334 Old and New Homes. 



OLD AND NEW HOMES. 

 CHAPTER III. 



New Work. — Strawberries. — Raspberries. — Peaches. — Blackberries. — Cultiva- 

 tion. — The Weeds. — New Theories. — Raising Truck. — Indoor Improvements. — 

 Our Advantages, Social and Literary. 



Very soon there came on busy days for all of us, as well for the women 

 in doors as for the iTien without. The farm-work must be first attended to, 

 as the season was already fir advanced, and much of the summer's profit 

 would depend on the labors of the next few weeks. The early pease were 

 up in some of our fields ; and the outgoing occupant had left us hot-beds 

 already made up, and planted with those tropical favorites, the egg-plant 

 and tomato, while in others the sweet-potato was sprouting finely. Then, 

 as I afterwards discovered, our farm was v.'cU stocked with fruit ; and there 

 was a large field of strawberries to be looked after. It seemed to me a 

 great thing indeed; for there must have been ten acres of it, — more straw- 

 berries in a single field than I had seen in all New England. But it was 

 only a fraction of what we subsequently learned our neighbors were doing, 

 as some of them were cultivating as many as forty acres of the same fruit. 

 There was also a large field of raspberries, — the common " Purple Cane ;" 

 and an acre of that recently-discovered favorite, the " Philadelphia." From 

 all these, the late tenant had forgotten to remove the last year's canes; and 

 here was a new job of work such as a careful fruit-grower will invariably 

 despatch as quickly as he can after the crop has been gathered. 



Then there was a great peach-orchard of I never knew how many trees. 

 Sound and thrifty they all looked ; for the buds were already swollen, and 

 showed plainly the bright red-and-white of the unfolding blossoms. Put 

 that solitary enemy of the peach-tree, the borer, had been permitted all win- 

 ter to depredate ujDon their roots, and must now be taken out. The gum 

 oozed away from the butts of one-half the trees, showing that no time was 

 to be lost in exterminating the enemy. It was a great task to go over all 

 the trees of a large orchard, and perform this indispensable operation; but 

 my father had left his Northern grain and grass farm to practise fruit-grow- 

 ing, and felt inclined to neglect no precaution necessary to success. This 



