none had acquired a more general regard among the passengers than the kansas farmer. he bore no resemblance to the typical farmer as represented in the comic publications but was, on the contrary, a well-dressed, imposing looking man of middle age, a college graduate, as stafford knew, and one who had selected his occupation because it appealed to him as, to their own and general good, it might appeal to hosts of others of the educated men of the country. stafford and he had become friends, as was almost a matter of course, and it was the former who insisted that the farmer bring to the front some curious experience of human nature in connection with farm life. "you are the tree we must tap now," he jested. "it's just because you are what you are that we want the thing. inevitably, you, with your experience and associations, can tell us something of the inner being and its ways on a farm which will be edifying. tell us the queerest and most unexplainable[192] thing you remember in connection with such life and of one man or woman's part in it."
the farmer stroked his grizzled, close-cut beard and laughed:
"it seems to me that the element of love has entered with tolerable regularity into most of the narratives to which i have had the pleasure of listening here. that is right, certainly, and natural. what i'm going to tell is a love story, too, in its way. it is of a love which budded and bloomed but bore no fruit, for the oddest reason in the world. it is about a man who loved a woman and was won away by sheep. no, he wasn't exactly won away; he just forgot. it was the strangest thing i ever knew or heard of, but it is true. i know the man and his sheep myself, though i never saw the woman. this is
jason's love story
a swamp oak stump is one of the most contumacious stumps in the world. it is usually big and its roots extend, like the arms of an octopus, in all directions save upward. furthermore, having been bred to the wet, feeding on dampness when alive, the wood does not rot willingly. the upper portion of the stump absorbs the showers of heaven and endures[193] the cracking heat of the sun apathetically and remains pretty much the same for a long time, while the roots lie solid in their dark bed, almost regardless of the years as men grow old. so it is that an otherwise cleared area of land occupied largely by swamp oak stumps is what the farmers in michigan's lower peninsula call an unpromising place for present making of crops. it was such an area that jason goodell—who was in love—owned. he possessed eighty acres, an eighth of a section, with fifteen acres cleared—but for stumps. the young woman whom he loved was melissa trumbull, the eldest daughter of "old man" trumbull, who was well-to-do.
the place where swamp oaks grow is of a sort to command respect. it has features. it is often a black ash swale. a swale is low ground, but not a swamp, crossed sometimes, at irregular intervals, by strips of higher ground referred to generally as beech ridges. in the lower ground thrive the black ash, the huge swamp oak, various moisture-loving bushes and luxurious growths of ferns. up on the ridges grow the maple, the white ash, the beech, ironwood and birch and bushes which[194] do not object to less damp soil, nannyberries elders and the like.
in the swale proper the growth underfoot is bush and there are hundreds of puddles where the frogs congregate in thousands, mostly the small, brown wood frog, not the big, green "kerplunk" sort of the ponds and streams. here the raccoon finds what is, to him, a land flowing with milk and honey, for he agrees with a frog diet as a frog diet agrees with him; here upon dead white trunks the solitary log-cock, the great black, red-crested woodpecker, largest of his genus, in the region, hammers away like a blacksmith; here the hermit thrush sings sometimes; and here little streams are born, to trickle at first, then ripple and then leap, bubbling and noisy, into the sloping fields outside, to attain the dignity of brooks at last and join the undercreek.
on the beech ridges life is different. there the ruffed grouse struts about and feeds upon the nuts and berries; and there are the squirrels, black, gray and red. the grouse raise great families on the ridges and the wooing "drumming" of the males in spring is like nothing else in the world. it is the most distinctively wildwood sound there is. as for the[195] squirrels, the black is no longer holding his own with the red and the gray. he is going like the red indian and the buffalo and no one can tell why. he was not born to civilization. the red and gray adapt themselves. of such swale and ridge, so peopled, consisted (as has been said) the greater portion of the estate of jason goodell; excellent land but requiring much work in its subjugation.
