188 MY GROWING GARDEN 



improvement league and to do other desirable 

 things for the community. Without glass protec- 

 tion, they certainly do run chances, and employ 

 expedients, as I understood when the husband of 

 one of the flower-women confided in me thus: ''I 

 don't mind takin' up the settin'-room carpet, to 

 put over the dinged posies, an' I didn't fuss when 

 she took the comfort off the bed one cold night, but 

 I drew the line when she sent me in for my Sunday 

 overcoat!" But I understood from the smiling 

 wife that she saved the 'mums! 



Every morning when I hurry before breakfast 

 to the garden and find that the white mist I have 

 seen from my window has not frozen in the shelter 

 of the great arborvitse hedge, I'm thankful for 

 another day of bloom and its beauty. The flowers 

 owe me no more; I have been well paid, fully 

 paid, for all I have done; and this extension 

 is in the nature of an encore to which I have no 

 real right, but which I am very glad to have 

 accorded me. 



The feast of vegetables continues, but it is natu- 

 rally waning. The last of the sweet corn was on 

 the table on the eighth day of the month, and that 

 means that we have had it continually since July 

 eighteenth — almost seventeen weeks of enjoyment 

 of the best of vegetables ! Anyone may do as well 



