Chapter III: Preface: To the First Edition (3)

What a comfort is the consciousness of usefulness! One may dig on his farm or delve in his library for weeks, with nothing to show for it, and with no murmuring applause. But let him once spread the table, put the pot to boiling, and set forth a meal; and the praise of housekeepers begins to ascend, sweet as frankincense or new-made apple-pies. But we are praise-proof in culinary matters. There are others around here that are liable to the puffing-up of vanity, if their domestic performances are loudly applauded. But we, of the stronger sex, can hear our beefsteak commended without a wrinkle upon our tranquil humility. We can have our coffee criticised without a flush of indignation. Even our method of cooking vegetables may be undervalued, without exciting us to controversy; so tranquil is our soul, when once under the inspiration of the _cuisine_. But some there are who mingle praise with suggestion—a cup of criticism with sugar in it. Thus:—

“We heartily thank him for his descriptions in ’summer
Dinners,’ and would mildly suggest, if he would add a pint
of nice, thick cream to a quart of peas, taken from milk
that has stood just six hours in a cool, airy, and clean
cellar—said milk must be milk, to start with; none of your
blue, watery stuff, such as some cows are said to give, but
rich, golden milk, caught in bright tin pails, so polished
that they reflect the happy faces of all who wish to take a
peep at them:—with such a dish, I think we could tempt—well,
Henry Ward, to dine with us; couldn’t we? especially if we
add an apple-pie made after a receipt you gave in the
_Ledger_ several years ago.

“Yours, very respectfully,
“Twenty-year-old DOT.”

If one wishes a new and composite dish, let the peas be smothered in cream. But, if one wishes _peas_, pure and simple, in their own flavor,—a flavor chosen out of the whole vegetable realm, and not repeated in any other growing thing,—let him not, let her not, audaciously introduce any rival flavor. Peas are good; cream is good; peas and cream are good,—each in its own severalty. But let each one stand in its own name. Do not call peas and cream, peas. One’s tenderest culinary susceptibility is touched, to be asked if he will take some green peas, and then to find himself eating peas and cream!

The English receipts recommend a sprig or two of mint to be thrown in while green peas are cooking. We do not challenge their right to do it. They may put in anise and cummin too, if they choose. But we do protest, in the name of kitchen literature, against calling such experimental compounds by the ever-dear name of “green peas.”

All smooth peas are tasteless compared with the wrinkled peas. It is proper that wrinkles should bring sweetness. The smooth-faced varieties are fairer to look upon. But they are not inwardly rich. That these should be flavored, enriched, and spiced with herbs, is not altogether against nature or analogy.

Still, if on some bright summer day, soon after the twelve musical strokes on the village bell, we shall find ourselves the guest of the sprightly “Dot,” we shall lay aside all pre-conceived notions and all prejudices; and if it prove to be that peas absorb cream into their bosoms without losing their peahood—nay, if this wedding shall prove, as all true weddings should, that individuality is developed and established—we shall gladly repent, confess, and recant our foregoing protest.

Another fair heart has suffered itself to fall into shocking doubts.

“DEAR SIR: It is with great pleasure that I read your weekly
articles in the _Ledger_, and I have especially relished
your ’summer Dinner,’ which was got up in such good style.
But—and this is what is very important—did you have to ask
your wife the different names of the vegetables, and how to
cook them? Or do you believe in _Men’s Rights_, and so know
how to do your own cooking, seasoning, and eating?”

The family should be sacred! This attempt to pry into its secrets must not succeed. This question answered, the next one would be, whether we wrote our own articles for the _Ledger_, or whether some one dictated them to us? And then would come questions as to who wrote the sermons? Then, when once the stream had broken over the bounds of proper privacy, it would rush through kitchen and pantry, closet and cupboard, cellar and attic, until the slime of curiosity would lie thick on all the sacred places of the household.

“Ask our wife,” forsooth! We asked her once for all, some years ago, and the answer lasts, full and strong, until this day.

XIV.

HENS.

_April 22d._

The day is bright and windy. The sky has sunk back to the uttermost, and the arch seems wonderfully deep above your head. Little cloud-ships go sailing about in the heavens as busily as if they carried freight to long-expectant owners. It is a day for the country. The city palls on the jaded nerve. I long to hear the hens cackle. There are lively times now in barn and barn-yard, I’ll warrant you. If I were lying on the east veranda of a cottage that I wot of, I should see flocks of pure white Leghorns, wind-blown, shining in the sunlight, searching for a morsel in and out of the shrubbery, and hear the cocks crowing, and the hens crooning. The Leghorn, of true blood, leads the race of fowls for continuous eggs, in season and out of season; eggs large enough, of fine quality, and sprung from hens that never think of chickens. For a true Leghorn seldom wants to sit. They believe in division of labor. They provide eggs; others must hatch them. Other fowls may surpass them on the spit or gridiron, but, as egg-layers, they easily take the lead. They are hardy, handsome, and immensely productive. As it is just as easy to keep good fowls as poor ones, thrifty housekeepers should secure a good laying breed. Not every pure white fowl is a Leghorn. There are many White Spanish sold as Leghorns. They may be known by their gray or pearl-colored legs. The pure Leghorn has a yellow leg, a single comb, quite long and usually lapping down. This breed is well known about New York, but no description of it can be found in English poultry-books. Indeed, we are informed that Tegetmayer, the standard authority, but recently knew anything about them, and then from a coop sent from New York.

