TEE SIX OF SPADES. 177 



home to hear the niggers (why are they coiibidered 

 to be so genteel at St. James's Hall, and so " vulgar " 

 everywhere else?) has gone back to think more of 

 his garden. 



And this brings me to speak of prizes for cottagers. 

 Now you can't do a poor man a greater kindness, in 

 my opinion, than by giving him a garden, and 

 encouraging him in every way to take an interest in 

 it ; and, after many years of experience, I feel 

 convinced that the best way to do this, so far as 

 shows are concerned, is to have separate exhibitions 

 for cottagers in the village schoolrooms, and not to 

 tack 'em on to those larger meetings at which they 

 cannot possibly receive the attention and the notice 

 which they well deserve. White and black currants 

 don't get much praise where there's Muscat and 

 Hamburg grapes ; and nobody cares, after looking at 

 dipladenias and allamaLdas and ixoras, for the poor 

 little window-plant. That posy of Mary Smith's in 

 the blue and white mug, with its bits of totter-grass 

 and ferns, is as pretty in my eyes as anything in all 

 the show ; but nine out of ten whom I ask to admire 

 it invite me, with a smile o' pity, to go and look at 

 Lady Bigge's bouquet of orchids. Some says, let the 

 cottagers have a tent to themselves, and they sticks 

 'em in a corner, like a peep-show at a fair behind 

 Wombwell's menagerie ; but I says, let 'em have a 

 show and a holiday to themselves, and let all their 

 neighbours go and help 'em, not only with their money, 

 but with kind words, which is better than silver, and 

 brotherly love, which is brighter than gold. There 

 ain't a happier sight to be seen than the people of 

 13 



