Part 8

I had been driven to "next year" quite early in the day, for all my plants would be more established, and therefore I trusted more lavish with bloom in their second year with me. They had done their best, I doubted not, and to my eye the promise of growth at the roots began to give as much satisfaction as the few blooms sent, almost tentatively, up into their new surroundings. Ah! for the time when the blue delphinium should be a massive background for the white lilies, and these shine against a thick clump of red valerian; and then the eye should catch the brilliant yellow of the tiger-lily and feel cool in the clear purple of the Indian-pea. And then this scheme should repeat itself, diversified with the stately hollyhock and flaring sunflower, or the feathers of the spiræa, which should rival it in height. More forward in the border should glow the warm-scented sweet-Williams and the bright-headed phlox; the pure white campanula should nod its bells, and the quaint Turk's head hold its own stiffly. Gaillardias and gladiolas, ixias and montbresias should strike a strong-coloured note, and clumps of Canterbury-bells, stocks, zinnias, penstemons, marigolds and scabious should each in turn--and some take a good long turn--bring their share of brightness; and the flowers of the past, the irises, the bleeding heart, the columbines, the bright scarlet geum, the yellow doronicum, should be marked by a patch of green that by diligent growing gave hope of more beauty for the future. In this bright future I was apt to wander and to lose sight of the rather meagre present. But that needs must be one of the consolations of a garden.

And so, hoping all things for my garden, I went to pay visits to other people's gardens.

One grand garden filled me with anything but envy. It was so terribly trim, such rows of variegated geraniums, big calceolarias, featherfew and lobelia. I determined never to treat any bed or border to edgings; to mass even lobelia together and only break it with taller plants, such as geraniums, of the pure good colours quite possible I found, or salvias or fuchsias. Here was line after line, pattern after pattern; surely they were the "goodly sights" Bacon had seen in tarts!

Grand beds of coleus and begonias there were, but these were beyond me, savouring too much of the greenhouse, and all the flowers in the rooms spoke of gardeners and hot-houses.

"I don't think my gardener cares much for herbaceous things," said my hostess. "What flowers _do_ live out of doors? in this climate, I mean."

And I found out that a greenhouse gardener very seldom does care for herbaceous things.

But another smaller garden made me envious. How the plants grew in that blessed soil, with a little river meandering through. No difficulty about water, and that was half the difficulty of flower cultivation overcome.

I knew at once that all I wanted for perfect contentment was one small stream and one small conservatory, then things should march; but I suppose even that highly-blessed woman had a "but" in her lot.

Gardeners are so good to one another. I long for the day when I too shall say, "Oh, I will send you some of that, wait until the autumn," and "You care for this? I can spare some." They must feel they are really doing so much good in the world.

It was a proud moment when one said, "If you have Canterbury-bells to spare, send me some; mine have failed me, they are wretched specimens, and will never do any good."

And mine were sturdy; I knew that.

Old Lovell was another of my customers. He was to have some sweet-Williams and some foxgloves, and I was to have two clumps of Turk's head in exchange, and some of the many young plants surrounding his big clump of that June joy, rosy red valerian. From my other friends I had promises of many good things; the small perennial sunflower, soleil d'or, some nice Michaelmas daisies, the useful pink and white Japanese anemone, a yellow lupin and some of the white variety. More delphiniums, too, I accepted with thankfulness, and I felt my garden growing and growing as the kind promises flowed in.

* * * * *

So back to my own garden with eyes terribly open to its deficiencies, "a poor thing, but mine own," at least, "mine own" for a time, and certainly "mine own" to improve; therefore the deficiencies were not to appal me, though they were still the most striking feature of my garden. The yellow beds still flared, the antirrhinums still marched, and, perhaps most consoling of all, the little plants for next year, and those for always, were well and thriving. The summer had not passed in vain as far as they were concerned. No, nor passed in vain even where it only chronicled failures, for Ignoramuses must take their share of these too, as a necessary part of their education; and how the spring and summer had opened my eyes!

