



Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Barbara Kosker and the
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  [Illustration]




  When Life Was Young

  At the Old Farm in Maine


  BY

  C. A. STEPHENS




  [Illustration]




  PUBLISHED BY
  THE YOUTH'S COMPANION
  BOSTON, MASS.




  _Copyright_, 1912
  BY C. A. STEPHENS

  _All rights reserved_


  _Electrotyped and Printed by
  THE COLONIAL PRESS
  C. H. Simonds & Co., Boston, U.S.A._




  DEDICATED

  WITH CORDIAL BEST

  WISHES TO THE MANY

  Readers of the Youth's Companion

  WHO HAVE SO KINDLY REMEMBERED

  US AT THE OLD SQUIRE'S

  FARM




                                Contents

  CHAPTER                                                           PAGE

          THE FARM ON THE PENNESSEEWASSEE                              1

       I. A NOSE IN COMMON                                             5

      II. WHITE SUNDAY                                                13

     III. MONDAY AT THE OLD FARM                                      28

      IV. OUR FIRST JERSEY COW                                        47

       V. SHEEP-WASHING--ADDISON'S NOVEL WATER-WARMER                 57

      VI. THE VERMIFUGE BOTTLE                                        72

     VII. IMMERSING THE LAMBS                                         94

    VIII. "OLD THREE-LEGS"                                           106

      IX. HOMESICK AGAIN. BLUE, OH, SO BLUE                          119

       X. MUG-BREAD, PONES AND JOHNNY-REB TOAST                      128

      XI. THE BIRDS AND BIRD-SONGS AT THE OLD FARM                   136

     XII. TWO VERY EARLY CALLERS--EACH ON BUSINESS                   153

    XIII. WE ALL SET OFF TO HAVE OUR PICTURES TAKEN                  166

     XIV. "THERE IS A MAN IN ENGLAND, NAMED DARWIN"                  176

      XV. A WET FOURTH OF JULY, WITH A GOOD DEAL OF
          HUMAN NATURE IN IT                                         187

     XVI. WOOD-CHUCKS IN THE CLOVER--ADDISON'S STRATAGEM             208

    XVII. HAYING TIME                                                218

   XVIII. APPLE-HOARDS                                               227

     XIX. DOG DAYS, GRAIN HARVEST, AND A TRULY LUCRETIAN TEMPEST     247

      XX. CEDAR BROOMS AND A NOBLE STRING OF TROUT                   255

     XXI. TOM'S FORT                                                 268

    XXII. HIGH TIMES                                                 286

   XXIII. THE THRASHERS COME                                         297

    XXIV. GOING TO THE CATTLE SHOW                                   308

     XXV. THE WILD ROSE SWEETING                                     321

    XXVI. THE OLD SQUIRE ALLOWS US FOUR DAYS FOR CAMPING OUT         329

   XXVII. AT THE OLD SLAVE'S FARM                                    340

  XXVIII. THE OLD SQUIRE'S PANTHER STORY                             384

    XXIX. THE OUTLAW DOGS                                            397

     XXX. A HEARTFELT THANKSGIVING AND A MERRY YOUNG MUSE THAT
          VISITED US UNINVITED                                       410




When Life Was Young

       *       *       *       *       *

THE FARM ON THE PENNESSEEWASSEE


Away down East in the Pine Tree State, there is a lake dearer to my
heart than all the other waters of this fair earth, for its shores were
the scenes of my boyhood, when Life was young and the world a romance
still unread.

Dearer to the heart;--for then glowed that roseate young joy and faith
in life and its grand possibilities; that hope and confidence that great
things can be done and that the doing of them will prove of high avail.
For such is ever our natural, normal first view of life; the clear young
brain's first vision of this wondrous bright universe of earth and sky;
the first picture on the sentient plate of consciousness, and the true
one, before error blurs and evil dims it; a joy and a faith in life
which as yet, on this still imperfect earth of ours, comes but once,
with youth.

The white settlers called it the Great Pond; but long before they came
to Maine, the Indians had named it Pennesseewassee, pronounced
Penny-see-was-see, the lake-where-the-women-died, from the Abnaki words,
penem-pegouas-abem, in memory, perhaps, of some unhistoric tragedy.

From their villages on the upper Saco waters, the Pequawkets were
accustomed to cross over to the Androscoggin and often stopped at this
lake, midway, to fish in the spring, and again in winter to hunt for
moose, then snowbound in their "yards." On snowshoes, or paddling their
birch canoes along the pine-shadowed streams, these tawny,
pre-Columbian warriors came and camped on the Pennesseewassee; we still
pick up their flint arrow-heads along the shore; and it may even be that
the short, brown Skraellings were here before them, in neolithic days.

There are two ponds, or lakes, of this name, the Great and the Little
Pennesseewassee, the latter lying a mile and a half to the west of the
larger expanse and connected with it by a brook.

To the northeast, north and west, the land rises in long, picturesque
ridges and mountains of medium altitude; and still beyond and above
these, in the west and northwest, loom Mt. Washington, Madison,
Kearsarge and other White Mountain peaks.

The larger lake is a fine sheet of water, five miles in length,
containing four dark-green islets; and the view from its bosom is one of
the most beautiful in this our State-of-Lakes.

Hither, shortly after the "Revolution," came the writer's
great-grandfather, poor in purse; for he had served throughout that
long, and at times hopeless struggle for liberty. In payment he had
received a large roll of "Continental Money," all of which would at that
time have sufficed, scarcely, to procure him a tavern dinner. No
"bounties," no "pensions," then stimulated the citizen soldiery. With
little to aid him save his axe on his shoulder, the unremunerated
patriot made a clearing on the <DW72>s, looking southward upon the lake;
and here, after some weeks, or months, of toil, he brought his young
family, consisting of my great-grandmother and two children. They came
up the lake in a skiff, fashioned from a pine log. Landing on a still
remembered rock, it is said that the ex-soldier turned about, and taking
the roll of Continental scrip from his pocket, threw it far out into the
water, exclaiming,--

"So much for soldiering! But here, by the blessing of God, we will have
a home yet!"

While going through the forest from the lake up to the clearing, a
distance of a mile or more, they lost their way, for night had fallen,
and after wandering for an hour, were obliged to sleep in the woods
beneath the boughs of a pine; and it was not till the next forenoon that
they found the clearing and the little log house in which my
great-grandmother began her humble housekeeping.

Other settlers made their way hither; and other farms were cleared.
Indians and moose departed and came no more. Then followed half a
century of robust, agricultural life, on a virgin soil. The boys grew
large and tall; the girls were strong and handsome. It was a hearty and
happy era.

But no happy era is enduring; the young men began to take what was
quaintly called "the western fever," and leave the home county for
greater opportunities in Illinois, Wisconsin and Iowa. The young women,
too, went away in numbers to work in the cotton factories at Lowell,
Lawrence and Biddeford; few of them came back; or if they returned, they
were