ quench his burnin’ lips. But -not so. Here it is sot down in black an’ white in de book ob books, -dat when you git thirsty, _jes’ keep on hoein’. Ho! every one dat -thirsteth! Ho!_ And dat is right; de Bible is allers right. Hoein’ is -good fur de limbs, good fur de wind, good fur de crap, an’ good fur de -soul. De sun am hot now, but de wind’ll be cold agin. De rays pour down -now, but de sleet’ll come bye an’ bye. Dese am de rays of drought an’ -thirst, but ef you want to set back when de rains come, smoke yo’ pipe -an’ sing dat song-- - - “Bile dat cabbage down - For it ain’t gwine to rain no mo’-- - -jes’ take off yo’ coat, shed yo’ shirt, an’ foller de corn an’ tater -row, an’ ef you git thirsty don’t stop to drink, but jes’ keep on -a-hoein’! - -“_Ho! everyone dat thirsteth! ho!_ - -“An’ ain’t dat de law an’ de sense? Whut you wanter stop an’ drink fur? -Won’t you jes’ get thirty agin? Keep on a-hoein’! - -“What did old Noah do when de windows ob de heabens was opened an’ de -flood ob de great deep began to kiver de earth, an’ de fools got round -him an’ laughed an’ ax him whut he buildin’ dat ole ark for? He was -tired, an’ thirsty, an’ hot, but he kep’ on a-hoein’, for he knowed -he’d get water enough bye and bye. _Ho! every one dat thirsteth! ho!_ - -“What did Abraham do when dey got roun’ him an’ tried to stop him from -gwine to de Promis’ Lan’? He kept on a hoein’ for Jordan. - -“Don’t let de flesh ob dis wurl’ fool you. Things ain’t whut dey -seem. Water looks mighty good, specially to Baptists, but whut we -Meferdists want to do is to keep on a hoein’. De wicked of Noah’s -day didn’t hoe any. Didn’t dey git water enough? De Egyptians didn’t -hoe enny, but follered de Israelites into de Red Sea. Didn’t dey get -water enough? Ole Jonah didn’t obey de Lord an’ hoe to de mark, an’ de -water swallowed him fust an’ de whale swallered ’im next. Let dat be a -warnin’ to you to stick to de tex’ of de Bible an’ de doctrine of de -church, an’ when you get thirsty keep on a-hoein’. It’s hard now, but -it’ll be sweet bye and bye. It’s hot now, but it’ll be cold bye and -bye. You git mighty thirsty an’ you think de taters ain’t never goin’ -to come, but when de winter rains come, an’ de winds blow, an’ you sot -down round de big fiah wid de sweet brown ’possum an’ dem taters, you -work so hard fur to get in de heat, an’ sweat, an’ thirst ob summer, -den will de heart ob de faithful be glad, den will you shout an’ sing: - - “Ho! every one that thirsteth, ho!” - -This last appeal was too much. The congregation arose in a body at the -words ’possum and potatoes and went off to hoe, leaving the old man -with no one to pass around the hat. - - -A RACE FOR LIFE. - -I saw a race--a race for life, too--that interested me the other day -more than any that I have seen this year. It occurred in mid-air, in -a kingdom not our own; but the fresh air was sweet where the race for -life went on, and the fields were green beneath, and the brooks purled -below and the sun shone gloriously over all, and to the poor creature -who raced for his life I doubt not but he took it all in and life was -as sweet to him as it is to us. - -It was a golden-winged butterfly, one of those beautiful creatures -that is more of heaven than of earth, more of the blossom than of the -brown heath, and it seemed cruel to me that this beautiful thing, -thrown off from the film of a rainbow and made with an organism so -spiritual that it lives on the nectar of flowers, dwells on the bosom -of a nodding lily and floats on the breath of a zephyr, must come under -the great selfish law of life and be forced to fight for its brief but -beautiful existence. Man must fight, we know--and all history, if it -lie not, is but a chronicle of battle, blood and death, in which the -survival of the fittest and the achievements of human destiny have been -gauged by the brains that were behind gunpowder, and the courage that -comes of God. Man, beasts, birds, reptiles, fishes--it is a survival -merely--and “nature, red in tooth and claw,” has been demonstrated to -be more merciful than nature rotting in the decrepitude of age. But, O, -that this ethereal thing--half rainbow and rose, half light and lily -blossom, half child and cherubim--might have been spared! - -And who were its enemies--two glorious mocking birds, that had sung -like spirits from an angel choir around my home all spring and -summer--that had reared their young in contentment and happiness and -should have had nothing against any of God’s creatures, whose life had -been a poem, whose breath a summer song--alas, that these should have -been its murderers! It almost makes me despair of the ethics of life. I -feel like saying to man: “Go, murder your fellow men--it is nature. Go, -rob, steal and plunder--it is law.” - -And is it not law? In spite of the ethics of religion and dictates -of equity, is it not at last a question of one getting and the other -giving--of money, love--ay, even life? - -Golden Wings was in my garden and he was content until that which -sustained his life gave out--food. He had sucked every flower--he -must go to pastures new. The distance to my neighbor’s garden was -some two hundred yards, and there was nothing but air between us. -He thought of it a long time--he hovered from flower to flower and -thought--of his mate, of life, of death. Had he been all spirit he -had stayed forever among the flowers. He had run no chance of death. -But he was half spirit and half life and that life was rebelling -and begging for food. He must go. It was life or death. He rose -reluctantly--frightened--straight up--every sense awake--every nerve -keyed--every eye on the lookout for an enemy--the spirit which had -never harmed even a flower, and which should have had no enemy. Up, -straight up, he arose--quivering, scared, frightened--then winged his -way across the blue ether in a flight, as it proved, for its life. - -The mocking-bird is a fly catcher, but not an expert one. Compared -with the swallow, the marten, the crested fly-catcher, the expert king -bird, the wood pewee, and Phoebe, he is a poor imitation. But the -mocking-bird is a poet, and everything is grist that comes to a poet’s -mill--from the grasshopper on the ground to the butterfly in the air. - -The male bird saw Golden Wings first and gave him the first heat for -his life. Up in the air he darted, circled and swooped. Poor Golden -Wings fled, turned, ducked, dived--and escaped. The poet dropped to -his twig in disgust, and his mate took up the race. Golden Wings saw -her coming and his heart bursted with fear. He fairly quivered in the -air. He knew not which way to turn. She darted, and all but caught -him. For a moment, in mid-air, I saw them whirling and twisting and -tumbling--poor Golden Wings panting and fluttering for a chance once -more for home and life, and the poetess for a morsel to eat. It ended -in the butterfly getting above the bird--which seemed always its -tactics--while the latter dropped down in disgust to her mate. Then -they both started after poor Golden Wings, and it looked as if his time -had come. But all the time he had been heading straight for the thick -trees beyond, where rested, perhaps, his distressed mate, waiting for -his return. - -It was a terrible chase the two poets gave him--the tumbling, darting, -circling of the birds in fiendish delight, in maddened earnestness. -Their very wings were often so close that they fanned him about until -he looked like a speck of gold tissue paper hurled about by contrary -winds. Twice they got above him, dropped on him and--missed. Twice I -lost him altogether, and, except that I saw the birds fluttering and -darting in the air, I had thought he was lost. When I saw him again -he had gotten above his enemies and was safely pursuing his zig-zag, -frightened, graceless, paper-fluttering flight for the trees and life. - -“Success to you, O, Golden Wings,” I said, “for already have you taught -me a lesson in life. Let us keep above our enemies, if we would be -safe--not beneath them, for there we are a prey to their dirty talons; -not on their level, for then we are no better than they; but above -them where they cannot reach us and where we may go on to our destiny -with only the sunlight around us and the stars above us.” - -The birds dropped down, baffled, to rest in the top of a sugar maple. -They had evidently lost their tempers, and, between panting and hard -breathing, I could hear them quarreling: “It was you,” said the -wife--“you conceited thing--all your fault. I had him once if you had -let me alone.” - -“O, you had him, you did--‘over the left.’ If your talents equaled -your tongue we’d be better off.” They screeched and shuffled about and -almost spat at each other. They were beaten, chagrined and mad, and -they took it out on each other. - -And if you want to see the refinement of ill-temper, stir up two poets! - -Golden Wings was safe. He was high in the air, his very flight was now -the flight of victory, his poise the poise of one who had won. Twenty -yards more he would drop down into the green trees where his mate, -perhaps, awaited him, and be safe. - -I was about to hurrah with delight, when I saw a lightning bolt of red -and white drop from the jagged bark of the dead limb of a towering oak -in the midst of the forest and high above poor, weary, fluttering yet -happy Golden Wings. I paled at the thought, for I knew no butterfly -ever escaped him. Even Golden Wings recognized his doom and, paralyzed -with fear, stopped his flight in mid-air and, in a few yards of his -goal, and lay floating in the air in hopeless fear. And well he might, -for the red and white bolt was the red-headed woodpecker, not generally -known to be a fly-catcher, but an expert in it, nevertheless. Often had -I seen him poise above a luckless moth, drop like a plummet, and no -moth would be there. I despised him as a marauder, besides, for only -yesterday I’d seen him pounce on a helpless young humming-bird and rend -it as if it had been a worm. - -Straight at poor Golden Wings he came. The race was up. - -He performed his old tactics, darted above the butterfly, some two -yards higher in the air, gauged instinctively a plummet line from the -point of his own beak to Golden Wings and then drops with folded wings -like a ball of lead. - -I forgot to say that I was out that morning with the twelve-gauge, -smokeless shells and one and a half ounces of No. 7 chilled, thinking I -might see a certain thieving crow that I had a grudge against. - -Thoughts are lightning--words thunder, and when I caught the first -glimpse of the red-headed marauder of the air all this went through my -mind: “Nature is nature--tooth and claw. And yet there is a God who -says even when a butterfly shall fall. He makes our lives and marks out -our destiny. Sometimes amid injustice He calls Himself Retribution, and -then He has been known to raise up a man and a gun, invent smokeless -powder and deadly chilled shot, give accuracy of aim and, most -wonderful of all, the voice of a purpose to say that harm shall not -happen even to a butterfly.” - -There was no smoke from the report and so I distinctly saw Golden Wings -drop joyfully among the green leaves. But a red-headed marauder lies in -the field where he fell. - -And if some one who knows, will tell me why I happened to be there, why -I carried my gun that morning, why I fired, I will tell him who God is. - - -HIS CHANCE. - -The summer day was nearly gone, and only a few clouds caught the gleam -of sunset in the west. A woman of thirty, with a sweet, sincere face, -came out of a cottage and walked to the little farm gate that opened -on the main road winding across the Iowa prairie. The cottage sat in a -small grove of trees, and farther off were neat outhouses, a stable and -dairy. Flowers bloomed in a little bed near the front gate, and several -hives of bees sat under cherry trees in the front yard. Everything -around the neat cottage, from the well-kept vines which climbed over -the porch to the orchard and fields of corn, clearly showed that Thrift -and Industry were the handmaidens that lived there. - -The woman was not pretty, neither was she handsome, but her face was -of unusual intelligence and strength. Her hands showed work, and a few -gray hairs shone over her temple. - -At the little gate she stood while the shadows grew darker around -her. There were chirpings of summer insects, and presently down the -walk stalked a huge St. Bernard, looking like a great bear in the -twilight. He seemed to think the woman had been out alone long enough, -and his very way of walking showed that he knew he was her protector. -He stalked up and thrust his big cold nose into her hand as it hung -listlessly by her side. She started, but closed it over his mouth with -a caress, saying: - -“Rex, you are silly about me.” - -A buggy came out of the gloaming down the road, and stopped at her -gate. The woman turned pale in the twilight, as she recognized -the middle-aged man who came toward her, holding out his hand: -“Jennie--I--well--it’s me!” - -He would have opened the gate, but the dog growled savagely, and she -hooked the latch hastily, as she said: - -“Ralph--why--why--I thought--but don’t try to come in--Rex--I could not -control him.” - -She was so agitated she could not speak further. Her knees shook, and -she clung to the gate, half leaning. - -“I have been back a week,” he said slowly. “You haven’t changed much,” -he added, eyeing her closely while she flushed under his gaze. “I never -expected to see you again.” - -“No--no--don’t try to come in--Rex--Rex!” - -The great dog had rushed at the gate as the man tried to open it again, -and she held her hand on the latch. - -“He don’t seem to know your friends from your enemies,” said the man -with a cynical laugh. - -“I think he does,” she said quietly, “better than I have ever known -them.” - -He looked at her quickly. Then he tried to laugh. - -“Why--Jennie--you know I haven’t seen you in so long.” - -“I never expected to see you again. I was not looking for you now,” she -said. - -“I never thought I’d ever come back, but the Klondike--well, a man pays -two dollars for every dollar’s worth of gold he finds there.” - -“Tell me about yourself,” she said, still leaning on the gate, one knee -resting on the lower plank for support. - -“Well, Jennie, after we had our little quarrel and you broke off with -me--” - -“You are mistaken,” she said quietly. “You left, Hugh, without a -word--without telling me good-bye. There was nothing left to do but to -send you your ring.” - -“We won’t quarrel again, now, Jennie. I have come back to you to tell -you--” - -She had been looking closely in his face, and her heart beat wildly. -She had seen it all--the bravado way, the flushed recklessness, the -sign everywhere of dissipation, of modesty gone, of truth, of the old -manhood. - -“Not that,” she said, quickly interrupting him, “but of yourself. Tell -me where you have been and--and what doing.” - -He laughed coldly. - -“Well, after we split up I went West, then to the Klondike. But it was -a nasty life. As I said, I have made nothing, and I hoped all the time -to make a fortune and bring it back to you, Jennie.” - -“Was it true--that I heard--the trouble?” - -“Why, yes, I did get to drinking too much, and got into trouble--but -the papers had it overdrawn. I returned him his money. Now I have come -back to you--to tell you I still--” - -“You need not tell it,” she said quickly. “You could tell nothing -I would believe now. You are not the man you were before you left, -and never will be. Then you were weak, but honest and sober. Now -you are weak, but dishonest and a drinker. And you must not come -in--no--no--you are not the Hugh I once knew and loved.” - -She sobbed in a quick way as she said it, but went on quietly: - -“After you left you know mother died, then father, and I was left -alone. Our little farm--well, I’ve paid off the mortgage. It was hard -work, but the five years have passed so quickly. They always do when -one works for love. I changed the old-fashion farming ways. I planted -orchards and raised bees. I diversified my crops. I--well--” she -laughed hopefully for the first time--a laugh which brought a pang to -his heart, for it was the old laugh. “I am not yet started in that, for -I am so enthusiastic a farmer and poultry raiser and stock woman that -I’ll talk shop all night if you let me. Anyway, they say I keep posted -and up with the times, and I have time, too, for good reading. - -“Hugh,” she said quickly, after awhile, “really I have thought of you -often, but I will not deceive you. You have gone out of my life. I -have heard enough--before you came--heard it, seen enough. In all our -lives, our romances I mean, it is imagination that counts more than -the reality. Common sense and farm work,” she said, “will cure it, and -I--think--I know I am happier than if I were now married to you--to you -as you are, Hugh,” she added more tenderly. - -“But--but, Jennie, I’ll change; give me a chance.” - -“Why, Hugh, that is what you had, and I mine. I have watched nature -since I’ve been a farmer, and I notice she never gives but one chance. -There are too many of her children that must have a chance.” - -He turned with a rough laugh and oath and walked off. - -“I’ve come home jus’ to make a fool of myself,” she heard him say with -another oath. - -But she did not pale even. She turned and walked in, the dog following -her. - -“I am so glad I saw him anyway,” she said, patting the dog’s head. -“Now, I can forget him so easily. Oh, Rex, life--life--how strange it -is, but we all have one chance. Oh, I am so glad I had mine, and it has -given me this sweet home and you. For it were better to love a dog that -is honest and true than a man who it not.” - - -BLUE JOHN. - -A Mississippi planter, and a gentleman of the old school, sends me -this one from a little town in the Delta: - -“My dear Trotwood, do you know what it is to get out of whisky -Christmas morning in a little one-horse Mississippi town where you have -to put a darkey on a mule and wait until he rides five miles through -the mud before you can get your Christmas toddy? Well, I hope you never -may, for that thing happened to me last Christmas. - -“The truth is, there was no need why we should have been out of the red -ingredient of Christmas jollity, for when we turned in the night before -we had a fine, big jug of it. But the Major was there, and the Colonel -and the Doctor, and somehow, before we knew it, it was gone. - -“I am a bachelor, you know, on a big Mississippi cotton farm, and these -were my guests and we went to bed with our boots on. About daylight -Christmas morning we all woke up with one impulse and an awful thirst. - -“The Doctor got to the jug first, and we heard him growl: - -“‘What infernal hog drank all this whisky last night?’ - -“This stirred up the Colonel, and he sat up in bed and remarked, with -his usual emphasis: - -“‘That licker gone a’ready? Christmas mornin’, too?’ - -“By this time we were all investigating it, and some of the talk -indulged in concerning the man who did it ought to have made him feel -anything but white. - -“By this time we would have given a dollar each for a drink. The -nearest whisky was five miles away, where Ikey Rosenstein, a little -Mississippi Jew, kept a cross-roads grocery. It was raining, and cold, -too, but there was nothing to do but to call Blue John and send him on -old Kit, the pacing mule, for a new jug of it. - -“‘Blue John,’ I said, when he poked his head in the door, ‘you’ll find -my bridle and saddle hanging up in the carriage house. Saddle old Kit -and take this jug up to old Ikey’s and bring it back full, p. d. q.’ - -“‘Yassah, Boss.’ - -“‘Blue John,’ yelled the Doctor, ‘don’t let old Kit throw off on us -this heat and we’ll give you first drink.’ - -“‘Yassah, Boss.’ - -“‘And, Blue John,’ said the Major, as he started off, ‘remember it’s -Christmas, old man, and get about in a hurry. Here’s a quarter to help -you along,’ he said, tossing it across the bed. - -“‘Yassah, Boss, yassah.’ - -“We all laid down again to wait for Blue John. - -“‘Boys,’ said the Colonel, after ten minutes of thirst, ‘I’ll bet I can -trace every step that old darkey takes. Let’s see, now: He’s got to the -barn door, hasn’t he? Now he has found the bridle and has caught old -Kit. Now the saddle goes on and he is mounting. - -“‘No, he ain’t quite up in the saddle yet,’ chimed in the Doctor. ‘He -has stopped to take a chew of twist tobacco and spit on his hands.’ - -“‘That’s a fact, Doc, but he’s up now, isn’t he?’ - -“‘Yes.’ - -“‘Now he’s pacing down to the big gate. He’s opening it----’ - -“‘No,’ put in again the Doctor, ‘he got down off of old Kit and opened -it. Hang the old fool, but isn’t he a slow one?’ - -“‘Well, he’s going up the road now, ain’t he?’ said the Colonel. - -“‘Yes, and he’s got to the big swamp. He’s creeping through it. Dad -gast, but ain’t it muddy there? Gehew, but I am thirsty,’ broke in the -Doctor. - -“Ten minutes later he added joyfully: ‘Well, he’s out of the swamp, and -he has spurred old Kit into a gallop, thinking of that drink. Oh, old -Blue John is a good one!’ - -“‘He’s at the three-mile post now,’ said the Major, twenty minutes -later. ‘Lord, but that old mule can hump when he tries!’ - -“We all smiled in satisfaction. - -“‘Where is he now, Doc?’ said the Colonel, after it had seemed an hour -of silence. - -“‘At old Ikey’s, boys. See, he’s handing old Ikey the jug. Now old Ikey -is fillin’ it.’ - -“‘From what barrel?’ asked the Major, excitedly. - -“‘Lincoln County, Tennessee.’ - -“We all grunted our assent in chorus. - -“‘He’s started home now,’ went on the Colonel, ‘and the way that mule -can pace! Blue John is settin’ up in that saddle, holdin’ that jug -under one arm and a-larrupin’ old Kit every yard. Scott, but ain’t he -comin’!’ - -“‘He’s got to the swamp again, Doc,’ said the Major, after twenty -minutes had passed. ‘He’ll get here directly.’ - -“‘Boys, he’s reached the big gate already. I hear him coming,’ said -the Colonel, excitedly. - -“Sure enough, we heard him. There was no mistake--Blue John was now -coming down the hall. - -“‘Open the door and let him in quick!’ said the Major, ‘By gum! but -ain’t he and that old mule a pair of buds?’ - -“By this time we had all jumped out of bed and were hunting for -tumblers and sugar. Blue John poked his head in the door. - -“‘Boss,’ said Blue John. - -“‘Come in, Blue John!’ cried the Major. ‘Fetch it right in. You’re a -good old man. Colonel, lend me your spoon a minute.’ - -“‘Boss, whar--whar----’ stammered Blue John. - -“‘Come in, Blue John!’ cried the Doctor, ‘come right in.’” - -“‘_Boss, whar de debbil you say you put dat bridle in de kerridge -house? I been huntin’ fur it fur er hour an’ I can’t find it ter sabe -my life._’” - - -A DRUNKEN WOMAN. - -I saw in a neighboring city not long ago a drunken woman. She was in -a fashionable hotel and stood beside a post in the little gallery -that ran around the court. She was not three feet above our heads, -was dressed in the height of fashion, wore a hat that looked like a -huge poppy and altogether she was not unlike a beautiful tiger lily -that seemed about to fall over into our arms. Instantly that wave of -romance and reverence as natural to man, when he sees beauty clothed -in purity, as the tides that do follow the midnight moon, swept over -me. Her form was faultless, her gown perfect, her face beautiful. - -At least I thought so until I looked up and happened to catch her eye. -She smiled the sensual smile of a wood-nymph and leered as disgustingly -as ever Bacchus through a glass of old Falerian. In a moment it all -changed. Her face was no longer beautiful, but hard and cruel. Her form -was made--her gown the gaudy thing of a demi-monde. - -I blushed when she singled me out and leered, and ducked my head, for -fear someone had seen me. But I soon saw that she leered at all alike -and knew no difference between a man and men. - -For a half hour she stood there, scarce able to cling to the post she -stood by, the observed of every man in the court, the disgusting moral -that pointed the old story of the fallen angel. - -It is bad enough to see a drunken man. Nothing so quickly robs goodness -of its sweetness, genius of its charm, greatness of its colossal form, -than to behold it drunk. There are some great men I know who, if I ever -saw them drunk, never again would I believe they were great. They say -Poe was a drunkard. I cannot imagine it. And S. S. Prentiss--I cannot -believe it. I cannot think of DeQuincy and Coleridge as opium eaters, -Byron and Burns as whisky-heads. If I did I could never again read -anything they wrote. For of all things that levels man to the beasts -and makes knowledge a strumpet and genius a bawdy, it is the maudlin -rottenness of a plain old drunk. - -Whisky and not death is the greatest leveler with the dirt. - -But to see a drunken woman--Good God! Nature is partial to a man. She -has made some laws for him she has not made for woman. She has filled -him with passion and strength and capacity for work and great things. -She overlooks it, perhaps, when he steps aside, under the burning law -she has forced on him for reproduction, and she sighs and smiles when -he drowns his strenuousness now and then in the forgetfulness of the -cup. He may do all that, and if his wife be pure still may he sire sons -who will be brave and honest, and daughters who will be pure and noble. - -But let the woman be weak and fall, and see how quickly nature revenges -herself for the desecration of her unwritten law by throwing back on -humanity sons who are thieves and daughters who are impure. This is an -unwritten law, but it proves that the mother is the great moral force -of the world. Let her violate it and the punishment comes quickly on -the race. - -As I looked at this woman I could not help thinking: “I hope, as one -who, interested in stock, is more interested in the human race, that -you carry in your life that penalty of impureness--barrenness. For it -were better for mankind that such as you should never be mothers, to -fill prison pens with thieves and forgers and bawdy houses with painted -Magdalenes. Indeed, it is up to you to pass off the stage of life and -cease to encumber an earth on which not one single womanly law is left -you to fill. The honest matron of the noble horse brings forth yearly -and within the sacred laws of nature an animal that is the pride of -man and the glory of his kind. The gentle mother of the dairy is an -inspiration and a blessing to the earth. The very brood sow of the pen -suckles her hungry brood begot in honorable wedlock. But you, O, being -of a higher world, O breeder of immortal beings, made in the image of -God and endowed with the reason of the angels, you from whom nature -expects so much, you fall below