MRS. SPARROWGRASS says that summer sketches should not come out in the winter. She thinks what was written in June is not fit to be read in December, and a paper made in July is out of season in January. “The one you are putting in your overcoat pocket, now,” she says, “was written last August, and I know it.” At first, I was as much confused as if I had been caught in some flagrant act of impropriety, but I rallied a little, for a lucky thought struck me. “Mrs. Sparrowgrass,” said I, “I will put the August paper in print, now; but, at the same time, request them not to read it until warm weather.” This admirable and original piece of finesse pleased by wife highly. “That will do,” she said, “but do not forget to tell them not to read it until then.” So 31 now, good reader, when you have reached this point, fold up the leaf, and do not open it until Sirius is in the noon-day sky.
We begin to enjoy the clouds since we have moved out of town. The city sky is all strips and patches; but the sky of the country forms a very comfortable whole. Then, you have the horizon, of which you get but an imperfect idea if you live in a crooked street; and besides, you can see distant rain storms passing over far-off landscapes, and as the light-winged breeze comes sweeping up and you fell the approaching dampness, there is a freshness and fragrance in it which is not at all like the miasmatic exhalations of a great city. Then, when the rain does come it is not simply an inconvenience, as it always is in town, but a real blessing, which even the stupid old cabbages know enough to enjoy. I think our musk-melons feel better now, as they lie there in sandy beds sucking the delicious fluid through their long vinous tubes. I think our Shaker corn, as he gives himself a rousing shake, and flings the big drops around him, does so with a species of boisterous joy, as if he could not have too much of it; and Monsieur Tomate, who is capering like Humpty Dumpty on 32 the wall, is evidently in high feather, which is not the case with our forlorn rooster, who is but poorly protected under the old basket, yonder. The rain came from the southwest. We saw the clouds rolling up over the Palisades in round masses, with a movement like puffs of smoke rolling up from the guns of a frigate. It was a dead calm; not a pensile leaf twinkled; the flat expanse of he river was without a ripple. We saw the conglomerated volumes of snow-white vapor ascending to the zenigh, and below lay the Hudson, roughening in the now audibly approaching breeze. Meanwhile the sky grew ashy pale in the southwest, and the big clouds overhead were sometimes veined with lightning, which was reflected momently by the darkening water. Just below us we heard the quick rattle of the rings, as the wood sloops dropped and reefed their broad sails in anticipation of the squall. Everything around us reposed in a sort of supernatural twilight, the grass turned grey and old, the tree trunks changed to iron, the air seemed denser, sullener, sultrier. Then a little breeze prattled through the chestnuts, and whitened the poplars. Then it subsided. Then the white cloud above appeared a tangle of dazzling light, 33 and a sharp fusillade followed on the instant. Then Mrs. Sparrowgrass got frightened, and said she must go in, and as she said so, the wind pounced upon her and carried up her sunbonnet at least three hundred feet above tide water. Then it slammed to every door in the house, prostrated my Lima beans, howled down the chimney, roared and whistled through the trees, tore the dust from the roads, and poured it through our open windows, hurried off the big gate, laid it on my pie-plants, blew down my beehive, liberated all my bees, who instantly settled upon our watch dog and stung him so that he ran away and did not return until the following Sunday.
Nevertheless, the scenery around was marvellously beautiful. South of us a grey rain-curtain was drawn across the river, shutting out everything beyond, except the spectral masts and spars of a schooner riding at anchor. The Palisades started up in the gloom, as their precipitous masses were revealed by the flashes of unearthly light that played through the rolling clouds. The river before us, flecked with snow, stretched away to the north, where it lay partly in sunshine, under a blue sky, dappled with fleecy vapors. Inland, the trees were 34 twisted in attitudes strikingly picturesque and novel; the scud flew before the blast like spray, and below it the swells and slopes of livid green had an aspect so unusual that it seems as if I had been transported into a strange place — a far countrie. Our cottage, too, which I had planned and built, changed its tinted walls to stark, staring white, with window-panes black as ink. From room to room Mrs. Sparrowgrass flitted like a phantom, closing the sashes, and making all secure. Then the electric prattled overhead for a moment, and wound up with a roar like the explosion of a stone quarry. Then a big drop fell and rolled itself up in a globule of dust in the path; then another — another — another. Then I bethought me of my new straw hat, and retreated into the house, and then — it rained!
Reader, did you ever see rain in the country? I hope you have; my pen is impotent; I cannot describe it. The storm hushed by degrees, and went off amid saffron flushes, and a glitter of hail. The western sky parted its ashy curtains, and the rugged Palisades lay warm and beautiful under the evening sun. Now the sun sinks amid melted topaz and rubies; and above it, on one side, 35 stretching aloft from the rocky precipices high up in the azure, is a crescent of crimson and golden fragments of clouds! Once more in the sunlight, and so we will throw open all the windows and let in the cool air.
