SOCIAL LIVING; LOVING, LISTENING, LEARNING
There were so many little stories unfolding simultaneously that I
am going to be unable to keep them all up to date as I go along.
While I have been telling about some of our working habits and
our little family customs, I find that the story of my love life
has been neglected. I must go back a way now and bring some of
my social living up to date.
Oh, yes! I had a sweetheart. Her name was Gladys, and I must
tell you about her.
You see, when we moved to the Exum farm, I was a little boy
barely five years old. But then, when we had lived there a year
and a half, I was no longer just a little kid. I was getting to
be a big boy, six and a half and going on seven. And my ears
were getting bigger also. I began to hear about sweethearts.
Susie was thirteen and was just the very one to explain it to me.
She told me once, jokingly, "A sweetheart is a chicken heart
baked in molasses."
But seriously, what she explained about sweethearts amounted to
something like this, "Sweethearts are one boy and one girl about
the same age who like each other and like to go together and like
to do things together. He is her sweetheart and she is his
sweetheart."
Now the Flints, who had moved onto our old farm, had a bunch of
boys and girls and we all played together. The one I liked best
was Gladys. She was just my size, she was six years old, and she
and I liked to go play together. So, when I learned what
sweethearts were, I knew for a fact that Gladys was my sweetheart
because we liked each other and played together.
Of course, I didn't tell anyone, not even Gladys. I didn't feel
any differently toward her. We just went right on playing
together as we had been doing. But I had this newly acquired
knowledge that she was my sweetheart.
No more than I knew or could understand about it all, I wondered
why boys and girls had sweethearts at all. They were just like
other boys and girls except they were your own age.
I never heard of any parents who objected to their older boys and
girls having sweethearts and dating. (In those days we called it
"going together.") But in our immediate community, there were
some pretty strict rules to govern their behavior.
The "good" people in our community didn't allow their boys and
girls to dance. So, there were no dances in our neighborhood
because there were no families that wanted to be branded as being
"not so good." Instead of dances we had parties. Many a Friday
night some good farm couple would give a party. These parties
were always family affairs. The young people didn't go to the
parties alone. Their parents took them to the parties and then
the grown-ups took part in many of the games.
I remember two of the games they played. They were "snap" and
"cross questions and crooked answers." There were many others
but I can't recall them just now. I was only eleven when we
moved out of that community, and we never had such parties at any
place we lived after that.
One night at one of the parties, Frank's girl "snapped" me. (We
didn't call them girl-friends as we do today, just "Girls.") But
I was so timid I just backed away like the bashful country kid
that I was. She told them she got "stood-up" and would have to
pick someone else.
I wanted to play in the games, but I realized that I was much
smaller than any of the others who took part in them, and I was
afraid I might do something wrong and cause them to laugh at me.
Two of the party song-and-dance "swings" they did were "Shoot the
Buffalo" and "Farmer by the Mill." These were the promenade type
dances where they swung their partners kind of like in a square
dance. Mr. Flint was about the best man in the neighborhood at
calling those dances.
Now I have gone and contradicted myself. I first said we didn't
have dances. Now I'm telling you we danced. But this was not
the kind of dance where they waltzed around in each other's arms.
They were party dances.
When the party activities got under way, the people were seated
all around the room next to the walls. Usually some were
standing in the adjoining rooms also, looking through the doors,
because the living room wasn't large enough to hold the crowd.
When that many came to a party, it was considered a good party.
A large crowd was just what they wanted. More people meant more
games and more happy people playing games. In general, when
there was a large crowd, things moved along at a faster pace.
The game of "snap" was usually played by the young set--that is,
the sweetheart set who enjoyed holding hands and chasing after
each other.
The game was easy to get started. All it took was a girl and a
boy to stand in the middle of the room and hold hands, facing
each other. Then the girls would "volunteer" one of their crowd
and push her forward to be "it." Then the "it" girl would circle
the room looking for the boy she wanted for a partner. When she
found him, she would snap her fingers in front of his face, just
as you would in school when you wanted to get the teacher's
attention.
This snap told the boy that he was her chosen, at least for a few
minutes. As soon as she snapped her fingers, she would hurry to
the couple in the middle of the room and the boy she "snapped"
would chase after her. His object was to touch the girl, and her
object was to try to prevent his touching her.
