ever are you doing, standing there, with your mouth open?"

"Eh!" said Mr. Jeminy, stupidly. "I was dreaming."

A red squirrel sped across the path, and stopped a moment in the
doorway, his tail arched above his back, his bright, black eyes peering
without envy at Mrs. Grumble, as she bent above the pail of soap-suds.
Then, with a flirt of his tail, he hurried away, to hide from other
squirrels the nuts, seeds, and acorns strewn by the winds of the autumn
impartially over the earth.

In the afternoon, Mr. Jeminy went into his garden, and began to measure
off rows of vegetables. "Two rows of beans," he said, "and two of
radishes; they grow anywhere. I'll get Crabbe to give me onion sets,
cabbages, and tomato plants. Two rows of peas, and one of lettuce; I
must have fine soil for my lettuce, and I must remember to plant my
peas deeply. A row of beets. . . ."

"Where," said Mrs. Grumble, who stood beside him, holding the hoe, "are
you going to plant squash?"

". . . and carrots," continued Mr. Jeminy hurriedly. . . .

"We must certainly have a few hills of squash," said Mrs. Grumble
firmly.

"Oh," said Mr. Jeminy, "squash. . . ."

He had left it out on purpose, because he disliked it. "You see," he
said finally, looking about him artlessly, "there's no more room."

"Go away," said Mrs. Grumble.

From his seat under a tree, to which he had retired, Mr. Jeminy watched
Mrs. Grumble mark the rows, hoe the straight, shallow furrows, drop in
the seeds, and cover them with earth again. As he watched, half in
indignation, he thought: "Thus, in other times, Ceres sowed the earth
with seed, and, like Mrs. Grumble, planted my garden with squash. I
would have asked her rather to sow melons here." Just then Mrs.
Grumble came to the edge of the vegetable garden.

"Seed potatoes are over three dollars a bushel," she said: "it's hardly
worth while putting them in."

"Then let's not put any in," Mr. Jeminy said promptly, "for they are
difficult to weed, and when they are grown you must begin to quarrel
with insects, for whose sake alone, I almost think, they grow at all."

"The bugs fall off," said Mrs. Grumble, "with a good shaking."

"Fie," said Mr. Jeminy, "how slovenly. It is better to kill them with
lime. But it is best of all not to tempt them; then there is no need
to kill them."

And as Mrs. Grumble made no reply, he added:

"That is something God has not learned yet."

"Please," said Mrs. Grumble, "