In spite of the persistent cold weather there has been enough excitement on the farm to send up the temperature several degrees. One day last week, when the mercury was sulking at zero, three lambs arrived on the place. Alas only one survived, in spite of tender care and the best advice of all the experienced sheep-raisers in the neighbourhood. One died at once and another followed a few hours later, though it was carefully fed and tucked in a warm nest beside the kitchen stove. The mother sheep could not be induced to take any interest in the weakling. One of her lambs was strong and vigorous, and to it she gave her whole care, seeming to know by instinct that nothing could save the others. And it is doubtful if she could have saved the one we have if we had not shared the cares of motherhood with her. At nightfall the thermometer went down and down until it reached 12 below, and the new lamb began to lose interest in this cold world. The frost penetrated to the snug box-stall, and the poor little lamb shivered and refused to pay attention to its mother. She pawed at it to make it get up, but it couldn't get on its feet. So we wrapped it in a horse-blanket and took it to the nest beside the stove. For the next couple of days we kept it warm and carried it to its mother for brief visits at meal times. In that way we kept it from being chilled to death, and now that the weather has moderated it is living with its mother and being much admired. But I am afraid that some of the interest taken in it is rather sordid. When the excitement was at its highest I found a boy studying the market reports. He was looking up the price of wool.

Like all the other live stock on the farm, the lamb has a name of its own. Its owner informed me that it is to be called Mary Belle. Why he was so superfluous as to give it two names I did not inquire. The name sounded good to me—the sound of it reminded me of how:

Mary Belle—Mary buds. There is a distinct assonance, but it is a slim one on which to hang a quotation. Still, the "Mary buds" reminded me of spring—and that led to results. Lambs are always associated with spring in literature, and why shouldn't they be in fact? My personal recollections of lambs all coincide with days:

So what on earth was a lamb doing in this world in January? On inquiry I learned that one must expect such things if he goes in for pure-bred, pedigreed sheep that may take prizes at the fall fairs. Any lamb that is born after 12 p.m. of December 31 of the preceding year is entitled to rank as a spring lamb. When the fall fairs come round Mary Belle will have the advantage of several months' growth over the lambs that come in the springtime—"the only pretty ring time." This makes it look to me as if prize-winning were rather more important than sheep-breeding. Poor Mary Belle will have to spend the most frisky months of her life in a little pen, instead of skipping about among the flowers, as a lamb should. She is being robbed of her youth in the hope that she may win a blue ribbon.