Mr. Hardy also tried many other experiments, as the climate is
suited to almost every kind of plant and vegetable. Among them was
the cultivation of ginger, of the vanilla bean, of flax, hemp, and
coffee. In all of them he obtained more or less success; but the
difficulty of obtaining labor, and the necessity of devoting more
and more attention to the increasing flocks, herds, and irrigated
land, prevented him from carrying them out on a large scale.
However, they served the purpose for which he principally undertook
them--of giving objects of interest and amusement to his children.
CHAPTER XII.
A STEADY HAND.
It was now more than eighteen months since the Hardys had been
fairly established at Mount Pleasant. A stranger who had passed
along at the time the house was first finished would certainly fail
to recognize it now. Then it was a bare, uninviting structure,
looking, as has been said, like a small dissenting chapel built on
the top of a gentle rise, without tree or shelter of any kind. Now
it appeared to rise from a mass of bright green foliage, so rapidly
had the trees grown, especially the bananas and other tropical
shrubs planted upon each side of the house. At the foot of the
slope were some sixty or seventy acres of cultivated ground, while
to the right were three or four large and strong wire enclosures,
in which the milch cows, the cattle, the sheep, and the pigs were
severally driven at night.
Pages:
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231