78 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ILLINOIS 



from Horace Greeley's address to the Indians, in 1685, when Wm. 

 Penn made such a solemn treaty with the red men under the now 

 famous old Charter Oak in South Park, Chicago. ) 



Just after adopting a line of operations and losing one boot in 

 the mud, the clouds returned to their usual occupation, that (5f weep- 

 ing like a spoiled child. Then wrapping myself in a rubber coat and 

 a solemn determination to end the matter at once, I rammed the 

 vines down in the mud without regard to labels, varieties or family 

 distinctions, and up to the present time I have not had intimate 

 acquaintance enough with these different varieties to enable me to 

 distinguish one from another, but the one I have supposed to be the 

 Pocklington has been a complete failure. The other varieties have 

 produced fair crops of very ordinary grapes, but have proved so very 

 unsatisfactory that I have since planted nothing but the Concord. 



A few years ago I was fortunate in securing a new variety of 

 early summer pear from one of our nurserymen. The name of which, 

 like most other things of minor importance, has passed beyond my 

 jurisdiction, but the tree, alas, has not. It stands as a monument to 

 the folly of one who is ever seeking after something which Solomon 

 declares does not exist. That is, something new. That the tree is 

 properly named, and that it belongs to the the pear familv, there can 

 be no doubt, for it bore one single specimen of fruit last year, and 

 another this, which according to Ray's mental arithmetic would 

 make it a pear tree. 



Liist year a little child was passing bigh, 

 8he saw the pear a hanging high, 

 And viewed it with an evil eigh; 

 She ate and hove a painful sigh, 

 And sought her little bed to digh. 



With pills and squills the doctor came. 

 And made her raise that fruit again. 

 This year the pear she did not take. 

 But left it there for me to shake, 

 I caught it ere it reached the ground, 

 And found it ripe, but firm and sound. 

 A pretty golden russet thinsr. 

 And hard enough to keep till spring. 

 I layed it by with greatest care. 

 Where sun and wind would not impair. 



The virtues that I dreamed were there, 



And when in time I took it down. 



And quartered it and passed it round. 



I heard but one sad solemn sound, 



Cut down the tree, why cumberetli it the ground ? 



If you will dissect this poem careful^ you will see that it is 

 divided into Cantos. Canto first, includes the temptation; Canto 

 second, the yielding to temptation; Canto third, the punishment for 



