The Manchester journal. [volume] (Manchester, Vt.) 1861-current, 1905-09-28

cold and hlo~, Addison sah. There VII
pot he ten barrels of apples ieft on ihss
} trees by to-mouo. 1t ths time.
, rbea what's the use TO pick exclaimed
| Hslstead. We might a. veil shake Aem cf
| aud done wihhl
Aud bruise ali Of them said Addison
! shortly. They would be nt only for cider
spples.
II II xe could spread down soms,ins. liks
, hay or Blankets, bell We IL would be lost
as well 10 shake 'em "A, before they blow
, a. a'gued lislste,d; aud Jim ID ane, the
hir,d man, thought 20, TOO. He was tired
Of picking sppies.
There's that old rag carpet out 10 the
sason-house, ssid jim. That would be Z
complete thing TO spretd under the trees
1 But Addison and were thinking what
the qalre would say to such perfor.
msnc, aud felt reluctant to asqaiesce In ".
BY tn och CT. however, the sky gave
such ipdubitable slgns Of wind that Il real-
lly .eemsd better to shake the apples 81 on
blankets than leave thsm to b. blown ~
helter-skeiter. 4.
| Halstead drove to the sheds for more bar.
lrels, and brought out the old rag carpet ard
all the horse blankets which he could hnd
In the stable. We spread these undcr 3
tree and shook T., then hastily flled baskets
and barrels. II does not take lorg to gath
.r tina frui, Of a tree 10 that way, but there
we're ninety trees, aud shaking a large Ap.
p'e-tree IL hard work.
We ought to hsve that batterIn'-ram o.
yours here, said Jim Dosne, when he had
shaken three trees. That would fetch em
down.
II is always easy to take second wrong
step when once you have taken the. first
one
All right, replied Addison. We may ~
well 90 the whole figure, now we have be-
gun.
| But the battering-ram was up In the
great woods, three miles away. The or.
chard bordered tract Of woodland, how
ever. Jim went for an Ak, and we felled a
Eastwood and cut q log from 1t twenty feet
long. For singing It up, so that we could
swing It, we made use Of three fence-rsils,
starding them up 10 the form OF q tripod
near an apple.tree, and chaining tba top
ends together so that we conld suspend the
log underneath by means Of the tackle and
block as before.
The contrivspce worked most efficiently
so fer as jsrring of the apples went. Five
"bunts" Of the ram against the trunk Of an
apple-tree would bring down nearly every
apple on 1t. 10 this wav we could "pick"
tree IN less than ten minutes,
| A little before noon Theodore and Ellen
came out to help US pick. They we're as
tonished when they saw what we we're do.
ing but we persuaded them to keep quiet
and help fill barrels. For we we're now
shaking trees as fast as Halstead ard Jim
Doane could shift the ram and tripod from
one tree to another. Addison and the girls
hauled the ca pet and blankets to the trees
and spread them down. Then plunk-plunk
would 20 the battering-ram, and down
would come the Bsldwins!
My own part that day was to haul out
load after load Of empty barrels with the
horses and rsck-cart from the shed where
the old squire had bi. barrels for that sea.
son carefully TERED up.
At noon, when grandmother asked US
how we we're getting on with the apples,
Halstesd cried, 'Finely!" The girls look.
ed distressed, but said little.
Ia truth, we did tremendous days
work. During tire afternoon the weather
turned colder, with sky full Of broken
wind.clouds, But by dark we had the last
Baldwin tree shaken, and three hundred
and sixty.three barrels Of loose apples
standing about the orchard. And ~ we
had expected, there was high wind before
morning.
During the two following days the bar
rels we're hsuled to the apple house; and
we then began sorting them and putting
them up for market. They proved to be
10 such good condition that we made an
other mistake, and determined to barrel
them aud say nothing to any one. Apples
wers smooth and wellgrown that year.
We put up two hundred and ninety barrels
Of pumber onts, and thirty eight Of num-
Der twos, and they were all drawn to mar.
ket ~ usual, about October 28b, before
! the old squire returned home.
But an ill.di'posed neishbor who disliked
us learned somehow n our operations with
the bat eringrsm. Out Of spite he told
the buyer that sll our apples had been
shaken a the trees, instead Il being pick.
I'd BY haud. The buyers wrote courteous
letter, n quiriog as to this--a letter which
the old squire did not receive until he came
hom' week or more after IL arrived. But
when he found what was alleged against
his ., piles, he cnme out. 10 hing very grave,
10 where Addison aud were at work, har-
vestine turnips, and read the letter aloud
to ~.
OF course there was now but one think
TO do. We begsn 1t the beginning, with
the beechnuttirg, and related just what had
occurred up to the Ialn-storm and after
ward-all but the psrt about the bstterlng-
ram neither Addison nor mentioned that.
The old squire heard "a through without
comment. But we saw that he felt badly.
He could hardy have felt worse than we
did.
BOYS, he exclaimed, at last, ! would
rather every apple over 10 that orchard bad
rotted on the ground than to have bad this
bsppeD.
That sftei noon he drove pevsn miles TO
sse the buyers ab' Ut II, for the apples had
not yet been slipped from the raIlwfy-sis-
tion. They rperd ten bsrrsl', bit or mIss,
and I, und ibs srples I'll right, apparently