mmunity. Near here are hundreds of
acres o' land goin' to waste. Buy it an' make it produce--wool,
meat, flax, grains, an' vegetables. Start a market an' a small
factory here, an' satisfy yourself as to what is a just price for
the necessaries of life. If the tradesmen are overchargin' us,
they'll have to reduce prices. Put your brain an' money into it;
make it a business. At least, you'll demonstrate what it ought to
cost to live here in New England. If it's so much that the average
Yankee can't afford it by honest work--if we must all be lawyers or
bankers or brokers or graspin' middle-men in order to live--let's
start a big Asylum for the Upright, an' give 'em a chance to die
comfortably. But it isn't so. I can raise potatoes right here for
thirty cents a bushel, as good as those you pay forty cents a peck
for at Sam Henshaw's. You'll set an example of inestimable value
in this republic of ours. Dan has begun the good work, an'
demonstrated that it will pay.'

"'It's a good idea--I'm with you,' he said. 'If we can get the
boys an' girls to marry while the bloom is on the rye, it's worth
while, an' I wouldn't wonder if indirectly we'd increase the crop
of Yankees an' the yield of happiness to the acre.'

"'Bill, you're a good fellow,' I said. 'You only need to be
reminded of your duty--you're like many another man.'

"'And I'll think you the best fellow in the world if you'll let us
keep those kids. We enjoy them. We've been having a lot of fun
lately.'

"'I can't do that,' I said, 'but I'll keep 'em here until we can
get some more. There are thousands of them as beautiful, as
friendless, as promising as these were.'

"'I wish you could let us have these,' he urged. 'We wouldn't
adopt them, probably, but we'd do our best for them--our very best.'

"'I can't,' I answered.

"'Why?'

"'Because they've got hold of my old heart--that's why. I hadn't
looked for that, Bill, but the little cusses have conquered _me_.'

"'Great God!' he exclaimed. 'I hadn't thought of that. And my
wife told me this morning that she loves that three-year-old boy as
dearly as she loves me. They've all won her heart. What shall I
do?'

"'Let me think it over,' I said, an' shook his hand an' left, an' I
knew that I was likely to indulge in the makin' of history right
away.

"I went home an' sat down an' wrote the best brief of my career--an
appeal to the Supreme Court o' this planet--a woman's heart. It
was