CHAPTER IX 



MORE SETBACKS 



URING all of this time my hotbeds 

 had been thriving, and although my 

 neighbors were busy planting their 

 gardens, I had done no more than lay 

 out a good-sized vegetable garden, and have it 

 horse-ploughed with the rest of the field. This 

 I harrowed with Lady M. I knew that by trans- 

 planting my artificially cultivated vegetables I 

 would be far in advance of my neighbors in the 

 growth of my garden, and so I was in no hurry 

 to jeopardize my plants with another cold snap. 



I am not entirely correct when I say I had done 

 no more than lay out a garden patch. I had no- 

 ticed with much disgust and concern that the 

 first green things that appeared were the hideous 

 and unsightly burdocks, which require no cultiva- 

 tion, and which, if not promptly checked, spread 

 like the Asiatic cholera and kill out every other 

 kind of vegetation. 



So I acted with great promptness and thorough- 

 ness, and not only cut them down with a scythe, 

 but spent the greater part of a sunny afternoon 

 in carefully grubbing up each individual root, 



