TAKING REINS IN HAND. 59 



extraordinary nicety of culture, and nearness to a 

 large market, which would warrant the expenditure 

 of even a thousand dollars per acre with profitable 

 results. 



But rocky farms, even away from markets, are 

 not without their profits, and a certain wild, yet sub- 

 dued order of their own. I have never seen sweeter 

 or warmer pasture ground, than upon certain hillsides 

 strown thick with great granite boulders, spangled 

 with mica, and green-gray mosses ; nor was the view 

 unthrifty, with its fat, ruffle-necked merino ewes 

 grazing in company; nor yet unattractive to other 

 than farm-eyes with its brook bursting from under 

 some ledge that is overhung with gnarled birches, 

 and illuminated with nodding, crimson columbines 

 then yawing away between its green banks, with a 

 new song for every stone that tripped its flow. 



One of the daintiest and most productive fruit 

 gardens it was ever my pleasure to see, was in the 

 midst of other gray rocks ; the grape vines so trained 

 as to receive the full reflection of the sun from the 

 surface of the boulders, and the intervals occupied 

 with rank growing gooseberries and plums, all faith- 

 fully subject to spade culture. The expense of the 

 removal of the rocks would have been enormous ; 

 and I doubt very seriously if the productive capacity 

 would have been increased. Again, I have seen a 