I have bought me a bugle. A bugle is a good thing to have in the country. The man of whom I bought it said it had an easy draught, so that a child could fill it. He asked me if I would try it. I told him I would prefer not, as my wind was not in order; but that when I got out in my boat, the instrument should be critically tested. When I reached home, I could scarcely finish my tea on account of my bugle. The bugle was a secret. I meant to surprise Mrs. Sparrowgrass. Play, I could not, but I would row off in the river, and blow a prolonged note softly; increasing it until it thrilled across the night like the dolorous trumpet of Roland, at the rout of Roncevalles. I slipped 36 away, took the hidden instrument from the bushes, handled the sculls, and soon put five hundred feet of brine between me and the cottage. Then I unwrapped the brown paper, and lifted the copper clarion to my lips. I blew until I thought my head would burst, and could not raise a toot. I drew a long breath, expanded my lungs to the utmost, and blew my eyes almost out of their sockets, but nothing came of it, saving a harsh, brassy note, within the metallic labyrinth. Then I attempted the persuasive, and finally cajoled a faint rhythmic sound from it that would have been inaudible at a pistol-shot distance. But this was encouraging — I had gotten the hang of it. Little by little I succeeded, and at last articulated a melancholy B flat, whereupon I looked over at the cottage. It was not there — the boat had drifted down stream, two miles at least; so I had to tug up against the tide until I nearly reached home, when I took the precaution of dropping an anchor to windward, and once more exalted my horn. Obstinacy is a Sparrowgrassic virtue. My upper-lip, under the tuition of the mouth-piece, had puffed out into the worst kind of a blister, yet still I persevered. I mastered three notes of the gamut, and then pulled 37 for the front of the cottage. Now, said I, Mrs. Sparrowgrass, look out for an unexpected serenade.
“Gnar-ty, Gnar-rra-rra-poo-poo-poop-en-arr-ty! Poo-poo-ta! Poo-poo-ta! Poo-poo-ta-rra-noop-en-taa-ty! Poopen te noopan ta ta! ’np! ’np! Graa-too-pen-tar-poopen-en-arrty!”
“Who is making that infernal noise?” said a voice on the shore.
“Rra-ty! ’traa-tar-poopen-tarty!”
“Get out with you!” and a big stone fell splash in the water. This was too much to bear on my own premises, so I rowed up to the beach to punish the offender, whom I found to be my neighbor.
“Oh, ho,” said he, “was that you, Sparrowgrass?”
I said it was me, and added, “You don’t seem to be fond of music?”
He said, not as a general thing, but he thought a tune on the fiddle, now and then, wasn’t bad to take.
I answered, that the relative merit of stringed and wind instruments had never been exactly settled, but if he preferred the former, he might stay at home and enjoy it, which would be better than intruding on my beach, and interrupting me when 38 I was practising. With this I locked up my boat, tucked the bugle under my arm, and marched off. Our neighbor merely laughed, and said nothing.
When I reached my domicile, Mrs. Sparrowgrass asked me who that was, “blowing up a fish-horn?” I have in consequence given up music as a source of enjoyment since that evening.
Our fruit did not turn out well this season on account of the drought. Our apple trees blossomed fairly, but the apples were stung by the curculio, and finished their growth by the time they got to look like dried prunes. I had the satisfaction, however, of producing a curious hybrid in my melon patch, by planting squashes in the next bed. I do not know which to admire most — the influence of the melon on the squash, or the influence of the squash on the melon. Planted side by side, you can scarcely tell one from the other, except from 39 appearance; but if you ever do eat a musk melon boiled, or a squash raw, you will have some idea of this singular and beautiful phenomenon.
On the Fourth of July we had company from town. “Dear,” said Mrs. S., “have you seen our cherry?” I answered, that I had set out many trees of that kind, and did not know which one she alluded to (at the same time a hopeful vision of “cherry pie on the Fourth of July” flitted across my pericranics.) As we all walked out to see the glorious spectacle, I told our guests aside, the young trees were so luxuriant of foliage that I had not observed what masses of fruit might be concealed underneath the leaves, but that Mrs. S. had a penetrating eye, and no doubt would surprise me as well as them. When we came to the tree, my wife turned around, after a slight examination, and coolly observed, she thought it was there, but some boy must have picked it off.
“Picked it off,” said I, as the truth flashed in my mind. “Yes,” she replied, with a mournful accent, “picked off the only cherry we ever had.”
This was a surprise, indeed, but not what I had expected. Mrs. Sparrowgrass, how could you expose me in such a way? How could you, after 40 all my bragging to these city people about our fine garden, make a revelation that carried away the foundations of my pride in one fell swoop? How could you, Mrs. Sparrowgrass?