The Brahmas and Cochins have good qualities. They are large, even huge. They are peaceable, and the Cochins do not _scratch_,—an important fact to all who have a garden, and who yet desire to let their poultry run at large. They are good layers, admirable mothers, and yield a fine carcass for the table, but the meat is not fine, though fairly good. But a more ungainly thing than buff Cochins the eye never saw. A flock of Leghorns is a delight to the eye. One is never tired of watching them. Their forms are symmetrical, and every motion is graceful. But the huge poddy Cochins waddle before you like over-fat buffoons. They are grotesque, good-natured, clumsy, useful creatures; but they have a great love of sitting. Every Cochin hen would love to bring out two broods in a season; while the white Leghorns fill their nests with eggs, and then think their whole duty done. We keep Cochin hens to sit on Leghorn eggs. Better mothers cannot be.

I hear my hens cackle! These bright spring days are passing, and the concert of the barn-yard is in full play, but I am tied up to the pen! Currant-bushes are pushing out their blossom-buds; rhubarb is showing its red knuckles above the ground; willows are pushing out their silky catkins; birds have come—everything has come but me! I cannot sprout yet. Patience! I shall be green enough in a few weeks. The city shall not always prevail. In due season I shall go to grass. Already I smell it. The odor of new grass can be perceived but for a few days only in spring. It should be noticed then, for it is unlike any other perfume, and will be perceived no more until another year. How happy are they that dwell among open fields,—or how happy they might be if they but knew their privileges!

XV.

FARMING.

_May 13th._

If one wishes to make money out of the soil, upon an Eastern farm, he must live upon it, study it, watch it, calk and groove it so that no leak shall be possible, economize rigidly, work fearfully, sell the best, use the unsalable,—in short, he must be a drudge or a genius. Not a genius in literature or art, but in money-making. Only think how some old-fashioned New England ministers lived on a salary of four hundred dollars; educated seven or eight children; worked their farm during the week, and preached on Sunday; and died rich, that is, worth anywhere from fifty to a hundred thousand dollars, which, fifty years ago, was as much as two hundred and fifty thousand dollars are now; for the purchasing power of gold and silver is steadily declining, and of course more of it is required for the same purposes.

But only now and then did such a man and minister turn up; and the general impression, even in his case, was, that the farm was better tilled than the parish.

But the small farmers in the old States north of the Delaware have a hard life. If they get on, it is by vigorous economy following excessive industry. There is a good deal of sentiment wasted on the delights of farming. But in New England, we suspect that for every farmer who lives in abundance or comparative ease, there are five, and perhaps ten, that fare coarsely, and are not half as well clothed and housed as the average mechanic. First-rate farmers are few; third and fourth rate farmers are many, and a hard time they have. But as one goes westward, to better soil, larger farms, and more congenial climate, things change. Farmers are prosperous without such exacting toil. Their dwellings grow better, particularly in the northern parts of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and the great Northwest. If one has money and leisure, he may carry on a farm in the Eastern States with great enjoyment. That is as pleasant a way to spend money as can well be devised, not even excepting the management of fast horses and fast yachts; for both of these deteriorate in the using, and some go under, while the farm steadily rises in value and force. But with the exception of the owners of uncommonly good land here and there, not much money is to be made at farming in the East. The farm is an institution designed to promote health and comfort in the expenditure of money. Money is the one manure which the farm greedily covets.

We say these things, not to discourage farming, but to dissuade the annual host from going out to make their fortunes on a farm, who, in five years, will come back stripped bare of everything but disgust—not of that. No man would think of going from the law, or from a store, into a mechanical trade without having served an apprenticeship, or having become in some way familiar with it. Lawyers do not set up at cabinet-making, nor go into steel works, nor set up for builders or painters. But when business is dull, and health delicate, many a professional man, many a clerk or unsuccessful merchant, concludes to buy a “snug farm,” and retire from the cares of the town or city, to lead the joyous life of a farmer. He has no knowledge of farming; but it requires none! Farming is simple. You rise with the dewy morn; you go forth to your prodigal acres; you rest under the trees bending with fruit; you eat from your bountiful table the food that sprung from your own soil,—and ever so much more romance of the same sort.

Prosperous farming requires knowledge, tact at managing men, skill in laying out work, incessant industry, very close calculations, good judgment in buying, and a good capacity of selling. In short, the qualities which go to make up a good merchant, a good manufacturer, and a good scientist ought to be combined in a first-class farmer. There are more passable orators born every year than there are first-class farmers. If any one doubts the truth of these views, let him try a farm for a few years!

XVI.

GARDENING UNDER DIFFICULTIES.

It is not every one who can toss off his provocations with so good a grace as our correspondent, whose letter we insert:—

NEW YORK, _April 19th_.

DEAR MR. BEECHER: Suppose you were fond of flowers and
shrubs, and that the plat of Mother Earth allotted you was
at the back of your city house, say about seventeen feet
square,—the most of it occupied by the space for drying
clothes; the rest a hard clayey soil, baked by the sun so
quickly that you wish the Israelites might have had it to
make brick, and one that no amount of foreign admixture
improves.

