I learned
that lesson at Fordham thirty years ago.
Up the railroad track I went, and at night hired out to a truck-farmer,
with the freedom of his hay-mow for my sleeping quarters. But when I
had hoed cucumbers three days in a scorching sun, till my back ached as
if it were going to break, and the farmer guessed that he would call it
square for three shillings, I went farther. A man is not necessarily a
philanthropist, it seems, because he tills the soil. I did not hire
out again. I did odd jobs to earn my meals, and slept in the fields at
night, still turning over in my mind how to get across the sea. An
incident of those wanderings comes to mind while I am writing. They
were carting in hay, and when night came on, somewhere about Mount
Vernon, I gathered an armful of wisps that had fallen from the loads,
and made a bed for myself in a wagon-shed by the roadside. In the
middle of the night I was awakened by a loud outcry. A fierce light
shone in my face. It was the lamp of a carriage that had been driven
into the shed. I was lying between the horse's feet unhurt. A
gentleman sprang from the carriage, more frightened than I, and bent
over me.
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