She would try to prolong the chase by dodging and sometimes
swinging around the couple in the center of the room. And
sometimes the couple would prolong the chase by favoring the
girl. They might raise their arms to let the girl go through
between them and then lower their arms quickly to stop the boy.
Or, if the boy was having a hard time catching her, they might
let her start through between them and then lower their arms
quickly and trap her in their arms.
As soon as the boy touched the girl, the chase was ended. Then
the couple who had held hands would leave and let the new couple
hold hands in the center of the room while another chase took
place.
This was not only a holding-hands game, at times it became a
body-
contact game. And yet, not too much contact, because the grown-
ups were watching. Anyway, snap was a popular game at our
parties.
Now, this Friday night the party might be at the Johnsons, but
before the party was over, you could bet good money that the
teen-
agers would have talked another family into giving a party next
Friday night.
These were strictly play parties. There were no refreshments
served, not a lot of cooking and fixing. Just make sure the
house is clean, the yard is clean, and there are plenty of places
to park buggies, hacks, and wagons. Then hope a big crowd begins
gathering soon after sundown.
Parties were preferred over dances because it was considered
immoral for a boy to put his arm around a girl before they were
married. Sweethearts could hold hands in the presence of adults,
if it were in the process of playing a game. But just to sit
this one out and hold hands was unthinkable.
A "good" mother would never tell her daughter it was all right
for her to hold hands in public, or to hug and kiss anywhere, on
her way to church or anywhere else, either afoot or in a buggy--
not even at night.
Somehow, I just can't help but believe that parents knew these
little things were going on between lovers, but they seemed to
think that if they told their kids it was all right for them to
do these things, it would be like saying "sic 'em" to a dog.
Putting it another way, parents were saying, "Don't ever let me
catch you doing such things." And the kids were not actually
saying but were thinking, "Okay, I'll try not to let you catch me
when I do them."
Dances were looked down upon because they attracted boys who
drank, and girls with loose morals. There were some boys and
girls who lived six or eight miles from us who were not wanted at
some of the parties given in our neighborhood, and were not
invited by some of our neighbors who were giving the parties.
But when my parents gave a party at our house, they invited
everyone who would come. They thought it unmannerly to invite
certain ones and leave others out. They seemed to figure that
their integrity would demand respect from the worst of them--and
it did. There never was any trouble at our house--no drinking,
no fighting, no "cussing."
I remember one of those parties when some young people came in a
buggy from quite a distance away. I think I was about nine years
old and, of course, I didn't know all about everything that went
on around me but I knew enough to realize there were some bad
feelings between their families and some of those in our
immediate neighborhood. The main reason seemed to be that those
youngsters attended dances in other communities and some parents
in our neighborhood sure didn't approve of that.
The incident I remember had to do with their buggy horse which
got sick with a severe attack of colic while the party was going
on. Someone had wandered outside and had discovered the horse in
great pain. The boy who owned the animal had seen the disease
before and knew how quickly it could kill a good horse. So he
offered to sell the animal to anyone for $10. It would have been
a bargain for Papa, because he knew exactly what to do to cure
the horse. And the horse was probably worth $50.
When Papa learned about the problem, he got a quart bottle,
filled it about a quarter-full of soda and then added about a
half-quart of kerosene. Then he climbed up in a tree, pulled the
horse's head high in the air with the bridle reins and poured the
mixture down his throat. Within ten minutes, the horse was
without pain and resting comfortably, except for a mighty bad
taste in his mouth.
I think the boy was truly grateful that Papa had not taken
advantage of him by buying the horse. Will Johnson knew that a
good name was rather to be chosen than the value of a buggy
horse.
Along with sweethearts, there were a few other things I didn't
understand altogether. One time during my younger days, I cut
out a picture of a baby buggy from a Sears, Roebuck catalog. I
don't remember just how old I was at the time. I was old enough
to do a pretty good job of cutting out, but I didn't do so well
with my reasoning. I was disappointed to learn that the buggy
wouldn't sit up and roll.
That was not altogether a case of stupidity but rather, a lack of
research. This was part of the research through which I learned
about the third dimension.
It's hard to believe a kid that stupid could become so smart
within the next few years and retain that smartness for the rest
of his life.
We also learned--not through research, but from concerned
parents, about the choice of words to use, the careful choice, I
might add.
