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  Cattle Show -- Fall of 1853 2? 6
The long looked for Day at last arrives -- Met with it disappointment?
to hundreds & hundreds of the holiday event of the Connecticut
Valley -- for the sky is overcast with dense watery clouds
that indicates instant rain -- it has even now commenced --
the light patter of the drops among the leaves is distinctly
audible -- it comes faster -- the Farmers hesitate -- they
dont know what to do -- they walk around -- consult the
weather cock, look in the West -- try to remember if Cattle-
Show days are every thing![ever ??] They hardly know what to do. But
they [?] guess, on the white[?], it will clear up ?ly --
They think they can see it growing lighter, and so they again harness up
the horses and yoke the cattle and coop up the hens, and box the
pigs and hustle small boys along with the sheep -- ?loading? all
the big pumpkins and long pear[?] vines and tall cornstalks and
homemade bed quilts and the butter and cheese and flowers --
ready for a part[?] as [?] as the smallest speck of the sky is ^{to be} seen --
I'd like to go on and tell you how pleasantly the afternoon sun
shone out and the roads[?] gradually filled up and how fine
every direction men & cattle of all sorts and size, age and condition
proved notable [?] till it was full -- another of the squealings
and bleatings and lowing and crowings -- and hurrahings[?] [?] --
of the enthusiasm & cheers when the Belchertown [?] [?]
decked out with all sorts of [?]s & [?]s, with certainly
180 persons, ?ed by a [?] [?] of music -- of the fun
the pretty girls had riding in the procession -- of all the
thousand funny & pleasant things I saw and heard --
[?] too late -- by aid of your imagination eyes[?] &
[?] from the [?] -- paper