A GREAT DAY
The morning of October first dawned cool and clear with just frost
enough in the air to make everyone feel as fit as a fighting cock. As
early as seven o’clock carriage loads of people passed my house from
the neighboring villages. Old men and young came, women and children,
glad of an excuse no matter how slight to journey to a common meeting
place and see and be seen. They came from as far away as twenty miles
and people who had not met for ten years took this opportunity to visit
with one another. Former residents, friends of present residents and
total strangers poured into town, obeying the instinct to herd together
for a day. The whole village kept open house and so far as it was
possible we tried to have everything free--to act as a town as hosts.
I for my part extended a general invitation to the gang and all my old
friends from Little Italy and spread a big table in the barn for them
because there wasn’t room in the house. As many as seventy-five women
and children came in the afternoon, while that evening about the whole
gang came along. They pretty nearly ate us out of house and home but I
had a big bonfire built in the yard and in this they roasted apples and
potatoes when everything else was gone.
The prize award was set for eleven o’clock and for an hour before the
band gave a concert. At the conclusion of this I estimated that fully
nine hundred people were gathered around the band stand. It was as
intense and excited a gathering as you ever saw. Not an inkling of
who had won the prizes leaked out although in most cases the general
discussion and known facts had narrowed the possibilities down to a
half dozen in each class. I myself didn’t know the winners except in
the cases where I acted as judge. When the band finished its programme
with “America” and Holt and the committee and the judges from the
Agricultural School who were present as guests, and myself stepped to
the platform you could have heard a pin drop. As president of the club
it was my duty to make a brief speech and in this I outlined for the
benefit of strangers present the object of the club, the money that
had been offered, what had been accomplished and on what basis the
awards were to be made.
“It seems to me,” I said at the end, “that every man and woman and boy
who is a member of this club ought to feel that he has won something
whether he draws a money prize or not.”
This was greeted with noisy cheering which it did my heart good to hear.
“Every one of you who planted a seed and cared for it has reaped the
reward of seeing it multiply at a rate possible in no other business.
Nature is the grand prize giver. Every farmer ought to consider himself
a partner with Nature--with God. Men give you for the use of a dollar
for one year four cents, possibly five or six cents; Nature gives us
for a dollar’s worth of seed as high as a thousand and two thousand
per cent. There isn’t a family in this village who planted a garden
last spring who hasn’t been paid by Nature in produce representing good
hard cash the wages of a skilled artisan. We’ve had all we wanted to
eat, some of us have put away enough for the winter and over and above
that we have sold in garden stuff alone thirty-eight hundred dollars’
worth. And that doesn’t represent the sum total of our products by
a good deal. So I insist that we’ve all won richer prizes than any
offered here to-day. And with the knowledge we’ve gained this year I
look to see this result doubled next year. I look to see our farms grow
better and better with good care; I look to see our orchards improve; I
look to see us raise all our own beef and mutton and pork and the grain
to feed the stock upon. I look to see us do all our hardy ancestors did
and with opportunities such as they never dreamed of wax so prosperous
that men in the business world outside will be forced to reckon with us
and give us the position that is our right--abreast of the leaders in
the productive enterprises of the world. This bit of extra money here,
in spite of all that Mr. Holt would have us believe, doesn’t represent
our goal. We’ve attained that already, and this is only just so much
more pin money. We’ve proven as individuals, we’ve proven as a club,
we’ve proven as a town, that farming can be made to pay. To prove that
is to have received our pay.”
I didn’t want any soreness left as a result of disappointed hopes and
so when I heard my words received with shouts and handclapping and
smiling faces I was very glad. I reached for the first sealed envelope
and tore it open. The noise subsided until you could have heard a pin
drop.
“For the best crop of hay on one acre of fresh broken land the prize is
one hundred dollars in cash. It gives me pleasure to announce that this
has been awarded to Horatio L. Harrison.”
I saw Harrison’s face. It went white, then red. A good many other faces
went white, too, and for a second there was an ominous silence. Then
Holt sprang to the front of the platform.
“Fellow citizens,” he shouted, “let’s give three cheers for Harrison.
Now--hurrah!”
Perhaps fifty voices joined him. At the second hurrah a hundred came
in, while at the third the whole crowd let themselves loose in a
fashion that was good to hear.
“Tiger,” shouted Holt.
And it came full throated from nine hundred people. Then someone called
for Harrison--he was a young man of thirty--and before he could escape
he had been pushed to the platform. Holt seized an arm and drew him
up while a dozen others boosted him. He faced the crowd an instant and
bowed. I handed him his money in greenbacks and he ducked out of sight.
