CHAPTER X 

 WHY A HARDY GARDEN IS BEST 



TIME was when most American flower gardens 

 were hardy. That was still the rule in grand- 

 mother's day the grandmother, say, of those who 

 now are getting toward middle life. 



Grandmother knew the intrinsic value of per- 

 manence in the garden ; she loved plants that stayed 

 by her, that endured with her the rigors of the 

 winter and woke up smiling in the spring. And 

 she knew full well that, with all else that she 

 had to do from the rising of the sun until long 

 past the going down thereof, such plants must 

 be her main reliance because they represented the 

 minimum of labor. 



Came mother. She was rather inclined to stick 

 up her nose at grandmother's garden. Like some 

 of the fine old furniture, it was not quite good 

 enough for the new day and generation. So many 

 a beautiful garden that had been treasured for 

 years by some one now gone to her last account 

 perished from lack of care, and lack of thought, 

 by a more or less slow process of petering out. 

 They died hard, not a few of them; here and 



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