ards
the fairs of her youth.

"Folks nowadays don't seem to think much about fairs," she continued;
"but when I was young a fair was something that the grown folks looked
forward to jest like children look for Christmas. The women and the
men, too, was gittin' ready for the fair all the year round, the women
piecin' quilts and knittin' socks and weavin' carpets and puttin' up
preserves and pickles, and the men raisin' fine stock; and when the
fair come, it was worth goin' to, child, and worth rememberin' after
you'd gone to it.

"I hear folks talkin' about the fair every year, and I laugh to myself
and I say, 'You folks don't know what a fair is.' And I set out there
on my porch fair week and watch the buggies and wagons goin' by in the
mornin' and comin' home at night, and I git right happy, thinkin'
about the time when me and Abram and the children used to go over the
same road to the fair, but a mighty different sort of fair from what
they have nowadays. One thing is, honey, they have the fairs too soon.
It never was intended for folks to go to fairs in hot weather, and
here they've got to havin' 'em the first week in September, about the
hottest, driest, dustiest time of the whole year. Nothin' looks pretty
then, and it always makes me think o' folks when they've been wearin'
their summer clothes for three months, and everything's all faded and
dusty and drabbled. That's the way it generally is in September. But
jest wait till two or three good rains come, and everything's washed
clean and sweet, and the trees look like they'd got a new set o'
leaves, and the grass comes out green and fresh like it does in the
spring, and the nights and the mornin's feel cool, though it's hot
enough in the middle o' the day; and maybe there'll come a touch of
early frost, jest enough to turn the top leaves on the sugar maples.
That's October, child, and that's the time for a fair.

"Lord, the good times I've seen in them days! Startin' early and
comin' home late, with the sun settin' in front of you, and by and by
the moon comin' up behind you, and the wind blowin' cool out o' the
woods on the side o' the road; the baby fast asleep in my arms, and
the other children talkin' with each other about what they'd seen, and
Abram drivin' slow over the rough places, and lookin' back every once
in a while to see if we was all there. It's a curious thing, honey; I
liked fairs as well as anybody, and I reckon I saw all there was to be
seen