Charles E. Burchfield (1893-1967)

culminated at midafternoon in a violent rainstorm. I sought shelter under the decayed porch of an old abandoned brick house. Here I found two farmers also enjoying the shelter and talking. One was relating an adventure of selling buying a cow. He owned half-interest in a heifer, and offered it to his would be seller, together with all the rye & wheat he had in the ground. The offer was too complicated for the owner of the cow, so he went into the house to figure it out. He reappeared presently and said “Man, you’ve just bought a cow.” The talk drifted to bulls; the older man confessed to a violent hatred and fear of them, but the younger man was quite boastful of his prowess in handling the animals, and became reminiscent. A cow of theirs being ready to be bred, they led her into the stall with the barn near the bull’s stall, while the young fellow went into the stall to loosen the bull. The cow was too fast however and jumped the bull, falling against the man and pinning him to the side of the stall. “For a minute I thought I was done for; but I managed to squirm around and get my arm free, and I hit her in the nose with my fist as hard as I could go it; and; that do you know, I pretty near knocked her stiff? My father said he never wanted me to hit him that way, or it’d kill