The Garden, You, and I | Page 8

the window to see to read, you develop a stiff neck. Also, the
difficulty is that thirty cents is only the beginning of a conversation
betwixt Mary Penrose and myself, for whoever begins it usually has to
pay for overtime, which provokes quarterly discussion. Is it not strange
that very generous men often have such serious objections to the
long-distance tails to their telephone bills, and insist upon investigating
them with vigour, when they pay a speculator an extra dollar for a
theatre ticket without a murmur? They must remember that telephones,
whatever may be said to the contrary, are one of the modern aids to
domesticity and preventives of gadding, while still keeping one not
only in touch with a friend but within range of the voice. Surely there
can be no woman so self-sufficient that she does not in silent moments
yearn for a spoken word with one of her kind.
When I had finished sowing my first planting of mignonette and
growled at the prospective labour entailed by thinning out the fall-sown
Shirley poppies (I have quite resolved to plant everything in the
vegetable-garden seed beds and then transplant to the flowering beds as

the easier task), Lavinia Cortright came up, note-book in hand, inviting
herself comfortably to spend the day, and thoroughly inspect the hardy
seed bed, to see what I had for exchange, as well as perfect her plan of
starting one of her own.
By noon the sun had made the south corner, where the Russian violets
grow, quite warm enough to make lunching out-of-doors possible, and
promising to protect Lavinia's rather thinly shod feet from the ground
with one of the rubber mats whereon I kneel when I transplant, she
consented to thus celebrate the coming of the season of liberty, doors
open to the air and sun, the soul to every whisper of Heart of Nature
himself, the steward of the plan and eternal messenger of God.
"Hard is the heart that loveth naught in May!" Yes, so hard that it is no
longer flesh and blood, for under the spell of renewal every grass blade
has new beauty, every trifle becomes of importance, and the humble
song sparrow a nightingale.
The stars that blazed of winter nights have fallen and turned to
dandelions in the grass; the Forsythias are decked in gold, a colour that
is carried up and down the garden borders in narcissus, dwarf tulips,
and pansies, peach blossoms giving a rosy tinge to the snow fall of
cherry bloom.
To-day there are two catbirds, Elle et Lui, and the first Johnny Wren is
inspecting the particular row of cottages that top the long screen of
honeysuckles back of the walk named by Richard Wren Street. Why is
the song sparrow calling "Dick, Dick!" so lustily and scratching so
testily in the leaves that have drifted under an old rose shrub? The
birds' bath and drinking basin is still empty; I pour out the libation to
the day by filling it.
The seed bed is reached at last. It has wintered fairly well, and the lines
of plants all show new growth. As I started to point out and explain,
Lavinia Cortright began to jot down name and quantity, and then,
stopping, said: "No, you must write it out as the first record for The
Garden, You, and I. I make a motion to that effect." As I was about to
protest, the postman brought some letters, one being from Mary

Penrose, to whom Mrs. Cortright stands as aunt by courtesy. I opened it,
and spreading it between us we began to read, so that afterward Lavinia
declared that her motion was passed by default.
"WOODRIDGE, April 30. "MY DEAR MRS. EVAN,
"I am going into gardening in earnest this spring, and I want you and
Aunt Lavinia to tell me things,--things that you have done yourselves
and succeeded or failed in. Especially about the failures. It is a great
mistake for garden books and papers to insist that there is no such word
in horticulture as fail, that every flower bed can be kept in full flower
six months of the year, in addition to listing things that will bloom
outdoors in winter in the Middle States, and give all floral
measurements as if seen through a telephoto lens. It makes one feel the
exceptional fool. It's discouraging and not stimulating in the least.
Doesn't even nature meet with disaster once in a while as if by way of
encouragement to us? And doesn't nature's garden have on and off
seasons? So why shouldn't ours?
"There is a quantity of Garden Goozle going about nowadays that is as
unbelievable, and quite as bad for the constitution and pocket, as the
guarantees of patent medicines. No, Garden Goozle is not my