COUNTRY LIFE
HAY and harvest are close together in our locality this year. It is not often that one sees hay being carted in one field while corn stooks are being set up in the next, but rain one month followed by warm sun, has resulted in the holding back of one task and the advancing of the other. A fortnight ago I looked up the valley at a hill of corn that was green, and saw that the hay beside it was still uncut, and now the binder is out bringing down oats that are already more silver than gold in appearance, while the haymakers are still struggling to load wagons and rake the field. Such happen- ings produce a sort of nightmare of toil on small farms where a great deal of the work has still to be done by manual effort, but somehow harvest and haymaking are achieved. Sowing corn is an act of faith and harvesting is a prayer. I have done both and watch progress on the surrounding farms with as keen an interest as I watch the drawing out of comb in the beehive. The activity involved is the same sort of urgent industry governed by sun and rain.
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