IN AN OLD GARDEN 251 



numbers, which is the sign of predominance, are 

 the small wingless people that have colonies on 

 every green stem and under every green leaf. 



These are the true generators of that heavenly 

 sweat, or saliva of the stars, concerning which 

 Pliny the Younger wrote so learnedly. And they 

 are many tribes — green, purple, brown, isabel- 

 line; but all are one nation, and sacred to that 

 fair god whom the Carian water-nymph loved 

 not wisely but too well. For, albeit the children 

 of an ancient union, they marry not, nor are given 

 in marriage, yet withal multiply exceedingly, so 

 that one (not two) may in a single season pro- 

 duce a billion. And at last when autumn comes, 

 won back from the cold god to his hot mother, 

 they know love and wedlock, and die like all 

 married things. These are the Aphides — some- 

 times unprettily called plant-lice, and vaguely 

 spoken of by the uninformed as "blight" — and 

 they nourish themselves on vegetable juices, that 

 thin green blood which is the plant's life. 



This, then, is the fruit which the birds have 

 come to gather. In June is their richest harvest; 

 It is more bountiful than September, when apples 

 redden, and grapes in distant southern lands are 