Some words were strictly forbidden. The word "bull" was one of
them. We didn't dare use that word in the presence of Papa or
Mama. And if any of the other kids heard us use it, they would
tattle on us. So, we just didn't use it. We were taught to use
the word "surley" instead.
As late as 1940 I knew middle-aged men who would not use the word
"bull" before a woman. One old farmer said, "I don't know what
the world is coming to. I believe the time will come when men
and women will use the word 'bull' in mixed company and think
nothing of it."
But that was in farming country. In cattle country it was
different. I'll bet a ranch boy wouldn't have known what a
surley was. One of my rancher uncles was talking to a farmer who
had some calves he wanted to sell to the rancher. He told the
rancher, "Three of those calves are still nursing." Well, my
uncle and his daughter had to put forth an effort to hold back
their laughter. They were not used to nursing calves. In cattle
country calves don't nurse, they suck.
Continuing along that same line, up until I was a teenager, I
never heard the words "sex" or "male" or "female" used except by
some dirty-mouthed kid. Even when I was in the seventh and
eighth grades, when I had to fill out certain school papers and
was told to put an M for male or an F for female, there was a wee
bit of embarrassment or shyness associated with the use of gender
words. The use of the word "sex" was still guarded against,
except in writing. The word was never spoken in mixed company.
The word "gender" was considered bad enough.
And speaking of dirty-mouthed kids--no one in our family ever
used any kind of dirty words, at least not in my presence. Some
of the brothers I grew up with are in their seventies now and I
can truthfully say, I can not recall ever having heard one of
them "cuss" nor utter a dirty word.
We have all heard of that proverbial corner around which
prosperity is lurking. Well, at the Exum place we finally
rounded that corner and bumped right into it. We got a
telephone.
I'm sure we didn't have a telephone at the Flint place. But by
about the time I started to school, almost everyone in our
neighborhood had one. There were maybe eight or ten parties on
the same line.
We owned our own telephone, put up our own lines, and bought our
own batteries. Having so many on one line wasn't the best
arrangement but it was better than no phone at all. It was a big
step forward at that time in the history of our community.
Every day at noon--straight up twelve o'clock--the operator would
ring a long, long ring. We could set our clocks by it and we
could listen to the weather forecast immediately after the long
ring. I don't know where they got the weather information,
probably from a record of what the weather did on that same day a
year ago, or maybe from the almanac. Anyway, wherever they got
it, most of us listened to it and were stuck with it.
In the above paragraph I said the operator would ring. That's
not exactly right. It's true, she was a woman operator. And we
kids knew she was a woman, but we didn't know she was an
operator. We only knew her as "Central." As far as we were
concerned, her name might just as well have been Mrs. Central.
At any rate, when we wanted to ring someone on our line, out our
direction from "Central," all we had to do was turn the crank and
ring their ring. For instance, our ring was a long and four
shorts. But, if we wanted to talk to someone on a line out
another direction from Hamlin, we had to ring a long ring to get
"Central" and get her to connect our line to the other line.
Then she would ring that party for us.
When any of us tried and tried to ring Central and couldn't get
her to answer, naturally all the phones on our line would be
ringing at the same time, and usually some neighbor on our line
would volunteer to ring for us and help us get through to
Central. Perhaps the neighbor's phone had a stronger magneto, or
perhaps two or three of us ringing at the same time might send a
stronger current and get through to her. We tried everything.
Come to think of it, there was the possibility that Central's
phone had been ringing from the beginning. It was just barely
possible that she was eating a sandwich in another room. And of
course, we shouldn't overlook the possibility that she might have
been out in the little house backed up to the alley.
Speaking of getting through to the operator, let me tell you
about one day when the operator got through to me. Now, on this
particular day, Frank was the operator. He was in command.
Frank, Earl, Joel and I were hoeing cotton. Frank, being the
oldest and the one who would have to answer to Papa if the work
didn't get done, was working hard and was way out ahead of the
rest of us. I was the youngest and least and was way behind, but
not too far behind to be able to talk to Earl and Joel.
After awhile Frank looked back and found us doing a lot of
standing and talking and not much working. He shouted to us to
get to work. We did for awhile because we knew Frank was boss.
But again we got to talking more than hoeing and Frank yelled
again, "Get to work back there!"
Now, I know it was hard on Frank, he being the oldest and having
all the responsibility for getting the hoeing done. It was hard
on me too, just being the youngest with no responsibility.
