"Everything has been greased for us this summer," said Thompson. "We got a bumper crop of hay, and the oats and corn are fine! I allow you've got fifty-five bushels of oats to the acre in those shocks, and the corn looks like it stood for more than seventy. We sold nine more calves the end of June, for $104. Mr. Tom must have a lot of money for you, for in August we sold the finest bunch of shoates you ever saw,--312 of them. They were not extra heavy, but they were fine as silk. Mr. Tom said they netted $4.15 per hundred, and they averaged a little over 260 pounds. I went down with them, and the buyers tumbled over each other to get them. I was mighty proud of the bunch, and brought back a check for $3407." "Good for you, Thompson! That's the best sale yet." "Some of the heifers will be coming in the last of this month or the first of next. Don't you want to get rid of those five scrub cows?" "Better wait six weeks, and then you may sell them. Do you know where you can place them?" "Jackson was looking at them a few days ago, and said he would give $35 apiece for them; but they are worth more." "Not for us, Thompson, and not for him, either, if he saw things just right. They're good for scrubs; but they don't pay well enough for us, and if he wants them he can have them at that price about the middle of October." The credit account for the second quarter of 1898 stood:-- 23 calves . . . . . $270.00 Eggs . . . . . . 637.00 Butter . . . . . . 1314.00 Total. . . . . . $2221.00 CHAPTER LXIV COMFORT ME WITH APPLES September added a new item to our list of articles sold; small, indeed, but the beginning of the fourth and last product of our factory farm,--fruit from our newly planted orchards. The three hundred plum trees in the chicken runs gave a moderate supply for the colony, and the dwarf-pear trees yielded a small crop; but these were hardly included in our scheme. I expected to be able, by and by, to sell $200 or $300 worth of plums; but the chief income from fruit would come from the fifty acres of young apple orchards. I hope to live to see the time when these young orchards will bring me at least $5 a year for each tree; and if I round out my expectancy (as the life-insurance people figure it), I may see them do much better. In the interim the day of small things must not be despised. In our climate the Yellow Transparent and the Duchess do not ripen until early September, and I was therefore at home in time to gather and market the little crop from my six hundred trees. The apples were carefully picked, for they do not bear handling well, and the perfect ones were placed in half-bushel boxes and sent to my city grocer. Not one defective apple was packed, for I was determined that the Four Oaks stencil should be as favorably known for fruit as for other products.