144 An American Fruit-Farm 



pigweed and burdock which mean rich, moist 

 soil. But the daisy, the gypsumweed, mean 

 hard, lean land, neglected, and the brown grass 

 on untilled land means soil-starvation. Nature 

 abhors naked earth, and hastens to cover it over 

 with a blanket of green; grass if she can, weeds 

 if she must. I believe in a well-covered soil in 

 winter; a well-cultivated soil in spring and summer; 

 a food-filled soil in autvimn. Left to herself, 

 Nature grows grass and weeds on our plantation. 

 Then come November winds and December snows, 

 and freezing and thawing of the earth in January 

 and February, and the weariness of March and its 

 desolation. If the earth is well covered by a 

 matting of straw, dead grasses, weeds, even a 

 blanket of snow, — shrub, tree, or vine will suffer no 

 harm. Raw, uncovered land in winter is leached 

 by storm, by rain, snow, and ice, and so loses its 

 virtues. The snow is our friend if we can get it to 

 lie still, even to the depth of a foot on the ground. 

 But if it blows hither and yon and the land is 

 swept by the besom of the storm, now covered with 

 snow, now bare-blown, the surface freezing and 

 bleaching, vast injury is done. The surface 

 drainage of the soil is quite destroyed and alternate 

 freezing and thawing of the earth means death to 

 many a tree and vine. In some vineyards, planted 

 in stiff, strong clay, the vines will be quite thrown 

 out of ground, so that the first horse-hoeing quite 

 completes the ruin, if the tool is held by a careless 

 hand. It is usual, all over the Valley, to horse- 



