SUMMER [Chap. 



spade in a sloping direction, and driving it down 

 with his foot, as far he can drive it, pressing 

 down the eye with one hand and applying the 

 other hand to the handle, lift up all the earth, 

 spit after spit, between these two rows, putting 

 the top of the earth into the place where the 

 bottom was before. Let him (though this is a 

 fine recipe for the gout) now lay by the spade, 

 and take another instrument, called a hoe, which 

 he may use without inconvenience to his back, 

 and just scrape over the ground, and kill the as- 

 piring weeds over the rest of the plat. Let him 

 look at the whole plat in a week from that time ; 

 and, though these two rows have had but half til- 

 lage, the greatness of their progress, compared 

 with that of the rest, he will find to be surprising. 

 104. In 1817, in Long Island, I had nothing 

 but a garden wherein to plant corn, or rather a 

 piece of ground which had once been a garden. 

 My neighbour ploughed it up for me with his 

 oxen ; and I planted in it five square rods with 

 corn. Want of room made me put the hills at 

 three feet apart ; but still my corn was very fine. 

 There could be no ploughing of such a little 

 piece, and the second digging was put off until 

 a very late season. The tassel was got up a 

 good height, and the silk was just ready to ap- 

 pear. But the weather was so tremendously hot, 

 and our bodies were so much like bits of leather. 



