Ti6 DAYS NEAR THANKSGIVING 
was hard and almost discouraging to begin; then 
came the middle, easy time, and at the end it grew 
hard again and dreary. Only,^’ I continued, ‘^you 
can put a cheerful ending on any composition, while 
it is difficult to have lively thoughts about a garden 
that is- — ” 
“Sleeping,’^ Joseph interrupted, knowing the 
ugly word I was about to utter. “I could write 
the composition about our garden,’’ he said 
eagerly. “Such a beginning as that would not be 
hard, because there is so much to say. Probably 
I could not get the composition all on one sheet of 
paper. Besides,” he added, “there is not another 
boy in the school who could write a composition 
about a garden. No one else there has ever made 
one, and only a few boys even know the names of 
the flowers. I think I will begin this evening.” 
Joseph was then as ready to begin his composi- 
tion as he had formerly been fearful of the under- 
taking. He had simply settled on a subject that 
he knew something about, and one which filled him 
with enthusiasm. I knew that, once he was fairly 
started on his work, his observations would be 
quaint and different from those of the catalogues 
and garden books. Joseph can express himself as 
well as most boys. Suddenly, I looked at him 
with an awakened interest. Would the day ever 
come for Joseph to write a better book than “An 
Ambitious Boy’s Garden” ? 
