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22 THE FARMER AND THE OAK

-------XXII------THE FARMER AND THE OAK - 1 STRONG , well-muscled young men were growing up at Lake Chisago's oldest settlement. Four sons had grown into men. Two were as tall as the father, two taller. Anyone of them could manage a job requiring a full-grown man. All were broad across the shoulders, strong in limbs, keen and handy. Their growth into manhood was the greatest change that had taken place at this settlement. Karl Oskar retained a father's authority over his sons; this must remain his as long as ate his bread and lived in his house. But the older they grew the less he knew about them. He was together with his boys in work, but outside the home they lived their own lives. He was the hermit, seldom away from home, they were lively, often away, associating with other people. And father and sons already used different languages when they spoke with each other. The children more and more discarded their mother tongue for Englishwhen he addressed them in Swedish they would reply in English. This seemed awkward to him and plainly askew. At first he tried to correct them, but by and by he became accustomed to it and after some time it no longer bothered him. There was nothing he could do about it, so perhaps it was better to say nothing . Mter all, his children were he must not hinder them from speaking their country's In the settlements hereabouts Swedish was all right, but outside the Chisago Lake district they had little use for their mother tongue. The surer they became in English, the easier would be their success in this country. Karl Oskar's children were to be saved from the language difficulties he had gone through in America. How hadn't it hindered him! How many humiliations hadn't he endured because he couldn't speak the country's language. At last he but like other Swedes at Chisago Lake he used his own brand of English, strongly mixed with the old language. He would never learn any193 194 THE LAST LETTER HOME thing else. Lately he more and more forgot the new since he seldom went beyond his farm, and he fell back on Swedish. He felt that his children, when outsiders were present, were ashamed of their father's way ofspeaking. The children didn't understand, couldn't understand , how much easier it was for them. All he could do was to pretend he didn't know they were ashamed oftheir father's expressions. With the growing children, the new language came into the house and expelled the old. It didn't even spare the name their home had had from the beginning . Karl Oskar's children no called their home New Duvemala. had given it another name, a name used by people who ofthe first setderneIlt at Chisago Lake. New Duvemala was no more, it was gone and would never be revived. Instead it was now called the Nilsson Settlement. - 2 THE OAK GROVE to the east ofthe house still stood, covering about twenty acres of fertile land where crops could grow. For ten years Karl Oskar had had his eye on this piece of ground. Then a mild, suitable autumn arrived which was to be the grove's last; the days ofthe mighty oaks were numbered. It had taken the farmer a long time to plan his attack on the oaks; this fall the plan was completed, now he had thought it over long enough. He had figured out how to go about it, how to turn this ground into a tilled field: The giant trees would be pulled up by the roots. Now with the boys he had sufficient help, and Karl Oskar Nilsson and his four sons approached the grove with their team one early morning. Five men and two horses-the combined strength of men and beasts would fell the old oaks. They began with one of the largest; they dug a ditch around the tree, four feet deep, and cut rhe roOts. They rook away the foothold of the oak. This was the trick to conquer it: Deprive it of its hold. They began down at the root; when the ditch was ready two of the boys climbed up the tree with a heavy iron chain, as high as they could get. They fastened it to the trunk and the father joined it to the pull lines from the team. Human...