Aug. 3.—There may be more argumentative jobs than thinning apples, but, as yet, I have not come across them. For the past couple of weeks I have been constantly on the defensive. Everybody seems to think that I am more destructive than a windstorm and that I am simply wasting apples. But the last time Mr. Clement came to see the orchard he said that there was altogether too much fruit, that it would not mature properly, and that if I wanted good fruit I would have to pick off a large percentage. Mine not to question why, mine but to do or die—and I went at it. In all the time I have been able to spare from other work and from arguments I have been stripping apples from the trees until the ground is covered with them. It does look like a slaughter, but there are still so many apples on the trees that there should be a big enough crop to satisfy any one. Besides, I have a little demonstration of the value of thinning the apples that satisfies me entirely. There are two branches of the Red Astrachan that according to the traditions of the orchard have never borne on the same year as the rest of the tree. When we were spraying in the spring these branches had such a trifling sprinkling of blossoms that I thought they were going to live up to their reputation. The rest of the tree was full of bloom. However, the whole tree was sprayed thoroughly and the straggling blossoms on the branches that were supposed to have missed were saved as well as the rest. At the present time the Red Astrachans are ripe and the two off-year branches are fairly well loaded with magnificent apples. Now that each stray blossom has matured in a perfect apple those branches are a sight worth seeing. Of course the rest of the tree is loaded, but the apples are small and many of them are badly shaped. All the best apples are on the two branches that were supposed to have missed. And I am inclined to think that the big apples on these branches would weigh fully as much as the small apples that are crowded on any two similar branches in the other part of the tree. And the big apples are not only a delight to the eye, but they are ripened better and are of finer flavour. An examination of that tree would convince any one that it does not pay to have too much fruit on the tree, but I seem to be about the only one it has convinced. "It just happened that way."

When Mr. Clement ordered the thinning to be done I admit I started at it with reluctance. There was one tree in particular that I hated to touch. It is a small tree that has nothing in it but fruit wood and every twig and spray is loaded. No one is able to tell me what kind it is, but those who are familiar with the orchard say it is a better apple than the Spy. Now, if there is a better apple than the Spy I want to know what it is. Yet they say that in the winter when they wanted a good apple to eat they would always take this one in preference to all others. Up to the present I have tasted no apple that suits my taste so thoroughly as a good ripe Spy and my mouth is watering already at the prospect of having something better. I have a sneaking hope that it is a new variety. I know that there are a few natural fruits in the orchard that grew from roots of the planted trees after the grafts had died. Wouldn't it be great luck if this was one? I cannot imagine how it could be a better apple than the Spy and not be known to everybody, if it is an established variety. Anyway, this tree is so beautifully loaded that it has been the show tree of the orchard. I always take every one to see it. But when Mr. Clement looked at it he said, "At least one-third of those apples should come off"—and they have come off. When he looked at the tree the fruit was not sufficiently developed for him to say what the variety is—especially as it is said to be better than the Spy. The number of apples that are better than the Spy must be very limited, but he did not seem to know what they could be any more than I do. I guess he must like Spies, too.

Though it was a painful job to pick so many apples off my pet tree, I was not much happier when thinning the Spies. I wished that there was some way of making them all mature properly, but as that way does not seem to be known to the scientists I did as I was told. But I didn't thin very savagely. I confined myself largely to apples that were badly formed or showed some blemish. Here and there on the lower branches there were occasional scabs and a few appeared to have been bitten or stung by insects, but on the whole the fruit looks clean and thrifty. The Baldwins, Kings, and Pippins were well loaded, but did not need any thinning. The chief destruction took place among the Ben Davises and Pewaukees. According to Mr. Clement, they had twice too many apples, and I guess he was right, for some of the branches were breaking under their load of fruit some weeks ago. I did not mind stripping the fruit from these inferior kinds, and it was an easier job as all I had to consider was the number of apples to be left on the branches. They were all clean and well formed, but on the Pewaukees especially they were so plentiful that some branches looked like clusters of grapes. On one branch I found a cluster of fifteen apples growing so close to one another that they could not move. They were wedged together like Brazil nuts. It would be impossible for such clusters to mature and colour properly, and thinning them out seemed to me a perfectly reasonable process, though when other people saw the apples on the ground they protested and could not understand why so much fruit should be wasted. Judging from all I have heard thinning apples must be something new in this part of the country.

