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“TYve Hanna Rion) Y re,

DECORATIONS BY

Neg York , 19]2 , Pebrde. Nast & Company

Published, March, 1912

;
eg

Sent si ate

TO MY
GARDEN PARTNER

PREFACE

Several of the chapters in this book have appeared,
essentially in their present form, in The Craftsman,
The Ladies’ World, Suburban Life and House and
Garden. To the editors of these magazines the au-
thor’s thanks are due for permission to use this ma-

terial again.

eo a -
aoe

CO NTE NES

INTRODUCTION

Tue First YEAR

ANNUALS

BIENNIALS AND PERENNIALS .

aries, WRis: AN PEOMIES (50) !6 le fe

LATS Se Se Sepa A&C Es ASSES A
CPM LOSES I Pets sits. acu leoeea tects
EET Sal phic oh WC UR SRL Rae RR Ea TOY UR ASE

Tue WiLp FLowers

SHRUBS AND VINES .

Tue Horsep anp TRANSPLANTING

THe TRANSIENT EDEN... AY Nee
GARDEN FURNITURE :
Tue GaArRvEN OF LURE .

Tue GARDEN IN WINTER .

CaRE OF THE GARDEN Birps .

Wuat My Garpen Means to ME .

PAGE

Pera ew eer RAT. 1 ONS

Perhaps I plagiarized a bit from the Japanese in design-

qe omy carches 0.28) eek eo Prontisptece
FACING
‘ é PAGE

Blossoms which lure to the garden birds I would never
EME EWES, BERT Bo Eyl cS Si a Une ntl cath Mobb aan Riad
PERT ALES OSS Hitec ys ale haste Ane Valeriy CRN PORSRR tT aeta tePRAP e

Nothing is so absolutely entrancing as a clump of nicotiana
Bie Ui CY MOO CLOW +00) 3))) sy dactbna veh af 8 tape IN aed (Loon OEE
ri URS ESET SN QR EE AMR RS Eh Ot RMP LE Ra ORE AVRO ESO

The Canterbury Bells add a delicacy and ida to every
bedsin, which they chime. 5.) 92 0° 2°. Adak 42
Hardy chrysanphemums) 5.) os 3h eu Cann Seam eh abe et baiel eae
The most decorative form in all the flower world. . . 58
LU Sra LE} ON Bh ae aes ee ean ei Woh nt ARP OM RRL aaa S|
ENG VMGESE-DIbems. ROSE 2° ns are Gan atay Soe a ras oa hal de
aia OCNes . FORES f°). 2K) SNR Oae eh snail! Unie) aaa ta
Tall single tulips and the eccentric parrots. . . . . 106
5 rg 5,5) 1s MR GPRM MOA SR. Uhr ee) a eR ea CRC Oi
In its ghost stage the dandelion reaches the spiritual . . 114

SELES PRONE OER Ur St SS bre uaPge Min AO ad eR

THE ILLUSTRATION S—continued

FACING
PAGE
Arch and trellis are painted a soft gray green. . . . 130
WER Peas ee ele eek UR ee a ee
We transplant our Shirley poppies and thereby have them
just where\we want them ..)..))..)%.2 a ee
Dhitley pPOppies | 326.92 ee ice hie oe ie er
Anmannual hollyhock (2020 oe
CobraZseandens 85 os 8) 0 a er
A bench alone Dutch lines :).02°. >.) 4. oe rr
Lady, Gay:roses.about the sundial: . 2... 22) eee
The public bath where members of the orchestra bathe and
LEU A ek sy de Veo as hk be oe. Soi, el lat rr
AYbuecaneer butterfly 3) 030. 0. os ee
A brook breaking ice barriers in spring. . . . . . 180
008 01 01ch (5 Ge ee AP eRe NACE 4
The poor English sparrow does not deserve the continuous
persecution that he suffers under: :.°. |.) 2) 938883
The imsatiable Tobia i050 09 Saks ake Gee pee
The: uardian of ‘the vearden® .4) 0 \s"0. 1. ey . ae

1 2 em ee EO Le arin Sau ee MC ROMER RE LT oo

Int roduction

Mates en
Bay

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SiG

NA eT
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ALU
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HERE are some phrases which carry magic in

their sound, a magic which cannot be explained

by mere logic, and the greatest of these phrases is,

* Let’s make a garden.” It has a “ Merry Christ-

mas,” * Hurrah for the Fourth of July ” tinkle of joy.

The instinct to mingle with the soil evidences itself

in the mud pie stage of childhood; as we grow older.

we merely make many more, and much more beauti-

ful mud pies with frosting of perfumed color, and
call it Garden.

No one ever entirely grows up who lives in a gar-
den. I feel sure almost all gardeners still believe
in Santa Claus; and as for fairies, was it not in
Kensington Gardens that Mr. Barrie discovered all
the wonderful facts about Peter Pan? Perhaps it is
the help of the Little People that makes gardening
so easy for mortals.

I know many professionals try to scare one with all

IRs Make Q oWer Chemdeg

sorts of bugaboo theories of the difficulties of flower
culture; but to refute this, we only have to take a
drive through the outlying districts of the town where
the workmen and washerwomen — the so-called hum-
bler citizens — live, and the prodigality of bloom sur-
rounding each busy doorstep will soon show us what
wealth even the supposed poor may own, without
adding extra burden to their tired backs.

We have to learn to cook, to sew, to paint, to
write, but there is scarcely the littlest child who does
not naturally grasp a hoe, and use it as if he were
born a graduate in the science. This is probably
an inherited instinct, for all of us are descended from
some original tiller of the soil. It is the oldest pro-
fession in the world.

As Plutarch says, ‘There is no exercise nor oc-
cupation which so certainly bringeth a man to love
and desire quietness as doth husbandry and _till-
age.”

In the springtime the sap of enthusiasm and new
life begins to stir in mortals just as it does in trees;
this fact, noted by the Romans, was expressed in the
name given by them to the first spring month, which
they called Aprilis, “because then is the chiefest
force and strength.” June (from juniores, mean-

Ids Melee a lofer ee

ing young men) was so called because it was as the
youth of the year.

As far back as the 8th century, B.C., there lived
one Hesiodus who was a poet, and being one, his
thoughts derived their inspiration and sustenance
from the earth. So great an authority did he be-
come on flowers, on all growing things, the influence
of the moon on plants, and lucky and unlucky days
for sowing, that he constantly spoke in proverbs con-
cerning these things. One can easily fancy all
friends pressing Hesiodus to put his thoughts into
enduring form. This he eventually did, becoming
the father of all garden books, and the author of a
volume entitled ‘Works and Days,” which con-
tained practical maxims and directions for hus-
bandry in all its phases. Nearly three thousand
years have passed since that old book was written,
yet to-day the subject is still as fresh and inexhausti-
ble as the spring itself.

Even the seed catalogues come absolutely new to
the mind each season. I shall never forget the day
in my childhood when I discovered the first floral cata-
logue. It was an epoch. It opened the gate to the
land of heart’s desire, the vineyard of dreams.

Catalogues haven’t changed much since my child-

Kets Malce Q Flower Coe

hood; I should hate to think they could. Ive read
every description, every promise, thousands of times,
yet never has my imagination felt jaded, never have
I failed to experience the old-new thrill. In all the
world’s literary classics, none contain for me the in-
exhaustible lure, the enchantment, the dream material,
to be found in the seed catalogue.

The making of a garden is much like the forma-
tion of character — the loveliest mature characters
are often the result of many early mistakes. But the
very fact that the garden is a matter of growth
makes it worth while, and there is no art in which
there are such compensations in the primary grade.
If you have brought one flower to perfection you
have not failed. When a day has been hard indoors
and full of defeat, a walk through the garden dis-
pels all the mists of gloom. It is the consolation
of flowers which is the real tie between them and
mankind. And there is never strife among the
blossoms; they exhale peace as they breathe per-
fume. |

The only time a garden is disappointing is when
we are taking strangers through it, and I think that
is perhaps because flowers are so like love. It is
when you walk alone, or with someone dear to you,

Ids Q Flower Croeilen

among your flower-children, that they tell you all
their secrets of joy.

I sometimes wonder just when I am happiest in
the garden. Is it when I am working with garden
tool in spring, my inner vision abloom with dreams
of future loveliness, made possible by my labor; or
is it when I later on go forth in the early summer
mornings with scissors and basket, gathering hun-
dreds of roses, and great golden bunches of double
sunflowers, and blue bouquets of cornflower and lark-
spur? Then again I think it is most restful when
I walk about after mealtime, stooping to inquire
about the health of some frail plant, hunting ex-
pected buds in another, gathering a few ripening seeds
here and there, putting a rose branch in place, and
then lingering and looking and gloating over the
beauty of everything. Again I seem happiest when,
the day’s work done, I lie in a hammock in the gloam-
ing shadows of the pines, enjoying the sunset glint-
ing through stencilled leaf form and reflected in dis-
tant flower groups, while blackbirds, gathered in the
boughs overhead, give that strange cry which thrills
the imagination with its wildness, breaking the
shackles of domesticated thought.

But when the moon comes over the eastern turrets

. 5

Neds Make Q FloWer Ce

of cedars, and I sit at the threshold of my rose gar-
den silently with one to whom words are unnecessary,
my eyes resting now on the garden of stars above,
now on the rose stars below, then indeed the garden
brings a brooding sense of completeness, content and
blessing — and I ask no more of life.

I have never resented being told I was made out
of dust, which really means soil, for to have the same
origin as the flowers and trees is a very fine thing
indeed, and makes us cousins to the violet and sisters
of the oak.

The flowers give us a truer sense of values; we
do not envy the dwellers in the money-mart; we have
a wealth which pays its hourly dividends in beauty
and happiness, and to add to our wealth we do not
need to rob or hurt any other fellow mortal. We
do not desire extraneous excitement, for a garden ban-
ishes boredom; no hour is empty, no day is futile.

Each year that passes brings another spring in
which to grow young, another fall in which to harvest
our riper dreams,

“The Firs? Yeor—

ess
‘ Negus

Oe hier

NCE upon a time two people, who were very

world-fagged, came to their senses and realized

that the cure for their mind sickness lay beyond the

clank of business chains, the sight of sky-scrapers
and the whir of elevated trains.

Their apparent quarrel with life was really only
hunger for the song of wild birds, the nearness of
great fields of pasture, the friendship of hills, the
sight of a brook breaking ice barriers in spring,
the artillery of forest limbs snapping in icy grip, the
lowing of cattle at eventide, the elbow touch with
simple, kindly folk, and above all to own a slice of
this great birthday cake of earth.

When you buy a piece of land, remember — you
own all above it; you own that far reach of ether
in which the stars drift over your land, the moon as
it hangs above your trees, the sun as it passes

eds Melee @ Flower GAEIES

through your sky-claim; and best of all you possess
all the dreams which lie between you and infinity.

And you own down, down, down to the centre of
the earth’s axis, and this is why owning land gives
one such a sense of anchorage and solidity.

When we came to our senses (for my humbler half
and I are the people of whom I spoke so mysteri-
ously in my opening sentence) we sought the coun-
try and became the proud possessors of a slice of
land and a real home. On our original plot — be-
fore we bought the adjoining two acres of wilder-
ness — there stood two apple trees, three peaches,
two cherries, white and purple lilacs, a deutzia, and
a flowermg almond,— nothing else. Now, after a
few years, to tell all our tree and flower possessions
would necessitate nine volumes of very fine print,
and then I’d have to leave out all the intangible
things we have come to own, things which have no
name but? which make one terribly happy in the
private possession thereof. |

The first autumn we spent so much time in con-
gratulating each other on our emancipation from the
city, marveling at the sunsets, rediscovering the
night sky, that we were really too stunned by
the seventy and seven wonders of the world revealed

Kets Hake a Power Garden

each day to think about gardening. So it was not
until we had had a whole winter in which to catch
our breath, that we even discussed flowers. When
I look back on that time I find we really didn’t know
the A, B, C’s of gardening (though we both thought
ourselves very wise), and that is why we’ve had such
a joyful, growing time of it, blundering along, learn-
ing bit by bit through a hundred mistakes; and
even after all these years we know there are equally
many surprises ahead and that six years hence, to-
day will be called blind and ignorant.

When the thought of garden dawned we began
very modestly, thinking of attempting only the eas-
iest, simplest things. When we pored over the cata-
logues, we paused only at the familiar names and
the ones we could pronounce; we both shied dread-
fully at botanical titles.

Then in our spring rambles of discovery we came
across many deserted farms and gaunt, ghostly
houses with weed choked gardens. With fine moral
scruples we rescued many plants which would other-
wise have died of neglect, pining for human love.
Of course some people might call this procedure hard
names, but it depends wholly on the point of view.
I’m sure it’s a very fine kind of missionary work to

Mets Meke Q FloWer Ca

relieve an old forgotten hollyhock of its poor little
children who are being choked to death by weeds and
haven’t a chance in the world. ‘Then, too, a scraggly
old lilac will be very grateful if you help yourself
to the dozens of suckers which are needlessly drain-
ing its health.

It was by means of such salvage that we started
a lilac hedge and were blessed by a row of blooming
hollyhocks from the piazza to the road, the summer
after their rescue.

There is no shorter route to country neighbors’
hearts than a love of flowers. Country people are
not specialists, carefully guarding rare flower treas-
ures; they are, on the contrary, big-hearted owners
of nice old-fashioned plants which they got through
earlier neighbors’ giving, and which they in turn
pass on to flower-loving newcomers.

So it happened I soon found each call from a
neighbor meant the enriching of our garden by iris,
rockets or hardy phlox clumps, while a return call
meant being the recipient of dozens of slips and
roots. I never before found it so easy and pleasant
to remember my social duties.

The really permanent things which found place
in our garden the first spring were therefore gotten

BLOSSOMS WHICH LURE TO THE GARDEN
BIRDS I WOULD NEVER OTHERWISE SEE

ets Make a Flower é en

either by loot or by gift; the remaining plants were
annuals, and wild things borrowed from fields, woods
and swamps.

For the sake of other beginners who want to do
the thing gradually and make a modest beginning
in gardening, I can’t do better than tell them of our
annuals that first season, and how much beauty we
surrounded ourselves with by sowing only the best-
known seed.

To start with, we found an old chicken yard on
the place; and as we couldn’t undertake chickens
we removed the chicken houses and stored the lum-
ber for the making of toolhouse and hotbed the fol-
lowing spring, reserving one long stretch of the
chicken wire for the support of sweet peas.

The rich soil of the former fowl yard made an
ideal place to start our seedbeds, and here we sowed
in May, blue ageratum, Marguerite carnations, cos-
mos, asters, marigolds, mignonette and pansies. We
planted at each column of the front porch wild
clematis found in a brush tangle near a brookside.
The clematis is a long-legged vine which remains as
bare about the knees as a Highlander, so we planted
nasturtiums to cover the lower part of these vines;
and sweet alyssum plants were invited to do the same

Keds Male a Flower Coorden
favor for the nasturtiums, as they grew tall and
given to yellow leaves about the feet.

From the porch to the road the aforesaid holly-
hocks were permitted to fulfill their prim mission by
being placed in a straight row next to the walk. At
their backs, adjoining the lawn, we placed alternate
clumps of gift iris and hardy phlox, with a gen-
erous sowing of opium poppies to insure midsummer
gayety. Then we removed the few lonesome and
purposeless shrubs dotted about the lawn to the other
boundary of our grass plot, and by leaving an un-
broken lawn we greatly improved the appearance of
our frontage. To surround these shrubs and to
keep them from feeling hurt, we made a long irreg-
ular bed, which ran between an apple and a cherry
tree, holding a very indiscriminate lot of plants and
a perfect kaleidoscope of color; we had not grown
fastidious then and we wanted flowers, no matter
whether they were intended for bedfellows or not.

Here California poppies, marigolds and calliopsis
made a blaze of gold; cornflowers, larkspurs and
ageratum equaled the sky in blueness; and Phlox
Drummondi of every shade of salmon pink, white and
red, were rivaled by the motley colors of the varie-
gated pansy border. It was beautiful chaos, and

eds Mabe 2 Power Garden

taught us much of the extent to which nature can
combine colors without jarring the eye.

At the rear we transformed a spinster-looking out-
building by draping its straight front with morning
glories, cunningly lured by strings tacked to the
very pinnacle of the roof. On the other side of the
building, in the shade, we planted in our blissful
ignorance a long row of sunflowers; in effort to see
their god, the sun, they were forced to grow to an
unheard-of height, their shining faces smiling fully
sixteen feet from the ground.

Bordering the path leading to the seed yard, we
made a hedge of four-o’clocks. In a long bed at the
side of the back yard were planted candytuft, di-
anthus, Marguerite carnations, asters and cosmos.
Well, you should have seen the bloom and riot of
color in the midst of which we had our happy being
that season! It began with the May snowdrift of
candytuft, and lasted through the midsummer blare
of marigolds, larkspur and poppies to the asters
in early fall, and the tall cosmos which bloomed long
into October, as the frost was late that year.

We had no problems at that time; there were no
roses to spray and carry over winter, no perennials
to mulch in the fall,— just a season of irresponsible

PES a Boker Coeeren

joy, color and fragrance, with nothing to do but
eradicate weeds and pick flowers. But, being hu-
man, we were not content; we had drunk of the wine
of lure, and we secretly conspired to add to our prob-
lems next season by entering further into the land
of flowers, and acquiring an adjoining wilderness
of two and a half acres to hold all our planned-for
treasures.

All winter long we pored over new catalogues,
mouthing the strange names of biennials and peren-
nials, the married and single names of roses, and the
hieroglyphic-like titles of lilies.

From a modest beginning that first year we have
become flower gourmands and experimentalists, just
as you, too, are sure to be, once you enter the
boundaries of that realm whose enchantments know

no limitations.

Rode

Hi y

we nnae Ble.
KY ag

T would seem wisest for the new garden enthusiast
to purchase mixed seed of everything at first, for
this gives so much wider range from which to make

an eventual choice of favorites.

Shirley Poppies

Our greatest discovery the second season was
the Shirley poppy, which ever since has held our
hearts enslaved. If I had to make a choice between
owning roses and Shirleys, ’d have to choose the
latter.

No day can be wholly desolate which holds a
Shirley poppy. From May to October a breakfast
without them would seem tasteless. In the early
morning I always go straight from my own bed
to that of the poppies, and there, in the midst
of intoxicated bees, stand as bewitched as they by

‘Lets Hake Bae Crooden

the dewy beauty of the silken flowers swaying in the
morning breeze.

If picked before the lover-bees have sapped their
strength and: loosened their petals, and the stems
placed at once in water, the Shirleys will last for two
or three days indoors.

Manure is generally fatal to members of the poppy
family, should they come in immediate contact;
therefore it is best to enrich by trenching the spots
which are to hold poppies, lining the bottom of the
excavation with manure; then for future fertilization
use commercial fertilizer worked in cautiously be-
tween the plants.

All bores can prove things, so I am content
merely to disprove. I take particular delight in
having shattered the truth of the statement made that
poppies cannot be transplanted. We transplant the
majority of our poppies, both Shirley and opium,
and thereby have them just where we want them, and
also assure their having plenty of space to spread
their branches. The secret lies in taking them up
when they are young, on a cloudy day or late in the
afternoon, digging so deep beneath that not one of
the tender hairlike roots is maimed. At first we re-
moved them in small clumps, then, when firmly estab-

eds Make Q Flower Crcden

lished, pulled up the four or five superfluous plants
in each group leaving only the strongest to develop.
-But now we have become such experts we plant them
singly with perfect success.

One of the dearest things about the Shirleys is the
sweet surprises they bring, by conspiring with the
breezes which aeroplane them to all sorts of odd
places, transforming neglected corners into domains
of beauty. The owner of an old country garden near
by supplied us with a variety we have never
found duplicated in any of the packages purchased
— white, pink and red beauties wearing nine ruffled
silk petticoats. The improved Shirleys are gener-
ally single or only slightly double. It is generally
conceded that the single form of any flower holds the
highest perfection of line, yet these old crinolined
Shirleys maintained their own, even when planted side
by side with the new poppies wearing the very latest
in plain gored skirts.

It is odd that when rare and strangely beautiful
tints are produced in a member of a flower family,
the plant itself is often puny. One year we pos-
sessed a single Shirley poppy plant of tuberculous
appearance, which coughed up one blue blossom; al-
though we sat up nights to save the seed, and appar-

es Hele a ater CE

ently secured a goodly number, yet the next season
only one or two sickly plants appeared to wanly smile
at us through a few blossoms, then passed forever
from our garden.

There was another poppy bearing flowers the shade
of a gray-blue twilight sky; fortunately, this un-
healthy Shirley maid was wedded by a bee priest, to a
stalwart Captain Kidd of a scarlet poppy, with the
result that the children were dusk gray with a flash of
flame about their middles —a variety which, thank
goodness, inherited the constitution of their lusty
father and still flourish, the loveliest of all our present
poppy inhabitants.

Shirleys are very particular creatures (except
when they become vagabonds), demanding rich soil
and lots of sunshine. =

Sow, sow, sow, sow in May, June, July up to fall,
and then sow more plentifully than ever for it is
the autumn-sown seed which will give the sturdiest
plants; attending to their own business of cheerful
existence through winter snows, they will bloom early
the following spring. While you are sowing dili-
gently all season for a succession of bloom, the pop-
pies will be sowing as hard as they can themselves,

so with their collaboration you may possibly get
99

[Sets Hake Q Floer Caden

enough to satisfy an ever increasing desire and love
for them.

