TRANSCRIPT

The New Arrival
A short story from 'Pioneer Tales and Other Human Stories'
By H.B. Adshead

As August drew on we both hoped and prayed for fine weather, but about the fifteenth it closed in and rained in torrents. The prairie was like a sponge, the trails mud, and Sleepy Creek's original banks were nowhere to be seen. The shack was almost an island and our crossing place nearly a quarter of a mile wide.
The barnyard was a foot deep in mud and manure, but we kept the horses in every night.
We now determined to make one dry spot in the shack even if the water did run down the walls inside from the roof. We picked up every available board from the barn and every stable door we could get and placed them on one corner of the roof. This helped greatly, the water only dripping in two or three places. The head of the bed was placed under the ridge pole and an umbrella over the head with a rubber rug over the rest. This completed our arrangements.