The red ash berries strewed the ground; the birds saw to that, finding pleasure in breaking them off with a knowing jerk of the head and not a bit from hunger; the convolvulus, nasturtium and canariensis were flinging themselves in wild confusion; there was a kind of riot even among the flowers and weeds in the long border. A few roses, especially the good old "Gloire," were giving a little after-show, but a touch of finality had come to my garden, and when a hush passed over it, broken only by an early falling leaf, I knew autumn had come, and I scarcely paused to say good-bye to my first summer's gardening, so eager was I for all that autumn meant in the way of work for the future.

* * * * *

SEASON IV

Autumn

"Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness."

"Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns."

So said George Eliot, and with all due reverence for her opinion, my soul would fly in the opposite direction, seeking the spring. If the autumn led straight on to spring I could love it more, but through its stillness I hear the winter blast; its gorgeous colouring scarce hides the baring boughs; day by day death lays a withering hand on flower and tree; day by day the sun runs quicker to its golden resting-place. Have you ever noticed how great a difference there is between the sun's summer and winter march across the heavens? Note the tree behind which he sinks in June and then again in November. A whole third of the heavens separates the two; and what does that not mean to us of lack in light and warmth? "Ah! would that the year were always May." And yet there are days, such days of perfect beauty that the year could never spare them. They come in early autumn, and it is as though a recording angel passed, so sweet, so solemn is the hush, the pause, with which Nature holds her breath and listens as she lays open her store of harvest to the "Well done" of the voiceless blessing.

And then, the blessed rest-day over, she turns about. "To work!" seems to be the order. "Away with these old flowers! No more need for pod-making; wither up the annuals, cut down the perennials, stop those busy youngsters and their growing process for a bit, shake off the leaves, they will come in useful later on, but pile them up now and let the children scuttle through them with happy feet, and have a good clear-out before you go to sleep and wake up again in the springtime--'the merry, merry springtime.' Away, you birds, and look out for yourselves those of you who stay; get your nests ready and your stores safely housed, my small friends of fur and feather, for my work is now to purge and to winnow, to try and to test, and woe betide the weaklings!" So the wind, Dame Nature's mighty broom-maiden, prepares her best besom, and there is soon a thorough good house-cleaning, to the great discomfort of the inhabitants.

Well, we have to put up with it; and the best plan is to do a little of the same work on one's own account, that so, being in harmony with Nature, one's temper is less sorely tried.

* * * * *

There is enough to be done.

I hardly consider September an autumn month, but the calendar does, so I will mention first one bit of work well worth doing. Sow a good long row of sweet-peas. Make a shallow trench and prepare it as was done in the spring, and before Nature stops all growth above ground you will have a lusty row of little plants five to six inches high. These I should stake before the winter, as a means of protection from frost and snow; and next year, a month earlier than most of your friends, you will have sweet-peas of a height, a size and profusion to make them all envious. And that is, of course, a consummation most devoutly to be wished.

Some people's autumn borders are things of great joy and beauty. Looking on the Master's profusion, I felt like the Queen of Sheba, for I expect she thought her own house and grounds a very poor show when she got back to Sheba. But I did not, like that celebrated queen, turn and bless him unreservedly. I felt more like--much more like--abusing Griggs.

Let me tell you what an autumn border can be like; not in my own poor words, but as a master-hand painted a Master's garden, and, though not _my_ Master's garden, the description fits.

"Against the deep green of the laurels, the rhododendron and box are sunflowers six feet high, lit up each of them with a score of blooms, and hollyhocks, taller still, are rosetted with deep claret flowers and mulberry and strange old pink. Between them bushes of cactus dahlias literally ablaze with scarlet. In front are standard roses, only crimson and damask, and now in October bright with their second bloom. Hiding their barren stems, compact and solid, an exquisite combination of green and purple, are perennial asters--a single spike of them, with its hundreds of little stars, makes a noble decoration in a room--and humbler, if more vivid, companies of tritonia. Here and again are old clumps of phlox, of fervent carmine or white starred with pink, and, to my mind, of singular beauty, the rudbeckias in brilliant clusters of chrome yellow.

