he roost Saturday
evenings (you see, we're thinning 'em out; no sense in keeping all of
'em over winter)--as a result, I say, of all this good eating, and the
outdoor life, and the necessity of stirring around a little lively these
days we feel pretty good. And yet we get kind of low in our minds, too.
The harvest is past, the summer is ended. It's gone, the good playtime
when we didn't have to go to school, when the only foot-covering we wore
was a rag around one big toe or the other; the days when we could stay
in swimming all day long except mealtimes; the days of Sabbath-school
picnics and excursions to the Soldiers' Home--it's gone. The harvest
is past, the summer is ended. The green and leafy things have heard the
word, and most of them are taking it pretty seriously, judging by their
looks. But the maples and some more of them, particularly the maples,
with daredevil recklessness, have resolved, as it were, to die with
their boots on, and flame out in such violent and unbelievable colors
that we feel obliged to take testimony in certain outrageous cases,
and file away the exhibits in the Family Bible where nobody will bother
them. The harvest is past, the summer is ended. Rainy days you can see
how played-out and forlorn the whole world looks. But at Fair time, when
the sun shines bright, it appears right cheerful.

It seems to me the Fair lasted three days. One of them was a holiday
from school, I know, and unless I'm wrong, it wasn't on the first day,
because then they were getting the things in, and it wasn't on the last
day, because then they were taking the things out, so it must have been
on the middle day, when everybody went. Charley Wells had both the depot
'buses out with "County FAIR" painted on muslin hung on the sides. The
Cornet Band rode all round town in one, and so on over to the "scene of
the festivities" as the Weekly Examiner very aptly put it, and then both
'buses stood out in front of the American House, waiting for passengers,
with Dinny Enright calling out: "This sway t' the Fair Groun's! Going
RIGHT over!" Only he always waited till he got a good load before he
turned a wheel. (Dinny's foreman at the chair factory now. Did you know
that? Doing fine. Gets $15 a week, and hasn't drunk a drop for nearly
two years.)

Everybody goes the middle day of the Fair, everybody that you ever did
know or hear tell of. You'll be going along, kind of half-listening to
the man selling Temperance Bitters,