He was obliged to give up work with them, and finally came home after turning them loose to help themselves to what hay was left at the camp.
The old Squire did not often concern himself with the affairs of his neighbors, but he went up to the logging camp with Jotham; and when he saw the pitiful condition the cattle were in he remonstrated with him.
"This is too bad," he said.

"You have worked these oxen nearly to death, and you haven't half fed them!" "Wal, my oxen don't have to work any harder than I do!" Jotham replied angrily.

"I ain't able to buy corn for them.

They must work without it." "You only lose by such a foolish course," the old Squire said to him.
But Jotham was not a man who could easily be convinced of his errors.
All his affairs were going badly; arguing with him only made him impatient.
The snow was now so soft that the oxen in their emaciated and weakened condition could not be driven home, and again Jotham left them at the camp to help themselves to fodder.

He promised, however, to send better hay and some potatoes up to them the next day.