Aug. 5.—Now that the celery is banked up and blanching properly I feel like expressing surprise that more farmers do not raise this excellent vegetable. It is easy to raise—the proof being that I can raise it. Every year we have had better luck with the celery than with anything else in the garden. We sow the seed in the spring when the ground is warm, transplant early in August, and then keep the ground clean. An hour's work each week sufficed to care for five hundred plants. The celery has been no harder to attend to than the potatoes. I am afraid too many people regard celery as a luxury, and would only think of raising it to sell. Our experience has been that we do not tire of it even though we have it every day in the fall and winter, and I regard it just as necessary to our winter supplies as potatoes. In the past we have pitted it in trenches in the ground, but last winter the mice got into some of the trenches, and this year they are so plentiful we do not dare to take any chances. The intention is to make a concrete root-house in a side-hill and keep the celery in it. This vegetable has something of a high-toned reputation because it is always served at banquets, but there is no reason why it should not be on every farmer's table. When it is crisp and well developed everybody likes it. All it needs to make it grow properly is an abundance of fertiliser and that is easy to get on the farm. We raise our celery in an old barn yard and I have yet to find any that beats our home grown. Our favourite is the White Plume, and though it is listed as a fall variety we have had it in first-class condition in February and a neighbour managed to keep it in a cellar all through March. Besides being good eating I am assured that its food and even medicinal values are high.

An altogether too meagre newspaper report tells that when President Creelman of the O.A.C. was addressing the guests at a luncheon given by the directors of the Industrial Exhibition in Toronto he said that there is a crying need for fun on the farm. I have noticed that. Farms are terribly serious-minded places. It was a city poet, not a country poet, who wrote:

Hard work seems to kill a man's capacity for fun, and of hard work on a farm there seems to be no end. But if Professor Creelman has any scheme for enlivening the labour of the farm so that men will sing at their work he will do as much for them as he can by teaching scientific farming.

Aug. 8.—When it comes to appreciating the bounty of nature you should go to a city. That's where you hear the stimulating talk. When I was in Toronto last week I heard more downright blowing about crops than I have heard in the country in the past year.

"Say! I wish you could take a run out to my place and see my garden," exclaimed one enthusiast after we had shaken hands and I had proudly pressed my callous spots into his soft and ladylike palm. "I tell you it's great."

Having had a city garden of my own years ago, and farther south, I couldn't help asking a few leading questions.

"Are you going in for specialties or doing ordinary mixed gardening?"

"Oh, I have a little of everything," he replied with the jaunty air of a man determined to bluff it out. "Say! I had a tomato for breakfast out of my own garden this morning."

I looked properly astonished, and even went so far as to admit that all the tomatoes I had enjoyed so far this season had been bought in a grocery store.

"Yes, sir! And I have had a tomato for breakfast from that garden every morning for the last three mornings."

"I notice that you speak of your tomato in the singular. Don't the other members of the family like tomatoes?"

"Aw, see here," he protested with offended dignity, "I'm not running a farm. I'm gardening on a town lot."

"Quite so. How is your squash doing?" I began to use the singular also.

"Say!" he exclaimed in a confidential tone, seeing that I understood something of his difficulties, "I admit that that squash was a mistake. The vine has already covered the carrot bed and the gravel walk, and is trespassing on my neighbour's lot at the rate of one yard of vine and three big leaves a day. It is making my garden look like a tropical jungle, and there isn't a sign of a squash on it yet, though there have been plenty of blossoms."

"How much space have you under garden?" I asked abruptly.

"Well," he squirmed, "we have a forty-foot frontage, and the garden runs back about thirty feet, but I haven't got it all under vegetables. We have a fine peach tree and a lilac bush, and my wife has a couple of flower beds in one corner, but I have all I can really attend to. It is intensive gardening all right, but we have been having something from it every day since the first radishes and lettuce came in."

Further conversation brought out the fact that he has four stalks of corn in his garden, and that some day soon he is going to have green corn for dinner. His corn is doing fine, by the way, and doesn't seem to be affected by the heat and drought.

