Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1903-12-12
BY the Waters of Sparta.
Ia Z. 4. BENSON.

Jectured country. ] gave him the stamps
and they filed him with a tremulous joy
But as you do not know who Anastasi is,
If ! am TO answer your letter ! must be-
gin from the beginning.
You ask me why ! finger in this bank
Fupt country among an abandoned popu-
lace, who drink resinated wine'' You
tell me that the golden days are npon
London, that the little green chairs IN the
park are full, that Sarah Bernhardts
voice is a more mellow miracle than ever
that you went to "Rigoletto'' last night
ana are going to Faust tomorrow, that
PIccadilly is gray aud shady. and sweet
with the smell of flower stalls and as
phalt, aud that blue mist hangs in Pail
Man, like the bloom on plum. Yet ! sit
here, and am not, like Ruth, sick for
home. | will tell you why.
The stglograph pen with which ! write
to you is>my only link with what you in
soiently call civilization. My English
clothes are all ontworn. and wear bar
barous garb; my hands and face are dyed
taWny brown with those inimtahle cos
metics, sun and air. | am sitting on the
edge of the riyerbed of the Eurotas Mt the
corner Of grove of Expresses. tall and
solemn like serge clad Romish priests,
and lncrusted with rough fruit. This has
oree been the garden round some Turkish
mouse, for in the middle stands a pile of
runs weathered and worn. Remember
ing Browning's Home thoughts from
abroad, l went and tapped. not with a
hoe, but with the end of my stick on the
moniderng plaster of a cornice, and sure
enough, with divine fitness, there dropped
out q scorpion with wide, angry nip
pers."
But the garden has long been allowed
70 run wild, and what is lovelier than
q garden run wild? Several olive trees
nave grown up among the Expresses, and
Wild vines, already covered with little
Rard green globes. loop and Irvine them.
selves among their branches. Here.
again, there IS promegranate-hav
You any idea of a pomegranate except
as a wrinkled. knobby lump bought on
the quay at Marseiles with thick red
h0Wers looking as if they We're made of
wax. On it. too the fruit is forming.
ana little green FURNISHED pitchers are
beginning TO take the place of the flow
ers.
! sit at the corner Of this wild garden,
which Nature has again taken "a 5r-
self. Adore ms there is sky of in
eleuble blue, in front the stream bed OF
the Eurotas. boisterous blue stream
with deep holes TO swim in, and across
that the olive covered plain. rising gent
ly TO the hills beyond, covered with
vegetation ON their lower slopes, hut
bare above, showing the good red earth,
and cast in fantastic FORMS They re.
mind me exactly of scene in n Bible
picture book. which | used to be shown
ON Sunday afternoon; in the foreground
the good Samaritan. with headgear re-
sembling an oyerripe pumpkin, was min
istering TO the man who fell among
thieves, and in the background was a
row of hills exactly like these.
IuNEA
by a millstream which joins the river a
hundred yards below at the farm OF
Anastasi's father. To my right there
rises a bed Of tail reeds ten feet high.
which talk together with dry pattering
tongues. and in the reeds the cicadas
are winding their watches. lean
against the trunk of white poplar, and
nightingale sings in the poplar.
Let us move ten yards further IN.
Here the millstream comes hurrying out
! of cool green tunnel of wild fig trees
the lair of tawny spider who has
woven his web across the opening. and
hangs malignant and busy on a silk sus-
pension bridge across the middle of the
stream. The web Oscillases . little hack
ward and forward; for out of the dark
ness cool draught draws down. Look
ing up into the moist, green cave. you
can see far up n white, uncertain glin-
meT of foam, where rock breaks the
stream, and lower down little luminous
specks of gold from the sunlight which
filters through the roof and ut the OPEN
ing the under sides of the strong five
fingered fig leaves are bright from the
reflection of the sun off the water. Now
and then a tortoise goes padding down
at the bottom of the stream. and grave
priestlike frogs sit on the edge in readi
ness to plunge in at your approach.
All down its course delicate clumns of
Z "a sa.l az u. L..
banks: the tips OF their leaves drag and
dabble in the stream, and tremble as the
water touches them. Fresh, juicy elders.
with white, parasol-like flowers. grow
thick on the banks, and here and there
the more sober green of myrtle leaves
pushes up among them. Over the water
tioat blue-winged dragon flies, and iust
now a swallowtail butterfly settled for n
moment on great yellow thistle close to
me. A couple of goats, one white. one
black, strayed, no doubt, from the farm
below, crop quickly and anxiously at
some young shoots OF hawthorn, like peo-
pie taking hurried meal before going 70
catch their train.
A hundred yards below stand the gray
ROOTS of the farm. 1t has once been y
mill. and wall of masonry still conducts
the millstream down a wooden cylinder 10
the millhouse. There 1t empties itself
bed, never, | think. joining the river. hnt
flushing an acre OF ground with a more
vivid vegetation. First it waters nil
those elumps of pink oleanders which
grow, not as they grow in your well he
loved green tubs in front of French cafes
with desolate stalks and few starved
leaves and flowers at the extreme tins
but in bushes which are one mass OF pink
blossoms. Then, turning to the left. II
gives drink 10 that row of poplars and
eucalyptus trees, and further on to wore
oleanders and meadow of wild spiraea.
which is just beginning to foam into
flower, Finally it attends to those great
yellow thistles mixed with spurse. and
there think it comes to an end. for he
yond lies band of dry shingle, unfinished
and barren. l found among the spurge
Yesterday the caterpillar of spurye
hawk moth, already full grown and madi.
tcting its chrysalis change Horned. red
legged, and spotted with yellow. il dis
damned eoncealment as il sat on the dull
red stalks of the plant. Soon" II
thought, II shall be safe enough"
The ford across the Eurotas lies inst in
front OF me, and an hour ago delightful
little drama was npf.Nd fhora ..o..-