"When he was nine years of age, a dear friend, now dead, advised me not
to injure so precocious an intellect by too much cultivation, but to put
the boy on a farm, where he could divide his time between healthful work
and youthful sports, and would be kept away from the contaminating
influences of the city, I agreed to make the experiment, though
reluctantly, for I could not bear the thought of parting with my child.
An old family acquaintance who owned a farm in Dutchess County, and had
no children, was willing to take my boy.
"Little Myndert liked the idea of going into the country, and for two
weeks he behaved very well; and his acting father wrote me, that if I
could spare the boy, he would like to adopt him as his own. But the next
letter, a week afterward, brought a different story. It was while
Myndert was not put to work, that he behaved so well. But when the
farmer gave him a little hoe, and asked him to grub up a few weeds in
the garden, the lad threw it down, and said to the farmer, 'I hate you.'
This was his favorite expression to those who aroused his displeasure
when a child.
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