Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1895-12-12
Old Times.

| Ed. Register-A few days ago / saw
a lot of boys and girls with their bas-
| kets out nutting. / saw in one of the
trees four or five boys, way up among
the branches, making the nuts rain
down. And yesterday was such a love-
| ly fall day. and as | lay in the ham,
mock summing and feasting my eyes on
the grand old mountains, with their
sides and tops clothed in such gorge
GUS colors, just laid and drank in my
soul full of comfort and delight. And
| what beautiful thoughts went wander
ing through my mind! How the early
scenes of my boyhood days came up so
fresh-the days at the old home, the
gathering chestnuts and beach nuts.
hickory nuts, etc. AS we look back
at those early days, how good it all
seemed.
As lay, thought of one scene
shall never forget, the fall the girl |
married came to spend the winter.
There were a great many nuts, ard
there was, on what is now part of the
farm. large grove of very large, tall
hickory trees, that bare full of nuts,
almost every year. On that year al
most every tree bore full of nuts. and
when there came the proper time to
gather them, the young folks of the
Valley made nutting party. Most
all of the boys and girls of the Valley
were invited-each boy and girl with
basket or baskets to gather the nuts
in. Among the boys present was my
..Old Pard." He and / were to do the
climbing and shake the trees. Old
Pard was most daring climber
There was no tree so tall or SO large
that he would not climb to the top, if
there was coon or possum, or wild
cat, in the top. 1t made no difference
how dark the night was, or high the
tree. he would get to the top.
When all Of the boys and girls had
got to the grove Old Pard said to me,
Il dare you to climb higher than /
do" Now. did not pride myself as
an extra climber. l had had two falls;
one of them broke my leg, and l did
not care to go up in the tall trees un-
less it was necessary. But / would
not take dare from him if broke
my neck. / could beat Old Pard
shooting and hunting. but he knew he
could beat me climbing and swimming.
We each carried large hammer to
pound on the limbs to jar the nuts off.
As we started up the trees. he would
take one side and / would take the
other side, and which ever would get
to the top and have shaken all the
nuts off was winner. We had been up
quite a number, and had got about
done for the day. But off at little
distance was a tree by itself. About
thirty Or forty feet from the ground it
| forked like letter V. Old Pard
|
out on my half thought felt it give
away under me. / did not feel very
good out on my limb, and it looked
long ways to the ground. So I let my
self down astride of the limb, and was
working myself along, pounding as
went. Old Pard had gots the nuts all
| off of his side. and as he turned to
come down he saw me and followed
| at me and said, "Fraid, ha! Come, let
| let me out there! I'll walk right over
you!" AS he reached my branch he
| made a spring on lt-and, my! you
just ought to have heard that limb
snap! When ..Old Pard" heard the
limb snap. he stopped and said, Easy,
now! Easy, now!" and commenced to
crawl back. / had thrown both arms
around the limb and was hugging it as
tight as could. called back to him
and said, .sCome on, come on, fraid!
Ha, coward, come on!'' But he did
not care to come. When we got down
from that tree we did not care to go
up any more trees that day; and don't
you think it makes my feet creep now
to think of it. No, sir, / never prided |
myself on being an extra climber. l |
had rather stay a little nearer the |
ground.
The fall Uncle Dunk help build the
old homestead, several OF US were pas
sing across one of the fields, and we
saw under small hickory tree quite a
lot of nice nuts. As we stopped and
gathered what there was of them, we
saw they were an extra nice nut, with
very thin shells and large nuts. And
they were delicious. So we took note
of that tree and saved it, and now that
tree bears nuts every year; and for all
of my married life / would gather
those nuts and crack them for my wife,
and to-day the ground is covered with
nuts. But. alasi most of them are
wormy. Such thing as wormy nut
we did not think of seeing in those
days, and can any of the readers OF the |
d rrrcrrp toll how IL nnrnos that naar rly 4