98 THE GARDEN OF EARTH 



in a garden, growing in a narrow bed which ran beside 

 the drive. It was fully in bloom, with a crowd of pretty 

 mauve-blue faces, turned smilingly upward. 



They were marvellously arranged, so that each one 

 might obtain as much light as possible. No attempt 

 had been made to follow the Sun in his journey across 

 the sky; for it would have been useless. The hedge 

 behind, and a wall in front, cut off much of the direct 

 sunshine, except at one certain time of the day. But 

 the plant had plainly done its best so to place its blooms 

 that, when the sun did come, they could make the very 

 most of him. And when he was gone, they would still 

 be in a position to get all the light that might be obtained 

 in that position. 



It was so cleverly managed ! Of all the seventy or 

 eighty flowers — I forget the exact number — not one lay 

 behind another. 



Many were touching at their edges, because there was 

 not too much space for them all. But they had so 

 spread themselves out as to find enough; making a 

 lovely pattern of delicate blooms, side by side or one 

 above another, close together, yet each one clear of the 

 rest. Only in one spot, I think, did I find a single 

 small corner of a petal behind the next flower, and that 

 was because it really could not be helped. 



And all this was worked out by the plant itself. Is 

 it not wonderful? 



Of course I do not mean that the plant thought it out, 

 as you or I might do. It is more like what goes on 

 perpetually in our own bodies — the living, the growing, 

 the putting-on of flesh, the breathing, and so on, without 

 any conscious effort of our own wills to bring it about. 