Suppose the florist came every spring, hoed and raked, and
distributed roses, verbenas, geraniums, and the like, at
regular intervals, also sticks, bare evidence of the
burial-place of various cherished bulbs that never come up,
but seem, like your carnations, to disappear with the
wheelbarrow.

Suppose the occupants of the tenement-house close to your
rear fence,—who always, _in all the stories_ of the day,
nurse a geranium in a cracked pot,—instead of thanking you
for the pleasant sight under their windows, garnished your
bed with egg-shells, old paper collars, rags, bones, empty
spools, and other _débris_ handy for the purpose.

Suppose the nine thousand and ninety cats and their families
roosted on the fence in the twilight, and tried their claws
on your shrubs, and the softness of your soil generally, in
the small hours of the night.

Suppose, with the first green leaves, the worms came also,
and the green lice, and the ants, and made your bushes a
sorrow and a vexation.

Suppose the hoop of the laundress was over it all, so to
speak, and the hose always burst when the weather was dry,
and your watering-pot held about a teacupful.

What would _you_ do, Mr. Beecher? Would you give over the
space to old shoes and ugliness, or would you fly in the
face of _manifest destiny_ and cultivate?

Dejectedly yours,
BREEZE.

The very first thing to be done with a tenacious and obstinate clay soil is to have it dug out and carted away bodily, and its place supplied with good fresh loam. This would be a serious job if there were several acres. But when there is but a plat of seventeen feet square, and the larger part of that reserved for laundry purposes, only borders being used for flowers, the amount to be removed would be comparatively small, and the satisfaction would be ample repayment. Any one with a cart can carry off the clay, but not every one can get good soil. An honest florist or garden jobber could put you in the way of that.

If you will have a garden, it is best to be your own gardener. Adam and Eve set the example.

The cats may be managed in various ways. A black-and-tan terrier kept in the back yard has a wonderful influence on cats, arousing in them a strong local prejudice. If the boys in the neighborhood knew that a premium were offered for cat scalps, it would be found greatly to interest the cats. At any rate, their number would grow less.

As to worms and aphides, no one is fit to own flowers who, in so small a space as seventeen feet square, cannot exterminate them,—worms by hand picking, and aphides by whale-oil soapsuds. A vigorous fidelity will in a short time put the last worm _hors de combat_. The whale-oil soap may be had at any large seed-store,—directions for use accompanying the little jar. A tin garden syringe may be had at the same place, costing but little, lasting, with care, twenty years, and carrying the soapsuds like spray over every leaf and twig.

We, too, in Brooklyn have _lawn dresses_ with equatorial hoops, and yet manage to have many a charming patch of flowers. But, of all things in this world, a garden needs the presence of its owner. If you do not love it enough to care for it as you would for a baby, better let it alone. Flowers know who love them. They will not be put off with arm’s-length cordiality. But, if you love them, you will easily overcome a hundred obstacles, and rejoice in your flowers all the more because they are the trophies of your patience and industry.

XVII.

CORN.

_September 19th._

We have artists who give themselves to specialties. One delights to know fruits. Another loves architecture, or landscape, or figures, or animals, or grasses and flowers. Now it has always seemed strange that the noblest of all grasses, maize, or Indian corn, has never found an enthusiastic lover. It has been painted often, but never yet interpreted. No one has done by it what has been done by the lily, the rose, the convolvulus.

And yet, where shall we find any union of strength and grace more perfect among herbaceous plants? The jointed stem, robust and stiff, gives off at each articulation the most gracefully curved sword-leaves, which diminish in length as the plant goes up to its fimbriated top, forming a symmetrical whole not to be equalled among field plants.

If one will wander along the edges of a cornfield, he will often see an exquisite picture, such as Nature loves to make. The wild convolvulus, which often fills the fence corners, has crept out of the grass into the furrow and twined around the corn, climbing to its very top, and, having power yet to grow, returns upon itself and fashions festoons of exquisite leaves and white blossoms, which hang down in every negligent form of beauty. Other vines too, besides the convolvulus, try their arts, and none fail; but none succeed so charmingly as this queen of twining vines.

A specialist might devote himself to corn without fear of exhausting the subject. Of all the grains it is the true type of republicanism. It knows how to live in the community without losing its individuality. The smaller grains—wheat, barley, and such like—produce their effects only in masses. Individual stalks are quite insignificant. It is the community, and not the individual, that is beautiful. But a field of corn does not swallow up in itself the stems which form its mass. Every plant yet retains it nobility. If corn is sown so thickly that it cannot find room for development, the whole degenerates into mere grass, and loses its proper force and beauty. But the husbandman has found out what rulers yet but slowly learn, and reluctantly,—that the force and beauty of the whole is to be sought in the development and strength of each single plant. Individuality and community are not only compatible, but each is the indispensable factor of the other.

Or, turn the subject in another light. Each stalk of corn is a father and mother. It does not live for itself. When it hastens on in the hot days of July, it is not its own beauty that it seeks. It takes that on the way to a higher end. In the cool juices of that polished stem glows the sacred fire of parentage. The arched and rustling leaves borrow of the sun and air food for the coming brood. No sooner does the tassel break forth at the top, than out peer the infant ears nestling at the side of the noble stem. Nor does the parent blossom into its final beauty until the exquisite silk hangs from the nascent ears of corn to feed upon the parent’s life, and in that find its own.