Another city farmer had been having some trouble and wanted to know if I could tell him what it was. His vegetables have been acting freakishly. They grew too fast at first, put on too much top, turned yellow, and then seemed to burn out in spite of watering and much cultivation. When I found out how much fertiliser he had surprised his eight-by-twelve patch of ground with I diagnosed the case as one of water-brash or some similar form of soil indigestion. I advised him to put his garden on a spoon diet till it got back to normal. At the present time it is evidently so strong that it is heaving the roots out of the ground. Another man complained that his troubles were due to a city ordinance that forbade the use of water during the recent hot spell.

"If I had been at home," he explained, "things would have been different. But I went away with my family for a two-weeks' holiday and left the garden to the care of a man who does odd jobs around the neighbourhood. I told him above all things to water it regularly, but as soon as he heard that the city forbade the use of water in that way he shut right off instead of finding some way of doing it at night when no one was looking. It's a corker how careful some people are about the law when it lets them get out of doing work."

But in spite of these occasional failures the crop reports for Toronto are very good. Cucumbers seem to be thriving especially well in captivity, and carrots that are kept in solitary confinement are doing wonderfully. If reciprocity is passed and the yield of canned vegetables is normal Toronto will pull through the winter all right.

Since coming home I have been busy shocking oats and I find that shocking, like every other occupation on the farm, has undergone a change. The shocks of my earliest recollection were works of art in their way. Although I am woefully lacking in specific information regarding these old-time shocks, I have a very distinct impression that they meant more than merely a convenient pile of sheaves set up to dry. Those old shocks, as I remember them, were made in two shapes and sizes. There were ten-sheaf shocks built in a straight line in which two sheaves were braced against each other in a way that is still customary. Then there was a round shock made of thirteen sheaves, twelve in the pile, and the thirteenth placed on the top with both ends spread out so as to make a kind of thatch roof. My impressions are vague, but I am setting them forth in the hope that some one who really knows will set me right so that a bit of information of pioneer days may be preserved. Those old-time shocks invariably had the same number of sheaves made as nearly as possible of the same size, and a definite number of them were supposed to represent a fair day's work, but just how many I cannot say. They served to keep tally as well as to preserve the grain, but these modern shocks of the kind I threw together are not ornamental and no more useful than the law demands. After some of them were put up I held my breath and moved away on tiptoe for fear of shaking them over. The number of sheaves in each one depended on the thickness of the sheaves at the point where I began my building operations. They are altogether too sketchy in appearance to serve as models for an agricultural implement poster, but it doesn't matter much, as there are no signs even of "local thunderstorms," and we intend to begin hauling in to-morrow.

My personal recollection of sheaves covers practically their whole evolution. Although the first reaping I remember was done with a horse-killing machine which carried two men, one of whom swept the sheaves off the table with a rake, I had a chance to see the work of some belated sickle men. In new land that was too stumpy for machines, or even successful work with the cradles, sickles were used. As the sickle men cut the wheat in handfuls, they were able to lay every straw in its place and make sheaves that for square butts and compactness surpassed any that can be turned out by the self-binders. They also made sheaves of practically the same size. Those who followed the cradles were apt to make big sheaves where the crop was heavy and little sheaves where it was light, and the swath would have to be raked for a considerable distance to get a proper bundle. There was also an artistic carelessness about the sheaves made with a self-rake machine, but the binder of to-day makes them all of the same size—a fact which makes the handling of sheaves much more convenient. Before leaving this subject I wish some one would tell me just why binders are made to go in the opposite direction to mowers. I can see no reason for this, and no one of whom I have asked has been able to offer an explanation.

Threshing is now in progress in all parts of the country, and as soon as we have that well in hand you may bring on your politics as fast as you like. The indications are that the yield of speeches is going to be large and weedy, but whether our statesmen will thresh out any No. 1 hard ideas remains to be seen. Already there are indications that flails may be used in the threshing by some of the workers. Moreover, I have noticed that, although it is hard to get good hired men on the farm, political hired men are cheap and plentiful. But enough of this.

Aug. 15.—"Do bees pay?"

