over with rods or hoop-bands to support the mats. Apply moderate waterings as necessary in the morn- 
ing or afternoon. Oiled paper frames^ formed either archwise^ or with 2 sloping sides, about 2 feet or 2 { 
feet high, and of the width of the bed, are very serviceable in this stage. Some persons use them from the 
first, under a deficiency of hand-glasses. But the proper time for having recourse to them, is when the 
plants have been forwarded in hand-glasses till the runners require training out beyond the limits of the 
glasses, some time in June ; then removing the glasses, substitute the oiled frames, as these paper screens 
will entirely afford protection from heavy rains or tempests, as well as from nocturnal cold, and also screen 
the plants from the excessive heat of the sun, while, being pellucid, they admit its influence, of light and 
warmth effectually. Give proper admission of free air below, and occasionally watering. 
A melon, says Mr.C.Williams,istherichest and most highly-flavoured of all the fleshy fruits. Itwas freely 
used in early times, and has been long raised in our own country. Here and in France it is grown as a luxury, 
but in some parts of the East it is the chief necessary of life. Niebuhr, the celebrated traveller, says, “Of 
pumpkins and melons, several sorts grow naturally in the woods, and serve for feeding camels; but the proper 
melons are planted in the fields, where a great variety of them is to be found, and in such abundance that 
the Arabians of all ranks use them, for some part of the year, as their principal article of food. They 
afford, also, a very agreeable liquor. When the fruit is nearly ripe, a hole is pierced into the pulp, then 
stopped with wax, and the melon is left upon the stalk. Within a few days after, the pulp is, in conse- 
quence of this process, converted into a delicious liquor.” To this Mr. Southey alludes when he says : — 
“ Whither is gone the boy ? 
He had pierced the melon’s pulp, 
And clothed with wax the wound ; 
And he had duly gone at morn, 
And watched its ripening rind ; 
And now all joyfully he brings 
The treasure now matured.” 
Of melons there is a great variety, and the number is constantly increasing. In Persia twenty sorts 
are known ; the finest grow in Khorasan. The fruit there is so large that two or three melons are a full 
load for a man. 
The following lines are from a “Hymn to Spring” by Wilson, author of the “Isle of Palms. — 
Ye fair Trees, 
How are ye changed, and changing while I gaze ! 
It seems as if some gleam of verdant light 
Fell on you from a rainbow ; but it lives 
Amid your tendrils, brightening every hour 
Into a deeper radiance. Ye sweet Birds, 
Were you asleep through all the wintry hours, 
Beneath the waters, or in mossy caves ? 
There are, ‘tis said, birds that pursue the spring, 
Where’er she flies, or else in death-like sleep 
Abide her annual reign, when forth they come 
With freshen’d plumage and enraptured song, 
As ye do now, unwearied choristers, 
’Till the land ring with joy. Yet are ye not, 
Sporting in tree and air, more beautiful 
Than the young lambs, that from the valley-side 
Send a soft bleating like an infant’s voice, 
Half happy, half afraid ! O blessed beings ! 
At sight of this your perfect innocence, 
The sterner thoughts of manhood melt away 
Into a mood as mild as woman’s dreams. 
The strife of working intellect, the stir 
Of hopes ambitious ; the disturbing sound 
Of fame, and all that worshipp’d pageantry 
That ardent spirits burn for in their pride, 
Fly like disparting clouds, and leave the soul 
Pure and serene as the blue depths of heaven. 
Now is the time in some meek solitude 
To hold communion with those innocent thoughts 
That bless’d our earlier days ; to list the voice 
Of conscience murmuring from her inmost shrine 
And learn if still she sing the quiet tune 
That fill’d the ear of youth. If then we feel, 
That ’mid the powers, the passions, and desires 
Of riper age, we still have kept our hearts 
Free from pollution, and ’mid tempting scenes 
Walk’d on with pure and unreproved steps, 
Fearless of guilt, as if we knew it not ; 
Ah me ! with what a new sublimity 
Will the green hills lift up their sunny heads, 
Ourselves as stately : smiling will we gaze, 
On the clouds whose happy home is in the heavens; 
Nor envy the clear streamlet that pursues 
His course ’mid flowers and music to the sea. 
But dread the beauty of a vernal day, 
Thou trembler before memory ! To the saint 
What sight so lovely as the angel form 
That smiles upon his sleep ! The sinner veils 
His face ashamed, — unable to endure 
The upbraiding silence of the seraph’s eyes ! 
