In this peaceful unison with yielding nature, I was a little taken
aback to find that a new enemy had turned up. The celery had just
rubbed through the fiery scorching of the drought, and stood a
faint chance to grow; when I noticed on the green leaves a big
green-and-black worm, called, I believe, the celery-worm: but I don't
know who called him; I am sure I did not. It was almost ludicrous that
he should turn up here, just at the end of the season, when I supposed
that my war with the living animals was over. Yet he was, no doubt,
predestinated; for he went to work as cheerfully as if he had arrived
in June, when everything was fresh and vigorous. It beats me--Nature
does. I doubt not, that, if I were to leave my garden now for a week,
it would n't know me on my return. The patch I scratched over for the
turnips, and left as clean as earth, is already full of ambitious
"pusley," which grows with all the confidence of youth and the skill of
old age. It beats the serpent as an emblem of immortality. While all
the others of us in the garden rest and sit in comfort a moment, upon
the summit of the summer, it is as rampant and vicious as ever. It
accepts no armistice.




FIFTEENTH WEEK

It is said that absence conquers all things, love included; but it
has a contrary effect on a garden. I was absent for two or three
weeks. I left my garden a paradise, as paradises go in this
protoplastic world; and when I returned, the trail of the serpent was
over it all, so to speak. (This is in addition to the actual snakes