The First Four Years

by Laura Ingalls Wilder

  It went across the country, leaving a blackened prairie behind until it reached the river, and then the wind went down with the sun. There it stopped, somewhere between fifty and one hundred miles from where it began. There was nothing to do but to re-seed the fields, for the seed was blown away or buried in the drifts of soil around the edges of the plowed land.

  So Manly bought more seed wheat and oats at the elevator in town, and at last the seeding was finished.

  Then the sheep were sheared and the selling of the wool cheered them all, for wool was worth twenty-five cents a pound and the sheep averaged ten pounds of wool apiece. Each sheep had paid for itself and fifty cents more with its wool alone. By the last of May, the lambs had all arrived, and there were so many twins that the flock was more than doubled. Lambing time was a busy time, both day and night, for the sheep must be watched and the lambs cared for. Among the hundred sheep there were only five ewes who could not or would not care for their lambs. These five lambs were brought into the house and warmed and fed milk from a bottle and raised by hand.

  Rose spent her time playing in the yard now, and Laura tried to watch her as the little pink sunbonnet went busily bobbing here and there. Once Laura was just in time to see Rose struggle upright in the tub of water that stood under the pump spout; and with water running down her face and from her spread fingers at each side, Rose said without a whimper, “I want to go to bed.”

  One afternoon, just after Rose had been washed and combed and dressed in fresh, clean clothes, Laura heard her shrieking with laughter, and going to the door, saw her running from the barn. “O-o-o,” Rose called. “Barnum did just like this.” And down she dropped in the dusty path, and with arms and legs waving, rolled over and over on the ground. She was such a comical sight that Laura could only laugh too, in spite of the wreck of the clean dress, the dirt on her face and hands and the dust in her hair.

  Another time, Laura missed her from the yard and with fear in her heart ran to the barn door. Barnum was lying down in his stall and Rose sat on his side, kicking her heels against his stomach.

  Carefully, so as not to disturb his body, the horse raised his head and looked at Laura and she was positive Barnum winked one eye. After that Laura tried to watch Rose closer, but she couldn’t bear to keep her in the house with the spring so fresh and gay outside. The work must be done between moments of looking at Rose through door and window.

  Once again she was just in time to see Rose miss an accident by a narrow margin. She had evidently gone farther afield than usual and was just coming back around the corner of the barn. Then Kelpie, Trixy’s latest colt, came running around the same corner with another colt chasing her. Kelpie saw Rose too late to turn, too late to stop, so she put an extra spring in her muscles and sailed over Rose’s head, while Susan, the other colt, proving, as she always tried to, that she could do anything Kelpie did, followed behind, going neatly over Rose’s head.

  Then Laura was there, and snatching Rose up, carried her to the house. Rose had not been frightened, but Laura was, and she felt rather sick. How could she ever keep up the daily work and still go through what was ahead. There was so much to be done and only herself to do it. She hated the farm and the stock and the smelly lambs, the cooking of food and the dirty dishes. Oh, she hated it all, and especially the debts that must be paid whether she could work or not.

  But Rose hadn’t been hurt and now she was wanting a bottle to feed one of the pet lambs. Laura would do the same; she’d be darned if she’d go down and stay down and howl about it. What was it someone had said in that story she read the other day? “The wheel goes round and round and the fly on the top’ll be the fly on the bottom after a while.” Well, she didn’t care what became of the fly, but she did wish the bottom one could crawl up a little way. She was tired of waiting for the wheel to turn. And the farmers were the ones at the bottom, she didn’t care what Manly said. If the weather wasn’t right they had nothing, but whether they had anything or not they must find it somehow to pay interest and taxes and a profit to the businessmen in town on everything they bought, and they must buy to live. There was that note at the bank Manly had to give to get the money to buy the grain for the re-seeding after the wind storm. He was paying three percent a month on that note. That was where the wool money would have to go. No one could pay such interest as that. But there was all the summer’s living before another harvest. Her head spun when she tried to figure it out.

  Would there be enough money to pay it? Their share of the wool money was only $125, and how much was that note? A bushel to the acre of seed wheat and $1 a bushel for the seed: $100. Sixty acres of oats and two bushels to the acre of seed: 120 bushels. At 42¢ a bushel, that would be $50.40. Added to the $100 for wheat the note must be for $150.40.

  It seemed to make a great difference in the price whether they were selling wheat or buying it. To be sure, as Manly said, there were freight charges out and back and elevator charges. But it didn’t seem fair even so.

  Anyway, they should pay the note at the bank as soon as possible. If they had to do so they could buy a book of coupons at the grocery store and give a note for that at only two percent a month. It was rather nice that the merchants had got those books with coupons from 25¢ to $5 in twenty five-or fifty-dollar books. It was convenient and it was cheaper interest. They had not bought any yet, and she had hoped they would not have to. Somehow the thought of it hurt her pride worse than a note at the bank. But pride must not stand in the way of a saving of one percent. She wouldn’t think about it anymore. Manly would do as he thought best about it. It was his business and he wasn’t worrying.