never better man for conquering a forest or making good soil yield the crops it has owed than this same brown-bearded jason goodell. personally strong, six full feet in height, though a trifle stooping, and slouchy in his gait, thewed like a draft-horse, broad of forehead and strong of chin, with firm mouth and steady gray eyes, this man was one to accomplish things as thoroughly and doggedly as victor hugo's gilliatt toiling sturdily at the wrecked ship. like gilliatt, too, jason was toiling for love's sake. he had never spoken of his passion to melissa trumbull, but they had studied together in the little district school, had grown up together, had confided their plans and hopes to each other and, until jason left the employ of old man trumbull and began work on his own "eighty," had been almost[196] constantly together. to jason, reticent, and timid as well, in a matter of this sort, it never occurred to make a definite engagement, and to melissa, black-eyed, gingham-clad, buoyant and with plenty of work to do, the situation doubtless presented itself with the same aspect. no pledged word, though, could have made the matter more fixed and serious than it was, at least to jason. what need of words? the first thing to do was to make a home for the occupancy of two young married people.
so jason built a rude cabin and lived in it alone and began clearing his land. at the end of the second year he had fifteen acres in crops of grass and grain, and the beginning of a herd of cattle and a drove of hogs, and was counted by his neighbors as a young man who would be well off some day. they were right in their conclusion. jason was the one to succeed as a farmer. living simply, working untiringly, the accomplishments of the isolated man were a surprise even to the rugged farmers who knew him well. at the end of the third year a new field had been hewed into the forest and the land first cleared had become more easily tillable. fire had fed on the stumps. half a dozen cows were feeding on the grassland, the hogs were fattening on[197] last year's corn crop and chickens and turkeys cackled and called about the rough log-barn. butter and pork and eggs had a value at the nearest little town, and jason had saved money. he bought another eighty acres of woodland—land was cheap then—and began to plan the building of a house. there was melissa!
no log house should this mansion be but one fit for a bride's reception. it should be a framed house, with all proper rooms, clap-boarded as to the sides and shingled as to the roof. there should be a porch in front and the building should be of two stories. jason brooded fondly over it all and planned and dreamed. he consulted often with jim rubens, the farmer carpenter of the locality: "never saw a man so wrapped up in his house-buildin' in all my life!" said rubens.
the beams and plates and joists and rafters for the house were planned and, with axe and broad-axe and saw, jason and rubens labored in the forest until oak and pine were cut and hewed, true to the line, and were then dragged by toiling oxen to the site of the house of which they were to be the stay and strength. the farmers round about assembled for the raising, there were heavings and shoutings, the[198] parts were reared under the hoarse overseeing of carpenter rubens and the great timbers, tongue in socket, pinned lastingly together, stood aloft, the sturdy white outline of a pleasant home to face the roadway. what days they were for jason as the two men labored afterward for weeks until the house stood all complete from cellar to roof-peak, and even painted—white, with green blinds, of course. furnished it was too, well furnished for the country. it was the finest house in the neighborhood and jason walked through the rooms with that feeling which comes to a man of purpose when he looks upon the thing accomplished. not yet, though, was the place ready for melissa. there was much to be done besides the mere building of a shelter, but, even now, the front part of it must be sacred for her. there jason nailed up the door solidly.
what comfort could a farmer's wife have with merely a house to live in! here must be all convenience for her outdoor work in connection with the household and all should be pleasant to look upon. jason settled down resolutely to what was yet to come.
obviously the old log barn had outlasted its original purposes. its small stable no longer[199] afforded shelter enough for the increasing herd of cattle and the horses nor its mows room for the hay and grain. there must be a frame barn, a big one, with high, wide doors into which a team with a load might be driven and with long stables and mows and roof room enough for all contingencies of harvest. the year after the completion of the house, the barn was built and the one of logs abandoned. but the barn had not absorbed jason's thoughts so fully as had the house.
