CHAPTER IV.

"At length arrayed

In all the colours of the flushing year, the garden glows."

THOMSON.

"MARCH, with its rude, rough, and boisterous winds, with the dark clouds and rain storms with beautiful gleams of sunshine, in which it delights, is now gone," said Mr. Stock, one morning; "and we shall now have the lighter gales, short and frequent showers of rain, with the warm sun, perhaps, shining all the time, which distinguishes the lovely month of April. I dare say you remember that this is called' April fools' day :' have you ever been made a fool of, Adam, on the first of April?" "Yes," said Adam; "and I once played a boy such a trick; but when he found out that I had made an April fool of him, he gave me such a thumping!" "Then he was a natural fool as well as an April one, Adam," said Mr. Stock, "or he would have laughed at the joke." "He was much bigger and older than I," said Adam, "or he would not have dared to thump me." I am pleased to hear you say so, Adam; never submit to a blow yourself, when you can help it; at the same time, never be a tyrant over others. Never be the first to quarrel; and do not be the last to make it up."

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This conversation took place in the garden, while they were planting out some balm, mint, sage, and other sweet herbs, on a border kept for that purpose; and, this finished, they set about weeding the asparagus beds; "For," said Mr. Stock, "weeds should never be suffered to spring higher

than an inch, or they take the food required by the plants.' Adam did not much like weeding, for it made his back ache. But his father soon convinced him how much happier was his lot than many thousands of his fellow-creatures. "You never worked for sixteen hours together in your life, Adam; but thousands younger than you were obliged to do so every day, until some kind-hearted gentlemen interfered, and got a law to prevent it. Think how rejoiced one of these poor sickly little creatures would be to come and take your place; or even to breathe the sweet air we are now breathing!" This rebuke made Adam very serious: he set to work in right earnest, and soon cleared the bed of weeds.

On the following day they planted out their first crop of brocoli in rows, and sowed more seed for a second crop; tied up the leaves of the most forward early cabbages, that the hearts might grow more quickly; planted out some of the sugar-loaf cabbages, red cabbages for pickling, and savoys from the seed beds: in fact, cropped all the vacant spots in the garden, except those kept for the main potato crop; weeded and thinned all the early beds; and, after walking round the garden, and examining the progress of their crops, they reached the bed of radishes sown by Adam. "Now, my boy," said Mr. Stock, "you shall enjoy some of the fruits of your labour; and, what is more, you shall see your mother and sisters enjoy them: your radishes ought now to be fit to draw; I will go and get some of my own sowing, while you pick a few bunches from these." Adam soon after followed his father, shouting with laughter, and holding up a bunch of stunted, ill-shaped, short-bodied radishes, with fibres like fingers projecting from them! "Oh, papa, look at this set

of scarecrows! Ha! ha! ha!" and he made the garden ring again with his laughter. But his attention was soon caught by the long taper roots his father was drawing, and his mirth ceased. "Why, papa," he said, "yours are not such stupid looking things,—what can make the difference?" "My dear boy, if any one else had brought me such things, I should say the ground had not been properly prepared." "How do you mean, papa?" "Why, that the manure had been. mixed with the surface soil, instead of being buried spit deep. Did I forget to tell you how I wished that bed to be managed? I am sure I did not; and this ugly crop must be caused by some other circumstance."

Adam began to feel very uncomfortable; and, for a moment, the thought passed through his mind that he would say nothing about his neglect, which he now well remembered. His disposition was, however, too noble to do so. He at once said, with "flushed cheek, but unshrinking eye," "Papa, I did not trench that bed; you told me how to do it; but I found it hard work, and I suppose I was conceited enough to think 1 knew better than you, and that it could not signify, so the manure was in, how; so I only digged the bed, and mixed the dung with the earth." "You have done very wrong, Adam, and I am displeased that a little boy should suppose he knew better than his father; but you have told the truth, and therefore I forgive you. When manure is laid near the surface of the soil which is intended for tap-rooted plants, it gives them a tendency to throw out roots at the side to take up the rich food, which the manure is to them; but when the manure is spread at the bottom, the single tap-root runs straight down to find it."

C

Adam was ashamed of his conceit; and his father, seeing his mortification, kindly avoided saying more on the subject. But his punishment was increased when he saw how much his mother and sisters enjoyed the beautiful radishes drawn from his father's bed, and thought how he had curtailed their store by disobeying his father's instructions.

Their garden was now well cropped; and their chief employment was to watch its development, and give the plants every little aid in their power. The early cauliflowers, which had been left under the hand-glasses, were now growing beautifully. They were earthed up, and the hand-glasses raised on bricks, so as to give them room to grow. The cucumber-frames were now opened in the middle of the day to inure the plants to the open air. The hoe was kept constantly going, and a careful eye was kept on the fruit trees to remove any caterpillars which made their appearance on them. One morning, while occupied in sticking the early peas, they heard the voice of the cuckoo for the first time. This well-known and welcome voice reminded Mr. Stock of Wordsworth's beautiful and simple poem, which he repeated to Adam, recommending him to learn it:

"O, blithe new comer! I have heard,

I hear thee, and rejoice:

O, cuckoo! shall I call thee bird,
Or but a wandering voice?

"While I am lying on the grass,

Thy loud note smites my ear;
From hill to hill it seems to pass,
At once far off and near!

"The same which in my schoolboy days

I listened to; that cry

Which made me look a thousand ways;

In bush, and tree, and sky.

"And I can listen to thee yet;

Can lie upon the plain,

And listen till I do beget

That golden time again."

Adam thought it very pretty; all except the last part, which he did not understand. His father explained to him, that the poet meant that he could lie on the grass and listen to the bird until he fancied himself a thoughtless, careless, and merry schoolboy again, and he calls his schoolboy days the "golden time;" "And if you live to be a man, Adam,” said he, "you will think so too. I used to think, when I was a little boy, how happy I should be if I were a man; and now that I am a man, I would give all I am worth, except you and your mother and sisters, to be a boy again. But I have some business in the village; go and ask your mamma and sisters if they will join us, and we will take a walk in the fields, if they can go with us." In a few minutes the whole party were ready. On the way, Mr. Stock entertained the party with anecdotes of the habits and instincts of the birds they saw. How the swallow traversed hundreds of miles to visit us, build its little house, rear its young, and again retraced its path on the approach of winter! How the wryneck, which they detected from its loud cry of "Week week!" many times repeated, as it perched on a gate-post, would hiss at you like a nest of snakes if you approached their nest, frightening many a cowardly boy who would have robbed it, but for the