CHAPTER XI

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.”