never to mention them, but awaited patiently the dénouement. Unfortunately, at this precise moment of suspense, Weeville called to see me; and although I endeavored to distract his attention-for his way was always so painfully abrupt--and tried to beguile him with the seductions of the mint-bed, one of his first questions was,

66

Well, how goes on the garden? Have you discovered any new way of growing beans wrong end up, or inducing potatoes to produce a dozen sprouts to every eye?"

I replied that my garden was getting along very well; and when he insisted upon a personal inspection, that he might get a lesson or two in science, as he expressed it, I did my best to lead him to the vegetable department. But the attempt was vain. He spied my strange flowers at once, and hastened directly toward a Datura with an expression of countenance that was far from reassuring.

"What on earth have you got there?" he burst forth, before he was near the plant, so that I, skillfully pretending to misunderstand him, and assuming that his question applied to a shrub near by, replied,

Oh, that is a spiræa. A handsome one, is it not? Growing finely; it will soon cover the entire path.”

"I don't mean that-"

"By the way," I inquired, interrupting him, "have you any egg-plants to spare? Ours are not as successful as they ought to be."

"Yes, yes; plenty. But I want to know why you have filled your garden—”

"Walk this way, if you please," I again broke in. “There's a remarkably pretty double Jacoboea that I should like to show you."

"In a minute; but tell me first—”

"And our Lima beans, they are really remarkable; and such carrots and turnips, to say nothing of many other excellent vegetables."

I was becoming a little incoherent, and not sticking to the absolute and naked truth, for Weeville was not to be moved. He stopped resolutely before a wonderful specimen of Datura, and said positively, "Before I go any where else, I want to know what you call that?”

Oh, that," I replied, with affected indifference, "that is a Datura."

As he broke into unpleasantly convulsive laughter, I added, hastily,

"I mean to say Meteloides." As he still appeared unconvinced and somewhat choked with merriment, I further explained: "Datura Wrightii Meteloides;

a plant which ought to be more extensively cultivated; bears flowers eight inches long, white bordered with lilac, sweet scented, beautiful beyond description."

"Beautiful!" he shouted; "sweet scented! Why, that is a stink-weed. If you don't believe me, just touch it."

It was. I am sorry to confess the fact, but my fears and suspicions were confirmed. I had succeeded in producing about a hundred stink-weeds. There is one disadvantage about science, which consists in the difficulty of understanding it. Datura and Meteloides are so little like stink-weed that the common mind could hardly connect the two together, although the latter have sweet-scented flowers eight inches long. Moreover, I had supposed that stramonium was the learned name, but it would appear that science had altered that. It was a good deal of trouble to get rid of those Daturas. I could not touch them, for by either name they smelt equally, although not absolutely sweet. It was out of the question to pull them up, and almost as difficult to cut them down. During the operation of their removal they gave forth an odor which seemed to me quite a satisfactory reason why they were not more extensively cultivated," and which rivaled the best

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efforts of the American civet, an animal vulgarly
When they were

known by a more plebeian name.
finally eradicated the garden looked quite bare, and
a fresh application had to be made to the florists for
bedding plants to fill up the vacancies. I still be-
lieve in science, but seedsmen should be more full in
their descriptions or more careful in their selections;
certainly stink-weeds are not very desirable flowers,
even under the romantic name Datura or Mete-
loides.

CHAPTER XIV.

A SECOND DIGRESSION-FAIRY TALES FOR LITTLE

FOLKS.

Y five acres at Flushing were located on the

MY

top of a hill called Monkey Hill; why so called I can not imagine, for there was never a monkey seen there since the earliest recollection of the first inhabitant; nor could it have been from the want of monkeys, as that is so common a deficiency on Long Island. To be sure, there is a settlement of Irish on one declivity near the salt meadow; but even supposing that, by a stretch of the imagination, Irishmen can be converted into monkeys, that is of comparatively modern date, whereas our Dutch ancestry named the hill generations back. Nevertheless, the hill is Monkey Hill, and the settlement is Monkey Town.

I wander through Monkey Town occasionally, admire the originality of its Celtic architecture, puzzling myself over the buildings to find out which are pig-pens and which are houses-for the pig-pens are