=== TUESDAY, AUGUST 16, 1870. === Our oats have become so rotten and dry that we can only bind them when the dew is on, so we work mornings and evenings. Tisdale is helping us & we hope to finish up to morrow morning if all is well. We have been drawing in barley in the middle of the day. This also we hope to finish to morrow. Charleys time is out to day I believe and He is going to help me for thirteen months longer at twelve dollars per month. This will put us about through with our seeding next fall. === WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 17, 1870. === Our work is still so mixed up that it seems as though we were not doing much. We have still some oats to bind and some barley to get in. I have been off to day after the threshers a couple of times but still I do not know when they are going to come. Our friend E. H. from Dover was, or rather is here on a little visit. The result of this intimacy appears to be rather serious, especially to me. I do not know how soon I may be deprived, in a manner, of my only companion, my dear mother, by it. Thy will be done, O Lord, Most High!