  As spring turned the corner into summer, the rains stopped and the grains began to suffer for lack of moisture. Every morning Manly looked anxiously for signs of rain, and seeing none, went on about his work.

  And then the hot winds came. Every day the wind blew strongly from the south. It felt on Laura’s cheek like the hot air from the oven when she opened the door on baking day. For a week, the hot winds blew, and when they stopped, the young wheat and oats were dried, brown and dead.

  The trees on the ten acres were nearly all killed too. Manly decided there was no hope of replanting to have the trees growing to fulfill the law for the claims.

  It was time to prove up and he could not. There was only one way to save the land. He could file on it as a pre-emption. If he did that he must prove up in six months and pay the United States $1.25 an acre. The continuous residence would be no trouble, for they were already there. The two hundred dollars cash at the end of the six months would be hard to find, but there was no other way. If Manly did not file on the land someone else would, for if he failed to prove up, the land would revert to the government and be open to settlement by anyone.

  So Manly pre-empted the land. There was one advantage: Manly did not have to work among the trees anymore. Here and there one had survived and those Manly mulched with manure and straw from the barn. The mulching would help to keep the land moist underneath and so help the trees to live. The cottonwood tree before Laura’s pantry window, being north of the house, had been protected from the full force of the hot winds and from the sun. It was growing in spite of the drought. Laura loved all its green branches that waved just the other side of the glass as she prepared food on the broad shelf before the window and washed the dishes there.

  No rain followed the windstorm, but often after that cyclone clouds would form in the sky and then drift away. It was cyclone weather. One sultry afternoon, Manly was in town and Peter gone with the sheep. Laura finished her work and she and Rose went out in the yard. Rose was playing with her play dishes under the cottonwood tree on the shady side of the house while Laura idly watched the clouds more from force of habit than a real fear, for she had become used to the danger of storms.

  The wind had been from the south strongly in the morning, but had died down, and now Laura noticed clouds piling up in the north. There was a solid bank of blackness and before it cloud
s rolled. Now the wind rose, blowing hard from the south, and watching, Laura saw the dreaded funnel-shaped cloud drop its point toward the ground from the wall of black. The light turned a greenish color, and seizing Rose, Laura ran with her into the house. She quickly shut all the doors and windows before she ran into the pantry to look again, from its window, toward the storm. The point of the funnel had touched the ground and she could see the dust rise up. It passed over a field of new breaking and the strips of sod were lifted up out of sight. Then it struck an old haystack. There was a blur and the stack disappeared. The funnel-shaped cloud was moving toward the house. Laura lifted the trap door in the pantry floor and taking Rose with her went quickly through it into the cellar, dropping the door shut behind her. Holding Rose tightly, she cowered close in a corner in the darkness and listened to the wind shriek above them, expecting every second that the house would be lifted and carried away.

  But nothing happened, and after what seemed hours but was really only a few minutes she heard Manly’s voice calling.

  Lifting the cellar door Laura carried Rose up the stairs. She found Manly standing by his team in the yard, watching the storm as it passed eastward less than a quarter of a mile north from where they stood. It went on blowing away buildings and haystacks, but only a sprinkle of rain fell on the parched earth. Manly, in town, had seen the storm cloud and hurried home so Laura and Rose should not be alone.

  There were no more cyclones, but the weather continued hot and dry, and August the fifth was especially warm.

  In the afternoon Manly sent Peter to bring Laura’s Ma, and at four o’clock he sent Peter again to town, this time on his running pony for the doctor. But their son was born before the doctor could get there. Laura was proud of the baby, but strangely she wanted Rose more than anything. Rose had been kept away from her mother for the sake of quiet, and a hired girl was taking indifferent care of her. When Laura insisted, the girl brought Rose in, a shy little thing with a round baby face herself, to see her little brother.

  After that Laura rested easily and soon could take an interest in the sounds from outside, knowing well, from them, what was going on. One day Peter came to the bedroom door to bid her good morning. He had stuck a long feather in his hatband and as it nodded above his good natured face he looked so comical that Laura had to laugh.

  Then she heard him talking to his pony and calling his dog and knew he was taking the sheep out. He was singing:

  “Oh, my! but ain’t she handsome!

  Dear me! she’s the sweetest name!

  Ky! yi! to love her is my dooty,

  My pretty, little, posy-pink

  Jenny Jerusha Jane.”

  And Peter and the sheep were gone until night.

  Then she heard Rose playing with her pet lambs. They were so large now that three of them went out with the sheep, but the two smallest still hung around the back door and yard to be fed and played with. Often they pushed Rose over, but it was all in the game. Then she heard the hired girl refuse to give Rose a piece of bread and butter, speaking crossly to her, and that Laura could not bear. Calling from her bed, she settled the question in Rose’s favor. Laura felt she must hurry and get her strength back. Rose shouldn’t be meanly treated by any hired girl; and besides, there were the wages of five dollars a week. They must be stopped as soon as possible for the time would come soon enough to pay a note.

