86 MY SUMMER IN A GARDEN. 



I had begun to nurse a good deal of pride 

 in presiding over a table whereon was the 

 fruit of my honest industry. But woman ! 

 John Stuart Mill is right when he says 

 that we do not know anything about women. 

 Six thousand years is as one day with them. 

 I thought I had something to do with those 

 vegetables. 



But when I saw Polly seated at her side 

 of the table, presiding over the new and sus- 

 ceptible vegetables, flanked by the squash 

 and the beans, and ' smiling upon the green 

 corn and the new potatoes, as cool as the 

 cucumbers which lay sliced in ice before her, 

 and when she began to dispense the fresh 

 dishes, I saw at once that the day of my 

 destiny was over. You would have thought 

 that she owned all the vegetables, and had 

 raised them all from their earliest years. 

 Such quiet, vegetable airs ! Such gracious 

 appropriation ! 



At length I said, 



" Polly, do you know who planted that 

 squash, or those squashes ? " 



