George Burroughs

Although George Burroughs often used a knife,As farmers must, to castrate or to kill,He took no pleasure in the touch of steel.As one who loved to feel things come to lifeBeneath his hands, to end the patient strifeOf calving heifers pleased him best of all.He liked the springtime better than the fall,But all his farm was fruitful save his wife.

They say that when the doctor came last SpringAnd said that he could never have a child,Although he neither stormed nor acted wild,He would not let the seed-drill work his landsBut walked the barren fields himself, sowingThe seed broadcast with quick jerks of his hands.