Having removed the corn, Mr. Jones plowed the field deeply, and then Merton and I set out the varieties of raspberries which promised best in our locality, making the hills four feet apart in the row, and the rows five feet from one another.  I followed the instructions of my fruit book closely, and cut back the canes of the plants to six inches, and sunk the roots so deep as to leave about four inches of soil above them, putting two or three plants in the hill.  Then over and about the hills we put on the surface of the ground two shovelfuls of compost, finally covering the plants beneath a slight mound of earth.  This would protect them from the severe frost of winter.

These labors and the final picking of the apples brought us to the last week of the month.  Of the smaller fruit, kept clean and sound for the purpose, we reserved enough to make two barrels of cider, of which one should go into vinegar, and the other be kept sweet, for our nut-crackings around the winter fire.  Bobsey’s dream of “millions of bushels” of nuts had not been realized, yet enough had been dried and stored away to satisfy even his eyes.  Not far away an old cider-mill was running steadily, and we soon had the barrels of russet nectar in our cellar.  Then came Saturday, and Merton and Junior were given one more day’s outing in the mountains with their guns.  On the following Monday they trudged off to the nearest public school, feeling that they had been treated liberally, and that brain-work must now begin in earnest.  Indeed from this time forth, for months to come, school and lessons took precedence of everything else, and the proper growing of boys and girls was the uppermost thought.

CHAPTER XLIII

THANKSGIVING DAY

November weather was occasionally so blustering and stormy that I turned schoolmaster in part, to relieve my wife.  During the month, however, were bright, genial days, and others softened by a smoky haze, which gave me opportunity to gather and store a large crop of turnips, to trench in my celery on a dry knoll, and to bury, with their heads downward, all the cabbages for which I could not find a good market.  The children still gave me some assistance, but, lessons over, they were usually permitted to amuse themselves in their own way.  Winnie, however, did not lose her interest in the poultry, and Merton regularly aided in the care of the stock and in looking after the evening supply of fire-wood.  I also spent a part of my time in the wood lot, but the main labor there was reserved for December.  The chief task of the month was the laying down and covering of the tender raspberries; and in this labor Bagley again gave me his aid.