The Birmingham age-herald., 1910-09-01
From the Louisville courier-Journal.


 M laborer at times. The plowman X homewardly podding his weary way is picturesque. The harvest hahu happily harvesting hay or grain appears to the imagination of the poet or painter The man with the grinding city job under an electric fan and conVeniehtis near his club likes to talk about the glao' free life of the agriculturist, who mereiy works and sleeps the sleep Of the rleht- eous and physically weary while the worried city man takes his nerves TOT an airing in an over-illuminated park, drinks deceiving stimulants and awakes next morning with a brick in his head. But 1t is a far cry from envying some ones lot from a safe distance to eXperl- encing its hardships and annoyances The poet who writes about the blow has never followed the furrow from sunup to sun down in the wake of a mule. The palmer who paints the harvest field does so without any bearded wheat, briars or hayseed distributed from the back of his neck to his belt, and without any sweat bees" stinging him as he labors. There is almost always a considerable differ ence between poetry and fact.
 A Princeton man, who felt 1t his patrl- otic duty to harvest wheat in Kansas because Kansas, according to the maga- zines needed thousands Of able-bodied young Americans" confides to reporter for the New York Herald that no amount of patriotism would ever make him serve his country similarly again. He might go to war for the United States, but not to work-not to that kind of work. Seek ing the bubble reputation at the cannons s mouth he would not mind, but shocking wheat in Kansas-nevermore.
 Visions of chicken dinners finished off with watermelons, the feast served by rural bellies, contributed an element of fascination that aided in firing the patri- otism of the Princeton undergraduate. The experience of eating pork and beans, drinking coffee the like of which was never served at college or in a fashionable club, and working in competition with natives who had apparently spent their lives getting i'll condition,' fioored the collegian, and caused him to repent his rashness. And when two strapping daughters of the Kansas farmer came Into the field in overalls and made him blush, not by appearing in trousers, but by outpointing him at work. his humilia ton was intense. They made us feel like children--those daughters of Vest cott," says the Princetonian.
 | He continues:
 About ' o'clock a horn was blown at the house and all hands were driven over for supper-boiled pork, boiled beans and boiled potatoes. But our appetites made everything taste good, although we were so tired and sore we could hardly eat. | Our hands were blistered and our faces and the backs of our necks burned like | fire. Our feet were simply crippled. We could hardly walk. We sighed with con | tentment at the thought of soon stretch ing out and getting a long rest and sleep. But mo- To our amazemeat, chagrin ar1 consternation, it was back to the fi---s immediately after supper. The moon was bright. and we could see to work as well as in the daytime. When we finally struck our pallets. in the garret it was Il o'clock. Sleep was out of the question. Every muscle was sore. Every bone ached. I never knew before that had as many separate bones and muscles as ached that night
 "It seemed to me I had hardly got asleep when heard Westcott calling me.
 It was o'clock in the morning, and we were being aroused for another day In the fields. buckled down to 1t good and hard. had made up my mind that
 would be my last day in those golden fields. When I climbed into the Westcott
 garret at Il o'clock that night I had my
 escape planned.
 1 'I never undressed. lay down till all
 was still. and then slipped out of the house and walked to the station, 16 miles
 away. Sore, lame and exhausted. it took me until o'clock to make those 16 miles,
 a distance I had easily made in less than
 two hours in my college runs.
 "An east bound train passed through at 9 o'clock and I boarded it. There was
 no happier being on that or any other
 train. I have never been back to Kan
 sas. I never expect to go there. l
 wouldn work in those harvest fields for S1OO a day"
 Pope looked at the harvest in this way:
 ..Indulsd the day. that housed their an ' n,,al grain a-'''sS'