I looked into her eager, wistful face, but said, firmly: "Not now, dear. The sun is too hot. Toward night, perhaps, I'll let you do a little. By helping mamma in the house you are doing your part."

We made good progress, and the two younger children speedily learned the knack of working carefully, so as not to disturb the little vegetables. I soon found that weeding was back-aching work for me, and therefore "spelled" myself by hoeing out the s.p.a.ces between the rows.

By the time the music of the dinner-bell sounded, hosts of our enemies were slain.

Mr. Jones, true to his promise, was on hand at one o'clock with his cultivator, and began with the corn, which was now a few inches high.

Merton and I followed with hoes, uncovering the tender shoots on which earth had been thrown, and dressing out the soil into clean flat hills.

As our neighbor had said, it was astonishing how much work the horse-cultivator performed in a short time. I saw that it would be wise for us, another year, to plant in a way that would permit the use of horse-power. Even in the garden this method should be followed as far as possible.

Mr. Jones was not a man of half-way measures. He remained helping us, till he had gone through the corn, once each way, twice between the long rows of potatoes, then twice through all the raspberry rows, giving us two full days of his time altogether.

I handed him a dollar in addition to his charge, saying that I had never paid out money with greater satisfaction.

"Well," he said, with a short, dry laugh, "I'll take it this time, for my work is sufferin' at home, but I didn't want you to get discouraged.

Now, keep the hoes flyin', and you're ahead once more. Junior's at it early and late, I can tell ye."

"So I supposed, for we've missed him."

"Good reason. When I'm through with him he's ready enough to crawl into his little bed."

So were we for a few days, in our winning fight with the weeds. One hot afternoon, about three o'clock, I saw that Merton was growing pale, and beginning to lag, and I said, decidedly: "Do you see that tree there?

Go and lie down under it till I call you."

"I guess I can stand it till night," he began, his pride a little touched.

"Obey orders! I am captain."

In five minutes he was fast asleep. I threw my coat over him, and sat down, proposing to have a half-hour's rest myself. My wife came out with a pitcher of cool b.u.t.ter-milk and nodded her head approvingly at us.

"Well, my thoughtful Eve," I said, "I find that our modern Eden will cost a great many back-aches."

"If you will only be prudent like this, you may save me a heart-ache.

Robert, you are ambitious, and unused to this kind of work. Please don't ever be so foolish as to forget the comparative value of vegetables and yourselves. Honestly now" (with one of her saucy looks), "I'd rather do with a few bushels less, than do without you and Merton;" and she sat down and kept me idle for an hour.

Then Merton got up, saying that he felt as "fresh as if he had had a night's rest," and we accomplished more in the cool of the day than if we had kept doggedly at work.

I found that Winnie and Bobsey required rather different treatment. For a while they got on very well, but one morning I set them at a bed of parsnips about which I was particular. In the middle of the forenoon I went to the garden to see how they were getting on. Shouts of laughter made me fear that all was not well, and I soon discovered that they were throwing lumps of earth at each other. So absorbed were they in their untimely and mischievous fun that I was not noticed until I found Bobsey sitting plump on the vegetables, and the rows behind both the children very shabbily cleaned, not a few of the little plants having been pulled up with the weeds.

Without a word I marched them into the house, then said: "Under arrest till night. Winnie, you go to your room. I shall strap Bobsey in his chair, and put him in the parlor by himself."

The exchange of the hot garden for the cool rooms seemed rather an agreeable punishment at first, although Winnie felt the disgrace somewhat. When, at dinner, nothing but a cup of water and a piece of dry bread was taken to them, Bobsey began to howl, and Winnie to look as if the affair was growing serious. Late in the afternoon, when she found that she was not to gather the eggs or feed her beloved chickens, she, too, broke down and sobbed that she "wouldn't do so any more."

Bobsey also pleaded so piteously for release, and promised such saint-like behavior, that I said: "Well, I will remit the rest of your punishment and put you on trial. You had no excuse for your mischief this morning, for I allow you to play the greater part of every afternoon, while Merton must stand by me the whole of the week."

My touch of discipline brought up the morale of my little squad effectually for a time. The next afternoon even the memory of trouble was banished by the finding of the first wild strawberries. Exultation and universal interest prevailed as cl.u.s.ters of green and red berries were handed around to be smelled and examined. "Truly," my wife remarked, "even roses can scarcely equal the fragrance of the wild strawberry."

From that day forward, for weeks, it seemed as if we entered on a diet of strawberries and roses. The old-fashioned bushes of the latter, near the house, had been well trimmed, and gave large, fine buds in consequence, while Mousie, Winnie, and Bobsey gleaned every wild berry that could be found, beginning with the sunny upland slopes and following the aromatic fruit down to the cool, moist borders of the creek.

"Another year," I said, "I think you will be tired even of strawberries, for we shall have to pick early and late."

CHAPTER x.x.xI

NATURE SMILES AND HELPS

The Sat.u.r.day evening which brought us almost to the middle of June was welcomed indeed. The days preceding had been filled with hard, yet successful labor, and the weeds had been slaughtered by the million.

The greater part of our crops had come up well and were growing nicely.

In hoeing the corn, we had planted over the few missing hills, and now, like soldiers who had won the first great success of the campaign, we were in a mood to enjoy a rest to the utmost.

