Farmer Boy

One day, a man with a white horse and red cart comes down the road. Almanzo cries out that it’s Nick Brown, the tin-peddler. Nick lives in his big cart, a house on wheels, and travels around bringing news, stories, and songs. He tells Father that horse buyers are looking for strong colts like his. Nick hitches his horse, stays for dinner, and makes them all laugh with stories and songs.

The next day, Nick opens his cart to show off many items made of tin, like pails, pie pans, basins, bread pans, dish pans, and more. Nick made the tin items. Mother trades her homemade rags and linens for tin items. He gives Eliza Jane and Alice some baking tins in fun shapes like hearts to bake cakes. He gives Almanzo a red tin horn to play with. Nick then heads out, whistling his songs, and Almanzo looks forward to next spring when they’ll see him again.

One day, a new horse buyer arrives, and Father sends the four-year-old colts into the pasture for display. Father tells him they’re gentle, trained for single- or double-driving carts, and healthy. The horse buyer inspects the horses, touching their legs, checking their teeth, and watching their gaits—walks, trots, and gallops. Almanzo is proud of the colts, whom he helped currycomb until their hides glistened.

After negotiating, the men settle on $200 per horse. The horse buyer leaves. Since it’s too late to go to the bank, Father keeps the money in the house. Mother feels nervous about the money, so she keeps moving it to new hiding places. Father tells her that no one will rob them, but they hear a noise outside. A skinny dog is at the door. Since its ribs are visible, Alice is allowed to feed the starving dog. She sets a plate of food outside for it.

Mother awakens before dawn because the dog is growling. She goes outside but doesn’t see anything. The dog keeps barking at the woodshed. A bit later, Father finds two sets of footprints by the woodshed. Someone had come to rob them, but the dog warned them. Father assumes that the horse buyer told someone in town he’d paid them the large sum of money, and the robbers overheard and tried to target them. The helpful dog leaves, hopefully to find its way home.

Almanzo and his friends Pierre and Louis lead the sheep down from a pasture to get their wool sheared (like haircuts). They lead the flock to the river first. Father and Lazy John catch the sheep, bathe them individually, and then push them to another gated pasture. When the sheep bleat and try to run away, Almanzo and the other boys block their path.

The next day, the cleaned sheep are led to the barnyard. Father, Lazy John, and Joe cut off their wool with shears until they can see their pink skin underneath. Almanzo, Royal, and their friends collect the wool and tie it together for safekeeping. Almanzo gets distracted by a barn cat with new kittens. Father scolds him to keep up with the wool. They turn the shearing and wool collecting into a game by seeing who can move faster: the shearers or the collectors. They laugh that Almanzo can’t keep up with their pace and they’ll win.

When they break for dinner, Almanzo stays behind and ties up one sheep alone in the barn to hide the animal. The men finish shearing all the sheep, telling Almanzo they won. However, Almanzo laughs that he has tied up all the wool and they missed a sheep: the secret one he tied up. They all laugh and think Almanzo played a great prank.

Almanzo returns to school for the spring term. Only the youngest children go, and he’s jealous that the rest of his family gets to stay home and work on chores. He can’t wait for summer to stay home and assist with chores. Father takes the wool to town to have it combed out on machines. Mother and the kids dye the wool different colors. Mother makes soap from the lard they saved from their cooking meats all winter. Soon, Almanzo helps plant pumpkins. He takes his time planting and pulling weeds so that he doesn’t have to go to school.

Since it’s a cold spring, the corn isn’t growing well yet. Near the Fourth of July, the weather isn’t as warm as usual, and Father fears that frost may get the corn. That night, Mother wakes Almanzo up to rush to save the corn from frost. The cold weather could kill their corn crop.

The family hurries with water to pour over the frozen corn so that the ice will melt. If the sun rises, it will kill the corn. Almanzo works until his whole body hurts, pouring water on the thousands of corn stalks. They save three acres of their corn crop with hard work, losing only a quarter of an acre’s worth.