t before school in winter he shovels paths;
in summer he turns the grindstone. He knows where there are lots of
winter-greens and sweet flag-root, but instead of going for them, he is
to stay in-doors and pare apples and stone raisins and pound something
in a mortar. And yet, with his mind full of schemes of what he would
like to do, and his hands full of occupations, he is an idle boy who has
nothing to busy himself with but school and chores! He would gladly do
all the work if somebody else would do the chores, he thinks, and yet I
doubt if any boy ever amounted to anything in the world, or was of much
use as a man, who did not enjoy the advantages of a liberal education in
the way of chores.

A boy on a farm is nothing without his pets; at least a dog, and
probably rabbits, chickens, ducks, and guinea-hens. A guinea-hen suits a
boy. It is entirely useless, and makes a more disagreeable noise than
a Chinese gong. I once domesticated a young fox which a neighbor had
caught. It is a mistake to suppose the fox cannot be tamed. Jacko was a
very clever little animal, and behaved, in all respects, with propriety.
He kept Sunday as well as any day, and all the ten commandments that he
could understand. He was a very graceful playfellow, and seemed to have
an affection for me. He lived in a wood-pile in the dooryard, and when I
lay down at the entrance to his house and called him, he would come out
and sit on his tail and lick my face just like a grown person. I taught
him a great many tricks and all the virtues. That year I had a large
number of hens, and Jacko went about among them with the most perfect
indifference, never looking on them to lust after them, as I could see,
and never touching an egg or a feather. So excellent was his reputation
that I would have trusted him in the hen-roost in the dark without
counting the hens. In short, he was domesticated, and I was fond of him
and very proud of him, exhibiting him to all our visitors as an example
of what affectionate treatment would do in subduing the brute instincts.
I preferred him to my dog, whom I had, with much patience, taught to go
up a long hill alone and surround the cows, and drive them home from the
remote pasture. He liked the fun of it at first, but by and by he seemed
to get the notion that it was a "chore," and when I whistled for him to
go for the cows, he would turn tail and run the other way, and the more
I whistled and threw stones at him, the faster