Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1883-09-02
THE OLD RAIL FENCE.


The placing of barbed-wire fences
around farms, usurping the place of the
old rail fence, destroys half of the pleas
ure of farming. There is something
about the old rail fence that is real COM
Portable, and the barbed-wire fence is
forbidding, cold, repulsive. Until you
come to think of it, there does not seem
as though there was great deal of solid
comfort in rail fence, but there is. Did
you ever see two old farmers leaning
against a rail fence whiting and talking
politics or a horse trade for hours to-
gether? They are more comfortable,
and rest more than they would if they
were occupying the softest sofa, or the
best stuffed arm chair in the world.
There are so many shapes man can get
into, to rest, about rail fence. First,
the farmer will fold his arms and rest
them on the top rail, and lean his breast
on the fence, and talk for half an hour,
until his legs are tired, then he will step
one foot up On the second rail from the
bottom, and stand and white for half
On hour, until the top Of the rail is as
polished as q piece Of mahogany. Then
ne vii change feet and lean one elbow
on the second rail from the top, and
sharpen his knife on his boot, and talk
fer half ~ ho;,r aboE5 how he is going
.5Ia. .a mortgage on bis farm next
Eea.. At nat position becomes irk-
so..- IL ,ji .u,n his back to the fence,
st3.s.i on LIS heels, and place his two
e; oss 81 the sop rail, and lean against
to- Ice, aad for half an hour he viii
tel, ah5.a5 low the Old mare that he is
trying to trade of cleaned out all the
teams on the road coming back from
+ the celebration at town, after the fire.
works on the 4th, and how, If he wasn't
fixed just as he is, and wanted the twenty
dollars boot money to send Nathan off
to the select school, there is no man on
! earth could buy that mare. Then he
] will get tired and stand around sideways,
put his left ann up on the fence, and
begin to white again, and swear the
man that runs the cheese factory down
at the corners is skinning us farmers out
of our teeth. Without going into
details as to ninety-nine other combina-
lions by which farmer can rest on,
about or against a rail fence, it may not
be out of place to speak of sitting on top
of fence. The farmers, after trying
several positions, will instinctively climb
| no the fence and rest on the top rail,
their feet resting on the third rail from
the top, which is always laid with pro-
jections enough to make good footing,
and an hour will pass as the fellows talk
of the times when they settled in the
country, and of the hardships they have
endured, and how the children have
grown up and gone away, and the con-
versation viii drift into sleepy channel,
and the sun will begin to sink in the
west, and the horny-handed sons oftoil
viii suddenly remember that the chores
are to be done, and with Goodnight,
Lige," and "Drop around agin to-
morrow, Ike" they will separate and
one will take a milk pail and one-legged
stool and go toward the lot where
the COWS have come home, while the
other will SO across the road to his barn
and throw down some hay for the horses,
and they will both go to bed at eight
o'clock as tired as though they had been
moving. But they had splendid, easy
visit on the old rail fence.-Peck's S,us.