all of these and brand yourself the -harlot of humanity!” - - * * * * * - -We want a good live agent in every town in the United States for -“Trotwood’s Monthly.” Write for terms to agents. Address Trotwood -Publishing Company, Nashville, Tenn. - - * * * * * - -_Depravity is not so much a creature of inheritance as of environment._ - - - - -Geers and Walter Direct - - -The most talked-of pacer in the light harness world to-day is Walter -Direct. The greatest living reinsman is Ed F. Geers, his breeder, joint -owner, trainer and driver. The object of this sketch is to tell the -story of these two--the one a horse, the other a man. For when it is -all sifted down at last, it will be found that there are many parallel -lines between a great race horse and a great driver. Each to succeed -must possess certain qualities in common which make for success. - -[Illustration: ED GEERS The silent man from Tennessee.] - -And first, each must be born for greatness. This may seem strange to -the uninitiated, but no man knows the truth of it more than he who has -spent his life in breeding great horses and in studying great men. It -is pedigree that counts in man and horse, and by pedigree I do not -mean blood lines only, though they count more in the life of the lower -animal, the horse, than in the life of the higher animal, the man. -Blood lines alone will not carry a man through the battle of life and -bring him out victor at the end. For there are two pedigrees in every -man which count for greatness or weakness in him. One is the pedigree -of his body, the other is the pedigree of his soul. With horse, the -pedigree of body counts most. With man, the soul. For it is that which -counts for honesty, for singleness of purpose, for truthfulness, for -silence, for thought, for right living, for that deathless spirit which -never says die. In victory, calm; in defeat, silent, but saying proudly: - - “Out of the darkness which surrounds me, - Black as the pit from pole to pole, - I thank whatever gods there be - For my unconquerable soul.” - -Unfortunately for man--outside of the pygmies which some call kings--he -keeps no record of his pedigree. This is wrong, for man should at least -take as much interest in his own pedigree as he does in his horses’ or -his dogs’. And so, now and then, a master, in his craft, comes out of -the great mass of humanity, with no extended pedigree but the product -of earnest and honest and strong God-fearing fathers and mothers -of many, many centuries. The child may not know them but for one -generation, but they are all there--there in his blood and his brain -and his brawn. - -And so he is born honest and earnest and strong. Such is Ed Geers--a -man who has come up from the common people. Common people of a century -ago, but O, how uncommon now in these days of trusts and steals and -grinding graft! In these days, when a millionaire is a poor man, these -days of the Equitable, these days of Rockefeller, these days of the -cursed trusts and tariff and the unspeakable graft-days when man is -nothing and money all. God of our fathers, give us back again the days -of the honest common people! - -From such source comes Shakespeare, whose genius was also the product -of honesty, of brawn, of rest. Shakespeare, who has written and left -nothing else to be said! From such a source came James Knox, and Andrew -Jackson, and John Wesley, and Abraham Lincoln--these and every other -great man whose silent statues now stand as the mile-posts of human -progress, each marking an era in the epoch of the thing God made him -for. - -And so, as I said, from such a source came Geers, the honest man -and the master reinsman of his age. And so, as I said, counting -the recorded pedigree, Walter Direct has it over Geers, for man, -who foolishly lets his own pedigree slip, has been very careful in -preserving that of his horse. Strange, isn’t it? And yet we are all -doing it. Ah, well, perhaps it is best for many of us that it is so. -For, as we say of the horse, in the fifth generation each one of us -would have to count for sixty-two fathers and mothers, landing us back -two hundred years ago in Scotland and Ireland, and out of that number, -in that age and country, fortunate is he who was not sent up for -poaching, for cattle-lifting, for breaking heads and, perhaps--locks! - -Walter’s pedigree is blue-blooded. His owners, Chaffin & Gears, saw to -that. We can make our horse’s pedigree better than we can make our -own--for that is made for us, and often, in the making, when two warm -youngsters fall in love and decide to marry, nothing but the grace of -God, or the breaking of a midnight ladder, has saved us. - -In _The Horse Review_ of 1900, when Walter Direct was then a suckling -at his mother’s heels, I wrote a description of him and predicted from -his blood lines that one day he would be the greatest of pacers. It -sounds prophetic now, but I rise hastily to disclaim it. Any horseman -posted in the pedigree and achievement of his sire and dam, and of all -his bluelines, would naturally have said the same thing. His sire, -Direct Hal, was the greatest horse of his day. His name and career are -household words in horsedom and will not be extended in this article. -But later on, in “The History of the Hals,” now running as a serial in -this Monthly, a chapter will be devoted to him in its proper place. It -is enough here to say that he was unbeaten and that his sire, Direct, -before him, was the greatest pacing stallion of his day, and that -beyond that lies the great Director, Dictator and Hambletonian 10--an -unbroken line of greatness--and in a horse greatness means gameness, -soundness, honesty, speed. - -Isn’t that enough to give us a tip on the breeding of boys and girls? - -Walter’s dam is a homely little mare called Ella Brown, with a record -of 2:11-1/4, made in 1893, to high-wheel sulky. With the sulky of -to-day it would have been 2:05. Never have I known a gamer, sweeter -little mare than Ella Brown, and well do I remember when she first came -out, and though suffering acutely, all through her racing career with -nervicular disease of the foot, often so lame that she could scarcely -score down for the word, yet, when she was in the fight, and the -clatter and hot breath of her competitors sounded the warning in her -ears, she would forget her lameness and her soreness and race like the -game little thing she was. - -And, like all other great mares, the pedigree of Ella Brown was no -accident. She was sired by Prince Pulaski, Jr., and he by old Prince -Pulaski, the sire of the old queen, Mattie Hunter, 2:12-3/4. The dam -of Ella Brown has only lately been correctly established. She was by -Evans’ Joe Bowers, son of Joe Bowers 2:32, son of Traveler. Her second -dam was by Tom Hal, sire of Brown Hal, and her third dam was said -to be by Brooks, sire of Bonesetter 2:19. Every horseman knows what -these mean. Mated with Direct Hal, and hence doubled in strength and -greatness, and behold Walter Direct, champion green pacer of the year. - -This is the pedigree of Edward Geers--this is the pedigree of Walter. -Both honest. - -Geers’ honesty is proverbial. His surname is “Honest Ed Geers, the -Silent Man of Tennessee.” Did you ever notice how naturally greatness -and silence go together? Let that greatest of all great men, -Shakespeare, tell it: - - Silence oft of pure innocence - Persuades when speaking fails. - -There are many stories told of the honesty of Ed Geers. It must be -remembered that in the life he has led, the terrible, bruising, -fighting battles of the turf, when fame and fortune often hang on the -wire for which hundreds of others are driving as well as he, that he -is often sorely and terribly tempted. Men are human at most, and in a -fight for money, for fame, for the joy of victory, all combined in one -race, all the great stakes of life, is it a wonder that millionaire -horsemen have tried to buy him, that rich breeders have tried to bribe -him, greedy owners corner him and tricksters and knaves foul him? Think -of twenty-five years of this and then coming out without a stain on his -name, a breath of suspicion and the pseudonum of Honest Ed Geers--won, -too, in the light of the fiercest conflict. - -Walter is game, so is Geers. In the many years in which the latter has -been in the sulky he has met with accidents which, if they failed to -break his neck, would have broken the heart of an ordinary man. - -All horsemen will recall the bad accident he had with Searchlight and -the one that sent him to the hospital at Memphis a few years ago, with -a broken ankle. But a few weeks ago he was in a bad mix-up at Buffalo, -when King Direct’s foot went into the sulky wheel of the contending -horse. The Nestor of the turf was unconscious when picked up, but -quickly revived and dryly remarked, “Now, don’t make a hurrah of this -thing and scare everybody to death for nothing.” That remark is an -index of his character. He hates a