The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-03-07
THE oswEGATcHrE ToAD-HuNrER.
How General Newton Martin Curtis Rescued
His Onion Patch from Grubs.
Albany N " Special.

Albany IN. W Special
They tell a good story Of the dainty reformer.
Newton Martin Curtis, up in ST. Lawrence coun-
ty, where he has always lived. Curtis made an
excellent record as q soldier during the war.
ana as everybody who knows him knows, had
an eye shot out at Fort Fisher, where he was the
first man into the confederate works. After the
war he returned to the wild Businesses of ST.
Lawrence county and started on a new career
which paralyzed his neighbors. He began to
show his experienced and expert farmer neigh
bors how to farm. 1t is true that up to that
time he could not distinguish the difference
between a harrow and a furrow, but his war
experience had made him a great man, and his
rank OF major-general by brevet had placed
him in a position where to receive advice
would be not only ridiculous but positively
mortifyipg. He bought a farm OF some hundred
acres, and p~loughed into it on his own hook and
in his own way. One season he raised nothing
but corn, another nothing but wheat Then
came a year when there was an onion famine.
Here was the Generals opportunity. He turned
his farm of several hundred acres into one
enormous onion patch. Some of his neighbors
shook their heads. Others expostulated with
him. Many tried to advise him to change his
plan.
1.-THE weeds will ruin you and the grubs de-
stroy the CROP they said. In vain. The obdu-
rate hero of Fort Fisher knew it all Had he
come from the command of thousands of men to
be told his business by illiterate and obscure st.
Lawrence county farmers2 The onions began
TO SprOuL 90 ala the weeds. Inc General took
off his coat and erergetically began on the weeds
a crusade of determination It was then that he
made a fresh discovery. Grubs nearly half a
foot in length. in myriads. were chew
ing up his precious food. Discouraged
Not he! He merely scratched his head
and pondered. He gazed refectively at his
neighbors' fields laughing with plenty. He ran
sacked his library for an antidote for gruos. If
the question had been one of fankinga victori-
Gus army or of charging an enemy's works. he
would not have h~esitated for a moment what
was the proper and most decisive thing TO do,
but as it was the momentous issue or gruos, he
was utterly at sea, and in the end had TO give it
up. Finally a neighbor came to his relief-a
sympathetic and kind-hearted neighbor, who
knew nothing of war but q great deal about
farms
saThe only way to kill them ere grubs,n he
said sis TO give EN- toads. So the General ad-
yertised for toads ct ten cents a dozen, delivered
on his farm.
..Plagues of Egypt he cried, when he saw a
procession a quarter of a mile long marching up
TO his place with from a dozen TO ten dozen toads.
Every day, regular as4he sun arose, the procession
appeared, received its ten cents q dozen for the
batrachians and left, and no doubt would have
continued till the present time had not the Cen
eral made the shocking discovery that while the
toads were delivered in the morning. they were
covertly collected at night and resold to him the
following morning. hence his name-the toad
hunter Of the Oswaeatchie. or the aisannoiDted
farmer"