No sooner do the new-born kernels swell, than the parent bequeaths itself and all its inward stores to its offspring. The long leaves swing idly in the air, as things that have nothing more to do. Every day the winds evoke a shriller sound from their motions. When the cob has covered itself with golden kernels, rich and ripe, the parent dies,—dies mourning sadly, shall we think? What though it shall live a hundred-fold in its children? All memory or consciousness will be gone. It has spent its life and beauty for others. But how strong, how fresh, how full, how beautiful its life, while doing its appointed work! How little does it really care to live when the end of living is accomplished! It did the work at hand, and drew all its beauty from that doing, then took its place in the great economy of nature, falling back to nothing.

With such thoughts men looked upon the fields thousands of years ago, and sighed, “As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more.”

It was thousands of years afterward that one said, “As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly…. Death is swallowed up in victory.”

The grass of the field may image forth the secular side of human life, but it can go no further than the grave. Beyond that it cannot point. Only one garden ever was that set forth the sure hope of immortality. “In the place where He was crucified, there was a garden…. There laid they Jesus.”

XVIII.

DANDELIONS.

_June 8th._

There are many charms connected with the ideal life of the tropics. The chief drawback is, that _manhood_ deliquesces and runs out under the equator. This is not paid for by luscious bananas, oranges, orchids, or ever-blooming vines and trees. Enjoyment palls when it flows unceasingly and without break. To live in summer forever, without one ungarlanded hour in the year, might, for aught we know, sate us with sweetness.

The tropics were not made to live in all the year. They are a refuge for one or two months. After frost and snow have had their full meal, and the northern winds have by familiarity bred contempt and influenzas, it is a good thing to go to sleep on the good steamer Moro Castle, and wake up in Cuba, or Jamaica, or to go on through the Gulf of Mexico to the Magdalena valley in Northern South America, which the painter Church once told me he regarded as the most perfect climate that he had ever found in all travels.

But as soon as the contrast is satisfied, we are sure that one in the tropics must long for the northern zones, northern fruits and northern flowers; for calm days without pestilent insects; for _grass_, and for DANDELIONS!

Now I have got upon my real subject. The foregoing sentences were in the nature of a rhetorical introduction,—a sly and adroit way of getting people to listen to the praises of one of the brightest charms of our northern spring days.

I am moved to celebrate this brilliant, and yet, I fear, not much-prized flower, from the glory of my morning view. Out of my back windows I look down on four or five grassy yards, all well kept and lying well open to the sun. Soon after the grass springs you may see such a gorgeous array of dandelions as might make a florist fairly envious! They jut out from the edges of the walks, they crowd the narrow strips of grass at the lower end, they fairly jostle each other like a crowd pouring out of a public hall, in their strife to get into the light and open their golden crowns to the sun.

So brilliant are they and so hardy, that we are apt to miss the sentiment that lives in them. They are not of the flowers that impudently push themselves forward, demanding us to look at them whether we will or no. With all their amazing brilliancy, they are still coy love-flowers, that wait for the sun, as a bride for the bridegroom. For dandelions do not wake up in the morning before we do. They wait till the sun has long called them, and then they fling open their golden disks, and shine with a real delight of existence, with a cheer and abundance which ought to strike joy into the heart of a misanthrope.

Soon after noon is at its highest, the dandelion, thinking that the world is bright enough, and that the sun can manage the rest of the day, folds itself up, laces the golden filaments with the green lepals, and retires to meditation. Thus it plays courtier in the morning, and nun in the afternoon.

But what a name! _Dens leonis!_ or _Dent-de-lion!_ Or, if you fly to the systematic name,—the harsh _Taraxacum!_ Shall such a home-loving, radiant creature be called _Lion’s Tooth_, because some impertinent, prying botanist fancied that he had espied the shape of a lion’s tooth in its minor forms?

Just as soon as we have got politics settled, business reformed, and human nature elevated, I am determined to form a society for the reformation of botanical names. Botany has been the Noah’s Ark of pedants. Every absurd whim of every pragmatical professor has been turned into Greek or Latin, and hung about the neck of unhappy flower. One might as well hang a dictionary around a child’s neck by way of ornament, as to impose on flowers such outrageous and outlandish names as now defend the science of botany from all approach, as a fort is defended by a line of _chevaux-de-frise_.

But blessings on those cheery children of the sun! They are born of brightness; their whole life is like a smile of love. They are not a flower for the hand; they are not to be worn in the bosom. They do not love the house, or the pressure of a close bouquet. Their life is in the free open air. They shine out on you along your daily walk. They crowd your yard with golden coin, which, good for nothing in the market, may yet have the power to confer more enjoyment than could golden dollars or ducats.

This is my annual tribute. To-day I look out of my window, and thank God for the gifts which he sends me by the hand of Dandelions! Do they know my thoughts as I gaze on them? Is there not some sympathy between things in nature which wake up the soul to delight, and aid the soul thus aroused? Behind signs and signals, back of all articulate utterance, may there not be a subtler relationship which will yet be discovered, as connecting the inward and the outward with a living relationship?