"They do. For the amount of the investment, and the labour required, they pay better than anything else a man can raise."

"Then why doesn't everybody raise bees?"—(At this point the fight begins.)

Those who are able to handle bees successfully always laugh at those who are not—the whole thing seems so simple to them. On the other hand, those who have tried and failed are liable to ruffle up when they hear bees mentioned, as if they could still feel the stings. In such a discussion an enthusiast on bees who has at the time of writing a cauliflower ear due to a bee sting may be expected to tell the truth. Therefore perpend.

Bees certainly pay, if given a ghost of a show. Any one who keeps an eye on the farmer's sales in the spring can buy good, strong hives for five dollars each. If he has the proper appliances, and gives the necessary attention at the right time, such a hive may reasonably be expected to yield ten dollars' worth of honey, at least two swarms, that, if properly hived, will each be as valuable for another year as the parent hive, and that may yield in the first year another ten dollars' worth of honey. As a handy man can make his own hives and can buy the fittings (frames for the honeycomb, pound sections, etc.) very cheaply, the actual money investment need not be large. The time investment is so small that it need not be taken into account—it can be credited to that indefinite part of farm work called "chores." Let us now see how this figures out. Expenses:—Parent hive, $5; extra hives, appliances, etc. (say), $5. Returns:—Honey, $20; three colonies of bees worth $5 each, $15, total $35; profit, $25. Can you beat it? If a company were formed to handle bees on that basis the prospectus would be excluded from the mails, and very properly, for the business seldom works out that way. A successful bee-handier seems to be born, not made.

"Don't you feel frightened when bees light on your hands and face?" a successful bee-keeper was asked.

"No, but I sometimes feel uncomfortable. Their feet tickle me when they walk about."

A farmer to whom this was repeated, snorted: "That's just it. There are some folks that bees will walk all over without stinging, and others that they'll sting all over without walking."

For two weeks the writer moved about fearlessly and unharmed among ten hives of bees, and indulged in the beautiful moral reflections that the thrifty colonies are supposed to inspire. Their constant industry recalled in an improved version the words of the poet:—

In spare moments he put together pound sections, fitting into each a strip of "starter"—wax foundations for combs—and similarly prepared frames for the larger boxes from which the honey will be extracted later on. At last the fateful day arrived when the pound sections were to be put on some of the hives, and the boxes with frames on others. A demonstration in practical bee-handling was to be given for his benefit. The demonstrator took the usual precaution of wearing thick woollen gloves and an ample gauze veil. The cautious observer, who never could see the use of taking unnecessary chances, viewed the proceedings from behind a screen door. Very simple the work seemed. The top of the hive was lifted off, a box of frames or pound sections put in place, and the top put on again. All went merrily until an old and somewhat imperfect hive was reached. It was found that the top had been gummed down by the bees, and a chisel was needed to pry it loose. This fussing angered the bees, but everything would have gone off right had not a sudden gust of wind blown the veil against the demonstrator's face. Instantly three bees got in their fine work. At this point another veil must be drawn.

When bees have once been angered, as were the inhabitants of this hive, it takes them some days to settle down—as the writer knows to his cost. On the morning after the demonstration he was standing fifty yards from the hive admiring a fine plump broiler, and wondering if he would have him served fried, with brown gravy, broiled, or À la Maryland, when a scouting bee lit for one hot moment on the Darwin tip of his ear. A wild slap that almost knocked his head off, a jump of two feet straight up in the air, and a staccato yell that roused the whole neighbourhood did no good. It was everlastingly too late—hence the cauliflower ear referred to above. This morning, three days later, an attempt to split some kindling wood within twenty yards of the hive led to another attack. Fortunately the bee was killed at the first swipe, and splitting kindling wood is a nuisance that one is only too glad of a good excuse for being rid of.

Bees are so scientific in their methods that it is easy for the skilled bee-keeper to meet them half-way and get the best results. The literature on the subject is so copious and precise that any one can have expert knowledge with a little study, and then, if he keeps on good terms with his colonies, he can handle them with ease and profit. He can be fully instructed just when to give them extra working room fitted with proper appliances, how to take the honey from them and induce them to do the greatest possible amount of work, and how to feed them with sugar in the fall so that they will be well prepared for the winter. The question of wintering the bees is the one that causes the beginner the most trouble, as a hive may be so weakened that it will not survive the winter, or will not be thrifty enough to do well in the spring. As for being on friendly terms with the bees, full instructions are given on that point. It is said that any one can acquire the knack of handling them without being stung; but the writer will listen to these stories with a more open mind when his ear feels better.

