88 SUCCESS WITH SMALL FRUITS. 



swamp, and also to manage the deceitful brook, was now 

 finished, and I waited for the results. During much of the 

 summer there was not a drop of water in the wide canal, 

 save where a living spring trickled into it. The ordinary fall 

 rains could scarcely more than cover the broad, pebbly 

 bottom, and the unsophisticated laughed and said that I 

 reminded them of the general who trained a forty-pound 

 gun on a belligerent mouse. I remembered what I had 

 seen, and bided my time. 



But I did not have to wait till March. One November 

 day it began to rain, and it kept on. All the following night 

 there was a steady rush and roar of falling water. It was 

 no ordinary pattering, but a gusty outpouring from the 

 "windows of heaven." The two swales in the front and 

 rear of the house became great muddy ponds, tawny as the 

 ''yellow Tiber," and through intervals of the storm came 

 the sullen roar of the little brook that had been purring like 

 a kitten all summer. Toward night, Nature grew breath- 

 less and exhausted ; there were sobbing gusts of wind and 

 sudden gushes of rain, that grew less and less frequent. It 

 was evident she would become quiet in the night and quite 

 serene after her long, tempestuous mood. 



As the sun was setting I ventured out with much mis- 

 giving. The deepening roar as I went down the lane 

 increased my fears, but I was fairly appalled by the wild 

 torrent that cut oif all approach to the bridge. The water 

 had not only filled the wide canal, but also, at a point a 

 little above the bridge, had broken over and washed away 

 the high embankment. I skirted along the tide until I 

 reached the part of the bank that still remained intact, and 

 there beneath my feet rushed a flood that would have in- 

 stantly swept away horse and rider. Indeed, quite a large 

 tree had been torn up by its roots, and carried down until it 



