for my family. I suppose Adam felt it
in Paradise; and, of merely and exclusively earthly enjoyments, there
are few purer and more harmless to be experienced. Speaking of beans, by
the way, they are a classical food, and their culture must have been the
occupation of many ancient sages and heroes. Summer-squashes are a very
pleasant vegetable to be acquainted with. They grow in the forms of urns
and vases,--some shallow, others deeper, and all with a beautifully
scalloped edge. Almost any squash in our garden might be copied by a
sculptor, and would look lovely in marble, or in china; and, if I could
afford it, I would have exact imitations of the real vegetable as
portions of my dining-service. They would be very appropriate dishes for
holding garden-vegetables. Besides the summer-squashes, we have the
crook-necked winter-squash, which I always delight to look at, when it
turns up its big rotundity to ripen in the autumn sun. Except a pumpkin,
there is no vegetable production that imparts such an idea of warmth and
comfort to the beholder. Our own crop, however, does not promise to be
very abundant; for the leaves formed such a superfluous shade over the
young blossoms, that most of them dropped off without producing the germ
of fruit. Yesterday and to-day I have cut off an immense number of
leaves, and have thus given the remaining blossoms a chance to profit by
the air and sunshine; but the season is too far advanced, I am afraid,
for the squashes to attain any great bulk, and grow yellow in the sun.
We have muskmelons and watermelons, which promise to supply us with as
many as we can eat. After all, the greatest interest of these vegetables
does not seem to consist in their being articles of food. It is rather
that we love to see something born into the world; and when a great
squash or melon is produced, it is a large and tangible existence, which
the imagination can seize hold of and rejoice in. I love, also, to see
my own works contributing to the life and well-being of animate nature.
It is pleasant to have the bees come and suck honey out of my
squash-blossoms, though, when they have laden themselves, they fly away
to some unknown hive, which will give me back nothing in return for what
my garden has given them. But there is much more honey in the world, and
so I am content. Indian corn, in the prime and glory of its verdure, is
a very beautiful vegetable, both considered in the separate plant, and
in a mass in