It seems only a few years since the man who had bees got his honey by smothering the hive. A hole was dug in the ground, and in the bottom a number of twigs were placed so as to hold up a bunch of cotton rags coated with melted sulphur. At night, when the bees were all in the hive, the sulphur was lit. The hive was then lifted cautiously and placed over the hole. A blanket was thrown over it to keep in the fumes, and the bees were quickly smothered. Even when such destructive methods were in vogue bee-keeping was considered profitable. It should be much more profitable now when nothing is wasted and the bees are carefully preserved.

The conclusion of the whole matter—the sting, if you like—is that bee-keeping is light, interesting, and profitable work for those who master its secrets; but the fact remains that most people are afraid of bees, and not without reason. Whether one can become a successful bee-keeper can only be learned by experience. Fortunately that experience can be gained easily, and can be gained in town almost as readily as in the country, for bees will travel far to find the blossoms from which to gather their honey. There is no reason why hardy suburbanites should not go in for bee culture as well as farmers—but—but—in spite of all the nice things that enthusiasts write about them bees do sting.

Aug. 17.—Yesterday I pitched oat-sheaves and it seemed so pleasant a form of exercise I am surprised that any one would call it work. But some people can make work of anything. I have even known people to wear themselves out counting up their money—but I didn't know them very well. If I had, I would have offered to help and to share their burdens.

I am inclined to believe that they have a finer harvesting spirit in the older countries than we have here. Once when passing a harvest field in England I thought there was a picnic of some kind in progress. Children were playing among the sheaves, girls wearing their brightest ribbons were wandering about among the workers, and those who were pitching and loading acted as if they were enjoying themselves instead of drudging. The jolly farmer whose crop was being taken to his barns called to me cheerily, and asked if I would come in and have a drink of hard cider. Every one acted as if nature's bounty were appreciated, and as if the harvest were a natural time of rejoicing. Here it is different. Everything is rush and hurry. I have even known a good farmer to fume and rage because the minister was so thoughtless as to make a pastoral call during the harvest and had delayed matters by asking a blessing at dinner. When folks get in a hurry here in Ontario, they make the fur fly. But I gave up being in a hurry long since, and yesterday the children were among the sheaves, and they rode on the loads, and we had a good time together that we'll probably talk about years afterwards.

Mushrooms are in. The wet weather has brought them up in the fields fully a month earlier than usual, and we have had several luxurious feeds. After all, I am not sure that the hand-raised mushrooms are any better than those that come up naturally in the fields. Of course, the cultivated ones are good and you can have them at any season of the year, but the pink-fleshed field mushrooms, when you are lucky enough to see them before the worms do, are just about as good as anything can be. Besides, there is something that appeals to one's sporting instinct in finding them out in the pasture. Getting field mushrooms compares with taking them from a bed as winging a partridge does with potting a fat domestic hen. But picking mushrooms is not an entire joy to me just yet. I know only two kinds: the common field mushroom and the inky mushroom, both of them delicious. But during the past few days I have found nine different varieties, some of them very tempting-looking, and I don't know whether they are poisonous or fit to eat. They are plentiful both in the fields and the woods, and it would be easy to get basketfuls if one only knew the right kinds. I have studied all the attractive-looking ones carefully, and the next time I go to Toronto I am going to hunt up J. McPherson Ross and find out all about them. He tells me that there are one hundred and twelve edible varieties and only six that are poisonous. It will be just my luck that six out of my nine will be poisonous ones. Anyway, I am taking no chances, even though I may be losing some of the best fungi that grow. Better to be safe than to be sick and sorry.

