voice is an
even-tempered voice; there is self-control in it and there is a dynamic
element behind it that will compel a hearing. Talking with many Country
Girls and reading long letters from them, one gains an impression that,
like the composite photograph, reveals a country girl personality whose
sanity and thoughtfulness win our respect, and whose serious facing of
the facts bodes ill for such country life leaders as may in the future
neglect the resources to be found in the sagacity, alertness, and powers
of execution stored up in the young womanhood of our rural life.

CHAPTER IV

A CALENDAR OF DAYS

A country life is sweet!
In moderate cold and heat,
To walk in the air how pleasant and fair!
In every field of wheat,
The fairest of flowers adorning the bowers
And every meadow's brow;
So that I say, no courtier may
Compare with them who clothe in gray,
And follow the useful plow.

They rise with the morning lark,
And labor till almost dark;
Then, folding their sheep, they hasten to sleep,
While every pleasant park
Next morning is ringing with birds that are singing
On each green, tender bough.
With what content and merriment
Their days are spent, whose minds are bent
To follow the useful plow.

_Anon._

CHAPTER IV

A CALENDAR OF DAYS

The wisest find life a difficult thing to classify; therefore young
girls must not be blamed if they do not critically analyze the causes
and the effects that appear in their personal environment. When asked,
however, to give pictures of their daily experiences they do not fail
us. Such glimpses of the real life of some Country Girls in their farm
homes will be afforded by the partial recitals given in this chapter. To
other Country Girls or to those to whom the welfare of the country girl
is dear, or even to those urbanized city residents who consider the
dwellers in the open country as a sort of alien race whose ways must be
made a matter of study before they can be comprehended--these and
perhaps others will surely be interested in these fresh and vivid
accounts of the everyday doings in the farm homes of our country.

A fortunate country girl when asked to write a description of a
representative working day of her life, sends the following joyous
account. She is fifteen years old. Her life is under the protection of
highly educated parents and the safeguards of right home training, taste
and r