Excerpt from Birth
A day of heat withered Burage. It was the eighth day of such heat. The people had counted, they began to take delight in its continuance. "She's gone up two degrees to-day," they told one another. And: "Looks like this'll go down as the hot Summer of Eighty-seven." Burage watched the thermometer, observed when the Wisconsin river ice finally blocked and when this ice began to move in Spring, kept in vases the list of these dates, and delighted when degrees and dates surpassed themselves. With many, this was no conscious touch with Nature, but a substitute for the competition impossible in their small town living, and yet not outgrown. However, there were some who kept these tallies for love of them.
At four o'clock on the eighth day of the heat, there came down the Burage main street a youth of six-and-twenty. His hair was flat and glossy-damp on his forehead, a limp handkerchief was tucked in his collar, his cheap, neat suit was dusty. He carried a sample case. His name was Marshall Pitt, and he was "traveling representative" for Hart, Hollow and Orr, Pickle and Fruit Products.
As he went, he glanced at the houses with no appraising eye. Most of these homes he had visited, most had already closed their doors upon him. When he reached Lawyer Granger's iron fence, he opened the gate with doggedness. That morning he had passed this house in the acute belief that it was far too magnificent to be expected to order from his sample case.
About the Publisher
Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com
Genre: Children's Fiction
A day of heat withered Burage. It was the eighth day of such heat. The people had counted, they began to take delight in its continuance. "She's gone up two degrees to-day," they told one another. And: "Looks like this'll go down as the hot Summer of Eighty-seven." Burage watched the thermometer, observed when the Wisconsin river ice finally blocked and when this ice began to move in Spring, kept in vases the list of these dates, and delighted when degrees and dates surpassed themselves. With many, this was no conscious touch with Nature, but a substitute for the competition impossible in their small town living, and yet not outgrown. However, there were some who kept these tallies for love of them.
At four o'clock on the eighth day of the heat, there came down the Burage main street a youth of six-and-twenty. His hair was flat and glossy-damp on his forehead, a limp handkerchief was tucked in his collar, his cheap, neat suit was dusty. He carried a sample case. His name was Marshall Pitt, and he was "traveling representative" for Hart, Hollow and Orr, Pickle and Fruit Products.
As he went, he glanced at the houses with no appraising eye. Most of these homes he had visited, most had already closed their doors upon him. When he reached Lawyer Granger's iron fence, he opened the gate with doggedness. That morning he had passed this house in the acute belief that it was far too magnificent to be expected to order from his sample case.
About the Publisher
Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com
Genre: Children's Fiction
Used availability for Zona Gale's Birth