friendly, busy place, much loved and frequented by the many cats and dogs. I remember also a coon that lived in a far corner for a time and some little coyotes that had been brought in from the range.
In the right wing, next the foreman’s room, was the store room, possibly more interesting because it was kept locked and only occasionally did we get access to the dried apples, the chocolate, the brown sugar and the fragrant lead foil that came in the gay boxes of Chinese tea. Many a wise mother-cat entered the fastness through the long window closed only by the iron bars where we could admire but not handle her babies.
One day I discovered a very beautiful heavy white smoke pouring out this window and hurried to find help. Father and the men who came had great difficulty in putting out the fire that had been caused by the drying-out and self-ignition of some stick phosphorous, kept for the preparation of poisoned wheat for use in the war with the squirrels who would have liked to eat up all the wheat we had raised.
Next to the store-room was a double-sized room, the usual one being square, the size of the width of the building. Here was a great chimney with a bellows and forge, and on the other side a long bench well-supplied with carpenter’s tools. One of our favorite occupations was to hunt up odd pieces of lead pipe, cut them into bits, beat them flat on the anvil and fold over into book-like shapes which we decorated with nail-prick design. I think it speaks something for the tastes of our elders that it was books we made.
