ad will agree not to fire farm fancies and figures at me
every time he catches me in an easy-chair."

"I'll promise, but you don't know what you're missing."

Four Oaks looked great, and I was tempted to tramp over every acre of
it, saying to each, "You are mine"; but first I had a little talk with
Thompson.

"Everything has been greased for us this summer," said Thompson. "We got
a bumper crop of hay, and the oats and corn are fine! I allow you've got
fifty-five bushels of oats to the acre in those shocks, and the corn
looks like it stood for more than seventy. We sold nine more calves the
end of June, for $104. Mr. Tom must have a lot of money for you, for in
August we sold the finest bunch of shoates you ever saw,--312 of them.
They were not extra heavy, but they were fine as silk. Mr. Tom said they
netted $4.15 per hundred, and they averaged a little over 260 pounds. I
went down with them, and the buyers tumbled over each other to get them.
I was mighty proud of the bunch, and brought back a check for $3407."

"Good for you, Thompson! That's the best sale yet."

"Some of the heifers will be coming in the last of this month or the
first of next. Don't you want to get rid of those five scrub cows?"

"Better wait six weeks, and then you may sell them. Do you know where
you can place them?"

"Jackson was looking at them a few days ago, and said he would give $35
apiece for them; but they are worth more."

"Not for us, Thompson, and not for him, either, if he saw things just
right. They're good for scrubs; but they don't pay well enough for us,
and if he wants them he can have them at that price about the middle of
October."

The credit account for the second quarter of 1898 stood:--

23 calves . . . . . $270.00
Eggs . . . . . . 637.00
Butter . . . . . . 1314.00
Total. . . . . . $2221.00

CHAPTER LXIV

COMFORT ME WITH APPLES

September added a new item to our list of articles sold; small, indeed,
but the beginning of the fourth and last product of our factory
farm,--fruit from our newly planted orchards. The three hundred plum
trees in the chicken runs gave a moderate supply for the colony, and the
dwarf-pear trees yielded a small crop; but these were hardly included in
our scheme. I expected to be able, by and by, to sell $200 or $300 worth
of plums; but the chief income from fruit would come from the fifty
acres of young apple orchards.

I hope to live to see the time when these y