48 



THE CANADIAN H0RTICULTTTRI8T. 



THE BEAUTIFUL DAY. 



"We did not mean to do wrong," she said, 

 With a mist in her eyes of tears unshed 



Lil<e the haze of the midsummer weather. 

 "We thought you would all be as happy as we? 

 But something, must always go wrong, you see, 



We have our play-time together. 



"Before the dew on the grass was dry, 

 Wc were out this movning, Reuben and I, 



And truly, I think that never— 

 For all that you and Mamma may say — 

 Will there be again sueh a happy day 



In all the days of forever. 

 " The sunshine was yellow as gold, and the skies 

 Were as sleepy and blue as the baby's eyes ; 



And a soft little wind was blowing, 

 And roeking the daisy buds to and fro ; 

 We played that the meadows were white with snow, 



Where the crowding blossoms were growing. 

 " The birds and the bees flew about in the sun, 

 And there was not a thing that was sorry— not one, 



That dear morning down in the meadow 

 But we could not bear to think — Reuben and I-- 

 That our beautiful day would be done, by and by, 



And our sunshiny world dark with shadow. 

 "So into the hall we quietly stepped. 

 It was cool and still, and a sunbeam crept 



Through the door, and the birds were singing. 

 We stole as softly as we could go 

 To the clock at the foot of the stairs, you know. 



With its big, bright pendulum swinging. 

 "We knew that the sun dripped down out of heaven. 

 And brought the night when the clock struck seven — 



For so I had heard Mamma saying ; 

 And we turn'd back the hands till they pointed to ten. 

 And our beautiful day began ovei' again. 



And then ran away to our jilaying. 

 "I'm afraid I can't tell you the rest," she said, 

 With a gorrowful droop of the fair little head. 



And the misty brown eyes overflowing. 

 "We had only been out such a few minutes more, 

 When, just as it always had happened before, 



We found that our dear day was going. 

 "The shadows grew long, and the blue skies were 



grey. 

 And the bees and butterflies all flew away. 



And the dew on the grass was falling. 

 The sun did not shine in the sky any more. 

 And the birds did not sing, and away by the door 



We heard Mamma's voice to us calling. 



"But the night will be done, I suppose, by and by; 

 And we have been thinking — Ri'Uben and I — 



That perhaps" —and she sniih^d through her sorrow, — 

 "Perhaps it may be, after all, better so. 

 For if to-day lasted forever, you know. 



There would mjver be any to-morrow !" 

 St. Nicholas. 



Profit.s of Small Fruits. — As a sample 

 of the profits they make in Southern Illi- 

 nois, Mr. Endicott owned up that he made, 

 clean profit, $4,200 this year from twelve 

 acres of strawberries and grapes. This, 

 he said, was after the picking and crates 

 were all deducted, the net profit ; and some 

 of the berries, Sharpless, were so poor a 

 crop as to yield only about a dozen crates 

 of marketable fruit per acre. His berry 

 for money, is the Crescent, with the Capt. 

 Jack or Wilson. The grapes, Ives, pay 

 an annual profit of from $200 to $300 per 

 acre, with good culture. 



A New Way op Blkaching Celtcrt. — 

 Some time since in strolling through 

 Stratford, the market garden of Bridge- 

 port and Birmingham, Conn., I was miich 

 interested in meeting W. H. Benjamin 

 and learning his method of bleaching cel- 

 ery. Instead of earthing it up as is usu- 

 ally done, Mr. Benjamin simply ties it up 

 closely in old news or other papers when 

 it is reaily for bleaching, and at the end 

 of from 12 to twenty days finds it as nicely 

 bleached as though it had been laboriously 

 banked up. He says one-third more celery 

 can be got from an acre, because when it is 

 not banked it does not need to be planted 

 so far apart ; that a great amount of labour 

 is saved and that by this process the celery 

 never rusts. 



Coal- Ashes forHi'.wy Soils.- — For the 

 purpose of making stiff" soil friable, sifted 

 coal-ashes, where they can be readily had 

 are better than sand. They are more 

 easily disseminated through the mass, and 

 contain a small proporticm of mineral salts 

 likewise, though thcnr merit is [jrincipally 

 mechanical. I had a patch of clay over 

 trajirock that, after a rain, took on the 

 consistence of putty. I could do nothing 

 with it. Vegetable manure it scorned, 

 and the spade cut in it as though it was 

 skim milk cheese. The idnce was made 

 the receptacle of the winter's ashes. Two 

 years after, it was dug up through a mis- 

 taken order in the fall. Next spring I 

 manured it, and had it dug over. Then I 

 planted it, of all things in the world, with 

 melons. They were a striking success. 

 More tlian tliat, the friability of the soil 

 remained permanent. — American Garden. 



Printed at the Steam Piess Establishment of Copp, Clark & Co., Colborne Street, Toronto. 



