went away. I began to fear then that climatic
influences had been at work on the seeds, but I had not fully given up
all hope.

At first the plants seemed to waver and hesitate over whether they had
better be wild parsnips or Lima beans. Then I concluded that they had
decided to be foliage plants or rhubarb. But they did not try to live up
to their portraits. Pretty soon I discovered that they had no bugs which
seemed to go with them, and then I knew they were weeds. Things that are
good to eat always have bugs and worms on them, while tansy and
castor-oil go through life unmolested.

I ordered a new style of gladiola eight years ago of a man who had his
portrait in the bow of his seed catalogue. If he succeeds no better in
resembling his portrait than his gladiolas did in resembling theirs, he
must be a human onion whose presence may easily be detected at a great
distance.

Last year I planted the seeds of a watermelon which I bought of a New
York seedsman who writes war articles winters and sells garden seeds in
the Spring. The portrait of this watermelon would tempt most any man to
climb a nine-rail fence in the dead of night and forget all else in
order to drown his better nature and his nose in its cool bosom. People
came for miles to look at the picture of this melon and went away with a
pleasant taste in their mouths.

The plants were a little sluggish, though I planted in hills far apart
each way in a rich warm loam enriched by everything that could make a
sincere watermelon get up and hump itself. The melons were to be very
large indeed, with a center like a rose. According to the picture, these
melons generally grew so large and plenty that most everybody had to put
side-boards on the garden fence to keep them from falling over into
other farms and annoying people who had all the melons they needed. I
fought squash bugs, cut worms, Hessian flies, chinch bugs, curculio,
mange, pip, drought, dropsy, caterpillars and contumely till the latter
part of August, when a friend from India came to visit me. I decided to
cut a watermelon in honor of his arrival. When the proper moment had
arrived and the dinner had progressed till the point of fruit, the
tropical depths of my garden gave up their season's wealth in the shape
of a low-browed citron about as large and succulent as a hot ball.

I have had other similar experiences, and I think we ought to do
something about it if we can. I have planted the seed of the