159 



XXVII. 

 RAIN ON THE ROOT CROPS. 



HERE in the country we are really beginning at last 

 to lose heart altogether. Night after night we see the 

 leaden mists gathering ominously over Pilbury-hill ; and 

 morning after morning we see a fallacious gleam of sun- 

 shine or two peeping through the lattice at five o'clock, 

 only to find the whole sky overcast again and heavy 

 showers pattering steadily against the window-panes an 

 hour before breakfast-time. Never was there such a 

 diluvial summer. Sometimes for a couple of days at 

 once we get a little respite, with nothing more serious 

 than occasional downpours from a passing white fleece 

 that drifts island-like before the wind through a sea of 

 blue ; and then the deceptive barometer struggles slowly 

 upward with every promise of settled weather. But just 

 as the .mercury and our spirits rise half-way to 30, an- 

 other squadron of black rain-clouds comes careering to 

 us across the Atlantic, till the glass and the farmer's 

 heart sink down together gloomily to ' very stormy.' 



To-day is just as bad as any of its predecessors. It 

 is now a full month since we carried our hay in the lower 

 croft, and still to this moment we have not been able to 

 put a scythe into the high meadow on the top of War- 



