Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 February 1915 — THE BOT FARMER. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE BOT FARMER.

Or d Member of me (tom Ww

By ASA PATRICK

Copyright, 1016* by Am| "Wood ashes are fine," Sam explain 7 ad. “They burn wood at the gin and there’s a little mountain of ashes there. Mr. Burton, the owner, gave them to me. Some of these days It won’t be so easy to get fertilizer for nothing. They don’t know what It’s worth now.” “Oh, I’m so anxious to get out to the old home again!” exclaimed Florence, j “When do you think we’ll move, Sam?” i “I expect It will be In March or the Ist of April,” was the reply. “I do hate for you and Florence to j ini«B any of the school,” said Mrs. Powell. “I’d forgotten to tell you, mother,” said her son, “that school will be out In April. We’ll 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. Powell 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 manure home bo as to be in readiness to drive to the farm next morning with his 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 horsie hitched to the loaded wagon, and the four boys rolled away over the gravelly road to the farm. In an hour’s time they had reached their destination, and the horse was unharnessed and turned loose to graze 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 bogs 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. “What’s to do?” Fred Mattin 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 ax. and how long must the poles be?” “Go ahead, Fred, you and Joe,” broke in Andrew, smiling. “We know you don’t like the looks of these briers and bushes, but we’ll not kick.” “You’ll find the ax in the wagon.” said Sam, “and you can cut the poles the same length as the fence rails. 1 think they’re about ten feet long.” When Fred and Joe had gone down in the woods Sam brought a brier hook and a sharp grabbing hoe with which to begin work on the tangled mass along the fence. “My,” he exclaimed, “but that’s going tp be a woolly job! Those boys had an eye to business, Andrew, when they took the chopping. It does seem like there ought to be some easier and quicker way of doing it than this.” “How long do yon think it will take us?” asked Andrew. “Well, I 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.” “If we could burn it out first,” suggested Andrew, “it wouldn’t be nearly so bad.” “No, but we’d burn up the fence.” “Couldn’t we follow along with water and put out the rails when they caught fire?” “Good for you. Andrew!” Sam exclaimed. “That’s the very idea. The lire will burn up nearly all the bushes and briers and kill all the boll 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. “I have two barrels up at the house,” Bam explained. “We'll unload the wagon and go 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 direction—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”gbt well started It burned rapidly and ha a very.short while it had gone entirely around the field. Nothing remained of the matted tangle except a few charred JjuaJies sand coarse briers. Taking the briar -#• r —-, ’• .

rioan Press Association, book and ti;e grabbing boe, Sam and Andrew had these all down in less than an hour. “Well, that Job’s done,” Sam exclaimed when they bad finished, “and tt wasn’t half as hard as I thought It was going to be.” “If we hadn’t figured out a new way to do It, though, it would have been bard enough,” said Andrew. “Yes,” Sam agreed, “we saved a lot of work there by using our minds a little. It doesn’t pay to work without thinking, and I’m going to mix a little of it with my work from now on. Let’s drive down after a load of poles and see how the choppers are getting along.” “Hello, there!” yelled Fred Martin when be saw Sam and his companion driving up. “Yon haven’t desertee that Job, have you?” “No,” the two replied in unison, “of tourse we haven’t deserted It. We Ad ished It, that’s all, and now We’re down after some poles.” “Aw, get out!” the two choppers scoffed. “Don’t tell us you’ve cleared out that streak of briers. Why, a rabbit couldn’t get through it” “No,” admitted Sam, “we didn’t clear quite all of it ourselves, but what we didn’t tlje fire did.” “Oh, you burned it out did you?” “Sure, we put the fire to it and the rats and rabbits had to hunt a new country.”— “Well,” Joe Watson remarked, “we have got the poles for you—about forty of them.” “Forty! My, but you must have been working,” Sam congratulated. “Forty will be enough to mend the fence, I think.” When it came to mending the fence Sam bad real reasoD to be glad that bis comrades had come with him. By himself he would have been forced to tear down a panel of fence wherever a rotten rail was to be replaced. With help, though, It was the work of only a minute to pry up the corners and put in a new pole. By noon the fence had been mended all round and the boys retired to a grove of walnut trees near the branch to eat their lunches. “That’s Job No 2 done,” said Sam when they were seated, “and goodness knows how long it would have taken me to do it if you boys hadn’t come along.” “Well, it wasn't very hard work," replied Fred Martin; “Just enough exercise in It to give us a good appe tite. If you don’t believe It Just watch what we do to this bacon and corn bread and these onioni” “My. but they taste good,” said Andrew, with his month full. “It’s strange, but I couldn’t eat these at home, and now there’s not going to be enough of it for me.” The boys all laughed and said that they were thinking the same thing Sam wouldn’t hear to his chums working in the afternoon. He thought that they had already done enough, so they stayed to gather walnuts and explore the creek, while Sam went off to haul ashes and scatter them on the acre that was to be his prize patch of com. Miles Fagan happened to pass along while Sam was at work and leaned over the fence to watch him for a minute. “What’s that you’re puttin’ on the land, Sam?” he asked, after he had watched the boy for some time. “Ashes,” Sam replied, and went on shoveling. “Ash'es?” Mr. Fagan questioned. “Do yon think it’ll do any good?” “Of course I do,” Sam answered. “Most anything would do this land good. But didn't you know, Mr. Fagan, that ashes are a fine fertilizer?” “Not I didn’t” he said, “and 1 don’t yet”

“Well, they are, anyhow," Sam assured him. “Two things that crop* have to hare are potash and phosphoric acid. Ton know that ashes contain potash, and they also contain some phosphoric add. A government bulletin that I borrowed says there are about eight pounds of potash and onethird as much phosphoric add In every hundred pounds of good ashes." “Well, 1 didn’t know they was good for anything," said Fagan, "except to get lye from to make soap." Bam wasn’t proud and didn’t think that he knew so much more than others, but he liked to be of help whenever he could. “Why don’t you send to the department of agriculture, Mr. Fagan.” he asked, “and get some of the bulletins it publishes? We pay for that work. and why not make use of it? They experiment and learn a whole lot or things that we ought to know. I’ve written for several of the bulletins.’’ “1 don’t want anything to do with snch foolishness,” said Fagan. “What do they know about farmin’?" "They know a lot," Sam replied, "and they’re learning more every day. It's their business to expejrljneiit. and 2nd out things. You mighty waste two

gk tkiree years experimenting to find out something that you could learn in five {minutes by reading a government bulletin.” Miles Fagan merely grunted in reply. “11 wish you’d let Bob join the Boys’ Coni clnb,” Sam continued. “There’s a chance for him to win a big prize, andj besides. It’ll teach him how to grow corn." “Guess 1 can learn my boy how to grow corn ’bout as well as anybody, said] Miles. “But Bob and that agent have been a-pesterin* me to death ’bout it and I told Bob yesterday that he could jlne if he’d use some o’ that stumpy land over there.” “I’m glad of that” said Sam. and stopped suddenly. From the lower edge of the field came a boom that was like the report of a small cannon. “Well, there goes some of my stumps,” remarked the young farmer. “Guess I’ll go down and watch a few of ’em Jump out of the ground. *■ want to see bow It’s done.” (To Be Continued.). -