did it ever happen?"

"I believe there is some record of such a thing, but my private opinion
is that the draining was done by some stingy owner who had little use
for a lake and thought he saw an opportunity to secure twenty acres of
good bottom land. Probably he thought he was a great economist. But as a
matter of fact he did a very foolish thing. This prairie country is
poverty stricken so far as lakes and woods are concerned. In the town I
live in there are many wealthy men who take their families long
distances every summer in order to reach a lake. A twenty acre lake is
only a pool in the lake country, but out here it is worth more than a
gold mine."

"And you think if you could make it a lake again you could sell it to
these wealthy people?"

"I know I could. I know an athletic club in town that would pay a big
price for it. There are many of our wealthy men who would pay five
hundred dollars for a hundred foot frontage, so that they might put up
bungalows for summer residences. My plan is to find those choked
springs, bring them again into their old channels, and convert the
Hollow into a lake. Mr. Ryder, our farmer friend who now owns this farm,
doesn't think much of my plan, and won't have anything to do with it any
more than to sell me options on the land and the privilege of cutting
this excellent stand of corn, and that is as far as my arrangements with
him extend."

"And what is the first thing for me to do?" asked Glen.

"Excellent talk, that, my boy. What would you advise as to the first
thing."

"I suppose you can't do much exploring while the corn stands. It should
be cut."

"It should, and it must be cut in the old fashioned way. Did you ever
cut corn in the old fashioned way?"

"You mean with a corn-knife. I helped cut a hundred acres at the school
last fall."

"Well, there's only about five acres of this land in corn so the
contract is smaller. The first thing is to borrow a corn-knife of our
friend Ryder."

Glen's attack upon the field of corn began that very day. A year ago, at
the reform school, he had hated this work; now, he enjoyed it. The corn
was higher than his head, and the heavy stalks, piled on his left arm as
he cut with his right, wore through his shirt and made an attempt upon
his skin, but he did not complain. He was doing a work into which his
heart entered, and so he was enjoying it.

Spencer could give no help at all. There are people, with like
misfortune to his,