in the central vale of Kent, and borough. The bloom of the chincontains so many curious old quapin, like that of the chestnut houses, and one of the largest and is a soft, amber hued catkin, with finest ancient parish churches in a delicate perfume. England.) We can imagine the JUGLANS NIGRA.-The black beauty, and picturesqueness of walnut is a most graceful treethe scene, when the rosy English none superior to it, and the nuts lads and lasses gather their filbert are rich in oil, but rather strong crops; and the fancy travels from in flavor. They grow easily, and the trimly-cut rows of filberts, to in great abundance in the Souththe lofty pecan forests of Texas, ern States. where the planter's children, and It is amongst nuts what bacon the little negroes, mingle their is amongst meats-strong and shouts of glee as the brown nuts patter down upon the springy, virgin soil.

The

greasy. The shell-bark is as delicate as fresh cream, the Pecan is next in delicacy, the Persian (or There are several varieties of English) walnut next, and then filbert,--the white-skinned, the red- our hardy native black species. skinned, the cluster-nut and the It is very productive. cobnut-the last being a very country lads of the South store large fine variety. The trees them away for winter's use by the begin to bear in four or five years wagon load-and they are a defrom the seed. licious ingredient in the home CASTANEA PUMILA.-Chinqua- made candy, the manufacture of pin or Dwarf Chestnut. This tree which affords such frolics in the is small, not attaining more than winter evenings. Jack, Harry twenty or thirty feet, even in the and Tom think walnut candy most favorable situations, and quite as good as the most exbearing usually at the height of pensive French, and the fun of four or five feet. A tree growing seeing and assisting at the makin Hopewell, Mecklenburg co., ing, enhances, ten fold, its value. N. C., produces fruit twice as To show the ease with which they large as the common kind. It is are cultivated, we give the followwell worthy of cultivation, but ing from a correspondent of the the people of the South have Prairie Farmer. hitherto been so indifferent to the productions of their own country, that the experiment has yet to be tried. The nuts sell readily school-boys particularly being always eager to buy them. When Charlotte becomes as old a town as Maidstone in Kent, perhaps the chinquapin orchards, will bloom and fruit around it, as the Another correspondent of the filbert orchards now do around same paper says, he planted five that quaint and lovely old English acres in walnuts in 1843, and in

"I planted the nuts in the fall soon after they fell, with a hoe about two inches deep. They grew rapidly and in six or seven years from the planting, they began to bear. I have since planted two acres west of my house. It would be better to plow the land deeply before planting."

1858, fifteen years after, some of from planting the seed. In Perhis trees were thirty-five feet in sia the most highly prized variety height.

is the 'Kaghazi' which there sell at four cents per hundred. The shell is almost as thin as papereasily broken by the hand. It is also the largest variety. A single tree will produce 25,000 nuts.

About 1,150,000 pounds of walnut kernels are annually consigned to the oil press in Cashmere, producing a large amount of oil and cake, of much value. They are much used also as an article of food. (Patent Office Report.)

JUGLANS REGIA.-The English walnut grows as easily and as rapidly as the black, and is also a splendidly picturesque and graceful tree. "It has strong claims upon the landscape gardener, being one of the grandest and most massive trees he can employ in his beautiful art. When full grown, it is scarcely inferior, in the boldness of its ramification, or the amplititude of its head, to the oak or chestnut; and what it lacks, in spirited outline, when We have now noticed seven compared with those trees, is varieties of most valuable nutfully compensated, in our estima- bearing trees, the Chestnut, the tion, by its superb and heavy Shellbark, the Pecan, the Black and masses of foliage, which catch Persian Walnuts, the Filbert and and throw off the broad lights Chinquapin. To plant them would and shadows in the finest manner," be an outlay of but little time and (Downing's Landscape Garden- money-the young growing trees ing.) In France extensive or will scarcely interfere with your chards of this nut are planted, crops, and we think it probable and large quantities are sold in that one acre of full bearing Chestall the markets of Europe. In nut, Shellbark, Pecan or Persian Persia it is one of the staple com- walnut trees, would yield more modities, and quantities of oil profitably than any acre of cotton, are there manufactured from it. rice, or sugar-cane that ever grew. It grows in many parts of the And some of them continue to South and bears abundantly, but bear, without cultivation, for is an exotic of course. The nut hundreds of years. The Tortis fine for the table, but not equal worth Chestnut must be near a to the Shellbark and Pecan.There are several varieties of the Persian walnut. "A tree of the 'Titmouse' or 'Thinshelled' variety (Juglans regia tenera) is standing on the premises of Col. Peter Force, of Washington City. This tree in 1855, was forty-five feet in height (twenty years from the planting) and bearing abundance of excellent nuts." It begins to bear in eight or ten years

thousand years old-as it was standing before the Conquest, and the one at Marsham still older.

The almond (Amygdalus communius) could be grown in this country with proper care. It flourishes in the neighborhood of Paris, where the winter climate is almost, if not quite, as severe as that of Washington City. It however requires a particular kind of soil, deep, dry and sandy

or calcareous. They will grow in any soil not too moist, but they do not flourish as they do in the soil best suited to them. It yields, in bearing years, about twenty pounds to a tree, which at 30 cents per pound, would amount to at least $1,000, to an acre.— The sweet, soft shelled variety (Amande a coque molle, of France) not to the practical agriculturist is the most highly prized. of this latitude.

The trees can be obtained from any nurseryman, and they also grow readily from the nuts, if they are fresh.