Nicotiana
Next to these poppies our greatest dependence
is put in the nicotiana or night-blooming tobacco.

After trying,:as was our duty, all the shades ad-
vertised, we decided to cling only to the white affinis
variety. This is the flower paramount for your
night beauty. Grant Allen tells of its incandescent
property, a phosphorescence which makes it a beacon
light for the buccaneers of the night.

Nothing is so absolutely entrancing as a corner of
these starry blossoms in the moon glow, with their
ever hovering, devoted swains, the moths. Their fra-
grance satisfies every craving of the human nose.

By trimming back behind the seed pods, the nico-
tiana’s blooming can be continued up to frost. Do
plant a mass of them near the veranda so you may

see them and whiff them every night of summer.

Annual Coreopsis
We simply couldn’t live without the gayety of
the annual coreopsis — called “ calliopsis” by the
seedsmen, but fortunately flowers don’t mind being

nicknamed.

[ets Make @ EloSer Crates

No other flower can so disguise its connection with
earth. The coreopsis stems are so fragile and incon-
spicuous that the flowers are constellations suspended
in space. ‘The wine-red variety cannot be surpassed
for velvety richness. Once given the freedom of
your garden, you need never bother your head again
about the coreopsis, but permit them to spring up
where they will, making gold frames for all your
flower pictures.

Sweet Peas

Because of the wire netting almost universally
used for sweet peas, it is wise to make very sure of the
spot whereon you desire them to abide before putting
up their permanent supports; for if anything can
disrupt a family’s peace and love it is trying to re-
move a stretch of chicken wire which has been
tightly nailed to posts.

If the spot is heavily enriched each year to replace
the drain on the earth’s strength, sweet peas really
do better where they have once grown than in entirely
new ground. No doubt there is some scientific rea-
son for this, but I’m not a scientist — only an ob-
server and recorder.

We make the trench very deep so that when the

ts Mabe a Hotes Gorden

peas come up they must grow six inches before they
can look the landscape over; this trench is gradually
filled as the vines grow, and having been forced to
deep roots they forgive us for not watering and
survive even prolonged droughts. As in the case of
almost all other flowers, we have only bought sweet
pea seed once, and the stock from our own seed in-
creases in bloom and variety each year. ‘The only
thing I don’t like about them is the way they bull-
doze you into picking their flowers every day whether
you want to or not, so I always solve this on the first
day of June by sweetly making a gift of the peas

to some member of the family.

Salpiglossis
For rich, glowing, unusual tones plant salpig-
lossis, a native of Chili, and a distant relative of the

petunia.

Petunias

Speaking of the petunias, I’ve changed my
former opinion of them since [’ve seen the wonders
wrought by that inspired hybridizer, Myrtle Francis
of California, the woman to whose tireless studies we
owe the extraordinary ruffled beauties, measuring six

| ets Blake a ower Crnccan

and a half inches across, in rose, blue, white, va-
riegated and red. One of the meekest moments of
my life was when Mrs. Francis asked me: “ Have
you ever put a ruffle on a flower?” I could only
shake my head negatively and make amends by my
homage to the woman who had.

Cornflowers

Of course we can never reflect the sky too often
in our garden, so all blue flowers are to be grown
profusely. Of these the king is the cornflower,
frankly claiming its royalty by its title of Kaiser
blumen. It is at its best in masses where it does not
need, nor make you desire, any other flower to perfect
the beauty. Then sprinkled throughout the garden,
preferably near the white and golden flowers, it is
also a harmonizer; I am not yet patriotic enough to
enjoy the cornflower in close proximity to red blos-
soms.

Sweet Sultans

The other variety of cornflowers dubs itself
sweet sultan, denoting an evidently unique virtue in
Turkish royalty. The sultans pretend to a greater
aristocracy than their blue German kindred, by being

NOTHING IS SO ABSOLUTELY ENTRANCING AS A
CLUMP OF NICOTIANA IN THE MOON GLOW

(ts Make a Mower Garden

fastidious about their location and snobbishly bloom-
ing less. But I bow the knee to their white and
lavender crowns and carefully save the seed, of which
they are rather sparing, acknowledging in my heart
their really imperial loveliness.

Mourning Bride |
When I was a child I thought the mourning
bride the most romantic of flowers, because of the
name and our not having any in our own home gar-
dens ; in order to see them I had to make a pilgrimage
across the railroad tracks to visit an old bride who
had been mourning her husband for about fifty years.
(Another reason I enjoyed going to visit this ancient
gardener was because she was the only perfectly bald
lady I had ever seen or heard of, but I think raising
the flowers had nothing to do with this peculiarity.)
Since I’ve grown up, the flowering mourning
brides’ sorrow has been mitigated; they have put on
half-mourning of lavender, and sometimes appear
garbed in white and pink like unwedded young girls.
I love the new widows who are perking up and taking
notice again, yet I still save my greatest admiration
for those inconsolable blossoms which remain true to

their memories while robed in funeral dress.

Is Make Q Flower GENES Es

Cosmos

In localities where frost is apt to steal upon the
garden prematurely, it is almost futile to attempt to
raise the splendid tall cosmos of dilatory habits, for
just about the time they are laden with buds, and the
plants have reached the height of eight feet, we go
forth some morning to find them blackened ruins,
which wrings the feelings unnecessarily.

Fortunately, however, there is a varicty of early
blooming cosmos which can get ahead of frosts. It
never attains the height of the lazy, more beautiful,
late kind, nor are the flowers as large. The foliage
of the cosmos is so light and airy it adds poetry of
background to any other flower, and I would grow it
for its foliage beauty even if it never flowered at all.
It is wise to tie the plants to firm stakes early in the
season, lest the first storm leaves them standing all
awry.

Phlox Drummondi
For reckless happy-go-lucky beauty sow gay
little Phlox Drummondi any and everywhere. Buy
mixed seed, then save with particular care the seed
of those of the rare tints of pale yellow and deeper
tan. By eradicating the plants of the magenta ones
28

ly Hake Moter Cramton

as soon as the blossoms dare to show their faces, you
may prevent their reappearance; all the other va-
rieties are exquisite and remind one of the quaint,
dainty old dresses of our grandmother found in gar-
ret trunks.

Each year we let some part of our vegetable gar-
den enjoy a rest cure, and sow it in clover which is
plowed under in the fall, making that portion of the
garden particularly rich the following season. With
the clover we once sowed all our superfluous phlox
seed, making a wonderfully pretty field. Another
year we combined the clover seed with Shirley pop-
pies — the result was wonderful.

When the early strawberries are through, give
them a deep spading between rows, then sow gay
little phlox to take the place of weeds which other-
wise are sure to come; the strawberries will be grate-
ful for the shade of the phlox, and the phlox will
add to your happiness every day of vegetable-pick-

ing during the summer.

Yellow Flowers

Before our grapevines had attained sufficient
size to require a trellis, we utilized a stretch of about
ten fect in width between the twenty vines to make a

Keds Hake Q lores Creelen

path of gold. On a line with the small vines we
planted the double sunflowers which look like monster
quilled dahlias; in front of these were the large
African marigolds, and next to the centre path there
was a border, three feet each side, of California
poppies of the glowing yellow and copper tints.
The path was of such dazzling brilliance that it quite
dazed the eye and took the breath away.

Dwarf Marigolds

The dear little marigolds of velvet rosettes make
the most fascinating dwarf hedges. ‘There is no more
pungent, charming odor than that of their leaves
crushed in the hand. In planting the hedge, give it
great richness and a space of eight inches between

plants.

Mignonette

Mignonette is seldom praised except for its fra-
grance, but if grown in rich soil, from seed of the
giant varieties, the flower heads will be fully eight
inches long and really beautiful in their greenish-
white and reddish tones. For mingling in vases with
other flowers they are ideal, harmonizing with every-
thing and lending a fragrance to an entire room.

ery Pele et Moder Crerden

Annual Mallow

The annual mallow is a most important factor
of summer beauty; its luscious, pink, hibiscus-like

flowers are borne in greatest profusion.

Nasturtiums

I think no one can have too many nasturtiums ;
they grow so easily they are taken for granted and
are not half as much appreciated as they would
be if perverse in their habits. There is not a more
beautiful form in the flower kingdom, and in color
the nasturtium blossoms reproduce flame and sun-
light.

We have obtained through accident a tint which
I’ve never seen in any other flower, that of old gold
with an actual gilt glistening over its surface.

The nasturtium vine, sad to say, is mentally idiotic ;
instead of using nice wire netting provided for
its climbing, it will unfailingly sneak off under the
porch, wasting its life in trying to pretend it is a
ghost in the cellar; or if planted by the side of the
house it will stupidly run against a crack in the wood,
and grow snub-nosed in an attempt to go through a
cranny two sizes too small.

But just as some mothers dote most on the child

het Poke a FloQee Gomes

which outsiders think intellectually inferior to her
others, so the very fact of a nasturtium’s not being
“right bright ” makes me very tender toward it, and
without apologies I declare it to be my favorite
flower-child. |

Diennakex Perennials

Liea

;
ye

aa Be Cae eee Crcanials

GARDENER lives in the future; he is planting

for years to come, and what dear conspirators

the flowers are to make him forget the aging face of
Time.

Many people do not have perennials in their gar-
dens because of a mistaken idea of the slowness of
their growth. There is really only one year of over-
ture and waiting when biennials and perennials are
planted, and a garden once begun continues itself in-
definitely, by self-seeding and root doubling; so in a
few years it is not a question of enlarging one’s flower
possessions but of finding space enough to accommo-
date the ever increasing floral army.

It is a fortunate sign when anyone mingles the
ephemeral sphere of annuals with the abiding one of
perennials, roses, shrubs and fruit, for it means they
have taken root themselves in the new home soil, hav-

eds Mekce @Q FloWer Coa

ing become human perennials who wish to surround

themselves with appropriate life companions.

Oriental Poppy

The most gorgeous of all perennials is the
Oriental poppy, the scarlet variety of which grows
readily from seed. J have never succeeded in raising
the shrimp pink and other delicate shades, except by
purchasing roots.

These poppies should be transplanted to their
permanent location when quite infantile, for they
throw down roots to the very centre of the earth if
left to develop fully in the seedbed; there is then no
implement that is long enough to transplant them
without amputating most of their rat-tail roots.
Planted so they may have a background of pine or
other evergreen, they are dazzlingly gorgeous in
May. Their splendor almost necessitates having the
field undisputed, for they are so exclamatory you
would not notice any other flower, and few blossoms
can stand the challenge of the poppies’ riotous color.

Dying down to the earth in midsummer they then
give an opportunity of using the space between them
for asters, which can be transplanted to the poppy
bed as soon as they have developed the third leaf.

bere Palas wo ote Gooden

Moles are the Oriental poppy’s only enemies, and I
know of no way to stop their destruction except al-
ways to have plenty of new roots, raised from one’s
own seed, to take the place of those devoured. I
have heard that planting castor oil beans will dis-

courage moles, but I have not tested it.

Foagloves

The foxglove, which once had the sweet name of
fairyglove, is one of the most dependable and dec-
orative of all biennials, and is always willing to
pretend a return to the wild state by blooming
happily in the most shady bits of the wood-garden.
Once buy a ten-cent package of mixed digitalis (as
the seed catalogues call them), and you are provided
for life with foxgloves, for they seed themselves,
scattering to all parts of the premises. ‘These self-
sown foxgloves generally make the largest and most
florescent plants.

The white variety is our favorite; at night it seems

like a miniature campanile hung with a hundred elfin

bells.
Delphinium
The delphinium is a prime favorite in English

gardens. It is larkspur elevated to a perennial and

ts Hoke @ Flower an Ea

more fashionable state. Purchased seed will not
succeed, for the delphiniwm seed seem to lose their
vitality unless planted a short time after maturing.
Therefore it is best to begin by purchasing roots of
the different shades at fifteen cents a root, then to
increase your stock it will be well to permit the per-
fection of seed in late July so you can plant them
early enough to have well established roots by
autumn. In succeeding years, however, by cutting
the flower stalks back after the first blooming period,
you may enjoy a second harvest of flowers. The
delphinium needs much richness of soil, which can be
made by digging into the ground the winter mulch-
ing of manure after the plants have begun to sprout

in early spring.

Hardy Phlox
The hardy phloxes are the very backbone of a

permanent garden. Purchasing roots of the pretti-

est shades, by saving your own seed and sowing at

once, you will have multiplied your stock in two

years to tremendous proportions. ‘The seed of the

hardy phlox, like that of the delphinium, will not

grow if not sown promptly, yet seed men persist in
38

Its Make. a Hover Creten

offering to the ever hopeful gardeners seed that is
years old.

After the plants have been established two years,
root division should begin. From that time on it is
necessary to be generous and begin giving plants
away to friends.

The salmon-pink phlox is beyond compare, and is
too beautiful to be mitigated by any combination un-
less it be with the pure white Miss Lingard. One of
the richest effects Pve seen was wrought by a long
hedgelike border of the red phloxes alone. We have
found that the hardy phloxes require moisture to do
their best, therefore we changed them frequently un-
til we discovered the most naturally moist, yet sun-

shiny portion of the garden.

Sweet Wiliam
For stability and a fine tone of time there is the
Sweet William, without which no garden seems a real
garden. Growing readily from seed they are prac-
tically immortal, for, although called biennials, such
is their habit of reseeding their own beds, if a
plant ever perishes there are so many children to take

its place, one never thinks of the departed mother.

Kets Hake a Power Gorden

It is well, however, to remove all the plants from the
bed about every five years, redigging deeply, refertil-
izing, then replanting, leaving about ten inches be-
tween the roots so the clumps may have plenty of
space to spread. Personally I love the single variety
best and the more multi-colored the effect the better
I like it, for some old-timey flowers are like patch
quilts — the more indiscriminate the mingling of color
the more consistently traditional they seem.

Canterbury Bells

I have never owned enough Canterbury bells, yet
I plant the seed every spring and always have hun-
dreds of big crowns to set out in the early fall.

They are the most witching plants, their bell-like
flowers of such loveliness I am always thankful they
did not add extreme perfume to their already perfect
sorcery.

The single ones seem far more beautiful than the
double or cup-and-saucer variety, but it is well to try
seed of every kind, then mark with tape the favorites
as they bloom, saving only the seed of the loveliest
for future association.

Coming in all delicate shades of lavender, blue,
pink and white, they add a delicacy and poetry to

4.0

Kets Makce @ Flower Garden
every bed in which their bells chime. As the plants
die after fulfilling their mission of beauty it is of
course necessary to keep a new supply on hand,
which becomes a simple matter once you have formed
the habit of seed gathering. Like all biennials they
do not bloom for a year from the time of seed plant-
ing, therefore they must be carried over the winter;
to do this successfully a covering of evergreens is

best, as manure mulching is apt to rot the crowns.

Hollyhocks

I could scarcely wait all these pages to rave over
the incomparable hollyhock, for there is nothing that
adds such dignity and picturesqueness to a garden as
these old, but ever improved, favorites. As sentinels to
guard entrances, as escorts down winding paths, they
have no rivals, and as impromptu stars they are often
our greatest teachers in unpremeditated composition.
Massing is a fine law and as a general rule is to be
observed, but it is wonderful how a Richard Strauss
of a hollyhock can spring up in some unlooked-for
spot, shattering all preconceived laws of harmony,
transforming all our theories of arrangement.

One hollyhock removed from its brethren and
standing tall and stately in a bed of other plants is
41

IQs Melce a Power Creodee

starred preéminently. There is no limit to their
tones, ranging through the whole palette from white
to black with the exception of blue, but the lavender
varieties approach even that color.

There are now offered hollyhock seed which bloom
the first season, and from these we have obtained
some of our rarest shades of salmon. Our annual
hollyhocks have also proven to be perennials, as they
flower even better the second and third season.

Unfortunately the hollyhock has of late years
been subject to a blight or scale, and although we
have had some success in keeping this in check by
use of a spray of permanganate of potash on the
underside of the leaves, yet on the whole I think it
is better to sacrifice the plant affected and try rais-
ing new ones from new seed.

One florist grows all his hollyhocks in Ohio, al-
though his nursery is in the Fast, as it has been
found that for some reason hollyhocks there grown
are free from the blight.

_Forget-me-not |
I often wonder how people find it so easy to do
without the forget-me-not, when I cannot conceive

of a spring without them. Planted on a bank wind-
AQ

EF Os os Fe aa

THE CANTERBURY BEI.LS ADD A DELICACY AND
POETRY TO EVERY BED IN WHICH THEY CHIME

ts Make 0: Hover Geren

ing along the uneven boundary of our celery marsh,
they make a sheet of blue in May. They are also
ideal plants for bordering shady beds, but they
thrive best in moist locations and scatter their seed

to the four winds.

Creeping Phiox
For early spring glory in the covering of bank
sides or bordering of beds, there is nothing better
than the creeping phlox subulata, or moss pink. It is
necessary to purchase a few clumps of the pink and
white, then by root division you may in two years
repeat them throughout the garden.

Perennial Alyssum
The perennial alyssum, saxatile compactum, is
also a very obliging flower for bank covering. It is
hardy and its small yellow flowers often bloom the

first season after seed planting.

Gaillardia
The gaillardia is so well known and so uni-
versally planted, it would probably resent any addi-
tional praise from me, especially as I, not particu-
larly admiring its peculiar tone of red, could only

give moderate praise.
43

Ios Moke a lower Garden
Red Sunflower

One of our most unique perennials we bought
under the name of “ hardy red sunflower,” but a
friend informs us it is the wild cone flower of Kansas.
Whatever it is, we consider it one of our treasures.
In color it is a pinkish red and has the single sun-
flower’s petals, with a high brown centre like a peaked
hat. The plant grows to four feet and the flowers
are about the size of the largest dwarf sunflowers.
Having very long stems, they are extremely beauti-

ful in a tall vase.

Feverfew

We can never have enough white flowers for
general harmonizers and creators of night beauty, so
we must be sure to include the old-fashioned white
feverfew which resembles the small button chrysan-

themum.

Hardy Coreopsis

For the Sahara parts of your garden — and in
every garden there are sure to be dry, desertlike
places — plant the hardy coreopsis. ‘There is no
flower so long-suffering, which will put up with such
poverty of soil and dearth of moisture, as this

ets Hake « Power Gorden

coreopsis, and there isn’t a lovelier flower, even
among the denizens of the field.

Speaking of moisture, it may be enlightening and
soothing to many to know that we never water our
flowers. Those which absolutely need moisture are
planted where nature has thoughtfully provided some ;
the others, from not being watered, throw their roots
down very deep and consequently learn to do with-
out artificial moisture. Watering undoubtedly in-
duces superficial root development and that is never
to be encouraged. ‘The fact that we lose so few
plants by freezing — and we live in a cold zone — I
attribute to the deep root our flowers have been
forced to make. Leave the watering to Providence
and both you and your plants will be better off.

Bamboo

The bamboos scarcely come under the title of
perennials, yet I want to mention them here and beg
you to try some if you do not live too far north; you
cannot imagine a more fascinating addition to a
garden. When wind-swept they kowtow with the
grace of court bows, and at night the crunching and
grinding of their poles against each other is weirdly
wonderful. The bambusa japonica—the “ me-

Pets Make a Mower Garden

take of gardens ” — grows to fifteen feet, and will
thrive in a drier locality than the other varieties. It
is perfectly hardy as far north as New York City,

if protected from the east wind.

Lily-of-the-Valley
There are some flowers which make me feel par-
ticularly queer and blissfully unreal, and the greatest _
of these is the lily-of-the-valley. It is so peculiarly
suggestive of fairies, while its odor wafts the senses
beyond the border land of memory.
The lhes spread rapidly and from a few pips to
start with, you may make every damp spot in your
garden quite heavenly with them in a couple of sea-

sons.

Hardy Chrysanthemums

With a small root capital of chrysanthemums in
a few years you can be a regular chrysanthemum
Creesus. They should be scattered in every portion
of the garden, for that means all pervading beauty
far into November.
The best time to separate the chrysanthemum is in
the spring. In the large varieties there are the white,
cream, red, wine red, yellow, orange and pink, besides

ets Make a lo®er ae Oe

the yellow and white daisy-like ones. With the
fringy larger ones and the exquisite little button va-
rieties of white, yellow, old gold and maroon, we
surely do not need to regret the impossibility of suc-
cessfully growing in our Northern gardens the large
show and Japanese varieties. When the branches
have grown to over a foot in height pinch out the
centre of each crown; these will then send out three
or four branches, giving many more flower tips in
the autumn. After the frost has blackened them,
cut down to the ground and mulch with old manure.

Plan so that no part of your garden is without
bloom for nine months in the year. This is easily
managed by taking a little forethought.

