III
LIFE ON A WISCONSIN FARM
Humanity in Oxen--Jack, the Pony--Learning to Ride--Nob and
Nell--Snakes--Mosquitoes and their Kin--Fish and
Fishing--Considering the Lilies--Learning to Swim--A Narrow
Escape from Drowning and a Victory--Accidents to Animals.
Coming direct from school in Scotland while we were still hopefully
ignorant and far from tame,--notwithstanding the unnatural profusion
of teaching and thrashing lavished upon us,--getting acquainted with
the animals about us was a never-failing source of wonder and delight.
At first my father, like nearly all the backwoods settlers, bought a
yoke of oxen to do the farm work, and as field after field was
cleared, the number was gradually increased until we had five yoke.
These wise, patient, plodding animals did all the ploughing, logging,
hauling, and hard work of every sort for the first four or five
years, and, never having seen oxen before, we looked at them with the
same eager freshness of conception as we did at the wild animals.
Pages:
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95