Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1899-07-29
MISS FEROBlA'S. FAILURE.
BY HELEN WHITNEY CLARK.

gardenin' business, to raise truck fur
the markets. y"
Timothy whistled.
"Yon'll make failure OF it., sure as
guns" he declared, uthlessly.
But Miss Ferobia was not to be dis
conraged.
"Ihere's plenty of men make livin'
at it, an why not me?" she asked.
"Ive got little money laid by to
tart on. An I've got stout PAR of
arms, aud never was sick day in my
life; so why should make failure of
it,"
Bat Timothy only shook his head
and remarked, vaguely, that it was
'onpracticable, and she should find
out, and declined to commit himself
further. And the conference was cut
short by their arrival at the cottage.
1t was lonelyplace, but Miss Fero-
bia was blessed with strong nerves, and
solitude had no terrors for her.
She had accumulated few odds
aud ends OF furniture from time to
time, the gifts of various friends and
relatives, which went good way
toward furnishing her diminutiye
dwelling.
And when they were arranged to her
satisfaction, and square of bright
rag carpet tackled down in the centre
of the room, Miss Ferobia felt as happy
as king.
She was too tired after her days
work to do more than take n cup of
tea and retire to rest. But comfort
able nights sleep on the old-fashioned
sqnare-p posted Ledstead restored her
energies, and for the next few days
she was as busy as a mailer over her
preparations.
Lem Dodson was hired TO pillow the
'truck patch," a COW with a young
calf was bargained for, and a few fowls
OF the Plymouth Rock and Dorking
species were purchased and were soon
cackling vigorously around their new
quarters.
After little more help from neigh
Dor Dodson, and vigorous use of the
hoe on Miss Ferobia's part, the ground
was in readiness for planting, and the
ambitious market gardener sat up till
long past her usual bedtime looking
over her stock of seeds and selecting
tho requi.ite for immediate use
There might still lie late frosts, she
reflected, and such tender plants rs
bean and cucumber2, summer sauashes
and nutmeg melons would he better
ont OF the ground than in it for few
days to come. But beets and lettuce,
spinach and marrowfat peas and ruta-
bagas would stand anything short of
regular freeze, and might lie safely
planted at once
And, late though she sat up, the first
pink flush of early dawn did not find
Miss Ferobia mapping the next morn.
ing, nor for many mornings to come.
She was up with the birds, and after
hasty breakfast ont she sailed, and
hoed and raked, weeded and trans
planted, till her back achel and her
fingers grew sore and her nose freckled
and her cheeks tanned. But garden
ing is hard work, at best, and though
Miss Ferobia labored with will, the
grass and weeds would creep in here
and there in spite of her vigilance.
The purslane-" pusly" she called it
and horse nettles grew faster than her
butter-head lettuce or white spine Gu
cumLers.
Then the weather was not always
propitious, and her first planting of
sugar corn and early rose potatoes
rotted in the aground.
But Miss Ferobia, nothing daunted,
replanted tho vacant rows with later
varieties, and in due time the seeds
sprouted and gave every promise of
luxuriant crop.
But flom that time on it was, as the
little woman declared, "tussle" he.
tween herself and the weeds.
While she was hoeing her cabbages
and kohl robes and wedding her sill.
ver-skin onions, the cookie burns and
wild morning glo! les were fouri hing
among her sweet con IL and potatoes.
She worked early and late, however,
to eradicate the tenacious interlopers,
AT finally succeeded in accomplishing
her task. When 10! one unlucky night
Farmer Nub' ms pigs forced their
way through a broken panel of the
fence and played havoc among the
growing crops.
Small wonder, indeed, if our heroine
lost her temper at last and pelted
those pigs with clods, or whatever
came handiest. and even whacked one
of them aci oss the snout with the
hoe handle.
But with all her efforts it was late
in the day when the last one of the
maraudels was disposed of and the
fence patched up, after fashion.
II will say here, in parenthess, that
I do believe woman could vote, and
even make laws, and execute them,
too, as well as man, under some cir
cnmstances. When say "nnder some
circumstances, mean if she were
not hamrerel by prejudiced. and I'M
reasonable colleagues. But when it
comes to patching railfences. the
least said about woman's capabilities
the better.
However, Miss Ferobia's workman
ship, if not exactly Al tistir, was sufii-
GENTLY ingenious to prevent further
i'm Dads in that direction.
But for some reason, from that
time on the Fates seemed to turn
cold shoulder on her efforts.
The rabbits feasted on her early
York cabbages and marrowfat peas, the
striped bugs worked destruction on
her cucumbers and Cassava melons,
the Colorado beetle devastated her
potatoes, and the squash bugs ate up
her Boston marrows and ratty-pan
squashes. The foxes, minks, owls
and haw ks, to say nothing OF opossums
and weasels, thinned the ranks of her
young Dorkings and Pl, mouth Rocks;