I took up the second envelope and opened it.
“For the best crop of hay on an acre of land already used as hay land
the prize is seventy-five dollars. This has been awarded to Seth Edgar
Lovejoy.”
Lovejoy was a man of sixty and one of those who had followed the
instructions of the agricultural expert in the matter of proper
fertilization with constant grumbling. I think his idea had been to
prove what a tarnation fool the expert was. In spite of this, however,
he had succeeded in raising a ton and three-quarters of hay on an acre
that last year had yielded him less than one ton. I was more than glad
therefore for this award as it left him nothing more to say. At my
announcement the younger men cheered lustily and demanded a speech from
him--calling him by his nickname Killjoy.
“Tell us how ye done it in spite of yerself,” yelled one man.
Lovejoy, much against his will, was forced to the platform, Holt
dragging him up as he had Harrison. He faced the crowd a second in a
daze.
“I dunno,” he muttered, “it’s th’ only piece of luck I ever hed.”
“Not luck,” broke in Holt. “Science and hard work did it. Three cheers
for Lovejoy who wasn’t too old to learn.”
They were given good naturedly and I opened the third envelope.
“Prize of one hundred dollars for the best crop of corn on an acre of
land. This has been awarded to George A. Wentworth.”
Everyone expected this. Wentworth was a lad of eighteen who had devoted
his whole time to this one acre of corn and had watched over every
stalk of it like a widow with one child. Where ordinarily twenty
bushels to the acre was considered a fair crop about here, he had
reaped thirty-seven--an increase of almost one hundred per cent. I had
watched the boy all summer long. He was the type of young man we needed
hereabout. He was earnest, industrious and with ambition to make a
good living. His father had a farm of some seventy acres which wasn’t
more than forty per cent. efficient and I hoped to see the boy come
into possession of it. He had confided in me that if he won a prize
he was going to buy a couple of acres of his father. The selection was
popular and he was given a great ovation. He was the only man so far
who was able to reach the platform unaided but perhaps he had learned
from the previous examples the uselessness of protest. Those who hadn’t
won were anxious to get as much sport as possible out of those who had.
Holt seized his arm and addressed the crowd.
“Here’s the type of boy who’s going to be one of the big men of this
town some day,” he said. “And it’s going to mean something to be a big
man in this town, for this is going to be a big town. Three cheers for
the boy who knows enough to stay East. Now--let ’em out!”
Holt was proving that a college education was good for one thing at
least; it taught him how to get noise out of a crowd. Leaning over the
rail with his two fists clenched and his arms swinging he looked as
though he were forcing every man to shout in spite of himself. I know I
joined in this time and the sedate committee back of me clapped their
hands noisily. As for Dick and Ruth they stood up on their seats and
shouted, looking straight into Holt’s eyes as though hypnotized. I
handed Wentworth his crisp new bills and saw that there were tears in
his eyes. It certainly does stir a man to hear eight or nine hundred
people shouting his name as these people did.
The fourth envelope contained the name of the winner of the best house
garden. Seventy-five dollars was the prize. I had largely to do with
this selection. I waited until there was a dead silence and then
announced: “It gives me great pleasure to report that this prize has
been awarded to Mrs. Lydia A. Cumberland.”
I think this came as a surprise, for nearly every man in the village
had considered himself a possible winner in this event. My own garden
approached the nearest of anyone’s to hers and in the matter of the
amount raised really excelled Mrs. Cumberland’s. However, I was of
course automatically barred from the competition, owing to my position
as judge. Mrs. Cumberland had planted about a half acre in the rear
of her house. This soil was naturally rich and she had bestowed
infinite pains upon her plants. She was a widow with two children and
had supplied her own table out of the produce, put up in glass jars
almost enough vegetables to last her through the winter and made a few
dollars’ profit in cash besides. I particularly wished to encourage
this practice of putting up our own vegetables for winter use and I had
brought here with me a sample jar of each vegetable. When the cheering
subsided I held up a jar of peas.
“Look at them,” I said.
Then I did the same with a jar of string beans, a jar of turnips,
of squash, of pickled small beets. Each exhibition was greeted with
cheering.
In the meanwhile Holt had found Mrs. Cumberland, and with her arm
through his was escorting her up the steps to the platform. She was
a dear, lovable lady of fifty with shy, gentle manners that won
everyone’s heart. As she approached, every man including the band rose
to his feet and faced her standing.
“Oh, dear! Oh, dear!” she choked.
Holt led her to a position in front of the crowd.
