rtional.
"Never mind, follow my order," haughtily commanded Alfred. "None of us
care for rolled oats and we all like buckwheat cakes." Alfred discharged
his regular farmer; he claimed the man got up too early; he got up at
four o'clock and threshed around making so much noise nobody could
sleep.

The hills had not been plowed in years. The land was shaly, easily
washed. It rained from the day the family moved onto the farm until late
in June. Seeds of all kinds from the fields above washed down into the
bottoms below. Beans, potatoes, egg plant, rye, peas, beets and cow peas
grew in the bottom as only noxious weeds and wild crops grow. From this
conglomeration sprang the noted bean that Bill Brown and Alfred are
forming a company to distribute.

The rain continued. The weather being cool, fires were necessary.
Nothing but wood was used as fuel. The wife protested the heat for
cooking was not sufficient. It just dried the juices in the meats. A
heating plant was put in. Kerosene lamps did not produce sufficient
light, so a lighting plant was installed. Springs and well were unhandy.
Alfred installed a water plant. Alfred swore you might just as well live
in the city if you had all city fixin's. The walks in the yard and
across the lawn were inches thick with mud. Pearl and Mrs. Field, by the
light of the wood fire, would read Bill Brown's life on the farm, while
Alfred watched the barometer. The women began to talk about moving back
to town. Alfred was as miserable as life could make him. Day after day
the rain fell in torrents. The dam that formed the lake wherein Alfred
intended raising fish in summer, and a skating pond in winter, and also
to furnish ice, broke, flooding the cow stables, washing out the sweet
corn patch and the garden floated.

Alfred was unmercifully berated that he had dragged his family to the
country, destroying their happiness and spending all his money
for--what, for what? Just to gratify a whim, a boyish illusion.

Alfred felt he must do something to turn the tide. The rain kept
falling. He started to the city on his mysterious errand. Returning he
proudly hung above the mantle piece this motto:

"It hain't no use to grumble and complain,
It's jest as cheap and easy to rejoice;
When God sorts out the weather and sends rain,
Why, rain's my choice."

The rain ceased. The sun shone, the grasses grew. Happiness came into
the family. Ere the summer was over, farm life had