the lonely toiling of the man was not lonely to him. he was strong and rejoiced in work, and there was ever melissa and always something to be done for her. from the front door of the house down to the roadway he made a wide gravelled path and along its sides he made beds of old-fashioned pinks and sowed and planted larkspur and phlox and dahlias and peonies and golden coreopsis and bachelor's buttons and other flowers named in the circulars of a seed firm in the distant city. he made a neat picket gate in the fence where the walk opened on the roadway and beside the fence he had hollyhocks, and sunflowers, the latter trying every day to see melissa, and turning their heads resolutely from sunrise until evening and going to sleep[200] every night with their faces toward her home, which was in the west. close beside the house he planted rosebushes and "old hen and chickens" and lady-slippers and morning-glories, and a madeira vine for the porch. there was a path from the front around the house to the kitchen—which had a porch as well—and beside this path jason had planted an abundance of sweet briar, thinking as he did so how its faint, sweet fragrance and fair blossoms would match melissa. a hop-vine clambered up the kitchen porch. jason was thirty years old, now, and melissa twenty-five.
one day old man trumbull, who was a great trader, suddenly disposed of his farm and moved into the adjacent county. somehow, the news did not have much effect on jason goodell. it would be as easy to bring her from thirty miles away as from where she had lived, he reasoned. the only difference to come would be that he would not see her often in the interval. there had never been any correspondence between them and it did not occur to jason to write now.
there came a hard winter, the horses and cattle and other stock required close attendance, and jason was much about the house. it was at this time when he discovered the faults of the[201] kitchen floor, which was of pine. the boards had shrunk and there were cracks and the soft wood had worn away under the tread of his heavy feet. that sort of kitchen floor would never do for melissa! he made a new floor and was happy at his labor all through "the big snow." the floor was of hard, seasoned ash, matched perfectly and smooth as the floor of a ball-room. "it will be easier to mop" said he, and thought of melissa's sunbonnet, and of how it would look hanging against the whitewashed wall.
all winter in jason's newer eighty acres the axes of two men had swung hardily and, with spring and early summer, came to jason a stress of effort in helping at the clearing and in attendance on the crops. he had little time for work about the garden, though it was not neglected, but he felt that he must somewhat change his home life. he had lived in the kitchen and a little room adjoining it. he had, from the time the house was built, never changed in the feeling that the front part of the house was sacred to melissa, but he felt that now a little change must come. his duties were increasing. he must have a hired man about him, one who would live with him. so the hired man came and slept in the room jason had occupied[202] while jason slept upstairs in what, in fancy, he had called "our room." "she won't mind," he thought.
there is spur to effort for the real farmer and a great comforting pride in looking out upon a conquered province, to note the corn swaying full-eared, the timothy and clover and grain fields changing color with the shift of the clouds and sweep of the breeze, the lowing cattle in the pastures and the general promise of autumn's wealth. jason enjoyed it all, for was it not the product of his design and energy, and as the farm grew, he grew with it. success fairly earned made him zealous for more. he broadened and was for trying things.
one day old rubens came along, and leaning idly over the front fence, began a farmer's chat with jason, who was digging among the flowers. rubens looked away at the vacant log barn.
"what are you going to do with the old barn?" he asked, "tool-house?"
"no," said jason, "i have a tool-room in the big barn. i don't know what i'll do with the old one. pull it down, maybe."
rubens gazed meditatively at the abandoned but still sound structure: "it would make a mighty good sheep barn," he suggested.[203]
no more was said at the time, but ruben's idea was not forgotten. it remained in jason's mind and the more he thought upon it the more he became impressed. jason had never raised sheep, successful as he had been with other animals. he considered, and rightly, that most of his land was too low for them. there was an eighty acres of woodland adjoining that which he had latest bought that was hilly, not heavily timbered and with many springs and brooks. partly cleared, with what woods were left well under-brushed, it would make a perfect sheep pasture. he had half a mind to buy it and experiment. and the plan grew in his mind until it overmastered him and he bought the land.