The bobolinks have changed colour, and, judging by their appearance, they are as fat as butter. In a few weeks they will be appearing at the best restaurants in New York, nicely spitted, as broiled rice birds, and if you try them you will find that a couple are fully worth the sixty cents you will be charged. When I see about a hundred of them (they are gathering in flocks now) stretched along a wire fence after they have been scared away from the oat shocks, I can't help wishing that I could defy the Insectivorous Birds Act and pot enough to make a good meal. I admit it would be a sin and a shame to shoot bobolinks. But what would be wrong about shooting a few rice birds? It seems odd that our musical and law-protected bobolinks, after a flight of a few hundred miles, will be the destructive and toothsome rice birds of the south. I fancy they would taste just as good here as they do down there if one only dared to try them.

This is an unusual year for black thimbleberries. Not only is the fruit more plentiful than usual, but the briers seem to be longer and sharper and the mosquitoes that protect them more plentiful and savage. Still we are picking all we can of them.

THE STONE

A man! A man! There is a man loose in Canada!
A man of heroic mould, a "throwback" of earlier ages,
Vigorous, public-spirited, not afraid of work!
A doer of deeds, not a dreamer and babbler;
A man, simple, direct, unaffected.
Such a one as Walt Whitman would have gloried in,
And made immortal in rugged man-poetry—
Vast polyphloesboean verses such as erstwhile he bellowed
Through roaring storm winds to the bull-mouthed Atlantic.

And yesterday the man passed among us unnoted!
Did his deed and went his way without boasting,
Leaving his act to speak, himself silent!

And I, beholding the marvel, stood for a space astonied,
Then threw up my hat and chortled,
And whooped in dithyrambic exultation.
Hark to my tale!
On the sixteenth sideroad of the township of Ekfrid,
Just south of the second concession line, some rods from the corner,
There was a stone, a stone in the road, a stumbling-block;
A jagged tooth of granite dropped from the jaw of a glacier
In an earlier age when the summers were colder;
A rock that horses tripped on, wheels bumped on, and sleigh-runners scrunched on,
And no man in all the land had the gumption to dig it out.
Pathmaster after pathmaster, full of his pride of office,
Rode by with haughty brow, and regarded it not,
Seeing only the weeds in the field of the amateur farmer,
And scrawling minatory letters ordering them cut,
But leaving the stone.
Oft in my hot youth I, riding in a lumber waggon,
By that lurking stone was catapulted skyward,
And picked myself up raging and vowing to dig it out—
But dug it not.
I didn't have a spade,
Or, if I had a spade,
I had a lame back—always an excuse.
And the stone stayed.
As passed the years—good years, bad years,
Years that were wet or dry, lean years and fat years,
Roaring election years (mouthing reforms); in short, all years
That oldest inhabitants keep in stock—there grew a tradition
About the stone.
Men, it was said, had tried to move it,
But it was a stubborn boulder, deep sunk in the earth,
And could only be moved by dynamite—at vast cost to the council;
But every councillor was a watchdog of the treasury,
And the stone stayed.
Since the memory of man runneth the stone was there.
It had stubbed the toe of the Algonquin brave, and haply
Had tripped the ferocious, marauding Iroquois.
It had jolted the slow, wobbling ox-cart of the pioneer;
Jolted the lumber waggons, democrats, buggies, sulkies;
Jolted the pungs, crotches, stoneboats, bobsleighs, cutters;
Upset loads of bolts, staves, cordwood, loads of logs and hay;
Jolted threshing machines, traction engines, automobiles,
Milk waggons with cans of whey, envied of querulous swine;
It had shattered the dreams of farmers, figuring on crops;
Of drovers planning sharp deals.
Of peddlers, agents, doctors, preachers;
It had jolted lovers into closer embraces, to their bashful delight;
But mostly it had shaken men into sinful tempers—
A wicked stone, a disturbing stone, a stumbling-block—
A stone in the middle of the road—
Insolent as a bank, obstructive as a merger!

Year after year the road flowed around it,
Now on the right side, now on the left;
But always on dark nights flowing straight over it,
Jolting the belated traveller into a passion black as midnight,
Making his rocking vocabulary slop over
With all the shorter and uglier words.
Boys grew to manhood and men grew to dotage.
And year after year they did statute-labour
By cutting the thistles and golden-rod, milkweeds and burdocks,
But left the stone untouched.

