* * * * *

MR. BLUFF DISCOURSES OF THE COUNTRY AND KINDRED THEMES.

(_In a Country Lane_.)

BACHELOR BLUFF. A LISTENER.


"The country," exclaimed Mr. Bluff, with an air of candor and
impartiality, "is, I admit, a very necessary and sometimes a very
charming place. I thank Heaven for the country when I eat my first green
peas, when the lettuce is crisp, when the potatoes are delicate and
mealy, when the well-fed poultry comes to town, when the ruddy peach and
the purple grape salute me at the fruit-stands. I love the country when
I think of a mountain ramble; when I am disposed to wander with rod and
reel along the forest-shadowed brook; when the apple-orchards are in
blossom; when the hills blaze with autumn foliage. But I protest
against the dogmatism of rural people, who claim all the cardinal and
all the remaining virtues for their rose-beds and cabbage-patches. The
town, sir, bestows felicities higher in character than the country does;
for men and women, and the works of men and women, are always worthier
our love and concern than the rocks and the hills ...

--"Oh, yes! I have heard before of the pleasures of the garden. Poets
have sung, enthusiasts have written, and old men have dreamed of them
since History began her chronicles. But have the _pains_ of the garden
ever been dwelt upon? Have people, now, been entirely honest in what
they have said and written on this theme? When enthusiasts have told us