Page:John Brown (W. E. B. Du Bois).djvu/67

Rh rutabagas and potatoes. This I think will be considered no mean alliance for our family and I most earnestly hope they will have wisdom given to make the most of it. It is certainly endorsing the poor bankrupt and his family, three of whom were but recently in Akron jail in a manner quite unexpected, and proves that notwithstanding we have been a company of 'belted knights,' our industrious and steady endeavors to maintain our integrity and our character have not been wholly overlooked."

Indeed, the offer seemed to John Brown a flood of light: a beloved occupation with space and time to think, to study and to dream, to get acquainted with himself and the world after the long struggle for bread and butter and the deep disappointment of failure almost in sight of success. By July, 1844, Brown was reporting 560 lambs raised and 2,700 pounds of wool, for which he had been offered fifty-six cents a pound, showing it to be of high grade. He began closing up his tanning business. "The general aspect of our worldly affairs is favorable. Hope we do not entirely forget God," he writes.

His daughter says: "As a shepherd, he showed the same watchful care over his sheep. I remember one spring a great many of his sheep had a disease called 'grub in the head,' and when the lambs came, the ewes would not own them. For two weeks he did not go to bed, but sat up or slept an