There is a merry tale that I heard in my childhood,
Standing between my father's knees, before the open fireplace,
Watching the sparks make soldiers on the blazing back-log,
While the shadows danced on the low-beamed ceiling;
A pretty tale, such as children love, and it comes to me now;
Comes with the sharp, crisp smell of wood smoke,
The crackle of flaming cordwood on the dockers,
The dancing shadows and the hand on my touzled head—
A clear memory, a dear memory, and ever the stone
As it lay in my path in the roadway brought back the story—
The loving voice, and, at the close, the laughter.

"Once upon a time there was a king, a mighty ruler,
Deep in the lore of human hearts, wise as a serpent,
Who placed a stone in the road in the midst of his kingdom,
On the way to his palace, where all men must pass it.
Straightway the people turned aside, turning to right and to left of it.
Statesmen, scholars, courtiers, noblemen, merchants,
Beggars, labourers, farmers, soldiers, generals, men of all classes
Passed the stone, and none tried to move it—
To clear the path of the travelling multitude.
But one day came a man, a kindly poor man,
Who thought it a shame that the stone should be there,
A stumbling-block to the nation.
Bowing his back He put his shoulder to it, and behold, a marvel!
The stone was but a shell, hollow as a bowl!
A child might have moved it.
And in the hollow was a purse of gold, and with it a writing:
'Let him who hath the public spirit to move the stone
Keep the purse and buy a courtly robe,
And come to the palace to serve the king as prime minister.'
So the kindly poor man who had public spirit
Became the chief ruler of all the nation.
When the news was told to them, all men rushed to the highways
And moved away the stones, but found no purse of gold;
But they cleared the roads of stones, and the 'Good Roads Movement'
Went through without cost because the king was wise
And well understood our weak, human nature."
Ever when passing the stone I remembered this story
And smiled, touched by memories of childhood,
But knew there was no purse under it; there might be an angle-worm,
But I was not going fishing—and the stone stayed.

Now mark the sequel, the conclusion of the matter!
Yesterday a man went by—whether neighbour or stranger,
No man can tell me, though I have questioned widely,
Questioned eagerly, longing to do him honour,
To chant his name in song, or cunningly engrave it
In monumental brass, with dÆdal phantasies—
To make it a landmark, a beacon to all future ages,
This good man, earnest, public-spirited,
Not fearing work, scorning tradition,
Doing his duty as he saw it, not waiting an order,
Dug out the stone and made it a matter of laughter,
For it was no boulder, deep-rooted, needing dynamite,
But just a little stone about the size of a milkpail.
A child might have moved it, and yet it had bumped us
For three generations because we lacked public spirit.
I blush with shame as I pass the stone now lying
In the roadside ditch where the good man rolled it,
And left it where all men may see it—a symbol, a portent.

Tremble, ye Oppressors!
Quake, ye Financial Pirates!
Your day is at hand, for there is a man loose in Canada!
A man to break through your illegal labyrinths,
A Theseus to cope with your corporate Minotaurs,
A Hercules to clean out your Augean stables of grafters,
A man who moves stones from the path of his fellows!
And makes smooth the way of the Worker!
And such a man may move you! Tremble, I say!

Aug. 20.—Yesterday I had a chance to do some excellent moralising, but missed it, because I couldn't keep from laughing. To moralise properly a man must be very solemn. He must look wise, so that the things he is saying will seem wise. Although I do not often indulge in moralising, I have done enough of it to know that its chief value lies in the satisfaction it gives to the moralist rather than in any good it does to his hearers. That is why I am sorry I missed my chance yesterday. It isn't often that I get a chance to feel wise and self-righteous. But I couldn't keep from laughing and that spoiled everything.

