“We use a ton of hay daily, after the pasture season is over,” remarked our guide.

When we came to look at the sleek Jersey cows and calves, with their fawn-like faces, our admiration knew no bounds.  We examined the stalls in which could stand thirty-four cows.  Over each was the name of the occupant, all blood animals of the purest breed, with a pedigree which might put to shame many newly rich people displaying coats-of-arms.  The children went into ecstasies over the pretty, innocent faces of the Jersey calves, and Mousie said they were “nice enough to kiss.”  Then we were shown the great, thick-necked, black-headed Jersey bull, and could scarcely believe our ears when told that he, his mother, and six brothers represented values amounting to about a hundred thousand dollars.

We next visited a great Norman mare, as big as two ordinary horses, and the large, clumsy colt at her side; then admired beautiful stallions with fiery eyes and arching necks; also the superb carriage-horses, and the sleek, strong work animals.  Their stalls were finely finished in Georgia pine.  Soon afterward, Bobsey went wild over the fat little Essex pigs, black as coals, but making the whitest and sweetest of pork.

“Possess your soul in patience, Bobsey,” I said.  “With our barn, I am going to make a sty, and then we will have some pigs.”

I had had no good place for them thus far, and felt that we had attempted enough for beginners.  Moreover, I could not endure to keep pigs in the muddy pens in ordinary use, feeling that we could never eat the pork produced under such conditions.

The milk-house and dairy were examined, and we thought of the oceans of milk that had passed through them.

A visit to “Crusoe Island” entertained the children more than anything else.  A mountain stream had been dammed so as to make an island.  On the surrounding waters were fleets of water-fowl, ducks and geese of various breeds, and, chief in interest, a flock of Canada wild-geese, domesticated.  Here we could look closely at these great wild migrants that, spring and fall, pass and repass high up in the sky, in flocks, flying in the form of a harrow or the two sides of a triangle, meanwhile sending out cries that, in the distance, sound strange and weird.

Leaving my wife and children admiring these birds and their rustic houses on the island, I went with Major Alvord to his offices, and saw the fine scientific appliances for carrying on agricultural experiments designed to extend the range of accurate and practical knowledge.  Not only was the great farm planted and reaped, blood stock grown and improved by careful breeding, but, accompanying all this labor, was maintained a careful system of experiments tending to develop and establish that supreme science—­the successful culture of the soil.  Major Alvord evidently deserved his reputation for doing the work thoroughly and intelligently, and I was glad to think that there were men in the land, like the proprietor of Houghton Farm, who are willing to spend thousands annually in enriching the rural classes by bringing within their reach the knowledge that is power.