I worked, for a while, four hours every day in the week. Cedar was found competent to act as first assistant to the president—in the cow-stable. Care of the cow being regarded as a disagreeable duty, Dr. Ripley took it upon himself, just as Mrs. Ripley took the scrubbing of the kitchen floor. Mrs. Ripley had other little matters to look after, general oversight of the girls, teaching Greek, entertaining distinguished guests, writing clever musical plays for the Festal Series, etc., but she kept the floor clean all the same.
In my honorable office I succeeded Nathaniel Hawthorne. The president and Cedar arose at 5 A. M., fed and milked 18 or 20 cows, and cleared up the stable. We bathed, dressed and breakfasted at 8 A. M. At 9 A. M. Dr. Ripley was in his office and I in the school room. In the evening two hours more were given to the cows. I liked the work, liked the cows, and especially liked to be with Dr. Ripley. His flattering report that Cedar could milk like a streak secured for me the maximum wage, ten cents an hour, so that, at twelve years of age or thereabouts I was earning nearly enough to pay the cost of board and lodging.
The milkers were necessarily late at breakfast and supper and these meals we took with the waiters, the pleasantest company in the dining room. Dr. and Mrs. Ripley were charming table companions and the bright girls were merry as happy children. Perhaps Cedar did not fill Hawthorne’s place quite so well at table as in the stable, but there were no intimations given to that effect. Making the most of the present moment was in order. Looking backward was not.
Nathaniel Hawthorne was one of the first members to join the community and was one of the first to leave it. He thought he could do better than to spend his time and energy in digging over a manure-pile with a dung fork. Do better he certainly did, for himself and for the world.
I have been asked more than once if the illustrious, poetic and romantic Hawthorne did actually feed the pigs at Brook Farm. My answer is that I do not know as I was not there during his residency, but I think he did not, my reason for thinking he did not being that there were no pigs to feed. The suggestion may have arisen from a passage in his Notes when he speaks of going out with Rev. John Allen to buy a litter of pigs. Minot Pratt, our head farmer, had some sort of interest in a place across the brook, and there may have been a pig-pen there, but if there was one on our place it was unknown to sharp-eyed youngsters who knew every rabbit-run in the woods, and every swallow’s hole in the sand banks. Many of the farmers were vegetarians and most of them had a Hebraic aversion to pork. That viand was never seen on the table except with the baked beans always served on Sunday; Mother Rykeman managing to keep on hand a supply of middlings for the bean-pot.