Nature is "awful smart." I intend to be complimentary in saying so. She
shows it in little things. I have mentioned my attempt to put in a few
modest turnips, near the close of the season. I sowed the seeds, by the
way, in the most liberal manner. Into three or four short rows I presume
I put enough to sow an acre; and they all came up,--came up as thick as
grass, as crowded and useless as babies in a Chinese village. Of course,
they had to be thinned out; that is, pretty much all pulled up; and it
took me a long time; for it takes a conscientious man some time to decide
which are the best and healthiest plants to spare. After all, I spared
too many. That is the great danger everywhere in this world (it may not
be in the next): things are too thick; we lose all in grasping for too
much. The Scotch say, that no man ought to thin out his own turnips,
because he will not sacrifice enough to leave room for the remainder to
grow: he should get his neighbor, who does not care for the plants, to do
it. But this is mere talk, and aside from the point: if there is
anything I desire to avoid in these agricultural papers, it is
digression. I did think that putting in these turnips so late in the
season, when general activity has ceased, and in a remote part of the
garden, they would pass unnoticed.
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