136 



IRISH GARDENING. 



SEPTEMBER 



ii 



IRISH GARDENING. 



an illustrated monthly. 

 Offices— 53 Upper Sackville Street. Dublin. 



Subscription. — 3 per annum, post Iree. 



EdltorlBl.- All Editorial Communications, copy, and photograplit 

 should be addressed to "The Editor." 



Business Communications.— All letters regarding Subscriptions, 

 Advertisements, and other business matters must be addressed to 

 ■■ The Manaeer." 



In Praise of Gardening. 



Lord Rosebery gave last month a delightful speech 

 at the opening ceremony of the Cramond parish 

 flower show on the subject of gardening and gar- 

 deners. It was freely reported by the public press. 

 We reproduce part of the speech as given in the 

 Scotsman. 



THEN when we come to the hour of 

 manhood, and before us He the vast 

 plains of life with their various paths 

 leading to good and to evil — then we have the 

 choice before us w'hether we will be g-ardeners or 

 not. I do not mean practical gardeners, but 

 gardeners in taste, in sentiment, in appreciation, 

 and it is from that moment I trace my deteriora- 

 tion, for I did not choose to be a gardener in 

 taste, and I am sometimes afraid it is almost 

 too late to adopt that special form of enjoyment. 

 Yet, sir, to this audience I am quite free to 

 confess that I was wrong. I feel it every day 

 more and more, because gardening is one of 

 the enjoyments which one appreciates more and 

 more with advancing years. When other amuse- 

 ments leave us, from want of strength and 

 aptitude, gardening remains to us an increasing 

 enjoyment and pleasure. That is the first 

 reason. The second is this — There is no litera- 

 ture more delightful than the literature of garden- 

 ing. I do not mean the nurserymen's cata- 

 logues, which are perhaps the most arid form 

 which printed matter can assume, but I do 

 mean the literature of gardening, from Bacon's 

 famous essay downwards, literature that gives 

 you a wish to be a gardener, and to taste the 

 simple pleasures of the hour. There are books, 

 like " Walton's .iXngler," which delight the 

 people who do not care about the sport they 

 treat of, books that give you a taste in the 

 mouth for the art they deal with, and give you 

 a pure and high satisfaction in reading them. 

 Well, the literature of gardening is another 

 reason which makes me regret I did not choose 

 to be a gardener in taste. The third is this — I 

 cannot help believing, aind believing very firmly. 



in the moral training and atmosphere of garden- 

 ing. I judge that partly from the cottagers' 

 gardens, which represent so much thought and 

 study and work given in moments of leisure to 

 produce what, I think, is almost invariably a 

 singularly brilliant and impressive result. 1 

 cannot believe that a cottager, when he gives 

 his few moments of leisure to produce some- 

 thing beautiful, not merely for his own enjoy- 

 ment, but for the pleasure of every passer-by — 

 I cannot believe that such a cottager is any- 

 thing but a good, a worthy, and an honest man. 

 But I feel sure that I am right in thinking 

 highly of the moral aspects of gardening as an 

 occupation. I cannot help thinking, without 

 disparagement to other splendid classes of our 

 rural dwellers, that gardeners, on the whole, 

 physically and mentally, are the cream of our 

 rural population. I do not mean by that any 

 disparagement to foresters or gamekeepers or 

 ploughmen, for all are splendid classes in theii 

 way. But I do think that a gardener, by the 

 nature of his occupation, is, or should be, 

 physically and intellectually and morally, the 

 best of our rural population. He leads, from a 

 physical point of view, a life which keeps him 

 always in the open air. He is perpetualh' face 

 to face with the elevating mystery of Nature. 

 He has the closest intercourse with our mother 

 earth, without the incessant labour of the 

 plough. His task is to explore and to watch 

 all her secrets. It is his duty to deal in turn 

 with all the miracles of Nature — the bud, the 

 flower, and the fruit. He is the first to see the 

 opening leaf and the first green spike that 

 pierces the mould, and then when the weather 

 fails, and when all is too inclement for other 

 pursuits, he is able to devote himself to the 

 preparation for another year, in the sure and 

 certain faith that the miracles of Nature, w'hich 

 he has witnessed in the current year, will recur 

 in orderly but miraculous rotation in the coming 

 spring. No one can fail to see, who appreciates 

 the daily task and toil of the gardener, that 

 there is none that can or should raise the nature 

 and the mind of man so completely as his ; and, 

 therefore, believing, as I do, that under these 

 circumstances they are, and they must be, the 

 best of our rural population, if I w^ere a ruler, 

 which, thank Heaven, I am not, I would do all 

 I could to multiply and increase such men, for 

 1 should feel that by so doing 1 was best serving 

 the interests of the rural parts of our country. 



