Norwich bulletin., 1918-12-27
Written Specially for The Bulletin.

nut Qu1Ee 4du yeLy LnOuSn SOmet11Qe5 feel like it. I'm old enough, however, to remember when the world agricul- tural was very different from what it is now. This anniversary, which I'm not celebrating" but passing very quietly and hurnbiy in the exercise of my ordinary duties about the farm stead, has set me thinking about some of the differences between now and then.
 For instance, as came down from the barn with the milk this morning 1 glanced over to my next neighhor's, where a thoroughly moderp drilling outfit is at work boring what it hoped to be an artesian well. They haven't yet got through the gravel and dirt, but the huge drill, driven by a gaso- line engine, is forcing its way down ward, carrying a six-inch iron pipe with 1t as it sinks, which piping will be continued till bedrock is struck. After that, the drill will go on down, just the same, and almost as fast.
 When 1 was a boy those neighbors got their water from a dug we'll just inside the dooryard fence, drawing it up in a wooden bucket with a Windlass made out of a round log cut in the woods and supplied with a wooden crank, likewise hewed out of native
 
 wooden pins.
 At the same date our own family we'll had long pole suspended to a 12 feet high post by a wooden pin driven through 1t at about the middle of it's length. The lighter end hung over the we'll and from it depended a not much overgrown bean pole, with the bucket at it's end. The heavier butt end of the long pole-we called it the 'sweep''-rested on the ground, nor mally, and kept the empty bucket just at the top of the well curbing. When we wanted water we pulled the small | pole down till the bucket reached the l bottom of the we'll. Then the heavy 1 butt almost balanced it, so that the | lifting to the surface was compara- 1 lively easy.
 | Now pump draws water from that 1 same we'll directly to the kitchen sink, while my neighbor proposes to have a i flowing artesian well, if he can get one with anything less than 800 feet of drilling.
 Spsakine of wells reminds me of ] another affair, Once, about 1860, the old folks went away for a few days, ! leaving me in sole charge. Nosing | around, as boys are sure to do under | such circumstances, 1 found the pump, | the point and about twelve feet of iron 1 pipe which had been bought for use as ] a. drive Welf' at the barnyard. Two attempts there, however. had resulted in the point striking hardpan some ten feet down, through which no tools at ! a farmers command would force it. So 1 the idea had been given up.
 l With no very definite conception of l what l was going to do, dragged the I point and pipe down into the farm lane and, with no better tool than the l old beetle" made of hornbeam knot, l l proceeded to pound it into the dirt. The beetle" was pretty heavy for an Swear old, and the driving grew | could see that it went a trif1e with 1 every blow. and so I kept on. l Before I had driven the twelve feet | of pipe all in, I struck a water vein. | ScreWing the pump on. found that it | drew and delivered a full stream of water, muddy at first, of course, but | soon clearing Up. It proved to be un- i usually cold and when my father re- 1 turned and tested the results of my boyish prank he gave little grunt | and said something to mother about | the Lord looking out for children and fools. Which I didn't think very com plimentary, at the time. But the real wonder of the affair is that this i driven well" put down in half a day by an Swear old boy, without any idea l In driving it except to have "a joke on Dad" has never gone dry from that l day to this, but has furnished all the water asked from it, no matter how many barrels at time, even in the midst of the worst droughts.
 Another memory came to me as ] glanced over northwards at my neigh bor's artesian drilling plant. It was just sixty years ago that I saw, ir the field lying between us, the first moving machine ever used in this town. I had small scythe of my own and, being big and strong of my age, used to mow quite a little witt my father. We were working away when the sound of this machine in tht Enext field attracted our attention Leaving our scythes in the swathes we went to the fence and, leanin: over it. watched the operation. , Don't get the idea that that primeva moving machine looked anything lik, what we now use. It was pretty near ly all built[of wood It was as big al a modern reaper and binder, and had ; huge reel. much like those still useC on some reapers. The cutter-bar wa
 a substantial beam of wood, reinforcet
 with iron straps, and the wheel at tn
 end was about the size and look of
 wheelbarrow wheel.
 It took four horses to draw tn
 clumsy contra ption. One man sat ol | a high seat and drove the vince
 horses. Another drove the leaders. :
 third man walked ahead, to make sur
 that the way was clear of stumps 0
 stones or woodchuck holes or bi
 weeds. Another walked behind an was kept busy freeing the knives
 which clogged up about every ten o
 twenty feet. . A fifth with fork fol
 lowed still farther back, and drew tn
 haggled off grass away from tn
 standing, so as to leave a foot stri
 clear for next time around.
 After watching the performance fo
 about fifteen minutes, my father sai
 to me with a chuek1e: Well bul
 you md I, with our old scythes, coul
 "a cut more grass in the same tim
 than that machine has done with fou
 horses to pull it and five men to ten
 it."
 Which was manifestiy the fact. W
 picked up our scythes and, in the re
 double the area which the machin
 cut, and did the job much cleaner an
 better.
 Recalling ali this, am led to ohser
 among other things, that even a
 epoch making invention, like that {
 the horse mower, has to be improve
 through long years of test and exper
 ment before it becomes the almei
 perfect tool any of us can buy todd
 LOUIS E. KENNEDY