The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1882-09-28
Along the Roadside.

lawns which have been neglected put
on their worst face, and have a rusty
an disordered look. Almost every
thing which has n green surface seems
not only BETTING, but beautiful, in
april and May. The incipient weeds,
even, are ornamental, and blend so with
the generally fresh color of grass and
foliage that, whether we relish their ap-
pearance or not, we do not feel that
their mere presence offends the sight.
The tender-leaved spear-mint is a pref
ty. toothsome morsel when it first
piefces its way through the roadside
swa-d ia spring; but when August
comes it has a specially rank and I'M
tidy garmenture. And this coarse, re-
pulsive look comes to all the various in
truders on the roadside grass plats In
this later period.
1 confess, when our long, scold win
tiers are over, feel a sympathy with
every effort that is made to cover the
brown. bare earth. l can almost give
a sort of lenity to the widespread plan
tain, and am not so eager to strike the
hoe at the root of the persistent bur-
dock as l am now. But there are too
many who leave the hoe and scythe al
together alone, SO far as concerns the
roadside, and suffer even now, when
they are IN their worst estate, all man.
ner OF unsightly weeds to overrun the
roadside lawns. In one place you will
see large patches of the thick-branch-
ing May-weed; in another, such high
stalks as the angelica and elecampane
spread themselves into nearly inn
passable thicket; and even such pests
as snap-dragon and Canada-thistle are
in frequent and shameful occurrence.
Now, it is neither good taste nor good
fnrrv Irn nh
servations and frame this Indictment
In fact, it is hard to do good farming,
and keep your own fields free from
weed pests, when your neighbor S road
space is made a nursery for every evil
bearing seed. The solidarity of inter
est between man and man is nowhere
better illustrated than where care and
sfovenliness come together on two adj
jacent farms. 1t is even exasperating
to do well when your neighbor harbors
the very enemies you strive, year by
| year, to exterminate, and, after giving
literal hospital leaves them where the
winds and the elements send them back
upon you in refreshed battalions. 1t
would seem to be enough to be obliged
to fight the evil forces themselves with
out having to encounter human help
leagued in their behalf.
So many State Legislatures have
come to this conclusion that we have
now in nearly every State some law
about weeds that only needs to be en-
forced to compel their destruction on
every highway. In this State the law
is sufficiently special and stringent for
every purpose that law can fulfill;
| but, so certain is law not valuable
where public sentiment is itself languid
and slothful on the subject, the result is
/ only iaI1 hat would Txyseh
| Where there is-yillage or neighborhood
| pride on the sub, ect the weeds are dis
| posed of without notice of the law,
and where no one cares the law is not
| operative.
There is, of course, some reason why
! laws of this kind are not easily sus.
tanned. 1t is certainly not pleasant to
complain of your near neighbour who
may be kind and neighborly in every
respect but this; and one feels that it is
a little in the nature of Officiousness to
| complain of those who live afar off. If
you are prompted by virtuous motive
/ to do so, your good intention will be
| either misconstrued or set down to some
| plausible ill-suspicion. At any rate, the
| law stands in all its firmness and integ-
! rity, and as l ride along the dusty
! August roads l perceive that the weeds
| stand, too, in all their uglness and de-
formity. The Canada-thistle seed, in
| large patches, is winged for its flight;
| the brown spikes of dock are full of
| evil fruitfulness, and motley of other
hndesired growths is strung along the
road borders.
1 suppose if Oscar Wilde had come
amongst us to uphold an aesthetic treat
ment of the landscape he would hardly
| have succeeded in gaining his present
notoriety, and would not have won his
estimated $50, 600. But the field is well
worth working on its economical aspect.
! One cannot easily overrate the increased
value which farm or country house
gains by having all the approaches to it
look neat and thrifty, as against a cor
responding one where the rOadways are
deformed by every careless and pestifer
Gus growth. A clean lawn is itself a
mantle of beauty and a badge of value;
and where the whole domestic land
scape is kept in a conspiracy to this end
the township and neighbOrhOOd at once
rise in value and popular estimation.
/ A correspondent of prominent BOs-
ton paper has lately described a model
| Massachusetts town where every man 5
| dOor-yard frontage has been put in con-
| spicuous healthy rivalry with its neigh
Dor. 1t is impossible to find a piece of
litter either on the street or lawn. 1t
| is all as if it were swept. Before he
thought. he carelessly threw away an
abandoned card on the sidewalk, but
this seemed at once such an of1ense he
picked it up and tossed it further off.
1t was still out of place, and he threw
it il the roadway itself Even there it
chided him, and was so glaring he was
compelled to go and pocket it for more
ignoble and secret destruction and bur-
ial. The neatness and thrift of the
street pierced his conscience and made
him seem a solitary and dreadful of
fender. What a benefcent mission it
would prove if several hundred country
residents in every county to-day could
spend week in Stockbridge, Massachu-
setts!-JoeI Benton, IN Christian B1aiOn.