not the sort of man to venture upon a new venture carelessly was jason, and he had a problem before him now: what sort of sheep should he raise? his cattle and hogs were of good breeds and to have seen to it that it was so he had found profitable. with sheep he was less acquainted. he asked advice. "get merinos, by all means," pronounced henry wilson, who lived to the north of him. "get southdowns and nothing else," said james remington, who lived to the west. "i'll get twenty[204] of each and experiment with them separately," decided jason.
now as between the merino and the southdown sheep there is a great gulf fixed. the merino is small with gnarled horns, wrinkled neck and nose; with silk-like wool curling close to the skin in its fineness, yellow underneath because of its oiliness, and dark outside because of the dust gathered and held by such close, sticky coat. well tried is the endurance of the sheep-washer who, in late spring before shearing time, stands waist deep in some stream and seeks to cleanse the fleece of a flock of shivering merinos driven bleating to the water, and dreading it like a tramp. but the fine merino wool commands a price; the fleece is heavy and the breeder profits from that, not from the mutton. the flesh of the merino requires for its consumption people who have been long besieged and who are hungry.
different is the quality of the southdown; not from spanish ancestors, feeding on andalusian hills, as came the merino, did he come, but from anglo-saxon forefathers who cropped the herbage of the hampshire and sussex downs. big and white of body and dark-faced, sturdy of build and garbed in clean, not over fine[205] white wool, hornless but stepping free and high, the southdown has a healthy individuality. as concerns his mutton, those who know how to eat, and what to eat, speak fluently while their eyes glisten.
and almost as the flocks throve under isaac, toiling for rebecca, throve the flocks of jason, toiling for melissa. in summer and autumn they fed in the new pasture land and in winter they were sheltered and fared well in the old barn, now renovated and with a great shed attached for further room. jason became absorbed in sheep-growing, as he had never been before in the growing of anything. he read books on the subject and tried experiments. at the end of the third year, with good flocks now his he selected from each the finest ram and ewe and entered them at the county fair. he wanted to learn with which breed he had been most successful.
canny and just are almost always the judges at an american county fair. known personally throughout the region, selected for their uprightness and knowledge of special beast or fowl or any product of the fields, their verdict is almost mechanically accepted as a final and just one. more and more interested became[206] jason regarding the issue of his experiments in thus entering into competition with breeders, some of whom had raised sheep before he was born, and he puzzled himself much over the problem of where, in the opinion of these unbiased experts, he would prove to have done best. the decision, when it came, was hardly a surprise to him. his merinos, it is true, received favorable mention, but his southdowns took first prize in a field where there was decided and worthy competition. a proud man was jason goodell when he saw the blue ribbons tied by a gray-bearded giant in jeans about the necks of his two entries. he made an instant resolution. "i'll not raise wool," he said, "i'll leave that to the ohioans of the western reserve. i'll raise mutton!"
he sold the prize-winners for a mighty price and returned to his farm. within a week the flock of merinos was sold, as well, and the money so received was invested in an importation of more southdowns, with blood as blue as that of the hapsburgs, and far stronger. then began sheep-raising that was sheep-raising.
it is hard to serve two masters and it must be admitted that, since his thoughts and plans had turned so absorbingly to southdowns, jason[207] felt less surpassingly the inspiration of melissa. there had been a time when he dreamed of her almost nightly, but, now, his sleeping visions were of great flocks upon the hillsides and the eyes into which he looked were not always the sparkling ones of melissa, but it might be the soft, gentle eyes of quite another color of some great ewe. dreams are grotesque things.
still, instinctively, sometimes fervently, jason worked and devised for the girl who had gone away. the big orchard back of the house and barns, now growing into fruitfulness, he cared for well. in the spring, feeding the just-weaned calves, as he put his fingers in the mouth of some vigorous youngster and then thrust its muzzle into the milk, that it might learn to drink, he thought as the calf butted joyously at the pail as if it were his own mother, how melissa would like the calves and how much better than he she would attend to them! he was somewhat troubled, too, because the spring in the hollow was not nearer the house—he did not want melissa to carry water so many yards—but he planned a "spring-house" with a cement floor, where melissa should keep the milk and make the butter. that would be less labor for her. there would not be much butter-making anyhow[208] he was not going to have butter and eggs to sell. only enough cattle and horses and hogs and chickens for farm purposes did he intend to keep. and he bought yet another eighty acres of land.
