That was months ago, and it looks a great deal more like it now.  I watched those trees with sadness at my heart.  Millions of brown, ugly, villanous worms gnawed, gnawed, gnawed, at the poor little tender leaves and buds,—­held them in foul embrace,—­polluted their sweetness with hateful breath.  I could almost feel the shudder of the trees in that slimy clasp,—­could almost hear the shrieking and moaning of the young fruit that saw its hope of happy life thus slowly consuming; but I was powerless to save.  For weeks that loathsome army preyed upon the unhappy, helpless trees, and then spun loathsomely to the ground, and buried itself in the reluctant, shuddering soil.  A few dismal little apples escaped the common fate, but when they rounded into greenness and a suspicion of pulp, a boring worm came and bored them, and they, too, died.  No apple-pies at Thanksgiving.  No apple-roasting in winter evenings.  No pan-pie with hot brown bread on Sunday mornings.

CHERRIES.—­They rivalled the apple-blooms in snowy profusion, and the branches were covered with tiny balls.  The sun mounted warm and high in the heavens and they blushed under his ardent gaze.  I felt an increasing conviction that here there would be no disappointment; but it soon became palpable that another class of depredators had marked our trees for their own.  Little brown toes could occasionally be seen peeping from the foliage, and little bare feet left their print on the garden-soil.  Humanity had evidently deposited its larva in the vicinity.  There was a schoolhouse not very far away, and the children used to draw water from an old well in a distant part of the garden.  It was surprising to see how thirsty they all became as the cherries ripened.  It was as if the village had simultaneously agreed to breakfast on salt fish.  Their wooden bucket might have been the urn of the Danaides, judging from the time it took to fill it.  The boys were as fleet of foot as young zebras, and presented upon discovery no apology or justification but their heels,—­which was a wise stroke in them.  A troop of rosy-cheeked, bright-eyed little snips in white pantalets, caught in the act, reasoned with in a semi-circle, and cajoled with candy, were as sweet as distilled honey, and promised with all their innocent hearts and hands not to do so any more.  But the real piece de resistance was a mass of pretty well developed crinoline which an informal walk in the infested district brought to light, engaged in a systematic raid upon the tempting fruit.  Now, in my country, the presence of unknown individuals in your own garden, plucking your fruit from your trees, without your knowledge and against your will, is universally considered as affording presumptive evidence of—­something.  In this part of the world, however, I find they do things differently.  It doesn’t furnish presumptive evidence of anything.  If you think it does, you do so at your own risk.  I thought it did, and escaped by the skin of my teeth.  I hinted my