I went back again down the slope with all the joy of a small boy who has suddenly made an older boy recognize his importance. I went at once to the shed, found a rusty saw (for my pruning saws, of course, had not yet come), and descended upon the orchard. I had a couple of bulletins on pruning in my pocket, with pictures of old trees remorselessly headed down. I took a fresh look at the pictures, reread some of the text where I had marked it, and tackled the first tree, carefully repeating to myself: "Remove only a third the first year, remove only a third the first year." This, I decided, quite naturally did not refer to dead wood. By the time I had the dead wood cut out of that first old tree, and all the water spouts removed (as I recalled my grandfather used to call them), which didn't seem necessary for new bearing wood, the poor thing began to look naked. On one side an old water spout or sucker had achieved the dignity of a limb and shot far into the air. I was up in the tree carefully heading this back and out when Bert came driving by with his wagon heaped to overflowing. "Hi!" he called, "yer tryin' ter kill them trees entire!" I got down and came out to the road. "You're a fine man and a true friend, Mr. Temple," said I, "but I'm going to be the doctor for this orchard. A chap's got to have _some_ say for himself, you know." "Well, they ain't much good, anyhow, them trees," said Bert cheerfully. We now fell to unloading the wagon. We opened up the woodsheds and storehouse behind the kitchen, stowed in the barrels of seed potatoes, the fertilizers, the various other seeds, the farm implements, sprayers, and so on. The hotbed frames and sashes were put away for future use, as it was too late to need them now. The horse hoe Bert had not been able to bring on this trip. Next we got my books and furniture into the house or shed, and tired, hot, and dirty, we drove on up the road for dinner. As we passed the upper field, I saw that the ploughing was nearly done. The brown furrows had already lost their gloss, as my hands had already lost their whiteness. "Well, I'm a farmer now!" said I, surveying my soil-caked boots and grimy clothes. "Yer on the way, anyhow," said Bert. "But yer'll have ter cultivate thet field hard, seein's how it oughter hev been ploughed last fall."