Now I want to make a point here: Dardoni was not a scientific farmer. He didn’t know anything about the science of farming. He was not reviving worn-out soil by the use of modern cultivation. He was not applying laboratory methods; he was applying horse sense. He didn’t know any more about farming, or as much perhaps, as every mother’s son of those who had been born and brought up here and their fathers before them. But he did know enough to work his land and he had learned to do that in a country where a single acre means something. The only difference between him and these others was that he got up early in the morning and worked--worked all day long. The one thing in his favor was that he also had a business instinct and appreciated the value of his city market. But principally his success lay in the fact that he used every single advantage and made the most of it. He lived in a large old-fashioned Colonial house which had once been owned by a local politician who had succeeded in being elected to Congress for a single term in Civil War days, and who had never found it necessary to do anything afterwards. His son dissipated his fortune and the place came on the market about the time Dardoni happened along. Dardoni hadn’t improved its appearance any but he had added a big barn and several out houses. His family consisted of a wife and six children, the oldest being Lucia who was eighteen and who had been educated at the local high school, and the youngest being Joe, now three years old. The rest of his household included a half dozen young men, all relatives, to whom he paid an average of ten dollars a week. They were good workers and seldom remained with him longer than three years before buying a place of their own. Through him, directly and indirectly, some forty families had already settled in the village. Personally I found Dardoni a most interesting and agreeable fellow, and the more I saw him the better I liked him. He had become thoroughly Americanized in the sense that he had really made America his home with the expectation of spending his life here and having his sons and daughters live here after him. He had been naturalized and was a heavy taxpayer but he took no interest in the affairs of the town. For one thing his home was his castle and for another his habit of thought was to accept conditions as they were and make the best of them without any attempt to change them. But whenever I suggested any needed improvement, such as in the matter of better roads, I found him alive and willing to do his share. One other incident that winter set me to thinking and made me feel more than ever the need of some radical revolution in this old town. Hadley came to me in January and wanted to borrow fifty dollars. “Show me that you really need it and I’ll let you have it,” I said. “I’ve got a note comin’ due,” he answered. “Who holds it?” I asked. “Dardoni,” he answered. “What did you borrow from him for?” I asked.