62 AN ISLAND GARDEN 



kill the precious Peas themselves ? I could not 

 bear it any longer, rose up and donned my dress- 

 ing gown, and out into the dark and dew I bore 

 the hose, over my shoulders coiled, to the very 

 farthest corners of the garden, and washed off 

 every atom of ashes in the black midnight, and 

 came back and slept in peace. 



These are most anxious times on account of 

 the slugs. Now, every morning when I rise I 

 go at once into the garden at four o'clock and 

 make a business of slaughtering them till half 

 past five, when I stop for breakfast. If the 

 day is pleasant they are all hidden by that time, 

 for they dread so the touch of the sun. But in 

 the hoary morning dew they delight. This is the 

 hardest part of my gardening, and I rejoice that 

 not one person in a thousand has this plague of 

 slugs to fight. It is so difficult to destroy them ; 

 to see their countless legions and feel so helpless 

 before their numbers, to find one's most precious 

 favorites nibbled and ragged, and everything 

 threatened with destruction is a trial indeed. I 

 carry a large pepper-box filled with air-slaked lime 

 and shake it over them everywhere. They are so 

 small this year that it destroys them ; they turn 

 milky and miserably perish, but the next morn- 

 ing there are just as many more to take their 

 places. Still I patiently persevere, carefully 

 washing off the lime, so anxious lest it should 

 harm the plants, and killing by hand all the larger 

 monsters. 



In that most charming old book, Gilbert 

 White's " Natural History of Selborne," I find he 