The delicious cocoanut, pistachio and other tropical nuts do not suit our climate, and we will not trouble our readers with them. ist, and to the general reader, but They are interesting to the botan

The days passed into weeks and ease and most brilliant dahlias in the weeks into months. The the neighborhood.

winter snows came and went, My mother insisted upon my now burying the landscape under accompanying her in her teaits bleaching purity, then leaving drinkings with her neighbors, and it green and sodden as if a spring as the little ones seemed to fancy dwelt beneath each little blade of me and we could always slip into grass, ready to pour forth a some quiet corner for the storysparkling rill at the touch of telling that they always exacted a butterfly's step. The usual from me. I did not object. The farming operations went on;- older girls, near my own age kept first the blade, then the ear, then shy of me, expressing it as their the full corn in the ear. Mother opinion that Mary Ashburton was had much spinning and weaving so old of her years and so far off done, brought out a new carpet from them that they could never from the loom for the dining- feel at ease with her or as if she room, the old one being cut in was like them, for all she was so pieces and distributed about the smart at housekeeping and could premises. I trained more vines make such pies and bread. on the walls, essaying a tropical creeper which I induced to flour ish after many efforts, and prided myself no little upon the garden which produced the largest hearts

· Continued from page 418.

Sometimes they came to see us, when I entertained them as well as I could, showing them my flowers, my various little arrangements, even my new dresses, if I happened to have any, and

thought the exhibition would in- empty spool mother had just put terest them. This seemed to gain down.

them somewhat, though the dis- I started and half arose with tance remained between us. I did not need them, and never sought to affiliate with them in any degree, for though many of our pursuits were the same, our tastes were dissimilar. I don't think they found my company more congenial, though I always strove to exhibit a friendly feeling towards all with whom I was thrown.

the violent beat my heart gave when his name was mentioned.— He was home then. Oh! what happiness to be near him againto feel that he was there. An exquisite sense of perfect content stole over me; the something that I missed when he was absent, was there, and a comparative happiness was mine. New life seemed to animate me;-I felt so joyous that I could have sung out with heart's delight. I felt the light stealing to my eyes, the color to my cheek, my whole being radiant with happiness.

I studied much, that is I seized upon every spare moment as an opportunity for mental improvement, picking up information wherever it was to be obtained, learning from every object in Near him again! see him again! nature to adore the Creator of all The birds seemed to sing more the beauty I enjoyed so intensely. sweetly, the meadows greener, the I arose early with a song of bleating lambs and the tinkle of praise and thanksgiving in my the distant bells more melodious; heart for the loveliness with which all the varied charms of evening He had clothed the earth, and I life had tenfold their harmony, sang among the birds and flowers, because I felt that he was near me feeling myself to be one almost again. Near, and yet so distant, with my blithe companions, work- an ocean might have separated ing briskly with hoe and spade. us-but I did not think of that on this, the first evening of his return; I gave myself up to the pleasure of feeling that he was near me.

Thus passed my days; so passéd away the spring and half the summer till

One evening we were seated out before the door, enjoying the pleasant breeze that sprang up after the heat of the day. Knitting in hand, I was seated on my bench under the honeysuckle, when a cloud of dust up the road attracted our attention, and presently a carriage emerged into view.

"It is young Chauncey; he returns to-day," said father, feeling in his pocket for his knife with which he intended to whittle the

That evening I was at my old post; looking past the garden, over the fields, across the park.— It was late when his light appeared at the window, the window that had been dim and pale ever since his departure, as the light had gone out from my heart.— Yes, I pictured the happy, rëunited family; the group in the porch gazing up at the lovely summer night, his hands in those of his parents while he made them laugh

Once he came to visit us, to pay his respects, he said, to his father's old friend, Mr. Ashburton, wishing to see his among the other kind, familiar faces that greeted his return. Like a frightened bird I ran out of the room when I saw him coming, and remained out during his visit, my heart

turn, yet too shy to do so.

and almost weep by turns as he then; preferring to associate alone told them of his various college with him in imagination rather scrapes and unwonted privations. than sustain the rude shock realiI could fancy it all till it seem- ty would force upon me of an ed as if I were of the group too, awakening from my dreams; his so real it grew to my active im- grave, distant bow, my own shy agination. I sat by the window awkwardness in returning it. for hours, hearing the katydid chirrupping in the grass beneath, the piercing treble of a concert of small insects from the meadow, in which the lonely frog threw his deep bass violin note; the fire-flies illuminating the silvery air flashing past me and sparkling like gems in the folds of my curtain. I wondered at the stars, wander- palpitating with the desire to reing among them in fancy, and if Alfred had the same thoughts at "Alfred Channcey asked for the same hour till the distance you, Mary," said mother when between us appeared to vanish he was gone and I had returned and we were beings of the same to the dining-room. sphere. To be sure every dictate of prudence had vanished also that night in the sudden, tumultuous joy that his return had given. I saw him ride out next day, galloping down the road with a party of gentlemen. Again and again I saw him on horseback with gay parties, in the fields, on the road, at church. Close confinement to study had thinned and paled him, but he looked all the more elegant and interesting, his light hair waving up from a forehead where the blue veins were more perceptible than they had been before. We never spoke, for I always shyly drew back when he came near me, never feeling the social distance between us as I did

"Asked for me, mother?" I repeated, my face burning as with coals of fire.

"Yes," replied mother, rocking away in her chair and drawing her thread through the wax repeatedly, "he asked me if my daughter was well, and that meant you, of course, as I had no other. I thought of making you come back, but you're such a shy thing that I concluded it was best not to trouble you."

Dear, matter-of-fact mother! how little she knew of her daughter's heart, the deep, sacrificial love that burned with a pure, steady flame on its altar, rendering her life a sorrow almost before it had begun.

CHAPTER IV.

Thus it went on from year to and went after his vacation of six year. He came every summer weeks, winning honors for him