THE DAILY LIFE OF OUR FARM. 59 



approached near, when he at once drew back — deliber- 

 ately watching the slaughter of his clan with apparently 

 the most imperturbable coolness. The next morning, 

 however, he was found dead on his shelf. It is possible 

 that he was the moneylender of the community, and 

 sorrowing for his bonds had expired of a broken heart. 



A problem often suggested to my mind, the solution 

 of which was of great importance, recurred again to- 

 day, as I watched a new Samuelson taking its trial trip 

 across the lawn. Why is it that a sward of coarsest 

 fibre, or, rather, of coarsest stems, will rapidly be over- 

 grown by a clothing of the dearest little white clover 

 when once a mowing machine has been brought to use its 

 cruel, crushing, bruising energies upon it ? I have not 

 only noticed it myself, but I have stated the fact to 

 others who have found invariably the same result. I 

 have now on this red sandstone formation acres of weak 

 grass, which I should be, oh ! so glad to see inter- 

 spersed with an enriching element of trefoil and clover 

 plant. Would that some recipe on a large scale could 

 be found to answer. 



* ' Oh ! many a time I am sad of heart, 

 And I haven't a word to say, 

 And I keep from the lasses and lads apart, 

 In the meadows a-making hay," 



when I take cognizance of the benty stuff that one has 

 to put up with after all, and when I recall how zealously 

 and repeatedly I have harrowed and sown with the 

 most approved " renovating mixtures " these selfsame 

 ungrateful plains. Come up it will as a rule, but it 

 seems as if it could find no resting place for the sole of 

 its foot ; for in the course of a very few years, or rather 

 months, the coveted shamrock development disappears. 