In one of our vaudeville beds, leading out to the
rose garden, the regular head-liners are snowdrops,
tulips, hyacinths, bluebells of Scotland, oriental
poppy dancers, then several midsummer performing
annuals — Shirley poppies, marigold and ten-weeks
stocks, followed by those autumn artists, the Japan-
ese anemones, cosmos and hardy chrysanthemums.
Take another spot; spring opens with scillas and
narcissi, continues with columbines, which are tagged
by foxgloves; then iris, Shasta daisies and larkspur

Ar]

eek Eek a Boer Conecen

continue until the hollyhocks’ great steeples of bloom
eclipse all that has gone before. Then lilies absorb
the admiration, until hardy phlox leads once more to
the inevitable chrysanthemum climax.

Near the house, huddled about a motherly lilac, is
another bed in which the crocuses, tucked all about,
first awaken in March; the jonquils then sing an
April solo, to the accompaniment of hardy primroses,
while the forget-me-nots lead up to the Sweet William,
followed by coreopsis and delphinium; asters, hardy
phlox and chrysanthemums bring the season to a close.

Perennials need particularly rich homes, and as
they are supposed to remain for some time in one
spot, the greatest chance for deep digging is before
they are planted.

A good way is to wait until you are very mad
about something, then it is remarkable with what
violence you can wield a garden tool and make the
dirt fly —it serves the double purpose of deep cul-
ture and relieving your own feelings.

I am accused of moving my entire garden each
fall, and I have to swallow the accusation, for there
is a perfect house-cleaning inaugurated each autumn
because of mentally recorded mistakes in arrange-
ment which I could not realize until the actual bloom-

IQs Make Q Mover Garden

ing season. It is only by means of constant shifting
and rearrangement that we can come nearer, or even
keep pace with, an ever-growing ideal of perfection.

As time goes on the perennials will gravitate to
their own inevitable niche- amid appropriate sur-
roundings, so don’t ask a professional landscape
gardener to solve your problems beforehand, for you
would thereby rob yourself of half the fun. A gar-
den planned for you by someone else would as little
fit your needs as a friend’s advice would solve our
own private life-riddles.

To produce by our own physical efforts all the
beauty to feed the soul, all the vegetables and fruit
to feed the body, would seem the natural ideal of life.
And to reach this ideal is happily possible even if
we do it merely as a byplay of our real life work.
The more exacting the profession, the more nerve
straining the daily occupation of the mind, the
greater is the respite and relaxation of the garden
— it above all else mends the ravelled threads of
nerves and keeps the mental balance true. Life is
so full of duties —the things we ought to do but
don’t like to —— and so full of imperfect professions,
which require us to do many unnatural things every
day, that gardening is the revolt, the reflex, the re-

; AQ

Inds Make ev MeGer \Crncdes

laxation. We can do in a garden the thing for
which all of us were intended, and that is create
beauty.

Above all we have a right to be frankly ourselves
in our own home surroundings, and the less the per-
sonal garden suggests the professional perfection, the
more does it hold of loving intimacy. Leave the
public parks to attain the “icily regular, splendidly
null.” T’ve seen many things in famous gardens
which I could admire tremendously as belonging to
someone else yet never covet for myself. There is
one garden I know that has all the paths made of
grass — grass so perfect a dandelion would not dare
creep in. The effect is beautiful and makes the walk-
ing very comfortable and soft to the feet, but I could
never have grass paths because I am the gardener,
and the perpetual use of the lawn mower required is
prohibitive.

Then, too, our garden is not at all a show place,
it is merely a happiness garden, and to keep it so
I must never introduce features which would shortly
transform it into a burden.

There are many parts of our wilderness which can
only claim accidental charm, for I have a foolish
habit of being grateful for any and every kind of

ey Make a Flower roeaen

flower, and if cornflowers, annual coreopsis, larkspur,
candytuft and Shirley poppies, foxgloves and holly-
hocks have taken their welcome for granted, I haven’t
the heart to weed them out. So it chances much
of my gardening is haphazard and entirely outside
of all law and order.

va
Re
a
ayy

ane
eis

Hic

lilies [ris & Deonies

ra ag

Mh Keon
aye, My
Pale wa

ACL a

Death
Ke

§ iris snies SSX

T needed much strategy for me to procure space

for my lilies, iris and peonies, for my garden
partner’s specialty is vegetables, and as he has a
lusty appetite it happens that he considers it most
important to retain the greater part of the back gar-
den — especially the richer parts—for his vege-
tables.

While he applauds and admires my efforts in the
flower domain, he does not care to lessen his spiritual
enjoyment of flowers by too great a corporeal labor,
or shattering intimacy. I never disputed in words
his natural right to the best parts of the back garden.

Always outwardly agree with a man —that is the
wisest thing I’ve thought so far in this book. —

I agreed and then racked my brain as to how I
could win by force of tact a certain tract of land

Ids Hale Q Flower Cen

abutting against the rear and sides of my rose garden
—a tract devoted to tomatoes and sweet potatoes,
both very pretty members of the vegetable family
and not in the least objectionable to my roses; but,
womanlike, I just coveted those two spaces. So IL
surreptitiously sent off for thirty roses and had them
shipped to him with my card. When they arrived
there was no place left im my own rose garden to
offer him, and after much indifference on my part as
to their fate, and many attempts on his to find rent
room in other crowded flower tenements, he finally
sighed: ‘I don’t see anything to do but remove
those sweet potatoes and place my rose garden on
your south side, then all the roses will be together.”

I demurred and raised a thousand objections to
spoiling so fine a potato patch, and in short so
dramatized my real sentiments he became quite
abusive of sweet potatoes and even peevishly insistent
on having his own rose garden where he pleased.

Having one victory to my credit, I planned a cam-
paign for my lilies the following season. |

It had always been his wily habit to present me
his tomato patch just when the weeds began to thrive,
generously permitting me the picking of his “ spoils
of labor,” as he picturesquely termed it. This sea-

frets eke @ Moter Crenden

son I callously refused his generosity, shamelessly
ignored the weed swamped condition, and always hap-
pened to be terribly busy elsewhere when the tiresome
picking of fruit took place.

After a tremendous tomato crop, which no one un-
assisted could handle properly, and a glutted market,
I was apparently amazed in the early autumn when
I was one day presented with the tomato patch to do
anything with I desired.

Now in my most fanciful reckoning I had not
hoped for such speedy reward of my virtues; be-
fore I knew it I had called the spot “ Kingdom
Come,” and so the land, to which the lilies, iris and
peonies were translated, has remained named from
that time.

Now that I’ve given sage advice as to one way
in which to obtain room for these aristocrats, I’ll beg
you to buy plenty of lilies, even if it bankrupts
you.

Auratums of every kind are marvelous, the red-
banded and golden striped auratum pictum, the
vittatum rubrum twelve inches across with a wide
crimson band through each petal, and the Witte
with gold streaked petals. One would think these
lilies would have a hard job to live up to their

ers Pleke o Rlower toceden

tongue-twisting names, but they even overdo it.
And their fragrance! It’s like I hope to smell in
Paradise.

There is the Brownii, a Japanese lily which is
much like the Bermuda lily of Easter fame only it
has an under side of petal which looks like a brown
suede glove. Other Nippon wonders are the Henryt
which has rare orange-colored blossoms (which is,
sad to say, $1.10 a bulb, but it’s worth it), and
the Leichtlini Red, an orange red with crimson
spots.

The speciosum Melpomene is particularly lovely,
but unlike the proud awratums it hangs its head most
demurely, and you have to lie on the ground to look
up into its face.

The dear old-fashioned candidum, the Madonna
or Annunciation lily, is one of my prime favorites.

The fine old tiger lily, with its honest freckled
face, must not be forgotten. It is known to the
growers as tigrinum simplex but it is the same reli-
able lily in spite of its alias.

By saving all those black peas which appear se
the flower stem above ground, and planting them in
a spot well marked so you won’t forget and dig them
up by mistake as I once did, you will after three

THE MOST DECORATIVE FORM IN

ALL THE FLOWER WORLD

ets Hobe Mover Garden

years have enough bulbs to start a nursery of tiger
lilies.

I dig and move my auratums every fall. Perhaps
it’s because I’m a nervous gardener, but I think it’s
really because I once heard that auratums had a
- habit of disappearing in the ground and I’m always
consumed with curiosity to see if mine have done it.
Thereby I discovered they have children (little girls
all named Lily, I suppose), along their stems under
ground. ‘These children I snatch as ruthlessly from
their mothers as if they were chickens, placing them
in the incubator ground about three inches deep. In
two years they grow up, so in addition to the old
mothers I have all the juvenile bulbs I want. It is
most important never to permit manure to come in
contact with the lily bulbs, so always place sand
above and below them in planting.

Our lilies which are fall planted do better and
bloom more freely than the spring planted ones. We
place a winter mulching of rather fresh manure on
the ground which is left undisturbed until after the
noses are well above ground in the spring, when it is
worked in only a few inches deep between the stems.
The winter freezing robs the manure of its burning
quality.

es Make @ FloSer Paces

Now for the Japanese iris; if you want to get
those which are named Gekla-no-Nami, Sofu-no-Koi,
Momijii-no-Taki, Ho-o-Jo, you may pay forty cents
apiece for them; but if you are content to get mixed
American grown roots, and shuffle the alphabet,
naming them yourself, say, “ frost-on-landscape,”

* petulant sea,” you

** moon-dancing-on-milky-way,
may obtain them for six dollars a hundred. We
have the latter variety, personally christened. The
only drawbacks to the Japanese irises are the misera-
ble little heart worms (which really belong in corn),
that insist on hiding in the sheaths of the buds,
gnawing internally. The only thing to do for them
is to watch and pray and murder. These irises will
not do their best unless planted in a moist situation.
Fortunately for me, “* Kingdom Come” has that
celestial quality.

I hear that in Japan they actually flush water
over the entire iris field just before flowering time,
treating them almost as they do rice, but of course
we can’t emulate this; and not even to obtain the
Japanese perfection would I go to the trouble of
watering.

The Spanish irises are much grown in England for
cut flowers. They are the most poetical of all.

oy Toke co Hotere Gorden

Weird tones of bronze, barbaric gold, black, yellow,
white and all shades of lavender and purple, give
them an almost limitless palette.

I hesitate to tell you their price for fear they will
decline in your estimation — unless you are like me;
I always think, when I get anything at a great bar-
gain, that I’ve accidentally found a treasure and that
the poor dear salesman is being cheated, which gives
an exquisite tinge of joy to the transaction. These
irises are to be had in mixture for ten cents a dozen,
thirty cents a hundred, two dollars and fifty cents a
thousand — a thousand — think of that!

They are small bulbs which should be planted
superficially — three or four inches deep. 'Tucked
between and around the other irises they make all
June lovely, then die down, effacing themselves until
the following fall when they spring up, prematurely
making ready for the next season.

The iris called ** German ”

is, strange to say, the
model of the French design of fleur-de-lis. Though
of very old lineage, many modern frills have been
added to the original white and purple “flags ” of
our grandfathers. I love them even more than the
aristocratic hypenated Japanese ones, because they
are not proud but will flourish all over the garden,

[Sts Make a FloSer Cymer

and they haven’t any “ varmints”; and above all,
they have the most decorative form in all the flower
world. |

I have often wondered why these irises are called
“ flags.”” In wondering aloud to a Frenchman the
other day I accidentally found why. It seems that
in Normandy the chaumiére or thatched cottage is
given a finish, a foot wide, of clay, extending the
entire length of roof peak. This is primarily for the
purpose of preventing leaks, but it serves, generally,
the more charming purpose of making a roof garden,
for along the entire length of this ridgepole of clay
sod, over the thatch, are planted these irises. From
the pinnacle of roof the flowers float in the breeze
like flags. |

During my girlhood, in the south, I remember that
many people pushed these flags out of their gardens,
forcing the poor things to take up their neglected
life on the edge of the dirt pavements in the dusty
atmosphere of the big road. As I came home from
school I would stop to gather a_ bunch lof
their frosted, ethereally-scented, peculiarly feminine
flowers, feeling a childish misgiving as to my taste
in secretly adoring these despised and so-called com-
mon things. Now that they may be had in lavender

heats Falce Ke) lower Keren

suffused with rose, yellow and maroon, white with
lavender edge, and all shades of yellow and purple,
they are prized and gloated over by gardeners. But
for celestial purity, the white ones have never been
surpassed.

These German irises increase so rapidly in root
they must be given plenty of space in which to multi-
ply. As they have a tendency toward pushing their
roots to the surface of the ground, it is well to cover
all exposed roots with extra soil. Divide every
fourth year.

Owning peonies makes one feel very opulent be-
cause the nurserymen charge so much for the roots
one can never really afford them; a true sense. of
wealth comes only through possessing things beyond
our incomes, such as automobiles, rare editions of
books and peonies. ‘Therefore, in view of their ex-
pensiveness, I should advise as a first step toward
peony possession, to make friends with somebody al-
ready owning a lot, then do her some great service,
such as saving her little dog’s life; and when the
owner is pouring forth gratitude and exclaiming,
* Oh! what can I ever do to show my appreciation? ”
cast an eye on her peony stock, and say, ** Those

clumps need separating dreadfully. Jl come over
p p g

Inds Make Q Flower Cows

to-morrow and help you do it, and perhaps you’ll
give me a few.”

I’ve never owned a peony of the tree variety, but
I’ve coveted all those which I’ve seen growing in other
people’s gardens and I hope some day some of these
good people will die and bequeath me one. They are
by far the most magnificent of the peony family and
grow to the size of shrubs.

When I get rich I’m going to own a Boule de Niege
peony at $1.50 a root, and an Eduard André at $3
per root, and a Festiva Maxima, and feel just as its
name sounds, for $2. But at present I only own
many unchristened clumps of mysterious single and
double ones, some of which I obtained for $6 a
dozen, others for $7.50, and I had to borrow from
my lord and master to own even these.

Peonies should always be planted in the fall. I
believe many people do not know that they may be
multiplied by very carefully bending down the new
shoots after they have grown to a fair height in
spring, covering the middle of shoot with earth and
confining it in place with pegs. ‘The earth covered
part will make a root of its own; the following fall
cut the child from the mother plant and reset else-

where.

lore Eleke. @ Power Craeden

A heavy mulching of manure should be given the
peonies in December, and this must not be disturbed
until spring when all the inebriate-looking noses are
far out of the ground; then draw the manure away
carefully and work into the ground between clumps.

About every five years separate the clumps, or
their roots will grow to look like Medusa’s hair, and
if not separated the blooming will lessen until, after
long neglect, it ceases entirely. The country method
of putting down four stakes encased in an old barrel
hoop is the best support for peonies, preventing the
heavy flower heads from becoming earth soiled.

RSo*s

Sa a BN

NANO vey
vy Na

Nea
Monae!

VER since I was a little girl I’ve hoped each
spring some nice old uncle from India would
send me fifty dollars accompanied by a gruesome
threat, such as: ‘‘ If you use one cent of this money
for anything but roses, the first night the east wind
blows, a blackbird will come along and nip off your
nose!” But as it hasn’t really happened yet, Ii.
have to pretend along the last part of April or first
of May that it is about to happen, and start to work
with pencil and greediness to select the fifty dollars’
worth. As the days go by, merging joyous make-
believe into saddening reality, my list is lopped, rose
by rose, until some desperate night I finally make a
neat list of the can’t-possibly-be-lived-without roses
(numbering perhaps only fifteen) and meekly send it
off to the rosarian.
Tt is so hard to advise another just what roses to

Lets Make w Hlo@er Coerden

get, because my list of irresistible ones grows each
year; and then the rose growers have been so gener-
ous in sending me unlabelled gift roses. It so hap-
pens now some of my loveliest roses’? real names
are unknown to me; they’ve had to attain names as
best they might. For instance, that delicate pinky-
white climber with the great loose clusters, having
the odor of frankincense and myrrh, is known to us
as the “ horse-bitten rose,” but to you that name
would not be enlightening.

And the men who label the roses — surely the per-
fume goes to their heads, for how often they mix the
labels!) ‘There was that Viscountess Folkestone I
ordered for the sake of “ Elizabeth of the German
~Garden.”” When it bloomed the flowers were of the
most tantalizing shades of orange, shell pink, gold
and flame —in short, compressed sunsets.

Prizing her so highly I of course smothered her to
death with winter flannels and in my anxiety un-
dressed her first of all in the spring. She did look
rather haggard, still I hoped to love her back to
health, but by May she was a wizened mummy. I
immediately ordered another Viscountess Folkestone
in memory of the deceased. The new one grew,
thrived, and bloomed — bloomed a well-bred, insipid

[ets Heke @ Flower eden

pink and white, showing not one trace of relationship
with the dazzling dead dowager. Of course we all
have reminiscent reasons for wanting certain roses,
and, if you are like me, you'll keep on trying
Marechal Niel and Fortune’s Yellow, even though
geography prohibits, and zero browbeats you.

One of my rose prides is the Cherokee which I
have teased through three winters now, because of
the great wild hedges I remember along the highways
in the south. Each winter I lighten its protection,
as I have a theory that if you can persuade a delicate
rose to survive several northern winters it grows
hardier, following out nature’s old law of adaptation
to circumstance.

Suppose we pretend together that the old uncle
from India has stingily sent us only $9.25 instead of
the expected $50 to spend on roses, and make the
best of it. Out of that amount we'll have to get
hybrid perpetuals, hybrid teas, plain teas, and climb-
ers — and feel thankful all at the same time.

The hybrid perpetuals, you know, are the per-
fectly hardy, stand-any-old-sort-of-thing roses, and
are supposed to only bloom in June, though mine
bloom spasmodically all through the following
months, because after each flowering I cut the branch

[ets Make @Q Flower Crerden

that has flowered almost back to the original stalk;
then it puts out new shoots which generally blos-
som. |

The hybrid teas are teas which have a hybrid per-
petual ancestor on one side, and will stand through
a northern winter, with protection. They are per-
petual joys, blooming constantly until November.
We'll have to blow ourselves to the hybrid teas even
if it means economizing on the hybrid perpetuals.
The tea roses —if you live in the north—are the
ones you'll keep on trying for sentimental reasons,
association, or sheer bravado, because they are not
hardy here. But they are the most florescent and
are very beautiful, so we'll have to indulge in a few
for luxury; and by getting two-year-old plants we
shall be generously rewarded this season anyway.
The climbers we shall purchase will be of the rambler
and wichuraiana varicties.

Now that we know all about the kinds we shall
have, here goes for the choosing.

If we could have only one hybrid perpetual, I’d
beg for Gloire Lyonnaise. Its blossoms are sumptu-
ously beautiful in form, and of a golden-white shade.
The foliage is very distinguished and is unpopular
with insects.

[dss Make Q FloWer CAGE es

Soliel d’Or is the most spectacular rose

au
mingling of peach, marigold and flame. Given great
richness of fare, the bush will grow to prodigious
size.

A splendid velvety, reddish-black rose is the Prince
Camille de Rohan.

With Mrs. John Laing — that exquisite pink —
we shall have a white, a pink, a red and a yellow.
And hurrah! we haven’t a Jacqueminot — which is a
good enough rose, but so ubiquitous it reminds me
of a rebuke my old negro mammy gave me on a visit
up north, when I directed her gaze skyward one
night. ‘*Go ’long, chile; I kin see dat ole moon at

home any time I wants to,”

she grumbled.

If you know roses at all, and I said, “‘ Guess which
hybrid tea I’ll mention first,” I wager you'd say,
** Killarney.”

Well, you’re right. It’s the Irish queen I’d be
pining for first of all. In bud it is perfection; when
open, it “*spreads and spreads till its heart lies
bare.” Even each fallen petal is a poem — a deep,
pink shallop with prow of gold.

Bessie Brown is so dignified, pallid and austere
that she is known as Elizabeth in my garden.

The Kaiserin Augusta Victoria has a Teutonic

Kets Moke a Mover Crarden

hardiness, and carries her cream-white flower head
high and regally.

Souvenir de President Carnot has a feminine blush,
but a masculine lustiness of vigor.

Wellesley gives us a delicious shade of pink.
Here we have two pinks, and we haven’t any red at
all; how could I have forgotten that giant J. B.
Clark, when he has grown to nine feet in height try-
ing to woo my Dorothy Perkins? He is the reddest,
healthiest, tallest man-rose in my garden.

For yellow we will choose the Maman Cochet of
that color.

Now that we have reached the plain tea roses, I’m
glad to begin with one that has proved almost as
hardy with me as a hybrid tea — that is the Coquette
de Lyon, which is a lemon yellow and _ positively
wears itself out blooming.

The Souvenir de Malmaison is, strictly speaking,
a Bourbon, but we'll let it be a tea for our purposes.
Shall we try it? It is so lovely with its shell pink
tones; with especial care we may: be able to winter
tt.

Of course we can’t possibly do without that fragile
creature, the Duchess de Brabant. Such silky tex-

rc:

“THE HORSE-BITTEN ROSE ”’

Ids Hake Q loSer Cacden

ture and delicate pinkness of cheek has she, I some-
times find myself kissing her before [I think.

* Citron red with amber and fawn shading,” says
the rose catalogue of Souvenir de Victor Hugo —
nobody could resist that. It is all that is sung of it
and more, for they did not mention its fragrance.

Isabelle Sprunt is another yellow lady of great
florescence. Strange, it is so much easier to get yel-
lows in the teas, and yellow seems to go with frail-
ness of constitution. But I’ve chosen only the teas
which have proven hardiest with me, and those I can
brag of having wintered a few times.