Finally Frank got so far ahead that it seemed not so necessary to
obey him. Some of us read the Bible with that same attitude. We
seem to think that God has gone so far away we need not obey him
any more. But I suppose God knows when we are loafing and
getting further behind, just as Frank knew about us boys that
day. Anyway, we got more and more lax and Frank got more and
more tense. Then he shouted again. "Get to work back there!"
Earl looked at me and said, "Tell him to come and make you."
Now, Earl always was one to recommend that someone else do
something he wouldn't do for anything. But Earl also knew me and
he was reasonably sure I would do it. That would leave him
guiltless and he would get to see the fun. His pleasure would be
twofold. He would glory in the thought that he had caused me to
do something that we both knew I shouldn't do and he would enjoy
seeing me get a good licking which he knew I had needed many
times more than I had gotten.
At the same time, I was eager to show off and furnish
entertainment for my "fans." So, I shouted back, "Come and make
me!"
And Frank did just that.
I knew what was coming long before he got to me. I knew it would
hurt and I knew I deserved every bit of it. But it was funny--in
a way.
By the time Frank got to me I was flat on my back with my feet
toward him. I kicked furiously. My laughing hindered me
somewhat but I managed to keep him at bay for awhile.
My feet were flying and aimed in his direction. He circled
around me, trying to get at my weaker end--my head. After two or
three rounds, he got me, and I got what was coming to me.
I was so tickled, it didn't seem to hurt at first. But the more
I laughed the harder he whipped me. If I remember right, I think
I quit laughing before he quit whipping. Anyway, I had my fun
and my punishment, Earl and Joel saw a good show and Frank did
what he had to do. And I worked harder after that.
Do you think I told Mama and Papa what Frank did to me? Of
course not. That would have brought a reprimand from them. I
knew I had done wrong. I also knew I had better let well enough
alone.
And did Frank tell them I had been a bad boy? Certainly not. He
had handled the situation well and we all knew he could do it
again next time. That's the way our family discipline worked.
There were a lot of disadvantages to being little when I was
growing up. I don't mean like the whipping I got from Frank.
That was okay. I needed that. I mean like things I wanted to
do. There were so many things I wanted to do that Mama and Papa
wouldn't let me do. They would say, "You're too little."
With Earl and Joel, it was different. They were not too little--
never had been. At least, if they had been, I couldn't remember
it.
One thing I wanted to do was go hunting with Uncle Robert and his
greyhounds. I remember I went one time, but most of the times I
was too little. I had to stay home and hear them tell about the
rabbit hunt afterwards.
I guess the time they let me go was when they weren't going very
far and they figured I could keep up with the others for awhile.
Anyway, Robert had some dogs that were mighty fast and well
matched. It was hard for a jack rabbit to get away from them.
Old Queen was his fastest one. She was his lead dog. Old Pluto
was almost as fast. He would run in single file behind Old
Queen, and when a rabbit began to circle, Old Pluto would begin
to cut the corner to keep the rabbit going straight.
A rabbit likes to circle back to his home territory. He knows
the lay of the land at home and figures he has a better chance to
survive. But Robert's dogs wouldn't let him circle back. That
seemed to frustrate him and make him easier to catch.
Robert also had about three other running dogs. They were not
quite as fast as Queen and Pluto but they played important roles
in the pack. They were good to spread out and help flush rabbits
out of the weeds and brush. And they were also there at the end
of the chase to catch the rabbit in case he dodged quickly and
the two leading dogs failed to catch him.
When those dogs jumped a jack rabbit, you could just about write
him off as another dead rabbit. About the only way a rabbit
could escape was to run into a patch of tall, thick feed where
the dogs couldn't see him.
Other men wanted to buy Robert's dogs at times but he took pride
in owning the best greyhounds for miles around, and his best ones
were not for sale.
Uncle Robert was a favorite of us boys. He was Papa's youngest
brother and was only eight years older than Frank. We liked just
about everything about him, especially the way he paid us when we
worked for him. When we hoed or picked cotton for him, he paid
us as soon as we were through, and he paid us in cash, never by
check. We hated checks. Some men paid us boys by check, with
all our wages figured in together, usually along with Papa's.
Then we had to wait for Papa to go to town and get the money,
which might be as much as a week later.
But not so with Uncle Robert. When time came for him to pay us
boys--as soon as the job was finished--he made it a point to have
a pocket full of coins so he could pay us then and there. There
was no piece of paper, no writing and no waiting. And he paid
each of us separately.
