The independent-reporter., 1910-07-14

chine used. is cleaned and oiled every
night SO that all implements are free
from rust The tool room is a pleas
ant apartment ceiled with white
boards, spotlessly neat and can be
warmed in winter. The men call ii
the Club House and here they as
sembled in the long evenings to
smoke and chat and play cards.
At present the live stock on the
farm consists of two horses and five
! foxes. the latter, little fellows who
bark at you If you come too near, but
who evidently fare well in captivity.
About September first when the barn
and other buildings are ready, Mr..
Patten expects to put in fifty sheep,
! 10 pigs, one hundred hens with ducks
and geese with fifteen COWS, prob
ably of the Holstein breed. There is
fine water in the house from a spring
on the hillside and this will eyentu-
ally be carried to the barns. A lit
tie pond nearby will be good for the
ducks and, on the western slope of
the mountain, is an ideal sheep pas
ture.
Capt. BENJAMIN Eaton built the
house now standing on this place and
cleared much of the land He was
brought up in the family of his grand
father, Joseph Ireland whose house
stood in the so-called Goodrich field
belonging to the same farm. At that
time the hill was called Mount Ire
land. Here most of Capt. Benja
Minis children were born including
Calvin who owned the property until
1906.
Eaton Mountain, otherwise known
as Birthstone Mountain because of the
peculiar color given its rocks by the
iron present in their composition is
seven hundred and sixty-fiye feet
above the sea level, over six hundred
feet higher than the river at the vii
lage 1t is the greatest elevation in
the vicinity approaching the height
of Bigelow hill on the other side of
the river and Bigelow is the high
est hill for miles around. The farm
buildings, eleven of them, are, of
course, not at the summit but amid
level fields on a spur of the mountain
and the winding road thither, runs
upward all the way to the journeys
6Ilu n NllllD DtCCp tllO luNhlly oiiOi -
brings you through the sheep pasture,
sweet with pennyroyal, and over the
Iout-cropping lodges to the top whence
you may view all the kingdoms of the
earth and the glory of them. On the
south the farms stretch away to-
wards Clinton and the Kennebec at
| Hinckley; westward lie the road, the
building in their setting of orchard
and cultivated fields, then miles of
beautiful country, hill valley, stretch
of the river at the eddy, the cluster
ing village, and in the northwest,
when the midsummer haze shall lift,
you may see the range of blue noun
tains bounding the prospect. Toward
the north and east are more hills,
Fosters the Pinnacle and two ponds,
Round and Oakes, Lake George being
just out of sight at the foot of the
Pinnacle. On the mountain top eX-
cept at midsummer is a little pond
the origin of which is a mystery. AT
this distance the fields and orchards
look like gardens. The rows of trees
in the large orchard on the west side
of the road are exactly in line with
those in Mrs. Sprague's orchard on
the east of the highway. Between the
rows the ground is green with spring
ing crops.
On this eminenCe Mr.. Patten dreams
of a bungalow, one of these days
where, from peaceful height, he
may view the busy world of men and
all summer overlook his own acres
and those of his neighbors, seeing
pretty we'll what they are about. The
present season he can count up fully
one hundred acres of potatoes within
his field of vision. Though the bun
galow is as yet but hope for the
future, this very year Clarence f
Sprague and wife have planned to put
up a tenting outfit near the little or
chard and spend their vacation en-
joying camp-life while Mr.. Sprague
looks after his wife's apple trees.
So up-to-date and careful farmer
as Mr.. Patten ought to be able to
carry out his plans to a successful
issue and, as We have said, his friends
await with interest the outcome of
this experiment.