For pure recklessness, let’s buy the Golden Gate,
simply because we can’t resist its adorable blending
of pale gold and rose.

Another extravagance will be the Sunset, which
we will be satisfied to entertain this one summer for
its topaz and ruby beauty.

Here we are to climbers, and I find Lynch’s hybrid
first at the tip of my pen. Wherever you live, you
may one day see a strange rose branch looking over
your fence, and I'll just tell you now, so you will
know, it will be my Lynch’s hybrid. Not content
with spreading in every direction, over all neighbor-

Weds Flake @Q lower a es

ing roses, I’m sure it will soon ignore garden bounds
and become a wandering minstrel. I permit: its
branches to grow six or ten feet, then drape them
over to adjacent arches and neighboring rose poles.
This has happened so often now that when the
Lynch’s hybrid blooms, there are ropes and ropes
of roses swinging in every direction from the original
trellis, and like the lady’s elbow in the “ Mikado ”—
“people come ‘miles to. see it.” Tt is) \ofmene
wichuratana family and blooms only in June, but it
blooms all of June. Its clusters are composed of
many perfect, fairylike roses of pink, paling to
white.

Of the wichuraianas my next favorite is the Ever-
green Gem. Its blossoms are not in clusters, but
each rose comes in an edition-de-luxe. Of a pale
yellow with apricot tones, the color of the flower is
enough to recommend it, but shut your eyes and
whiff its perfume and [ll wager you'll say: “ Ripe
apple.” The Evergreen Gem prefers to sprawl on
the ground, and delights in covering stone terraces,
though it can be trained up, just as a monkey can
be taught manshines,— but what’s the use?

Manda’s ‘Triumph (white) and Lady Gay
(cherry pink) we must have. Of course I can’t re-

Rs Make a Flower Gorden

sist ending with Dorothy Perkins, but to praise its
well-known charms would use up needless type. I'll
only say, save all the cuttings of the first Dorothy
you plant, so you will have at least a thousand to
comfort you, when you’ve grown old.

Now we'll count up our list and put the roses down
sensibly in line, so we may see both what we have

and what we have spent.

HYBRID PERPETUALS

Gloire Lyonnaisé,, larger size......-..4.....- $ .20
Bevel) Or, bwoO-year-Old cc im. o.. oie es eas .60
Prince Camille de Rohan, larger size......... .20
Mrs. John Tame, larger size.)s ii... 2 2/2. 4 20

HYBRID TEAS

iSdlarney, Vareer ‘size... 5 se a eM IA 30
Bessie ‘Brown, larger size 7/2/66 bsj0ies= Hie oss = a.
Kaiserin Augusta Victoria, larger size........ 20
Souvenir de President Carnot, larger size..... 20
Riretlestey, \deurmer Sizes 7 iy areca te. Ashe tel ape clans 30
probe lerlc, ear erer SIZE feo cr aye AL ono) Ua daisp so eae 2 40
Yellow Maman Cochet, larger size........... 25

[ets Make a Hover Craden

TEAS

Coquette: de Iiyon, two-year-old... 0). ..!. ot

Souvenir de Malmaison (Bourbon) two-year-old

Duchess de Brabant, two-year-old...........
Souvenir de Victor Hugo, two-year-old......
Isabelle Sprunt, two-year-old. . (2). 0. 22) ae

Golden Gate, Be Na Termin cogtek hau ee alr one ee

Sunset, SME GRRE ME ay calye ieal SBiese 9h

CLIMBERS

Lynch’s Hybrid (Wichuraiana) two-year-old. .
Evergreen Gem, i ? Foc

Manda’s Triumph ~” ‘i app eaale eae
Lady Gay (Rambler) two-year-old..........

Dorothy Perkins (Rambler) two-year-old....

$7.50

So after all we haven’t used up all the $9.25; you

may either change “ larger size” to “* two-year-old ”

or you may spend the surplus on that dream-shat-

terer I see advertised on the back of the last year’s

rose catalogues.

The discovery of the North Pole was the most

eee Hale Mla ter Crarden

awful blow ever dealt the human imagination; it
left poor disillusionized mortals but one realm to
dream about —** The Blue-Rose Country.”

And now, alas! and alas! they’ve robbed us even
of that. With the accompaniment of brass band
and fireworks the rosarians announced the greatest
achievement of the centuries, the materialization of
the long sought blue rose. And that it should have
happened so soon after the polar calamity and the
advent of the sky prowlers — Oh! it is too much to
bear with fortitude.

As I said, you may spend that surplus on the blue
rose if you feel so disposed, but I— no; far be it
from me to erase a time-honored phrase from litera-
ture, and destroy that haleyon land where my fancy
may stray when jaded by the banality of man’s dis-
coveries. ,

But to go back to the subject of our expenditures ;
just think, an ordinary bunch of roses you’d buy at
the florist’s to send your sweetheart (if you’re a
man), or your sweetheart would send you (if you’re
a woman) might cost more than all our old miserly
uncle has sent us — and the bouquet from the florist’s
would be withered and thrown out in a week, while

here we’re starting a rose garden for the grandchil-

(ols Fabs a Ploter (den

dren of that sweetheart to enjoy years and years from
now.

And when we begin our rose garden we'll begin it
right —no superficial digging, and sticking in any
old way, of these precious plants. No; we'll lay
our garden out first with a ball of twine tied to a
stick, either informally or improvising as we go, in
some private, original design which expresses us, not
our neighbor.

Then we will have it all dug as deep as we, by
strategy and beguilement, can lure some man to dig
and yet live after. When it is all dug, then mark
out the individual holes, leaving generous space be-
tween the hybrid perpetuals because they grow to
be such big fellows, and don’t forget to give Mr. J.
B. Clark plenty of courting room.

The hybrid teas need less space, generally speak-
ing, while the teas may be planted about a foot
apart.

Save a climber to cover the arch (designed by
yourself, not a store bought one) at the entrance to
your rose garden, and trail the others over your
paths in spots, where one will perhaps have to stoop
a little when passing under blossoming branches, to
find new beauty on the other side.

ets Malce Q Mloter Carlen

Each hole must be twenty inches deep; take out
all the old every-day soil, and put a little coal
ashes in the bottom for drainage. If you have a
compost pile, mix compost and well rotted cow
manure, filling half the hole with the mixture.
Sprinkle this with the plain soil, then place the sacred
bush in the hole, spreading the roots in the direction
they naturally take. Cover the roots with more bed
soil, then press gently, gently, until the plant is
firm; now pour in water from which the chill has
been taken, until the hole is almost full, letting it
soak in gradually ; then put compost and cow manure
until it is higher than surrounding ground. Plant
your feet firmly but not disrespectfully on the sur-
face of the hole, packing it down around the rose
bush, which you meantime hold in upright position.

As a finality draw the bed soil up loosely about
the stem of the rose, leaving the surface quite dry so
the sun may have no chance to bake or broil.

If you’ve done properly all this simple yet seem-
ingly complex business, you need never water your
rose again!

When the bushes are in the blooming stage, trim
back severely all branches which have flowered, al-
ways trimming so as to leave an eye on the outside

Inds Moke mo HloWer Ceara:

of the branch. Don’t be afraid of cutting too much.
The courageous rose surgeon is the one who gets the
largest fees in flowers.

If you have done enough trimming along through
the summer blooming months, there will be no neces-
sity for any trimming in the fall, except to cut out
dead branches. ‘Then, too, when you think of the
cold that’s coming, and the struggle the poor things
will have to go through during the winter, to trim
them at this perilous time would be as mean as to
strike a man when he’s down. In mid-April prune
all blackened ends and weak branches.

Some of your hybrid teas may look absolutely
dead, but don’t hold funeral services over them yet.
Trim these apparently defunct bushes down to within
two inches of the ground, and shortly you will be
rejoiced to see red nosed sprouts peeping through
the ground — shoots from the rose-roots which gen-
erally survive.

If you don’t own a compost pile do begin one to-
day. Even a weed becomes valuable when pulled up
and thrown on the compost pile. Contribute all
dead blossoms, weedings, trimmings, garden rubbish,
Jeaves, manure rakings, and even some garbage and
dish water, if you can persuade the kitchen queen

[dss Hake @Q loGer aeden

to donate these valuables to your pile. Place the
compost far enough from the house, so you won’t
bother about the sanitary problem, and every few
weeks spade a few shovelfuls of earth over the whole
pile. After a year’s mellowing you will have some-
thing more valuable than manure to work into your
rose beds. )

Dig continually about the roses, with pronged
spade, being careful not to tear the roots. The soil
should always be kept loose if you would be spared
the bugbear of watering. Mulch with lawn clip-
pings, spading old supply under when the fresh is
ready. Spray once a week with a water made foamy
by tobacco and sulphur soap. You will not van-
quish the insects — no, not in this world, but even
abating them is a human triumph.

About the middle of November purchase rye straw
in bundles and after tying your rose bushes gently
to a firm stake, sheathe the straw about the hybrid
teas and plain teas, not too tightly, tying in about
three places. The hybrid perpetuals may go nude
all winter. ‘Take a trip to the West Indies or Sicily
about the middle of March so you may avoid the un-
conquerable temptation to uncover your roses too
soon. Return about the second week of April, dis-

le *s Make a lower Cracden

robe your plants and — live happily ever after all
summer.

You will realize, of course, that raising roses is
not eating ice cream and cake. Believe me, the rose
grower cannot be either a fool man or a lazy lady.

It’s so hard to write plain, practical facts about
roses. ‘l’o write of them properly one would irresist-
ibly commit a sonnet. When you pick your first
great basketful some very dewy morning next June,
please place them in an old blue bowl, for my sake
(and the sake of our Indian uncle, whom we had al-
most forgotten).

Cher POose@)

7 h

Tt a ne
NAAT PACHA ye" yy
Ararat lh

eet

OSES more than any other flower excuse the

formal garden; in fact by their stateliness and
pride, they seem to demand an exclusive spot laid
out in beds of beautiful line.

A rose garden enclosed by a hedge really seems
the ideal, yet a hedge is such a hungry thing it gen-
erally eats all the richness of the neighboring soil,
and roses need all the undivided food there is to be
had.

If you desire a hedge, though, you can have the
most beautiful, appropriate and impenetrable one
made of rugosa roses—the Sir Thomas Lipton
(white), Rosa Rugosa (red) and New Century
(pink). )

These planted a foot apart will by their vigor-
ous growth in two years make a hedge which neither
small boy nor animal can penetrate. ‘They are per-

Fey Make a Clever Cola

fectly hardy, needing no winter protection; their
single blossoms are rarely beautiful and their red
pips look very gay in winter.

For the design of the rose garden it always seems
safe to begin with a centre circle, then one can hardly
go wrong; paths leading from the circle at right and
left angles suggest themselves readily, cutting the re-
maining spaces into attractive slices of earth pie,
both narrow and fat. —

At the top of my rose garden, facing east, I
placed the red bed on the right, the white one on the
left; at the bottom of the garden, the yellow bed on
the right, the pink on the left. The centre circular
bed is not planted with roses at all, but filled with
tulips, hyacinths, narcissi, and crocuses to divert the
eye in spring while the roses are getting their June
trousseaus ready. Later on this bed is filled with an
all-summer bloom by gay little Phlox Drummondi,
bordered by the blue dwarf ageratwm.

The rose garden extension belonging to the garden
partner has now grown to greater dimensions than
my original rose kingdom —a proof of the wiles of
woman.

This annex consists of two long outer beds the
length of the entire rose domain, with two shorter

Ids Make eed Crheven

inner beds flanked by short crosswise beds at each
end. Thus our rose garden has a very hybrid com-
position which really looks much prettier on ground
than it does on paper.

The chief advantage of the plan is not so much in
its unique landscape gardening as in the many chances
it gives for arches at the meeting of paths; at each of
these places we have climbing roses which make an
almost continuous canopy over the head when one
strolls around.

There are places for thirty-six climbers and these
quite hide the design of the kingdom except when
we stand on the tree-covered hill to the east of the -
garden. ‘These trees give a partial shade which pro-
tects the roses from the sun’s greatest heat, while
they are still far enough removed so their roots can-
not rob the garden of its strength.

For the white climbers there are the White Rambler
and White Star; for the pink, Lynch’s hybrid,
Dorothy Perkins, Baltimore Belle (an old-fashioned
rose), Lady Gay and Débutante.

There are fortunately several beautiful yellow
climbers including Keystone, Evergreen Gem (which
will climb if forced to) and Aglaia (the yellow
rambler). The red is supplied by the Empress of

Kets Clalce ns [elon © neta

China (generally known as the Apple-blossom rose),
and red Memorial Queen and Hiawatha (a beautiful
single crimson with pure white eye).

To have a blooming success with climbers neces-
sitates careful pruning, which means first owning a
pair of thorn-proof gloves, the sharpest of pruning
shears, and a stepladder.

Immediately after the blooming season of such
climbers as Dorothy Perkins, White Rambler, etc.,
which only have their one great yearly fling, it is
important to cut away all the old wood on which this
wealth of bloom has occurred; this is no small job
and requires much callousness of heart, for it often
means taking away over half the vine.

We are, however, soon repaid by the prodigious
new growth which immediately shoots up from the
roots, more than taking the place of all removed.
It is on these new branches that next season’s blos-
soms will appear. We save all we can from the trim-
mings for cuttings.

From one thriving Dorothy Perkins you may in
two years get enough sons to have a standing army of
Perkins guarding your entire dynasty.

As to the best mode of treating cuttings I am go-
ing to quote from my mother’s old garden book,

Ids Mele Q Hower GRIN Sa

“The Southern Florist,’ published way back in
1860.

“The cuttings should be from four to six inches
long according to the thickness of stem. Cut with
a very sharp knife below the lower bud (or eye),
commencing on the side opposite that bud, and slant-
ing downward. In choosing a situation for the cut-
ting plantation select the north side of house or
fence. Make the soil, as far as the cuttings reach,
of pure sand, the cleaner the better. Thrust a
garden trowel down slanting, in order that the cut-
ting may lean toward the south; insert the cutting so
that the bud next to the top bud will be just under
the surface of soil, turning the upper bud to the
north.

* Holding the cutting with left hand, thrust in the
trowel on the north of cutting, and prize it while in
the ground against the cutting; this will pack the
sand tightly against cutting. Withdrawing the
trowel, fill in gap with ordinary earth.

* Plant the row of cuttings from east to west,
six inches apart. Scatter charcoal dust around
them, then cover with short straw being careful to
leave the ends of cuttings uncovered. Water every
_ evening after sundown until the cuttings show signs

lees Pele a ee lee

of growth. After they begin to send out shoots, se-
lect the one of most vigorous growth cutting off all
other shoots as they appear. Transplant when one
year old.”

There is another way in which you may also greatly
multiply your roses; take one of the new long shocts
of either climber or bush rose, and bend down care-
fully ; at mid-length the branch, scrape away about
an inch of the green bark on the under side of branch;
bury this under three inches of soil, then place a
stone on top to hold the branch firmly under ground.
This will leave about a foot or more of branch be-
yond the stone. ‘The scraped portion will send down
roots of its own, and as the branch still draws its
nourishment from the parent bush, it does not have
to depend on its own tender roots for sustenance.

When the new roots are firmly established, cut
with sharp knife immediately beyond them on the
mother end of branch, and you then have a new vine
of even larger size and greater vigor than two-year-
old purchased roses.

So many people have said to me, “* We would like
to have rose gardens but we don’t know what kind of
roses to order, nor which ones to choose from the
thousands offered in catalogues.”

[ots Hoke Q loWer Carden

As in the case of all the rest of this book, I am
not writing for the professional who knows much
more than I, but for other garden lovers and strug-
gling amateurs like myself whom I hope to help a
little by what I have found out by my own personal
association with the flowers. The names of roses
which I give are those which I have grown success-
fully and found beautiful.

The hybrid perpetuals are hardy in any reason-
able latitude and need no protection whatever.

The hybrid teas which I shall mention we have
managed to save through our severe winters by straw
covering, sheath-gown style, permitting the air to
circulate about the limbs.

Of the hybrid teas, there are Betty (a relative of
the Killarney), which is copper and rose; Joseph
Hill, salmon gold and pink; the scarlet Richmond,
so popular as a cut flower; Peggy, a yellow with red-
dish blush; Queen Beatrice, a wonderful pink, and
a rose for the control of which one rosarian paid
thirty thousand dollars; Dean Hole, a salmon shaded
with carmine; Virginia R. Coxe, one of the best
crimsons; an entire set of the Cochet roses; Etoile
| de France, crimson; Franz Deegan, a rich orange;
La France, which of course everyone knows; the

ets Make a Hower Gorden

White La France (Augustine Guinoisseau ) ; Madame
Abel Chateney, a carmine which is unusually hardy ;
Madame Jules Grolez, cherry red.

The hybrid perpetuals are: Baroness Rothschilds,
pink; Anne de Diesbach, carmine; Captain Christy,
pink; Glory of the Exposition of Brussels, blackish
red; Jean Liabaud, another deep red; Giant of Bat-
tles, a light crimson of peculiarly old timey fra-
grance; Mrs. R. G. Sharman Crawford, a_ gold-
medalled pink; Margaret Dickson, a white of loveliest
form; the reliable old white Madame Plantier; the
well-known pink Paul Neyron; Ulrich Brunner, red
(of great beauty of bud); and last of all Gloire
Lyonnaise, the most beautiful rose in our garden.

Our one garden extravagance is ordering new two-
year-old teas each spring to take the place of winter-
killed ones, for the tea is not hardy north of New
York.

The most beautiful ones we have tried so far are:
Enfant de Lyon, rosy cream with copper tints;
Devoniensis, cream with pinkish centre (a great fa-
vorite in the south); Souvenir de Pierre Notting,
apricot blended with rose; Helen Good, pale yellow
and rose; Marie Lambert, cream white; Marie van
Houtte, cream tinged with lemon; Papa Gontier,

eds Mele @ PloWer Gorden

crimson; Safrano, yellow, with shadings of orange
and fawn; Sunrise, which has all the tones of its
name; the Bride, one of the purest white roses;
Bridesmaid, dark pink; Duchess de Brabant, which
I have lauded in the preceding chapter; and For-
tune’s Yellow, sulphur which shows copper tints as
the days grow chilly in fall.

Almost all rose catalogues warn one against pur-
chasing the monster dormant roses offered for $1.25
a dozen by many department stores, as they declare
them to be worn-out roses which have been forced by
florists for cut flowers and then thrown out by them
when superannuated. The catalogues also further
declare these cheap roses to be budded on Holland
stock, the budded part of which will in a short time
die, while only suckers from the original stock will
be left on your hands. In justice to those rose phi-
lanthropists, the department store keepers, I feel it
is only fair I should refute the catalogue scandal.
The majority of the large dormant bushes offered
are hybrid perpetuals and these roses are seldom, if
ever, used by florists for cut flowers — teas and hy-
brid teas furnish the roses handled by them.

With three dozen department store roses I started
my original stock of hybrid perpetuals and they have

ets Hales Motor ese

positively proven the largest, healthiest, most re-
lable roses in my garden.

They were purchased and planted in early spring
and bloomed heavily the first summer. In the four
years since their planting only one bush has shown
signs of suckering, and after amputating those
shoots a few times they grew discouraged and ceased
to appear.

It is very important to soak these dormant roses in
a tub of water for a few days, as they are apt to be
a bit dry from long continuance out of ground.
Then trim with sharp knife all bruised, wilted, or
torn portions of roots, and all darkened ends of
branches.

For quick results I most gleefully recommend them
to all beginners who wish their rose garden to look
fully grown the first season, and to be filled with
bloom all June. The only thing I can say against
them is that they do not always turn out to be what
their labels declare; but so long as they are beautiful
IT don’t mind. When a dozen women, all having
rose hysteria at once, begin to claw and dispute over
clumps of roses in a department store’s damp cellar,
it would be a miracle indeed if the poor roses could
hang on to their own names.

96:

Inds Male @ oer eden

At present we have altogether over three hundred
roses of all. kinds, but we are by no means satisfied ;
once started on the downward path of rose idolatry
there is no limit to one’s excesses. I keep on inviting
to my garden new roses to which T’ve never been
formally. introduced, thereby making new friends
each season.

I suppose you have noticed that in all these pages
I have not mentioned the Crimson Rambler. I hope
you hate it as I do. It is the most diseased, bug-
infested, shabby, mildewed, common rose in the world.
Our one Crimson Rambler has been sent to our “ penal
colony.”

It’s a good scheme to have a penal colony in the
garden; take some miserable spot — not the Sahara
desert, but first cousin to it, and there deport flowers
which misbehave, cause scandals, are hopelessly dis-
eased, or persist in dressing in magenta. It’s a soul
satisfying way of committing euthanasia. I’m such
a floral coward I can’t kill a flower outright, but if
I put it in the penal colony and it dies — well, I’m
not to blame, and the flower is probably happier. At
present we have banished to this spot a very snarly
rose brought me by a neighbor, some disorderly
rockets, magenta hardy phlox, orange day lilies, a

IQs Fle = Moser Carles

hideous green rose some mistaken rosarian sent me
(I suppose as a curiosity), and our abhorred Crim-
son Rambler.

Bulls.

