The Booker T. Washington Papers, Vol.6, page 135, June 1901, U. of Illinois Press

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JUNE · 1901 that my work there was not directly connected with the stock, the mere fact that I saw the best kinds of animals and fowls day after. day increased my love for them, and made me resolve that when I went out into the world I would have some as nearly like them as possible. I think that I owe a great deal of my present strength and ability to work to my love of outdoor life. It is true that the amount of time that I can spend in the open air is now very limited. Taken on an average, it is perhaps not more than an hour a day, but I make the most of that hour. In addition to this I get much pleasure out of the anticipation and the planning for that hour. I do not believe that any one who has not worked in a garden can begin to understand how much pleasure and strength of body and mind and soul can be derived from one's garden, no matter how small it may be; the smaller it is, the better, I think, in some respects. If the garden be very small, a man can have the gratifying experience of finding out how much can be produced on a small plot carefully laid out, thoroughly fertilized, and well cultivated. And then, when the garden is small, but the vegetables and plants large, there springs up a feeling of kinship between the man and the plant, as he tends and watches the growth of each individual plant from day to day. Each day there is some new development. The rain, the dew, the sunshine, each causes some new growth. The letter or the address that one began writing the day before never budges or moves forward one iota until you return and take up the work where it was left off; not so with the plant. Some change has taken place during the night; there is the appearance of bud or blossom or fruit. This sense of newness, of expectancy, brings to me a freshness, an inspiration for each day, that it is difficult to describe. It is not only a pleasure to grow good vegetables for one's own table, but I get much satisfaction from sending some of the best specimens to some neighbor whose garden is backward, or to some one who has not learned the art of raising the best or the earliest varieties, and who is therefore surprised to receive some new potatoes two weeks in advance of any one else. When I am at my home at Tuskegee, I usually find a way, by rising early in the morning, to spend at least half an hour in my i35