FEATHERS AND CHAFF.

Waikato Times, Volume X, Issue 781, 3 July 1877, Page 3

FEATHERS AND CHAFF.

(From an Auckland Correspondent.)

AMATEUR GARDENING. The other evening the wayfarer in Queen street might have observed a stout personage of distinguished appearance walking cautiously along the footpath and bearing aloft two agricultural implements. TW individual was your correspondent, and the implements were a hoe, a rake, and a spade. I had been to the last agricultural dinner and listened to an oration on tbejJiofeility and manly dignity oi tOftTall about the grand achievemaking two blades, of grass to grow where there was previously but one, and the conscious pride of a man who was adding by his labour to the productive welth of the country. I got worked up so that I resolvsd at the first opportunity to make a desperate attempt at horticulture and I went straightway and bought the agricultural implements previously referred to. It requires considerable dexterity to .carry a long-handled rake and a hoe through a crowded thoroughfare. I was getting along all right when I heard a yell just behind, and turning round I beheld a charming damsel bareheaded and looking unutterable things, while her hat with a big feather, and about a yard of lovely blonde hair dangling on my rake. It was all through a stout man in front who collided against me causing the sudden tilting up of the handle of the i'ake and a corresponding depression ot the other end. In turning round to apologise and restore the lady's head-gear the handle of the hoe weut through a jeweller's shop window, value £1 10s, and just then the. girl's young man came up and said he'd soon teach me not to insult ladies in the street. I was obliged to apologise, pay 30s and sneak off. I took the middle of the street the lest of the way home and was nearly ruu down by a cab. Next morning * I rose with the lark, and it was certainly a great lark to rise so early. I am a believer in the philosopher who declared it was ' like tempting providence to get out. of a warm bed before the earth was ! dry. But I went to work. It was, stiff fclay, and before I had been ' long at work I felt something wrong with the small of niy back. I persevered and dug a piece of ground about thej[sizeof a baby's grave. This was quite enough for one day, especially as I had lost about five'pounds of skin off my hands and |gotj concussion of the spine. "Next day I concluded that the best way to garden was to have < a gardner and look on. I got a ' man, he said he was badly in want ) of a job, and wouldn't mind working for Gs a day and tucker, which - 1 means tuck in, and the way that ' mau tucked in was a caution to beefeaters. He said, turning up fresh grouud made a fellow peckish. My opinionis that it made a man ciocodilioiiß, but T didn't tell him to. It was worth the money to see him feed. After due cogitation I determined to put in cabbages There's a that fools build bouses,. Wise men live in e'm. So it iff with cabbages, fools grow e'm, wise men eat e'm. I learnt this by experience. Alas why have I become a prey .to anxious days and sleepless nights 1 But let me tell my sad story.' I planted rows of cabbages in beautifull jrank like a regiment|of soldiers, inspected the lines in front rank and rear, dressed e'm, and retired in the blisful consciousness of having'done a noble deed. I dreamed of vast rows of great cabbages with big white "hearts spread out in a great vista as far as the eyes could reach on every side. I gloated over the contemplation of cutting my own cabbages and congratulating myself in the saving effected in the household expenditure. To wit: • - Mr- , amateur gardener, in account current with a cabbag i Dr. £ s d To 2000 cabbages at 3d 25 0 0 Cr. ■£ a d By 1 spade, hoe, and rake 0 13 0 ". 200Q plants ... 1 0 0 " Labour ... ... 110 0 " Tucker ... ..; 2- 0 0 Balance profit ... .... 19 17 0 Total ... .... ... 0 0 Alas, for the vanity of human wishes 1 How delusive, how fleeting are all the joys of this world ! . In the morniug, I arose early, and went to see how much the cabbages had grown during the night. Woe is me Bismillah ? Someone had been done with a thousand gimlets and bored holes through all the leaves. A friend of mine said it was slugs, and advised liemQ. I got several bushes spread out neatly around the caV bages/~aud gloated with: murderous instincts oyer the corning slaughter. It rained .that night; all next day,

and the next night. Next morn, ing I found that some mean prowling thief had been around in the night and had cat off most of my greens. I communicated the fact to a neighbour. He laug-hed, and said the slugs had been there again. . I said I didn't think it would be a profitable business to feed slugs. I wasn't interested in Cleopatra or anything of that sort, and perhaps M I didn't put in any cabbages a kind providence' would furnish some other kind of green things to keep up the necessary supply of slugs in the world.; The neighbour said cabbage-growing was an experimental He had planted a little piece of ground sixteen times, and each time things had gone to the doga—l mean the slugs. I said a bright idea had struck me. How would it do to buy full-grown cabbages and lay 'em in suitable situations about the ground to appease the voracious appetites of the slug until the plants arrived at maturity. He replied that slugs didn't care for full-grown cabbages, they were rather fastiduous in their tastes, and preferred the young and tender, just like old reprobates. The onlj' way to get the bulge on a slug was to rise up during the night, catch 'em with a pair of-scissors, guillotine 'em, and put 'em in a basin of salt. I said slugs reminded one of what Johnson said about style in composition—" Whoever would be master of tbe English language must devote his days and nights to Addison." It is just so with gardening—"Whoever would be master of a cabbage garden' must give his days and nights to slugs." It is the survival of the fittest. I planted fresh cab-bage-plants, and all hours of the night got up-*—and I got a cold that laid me up for a week. When I arose irom a couch of pain, with rheumatic gout, tic douloureux, catarrh, and a doctor's bill, I went out on crutches to see if any consolation could be derived from a contemplation of the cabbages, which, of course, must have grown greatly in the interval. Alas for the vanity of human hopes—there were no cabbages, not a 'leaf, hardly a J stump, the Assyrians had come down likewoLvesonthefold. I've concluded to leave cabbage-growing to those who have studied the intricacies of the science. I'm close on forty, and I dont think I shall live long enough to masier it, and I've spent about as much in one experiment as would have maintained me affluently in cabbages for the remainder of. my days, if I ever survive the rheumatism. I shall have a much higher [ j-espect henceforth for farmers. The man who can make two, cabbages v to grow where only one grew before, is not only a benefactor to his species, but a genius who has accomplished a feat almost as great as extracting sunbeams from, cucumbers. As to making the two blades of grass to grow instead of one, that's simple enough, and I mean to try it. At all eveuts, it has the merit of cheapness.