CURIOUS quality of flowers is that whichever

one you are talking about, planting, or holding

in your hand, that flower for the time being seems
the sweetest in the world.

When I was writing of roses at such happy length
I thought, “ Surely this is the loveliest of all sub-
jects,” yet here I am thinking the same of bulbs,
and I haven’t the decency to even feel disloyal or
fickle.

When we plant the bulbs in autumn we are a bit
gorged with the fanfare of annuals and perennials,
and it’s such an utter change to turn the thoughts
to crocuses and hyacinths.

Then later on, in March, when the mind is thaw-
ing after winter chill, we are so flower hungry and

101

os abe a lower Garden

impatient we feel we can never wait for the days
to grow warm enough to remove our roses’ winter
flannels — then all of a sudden one day we stumble
on the white cup of a crocus, and straightway we
forget the roses and our impatience, and spend each
day hunting for another and another crocus, until
all of a sudden the whole lawn is dappled with
lavender, white and gold.

Then still a little later, our hearts are chiming in
tune to the hyacinth bells, we sip mental nectar from
the tulip chalice, and whiff the fragrance of the nar-
cissus, and fall in love with life all over again.

For the overture preceding the real opera of spring
we must engage thousands of crocus musicians, and
in order to be ahead of other garden impresarios we
should get our order in before July 1st, for these and
all other bulbs.

We can afford many crocuses for in mixed colors
they are to be had for three dollars and fifty cents a
thousand. (I always like to think in thousands, es-
pecially where flowers are concerned.) To insure
having lots of early spring sunshine scattered over
the lawn we should have a generous supply of the
giant yellow ones.

As soon as they arrive in the fall we will shave

102

(ets Fake a Power Gorden

the lawn so we may start with a clear field, then
taking an apronful of crocuses stand in the centre of
the lawn and make believe we are merry-go-rounds,
spinning about in circles, tossing the bulbs as we
whirl. This distributes them in a more impromptu,
artistic and natural manner than we could ever delib-
erately plan.

The grass being clipped close it is easy to see the
small bulbs; then it is only a matter of sharpening
a stick with which to punch the holes. Starting at
one end of the lawn go back and forth on all fours,
making a jab in the grass three inches deep with
stick, then push the crocuses in just where they have
fallen. But do be sure to notice first which is the
head and which the tail of the crocus, for it would
be horrible to make them stand on their heads all
winter.

If you have a few dozen left over, use them to
border a bed of tulips or hyacinths, then save out
a few, say fourteen, and walk into the garden, shut
your eyes and stick them in any old place, just for a
private surprise next spring.

I am a great believer in getting mixed things, be-
cause one can always get them cheaper, and besides,
one thereby chances to get many beautiful varieties

103

Ids Male a: Ao@er <reeden

one would otherwise miss; therefore I always get
mixed hyacinths, which are to be had for three dollars
a hundred (single) and four dollars a hundred (dou-
ble). For some especially fine place, say the cen-
tre circular bed of the rose garden, please get a
dozen single light blue Lord Byron, which have the
most gigantic spikes of flowers. Next in beauty is
the salmon pink Cavaignac.

For spirituelle beauty there are the precious little
Roman hyacinths. Other remarkably beautiful kinds
are the Buff Beauty; La Plaie d’Or, a pale yellow;
Daylight, an orange; Maria Cornelia, the earliest
light pink; Hein Roozen, a very large white; La Vic-
toire, the most brilliant red, and Sir Henry Barclay,
which is so dark it might almost be called the black
hyacinth.

These in addition to the many colors to be found
in the cheaper mixed ones will give a wonderful col-
lection. After the third year dig and separate the
bulbs, then make the bulb beds exceedingly rich with
fully decayed manure. }

Have plenty of sand ready for the replanting, for
in the case of all bulbs it is most necessary to incase
them in sand, both for drainage and to prevent the
manure rotting them by accidental contact.

104

Inds Hale @ Ploer Caden

Replant the larger bulbs in the beds made ready
in the garden proper, then take all the wee children
to an especial nursery prepared for them in the vege-
table garden; by the following season they will be
sufficiently grown to be permitted to make their dé-
but, when they should bloom, even though modestly.

The most exciting of all tulips is the Gesneriana
spathulata — not because of its spectacular name,
but because of its history and its transcendent
beauty. This is the tulip which turned the Holland-
ers quite mad — for all those phlegmatic eaters of
three hundred and sixty-five cold, hard-boiled eggs a
year, sold or mortgaged all their terrestrial posses-
sions to gamble in the Gesneriana stock.

One bulb sometimes brought —I forget just what,
but it went way up into the thousand dollars some-
where ; and Gesneriana was even quoted regularly on
the London stock exchange, as if it were a gold mine,
or transcontinental railroad.

When the corner in Gesneriana broke, thousands of

Dutchmen ‘

‘went broke ” too, and as great a panic
spread through the land as if the dikes had all
broken. No wonder the spathulata holds its head
so high with such a history as this. It stands on a
stem twenty-four inches high, and is of the clearest

105

ets Make a ote Carlen

scarlet, with a glittering eye of peacock blue. To
look at it in the midday sun makes the head reel.
From thousands of dollars for a single bulb, in the
heyday of their infancy, they have become so reason-
able anyone may have them to-day for the meek sum
of one dollar and seventy-five cents a hundred.
And yet they speak of the good old days! There
are also other Gesnerianas, including a yellow, and a
white edged with pink.

For the “dead queer” tulips, take the Bizarres,
which look as if they were Easter eggs colored by a
freakish child who dribbed the color on instead of
dipping the egg in the dye. Of these the prettiest are
the Violettes, which are marbled purple and white.

The Parrot tulips are equally strange, if not more
queer than the Bizarres. ‘They are most appropri-
ately named, for their color is plagiarized from the
parrot’s own feathers. Not content with possessing
such weird, birdlike tints, these tulips grow just as
queerly as they can, flinging their blossoms at every
grotesque angle, never standing upright like any
other sensible tulip. But although they are as lack-
ing in mentality as the parrot itself, they are yet
among the most desirous of all their family, and

106

AND THE

LIPS
Cre

TALL SINGLE TU

ARROTS

ECCENTRI

[ets Hake @ FloSer Clin

their fantastic beauty may be added to the garden |
for a very modest sum.

The double tulips of long ago were despised, and
perhaps rightly so, but such improvements have been
made in them, that now many quite rival the peony
in beauty and size.

The Boule de Neige is the largest double white;
other fine types are Brimstone Beauty, a rosy yellow;
the Tournesol, a wonderful yellow; Raphael, largest
pink; and Vuurbaak, vermilion; these are all early
blooming.

Of the late double ones, blooming in May, the best
we've tried are Yellow Rose, gold colored; La Belle
Alliance, a feathery white and blue; and Blue Flag,
purplish-blue.

If you are a greedy lover of tulips, you will prob-
ably want a hundred of the extra fine single ones,
which can make you feel like a multi-millionaire at an
outlay of only one dollar. It is well to order an
equal quantity of both late and early kinds to extend
the tulip festival even into early June.

The tulips form their progeny under the old bulb,
and if these children are not removed every third
year the old bulb becomes so weakened the bloom will

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Kets Make @ Flower olen

often cease. The small bulbs should be treated just
hike the hyacinth juniors.

It is best to make all bulb beds higher in the mid-
dle, so the water is easily shed and does not stand
to freeze too much in winter. We mulch with ma-
nure in December, then cover with litter such as
the lopped-off stalks of chrysanthemums and the
other perennials.

Of all the narcissus family my favorite is the
Poet’s, with its pheasant eye.

One pleasant thing about the narcissi is that they
do not positively need redigging so often as other
bulbs, yet to obtain greatest florescence I remove those
in beds every five years. If they are naturalized on
the banks of lawn or stream, they should of course
remain undisturbed. The imperative thing, as in the
case of all other bulbs, is not to cut them down before
the foliage is quite yellow which denotes the full ma-
turity of the bulb.

The Paper White narcissus, so popular as a cut
flower, is not considered hardy for outdoor culture in
cold climates, yet I have succeeded in growing them
in the garden by covering very deep with manure,
then putting evergreens over that and placing boards
tight together over the boughs. The boards are not

108

etss Make a Flower codon

removed until April, and the evergreens not until I
find the noses are above ground.

As you’ve probably often heard, it is not the freez-
ing which kills things but the thawing, so all winter
covering and mulching is for the purpose of protec-
tion from the sun, not the snow and ice.

Other beautiful narcissi are the double Poet’s,
alba plena odorata; orange Phoenix, double white and
orange; Barri Maurice Vilmorin, cream white with
red cup; and Burbidgii Falstaff, white with lemon
yellow cup.

The Emperor daffodil, Von Sion and Welsh daffo-
dil (the Incomparabilis Sir Watkins) are the best we
have grown. Of the smaller bulbs, Chionodowxa gi-
gantea and Scilla campanulata caerulea furnish us
with light and dark tones of blue. The Scilla Si-
birica (sky-blue) blooms at the same time as that
lovely forerunner of the spring, the snowdrop.

Some hoar March morning we will be awakened
by the wee groping chirp of a robin threading the
darkness; though the thermometer may have regis-
tered only twenty degrees above zero the day before,
all material proofs of winter are forgotten. It had
not occurred to us the day before to search for a
flower in the hostile out-of-doors, but to-day, with

109

eds Blake 0” Flo@er (neces

a note of gold still sounding in the ear and heart,
we dance over the snow, stoop, and confidently brush
it aside, expecting not a miracle — only the fulfil-
ment of the robin’s prophecy. Sure enough, there
before us, awakening from its bed of white, is the
still drowsy head of the snowdrop — small bell-like
head, whose tinkle is only to be heard by the fairies
and the friends of the fairies.

110

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CAN never be thankful enough that nature be-

gan the trees of our Wilderness garden annex

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so many years before we ourselves were planned.
Here we found, ready-made, great pines, large and
small hemlocks, Italian-like cedars, birches draped
with wild grapevine, poplars, sumach and _bitter-
sweet. Under these were treasures of columbine,
hepatica, violets and bloodroot. It seems almost a
necessity to have a natural stage setting of matured
and half-grown trees for a garden, for perfunctory
beds of casual flowers do not constitute a garden.
Then, too, the arrangement, composition of Nature,
is almost infallible — Whistler to the contrary.
Study a bit of wild brushwood or sequestered forest,
then go home in chastened spirit to try to humbly
follow out the natural. Notice how the goldenrod
and purple aster intermingle. Could anything be
better art?
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Kets Moke a Flo®er Garden

In the middle break in our Wilderness — the Inter-
mezzo, so to speak — we have made a great irregular
mass of dozens of goldenrod, dozens of wild purple
asters, sneeze-weeds, black-eyed Susans and ferns,
with a border of hepatica for early spring praise.
It is our greatest gardening achievement. Purple
and gold, gold and purple—even the words are
magical.

With the blue-green pines before and behind, the
blue sky overhead, and the green grass and pine-
needled ground leading up to the purple and gold,
it is sheer poetry.

Then take the bank near it, sloping from pine,
birch and poplars down to the country road, what
more appropriate flower for this spot than the dande-
lion? Pick a dandelion reverently, study it care-
fully — was there ever greater perfection of form,
more embodied sunlight? In its ghost stage it
reaches the spiritual.

Walk through a shadow-dim forest and arrive sud-
denly upon a clump of blooming rhododendron, it
takes the breath away with its unpremeditated won-
der. That is the element we need to achieve through-
out all our garden, the unexpected. A dear old lady
trailed after me through our Wilderness and after

114

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she had breathed ** Oh!” innumerable times over sud-
denly revealed beauty, she said, “ Your garden is
the Garden of Surprise.” If you have a clump of
evergreens, let the path wind sinuously through,
bringing you out suddenly on, say, a clump of shim-
mering white mountain laurel, and I assure you it
will make you gasp with delight.

A very little girl once visited our garden and
afterward begged her mother to take her back to
“the place of the many little paths.”

We haven’t a broad walk in the Wilderness, be-
cause to begin with we only had trails, half-hidden
paths where we had to push through tangles to find
some beautiful spot; so the paths remain as irregular
and winding as if we were cows. Then, too, I don’t
want strangers to know how to get about my garden
alone. The stranger’s feet step on things. I pre-
fer to lead, and have the path so narrow visitors
are prohibited from walking abreast, having no
choice but to humbly follow the gardener.

Paths mean intimacy, not publicity. The path is
a trail in which to wander, leading the imagination
eropingly with promise of mystery. And a garden
must have material for mystery. We felt this so
convincingly we refused to discover all our Wil-

115

Kets Make 0 over Garden

derness the first year of possession. There is a
rocky promontory near the ravine, crowned by a great
hemlock, secreted by wild’ grapevines and wild roses,
and dotted over by hundreds of cedars; this do-
main we selected to be our “‘ forbidden land.’”? We
were placed on our honor not to put foot on it for
a year, and I assure you its mysteries grew ever
greater until I came to believe it to be the strong-
hold of trolls and other magical creatures. When
the year passed, the habit of not intruding had
grown upon us to such a degree we no longer cared
to trespass but preferred to leave its secrets to the
trolls, rabbits and birds.

We can well afford to spare this bit of nature for
the imagination to dwell on unsated by exploration,
for there are many other equally wild portions of
the garden in which we may feel as unfettered as
Pan himself. There is the birchwood tangle where
we never work disturbingly with garden tool, but only
go to sit quietly on the ground in the shadows, to
attend the song services of our birds.

We guard as heirlooms the precious bits of wild
beauty which were our legacy from nature.

Every ramble in the neighboring woods adds more
treasures to our horde. By always carrying a trowel

116

Inds ma Klower Crorlen

and basket we are prepared to invite any beauti-
ful thing we see to make its home with us. Thus
we have carpeted with wild violets all the damp, sun-
less ground on the north side of the house where
grass would not grow. I know of a beautiful place
in the south where the many large trees in front of
the house made it impossible to have a lawn; wild
violets solved the problem there. They were planted
so as to cover the entire ground right up to the tree
roots; even when not blooming the violets make a
rich, dark, velvety surface, which never needs mow-
ing.

The fall is the ideal time to remove wild things,
and it is then that the garden itself demands less,
the days are cooler and the world so full of color
one feels a greater inclination to take long tramps;
the fields are aflame with goldenrod, the roadsides
glowing with sumach, each fence and old post trans-
figured by the crimson creepers, and deep in the
forest shadows shines the beacon light of the dog-
wood.

Poring over catalogues and the ordering of seed is
indeed an exciting and alluring phase of gardening,
but it seems prosaic indeed compared to the delight-
ful circumstances under which we become the pos-

ee 4 eke’ a Moteur Crecden

sessors of wild flowers. Money alone never seems
to make a thing ours. ‘The clothes we buy do not
wholly become ours until we have worn them often
and they have assumed the wrinkles indicative of our
habits of work and rest.

The plants and seed we purchase do not seem ours
until we have made them so by our loving service
and care. I do not love flowers in the abstract; I
love only those flowers which I have guarded and
brought to fulfilment. Roses displayed in a shop
window seldom interest me beyond a passing glance,
for they are not my roses — I have contributed noth-
ing to their life.

It is particularly because we do not exchange coin
for the wild flowers that they hold such a peculiar
significance. It is as though Nature held them out
in her arms, a gift to all who seek her lovingly.

So when I pass near my wild things there is ever
a reminiscence connected with them, such as the day
we tramped miles through a great hemlock forest, un-
devastated by axe or fire, following along an erratic
little brook until it opened out into a pool where
muskrats made their home, guarded by gnarled old
willows. Here, spread over a sweet, wide meadow,
were thousands of wild irises making the ground as

118

ety Flake a: Hotter Gorden

richly beautiful as a queen’s royal robe; and here,
too, we found our buttercups.

Another tramp up the precipitous sides of a fire-
scorched mountain side, brought us to the secluded
home of the arbutus, and a sight of “the fox’s
den O!”

Every quest of bloodroot and Solomon’s seal means
an adventure — the glimpse of shy hunted creatures,
the happy comradeship of squirrels, the song of the
Bobwhite.

If you have ever been in the country near Wash-
ington you know the beauty of the Judas trees col-
oring all the landscape on the wooded banks of the
Potomac with their purplish-pink boughs. An
April jaunt to the Potomac’s shores procured several
of these trees for our garden, and they have proven
quite hardy in the more northern clime.

Some of our beautiful mountain laurels (the na-
tive kalmia) were brought home by us from the Berk-
shire Hills and I never pass them without reliving
a day when we were invited to take a “little walk”
by a friend who had a vague memory of a trout
stream where he had delightedly fished out of season
in youth’s lawless days.

We started immediately after breakfast with per- ,

bats

(ets Make a” MoRer Gorden

fect faith in his memory. Soon we were far from
any human trail, battling through impenetrable
brush, going knee-deep in the trunks of fallen trees
which looked intact until stepped upon, rolling on
hidden loose stones, down mountain sides jagged
with ice snapped limbs. On we plodded for hoary
hours and not one of the party threw that brook
up to our friend — no, we were too busy just keep-
ing alive. About the time I wanly thought, “ Per-
haps the sun is setting on civilization,” then won-
dered if perchance we had really walked through the
night and maybe it was to-morrow, I caught the one
good leg I had left in a vine and rolled several miles,
mostly head down; suddenly I came to and felt some-
thing damp — lo and behold! I had Ponce de Leon-ed
the long lost trout brook of our friend’s guilty
youth!

The rest of the party arrived by various acrobatic
feats, and then we really began to work; the hours
before were mere teething rings compared to the
hours which followed. It ceased to be walking — it
was hopping and leaping when we weren’t being
hauled out of the stream.

But to tell the truth that trout brook was all our
friend had said, and more. It is worth your start-
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Keds Fake a pice Carden

ing off to-day to find — find as we did by walking
toward nowhere, ignoring the compass and trusting
in fate.

It was the wildest trout brook that ever flowed
from a man’s memory ; it dashed, swirled, laughed and
sobbed through a mountain whose echoes had hitherto
answered only the voices of wildest creatures. Across
the stream, felled by some Titanic storm of fifty
or more years before, were giant tree trunks. On
all sides every trace of ground was hidden by a tan-
gle of millions of mountain laurel. And in the twi-
light shadows under great stones flashed the
speckled trout. In the far forest cracked a bough,
and the unknown voice of some animal came to us
on the wind. On, on, on we followed the brook, and
when the light was dying and we were too, there
suddenly loomed the ruins of an old mill; by its si-
lent gray wheel stood two boys with the eyes of
startled fauns. They gave one frightened look and
disappeared in the brush, but we followed with a rush
and came out upon a little clearmg where stood an
unpainted cabin whose walls were almost covered with
the drying skins of wild animals. A sad-eyed woman
sat on the rude porch, three frightened children cling-
ing to her. If we had been bears she would probably

: 121

IR 5 Moke @Q Aa Gas

have felt no surprise, but she had long given up ex-
pecting human beings.

At last she broke her silence and gave us directions
for our return, leading us through a cornfield which
the deer had trampled down the night before, to an
old abandoned road, by following which we finally
reached our own farmhouse, pumpkin pie and bed.

If I had not held on to my laurel all day perhaps
I wouldn’t have fallen into the stream so often, but
the falls are past and the kalmia will make me happy —
every spring of my life.

The few closed gentians which now live on the
banks of our marsh were brought home from Con-
necticut after a wonderful visit to another friend
with whom we followed another brook, a quiet, Puri-
tanical, gentle brook which meandered through pen-
sive New England hills, on whose banks one could
walk at ease and meditatively, sitting down to rest
in the embrace of a watery arm on a lawnlike bank.
And we sat down frequently, for the friend chanced
to be a great author who had chosen this idyllic way
of reading to us the manuscript of a just finished
book.

A chapter read aloud, then a mile of brook; an-
other chapter, then baked beans served on autumn

122

Ids Heke Q Flower Crerden

leaves ; another chapter, then more brook, until just as
the sun was setting and we turned our faces homeward
to read the last chapters before the great fireplace
of the “ House of Low Ceilings,” I espied the clump
of closed gentians and made them mine, mine along
with the memories of a book heard under circum-
stances which made it seem the greatest pastoral
ever written. And as I dug the gentians the author
remembered an old legend which told of their bloom-
ing on a certain ancient hill where there was enacted
the greatest of all human tragedies, when men put
to death the gentlest of all men. The flowers gazed
with sadness on that Crucifixion, then closed their
eyes forever more.

So beyond all other flowers of the garden, the wild
ones are those most haloed by associations — asso-
ciations which can even make a Lord Bishop of a
mere “ Jack-in-the-pulpit.”

123

ie ne eVin es

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HE spring flowering shrubs such as lilacs, sy-
ringas, deutzias and spireas should be trimmed
immediately after their blooming period.

Prune the lilac branches where the flower heads
have been, back to main limb, and take out all
branches which rub each other. All shrubs do bet-
ter if not permitted to bush too thickly, so trim out
congested parts that sun may permeate and the air
circulate freely. eh are

We always leave the lilac root suckers alone in
the spring, permitting them to develop during the
summer; then in fall they are removed by pulling
up violently (not digging); the torn ends of root
are then trimmed, and we thus have many new lilacs
to transplant to all parts of the garden.

One can never have too many lilacs; somehow they
create a home feeling more than does any other shrub.

