The roof of the tall red-painted house was rounded with snow, and from all the eaves hung a fringe of great icicles. The front of the house was dark, but a sled-track went to the big barns and a path had been shoveled to the side door, and candle-light shone in the kitchen windows.
Almanzo did not go into the house. He gave the dinner-pail to Alice, and he went to the barns with Royal.
There were three long, enormous barns, around three sides of the square barnyard. All together, they were the finest barns in all that country.
Almanzo went first into the Horse-Barn. It faced the house, and it was one hundred feet long. The horses’ row of box-stalls was in the middle; at one end was the calves’ shed, and beyond it the snug henhouse; at the other end was the Buggy House. It was so large that two buggies and the sleigh could be driven into it, with plenty of room to unhitch the horses. The horses went from it into their stalls, without going out again into the cold.
The Big Barn began at the west end of the Horse-Barn, and made the west side of the barnyard. In the Big Barn’s middle was the Big-Barn Floor. Great doors opened onto it from the meadows, to let loaded hay-wagons in. On one side was the great hay-bay, fifty feet long and twenty feet wide, crammed full of hay to the peak of the roof far overhead.
Beyond the Big-Barn Floor were fourteen stalls for the cows and oxen. Beyond them was the machine-shed, and beyond it was the tool-shed. There you turned the corner into the South Barn.
In it was the feed-room, then the hog-pens, then the calf-pens, then the South-Barn Floor. That was the threshing-floor. It was even larger than the Big-Barn Floor, and the fanning-mill stood there.
Beyond the South-Barn Floor was a shed for the young cattle, and beyond it was the sheepfold. That was all of the South Barn.
A tight board fence twelve feet high stood along the east side of the barnyard. The three huge barns and the fence walled in the snug yard. Winds howled and snow beat against them, but could not get in. No matter how stormy the winter, there was hardly ever more than two feet of snow in the sheltered barnyard.
When Almanzo went into these great barns, he always went through the Horse-Barn’s little door. He loved horses. There they stood in their roomy box-stalls, clean and sleek and gleaming brown, with long black manes and tails. The wise, sedate work-horses placidly munched hay. The three-year-olds put their noses together across the bars, they seemed to whisper together. Then softly their nostrils whooshed along one another’s necks; one pretended to bite, and they squealed and whirled and kicked in play. The old horses turned their heads and looked like grandmothers at the young ones. But the colts ran about excited, on their gangling legs, and stared and wondered.
They all knew Almanzo. Their ears pricked up and their eyes shone softly when they saw him. The three-year-olds came eagerly and thrust their heads out to nuzzle at him. Their noses, prickled with a few stiff hairs, were soft as velvet, and on their foreheads the short, fine hair was silky smooth. Their necks arched proudly, firm and round, and the black manes fell over them like a heavy fringe. You could run your hand along those firm, curved necks, in the warmth under the mane.
But Almanzo hardly dared to do it. He was not allowed to touch the beautiful three-year-olds. He could not go into their stalls, not even to clean them. Father would not let him handle the young hors
es or the colts. Father didn’t trust him yet, because colts and young, unbroken horses are very easily spoiled.
A boy who didn’t know any better might scare a young horse, or tease it, or even strike it, and that would ruin it. It would learn to bite and kick and hate people, and then it would never be a good horse.
Almanzo did know better; he wouldn’t ever scare or hurt one of those beautiful colts. He would always be quiet, and gentle, and patient; he wouldn’t startle a colt, or shout at it, not even if it stepped on his foot. But Father wouldn’t believe this.
So Almanzo could only look longingly at the eager three-year-olds. He just touched their velvety noses, and then he went quickly away from them, and put on his barn frock over his good school-clothes.
Father had already watered all the stock, and he was beginning to give them their grain. Royal and Almanzo took pitchforks and went from stall to stall, cleaning out the soiled hay underfoot, and spreading fresh hay from the manger to make clean beds for the cows and the oxen and the calves and the sheep.
They did not have to make beds for the hogs, because hogs make their own beds and keep them clean.
In the South Barn, Almanzo’s own two little calves were in one stall. They came crowding each other at the bars when they saw him. Both calves were red, and one had a white spot on his forehead. Almanzo had named him Star. The other was a bright red all over, and Almanzo called him Bright.
Star and Bright were young calves, not yet a year old. Their little horns had only begun to grow hard in the soft hair by their ears. Almanzo scratched around the little horns, because calves like that. They pushed their moist, blunt noses between the bars, and licked with their rough tongues.
Almanzo took two carrots from the cows’ feed-box, and snapped little pieces off them, and fed the pieces one by one to Star and Bright.
Then he took his pitchfork again and climbed into the haymows overhead. It was dark there; only a little light came from the pierced tin sides of the lantern hung in the alleyway below. Royal and Almanzo were not allowed to take a lantern into the haymows, for fear of fire. But in a moment they could see in the dusk.
They worked fast, pitching hay into the mangers below. Almanzo could hear the crunching of all the animals eating. The haymows were warm with the warmth of all the stock below, and the hay smelled dusty-sweet. There was a smell, too, of the horses and cows, and a woolly smell of sheep. And before the boys finished filling the mangers there was the good smell of warm milk foaming into Father’s milk-pail.
Almanzo took his own little milking-stool, and a pail, and sat in Blossom’s stall to milk her. His hands were not yet strong enough to milk a hard milker, but he could milk Blossom and Bossy. They were good old cows who gave down their milk easily, and hardly ever switched a stinging tail into his eyes, or upset the pail with a hind foot.
He sat with the pail between his feet, and milked steadily. Left, right! swish, swish! the streams of milk slanted into the pail, while the cows licked up their grain and crunched their carrots.
The barn cats curved their bodies against the corners of the stall, loudly purring. They were sleek and fat from eating mice. Every barn cat had large ears and a long tail, sure signs of a good mouser. Day and night they patrolled the barns, keeping mice and rats from the feed-bins, and at milking-time they lapped up pans of warm milk.
When Almanzo had finished milking, he filled the pans for the cats. His father went into Blossom’s stall with his own pail and stool, and sat down to strip the last, richest drops of milk from Blossom’s udder. But Almanzo had got it all. Then Father went into Bossy’s stall. He came out at once, and said:
“You’re a good milker, son.”
Almanzo just turned around and kicked at the straw on the floor. He was too pleased to say anything. Now he could milk cows by himself; Father needn’t strip them after him. Pretty soon he would be milking the hardest milkers.
Almanzo’s father had pleasant blue eyes that twinkled. He was a big man, with a long, soft brown beard and soft brown hair. His frock of brown wool hung to the tops of his tall boots. The two fronts of it were crossed on his broad chest and belted snug around his waist, then the skirt of it hung down over his trousers of good brown fullcloth.