No, to this day a vision of the "Parson" (Capen) comes to me, reading by the light of an oil lamp placed on a shelf at the head of his bedstead, long after others were asleep; lying in bed at the furthermost portion of thy space; now chuckling to himself, then drowsily reading on and on, with his spectacles dropped down on to the point of his long nose--as the passage was either witty or dry; or visions of the early risers, waking betimes and disturbing the dreams of the later ones by the preparations of the toilet; or the sound of the morning horn as it rose from beneath us on the clear air!
I was seventeen years of age, and having passed the time when I could have been by right a pupil in the day school, was assigned to manual labor. You will see by the Constitution that I was a "Probationer." It was fortunate that I loved the grass and trees, and the routine of farm life. My youth excused and deprived me of the council meetings and the right to vote, so that many hours spent by some, though but a little older than myself, in meetings, were absolutely mine to rove in, or to use as I liked. Though born to city life and work I dearly loved the country and a farm, but did not know its duties, nor had I the strength for heavy labor, so I assisted in work in and about the houses in the early hours of the day, and in some of the lighter farming, as planting, hoeing, weeding and driving the oxen, horses and cows; in fact, taking a lad's place in the farm and house employments.
Owing to the amount of labor and the disproportion of female help, some of the young men under age oftentimes assisted after meals in wiping dishes and supplying hot and cold water. It was a matter of rivalry between parties to see which could beat in a match, the washer or wipers. Two lads of near my own age supplied dishes and hot water as fast as it was needed, and one young lady washed the plates, saucers, mugs and the like, the same young men doing the wiping.
There was plenty of plain crockery piled up and it was rushed into a capacious receptacle and washed with great dexterity. Then wipe, young men, wipe! Will you allow a young lady to wash faster than two can wipe? _Never_, _boys_, never! and with incredible speed the surface of the plates and dishes was changed into mirrors. There was one young lady who was hard to beat; often when the parties thought they had nearly succeeded she would cry out for "hot water"! and one would have to supply her with it, and by that time his partner would be overwhelmed with a stock of unwiped crockery. Need I say that at times I was one of those boys?