7<D Success with Small Fruits. 



The lower part of the meadow was also under water. It had been 

 plowed, and therefore would wash readily. Would any soil be left ? A 

 few moments of calm reflection, however, removed my fears. The treach- 

 erous brook had not beguiled me during the summer into inadequate pro- 

 vision for this unprecedented outbreak. I saw that my deep, wide cut had 

 kept the flood wholly from the upper part of the meadow, which contained 

 a very valuable bed of high-priced strawberry plants, and that the slowly 

 moving tide which covered the lower part was little more than back-water 

 and overflow. The wide ditches were carrying off swiftly and harmlessly 

 the great volume that, had not such channels been provided, would have 

 made my rich alluvial meadow little else than a stony, gravelly waste. And 

 the embankment had given way at a point too low down to permit much 

 damage. 



The two swales in the front and rear of the house appeared like 

 mill-ponds. In the former instance, the water had backed up from the 

 mountain stream into which my drain emptied, and, therefore, it could not 

 pass off; and in the latter instance, I cotild scarcely expect my little under- 

 ground channel to dispose at once of the torrents that for forty hours 

 had poured from the skies. I must give it at least a night in which to 

 catch up. And a busy night it put in, for by morning it had conveyed 

 to depths unknown the wide, discolored pond, that otherwise would have 

 smothered the plants it covered. As soon, also, as the mountain stream 

 fell below the mouth of the lower drain, it emptied at once the water 

 resting on the lower swale. Throughout the day came successive tales of 

 havoc and disaster, of dams scooped out, bridges swept away, roads washed 

 into stony gulches, and fields and gardens overwhelmed with debris. 

 The Idlewild brook, that the poet Willis made so famous, seemed almost 

 demoniac in its power and fury. Not content with washing away dams, 

 roads and bridges, it swept a heavy wall across a field as if the stones 

 were pebbles. 



My three diverse systems of drainage had thus practically stood the 

 severest test, perhaps, that will ever be put upon them, and my grounds 

 had not been damaged to any extent worth naming. The cost had been 

 considerable, but the injury caused by that one storm would have 

 amounted to a larger sum had there been no other channels for the water 

 than those provided by nature. 



My readers will find, in many instances, that they have land which 

 must be or may be drained. If it can be done sufficiently, the very ideal 

 strawberry soil may be secured moist and deep, but not wet. 