XIX.

HOW TO BEAUTIFY HOMES.

_August 25th._

No one needs to be told how much a house is adorned by _vines_; and yet many are averse to their liberal use from the impression that they make a house damp. It is true that they _may_, but it is not necessary that they should. Vines do not _collect_ dampness. If any part of the house wall needs the sun to warm it, and is covered by a vine from its influence, it may favor dampness. But an ivy vine, on the other hand, is reputed to make a wall dry, and has sometimes been employed to correct the undue moisture to which certain portions of a dwelling are subject. A grape vine, trained upon slats, which shall have a few inches of air-space underneath it, will not injure the house. Upon porches, over trellises, vines may be trained with charming effect, and without offending those who are superstitiously prejudiced against vines on the house.

The kinds of vines must be left, in the case of thousands, to accident. Men that are obliged to count the very last penny in their expenses cannot send many orders to florists for beautiful things, but must take what they can get in their own neighborhood. We will mention a few things now generally diffused.

The _Glycine_, or _Wistaria_, is one of the noblest. It will run a hundred feet or more, and grow in time to have a trunk like a small tree. Nothing can surpass it at its blossoming period. It is like a vision of the garden of heaven. It may be raised by _layers_, but will be found somewhat slow in taking hold after transplantation. Its arms may be carried out in tier above tier to cover the whole side of the house, when economy of space is no object; but where one desires to spare for other things, the _Wistaria_ may be trained upon a corner, or along the eaves.

There is nothing more beautiful in its summer greenness or gorgeous in its autumn reds and purples, than the Virginia Creeper—_Ampelopsis hederacea_. There is a variety called _Ampelopsis Veitchii_, or Veitch’s, which is extremely beautiful. It clings to wood or brick with as much tenacity as the ivy. Its foliage is fine, and its habit fits it to fill small spaces. It is a plant that, having once owned, no one would part with.

If one wishes a dense screen, there is no vine that grows more rapidly or that is more hardy than the _Aristoloicha sipho_, or Dutchman’s pipe. One might as well attempt to look through a brick wall as through the opaque mass made by its enormous leaves. But its coarseness fits it chiefly for hiding ungainly things or shading from the light.

The _Trumpet Creeper_ is effective at a distance, but its coarseness excludes it from familiar nearness.

Few people are aware of the vast improvements which have taken place in the _Clematis_. Every one knows the wild white clematis, which is beautiful in blossom, and almost as fine when its seeds are ripened. It abounds in our fields, and bears transplantation easily. The new kinds, or those comparatively new, deserve to be better known. Fortune’s, Henderson’s, Jackman’s, the Prince of Wales, Standish’s, together with Helena, Sophia, Lanuginosa, are obtainable at our first-class nurseries, and may be easily propagated. Besides these, there are every year new varieties introduced. There is no vine that we should spare with more reluctance. The sheets of gorgeous bloom, which, by judicious selection of kinds, will last from June to September, the perfect hardiness of the plant, and the ease with which it is trained, fit it eminently for small places and sunny spots. For it loves the full blaze, and will not flourish well even when planted with other vines that at all shade it. Indeed, to have the best effect of clematis, it should be trained in a clear and open space to a trellis of its own.

But, of all vines, none is more popular, and deservedly so, than the honeysuckle. The kinds are numerous. But if but one can be had, let it be the _Halleana_, or Hall’s Japan honeysuckle. It cannot be distinguished from the _Brachypoda_, in leaf or blossom; but it excels that immeasurably in the habit of blossoming all summer. The _Flexuoso_, or Chinese, is fine, but we consider it second to Hall’s, which ought to be better known and more widely diffused than it is. By planting it on open soil, without support, it spreads over the ground, and roots at every joint, so that hundreds of new plants may be gained every year.

There is a beautiful golden honeysuckle—_aurea reticulata_. This ought not to be planted by the side of green-leaved varieties. It produces the effect of a diseased or weak branch, rather than of contrast and variety. But the golden-leaved, if planted by itself, and well grown, is gorgeous. It is perfectly hardy, and is of good growth and constitution. If one has a yard of ground, he may have a vine which will give unfeigned pleasure through the whole summer.

XX.

BIRCH AND ASPEN.

_September 28th._

Looking out from my window upon the dark sides of the mountains, upon the massive clouds, upon the wind-blown trees, I see my pet, the birch, all in a shiver with each blast. The American white birch has all the grace and delicacy of its European namesake, and, besides, a sensibility which it borrows from the aspen, or shares with it.

One should have, on every side of a country house, a group of aspens and birches. Planted together, they will give you motion in charming variety. On other trees the leaves are so rigid in the stem, that a wind strong enough to set them in full activity is strong enough to set all the branches in motion. We recognize the force, and, in large trees, the grandeur of motion. When a strong wind moves the whole tree, it swings its great boughs hither and thither, all its leaves and twigs utter their voices, which in chorus often rise to a roar. Yet, though the whole tree is agitated, and seems convulsed, one sees that it is only upon the exterior; while the top and sides are in full motion, the trunk stands firm, and seems motionless. Not till its very roots give way will it move, and then it does not bend, but goes down with stiff trunk.