hurrah. The plumage of the peacock -has never become the pit game trimmed for the fight. He is loyal to -his friends, modest, quiet, honest, and with reverence for all that is -sacred and good. He is one of the large men of his calling. - -The training of Walter Direct has been in keeping with Mr. Geers’ -theory that colts should be trained early but not hard. From the May -night when he was foaled in a terrific thunderstorm, so fierce that -Old Wash, who acted as his midwife, was scarcely able to keep him from -drowning, until to-day, he has had the best of attention. His dam was -fed grain during the nursing period, and Walter soon learned to eat it -with her. He was broken to halter as a weanling, and the next spring, -Negley, the colored caretaker, broke him to harness, with occasional -jogs. The fall after he was a two-year-old he was sent to Memphis to -Geers and given his first real lessons, and so trained each winter, -with joggings in the summer by Negley at Columbia. Mr. Geers’ rule is -to keep them feeling good with a brush now and then for speed. He has -a horror of overworking colts. Indeed, his stable is never asked to go -the fast heats that many other owners delight in before being shipped -to the races. He saves their speed and vital force for the time when -it is needed most. In the spring when Walter was a three-year-old he -was asked to go a fast mile in 2:14, and was sent to Columbia to be -jogged and turned out. The next spring he paced his mile in 2:08-3/4, -when he was sent back home again. On September 15, 1904 he was sent -again to Mr. Geers and to fame. - - * * * * * - -LORD ULLIN’S DAUGHTER. - -(Revised by Trotwood and brought up to date.) - - A chieftain to the Highland bound - Would steal Lord Ullin’s daughter; - He bought a new machine in town-- - A thing he hadn’t auto. - - He sought the castle by the sea - And stopped behind the kitchen; - “This beats a pony bad,” said he, - “Because it don’t need hitchin’.” - - He got the girl and started out - By pullin’ of a lever, - And then that auto turned about-- - It was a gay deceiver. - - It snorted, backed, went round and round, - Broke belly-band and breechin’, - Reared up and kicked--then, with a bound, - It started through the kitchen. - - In there was Ullin fast asleep, - His stomach full of mutton; - That auto knocked him in a heap - It broke his only button. - - “O, haste, thee--haste!” the Lady cries, - “Tho’ steams around me gather, - I’ll meet the ragings of the skies - But not a naked Father.” - - “Aha--farewell--and now we’ll go,” - Said Laddy, smiling grimly; - He tried to head her for the door-- - She started for the chimney. - - “Come back--come back!” old Ullin cries, - “Not up there--that’s my larder; - You’ll ruin my meat and pies-- - Come back an’ take my darter.” - - By this the thing grew loud of pace, - Its waterworks were shrieking; - It started for the old staircase, - While Ullin was a-speaking. - - It met Mrs. Ullin coming down-- - She’d tucked the kids to cover; - She wore her night-cap and her gown-- - She never wore another! - - It buzzed amid the trundle beds, - Ran over lairds and lasses, - Went through the window, down the sheds, - And waked up all the asses. - - It chased the hound-pups round the yard, - Ran over kairn and cattle; - The clans turned out with tunics barr’d, - And pibrocks, armed for battle. - - The girl had fainted, sore dismayed, - Twice had it turned her over: - One lovely arm was stretched for aid, - And one was round her lover. - - Up spake a hardy Highland wight-- - (A rope was round him, ready): - “Just watch me rope her hind leg tight - And stop her, staunch and steady!” - - He threw and caught her fast and fair, - It set their blood to fighting-- - They saw him sailing through the air, - A tail he was--and kiting! - - Now Ullin had a mother-in-law, - A saint she was from Zion; - Her lungs were rubber, cheeks were bra’, - Her body--well, SCRAP iron! - - She waked and heard the dreadful din, - Ran down, the thing to worst it; - It struck her, knocked its inwards in, - It wheezed and groaned--and burst it! - - They slew poor Laddy where he sat - With blunderbuss and bullit; - “’Tis not,” said Ullin, “’cause the brat - Was monkeyin’ with my pullit, - - “But comin’ here in this vile car - To run off with my darter, - An’ not like neighbor Lochinvar, - On hoss-flesh, as he orter.” - - --JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - * * * * * - -_Humor is a great thing, but it has never yet won a battle, built a -city or bred a horse._ - - - - -The Meaning of Sorrow - - -BY REV. W. D. CAPERS, RECTOR ST. PETER’S CHURCH, COLUMBIA, TENN. - -“Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now have I kept Thy word.” -(Ps. 119: 67.) - -From one point of view there is no mystery so impenetrable as that -involved in the suffering and sorrow which exists in every department -and sphere of life. The suffering of humanity, the fact that “the world -groaneth and travaileth in pain until now” presented to the sensitive -mind of Dr. John Hall the supreme difficulty with which he struggled -during a great part of his remarkable ministry, until courage, faith -and experience taught him to understand and to recognize suffering -as having its mission in life and in the development of character, -just as happiness has its place, each acting as one of the two great -interpreters of moral and spiritual development. It is impossible to -have a creed or to form an adequate philosophy of life and overlook -the really essential and universal place suffering, in one form or -another, occupies therein. Just try and think, if you can, of a world -in which there is no suffering, no sorrow, no pain; a world in which -there are no tears, no bitterness, no woe. The thing is unthinkable, -it is simply inconceivable, and as a condition of life, utterly and -eternally impossible. Why? Because pleasure and pain are relative. -Suffering and joy face each other in a blessed contrast. There has to -be a standard of comparison by which we are to make the proper estimate -of these things, otherwise we would be unable to distinguish between -them; otherwise happiness would have no reality to it, no vitality -in it, and neither strength nor power of growth, while life would be -without an essential variety of emotions, and therefore necessarily -become “stale, flat and unprofitable” indeed. A remarkable description -of hell’s severest punishment, though very fanciful, is that, wherein -the victims are made to do that which they most loved to do here in -this life, incessantly, continuously and strenuously. The suggestion -to my mind is very significant and teaches that the most tortuous and -horrible suffering is just that which comes through uninterrupted -monotony. To dance your life away, to drink your life away, to play and -fritter your life away in purposeless amusement and never to suffer a -reverse or be conscious of a struggle, never to know a pang of pain -or experience a momentary disappointment, may seem to those who have -just sipped an occasional drop from the cup of pleasure and mirth an -enviable existence, a consummation in life devoutly to be wished. But -to dance or play or laugh or sing through endless eons of time and to -experience not one inspiring struggle which brings moral and spiritual -strengthening, to have to live through eternity would be misery indeed. -Suffering then, in the first place, heightens and intensifies our joys, -it helps develop the power of enjoyment, and it makes a larger and a -more real happiness possible. To illustrate: There was unspeakable joy -in the home of the prodigal, as the aged father rushed out to meet and -greet his wayward boy, for to the old man his son had been dead, and -behold he was alive again, he had been lost and was found. It was the -suffering of the separation which alone made possible the intense and -glorified happiness of their reunion. And how often it happens that -not only are “troubled times praying times,” but that “man’s extremity -is God’s opportunity.” Thus suffering often brings a man to his senses -and makes him conscious of his dependence upon God. As we read, it was -only when the prodigal “came to himself” that he concluded to arise -and go to his father, and we must conclude that it was the suffering, -sorrow and bitterness of privation and disappointed hopes that drove -him to a realization of his true condition, and in the end brought -to him a real and lasting happiness. In this and in similar acts of -conduct history never fails to repeat itself in every age, in every -epoch, in every generation, as well as yearly, daily and hourly in the -life of individuals and of nations. Opulence, ease, prosperity and an -unwholesome peace have repeatedly rushed peoples and principalities to -a shameful and untimely ruin, wherein men have lost their reason and -nations drunk with a sense of power have reeled and staggered to and -fro like a drunken man and then lay prostrate