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Show V TREADING DOWN TiTo HERD'S GRASS H By Charles Adams. 9 Tii ii iiXifiririi ii ii ii ii ii S (fifi m T wns In hnylng time, una ; li i, (in, wcnthcr wns so fair 'A I Hint we liml mowed nil tlio 9 O frSl Rl,lss lM ,ho "south Held." PI UaJll Wu lind doubts about cut- ting uown so much, for there were H only three of us to tnke enre o; It; hut the weuthcr hail clonrcd off bright nml windy Hint morning, nfter n thuniler H shower In the night. "There nre pietty snro to be three or four dnys of good, bnrd weather now," snld Nupoloon, or "I'o'.e.v," ns we called H him. "Lot's down with It!" HJ And wo did. There weie six neres HJ . of It, nil stout grnss, following clover the summer before: two tons nnd a hnlf to the acre of long stalked herd's gniss, which, when dry and ready to go Into the barn. Is about as stiff nnd H hard to pitch and handle as fo much ' wire. Any country boj wtto has ever "mowed nway" knows whnt such grnss Is when It Is pitched on." the. curt to H him In bin forkfuls. The sun shone hot all that first day, H and heavy as the grnrs was It "made" well. Wo raked It Into windrows with the horso rake during the afternoon. B M l'nther was nway In the north part 9 1 ?r- of the State, "cruising" for pine and !' spruce, In the employ of n lumber M t'ompanj, nnd Napoleon and I had the haying to do, with the assistance or H one hlrd man. H The next morning, as soon ns the dew was off, we turned the wlndiows. There were about twenty rack-loads of .the hay. We planned to haul In I ten loads that second day nnd ten the next. Seven or eight tons of hay, as every I one knows, are about ns much ns three I men ought to handle In one nfternoon. I It hns nil to be pitched over twice I with forks and trodden down In the I haymow; nnd this latter part of the I work, In the case of coarse herd's I grnss. Is the worst, for the tramping I has to be done In n hot, close barn, I amid choking dust. I 1'iitll noon of the second day, when I wo began hauling, the weather was I fair; but Immediately after 12 o'clock I n change was apparent. A gray haze I appeared In the fouHi. oon followed I by small shreds of cloud, which In- creased in size. In Maine we knew those signs only too well during the I warm season. Such southern rains I como on suddenly. I "It will pour by ." o'clock," snld Na- I poleon. "And nil this hay out! What's I to be done. I The only thing we could do was to I. swallow 11 hasty luncheon nnd begin I A hnullng ns fnst ns possible. M, yk Wo sent word of our plight to our I ' next neighbors, tbe Wldtcnnibs, nnd ns they hail finished their haying n day or two previously, they kindly sent over their two hired men. with hay rack nnd o team, to help us. Wo had been savini what we called the "west bay" of the barn In which to put this herd's grass. The usual cross girders had been taken out of this bay, making one long haymow of It, fifty feet by twenty, nnd wo know Hint the crop In the south Hold would fill It to the "grent beams" of tho barn, eighteen or twenty feet nbove the born Hoor. When we drove In with the tlrst load the hired man stnrted to pitch It off Into the hay, nnd I undertook to stow It. .Napoleon had remained out In the field to roll the windrow up Into "tumbles," "tum-bles," ready to bo pitched upon the cart ns soon as It returned from tho barn. The hired man was a large, strong fellow. At eory forkful he Hung off nliout a hundred-weight of that coarse, snarled hay, and I soon found that I was going to have quite ns much work ns I coild innnnge, for I hnd to pull the liny back Into the long, deep bay, trend It down In the dust and licit, nnd return to the front In time to take the next tough, snarly forkfuls ns they ""A came rolling dow'n off the cart. I could -p. not do It; no one could. My weight, Indeed, wns not sulllclcnt to trend the conrse stuff down. This first load was no sooner pitched off nnd tho enrt hncked out than In drove the Whltcomb rack, piled high with another load. One of the m'li