“To be sure he was; but then you might be if you pricked your finger with the thorns of a rose, or had to do something in the garden when it was freezing hard, eh?”
“I don’t think I should be,” I replied.
“But you must think,” he said. “It’s very nice to see flowers blooming and fruit fit to pick with the sun shining and the sky blue; but life is not all summer, my boy, is it? There are wet days and storms, and rough times, and the flowers you see blossoming have been got ready in the cold wintry weather, when they were only seeds, or bare shabby-looking roots.”
“Yes, I know that,” I said.
“And you think you would like to come?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What for? to play in the garden, and look on while the work is done?”
“I think I should be ashamed to do that,” I said; “it would be so lazy. If you please, Mr Brownsmith, I’ve got to work and do something, and if you will have me, I should like to come.”
“Well, well,” he said, “mine’s a good business and profitable and healthy, and there are times when, in spite of bad crops, bad weather, and market losses, I thank God that I took to such a pleasant and instructive way of getting a living.”
“It is instructive then, sir?” I said.