156 MY SUMMER IN A GARDEN. 



heads with nothing within. Even the 

 largest cabbages are not always the best. 

 But I mention these things, not from any 

 sympathy I have with the vegetables named, 

 but to show how hard it is to go contrary to 

 the expectations of society. Society expects 

 every man to have certain things in his gar- 

 den. Not to raise cabbage is as if one had 

 no pew in church. Perhaps we shall come 

 some day to free churches and free gardens ; 

 when I can show my neighbor through my 

 tired garden, at the end of the season, when 

 skies are overcast, and brown leaves are 

 swirling down, and not mind if he does raise 

 his eyebrows when he observes, " Ah ! I 

 see you have none of this, and of that." 

 At present we want the moral courage to 

 plant only what we need ; to spend only 

 what will bring us peace, regardless of what 

 is going on over the fence. We are half 

 ruined by conformity, but we should be 

 wholly ruined without it : and I presume I 

 shall make a garden next year that will be 

 as popular as possible. 