"Three times in the long border Japanese anemones, mixed white and terra cotta, mark noble periods in the great curve of colour; and at corresponding intervals, as you walk round, your eye catches the beautiful response, set further forward, of clumps of chrysanthemums, lemon yellow and Indian red, tiny flowers, no doubt, 'for chrysanthemums', but sweetly pretty in their profusion and artless growth. Is that enough? Well, then, for more. There are the snapdragons in every shade of snapdragon colour, and geums now making second displays of flower, and penstemons; and salvias shaded in butterfly-blue, and Iceland poppies, and the round lavender balls--like the spiked horrors which genial Crusaders wore at the end of chains for the thumping of Saracens and similar heathens--which the Blessed Thistle bears.

"Can you see this October garden at all?"[2]

[2] _In Garden, Orchard and Spinney,_ by Phil Robinson.

Indeed, that must look something like a garden border; and after all, friend Ignoramus, it is not totally out of your reach. Even with my disadvantages some of those glories can be mine.

The sunflowers, of course, I had, and though rather roughly staked by my old enemy, yet their golden heads were there, and by diligent decapitation they continued until I "did up" the border. The dahlias did fairly, and some of the poor little water-starved annuals picked up a little and gave patches of colour, notably the marigolds. The Michaelmas daisy--which is here called "perennial aster"--gave but little bloom; all my bushy perennial plants will be better next year. The golden rod, that old inhabitant, was fine and useful even this first September. It kept the big jar in the drawing-room going with dahlias and sunflowers, but the day came all too soon when even these gave out, and then I fell back on Dame Nature and plundered her hedgerows. Such leaves, such yellows and reds, and berries, black, red and green, never was a bunch more beautiful than that provided by the country lanes; and if only a garden would go wild in such a fashion I should leave it to itself. But that is the trouble. When once civilisation has laid her hand on flower or savage there is no going back; one must progress, the primitive conditions are lost for ever. Unless the new ideal be lived up to, the latter state is worse than the first.

* * * * *

I had been collecting ideas as well as had experience during the summer months, and some of the ideas were greatly augmented by a Visitor who came into the garden during the month of October. He had had varied experiences during the years, not so many either, of his pilgrimage, and after having claimed America, Australia, India as his fields of action, and ranching, mining, pearl-fishing, architecture and the stock exchange as some of his employments, I was not surprised to find he had also made a thorough study of the art of Gardening; in fact, had thought of landscape gardening as a profession.

His Reverence had said, "Get him to give you some advice; he knows all about it."

So I sought this fount of knowledge.

My garden looked indeed a poor thing seen through his eyes.

He stood taking in the general effect.

"Hump!--ha!--yes!--you ought to have all that cleared away," waving a hand towards a shrubbery which indeed looked as though it needed judicious pruning; "it is in the wrong place, and it would add considerably to the size of the lawn if it were done away with. And that path, you notice the fatal curve. Why in the name of Reason make a curve when a straight line leads quicker between two places? Curves and circles are an abomination in a garden. Don't you see it?"

"Oh, quite, but I didn't make that path."

"No, but why tolerate it? I can assure you I could not live with that silly crooked line waving itself aside like a fanciful damsel. Pah! Get that altered for one thing, and then, _don't_ have it gravelled. Between grass, what can look so staring and hideous as that patch of yellow? Not that yours is very yellow, been down some time, eh? Buy some old slabs of slate, quite easy to get. Go round to the old churches; you are sure to find some Philistine parson removing the old slate leading through the churchyard and putting down hideous, gritty gravel! You can benefit by his crass stupidity. And then--ah, yes--don't have wire fencing between the garden and that field. Prettily-laid-out field that is, too. I congratulate you on that clump of trees. Very nice! yes, very nice But that aggressive railing paling thing! Away with it! and have a sunk fence if you need anything."

