The orange men in California sent an expert all over Europe to
find an enemy of the scale that was destroying the fruit-trees
of California. One day, in Spain, he found a tiny creature which
he named the lady-bird. It has a sharp lancet that it thrusts
into each insect. It goes over the tree with inconceivable
rapidity. When it finds the scale under the bark it thrusts the
sword down, and now the lady-bird is working together with the
husbandman, amid the prune- and orange-trees of California.
Cockleburs are foes of corn, but a hoe has a sharp edge. Ye are
God’s harvest field. Hate is a weed, envy and jealousy are sharp
thorns. Selfishness is a poison vine. Surliness is a fungus
growth; lurking evil is the deadly night-shade. But love is a
rose, joy is like a tiger-lily; peace is the modest arbutus.
Contentment is a sweet vine that grows over the door of the
house of man’s soul. Honesty and industry are the goodly shocks
and sheaves; these homely virtues are food to the hungry. God is
a husbandman.--N. D. HILLIS.
(1470)
=Husband’s Disloyalty=--See SALOON EFFECTS.
=Hygienic Conditions=--See HEALTH, ECONOMICS OF.