Another thing I was too little to do was go upstairs at
Grandma's. Yet, I didn't mind that so much because I wasn't the
only one. Even Earl and Joel couldn't go up there.
Robert and Ed were still living at home and not married. Their
rooms were upstairs and they didn't want us little kids messing
around up there. Besides, there was danger we might fall on the
steps and get hurt.
I didn't know at the time why they didn't want us to go upstairs.
They didn't tell us the truth about it. What they told us was,
"If you go up there, the Old Bootjack will get you." Well, I was
almost grown before I learned what a bootjack was. Then it was
easy to see that a bootjack wouldn't hurt anyone, especially
little kids. But the fear of it served its purpose. And I
suppose we were not mentally warped because of having been fibbed
to.
We learned other lessons also--some the expensive way. I
remember, some of us Johnson kids were at Uncle John Hudson's
house one day, playing with all his kids, when we discovered a
pig out of his pen.
Now, Uncle John was away from home at that time and we thought we
should do him a big favor and get his pig back in the pen with
its mama. I don't know why, he couldn't hurt anything, he was
too small. But he had a pen and we kids thought a pig ought to
be in his pen. So we got after him.
It was a hot day. In fact, it was so hot that the sandy ground
burned our bare feet. We were suffering from the heat but we
thought we must not stop until we caught him. We felt duty bound
to get that pig back in his pen.
We chased him all over the place and finally caught him out in
the peach orchard. Well, we were hot, the ground was hot, the
weather was hot, but most of all, that little pig was hot.
We carried our little prisoner and we all got under the shade of
a peach tree. We kids cooled off right away, but the pig was so
tired and was breathing so fast, we thought we ought to cool him
off with some cool water.
We carried water from the windmill--good, cool water right out of
the well. Then we poured it on the little pig--and he was dead
in about one minute flat.
We were sorry, but how were we to know that cold water would kill
a hot pig? No one had ever told us it would. We learned that
lesson the hard way--that is, hard on Uncle John. And we learned
some other things too, when he learned about his pig. Oh yes, he
told us a few things he wanted us to know.
Regardless of all the little mistakes we kids made, we generally
had the run of the farm at our Exum place, except for a few
things which were not allowed. One of these was, "Don't climb on
the feed stacks." That would destroy a lot of the feed and allow
rainwater to run in and ruin even more of it. No problem there.
Most any kid could follow that line of reasoning. But another
"Don't" that was not so easily understood was, "Don't play in the
cottonseed."
What could it hurt to play in it? It was in a nice bin, and we
would leave it in the bin. Walking on it wouldn't hurt it.
Digging holes and tunnels in it wouldn't damage the seed. This
was forbidden fruit we just couldn't understand.
So, the rule about not playing in the cottonseed had its effect
on cultivating our dishonesty. It was so much fun, we went ahead
and played in the cottonseed bin anyway, when we thought the
coast was clear. And I can't remember ever having gotten caught
at it.
I can understand it all now. If we had been allowed to play in
the cottonseed, we might have gotten careless about wasting seed
out the door when we were having a cottonseed fight. And, more
than likely, we would have left the door open at times for the
rain and rats and cows to get in. And of course, a cave-in in
one of our tunnels might have trapped one of the smaller kids
when there were no large ones around for rescue work. We hadn't
thought of that.
But we couldn't understand it at that time, and it seemed to us
that this cottonseed "don't" was not an absolute "don't," but
perhaps more of an "I don't think you ought to" kind of a
"don't." So, when viewed from that angle, we didn't feel so
guilty. We just played in the seed and enjoyed it.
But since there was at least a half-hearted rule against playing
in the cottonseed, we didn't dare leave the door open when we
were playing inside. Papa could have spotted that open door a
quarter-mile away and, come supper time, we kids would have had
to answer a question or two. Also, a few seeds outside on the
ground could have been seen by conservative parents or maybe by a
brother who was bent on "getting even" with another brother, and
at the same time, putting a fresh shine on his little halo by
tattling.
In spite of all the drawbacks, we played in the cottonseed, and
naturally we stirred up dust. And when the sun shone through the
cracks onto that dust, it was hard to see through it--it was sort
of like a wall that you could walk right through.