"Sheep are sometimes put in that field," I said timidly, for I felt, in spite of that clump of trees, that I was responsible for a great deal of fearful ignorance.

"Oh, well, a sunk fence will keep them out. Now let us walk on a bit. Dear, dear, how those two round beds hurt one! Remind one of bulls'-eyes, don't they? You must not have round beds, have them in squares; two oblongs would fit in better there. But let me see, ah, yes, that would be better. Now look here. Take away that hedge"--he pointed to the holly hedge dividing the lawn from the kitchen garden--"right away; make there a good border, that will give you the colour, and you can do away with those beds."

"But the kitchen garden!"

"Don't you like the look of a kitchen garden? Nothing more beautiful. Border everything with flowers, and think what a vista you have from your window."

"Oh, I know. I want an opening somewhere."

"An opening! You want it _open_, not boxed in like this. The intention of hedges was to shut out the roads or one's prying neighbours. You have neither. For goodness' sake give yourself room. What is there so attractive in that prickly hedge? But if you want a division, if you must keep the vulgar vegetables in their place, why, put up a pergola!"

"Oh!" I exclaimed. Pergola somehow suggested fairy-land, or Italian lakes at the least.

"Yes, pergola. Now just see it. Beautiful green lawn. By the way, you must have this re-turfed, it is quite hopeless; good grass leading straight down to that hedge, no pathway between," and he shuddered. "Do away with the prickly hedge, have a border of bright flowers taking its place; behind that a pergola of roses, through which you get vistas of all the good sprouting green things, and clumps of flowers, hedges of sweet-peas, banks of poppies, and everything bright and beautiful, with suggestions of gooseberry bushes and strawberry beds, and feathery carrots and waving asparagus. Now, how does that sound?"

"Delightful," I replied, sinking on a garden seat with a most doleful sigh, and looking from that picture to the one that lay before me.

"Ah, yes," following my eye, "and don't forget that path; straight, mind you, and slates. There is something about a wet slate bordered with grass that gives you sensations of coolness and repose that really consoles you for the rain. You try it! Now, I daresay I could suggest a good many more things that need doing, but I suppose you won't manage more this autumn."

"It is very kind of you," I began.

"Oh, not at all, not at all. I assure you it is a great pleasure to suggest improvements. Now here you have a little garden, nothing much about it, you may say, but at once I see what can be made of it. My mind is full of the higher vision, until really sometimes it is a shock to me to come back to real earth, as it were, and find how far it is from the ideal."

"Yes, I should think so," I murmured.

"Of course that is what is needed for landscape gardening, to which I gave special attention at one time. Flowers I have not yet taken up; but shrubs! ah, well, I think I won't begin on shrubs, for I have to catch that train."

Then we walked back to the house, and I wished I too had a train to catch that I might never, never look at my garden again.

The Others said I was very depressed for some days, but at last I resolutely faced my garden.

"You are all wrong," I said, "made wrong from the beginning, and I can't alter you, but as you are the only one we have I must just make the best of you. One thing I can do, and that is to have down the old holly hedge and make a pergola."

So I approached the Others.

They agreed at once that we wanted vistas, and jumped at the pergola, but Jim shook his head.

"No go," said he, and said no more.

"But I am not sure about a vista of cabbages and onions," remarked a cautious One. "I don't like them in any form."

"But I should have borders of flowers everywhere," and the Visitor's picture rose in my mind. "You don't mind asparagus."

"No, if you can keep your vistas to that."

"But a pergola! Mary, that sounds a large order."

"Yes. But this is a thing that affects us all, so we must all make an effort."

"Does your effort mean £ s. d.?"

"Something very like it."

And there was a chorus of "Oh's" and "That's all very fine! _but_--"

"Well, you are all _for_ it, anyhow?" I said.

"Oh, yes, we are all _for_ it."

"Then I am going to tackle his Reverence."

"There he is, then, at the bottom of the lawn, with a slaughtered bunny in his hand, so the moment should be auspicious."

But it wasn't.