The elastic birch, with long and slender limbs, avoiding horizontal positions and aiming at the zenith, flexible to the last degree, moves in the wind with a grace and elasticity which has no parallel.

The American aspen has a shivering leaf upon a rigid branch. It stands quite stiff and motionless in bough, while its leaves are quivering and shivering in the most industrious manner. Right over against the east door of the Twin Mountain House, New Hampshire, at a little distance, is a group of aspens, which are my perpetual delight. They are my wind-meters, or, rather, zephyr measurers. On a hot noon, when no air seems stirring, and the trees about them doze and slumber, like good men at church, these twinklers, like roguish boys, are dancing in an imaginary breeze, and playing with themselves, without a particle of wind, so far as I can perceive. Now a shiver runs over them from head to foot; then the topmost leaves shake and swirl, while the bottom rests. Gradually the motion dies away all over, and the frolic ends. No, a single leaf begins to wag; it goes on in single blessedness, with accelerated pace, up and down, round and round, until, for the life of me, I cannot help bursting into a fit of laughter at this solitary dance.

At times, in certain moods, one cannot help thinking that the aspen is striving to communicate something. It seems so sigh and pant. It supplicates as one that suffers. Then, changing suddenly, it coaxes and winks and blinks at you as if it was only in fun. It will stand perfectly still a minute as if looking to see what you will do, and then a laughing ripple runs all over it. It frolics with the same tireless grace as a kitten. Indeed, it is a kind of compound kitten-tree, each particular leaf a kitten, all frolicking together; though there is not one of them, if the rest won’t play, that is not ready, kitten-like, as it were, to chase its own tail.

Why have landscape gardeners done so little with birches and aspens? Maples, oaks, ashes, and evergreens are well; but in what other direction shall we look for such grace in form, such susceptibility to aerial influences, and such exquisite motion both of branch and leaf, as we find in the aspen and birch? The birches grow rapidly, are extremely hardy, and will flourish upon poor soil, though loving a generous soil better. In ten years, with birch and aspen, one may rejoice in a thick grove. If the yellow locust be added to these, and the silver maple, one who plants at sixty may hope to see high over his head a respectable young forest, dense enough for shade and high enough to begin to comfort the imagination.

Long live the aspen and the birch! Only the young have just grounds for prejudice; but even boys soon outgrow the birch, and watch its sinewy motion without a thought of moving too, in shivering accord.

XXI.

AUTUMN.

_November 2d._

The summer is gone. The autumn is here. Not this year, as last, in the plenitude of color, but more soberly, frugally, and sedately. The autumn of 1871 was eminently a color season. Only once in three or four years does Nature make a full pallet. Then the colors are pure, intense, tender, and fresh. Such was last year. The scarlets were brilliant, the orange was pure, the crocuses and yellows were clear and rich. But, as autumnal days steal upon us now, we see already that we shall have picture-forests of only second or third rate brilliancy. The hickories are of a rusty and spotted golden brown. The maples are fine, yet not exquisite.

The sumach is always brilliant. So are some of the vines. The pepperidge-tree (_Nyssa sylvatica_) is very fine. If any one doubts it, let him go over to Prospect Park, in Brooklyn, not far from the stone cottage, on the south side, and he will have an opportunity to review his opinion, and to wonder why it is that one of the most magnificent color trees of the American forests is so little known or introduced into decorated grounds. It ranks among the very first in merit, and stands among the very last in use.

By the way, the parks of New York and Brooklyn should be used for something else and more than mere walking and driving. They are the best schools that America possesses for the study of trees and shrubs. There are few things which our climate will allow to grow that may not be found here, under circumstances which tend to produce their most favorable development. Gentlemen who have country places may, by some little pains, here see just what things they need, how to combine them for the best effects, and how to provide for them soil and site. Once possessed, the love of trees becomes a passion, and inspires more pleasure than one can imagine who has never become an enthusiast in that direction.

One may learn, particularly in the Brooklyn Park, the value of the new _golden_ evergreens of various sorts. They are destined to work a revolution in yards and gardens. Some of the more choice ones are marvels of brilliancy, and carry their glowing yellows right through the winter. One may learn in these parks how to decorate _rocks_. There is many a place in the country abounding in outcropping ledges, huge bowlders, or jutting rocks, which the proprietor wishes he could dig out and cart away. But he is rich who has large rocks upon his grounds. If one will see what use can be made of them, what a frame they furnish for mosses, ferns, vines, and various elegant shrubs, he will cease foolishly spending money to get rid of that which many men would gladly spend money to obtain.

It is a fortunate thing for our country that so much attention is now paid to the planting of trees. We hope to see the day when no longer ninety-nine in every hundred that are planted in streets or yards shall be maples and elms. What a sight would be a road on which one could ride for a mile through an avenue of scarlet oaks, and then for a mile through stately avenue of tulip-trees, and then through lines of scarlet maples, pepperidge-trees, cypress, or long rows of gentlemanly walnut-trees! The time will come when, on the great roads, one may travel a whole day in the shade of stately trees.

It is not enough to plant your own grounds. Every village should line its streets with shade trees. It is not enough to plant shade trees in the streets. They ought to outrun the town, and reach from village to village, until the whole region is filled with shadowed roads. In doing this, we ought to avoid the monotony of a few varieties endlessly reproduced, and make a generous use of the noble sorts that are so abundantly scattered over our forests and fields.

