acres is different soil from that which you kick up on your neighbor's land—different because it is yours. Another man's tree, another man's rock heap, is a simple tree or a mere rock heap, as the case may be; and nothing more. But your tree and your rock heap assume a peculiar value, a special interest, a unique and individual picturesqueness. 

 And oh, the thrill that permeates your being when you see the first furrow of brown earth turned up in your field, or the first shovel-load of sod lifted from the spot where your home is to stand! And oh, the first walk through the budding woods in the springtime! And the first spray of trailing arbutus! And the first spray of trailing poison ivy! And the first mortgage! And the first time you tread on one of those large slick brown worms, designed, inside and out, like a chocolate éclair! 

 After all, it's the only life! But on the way to it there are pitfalls and obstacles and setbacks, and steadily mounting monthly pay rolls. 

 As shall presently develop. 

  

  

 CHAPTER IV. HAPPY DAYS FOR MAJOR GLOOM 

Soon after we moved to the country we became eligible to join the Westchester County Despair Association, on account of an artesian well—or, to be exact, on account of three artesian wells, complicated with several springs. 

S

 I spoke some pages back of the Westchester County Despair Association, which was founded by George Creel and which has a large membership in our immediate section. As I stated then, any city-bred man who turns amateur farmer and moves into our neighborhood, and who in developing his country place has a streak of hard labor, is eligible to join this organization. And sooner or later—but as a general thing sooner—all the urbanites who settle up our way do join. Some day we shall be strong enough to club in and elect our own county officers on a ticket pledged to run a macadam highway past the estate of each member. 

 Our main claim to qualification was based upon the water question; and yet at the outset it appeared to us that lack of water would be the very least of our troubles. When we took title to our abandoned farm, and for the first time explored the bramble-grown valley leading up from the proposed site of our house 

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