CHAPTER XXXII. 



Potato Culture — Sensibility of the Potato Shaw to Weather changes — The Carline Thistle — 

 Burns — The true Carduus Scottictis — The old Dog-Rhyme. 



Op no place in existence, perhaps, is the old adage, in its most 

 literal sense, truer than of Lochaber, that " it never rains but it 

 pours " [June 1872]. When we last wrote rain was much needed ; 

 no mid-March could be dustier or colder than was our mid-May ; 

 rain, rain was the cry on all hands ; the birds, as they alighted on 

 the branches or flew overhead, cheeped it querulously ; the ducks 

 quacked it energetically ; the hens cackled and gaped for it ; while 

 the cattle afield lowed for it in a manner the meaning of which 

 there was no mistaking ; and at last the change of weather, so 

 universally wished for, came — came first of all in the shape of hail, 

 the clira grando of Horace, the downright pea-size genuine article, 

 which left the hills around as white as if, in questionable taste, 

 they had whitewashed themselves for the season. Hail ! fellow, 

 well met, was the natural and appropriate greeting. Then came 

 sleet, a milder form of the same visitation, not very pleasant, 

 perhaps, but we were grateful ; then with the wind from the west, 

 soft and pleasant as the breath of a child, came warm, genial 

 summer rain ; the tiniest blade of grass felt the benign influence, 

 and, in the beautiful language of oriental imagery, " themountains 

 and the hUls broke forth before us into singing, and the trees 

 and fields clapped their hands." It is now mild and beautiful 

 exceedingly, with just enough of rain from time to time to keep 

 everything fresh and green, and at full stretch of growth, so that 



