Such a summer was that of 1868.
At the old farm our rule was to begin haying the day after the Fourth of July and to push the work as fast as possible, so as to get in most of the crop before dog-days.

That summer I remember we had mowed four acres of grass on the morning of the fifth.

But in the afternoon the sky clouded, the night turned wet, and the sun scarcely showed again for a week.

A day and a half of clear weather followed; but showers came before the sodden swaths could be shaken up and the moisture dried out, and then dull or wet days followed for a week longer; that is, to the twenty-first of the month.

Not a hundredweight of hay had we put into the barn, and the first hay we had mown had spoiled in the field.
At such times the northeastern farmer must keep his patience--if he can.
The old Squire had seen Maine weather for many years and had learned the uselessness of fretting.