CROPS AND PROFITS 



this capricious fruit be planted under the 

 shadow of a north wall, in soil compact and 

 deep ; it should be thoroughly enriched, pruned 

 severely, watered abundantly, and mulched (if 

 possible) with kelp, fresh from the sea shore. 

 These conditions and appliances may give a 

 clean cheek, even to the Conquering-Hero. 



But it is not so much for any piquancy of 

 flavor that I prize the fruit, as because its Eng- 

 lish bloat is pleasantly suggestive of little tart- 

 lets (smothered in clotted cream) eaten long 

 ago under the lee of Dartmoor hills— of Lan- 

 cashire gardens, where prize berries reposed on 

 miniature scaffoldings, or swam in porcelain 

 saucers— and of bristling thickets in Cowper's 

 ''Wilderness" by Olney. 



Is it lonely in my garden of a summer's 

 evening? Have the little pattering feet gone 

 their ways — to bed? Then I people the goose- 

 berry alley with old Doctor Primrose, and his 

 daughters Sophia and Olivia; Squire Burchell 

 comes, and sits upon the bench with me under 

 the arbor, as I smoke my pipe. How shall we 

 measure our indebtedness to such pleasant 

 books, that people our solitude so many years 

 after they are written! Oliver Goldsmith, I 

 thank you ! Crown-Bob, I thank you. Goose- 

 berries, like the English, are rather indigestible. 



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