56 MY GARDEN HOW IT GREW. 



a tolerably fair condition for corn and potatoes, 

 but according to Henderson, and I soon found, 

 experience also, in no state for a garden. It 

 was very stony, and all the finer and more val- 

 uable vegetables made slow growth upon it. 

 After it was once ploughed and planted I did 

 nothing more with a horse, not having any, but 

 all was handiwork. 



From my easy-going, deliberate Teuton I 

 went to the other extreme, and obtained a chol- 

 , eric Dutchman, who was a perfect steam-engine 

 at work. But he was touchy as gunpowder, 

 and 1 had to walk around my own garden most 

 circumspectly. If he started off rightly he ac- 

 complished wonders ; but if wrong, there seemed 

 even greater energy ; and how to stop him and 

 correct matters without a grand explosion was 

 a knotty and delicate problem. He was not a 

 gardener by profession, but accustomed to work 

 alone at employment devoid of all the little 



