"My dear," she says, like a blooming icicle, "John and I had all these plans when we owned a house, and we never did get our yard fixed. You have no idea of the work and the expense and the disappointments! And don't plant any Government seeds. They never come up." It's an odd coincidence that your Congressman has just supplied you with a lot of radish, onion, lettuce, and other seeds, and that you have been lying awake nights passing resolutions of thanks to the Agricultural Department. But there is one who comes--Heaven bless her!--who goes into seven fits of joy and envies you your happiness. You love her because of it--and because she is your mother. EIGHTH PERIOD The real enjoyment of home comes when for the first time you are taking a week off. "Are you going to Atlantic City?" asks Jones. You curl your lip in a sneer and tilt your nose and snort, and make yourself superior. "Atlantic City! Do I look easy? Atlantic City, boardwalk, red hot sun, skinny bathers, flies in the dining-room, at $7 a day? Not on your life! I'm going to stay home and take the rest cure--that's me! I'm going to sleep late, eat four meals a day, spade my garden when I feel like it and enjoy life right. I'm going to take a shower bath every thirty-six minutes and no company--not a blooming visitor--the whole week. What I want is absolute rest." Jones listens, but with an air of one who is wise. That was my experience. I was getting fagged, brain-weary and nervous from a terrific strain of making an appearance at work. The bluff went over and the powers that be told me to go away and cut out the telephone. So out to That House I Bought forthwith hied me--instanter removed. To drop the load, to forget the worries, to submerge the business ego in a week of solid rest! I was getting near to Heaven. The first morning I awoke with a start, leaped out of bed, shed my pajamas and grabbed for the things on the chair. I was dressed and halfway down stairs before I realized that it was off duty for mine. O joy! I got THE SUN from the porch and read the leading locals and saw half a dozen stories sticking out between the lines. The telephone was handy; I'd call up the office and suggest--whoa! The telephone had been cut out. "Good!" I exclaimed internally. "I'll have late breakfast and sleep a couple of hours." My wife came down. "While I'm getting breakfast," she said, "suppose you turn the hose on the porch, and just kind of dust it off with this broom. The girl won't come until next week, and you know I'm a sick woman." I squirted the hose and dusted. Scrubbery is one of my short talents. When the sun dried it off, the porch was streaked from end to end, and I had to do it over with my wife supervising.