e. You see, this is a factory
farm from fence to fence, except this forty which Polly bosses, and the
utilitarian idea is on top. Keeping the bull didn't exactly run with my
notion of economy, especially when I could conveniently have him kept so
near, and at the same time be generous to a neighbor."

"That's it, and it's taken me two years to find it out. You're trying to
follow that idea all along the line. You're dead right, and I'm going to
tag on, if you don't mind. I was glad enough for your present at the
time, and I'm glad yet; but I've learned my lesson, and you may bet your
dear life that no man will ever again give me a bull."

"That's right, Jackson. Now you have struck the key-note; stick to it,
and you will make money twice as fast as you have done. Have a mark, and
keep your eye on it, and your plough will turn a straight furrow."

Jackson sent for his horse, and just before he mounted, I said, "Are
you thinking of selling your farm?"

"I used to think of it, but I've been to school lately and can 'do my
sums' better. No, I guess I won't sell the paternal acres; but who wants
to buy?"

"Kyrle, here, is looking for a farm about the size of yours, and to tell
you the truth I should like him for a neighbor. It's dollars to
doughnuts that I could give him a whole herd of bulls."

"Indeed, you can't do anything of the kind! I wouldn't take a gold
dollar from you until I had it tested. I'm on to your curves."

"But seriously, Jackson, I must have more land; my stock will eat me out
of house and home by the time the factory is running full steam. What
would you say to a proposition of $10,000 for one hundred acres along my
north line?"

"A year ago I would have jumped at it. Now I say 'nit.' I need it all,
Doctor; I told you I was going to tag on. But what's the matter with the
old lady's quarter across your south road?"

"Nothing's the matter with the land, only she won't sell it at any
price."

"I know; but that drunken brute of a son will sell as soon as she's
under the sod, and they say the poor old girl is on her last legs,--down
with distemper or some other beastly disease. I'll tell you what I'll
do. I'll sound the renegade son and see how he measures. Some one will
get it before long, and it might as well be you."

Jackson galloped off, and Kyrle and I sat on the porch and divided the
widow's 160-acre mite. It was a good strip of land, lying a fair mile on
the south road and a quarter of a m