in the dust. In support -of this I appeal to history. In support of this Mr. Kipling appeals to -history when in his recessional poem he said: - - “Far called our navies melt away-- - On dune and headland sinks the fire-- - Lo, all our pomp of yesterday - Is one with Nineveh and Tyre. - Judge of the nations, spare us yet - Lest we forget--lest we forget.” - -Suffering then, often serves to give us a fuller, freer, wiser and -wider view of life. It was only when through suffering that the -prodigal “came to himself,” and when he received this self-revelation, -then he “arose and went to his father,” and in like manner when man -“comes to himself” he goes to God. But mark you, self-revelation seldom -if ever comes to one while sailing the seas of glory and sounding all -the depths and shoals of mere worldly splendor and prosperity. “Before -I was afflicted I went astray, but now I have kept my word,” said -the Psalmist, and when Job came to himself through the trial of his -faith and patience, he ceased to question the ways of Providence, he -reverently placed his hand upon his mouth and would “speak no further,” -for fear he now no longer knew God “by the hearing of the ear,” but by -the “seeing of the eye,” and he went to his knees in supplication, “and -the Lord turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his friends.” - -Again, we are to notice that suffering brings us courage and broadens -and deepens and intensifies our sympathies. “Pity makes the whole world -akin,” and so quickens our consciousness of brotherliness. “At sea when -the ship is in great peril the passengers crowd together, not because -they can escape peril by facing it in company, but because they can -gain courage by companionship. The sense of human kinship grows fresh -and keen when men stand together in the face of a common danger.” It -is therefore through suffering that men gain courage through a vivid -realization of the brotherhood of man and the solidarity of the race. -It often is as Dr. Mabie has said: “Through sorrowful ways men have -climbed to the heights from which they now look into the heavens and -over the landscape of life.” - -And this brings us to our final thought which is that suffering in some -of its manifold forms gives that variety to life which is essential to -the proper development of all the faculties of heart, soul, mind and -body. By way of illustration, let us suppose that you could take from -the public and private libraries of the world every book that contained -a poem, a reference or a treatise touching the theme of sorrow, and -what a dull, dead, gloomy monotony of uninspired literature would -remain, while, in rather figurative language, the world itself could -not contain the books thus mutilated and cast away. Apply the same -test to art, and the galleries of the world would be destroyed, miles -upon miles of bare walls would greet us at every turn as we made our -heart-sick pilgrimage from gallery to gallery. Apply the same test to -music, and you will never again hear the singing of a song with genius -and power in it strong enough to stir the heart’s deepest emotions or -to cause the soul to glow with a conscious ecstacy of faith and hope -and the brain to burn with the fire of a high and holy resolution. -The organ’s rich peal, the ring of stringed instruments, the wailing -of the lute would lose the voice of melody, while “The Marseillaise,” -“The Star-Spangled Banner,” “Dixie Land” and similar martial airs would -never have found voice to speak for patriotic devotion or to chant the -glory of a martyrdom for home or for country, had not the spirit of -sacrifice and suffering pervaded them and given to them immortality. - -No, suffering is a vital part and condition of life, and from the -right use of it we gather strength and grow beautiful in moral and -spiritual stature, while we gain the only happiness that maintains and -has power to bless mankind, happiness which is the child of conscious -strength acquired on the battlefield of conflict and in the vale of -tears. How then are you going to use the sorrows, the afflictions, the -disappointments and the trials that must come inevitably into your -life? The late Maltby Babcock has a fine passage in this connection: -“Byron eagerly coveted a place among the immortals, yet accepted -his club feet with cursings and bitterness; while St. Paul accepted -his ‘thorn in the flesh’ with sweetness and was thereby exalted and -transfigured. The poet wishes to become a hero for the public while -privately tasting of the sweets of profligacy. Sinning against his -finer feelings his art steadily declines, until at thirty-five it has -passed into the sear and yellow leaf.” Let us strive to emulate the -example of St. Paul, and when having no power to expel from our life -that which brings pain and suffering, let us endeavor to accept such -sorrow as an opportunity to develop character, and thereby be exalted -and made strong, remembering always that since “The Man of Sorrows” -hung upon the cross, transfigured sorrow is that which has blessed -humanity most, and brought men nearest to the heart and mind of the -Master. And train yourself to believe that. - - “Sometime, when all life’s lessons have been learned, - And sun and stars forevermore have set, - The things which one weak judgment here has spurned, - The things o’er which we grieved, with lashes wet, - Will flash before us out of life’s dark night, - As stars shine best in deepest tints of blue; - And we shall see how all God’s plans were right, - And that which seemed reproof was love most true.” - - * * * * * - -OUR STAR - -(In memory of Mrs. Annie Horne Fry, who died August 13, 1905.) - - Sunset and Sorrow’s tide, - Over the bar-- - Sunset, and daylight died - Seeing a Star. - - Twilight, and Hope had fled, - Fled from afar. - Twilight, and Hope lay dead, - Holding a Star. - - Midnight and mourning loud - Cometh to mar. - Midnight, yet o’er her shroud - Shineth the Star. - - Morning, and from the mist-- - Sweet Avatar-- - Hope-crowned and Sorrow-kissed - Standeth our Star. - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - * * * * * - -=TROTWOOD’S MONTHLY= Devoted to Farm, Horse and Home. - -TROTWOOD PUBLISHING COMPANY, Nashville, Tenn. - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE, Editor-in-Chief. - - E. E. SWEETLAND Business Manager - - GEO. E. McKENNON President - JOHN W. FRY Vice-President - EUGENE ANDERSON Treas. - WOOTEN MOORE Sec’y. - -=TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION=: One Year, $1.00; Single Copy, 10 cents. -Advertising Rates on application. - -NASHVILLE, TENN. OCTOBER, 1905. - - - - -With Trotwood - - -There are nearly a fourth of a thousand farm papers in the United -States, all bent on teaching the farmers how to attend to their own -business. Some of these papers are good, many are bad and the others -are awful. The good ones may be had for a dollar and the others for the -asking. Looking the literary field over, everybody seems to be entitled -to something good but the farmer. From the roasts and broils of the -intellectual feasts of to-day he will get the leavings, next week, in -the shape of a stale hash, served on cheap paper, flanked with guessing -contests and patent medicine advertisements and surrounded by the -green, green cresses of the same old thing. - -And yet a large and most respectable majority of the people of these -United States are farmers or interested in the soil. Their daily needs -include all the things the man in the city needs and much more, for -the man in the city does not plow, neither does he reap nor sow. These -people of the soil are progressive to the extent of their chances, -honest, and seekers of the truth and better ways, lovers of the good -in fiction and in fact. They constitute about seventy per cent of our -population and commit about two per cent of our crime. Why should not -they have a literature? Why should not a magazine laid around the soil, -come into their homes, as it comes into the homes of the dwellers in -the strenuous city, not to teach them their business but to help to -amuse, to interest, to uplift? - -This is the object of Trotwood’s Monthly. If it does not tell you -when to plant your beans and when to eat your potatoes, it hopes to -give you a literature that will help you to be satisfied with your -diet of potatoes and your burden of beans. For in truth, the editor -of Trotwood’s Monthly does not know all about potatoes nor beans nor -corn. Indeed, he is willing to admit that any good farmer in all this -country who knows his business knows more about it than the editor of -Trotwood’s Monthly. For his business in life is literature. He has -made it his profession, as the farmer or stockman has made farming and -stock-raising his, and he has toiled at it through years in the heat of -the noonday sun and often--often--while the world around him slept, by -the light of a sleepless lamp. He will not try to tell