Part 12 (2/2)
My Holstein cows consume a trifle less than three tons of grain each per year,--about fifteen pounds a day. Taking the ration for four cows as a matter of convenience, we have: corn and cob meal, three tons, and oatmeal, three tons, both kinds raised and ground on the farm, and not charged in this account; wheat bran, three tons at $18, $54; gluten meal, two tons at $24, $48; oil meal, one ton, $26; total cash outlay for four cows, $128, or $32 per head. This estimate is, however, about $2 too liberal. We will, hereafter, charge each milch cow $30, and will also charge each hog fattened on the place $1 for shorts and middlings consumed. This is not exact, but it is near enough, and it greatly simplifies accounts.
As I kept twenty-six cows ten months, and ten more for an average of four and a half months, the feeding for 1896 would be equivalent to one year for thirty cows, or $900. To this add $120 for swine food and $25 for grits and oyster sh.e.l.ls for the chickens, and we have $1045 paid for food for stock. Shoeing the horses for the year and repairs to machinery cost $157. The purchased food for eight employees for twelve months and for two additional ones for eight months, amounted to $734. The wage account, including $50 extra to Thompson, was $2358.
A second hen-house, a duplicate of the first, was built before October.
It was intended that each house should accommodate four hundred laying hens. We have now on the place five of these houses; but only two of them, besides the incubator and the brooder-house, were built in 1896.
As offset to the heavy expenditure of this year, I had not much to show.
Seven hundred c.o.c.kerels were sold in November for $342. In October the pullets began laying in desultory fas.h.i.+on, and by November they had settled down to business; and that quarter they gave me 703 dozen eggs to sell. As these eggs were marketed within twenty-four hours, and under a guarantee, I had no difficulty in getting thirty cents a dozen, net.
November eggs brought $211, and the December out-put, $252. I sold 600 bushels of potatoes for $150, and the apples from 150 of the old trees (which, by the way, were greatly improved this year) brought $450 on the trees.
The cows did well. In the thirty-three weeks from May 12 to December 31, I sold a little more than 6600 pounds of b.u.t.ter, which netted me $2127.
We had 122 young hogs to sell in December. They had been crowded as fast as possible to make good weight, and they went to market at an average of 290 pounds a head. The price was low, but I got the top of the market,--$3.55 a hundred, which amounted to $1170 after paying charges.
I had reserved twenty-five of the most likely young sows to stay on the farm, and had transferred eight to the village butcher, who was to return them in the shape of two barrels of salt pork, thirty-two smoked hams and shoulders, and a lot of bacon.
The old sows farrowed again in September and early October, and we went into the winter with 162 young pigs. I get these details out of the way now in order to turn to the family and the social side of life at Four Oaks.
CHAPTER x.x.xI
THE CHILDREN
The house did not progress as fast as Nelson had promised, and it was likely to be well toward Christmas before we could occupy it. As the days shortened, Polly and I found them crowded with interests. Life at Four Oaks was to mean such a radical change that we could not help speculating about its influence upon us and upon the children. Would it be satisfactory to us and to them? Or should we find after a year or two of experiment that we had been mistaken in believing that we could live happier lives in the country than in town? A year and a half of outdoor life and freedom from professional responsibilities had wrought a great change in me. I could now eat and sleep like a hired man, and it seemed preposterous to claim that I was going to the country for my health. My medical adviser, however, insisted that I had not gotten far enough away from the cause of my breakdown, and that it would be unwise for me to take up work again for at least another year. In my own mind there was a fixed opinion that I should never take it up again. I loved it dearly; but I had given long, hard service to it, and felt that I had earned the right to freedom from its exacting demands. I have never lost interest in this, the n.o.blest of professions, but I had done my share, and was now willing to watch the work of others. In my mind there was no doubt about the desirability of the change. I have always loved the thought of country life, and now that my thoughts were taking material shape, I was keen to push on. Polly looked toward the untrammelled life we hoped to lead with as great pleasure as I.
But how about the children? Would it appeal to them with the same force as to us? The children have thus far been kept in the background. I wanted to start my factory farm and to get through with most of its dull details before introducing them to the reader, lest I should be diverted from the business to the domestic, or social, proposition.
The farm is laid by for the winter, and most of the details needed for a just comprehension of our experiment have been given. From this time on we will deal chiefly with results. We will watch the out-put from the factory, and commend or find fault as the case may deserve.
The social side of life is quite as important as the commercial, for though we gain money, if we lose happiness, what profit have we? Let us study the children to see what chances for happiness and good fellows.h.i.+p lie in them.
Kate is our first-born. She is a bright, beautiful woman of five-and-twenty, who has had a husband these six years, one daughter for four years, and, wonderful to relate, another daughter for two years.
She is quick and practical, with strong opinions of her own, prompt with advice and just as prompt with aid; a woman with a temper, but a friend to tie to in time of stress. She has the education of a good school, and what is infinitely better, the cultivation of an observing mind. She is quick with tongue and pen, but her quickness is so tempered by unquestioned friendliness that it fastens people to her as with a cord.
She overflows with interests of every description, but she is never too busy to listen sympathetically to a child or a friend. She is the practical member of the family, and we rarely do much out of the ordinary without first talking it over with Kate.
Tom Hamilton, her husband, is a young man who is getting on in the world. He is clever in his profession, and sure to succeed beyond the success of most men. He is quiet in manner, but he seems to have a way of managing his quick, handsome wife, which is something of a surprise to me, and to her also, I fancy. They are congenial and happy, and their children are beings to adore. Tom and Kate are to live in town. They are too young for the joys of country life, and must needs drag on as they are, loved and admired by a host of friends. They can, and will, however, spend much time at Four Oaks; and I need not say they approved our plans.
Jack is our second. He was a junior at Yale, and I am shy of saying much about him lest I be accused of partiality. Enough to say that he is tall, blond, handsome, and that he has gentle, winning ways that draw the love of men and women. He is a dreamer of dreams, but he has a st.u.r.dy drop of Puritan blood in his veins that makes him strong in conviction and brave in action. Jack has never caused me an hour of anxiety, and I was ever proud to see him in any company.
Concerning Jane, I must be pardoned in advance for a father's favoritism. She is my youngest, and to me she seems all that a father could wish. Of fair height and well moulded, her physique is perfect.
Good health and a happy life had set the stamp of superb womanhood upon her eighteen years. Any effort to describe her would be vain and unsatisfactory. Suffice it to say that she is a pure blonde, with eyes, hair, and skin just to my liking. She is quiet and shy in manner, deliberate in speech, sensitive beyond measure, wise in intuitive judgment, clever in history and literature, but always a little in doubt as to the result of putting seven and eight together, and not unreasonably dominated by the rules of orthography. She is fond of outdoor life, in love with horses and dogs, and withal very much of a home girl. Every one makes much of Jane, and she is not spoiled, but rather improved by it. She was in her second year at Farmington, and, like all Farmington students, she cared more for girls than for boys.
These were the children whom I was to transport from the city, where they were born, to the quiet life at Four Oaks. After carefully taking their measures, I felt little hesitation about making the change. They, of course, had known of the plan, and had often been to the farm; but they were still to find out what it really meant to live there. A saddle horse and dogs galore would square me with Jane, beyond question; but what about Jack? Time must decide that. His plan of life was not yet formed, and we could afford to wait. We did not have much time in which to weigh these matters, for the Christmas holidays were near, and the youngsters would soon be home. We planned to be settled in the new house when they arrived.
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