XXII.

PLANT TREES!

April is the time for planting trees. Too much cannot be said to induce people to fill their villages, and the great roads between village and village, with fine shade trees, and private grounds with the choicer kinds. To write a good hymn or plant a good tree makes one a benefactor to his generation.

It is hardly to be expected that the old men, hard-working, and with enough to do at any rate, will trouble themselves to plant trees along public roads. But we may hope for such service from enterprising young men, and even more from the public spirit of young women. Several instances have come to our knowledge in which women have formed associations for beautifying towns and villages by tree-planting, and in a few years have transformed the places. Nor is it unworthy of mention that this has been done by the influence of articles in the _New York Ledger_. A tree-planting week might be made a festival week; or persons might agree to secure a given number during the season.

And here it may be well to say, that, although spring and fall are the best seasons for transplanting, yet trees may be moved in any month in the year,—in the middle of August, if need be. A long row of maples, in Peekskill, were moved—in consequence of grading and fence-building—during the month of July, and only two of them experienced any permanent injury.

But it should be borne in mind that only _small_ trees should be removed in hot months, and after the foliage is expanded, unless one has a mind to go to great expense. But trees six or eight feet high, if taken with ample roots, and especially if moved in damp or wet weather, may be safely transplanted in midsummer. Of course, it will require twice the care and labor which the same tree would need in spring, to produce the same result.

The three or four trees usually planted in grounds are maples, elms, horse-chestnuts, and locusts. These are very well. But there are many kinds of maple seldom seen that deserve a place; such as the English field maple (_Acer compestre_), and notably the American red maple, called swamp maple (_Acer rubrum_), the former for its finely cut leaves, and the latter for early blossoms and for the exquisite scarlet autumn hues of its leaves.

The cut-leaf or fern-leaf white birch is now common in nurseries. It grows rapidly, is extremely graceful, has leaves delicate as a fern, and in winter throws against the sky a tracery of twigs which is beautiful to look upon. It ought to be in every small collection. The _liquidomen_ has a very beautiful leaf, star-like, and changes in autumn to a purplish bronze, quite distinct from all other leaves. If one can get the _tupelo_, which abounds in New England, and may be found in some nurseries, he will secure a tree much neglected, but which ought to be universally diffused.

Few people know how beautiful is the sassafras-tree, when well grown. In the woods it is hardly more than a shrub, or scrawny tree; but when planted young in an open space, and in good soil, it has a peculiar beauty of its own which is not repeated in any other tree.

Why are magnolias so seldom planted? They are as hardy as maples—some of them at least. The _M. conspicua_, the _M. soulangiana_, _M. glanca_, and _M. tripetala_ are easily had, are fine all summer, and are the glory of the spring when their flowers expand.

The American and the English beech, and also the purple beech, should be more often planted. An old beech-tree, grown on good soil, in an open field, and not mutilated, has nothing to fear when standing among all the kings of trees. No trees that we saw in England impressed us as did the beeches at Warwick Castle.

In street planting, and along roadsides, nothing could be finer than the tulip-tree, which grows rapidly, is clean, and bears fine blossoms in early summer. They should be transplanted when small, as they easily die off if moved when large. The same is true of chestnuts, walnuts, and pecan-nuts.

Of evergreens I shall not speak, as they deserve a separate mention. But do not plant them in the city, nor in any close yard. They do not thrive, and become disfigurements rather than ornaments.

XXIII.

FAREWELL TO “SUMMER REST.”

In this bright October day I know, not what Eve felt in leaving Paradise, but what John Milton imagined that she felt. To be sure, I have no such garden as hers must have been, and besides, I leave at a different season of the year; for she inquires feelingly, “Who now shall train these flowers?” whereas my flowers are so nearly spent that there is no need of training them. Tuberoses are gone, verbenas are gone, phloxes, common roses, and all the garden tribe, except scarlet sage, faithful marigolds, that never flinch to the last, and petunias, that are more graceful than they, and full as constant. Besides, there is the slow-footed chrysanthemum, too late for summer, often too late for autumn,—that never gets its Sunday jacket on until it is time to take it off again. But the amplitude of the floral harvest has been reaped. Now we only glean. Still one leaves a home of two months—summer months—not without a fluttering somewhere about the heart. The still days, the deep days, the mellow days, without taxation or excitement, are over. Now for the plunge and rush! Now for _men_. Farewell, Nature!

Good by, top of the hill! from which not a dwelling can be seen, only an horizon of mountains; and where, so often, just after the sun sets, we have lingered alone, in the mystery and inexplicable delight of an evening solitary hour, lifted far above the surrounding earth, and almost as one suspended in the very ether.

