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instead of puttering around in the woods all the time
 

      “A good education,” broke in the other contemptuously. “What good is that? Go into town and see what that will get you. Why, you couldn’t keep off the town farm.”
      “I know,” the young man admitted, “that it wouldn’t be much good out here in the country, but in the city —”
      Again Eben interrupted. “No girl of mine goes to the city to starve. You get out and learn a trade or learn how to run that big farm of yours instead of puttering around in the woods all the time, and then I’ll talk to you. Show me that you can support a wife by your own efforts. That’s all I’ve got to say to you. Giddap,” and he moved off, down the field.
      The young man slowly climbed the fence and sauntered moodily across the adjoining field, flicking angrily at the yellow heads of the dandelions with his light cane.
      “Learn a trade,” he remarked scornfully. “With all my money! Plow a furrow. As if that was the only respectable occupation on earth. I won’t do any such thing.”
      John Wilmot was an orphan. His mother had died in his youth and his father during John’s last week at college, leaving behind him a substantial fortune for his only child. The nucleus of this wealth had been earned on a farm in the vicinity of Sidney and, by judicious investment, Mr. Wilmot had accumulated the rest.

ex Fred F. Fitch, “John Wilmot’s Justification” in Our Paper (Massachusetts Reformatory, Concord Junction) 22:27 (July 7, 1906) : 418-419 (419)
NYPL copy/scan (via google books) : link

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John Wilmot wins Eben’s approval to marry his daughter, upon getting a government contract to be a forestry expert, based on experience managing his own forest (that the neighbors all want him to cut down)

MCI-Concord (now closed, with redevelopment planning under way) : wikipedia : link
 

11 August 2025