it is wonderful how some over-mastering aim, one the accomplishment of which requires concentration of thought and exertion of all energy in one direction, will get its grip upon a man and hold it to the end. with high and low it is the same. mozart died with the score of the requiem mass hardly dry from his feeble hand. napoleon died with the word of command upon his lips. seekers, investigators, experimenters in all fields, great and small, have grown into a forgetfulness of aught save one object, have abandoned all outside, and have dreamed and devised and labored toward one absorbing end. such compelling influence in life may come to the farmer as to others. with jason, who recognized a farmer's dignity, who knew that the farmer often fought men's battles and at all times fed them, the attainment of his own ambition was nothing small. he became almost a monomaniac over southdowns. how they thrived!—for nature ever loves a mentor. peas grew where oats had grown, clover where was [209]before a cornfield, turnips where had been potatoes, for sheep must eat in winter. it became a southdown farm, and acres were yet added, for the undertaking was most profitable—until the time came when jason's keen eyes could not, as he stood looking from the barn door, reach more than vaguely the outlines of his own domain. one day, a girl wearing a sunbonnet matching exactly in shape and color the one melissa had once worn, passed by and jason's thoughts went back. that afternoon he took horses and wagon and drove to the growing town. he returned with a piano. "melissa may have learned to play," he said to himself, "and she will be glad to find it here." but, for weeks, perhaps for months afterward, no melissa came again into his waking dreams nor in his sleep.
he had abundance of help about him now. another hired man, accompanied by his wife, had been brought into the house, the wife proving a notable housekeeper and relieving jason of all petty duties. he visited his neighbors and was liked among them. the children especially were fond of him and he allowed them to visit his house at will and to carry away armfuls of blossoms from his great flower-garden, seeing to it only that they did not harm the plants. but[210] the parlor, with its furniture still unworn, though becoming somewhat old-fashioned now, and with its piano still untouched, was never entered except for dusting, and the front door was never opened.
far and wide as the great breeder of southdown sheep, became known the name of jason goodell, and his flocks and barns grew with acres steadily. one afternoon a traveling nurseryman came to see him upon business and stayed to dinner. they chatted over the meal:
"i was over at wishtigo last week," said the man; "drove over one day and came back the next. who d'ye think i met?"
"couldn't guess."
"i met county clerk jim lacey's wife—her that used to be melissa trumbull, you know. it was the first i knew of it. i took dinner with 'em; she wouldn't allow anything else. they've been married seven years and they've got a mighty nice little family: three children. jim's a good fellow."
jason said nothing for a few moments. then he assented deliberately: "yes, jim's a good fellow. i've met him often. i didn't know whether he was married or not, though. what was it you said about them young pear trees? i may take a dozen or two of 'em."[211]
in the middle of the forenoon a few days later, while jason was looking over the sheep barns and giving directions to the men at work there, a sudden fancy came upon him. he went to the house, asked for a hammer and withdrew the nails from the front door. then he opened all the parlor windows and let in the sunlight. "it'll be healthier," he explained to the astonished and delighted housekeeper. "keep them open as much as you want to now, in pleasant weather, and let the children in, too, if they like it. it'll brighten things up."
at a table in one of the fine restaurants in the big city sat, recently, at dinner a man and woman, he a man of the world, she charming as women so often are. they were delighted with the wonderful mutton they had just eaten and were talking of it.
"it's a mutton only kings would be allowed to eat, if these were ancient times," the man asserted laughingly. "it's delicate as strawberries, though that isn't a good comparison. it may have come direct from the goodell fields."
"who is goodell?" queried the lady.
"goodell, my dear madam, is a public benefactor.[212] he is one of the wisest raisers of southdown sheep the country knows. he's a splendid old fellow, too. i've visited his farm and met him. he's awfully fond of children."