This rest seemed all the more delightful when we awoke on the following morning, to the soft patter of rain. The preceding days had been unusually dry and warm, so that the gra.s.s and tender vegetables were beginning to suffer. I was worrying about the raspberries also, which were pa.s.sing out of blossom. The cultivator had been through them, and Merton and I, only the evening before, had finished hoeing out the sprouting weeds and surplus suckers. I had observed, with dread, that just as the fruit was forming, the earth, especially around the hills, was getting dry.

Now, looking out, I saw that the needful watering was not coming from a pa.s.sing shower. The clouds were leaden from horizon to horizon; the rain fell with a gentle steadiness of a quiet summer storm, and had evidently been falling some hours already. The air was so fragrant that I threw wide open the door and windows. It was a true June incense, such as no art could distil, and when, at last, we all sat down to breakfast, of which crisp radishes taken a few moments before from our own garden formed a part, we felt that nature was carrying on our work of the past week in a way that filled our hearts with grat.i.tude. The air was so warm that we did not fear the dampness. The door and windows were left open that we might enjoy the delicious odors and listen to the musical patter of the rain, which fell so softly that the birds were quite as tuneful as on other days.

The children joined me in the porch, and my wife came out laughing, and put her hand on my shoulder as she said, "You are not through with July and August yet."

Mousie held her hands out in the warm rain, saying: "I feel as if it would make me grow, too. Look at the green cherries up there, bobbing as the drops. .h.i.t them."

"Rain isn't good for chickens," Winnie remarked, doubtfully.

"It won't hurt them," I replied, "for I have fed them so well that they needn't go out in the wet for food."

The clouds gave us a more and more copious downfall as the day advanced, and I sat on the porch, resting and observing with conscious grat.i.tude how beautifully nature was furthering all our labor, and fulfilling our hopes. This rain would greatly increase the hay-crops for the old horse and the cow; it would carry my vegetables rapidly toward maturity; and, best of all, would soak the raspberry ground so thoroughly that the fruit would be almost safe. What was true of our little plot was equally so of neighbor Jones's farm, and thousands of others. My wife sat with me much of the day, and I truly think that our thoughts were acceptable worship. By four in the afternoon the western horizon lightened, the clouds soon broke away, and the sun shone out briefly in undiminished splendor, turning the countless raindrops on foliage and gra.s.s into gems, literally, of the purest water. The bird-songs seemed almost ecstatic, and the voices of the children, permitted at last to go out of doors, vied with them in gladness.

"Let July and August--yes, and bleak January--bring what they may," I said to my wife, "nevertheless, this is Eden."

In spite of the muddy walks, we picked our way around the garden, exclaiming in pleased wonder at the growth made by our vegetable nurslings in a few brief hours, while, across the field, the corn and potato rows showed green, strong outlines.

I found that Brindle in the pasture hadn't minded the rain, but only appeared the sleeker for it. When at last I came in to supper, I gave my wife a handful of berries, at which she and the children exclaimed.

I had permitted a dozen plants of each variety of my garden strawberries to bear, that I might get some idea of the fruit. The blossoms on the other plants had been picked off as soon as they appeared, so that all the strength might go toward forming new plants.

I found that a few of the berries of the two early kinds were ripe, also that the robins had been sampling them. In size, at least, they seemed wonderful compared with the wild fruit from the field, and I said:

"There will be lively times for us when we must get a dozen bushels a day, like these, off to Mr. Bogart."

The children, then, thought it would be the greatest fun in the world.

By the time supper was over, Mr. Jones and Junior appeared, and my neighbor said in hearty good-will:

"You got your cultivatin' done in the nick of time, Mr. Durham. This rain is a good hundred dollars in your pocket and mine, too."

I soon perceived that our enemies, the weeds, had millions in reserve, and on Monday--the day after the rain--with all the children helping, even Mousie part of the time, we went at the garden again. To Mousie, scarcely an invalid any longer, was given the pleasure of picking the first green peas and sh.e.l.ling them for dinner. We had long been enjoying the succulent lettuce and the radishes, and now I said to Winnie: "To-morrow you can begin thinning out the beets, leaving the plants three inches apart. What you pull up can be cooked as spinach, or 'greens,' as country people say. Our garden will soon enable us to live like princes."

As the ground dried after the rain, a light crust formed on the surface, and in the wetter portions it was even inclined to bake or crack. I was surprised at the almost magical effect of breaking up the crust and making the soil loose and mellow by cultivation. The letting in of air and light caused the plants to grow with wonderful vigor.

On Wednesday morning Merton came running in, exclaiming, "O papa!

there's a green worm eating all the leaves off the currant and gooseberry bushes."

I followed him hastily, and found that considerable mischief had already been done, and I went to one of my fruit books in a hurry to find out how to cope with this new enemy.

As a result, I said: "Merton, mamma wishes to go to the village. You drive her and Mousie down, and at the drug-store get two pounds of white h.e.l.lebore, also a pound of Paris green, for I find that the potato bugs are getting too thick to be managed by hand. Remember that these are poisons, the Paris green a deadly one. Have them carefully wrapped up, and keep them from everything else. When you return I'll take charge of them. Also, get a new large watering-can."