  Laura was doing her own work again one day three weeks later when the baby was taken with spasms, and he died so quickly that the doctor was too late.

  To Laura, the days that followed were mercifully blurred. Her feelings were numbed and she only wanted to rest—to rest and not to think. But the work must go on. Haying had begun and Manly, Peter, and the herd boy must be fed. Rose must be cared for and all the numberless little chores attended to. The hay was going to be short of what was needed, for it had been so dry that even the wild prairie grass had not grown well. There were more sheep and cattle and horses to feed, so there must be more hay instead of less.

  Manly and Peter were putting up hay on some land two miles away a week later. Laura started the fire for supper in the kitchen stove. The summer fuel was old, tough, long, slough hay, and Manly had brought an armful into the kitchen and put it down near the stove.

  After lighting a fire and putting the tea kettle on, Laura went back into the other part of the house, shutting the kitchen door.

  When she opened it again, a few minutes later, the whole inside of the kitchen was ablaze: the ceiling, the hay, and the floor underneath and wall behind.

  As usual, a strong wind was blowing from the south, and by the time the neighbors arrived to help, the whole house was in flames. Manly and Peter had seen the fire and come on the run with the team and load of hay. Laura had thrown one bucket of water on the fire in the hay, and then, knowing she was not strong enough to work the pump for more water, taking the little deed-box from the bedroom and Rose by the hand, she ran out and dropped on the ground in the little half-circle drive before the house. Burying her face on her knees she screamed and sobbed, saying over and over, “Oh, what will Manly say to me?” And there Manly found her and Rose, just as the roof was falling in.

  The neighbors had done what they could but the fire was so fierce that they were unable to go into the house.

  Mr. Sheldon had gone in through the pantry window and thrown all the dishes out through it toward the trunk of the little cottonwood tree, so the silver wedding knives and forks and spoons rolled up in their wrappers had survived. Nothing else had been saved from the fire except the deed-box, a few work clothes, three sauce dishes from the first Christmas dishes, and the oval glass bread plate around the margin of which were the words, “Give us this day our daily bread.”

  And the young cottonwood stood by the open cellar hole, scorched and blackened and dead. After the fire Laura and Rose stayed at her Pa’s for a few days. The top of Laura’s head had been blistered from the fire and something was wrong with her eyes. The doctor said that heat had injured the nerves and so she rested for a little at her old home, but at the end of the week Manly came for her.

  Mr. Sheldon needed a housekeeper and gave Laura and Manly houseroom and use of his furniture in return for board for himself and his brother. Now Laura was so busy she had no time for worry, caring for her family of three men, Peter, and Rose, through the rest of the haying and while Manly and Peter built a long shanty, three rooms in a row, near the ruins of their house. It was built of only one thickness of boards and tar-papered on the outside, but it was built tightly, and being new, it was very snug and quite warm. September nights were growing cool when the new house was ready and moved into. The twenty-fifth of August had passed unnoticed and the year of grace was ended.

  Was farming a success?

  “It depends on how you look at it,” Manly said when Laura asked him the question.

  They had had a lot of bad luck, but anyone was liable to have bad luck even if he weren’t a farmer. There had been so many dry seasons now that surely next year would be a good crop year. They had a lot of stock. The two oldest colts would be ready to sell in the spring. Some newcomer to the land would be sure to want them, and there were the younger colts coming on. There were a couple of steers ready to sell now. Oh, they’d likely bring twelve or thirteen dollars apiece.

  And there were the sheep, twice as many as last year to keep, and some lambs and the six old sheep to sell.

  By building the new house so cheaply, they had money left to help pay for proving up on the land.

  Maybe sheep were the answer. “Everything will be all right, for it all evens up in time. You’ll see,” Manly said, as he started for the barn. As Laura watched him go, she thought, yes, everything is evened up in time. The rich have their ice in summer, but the poor get theirs in winter, and ours is coming soon.

  Winter was coming on, and in sight of the ruins of their comfortable little house they were making a fresh start with nothing. Their possessions would no more than bal
ance their debts, if that. If they could find the two hundred dollars to prove up, the land would be theirs, anyway, and Manly thought he could.

  It would be a fight to win out in this business of farming, but strangely she felt her spirit rising for the struggle.

  The incurable optimism of the farmer who throws his seed on the ground every spring, betting it and his time against the elements, seemed inextricably to blend with the creed of her pioneer forefathers that “it is better farther on”—only instead of farther on in space, it was farther on in time, over the horizon of the years ahead instead of the far horizon of the west. She was still the pioneer girl and she could understand Manly’s love of the land through its appeal to herself.

  “Oh, well,” Laura sighed, summing up her idea of the situation in a saying of her Ma’s:

  “We’ll always be farmers, for what is bred in the bone will come out in the flesh.” And then Laura smiled, for Manly was coming from the barn and he was singing:

  “You talk of the mines of Australia,

  They’ve wealth in red gold, without doubt;