ong.

"Are you sure your mother won't mind?" Mrs. Burns asked the boys,
knowing Harry's folks did not need the money paid to pick the peas. "Of
course I'm very glad to have you if your mothers are satisfied."

Soon each boy had a big basket under his arm, and was off for the
beautiful field of soft green peas, that stretched along the pond bank
at the side of Mrs. Burns' home. Now, peas are quite an expensive
vegetable when they come in first, and farmers who have big fields of
them depend upon the return from the crop as an important part of the
summer's income. But the peas must be picked just as soon as they are
ripe, or else they will spoil. This was why Harry got his friends to
turn in to help poor Peter Burns.

"I'll go down this row and you take that." suggested Bert to Harry.
"Then we can talk to each other without hollering."

"All right," Harry replied, snapping the peas off the vines and
dropping them into his basket like a real farmer.

"Let's have a race," called Tom. "See who gets his basket full first."

"But no skipping for big ones," put in Jack. "You have to pick every
ripe one."

The boys all started in at the top of the hill, each working two rows
at a time. They were so interested in the race that scarcely a word was
spoken. The peas were plentiful and ripe too, so that the baskets were
filling up quickly. Mrs. Burns herself was picking, in fact she had
been in the field since the very first peep of dawn, and she would be
sure to stay out until the darkness would drive her in.

"You are fine pickers," she told the boys, seeing how quickly they
worked. "I pay ten cents a basket, you know."

"I guess we can earn a dollar a day at this rate," laughed Tom, whose
basket was almost full.

"I'm done," called Jack from his row.

"No, you're not," said Harry, "you have to cover the rim."

"Oh!" exclaimed Jack, who had just slipped between the rows. "Oh! there
goes my basket."

And sure enough the big basket had been upset in Jack's fall, and most
of the peas were scattered on the ground.

"Ha! ha!" laughed Bert. "I'm first. My basket is full."

"I'm next!" called Tom, picking his basket up in his arms.

"Well, I'll be last I guess," laughed Tom, trying hard to pick up the
scattered peas.

"There's mine!" called Harry, and now all the boys carried their
baskets to the big bag at the end of the field and dumped them in.

"It won't take long to fill the bag," said Harry, "and it will be so