Good by, homely stone wall! along which have grown so many weeds which we naughtily admired and cherished, contrary to good farming manners; where so many shrubs, finding good soil, shot up into thickets laced with wild grape vines. Old tumble-down stone wall! Every stone colored and built over with weather-stains of hard moss; stones covered with brilliant ampelopsis, with the three-leaved ivy, fair to see, foul to touch, and with the rampant bitter-sweet! Let no one despise a stone wall, nor judge of it only from the cow’s point of view. It is the city of refuge to all the little fry. Squirrels run in and out, with saucy alertness, every summer’s day. Hares and rabbits find it a bulwark. The hoary old fat woodchuck rejoices in it as in a fenced city. Birds, too, wrens and sparrows, creep in and out, like children playing bo-peep. On these sturdy stones have we sat hours and hours, asking no softer cushion, and desiring no finer spectacle than God sent down from the heavens, or displayed upon the earth. The winter will soon vault into my seat, and a white shroud cover down the neglected old wall on the hill-top! Good by!

Neither can a sensitive nature forget his summer companions, or stint them in their meed of praise and gratitude. Worms whose metamorphosis we have watched; spiders whose webs glitter along the grass at morning and at evening, or mark out geometric figures among the trees,—spiders red, brown, black, green, gray, yellow, and speckled; soft-winged moths, gorgeous butterflies, steel-colored and shining black crickets, locusts, and grasshoppers, and all the rabble of creaking, singing, fiddling fellows besides, which swarm in air and earth,—we bid you all a hearty good-by. Sooth to say, we part from some of you without regret. But for the million we feel a true yearning,—so much have we watched your ways, so many hours has our soul been fed by you through our eyes. Ye are a part of the Great Father’s family.

O, how goodly a book is that which God has opened in this world! Every day is a separate leaf,—nay, not leaf, but volume, with text and note and picture, with every dainty quip and quirk of graceful art, with stores of knowledge illimitable, if one will only humble himself to receive it!

One should not willingly be ungrateful, even to the smallest creatures, or to inanimate objects, that have served his pleasure. And so, to reed and grass, bush and tree, stone and hill, brook and lake, all creeping things and all things that fly, to early birds and late chirping locusts, we wave our hand in grateful thanks!

But to that Providence over all, source of their joy and mine, what words can express what every manly heart must feel? Only the life itself can give thanks for life!

PLEASANT TALK

ABOUT

FRUIT, FLOWERS AND FARMING.

PRELIMINARY.

We understand very well that every region must fashion its _system_ of agriculture upon the nature of its soil, its climate, etc. The _principles_ of agriculture may be alike in every zone, but the _processes_ depend upon circumstances. It would be folly for a new country, without commerce, to imitate an old country with an active commerce; it would be folly, where land is cheap, abundant, and naturally fertile, to adopt the habits of those who are stinted in lands, who have a redundant population, and who find a market for even the weeds which are indigenous to the soil. The husbandry of Holland is suited to a wet soil, and of England to a humid atmosphere and a very even annual temperature. But our soil is subject to extreme wet in spring and dryness in summer, to severe cold and intense heat. A farm whose bottom-lands are reinvigorated by yearly inundations, may thrive under an exacting husbandry that would exhaust an upland farm in a few years. Modes of agriculture must be suited to circumstances. Nevertheless, the experiments and discoveries and practices of every land are worth our careful attention. We do not import _clothes_—but we do _cloth_, to be _made up_ to suit our own habits and wants.

The two extremes of husbandry are, the _adoption_ of every novelty and every experiment indiscriminately, and the _rejection_ of every new thing and every improvement, as indiscriminately. Wisdom consists in “proving all things and holding fast that which is _good_.” We do not advocate large outlays for expensive machines—for fancy cattle, for every new thing that turns up. But when, after full trial, it is ascertained what are the best farm horses, the best breed of cattle, the best milch cows, the most profitable breed of hogs and sheep, and the most skillful routine of cultivation, we think our farmers ought to profit by the knowledge. It is never a good economy to have poor things when you can just as well have the best. This, then, is

OUR CREED.

We believe in small farms and thorough cultivation.

We believe that soil loves to eat, as well as its owner, and ought, therefore, to be manured.

We believe in large crops which leave the land better than they found it—making both the farmer and the farm rich at once.

We believe in going to the bottom of things and, therefore, in deep plowing, and enough of it. All the better if with a sub-soil plow.

We believe that every farm should own a good farmer.

We believe that the best fertilizer of any soil, is a spirit of industry, enterprise, and intelligence—without this, lime and gypsum, bones and green manure, marl and guano will be of little use.

We believe in good fences, good barns, good farmhouses, good stock, good orchards, and children enough to gather the fruit.

We believe in a clean kitchen, a neat wife in it, a spinning-piano, a clean cupboard, a clean dairy, and a clean conscience.

We firmly disbelieve in farmers that will not improve; in farms that grow poorer every year; in starveling cattle; in farmers’ boys turning into clerks and merchants; in farmers’ daughters unwilling to work, and in all farmers ashamed of their vocation, or who drink whisky till honest people are ashamed of them.

ALMANAC FOR THE YEAR.

1. WORK FOR JANUARY.—If you have done as you ought to have done, you have a snug ice-house, with double walls, the space between which is filled with non-conducting substances, as pulverized charcoal, or dried saw-dust, or tanbark, which are mentioned in the order of their value. Cut your blocks of ice of a size and shape with reference to close packing. Cover over thickly with clean straw when the stock of ice is all in. Look out not to lose all your chance in waiting for a better one; sometimes careful folks mean to have such glorious ice, that an open winter cheats them out of any at all.