One day we were playing in the seed when the sun was shining
through a horizontal crack in the boards. The dust in the
sunshine looked a lot like a large board, lying flat above the
seed. I tried to crawl up on the dust as though it were a table
top. But of course, it wouldn't hold me up.
I couldn't understand it. So I stirred up more dust until it
became very dense. Then I tried jumping up on it. But it still
wouldn't hold me up.
Years later, I learned why. The dust wasn't as dense as I was.
I have told you about a three or four-year-old boy planting with
a two-row planter, a dog plowing for his master, and Texas kids
trying to walk on dust clouds. Don't go away, I have other true
stories to tell you.
As I mentioned before, I have heard Papa tell of trail driving
near San Angelo, Texas. He was just a lad at that time--couldn't
have been more than 17 or 18 years old. Here is what he told me
about 35 years later:
One time when they were on the trail, they had bedded their
cattle down one night near San Angelo and were sitting around the
camp fire doing nothing when one cowboy said, "Let's go into town
and get something to drink."
Another one said, "Good idea, but we're all broke and the boss is
two days behind. How you gonna get whiskey without money?"
He said, "Saddle up and go with me and I'll show you."
Now this would be worth seeing, so quite a few of the boys rode
with him into town--carrying jugs half full of water.
History tells us that along about that time, San Angelo was made
up of at least 20 saloons and fewer than that number of all other
stores combined.
Before the cowboys reached town, they all knew just what to do.
After hiding their billfolds in their saddle bags, they each took
a jug and split up, one going to this saloon and one to that
saloon and so on.
Then each in turn told the bartender that they were out on the
trail with only half a jug of whiskey, and would he finish
filling it up? After the jug was filled, the cowboy would reach
for his wallet only to "discover" that he had lost it. The
bartender would just have to take back his half-gallon. The poor
boy would have to "make out" with only his original half-gallon.
Now, with quite a few cowpokes pulling this little stunt in about
half the saloons in San Angelo, you can bet your boots they rode
back to camp with plenty of what they came for, a little weak,
but free.
When Papa was a boy, the lives of his entire family had to do
with saddle horses and cattle. Even the little girls liked to
ride horses and play cowboy. The youngest girl, Annie, was one
of those little girls. But when Annie became big enough to do
chores, one of her chores was to churn the milk that made the
butter for the family. And she hated to have to stay home and
churn while her brothers rode out into the pasture after the
cows.
Now, I'm not positive of this, but knowing Papa as I do, I
wouldn't be surprised if he had something to do with helping his
little sister solve her problem. Whoever it was, the idea worked
well and made a little girl happy. She would tie a jar of milk
to her saddle and ride on out with the boys, letting her horse do
the churning.
At the Exum farm Mr. Whatley's pasture joined our field. And in
his pasture he had an old cow which was well educated in the art
of breaking through fences. And she seemed to enjoy slipping
into our corn patch.
Now, the normal procedure for the average farmer was to put a
yoke on the neck of such an animal. Of course, the purpose of
the yoke was to bridge across the wires and stop the cow from
going through the fence.
But this old cow soon learned to use the yoke to break the wires
so she could get through the fence easier. And she had been
spending entirely too much of her time in our field. Mr. Whatley
either could not or would not keep her out. Papa thought he
ought to keep her out.
I never learned where Papa got the idea of shooting the cow--
whether it was his own idea or whether a neighbor had prescribed
the remedy. And even though Papa was smart in most cases, I
really think he used poor judgment when he shot the cow. He only
meant for the shots to sting her enough to make our corn patch
unpleasant for her. But he either misjudged his distance from
the cow or he misread the size of shot in the shell he used.
When he shot the cow, she just stood there, I guess wondering
what hit her. Papa doubted that he had hit her at all. So he
moved up closer and fired a second shot, which really hurt the
old cow much more than Papa had meant to hurt her.
When Mr. Whatley took a look at his cow, he was hurt even more.
He told the County Judge about it and the judge told Papa to pay
Mr. Whatley for his wounded cow.
Papa argued that the cow had damaged his corn more than he had
damaged the cow--in fact, more than the cow was worth. The judge
agreed, that might well be true, but it didn't give Papa the
right to go around shooting his neighbor's cow. Besides, in this
case, the corn would get well much sooner than the cow would.
Papa paid Mr. Whatley for his cow, and went home a little poorer
and a lot wiser. I don't think Papa ever shot another cow. If
he did, he didn't tell us about it.