e tender shepherd's purse
coming easily on a straight twitch; the tough ragweed that yields to
almost any kind of jerk. Even witch-grass, the bane of the farmer, has its
rewarding side, when one really does get out its handful of
wicked-looking, crawly, white tubers.

Weeding is most fun when the weeds are not too small. Yes, from the aspect
of a sport there is something to be said for letting weeds grow. Pulling
out little tender ones is poor work compared with the satisfaction of
hauling up a spreading treelet of ragweed or a far-flaunting wild
buckwheat. You seem to get so much for your effort, and it stirs up the
ground so, and no other weeds have grown under the shade of the big one,
so its departure leaves a good bit of empty brown earth.

Surely, weeding is good fun. If faults could be yanked out of children in
the same entertaining way, the orphan asylums would soon be emptied
through the craze for adoption as a major sport.

One of the pleasantest mornings of my life was spent weeding, in the rain,
a long-neglected corner of my garden, while a young friend stood around
the edges and explained the current political situation to me, and carted
away armfuls of green stuff as I handed them out to him. The rain
drizzled, and the air was fragrant with the smell of wet earth and bruised
stems. Ideally, of course, weeds should never reach this state of sportive
rankness. But most of my friends admit, under pressure, that there are
corners where such things do happen.

Naturally, all this is assuming that one is one's own gardener. There may
be pleasure in having a garden kept up by a real gardener, but that always
seems to me a little like having a doll and letting somebody else dress
and undress it. My garden must never grow so big that I cannot take care
of it--and neglect it--myself.

In saying this, however, I don't count rocks. When it comes to rocks, I
call in Jonathan. And it often comes to rocks.

For mine is a Connecticut garden. Now in the beginning Connecticut was
composed entirely of rocks. Then the little earth gnomes, fearing that no
one would ever come there to give them sport, sprinkled a little earth
amongst the rocks, partly covered some, wholly covered others, and then
hid to see what the gardeners would do about it. And ever since the
gardeners have been patiently, or impatiently, tucking in their seeds and
plants in the thimblefuls of earth left by the gnomes. They have been
picking out the r