“The mother of our future pioneers--a pioneer herself,” he said with
fine feeling.
Then without any prompting on his part the crowd let itself loose. She
took out a little white handkerchief and waved it a second. Then she
pressed it to her eyes and shied back, and Holt stepping in front of
her shielded her from further view of the audience.
It was fine--fine. I don’t know what there is about such little
incidents to so touch the heart of a gathering of men and women but I
do know they are mighty good for men and women. There wasn’t a person
there who wasn’t left mellowed and almost hallowed by those few tense
seconds. In and of itself and apart from all else we had done, this was
worth all our labor. It sweetened the whole of us and left us with a
finer human feeling.
The prize for the best market garden went to Higginbotham and the prize
for the best flower garden went to Mildred Cunningham, the minister’s
daughter. You ought to have seen the pride with which Cunningham
escorted the girl to the platform. The man since the inception of the
movement had really done what he could to help us both in his sermons
and his rounds of the parish. But to my mind the little girl had done
more than he. I’d give more any time for a person who actually gets
into a forward movement than one who merely talks about it. She had
kept half the sick people of the village supplied with posies all
summer long.
The seventh envelope contained the winner of the prize for the
best potato crop--one hundred dollars. I hadn’t any idea whom the
Agricultural School experts had decided upon. I tore open the envelope
and read automatically as follows:
“For the best crop of potatoes raised upon an acre of land--one hundred
dollars. It gives me great pleasure to announce as the winner--”
Then I stopped. I couldn’t believe my own eyes. The name which followed
was my own.
“Go on,” someone yelled impatiently.
“I think there must be some mistake,” I said, turning to the judge. “I
didn’t consider myself a competitor.”
“Name! Name!” came a chorus.
“Name!” insisted Holt.
I turned to the crowd.
“The name is William Carleton,” I said, “But I don’t feel--”
I didn’t get any farther. The crowd began to cheer and Holt stepped
forward to egg them on. When the clamor died down a little, Holt seized
my arm. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he announced, “Mr. William Carleton--a
farmer from the city but now a citizen of the farm. He’s the greatest
pioneer of us all. I’ve seen his potato field and watched him care for
it until I almost wished I was a potato. He’s done everything except
make feather beds for ’em and tuck ’em in at night. Three cheers more
for Pioneer Carleton.”
As soon as I could get my voice I responded.
“I’m glad of the honor,” I said, “I don’t remember anything which has
ever made me feel prouder. I shall always remember this. But, the
hundred dollars I want to turn back right here to the Pioneer Club.”
It was a minute or two after I had torn open the eighth envelope before
I could make myself heard. This was a prize of one hundred dollars
for the largest return from chickens according to capital invested.
This went to Guy Holborne, who had invested eighteen dollars for six
Plymouth Rocks with a rooster, five dollars in eggs to set and three
dollars in miscellaneous expenses. He had sold five dollars’ worth of
eggs up to date and had sixty fine pullets worth seventy-five cents a
piece ready for the market. He had fed his chickens largely on waste
collected from his neighbors.
The prize for the largest return from cows according to capital
invested went to Ebenezer Blunt, the prize for the largest return from
pigs to Arthur Libby and the prize for the most notable improvement in
an old orchard was divided between Henderson and Talbot, two of our
largest land owners. They followed my example and turned the money back
to the Pioneer Club.
As the last announcement was made Holt roused the band and they played
“America,” everyone standing.
The athletic events under Dick’s direction followed and kept the crowd
amused until dinner time. During the afternoon the fakirs did a brisk
business while the town hall was packed until dark. A goodly number
of automobiles loaded with city folks anxious to see an old-fashioned
country fair came and went, adding to the general holiday atmosphere.
It was late that night before I really had a chance to talk over things
with Ruth.
“Well,” I said when we were alone, “how did it go?”
“Don’t see how it could have gone any better,” she answered.
“That was a great move of Holt’s in leading the cheering,” I said.
“Fine! Fine!”
“Think the decisions left any hard feelings?”
“Only the usual per cent., Billy,” she answered, “and they won’t last.
I heard most of them talking about what they were going to do next
year.”
“That’s the stuff,” I said.
“You see they had worked out the results pretty well for themselves
before the announcement. No; it has been a success--a success from
beginning to end.”
“And the women?”
“There isn’t one who isn’t going to bed to-night tired and happy.”
“It isn’t unusual for them to go to bed tired,” I said.
She nodded.
“But you can be tired in twenty different ways,” she said. “And this is
the kind of tired that’s good for them.”