CHAPTER T. 



HOME GARDENING. 



GARDENING FOR PLEASURE, HEALTH, PROFIT AND MORALITY. 



" Man shall not live by bread alone." 



OW I pity the people who from choice or necessity 

 are confirmed eaters of hog, and the murderous 

 monotony of whose scrofulous diet is not broken 

 or offset by the gratifying changes which the 

 home garden affords. How I pity the sad-eyed 

 house-wife with the daily questions on her mind 

 "What shall I cook for breakfast, what for din- 

 ner, and what for supper ? " with nothing but 

 the pork barrel, the flour chest and the potato bin from which to 

 draw material. How I pity the mother whose children are 

 ciying for fruit and vegetables, and who is compelled to hand 

 them — worse than a stone — a piece of salt meat. And above all, 

 how I pity the children — the blessed children with their natural 

 craving for the luscious fruits and the crisp vegetables of the 

 garden, ever yearning for them as the deer is for salt, or the fam- 

 ished traveler in the desert for water — but their desire never to be 

 satisfied, unless they steal the articles that their nature urgently 

 demands from the gardens of more fortunate neighbors. 



With the opportunities that the vast territory of the States, 

 with its thirty acres of land, six of them arable, to each inhabi- 

 tant, affords to its people, there is no need of many families 

 depriving themselves of garden privileges, and there is not the 

 slightest excuse for people in the rural districts to do without 

 them. 



The physician, the lawyer, the preacher, the book-keeper, 

 the bank clerk — in short all people whose life occupation confines 

 them to study or ofifice for a large part of the day, and who for 

 this reason are in danger of waxing tender and sensitive like hot- 

 house plants — will find the gratification of the greatest need of 

 their lives in a little garden of their own, namely, contact with 

 nature, unadulterated air, relaxation and recreation, pleasure, 

 health and ruggedness, not to speak of the more substantial and 

 more immediate results : freshly-plucked berries (not the stale 

 fruit of the market stands, in the first or more advanced stages 

 of decay — in other words, half-rotten), crisp lettuce and radishes 

 (12) 



