The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1881-07-15

L
band brought in the stiff and lifeless
carcasses and mildly suggested that they
had better be dressed off to save them,
Mrs. Robbins indignation rose so sudden
" that it overfowed its legitimate chan:
mel, and the meek victim before her had
no time to escape its inundati0n.
"Do you think can ever dress of
and eat those beautiful hens?" she de-
manded. ssThe first mouthful would
choke me. You'll have to dress them
yourself if you want it done. If you 60
on this way, Philo, and never stand up
for yourself at all, that man will ride
over US rough shod. Next news, one OF
the children will crawl through the fence
by mistake and be flung back with his
neck wrung. Don't 60 to scalding that
hen in the dinner pot; there's dish
kettle. Oh, how 1 wish you would ever
try and spunk up little: I wonder
what he will think he can do to us next!' -
Mr.. Robbins, who had pulled off the
first handful of feathers, was much
embarrassed by the unpleasant way in
which they stuck to his fingers.
"Wife," said he, helplessly, ''what
shall do with these?"
You never can pick that hen," she
declared. "Here, let me take it. I
think now you might sue old Fargo for
damages. You'd have strong case
against him, and taste of the law
would give him good scare"
elf you really feel as if you couldn't
eat them," said Mr.. Robbins, who was
picking the feathers from his fingers,
s'we might dress off a pair and send
them to Mr.. Fargo, and say we were
very sorry for the damage. they have
done. 1 should be very glad to give
those poor folks good dinner, and it
would be heaping Goals of fire on his
head"
There was faint suggestion of Turk
ing mischief in his eyes as he spoke.
Mrs. Robbins found it too great a
strain upon her self control to remain
speeches. with indignation, as she first
intended.
"Philo Robbins, do believe you are
crazy?" she burst forth. Gas if Goals of
fire would make any impression on his
tough old head! And you wouldn't
catch the town poor getting anything so
good; he'd eat them oil himself
first. He came to the Sunday-school
festival with bag of peanuts he got on
the Christmas tree last winter, and q
roll of butter he couldn't sell at the store,
for his contribution, and then sat down
and ate two plates of biscuit and a whole
hen. No, indeed! I'll eat them myself
before he shall touch q mouthful-
besides, I'm going to send pair over to
Mothers"
Mr.. Robbins discreetly retired from
the discussion, but his wife made the
neighborhood ring with her grievance.
Every good housewife who owned q
flock of hens was ready with her sympa-
thy, and there was general opinion
current that Philo Robbins chad stood it
about as long as he'd ought to-"
"He's afraid of him; that's what's
the NATTER" declared Abel Crafts.
"When Fargo's cattle got in last fall and
ate up his corn, told him then that if
he'd sue him for damages it would be
more help to his fences than anything
he could do. You see Fargo knows
he'll never touch him, and that's what
makes him so bold. I'm real sorry for
Mrs. Robbins, she's a smart, likely
woman, and they say she's clean out of
patience with her husband. She'd sold
twenty-five dozen eggs this spring from
them hens, besides what she's set, and
haint been sparing of 'em in the house
nuther."
Philo Robbins pursued his peaceful
way apparently regardless of the criti-
cismS of his neighbors and the vehement
IS his In Tho
ject much prayerful attention, and list
ened quietly to all the advice given him,
forming slowly and deliberately resolves
that would not easily be shaken. There
were rumors that he had once or twice
been seen in earnest conversation
with his refractory neighbor, as they
hoed their potatoes in adjoining fields;
but as these reports did not chance to
come to Mrs. Robbins ears, the secret of
the interviews was not wrested from
him. The summer went on; by the first
of August his haying was over and he
could rest a little from the severe tension
of mind and body wrought by the su-
preme crisis of the farmers year. He
sat one evening on his pleasant piazza,
in the calm enjoyment of q mind at
peace with God and with himself, sur
veying the smiling fields that lay spread
out before him. One moving in partic-
ular was his especial pride, q rich,
smooth field without tree, rock or stump
to mar its even surface, where the grass
grew so luxuriant that it produced two
crops year. 1t was always cut at the
first of the haying, and even now the sill
yer wave ran over it at each breath of
the evening breeze. Mr.. Robbins had
felt little anxiety concerning his rowen
crop, on account of the unusual number
of grasshoppers that had lately ap-
peared. Some of the Oldest inhabitants
when they had done seri-
Gus damage to the crops; others talked
of the mischief wrought in Kansas, and
+" guessed we'd have them as bad in
yet" Mr.. Robbins had
just returned from his favorite moving,
and remarking to. his wife that "the
were pretty thick, but he
guessed the grass would get ahead of
them, and if she drove the turkeys down
they would trample the rowen and do
more harm than the critters would" sat
down to enjoy the beauty of the summer
evening and dismissed all anxieties from
hie mind HiS Doacofnl mion soo,nnd