HOW TO SUCCEED 31 



If your cousin's wife has famous larkspurs every 

 summer larkspurs more than six feet tall and 

 with enormous spikes of bloom that is not "Ser- 

 ena's luck"; she took pains. Serena took pains to 

 secure the very best seed, or plants, obtainable; 

 you may be sure of that. She took pains to pre- 

 pare a bed of deep and well-drained soil for them 

 and to enrich the same without letting manure 

 come next to the roots. Every May she takes pains 

 to work a little bone meal into the soil around 

 the plants. And she stakes the plants in time; 

 early and late she is mindful of her larkspurs 

 which she knows will respond quickly enough if 

 she gives them what they want. Serena is "on 

 to her job," or everybody would not be talking 

 about her larkspurs. 



It is not luck that counts; it is ordinarily in- 

 telligent labor. If only everyone would realize 

 that this uses up no more time than pottering, not 

 infrequently a great deal less! The labor that 

 makes for success is marked by the timeliness that 

 finds it materially easier to get ahead of work 

 than to lag behind it. Things are done when 

 they ought to be done. Labor is thus so distributed 

 through the season that at no time does it become 

 wearisome enough to cease to be a pleasurable rec- 

 reation. And by system every step possible is 

 saved. 



All this is helped along by a good memory. 

 Every successful grower of flowers has a good, or, 

 at any rate, a serviceable, one. The memory may 



