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Show We had had only Shorthornns before that~-red,or white or roan- mostly roan;so that Jerseys were of great interest. I remember we child-em in a sroup on the porch with a dish of skim milk having tablespoons full,turn about,and sayins it tastei differently-like boiled wheat,we thot. It was old llige I learned to milk. In the summer of 1889) papa and Geo.were up at the farm in Franklin Co.setting in the harvest. I had gone also the year before. It was arranged that a neighbor should do the milking but he left town without gettins a substitute. We had to have milk for the baby Glover and the other children,so I did my best. Poor old Nige would stand for an hour and a half before she concluded that was enough,but I learned to milk before the summer was over. She and her decendants were our herd after we m4ved to Spencer St. but finally ahe got too old to be useful;and it was decided to m&ie her the winter meat .She was so rawboned that we tried to fatten her up 1st, but she didn't look a bit fatter when the butcher took her away.Such fat meat I never SHWI We tried out sallons of tallow. Some of the meat was corned but most of it was buried in snow in a big box back of the house. It was no fun to dig out the pieces and thaw them in cold water before cooking. Ansie wouldn't touch a mouthful. Said"I'd as soon eat my Grands* mother! "She didn't even use the milk gravy made with the fat. I protested, "But, Angie,it isn't Nige anymore now, It is just meat."But she could-n't see it so. WTe enjoyed any errand that took us onto the prairie. WhenI first remember,there was a wide v&4w south of the 320 A. farm,A mile away we could see Mr. Morgans house. He had a small grove started. Papa planted a great manny trees-a sroup of soft maples near the house;an apple orchard north north .of it with a windbreak of three rows of cotten woods at the north side,and four rows of mixed elm,maple,and boxelder at the west of it; and across the raeddow at the west edge of the farm,quite an extensive belt between the railroad and the road. In order to put the house on hightest ground,it was back a couple of hundred yards from the road,which was on low ground along the creek. The driveway down from the barnyard had a trimed osage hedge on the east side and a row of willows on the other. Prairie sod is tough but the horses feet and wagoawheels cut thru and wore gown the ruts: so that 0 remember them as ten inches deep,with a ridge in the middle still topped with prairie flowers. After After we moved to town I had a very vivid dream that comes to me when I think of that hedge. I dreamed Geo. and I were horses,racing down the hill toward the sate,and tossing our mane about and what fun it was.! All the farmers around pastured their horses and cattle on the prarie and at nisht we had/to drive those of ours home,Once when we were a bit ^arly the cows were clear over near Mr. Morgans house-a half mile-and as we crossed the rolling hills toward them I nearly stepped into a prairie chickens nest. The eg^s were not so big as tame hens and the nest in a hollow,with some dry grass for lining,was quite full. No trees except those recently planted were in sight,but several miles away at Iowa River,were natural woods. The moist strips between the hills-sloughs-had quite tall grass.I remember ridins across one in a lumber wagon and seeing the blue-joint grass above my head as we sat on the seat;but on the pastured prairie evensloush srass was often not more than 2 ft. tall and in dry summpfs the prairie srasses less than one. 3ut the flowers! Hillsides in Spring Dale lavendar with prairie violets;then patches of phlox,sweet william, crimson,pink,whitewith purple eye; yellow star grass;deep oranse puccoon £all crimson spikes of biasing star or hiatris;dusty milkweed and bright oranse butter-fly weed or pleussy root; dull yellow lousewort-bura-ble bee weed:silvery silky grapsoralwa with tiny dark blue peashaped flowers;shoestrins dusty sray foliase and brilliant purple and sold spikes of bloom;pinkish balm and wild bergamont;thimble flower,red ana white; Grays purple clover;wild roses of every shade of pink;brown eyed Susans and yellow cone,which had a yellow eenterja purple cone or nigger head from the black head left after the pink petals faded. |