," said he, "but he wants too much for 'em, Price
thinks. He's got cabbages, too, and them's too high. Guess you had
better look at 'em yourself, Price says."

So Anderson went out to interview the farmer, sparsely bearded, lank,
and long-necked and seamy-skinned, his face ineffectual yet shrewd, a
poor white of the South strung on wiry nerves, instead of lax
muscles, the outcome of the New Jersey soil. He shuffled determinedly
in his great boots, heavy with red shale, standing guard over his
fine vegetables. He nodded phlegmatically at Anderson. He never
smiled. Occasionally his long facial muscles relaxed, but they never
widened. He was indefinably serious by nature, yet not melancholy,
and absolutely acquiescent in his life conditions. The farmer of New
Jersey is not of the stuff which breeds anarchy. He is rooted fast to
his red-clinging native soil, which has taken hold of his spirit. He
is tenacious, but not revolutionary. He was as adamant on the prices
of his vegetables, and finally Anderson purchased at his terms.

"You got stuck," Price said, after the farmer, in his rusty wagon,
drawn by a horse which was rather a fine animal, had disappeared down
the street.

"Well, I don't know," Anderson replied. "His vegetables are pretty
fine."

"Folks won't pay the prices you ought to ask to make a penny on it."

"Oh, I am not so sure of that. People want a good article, and very
few raise potatoes or cabbages or even turnips in their own gardens."

"Ingram is selling potatoes two cents less than you, and I rather
think turnips, too."

"Not these turnips."

"No, guess not. He has his from another man, but they look pretty
good, and half the folks don't know the dif."

"Well," Anderson replied, "sell them for less, if you have to, rather
than keep them. Selling a superfine article for no profit is
sometimes the best and cheapest advertisement in the world."

Anderson stood a while observing the display of vegetables and fruit
piled on the sidewalk before his store and in the store window. He
took a certain honest pleasure of proprietorship, and also an
artistic delight in it. He observed the great green cabbages, like
enormous roses, the turnips, like ivory carvings veined with purplish
rose towards their roots, the smooth russet of the potatoes. There
were also baskets of fine grapes, the tender pink bloom of Delawares,
and the pale emerald of Niagaras, with the plummy gloss of Concords.
There were enormous