dance half the night.  You should really see him when he dances!  He can jump straight up and click his heels twice together before he comes down again!  On such occasions he is marvellously clad, as befits the gallant that he really is, but this morning he wore a faded shirt and one of his suspender cords behind was fastened with a nail instead of a button.  His socks are sometimes pale blue and sometimes lavender and commonly, therefore, he turns up his trouser legs so that these vanities may not be wholly lost upon a dull world.  His full name is Richard Tecumseh Sheridan, but every one calls him Dick.  A good, cheerful fellow, Dick, and a hard worker.  I like him.

“Hello, Dick,” I shouted.

“Hello yourself, Mr. Grayson,” he replied.

He hung his scythe in the branches of a pear tree and we both turned into the barnyard to get the chores out of the way.  I wanted to delay cutting as long as I could—­until the dew on the clover should begin—­at least—­to disappear.

By half-past-seven we were ready for work.  We rolled back our sleeves, stood our scythes on end and gave them a final lively stoning.  You could hear the brisk sound of the ringing metal pealing through the still morning air.

“It’s a great day for haying,” I said.

“A dang good one,” responded the laconic Dick, wetting his thumb to feel the edge of his scythe.

I cannot convey with any mere pen upon any mere paper the feeling of jauntiness I had at that moment, as of conquest and fresh adventure, as of great things to be done in a great world!  You may say if you like that this exhilaration was due to good health and the exuberance of youth.  But it was more than that—­far more.  I cannot well express it, but it seemed as though at that moment Dick and I were stepping out into some vast current of human activity:  as though we had the universe itself behind us, and the warm regard and approval of all men.

I stuck my whetstone in my hip-pocket, bent forward and cut the first short sharp swath in the clover.  I swept the mass of tangled green stems into the open space just outside the gate.  Three or four more strokes and Dick stopped whistling suddenly, spat on his hands and with a lively “Here she goes!” came swinging in behind me.  The clover-cutting had begun.

At first I thought the heat would be utterly unendurable, and, then, with dripping face and wet shoulders, I forgot all about it.  Oh, there is something incomparable about such work—­the long steady pull of willing and healthy muscles, the mind undisturbed by any disquieting thought, the feeling of attainment through vigorous effort!  It was a steady swing and swish, swish and swing!  When Dick led I have a picture of him in my mind’s eye—­his wiry thin legs, one heel lifted at each step and held rigid for a single instant, a glimpse of pale blue socks above his rusty shoes and three inches of whetstone sticking from his tight hip-pocket.  It was good to have him there whether he led or followed.