127

Ids Make Q FloWer Craton

Didn’t you envy the German Elizabeth her mile
long lilac hedge? What a wondrous sight it must
be in spring!

In trimming spireas, take out all the old wood
which has held bloom; the new growth will then
spring up with tremendous rapidity and many more
flowers next season will be your reward.

The herbaceous blue spirea is very pretty, grow-
ing to about two feet in height. It is quite hardy if
given a winter mulch. (This spirea of course needs
no trimming, as it dies down to the ground each
fall.)

I clip the white deutzia (gracilis) with the hedge
shears, as it is too great a job to trim the millions
of dried flower heads individually. Each summer a
fourth of the old wood is cut away.

The pink deutzia, to be at its best, needs to have
every bit of its old wood removed after its midsummer
blooming.

There is a beautiful treelike shrub much grown
in the middle south which will also thrive even
where there is a moderate amount of snow and frost;
in South Carolina it is called Crépe Myrtle, in the
island of Saba, Queen of the Garden, in Bermuda,

128

Ids Make @ Flower olen

Queen of the Shrubs. I have never seen it listed in
catalogues under any recognizable title, and I am ig-
norant of its botanical name.

In July it is a mass of crépe flowers of the tone
of the heart of a watermelon, and has a mellow per-
fume. ‘There are also other varieties having ugly
shades of magenta flowers, as well as a few rare ones
of exquisite white. In the autumn its leaves turn
orange and carmine.

For the new home, where you desire the quick ef-
fect of shrubs while waiting for the real shrubs of
slower growth to develop, there is the herbaceous
hibiscus. The loveliest variety has pale pink blos-
soms with lemon yellow centres, the flowers being as
large as a tea-plate.

Altheas make wonderful hedges, though slow of
growth and needing much early trimming to produce
thickness about the roots. Growing singly, if
pruned to one trunk they will attain great height.
In an old country garden near me there is a pink
althea reaching the second story window. The
Jeanne d’Arc is a very fine new strain bearing dou-
ble flowers of perfect whiteness.

Nothing is more beautiful than the hardy azaleas.

129

ets Male a Flower Qa

Of course in the north we must be satisfied with
more or less miniature bushes, for we cannot have
the variety which grows to tree height in the south,
The most wonderful flower spectacle in our whole
country is the azaleas in full bloom in “ Magnolia
Gardens,” near Charleston, exceeding even the cherry
blossom festival in Japan. Here miles of avenues
bordered with very old and gigantic azaleas of every
hue, make a gorgeousness of color bewildering to the
senses.

In the north we may grow several varieties out-
doors by covering with straw in winter, as for rose
protection. ‘These are the native arborescens; the
Ghent, growing to eighteen inches; mollis, a rather
dwarf species, and Vaseyi. ‘They are to be had in
white, orange, rosy purple, shrimp pink, cerise, light
pink and salmon.

All gardens should include the old-fashioned
* sweet shrub,” called ‘* calycanthus ” by the nursery-
men, apparently to confuse us. The bush bearing
snuff-brown flowers is the best known, but there is
another rarer, much lovelier kind called the banana
shrub, which has blossoms of a pale cream yellow
and of a sweetness beyond description. Gathered
and placed in a thin muslin bag and put among one’s

130

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Kets Make Q Flower Coen

handkerchiefs, they will retain their sweetness for
weeks.

The Cydonia Japonica or Japan quince, known
familiarly as burning bush, is a most brilliant ac-
quisition to any garden. ‘There is another variety
bearing white blossoms tinged with pink which are
almost identical with apple blossoms in form and
color.

Golden bells (Forsythia) should always be given
a trellis support, for it is such a feminine plant it
needs a strong arm to sustain its willowy branches.
It is sometimes made to pretend it is a vine, but grown
in this way it is seldom satisfactory, as it must be
constantly tied, having no tendrils to clasp with, and
it is apt to look thin and gawky.

The Scotch broom has all the hardiness of its na-
tive bleak hills and is as gorgeous as the tender
genista, so much sold in the florist shops. Genista
is one of the few golden flowered shrubs, and is val-
uable for that alone.

The dwarf Chinese plum having double red flow-
ers is well worth growing, as are also the dwarf peach,
crab apple and cherry. |

For sweetness we must have syringa, or mock
orange.’

131

IRs Malce a Flo®er Coordea

All weigelas are splendid shrubs, especially the
Conquete, which has unusually large, deep, rose flow-
ers; and also the white candida.

For evergreen shrubs we may get the Daphne
Cneorum, a very dwarf trailing plant with pretty
pink flowers ; Leucothde Catesbaei, a shrub with bell-
shaped white blossoms; the American holly; Andro-
meda Japonica, an evergreen from Japan, and
Berberis stenophylla, which has leaves suggesting the
holly. (Don’t you wish they had named _ plants
plain, sensible names, such as Sally, Bill and Bea-
trice?)

I have left my very heart’s love to the last — the
rhododendron. ‘There is no shrub which can ap-
proach it in beauty, either when blooming or bare,
for its leaves, radiating starlike from branches, are
of a richness and glossiness which would make it
worth growing even if it never flowered. And the
blossoms — their beauty is overpowering! Deepest
purple, lavender, reddish-purple, white — it would be
hard to say which is loveliest. |

It is best to get them by the dozen, for to begin
with one would never satisfy anybody, and they are
much cheaper in quantity, ranging in price from
five to ten dollars a dozen. For large estates they

132

[Sts Rates xk le terCrerden

can be obtained by carload at a still smaller figure
per thousand. ‘The rhododendron cannot stand the
sun, therefore it may be planted in the spot so often
difficult to fill— the north side of the house. Wher-
ever located take the precaution to protect it in win-
ter by making a wigwam of evergreens or straw
about the separate clumps.

For true splendor rhododendrons should be grown
in great masses, and on protected hillsides one can
reproduce in miniature the marvelous effect of the
North Carolina mountains when covered with blooms
of the Rhododendron Catawbiense.

There is nothing which adds such poetry and cozi-
ness to a garden as vines. What is home without a
honeysuckle!

There is no easier way in literature to make the
residing place of the heroine instantly fascinating,
intimate and cosy than to drape the porch with
honeysuckle. The immortal “ vine-clad cottage ”
which plays so great a part in every girl’s romantic
dreams, has, nine cases out of ten, the honeysuckle to
do the cladding.

This vine grows so readily and is so multifarious
it is taken entirely too much for granted. I have

133

[sods Make @ Hover Crorden

never become accustomed to its fragrance; each sum-
mer it revives within me the positive thrill of sur-
prise. There is no sweeter vine to grow near the
house, especially where it may embower a window,
sending its perfume through all the room.

Next to the honeysuckle the vine richest in senti-
ment is the wistaria. I hope sometime to have a
heroine worthy of a home draped before with wis-
taria and behind with honeysuckle; then her literary
popularity would be insured, especially if I add a
York and Lancaster rose to peep in her latticed case-
ment betimes o’ the morning.

We have been blarneyed by the catalogued descrip-
tions of the multijuga wistaria’s racemes of flowers
three feet long, into purchasing one root, and it is a
fine healthy-looking vine, but as it has not yet bloomed
I cannot swear to its marvels. The frutescens va-
riety has the additional charm of blooming at inter-
vals all summer long.

The Clematis paniculata is the loveliest of its fam-
ily, and is amenable to all sorts of uses. In one gar-
den I know, there is a long bamboo arbor spanning
a walk fifty feet long; this in summer is completely
covered with the paniculata, making a unique effect
of pleached alley.

134

[ds Make a Flower Ceacden

Another pretty mode of using it is to take one
centre pole and at about the height of nine feet, nail
spokes running out from main pole in wheel shape.
When the clematis blooms it makes a perfect giant
umbrella of white, an ideal spot under which to place
a seat.

The akebia is not as generally grown as it would
be if people really knew its beauty and the fragrance
‘of its odd, chocolate brown, rubberlike flowers. The
leaf is rarely beautiful, being an enlarged edition of
the clover form.

Bignonia grandiflora is the largest of the trumpet
flowers, having a salmon bloom of great magnificence.
It will, if given time, cover anything from an hum-
ble cot to a cathedral.

For the first summer in a new home, gourd vines
will help out wonderfully. The flower is really ex-
quisite, the leaf form artistic, and the gourds will
provide one with lots of “ bird bungalettes ” to hang
through the garden the following spring, to rent for
a song to bluebirds and wrens.

135

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The Motbed & Tronsplanting,

Oe personal idiosyncrasies are irresistibly
carried into gardening, therefore directions
given by others serve only as a basis or theme for
one’s own variations. My hotbed is probably unlike
any other in looks, and yours — even if you are good
enough to read about mine and try to follow my
example — will probably be just as distinctive.

I always love a dress more if it is the reincarna-
tion of some one or two defunct gowns. The rem-
nant counter is a response to a fundamental need in
human nature, feminine human nature — the desire
to make something useful out of odds and ends. So
with my inherent love of remnants of course my hot-
bed was made of odds and ends of old planks saved
from the wreckage of a chicken house, and in shape
and size the bed had to conform to the erratic ma-
terial. The planks were nice thick ones, two-inch

139

[Pee Pek a ower Crden

lumber, and there were enough planks to make a bed
twelve by eight feet; this proved to be all the space
we could possibly have used.

The inside pit was dug four feet deep and all! the
excavated soil was thrown to one side in a pile.
When the side plank walls were finally made solid to
the four corner posts, they were given a generous
coat of tar to prevent rotting under the soil which
would eventually cover them. While this tar was
soaking in, we had the earth dug away four feet in
depth on the outside of the walls, and after the outer
planks had been given another coating of tar we
then brought many barrow loads of pine needles and
dumped them in the outside trench, trampling the
needles down as firmly as possible. ‘This was to pre-
vent the frost forming close to the outer walls of the
hotbed. After the needles had settled, the pile of
excavated soil was banked over them and up to the
very top of the hotbed, the sides of which extended,
two feet at the top and one foot at the bottom, above
the original surface of earth. The clay subsoil
made this bank almost as hard and impervious to
rain washing as if it had been cement.

The bed must be built with a slope to the south,
with a drop of about a foot, so the glass may shed

140

IRs Make @ Flower ended

the rain and the sun rays reach the seed better. The
sliding glass frames are a great nuisance and when
drawn from the bed they are a positive magnet to
the human foot, and a lure to losing one’s equilib-
rium. Our four sashes lift on hinges. <A centre
board running from north to south divides the bed
and on each side of this division are two sashes. The
upper ones lift to the north and are hooked to the
side of the toolhouse. The lower sashes lift from
the east and west, are hooked back to back to a pole
rising from the centre dividing board of original
framework. This leaves the approach to the bed
free to the foot when the sashes are raised, so there
is no way in which the glass can possibly be broken,
unless, of course, one should be unexpectedly seized
with an epileptic fit. _

The hotbed proper cost nothing but the mental
and physical labor involved in making a patch work
quilt of the old lumber, so the glass frames were the
only expense. This glass is not puttied lke ordinary
glass windows; the panes are fitted to lap over each
other — why, I can’t imagine, unless the frost loosens
putty.

It is best to make your hotbed in the fall even
though you are not to use it until the following

141

Keds Fake Q Flower Cecton

spring, just as an opera must have an overture, and
one should fall in love before getting married. If
it is made in the fall then you can be forearmed by
saving several barrels of fully rotted compost mixed
with one-fourth sand; these barrels must be kept in
a toolhouse or cellar out of the reach of freezing.
If you’ve ever tried the heart-breaking method of
thawing frozen earth in the hotbed with manure,
and found in the end that you had only mud in whieh
to plant your seed, you'll then appreciate the wis-
dom of the fall saving of soil.

In the early spring have two feet of steaming
manure placed in the bottom of the bed, and let it
steam for several days; then empty the barrels of
compost and sand on top of manure, shut the sashes
and ‘let her bile.” It will steam tremendously for
four or five days, then it gets down to regular busi-
ness of more or less even heat.

There are nice thermometers to be had to take
the bed’s temperature, and find out when its fever
has dropped below 90 degrees; then you know it’s
time to go ahead and plant. But as no one ever
gave me one of these thermometers I have to keep
sticking my finger down in the soil, and when it feels
about blood heat I plant; that is generally on or

142

Keds Palas <a) oer Carden

about the tenth day after the manure and soil are
put in.

It is really unnecessary for the amateur gardener
to sow the hotbed sooner than six weeks before the
end of frost time, for if it is sown earlier, the plants
grow so spindling before they can be set out that
they are really weakened in constitution and ruined
in figure. I sow every flower seed (perennial as well
as annual) I have room for, as I like to get ahead
of the calendar as much as possible. I’m allowed
only one-half of the bed for my flowers; the rest
goes for sensible things like tomatoes, peppers,
cauliflowers, cabbage and lettuce.

On cold nights I throw an old piece of sailcloth
over the frames for additional protection. A mar-
ket gardener I know has made very fine comfortables
for his seedbed out of old crocus sacks stuffed four
inches thick with excelsior. His beds, however, need
more protection than mine, for he must start his
vegetable seed betimes in February or March.

On warm, sunny days give the little plants an
air bath; even on any kind of day it is well to put
a small stone under one of the sashes for an hour’s
ventilation. After the days become quite gentle in
late April it is still a wise precaution to put the

143

PRES Malce a Flower Car nee

glass down and say good night to the baby plants at
about 4 p. mM.

When the soil seems drying, sprinkle with luke-
warm water, using the finest nozzle on watering pot;
keep soil loosened about seedlings, and weed every
day. (I know that sounds like brutal advice, for only
natural born acrobats can, with comfort, perform
weeding in a hotbed. )

In the late autumn when we dig the celery we
leave a lot of soil on the roots and replant, thick
as sardines, in the hotbed. The plants never wilt
and if they know they have been moved they don’t
let on. The rest of the celery is put out in the
garden in a deep grave, covered with boards and
soil. ‘The celery in the hotbed keeps us supplied up
to the end of December, when we spade all the old
soil and manure out of the bed and pile it to one
side, leaving the hotbed clean and ready for early
spring operations. The sashes are merely hooked
to toolhouse and centre stake, and there they remain
perfectly safe all winter — much safer than if we
ran the chance of breaking them by removal to in-
terior of toolhouse.

The pile of last year’s discarded richness is per-
fect to use for roses or any other flowers, so each

144

Ids Make a oGer clon

spring the manure and compost remnants of last
year’s hotbed may be made over into glowing blos-
som-garments of lavender, pink, blue and gold.

Transplanting

I have bragged once before in print about my
success in transplanting, but hoping you were lucky
enough not to have read it, Pll say it all over: I
have yet to lose a plant because of transplanting!

The majority of gardeners set out plants immedi-
ately after a rain when the ground is quite wet.
This is probably a nice habit for lazy people who
don’t want to lug the watering pot ‘around. Dur-
ing a lazy spell I tried it myself, and had hard work
to save my plants. Many authorities advise ‘* trans-
planting just before a rain.” Unfortunately I have
never personally known any wizards who could pre-
dict with a certainty when it is going to rain. Even
the weather bureau’s guessing is seldom corroborated
by showers on time. So this fine advice has been
useless to me.

I always transplant on dry days after the sun
has gone down. When the hole is dug the full depth
of the plant’s root length, I place the plant in hole,
fill hole half full of water, throwing in dirt to make a

145

rs Mabe a Mower Gorden

soft mud about the roots, then the upper half of
hole is filled with perfectly dry soil. The plant does
not wilt at all, and that is owing to the fact that ©
there is no moisture on the surface of ground for
the sun to bake or steam. There is no interruption
in the growth as the moisture about the roots evap-
orates so slowly. This first watering is the only one
the plant ever gets.

When transplanting shrubs or trees it is well to
tie a little piece of tape on the southern side of the
plant before removing it, then when replanting, place
it in the same relation it formerly had to the sun.
If you forget the tape you can generally tell the
relation it held with the compass by its leaves —
the leaf face is turned to the south, the back to the
north. After proceeding as I’ve already told, when
the hole is entirely filled about the tree or shrub,
raise a circular ridge about the stem, forming a
basin to catch the first rain which falls.

If ants proceed to build their “ castles in Spain”
about the trunk of a transplanted tree, try mixing
Paris green with sugar and sprinkle it mercilessly
about their turrets. There is a time to be kind and
a time to kill. I’m not a murderer by nature and
I’m generally tender-hearted toward all humble

146

D THEREBY

ANT OUR SHIRLEY POPPIES AN

E TRANSPL

AVE THEM JUST WHERE WE WANT THEM

ts Hake a Plo®er Gorden

things as long as they behave humbly. I once
almost bought a two-dollar book on ‘‘ The Wonder-
ful Ants,” but I’ve suffered so much at their hands
and I’ve had such ample opportunity to study their
wonders, and I’ve been so licked to a standstill by
them, that I could now write a $4.98 book myself on
“ Ants’? Strategy in Warfare.”

147

“The “Tran a) Eden

one ay
Saat
HEC

Na | ti

Le ay a Eden

UPPOSE you are by nature a home-making
genius but by some strange whimsy of fate you
are exiled for a time in a breakfast-food-box, made-
for-discomfort house, or doing spiritual penance in
a furnished home of somebody else’s, or staying for
the season in a country place; suppose any antithesis
of a permanent abiding place; why not add one
touch of reality by a small garden of flowers?
Don’t be like two migratory birds I once knew,
possessed by a perpetual spirit of unrest; seeking
ever the perfect condition in a delightfully imperfect
world, they shuffled from one desolate place to an-
other. They ‘ weren’t going to stay there long,”
what was the use of making any improvements? So
these two malcontents existed in one Sahara after
another, seeing no beauty, making no beauty, leay-
ing no legacy of beauty behind.
ey ae

Ids Make a PloWer Crpten

They once read a nature book by mistake, and in
an obsession of temporary enthusiasm purchased a
farm. ‘They planted one field of corn, and the man
was so discouraged because unhoed weeds won the
battle in the survival of the stronger that he never
planted another rod. |

He fretted hour after hour over weeds; weeds
choked his very thoughts. One day in desperation
he exclaimed: “Id give half of all I own to any-
body who’d tell me how to get rid of weeds.”

‘I know the solution,” I replied, modestly making
a bid for half his kingdom. ‘ Asphalt your whole
blame farm.”

But to return to-our transient garden; because of
its very nature we must perforce select seed which
will develop quickly and give almost gratuitous re-
turns for casual trouble. Then, too, I presume we
shall have but a small piece of ground, so we must
concentrate as much as possible.

Naturally the choice of flowers must be made from
annuals. Our first desire in a transient home is for

“¢ sunshine bed”? where it

cheer, so we'll plan our
can be seen from the dining or living room windows.
All along the back of this bed plant double sun-
flowers; about a foot in front of these sow the

152

Lele Make 6 oer Garden

largest varieties of lemon and orange colored mari-
golds; in front of these calliopsis, then yellow Cali-
fornia poppies (Eschscholzia), bordering the entire
bed with dwarf marigolds. I would sow broadcast
both calliopsis and California poppies.

Next we will compose a symphony in blue; be-
ginning at the rear sow giant larkspurs, then broad-
cast Kaiser-blumen (cornflowers), and border the en-
tire mass with dwarf blue ageratum. I once planned
a little blue garden like this for a very little girl, and
she called it her “ fairyland.”

Now that we’ve planned flowers for day beauty,
blossoms which reflect both sunlight and sky, we
must arrange another bed which we will call our
night garden.

Here sow great masses of nicotiana affinis, then in
front broadcast with candytuft, using sweet alyssum
for the border.

Everyone loves hedges; we associate them with old
gardens and long loved homes, yet the very thought
of a hedge seems intimidating, as we naturally think
of the years of continuous growth they generally
represent.

However, even in our transient home we may have
imitation hedges; they will not be as high as our

153

Kets Make a Mover Counter

heads, but they will help, more than anything else, to
give a visual delusion of permanency.

Take some path which you traverse daily and sow
a, line on each side with Kochia Trihophylla or Sum-
mer Cypress. This will make a hedge about two and
a half feet high of the most exquisite green, filmy
foliage, which changes to a ruddy glow as the sum-
mer wanes and the seeds appear.

Another hedge which I plant each summer is made
from the old-fashioned four-o’clocks. Get mixed
seed, and have a quaint patch-quilt effect of varie-
gated colors. The fragrance of the blossoms will
inake every evening and early morning walk down the
path a delight.

If the porch is full of glare and devoid of vines,
so long as we can’t all be Jack and have his beanstalk,
we must get the best substitute obtainable for miracu-
lous results.

Cobea scandens is a vine of phenomenal qualities,
growing twenty feet in a season. It has beautiful
foliage and bell-like flowers of a weird blue-green.

In transient homes there are sure to be eyesores,
ugly, ill-kept spots which we will want to hide from
our own eyes and the knowledge of others. Morning
glories and nasturtiums will rapidly respond to our

154

AN ANNUAL HOLLYHOCK

eds e Lower Gerden

call for help and under draperies of loveliness dis-
guise the secrets of sordidness.

Of course the ground must be put in condition if
good and quick results are to be obtained. Unless
it is hopelessly hard soil, even if you are a woman
there is no reason why you can’t enjoy the prepara-
tion of the ground yourself, using one of those claw
forks or potato diggers.

