the children briefly about road materials;
how soft limestone makes too weak roads for loads, how easily they wash
and wear; how granite, because of its being made up of several
materials, is poor, too; how flint and quartz, while hard, are brittle,
and are not sufficiently tough; and that sandstone was impossible. Then
he told them that good gravel, tough limestone and trap-rock were good
road materials. Roads need materials having hardness, toughness and
cementing qualities.

By taking a trip to a gravel bed, some three miles out of town, the boys
were able to get gravel for their patchwork. They did not merely fill
in the breaks but dug out the road bed straight across wherever a break
occurred until they came to good road. Coarse gravel was put at the
bottom up to six inches of the top surface. This was packed down and
rolled. At the same time it was watered until mud rose or flushed over
the top surface. Finally pebbles from about a half-inch size to coarse
sand were laid on and rolled thoroughly.

This is the way these lads fixed one piece of poor roadway.

It happened that one of the farmers near by tethered his cow on the
school grounds during the summer. One of the girls gave a workable
solution for this problem. This was it: the boys should come back in
relays all summer long and keep the grass so short that no cow could get
a nibble from their new lawn. This was done and it worked.

When the subject of the care of the flower garden arose it was easily
settled. The girls gladly divided themselves off into committees. Each
committee's business was that of weeding, picking and distributing the
flowers. The prophecy that there would be blossoms enough to supply the
homes, the churches and the sick proved true. To be sure the garden did
not look so well in the fall as in early summer, but it took only a
short time to fix up the grounds when school re-opened.

Plans were made for another spring during the first weeks of school. The
lawn would need a little more work done on it, an oak should be planted,
a group of shrubs put in. But the foundation work had been done.

And one day when the news was brought that the town was going to put the
first strip of real macadam road by the schoolhouse, a deafening shout
went up.

VIII

MYRON'S STRAWBERRY BED

One fine day in early April Myron spaded up his strawberry bed. The bed
was made in a sunny spot, on moist but not soggy soil, land excellent
for stra