WHAT I KNOW ABOUT GARDENING. 57 



and wisest men will not need to study with 

 care. 



I need not add that the care of a garden with 

 this hoe becomes the merest pastime. I would 

 not be without one for a single night. The only 

 danger is, that you may rather make an idol of 

 the hoe, and somewhat neglect your garden in 

 explaining it, and fooling about with it. I almost 

 think that, with one of these in the hands of an 

 ordinary day-laborer, you might see at night 

 where he had been working. 



Let us have peas. I have been a zealous ad- 

 vocate of the birds. I have rejoiced in their 

 multiplication. I have endured their concerts 

 at four o'clock in the morning without a mur- 

 mur. Let them come, I said, and eat the worms, 

 in order that we, later, may enjoy the foliage and 

 the fruits of the earth. We have a cat, a magnifi- 

 cent animal, of the sex which votes (but not a 

 pole-cat), so large and powerful that, if he 



3* 