Beg, buy or steal some old manure and work in
well, leaving the beds to mellow for a few days, then
rake and sow. All seed should be planted shallow ex-
cept the sunflowers and nasturtiums, which you press
into the ground with your finger. The smallest seed

just sprinkle on top of the soil, then take a few hand-
_fuls of earth and dust over them.

After everything is planted get a board, put it
down and tramp back and forth over the seed, press-
ing them firmly into the earth; this insures quick
germination and keeps the seed in place.

The entire monetary cost of effecting a transfor-
mation from barrenness to beauty in this temporary
home will be one dollar and twenty-five cents — fifty
cents for the yellow bed, twenty-five for the blue, fif-
teen for the white, fifteen for the hedges and twenty
for the vines.

155

ets Mole @ lower Gorden

Blossoms which we buy from the florist’s shop and
bring home half blown, to quickly wilt, satisfy but
poorly a flower-yearning heart. Bought flowers are
never really ours, they are extraneous things without
one touch of personality. The poorest little stunted
blossom, the seed of which we ourselves sow, weed and
watch from day to day becomes a part of our lives
and dreams, and is worth more spiritually than a
dozen American Beauties purchased at a bull market
price.

If you happen to be some rare variety of altruist
who not only wishes to paint the landscape of your
temporary home with beauty, but would strew the
path of your successor with welcoming posies, per-
haps you will add a few abiding perennials to the list
I have suggested.

But even with the garden you now plant, the flow-
ers will sow their own seed sufficiently to carry a post-
script of loveliness to the stranger who follows you.
Although it takes a peculiar selflessness to think hap-
pily of another’s enjoyment of the thing we have lost,
wouldn’t anyone be glad if it could be said of her, as
someone said of Ellen Terry, ‘“ Wherever she passed,
flowers grew ”’?

156

Alen [Rare

I
aie

“)

iat
ma }

N the early spring we are too busy planning, plant-
ing, dreaming and digging to ever think of sit-
ting down, but when our plans have reached fruition
and the garden is full of bloom, then the mind takes
on a contemplative turn and there is an ever growing
tendency to happy inaction. It is well to provide for
this stage by having garden seats placed at spots
commanding the prettiest vistas; then one is saved
the danger of rheumatism by squatting Orientally on
damp grass.

It is amazing what poor provision the stores have
made for the gardener’s rest and enjoyment. The
inexplicable, popular ‘‘ rustic ” benches are inquisi-
tional in their uncomfortableness. ‘The only other
choice are the slatted affairs always painted a fiery
red, which kills any color scheme of flowers.

159

aes Make a Flower QS

After much futile searching for ready-made
benches we were forced to the conclusion that we
would have to design our own.

The handy man and general genius of the village
was sought to materialize our sketches. Good clear
pine with no knots was chosen for the wood; the end
supports had to be milled at a planing mill. Two of
the seats were planned along Dutch lines, and these
had an under bar for extra support, locked on out-
side by square wooden pins. ‘The other two benches
are of an Italian character and are without under bar,
but have extra braces under the seat nailed to end.
supports. [The Dutch benches were stained a soft
neutral green, for these seats were to be placed among
the pines and cedars.

The Italian benches were painted white, as they
were to reside respectively at head of rose garden and
moon garden. After remaining outdoors in every
vicissitude of all-year-round weather they have not
cracked nor shown any deterioration, only needing a
fresh coat of stain and paint each spring for general
looks and preservation. They are five feet long, six-
teen inches high, and fifteen inches wide.

The entire cost of the four benches was as fol-
lows:

160

A BENCH ALONG DUTCH LINES

ets Make a ower Gorden

UGTIN crag fe Gist 1 rc cae pee ae aoe coe $ 6.02
Rail for under support of two benches....... 35
Greenstein, paint, oil-and: dryer... 4... 5%:.:.- 40
Labor, making and painting............ fear aes

SLl.ed

Thus for less than twelve dollars we have benches
which are as solid as the trees themselves and far
more decorative than any to be had ready-made at
exorbitant prices.

Our venture in seats having turned out so satisfac-
torily, we next planned arches and rose trellises. The
rounded arch,-while beautiful, we decided against on
account of its expense. Perhaps I plagiarized a bit
from the Japanese; at any rate the design suggests
their simple methods.

The photograph will give their form; the wide lat-
tice is composed of common laths smoothed by the
plane. The legs or stilts extending below arches
should be eighteen inches long to give firm root in the
ground, and they must be coated liberally with coal
tar to prevent rotting.

Of course in placing the arches it is necessary to
employ a carpenter’s level to get them perfectly
plumb.

161

122s Habe o Power GA

When it came to painting the arches we pendu-
lumed between green and white, then settled at last on
a compromise between the two; we desired a color
which would be starred at night yet not be glaring
during the day, and one that would harmonize with
white, pink, yellow and red roses; so we selected a
soft gray green, exactly the shade of the poplar tree
trunk, a color that sank into the landscape, yet
gleamed in the moonlight.

In designing the fan trellises, a sudden exuberance
of feeling caused my pencil to make an extra flourish
and the accident produced such a happy effect I
hailed it as the permanent. Consequently instead of
a conventional fan shape of equal proportions, our
fans have an almost vertical effect on one side and
curve almost to the ground on the other. These were
painted the same tone as the arches.

The cost of arches and trellises was as follows:

Mabernal forsoliarches iio tide oa) wee ae $ 2.85
Material: for 4 ‘trellises. .o 35) gh Sa be ee 2.66
Petting jand “pamime Uys calle. eee ates TA5

$12.96

162

ely Fale a Moiee Crovden

The birds are the natural orchestra of the garden,
and the members of the orchestra like to bathe and
drink just like all other musicians ; so we next planned
a little bowl to be kept filled with very fresh water.

A wooden chopping bowl of largest proportions
was procured; three squat legs were then fitted to
the curved bottom, and nailed firmly; then the entire
thing was treated to several coats of gray-green paint,
giving each coat plenty of time to dry. A last coat
was applied and while still wet some very fine sand
was sprinkled over the surface of the entire bowl,
which suddenly transformed the wood into an ap-
pearance of stone. When finished it was beautiful,
and as queer and ancient looking as if we had acci-
dentally discovered it in Egypt. The entire cost of
this bathing and drinking bowl was _ seventy-five
cents!

A flat round stone was then placed in the centre
on which the birds could stand. Pouring the water
so as to leave top of stone exposed, we retired to the
studio to see who would be its first patron. In less
than fifteen minutes here came the curious catbird,
mewing excitedly ; he made several swoops toward it,
not being thoroughly convinced of its safety, then
suddenly lighted on the centre stone and drank and

163

12s Melee Q Flower Crue

delightedly performed his bath. Having set the
stamp of his approval on the public bath, the other
birds accepted it without question.

It affords us constant amusement to watch the
antics of the various bathers; mother birds fre-
quently bring their little broods which with nervous
timidity of quivering wing dare not brave the terrors
of the sea, until emboldened by watching their
mother’s ablutions. |

About the drinking bowl we daily throw handfuls
of chicken feed and old bread to add to its allure-
ments. In winter we keep the spot popular, after
the bowl has been retired to the cellar, by hanging
many pieces of suet on strings to the boughs of the
apple tree which shades the bowl in summer. The
suet is for the especial cheer of the chickadees, who
blithely hang upside down, feasting, swinging and
singing between mouthfuls in the wintry gusts of

wind.

164

‘The Gorden of Isure

Ait)

H
LR eh
i jh

()* E of the greatest compensations of gardening

is the sense of partnership which grows between
the birds and ourselves. We do not grow visible
wings, but if we have the inner sense of them, the
birds will recognize us as kindred.

Greater than riches, more precious than fame is
the trust of one wild bird.

I feel sure the creatures of wing have a great ap-
preciation of beauty, and if you surround your home
with color and perfume and trees you may count on
the presence of birds.

And if you are watchful of eye and open of heart,
and have a true longing for their friendship, you will
find each year adding to your knowledge of allure-
ments to bring them in ever greater number.

If you can make your garden a beautiful spot for
their love, a safe sanctuary for their domestic life,

167

eds Melee a Flo®er Creeiin

and a larder for their appetite, they will spread the
news far and wide, and your fame will soar through
the skies.

Of course most of the valuable knowledge a gar-
dener accumulates comes by the great law of accident.
I’ve learned to value the apple, cherry, peach and
pear trees not for their fruit alone. They lure to the
garden birds I would never otherwise see, small jewel-
like creatures who appear during blossom time and
are as fleeting as the blossoms, disappearing into the
infinite as the petals are blown earthward.

On one thirteenth of May, when the air was so
thronging with birds that I did not have time to lunch
at all, I sat at a window which looked out on two
fruit trees and counted thirty-three different kinds
of birds. And of this number eleven were the will-
o’-the-wisps of blossom time, flitting into my life and
out again — only flashes of cerulean, gold and green,
but painting indelibly the tapestry of memory with
their magical hues.

Then, too, the fruit trees insure us the company
of that feathered embodiment of spring, the oriole.
All through May his fife will startle the most sluggish
thought from the commonplace to a sudden realiza-
tion of the festival season. He gilds the air in his

168

ets Make a FloWer Carden
quick swoops, darting like thought. If we are for-
tunate in winning his favor during the period of love-
making we may behold him swinging a bassinet in
our pear tree to hold his downy souvenirs of blossom
time.

Most gardeners grow to be such delightful idiots
they are glad to share their fruit with the birds, and
the right sort of garden should have enough of every-
thing to feed both the family indoors and the family
outside.

Still, if we have an indisposition to such generos-
ity, we can divert the birds from the forbidden fruit
by planting many mulberry trees, the fruit of which
they generally prefer to all others.

We all know the fasciation of the drone of the
bees in the flowering fruit trees. We can prolong
this hypnotic music from May until late autumn by
_ planting many Shirley poppies.

The Kansas gayfeather is not a very beautiful
flower in itself, but a gardener learns to love it be-
cause the butterflies do.

I have always adored the Kaiser-blumen cornflow-
ers for their silver-green foliage, and flowers of tight
laced bodice with ruff of blue silk. A great mass of
them, when rippled by the breeze, makes one think of

169

Kets Melee a BloWer Coneden

the sea. But I love them now for a finer reason,
which dates from the ripening of the seed of the
earlier flowers. With the first seed came the gold-
finches, who darted and poised on the blue-tipped
cernuous branches, chirping and feasting while they
unconsciously made part of a poem of blue, green,
gold and black.

I bordered all my rose garden with old-fashioned
Scotch pinks, because my mother’s garden had them,
and because their leaf tone harmonizes with every
rose color. But they have become glorified since I’ve
found their lover to be the ruby-throated humming
bird. He also loves the nasturtiums which garland
the porch, and the morning glories which cover the
trunk of a tall dead cedar ; but if I really want to have
a long opportunity for studying this miracle of
beauty and motion, I take a small stool and sit for an
hour half hidden among the pinks.

One of the most ecstatic, breathless moments of
my life was when a humming bird sat to rest on a
rose branch within two inches of my hand.

The cedars bring cheer to the garden in winter
and they add mystery at night; then when their blue
berries ripen they may bring us an unexpected visit

170

MNIYG GNV GQHLVA VULSAHOYO
GHG FO SHAANAW AYAHM HLVEA OIIGOd AHL

[et Make Q HoSer Caan

from that most exquisite of wanderers, the Bohemian
wax wing.

When we left a great row of elderberry bushes
along the back of our garden we did so because they
reminded us of hedgerows, and banks of old brooks
where we once went a-fishing back in childhood’s
‘country. When the bushes were covered with great
clusters of white flowers the garden was filled with
memory-thrilling perfume. When the blossoms de-
veloped into masses of dark jewels we planned to
make wine, but we changed our minds when we found
the fruit attracted every catbird and robin in the
countryside.

The sunflowers planted for decorative purposes
were appropriated by the buccaneer bumblebees, who
wallowed about the flower centres until they emerged
clothed in golden pollen.

When the sunflower seed ripens it is an invitation
to every chickadee, goldfinch and nuthatch for miles
about.

The most beautiful garden in the world would be
utterly barren without birds, bees and butterflies.

The butterflies and bees need little luring, but the
birds confer their presence and fellowship with royal

171 -

122s Melos Q oWer Crnclea

discrimination. After we have charmed them into
our lives we must devise means of holding them, study
their needs, never lessen their faith in us, keep a
watchful eye for neighbors’ cats, grow soft of foot,
and sweeter of soul.

And for our service and love, one hermit thrush
alone can repay us a thousandfold by his celestial
song in the hush of a twilight in June.

172

‘The (Garden in \Winter—

ge mn eat
ha (
eh

“The Garde yon \Winter—

| a friend who had spent some time with us dur-

ing the summer when the garden was in its pop-
pied, rosy heyday, writes to me when December
snows arrive: ‘ Now that winter is here I suppose
your friends may expect to hear from you once in
awhile as you will certainly be forced willy nilly to
lay down your rake and hoe.”

It is the second of December when I quizzically
smile over this letter and wonder if this city moth
will believe me if I tell her I look forward to one of
my busiest months in the garden; that there will not
be a day’s cessation of the labor and joy in the out-
of-doors. This is a blessed provision of necessity
for with the first brittle taste of December and the
crisping of energy, the very frost in the nostrils
whets the muscles to toil, and with every breath of
the chilling air there is the message to hurry, to

175

hes Flake a [loWer (inp

achieve, before the ice bound days of January are
upon us.

So on this second of December I toss aside the
grey artificially scented letter, and sally forth with
my garden partner, arms laden with our precious
horde of freshly arrived Japanese lilies, making our
way toward Kingdom Come. ‘Then from the cellar
is fetched the great box of sand which we had care-
fully stored away one warm, scarlet splashed autumn
day, in expectation of this exciting December morn-
ing.

The few inches of snow are lifted with a spade and
the earth proves to be frozen only a little over an
inch! Holes twelve inches deep are dug, then the
good old wheelbarrow is squeaked upon the scene
laden with a rich compost of old manure and decayed
sod and weeds. The holes are given two inches of
compost in the bottom, then a heaping trowel of sand
is thrown in to make a bed for the great, luscious
auratum bulbs to lie in, with a counterpane of the
same sand to cover them. We then fill the hole with
the mingled compost and original soil.

Leaves which we have prudently saved in gunny
sacks for this purpose, are then piled over the hole,
while over them moderately fresh manure is laid for

176

(eds Make a Flo®er Crerden

the triple purpose of holding the leaves in place,
warmth and spring fertilization.

We always have great difficulty to avoid coming
to blows over the subject of depth in planting.

Taven’t you met the variety of gardener who would,
if left to himself, always plant everything in the
centre of the earth’s axis if he could dig that deep?
Well then, you know what I have to contend with,
and what spirited discussions and stilted dignity
occur before a compromise is reached.

The larger awratum bulbs should be planted ten
inches deep; the speciosum Melpomene and smaller
lily bulbs about six inches.

All told we plant twenty-six lilies among the
peonies ; the latter will give the bulbs shade about the
stalks in summer, conserving the moisture, while
the foliage of the peonies will make leafy vases
for the bouquets of lilies to rise from.

With tired backs but gleeful hearts we trudge
toward the house, and on the way I stoop and brush
the snow from a border, finding a quantity of very
fresh sweet alyssum smiling happily under its glitter-
ing cover. Across the path, in a nook under the white
lilac, are several clumps of brave purple stocks look-
ing like monster double violets.

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Ids Moke a loser Conk

The hardy chrysanthemums are reluctantly cut
down, for they still display touches of yellow, red,
pink and white in the centre, within the brownish
edges of the frosted outer petals. The stalks are cut
close to the new growth already courageously making
haste for the next season. The plants are then
mulched with leaves and manure.

Between labors we sit on the garden bench under
the pines where the chickadees come and sass us,
while a redheaded woodpecker drums on the tree
trunk above our heads.

The green and white benches, as I’ve said before,
are left out all winter, for why should we not enjoy a
peaceful, comfortable hour in the out-of-doors when
it is in its most beautiful white, winter stage?

There are only three months in the year when I
cannot gather flowers daily from the garden, and
even during those months the garden is still magical
in its loveliness because of its bitter-sweet vines
gleaming with red berries, the scarlet fruited sumachs,
evergreen cedars, pines and hemlocks. The white
birch gains in spiritual beauty during its winter bare-

ness when frail limbs make a tracery against sunset

sky — the last note of poetic suggestion. ‘The pop-
lars (not Lombardy, but that variety having silver

178

IRs Make @ oer Crates

aspenlike leaves which quiver at the touch of summer
wind) have a beauty scarce earthly when their pale
jade trunks rise from the white surface of snow.

The morning after a great icy rain we awaken to
find the pines wearing a million diamonds, the birches
shimmering in sunlight with every tint of the rain-
bow.

Then when the snow covers all the ground there
are a thousand new beauties in things we accepted
casually throughout summer. The white earth be-
comes a canvas on which each crooked limb, humble
weed, straggling vine, may paint a masterpiece in
blue and purple shadow.

A certain proportion of winter severity is a blessing
to both gardener and garden. I have lived in south-
ern and northern states, and the West Indies, and
of course have made gardens wherever I lived; and
I assure you, if your garden is situated in a cold
clime you may feel well content, even if you can’t
have royal ponceanas, bougainvilleas, palms, camel-
lias and gardenias growing out-of-doors, you may
have three-fourths of all the loveliest flowers in the
world.

Where there is no winter freezing to partially kill
the insects a gardener’s battle is fearful. Ants,

Ids Moke @ oGer feed Cl

sowbugs, wireworms, can, in the warmer climes,
almost fret the soul to hopelessness. The flowers
which are native in the tropics have a hardihood which
can resist the insects and the heat; it is true they keep
a cycle of bloom the year round, but they are apt
to be limited in number and consequently are repeated
endlessly in all gardens, producing in a foreigner the
sensation of living amid set stage scenes of undeni-
able beauty, but a beauty which eventually palls on
the mind to an unendurable degree.

The great contrast of our snowy winters gives the
eye a change and rest, and breeds a new zest for the
next season’s pageant of flowers. And how imper-
ceptibly nature reintroduces us to color; the earliest
spring flowers are all demure and modest in form and
tint; from the snowdrop and crocus we are led by
scillas, hyacinths and narcissi to the bolder tones
of the tulips.

The winter severities weld our hearts closer to the
creatures of the out-of-doors. There are the traces
of Br’er Rabbit to be seen each morning after a snow.
I always feel a thrill when I see the pathetic track of
his hunted feet. I wish there were some way to con-
vey a general invitation to his race to make their
winter quarters in the safe refuge of our garden,

180

A BROOK BREAKING ICE

BARRIERS IN SPRIN

bees tke er Matter Crarden

where many borders of Scotch pinks will feed them
generously and save me trimming next spring. They
can also make a midnight feast from the frozen apples
and nibble the Brussels sprouts.

On the twenty-fourth of December the Christmas

tree 1s cut— always with a qualm, for it seems so
cruel to end its life in the woods for a brief, gay
existence indoors.

We save enough sand from the lily planting to
use for the Christmas tree. The trunk is placed in
a bucket and the sand filled in about it, making the
firmest, neatest and simplest arrangement possible.

For the Christmas table decoration there is nothing
prettier than cyclamen. No other flower will’stand
the hardships of indoor winter life as well as this.
It needs but little sun and will continue to bloom
under the most vacillating conditions of heat and
cold, light and darkness.

It seems only fair, though, that between meals it
should be given a chance at some bright window to
enjoy a more natural existence. These plants can
be raised from seed and in this way one may obtain
a great variety and by having many plants let them
take turn in brightening the dining table.

With the first of January approaching we look

181

Is Make fe FloSes Crepe

forward to the arrival of the catalogues from seeds-
men and rosarians, then the search for novelties
begins, the glad renewal of acquaintance with beloved
old flower friends, and the ever new delight in the
never varying pictures.

Then, although the gardening hands will perhaps
be folded for a time, losing their freckles, tan and
callous spots, the gardening brain is working harder
than ever, planning the spring campaign of beauty;
dreaming at night of the fall planted bulbs; forswear-
ing during the day the dress planned for Easter, that
one may purchase those marvelous azaleas which
smile from the cover of a particularly enticing new
catalogue.

Soythe season merges from one dream to another,
an endless circle of hope and work, always garlanded
with ‘blossoms, which only bloom the more in the
mind’s eye when the trees bow earthward with snow
and the plant children lie tucked in their white beds,
perhaps dreaming as we dream of the great Spring

Pantomime.

182

Care ot the Gorden Dirds

TAK the Getle

HE winter care of the birds really begins during

the summer before. For then it is that we plant

great quantities of sunflowers, planting so many we

may leave at least half the seed heads untouched for

the autumn birds to help themselves to, the remainder

being stored away in crates carefully protected from
rats for the bird hard times in midwinter.

- There is also a large patch of peanuts planted for
the chickadees and nuthatches. The chickadees
eventually become so tame they permit us to offer
them peanuts in the fingers, perching on the hand
when nibbling. The peanuts (crushed) are daily
spread on a shelf extending beyond the studio win-
dow in full sight, where we may enjoy the merry
feasting of the chickadees and the sly thief-like
snatching of the hatches.