you, therefore, -of the things he knows but little about, neither will he attempt to -carry intellectual coals to a new castle of newly mown hay. He will -not attempt the impossible and the ridiculous; but if, in looking over -his handiwork month after month, you find something to make you forget -for awhile the burdens and problems of life; if through his magazine -you learn to realize the unseen sweetness and independence of the life -of him who claims kindred with the soil; if you are shown nature with -truer eye, and learn to love her and all that is hers; if you catch, -now and then, a spark of that finer spirit that burns so brightly in -true literature, lighting the lamp of ambition in your boy or girl, and -carrying you for a moment from the world of soil to the world of soul; -if something in it uplifts you, and something amuses you and something -in the special features by experts in the classes, who know, instructs -and helps you, then you may know that Trotwood’s Monthly has done for -you what it started out to do. - - * * * * * - -Trotwood’s Monthly will, each issue, contain special expert articles -on subjects relating to its scope. There are four in this issue, -and we have reason to be proud of all of them. This is an age of -concentration, of specialization. It is the man who concentrates that -accomplishes. Knowledge to-day is so vast and covers so great a scope -that Solomon’s wisdom would scarcely attract attention unless the -saffron press wrote him with pictures of his wives, and that might make -some think he was not wise at all. - - * * * * * - -LINES TO AN AUTOMOBILE. - - Break, break, break, - Some other man’s face with glee, - Or shatter his collar-bone if you will, - But, pray, don’t run over me! - - O, woe is the farmer’s boy - As he shouts with his sister at play. - But the chauffeur darts from a cloud of dust, - And carries a leg away. - - O, woe is the man who drives - Where the automobile sweeps; - His horse butts into the wayside wall - And smashes the cart for keeps. - - And the big machine goes on, - A-kiting over the hill, - But, O, for the touch of a vanished hand - And the sound of a voice that is still. - - Break, break, break, - Whate’er in your path you see, - But an arm and an ear and a horse that is dead - Will never come back to me. - - --From a Horseman. - - * * * * * - -This is the page where all of those who wish to, or who have a message -to tell, may come in and talk with Trotwood. Do not be backward--you -are welcome. But be sure that what you write shall be of general -interest to our readers. Remember that they are paying for the Monthly -to be interested and instructed. So come in, but come in with something -to say, something that will help others. - - * * * * * - -For, indeed, Trotwood is optimistic. He believes in men and women; he -has faith in humanity. He would have men look up, not down; forward, -not backward. He is too busy doing to garner doubt and discouragement, -those twins which come chiefly from idleness and unclear thinking. - - * * * * * - -Therefore, think clearly and live purely. For one depends upon the -other. Believe in the men and women around you and they will soon begin -to believe in themselves. Get into the habit of thinking and speaking -kindly, for character as well as life is made up of habits. Believe in -humanity. Try to be patient with fools. It is the most difficult of all -things to do. Believe in humanity. Sometimes you will get a jolt, but -when you come to weigh your own life, you will find that, taking it all -in all, the world has been kinder to you than you have deserved. - - * * * * * - -We may be pardoned for being often personal in this, the first issue -of Trotwood’s Monthly, but we beg you to bear in mind that this issue -was created hurriedly, and while we are not ashamed of it by any means, -we did not have the chance to give it the scope it will soon attain. -This is not a sectional monthly. Its aim is to cover the whole country -North and South. We are selling farm literature--not farm products--and -we will see that all sections, Michigan as well as Alabama, Maine as -well as Texas, is represented. If you are not in it it will be your own -fault. - - * * * * * - -A bright literary woman--one who has written novels that have sold--in -a personal letter, says: “The publication of a book figures to me as -a marriage, in which the author is the woman, the publisher the man, -and it is not well to let one’s heart ache too much over mistreated -offspring in the way of books. Be glad that it is for a year. Just a -year, that the contract is not for life, and that in it divorce is no -disgrace, and with the optimistic belief that there is always to be -better luck next time.” - -Was ever anything better said? - - * * * * * - -The most encouraging news comes from the bedside of that veteran -breeder, Capt. M. C. Campbell, of Cleburne Farm. Capt. Campbell has -been very ill for over a month, and once it looked as if the owner of -Brown Hal and the breeder of more great Jerseys and pacing horses than -any living man, would not recover. But the life he has led has been -clean and pure, and his strength was great. Like the great Tennessee -pacers he has bred he proved game, and his friends, and they are -counted all who know him, are happy to think he is now on the road -to recovery. No man in the State has made a higher mark for honesty, -manhood and all that makes a man than Capt. M. C. Campbell, and may he -live long and prosper. - -In a personal letter from his son, Mr. Allen Campbell, who is also -manager of Cleburne Farm, he writes that they have some of the greatest -colts and Jerseys ever seen at that famous nursery. Several of their -colts are showing extreme speed, among them being the young son of -Brown Hal, dam by Bay Tom, that Cleburne Farm has reserved to take -Brown Hal’s place. He is showing 2:10 speed as a three-year-old. Two -colts by Direct 2:05-1/2, one out of the dam of Twinkle 2:06-1/2, are -showing up very fast. Trainer John Walker has a dozen head of Mr. -Geers’ stable training them at Cleburne’s famous mile track. - - * * * * * - -Speaking of John R. Gentry’s influence at Ewell Farm Mr. Geo. Campbell -Brown writes: - -“It is the aim of Ewell Farm to breed beauty and let speed stand as a -secondary consideration, and for this reason it continues the use of -McEwen, one of the grandest individuals in the country, as shown by his -long list of showing prizes and of John R. Gentry, a horse of perfect -conformation and unbeaten in the show ring. - -“The Hal strain at Ewell Farm is being perpetuated by Hal Brown, -certainly one of the most successful young sires of that breed. - -“The brood mares at Ewell Farm are in proportion to the numbers owned -there, the greatest collection of producers in the United States. No -less than four have produced four each to beat 2:30, and ten are -producers of 2:10 or better horses, while one has thrown a world’s -champion. - -“The blood of Sweepstakes, dam of Star Pointer, is better represented -at Ewell Farm than at any other farm in the country. Two of her -granddaughters, Mabel Best and Windsweep, daughters of Villette, sister -to Star Pointer, being owned there, and both have foals by John R. -Gentry. - -“Of the dozen yearlings at Ewell Farm by John R. Gentry, only one -has been trained, and he a trotter can now show a 2:52 gait. He will -certainly make a great trotter. - -“A three-year-old trotter by this great sire has beaten 2:20, and a -three-year-old pacer, Gentry’s Star, can pace a mile in 2:10. The -unparalleled beauty and speed of the youngsters by John R. Gentry -foreshadows his future fame as a sire, and it is a safe prediction that -he will more than equal his sire, Ashland Wilkes, that has for several -years been the leading sire of new 2:30 performers. Analysis of records -in John R. Gentry’s pedigree show him to be the fastest and best son of -Ashland Wilkes. This horse is in turn the best representative of Red -Wilkes, the greatest speed sire of all the sons of George Wilkes, whose -strain has been preeminent in the trotting world for twenty-five years.” - - * * * * * - -Trotwood can vouch for every word of the following letter. He visited -the great Dakota prairies last fall. Such vastness, such fertility, -such lands! - - Fargo, N. D., August 15. - -Editor Trotwood’s Monthly: - -When I was a resident of your country I thought then that there was -only one God’s country, and that was the Central Basin of Tennessee. My -reason for arriving at such a conclusion was the land in the Central -Basin, but more particularly in and around Maury County, had maintained -its fertility and wonderful productive power for a hundred years with -only the ordinary American style of farming. That is, taking all out -of the land and putting nothing back again. But since that time a -discovery has been made which accounts for the land in your section -of country maintaining its wonderful endurance for raising