Hiram The Young Farmer | Page 7

body down so.
"Here's my uncle--my poor mother's only brother and about the only
relative I've got in the world--here's Uncle Jeptha down with the grip,
or suthin', and goodness knows if he'll ever get over it. And I can't
leave to go and see him die peaceable."
"Does he live far from here?" asked Hiram, politely, although he had
no particular reason for being interested in Uncle Jeptha.
"He lives on a farm out Scoville way. He's lived there most all his life.
He used to make a right good living off'n that farm, too; but it's run
down some now.
"The last time I was out there, two years ago, he was just keepin' along

and that's all. And now I expect he's dying, without a chick or child of
his own by him," and she burst out crying again, the tears sprinkling the
square of toast into which she continued to bite.
Of course, it was ridiculous. A middle-aged woman weeping and eating
toast and drinking strong boiled tea is not a romantic picture. But as
Hiram climbed to his room he wished with all his heart that he could
help Mrs. Atterson.
He wasn't the only person in the world who seemed to have got into a
wrong environment--lots of people didn't fit right into their
circumstances in life.
"We're square pegs in round holes--that's what we are," mused Hiram.
"That's what I am. I wish I was out of it. I wish I was back on the
farm."

CHAPTER III
A DREARY DAY
Daniel Dwight's Emporium, the general store was called, and it was in
a very populous part of the town of Crawberry. Old Daniel was a driver,
he seldom had clerks enough to handle his trade properly, and nobody
could suit him. As general helper and junior clerk, Hiram Strong had
remained with the concern longer than any other boy Daniel had hired
in years.
When the early Monday morning rush was over, and there was
moment's breathing space, Hiram went to the door to re-arrange the
trays of vegetables which were his particular care. Hiram had a knack
of making a bank of the most plebeian vegetable and salads look like
the display-window of a florist.
Now the youth looked out upon a typical city street, the dwellings on
either side being four and five story tenement houses, occupied by

artisans and mechanics.
A few quarreling children paddled sticks, or sailed chip boats, in the
gutters.
"Come on, now! Get a move on you, Hi!" sounded the raucous voice of
Daniel Dwight the elder, behind him in the store.
Hiram went at his task with neither interest nor energy.
All about him the houses and the street were grimy and depressing. It
had been a gray and murky morning; but overhead a patch of sky was
as blue as June. He suddenly saw a flock of pigeons wheeling above the
tunnel of the street, and the boy's heart leaped at the sight.
He longed for freedom. He wished he could fly, up, up, up above the
housetops and the streets, like those feathered fowl.
He knew he was stagnating here in this dingy store; the deadly
sameness of his life chafed him sorely.
"I'd take another job if I could find one," he muttered, stirring up the
bunches of yellowing radish leaves and trying to make them look fresh.
"And Old Daniel is likely to give me a chance to hunt a job pretty
sudden--the way he talks. But if Dan, Junior, told him what happened
yesterday, I wonder the old gentleman hasn't been after me with a sharp
stick."
From somewhere--out of the far-distant open country where it had been
breathing all night the quivering pines, and brown swamps, and the
white and gray checkered fields that would soon be upturned by the
plowshares--a vagrant wind wandered into the city street.
The lingering, but faint perfume wafted here from God's open world to
die in this man-made town inspired in the youth thoughts and desires
that had been struggling within him for expression for days past.
"I know what I want," said Hiram Strong, aloud. "I want to get back to

the land!"
The progress of the day was not inducive to a hopeful outlook for
Hiram. When closing time came he was heartily sick of the business of
storekeeping, if he never had been before.
And when he dragged himself home to the boarding house, he found
the atmosphere there as dreary as the street itself. The boarders were
grumpy and Mrs. Atterson was in a tearful state again.
Hiram could not stay in his room. It was a narrow, cold place at the end
of the back hall at the top of the house. There was a little, painted
bureau in