AS VOU LIKE IT. 459 



Wears yet a precious jewel in his head ; 

 And this our life, exempt from the public haunt 

 Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 

 Sermons in stones and good in everything." 



Thus from the olden time on to the strenuous now hath 

 nature held out a beckoning hand to the exile, for far down the 

 ages we see the Pilgrim Fathers coming to free America, where, 

 in the forests primeval, they could, "as they liked it," worship 

 God and make for themselves homes. Coming a century nearer, 

 we find our own forefathers in the log cabin making for them- 

 selves an abiding place, and even in the hardy life of the pioneers 

 they took from nature her priceless gift and returned even a 

 hundredfold, for every farm home had its orchard, vegetable 

 and flower gardens. Looking backward through memory's 

 pages, I see the long, straight path to grandmother's cabin door, 

 on both sides of which are borders of gay marigolds, larkspur, 

 snap-dragons, hollyhocks, phlox, pinks and sweet-williams, while 

 at one side of the cabin is the herb bed full of something to add 

 to a savory soup or make a tea for the invalid ; and on beyond 

 the garden, from which came foundations for dishes even better 

 than "mother makes," and at the other side restfully sit we 'neath 

 the apple trees. "As you like it," they had from stern necessity 

 as well as the inborn love of the beautiful. 



Coming to the 20th century we find the pioneers have right 

 royally clothed the prairies of Minnesota. The persistent Peter 

 Gideon believed in doing "as you like it" and labored for nearly 

 half a century, now losing, now gaining, to bring to himself and 

 through himself to Minnesota that coveted "apple of gold." 

 From economical necessity he wore a suit of clothes, not only of 

 many colors but of many patches, that he might buy a bushel of 

 apple seeds from which came the far-famed Wealthy apple. 

 From then till his death he labelled every orchard in Minnesota 

 with the stamp of his patient, untiring zeal and devotion in leav- 

 ing to the North Star State a bequest, from which the barefooted 

 school boy and the philanthropic millionaire share and share 

 alike. 



Another pioneer, John S. Harris, who at the early age of eleven 

 had a nursery and garden of his own, had proved that not any- 

 where save on the broad acres of the farm do we have the same 

 opportunity and privilege of doing "as we like it;" for he, too, 

 for just half a century, planted and experimented to success, with 

 all kinds of fruit, justly earning a "well done" from every Minne- 

 sotan. 