with tills team had remained In the field, rolling up tumbles; the driver was ready to tluow olf the hay, anil tney all t-eemed to think that I could take care of It. Finding myself worsted, I ran Into tho house to see If I could not get some of tho women to help mo tread tho hay down, but they had all gono raspherrylnp. As I ran back to the barn, however, I happened to see In the lane two three-yenr-old colts that we were pasturing for Grandfather Adnms. They worn hnndsomo brown .Morgan colts, of which the old gentleman wns very fond, for they were well matched, nnd ho expected to exhibit them ns a trotting trot-ting pnlr nt the State fair. lie wns out nenrly every day looking nt his pots, giving theni salt or titbits, and Roelng to It that we kept tho watering trough In the lane pumped full of wu- 8 tor. Ho nlso made us put brass halls on tho horns of nil the joiing cattle, for fenr they would hook thoso colts. It enmo Into my mind (lint I might mnke them trend Hint hay down In the L mow. My need of aid was pressing. M I run nut to the Inue nnd culled the 11 colts through tho yard Into tho barn. f then led them ncross the bnrn lloor nnd urged them Into tho mow. The liny was Just about level with the bnrn lloor when I drovo thorn In, mid I put up n board to keep them from coming out. The Wh t 'omb load wns hnlf. off by this tlmo; but I pulled a part of it 'Jack, uud then, bringing a horsewhip from the wagon house, 1 ran those colts up and down tho mow. They wcro tine, plump, heavy colts, and tho way they tramped that herd's grass down was n Joy to behold. The Whltcomb enrt had no sooner backed out of the barn tloor than In came our cart with Its second load. Napoleon had loaded It hastily, for tho sky wns darkening. "Pitch It on: Hull it off!" I exclaimed to the hired man. "I'll tnke cure of HI I'll stow It now ns fust as all qf you enn bring it to met" I would wait till I had half n rack load of It rolled back and distributed nliout n little; then I would get up on the front girders with the horsewhip and send those colts back nnd forth, from one end of the long bay to the other, Klght feet nre much better than two for treading down hay, nnd the difference between HO pounds of boys nnd 1C00 pounds of colt was nt once nppnrent. It was n grent scheme! Meanwhile the loads came In hurry and haste. One was no sooner pitched off to 1110 than another was ready. Wo were all working ns swiftly ns po's-Mble. po's-Mble. Hut while throwing olt the eighth load our hired ninu suddenly Mopped, leaned on his fork, nnd began to laugh, "Say," he drawled, "I s'poo you see that this haymow Is tllllu' up pretty fast. It Is up to the front bconis now. 'Taln't any o' my business, but how nre you goin' to git tho colts down oft'n tl e mow?" In the heat nnd hurry of tho emergency emer-gency I hnd not thought of that, nnd they were being elevnted higher and higher with every load. In fnct, they wcro up nine or ten feet nbove the barn lloor already; too high for them to jump down without breaking their less. The hired man stood and laughed. "Thoso colts'll be up in the ioor of tho bnrn when this field of hay Is in," said he. When ho drove out to the Cold he told Napoleon of the fix I was getting into wltl the colts, and Poley cuiue miming In to see about It. . "That's a pretty go!" he exclaimed. "What will Grandpa Adams say? 1 don't think you ought to have taken those colts for such a Job. Tho dust la making them cough." "Well, they might Just ns well he on the grent beams ns where they are." snld I. "Now they are up here, I an going to keep them at It till this hay Is In." There'll be tho mischief to 1 ay If grandpa finds it out!" replied Nnpo-Icon. Nnpo-Icon. He hurried back to the field, however, for the cart was waiting. I felt net n little anxious about tho sltuntlon; but tho londs were coming think nnd fnst. As I could could not get the colts down, I. kept them trendlifg, nnd getting higher with eery load. Ihc rain did not begin until nearly live o'clock, nnd we hnulcd In eighteen