LESSON 5
A BOY ON A FARM
Charles Dudley Warner (b. 1829, d. 1900) was born at Plainfield, Mass. In 1851 he graduated at Hamilton College, and in 1856 was admitted to the bar at Philadelphia, but moved to Chicago to practice his profession. There he remained until 1860, when he became connected with the press at Hartford, Conn., and has ever since devoted himself to literature. “My Summer in a Garden, ” “Saunterings, ”and “Backlog Studies” are his best known works. The following extract is from “Being a Boy.”
1. Say what you will about the general usefulness of boys, it is my impression that a farm without a boy would very soon come to grief. What the boy does is the life of the farm. He is the factotum, always in demand, always expected to do the thousand indispensable things that nobody else will do. Upon him fall all the odds and ends, the most difficult things.
2. After everybody else is through, he has to finish up. His work is like a woman's, —perpetually waiting on others. Everybody knows how much easier it is to eat a good dinner than it is to wash the dishes afterwards. Consider what a boy on a farm is required to do, —things that must be done, or life would actually stop.
3. It is understood, in the first place, that he is to do all the errands, to go to the store, to the post office, and to carry all sorts of messages. If he had as many legs as a centipede, they would tire before night. His two short limbs seem to him entirely inadequate to the task. He would like to have as many legs as a wheel has spokes, and rotate about in the same way.
4. This he sometimes tries to do; and the people who have seen him“turning cart wheels” along the side of the road, have supposed that he was amusing himself and idling his time; he was only trying to invent a new mode of locomotion, so that he could economize his legs, and do his errands with greater dispatch.
5. He practices standing on his head, in order to accustom himself to any position. Leapfrog is one of his methods of getting over the ground quickly. He would willingly go an errand any distance if he could leapfrog it with a few other boys.
6. He has a natural genius for combining pleasure with business. This is the reason why, when he is sent to the spring for a pitcher of water, he is absent so long; for he stops to poke the frog that sits on the stone, or, if there is a penstock, to put his hand over the spout, and squirt the water a little while.
7. He is the one who spreads the grass when the men have cut it; he mows it away in the barn; he rides the horse, to cultivate the corn, up and down the hot, weary rows; he picks up the potatoes when they are dug; he drives the cows night and morning; he brings wood and water, and splits kindling; he gets up the horse, and puts out the horse; whether he is in the house or out of it, there is always something for him to do.
8. Just before the school in winter he shovels paths; in summer he turns the grindstone. He knows where there are lots of wintergreens and sweet flags, but instead of going for them, he is to stay indoors and pare apples, and stone raisins, and pound something in a mortar. And yet, with his mind full of schemes of what he would like to do, and his hands full of occupations, he is an idle boy, who has nothing to busy himself with but school and chores!
9. He would gladly do all the work if somebody else would do the chores, he thinks; and yet I doubt if any boy ever amounted to anything in the world, or was of much use as a man, who did not enjoy the advantages of a liberal education in the way of chores.
STUDY GUIDE
A. Word Definition
1.factotum:person employed to do all kinds of work.
2.indispensable:absolutely necessary.
3.perpetually:continually.
4.centipede:insect with a great number of feet.
5.cart wheels:circular sideways arm springs.
6.locomotion:movement from place to place.
7.economize:save.
8.dispatch:diligence,haste.
9.leapfrog:game in which players vault over others bending down.
10.penstock:wooden tube for conducting water.
11.grindstone:disc used for grinding,sharpening and polishing.
12.wintergreens:plants which stay green all winter.
13.sweet flags:waterside plants used medicinally and as a flavoring.
14.occupations:pastimes,work.
15.chores:light household work both inside and out.
B. Comprehension Questions
1. This lesson about working hard was considered very valuable by the editors of “The Eclectic Reader.” Do you agree with them?
2. Today children of any age can legally work on small American farms with their parents' permission but they die at four times the rate of other young workers. Why do you think this happens?
3. What kinds of chores did girls do on American farms in the late 19th century?
a. cooking
b. laundry
c. sewing
d. childcare
e. all of these
4. Do you think nineteenth century children on farms in other countries worked as hard as the boy in this story? Explain.
5. How important was school for American children when this story was written? Did both boys and girls attend regularly?
6. Compare a modern American farm with one from the nineteenth century.
7. How important is farming to the economy of your country? What percentage of the population are farmers?
8. Do you think American boys were considered more valuable than girls in the nineteenth century? Explain.
C. Writing Work
Write 200 words about working on a farm.