Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-06-12
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES E. TRACEWELL.

highs" and the other way around,
will bring storms in their season.
| Waking in the night without s-7er-
| natural fear, nevertheless, we are over
whelmed with apprehension at what
these natural forces may do to us in
our little houses covered with tin, made
of brick or wood and other materials
which, after all, would offer little re-
sistance to determined cyclone.
X r \
The storm builds itself up carefully,
| almost as If some director sat In the
wings formed by the hills of the city
and waved his hand for the increase he
| desired
Following upon those first big drops
which played their solemn tattoo upon
| the roof, the rush of the wind grew
louder little by little, until it became
! big, and the sound of the rain grew
noisler and noiser, until it came sweep
ing up to the very place the listener lay.
The conglomeration of sounds seemed
to rush in from everywhere with sort
OF galloping noise, steadily closer and
closer, yet without any particular hurry,
as If quite convinced of their own
| worth, In no need whatever of impress
ing any one.
Nature is the supreme master of
cause and effect. Her processes are
worthy because usually they do good
her good, which may or may not be
ours.
| She never sows a seed but what she
| expects birth. and never sends the
ram but what " may do some good to
struggling plants gaSping in the dust
on the other hand, as Emerson pointed
| out, she had as lief drown a saint as a
tiger. At times she seems a mercileSs
thing of brutal causes and no less ter
4 nf 1.
the other, but each needless, except in
her inscrutable designs, without pattern
or plan or intent.
Tonight the rain falls like a bene-
dlction upon the grounds beneath,
earth parched for days by an unsea-
! sonable drought. Those who love<fheir
gardens rejoice, because the grass and
the Mowers and the vegetables are re-
Joicing in their dumb, vegetative way.
Ihose queer creakings in the wind
| must be the voices of the flowers and
the shrubs as they drink in the falling
water. Those shrill squeakings, easily
heard through the roar of the storm,
surely they are nothing less than the
voice OF the grass, each thirsty root
and blade purring like so many cats in
the night.
Let the dull Of spirit turn over in
their beds and go to sleep again, ours
| arg IAAC ~ OSpcCIS OI d wet Gay 10 SPOIL
some outing tomorrow; the gardener
VIII lie there quietly, imagining him
self TO be plant and to be thrilling
from root to leaf beneath the down.
| pour
Pain and pleasure seem to be locked
up by Nature in all created things. It
is not possible to declare knowingly
that the plants do not actually enjoy
the rain, any more than it is to say
positively that ants and bees do not
think. Some of the latest researches
tend to show that they do and maybe
we shall find out ultimately that the
vegetable kingdom enjoys itself in its
lowly wav.
The gardener lies quietly, picturing
that TO- Of his plants and the huge
benefit which they are receiving from
the tremendous sluicing which they are
undergoing. The grass which was
burning up is getting greener already
The petunias, already in bloom, are
fiattened to the ground, but they will
straighten up again, their whole beings
! filled with fresh moisture, in which
| they live and have their very being.