big londs of thnt herd's grnss, there were only nbout two loads that became too wet to get In. Hut those eighteen loads had filled that haymow quite up to the great beams of the barn. As tho hired man had anticipated, the colts wero up in the top of that high barn with hardly room to stand under tho roof. Truth to say, too, they 'were hot and sweaty. The men from Mr. Wbltcomb's went oft home, laughlm; over it; ns for Nnpoloon nnd me, the more wo studied tho problem of geiung the colts down, the more dllllcult It looked. Wo set u long ladder nnd carried up two buckets of wnter to them, nnd let them stand In tho hny nnd cut whnt they wonted. In fact, wo wero tired out with our hard afternoon's work-, nnd tliero wero the cows t milk, nnd nil tho bnrn chores to ('o. It wns Saturday Satur-day night nnd our hired man went home. WI1II0 wo were milking wo hcaid Grandpa Adams calling the colts. It wns now mining hard, and ho hnd como over to see thnt they hnd opportunity to get under the bnrn yard sheds. "Now what shah wo tell him?'.' said Napoleon, anxiously. Of course I ought to have gono nnd confessed. I knew It, but I did not want to have him Hnd out what I had done. It disturbed mo .1 good deal to hear the' old gentleman out In the rain calling, "Nobby, nobby, nobby!" nnd "C'ojnck, cojnek, cojock.' up nnd down tho pasture but I kept quiet, nnd when nt lust he enino linck to the bnrn nnd looked for us boys, 10 nsk nbout the colts, Napoleon and I kept out of sight. Grandfather nt last decided that they must have taken shelter In tho woods nt the fur sldo of the pnsture, as they sometimes did, nnd although htlll Mimovt hat disappointed by their iion-appearnnce, he went homo withouf making any further search. Duy.hod no sooner broken next morning morn-ing than Nnpnleon nnd I wero nt tno burn. Wn know thnt we must get those colls down In some wny even If It wcro .Sunday. It wns really work of necessity, but how to manage It nnd not Injure the animals was something some-thing of n problem. We went quietly to Mr. Wbltcomb's, nud culled i-ut his two hired men, ami held n conference. We hit upon n scheme nnd to carry It out we wero obliged to go to n sawmill half a mile distant nnd bring four Btlcks of timber, two by eight Inches, nnd each twenty-four twenty-four feet lu length. Theso we set up nslnnt, closo together, to-gether, reaching from tho bnrn lloor to the top of the haymow, nnd forming form-ing n kind of n chute. Taking halters nnd bits of rope, three of us then climbed on the mow, uud by pushing against the'.r sides suddenly ns they stood In tho snnrly liny, threw down tlrst one, then the other, of tho colts, nnd tied their legs securely, to prevent them from stiuggllng. Then wo dragged them forward to tho top of tho chute. While wo wero thus employed Nn-poleon Nn-poleon hnd gone to bring tho loug, 1 lnrgo ror from n set of pulley bloiKs, nud nlso nr. old buffalo skin. Having wrapped tho skin round one of the colts to prevent Injury to Its sides, we thou let the nnliunl slide down the chute, steadying it with the lnrgo rope passed around Its body. Wo were fortunate to get both of them down without accident, nnd we then untied their legs nnd turned them out. The colts were lu the pnsture, feeding feed-ing ns If nothing hnd hnppened, when Grandfather Adnms came nt eight o'clock, lie looked them nil over, but could not ix-id n scratch or n mark on either of them. They did cough n little for several dnys nfterwnrd, but he did not chance to hour or notice thnt, Thnt winter, howeer. In December, when fnther begun to take tho liny out of the mow, he hnd some dllllculty. Nnpoleon nnd I were from homo nt the time, teaching district schools several miles nwny, but he wrote to us: "I should like to know bow you two boys stowed thnt herd's grass hay last summer, nnd whnt you did to It; you must hnve used n pile driver. I hnve sent for n grip fork, nnd I wnnt you both to como home Pnturday nnd help mo pull out two or three tons of It with n tncklo nnd block." Youth's Companion. |