But when thundershowers or occasional fogs or heavy dew came it was always open to us to put the grass through the haymaker.

In a wet season it gave us a delightful feeling of independence.

"Let it rain," the old Squire used to say with a smile.
"We've got the haymaker." Late in September the first fall after we built the haymaker, there came a heavy gale that blew off fully one half the apple crop--Baldwins, Greenings, Blue Pearmains and Spitzenburgs.

Since we could barrel none of the windfalls as number one fruit, that part of our harvest, more than a thousand bushels, seemed likely to prove a loss.

The old Squire would never make cider to sell; and we young folks at the farm, particularly Theodora and Ellen, disliked exceedingly to dry apples by hand.
But there lay all those fair apples.