270 THE DAILY LIFE OF OUR FARM. 



upon the one side, upon the other pours along, swishing 

 surlily with a deep smothered sound, suggestive only 

 of suicide. 



But how after all did the jetties answer ? Perfectly. 

 And how did the newly-made banks hold ? Excel- 

 lently, so long (I am bound to record all my experience) 

 as the flood did not rise above the top of the stone, 

 where it is built into the land. Not an atom of the 

 newly-disturbed soil gave way until then. But when 

 the angry waves surmounted the uppermost stones, and 

 overran the whole plain, then, resenting the obstacles 

 to its progress, it did wash off a good part of the softest 

 mould, accumulating, however, a quantity at the bottom 

 of the river between the piers. So that, after all, I am 

 upon the whole rather a gainer than a loser. Where I 

 had turfed the slope it did not suffer. It was only 

 where the holes had been filled with soil and sown too 

 late in the season for the grass to gather root. I am 

 rapidly repairing the damage with a paring plough, 

 taking off the rough surface of some inferior sward, 

 which I beat and peg down, and which I propose to 

 overlay with close small laurel twigs, which old Melon 

 has been trimming off the avenue, stuck in flat and 

 closely like the feathers on a pheasant's breast. Over 

 this the water will glance, as I know by experiment 

 already made. Next year I shall raise the jetties a foot 

 above the mainland, and then no harm can possibly 

 occur to the bank. 