I approached my subject delicately, mindful of the overwhelming sense of impossibility with which the Visitor's suggestions had filled my soul; but when it dawned on his Reverence that I wanted not only to erect a pergola but to cut down the holly hedge, it then transpired that the holly hedge was the joy of his heart and the pride of his eyes; when other things failed, and snails ate the onions, _that_ hedge was always there, always green, always solid, and always a consolation.

I explained my views and he explained his, and then we both explained them together; he said I was very obstinate, and I said he was not allowing me a free hand. He said he did, and I said, "Then may I do it?" He said, "Certainly not," and I said, "Very good, then, I resign the garden." I heard his laugh--a hearty one--as I marched with dignity back to the drawing-room.

"Well!" the Others cried, "you look as though you had had a lively time."

"I could have told you exactly what his Reverence would say and saved you the trouble of a row."

I tried to squash Jim with a look, but nothing under many hundredweights could do that. So I said coldly,

"We had no row; and little boys don't always know what their elders will say."

"Bet you I know what _he_ said to you. And on the whole I agree with him. It's no use taking a bigger bite than you can chew."

"It isn't a bigger bite than--Jim, you are very vulgar! But I don't care now, I have given up the garden."

"Resigned your stewardship!" said Jim, tragically. "Anything over of the five pounds? I wouldn't retire yet, you can't have saved enough."

"Don't talk nonsense, Mary. At least, it doesn't matter _what_ you talk, you can't do it," said one of the Others.

"Can't I? we shall see," hardening my heart.

"What did his Reverence say to your resignation?"

"He--he didn't say anything."

"He laughed! I heard him," said Jim, "and he is splitting his sides telling the Young Man all about it."

"He isn't! Jim, go quick, interrupt them. I won't let them talk of m--my garden."

Jim is really a nice boy; he swaggered off with his hands in his pockets, whistling, and joined the two men. I knew he would give the conversation the turn I wished.

I began to cool down. It was easy to say I would "resign" the garden, but could I? Putting pride aside, was not my interest in all those young promising plants for the spring too deep for me now to desert them? Had I not rooted, amongst other things, too much of myself in my garden for me now lightly to withdraw?

While I pondered I strolled down the garden, and coming up the other side ran into the group of three viewing the holly hedge from the back.

"It is one of the best holly hedges I have ever seen," his Reverence was saying. "Cut it down! Why, it would be sheer madness."

Then the Young Man, without noticing me, began,

"All the same, you do want an opening somewhere. It is quite true that fine hedge shuts you in very much."

"I like being shut in," said his Reverence; "but I might consider your idea of an opening here, an archway in the middle, particularly as the hedge is already rather thin in one place, only 'Mary, Mary, quite contrairy.'"

"You had better not abuse me, because I am listening," I put in.

"Oh, here you are. I was going to say you had resigned."

"If you had heard all _your_ Visitor suggested you would have thrown up the living."

"Bumptious fellow! I should not have listened to him."

"But you told me to."

"Because I had had enough of him."

"But what he said was true. It is absolutely immoral to have that curveting path, that hideous paling, and this bisecting hedge."

"Well, Mary, I did give you credit for _some_ common sense."

"It's un-common sense I am blessed with, and I am trying to educate you up to higher ideals for the garden."

But I had taken his arm.

"Then do it by degrees. The Young Man suggests a peep-hole through the hedge. Will that satisfy you?"

"Well, may I have this gravel path up and make a border here?"

"What! more borders? However will you and Griggs manage those you have already?"

"Perhaps if I have this I won't poach any more on the kitchen garden."

His Reverence looked at the gravel path critically. "I don't see that we need this path very much, but it means a lot of work to take away this gravel and bring in good mould. It is no use having a bad border while you are about it. Who is to do it?"

"Griggs and--and help," I answered boldly, "and you shall direct."

"And you won't resign?"

"I will think better of my decision."

"And I may keep my holly hedge?"

"For the present, until I have educated you up to the pergola."

"Oh! thank you."