The Norfolk weekly news-journal., 1911-05-12

udhA smaller farms.
How They Cut Grain.
The cut grain Is piled In the center
of temporary circular enclosure some
one hundred feet in diameter Then
twenty or thirty mares are driven In
and the gate Is shut while the mares
are driven round and round the pile
by yelling huasos on horseback There
are two shifts and they change off
every hour or two. When the straw
is all tramped to fine chat and the
mares are dispensed with, the pile has
assumed much different shape Now
the center of the enclosure is bare,
while the fine straw with the grain
intcrmingled forms a large ring around
1t and slantng down to the center.
Then men spend a few days in sift-
ing the mixture i'm the breeze until
there remains one long pile of chan
and another of clean wheat. The
grain Is then sacked and hauled to
the mill in the nearby town. In the
harvest season it is a common sight
to see trains of eight or ten two
wheeled oN carts, slowly vending
their way along the dusty country
roads to market. each driver carrying
a long bamboo rod as he walks ahead
a.
head of the procession, bearing the
name of the "dueuO" or owner Of all.
Many of these lIaccndados have farms
of ten or twelve hundred acres and
some as much as four thousand, pro-
! ducing from five hundred to three
| thousand thrce-bushel sacks of grain,
besides supporting large herds of cat
| tie and yielding good crops of corn,
beans, potatoes and fruits.
From the nearby pueblo, San Car
los, there runs east public road
which, if followed, leads over the
mountains and into Argentina
About fourteen leagues on this road
up from San Carlos, nesting among
the hills at the foot of the mountains,
is the miniature, ramshackle, tumble
down, frontier town of San Fabian.
The road on the way up there passes
for many leagues through the largest
farm in Chile, under more or less
complete cultivation. 1t covers some
two hundred thousand acres and be-
sides extending for some twenty miles
along the railroad it turns and
stretches away up over the mountains
into Argentina.
Along both sides of all the roads
farm are closely planted triple rows
Of alimo trees about three feet apart.
There are some beautiful. straight
roads thus decorated stretching for
two or three miles without turn,
and when the trees are old and high
they give the way the appearance of a
canon.
As the hills are approached there
seems to be a wide belt with very
little vegetation on it,, but on a few
miles farther the hills are seen to be
beautifully wooded with native oak.
On the lower slopes of these hills the
farmers are clearing away the forest
to make room for more wheat fields.
Scanty as the crop is at best on the
hills, still it is the best crop they
would yield.
San Fabian lies on a gently sloping
plateau at the foot of the mountains,
among great hills, at the side of the
Nuble river. This seems a queer com
bination but it quite describes its sit
uation.
Go out of doors in the early morn
ing, say between and Z, and
look about you while inhaling the
clear, bracing, mountain air. The sun
lis shining down in the valley forty
miles below but as yet has not APP
peared to view in the little village.
| The rugged mountain tops are still
| hiding old Soils welcome face. The
birds are chirping and singing; little
curls of smoke rise lazily up into the
still air from the kitchen fires; all
is peaceful and calm and quiet and
the great wooded hills rise majestical
! ly around you like ponderous senti-
nels keeping guard over the peace of
the village. The air is so good, so
clean so pure that it makes one wish
he were ten feet tall and nothing but
| lung.
Go up the road which leads through
the village, at almost any time dur
ing the day, and you see the good
natured but not hard-worked shop
keepers lounging dreamily at their
! shop doors, or coming out to see you
as you pass. You may pass a group
of roughly clad, rugged looking men
on ponies who have just arrived
| from Argentina. Though the street
is strewn with rocks and boulders
much the same as the bed of a noun
tain stream, and you let your horse
walk and pick his way carefully along,
| yet you may ne dlluOSl uOIIlueu W
see some frontiersman, just over
from Argentina and pretty nearly
dead drunk, go dashing down the
street with his pony on the dead run,
reeling to and fro in his saddle while
you stand breathlessly looking after
! him and expecting to see him fall
headlong from his horse, any moment,
and dash his brains out on the rocks.
But a native of the town tells you,
Never fear. They never fall" And
you believe him as YOU watch this
horseman far down the road till he
turns up another road sharply.
Up above San Fabian three or four
miles there lives a typical Chilean
frontier farmer with his wife and fam
lily on three or four thousand acre
''fundo." His land borders the river
and rises in long, broad, level ter
races right up to the neighboring,
wooded hills. There he lives the
year round with the exception of an
occasional trip over the mountains
where his cattle and horses are being
pastured in Argentina, or to the little
valley town of San Carlos.
He is an old man of sixty, hearty
and hale and with the tan and dirt of
years making brown his rugged face.
He stands over six feet and has a