ght in assuming that he could manage the team, and could keep
the little farm up, not to its full production under his father, but to
a crop large enough to make them comfortable. Every little while there
had to be a consultation. Mr. Snyder came down one day to offer him
forty dollars a month and his board, if he would go off on a surveying
party and carry chain for the engineers. It would be in a good line for
promotion. Forty dollars a month to send home to Fanny was a great
temptation. And George and Fanny put an extra pine-knot on the fire,
after the children had gone to bed, that they might talk it over. But
George declined the proposal, with many thanks to Mr. Snyder. He said to
him, "that, if he went away, the whole household would be very much
weakened. The boys could not carry on the farm alone, and would have to
hire out. He thought they were too young for that. After all, Mr.
Snyder, 'Love is the whole.'" And Mr. Snyder agreed with him.

Then, as a few years passed by, after another long council, in which
another pine-knot was sacrificed on the hearth, and in which Walter
assisted with George and Fanny, it was agreed that Walter should "hire
out." He had "a chance," as they said, to go over to the Stacy Brothers,
in the next county. Now the Stacy Brothers had the greatest stock farm
in all that part of Illinois. They had to hire a great deal of help, and
it was a great question to George and Fanny whether poor Walter might
not get more harm than good there. But they told Walter perfectly
frankly their doubts and their hopes. And he said boldly, "Never you
fear me. Do you think I am such a fool as to forget? Do I not know that
'Love is the whole'? Shall I ever forget who taught us so?" And so it
was determined that he should go.

Yes, and he went. The Stacys' great establishment was different indeed
from the little cabin he had left. But the other boys there, and the men
he met, Norwegians, Welshmen, Germans, Yankees, all sorts of people, all
had hearts just like his heart. And a helpful boy, honest as a clock and
brave as St. Paul, who really tried to serve every one as he found
opportunity, made friends on the great stock farm just as he had in the
corn-room at the end of the wood-house. And once a month, when their
wages were paid, he was able to send home the lion's share of his to
Fanny, in letters which every month were written a little better, and
seemed a little more easy for him to write. And when Th