38 1I1E FI.OKlc^T. 



jjossibility that, in our over-anxiety to rid ourj^elves of some otlier 

 fancied pests, we have been destroying the natural enemies which 

 would have kei)t in check these troublesome hordes ? I have more 

 to say for earth-worms. 1 believe them to be the active members of 

 a large draining association for the benefit of man ; and 1 do not 

 hesitate to affirm, that he who chops a worm in two with a spade, or 

 otherwise destroys it, has done a cruel and a foolish action. 



Of a like character is the common practice of kilhng harmless 

 toads and frogs, — some of the most useful auxiliaries of a gardening 

 establishment. 



The sum of all this is, that it appears to me to be worth the con- 

 sideration of every gardener, how he may destroy as little as possible 

 of the sensitive creation ; and that he should not think he has done 

 well when, with fell determination, he has destroyed as many as pos- 

 sible of God's creatures, but when he has learnt to spare every one 

 which he caimot convince himself, on due reflection, to be a downright 

 plague. 



Descending in the scale of creation, I come now to the vegetable 

 world. Here, as we have no pain to inflict, no blood to shed, I have 

 no doubt we may exercise our discretion as to the destruction of 

 plants, weeds, &c. 



At the Fall the ground was cursed, and it began to bring forth 

 briers, thorns, and the like. As, then, they seem to have been sent 

 to punish man for his sin, to increase his difficulty in tilhng the 

 ground, I see not but what man may do his best to root them out, 

 and thus lessen the labour which has become his portion. 



Yet even the destruction of small plants and weeds cannot be 

 carried out, without exciting in the minds of the thoughtful some 

 passing feeling of regret at uprooting a being full of life, thus bring- 

 ing it to a premature, an early death. Burns the poet seems to have 

 felt this when he wrote his sweet little poem on " A Mountain Daisy, 

 upon turning one down with the plough in April 1786." The first 

 stanza shews the poet's feeling : 



" Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow'r, 

 Thou's met me in an evil hour ; 

 For I maun crush amang the stoure 



Thy slender stem ; 

 To spare thee now is past my pow'r, 



Thou bonnie gem." 



The poet's moral in the last stanza is also worth recalling : 



" Ev'n thou Avho mourn 'st the Daisy's fate, 

 That fate is thine — no distant date ; 

 Stern Ruin's ploughshare drives, elate. 



Full on thy bloom. 

 Till crush 'd beneath the furrow's weiglit 



Shall be thy doom." 



Kind readers, will it be believed, that after this v^ord of mercy 

 for the sensitive creation, this pleasing reminiscence of the poet's 

 tenderness of heart, I should come forward to counsel the destruction 