During the autumn little bird hotels are erected in
185

eds tale w Mo@er Crneune

sheltered spots, in trees near the house, out of cat
reach, for the universally and unjustly despised Eng-
lish sparrows. We take ordinary wooden boxes and
by adding partitions form various little apartments,
for even sparrows like private rooms and, having
once appropriated them, hold and defend their prop-
erty against all intruders.

After five years of intimacy and unprejudiced,
careful investigation of the English sparrow, I have
not found to be true one thing their detractors say.
And they do not chase other birds away.

I have attracted all the sparrows I can to my
garden and I have more robins, juncos, thrushes,
catbirds, chickadees, nuthatches, hermit thrushes,
Pheebes, orioles and song sparrows than can be found
anywhere else within miles of the Wilderness. The
sparrows live on terms of greatest amity with all
the other birds — their quarrels being confined to
their own family.

And as for quarrelsomeness, the nearest approach
to actual dueling I’ve ever witnessed was between two
robins. For sheer peevishness and peckingness, none
surpass the white-striped headed sparrows of high
degree, while even the dear chickadee is remarkably
quick of temper and snippety.

186

Paty TMakeicar Mower Carden

The poor English sparrow has been so persecuted
and talked about he is very sensitive and espe-
cially grateful for kindness, showing actual devotion
to a human friend. When I go out under the apple
trees and call, “ Come on, little children, come on,”
they flock to me from all directions, fluttering about
my head like tame pigeons. The morning after a
snowstorm I find the embroidery of little feet all over
the front porch up to the very door, where I suppose
they would knock if they were stronger. There they
sit or flutter about the bare vines, knowing they can
count on us for food supplies during this stormy
time.

The sparrows suffer so much during the winter;
we always have a few cripples in our flock — poor
birds who perhaps perched for the night on a bare
bough and woke in the morning to find their feet
frozen to the limb.

For two winters we entertained a one-legged junco
who, I’m sorry to say, was much persecuted by his
kindred, but perhaps it was for some individual
unpleasant trait that I didn’t know about. He even-
tually waited until dusk to come alone for his meal
under the studio window, stumping about most piti-
fully, using one wing as a sort of crutch.

187

elie Phalen vel eto der Cracden

The birds learn to look on us as protectors and it
is a proud position to fill. Id even rather be a bird
protector than a policeman on Broadway.

When we are awakened, before the workman’s
whistle, by a hullabaloo at our window, and rush out
in nebulous garments just in time to save our spar-
row colony from.a hawk, it is indeed a proud moment.

During last summer we noticed that the sparrows
deserted the drinking bowl for days and kept
raucously trying to tell us some scandal about it,
but it was only by a chance glance out one evening
that we discovered the trouble. It was a rat who
sneaked out to the bowl from the cellar, stealing the
bird bread and perhaps pouncing on sparrow orphans
and widows.

A small child’s rifle aimed nervously and amateur-
ishly fired, only served to wound the rat, and then
there was a frolic. All the family rushed at the rat
with various nice weapons, such as a chafing dish,
brass poker and Samurai sword, and when the spar-
rows saw their enemy wounded, and our efforts to
slaughter him, they joined us with all fear departed,
diving down between our weapons, getting in the way
of blows, pecking the rat’s back until somehow some-
body — sparrows or we —killed the enemy. ‘There

188

YHHaNO SHHAHOS AH LVHL NOILOOWSYAd SNOANILNOO
aL GAAUMASAd LON SHOdGd MOUUVdS HSITONGA WHOOd AHL

[ets Make Q Flower Creeden

was a general festival and a grand funeral which all
the birds attended.

Of course, taking the responsibility for the birds
can be carried too far, if the birds begin to shirk
responsibility themselves and expect you to look after
the children who desert the nest too soon, the parents
demanding, ‘“‘ Where is -my wandering boy?” every
time you go into the garden, instead of feeding the
little bawlers themselves.

Then, too, it’s a terrible responsibility to have to
assist in the general pandemonium when an entire
brood of post wrens fly the coop at once.

There was “ Spilly Willy,” the post wren, and his
little wife, ‘“ Tildy.”? He came to the back porch,
_ then to the front porch, searching and begging for a
home, having been unexpectedly accepted by Tildy
the day before. We hurried and found a little
stunted failure of a gourd that looked about the size
of his necessity, broke a fine knife making a round
door, and mashed a favorite finger nailing it up to
the veranda post. Spilly Willy accepted it in three
hours, and he and Tildy nearly killed themselves
spilling over with song-joy while trying to fit four-
inch twigs of wood cross-ways in an inch door hole.
Then we found another gourd a size larger, with a

189

on Melee @ Flo®er onuen

dried, crooked stem (which would make a beautiful
balcony), and in this one we made two doors, front
and back, and nailed it to another post in case Spilly
Willy had a cousin or college chum who also wanted
to go to hurried housekeeping. We had scarcely
gotten it in place when Tildy — curiosity beset
woman — flitted over to investigate the new house
and went in the back door and out of the front door
and sat on the balcony and went indoors again and
squatted down to try its hatching qualities; and then
out she came and called to Spilly Willy (who was
still trying, manlike, to do an impossible mathe-
matical problem with twigs) to come over and behold
this model abode with all the modern improvements.
After much feminine argument Tildy had her way,
of course, and Spilly Willy reluctantly gave up the
rustic cottage he’d set his heart on and began all
over again the task of bringing twigs for the furnish-
ing. I never saw such work as those two accom-
plished in the next few days— and I never heard
such rapturous singing as they kept up perpetually,
perfect cataracts of music tumbling from their little
throats.

Then the laying started and poor Spilly Willy was

190

[ets Malce a ower A

completely left out of it — didn’t know what to do
with himself, didn’t even have a pipe to smoke — so
he just sat on the balcony while Tildy laid the eggs
as fast as she could, and sang his very heart out
serenading and encouraging her. Spilly Willy no
longer had the freedom of the home as he had when
there was house furnishing to do; Tildy treated him
as if he were a bull in a china shop and wouldn’t let
him do more than peek in at the precious fragile
eggs, so Spilly Willy, having no club to go to, formed
a habit of going to the first gourd cottage, sitting
contemplatively therein.

Tildy sat and sat and sat, and Spilly Willy sang
and sang and sang and brought all the delicacies to
be found in the universe to his little wife, until at last
the first son and heir emerged from his shell.

After little Billee arrived, other little brothers and
sisters appeared, until there were in all six hungry,
cavernous mouths to feed. Tildy and Spilly Willy
nearly worked themselves to feathers and bone pro-
viding for that family, until I was afraid the world’s
store of grubs and spiders would be exhausted. And
Tildy kept reminding him what a blessing it was they
moved to the model house, for now she could go in

Ids Fede a PloGer Gerden

at the back door and feed the children and out of the
front, when he arrived at the back door with more
food. |

Then came a day when Spilly Willy summoned me
with piercing shrieks of alarm. I rushed out and
sat long before I understood. 'Tildy, it seemed, had
gone off as usual for a spider and, alack and alas,
had not returned. ‘There was no use to hunt —I
didn’t know where to go —TI could only say all the
comforting things I could think of and keep a vigil
over the little flock while the disconsolate husband
sought far, and near, coming back every now and
again with food which he hastily and silently deliv-
ered only to be off again, desperately calling in heart-
breaking tones, through the Tildyless distance.

Toward the end of the third hour, what with his
heartache and double duty of feeding the children,
Spilly Willy was nigh dead, and I never saw a sadder
thing than when he went over to their first little home
and crawled inside, his back turned to the world,
alone with his memories and his sorrow.

We had both given up hope —TI believed a cat
had gotten her or she had become entangled in a
wire fence— when suddenly a Niagara of song
sounded near.

192

Ids Make @ FeloSexe CL,

Spilly Willy sprang forth from his retreat as one
electrified, and gave a cry of joyous relief that
gripped my throat. It was Tildy in the flesh, Tildy
safe, Tildy back home again to her lover and her
brood! She gave Spilly Willy one gleeful greeting
and song of explanation, then sped within the back
door to her crying children.

Spilly sat on the balcony stem outside; his vigil,
his labor, his heartaches suddenly relieved, his little
head drooped and nodded in the exhaustion of sleep.

As the children grew older they would hang out
the front and back doors squawking for food, and
almost tumble out before their parents could bring
it. This nearly frightened Tildy to death but I
really believe Spilly Willy took pride in it, for one
day while Tildy was off foraging he deliberately sat
on the baleony and dared little Billee to come clean
out. Billee did and so did Sally and Tildy, Jr., and
Beatrice and Harold and little Pearl — all six just
fluttered, fell and spilled out front and back doors
and made off for inaccessible foreign parts.

Then Tildy returned and was flabbergasted; she
accused Spilly Willy; he denied it and I didn’t tell
on him. There was pandemonium, wifely shrieks
and flutterings, then all of a sudden both laid all the

| 193

eds Moke @Q Flo®er Oreeden

blame on me, and I was made to understand that as
long as I was responsible for the breaking up of their
home it was up to me to search for the children.

Of course, they had gotten under our porch and
neighboring porches, down cellar and in every other
difficult place, where I bumped my head and nearly
skinned my back reaching them, only to have the
wretched little things flutter farther away. After an
hour’s ceaseless pursuit I eventually landed the entire
six babies, placed them unhurt on the boughs of a
sumach, and delivered myself of an oration to the
parents, in which I forthwith washed my hands of the
entire business.

194

What Ms Garden ee
oM

ae
ae

hd
ee
FAW ih

jaa
iy

*iND

Ss
= (3 S aos fi
aa. 2s
Pai 1 EG f= h Bote

What “Ay arden Means
toMe

HE greatest gift of a garden is the restoration
of the five senses.

During the first year in the country I noticed but
few birds, the second year I saw a few more, but by
the fourth year the air, the tree tops, the thickets and
_ ground seemed teeming with bird life. ‘‘ Where did
they all suddenly come from?” I asked myself. The
birds had always been there, but I hadn’t the power
to see; I had been made purblind by the city and
only gradually regained my power of sight.

My ears, deafened by the ceaseless whir and din
of commerce, had lost the keenness which catches
the nuances of bird melody, and it was long before
I was aware of distinguishing the varying tones that
afterward meant joy, sorrow, loss or love, to me.
That hearing has now become so keen, there is no
bond of sleep so strong that the note of a strange

197

[Sts a RloWer Coals

bird will not pierce to the unsleeping, subconscious
ear and arouse me instantly to alertness in every fibre
of my being. I wonder if even death will make me
insensate to the first chirp of a vanguard robin in
March. |

During that half-awake first year of country life
I was walking with a nature-wise man and as we
passed by a field where the cut hay lay wilting, he
whiffed and said, “ There’s a good deal of rag weed
in that hay.” I gazed on him with the admiration
I’ve saved all my life for wizards and wondered what
peculiar brand of nose he had.

Then the heart, the poor jaded heart, that must
etherize itself to endure the grimness of city life at
all, how subtly it begins throbbing again in unison
with the great symphony of the natural. The awak-
ened heart can sense spring in the air when there is no
visible suggestion in calendar or frosted earth, and
knowing the songful secret, the heart can cause the
feet to dance through a day that would only mean
winter to an urbanite. ;

The sense of taste can only be restored by a con-
stant diet of unwilted vegetables and freshly picked
fruit.

The delicacy of touch comes back gradually by

198

Sed Fake @ Flower Cyeeden

tending injured birdlings, by the handling of fragile
infant plants, and by the acquaintance with different
leaf textures, which finally makes one able to distin-
guish a plant, even in the dark, by its Irish tweed,
silken or fur finish.

And the foot, how intangibly it becomes sensi-
tized; how instinctively it avoids a plant even when
the eye is busy elsewhere. On the darkest night I
can traverse the rocky ravine, the thickets, the sinu-
ous paths through overgrown patches, and never
stumble, scratch myself or crush a leaf. My foot
knows every unevenness of each individual bit of
garden, and adjusts itself lovingly without conscious
thought of brain.

To the ears that have learned to catch the first
tentative lute of a marsh frog in spring, orchestras
are no longer necessary. To the eyes that have
regained their sight, more wonder lies in the crafts-
manship of a tiny leaf-form of inconsequential weed,
than is to be found in a bombastic arras. To the
resuscitated nose is revealed the illimitable secrets of
earth incense, the whole gamut of flower perfume,
and other fragrant odors too intangible to be classed,
odors which wing the spirit to realms our bodies are
as yet too clumsy to inhabit.

199

ets Make @ Ko@er Creden

To the awakened mind there is nothing so lowly
in the things below and above ground but can com-
mand respect and study. Darwin spent only thirty
years on the study of the humble earthworm.

To get the greatest good from a garden we should
not undertake more than we can personally take care
of. I have not had a gardener since the first year
when outside help was necessary for the translation
of the sumach and briar patches of our Wilderness
into arable land. A gardener is only helpful for the
preliminary work of spading, after that his very
presence is a profanation. :

Garden making is creative work, just as much as
painting or writing a poem. It is a personal ex-
pression of self, an individual conception of beauty.
I should as soon think of asking a secretary to
write my book, or the cook to assist in a water
color painting, as to permit a gardener to plant
or dig among my flowers. For in even the most
unimportant parts of my garden are little secret
treasures — a stray cornflower that a Bedouin wind
lured from its home bed; a shy wild violet that
strayed from the woods, being tired of blushing
unseen; a bloodroot which must have been brought
some night by a fairy; where is the gardener whose

200

Kets Make a Plover Garden
eye and heart have been trained to respect these
chance visitors?

The ancients had a delightful way of commemo-
rating events and people by marble and other endur-
ing things. I can see why we should hesitate to
borrow from friends, but I don’t see why we should
not borrow from dead Greeks; therefore I’ve made
my garden largely commemorative and memorial.

For instance, there’s that hedge on the north
boundary; it’s true we needed a wind-break there,
but it was much sweeter to forget necessity and let
its planting become an epic; therefore, after one
especially delightful honeymoon (we have them an-
nually and sometimes accidentally) we came home with
the new enthusiasm bred of a short absence from
home, and set out ninety-something hemlocks and
ealled it ‘* The Honeymoon Hedge.”

Then there is the terrace planned in honor of the
advent of two dearly loved friends who had a weak-
ness for breakfasting outdoors. I made my garden
partner haul stones for days like an Italian laborer,
and we both behaved like ground moles tunnelling
out earth for many other days; and then a great
christening rain descended prematurely and we only
achieved a mud hole in a stone quarry by the time

201

bey a Maver a

the friends arrived. But they had the prophetic
eyes of poets, and when shod with galoshes they
plowed through the mud of their future terrace and
could imagine all the beauty we had intended; they
almost wept with gratitude and were perfectly docile
about breakfasting indoors!

The terrace was eventually finished. I ought to
know because [I laid thirty feet of stone wall (which
I find out by the dictionary should be called a
“ Ha-Ha,” though I never suspected it had such a
mirthful name at that skinned thumb time); and we
planted it with hundreds of tulips, thousands of
hyacinths, a million crocuses, a trillion grass seed
and six Dorothy Perkins. ‘The next year when the
dear friends came again, the terrace was too beautiful
to breakfast upon; they could only stand at a respect-
ful distance, with bared heads, while it was formally
dedicated.

There also is the rose-garden annex surprise,
planned for the aforesaid partner’s birthday, he
being prohibited for days from taking his “ consti-
tutional” in that portion of our realm. When the
first of June arrived there stood — well, I won’t say
exactly the number, but if I had been a prosaic
person I would have purchased just the same number

202

THE GUARDIAN OF THE GARDEN

ee. ae eal.

of candles to stick in a short-lived birthday cake, as
I planted roses in the abiding chocolate cake of the
ground.

Of course every true gardener saves his own seed,
thereby gradually bringing all the different varieties
to greater perfection; incidentally he may name these
self-developed brands after otherwise unfamed friends.

Whenever there is a particularly eccentric or
beautiful color shown in a blossom I tie a tape about
it, and write its praise on the tape, so when the seed
is harvested a fickle memory need not be relied upon.
By saving each year the very darkest hollyhock of
the blackish variety, I finally achieved the actually
black flowers and had a chance to evidence my admi-
ration of a certain friend’s hair (not her character)
by bestowing her name on the hollyhock.

If a man has an extravagant wife who cannot
resist Irish lace robes when displayed on a lay-lady
in a department store window, he should just gently
lead her to the country, present her with two acres
of ground, or one and a half, introduce her to flower
catalogues and teach her to dig. She'll soon forget
even manicurists. It’s the simplest general cure I
know for all feminine weaknesses.

No woman once demoralized into a gardener ever

203

[ets Hales a’ Plover Creede

hesitated when confronted with a choice between a

new gown and—well, say the same amount spent
in peonies, peach trees, roses and rhubarb plants.
No wonder the first woman gardener could only
afford the fig leaf; all her clothes money went for
anemones and more apple trees.

One can only measure change by retrospection;
when a backward glance produces a finer content
with one’s present state, then surely the spirit is not
retrograding. I’m sure I’m a reconstructed being
in more ways than one since I moved to the country,
especially in my attitude toward vegetables. Dur-
ing the first year I ignored the “ sass patch,” treated
it as a snob does the real toilers of this world. But
gradually lured by the sheer beauty of bejeweled-
by-dew cabbage, the fragance of the onion, I now
expend as much muscle on the vegetable kingdom
as I do on my roses, and, incidentally, I have become
a vegetarian. That’s the only way to become one —
just because there are so many good vegetables, one
‘doesn’t need to encourage the slaughter of beasts.

And this kind of vegetarian, the accidental kind,
is not afflicted with anemia; it is only the theories
of the professional vegetarian that makes him look
so bloodless.

204

Keds Male nh Melia (reprlen

Once when we were without a maid, and very busy
in the studio, we didn’t have time to prepare course
dinners, so we chucked thirteen different kinds of
vegetables in a big aluminum preserving kettle and
went off about our business of being great. After
several hours we came to, and remembering the pot
a-boiling, gave a yell of dismay; we were so sure it
was burnt I think we had no time to use the stairs —
the banisters were more expedite.

Now if that pot had contained a chicken it would
have gone to glory; but lo and behold! there were
our faithful vegetables philosophically stewing away,
sending forth a fragrance that was like a patch quilt
of odors. And when we sat down to sample the
thirteen courses compressed into one we found a dish
delectable enough to make Lucullus and Sulla resur-
rect before their time.

Of course we had so much left over, after we’d
gorged ourselves, the next day was provided for
too; and by merely adding a preponderance of
tomato, the stew was metamorphosed on ‘Tuesday
(we'll say it was Monday when this kitchen vaudeville
began), so on Tuesday the meal was quite different.
On Wednesday, by the addition of much cabbage
and little disks of bacon, still another culinary

205

Kets Male a Plover C@orden

enigma was achieved. On Thursday a heavy hand
with celery made a new avatar of the dish. On Fri-
day carrots recklessly donated caused a_ strange
masquerade of flavor. On Saturday cauliflower gave
the departing a reprieve. And on Sunday we held
a wake over all the ghosts of thirteen vanishing vege-
tables.

The gardener is an explorer, an experimentalist,
an idealist, and best of all he becomes inevitably a
humanitarian. If he is an artist, he can satisfy all
the cravings of his soul for color and pictures; if
a musician he can find expression for all the harmony
in his being. Music, painting and gardening are
based on the same laws of color, harmony, compo-
sition.

Take if you will a long path that is bordered by
hollyhocks on each side, ranging from white through
pink, lilac, salmon, red, yellow, climaxing with black ;
the path leads curvingly, luringly to a point of ex-
ceeding loveliness, an open vista commanding a gen-
eral view of the garden, and the distant hills and
countryside. Who will say that it is not lke the
gradual crescendo of a passage of music developing
through tones of ever increasing richness to the final
magnificent chord?

206

[ets Fake a Mower Crerden

A gardener lives in the present and future; if he
has a sad past, he forgets it.

A garden is ageless and the gardener becomes age-
less too, as ageless as the wind, the rain, the sun,
summer and winter, for he becomes one with them
all.

I believe no living creature could remain bad if
associated daily with flowers, for flowers have such
an Irish way of seducing, with the blarney of
beauty, to the simple, real and only abiding things
of life.

Finding contentment, the gardener exhales it.

Tucked away in a dim corner of the curiosity shop
of my brain is a fragment heard, read or dreamed
some time in the nebulous past; it runs:

** A weary traveler was passing along and noticed
in his path a dry, shriveled leaf. Picking it up, he
was amazed at the perfume it exhaled. ‘Oh! thou
poor withered leaf, whence comest this exquisite
perfume? ’

“ The leaf replied: ‘I have lain for a time in the

company of a rose.’ ”

Once a gardener, always a gardener; there is no
happier creature than the soil and flower lover.

207

Ils Make. a PloGer Crepes

Make friends with the shy things of the woods, the
winged creatures of air, the sun and the rain, and
there is no poverty that can reach you, no world
weariness which will not be effaced. The birds bring
their sorrows to you and you forget your own; they
bring you their joy and brim your heart with song.

The flowers know you for their sweetheart, the
bees buzz fraternally about you, even the wasps let
you share the secrets of their households, saving
their stings for their enemies.

The twilight restores all your childhood’s dreams,
the moon gilds your present hopes, and the seasons
take you by the hand, leading so gently along the
pathway. of the years that there is no age to fear,
only a vista opening ever wider to the clearer eye,
the keener ear, the vibrant heart.

208

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