such an -excellent quality of wheat over a period of seventy years, without -rotation of crops, and that is the almost inexhaustible deposit of -phosphate rock that underlies so much of your lands. But I have found -another God’s country. While it cannot boast of being underlaid with -phosphate rock like your lands in and around Maury County, but when -this country was opened up for settlement in the ’70’s it was as -rich in all the constituent elements of fertility as the lands in -the Central Basin of Tennessee. This Red River Valley is a wonderful -country, and Fargo, N. D., is the center of this granary of the great -Northwest. Although Fargo is not a very large city, the population is -about twelve or thirteen thousand inhabitants, it is a live town, and -full of enterprising business men. - -This town is the third largest farm implement distributing point in the -world. That’s saying a good deal. Moscow, Russia, comes first; Kansas -City second, and Fargo third. According to the Bureau of Statistics, -United States Department of Agriculture, for 1904, the State of North -Dakota produced some fifty-four million bushels of wheat and the set -counties in the Red River Valley raised of the above amount nearly -twelve million bushels. This is not counting the Minnesota side of -the Red River Valley. The farmers in the Red River Valley seem to be -pretty well fixed. The great Dalrymple farm is in this county of Cass. -These gentlemen farm about 30,000 acres of wheat land. The soil in -this valley is a rich, black, glacial drift, and though it is not corn -country, not being warm enough, yet all other farm products do fine -(there is an immense crop this year), as wheat, oats, barley, rye, -buckwheat, flaxseed, hay and the most excellent Irish potatoes are -raised here, and 200 bushels per acre is a fair crop. But the farmers -in the Red River Valley have been raising wheat almost exclusively for -the past twenty-five years, and wheat of fine quality. But if they want -to maintain the reputation of this land as a wheat-growing country, the -farmers will have to put on their considering caps and ask you Maury -Countians to send them up some acid phosphate to put and keep their -land in balance, so that they can go on and again raise No. 1 hard -wheat. - - WM. DENNISON. - - * * * * * - -TO MY FRIENDS: - -Pardon this final word as the magazine goes to press, but Trotwood is -gratified to see that subscriptions are pouring in from every corner of -the United States, from Canada and from Mexico. Far away Halifax, N. -S., sends a good list in the same mail with New Braunsfels, Southern -Texas. - -I am indeed proud of this, for it is the work of my personal friends, -whose loyalty and friendship have no measure; who in the past have -sent me words of comfort and cheer, in my fight through the columns of -that great turf journal, “The Horse Review,” for what I conceived to -be clean living, clean thinking, clean racing and clean and hopeful -literature. - -I have longed for this day when I might talk to my many friends -through the columns of my own publication, and in the department “With -Trotwood” I want to meet you often, and I want you to meet each other. - -To my old tried and true friend, John C. Bauer, of the Chicago Horse -Review, whose firm and lasting friendship has helped to make life -pleasant, and whose sterling manhood and unfailing courtesy in the -twelve years that I was associated with the Horse Review, has endeared -him to me and given me greater faith in man, I extend my hearty and -sincere thanks for the unselfish way in which he has so cheerfully and -willingly helped in starting us down the track of literature toward -what promises to be a successful goal. - -To my many other friends who have responded so liberally with their -dollars and who have been so free with their expressions of loyalty and -good will, I thank you one and all, and I wish that I could meet each -and every one of you, and with a hearty handshake tell you how much I -appreciate your friendship and your encouragement. - -With my very best wishes and regards to all, I am sincerely yours, - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - * * * * * - -A word from the Business Manager: - -If you feel friendly toward Trotwood, no doubt you feel just as -friendly toward “Trotwood’s Monthly.” I want every reader of this -monthly to write us a letter, sending us the names and address of your -friends whom you think would be interested in this monthly. I will mail -them a sample copy with your compliments, and ask them to join us in -making what we hope to make--=The greatest farm and horse magazine in -the world=. Respectfully, - - E. E. SWEETLAND, - Business Manager. - - * * * * * - -TRAFFIC - -A large tree has just been cut from the land of Mr. J. R. Marshall, -four miles from Columbia. At its base it was sixteen feet in diameter, -and out of it five logs ten feet long were cut, containing 7,650 feet -of lumber. The top of the tree made thirteen cords of wood.--Columbia -(Tenn.) Herald. - - And I would weep for thee, thou monarch of the wood, - Thou king that long the scorn of Time has stood. - King by the royal right of strength alone-- - With star-crowned head bared to the circling zone-- - Of good deeds done, of sweetness and of mirth, - Scion of the sun, defender of the earth-- - O, I would weep for thee. - - And I would mourn for thee, ay, truly mourn, - For what thou wast, and all that thou hast borne. - Brother to the skies, companion to the hills, - Comrade of the clouds and mother of the rills, - Gatherer of dews, garnerer of herb and flowers, - Guardian of the muse in trysting twilight hours-- - O, I would mourn for thee. - - And I would honor thee for what thou’st done, - Scorner of winter’s wind and summer’s sun, - Builder of birds’ nests, brewer of bubbling pool, - Painter of shadows dark on landscapes cool, - Wafter of odors sweet on summer’s breeze; - Warrior of winter’s sleet and biting freeze-- - O, I would honor thee. - - And I would reverence thee, thou hoary one, - Thou who hast stood while centuries have run, - Thou who hast seen the Indian lover stand - While virgin moon smiled down on virgin land-- - The ax, the rifle of the pioneer-- - All these have passed, and all had left thee here-- - And I would reverence thee. - - O, Ax of Traffic, buzzing Saws of Trade, - Dost think for thee alone the Earth was made? - For thee, to garner clean her fields of corn, - With barren hills to greet the babe unborn; - For thee, to glutton in her sweet-stored vine! - And leave no grape on fainting Future’s vine? - - JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE. - - * * * * * - -_Fortunate is the man who has found his lifework, and--his Jonah._ - - * * * * * - -_Build--for if you build at all you will build better than you know._ - - * * * * * - - 1:59-1/2 =EWELL FARM= 2:00-1/2 - (Established 1870.) - - GEORGE CAMPBELL BROWN and PERCY BROWN - Spring Hill, Maury County, Tennessee - - _SHETLAND PONIES JERSEY CATTLE_ - _TROTTING and PACING HORSES_ - _SOUTHDOWN SHEEP_ - -[Illustration: John R. Gentry 2:00-1/2.] - -IN THE STUD - -=JOHN R. GENTRY 2:00-1/2=, the handsomest of all turf horses. Has held -ten world’s records. Twice grand champion for one and three heats. A -winner in =Madison Square Garden=. A sire of pronounced beauty, speed -and intelligence. Sires both trotters and pacers of extraordinary speed -and destined to be the greatest sire in the world. =Fee, $100.00.= - -The =SHETLANDS= at =Ewell Farm= have been selected with great care, -especial attention having been paid to beauty, uniformity in size (36 -to 42 inches), and docility of temper. Not for many years have these -ponies failed to delight their purchasers. Geldings 1 to 3 years old -for sale. - - * * * * * - -Transcriber’s Notes: - -Illustrations have been moved to paragraph breaks near where they are -mentioned. - -Punctuation has been made consistent. - -Variations in spelling and hyphenation were retained as they appear in -the original publication, except that obvious typographical errors have -been corrected. - -p. 26: The description of the test plots is missing a description for -No. 1, and the description given for No. 1 is actually for No. 3. - -The following change was made: - -p. 30: delvered changed to delved (the deep-delved cellars) - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Trotwood's Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, -October 1905, by Various - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TROTWOOD'S MONTHLY, OCTOBER 1905 *** - -***** This file should be named 62454-0.txt or 62454-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/2/4/5/62454/ - -Produced by hekula03, Craig Kirkwood, and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This -book was produced from images made available by the -HathiTrust Digital Library.) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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