iftiest of
householders, we feed the hens here in the yard, and then "shoo" them
away, when they would fain take profligate dust-baths under the syringa,
leaving unsightly hollows. But however, and with what complexion, our
dooryards may face the later year, they begin it with purification. Here
are they an unfailing index of the severer virtues; for, in Tiverton,
there is no housewife who, in her spring cleaning, omits to set in order
this outer pale of the temple. Long before the merry months are well
under way, or the cows go kicking up their heels to pasture, or plants
are taken from the south window and clapped into chilly ground, orderly
passions begin to riot within us, and we "clear up" our yards. We
gather stray chips, and pieces of bone brought in by the scavenger dog,
who sits now with his tail tucked under him, oblivious of such vagrom
ways. We rake the grass, and then, gilding refined gold, we sweep it.
There is a tradition that Miss Lois May once went to the length of
trimming her grass about the doorstone and clothes-pole with embroidery
scissors; but that was a too-hasty encomium bestowed by a widower whom
she rejected next week, and who qualified his statement by saying they
were pruning-shears.

After this preliminary skirmishing arises much anxious inspection of
ancient shrubs and the faithful among old-fashioned plants, to see
whether they have "stood the winter." The fresh, brown "piny" heads are
brooded over with a motherly care; wormwood roots are loosened, and the
horse-radish plant is given a thrifty touch. There is more than the
delight of occupation in thus stirring the wheels of the year. We are
Nature's poor handmaidens, and our labor gives us joy.

But sweet as these homespun spots can make themselves, in their mixture
of thrift and prodigality, they are dearer than ever at the points where
they register family traits, and so touch the humanity of us all. Here
is imprinted the story of the man who owns the farm, that of the father
who inherited it, and the grandfather who reclaimed it from waste; here
have they and their womenkind set the foot of daily living and traced
indelible paths. They have left here the marks of tragedy, of pathos, or
of joy. One yard has a level bit of grassless ground between barn and
pump, and you may call it a battlefield, if you will, since famine and
desire have striven there together. Or, if you choose to read fine
meanings into threadbare things, you may see