We were waiting for the horses to finish their dinner before returning to the cornfield, when one of the boys threw a crust of bread among the hens. They all made a dive for it and a moment later a nimble Leghorn broke out of the scrimmage with the crust in her beak. It was too big to be swallowed at a gulp, and she had to find some quiet place where she could peck it to pieces and swallow it bit by bit. But to get the necessary quiet and leisure was the problem. Half a dozen other hens pursued her across the barnyard snatching at the crust. With neck outstretched, and a look of vested rights in her eye, she ducked under the granary still pressed by her relentless pursuers. A moment later she appeared at the other side, and as they say in the old-fashioned novels, "The villains still pursued her." Back she came across the yard a neck ahead of her tormentors. Occasionally one of her pursuers would drop out of the race, but her place would be taken at once by a fresh plunderer. The chase disappeared around the corner of the stable only to appear a few seconds later around the other side. Try as she would, she could not shake off her pursuers. Her steps began to show signs of weariness, but to stop meant to lose her prize. She started towards the house, but her pursuers, fresh ones that had just joined the chase, were just at her shoulder. Her steps began to wobble, for she was about winded, and at last she had to open her beak to pant. The crust fell to the ground, where it was immediately picked up by one of her pursuers. But the new owner was no better off than the one that had been robbed. The change of ownership seemed to increase the energy of the other hens, and the run continued. Back they came to the granary, passed under it, across the yard, around the stable and hen house, and into the orchard where a new bunch of hens took up the chase. While we continued to watch the crust changed ownership three times, and not a morsel of it had been eaten. At one time or another every hen in the flock had taken part in the fruitless pursuit. When we started for the field the crust was being carried by a long-legged Andalusian, but though gifted with more speed she was faring no better than the others, for there was a fresh hen at every turn ready to take up the chase. Now, if you stop to consider the matter could you possibly get a better example of the embarrassment of riches? Just like a man who has acquired a fortune, the hen in possession had to spend all her energy in protecting it and could not take time to enjoy it. And just like wealth, it was constantly changing hands—or beaks. What finally became of the crust we did not learn, as we could not spend the whole afternoon in watching, but at the last glimpse we got the Andalusian was still running strong. Probably the chase was kept up until roosting time. But though I missed the chance to moralise because I could not keep from laughing at the plight of the hen in possession, I may be permitted to score a point with poultry raisers. I understand that to do record laying hens must have plenty of exercise. From what I saw yesterday I learned that a whole flock of hens can be made to exercise to the point of falling from exhaustion by one crust of bread. Here is a scheme for giving hens exercise that beats the usual one of giving them their grain in chaff or straw so that they will have to scratch. One durable crust would keep a flock in motion for a whole day. So you see I learned something even though I missed the chance to enjoy the pleasure of moralising.

Having ventured to give a tip to the scientists about the best methods of exercising hens, I may as well unburden my mind of some more scientific suggestions. I have been watching with interest the wonderful work that is being done in the development of improved strains of grain by selection, and have been wondering if the scientists are not missing something. The work of natural selection is going on all around us, and haven't you noticed what vigorous weeds Nature is producing in spite of our efforts to destroy them. Many weeds seem to be like "The camomile, the more it is trodden the more it grows." Is it not possible that the scientists are coddling the plants they are favouring? They are doing wonders in the way of producing better yields of corn, wheat, oats, etc., and maturing them in shorter time, but all these better products only tend to fasten on us more securely the curse of labour that makes us earn our bread in the sweat of our brows. These improved products require unusually careful cultivation, and that is not Nature's method at all. Nature seems to aim at getting results without cultivation of any kind. Now why should not the scientists make some experiments along the same line. If they were to throw handfuls of corn among weeds and grass it is probable that a few grains would struggle through and mature ears of corn. If the best of these were selected and sown again under the same conditions, a hardier and more vigorous product could be secured. The process of selection could go on by constantly choosing the most vigorous and best-yielding products until in time we might produce a strain of corn that would not only be able to hold its own with the weeds, but would choke them out and still give a noble yield. By following this suggestion they would simply be aiding natural selection instead of developing strains that need artificial conditions to make them do their best. Think of what a boon it would be to have grains that would grow like weeds without cultivation of any kind and still yield good crops. With hired help so scarce this suggestion should not be brushed aside too scornfully. Besides it would make farming possible for amateur farmers who are obeying the impulse to get back to the land. I am afraid that scientific agriculture is suffering from the same defects as our educational system. There is too much coddling. What I want to see is self-producing crops. If we once get that, the farmers can produce more just as they are being urged by the editorial sages of the city papers. Trusting that the scientists will accept this suggestion in the spirit in which it is meant, I offer it for what it is worth.

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