St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1915-05-19


4zsL or april" was the reply.
Il do hate for you and Florence TO
miss any of the school," said Mrs.
Powell.
sd forgotten to tell you, mother
said her son, that school will be out
in April. Well miss only a week or
two. They had to cut the session short
because they've run out of money to
pay the teachers"
''Well. that's not so bad,'' Mrs. Pow
ell reflected. although you miss
school, just the same, it really can't
be helped"
The next day being Friday, Sam
went down to the stable after school
hours and hauled the first load of ma
nure home so as to be in readiness to
drive to the farm next morning with
Ills companions, who were to be on
hand at the appointed hour.
Early Saturday morning the boys
Fred, Joe and Andrew-were on hand
at the appointed hour Sam soon had
the horse hitched to the loaded wagon,
and the four boys rolled away over the
gravelly road to the farm.
their destination, and the horse was
embarrassed and turned loose to Craze
in the field. Sam found the farm in a
| worse condition than he had expected,
and he had expected it to be bad. Bri-
ers and bushes and tall grass grew
thick along the rail fence all around
the field. Here and there next to the
! ground rails had rOtted and allowed
hogs to come in or go out at will. The
last tenants hadn't taken any trouble
to mend these gaps, and the hogs that
ran outside had destroyed a part of
the crops for two or three years.
my! There's certainly some work
to do here" Sam remarked.
whats to dO?" Fred Martin asked.
''For the first thing Sam replied
this fence row is to clean out, and
then I'll have to cut some poles to put
in the place of those rotten rails"
'Let me and Joe cut the poles," said
Fred, ''while you and Andrew clean
out the fence row. Where's the ak,
and how long must the poles be?''
$50 ahead, Fred, you and Joe," broke
in Andrew, smiling. eve know you
bushes, but We'll not kick"
you'll find the ak in the wagon
said Sam, "and you can cut the poles
the same length as the fence rails.
think they're about ten feet long"
When Fred and Joe had gone down
in the woods Sam brought a brier
hook and sharp grabbing hoe with
which to begin work on the tangled
mass along the fence.
my" he exclaimed, "but that's go
ing to be a woolly job! Those bows
had an eye to business, Andrew, when
they took the chopping. 1t does seem
like there ought to be some easier and
quicker way of doing it than this
How long do you think it will take
usY' asked Andrew
'Well, l did think at first" replied
Sam, "that it wouldn't take long. But
now, since I've had a second look at
it, I think we won't more than get
started good today"
eff we could burn it out first" sug-
gested Andrew, 'it wouldn't be nearly
so BAD
mo, but we'd burn up the fence"
Couldn't we follow along with wa
ter and put out the rails when they
caught fire?'
Good for you, Andrew Sam ex-
claimed. That's the very idea. The
fire will burn up nearly all the bushes
and briers and kill all the boil weevils
and other insects that are wintering in
there at the same time. That's why
fence rows ought not to grow up like
this. Insects live in there in winter
and come out to work on the crops in
summer"
''Well, let's get the water and start
our fire. I'm anxious to see how it
works." said Andrew.
81 have two barrels up at the house,"
Sam explained. Wen unload the
wagon and 90 up and haul them down
full of water
The horse was harnessed again, the
manure scattered and the boys were
soon back with two barrels of water
and a bucket. The fire was started
and allowed to burn only in one direc-
tion-the way the wind carried it.
Sam followed close behind with the
bucket and poured water on the rails
that now and then took fire. Andrew
drove the wagon alongside and refilled
the bucket from the barrels for Sam.
Once the fire had got well started it
burned rapidly and in a very short
while it had gone entirely around the
field. Nothing remained of the matted
tangle except a few charred bushes
and coarse briers. Taking the brier
hook and the grubbing hoe, Sam and
Andrew had these all down in less than
an hour.
''Well, that jobs done,' Sam exclaim-
ed when they had finished, land it
wasn't half as hard as 1 thought it
was going to be-
IF we hadn't figured out new way i
to do it, though, it would have been I,