AUGUST. 2/3 



the labourer, old or young, is there to collect 

 what he has sown with toil, and watched in its 

 growth with pride ; the dame has left her wheel 

 and her shady cottage, and, with sleeve- de- 

 fended arms, scorns to do less than the best of 

 them: the blooming damsel is there, adding 

 her sunny beauty to that of universal nature 

 the boy cuts down the stalks which overtop his 

 head ; children glean amongst the shocks ; and 

 even the unwalkable infant, sits propt with 

 sheaves, and plays with the stubble, and 



With all its twined flowers. 



Such groups are often seen in the wheat-field as 

 deserve the immortality of the pencil. There 

 is something too about wheat-harvest which 

 carries back the mind and feasts it with the 

 pleasures of antiquity. The sickle is almost 

 the only implement which has descended from 

 the olden times in its pristine simplicity to 

 the present hour neither altering its form, nor 

 becoming obsolete amid all the fashions and 

 improvements of the world. It is the same 

 now as it was in those scenes of rural beauty 

 which the scripture history, without any la- 

 T 



